Welcome to what is roughly the middle of the year, which means that it’s time for Rosy Overdrive to select forty records that we’ve loved above the rest in the first half of 2023. The last few months have been the busiest ever for the blog, which means that I’ve covered a lot of good albums that I did not have room for on this list (view the website’s archive for a lot more good new music). Choosing the mid-year list is not as an exhaustive process as I go through for my year-end lists; consider this an incomplete but very strong snapshot of the best of 2023 thus far.
The list is unranked, ordered reverse-alphabetically by artist name (last year I did it alphabetically, and I alternate it every year). Like last year, I mostly stuck to full-lengths, but readers will notice a couple of EPs in here as well.
Thanks for reading, and here are links to stream a playlist of these selections via Spotify and Tidal (Bandcamp links are provided for all records).
Check out part two of the list here!
Nicole Yun – Matter
Release date: April 14th
Record label: Kanine
Genre: Indie pop, dream pop, power pop
Formats: Vinyl, digital
Nicole Yun led the 2010s Richmond dreamy indie rock group Eternal Summers, but in recent years she’s turned her attention to a solo career. Her second album, Matter, is a breezy collection of fluffy but meaty pop rock songs that are aided in no small part due to Yun’s front-and-center, charismatic vocals. There’s a Guided by Voices-esque effortless catchiness to a lot of Matter (interestingly enough, Yun has collaborated with GBV’s Doug Gillard before, but not on this record), although it takes a seasoned songwriter to offer up this many hooks.
Young Fathers – Heavy Heavy
Release date: February 3rd
Record label: Ninja Tune
Genre: Art pop, experimental pop
Formats: Vinyl, cassette, CD digital
Young Fathers’ last album, Cocoa Sugar, was nearly five years ago–I liked that one, but I wasn’t sure what to expect with Heavy Heavy a half-decade later. Well, the Edinburgh trio’s fourth album is a surprisingly excitable pop record that manages to feel incredibly lean but full-sounding all the same. Songs like opening track “Rice” and late highlight “Holy Moly” are massively catchy and straightforward, and the busier or less immediate ones like “Ululation” and “Drum” still work and fall into lockstep with the rest of Heavy Heavy.
Yo La Tengo – This Stupid World
Release date: February 10th
Record label: Matador
Genre: 90s indie rock, experimental rock, noise pop
Formats: Vinyl, CD digital
As usual, I like the new Yo La Tengo album, although this time around there was a surprising amount of acclaim accompanying its release. I’m less interested in doing the “Yo La Tengo’s best album since ___” game and more apt to just appreciate This Stupid World for being a very good Yo La Tengo album (a commodity that maybe had been undervalued in recent years). Nine fairly disparate but all classic Yo La Tengo songs here–the beautifully empty “Apology Letter”, the transcendent noisiness of “Brain Capers”, hit single “Fallout”, that opening track. Okay, maybe This Stupid World is the best front-to-back Yo La Tengo album since–
Whitney’s Playland – Sunset Sea Breeze
Release date: March 17th
Record label: Paisley Shirt/Meritorio
Genre: Power pop, indie pop, jangle pop
Formats: Vinyl, cassette, digital
The debut record from the Bay Area’s Whitney’s Playland is a strong opening statement. The band’s sound fits in with the sleepy, dreamy side of jangle pop, but Sunset Sea Breeze is also one of the straight-up catchiest records I’ve heard this year–it’s a lo-fi power pop record first and foremost. The four-piece band offer up the transcendent indie pop of the title track, the big-electric-guitar-wielding “Mercy”, and a host of other hits; Sunset Sea Breeze offers enough strong hooks for several records’ worth of indie pop. (Read more)
Washer – Improved Means to Deteriorated Ends
Release date: April 28th
Record label: Exploding in Sound
Genre: Garage rock, post-punk, punk
Formats: Vinyl, digital
Washer’s long-awaited third album has been one of my most anticipated records since 2017’s All Aboard–six years later, we finally have Improved Means to Deteriorated Ends, and from the first seconds of opening track “King Insignificant”, the band instantly bridges the long gap. Washer haven’t abandoned their core sound (a barebones blend of punk, post-punk, post-hardcore, and noise rock), but what they’ve been working on, it seems like, is packing it with as much as possible. The record’s fifteen songs grapple with thoughts on the passage of time, difficulties in holding on to motivation, and failing to meet one’s own expectations and live up to one’s self-image, all over their spirited music. (Read more)
Vista House – Oregon III
Release date: February 10th
Record label: Anything Bagel
Genre: Alt-country
Formats: Cassette, digital
Portland, Oregon’s Tim Howe first appeared on my radar last year as one half of First Rodeo, but he also fronts the country rock group Vista House. The newest Vista House album, Oregon III, contains plenty of the twangy sound found in Howe’s contributions to First Rodeo, but it also accentuates Howe’s fuzzier and rockier sides. The album achieves a full-band indie rock sound in places, although it also has a bedroom pop charm in others. Howe’s voice is the main constant throughout Oregon III, a comforting and deep-felt presence throughout the record. (Read more)
The Unknowns – East Coast Low
Release date: March 10th
Record label: Bargain Bin
Genre: Garage punk, power pop
Formats: Vinyl, digital
The Unknowns are yet another excellent Australian garage rock/power pop band, a subset that has really shone in 2023. The Brisbane group have been around for awhile and are associated with Aussie punk superstars The Chats, although their second album, East Coast Low, is a lot more indebted into classic punk-adjacent power pop than the bigger band’s pure punk rock. Songs like “Shot Down”, “Thinking About You”, and “Crying” are pure rock and roll with massive hooks and plenty of shout-along moments.
