Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more
Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more
Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more
Far from the music industry’s prevailing belief that fans want everything spoon-fed to them, 2025’s best (and rapturously received) album offerings were also some of the most challenging.
Artists were clearly in a confessional mood, from Lily Allen’s eviscerating divorce drama West End Girlto Dave’s candid reflections on fame, wealth and faith in The Boy Who Played the Harp. Rosalía, too, gave us something to worship in the form of her remarkable opus, Lux, while Lola Young shattered our boredom over the persisting “clean girl” aesthetic with the messy, confrontational pop of I’m Only F***ing Myself.
Here are The Independent’s 20 top albums of 2025.
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Turnstile: Your favourite band’s favourite band (Supplied)
If you’ve ever had the urge to get into heavy music, let me introduce you to Turnstile. They’re an unusual proposition from Baltimore, who emerged from the hardcore punk scene and have transformed into every musician’s favourite band. Ahead of Never Enough’s release, they posted about recording with former emo queen (now genre-agnostic) Hayley Williams, someone who makes total sense as a blueprint slash ally for this band. From the eardrum-obliterating “Sole” to the funky jam “Seeing Stars”, you never quite know what direction you’re being led in, but it’s an almost-psychedelic journey. Twitchy highlight “Birds” builds tension until it explodes into some classic hardcore with whirring electronics. “I found a song playing just for me,” calls out frontman Brendan Yates in this ode to freedom. There will be a song, whether it’s the joyful existentialism of “Time Is Happening” or the sludgy sexiness of “Slowdive”, for you here. Hannah Ewens
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On ‘Dog Eared’, Billie Marten is an artist following her own intuition (Fiction Records)
Having established herself in her mid-teens as one of the UK’s leading young folk artists, Billie Marten set off in search of new territory for her fifth album, Dog Eared. Recorded in Brooklyn with producer Philip Weinrobe, it speaks strongly of an artist following her own intuition. As a consequence, the album has a wonderful, lolloping pace, from the jangling guitars and pedal steel of autumnal opener “Feeling”, to the gentle, rain-dappled “Planets”, closing with the tos and fros of “Swing”. Marten’s voice, as usual, is at the centre of it all: an airy croon delivered with the sweetness of a sigh. Roisin O’Connor
18. Jim Legxacy –Black British Music
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Jim Legxacy delivers a head-spinning mish-mash of different sounds (Igoris Taran)
Rapper Jim Legxacy’s astute observations on grief run deep on Black British Music, his first mixtape for independent label XL Recordings. He opens, helpfully, with “context”, a conversational interlude documenting, in part, the death of his sister, his mum suffering two strokes and his brother dealing with psychosis. “You get out of mud, then there’s… always gonna be mud, bro,” he points out. The album picks up in resolve from there, a head-spinning mish-mash of echoing beats, vintage samples, claustrophobic synths. “’06 Wayne Rooney” is racing, muted pop-punk made brighter by some deft electric guitar playing. The music itself is almost an internal monologue: the buzzes, whirls and glitches as we struggle to make sense of life. It’s incredibly moving. ROC
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With ‘That’s Showbiz Baby’, JADE asserted herself as one of the UK’s most exciting new pop stars (Press)
Every Little Mix aficionado had their money on Jade Thirlwall making the most interesting album of all the members post-split. She’s always been cheeky, daring and playful and she didn’t disappoint with debut solo album, That’s Showbiz Baby! Finally free of the need to dilute her musical influences and opinions through the prism of three other young women, Jade and her singular vision can run wild. On her Catherine wheel of a lead single, “Angel of My Dreams”, the music jerks and explodes as she tears through the horrors of the music industry and pop stardom, introducing it as a heartbreaking ballad before strutting off to the sound of an aggressive pop banger. From instant mid-tempo club classic, the sassy “FUFN (F*** You For Now)” to the Ariana Grande-smooth “Lip Service,” she dances around sex and bad relationships. Her playfulness shines through in the lyrics:“I’m the ride of your life not a rental / I’m the editor, call me Mr Enninful,” she asserts on “Midnight Cowboy”, then, “What is your cup of tea? I’ll sip it, and I’ll add the sugar, babe” on “It Girl”. That’s Showbiz Baby gives us the firm sense that Jade is truly being herself… and she’s having a laugh doing it. HE
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Brandi Carlile’s ‘Returning to Myself’ is subdued but strikingly contemplative (Collier Schorr)
Carlile has steadily built a reputation as one of US folk-rock’s most distinguished voices. Fresh off her playful collaborative album with Elton John, the Americana singer both nurtured and excavated her most philosophical and spiritual instincts to create Returning to Myself. Stripped-back moments sit painfully – and beautifully – alongside sweeping instrumentals, documenting a quiet, midlife transformation: years into marriage and motherhood, pushed to grow in every direction.
