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The Best Records of 2025… So Far!

Feature

The Best Records of 2025… So Far!

We have passed the halfway mark on 2025. Six months’ worth of New Music Friday and so many killer new releases. Today, we wanted to take stock and highlight some of our favourites.


2025 has already been a year for big returns, and some exceptional debuts too as it happens, but this feature is going to focus on shedding more light on some of less headline grabbing releases that we’ve been really loving and most playing. We won’t talk more at this stage about our first six Records of the Month (Delivery, Darkside, Los Pirañas, Walt McClements, Stereolab and Durand Jones & The Indications) for 2025, as it goes without saying that we love them, but you can read more about them all here.

Below is a list of twenty one releases that have to be considered essential listening, and to help with that we have created a playlist that you can tune into here and by scrolling down the page a little.

Claire Rousay / more eaze
- No Floor
Lush and collaborative long evolving ambience from Texan artists claire rousay and Mari Maurice, aka more eaze.

Quinie - Forefowk Mind Me
Sung for the vast majority in Scottish, this is a really stunning blast of traditionalism from the Glasgow-based Quinie.

Daniel O’Sullivan - Eros
An absolute masterclass from composer and multi-instrumentalist Daniel O'Sullivan (of Grumbling Fur and about three dozen other essential artistic ventures).

Fly Anakin
- (The) Forever Dream
Blazing lines at super-speed and crazy, left-of-centre beats from Virginia. One of the year’s finest rap records with no doubts.

Sure Fire Soul Ensemble - Gemini
Funk-jazz grooves from the San Diego 9-piece band. Echoes of library music, spiritual jazz and cosmic soul too. A vibe.

Nyx - Nyx
A luminous blend of choral traditions and electronic textures from the London-based collective. Meditative, grounded and quietly powerful. 

Confucius MC & Bastien Keb - Songs For Lost Travellers
One of the year’s most played already. Unexplored pathways between rap, folk, and jazz. Such sublime energy with flashes of Kofi Flexxx on flute too.

Ouzo Bazooka - Kapaim
Anatolian guitar licks, gritty soul energy and a mix of the traditional and the out-there from the Middle Eastern psychedelia trailblazers. We like this one a lot.

Little Barrie & Malcolm Catto - Electric War
British trio Little Barrie team up with producer Malcolm Catto. Sharp guitars, pounding drums and swirling textures through rock and psychedelia.

Laurie Torres - Après coup [RESTOCK DUE]
Piano meditations with synthesizer and field recordings warbling in and out of the mix. Subtle and gorgeous. 

Damon LocksList Of Demands
Spoken word tapestries with poetic flow from the Chicago-based musician and educator. Plenty of sonic experimentalism, really enthralling.

Ichiko Aoba - Luminescent Creatures
Slow and minimal arrangements gently flowing into melancholic and equally stirring moods around her beautiful, whispered vocals. Astonishing stuff.

Okonski - Entrance Music [RESTOCK DUE]
Another of the year’s most played with the sublime and spontaneous set from the long-time collaborators. So graceful.

Dirty Projectors, David Longstreth & s t a r g a z e - Song Of The Earth
David Longstreth and his band Dirty Projectors present Song of the Earth, an expansive, genre-dissolving collaboration with Berlin-based chamber orchestra s t a r g a z e. Gorgeous.

Natural Information Society & Bitchin Bajas - Totality
A captivating blend of ecstatic minimalism and dynamic sound, divided into “space” and “time”. One to really get lost in. 

William Tyler - Time Indefinite
Built from cassette sketches and distant collaborations, this is a really moving album from the esteemed Nashville guitarist.

Hieroglyphic Being
- Dance Music for Bad People 
A new set from Chicago house veteran Jamal Moss as Hieroglyphic Being. It swims through the reverbs with proper all-night basslines. 

Resavoir & Matt Gold - Horizon
A collaboration between Chicago-based producers, with vintage Latin-leaning, jazz-and-soul. Glorious sunshine energy, it really flows.

Holden & Zimpel - The Universe Will Take Care Of You
A fuzzy and slow evolving treasure from British synth wizard James Holden and Polish clarinet guru Waclaw Zimpel. Such bubbling arpeggios!

Lavinia Blackwall - The Making
Best known as the celebrated voice behind Trembling Bells, this new solo LP retains that lush mix of folk and rock and psych and fun. A proper high queen of folk-rock-weirdness.

Lastly then, the album that has most consistently sent us all totally bananas at the shop is France’s Destino Scifosi, an album of serious raw power across hurdy-gurdy-powered kraut/psych/folk drones. It is absolutely thrilling.

Dive in, take a trip. Tell us what you've been enjoying.