The 20 best rock songs right now

Dogleg burst out of the traps and don’t slow down for a second on “Fox.” Breathless, life-affirming stuff from the Michigan band.

Irish punks Pillow Queens drop the feedback for an unashamedly sentimental ode to the men in their lives. “Brothers” isn’t subtle, but it’s a moving tribute that cuts straight to the heart.

British teen Christian Alexander just dropped Summer ‘19, his second album of the year. “Someday, Sometime” is its highlight: a scrappy but heartfelt slice of melancholic bedroom pop custom-built for sombre days.

Fiona Apple covered the Waterboys classic for the finale of the inexplicably-still-on The Affair. Prestige TV, baby — can’t beat it.

Silverbacks are so indebted to LCD Soundsystem that James Murphy just took their TV away. In fairness, the Irish band acknowledge their influences here, and even ask the band not to sue.

Moses Sumney went away and came back sounding like Nine Inch Nails. Here for it.

FYI: Your best of the decade lists are incomplete without Best Coast.

Beach Bunny are a rarity: a rock band best known for a viral TikTok hit (“Prom Queen”). This buzzy new song about nervously edging your way to happiness is their first since signing to Mom + Pop.

Fun fact; Paul Thomas Anderson has worked with HAIM more times than he did with Philip Seymour Hoffman.

A highlight of Iowa Dream, a new collection of unreleased rarities from the Russell vaults. “I Never Get Lonesome” has a sentimental heart and country twang that offsets the deep melancholy that Russell always brought as standard.

Meg Duffy, a.k.a. Hand Habits, made one of the year’s most slept-on albums with placeholder. This month they’re breathing new life into it by recruiting friends to cover “wildfire” and donating all proceeds to the non-profit Amazon Conservation Association. Lomelda’s amorphous and touching take on the track soars.

Boman’s soft-focus indie pop is delicate to the touch, but delivers a hefty emotional punch capable of delivering an unlikely K.O.

“Do you want to marry me in the hotel by the airport before you have to leave?” Yacina asks on this, her ode to new love. Her latest album, Remember The Silver, drops December 6.

Denzel Curry sounds good on just about anything, huh?

Freshly signed to Bon Iver and Aaron Dessner’s 37d03d label, Eve Owen introduces herself with a beautiful piano ballad offering a hopeful outlook from a position of abject loneliness.

This U.K. singer-songwriter boasts an ability to nail observational details comparable to her fellow countrymen Alex Turner and Mike Skinner. On “Angel’s Song,” she turns her sympathetic eye to a friend struggling with a cocktail of issues. Parks’ music is a reason to carry on.

Is that the long tail of chillwave’s influence making its way into 2020? Quite possibly.

Folksy and frantic, the immediately anthemic “Alien with a Sleep Mask On” marks the return on Ratboys ahead of their new album Printer’s Devil.

Real Lies double up on the melancholy on their first new single. The gauzy synth-pop indebted to Pet Shop Boys and New Order they inhabit remains, but now with a more abstract and unknowing quality that pulls you in that little bit closer.

Dijon is a tricky one to pigeonhole, but he rarely puts a foot wrong. “Crybaby” is another impressive moment from the LA-based artist.