By skyforbes 
Written and curated by Tucker Pennington and Zach Weingarten
There is no greater sorrow than to recall our times of joy in wretchedness
The paradox of nostalgia is that after every year, we could only look back at what the previous days brought us and feel a tide of omens washing over us; yet, when looking back at the remains of the past five years, the most brilliant, touching, thought-provoking, and ebullient musical moments remained. For every uncertainty, a new song settled into its place as a foundational piece of music in our lives. For every loss, a burgeoning artist was born. And when we faced the denaturing forces of modern reality, oneiric art proved vital.
However, time levels all. And when every day chips away at our sanity, it’s important to look back and realize that as long as humans survive, art will survive. That’s not to say that this is what matters; on the contrary, the albums and EPs that are worth noting this decade are the least consequential thing we could be spending our time talking about when looking at the wider issues of today. But again we return to paradoxes. Art, a fraction of the spiritual manifestation of humanity, feels frivolous when confronting the rest of life. But without it we march toward a horizon that is both unreachable and hidden behind a fog of mundanity. So take this list as it is: a brief peek into humanity’s limitless potential that simultaneously cannot begin to capture the depth and resolve of the people who listen, breathe, and create.
Please enjoy our 100–81 mix on SoundCloud below.
It’s been four years since Grouper’s Shade. That was the last piece of solo music Liz Harris released, under the Grouper name or otherwise. At the time, its compilatory nature made it feel grand, a summation of singular folk songs and ambient drone pieces that bled into one another. The interplay between a simple guitar-driven track and a foggy tone shrouded in static dug into the anatomy of Harris’ skill as a songwriter, illuminating her talent and control of mood that made her compositions feel both personal and universal. Returning to these songs in 2025, time has shrunk them into something distorted and distant. The time period when they were written feels compressed and stunted, like a snapshot of a snapshot. Time has proven it naive to think a singular album could capture the entire career of one artist, and I have to think that Harris knew that when she released Shade. However, time’s solipsistic quality also shows that while it shrinks these songs down, it brings us with them and makes their warmth feel all the more special when we come back to them. These moments are small, but their luminance will never be erased. — TP
Do you remember? We were in Heaven.
Harlecore was Biblical. Not in a religious sense, per se, but a spiritual one. On the cover, the chromatic DJ Danny displayed his arms outstretched like He was bound to some celestial cross. But He was not alone; no, Harlecore introduced us to the Holy Trinity: the father (DJ Danny), the son (MC Boing), and the Holy Spirit (Danny L Harle). Three as one, each wholly distinct. This impossible Truth propelled us beyond a state of understanding and into one of total euphoria. We saw the light, and its neon intensity gloriously blinded us while the BPMs rose and the angels, taking the form of Caroline Polacheck and Hudson Mohawke, sang. It was more than a long play-through that told the story of the Club as Church. No, Harlecore professed a singular Truth: dance music is our passage to ascension far beyond this earthly existence. — ZW
Ungodly Hour became a time capsule, a near-premonition for a half-dozen other “what-if’s” that could only play out in our imagination. On the precipice of Halle Bailey’s transformation into a megastar, Ungodly Hour dripped in messy opulence, its singers eyeing stages larger than their sophomoric budget would afford them. But even with that sort of half-focused, amateurish energy, the two sisters offered up more captivating R&B moments than the true A-listers could provide us with this decade. We found ourselves unable to stop returning to Ungodly Hour not necessarily because of some grand profundity or otherwise disruption to the genre, but because of the duo’s velvety vocalizations, their sweetly infectious hooks, and the unbelievable lasting power of songs like “Lonely” and “Don’t Make It Harder On Me.” Not everything needed to move the needle, but it remained one of the bigger surprises of the decade that this didn’t. We should all be held culpable for not elevating Ungodly Hour as a permanent fixture in the conversation, rather than a footnote in an otherwise supersonic career. — ZW
Phoenix captured the corruption of human touch. Each and every modern classical arrangement became sullied by electronic glitches or imperfect vocalizations. Alexandra Drewchin’s lyrics, windswept in serenity and sadness, showed her yearning for that same damaging touch. For all of its pristine delivery, Phoenix was raw and perverse, dripping in guilt but nonetheless determined in its pleas. A relationship ended but a future held together by lust and impossible promises — the immortal bird a symbol of regenerative life; here, instead, a symbol of the enduring nature of toxic dependency. Each replay resuscitated the phoenix, each of us a participant in this infinite circle of desire, heartbreak, desire, heartbreak. — ZW
