Rearview Rock
Looking Back. Looking Forward. The Sound Between.
Rock music doesn’t end its years with full stops. It fades out. It hums. It leaves tape hiss behind.
The most important moments rarely arrive with fireworks. They slip past quietly — tucked into B-sides, buried on albums released too early, or hiding in songs that didn’t fit the moment they were born into.
This isn’t a year-end countdown. It’s a look in the rearview mirror — not to relive the past, but to understand how we got here, and why rock keeps finding ways to move forward without ever really leaving its roots.
The playlist below is the spine of this story. Each track is a loose end, a quiet pivot, a signal flare that only makes sense when you stop chasing the next big thing and start listening sideways.
Looking Back: The Ghosts That Stayed
Some sounds never disappear — they just wait.
The Pretty Things – “L.S.D.” (1966)
Before psychedelia became colourful and commercial, it was raw, dangerous and unhinged. “L.S.D.” doesn’t sound like a hit — it sounds like a warning. This was rock testing how far it could stretch before tearing itself apart.
Love – “Laughing Stock” (1967)
Fragile, orchestral, emotionally exposed. Long before indie rock learned how to whisper, Love were already doing it. This isn’t nostalgia — it’s a blueprint that went largely uncredited.
The Groundhogs – “Split, Part Two” (1970)
British blues-rock pushed into something feral and confrontational. You can hear punk lurking in the shadows here, years before anyone gave it a name.
Fanny – “Blind Alley” (1972)
Sharp, melodic, unapologetic. A reminder that rock history didn’t forget women — it simply chose not to look. This track holds its ground effortlessly, decades later.
These songs weren’t loud enough for the moment they arrived in. But time has a way of turning quiet conviction into permanence.
Static Years: When Rock Didn’t Know Where It Was Going
Progress isn’t always forward motion. Sometimes it stalls. Sometimes it flickers.
Japan – “The Tenant” (1978)
Post-punk restraint edging toward something colder, more elegant. This is a band standing at a crossroads, unsure which future to step into — and that uncertainty is the point.
Magazine – “Permafrost” (1979)
Tense, icy, emotionally distant. Post-punk refusing comfort, refusing warmth. A sound that didn’t want to be liked — only understood.
The Sound – “Skeletons” (1981)
Urgent without spectacle. Emotional without melodrama. One of rock’s great “what if” bands, leaving behind songs that feel more relevant with every passing year.
The Church – “Almost With You” (1982)
Not the obvious choice — and that’s exactly why it matters. Shimmering, introspective, quietly influential. You can hear alternative rock learning how to breathe here.
These tracks live in the in-between — not revolutionary enough to dominate headlines, not safe enough to endure on classic-rock radio. They exist in static. And static, it turns out, is where evolution often hides.
Looking Forward: Signals, Not Predictions
Rock doesn’t announce its next phase. It whispers it.
Low – “Laser Beam” (1999)
Minimalism as defiance. Heavy without volume. This track quietly dismantled the idea that rock had to be loud to be powerful.
Tindersticks – “Tiny Tears” (1995)
Slow, cinematic, emotionally devastating. Proof that rock could mature without losing its edge — and that vulnerability could be its sharpest weapon.
Savages – “Marshal Dear” (2013)
Urgent, stripped back, confrontational. Not revivalist — resolute. A modern band refusing to sand down rock’s angles.
Fontaines D.C. – “No” (2019)
Sharp, literary, restless. Rock remembering that words matter, attitude matters, and discomfort is often a sign of life.
These aren’t predictions. They’re signals. Signs that rock hasn’t disappeared — it’s simply stopped shouting.
Why Rearview Rock Matters
Looking back isn’t nostalgia. It’s navigation.
Rock music has always survived by carrying unfinished ideas forward — ideas that didn’t fit, didn’t sell, didn’t land the first time around. B-sides aren’t leftovers. They’re parallel histories. Alternate routes. Proof that the story was always bigger than the hits.
As this year fades out, there’s no neat conclusion waiting. Just echoes, loose threads, and a low hum of possibility.
The needle lifts.
Side B keeps spinning.
And if you’re listening closely, the best parts of what’s coming next are already there — hiding in the static.
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