Below are my 20 favorite albums I heard in 2022. I once again tried to focus on music that has actually hit my turntable this year; however, three of the following 20 releases I’ve yet to acquire on vinyl, primarily due to supply chain issues. I’ve included Spotify streaming links for all titles for convenience’s sake, as well as links to buy the vinyl versions directly from the artists/labels involved.
As I whittled this list down from about 75 or so titles, I began to notice a theme: Old dudes can still rock. Granted, “old” is relative, but I think having turned 40 this year, I subconsciously surrounded myself with music being made by fellow 40-somethings, as a reminder that yes, age truly is just a number.
20. Weird Nightmare - Weird Nightmare (Sub Pop) BUY / STREAM
Weird Nightmare is the alter ego of Metz frontman Alex Edkins, and his self-titled debut is sort of a funhouse mirror version of Weezer’s Blue Album — it’s 10 tracks of tightly wound power-pop that ends with a seven-plus-minute epic that is built for getting stoned and staring at the ceiling. (Not that I would know. Also, Mom, thanks for reading.) If you like Metz but want a tiny bit less crunch, this is for you.
19. The Beths - Expert In A Dying Field (Carpark) BUY / STREAM
When I wrote about this band in my top singles of the year list, I mentioned they’re quickly becoming the heirs apparent to the Weakerthans. The tunes are well crafted, the lyrics are engaging and quirky, and the guitar solos, oh the guitar solos! The Beths, like the Weakerthans, have yet to make a bad record, and Expert In A Dying Field is as good a place as any to dive in.
18. Signals Midwest - DENT (Lauren) BUY / STREAM
Appearance No. 1 for Max Stern on this year’s list, not solely for the song “Blind Contour” (which is the best Dillinger Four song written in the past 15 years), but also for the rest of the J. Robbins-produced DENT, which has given Signals Midwest a new lease on life. This record goes, man.
17. Death Cab For Cutie - Asphalt Meadows (Atlantic/Barsuk) BUY / STREAM
Example No. 1 in my “old dudes can still rock” thesis, the new Death Cab For Cutie record might be their most compelling since, I dunno, Narrow Stairs? Death Cab is at a point in their career where their sonic consistency is the best thing going for them, so the fact that they pushed outside their alt-radio-rock tendencies and delivered stunners like “Foxglove Through The Clearcut” is something to be celebrated. Also, Ben Gibbard still writes one hell of an alt-rock radio banger (see “Here To Forever,” with its absolutely brutal opening couplet: “In every movie I watch from the ’50s, there's only one thought that swirls around my head now / And that's that everyone there on the screen, yeah, everyone there on the screen, well, they're all dead now”).
16. 84 Tigers - Time In The Lighthouse (Spartan) BUY / STREAM
Example No. 2 in my “old dudes can still rock” thesis, 84 Tigers is the Reed brothers, Mike and Ben — the voices behind the mighty Michigan post-hardcore unit Small Brown Bike — essentially delivering the best SBB record since Dead Reckoning, with the help of the Swellers’ Jonathan Diener on drums. If you like Small Brown Bike (or any other bands the Reeds have created in the past few decades), there is absolutely no reason you won’t headbang along to this release in all its 6/8 time signature glory.
15. Tim Kasher - Middling Age (15 Passenger) BUY / STREAM
Example No. 3 in my “old dudes can still rock” thesis, Tim Kasher fucked around and made his best solo album of his career by a landslide. Middling Age features some of his most emotionally devastating material Kasher has written for any of his projects (see the album-opening “I Don’t Think About You” and album-closing “Forever Of The Living Dead”), as well as a song that taught me about an infamous Nebraskan serial killer (“The John Jouberts”). “On My Knees” could’ve been a Happy Hollow outtake; “Up And Cut Me Loose” could’ve been an Album Of The Year B-side — if these references mean anything to you, then listen to this record immediately.
14. Hot Water Music - Feel The Void (Equal Vision) BUY / STREAM
Example No. 4 in my “old dudes can still rock” thesis, holy shit Hot Water Music is fuckin’ back, baybeeee! This is easily the best HWM record since Caution, and it’s full of surefire live favorites in the Chuck Ragan-bellowed “Killing Time” the Chris Wollard-howled “Collect Your Things And Run” and the Chris Cresswell-crooned “Turn The Dial.” George Rebelo and Jason Black remain the best rhythm section in punk rock, with an absolutely unrivaled groove across Feel The Void’s dozen tracks. If you fell off the HWM train after Light It Up (I wouldn’t blame you), get back onboard.
