All Songs Considered: Viking's Choice 2025 – The Guitar

NPR, Host: Robin Hilton, Guest: Lars Gottrich
Aired: December 30, 2025

Overview

In this special year-end episode, Robin Hilton is joined by NPR Music's Lars Gottrich for the 2025 edition of Viking's Choice. This year’s theme is The Guitar, celebrating the instrument’s versatility and artistry across genres—from fingerstyle folk to power trios, ambient experimentation, and global traditions. Lars curates some of 2025's most captivating guitar-driven music, sharing personal insights and memorable stories about each pick.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Theme: A Year for the Guitar

• Lars announces the theme: “I couldn't help but notice that it was 2025 was just a great year for the guitar… not just rock music… classic guitar, jazz, [and] ambient, but all using my personal favorite instrument. The instrument that I've been playing since I was 12 years old.” (02:16 – 02:48)
• Robin and Lars reflect on Lars’ eclectic taste, his love for the “misshapen misfits music,” and his reputation as “king on the island of Misfit toys.”
• The episode explores not only traditional guitar genres but also how the guitar has inspired innovation and community across the world.

2. Category: Fingerstyle Renaissance

Gwennifer Raymond – Last Night I Heard the Dog Star Bark ("Bleak Night in Rabbit's Wood")

• Album of the year for Lars.
• Described as a “one-woman speed metal band” with haunting, physical, and tuneful playing.
• Lars: “You feel like you're inside the belly of the guitar when she is playing. It's just so raw and rambling, but so tuneful… you feel the physicality of her hands and her body.” (05:27 – 06:00)
• Noted for her multidisciplinary talents: astrophysicist, video game creator, and guitarist.
• Discussion on the revival of fingerstyle guitar—influence from Jack Rose, growing public appetite for human, organic performance as a backlash to AI, and cultural moments like film and TV soundtracks.

Hayden Pedigo – I’ll Be Waving As You Drive Away ("Houndstooth")

• Showcases storytelling and lyrical guitar.
• Robin: “It is just… sometimes hard to make music this calming when it has so much movement in it, because there's quite a lot of movement in this. But he does it so beautifully.” (10:46 – 10:57)
• Lars highlights how Pedigo’s touch is both “delicate and demonstrative,” building a unique personal style that feels like storytelling without words.

3. Category: Power Trio Reimagined

Takat – Is Noise Volume One ("Ishmar")

• Composed of MDU Mokhtar's backing band, adding punk and dub to Tuareg desert blues tradition.
• Robin: “It is like the music of life.” (14:34 – 14:38)
• Lars: “There's a little bit more dub… and a bit more, like, punk attitude… they specifically cited Fugazi.” (14:38 – 14:54)
• Live performance energy described as “vibrating… thrashing in place” (15:01 – 15:24)
• Commentary on scarcity and creativity: Even made under “extreme or limiting conditions,” this music becomes “larger than life.” (15:56 – 16:08)

4. Category: Restrung Repertoire

Rafael Toral – Traveling Light ("You Don't Know What Love Is")

• Portuguese artist transforming jazz standards into ambient, slow-moving pieces.
• Robin: “It really is like he took a little piece of audio and used this tool… to stretch audio. You can turn like a 5 second audio clip into an hour long ambient piece just by stretching it out.” (20:58 – 21:25)
• Lars: “Every chord change feels like a triumph. That's kind of like the magic of this record… it really does feel like you are traveling through space.” (21:25 – 21:49)
• Sparking memories of hearing guitar deconstructed for the first time—Robin cites Adrian Belew; Lars recalls Keith Rowe. (22:07 – 23:07)

Laura Snowden – This Changing Sky (Title Track)

• Classical guitarist acclaimed for composing as well as performing.
• Robin: “She uses space and really lets this piece breathe. I mean, that's my favorite kind of guitar playing, honestly.” (25:11 – 25:21)
• Snowden’s work is used in guitar schools to grade technical progress—a testament to her compositional skill.
• Vocals woven into the guitar in an “eerie and unexpected, but very beautiful” way. (26:28 – 26:55)

5. Category: Guitar in Conversation & Community

Madala Kunene & Sibusile Xaba – QuanTu ("Wam Fana")

• South African master and student duo, blending Zulu tradition with jazz fusion.
• Robin: “I love the sense of community and the comfort that you find in it, in that sort of call and response…” (29:08 – 29:29)
• Lars: “It just sounds like a conversation between two guitars… they've just become one. It's very earthy and meditative.” (29:38 – 30:22)
• Encourages listeners to explore classic Zulu guitar compilations from the 1950s and 60s.