In an interview with The Independent, she explained of her ballads that the melancholic “Anniversary” was written during a period when she was “struggling to find my footing” in her marriage, while the soulful and free “A Woman Oversees” recalls a simpler time, steeped in carefree youthful flings abroad. There are no big, bombastic anthems or raucous rock-and-roll breaks – and as a listener, you’re unlikely to miss them. This is subdued but strikingly contemplative, nuanced songwriting. In taking that risk, Carlile captures something true about what it means to grow older, and more fully into yourself. HE
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FKA Twigs finds freedom in movement on ‘Eusexua’ (Atlantic Records)
There’s so much to say about Twigs’ near-perfect “love letter to the dancefloor”. Eusexua, her third studio album, takes you through an entire club night from start to finish. It opens with her whispery admission that “People always told me that I take my love too far” over a four-on-the-floor techno beat. Her answer to trauma and toxic relationships is to move her body among other people and free herself that way. Whether it’s on the truly sexually euphoric “Girl Feels Good” or the playful collaboration with North West “Childlike Things”, Twigs uses her versatile voice as the only necessary instrument against synths and thumping bass. It’s been a long time, probably since 2014’s debut album LP1, that the alternative artist has made something that both feels like her distilled essence and also danceable, f***able, accessible. It feels good to have this Twigs back as my most-listened to artist of the year. HE
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Take a sexy picture of me: CMAT tackles capitalism on her third album ‘Euro-Country’ (Sarah Doyle)
Camp celebration! An Irish spin on country! A song that namechecks Jamie Oliver! CMAT’s third album has it all. But anyone acquainted with Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson would expect nothing less: Euro-Country built on the charming and surprising storytelling of her previous work and delivered more than the sum of CMAT’s parts. It’s essentially an album about how capitalism destroys us from the inside, forces us into shades of loneliness. “I was 12 when the das started killing themselves all around me,” she sings, full of tragedy, on the title-track. Elsewhere, on “Take a Sexy Picture of Me” she mocks those online trolls who made horrible comments about her looks on a BBC livestream. Here, there and everywhere across Euro-Country, CMAT’s work is eye-wateringly idiosyncratic. Get on board now so you can say you never missed the party boat. HE
13. Dave – The Boy Who Played the Harp
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Dave seemed trapped at an impasse on his candid third album, ‘The Boy Who Played the Harp’ (Gabriel Moses)
Four years is an eternity in the music industry. After a conspicuous period out of the spotlight, Mercury Prize winner Dave returned to remind us why he captured our attention in the first place, with an ambitious and thoughtful third album, The Boy Who Played the Harp. Even for the UK’s most introspective rapper, it’s a sombre affair of muted synths, glitchy beats and his own rather glum delivery. That’s not to say it doesn’t all make for an engaging listen: confessional “175 Months” wonders if he’s neglected his faith for too long to redeem himself, at the same time calling out his perceived shallowness (“All I ever did was ask, shattered glass, crucifixes on my chest/ Pray to purchase a Patek, for my church, they cut a check”). On “Chapter 16” he engages in a thoughtful back-and-forth with Kano in his capacity as elder statesman, swapping thoughts on success, art, faith and family over a meandering piano and, later, the harp. For the eight minutes of “My 27th Birthday”, he offers up a crisis of identity with moving frankness: “I cried about slavery, then went to Dubai with my girl…” It sounds as though he’s been trapped at an impasse, no longer sure whether he’s making music for the right reasons. But from the calibre of this album, it seems that he’s back on the right path. ROC
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Big Thief returned as a trio, stronger than ever (2025 Invision)