Look, I know what a lot of you are thinking. What is an album like this doing here? Languid, schmaltzy music that you would find topping AOTY lists for NPR doesn’t belong here. But listen. It’s been a long half-decade, and sometimes we all need a safe space where we can lib out. That’s what De Todas las Flores is for us. Natalia Lafourcade’s blend of folk and Latin jazz is unchallenging in the most fulfilling way: contemplative without being overly technical, nourishing without being too cathartic. Sometimes we don’t have time to scour record stores looking for the best new reissue from the Numero Group — sometimes we need an easy album. So take a break from this list, put on “El lugar correcto,” and rest for a few minutes. — TP
I expect many of Vampire Weekend’s generational contemporaries harbor a secret jealousy toward the band. It’s rare for any artist to break out in one decade, reach a peak in the next, and enter a third with more goodwill than they’ve ever had before. Even hushed whisperings that their frontman may have behaved inappropriately couldn’t touch them. They seem to be the teflon band of their generation. And it makes sense when their fifth album, Only God Was Above Us, is just as ambitious, reflective, and endearing as their previous releases. Remixing and adding the perfect level of grease and edge to their recording process, the 10 songs here represent a band knowing how to age gracefully, leaning on their strengths and largely avoiding embarrassment, save for a few cheeky moments of self-aware cringe. All the anxiety about the wider world and growing up in uncertain times has evolved to settling in for those uncertain times, and with that the trio sound comfortable doing what they do best: crafting baroque indie-rock that always knows to play it cool. — TP
As far as reintroductions go, you’d be hard pressed to find an album that aimed to be as low-key as The Price of Tea in China. Seven years after their first collaborative album on Mass Appeal, Boldy James and the Alchemist underwent simultaneous evolutions. Gone were the bombastic drums and jabbing flows that were consistently triumphant. Instead, we’re met with a minimalist approach being pared down further to razor-thin effectiveness. Eerie and unhurried, the laid-back storytelling unveils a brutal chiaroscuro of death, robbery, and everyday pain. Vivid, lush, but above all simple, it’s an approach that both artists haven’t really deviated from this decade. But when you kick off your career renaissance with something as refined as this, why would you? — TP
In extreme genre spaces, it sometimes feels like a futile race to have the most superlatives attached to your project. Fastest. Hardest. Loudest. Most likely to turn off someone who is trying to get into said genre. Duma’s self-titled album cleverly sidesteps this contest. That is not to say Duma is not an intense listen; the harsh synth work that is sewn together with punk vocals make this a convincingly punishing listen. Instead, the duo of Martin Khanja and Sam Karugu allow you to wade into their noisy maelstrom before warping into a more ambient, ethereal soundscape. Forgoing build-up and pay-off for constantly shifting sounds and rhythms gives Duma a constantly unsettling atmosphere. Bubbling without erupting, it eschews extremity for constant buzzing terror, and it’s all the more memorable for it. — TP
The ultimate magic eye puzzle of an album, Lazer Dim 700’s Injoy is the only release on this list that I’d argue has no great songs. To make matters more frustrating, I’d also argue each song has a moment of perfect songwriting on it. The rushed, sloppy, awkward, stilted delivery with brazenly off-beat flows and comically blown out 808’s can evolve into off-the-cuff brilliance, itinerant and scuffed, but riding on lean kineticism to get to the finish line. Truthfully, it would be a disingenuous copout to say it’s powering through the unlistenable moments to get to the genius parts that make it worth it, because at this point I can’t discern between the two. It’s a slippery album that coasts on bass-boosted vibes and insane quotables, and those elements can force your eyes to cross as they surge together, often failing to coalesce. But sometimes, for a few seconds on each song, I can see the vision. Through the wall of static, Dim’s flow carves a path that’s improvisational quality feels like the future of rap. Those seconds are vaporous, but entirely worth it. — TP
It’s raining now. It was always raining on Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You. But Big Thief kept us distracted, kept us warm with their music. That quiet sadness of being forced inside didn’t feel so pronounced anymore. In truth, it wasn’t ever about the rain. It was the elements, natural and human. The creeping sadness of existence, of just getting older, of not being a child anymore. We used to look to our parents, but now we carry the knowledge that our parents also looked to us. We were each other’s comforts. Love as a distraction from the fear of being alone. Love as the only remedy. Would you live forever, never die? When we heard the ambient patter of the soft rain outside, it sounded the same as it did twenty years ago. Our insides too were the same as they were then, even though our outsides had become different. Weathered. There’s a sadness in it all, but there’s something even brighter to have experienced it at all. Even if I’m tired, I don’t wanna miss the ride. — ZW
Tap to pay, keep it open. She wants to stay a little longer. Not her favorite bar (who has a favorite bar?) but a safe one at least. We keep unintentionally rubbing up against Philadelphia’s most affluent children, sipping our favorite Philly local, imagining what comes next.
