Best Albums of 2025 so far (& a few singles & EPs)
Gordon Withers shares favorite releases from the first half of 2025, including a playlist.
Happy Friday! Can you believe 2025 is six months old? It feels more like sixty. To honor the halfway mark of this disastrous year, here is something positive — a list of some of the incredible music released in the past six months. And I don’t think any of it was generated by AI!
Listen
YouTube Music mix (missing Czonka)
Bandcamp mix (missing Deafheaven, Turstile, and Hudson Freeman)
STANDOUT: Lung — The Swankeeper
An absolute tour-de-force, this album from Lung, a cellocore (yesssss) duo from Cincinnati, veers between punk, classical, opera, metal, and math-rock — often within the same song. Singer/cellist Kate Wakefield takes on a wide swath of 2025-era bullshit, from wellness gurus to the expectation of artists to give away everything for free (the subject of the song included here, “Lucky You”). It might not be the most accessible entry point for a new Lung fan, but it’s perfectly timed, feeling like it exactly captures the current moment.
I consider this album a twin with Wakefield’s solo release Everything Goes Around and Around. The latter is stylistically the polar opposite of The Swankeeper and therefore the perfect mirror image — the contemplative (and quietly scary) night to The Swankeeper’s bombastic day. Although Everything Goes Around and Around was released in very late 2024, I still count it as 2025, since it came out after most year-end lists were published, so it gets a spot here too.
Stereolab — Instant Holograms on Metal Film
An outstanding accomplishment, this new Stereloab album will surely remain in my top 5 for the year.
Deerhoof — Noble and Godlike In Ruin
A wild, avant-garde journey into humanity’s madness. I am astounded at how Deerhoof can create album after album of artistically brilliant statements, often in entirely new genres. What a contrast to King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard! (who I also love, but I’d say they have a 37% success rate at genre-hopping compared to Deerhoof’s 100%)1
Momma — Welcome To My Blue Sky
This record is so listenable, it’s like the comfort food of indie shoegaze pop grunge (a genre combination I’m excited exists). Even your kids will like it! Although they may not want to be seen with you while you’re obviously singing along.
TURNSTILE — NEVER ENOUGH
I love that hardcore in 2025 can include all sorts of wild genre explorations (truly, it always could — look at Bad Brains), but Turnstile celebrates how creative and diverse punk can be. Also, they gave us the wonderful and iconic “free Baltimore show flying pants” moment of 2025:
Deafheaven — Lonely People With Power
Blistering and beautiful. They are one of the best bands on Earth at this moment in time.
Destroyer — Dan’s Boogie
I usually like one song per Destroyer album and find the rest insufferable, but this latest one just keeps shifting from one brilliant musical idea to another. Absolutely outstanding.
Swervedriver — The World’s Fair EP
The world is not completely cursed, since we are blessed in 2025 with new music from the classic Oxford shoegaze pioneers. This EP was partly produced by YouTube personality Beato, which seems to be giving the band a much-deserved bump with new generations of music lovers.
Mogwai — The Bad Fire
A lot of folks found this record underwhelming but I thought each song hit the spot perfectly. Maybe try it again?
and now, The Obscure Section (my favorite)…
Czonka — The Geography of Nowhere
Somewhere in the treacherous mountain passage between the lush valleys of post-punk and post-rock, Czonka toils methodically, honing their craft. Their compositions are minimalist (they are a duo with bass, drums, and sometimes sequencers), yet somehow always sound full and complete. They boast DC-area pedigrees (Imperial China, Pitchblende, etc.) but they stand on their own. Check them out! (New record currently only on Bandcamp). RIYL: El Ten Eleven, Holy Fuck, Yesness
Damon Locks — List of Demands
Venerated Chicago artist and bandleader (Black Monument Ensemble, The Eternals, Trenchmouth) Damon Locks recently released a fantastic, trippy album of poetry/hip-hop/sample-based compositions. “Isn’t It Beautiful” is the perfect lead-off track on the mix above, with its seasick, warped-record start and lyrical focus on movement collapse — it’s a great representation of how it feels to be living through this year.
Cling Ring — Godess Is Sleeping
LA bedroom shoegaze artist’s new album makes heavy use of cassette recording and Nintendo64 synths. It’s a hazy, dreamy, upside-down world perfect for soundtracking your “I’m now on the first flight out in the morning after my evening flight was canceled and I just pulled an all-nighter at the airport delirium” (a.k.a. two Fridays ago, personally)
The Ex — If Your Mirror Breaks
Maybe you’ve already heard legendary Danish anarchist punk band The Ex and maybe you even are a fan… but did you know that they are still releasing music? (this album is from April!)
Maddie Ashman — otherworld + “Toffee” single
An EP of guitar & vocal microtonal pop melodies. Yes, it can be done. And it’s brilliant. “Toffee” is a banger and features cello & drums as well.
Hudson Freeman — “Good Faith/Dean” single
Brooklyn lo-fi acoustic grunge artist Hudson Freeman’s dirge-y, bittersweet song about drifting away from his evangelical/conservative friends & family really hits hard, especially this year. He was on my 2024 list as well, and I think he’s going to become very popular over the next year or two.
Weatherday — Hornet Disaster
I’m not entirely sure what’s going on here (and why it took me six years to hear about this reclusive Swedish genius artist and underground legend, Sputnik). But it’s great! This second album from Sputnik’s project Weatherday is like, uh… lo-fi-bedroom Built To Screamo. Yes, that’s it.
Full of Hell — Broken Sword, Rotten Shield
My favorite metal bands perfect the art of simultaneously being in on the joke while still blowing you away. Full of Hell hilariously and playfully invites you in on all of the jokes, too. The fact that all of their songs are Minor Threat-length adds to the brilliance.
Ventura — Superheld
There is an alternate universe where Swiss power-trio Ventura — who consistently put out a brilliant, blistering album every 5-6 years for the past 23 — are one of the most popular indie/alt bands in the world. It’s a crime they’re relatively unknown in our universe, but thank goodness they still exist here.
That’s it for now — let me know what you think, and what other brilliant 2025 releases you’ve been listening to!
Stay joyful,
GW
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