Ben Kweller
“Dollar Store (feat. Waxahatchee)”
The Noise Company
This will be my song of 2025 because I’ve listened to it the most.
This will be my song of 2025 because it’s a damn near perfect piece of brooding alternative rock music.
And it’s a perfect piece of music even without the heartwrenching backstory behind it.
Ben Kweller released his seventh studio album, “Cover The Mirrors,” as a release of his grief after losing his 16-year-old son Dorian in a car accident.
“This is the most personal, emotionally raw project I’ve ever worked on,” Kweller said in a statement when the album was first announced. “When Dorian died in 2023 I was overcome with the need to make music. I didn’t care what came out of me because it was the only way I could find peace in my earth-shattering grief.”
That grief informs every piece of this album, but it truly radiates with love, loss and the brutality of both with “Dollar Store.” It’s the quiet simple guitar in the beginning. It’s Kweller’s stellar songwriting and ability to find a vocal hook with just voice and guitar, before the song explodes at the end, amplifiers on blast, Waxahatchee’s voice following Kweller’s and adding so much weight as she goes. (I’d love to hear more from this duet.)
“I'm looking for some motivation / I don't know what I'm looking for.”
I can’t think of a lyric that feels like grief more than that.
Most importantly, even without the backstory behind Kweller’s return to music, “Dollar Store” would still stand on its own as a thrilling piece of music that proves you don’t need much more than a great hook, great songwriting and some quiet-loud dynamics to bring it all home.
