Greetings, dear reader! I bet you are burning with the question of whether or not I will, for the fourth year at least, open the April edition of Editors' Picks with words about the coming of Spring. However, I must disappoint you; April has been pretty cold and dreary where I am, so I am not quite yet bursting with the energies of nature's renewal (but I can feel it growing, so don't worry). Interestingly enough though, I do feel an even larger than usual appetite for new music.
While it is a cliche by now to say that release years are not actually different, it does feel like 2025 has been delivering some excellent music for us. From tried and true bands, through a lot of bands that are new to me, and all the way to down right fresh names that have released little to no music before, great releases abound. Here are some of our favorites but I encourage you to check out the last few Release Day Round Ups and stay tuned for more of our columns; there are a lot of good albums in there.
Enjoy and, as always, thanks for reading.
-Eden Kupermintz
clipping. – Dead Channel Sky (noise hip-hop)
Yes, there is a big post coming analyzing the themes and lyrics of this album, just as I’ve done for every clipping. release since Splendor & Misery but it is not this one (because it takes a lot of work and time to write). Instead, I’m here to confirm what most of you already know - the new clipping. album, Dead Channel Sky, is very good. The band use it to continue their exploration of “genre” aesthetics, this time focusing on cyberpunk. Interestingly enough, their approach to the overall structure of the album is the most straight-forward it has been since CLPPNG, comprised more of a series of songs than their more recent work. The songs themselves also tend to be more approachable, built in easier to digest structures and progressions.
Which does not mean, for one second, that clipping. have lost their edge. There is a lot of noise and strange sounds, perhaps enabled even more by the electronic nature of cyberpunk itself. Whether it is satellites falling out of orbit (“Dodger”), the “real” breaking down into the virtual (“Code”) or our dystopian present accelerating into an even worse future (“Polaroids”), clipping. rely on the basic balance that has kept them going for so long, namely the balance between Daveed Diggs’ incisive lyrics and voice and Jonathan and Williams’ deft and heads-on approach to what constitutes melody, noise, and rhythm.
It’s hard to single out one track which will give you a taste of what this album but I’d like to try and make what is, I believe, an unorthodox choice by sending you to “Madcap”. It’s not one of the album’s stand out tracks, though it’s quite good. It lacks a big verse or hook and its themes are “smaller”, focusing on the image of “the corpo” in cyberpunk. But it does feature some wild and absolutely ear-worming distortions to Daveed’s sound, both via digital manipulation and by interesting and odd rhythm choices from Diggs himself. Try it out - it’s a good indication of what clipping. are going for here and their approach to cyberpunk. From there, go back to the start and dive into one of 2025’s more ambitious lyrical albums and wait for me to return and break it into pieces. You cool with that?
-EK
Deafheaven - Lonely People With Power
Does this intro even need to be written? It’s Deafheaven. At this point you either adore them or despise them. They are who they are. It is what it is. Though Infinite Granite definitely put the band in a different sonic space (teased by the underrated Ordinary Corrupt Human Love), a place where even the most diehard fans had to rightfully question the bands future trajectory. Well we now have the answer to that inquiry. Lonely People With Power, the band’s fifth full-length outing, is a culmination of the band’s work to date. While that may seem fairly lame as a descriptor, I can confidently state that there have been few albums of this ilk that have so effectively consolidated everything that a band does well in one collection of tracks. You should already know my opinion based on the fact that I’m writing this for Editors’ Picks: This thing slaps to high heaven and is one of the best releases of Deafheaven’s storied career.
From the outset, it’s clear that Deafheaven are focusing primarily on riffs this time around. After a short typical blackgaze introduction with “Incidental I,” “Doberman” rages forth with all the intensity and manic wall-of-sound instrumentation fans have grown to love. It’s a robust, somewhat crushing intro that sees George and Kerry operating at the peak of their respective powers. Fans of Roads to Judah and New Bermuda in particular should be rightly pleased with this opening salvo, which firmly places the band in a space outside of the gentler tones of Infinite Granite and back to the bands blackened roots, bashing and smashing the listener with grandiosity and force. It’s a statement track if there ever was one, containing some of the band’s most intense sequences of riffs since they dropped “Black Brick” back in 2019. Follow-up “Magnolia” doubles down on this re-established fierceness, presenting one of the band’s most wild and intense album introductions yet.
But if “Doberman” and “Magnolia” present a welcome blast from the past, those who love the band’s nuanced take on shoegaze-infused extrapolation will find themselves in comfortable territory with “The Garden Route” and “Heathen,” two tracks that are as carefully and expertly written and performed as anything in Deafheaven’s catalog. Kicking off with some incredible kit work from the indefatigable Dan Tracey (a man who is criminally neglected in the “best active drummers” conversation routinely and it makes me sick), these tracks masterfully bring back the shoegazeyness that made their name, deftly balancing harsh extremes and gorgeous sequences of mid-tempo guitar atmospherics that are simply beautiful. Deafheaven seem here to have finally mastered their own impression of Thanos’ perfect balance, presenting us with a sequence of tracks that find Deafheaven writing with complete control.
Shockingly, everything presented thus far isn’t even the peak of the album. That title belongs to “Amethyst,” “Winona,” and “The Marvelous Orange Tree,” which find Deafheaven reaching unbelievable heights of emotional resonance. Working within the sonic realm of Sunbather, these tracks are nothing short of awe inspiring. The album finale of “Winona” and “The Marvelous Orange Tree” in particular are jaw-droppingly gorgeous, showcasing Deafheaven’s continued ability to write music that is truly transportative. Just… god. Listen to them. They’re magnificent.
