Notes on 2025
I’ve been struggling to get anything down lately.
I suppose it’s a combination of unlimited scope and limited time: I have a lot I want to talk about, but when I get going, I tend to just run and run until I’m hopelessly lost. I’m retracing my steps through those bigger pieces, but for now, putting down some simpler words about something might help me out. I thought I’d write about some of my favourite touchstones of the year.
I was a bit off trend this year. I spent most of my time digging deeper into some older pockets, running down rabbit holes, broadening my base. I’ve missed out on a lot, and I’m in the process of catching myself up, but in the meantime, here are some active artists that’ve meant a lot to me in 2025 —
Nate Amos
Nate Amos has had a couple of truly envious years. Last year, he dropped Box for Buddy, Box for Star, one of 2024’s best albums, and this year he delivered two exceptional records. The first, It’s A Beautiful Place, came courtesy of Water From Your Eyes, his longstanding collaboration with Rachel Brown; the second, Holo Boy, was a vibrant excavation of his deep This Is Lorelei back catalogue.
It’s A Beautiful Place is another inspired blend of alt-pop and indie rock, recorded in Amos’ bedroom and produced on his computer. The songs feel of this secreted process, with Brown’s vocal frankness giving a disaffected heft to her personal trials. You’re rushing about in your city, thrashing about in your room, coming apart inside yourself, and it’s all sort of ridiculous, borne out in the tinkering percussion, spacey textures and squealing guitar bursts.
Holo Boy, Amos’ solo reminiscence, throws a spotlight on selections from his manifold Lorelei releases. It couldn’t have come at a better time, with 2024’s Box for Buddy, Box for Star — one of the year’s best albums — a breakout moment for the hard working singer-songwriter. That album cemented him as one of our best working songwriters, and this record further justifies it. 25 minutes of undeniable craft, stripping back the delightful quirk of It’s A Beautiful Place to reveal the engine underneath: sleek, shiny, firing on all cylinders.
The deluxe version of Box for Buddy, Box for Star also arrived this year, which included three new covers. MJ Lenderman’s rendition of “Dancing In The Club” got a lot of shine and ended up on a few end of year lists, but it’s still not as strong as the original, a shimmering slice of upbeat heartbreak.
Zara Larsson
I sit near an Alexa-powered radio at work, and it starts up about five or so minutes after I arrive. The IT guy walks over, puts his face about two feet from the thing, and says “Alexa, play 105.1 FM.” I’ve been absentmindedly taking in radio programming for almost 40 hours a week, which feels a little novel at this stage. Thinking back, I’ve never been this exposed to the engine room of the Top 40.
It’s a lot of “Golden,” a lot of “Ordinary,” a surprisingly wide selection of Benson Boone, and lately, a lot of both “Opalite” and “The Fate of Ophelia.” There are few bright spots in there, but when Zara Larsson started getting play, I was surprised. “Crush” sounded pretty good from 15 feet away, carrying like a vague notion. It took a few weeks for me to throw it on of my own accord, but when I did, it still surprised me.
“Crush” is sharp, fun, and beautifully produced — a microcosm of Midnight Sun as a whole. There are a lot of people trying to fuse the post-hyperpop moment with nostalgic Y2k influences, and while I’m immune to most, Larsson has landed on just the right balance. “Midnight Sun,” “Girl’s Girl,” “Eurosummer,” “Hot and Sexy,” all standouts. Great voice, too.
Native Son
I’ve been in the tank for Native Son since before he was Native Son. I first came across his work many years back, when I was helping to run a music discovery section of a publication I edited. The Native Son project was a huge leap forward and, on the release of Metro Dread in 2020, I was all but proselytizing to anybody who would listen. An essential New York record and a perfect distillation of immediately pre- and early COVID, it quickly became a personal touchstone.