The departure of a longtime band member can cause even the most confident of bands to stumble. This was not the case for Big Thief, who with Double Infinity managed to release another career standout of sharp, soul-searching songs that vibrate with earthy energy. Singer Adrianne Lenker’s superb storytelling weaves in vignettes that flash by like scenes from a moving train. “The picture box is full,” she sings on “Los Angeles”, and “we are kissing in a fistful of fragments falling down/ I throw them up and I watch them hit the ground like snow.” There’s an abstract nature to “Words”, in which she finds herself walking down the street humming a familiar melody: “Words are tired and tense/ Words don’t make sense/ Words are feathered and light/ Words don’t make it right.” Lenker, whose voice maintains its otherworldly qualities, poses smart questions about the moments in life where words will simply not do. Here the band are more concerned about feelings, expressions, the things that cannot be explained. ROC
11. PinkPantheress –Fancy That
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‘My name is Pink…’ PinkPantheress isn’t bothered about adhering to pop’s rules (Getty Images)
“My name is Pink and I’m really glad to meet you,” is the earworm that plagued the chronically online of summer 2025. And with good reason: this brilliant third album by PinkPantheress – the bashful handbag-clad singer named Victoria Beverley Walker who broke out with TikTok hits “I Must Apologise” and “Pain” – has become an inescapable British export in the online world. Fancy That’s nine tracks hop across pop’s past and present, stitching together UK garage, drum’n’bass, EDM, Jersey Club, trance and house. This is a whirlpool of fleeting genres; the album isn’t preoccupied with appearing cool or adhering to rules of pop, instead designed for the short-attention spans of the TikTok-pilled. It is not to be dwelled upon but appreciated in its full fast-paced glory.
Walker, who dresses like a librarian from 2002, might be 24 but her list of samples on this album points towards her mature, virtuosic ear: from Underworld’s “Dark and Long” (1994) to Basement Jaxx’s “Good Luck” (2004) and Just Jack’s “Stars in Their Eyes” (2007). It’s proof that reimagining Nineties and Noughties hits for her Gen Z audience is what she does best; Fancy That is a masterclass in nostalgia for those who are yet to know what that word actually means. Ellie Muir
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Lola Young continues her ‘messy’ era on new album ‘I’m Only F***ing Myself’ (Press)
The punkish energy of Lola Young’s third album, I’m Only F***ing Myself, matches the distracted mood of its narrator. Its on-the-nose songwriting isn’t dissimilar to the jaw-dropping confessionals of Lily Allen on West End Girl, only here, Young is owning up to her own discretions in a (mostly) unabashed manner. She’s in the driver’s seat on “One Thing”, detailing her fantasies amid star-spangled synths and playful electric guitar licks. Viral single “Messy”, which introduced her defiant but damaged persona to the world, has her pushing back against a demanding, toxic other. She writes about her substance abuse struggles with startling candour: “Can We Ignore It? :(“ pleads for a day off from sobriety, oscillating between an addict’s denial and desperation. Album standouts “SPIDERS” and “Post Sex Clarity” strip away the bratty armour in moments of true vulnerability, both bolstered by scuzzy grunge-influenced guitars. ROC
9. Tyler Childers – Snipe Hunter
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Country artist Tyler Childers offers up his most unusual and spirited songs to date (RCA)
There’s no real concept or argument being made here by one of country music’s most singular artists. No grand plan behind it all. Childers’ album is just a rousing, joyful, tearaway collection of feel-good songs that are his most unusual and spirited to date. He tears into new country classic “Eatin’ Big Time”, asking his listeners to imagine the chance “to hold and blow a thousand f***ing dollars”. He destroys his enemies in the throwdown romp that is “Bitin’ List”. Then he takes a free-wheeling trip to Australia on travel epic “Down Under”. But it’s the tortured bluesy “Nose on the Grindstone” that will have you frozen to the spot: “keep your nose on the grindstone and out of the pills” he advises, pairing the images of hard work and graft with opioid addiction. It’s an album for wanderers and roamers. As he put it simply in a GQ interview earlier this year, “It’s observations from a travelling hillbilly.” HE
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Perfume Genius exists in two realms on ‘Glory’ (Cody Critcheloe)
