As we shovel the last of the dirt onto the grave of the blackened and bloated corpse of 2025, I can't help but think, as I'm looking down at the shallow woodland grave, "what a fucking shitshow." I don't think I can recall a year of so much blatant hate and utter heinousness. The amount of death and despair that I've seen this year and the shameless passivity in response has me truly despondent. I feel like a frog in a slowly boiling pot of dystopian fascism.
Practically from the ball drop of 2025 I saw mangled bodies on the streets of New Orleans, followed by witnessing Los Angeles burn to ash, then the nightmare scenario of the second term of a regime that I think we all knew was vehemently immoral—and now is clearly riddled with psychopathy. And that was just January! Events such as ongoing war, genocide, environmental disasters, AI, ICE, discriminatory legislation, are all universally understood to be glaringly hellish and I don't think I really need to expand on them. However, their detriment to modern life cannot be ignored. Focusing on the positives has become harder and harder. I almost feel guilty when trying to do so, like I owe it to the world to sit in the shit. Positivity was never really my forte.
All that said, I think we can agree that grindcore is a constant positive in our lives. Whether it be listening to music, or record collecting, or attending shows, or playing in bands, grindcore has been both the outlet and the distraction. My whole life I've said punk rock saved my life, and as a teenager that was certainly true. At this point in my life I feel like grindcore has given me a community. The House of Grindcore exists solely because of the appreciation and invested interest of those of you who are reading this now. Without the submissions from the bands and labels and the eyes of the readers, this web blog would not be able to survive. Once again this year, I would like to express my immense gratitude to the readers and to all the bands.
Below I have listed and ranked my personal choices for the top ten grindcore releases of the year. As it is every year, there were a significant number of exceptional grind releases this year and I did my best to make a representational registry of my favorite. And when I tell you that I accidentally deleted that list, twice, I mean I fucking accidentally deleted it, twice! Hopefully this list is a fair representation of whatever it was that I had originally figured out. I eventually had to just stop fucking with it.
Honorable mentions:
Durian returned in 2025 with their second full-length album, Pecking Order. As I understand it, the LP was written, recorded, mixed, packaged, and released entirely independently by the band, without any label involvement. Pecking Order is a relentless bombardment of hurtling blast beats and darting skate-punk riffs. More "grind" than "violence," Durian's slinky and stylized brand of grindcore pulls from several genres—including powerviolence, crust punk, and hardcore—in a way that feels wholly original. Durian pairs just as well with Bandit as they do with Bad Brains.
I always referred to Durian as a "bass player's grind band," as every song is saturated—if not outright overflowing—with the springy-recoil of the band's bass guitar. The album's dense grindcore and its wavering tempo plays like a cassette tape stuck on fast-forward until the batteries in the Walkman eventually wane and die. Pecking Order's exhaustive twenty tracks of unabated blasting and gravelly-throated barks make for a truly torrential album that I don't hear being talked about enough.
The Nepali-American self-identifying "immigrindcore," Chepang return with their first album since their magnum opus, Swatta in 2023. While Swatta was released to high acclaim for its experimentation and far reaching collaboration, Jhyappa sees Chepang more aggressive and stripped down for their Relapse Records debut. The band mixes a fierce, albeit, more polished mix of grindcore a long with death metal, and an almost hardcore tribalism. The band's sharp riffs, lightning-quick drumming, and high-pitched shrieks make for a short yet hammering death-grind listen. (Comparisons to Nasum's broad appeal come to mind.)
Now, in every review you will read about Jhyappa you're going to read about a mention of "immigrindcore" and about the "personal self-immolation," themes of the album. However, in present day America—a time of state violence against immigrants, Gestapo-esque ICE raids and abductions, and open xenophobia—the band's immigrant identity sadly takes on different connotations. Whether it was the band's intention or not, Jhyappa has to be looked upon as a form of activism. In a time and place where immigrants are being systematically targeted, persecuted, and criminalized, Chepang's mere existence as a band is, in and of itself, a radical act. Jhyappa's artistic expression becomes a moral and political act of defiance.
10. Stimulant - "Sub-Normal" LP
Sonically strident and digitally discordant, New York's Stimulant return with a fast-paced, high-powered, aural assault of an album. Sub-Normal is a mercilessly crushing twenty minutes of grinding noise-violence. Like the white stuff around your remote control's dead batteries, the blasting drums and thick guitar distortion are corroded with grating harsh noise, stabbing feedback, and groove plodding slogs. Sub-Normal's powerviolence sludge is thicker than the acidic mud of the third world country where your abandoned iPods rot and ooze lead and mercury into some poor villages' drinking water. The microplastics and circuit boards kill off flora and fauna; and babies are born more cancer than kid. Was that analogy a bit much? I'd say so, but that's how depraved this album is. The dual vocals are a back and forth argument consisting of A) caustic shrieks and B) some old school powerviolence vocals that are clearly shouted from the void or some neighboring alternate dimension. Retro Tron-esque "beeps" and "boops" float atop heavy bombing bass drones that I'm fairly certain broke the speaker in my front driver's side door. Meanwhile, shrill warbles of noisy bleating reverberate like the death rattle of some poor practice space amp head. Sub-Normal is literally screaming at you. It hates you.
