As always with these year-end mixes, these aren’t all tracks that came out in 2025 (although many are), but are instead the tracks that I was most into in 2025. Enjoy.
Open The Fucking Fantasy – Black Moth Super Rainbow
It’s such a rare treat to get a new BMSR record. One of my absolutely favorite bands still making music and touring. omg see them if you can. Is it possible that this might be their best record yet? Even after so many years in the game. They’ve been at it since 2007??! I can still remember when Jay B played me the first BMSR track I ever heard at an Elxclub jam session early in our NYC years. At some point they became my go-to answer when people would ask who my favourite band was. Although, these days with the celestial jukebox letting us listen to whatever we want, whenever we want, is there such a thing as a favourite band?
Many albums and live shows later, Tobacco & BMSR are still at it. This new album is amazing. The first 3 tracks are so killer. Maxine told me this story about how one of her friends was giving her grief in the past about her music sounding like “underwater music.” And this 100% fits that bill. It’s shorthand between us now for a certain type of woozy underground vibe, and this is my best most favoritest underwater music.
Stranger – Alan Sparkhawk
I first heard this track on a nighttime bus in Bristol, circling around the Bear Pit roundabout. And somehow that was perfect? His voice has always been strong, but now it’s getting a kind of ragged glory (!) to it. When those harmonies come in, it sends chills. I still miss his wife and former Low cohort Mimi, one of those few public figures where, when hearing of their death, I felt terribly moved. The lyrics are so inscrutable, but for some reason I love when he sings “you gotta clean your / dashboard cupholder”. And a handful of folks nicknamed me “Danger” back in the day (joke rhyme with Granger), and when he sings the word danger, I think of them, and myself lol.
Guericke’s Unicorn – Beirut
His voice is always so velvety. The synths are so underwater. The lyrics have this yearning and melancholy to them that I am a sucker for. Maxine and I saw them live in McCarren Park, many moons ago, and it was in a parking lot and weird, and kind of perfect. I like the synthy version of the band as much, if not more (maybe?), than the horns and folk instruments version.
Crystal Breath – Kim Deal
Yeah, KD was on a lot of folks’ 2024 best-of’s, but I didn’t get into the album until early 25. Maybe I’d been burned by so many additional Breeders records and The Amps, etc. Everyone was always like, oh yeah this one is so good! And I was never into it. But this one!!!!? Hit me just right. Double points for this album sparking the memory of driving to Beacon with Maxine and my kids right after my mom’s memorial in February when I was deepest in love with this record. The girls wanted to know what I’d been listening to, and they knew Kim bc I’d given them the Breeders Last Splash vinyl, which they loved (god bless them). Good nighttime road trip music. It got us through.
Get Still – Alan Sparhawk
2 Alan Sparhawk tracks???? Wth 2025. But this one is so different. Apologies to Maxine who has a downright allergic reaction to auto tune (but can just about handle a true vocoder lol). Very metallic where his earlier track was natural wood. This was a spotify suggestion to play after Kim Deal’s Crystal Breath, so yes, the algorithm is driving this part of the mix. It was a good pick! But over this Christmas break I’m 100% quitting spotify, so I’ve been reading a ton of how to switch and what to switch to. Haven’t made the switch yet tho, so apologies for the spotify links and playlists. Hopefully in the future this will all seem quaint and anachronistic. Many folks go apple music, many are going Quoboz. Hmmm. What do you think?
Getting Killed – Geese
Have you heard of Geese? Cameron Winter? The hype is bonkers, which is fun, bc it’s been a while since we had this level of hype. Dan R mentioned the Strokes maybe? I held off listening for a long time bc I wanted to absorb enough of the hype that I could make up my own mind. So Maxine and I listened and were like, huh hmm ok, whatever. A bit YLT, the Velvets, Radiohead vocals, other touchstones, who cares. But then I wanted to hear it again. And again. And the lyrics I was picking out were kind of grabbing hold of me. And suddenly I was way in! Decided I would go to the Bristol show after all, but it was mega sold out, natch. Like original £30 now £300 kind of sold out. But this stuff is great and I can’t quite put my finger on what’s working for me, but it’s working really well.
An additional fun game is that Cameron Winter is having solo success at the same time his band Geese is blowing up. We’ve been trying to come up with any other band/solo situation in rock history where that has happened. Dan R’s pal mentioned Rod Stewart & The Faces, which isn’t bad. I suggested Black Moth Super Rainbow & Tobacco, which is both kind of a joke and kind of right on the money. Although I suppose the acts should be well-known to make a true parallel. I keep thinking Dylan & The Band, although that one’s not really a true match either. Any ideas?
