Staff Picks: Favorite Albums of April 2025

Every month, our Staff Picks column sees Consequence writers and editors highlight some of our favorite new music from the past four weeks. Check out the selections for the best albums of April 2025 below.

Maybe it’s just us, but April 2025 felt like the most stacked release month of the year so far.

In between Coachella weekends and our sprawling Guitar Week this month, there were loads of great new albums that captured our attention. Bon Iver returned with his first new album in six years, and it was absolutely worth the wait; meanwhile former CoSigns Beach Bunny, Wishy, Momma, and Samia all arrived with excellent follow-ups. Plus, a collaborative Elton John and Brandi Carlile record, a wild new offering from Jane Remover, and a lovely return from The Hold Steady frontman Craig Finn.

Read on for our favorite albums of April 2025 below, listed in alphabetical order.

2hollis — star  

2hollis, one of our emerging artists to watch in 2025, has been happily overactive. A consistent string of singles over the last two years straight culminated in the full-length releases boy and this year’s star, which also serves as his Interscope Records debut. The release cadence matches Hollis’ restless attitude; on so many of his songs, he’s impulsive, tense, even erratic. star may not be as sonically dynamic as boy, but it does dig deeper into this strange paranoia that many of his songs feature. At the same time, star is covered wall to wall with bangers, building out hollis’ unique pop star persona with more throttling drops and raspy hooks than ever. — Paolo Ragusa

Stream star on Apple Music or Amazon Music

Beach Bunny — Tunnel Vision

On their third album, Tunnel Vision, Lili Trifilio and co. sharpen Beach Bunny’s hook-laden, guitar-driven sound into a cathartic portrait of a quarter-life crisis. Recorded in Chicago with producer Sean O’Keefe, the album showcases Trifilio’s knack for candid, unflinchingly direct lyrics (“Oh, am I enough?” she sings on “Chasm”), but also sees the band venture into new thematic territory, at times grappling with politics (“Violence”) and the ways society influences us (“Just Around the Corner”). Throughout, Trifilio’s crisp vocals cut through the dynamic guitar riffs and energetic drum parts, encapsulating the chaos of being a young adult in the 2020s with a resonant sense of grudging perseverance. — Jo Vito

Stream Tunnel Vision on Apple Music or Amazon Music 

Black Country, New Road — Forever Howlong

Even for a band whose identity has always been somewhat malleable, much credit is due to Black Country, New Road for forging on after the departure of their distinctive frontperson, Isaac Wood. Wisely, they don’t try to replicate the past on Forever Howlong, instead splitting vocal duties among Georgia Ellery, Tyler Hyde, and May Kershaw while fully embracing their baroque progressiveness. From the Western scenic shifts of “Two Horses” to the twee operatics of “For the Cold Country,” there are risks taken everywhere, ultimately paying off in an album bursting with explorative creativity. Given the journey the band took getting here, that’s the sort of inspiring reinvention any artist hopes for. — Ben Kaye

Stream Forever Howlong on Apple Music or Amazon Music | Buy on Vinyl/CD