[2025] A roundup of recommended UK bands, featuring many up-and-coming artists!
In Japan, both now and in the past, bands from the UK have been especially popular among Western music.
As fellow island nations, there’s a shared sensibility—those slightly damp, melancholic melodies and lyricism resonate perfectly with Japanese tastes, and many people are also drawn to the distinctly European worldview.
In this article, we’ve researched recommended UK bands.
The first half spotlights up-and-coming and new artists you should watch to understand the “now” of Britain, while the second half takes a broader look—centered on rock—at veterans and mid-career acts you ought to know.
It features plenty of bands that are great for beginners to UK rock and Western music alike, so be sure to check it out!
- Recommended UK rock bands. Popular overseas bands.
- [2025] Popular British Artists: Recommended Singer-Songwriters
- [2025] Classic UK rock albums: A roundup of must-hear recommendations
- [2025] A roundup of classic UK rock songs: from the latest tracks to timeless staples!
- Recommendation of Western Rock: Recommended Foreign Rock Bands, Popular Bands
- Most Popular Western Music Bands Ranking [2025]
- Western Rock Music Popularity Ranking [2025]
- [Grabs Your Heart] A Compilation of Western Songs with Cool Intros [2025]
- Cool Western music bands. Recommended overseas bands that will get you pumped just by listening.
- [2025] Cool! A roundup of Western bands with twin vocals
- Popular Western Girls' Bands Ranking [2025]
- [2025] Trending Western Music: The Latest Hit Songs to Watch
- [2025] Australia’s Band Scene: Talented Artists on a Rapid Rise in Popularity!
[2025] A roundup of recommended British bands: plenty of up-and-coming acts too! (131–140)
Stuck Between A Rock & A White FaceOne Minute Silence
A four-piece nu metal band formed in 1995.
They have cited influences from Rage Against The Machine, Pantera, Black Sabbath, and Tool, and their sound is essentially like a blend right down the middle of those bands.
Young GirlsPINS
UK is a four-piece girls rock band formed in Manchester in 2011.
Their sound layers darker influences—garage, psychedelic, and grunge—onto indie rock, resulting in a highly addictive style.
Even with the tambourine shaking, it never turns fully bright; that deliberately unresolved, smoldering texture is quintessentially UK.
Best YearsPRAYING MANTIS
An HR/HM band led by brothers Tino and Chris Troy.
This track is included on their fifth album, “Forever In Time,” released in 1998.
The album was produced with a new vocalist on board.
The band is known for its melancholic melodies and dramatic, wistful song structures.
A Winter Shade of PaleProcol Harum
Some people might feel they’ve heard the intro of this song somewhere before.
It features a beautiful, almost classical-sounding melody, and it seems to have been used in commercials in Japan as well.
It’s known as a favorite of many major artists, including Billy Joel, and has been covered by numerous musicians.
DakotaStereophonics
Stereophonics is a rock band from Wales, United Kingdom.
Known for their husky-voiced, hard-edged rock, they have achieved commercial success—such as five consecutive UK number-one albums starting with their second—while also earning high critical acclaim for their musicality.
Get it OnT-REX
Since their debut in 1967, they had as many as 11 songs make the top 10 in the UK.
They apparently were active in the same generation as the Beatles in the UK and were constantly compared to them, but in 1977 the band lost momentum when their vocalist, Mark, died in a traffic accident.
Mark was 29 at the time, making their activity span a mere 10 years—an extremely unfortunate turn of events.
LovesongThe Cure
The Cure have a long history, and even as their lineup has changed little by little, they’ve kept creating songs across a variety of genres—one of the band’s charms is that they never let their fans get bored.
This song reached as high as No.
2 in the U.
S.
and was also used in the film “Love Song.”