10 Best Rock Albums Of 2020

It's no secret that 2020 wasn't the best year of the 2020's. Hell, the joke of 2020 being a horrible year stopped being funny somewhere back in September. Though there was a general hellscape going on just outside, you could at least take comfort in the kick ass music coming down the pipeline.

Yeah, rather than be a reflection of the times, rock had a pretty awesome year all things considered. Granted, there was a bit of a slow start to everything due to obvious circumstances, and yet these artists found ways to reach deep inside their souls and come through with some of their best records in ages. It wasn't just the old dogs either, with plenty of newer acts starting to make waves and become the next big thing in music. That's not to say the familiar faces had gone anywhere though, with some of the most inventive albums of the year being bold new reinventions from some of rock's most promising talents.

Though there were plenty of decent albums pumped out during the age of quarantine, these are the few bands that knew how to lift our spirits if only for a little bit. The struggles of this year might not last, but you better believe that the songs will.

Poppy has been having quite the career switch as of late. Whereas most of her earlier work showed different influences of ska, electronica, and...well...pop, her sudden left turn into industrial sounds on her 2019 EP Choke left many wondering what the hell we would be in for around the corner. Even though there was a lot of good material on that EP, nothing could have prepared us for I Disagree.

As it stands, this album came out in January and still hasn't dulled with the passage of time. From one song to the next, Poppy seems to be ripping up different parts of her old sound and injecting them with a healthy dose of rock and venom. You can definitely hear the old pop star many used to know on songs like Bite Your Own Teeth, but the way everything is constructed feels like it could have been hammered out by Nine Inch Nails back in the '90s.

One of the standout moments is Concrete, which can snap on a dime from being a metal banger to a bubblegum pop song to a grandiose finish, in what is surely the best BabyMetal imitation of the year. While there's pretty much no guarantee this is going to be an ongoing thing for Poppy, this is an amazing sonic left turn that is well worth taking the plunge on regardless.