Did your favorite make the cut?
Below, (in no particular order) explore 31 albums that have been the most important, influential and adored by us at Rough Trade US!
Kamasi Washington - Fearless Movement
Input from George Clinton, André 3000 and Washington’s toddler daughter feature on his virtuosic, richly varied celebration of Black American music.
Waxahatchee - Tigers Blood
A beautiful slice of country-tinged magic that never descends into nostalgia, this a twisting country album of anthemic earworms that evoke long summer evenings, intimate chats and misty-eyed regret.
Charlie XCX - brat
Charli XCX gets her hands dirty to guarantee you the best night out of your life.
The Smile - Wall of Eyes
Too cryptic to be apathetic, too funky to be downbeat and too layered and haunting to be a simple ‘fuck you’ to the system, this LP is among the best work from Thom and Jonny since In Rainbows.
Yaya Bey - Ten Fold
New Yorker's incredible 5th LP features catchy dancefloor bangers, alongside soulful odes, homespun funk, and R&B... Unmissable.
Adrianne Lenker - Bright Future
A beautiful record that tactfully captures the often confusing and contradicting feelings when truly in love, this LP showcases good old-fashioned song craftsmanship at its most inspiring finest.
DIIV - Frog In Boiling Water
The fourth full-length release from the Brooklyn four-piece is a masterful example of political shoegaze. Truly special.
Vampire Weekend - Only God Was Above Us
Some of the most beautiful but disquieting indie-rock in recent memory.
Mannequin Pussy - I Got Heaven
This is punk at its most multifaceted and emotional, overflowing with desire and angst.
The Last Dinner Party - Prelude To Ecstasy
A little bit Kate Bush, a little bit BCNR, a little bit Weyes Blood, and a little bit of your favorite indie band, this debut from the all-female London band is as promising as it gets.
Cloud Nothings - Final Summer
Cleveland indie rock, full of gargantuan hooks that make you feel alive.
Faye Webster - Underdressed at the Symphony
70s-tinged alt-country is delicate and eclectic, complete with guest spots from Wilco’s Nels Cline and rapper Lil Yachty
Yard Act - Where's My Utopia?
Wry, riveting, chaotic, and infectious throughout, this is a fearless album brimming with innovative arrangements and mind-altering narratives, all held together by danceable grooves and infectious musicianship.
SPRINTS - Letter To Self
So engaging, you might even forget your phone for 40 minutes, this debut is a bracing, frantic record designed for both thrashing mosh pits and solo meltdowns, best heard with the volume turned up loud.
Beth Gibbons - Lives Outgrown
Timeless and considered, Lives Outgrown by Portishead's Beth Gibbons is a complete, but still complicated, portrait of the intersection of grief and life.
DEHD - Poetry
Pulsing like summer, maybe album of the summer (?), this is fun, fresh indie rock that doesn't take itself too seriously.
IDLES - TANGK
One of the year's most innovative and exciting rock albums, it's a raw, vulnerable, raucous expression of love.
Jessica Pratt - Here In The Pitch
Packed with rollicking, sugar-sweet verses and vocalizations you can twirl your body to and curl up and anguish over all the same.
Knocked Loose - You Won't Go Before You're Supposed To
Kentucky metalcore. What more do you need to know? Just when you thought it couldn’t get any heavier, it does. Epic.
Khruangbin - A LA SALA
Another great summer record by the Houston trio, their intricate instrumental music is so gentle it lulls the listener into a newly imaginative state.
The Lemon Twigs - A Dream Is All We Know
A delectable mélange of Harrisonian 12-string riffs, Wilsonian harmonies and layer-cake hooks - crooning sugary pop-rock in the best of ways.
St. Vincent - All Born Screaming
From the noisy low end of lead track "Broken Man," through Flea’s prowling industrial pop and the superlative goth jazz, Bond-like theme of "Violent Times," it’s a loud and unapologetically varied work.
Corridor - Mimi
Montreal's Corridor sing in French, and draw from both European and American influences, creating a distinct, wide-eyed melody that's constantly changing and being disrupted. A thrilling, mesmerizing listen.
Pissed Jeans - Half Divorced
Contender for punk album of the year. Fast, furious, funny, sad and above all real.
Fabiana Palladino - Fabiana Palladino
A near-effortless reinvention of retro pop, soul, funk, and R&B, with a glossy modern sheen, all voiced with captivating and confident flair by a razor-sharp songwriter. One of the finest debuts in a long, long while.
Chanel Beads - Your Day Will Come
A Brooklyn band everyone seems to have seen live either on some guy’s rooftop or in a small, crowded bar—and all that hard work has culminated into a gorgeous, career-long debut.
Kim Gordon - The Collective
Unsurprisingly adventurous, charmingly deadpan and visceral at every turn, Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon has created an underground hip-hop record made by an inveterate envelope-pushing postmodernist.
Ibibio Sound Machine - Pull The Rope
The London-based Afro-funk electronic collective merge hypnotic rhythms with pulsing electro, and the result is a potent fusion.
Peggy Gou - I Hear You
A fun, adventurous record confirming Peggy Gou's status as one of the more distinctive figures in club music, with guest appearances by Villano Antillano and Lenny Kravitz.
Pond - Stung!
Gleeful & glorious psych-rock. What's not to like?
Justice - Hyperdrama
One of this year's most engrossing listening experiences courtesy of the French electronic maestros. Featuring guest appearances by Miguel, Connan Mockasin, Rimon, Tame Impala, The Flints, and Thundercat.