Singin' to an Empty Chair - Ratboys (2026)

I’ve gotten into a brutal speed-dating sort of mindset about listening to a new record. This is especially acute in new rock music, because so much of it is built from the same basic stuff as rock music has been for 60 years so it’s already hard for a new release to differentiate itself.

So to impress me into listening further, you get the first song (or really maybe the first minute of the first song), and then maybe one or two other minutes of the record. If that first minute is repetitive (all quiet intro, all blaring riff, all acoustic prelude), I might actually skip to a different part of the track to see if it sounds that way all the way through.

This is all entirely unfair to the working musicians who are hoping to connect me to the music they’ve spent months creating. But there might be a dozen new rock records this week that are worth a listen, let alone all the ones from the previous 20 weeks that each had a dozen such options, and the hundreds of rock records I already love and could just listen to again.

It’s hard for me to be impressed by a new rock record. As you might have guessed, Chicago’s Ratboys has done just that.

This is a great batch of country-soaked rock n roll that’s heavy on emotion and a lively, noisy energy.

Tracks I Liked

Light Night Mountains All That - my favorite of the batch. A non-stop crescendo

Anywhere - a more throwback 60s pop vibe, but still with plenty of shred

Just Want You To Know The Truth - a second-side slowdown showcases some of the more raw lyrical approaches in the songs