I Asked My Favorite Artists What They Loved Most in 2025
Hotline TNT, Alien Boy, Amy Millan, DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ, and more share what they've been digging.
Season’s Greetings from The Wax Museum, where instead of gifting you socks or scented candles, I come bearing something far more useful: a bag full of record-mendations straight from the source.
I reached out to some of my favorite artists — all of whom dropped killer albums this year or last — and asked a simple question: What’s the best thing you heard in 2025?
Their answers delivered plenty of new favorites, deep cuts, and surprises. Below, you’ll find each artist’s picks, along with a link to their latest record — all of which have been praised in these pages before and belong on your shelf.
Plenty of rabbit holes await, let’s jump in.
Will Anderson (Hotline TNT)
Get Vinyl: Raspberry Moon (2025) on Sapphire Slush Puppy | Signed! | Black
Best thing I heard this year? This is kind of boring, but I finally drank the whole pitcher of Kool-Aid on Cindy Lee. I always thought it was good but it wasn’t until 2025 that we finally ran the whole album [Diamond Jubilee] front to back in the van a few times and collectively realized it was deserving of every bit of hype it received and agreed that it’s a genius record. So I am trying to track that one down on vinyl whenever I find it in the wild.
Honorable mention to the new Mystic 100’s tape that just came out this month “First Day of Peace”, I have been listening to that a lot in my office as I ship out Christmas orders.
Kenny Boothby (Little Kid)
Get Vinyl: A Million Easy Payments (2024) on Brick | Black
A big and consistent listen for me this year has been the podcast Drifting Off… with Joe Pera. I generally have no trouble getting to sleep at night, but sometimes I suddenly find myself wide awake around 3 or 4 AM for no reason and it can be hard to get myself back to sleep. I find Joe Pera’s podcast to be one of the most reliable ways to help ease back into sleep for the last few hours before my alarm goes off for work. The episode called “D(r)iving” is especially effective for me. I subscribe to the Patreon, so I have access to the “Max Drift” versions and his read-through of Willa Cather’s “My Ántonia,” which I am really enjoying while listening to it in tiny chunks before falling asleep.
I also listened to Allegra Krieger’s I Keep My Feet on the Fragile Plane almost exclusively in January and February this year as well, and it has remained in pretty steady rotation since then as well. I think she’s the best songwriter going right now. The chord progressions and melodies are transcendent, and her lyrics are great too. The production is so unique on that album, which is what makes it my favourite of hers.
DJ Sabrina The Teenage DJ
Get Vinyl: Fantasy (2025) on 6 LP Signed (!) Box Set
Best thing I’ve heard this year would be HAIM live, when they came to the UK and did their tour. I hadn’t heard the new album yet so to hear the songs in this setting live for the first time was incredible, as well as so many of their amazing classics and hits. Hearing “The Wire” live (first HAIM song I fell in love with) was such an experience! HAIM are such brilliant musicians and singers and they really put on a fantastic show, one of the best I’ve seen. Definitely a highlight of 2025 for me!
Vinicius Lourenço (terraplana)
Get Vinyl: Natural (2025) on Red | Black
One of my favorite releases this year was Contato by Pelados. This Brazilian indie band released this record and it shows a lot of cool rhythms, textures, melodies, samples and with very fun lyrics. One of my favorite songs is “planeta oxxo” (that features another great artist called Felipe Vaqueiro), which talks about a mini market franchise that’s taking over Sao Paulo, sadly replacing local markets, grocery stores, restaurants, bars, galleries, etc. The themes in the album are very diverse and it’s a really fun listen, very electronic based but still with good acoustic instruments and real drums on top of some beats and samples.
Nina Maia
Get Vinyl: INTEIRA (2025) on Cream | Black
Two of my favorite records from this year were Big city life by Smerz and HANDYCAM by Brazilian composers Sophia Chablau and Felipe Vaqueiro.
Smerz was a big revelation for me. I didn’t know the duo until I heard “You Got Time and I Got Money” from a Caroline Polacheck post. Was immediately struck by it. When the whole album came out, I thought it was the coolest thing I have ever heard.
And HANDYCAM is a beautiful record. Full of great compositions based in MPB with some rock and punk influences to it, which reminds me of the best of Tropicalia, mostly Caetano Veloso’s “Transa”. It’s young, it’s political, it’s rare. Shoutout to my talented friends!
Amy Millan (Stars, Broken Social Scene)
Get Vinyl: I Went To Find You (2025) on Hot Pink
The Besnard Lakes, the great band from Montreal, put out their new album [The Besnard Lakes are the Ghost Nation] this year and their live show to celebrate the new album was a mind blower. I was completely enveloped by their sound and the band was absolutely on fire. It was my favourite show of the year they have stadium hearts.
