In Defense of the Genre: Best Punk & Emo Songs of January

Poison the Well (photo by James Richards IV)

In Defense of the Genre is a column on BrooklynVegan about punk, pop punk, emo, hardcore, post-hardcore, ska-punk, and more, including and often especially the bands and albums and subgenres that weren’t always taken so seriously.

The first month of 2026 is a wrap! Hopefully you’re caught up on the 50 best punk albums of 2025 (and hopefully you caught the best punk songs of December list that went live around New Year’s) and feeling ready to dive into the great music that 2026 has to offer, because there’s already a lot of it.

I’ve so far reviewed 11 albums from in and around the punk, emo, and hardcore realm that came out this year, including Joyce Manor, Red Sun, I Promised the World, Feels Like Heaven, Rifle, Violent Way, Home Star (mem Marietta), Youth Novel, Crush Your Soul (mem Mindforce), Backengrillen (mem Refused), and Colossal Rains (mem Blacklisted), and I’ve picked 10 songs released this month that are (mostly) from upcoming albums that I highlight below.

But first, let’s celebrate some anniversaries, like some classic emo & post-hardcore albums that turn 30 and turn 25 this year.

Also check out my list of 10 Classic Albums That Influenced Nu Metal, a list that has more punk/hardcore-derived albums on it than metal albums.

Lastly, we’ve got some new exclusive vinyl in the shop, including new color pressings of Hot Water Music’s Caution, Piebald’s If It Weren’t For Venetian Blinds, It Would be Curtains For Us All, and Quicksand’s Manic Compression; color variants of the upcoming albums from Tigers Jaw, Poison The Well, The Academy Is, Free Throw, and The Saddest Landscape; and more.

Head below for my picks of the 10 best songs of January that fall somewhere under the punk umbrella, in no particular order.

Poison The Well by Sarai Kelley

Poison The Well – “Thoroughbreds”

After writing the blueprint for the melodic metalcore boom of the early 2000s with 1999’s The Opposite of December, Poison The Well never looked back. They went in a different direction on each of the four albums that followed, and they ended on their most experimental note. Now they’re back and set to release their first album in 17 years, Peace In Place, and its first single pulls off a balancing act between just about everything that Poison The Well have ever done. At various points, “Thoroughbreds” finds the shapeshifting band at their heaviest, their most melodic, and their most unpredictable, and it feels like a genuine step forward. We’ll find out on March 20 whatever else Poison The Well has in store, but for now, a very exciting stage is set.

Pick up our exclusive “solid gold” vinyl variant of PTW’s new album in the BV shop.

Honor Choir – “Satellite Receiver”

I’ve been seeing an increasing amount of newer bands cite untitled blink and Box Car Racer as influences, but I’ve never heard a band actually attempt to sound like those records the way Honor Choir do. “Satellite Receiver” off the OKC band’s upcoming Modes of Transport EP sounds like a lost Tom DeLonge song from 2002-2003, and it hits the same sweet spot that all of Tom’s actual songs from that era do. They’re not shy at all about who they’re influenced by (they also cite Rival Schools, Far, and Hey Mercedes, which checks out), but hey, with a zillion bands ripping off Enema of the State over the years, it’s beyond overdue to get a band that’s this good at capturing Tom’s darker, artsier side.

Holder by Cooper Rich

Holder – “Inconsolable”

There are a lot of newer bands bringing back the post-hardcore, metalcore, and screamo of the early 2000s right now, and Western Mass band Holder kicked off 2026 with a two-song single for the DAZE label that stands out from the pack. They cite This Day Forward and early Underoath as influences, and like both of those bands, they teeter on the line between screamo and metalcore in that very ’99-’02 way, when the mainstream hadn’t fully caught on to this music and the lines between these genres were so often blurry. They do it without ever seeming pastiche, and their vocalist (who goes simply by Brie) has a scream that’s simply hair-raising.

Dry Socket – “Rigged Survival”

Feeling crushed by the weight of the cost of living is the kind of thing that could make you wanna write a swingin’, powerviolence-y hardcore song, and that’s what Portland’s Dry Socket have done with “Rigged Survival.” It’s the first taste of their upcoming sophomore album Self Defense Techniques, and the band says it’s meant to mirror the panic that sets in as we all try to survive “a system built to constantly extract from us.” Right from Dani Allen’s opening shriek of “IT’S FUCKING WITH MY HEAD!”, that’s exactly what it does.

Feels Like Heaven – “Sandra Bullock”

Just a few months after Swedish hardcore band Speedway released one of the best punk albums of 2025 with their Revolution Summer-ish A Life’s Refrain, members of Speedway kicked off 2026 in style with the debut LP from another band they’re in called Feels Like Heaven. And in just a few weeks, Feels Like Heaven are already stirring up at least as much excitement this year as Speedway did last year. Their whole Within Dreams LP is a killer offering of emo-ish melodic hardcore, but “Sandra Bullock” stands out partially because it doesn’t really sound like anything else on the record. It’s a softer, more mid-tempo song than the circle-pit-inducing rippers that make up most of Within Dreams, and it kinda sounds like a cross between Fiddlehead and Braid. It’s a version of emo that we don’t get enough of these days, and Feels Like Heaven do it very well.