13. PUP - The Unraveling Of PUPTHEBAND (Rise) BUY / STREAM
I’m still not sure if PUP has made their career-defining record yet. Each album continues to hone in on what the band does well (sardonic lyrics, wild guitar tones, big ol’ sing-alongs, the occasional toe-dip into hardcore), and The Unraveling Of PUPTHEBAND continues on that path, atrocious artwork and all. (Seriously, there are fewer modern punk bands with songs this good that have merch this cringe.)
12. Cave In - Heavy Pendulum (Relapse) BUY / STREAM
Old dudes can still shred too, man.
11. Murder By Death - Spell/Bound (Tent Show) BUY / STREAM
10. Meridian - New Ways For Old Days (Sleep) BUY / STREAM
There’s this idea of “blood harmony,” which is what happens when family members sing together. It comes off as magical, producing vocal harmonies that can only come from family. It’s why groups like the Avett Brothers and First Aid Kit oftentimes sound so etherial, and it’s why Americana-rock band Meridian’s long-anticipated third album New Ways For Old Days feels so special, too. Brothers Max and Jake Stern effortlessly link their voices on song after song, weaving guitar and banjo in the spaces in between, giving the entire album a feeling of wistful nostalgia (also because most of these songs are upwards of a decade old, giving them a “lived in” quality).
(Full disclosure: I released the two previous Meridian full-lengths and a split 7-inch on my now-defunct record label, Youth Conspiracy Records. However, I have zero stake in this release, and I’ve returned the digital rights of their back catalog back to the band, so there is no financial incentive for me telling you to listen to this record.)
9. The Stereo - Thirteen (self-released) BUY / STREAM
Being the first Stereo album in 20 years and the first Stereo album with Rory Phillips back in the lineup since 1999’s stone-cold classic 300, Thirteen had a lot to live up to, and boy oh boy did it — Rory’s numbers (the title track in all its riffy, 13/4 time-signature glory, the beautiful love song “Do You/Don’t You” and the subdued, album-closing “Seek & Find”) might be the best songs he’s written, and Jamie Woolford brings the fire with melodic-rock gems like “Kings Of No Hope,” “My Ready Arms” and “Truth Or Dare.” And when the two come together for vocal tradeoffs as they do in “Perils Of Underestimation” and “Long, Long Time”? Literal heaven, you guys.
8. PLOSIVS - PLOSIVS (Swami) BUY / STREAM
Either the names (and associated musical pedigrees of) John Reis and Rob Crow mean something to you, in which case you’ve already bought and fallen in love with this album, or they don’t, in which case you need PLOSIVS in your life pronto. Bonus: Atom Willard is their drummer, so you know that shit hits hard.
7. Dashboard Confessional - All The Truth That I Can Tell (Hidden Note) BUY / STREAM
It seems like the mall-emo revival that put My Chemical Romance, Blink-182 and Paramore back into arenas has largely passed Chris Carrabba by, which is a true shame because the new Dashboard Confessional album is the best thing that project has made since Dusk And Summer, and it’s the best acoustic DC record since The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most. (Those are Dashboard’s two best albums, so please know I don’t throw those comparisons around lightly!) All The Truth That I Can Tell feels like it came out of a time capsule buried underneath an old Hot Topic that was padded out with old issues of Alternative Press and various autographed photos of Fuse VJs, with massive, youthful sing-alongs like “Everyone Else Is Just Noise” and “Here’s To Moving On” next to legitimately mature material like “Sleep In” (which might be the most beautiful love song this dude’s ever written) and “Me And Mine” (which is cringey in the most “c’mon, Dad, you’re embarrassing me!” teen-angst way). It’s wild to see so many elder emos sleeping on this record.