Perfume Genius’s seventh album hums with paranoia. It’s in the jittery, jagged opener “It’s a Mirror”, in which the US artist born Mike Hadreas berates himself for his avoidant tendencies (“What do I get out of being established?/ I still run and hide when a man’s at the door”). “In a Row” orbits around low pulses of synths, as Hadreas imagines himself a kidnapping victim – then thinks of all the songwriting material he could glean from the experience. Death stalks the record, informed initially by Hadreas being acutely aware that he had yet to go through any profound loss, and fearing a time without his mother. The song “Left for Tomorrow” then shifted in context upon the death of Hadreas and his partner Alan Wyffels’ cherished dog, Wanda. It’s a work by an artist who exists in two realms – the sacred, quiet home he’s built with Wyffels, and the exhibitionist, body-contorting, liberated world he creates onstage. It’s marvellous. ROC
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Little Simz didn’t hold back on her vengeful album, ‘Lotus’ (Thibaut Grivet)
The lotus symbolises rebirth and spiritual awakening. Little Simz’s eyes are wide open on her sixth studio album, a bristling work that takes frequent aim at someone who betrayed her. It arrived in the wake of possibly the most tumultuous period of her life, with a headline tour of the US cancelled due to financial issues and a lawsuit against her longtime producer and onetime friend Inflo (real name Dean Cover) for allegedly failing to repay a loan of £1.7m. You can feel her white-hot rage on “Hollow”, as she seethes: “You told me to be wary of the sharks then you became one/ What can anyone truly expect from a day one.” On “Thief”, she’s a detective stalking her criminal down dark alleyways of skittering percussion and ominous bass guitar. Her acting credentials on shows such as Top Boy come in handy, as she’s never sounded so characterful as on the jeering “Young” or insouciant “Lion”. Despite its peaceful-sounding name, Lotus is a kill-shot from one of the greatest artists of her generation. ROC
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Addison Rae became 2025’s breakout pop star
Who would’ve thought that the girl performing viral air-traffic control TikTok dances in lockdown would have become 2025’s breakout pop star? Addison Rae’s rebrand has been one to marvel at, as she shimmied out of the content creation HQ Hype House and launched her slickly curated dream pop brand. On her exceptional self-titled debut album Addison, you have the glitchy Jersey-club of “New York”, euphoric key changes and Lana Del Rey influences on “Diet Pepsi” and the siren song “Aquamarine”, which has hues of Madonna’s “Ray of Light” or Kylie Minogue’s “Fever”. The mood is often wistful, accompanied by the imagery of fog-shrouded windows, sun-kissed skin, squashed Vogue cigarettes and discarded stiletto heels. Did I spend a solid two hours crying tears of joy at Rae’s concert earlier this summer? Absolutely. It’s pure euphoria. EM
5. Geese – Getting Killed
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Brooklyn four-piece Geese are the band everyone is talking about (Lewis Evans)
The fourth album from buzzy Brooklyn indie-rock band Geese is suffused with the kind of sharp, streetwise intellect most bands only dream of. They’ve been the band on many a fellow musician or industry figure’s lips for months now – Jon Bon Jovi, of all people, told me just weeks ago that his son, who’s also in a band, had got him onto them. While some have warned of a Strokes-style hype overload, the praise is warranted.
Frontman Cameron Winter, who released his own, critically adored, solo album Heavy Metal (a red herring of a title) earlier this year, is a remarkable narrator, singing in a slouchy, slurred warble that evokes Thom Yorke’s lupine howl one moment, Mick Jagger’s guttural bark the next. Our fractured times are evoked in similarly splintered lyrics: “All the horses must go dancing/ There is only dancing music in times of war,” Winter sings on the bruised, swaggering funk-rock of “100 Horses”. Opener “Trinidad” is sneaky and suspicious, while “Au Pays du Cocaine” swirls slowly, carousel-like, around gorgeous melodies. It’s surreal, dark and absurd. Excellent, in short. ROC
4. Bad Bunny – Debí Tirar Más Fotos
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Bad Bunny’s latest album was a soul-achingly vibrant fusion of sounds (Invision)
Global domination had felt inevitable for years, and with this album the Puerto Rican superstar fully cemented himself as one of the biggest pop artists on the planet – all while singing primarily in Spanish. Debí Tirar Más Fotos (“I Should Have Taken More Photos”) is a soul-achingly vibrant fusion of reggaetón, plena and salsa, its gorgeous lyrics meditating on the fate of Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio’s homeland. From the juicy opener “NUEVAYoL” to the bittersweet ache of “BAILE INoLVIDABLE,” Bad Bunny transports listeners into a sensual yet contemplative world where mind, body and soul feel simultaneously activated and alert.
