Best of 2025.5: Josh

It’s been a rocky year, to say the least, but we here at Reviler are trying to see our way through the fog and still celebrate the music that has brought us joy, solace or at least some blissful distraction in the first half of this year. Check out Josh’s favorite albums (both national and local), songs and shows. Enjoy!

Best National Albums

(All album/song lists unranked but kind of in order)

Los Thuthanka – Los Thuthanka

Ale Hop & Titi Bakorta – Mapambazuko

Nathan Salsburg – Ipsa Corpora

Hayden Pedigo – I’ll Be Waving As You Drive Away

Matmos – Metallic Life Review

Billy woods – Golliwog

Friendship – Caveman Wakes Up

TAAKAT – Is Noise, Vol. 1

Stereolab – Instant Holograms on Metal Film

Panda Bear – Sinister Grift

Clipse – Let God Sort Em Out

Whatever the Weather – II

Emergency Group – Live at Westbath

Jeremiah Chiu – Different Rooms 

Bill Orcutt Guitar Quartet – HausLive 4

Water Damage – Instrumentals

Natural Information Society and Bitchin Bajas – Totality 

Charif Magarbane – Hawalat

DjRUM – Under Tangled Silence

Pan-American + Kramer – Interior of an Edifice Under the Sea

The Cosmic Tones Research Trio – All is Sound

Best Reissues

Repetition Repetition – Fit for Consequences: Original Recordings, 1984-1984

Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru – Church of Kidane Mehret

Hiroshi Yoshimura- Flora

Best MN Albums 

Cole Pulice – Land’s End Eternal (note: like we’ve done with other MN expats, we’re still claiming them as “one of us”)

IE – Reverse Earth

Choir Bells – Intervals, Vibraphones

Muja – Godna

The Daily Norm – Sometime, Elsewhere

Guitar Band – Guitar Band

room3 – Bill’s Garden

Pat Keen – Pneuma 

Ant – Collection of Sounds Vol. 4

Alan Sparhawk with Trampled By Turtles – s/t

Songs (not on best albums)

Friends meeting – some fantastic proportion
Darkside – S.N.C

M.geddes Gengras – QUIK-MELT (technically an EP but one long song)

Hard Quartet – Lies (Something You Can Do)

Jlin – B12

L’Eclair – Nova Umbra

Sofia Kourtesis – Unidos

Wednesday – Elderberry Wine

Basic – Changes, Changing

The Budos Band – Lair of 1,000 Serpents

Destroyer – Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World

Best Concerts 

1/24-1/25 – Drone Not Drones at Cedar Cultural Center

4/5 – Hard Quartet at First Ave

5/20 – TAKAAT (¾ of Modu Moctar) at Minneapolis Warehouse Space

5/30 – Totally Gross National Party at Icehouse (esp the amazing set by Chuquimamani-Condor)

6/28 – IE release show at Cloudland

7/10 – Los Bitchos at 7th St Entry

7/11 – Friendship at 7th St Entry

7/17 – Digable Planets – Millenium Park