6. Dan Andriano & The Bygones - Dear Darkness (Epitaph) BUY / STREAM
True fans know that in terms of Alkaline Trio songwriting, it goes Dan > Derek > Matt. (You can argue with me, but you’ll be wrong.) So while Matt Skiba was off making the two worst Blink-182 albums of all time, Dan Andriano was stockpiling nugget after nugget of singer/songwriter power-pop that feels like a natural extension of his Emergency Room persona (“Sea Level,” the title track), but with guitar solos that fully justify the new “Bygones” moniker. (Randy Moore’s guitar solos on “Wrong” and “The Excess” are absolutely breathtaking.) Hell, there’s even some songs on here that absolutely could have been Alkaline Trio deep cuts (“One Minute Wasted,” “It’s A Trap Door!”). In case you missed the memo, old dudes can still rock.
5. Wet Leg - Wet Leg (Domino) BUY / STREAM
There’s nothing I love more than a band whose entire existence just feels like a Gen Z pisstake on millennial indie rock. Their band name came from random emojis! Their singer is classically trained but relies almost entirely on monotone delivery! (She also is herself a millennial!) They sing about Instagram and free beer! They blatantly lift a guitar lick from “The Man Who Sold The World” and no one seems to care! Their first U.S. “tour” was exclusively in New York and L.A., and was entirely sold out on the strength of a novelty single! Everything about this band screams “aging millennial ex-rock critics should hate this” and yet I fuckin’ loooooooove it. It takes so much work to make songs sound this easy, and I commend Wet Leg for knocking it out of the park.
4. Big Nothing - Dog Hours (Lame-O) BUY / STREAM
There’s something to be said for leaving people wanting more, but would it kill Big Nothing to throw in an extra chorus on some of these tracks? Dog Hours is a whopping 27 minutes and one second long, with its best songs (“A Lot Of Finding Out,” “Accents” and “Make Believe” among them) clock in at well under three minutes. Guys, we already have Joyce Manor and Tony Molina, we don’t need another Rivers Cuomo-indebted power-pop band cutting things too short. Honestly Big Nothing is more Gin Blossoms than Weezer, with jangly guitar lines underpinned by melancholy coed vocals. If you miss the Forecast as much as I do, Big Nothing is for you.
3. Frank Turner - FTHC (Xtra Mile/Polydor) BUY / STREAM
Frank Turner’s last two efforts, 2019’s No Man’s Land and 2018’s Be More Kind, were big misses for me; 2015’s Positive Songs For Negative People was good enough to make me put him on the cover of a magazine but it still didn’t quite hold up to Frank’s Epitaph-era releases. However, I am here to tell you that FTHC is legitimately the most enjoyable Frank Turner album since Tape Deck Heart, if not earlier. In short: This shit fuckin’ rocks, man. From a nice McClusky nod (“Non Serviam”) to über-catchy pop-rock (“Haven’t Been Doing So Well”) to the beautiful retelling of his father’s journey toward inner peace (“Miranda”) to an incredibly powerful tribute to Frightened Rabbit’s Scott Hutchison (“A Wave Across The Bay”) to an absolutely dynamite album closer (“Farewell To My City”), FTHC is all killer, no filler. This might not be the best Frank Turner album of all time, but it is certainly the most Frank Turner album of all time.
2. Cheekface - Too Much To Ask (self-released) BUY / STREAM
Allow me to share a text message exchange with a friend of mine:
In case you were wondering what happened on September 8, said friend announced a series of tour dates with Cheekface opening. So yeah, it’s good.
1. Big Thief - Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You (4AD) BUY / STREAM
I am extremely late to the party on Big Thief, which shouldn’t be that surprising — their first album came out on May 27, 2016, which is the same weekend I was let go from Substream Magazine, effectively ending my full-time music journalism career. The past six years have been spent understanding who I was (thanks, therapy), rebuilding who I am (thanks, School Of Rock) and mapping out who I want to be (thanks, Cleveland State University). I missed a lot of cool stuff as a result. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
But in that six-year span of me trying to find myself, Big Thief has released five full-lengths, each earning more critical acclaim and dedicated fans than the one before, culminating with this year’s 80-minute, 20-song opus Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You. It’s an absolutely astonishing record, effortlessly moving from whisper-quiet Appalachian folk to late-night country jams to jangly indie rock to fingerpicked balladry and back again. It would be foolish to compare them to other bands or single out specific songs, because the whole record is just that good. You owe it to yourself to light a candle, pour a drink and have a good, long listen. Good luck.
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