Casting My Spell – The Pirates
Oh wow, have you heard A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs? If my audio year was dominated by anything, it was this podcast. Some folks can’t handle his voice or phrasing (Dan R and I shorthand call him the robot), but the info and storytelling is so top notch. And listening to the eps in order really gives a good feeling for how it felt as the 50’s moved into the 60’s etc. I can’t recommend it enough, if that’s your kind of thing. At some point I started a playlist of the songs that jumped out at me, and this is one. My god it just jumps out of the speakers at me, and this vibe of British bands in the 60’s covering American acts but adding that raw energy to it. Had a fun youtube session on this song where I saw the Johnny Otis original (that’s the original right?), and some weird TV version with Donna Loren and Bobby Sherman?? Wild. No video of this Pirates version unfortunately. Damn, The Pirates really were amazing weren’t they.
Bodyguard – Beyoncé
Ok sure, also a 2024 powerhouse, but 2025 for me. I guess at first I thought the whole record was Beyoncé trolling the music industry, like “oh I know what you want, how about I give it to you and blow your minds you pathetic mortals.” But now I feel like…maybe she just does whatever she wants? And she wanted to make this Cowboy Carter record? I mean, there’s really no way to know what it’s like to be Beyoncé, is there. Is there? Do we have fanfic written about how she came up with this concept and recorded it? Is there a fanfic expert in the house I could ask about this? However it happened, this song is killer. SHE WANTS TO PROTECT YOU IN THE MOSH PIT
Now and Again – Pale Blue Eyes
I came across this band in a Resident Music recommendation a few years back? I was both intrigued and put off by the band name. But then hooked by the shoegaze reverb-drench. Maxine and I saw them last Spring on Thekla (you know, the venue that’s in the bottom of a boat in Bristol that was sailed in by a member of the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band decades ago, that’s still having shows, including Peter Buck’s latest tour ETC), and the show was a blast. So many smiles, so much charisma. Their shirts said Devon Cream Pop meets Sonic Yorks, and I should have gotten one.
Welcome to the Noosphere – Ursa Major Moving Group
Turns out a barista at our local coffee spot (also a farm produce shop) is a drummer/musician/songwriter, and this is her project. It’s great! I think she’s playing all the instruments? We’ve had some fun talks about synths and drone music and creative projects, I told her about the music I’ve been doing and it’s been a blast. Coffee shops with musicians and good chats, echoes of Brooklyn, BBar, Antlers, Nick & Port St. Willow, etc. The magic continues. I love the way this song builds and builds and builds in the middle, and it feels like it’s going to crash to an end and then the acoustic guitar comes in and it turns into gentleness again. So strong! That line about the biosphere gets stuck in my head.
Aerial Troubles – Stereolab
A new Stereolab album??? And it’s so good? I’m in! I saw them in 2024 in Bristol at Marble Factory (RIP) and they were so tight and powerful. Now this? The groove is vintage (hmm vintage Stereolab or vintage like 60’s Beach Boys?), and the lyrics are hitting me so hard: “The numbing / isn’t working any more”, “we can’t eat / our way out of it”. Whoa, are they reading my mind? Are we all going through the same things? Do they just have a perfect handle on the modern experience, as always? French marxists will always have their fingers on the pulse probably. That harmony vocal ending, into the random bleeping filter sweep, is PERFECT.
Torn – Ebbb
This is a pull from Mike A, who generously shared his year-long work-in-progress 2025 playlist with me. I felt weird listening to it before the year was up, but also, it was fun! Also also, otherwise some of these end of year playlists are too massive to really absorb. We went to see Dutch Mustard at The Louisiana last year (what a venue! what a great show) and he was telling me an Ebbb show was coming up, and that it was spelled “with 3 b’s”. I said that in that case, I was out. That kind of band spelling thing makes me crazy! But I was very wrong, this band is fascinating. And this track just keeps morphing from one thing to the next, while still remaining itself. The pounding bass drum is not something I would normally dig, but they’ve EQd it really nicely so it sort of sounds like it’s coming from next door, through the walls, you know? And then that glitch house remix vibe at 2:30 is killer, I live for it. Let’s hear it again.
All of My Heart – ABC
My rock n roll book club read a bunch of interesting books this year, and I suggested Trevor Horn’s autobiography for it. And….it wasn’t good. Ignoring all the basic tenets of good storytelling, it was kind of a series of “and then” “and then” “and then”’s. But! I have loved Trevor’s music project Art of Noise since I was a kid. Frankie Goes to Hollywood have 3 all-killer singles. Band Aid was a monster hit. Yes’s “Owner of a Lonely Heart”? Stone cold classic. Trevor knows his way around an 80’s era mixing desk. He’s partly responsible for that whole 80’s glossy sound, and that used to be a bad thing, but not any more. Maybe? I listened to a ton of Trevor’s work, and it’s shiny and I dig it.