While no album Deafheaven releases will ever top Sunbather for me, it’s shocking how close Lonely People With Power gets to matching that album’s peaks. One of the most spectacular releases of an already incredible career, the band’s fifth full-length is a testament to the genuine talent Deafheaven has displayed from the beginning, with each track highlighting their immense growth since Roads to Judah and serving as a celebration of every aspect that makes this band the truly special entity that it is and always has been. I cannot praise this album enough. Potentially the best record of 2025 thus far, and a definitive high point of Deafheaven’s career so far. Masterful stuff.
-Jonathan Adams
Ainsoph - Affection & Vengeance (gothic rockin’ post-metalgaze)
In 2020, mysterious Dutch group Ainsoph captured the attention of the post-metal underground with their impressively genre-bending debut Ω - V, bringing jangly post-punk to black metal and drawing comparisons to Deafheaven’s previous two albums and Oathbreaker. Five years later, this trio have returned with their second outing, Affection & Vengeance. Building and refining on their established sound, the black metal influence is slightly dialed back in favour of more ethereally immersive and urgently intense post-metal and doomgaze with a haunting gothic rock spin. The end product is refreshingly quite unlike anything else out there.
What really brings this album to life and stand out from its peers is the vocal performance from Isa Verheul, who is likely responsible for some of the goth rock tags getting attached to this release. Like Siouxie fronting Brutus, powerfully emphatic and banshee-like vocals tie together this captivating and hypnotic record. Dynamic songwriting draws influence from the melancholy of both post-punk and blackgaze, with frequent tempo swings. Yet, despite those influences, Affection & Vengeance manages to avoid feeling overly cold. Instead it embraces the warmer textures of shoegaze, with a rustic comfort to it. The production helps here, adding this shimmery vintage vinyl feel.
Affection & Vengeance is the sort of album that feels like it’s from a different time and space. There’s plenty of the reverb-laden guitar you’d expect in modern post-metal or heavy shoegaze, with immersive walls of sound that are both dense and vibrant, and bass riffs often grounded closer to that post-punk influence for a neat contrast. But it’s on the emotional and spiritual level where Ainsoph really shines and transports you somewhere else. Tracks like “Sevens Mouths in the Neck” manage to capture this stirring mystical, occult sensation that feels so detached from the bustling stresses of modern society in such a compelling way that it’s hard not to get lost in. And as framed in the title that feeling is evoked through these contrasting emotions with a strong balance of soulful tenderness and an inspiring fury that gives this a ton of replay value. Affection & Vengeance is available to stream or download below for name your price.
-Trent Bos
Further Listening
Teitanblood - From the Visceral Abyss
Man, I’ve missed this band so much. The most suffocating, relentless, technically astute, and strangely nuanced album of Teitanblood’s career, From the Visceral Abyss is a truly suffocating and special record that is as warlike as war metal gets. A spectacular piece of sonic abuse that is one of the most enjoyable listens of the year. For those who enjoy being vaporized by their metal, of course.
-JA
Necrambulant - Upheaval of Malignant Necrambulance (slam)
Necrambulant deliver a heavy dose of good ol’ fashioned guts and gore on their sophomore album. Their vicious strain of slam and brutal death metal is descended from the old school gods of yore, blending buzzsaw grooves with disgustingly guttural vocals and crushing breakdowns. This is meaty, nasty slam that satisfies like nothing else.
-Bridget Hughes
Pillars of Cacophony - Paralipomena (dissonant-tech-death)
Aptly named Austrian solo-tech-death project Pillars of Cacophony returned last month with an album that’s both compellingly discordant yet oddly digestible. Taking lyrical influence from the world of biochemistry, their sound brings together a glorious trifecta of complex mechanically churning rhythms, technical free-flowing leads, and the unsettling dissonant atmosphere of newer Ulcerate.
-TB
Backxwash - Only Dust Remains (abstract/experimental hip-hop)
With their fifth and strongest album to date, Backxwash better start getting recognized as the best rapper in Canada. Only Dust Remains has been polarizing for its departure from their horrorcore and industrial roots, opting for broader and more abstract production drawing from their roots in Zambia to the conscious and political hip-hop of the 90s and 00s, but is just as hard-hitting when it needs to be. Tackling their experiences existing in [current year] as a black trans person, mental health, religion, and the thought provoking reflection and struggle of existing in a society that enables fascism, this album is as pertinent to modern culture and hip-hop as it is good. Fucking extremely. Also, how great would a clipping x backwash tour be?
-TB
Symbiotic Growth – Beyond the Sleepless Aether (progressive/posty black metal)
Alien Weaponry – Te Rā (folky nu/groove-metal)
Amenra – De Toorn / With Fang And Claw (post-blackened doom-drone)
Daevar – Sub Rosa (sludgy doom-metal)
Grey Aura – Zwart Vierkant: Slotstuk (weird/progressive black metal)
Judicator – Concord (power metal)
Nothing – The Self Repair Manifesto (progressive death metal)
Pillars of Cacophony – Paralipomena (progish disso-death)
Telepathy – Transmissions (post metal)
Imperial Triumphant – Goldstar (dissonant jazz-death)
Bloodywood – Nu Delhi (nu/folk metal)
Dissocia – To Lift The Veil (symphonic prog death)
Spiritworld – Helldorado (thrash)
Warbringer – Wrath and Ruin (thrash metal)
Monkey Okay – Mausoleum (proggy prog-rock/metal)
Rwake – The Return of Magik (sludge)
Frogg – Eclipse (progressive tech-death/metal)
Crossed - Realismo ausente (metalcore, blackened screamo)