Best Of 2025 (So Far)
Paying homage to 25 albums and EPs that helped get me from January to July
The year has lurched to its midpoint. As someone for whom music is second only to family ties in maintaining my psychic health, I have nothing but gratitude for all the artists who have met the moment with new releases. However, this midyear exercise is always a little fraught, especially when considering what will come out in the next six months, leading to even more year-end decision-making.
This is even truer in 2025, when I’m already looking forward to new releases from Clipse, Molly Joyce, The Thing, Water From Your Eyes, and Wet Leg, all of whom have troubled best-of lists in the past. There are also upcoming albums from Ethel Cain, Alison Goldfrapp, Shame, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, Emma Swift, Tchotchke, and others that promise to be strong.
Now, I mentioned “decision-making” when it comes to these lists. In reality, it’s the records you find yourself reaching for almost without thinking that make up the final cut. No reminders necessary, you instinctively push PLAY and are nourished. Creating this list was a matter of centering myself, quieting my rational mind, and paying homage to the albums that got me this far in 2025.
If any did the same for you, I hope you’ll let me know. If I’ve introduced you to something that helps get you to December, even better!
Listen to the playlist here or below while you read. It contains 24 of the 25 albums and EPs discussed.
Florist - Jellywish “All the songs will reward your patient attention, gradually revealing more riches with each listen.”
Car Seat Headrest - The Scholars “While I can imagine it might be daunting to enter the story of a band on their 13th album…The Scholars solidifies Car Seat Headrest’s position as one of the century’s greatest bands.”
The Beverage Station - Little Grey Cells “Little Grey Cells is just a fantastic album that satisfies on so many levels, I lost count.”
Melissa Mary Ahern - Kerosene “Ahern’s journey of loss, despair, and recovery has led her here: to what will surely be recognized as one of the best debuts and finest collections of songs in 2025.”
Hamilton Leithauser - This Side Of The Island “It all comes down to the songs, of course, and they are sturdy and beautiful, with a lean towards Waitsian Americana.”
Bakudi Scream - Prey “The intense music on Prey is fueled by some intense thoughts…You can dwell on that as you listen to Prey or discover a new narrative in how these genius noises resonate with your heart and soul.”
Richard Aufrichtig - Everybody On The Breeze “Richard’s production and engineering shine throughout, with every instrument given its own space and weight while still cohering into a unified sound.”
Stephen Vitiello with Brendan Candy and Hahn Rowe - Second “…it’s a homecoming with zero nostalgia, just three expert musicians reveling in the pleasures of hypnotic guitars, rich electronics, questing bass, and time-shifting percussion.”
Horsegirl - Phonetics On And On “Somehow they manage to sound precisely like themselves while stripping away anything inessential in an exercise in mesmerically tuneful minimalism.”
Daughter Of Swords - Alex “There are all kinds of fun jagged edges and sprightly melodies, with distorted guitar or plinking keyboards leaping out of the mix.”
Pachyman - Another Place “Another sign of his expanding mastery is False Moves, which sees him using his playfulness to make essential connections between psychedelia, dub, and post-punk.”
Deep Sea Diver - Billboard Heart “Nearly every song features either a distinctive riff or explosive solo - or both - that lifts it out of the ordinary.”
NO HAY BANDA & Steven Kazuo Takasugi - Il Teatro Rosso “…a mind-boggling series of fragmented notes, sounds, and textures that seems to expand outward like a pane of glass shattering in slow motion.”
Hannah Cohen - Earthstar Mountain On her fourth album (and first in six years), Cohen completes the journey of artistic assertion that began on Welcome Home in 2019. With echoes of Dusty Springfield, Minnie Ripperton (Les Fleurs!), Faye Webster, Jenny O., and even Ennio Morricone, she and her production and life partner, Sam Owens (AKA Sam Evian), have concocted an addictive blend of folk, country-rock, pop, and R&B. Even though the album came out in March, Summer Sweat has a legit claim on “song of the summer” status, with a mirror ball spinning lazily as Cohen enters her diva era.
