The Price of Progress by Hold Steady

The Price of Progress, the Hold Steady's ninth studio album, arrived on March 31, 2023, through Positive Jams and Thirty Tigers, the third record in a row the Brooklyn band made with producer Josh Kaufman after Thrashing Thru the Passion and Open Door Policy. It's the six-piece lineup again: Franz Nicolay's keys back in the mix since his 2016 return, Steve Selvidge making it three guitars alongside Craig Finn and Tad Kubler, and Galen Polivka and Bobby Drake holding down the rhythm.

Finn is still a storyteller first, cramming his verses with characters, scenes and hard-won second chances, and the band frames all that talk with sturdy classic-rock muscle. "Sideways Skull", "Sixers" and "Understudies" went out as singles ahead of it, critics mostly liked what they heard, and "Grand Junction" is the song that made the countdowns.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.