Steve & Keith return to The New Dad Rock with their annual year-end ritual: sorting the chaos, controversy, and unexpected brilliance of 2025 into a definitive Top 25. Consider this episode your backstage pass to how the list is made—before the list is actually made.
In this preview, the dads look at the albums that shaped the year’s conversations: the boundary-pushing weirdos, the stadium-level juggernauts, the surprise returns, the late-career reinventions, and the underground records that quietly changed everything. They compare notes, swap arguments, expose blind spots, and celebrate the wildly different ways two lifelong friends hear the same year in music.
If you want to be fully armed for year-end list season—or just want to know what the dads can’t stop blasting—this is the episode to cue up. A fast, fun, opinionated warm-up lap before the official Top 25 drops.
Turn it up. Argue along. And get ready for 2025’s victory lap.
Did you know that The New Dad Rock has swag? Coffee mugs, pillow and t-shirts in a multitude of colors and arm lengths.
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