6. Category: Ambient/Experimental – Spacing Out

William Tyler – Time Indefinite ("Star of Hope")

• A more experimental and ambient direction for Tyler.
• Lars: “He's contending with a broken world and he's using music to find his way out.” (32:29 – 32:42)
• Features a hymnal melody discovered on AM radio, subtly sampled into the mix.
• Robin: “It's not at all what I was expecting from him… experimental… there's a Seed of Hope in this record.” (34:24 – 35:13)

7. Category: Keep Guitar Weird

Jorge Espinal – Bombos y Cencerros ("Ají de Pollera")

• Peruvian guitarist creating rhythm and percussion from the guitar’s body and strings, looping everything live.
• Lars: “He really thinks about the physicality of the guitar itself and the rhythms that it can create… a one-man band situation.” (36:47 – 37:27)
• Song title translates to “Chicken Restaurant Chili Sauce”—playful, inventive music.
• Lars: “Any object can become an instrument. What makes it one is intention.” (39:26 – 39:38)

8. Grand Finale: Guitar Heroics

Vernon Reid (of Living Colour) – Hoodoo Telemetry ("Meditation on the Last Time I Saw Arthur Rhames")

• Living Color's Vernon Reid delivers virtuosic, genre-blending guitar on his solo record.
• Lars: “I planted myself right in front of Vernon Reed specifically to watch him do his mastery… It's just so fun. It's got Living color vibes… but it's essentially his version of a fusion record.” (40:05 – 40:28)
• Sweet moment: Lars describes playing air guitar with his daughter to the track: “She starts air guitar. And so I pick her up and I use her body as an air guitar… it is the sweetest thing in the world.” (41:15 – 41:30)

Notable Quotes & Moments

• On community & discovery:
  Robin: “You are the king on the island of Misfit toys.” (01:18)
  Lars: “What makes [an object an instrument] is intention.” (39:37)

• On the magic of the guitar:
  Lars: “You feel like you're inside the belly of the guitar when she [Gwennifer Raymond] is playing.” (05:34)
  Robin (on Hayden Pedigo): “Such a lyrical guitar player… a storyteller without words.” (10:57 – 11:27)

• On genres blending and boundaries breaking:
  Robin (on Takat): “It is like the music of life.” (14:34) Lars (on Rafael Toral): “Every chord change feels like a triumph.” (21:25) Robin (on Laura Snowden): “I love how she uses space… lets this piece breathe.” (25:11)

• On playfulness and intention:
  Lars (on Jorge Espinal): “I think that any object can become an instrument. What makes it one is intention.” (39:37)

Key Timestamps

• 02:02: This year's theme: The Guitar
• 03:01–06:15: Gwennifer Raymond & the fingerstyle renaissance
• 06:15–08:55: Dialogue on why fingerstyle has resurged—AI backlash, "sinner's effect," and cultural revivals
• 09:02–11:45: Hayden Pedigo’s storytelling guitar
• 11:45–16:28: Power trios: Takat and the modern desert blues
• 18:04–23:07: Restrung Repertoire: Rafael Toral and Laura Snowden
• 27:15–31:18: Duo conversation: Madala Kunene & Sibusile Xaba, Zulu tradition
• 32:02–36:14: Ambient/Experimental: William Tyler and the search for hope
• 36:16–39:50: Keep Guitar Weird: Jorge Espinal’s percussive experiments
• 39:51–41:48: Finale: Vernon Reid’s virtuosic celebration, air-guitar jams with his daughter

Conclusion

The Viking’s Choice 2025 Guitar episode is a sonic adventure across genres, continents, and eras. From Welsh fingerstyle prodigies to South African guitar duos, desert blues powerhouses, and avant-garde experimenters, Lars and Robin illuminate the guitar’s limitless reinvention. The show closes with a heartfelt and playful tribute to guitar heroes, underlining why this instrument—and the communities built around it—continue to capture the imagination.

Further Listening

Check out the extended Viking’s Choice list at NPR Music. As Robin says:
"Listen to this podcast and if you want more, check out npr.org allspace songs and you'll get, you'll get like a much longer list of guitar stuff if that's what you're into." (41:54 – 42:06)

End of summary.