''Universe Room'' is the forty-first

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track cartridge, 8-track or Cassette tape, cassette), or digital distribution, dig ...

released by American

indie rock Indie rock is a Music subgenre, subgenre of rock music that originated in the United Kingdom, United States and New Zealand in the early to mid-1980s. Although the term was originally used to describe rock music released through independent reco ...

band

Guided by Voices Guided by Voices is an American indie rock band formed in 1983 in Dayton, Ohio. It has made frequent personnel changes but always maintained the presence of principal songwriter Robert Pollard. The most well-known lineup of the band consisted o ...

, released on February 7, 2025, through their own Guided By Voices Inc. label It was preceded by the singles "Fly Religion" (November 22, 2024), "The Great Man" (December 13, 2024), "Dawn Believes" (January 22, 2025), and "Elfin Flower with Knees" (January 24, 2025).

Background

On November 19, 2024, the band announced the release of their new studio album, along with the first single "Fly Religion". Of the new album, frontman

Robert Pollard Robert Ellsworth Pollard Jr. (born October 31, 1957) is an American singer and songwriter. He is the frontman and leader of indie rock band Guided by Voices, which he also the band’s only constant member. In addition to this, he has also rele ...

said:

Critical reception

''Universe Room'' was met with "generally favorable" reviews from critics. At

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, this release received an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

score of 71, based on 6 reviews.

Track listing

All songs written by

. # "Driving Time" – 2:05 # "I Couldn't See the Light" – 2:55 # "I Will Be a Monk" – 1:30 # "The Great Man" – 2:03 # "Clearly Aware" – 2:36 # "Dawn Believes" – 3:26 # "Play Shadows" – 2:00 # "Fly Religion" – 2:25 # "The Well Known Soldier" – 1:07 # "Hers Purple" – 1:05 # "Independent Animal" – 1:13 # "19th Man to Fly an Airplane" – 3:41 # "Elfin Flower with Knees" – 2:20 # "Fran Cisco" – 3:07 # "Aluminum Stingray Girl" – 2:19 # "Aesop Dreamed of Lions" – 3:07 # "Everybody's a Star" – 2:23

Personnel

Guided by Voices

– lead vocals, artwork,

layout In general terms, a layout is a structured arrangement of items within certain limits, or a plan for such arrangement. Specifically, layout may refer to: * Page layout, the arrangement of visual elements on a page ** Comprehensive layout (comp), ...

Doug Gillard Douglas Scott Gillard (born December 23, 1965) is an American guitarist and songwriter. He has been a member of major indie pop and punk bands, most notably Guided by Voices, Nada Surf, Bambi Kino, Death of Samantha, and Cobra Verde. Early ...

– electric guitar, strings * Bobby Bare Jr. – electric guitar * Mark Shue – electric bass guitar * Kevin March – drums

Additional contributors

* Travis Harrison –

production Production may refer to: Economics and business * Production (economics) * Production, the act of manufacturing goods * Production, in the outline of industrial organization, the act of making products (goods and services) * Production as a stat ...

floor tom A floor tom or low tom is a double-headed tom-tom drum which usually stands on the floor on three legs. However, they can also be attached to a cymbal stand with a drum clamp, or supported by a rim mount. It is a cylindrical drum without snare ...

on "Aluminum Stingray Girl" * Ray Ketchem – additional drum recording * Beckham Bare – piano on "Hers Purple"

References

2025 albums Guided by Voices albums {{2020s-rock-album-stub