On “BAILE INoLVIDABLE,” he looks back on a past relationship in which memories – especially of dancing – remain painfully vivid. “No, I can’t forget you / No, I can’t erase you / You taught me to love / You taught me to dance,” he sings, each line cutting a little deeper. Since its release in early January, the album’s atmospheric shifts – late-night regret, sun-drenched mornings, genre-blurring moods – have captured the hearts of millions. Between Bad Bunny’s latest and the success of Rosalía’s Lux, it’s clear that English-speaking mainstream listeners are more than ready to have their musical expectations challenged. HE
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Lily Allen’s ‘West End Girl’ was sharp-tongued and blistering (Lily Allen/Nieves González)
When I first heard this blistering album from the sharp-tongued British star, the world around me disappeared. I was no longer hunched behind a laptop in an office block in London but whirling around Manhattan in a paranoid frenzy, scouring my husband’s phone, discovering hundreds of Trojans. My hands moved unconsciously to Google what a dojo is. We were all sucked into the revenge drama; fictional or otherwise, this is the post-breakup fantasy everyone has had at some point. To release a piece of confessional art detailing every hurt – and it actually being good? Delicious. I gave West End Girlfive stars for the nerve, lyricism and execution but I didn’t anticipate listening to it so much. Or that “Pussy Palace”, the greatest earworm on the record, reserved brutally for revealing the speaker’s ex’s dirty deeds, would be stuck in my head for the remainder of the year. Dating artists should come with a waiver. HE
2. McKinley Dixon – Magic, Alive!
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McKinley Dixon dazzled us with his concept album ‘Magic, Alive!’ (City Slang)
Richmond, Virginia-born rapper McKinley Dixon’s Magic, Alive! is a firecracker of a record, a staggering concept album that follows three friends trying to resurrect the fourth member of their gang. Dixon’s upbringing as a churchgoer – at those big, southern productions – goes some way to explaining how brilliantly he commands the listener. He sets the scene on opener “Watch My Hands” with bold detail before the triumphant “Sugar Water” bursts in, backed by a live jazz band and gospel choir. The double bass thrums; a saxophone coils hypnotically. I adore the sparse, trippy piano on “Recitatif” (taking its title from Toni Morrison’s 1983 short story). Dixon’s voice lands hushed and conspiratorial until a new more menacing beat drops – now he’s spitting in manic, deranged yelps – building to a grinding, industrial guitar riff. The sun is a frequent visitor, at times benevolent, others malevolent, while Dixon intertwines Greek myths with Christian iconography, church organs with sultry sax. All of it burns bright, until you’re completely dazzled, believing in his magic but not quite sure how he did it. ROC
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Rosalía had us worshipping her extraordinary album ‘Lux’ (Press)
In an interview with the New York Times, Rosalía agreed that she was “demanding a lot” from listeners with her fourth album, Lux, “but I think that the more we are in the era of dopamine, the more I want the opposite”. The rapturous reception from fans and critics proves that we’ve been crying out for art that challenges us. This is a work by an artist who abandoned her fear of failure to create something that transcends genre, imbued with fierce intelligence, ambition and depth of emotion. As well as an astonishing display of vocal prowess, it demonstrates Rosalía’s evolving ideas around love, faith, and the divine feminine. On “Sauvignon Blanc”, she emulates the saints and promises to throw away her Jimmy Choos in order to be with the one she loves. “Focu ‘Ranni”, for which she sings in Sicilian, has her pledging to jump into a fire before giving up her freedom.
Yet for all the album’s awe-inspiring prowess, Rosalía delivers us moments of levity, too: “La Perla” is a satisfying evisceration of a useless ex (“Local fiasco/ National heartbreaker/ Emotional terrorist/ World-class f***-up”), while the devastating “Mio Cristo Piange Diamanti” closes on her telling the orchestra how dramatic she wants it: “That’s gonna be the energy…” And please, ignore the whines of gatekeepers accusing her of using classical music for emotional heft. You don’t have to speak any of Lux’s 13 languages for it to translate on a deeper level. It’s a 21st-century opus, one that demands – and deserves – your complete attention. ROC
Honorary mentions go to: Florence and the Machine – ‘Everybody Scream’, Olivia Dean – ‘The Art of Loving’, Laufey – ‘A Matter of Time’, Dove Ellis – ‘Blizzard’, Zara Larsson – ‘Midnight Sun’, Kojey Radical – ‘Don’t Look Down’, Cameron Winter – ‘Heavy Metal’, Hayley Williams – ‘Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party’, Deftones – ‘Private Music’, Jason Isbell – ‘Foxes in the Snow’.
