9 Great experimental albums from summer/fall 2025
Here at Treble HQ, our full slate of quarterly columns covering various genres is in full swing with more set to be dropped. Today, we put the microscope on the vast spectrum that is experimental music, introducing a column under the name Without A Net.
For you Deadheads out there, that’s the title of a much-maligned Grateful Dead album released in 1990 that collected random live performances from the 1989 to 1990 era. Hey, I was thinking of titling this column “The Process of Weeding Out” (in homage to Black Flag) because to pick and choose only a small amount of recordings released over a three-month period and pare it down to between six to ten is no easy task! There’s tons of incredible albums under the experimental music umbrella dropped all the time and I wish I could sing the praises of all of them…but alas. The limited space (and budget) puts the kibosh on that.
Anyway, on a whim, I went with Without A Net because that’s what I intend to cover here, or attempt to: a far-ranging scope. “Experimental music” as a whole has a boatload of definitions and in this column I hope to cover many of the bases and put a spotlight on stellar records deserving of attention.
Animal, Surrender! – A Boot For Every Bane
Bassist Peter Kerlin and drummer Rob Smith, the one-two punch at the forefront of Animal, Surrender!, put the rhythm in rhythm section with deep-thinking poise and a mind-expanding approach. Both trusted veterans of the indie and experimental underground and psych-rock scenes as members of Sunwatchers, Chris Forsyth Solar Motel Band, Rhyton, Bent Arcana, Pigeons and other killer bands, Kerlin and Smith have more than proven their worth as rock solid anchors in holding it down in their respective groups. Together on A Boot For Every Bane, their second full-length as Animal, Surrender!, the duo require only an 8-string bass, drums and touches of pipe organ (courtesy of Curt Sydnor) to achieve spellbinding low end-driven bliss. The big bottom of Kerlin’s lead bass riffs are intensely rhythmic and turbulent, so much so you can feel the floor reverberate when pick-hits-strings as Smith keeps the trance-like motorik groove surging ahead. It’s sort of a cross between Bitchin Bajas, Mike Watt and Kira’s bass duo dos with early Tortoise vibes on a Krautrock kick. Animal, Surrender! are a chill rhythm ‘n’ grooves machine.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Tim Barnes – Inside Energy
Tim Barnes has appeared on so many touchstone records over the past few decades that he could best be described as de facto “house drummer” for the underground rock and experimental music lot. To name a few, Barnes has manned the drum set on seminal albums by Jim O’Rourke and Silver Jews and collaborated with Sonic Youth. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg of his invaluable contributions to the independent landscape. In a sad turn of events, Barnes was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s Disease in 2021 but tragedy turned to action as his peers and the community rallied to his side with a successful GoFundMe campaign. A pair of must-have albums released by Drag City in the aftermath of Barnes’ diagnosis recently dropped (Lost Words and Noumena). A third long player, called Inside Energy, completes the Barnes trifecta, an essential document crystallizing the drummer’s all-encompassing genius and a brain-scrambling experience. As guitarist Nathan Salsberg explains in the liner notes, “Tim Barnes is the touch” and on the marathon-length free-improv space-rock jams, he has it, leading the propulsive charge with his singular sonic beats-powered language. The six stoner free jazz/rock fusion epics finds Barnes joining forces with pals like Ken “Bundy” Brown, Tara Jane O’Neil, Slint’s Britt Walford, Tortoise’s Doug McCombs, Glenn Kotche of Wilco, Chris Forsyth, Ryan Jewell and more where they trip out on other dimensions in cosmic sound.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Cochrane + Perez + Zenkov – If Computers Had Dreams
Multi-instrumental avant-garde kingpin and longtime downtown New York City staple Elliott Sharp has been releasing experimental and jazz recordings of the highest order via his zOaR label since the late 1970s and you’d be hard pressed to find a single clunker in the bunch. Each and every one is a keeper and this off-the-cuff trio set isn’t any different. If Computers Had Dreams showcases three experimental heavyweights at the height of their free-improvisational powers as they navigate uncharted spaceways of sound. It’s a gift someone pressed record at this live gig at the legendary NYC record shop Downtown Music Gallery when Chris Cochrane, a veteran guitar wizard who’s played with Thurston Moore, Marc Ribot and tons of other titans, teamed up with a pair of upstarts in guitarist Gían Pérez and bass clarinetist and alto saxophonist Stan Zenkov. The unearthly staccato clusters these three stab, pluck and scrape from the strings and blow from the horns are akin to detuned, scribbly dispatches from some other galaxy instead of coming from a basement in Chinatown. A mind-blowing listen. Speaking of Cochrane, his sprawling record Unhinged, released this past September, is well worth seeking out.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Shane Parish – Solo at Cafe Oto
It’s no wonder former Harry Pussy noisemaker Bill Orcutt tapped Shane Parish for his Guitar Quartet alongside Wendy Eisenberg and Ava Mendoza and Orcutt himself: dude absolutely slays on the six-string. Parish is so versatile that he can easily switch from the brain-exploding prog-metal intricacies of his trio Ahleuchatistas to freakish improvisatory folk-centric finger pickage in the blink of an eye. Solo at Cafe Oto further validates Parish as a prolific rising force whose ax-wielding wizardry covers a wide range of stylistic bases. Recorded at the storied London creative music venue in 2023 on the same night Orcutt’s Guitar Quartet performed, this live set captures the sonic spectrum of Parish’s repertoire in all its investigative, meditative—and shredding—glory. Lush and gritty melodicism, free-form pyrotechnics and country-fried twang collide as Parish, playing on a Fender Squier Telecaster gifted to him by Orcutt, puts his unique spin on ballads written by a diverse set of trailblazers including John Jacob Niles, Anne Briggs, Shirley Collins and David Lynch & Angelo Badalamenti.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Sam Prekop – Open Close