The Tubs – Dead Meat
Release date: January 27th
Record label: Trouble in Mind
Genre: Post-punk, jangle pop
Formats: Vinyl, CD, cassette, digital
The debut full-length record from The Tubs delivers on the promise of their 2021 EP Names (perhaps unsurprisingly, given Owen Williams’ work in Joanna Gruesome and Ex-Vöid). Dead Meat is an ace mix of vintage 80s post-punk and jangly indie pop, as catchy as it is chilly overall. The Tubs have a propulsive urgency to them in highlights like “Illusion Pt. II” and “Wretched Lie”, and Williams’ dark, self-lacerating songwriting gives a bite to songs like “Sniveller”, counterbalancing its massive chorus.
Total Downer – Caretaker
Release date: January 27th
Record label: Just Because
Genre: Power pop, pop punk, emo
Formats: Cassette, digital
Total Downer’s debut full-length album is an excellent collection of punk-y power pop tunes that establishes bandleader Andy Schumann as both a catchy and weighty songwriter. Caretaker is a brief record, coming in at about 26 minutes, but Total Downer tear through thirteen fiery tracks that find Schumann covering lyrical subjects that can be as wide-ranging as they are hard-hitting. Total Downer wield big choruses in the service of pure catharsis, tackling everything from childhood trauma to shitty bosses to the loss of a close friend with good and loud alt-rock. (Read more)
Timeout Room – Tight-Ass Goku Pictures
Release date: February 3rd
Record label: Tough Gum
Genre: Power pop, lo-fi pop, jangle pop
Formats: Cassette, digital
The first release from S.T. McCrary’s solo project, Timeout Room (fascinatingly called Tight-Ass Goku Pictures) is a guitar pop album with personality and hooks to spare in its thirty minutes. McCrary’s home recording style is lo-fi but clear-sounding, in a way that reminds me of The Cleaners from Venus, and his influences range from bright indie pop groups like those on Flying Nun’s roster to more punk bands like the Wipers. Tight-Ass Goku Pictures ends up a unique mix that doesn’t quite sound like either of those extremes, offering up groovy punk-pop bangers and off-kilter and swerving songs in spades. (Read more)
Ther – A Horrid Whisper Echoes in a Palace of Endless Joy
Release date: April 14th
Record label: Dead Definition
Genre: Indie folk, slowcore
Formats: Cassette, digital
Coming fourteen months after their latest album, Ther’s A Horrid Whisper Echoes in a Palace of Endless Joy takes a turn towards quiet and sparse but quite spirited-sounding indie folk. A Horrid Whisper… is a stark-sounding, vulnerable album that’s guided by Heather Jones’ unwavering, central vocals, but Ther find shades within their folk sound, like the prominent pedal steel in the country-tinged “Impossible Things”, the acoustic-picked slowcore of “Love Is Always”, and the soaring, crescendoing folk rock of “Big Papi Lassos the Moon”. (Read more)
Telehealth – Content Oscillator
Release date: March 31st
Record label: Very Famous
Genre: New wave, synthpunk, egg punk, post-punk
Formats: Vinyl, cassette, digital
Telehealth’s debut record, Content Oscillator, is an incredibly fun-sounding synthpop/egg punk record, devoting just as much time to jamming lead singer Alex Attitude’s societal observations, sketches, and satirical portrayals into its songs as it devotes to making them as enjoyable and entertaining as possible. Telehealth sound a lot like Devo on Content Oscillator–and, befitting of its subject matter, Attitude and collaborator Kendra Cox accomplish this by embracing much more than surface-level “Devo-core” aesthetics, going further and dedicating themselves to developing an entire worldview over the course of the record. (Read more)
Tee Vee Repairmann – What’s on TV?
Release date: February 4th
Record label: Total Punk
Genre: Garage punk, power pop
Formats: Vinyl, cassette, digital
The debut full-length from Sydney’s Tee Vee Repairmann follows a couple of EPs over the past two years, and their take on Australian garage rock-y power pop is quite compelling on What’s on TV? The group cut through a dozen songs in 24 minutes, although tracks like “Out of Order”, “Time 2 Kill”, and “Bus Stop” don’t need any more than their 1-2 minutes to make their marks. What’s on TV? is an energetic and occasionally less-than-polished album, but Tee Vee Repairmann are a pop group at their core, and the entirety of the record reflects this.