Contributions from Sufjan Stevens, Clairo, Sean Mullins, Liam Kazar, and Oliver Hill lend a warm sense of community and support to the collection as Cohen delineates themes of love, loss, and life in the Catskills from 2020 to 2024. Keys her lyrical resonance are a focus on sensual details, as in Summer Sweat when she sings, “Do you remember/How the chair stuck to the backs of your legs and neck/Oh that summer, that summer sweat,” or hard-won wisdom, as in Mountain’s opening line, “Losing you is a mountain/Of stillness.” Many thanks to Cohen for living through it all and gifting us with this gem of an album.
Anna Thorvaldsdottir - UBIQUE “The electronics and extended techniques often free the instruments from any prosaic sense of their possibilities, generating what feels like pure music.”
Youth Lagoon - Rarely Do I Dream “While he composed most of Rarely Do I Dream on guitar, keyboards still lead a lot of the songs, whether the tinkling notes of Football or the warm chording of My Beautiful Girl.”
Dead Gowns - It’s Summer, I Love You, And I’m Surrounded By Snow “Recorded over the last few years, this expansive album draws on a deep well of emotion in high-powered guitar epics and high lonesome ballads alike.”
Eli Keszler - s/t In the annals of record-making, there’s a wonderful minor genre of soundtracks for non-existent movies. This goes back at least to 1959’s Lonelyville: “The Nervous Beat” by The Creed Taylor Orchestra with arrangements by the great film composer Kenyon Hopkins. Other notable entries in the genre include John Zorn’s Spillane (1987) and, perhaps best of all, Barry Adamson’s Moss Side Story (1989).
Now, Keszler, a percussionist and composer, has released an album that will make all those other records step aside and make room. In a career that started in 2008, Keszler has explored a variety of projects, from film scores to sound art, including 2017’s marvelous Northern Stair Projection, based on an installation at Boston’s iconic City Hall, one of the best examples of brutalism in the Northeast. This self-titled masterpiece is a culmination of all those pursuits, blending crime jazz, atmospheric electronics, and explosive percussion. While much of the album features just Keszler, he has two collaborators without whom I might never have discovered the man or his music. The most prominent is Sofie Royer, the DJ (her SOS Mix is a perfect snapshot of 2016), violinist, and singer, who fits this moody new context perfectly. Sax player and multi-instrumentalist Sam Gendel also appears, but ultimately, the vision is all Keszler’s, and he tells a captivating story.
Molto Ohm - FEED “…your invitation to the rave where you dance on the bones of late capitalism while the DJ tries to sell you investment advice.”
Andy Jenkins - Since Always “The songs are the center, of course, and they are incredibly well-crafted, with verses and choruses that seem instantly inevitable and novel at the same time.”
Lifeguard - Ripped And Torn “Guitars scrub and whine, drums push and pull, and vocals shout and soar on this debut LP…”
Clutter - Loves You “The post-hardcore/art rock bastions of Chicago and Philadelphia may have just found a sister city in Sweden’s capital.”
MIKE - Showbiz! “…a seamless 47-minute tapestry of keyboard sparkle, rumbling rhythms, sampled voices, and his trademark syrupy flow…”
Frankie And The Witch Fingers - Trash Classic “The energy levels are through the roof, and new synth-wiz Jon Modaff adds some no-wave noises to their patented punk-prog-psych mix.”
Elsa Hewitt - Dominant Heartstrings “…Hewitt gifts us with lovely clouds of song and sound based on live improvisations…”
It’s been a banner year for music so far, with at least a few hundred albums demanding my attention. Feast your ears on the full meal in my Of Note In 2025 playlist and tell me what I might have missed!
From The Archives
Best Of 2024 (So Far)
Best Of 2023 (So Far)
The Best Of 2022 (So Far)
The Best Of 2021 (So Far)
The Best Of 2020 (So Far)
Wonderful to see Car Seat Headrest on the list! Definitely a band that does not get their due.
That Deep Sea Diver record has really grown on me!