The crucial footprint that Sam Prekop has etched in the vast sound-worlds of the post-___ movements is indelible. A Chicago mainstay and indie underground force for decades, Prekop was post-rock before the infamous term was even coined, first making waves in Shrimp Boat then he went on to blaze new directions in The Sea and Cake, a post-jazz institution who still make the occasional new record to this day (they are about due for a new one). Besides his wildly inventive guitar work in The Sea and Cake and his more jazz-centric pop-oriented solo jaunts, Prekop is also an adventurous soundscapist whose knob turning and twiddling and button pushing virtuosity has produced a string of heady and psychedelically abstract releases beginning with 2010’s Old Punch Card. Prekop’s new offering, titled Open Close, is on another cosmic level as it ventures even further into the modular synth-charged melodies explored on solo joint The Sparrow (2022) and the bangers he and John McEntire cranked out as Sons Of on their 2022 debut. The texturally vivid sonic architecture that Prekop exquisitely crafts on Open Close fittingly opens up a glistening meld of blips, bleeps and tones that converge and form mellifluous fields. Perched at his modular synthesizers, Prekop rains down bright and dreamlike constellations that flutter and throb with techno-ish beats while glowing like the summer sun. Pulsating gems like “Font,” “Light Shadow,” and “Opera” will surely get bodies moving.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Patrick Shirioshi – Forgetting Is Violent
The deep, exploratory and earsplitting sounds of intrepid saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist Patrick Shiroishi crosses all stylistic boundaries. Shiroishi is a member of hardcore collective The Armed, ambient-jazz outfit Fuubutsushi, contemporary music collective Wild Up and noise-jazz duo Oort Smog, along with a growing number of solo recordings. On the heels of 2024’s meditative and atmospheric Glass House released by the ascendant Otherly Love label, Shiroishi intensifies the emotional pull, spiritual uplift, human connection and sonic din on Forgetting Is Violent, a weighty recording in which themes of racism and colonialism from the past to the present is ruminated on. With tapestries of field recordings, electronics, effects, loops, feedback and vocalizations sculpted by guests such as Aaron Turner of SUMAC, Savages’ Gemma Thompson, Faith Coloccia of Mamiffer, Elizabeth Colour Wheel vocalist otay::onii and BIG|BRAVE guitarist Mat Ball and Shiroishi’s arresting vocabulary and passages leading the way, the aptly titled Forgetting Is Violent is essential listening, a wakeup call in this dark period of history.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Heather Stebbins – On Separation
The burgeoning Washington, D.C.-based Outside Time label has quickly established itself as a haven for dauntless experimental music and On Separation by sound artist and composer Heather Stebbins, is solid proof of its adventurous vision. Stebbins creates the hallucinatory and woozy fields of tones and timbres found on On Separation using a blend of synthesizers, cello, electronics and field recordings and the chamber-music-like droning and synth-roiling effect she shapes from her instrumental stockpile exudes floating on air vibes. Rich in textural detail and deeply moving, Stebbins’ trance-inducing and weightless sound collages result in a revelatory experience that grips the listener and doesn’t let go.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
The Gate – Almost Live
The sludge-thick and primal low-register boom that The Gate have been spewing out for the last fifteen-odd years would make Bullhead-era Melvins blush. And this trio improbably doles out their punishment without the presence of a single guitar. Instead, the blown-out tuba of Dan Peck, Tom Blancarte’s distortion-dripping bass and Brian Osborne’s hectic drums cut from a free-improv cloth are The Gate’s triple threat that has wreaked head banging havoc over a string of recordings since the early 2010s. The trio first served up a record titled Live! and now a decade later Almost Live has arrived. It’s arguably,The Gate at their heaviest while, indisputably, finding them shattering the fucked-up scale on every level. Their hallmark blackened doom jazz is full tilt here but Almost Live takes unpredictable left turns into noise-splattered overdrive with assists from avant luminaries like Cecilia Lopez, Sam Pluta, Aki Onda, Jeff Snyder and Zach Rowden. What manifests over its single 35-minute tour force are mutant forms and fragments of Musique concrète, earth-shaking Sunn O)))-like dronescapes and electronics-laced and effects pedal-fueled tuba salvos. It’s a bone-crushing and gonzo hellride, perfect for metal and jazz heads alike. For more weirdo Gate hijinks, go behind the scenes of the making of Almost Live in this mini-documentary.
As for Lopez, stay tuned for the next edition of this column for a writeup of her just-dropped collaborative album with Zeena Parkins, Red Shifts.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Thee Reps – Cryptocartography
Thee Reps, a guitarless, all-instrumental five-piece made up of synthesizer, electric piano, strings, bass and drums, pull off a near-impossible trick: they craft the most rigid and meticulous of compositional structures of the classical contemporary variety but the ultimate outcome is elastic art-pop of weirdly infectious proportions. Comprising members of Modern Nature, Sunwatchers, thingNY and other experimental ensembles, the NYC-based Thee Reps, as heard on their second album Cryptocartography, invoke the robotic new wave danceability of Devo under the influence of chamber-music, the math rock of Battles and Don Caballero and Chicago post-rock. The magical secret to Thee Reps’ blueprint is the repeating patterns and forms: it’s completely disorienting and easy to fall under its catchy spell. Thee Reps’ bassist Jeff Tobias also just dropped his highly recommended second solo record One Hundredfold Now in This Age.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
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