TEE’s Best of 2011-2018

I once received an email asking me if I had best-of lists for previous years before I started this site. I do, but I didn’t have easy access to them. Posting rundowns of new music I listened to in a given year was something I did on my personal Facebook page via the site’s now-defunct Notes feature 2011-2018.

Recently, I decided to see if I could access them, and it turns out I can! It’s just a hassle. I figured it may be good to copy them over here to hopefully give them greater longevity. I don’t trust Zuck to not just entirely nuke the Notes archive at any given moment.

Before I get into this, a few disclaimers and clarifications:

My first best-of list was actually in 2010, but I do not have that. At the time, I had a show on the University of Washington’s radio station, and the station asked everyone for a top 10 list for that year. I submitted my list, along with a one-sentence description of each record. Everyone’s lists were published in the campus paper. I tried searching The Daily’s archives, but I couldn’t find it.

For the first few years I did this, it wasn’t a ranking. It was everything listed alphabetically with a score out of ten. (It should also be noted that my scores out of 10 are scaled differently than my scores out of 100, which are in turn different from my RYM 5-point scale and ProgArchives’ 5-point scale.) I eventually eschewed the scores in favor of a ranked-list.

These are also not curated best-of lists. These cover all records released in a given year I listened to, so there’s usually some real crap mixed in there.

While I would say my taste has mostly remained consistent, my opinions on a number of records have shifted over the years, sometimes significantly. I will be posting the lists in the order in which I originally posted them with my original commentary, typos and all. However, if my views have shifted significantly, I will add a note explaining so.

I’m not planning to add images to this. That’s just going to take too long. From 2015 onward, I included Bandcamp links. For earlier ones, I would often include a YouTube link; I will add Bandcamp links where I can.

Alright, let’s get to it!

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Best of 2025: Top 50 Prog Albums Part 1: 50-26

Welcome to The Elite Extremophile’s Top Prog Albums of 2025! As usual, this is a two-part list of 50 total entries. Part two is here.

As a reminder, the music on this list spans December 2024 through November 2025. Music from December 2025 will be on the 2026 list. I’m sure there is plenty of good music I missed, but when it comes to the reviewing, this is a one-man operation. (My proofreaders/editors, Kelci and Dan, have been very helpful, as always.) There are also certain trends and styles I simply don’t like very much.

2025 was a fantastic year for progressive rock and related genres. I was spoiled for choice with this list, and this may be the overall-strongest batch of recommendations I’ve given to date.

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Album Review: Amplifier – Gargantuan

Band: Amplifier | Album: Gargantuan | Genre: Progressive rock, Space rock | Year: 2025

From: Manchester, UK | Label: Rockosmos

For fans of: Devin Townsend’s less metallic stuff, Porcupine Tree, latter-era Beatles

Bandcamp

Amplifier is a band that’s been around for a while, and they’ve often skirted the edges of this site’s purview. They’re primarily an alt-rock band, but they frequently include prog, psych, and space elements in their music. I’m especially fond of their 2011 release, The Octopus. Gargantuan is the band’s eighth studio album, and it sees them largely stick to their usual sound, but with a bit more space rock influence than on their last album. Things are grand and huge and often overblown here, but the band pulls it off quite well.

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Album Review: Vylet Pony – Monarch of Monsters

Band: Vylet Pony | Album: Monarch of Monsters | Genre: Alternative rock, Progressive rock | Year: 2024

From: Portland, USA | Label: Horse Friends Music

For fans of: Meer, Tool, angsty music from 1998-2006

Bandcamp

This record has been generating a lot of buzz lately, and I think it’s only about 60% related to the semi-erotic furry artwork that graces the album cover. And considering Vylet Pony’s origins, such album art makes sense.

Vylet Pony is a one-woman project based out of Portland. She got her start in music in the early 2010s making My Little Pony-themed electronic music. I’ve never seen My Little Pony. I’m sure it’s a perfectly fine show, but it’s one of those things that had (has? Is brony-dom still going? I don’t wanna research it.) one of the most irritating fanbases I’ve ever encountered. I classify it the same way as things like Steven Universe and Doctor Who: shows I’ve heard generally positive things about but with a fandom so annoying, I’m never going to watch any of it.

However, I strive to be a serious music critic on this site, and acts can evolve well beyond their origins. Hell, if you told me back in college that I’d like a Job for a Cowboy record, I would’ve said you were nuts. If someone got their start in music in a niche I found personally grating, I think I can set that aside if they really have put out a great album.

Now, as regular readers of my site know by now, I’m not a lyrics guy. I like the sound of the human voice, but I usually don’t care about the specific words themselves. There are exceptions, and when there are those exceptions, it’s usually a bad sign for the album in question (*cough* Somalgia *cough*). Monarch of Monsters is based on a novella by the artist. I didn’t read it, and I’m not planning to. I’m writing this during Thanksgiving week, and I don’t really have the time to. (I’m also honestly not much of a fiction reader, either.) I wanted to get that out there for full disclosure.

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Odds & Ends: July 1, 2024

Band: April 1830 | Album: The Adventures of Space Pig | Genre: Progressive rock | Bandcamp

This Philadelphian band claims to write songs about “pig failure,” and that alone grabbed my attention enough to give this record a spin. (For what it’s worth, the vocals are relatively low in the mix and somewhat willowy, so actual themes of pig failure can be hard to discern.) The music is energetic, often drawing from pop and punk. Certain passages remind me of Cardiacs, if Cardiacs were a very synth-forward, female-fronted band. It’s fun and inventive, and I had a good time listening to this.

Score: 78/100

Band: Custard Flux | Album: Einsteinium Delirium | Genre: Psychedelic rock | Bandcamp

Custard Flux’s fifth full length album is their first fully-electric endeavor. They’ve ditched their (mostly) acoustic schtick, and it has resulted in a pretty good release. The band tightened up their songwriting after 2022’s bloated-as-hell Phosphorus, and that renewed focus is appreciated. The music here is catchy and punchy, and the swirling, psychedelic textures are enjoyable. Hints of alternative rock crop up on occasion, too.

Score: 76/100

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