Tap to pay, keep it open. Oh my God, get up, they’re playing “Oblivion.” No, you know this song. How many times have I told you about that otherworldly feeling I get when I hear this played at night? It’s so heavenly in this godless place.
Tap to pay, keep it open. Dance with me, I know there’s no room, sweat with me, I know there’s no air. Need a little break, gotta get liquor. Tonight, we don’t have bank accounts; tonight, we ignore that gnawing sensation that something horrible is coming; tonight, we forget about ourselves and everything outside this club. I know it’s getting late, but please, don’t call the Uber yet.
Tap to pay, keep it open. I’m not ready to wake up. — ZW
Nourished By Time’s Catching Chickens can be placed in a storied lineage of EPs, the rare release where creative leaps couldn’t wait for the next album. This kind of EP was what Burial made a career out of and what led My Bloody Valentine to transcendent peaks. To be clear, what this isn’t is a full-length album with its legs cut off. Instead, it’s the EP made ideal, where each song is a molecule with the potential to evolve into albums unto themselves. The foundation of Marcus Brown’s sound — crooning bedroom R&B and hypnagogia — was laid on Erotic Probiotic 2. Catching Chickens takes it and infuses it with a steroid. Hooks smash through the roof and the atmospheric guitar tones are arranged into perfectly smeared swirls. It’s impossible to say if whatever follows this EP will reach these same heights, but what’s offered here is a glimpse into parallel futures where the name Nourished By Time has influenced bedroom pop from an infinite number of dimensions. — TP
Orville Peck’s 2019 debut was such a forceful stampede that it became hard to remember what the landscape looked like before him. In the span of almost zero time, he solidified himself as a permanent cultural fixture. But Peck is not a cowboy caricature pigeonholed to any one corner of the West. Where Pony offered an unabashedly queer perspective on the dark alt-country sounds of the 90s, Bronco laid claim to the entire gambit of contemporary country. It was a dizzying smattering of Americana influence, each moment — from the operatic “Let Me Down” to the subdued jukebox classic “All I Can Say” — offering a total reclamation of the (historically) conservative. But what catapulted Bronco beyond just a subversion of genres was Peck’s tender understanding that country’s evolution from blues makes it an unparalleled vessel for heartache. So whether you’re the type of person who likes all genres (except for country!!) or the type to only listen to the latest entourage of CMA winners, drop any pretense you may still be clinging to, dive deep into Bronco, and cry, baby, cry. — ZW
It’s only been a year since DJ Anderson do Paraiso’s Queridão first stopped us in our tracks, standing out as a distinct stylistic detour from other baile funk albums. But even in this short gestation period, it’s clear that the murky, sickening sounds of this record are going to continue to fester. Misshapen samples and incanted vocals echo and repeat; there’s very little eruption, it’s all downward spiral for nearly 40 minutes. An atmosphere thick with prurient tones and haunting rhythms. Shadows elliptically obscuring the structure of each track. Debauched excessiveness that you never fully grasp. The same way we look back at films with real squibs and wired stunts with awe at their viscerality, Queridão will be seen as an inimitable record of filth for years to come. — TP
Don’t stay up.
I heard a woman covering Cyndi Lauper in Italian as I walked by a café alone in Verona. In an effort to strip away any pretension, I must admit I felt I witnessed an undeniable beauty in the ubiquity, in music as transcendent of language. Yet I continued walking. Gone forever, limitlessly classic. Less than sixty seconds of serenity that have stayed with me for years. I should have stayed longer. Now, the geography of my mind is an imprint of melodious totems that flash loooong after I have forgotten to remember.