There had been a few quiet releases since then, including the exceptional “Ctrl Freak,” but it wasn’t until the middle of this year that word of a new record emerged. Where Metro Dread forged a path through the bike lanes of Manhattan, Toy Circuit courses through the labyrinthine self. These contours are fertile ground, and Ano’s lyrics feel like unmailed dispatches from the soul; unsaid words aimed squarely at some solitary ‘you’. Flashes of funk and jazz influence elevate the indie fundamentals, building on the already-sharp Native Son sound. The feelings are knottier, the images more abstracted, the drums junglier, and the palettes deeper. “Pathfinder,” the standout opener, slides Marvin Gaye into the cracks between candour and hesitation. There’s a sly Prince-ness to “Walk, Run, Crawl, Spit!” that I really enjoy, and previous singles “Mach 1” and “On Keelhaul Hill” are both propulsively compelling.
He’s a knack for the memorable, and his words have been cropping up in my head all year. I fell back into the first Native Son project when I arrived in New York, and it was an invaluable guide to the adjustment; now, with Toy Circuit out, I can’t help but see that move — and the violent, psyche-shatting estrangement that precipitated it — reflected back at me. It is the album I’m probably most thankful for this year as, like Metro Dread before it, I see something of myself in it. A great artist does that once; a brilliant artist does it twice.
Geese
It’s a great time to be a gander… there’s more Geese than ever.
We all know about Geese. The album’s noisy, eccentric, bold, inventive… it’s filled with interesting choices and explosive moments, buoyed by Cameron Winter’s inspired vocal choices and underwritten by a young band with experience under their belt. This is what they’ve been building to for a while now, and the spotlight is well deserved. “Taxes,” “Half Real,” “Au Pays du Cocaine,” “Cobra,” “100 Horses”... an album brimming with powerhouse talent.
Included in this general enthusiasm, but entirely distinct from it, is Cameron Winter’s 2024 solo debut, Heavy Metal, which casts him in a complementary light. It seems like we don’t get many solo albums from active band vocalists — I enjoyed when Brandon Flowers was doing it — but having a space for a frontman to move into different modes, explore quieter spaces. Brandon Flowers in The Killers is Bruce Springsteen or Iva Davies; Brandon Flowers in the spotlight is Bruce Hornsby. I’m still trying to figure out who Winter is, and that’s sure to evolve, but many vocal comparisons I’ve seen point to Mick Jagger. I’ll say this much: the Stones were the Stones, but there’s no Jagger album as good as this.
fantasy of a broken heart
One of my favourite news bands of 2024, fantasy — a Brooklyn-based duo working overtime as members of Water From Your Eyes’ touring band — returned with the Chaos Practitioner EP. This one was mixed by fellow list member Nate Amos, the busiest man in the world.
There’s a lot to be taken from this brief offering, but it’s really the second half of the project that’s kept this fresh in my mind since April. “Star Inside The Earth” is a blistering stop-start panic attack that leads into “Road Song,” a heartbreakingly dejected tale of bitterness and estrangement. The final track, “We Confront the Demon In Mysterious Ways,” puts the push-and-pull of a crumbling relationship to the band’s unique take on indie rock.
There’s a power at the intersection of their animated vocals and incisive lyrics; it makes the whole affair feel more candid, more cutting. If you like what you hear, check out their 2024 debut, feats of engineering: by the time you hit “Catharsis,” the album’s climactic moment, the fusion of ridiculous theatrics and sincere conviction has built to more than the sum of its parts.
billy woods
Any year that billy woods drops is a billy woods year, and by that metric, we’ve been living through the age of woods.
woods came to my attention in college, when I first heard History Will Absolve Me, but his stature was truly cemented by his 2019 two-hander, Hiding Places and Terror Management. In the years since, he’s dropped a handful of classics: Aethiopes, Church, and Maps stand tall, as does his 2024 collaboration with E L U C I D, Armand Hammer’s We Buy Diabetic Test Strips. 2025 brought two more towering achievements: G*******g and Mercy.