Soft on Crime – New Suite
Release date: February 3rd
Record label: Eats It
Genre: Jangle pop, power pop, psychedelic pop
Formats: Cassette, digital
Soft on Crime eagerly explore guitar pop of several stripes on their debut record, New Suite. The trio toss off excellent tunes in the vein of retro psychedelia, fuzzy lo-fi indie rock, and starry-eyed college rock across the album’s runtime–the pitch-perfect “Telex Eyes”, the giddily melodic “Crying Swimming Pool”, the crunchy “Splendid Life”. Soft on Crime jam these dozen songs with as many instrumental and vocals hooks as possible per track, even when they’re putting together numbers that reflect their less overtly poppy influences, like the jerky, Devo-ish “Pretty Purgatory”. (Read more)
Shredded Sun – Each Dot and Each Line
Release date: February 24th
Record label: Self-released
Genre: Psychedelic pop, indie pop, garage rock, noise pop
Formats: Digital
Shredded Sun’s members have a shared history dating back to their time in 2000s lo-fi garage punk group Fake Fictions, and they’ve also put out another album and a few EPs under their newer band over the past decade. Their time playing together assuredly is helpful in pulling off something like Each Dot and Each Line, which is a delightfully eclectic indie rock record that combines fuzz rock/shoegaze noiseness, a garage-punk edge, and power pop catchiness. They pull from several different eras of “alternative” and indie rock in a Yo La Tengo-esque, “music fan first and foremost” way, and their overall enthusiasm ensures that they pull every genre shift off. (Read more)
Sharp Pins – Turtle Rock
Release date: March 1st
Record label: Hallogallo
Genre: Lo-fi indie rock, noise pop, 90s indie rock
Formats: Cassette, digital
Sharp Pins is the solo project of Chicago’s Kai Slater, who also plays in good bands like Dwaal Troupe and Lifeguard. Sharp Pins’ latest album, Turtle Rock, hews closer to Dwaal Troupe’s lo-fi, poppy indie rock than Lifeguard’s post-hardcore sound, although Slater covers a lot of ground over the album’s thirteen songs and 35 minutes. Slater has a knack for wistful but exuberant lo-fi pop that reminds me of early Guided by Voices in a way that goes beyond aesthetics and recording styles–Sharp Pins will lapse into noisiness, but nothing call dull the impact of gems like “Bettie Wait” and “You Turned Off the Light”.
Screaming Females – Desire Pathway
Release date: February 17th
Record label: Don Giovanni
Genre: Alt-rock, punk, power pop
Formats: Vinyl, CD, digital
It’s been five years since the last Screaming Females record (2018’s All at Once), but Desire Pathway makes it feel like they were never gone. The trio sound as tight and laser-focused as ever on the new one–it’s a little surprising that they’ve returned with something this concise compared to All at Once’s sprawl, but Screaming Females sound so alive while playing songs like “Desert Train”, “Mourning Dove”, and “Ornament” that it’s clear that they’re exactly where they should be on Desire Pathway.
Rust Ring – North to the Future
Release date: February 24th
Record label: Knifepunch
Genre: Emo, punk rock
Formats: Cassette, digital
Named after Alaska’s state motto, North to the Future uses the Last Frontier’s isolation as a jumping point for Rust Ring frontwoman Joram Zbichorski to write about her relationship with gender in a fantastical but still very close-hitting way. Oh, and it’s also a jumping point for a bunch of very good, very cathartic, gang-vocal-sporting emo-punk anthems. It’s a really great-sounding record, with Zbichorski and her collaborators bringing their A-game musically–North to the Future is interesting conceptually, but it wouldn’t be nearly as remarkable if Rust Ring didn’t execute it as well as they do. (Read more)
Poppy Patica – Black Cat Back Stage
Release date: May 5th
Record label: House of Joy
Genre: Power pop, 90s indie rock, indie pop
Formats: Vinyl, digital
After a string of self-recorded and -released records, Poppy Patica’s Peter Hartmann takes advantage of a full band backing on his latest album, Black Cat Back Stage. Although these recordings place Hartmann’s songwriting front and center, the songs are dressed up with a style that combines Hartmann’s 90s indie rock influences with deep, layered synths and organs brought forward by the other members. It’s a charming but weighty sheen for Black Cat Back Stage, which deals with Hartmann’s original home of Washington, D.C. over the course of its ten songs. (Read more)
Parister – Here’s What You Wonder
Release date: May 11th
Record label: Candlepin
Genre: Lo-fi indie rock, alt-country
Formats: Cassette, digital
The humble presentation of Here’s What You Wonder’s songs, in addition to Parister’s not-infrequent use of 90s indie rock distortion, helps them fit in with other bands on their label, Candlepin Records. There’s an obvious twang in the playing of the Louisville band and in the songwriting of guitarist/vocalist Jake Tapley that also puts them in the realm of modern fuzz-country (“country-gaze”, perhaps) groups. Here’s What You Wonder is a generous album, with its thirteen songs all feeling full and complete, unfolding with Tapley’s unassuming but steady vocals guiding them, and the band play as polished or as loud as any one track requires. (Read more)
Rosy Overdrive 