The punk/alternative supergroup’s (members of Thursday, My Chemical Romance, Coheed and Combria, and Circa Survive) debut, Past Lives, navigated through dark, thunderous clouds—each song a lightning bolt illuminating the raw, untamed experimentation of the band. Violet, on the other hand, is the radiant dawn that breaks after the tempest, bringing with it a new hope with its profound lyrics and melancholically hopeful melodies.

Forever is a raw, unvarnished work of love and trust that walks the line between alt-rock muscle and singer-songwriter sensitivity. It is a bold, guitar-driven, exploration of maturity and adulthood that grapples with growth and change, escape and anxiety, self-loathing and self-love, and the songs are intensely vulnerable, full of diaristic snapshots.

Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, and Eric Johnson inaugurated the G3 Tour concept 28 years ago which put them on stage together for the first time ever. In 2024, G3 reunited for a sold-out run of US dates. “Reunion Live” much more than just a live album, containing a new album from each artist plus a new LP from the certified supergroup.

Beautifully varied and richly rendered, Lefty is an album that wanders from theme to theme, style to style, exultation to tragedy. Yet it is never lost. If anything, it is at play. Lefty feels like not just a celebration of their journey beyond the bounds of their traditional genre, but as if they have rediscovered the joy in music by honoring the sounds that inspired two boys growing up in Texas to one day make the damn stuff themselves.

On her first studio album in five years, the ever-experimental artist searches for transcendence in her own inimitable language. As promised, twigs’ long-awaited third album is inspired by techno – it’s also her warmest and brightest material to date. The hazy underground equivalent of BRAT summer with a massive injection of purified sex.

Backed by a seven-piece band, Iggy breathes new fire into Stooges classics like “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and “T.V. Eye” and ignites the adoring crowd with visceral run-throughs of “The Passenger” and, of course, “Lust for Life.” Live At Montreux… captures the avant-garde icon and punk pioneer in a performance that could only happen here. A singular moment in a singular career.

Recorded in 2014 but never released, Mac Miller’s second posthumous album is the missing link between the earnest rapper he was and the evocative songwriter he would become. Feeling distinct from his broader catalogue, Balloonerism equally tethers itself to other points in Mac’s work. It’s a rather wonderful, albeit unsettling, reminder of a talent lost.

If peppering political songs with humor is like sticking a sparkler in some bread, then Who Let The Dogs Out is like a fireworks display in the factory itself: strange, dangerous, exciting. Sirens blare over a heavy distorted bass and a live drum breakbeat. The band dance between upbeat pop punk, dirty grunge tones and discordant post-punk. A take-no-prisoners debut from one of the UK’s most fun and fearless bands.

Mark Tremonti levels up all around on his 19th overall album, joined by bandmates Eric Friedman [guitar], Ryan Bennett [drums], and Tanner Keegan [bass]. The End Will Show Us How charges with inspirational lyricism, metallic barrages, and Tremonti’s most incisive displays of fret fireworks - a testament to his legacy of ceaseless creativity and a certified triumph!

The band’s sixth full-length album showcases Franz at their most immediate, upbeat and life-affirming, unashamedly going for the pop-jugular in classic Franz style. Recorded at AYR studios in Scotland, the 11 songs on The Human Fear all allude to some deep-set human fears and how overcoming and accepting these fears drives and defines our lives.