I first listened to G*******g as I walked the length of Manhattan, from 238th Street in the Bronx to Battery Park. I was wandering through the quiet trails of Inwood Park when the record started to hit, which coincided with the cover art, but the atmosphere immediately took a malevolent turn. A murderer’s row of dark and dusty producers conspire, with beats from longtime collaborators Kenny Segal, The Alchemist, Messiah Musik and Conductor Williams making this one of the year’s most stacked rap records. “Waterproof Mascara” is an evil song, the most dread-inducing listen of the year, and the El-P-produced “Corinthians” isn’t far behind, with jet-black bars that have been seared into my mind all year: “twelve billion USD hovering over the Gaza Strip / you don't wanna know what it cost to live / what it cost to hide behind eyelids…”
Mercy, Armand Hammer’s second full-record collaboration with The Alchemist, opens on a serrated guitar and kinetic kit. The record stretches its legs and finds space, but the bars never let up: even at their most laconic, woods and E L U C I D wield words like truncheons. It’s always a good idea to keep an eye on Quelle Chris, Pink Siifu and Earl Sweatshirt, and they all make appearances. “Calypso Gene,” “Glue Traps,” “Crisis Phone” and “California Games” are must-hear, and woods’ verse on “Dogeared” is one of my recent favourites.
Vegyn
A quietly big year for Vegyn, who released a couple of great albums: a full-record remix of Air’s seminal Moon Safari, and Thank You For Almost Everything, the most recent record from his Headache project.
The Moon Safari remix, Blue Moon Safari, came as a welcome surprise. I’ve long been a big Air fan, and I’ve long been a big Vegyn fan — I’ve interviewed both Nicholas Godin and Vegyn — and, on paper, it seems like a great fusion. On wax, however, it’s even better than expected: the remixes run the gamut from a light touch to a solid retooling, and while some of my enjoyment may have come from reimmersing myself in the 1997 classic, I’ve found myself navigating back to the remix album a lot. The “Sexy Boy” remix is a strong sampler, as is his take on “Talisman.” If you’d have asked me if this project was a good idea, I’d have said no, but that shows you what I know.
Headache combines the music of Vegyn with the poetry of Francis Hornsby Clark, albeit with an interesting caveat: all the spoken word is performed by a distinctive text-to-voice program. It’s a potent brew. Vegyn’s productions have always channeled a kind of transcendental quality — take my favourite, “It’s Good To Be Alive,” which uses vocal snippets to a life-affirming end — and Hornsby Clark’s poetry fits this mold. The vivid specificity and naked sincerity of his words press up against the cold veneer of the software, the precision diction drawing further attention to the heartfelt sentiment. It’s lived in, mined from the tiny minutiae of a real life, filtered back through something incapable of those memories. “Is any of this real? Is any of this true? The answer is no.” This verges on new age, especially with Vegyn’s approach to the material, and it certainly isn’t for everyone, but if it clicks for you like it did me, you’ll be lucky to have it.
Ethel Cain
I had a couple of moments with Ethel this year.
The first came early, when I listened to Perverts for the first time. I was walking around a cemetery with my camera in hand; there was snow on the ground. I don’t think I saw another person for the entire experience. A slow, patient, moving experience. I could feel myself getting lost in the contours of the record, the repetition, the ghostly dismembered voices hiding amongst the slow-moving textures. I’ve been on a bit of a slowcore kick — I saw an intimate Codeine show this year, and I caught Karate, one of my favourite bands, around the same time — so my fondness for Perverts was not totally surprising.
Willoughby Tucker, I'll Always Love You, though more conventional, is no less stirring. It was just the other day that, on the way home from work, I sunk back into the album. I closed my eyes, leaned my head back, and let go. I was particularly struck by “Fuck Me Eyes,” which progresses so beautifully in both story and form, the swelling synths and desperate despair fusing into this overwhelming emotional release. One of my favourite songs of the year, and one of the more beautiful ones I’ve heard in a long while.
Clipse
The return of Clipse, once unlikely, was undeniable.