9. Sulfuric Cautery - "Consummate Extirpation" LP
Los Angeles-based Sulfuric Cautery have clawed and gutted their way to the top of the goregrind/grindcore chum pile over the last few years with their unmistakably distinct "propeller blade vs. tin can" hyper-blasting snare tone and detuned gurgle-grind.
Blast-beat phenom Isaac Horne’s talent behind the kit is full of ear-catching fills, clamoring transitions, skipping tempos, and jaw-dropping insanity-blasts.
Sulfuric Cautery not only released Consummate Extirpation in 2025, but the band also released the twenty-one-track Killing Spree LP back in July. Either album was more than worthy of making this list; however, I chose the nine-track Consummate Extirpation for its longer songs and superior production. Compared to the rest of the band’s more low-fi and raw-sounding discography, Consummate Extirpation’s improved production quality gives the album—and the band—a more sincere edge, in my opinion. Consummate Extirpation trades micro-blast decimation for a heavy blend of grindcore and brutal death metal.
8. Forced Starvation - "Forced Starvation" LP
To be completely honest, I wasn't expecting much from Forced Starvation. When I first laid eyes on the album cover, I presumptuously assumed the album was another goregrind demo left to rot in the bowels of Bandcamp. The 1920's era Russian famine cannibal cover photo, certainly didn't instill confidence as I have seen that image used on countless releases prior. Nevertheless, as I listened to Forced Starvation's self-titled debut full-length I was forced to eat crow and reconsider.
New Zealand's Forced Starvation are absolutely savage! Their rabid and raw grindcore is manically paced and viciously heavy. The drums are a blur of blast beats and boiling punk gallops. The guitars are thick and gnarly, yet can turn hauntingly somber when need be. The vocals are harsh and demonic. Despite the album's rampaging tempo and callous exterior, Forced Starvation manage a quite poignant song about the Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, Ireland. Needless to say, Forced Starvation was probably my most surprising pick of the year.
7. Noisy Neighbors - "Insolvent" LP
San Antonio, Texas' very own genre meme-smiths, Noisy Neighbors, are back, picking up right where they left off with their 2023 release, Derailing the Hype Train. Noisy Neighbors have been consistently turning out pummeling grindcore since their 2018 debut and have yet to falter. Guitarist and drummer duo Shane and John are kings of the onstage banter as well as one of the sharpest songwriting teams in Texas grindcore. Noisy Neighbors' patented brand of no-frills, straight forward, stampeding grindcore is full bore in their latest LP, Insolvent. The album is pure, unremitting, rapid-fire blast beats knotted around crushing metallic riffs, slathered in gruff, and guttural vocals. The album's top-notch studio mix and master gives the drumming a deep impact and the guitar a solid crunch. Insolvent is a heavy and rich sounding record and is yet another addition in the band's extremely strong and respectable discography.
6. Type: Armor Unit - "Revolutions In Saecula"
Revolutions In Saecula is arguably the most interesting release on this list. Type: Armor Unit is a one-man sci-fi grind project from Days Of Desolation drummer Owen Swerts, who handled everything from instrumentation to mixing, mastering, and even the cover art. Set twenty thousand years in the future, the LP is a futuristic concept album following a freedom fighter named Kasa, who struggles to survive behind enemy lines in a war against world-threatening techno-fascists.
Revolutions In Saecula is more than a detailed galactic parable; it is an unrelenting "space-grind" saga. Stylistically situated between Psudoku and Gridlink, Type: Armor Unit and Revolutions In Saecula deliver a tight stranglehold of blast beats, dissonant tech-grind, and cosmic noise. Any sense of groove or break in tempo is treated as a mocking taunt rather than a reprieve. The only true respite is a single, serene and tranquil astral soundscape that eventually glimmers away into an infinite abyss of screaming guitars. At twenty tracks, Revolutions In Saecula is an operatic grind epic that is as beautiful as it is brutal.
5. Guilt Dispenser - "Detonation"
January 1, 2025, day one, Guilt Dispenser dropped this little gemmy on the table like a Paul Allen business card. The metaphorical gauntlet: Detonation is the Los Angeles-based band's first release since their 2021 split with Hong Kong Fuck You. It is a fun-sized blast of schizophrenic grinding hardcore/powerviolence in the best way imaginable.