There was one great story in the book about how Trevor felt so strongly about ABC and knew that they could be mega-stars but felt their bassist was letting the whole side down. He managed to convince them to fire him and replace him with some more technical master. So I keep listening to the bass lines in this track to see if they sound remarkable, and they don’t seem to? The best payoff of the story is that later Trevor was up for recording an early U2 album but they had heard about him getting the bassist fired and were like, you’re not gonna do that to us, you jerk. Bounce! So he didn’t get the gig. Sometimes ego-centrism doesn’t pay. All that said, this ABC track tugs at my heart strings, and I love all the sparkly details: the hi-hats, the strings (swoon!), the vocals, that chorus melody. The fact that the hook in the chorus is nothing but his solo voice saying “All of my heart”! I don’t need that ending saxophone but at least it only shows up at the end fade out (which seems to take 5 minutes to fade). Keep rocking, Trevor.
Nonmonogamummy – Lilly Allen
I mean, again, sometimes it’s hard to separate the hype from the music, so we waited a good long time before checking this album out. And it’s wild! The songs are good sparkly pop, and then the lyrics are all intense story-songs forming a rock operetta (can we make that a thing?) about her break-up and ex and being poly. ETC. It’s super weird to be walking around the house idly singing “pussy palace” in my head, but sort of like the Geese album, I keep wanting to hear this one again. It’s fun to tease out the details, to catch new facets of the story lurking in each track. And they’re all quite different sounding which is fun. What can I say, it’s good.
For Your Love – Harrison Storm
Angie and Alirio came to visit over Thanksgiving (it was A BLAST), and we knew we needed to get them to some music in Bristol, bc that’s such a huge part of being here. I couldn’t believe during their visit there would be no Bleep Klub, EMOM, AV Jumble Sail, Sensitivity Sound Program. All my go-to’s! So I scoured all the usual spots, seeing what we could see at The Louie, Fleece, Frome’s Cheese & Grain, Thekla. Thekla! Harrison Storm was playing, never heard of the guy, but it sounded pleasant enough and come on, they should experience the boat. And… it was killer! Even better live, and the band had an amazing woman playing violin on every track that I wish wish wish was on here. But so be it. This one stuck out to me especially. It’s sweet.
More Than Real – Rich(ard) Dawson
One of my favourite records to come out last year, Dawson’s latest is full of gems and jewels, each song like a short story. And am I over-reading it, or is every song split into two parts, with two points of view, separated by time? This one slays me. It has literally brought me to tears many times. The opening theme of recovery is poignant, “it ends with me”…and the idea of becoming exactly what you were trying so desperately not to be. Yeesh. And then the second act, the woman’s voice, the death of a parent—which of course is gonna get me barely a year after my mom’s death, and echoes of my dad’s, and his heart attack when I was a kid. “Yes I’m sure he squeezed my hand,” and yes, it’s true, my mom squeezed my hand right before she died. It was devastating, and true, and emotional, and powerful, and small, and mundane, and the most massive, and love, all at once. And somehow that’s what I get from this song, every time.
Sunson – Nils Frahm
This year we saw the Eno documentary a few times—you know, the one that changes every time you see it? Runs off generative software? See it!—and when we saw the streaming event, they had an intermission where Devin Turnball played Discrete Music on one of his custom-built sound systems. Not only had I never heard this record (!), I had never heard of Turnball, and had no idea that these ultra hi-if listening systems were even a thing. When I looked him up, it turned out that he had a Listening Room opening in London a few weeks later, and we were set to go to London just after. I bought tickets and went, and it blew my mind to pieces. He’s designed and built every component, wire, speaker and plug to create the “best” listening experience possible. I went, took off my shoes, entered the room, sat down in a comfy cushioned chair, and chilled out. The music was all vinyl (there were also 2inch master tapes available, but I didn’t hear any of those), and selected by various curators. They would play a side of an album before moving on. When I entered, they had just started Isaac Hayes’s Hot Buttered Soul, which I had never heard before. And… o… m… g… what a sonic experience. The sounds were so… present, I guess. It sounded sort of like you were in the room while it was being played, but not quite that. The fidelity was nuts. It felt like a meditation. It didn’t hurt that this album is fantastic, and turns out I knew a handful of musical phrases because The RZA sampled it liberally for some of my favourite Wu Tang tracks. But wow!
The next record was this live Nils Frahm album. I knew some of Nils Frahm, and had heard a bunch on NPR podcasts over the years (hat tip Bob Boilen), but it had always left me with a meh shrug. Not this time! Mind. Completely. Melted. In fact, after this record, a new curator came in and talked about how hard it would be to follow the Nils Frahm record. He played an album by Actress that sounded thin, metallic and lame. Later Maxine and I listened to the live Nils Frahm record while driving through the wetlands near a swimming pool we sourced in a heatwave. On our way to The Sheppy, an epic and weird pub in the middle of nowhere. The sun was setting, the landscape was uncanny, and it fit perfectly. Just like 2025.