Please, don’t wake up.
Last night I dreamt I heard the most beautiful song of my entire life. “This is my favorite,” I thought. “This will always be my favorite.” I was crying, the performer’s face shrouded in a hazy fog, my dreamland brain unable to read the marquee after the show. I awoke and remembered “Fwdbk.” — ZW
Sticky and elastic, most of Mirror Guide dribbled in and out existence like its sounds were known before man’s. An artificial trumpet blare degraded into a digitized fly, buzzing around the psyche. An impossible guitar. Was that screaming? The Medieval is the Proterozoic is the Post-Postmodern, and it’s all online, readily available. Or, maybe it existed before anyone was “online.” Human ingenuity bred human anxieties; progression as escapism. A multitude of pleasantries — choral soothing and elegant string arrangements that softened the atmosphere — yet that familiar dread still bubbled beneath. The discography of Giant Claw is certainly pointed in its blame, but Mirror Guide was the first time Keith Rankin looked backward in time to understand our obsession with relentlessly moving forward. Ascend further, exponentially. Please — stop ascending. — ZW
Footwork might not have been the most obvious genre through which to express depression, but it certainly proved to be the most effective with Painful Enlightenment. Jana Rush’s noisy disarray cluttered the psyche like intrusive thoughts. The distorted wails (“Drivin’ Me Insane”), the bouts of nymphomania (“G-Spot”), and the tepid silence of isolation (“Mynd Fuc”) each represented a perfectly acceptable humanistic response to the brain’s self-immolation. But our own expectations forced us to question how someone could exhibit each of these together, a reflection of our own preconceptions of how those around us should handle themselves. Jana Rush attacked these preconceptions. The pulsing rhythms weren’t designed for spastic dancing, they raced towards a premature conclusion, one that so many fail to fight off every day. But for all of its intense emotional appeal, Painful Enlightenment wasn’t a sacred text on vanquishment, nor was it a concept album that pointed to a better future. Jana Rush dropped us squarely into her headspace, gave us a thorough tour, and then assured us that this was just a taste. The white semicolon shrouded in emptiness on the cover was our only possible clue as to what that taste meant for the future. — ZW
To be honest, any one of claire rousay’s dozens of albums that she released this decade could have been chosen for this list. Since her debut in 2019, she’s been both prolific and detailed in capturing field recordings and marrying them with sublte shifts of orchestral quietude. So it’s no surprise that she first blew up in 2021, a year where we all collectively thawed out, emerged to the public sphere. a softer focus was one of many rousay releases that captured the everyday lulls of quarantine and the miniscule peaks into opening up that occurred in 2021. Mumbled autotune and household shuffling are infused with warm breaths of orchestral tones and overheard conversations. It’s a combination that’s come to be quintessentially claire rousay, and it’s hard to describe how fundamentally life-affirming it was in 2021 when it felt like we were collectively waking up from a very long and troubled sleep. — TP
This won’t be the first album to be classified as “minimalist” or “drone” on this list, but it should be the first you listen to if you’ve never heard albums that have been described as such. All Thoughts Fly wastes no time in being immediately gratifying; Ann von Hausswolff’s pipe organ compositions swell with gothic beauty, towering over you like the steeple of a church has burst forth at your feet. Melodic and haunting, it’s an instantly gripping listen for newcomers and equally as magnetic for those who continue to return to it. — TP
The fluidity of genre as the fluidity of gender. More than ever before (or since), The Asymptotical World demonstrated the spellbinding power of Yves Tumor’s sorcery. They were transformational. They could summon Prince as easily as they could summon Ian Curtis. They channeled the masculine with the same effortlessness as when they channeled the feminine. Above all, The Asymptotical World saw Yves finally centering themselves squarely into their music. When Man Fails You debuted Yves the producer, and over the course of their still-burgeoning career they’ve slowly transmuted into Yves the frontman. The single art for “Jackie,” still one of the most iconic of the decade, offered an ostentatious promise: this record would be Yves at the height of their bravado. What was unexpected was how it was also the height of their intimacy. — ZW
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