Let God Sort Em Out, the duo’s fourth album, is their first in sixteen years. In that time, Pusha T has ascended to dizzying heights as hip-hop’s premier coke mover, while Malice deepened his Christian faith and made occasional appearances under the name No Malice. It all came back together rather quickly: the pair reunited on Kanye’s Jesus Is Lord, Pusha bought his way out of his Def Jam contract, and longtime producer Pharrell started teasing new cuts.
It’s no surprise that Push is steadfast, with more than a decade of sustained solo excellence, but the ease with which Malice slips back into his mantle is incredible. The interplay between the siblings has always been electric, and neither age nor separation have dulled their spark. “So Be It” chases excellence with excellence, but Malice’s second verse stands tall as one of the best of the year. Hell, there’s a four track run here — “Chains & Whips” through “Ace Trumpets” — that’s as blistering as any sequence released this year.
Pharrell does great work, and sometimes touches on brilliance, but his rapport with Clipse sets a high bar. It was just a few years ago that he produced half of Pusha’s It’s Almost Dry, comfortably outstripping fellow producer Ye. It might be dark days for that figure, but besting him with beats still means something.
Folk Bitch Trio
Hometown heroes Folk Bitch Trio release long awaited debut album, receive well-deserved adulation, embark on extensive world tour.
I caught Folk Bitch Trio twice this year: first at Night Club 101, a couple of days before the release of Now Would Be A Good Time, and again at Baby’s All Right in November, after that record had made a good splash. As a Melburnian, I’ve been across FBT for a while — I had a tiny, unseeable cameo in a music video with Gracie years back — but the pre-release show was a revelation. The room was packed, the atmosphere reverent, and it was immediately apparent that the Trio were on the cusp of something remarkable. The beautiful three-part harmonies, the evocative songwriting, the candour with which they commanded the stage: as impressive as it was undeniable. You could feel the awe emanate from the crowd, an understanding that what we were seeing was uncommon, beautiful, and destined for more than a small-capacity club in Alphabet City. It’s already a memory to treasure, but it will only appreciate with time, as these three musicians take themselves to dizzying heights.
Now Would Be A Good Time is a front-to-back folk treat. Opening track and lead single “God’s A Different Sword” disarms in its understated beauty; “Hotel TV” is a forthright tale of yearning and insomnia. My favourite track, “The Actor,” is a heartbreaking disillusion, all masquerades and misunderstandings. Then there’s “Moth Song,” “Foreign Bird,” and single “Cathode Ray,” or really any of the other tracks, the album being so cohesive and engaging throughout. Their Like A Version cover of Kings of Leon’s “Sex on Fire” also finds a perfect pocket within this sound, with the group’s interpretative skills testament to their already fully-formed artistic identity.
A great new-ish band with a really pleasant sound. I’m excited for what’s next, and you should be too.
There were a few smaller notes too. I think the Steve Lacy single came and went too fast — a good next step after the colossal star-making success of Gemini Rights. Addison Rae gets it, and both “Fame Is A Gun” and “Diet Pepsi” still get play. The Djo album had some good stuff on it, too. Boldy James had some good moments, though he’s having too many moments; Oklou album fantastic; Tamara and the Dreams’ “Successful Bisexual” is a blast; HAIM had two very good singles; I really liked that one Kid Laroi track, “HOW DOES IT FEEL?”; Blood Orange album was very pleasant and Lorde album was better than many said. Oh, some more great new records: Nourished By Time, Danny Brown, Kilo Kish, MIKE, Camille Schmidt. I could go on and on. I guess I’m already doing that.
I could dig up more artists, reflect on more that I’ve enjoyed, but every piece, like every year, must come to a close. That’s some wisdom I’ll be trying to take into the next go around: sometimes you just have to decide that something is sorted, put it out there, and move on to the next one. The days of hang-wringing are over; the age of reckless abandon is upon us.
I’m hoping we get a new Avalanches album in 2026, and I’m guessing we’ll get something, but that’s historically a fairly dangerous bet. Speaking of dangerous bets, I’m writing up my resolutions for next year: if I’m any good at keeping them, I’ll be throwing words up here a little more often.
Until then—