The explosive and chronically shifting high-powered blender of noise, fastcore, grindcore, hardcore, and powerviolence is as brutal as it is erratic. Guilt Dispenser changes genres and tempos like flipping stations on a car radio while stuck at a red light; Detonation is a dynamic grab bag of frantic timing and hairpin turns.
Now, I can imagine there might be some controversy regarding this release because the record was pressed on seven-inch vinyl. While I've seen Detonation listed as an EP, the eighteen tracks and the fact that the band refers to it as a full-length should make it exactly that, if you ask me. Being pressed on a seven-inch was most likely just a good economical decision.
Everything you could want in a grind record—shredding riffs, breakneck drumming, and throat-scouring vocals—Sick Destroyer's self-titled LP delivers exactly that and more. The Czech and Slovak grinders' debut full-length is both extremely brutal and ravenous: eighteen tracks of absolute, face-melting grind. Sick Destroyer is non-stop punishing. The band's blistering blast beats, in combination with their thick, lashing guitars, create more aggressive forward momentum than perhaps any other release on this list. The album's production is flawless, allowing each instrument to sit heavy in the mix while maintaining just the right amount of grime to give it some texture. With members of Lycanthrophy, Needful Things, Morbid Angel Dust, and Controlled Existence, it's no mystery why Sick Destroyer has quickly jumped to the top of the global grindcore heap.
3. Meth Leppard - "Gatekeepers" LP
Their first release in five years, Meth Leppard's Gatekeepers reminds us why the Aussie duo are currently one of the top bands in the genre. Led by the band's surgically-sharp and technically deft thrashing guitar, Gatekeepers plays as both brutally intense and purposefully refined. The guitar tone is stringent and vividly keen, while the mechanized, precision-blasting of the drums is pummeling, washer-tight, and impeccably performed. Meth Leppard manages to hide a tense sense of darkness behind such relentless speed and facetious song titles. The album's tangled guitars, roaring vocals, and clinical blast beats are borderline perfection. The album's compositional depth disciplines the band's speeding intensity into a singularly concentrated grindcore masterpiece.
2. Barren Path - "Grieving" LP
As I understand it, when Jon Chang walked away from Gridlink, the band turned to Mitchell Luna of Maruta and Shock Withdrawal to step in and provide vocals for the unfinished tracks. That project would eventually evolve into the band Barren Path and their debut full-length, Grieving.
Barren Path might have the telltale virtuosic guitar prowess of Takafumi Matsubara and the signature drumming chops of Bryan Fajardo, but the band is a whole new beast. Where Gridlink's later albums drifted further and further into outer space, Barren Path and Grieving have both feet firmly planted in the death-grind dirt. The album is a supersonic, terrestrial tech-grind exercise in sheer precision and velocity. Each member of Barren Path is a master of their craft and their proficiency propels this record into the forefront of the 2025 releases. From its annihilative blast beats to its dizzying guitarwork, Grieving's pulverizing dissonant grindcore has set a high-water mark for both the musicians and the genre as a whole. It doesn't get much better than this.
1. Shitbrains/Exorbidant Prices Must Diminish - split LP
In 2025 Shitbrains members Anthony and Emi lost their home in the Los Angeles fires alongside so many others. Despite such an unimaginable loss, the band was able to release a split LP with Swiss grinders, Exorbitant Prices Must Diminish, and the two bands embarked on a memorable co-headlining tour of the West Coast of the United States and Canada in support of the album.
Shitbrains' side of the record is an affirmation in why their frenzied brand of stop-and-go grindcore has them in the highest echelons of the West Coast's grindcore and powerviolence scene. Ballistically crisp as always, Shitbrains' drumming is a ricocheting barrage of power drill fills and tight turn-arounds. Punishingly kinetic, the blast beats are sickeningly fast and blink off and on quicker than a strobe light. The guitar is a blaring spiral that is just as shifty as the drums. The band's dual vocals are scathing enough to scrape the weathering off wood. They blast just as much as the guitar and drums. Shitbrains' latest is as relentless as it is succinct and as clean as it is berserk.
Exorbitant Prices Must Diminish have once again found themselves at the number one spot for the second year in a row. That is no small feat. Much like their split-mates, Exorbitant Prices Must Diminish are very much that high-strung, popcorn-snare-worshipping, spasmatic, start/stop grindcore. The band's songwriting is a maniacal stuttering of blistering chaos—almost a crust-punk take on grindviolence. Instruments are leapfrogging over one another, vying for their microseconds of the spotlight. The guitarwork is a violent mélange of punk rock riffs and death metal licks, all chopped up in a blender. The band's beautiful basslines are rich and intertwined; its quick interjections and solos stick out like the bouncing springs shooting out from some broken cartoon clockwork.
The split between Shitbrains and Exorbitant Prices Must Diminish is a firecracker string of snare busting blast beats and calamitous volatility. This record is a match made in grindcore heaven, but it's the perfect soundtrack to your living Hell.
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