Soffi Peters (Blush)
Get Vinyl: Beauty Fades, Pain Lasts Forever (2025) on Pink
An old song but new discovery would be “The Boy” by The Smashing Pumpkins via their The Aeroplanes Fly High (Deluxe) release - new to me but I feel lucky to be able to enjoy it ever 🎃
Really love “…Said Sadly” too, featuring Nina Gordon of Veruca Salt and the cover of “Dreaming” by Blondie. Maybe the best discovery after all was this 5-disc release and my new penchant for James Iha songs.
Marco Pini (Sorry)
Get Vinyl: Cosplay (2025) on Red | Black
I wish i could say anything other than Witness One Hope by Roots Manuva, it could be cameron winter, it could be geese, it could be world peace dmt, but its not, its always Witness One Hope. Every house party deserves better and its still witness one hope by roots manuva. Heard hes lost hims mind which is a shame, but either way its still witness one hope by roots manuva.
Ben Seretan
Get Vinyl: Allora (2024) on Orange and Bone | Highlighter Yellow
I think the best, like, true sound I heard all year was probably the sad, piercing whistles of the camote / sweet potato carts that toot toot around Mexico City. Using the same steam they use to cook the plantains and sweet potatoes on their little homebrew vending push carts, they make these unbelievably beautiful tones that bend and echo as they walk around the neighborhood (plus they taste amazing).
I think I played, attended, or mixed well over 100 different sets of music in 2025 and heard many wonderful things, a very incomplete list - a semi acoustic (???) version of “Pass the Hatchet” when Yo La Tengo played at the 100ish cap Avalon Lounge in Catskill, NY, some really hilariously druggy audience reactions to the late night SML set I caught at Pickathon, a truly inspiring one man set by Gull in Richmond, VA, a beautifully disorienting in-the-round set by Chuquimamani-Condori at Dripping, my friend Nico’s new band Folding (who don’t have any music online yet but they are LOUD and GOOD), plus I got to see Nine Inch Nails play Barclays which was overwhelmingly great but at the very end they suddenly turned all the lights on full and blasted “Laura’s Theme” from Angelo Badalemnti’s score for Twin Peaks and it was so jarring and perfect.
But I think top spot for best thing I heard this year’s gotta go to my buddy OHYUNG who, after making a ton of inspiring work as more of a noise artist and film scorer, swung for the fences with an honest-to-goodness shiny pop record with great outfits and choreography and everything.
I’ve had the melody from “dancing on the soft knife” stuck in my head for months and they just released a feverish live version on the remix album that does a good job of capturing her violent, infectious mania as a live performer (see her play if you can). Plus all proceeds from the remix album go to NYC ICE WATCH because maybe hearing people shout “FUCK ICE” is the actual best thing I heard all year.
Sonia Weber (Alien Boy)
Get Vinyl: You Wanna Fade? (2025) on Smokey Clear | Baby Blue
Best thing I’ve heard all year?? Tough with a year that brought us so much great rock music. I became a Geese/Cameron Winter head just like everybody else, I fell in love with HAIM all over again and got to see them too that shit was incredible, Turnstile hit it big again and hearing their new album in theaters along with the music videos was so fucking cool, my longtime friend and collaborator A.P. Fiedler put out a collection of demos titled ALEX 100 I’d been hearing him making in our house over the last few years — finally hearing it all together I was so impressed by the new range of songwriting he achieved, the Momma record, the Water From Your Eyes record, Waxahatchee AND MJ Lenderman AND Cameron Winter all covering This is Lorelei this year, the list and this run on sentence could go on and on and on.
All of this stuff was amazing and inspiring but nothing comes close to seeing Oasis in LA at the Rose Bowl. I went both nights, second night I snuck into GA and screamed the whole fucking time. There were a ton of emotional transcendent moments but one that sticks out to me as the most memorable is when they played Rock and Roll Star. Last song of the set before the encore (which was fucking INSANE! Don’t Look Back In Anger AND Wonderwall AND Champagne Supernova with thousands of people singing along it felt like we were all going to levitate or something). I got so emotional singing “I live my life for the stars that shine people say it’s just a waste of time” I burst into tears. I’ll never forget it. That band is larger than life, I would see them a hundred more times if I could and it would always take the top spot.
My thanks to all the above artists for contributing — go support their work, buy a record, see a show.
On your way out, exit through The Wax Museum Gift Shop. We’ve got a mousepad for your desk, a vinyl tote for your record hauls, a coffee mug for your morning spins, and a Weekender bag for any adventure :)
Thanks as always for stopping by and I’ll see you in 2026,
Jared
Great feature!