Racecourse – “Caledonia”

It looks like there’s something going on with the emo scene in Santa Cruz. First Day Back were last year’s breakthrough OG-style emo band, and on New Year’s Eve we got the debut album from their friends Racecourse, July, December. It was produced by their own drummer, Ben Chung, who also produced the First Day Back album, and it was made with bass playing and writing from First Day Back’s Luke Johnson. But while FDB sound like a cross between Cap’n Jazz and Sunny Day Real Estate, Racecourse make delicate, slowcore-ish emo in the vein of Mineral and Everyone Asked About You, as you can hear on album highlight “Caledonia.” With its slow pace, lightly buzzing synths, sparkling guitars, kinetic bassline, and the wintry vocals of Reya Langen, it’s a dose of hushed melancholy that sounds like a lost emo classic from 1999 and hits just as hard in 2026 as it would have back then.

The Saddest Landscape – “From Home They Run”

The Saddest Landscape have been one of the most underrated screamo bands around for pretty much the entirety of their nearly-25-year-long career, but maybe they’re about to get a much-deserved boost in 2026. They recently announced their first album in 10 years, Alone With Heaven, and it features three guest appearances that should definitely turn some heads: Touché Amoré‘s Jeremy Bolm, Into It. Over It.‘s Evan Weiss, and Julien Baker. Not to mention, it was recorded in part with the legendary Steve Albini before his passing, and in part with Jack Shirley (Deafheaven, Gouge Away, Loma Prieta, etc). We’ll have to wait to hear the songs with the guests, but meanwhile, “From Home They Run” is already a very promising first taste. It sounds as pained and desperate as The Saddest Landscape always have, and the 10 years since Darkness Forgives have only made the band sound even more world-weary. For an anxiety-fueled song like this one, that’s very much a compliment.

We’ve also got an exclusive vinyl variant of the Saddest Landscape album up for pre-order in the BV shop.

Commitment – “Dog Pound”

Commitment has some familiar faces from the Philly hardcore scene, including Soul Glo vocalist Pierce Jordan on drums and Eye Flys’ Jake Smith on guitar, but their vocalist Tati Salazar is new to hardcore, having previously made indie singer/songwriter type material as Le Siren and The Childlike Empress. As it turns out, Tati has a ferocious scream, and the two songs we’ve heard from Commitment’s upcoming debut LP Fear Of are both ragers. The latest and fiercest is “Dog Pound,” an 87-second whiplash in which Tati “[divulges] in my violent fantasies towards men that deserve such treatment.” The video has snuff film vibes, and the song is just as merciless.

Bitter Branches by Michelle Mennona

Bitter Branches – “Cave Dwellers”

Just a few months after NJ metalcore pioneers Deadguy released their first album in 30 years, vocalist Tim Singer is already set to release a new album by his newer band Bitter Branches, which also features Dan Yemin (Paint It Black, Kid Dynamite, Lifetime) on bass/vocals along with members of Cavalry, Lighten Up!, and Walleye. And after doing what Deadguy does best on that band’s new LP, Tim and the rest of Bitter Branches are diving into their love of Jesus Lizard-style post-hardcore on the upcoming Let’s Give the Land Back to the Animals. Two songs are out now, and my favorite is the more chaotic “Cave Dwellers,” which finds the band moving and grooving in a way that’s looser and freer than Deadguy and perhaps even darker.

How Much Art – “XO”

Pat Flynn and Shawn Costa just cannot be stopped. The vocalist/drummer duo remain busy with Fiddlehead, they recently reunited Have Heart, and this year their new band How Much Art will release their debut EP Public Relations on Convulse Records. The lineup is rounded out by Gel guitarist Maddi Nave, along with members of Downtalker, Qualms, and So Automatic, and whatever you do, don’t downplay this as a “Fiddlehead side project.” “XO” and previous single “PR” both sound like if Fiddlehead veered a little more towards ’80s post-punk, and they’re two of the catchiest songs Pat Flynn has ever written. That “surrender!” hook on “XO” will be stuck in your head for days.

Also of note, this song features five different languages, with Chinese, Irish, and Spanish speakers reciting love poems in their native tongue, and Paris duo Copycat (who Pat Flynn met after they covered a Fiddlehead song) singing in French.

—

Being that this is the first In Defense of the Genre of 2026, I’ll add that there are so many other punk/emo/hardcore albums I’m looking forward to this year, including the Tigers Jaw, Angel Du$t, Gladie, Sweet Pill, Converge, Knumears, Sweet Pill, Hit Like A Girl, and Footballhead albums that I included previous singles from in some of last year’s monthly punk lists. So check those out and here’s a playlist with even more punk songs from 2026:

—

Read past and future editions of ‘In Defense of the Genre’ here.

Browse our selection of hand-picked punk vinyl.