© 2025 Boise State Public Radio
NPR in Idaho
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
There will be intermittent power reductions for KBSX and KBSU throughout the next week, including weekends.

NPR Music 2022 Staff Picks: Lars Gotrich

Björk
Vidar Logi
/
Courtesy of the artist
Björk

As a '90s kid who spent hours with a Walkman in the backseat of a car, an appreciation for the sonic narrative has stuck — that same patience, nuance and attention to detail can be found in my favorite albums of 2022. But songs? I needed immediate thrills, so that's why I've opted for 10 hardcore rippers that whipped my ass. Bonus shout out to @tacoplug's Turnstile/"Peanut Butter Jelly Time" mashup, the hardest mesh-shorts mosh-jam of 2022. No ranks, no masters. See y'all in the pit.

Top 10 Albums of 2022

▶ LISTEN ON SPOTIFY

• Björk, Fossora
• Straw Man Army, SOS
• Maggie Rogers, Surrender
• Linda Ayupuka, God Created Everything
• caroline, caroline
• Nancy Mounir, Nozhet El Nofous
• Bill Orcutt, Music for Four Guitars
• Editrix, Editrix II: Editrix Goes to Hell
• Hikaru Utada, BAD MODE
• SONJA, Loud Arriver

Top 10 Hardcore Songs of 2022

▶ LISTEN ON SPOTIFY

• Soul Glo, "Jump!! (Or Get Jumped!!!)((by the future))"
• daddy's boy, "brb fetching the guillotine"
• Rigorous Institution, "Tempt Fate... And Win!"
• Gates of Hopeless, "True Justice Never Die"
• Warthog, "Four Walls"
• GEL, "Predominant Mask"
• Devil Despize, "Alpha & Omega"
• Hammered Hulls, "Rights and Reproduction"
• Petrol Girls, "Preachers"
• Speed, "Not That Nice"

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Listen to the Viking's Choice playlist, subscribe to the newsletter.

You make stories like this possible.

The biggest portion of Boise State Public Radio's funding comes from readers like you who value fact-based journalism and trustworthy information.

Your donation today helps make our local reporting free for our entire community.