Top 5 All Time - Albums of 2022
Dave Grohl of the world-famous, critically acclaimed rock band Dream Widow.
Not much to say really… 2022 kicked serious ass for new music. One thing that stands out to me above all is how alive and well the young hardcore scene is. So many good new bands, I know in past years of this list I have included some, so it’s not a surprise; but this year really stepped it up.
I have three kids now, so as much as this probably seems like an “any album I got to listen to all the way through” list, I did leave some off that just didn’t do it for me. I like so many of the honorable mentions SO much, it was really hard narrowing this list down to five. Most people do a top 10, but because I’m a dummy and used a Pharoahe Monch line as a content collection, I’m stuck whittling away. I’m confident in my choices though.
I added Song of the Year and EP of the Year also as separate categories, because it doesn’t seem fair to include an EP in an album of the year list (like I wanted to do last year with Ignite).
Song of the year
Botch - One Twenty Two
Honorable Mentions
Anxious - You When You’re Gone
Be Well - In The Shadow Of Who You Thought I Was
EP of the year
Foreign Hands - Bleed the Dream: This band is 7 Angels 7 Plagues reincarnated and I love every second of it. Very promising new band that borrows their sound from all the best late 90s/early 2000s metalcore bands. Big fan.
Honorable Mentions
Fugitive - Maniac EP: Members of Power Trip made a new band. I don’t really have to say anything else. Obviously it shreds.
END/Cult Leader - Gather & Mourn split: Possibly the heaviest album of the year and it’s only 4 songs. Two of the greatest bands of their generation teaming up to show the kids how it’s done.
Top 5 Albums of 2022
5) Ignite - Ignite
Ignite are one of the pioneers of melodic hardcore. Next year (tomorrow) will make THIRTY years since they formed. Of course everyone was nervous when singer Zoli Teglas announced he was leaving the band, as his voice was such a big part of their success. But man, this album just rips. It is pure Ignite at their very best. New singer Eli Santana is the right man for the job, as his vocal range fits perfectly with the guitar riffs all over this album. From start to finish, a pure banger.
4) Cave In - Heavy Pendulum
Man I give these guys so much credit. After their singer/bassist Caleb Scofield passed away tragically in 2018, you could feel the heartbreak through the remaining members. You wouldn’t blame them all for going on with their other projects and letting Cave In’s time expire. Instead, Stephen Brodsky and company leaned into the emotion. After releasing the last of Scofield’s music as Final Transmission in 2019, they recruited Nate Newton of Converge/Jesuit/Old Man Gloom/every band ever. The result is Heavy Pendulum, a 70-minute, Kurt Ballou-produced masterpiece in sludgy, grungy, groovy metal. A total of 14 songs; some 2 minutes, some 7+ minutes, and every single one will make you nod your head in approval. Just an amazing offering from one of the best to ever do it.
3) Anxious - Little Green House
Every year, I need an album like this. I need an album of a band I’m not familiar with, that is a certain style of upbeat indie rock/punk blend. Last year it was Former Member, this year it’s Anxious. A buddy mentioned this album to me as one that was a must-listen, and the only thing I knew was this was the band that opened for the Thrice/Bayside tour that I missed due to COVID. So I checked out the band and was hooked from the very first song. Amazing songwriting, heavy when it has to be, catchy and emotional all in one. Their untraditional song transitions keep the album fun and the listener guessing. The last song, “You When You’re Gone” is one of my favorite songs of the year. I really hope they keep on this trajectory; their two new singles they released after this album already see them changing their sound.
2) Mindforce - New Lords
When I said that young hardcore bands are alive and well, really this is what I meant. Mindforce, out of Poughkeepsie, NY, are the heir apparent to Drain as the best new hardcore band around. Where Cave In’s album is seventy minutes, Mindforce’s New Lords clocks in at seventeen minutes of pure, pissed off, unadulterated hardcore. Mike Shaw is a maddeningly good guitarist for a hardcore band, adding slick riffs to songs loaded with breakdowns. Vocalist Jay Peta is an absolute madman, and may have the best translation of voice from recording to live show that I’ve ever heard.
Speaking of live shows, this is the only band on this Top 5 list that I was actually able to see this year, and WHOA. Band absolutely rips live. Heavy and violent and fast and pissed off. Do not miss them if they come through your area.
1) KEN mode - Null
One minute. That’s all it takes. Sixty seconds into the 35-minute album and you are either scared to death or hooked until the end. Once I heard newest KEN mode member Kathryn Kerr’s saxophone come out of NOWHERE on a sludge metal album, I had a smile on my face from ear to ear. The band has been around for over 20 years, and while I’ve listened to most of their eight album catalog (especially 2018’s Loved), their latest release Null blew me away. The last four years have not been kind to the world (or in their words, “Something is broken, something is fucked.”), so KEN mode have decided that they are going to put out the meanest, angriest, most frustrated album possible. “Lost Grip” and “Throw Your Phone in the River” are particular highlights for me, and the entire album’s lyrical themes intentionally don’t leave much wiggle room for interpretation. I really hope this is the album that launches their success, as they more than deserve it.
Honorable Mentions (in no particular order)
Ithaca - They Fear Us
La Armada - Anti Colonial Volume 2
Vein - This World is Going to Ruin You
Hot Water Music - Feel the Void
Dream Widow - Dream Widow
Terror - Pain Into Power
Nas - King’s Disease III
Alexisonfire - Otherness
Haunt - Windows Of Your Heart
Municipal Waste - Electrified Brain
Zeta - Todo Bailaro
Regulate - Self Titled
Callous Daoboys - Celebrity Therapist
Be Well - Hello Sun
Birds in Row - Gris Klein
Holy Fawn - Dimensional Bleed
Soul Glo - Diaspora Problems
