Best Album—Geese “Getting Killed”
This was the Year of Geese. Why resist it and why would I want to? Since I first heard the title song from 3D Country this band has staked out its own territory in my brain. I’m not even a hobby level neurologist, but I think Geese work on my hippocampus like it’s a speedbag, emotion and memory in a loud blur. The band often sounds old, but still musically voices the ineffable mood under our New Dictatorship. ‘Au Pays du Cocaine’ I swear is a Zevon song that should have been covered by Linda Ronstadt. ‘Trinidad’ is the song of 2025, a year that began on New Year’s Day morning with the guy blowing up a Cybertruck in front of the Trump hotel and casino in Vegas and went downhill from there. This album is wrenching, funny, inscrutable, crystal clear and rocks in a distinctly complicated way.
Best Gig—Geese at The Fillmore, San Francisco
This was the event, the anointed Saviors of Indie Rawk in the chandeliered temple of rock ‘n roll. The band live is always on the verge of falling off a cliff but is alternately pushed and pulled back by its thrill-seeking rhythm section. Drummer Max Bassin is the beast at the controls, barely. The band clatters and heaves. Guitarist Emily Green glides over the churning below with a placid cool like, uh, a goose. And then there is the man of the moment, Cameron Winter, the sweet galoot, answering the question of what if Jon Spencer had been emotionally aware and entirely sincere. This show made me wickedly happy to be alive.
Surprise of the Year— Water From Your Eyes “It’s A Beautiful Place”
The duo’s 2023 album was critically acclaimed but did not click for me. I listened to the new one out of a sense of obligation more than anything else and was really thrown for a loop. It’s catchy and off-center. It makes sounds that I’ve never heard together before, like on the singular ‘Nights in Armour.’ These sounds are pleasing to me. The whole damn thing is beguiling. Top 3 album of 2025.
Discovery of the Year—ÅÅsAA
Åsa Söderqvist is the mastermind behind Sweden’s ShitKid, one of my favorite recent bands. The “band” dissolved a few years ago on the cusp of expanded recognition and Åsa seemed to disappear. But this year she self-released this techno/club album under this elongation of her name. Not usually my cup of lutfisk, that genre, but hearing her snotty voice again (like on ‘Vi ba väntar’) was one of my favorite unexpected moments of 2025 along with her Instagram reels where she was playing these songs with a boombox touring what appeared to be Bulgarian garages. And then she announced a ShitKid reunion tour! Yet another reason to renew my passport.
An album the other Bastards were wrong about in 2025 —Bon Iver
I feel like I’m being pranked every time I read glowing reviews of this guy. His whole vibe is skeezy youth minister in it to meet chicks. I’m sad, come to my cabin, pull up a beanbag chair while I just grab my guitar. His songs are middle school poems thinly crooned over dull melodies. I bet he dots his “I”s with little broken hearts. I’d much rather listen to a cruise ship Cat Stevens tribute act.
Words by Rick Larson
Picky Bastards 