Phil's Superpower of Enthusiasm

A place to write about things I enjoy, for my own edification. Headphones, audio gear, albums, whiskey, wine, golden retrievers etc.

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Lawyer, unabashed nerd and geek. Purveyor and pusher of excellent sci-fi/fantasy, good food, and repartee. He/him. Dog dad/servant to @Goldendenali.

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Phil’s Top Ten Albums of 2025

2025 was an interesting year in music. My total listening didn’t drop, but like 2024 I didn’t spend as much time with “new” music; my listening patterns (listening mostly via Roon) mean that a lot of my “new” music is new to me, rather than newly released. I think I might do two lists this year; one for music released in 2025 (this list) and a second for music *I* discovered this year. I also suffered a complete Roon server meltdown in September, which means that I lost a lot of track-level data from my statistics, though I should still be able to pull overall statistics out of last.fm in January when they complete their annual report out.

I also listened to a lot less vinyl this year; my transition to more headphone listening and less speaker listening just means that my record players sat silent for more of the year (and are currently buried in other stuff).

Without further ado, my favorite releases of 2025:

  1. “Somni” by Snarky Puppy and Metropole Orkest. I’ve been really enjoying Snarky Puppy’s back catalog since my friend Robin first invited me to see them a number of years ago, but this is the first of their albums I’ve picked up and listened to extensively immediately after release.1 It’s … really, really good. Lush, well designed, played, and mixed tracks, a really good and intriguing spatial mix for ATMOS, etc. I wish I’d been there for some of the live shows that they recorded to create the album.2 “Only Here and Nowhere Else” is the standout track to me, and I’m up to 85 listens already.3
  2. “Eusexua” by FKA twigs. I’ve been an unabashed fan of FKA twigs since at least 2022, when I fell pretty hard for “CAPRISONGS” after a couple of Peloton instructors played it a lot. “Eusexua” was a great January doldrums treat, particularly as I was breaking in a few new pairs of headphones I’d gotten over Christmas. It’s a … deeply sexy album with an interesting danceclub streak mixed throughout. The standout tracks to me are “Sticky” and “Striptease”.
  3. “Lotus” by Little Simz. This album hit my radar via an episode of Hrishikesh Hirway’s excellent podcast “Song Exploder” (thanks for the recommendation, Kristi!).4 The album is a thoughtful, poetic, and intense journey through changes in Little Simz’ life and career. It also features cameos by incredible artists like Moses Sumney, Little Dragon’s Yukimi, Yussef Dayes, and Sampha. Standout tracks are “Free” (I dare you to not groove to the last minute as Simz effortlessly flips between “free” and “three”), “Peace” (featuring Sumney), and the dance-hall-inflected “Blood”.
  4. “Baby” by Dijon. I don’t even really know how to describe this album. It’s … intense, and beautiful, and occasionally hard to listen to. It’s the kind of album that demands your attention and rewards it with an emotional journey. Standouts are “My Man” (see the previous comment about hard to listen to, though) and the groovy “Kindalove.”
  5. “Essex Honey” by Blood Orange. “Essex Honey” feels in a lot of ways like a call-back to 2013’s “Cupid Deluxe,” an album I’ve been coming back to over and over for more than a decade. It’s a great mix of orchestral strings and electronica-adjacent beats, floating vocals, funky basslines, and even a few danceable moments. My favorite track is probably “Somewhere in Between”, though the middle section of “The Last of England” feels a little like “Sympathy”-era Massive Attack (and if you know me, you know what a huge compliment that is).
  6. “Unerthed: Hole Erth Unplugged” by Toro y Moi. Toro is always unpredictable to me; I either end up loving his albums (“Anything In Return”, “Soul Trash”) or I figure out right away that they’re not for me (interestingly, “Hole Erth”). This album an acoustic-ish, country-fied version of an album that I didn’t love. It’s a stroll through a warm rain, nice and comforting and great for the background on a rainy day. My favorite track is “Undercurrent (unerthed).”
  7. “AIN’T NO DAMN WAY!” by KAYTRANADA. This is a great pump up album; I’ve been throwing it on when cleaning and it keeps me moving. I really like the opener, “Space Invaders”, and “THINGS” is an absolute groove. Not Kaytranada’s most interesting or inspirational album, but a real bop from end to end, with a nice balance up uppers and downers.
  8. “SABLE, fABLE” by Bon Iver. Probably the most accessible Bon Iver record I’ve heard? It’s nice. If you like Bon Iver, you’ll love this album. I think it’s less interesting than “22, A Million” or “For Emma, Forever Ago”, but that’s a high bar and “SABLE” is still a good album. Standout track is “There’s a Rhythm” with an interestingly bluegrass-y steel guitar, and “If Only I Could Wait” which not only features HAIM’s Danielle Haim but also brings some of their pop sensibilities (but with very Bon Iver accents).
  9. “Get Sunk” by Matt Berninger. It’s always interesting to listen to side projects from members of bands you love; this is even more true when it comes to The National’s lead singer; whether or not you love a particular album there’s something kind of cool about figuring out which pieces of a band’s work comes from which members. I have a bit of a mixed record with Matt Berninger’s side projects (loved EL VY’s “Return to the Moon”, was much more ambivalent about his first solo record, “Serpentine Prison”). Berninger’s lyrics are always great, wandering between serious and evocative and silly and fun, and this is no exception. I really enjoy “No Love” and “Junk”; the rest of the album is good but not quite as memorable.
  10. “Deadbeat” by Tame Impala. This album is a hoot; a fun mix of danceable EDM, more traditional Tame Impala fare, and even a track or two with some real Enya vibes (“Piece of Heaven”; I legitimately thought my system was shuffling when it started the first time). It’s not “The Slow Rush”, but that’s an impossibly high bar. Favorite tracks are “Not My World,” “Afterthought,” and “End of Summer.”

Honorable mentions/need more time with:

  1. “Everybody Scream” by Florence + the Machine. Florence always deserves our attention; this just popped up on my radar too late in the year for me to have given it as much time as I should. I’ll work on that in January.
  2. “the paper doors” by Justin Tyson. Justin Tyson is a long-time collaborator of Robert Glasper and when Jahi Sundance referred to it as an album about liminal spaces, I was … intrigued. After a few listens … I still am. There’s something special here, I think. In particular I commend “Place 5” to your attention.
  3. “Voices (Expanded Edition)” by Phantogram. This is a re-release of a truly fantastic 2014 album that fell off of my radar for a while. This gets an honorable mention just because it reminded me to go back and listen to it more, though I’ve definitely enjoyed some of the new remixed versions of old tracks; “Black Out Days (Stay Away)” is a standout.

Top EPs:

  1. “Hey Girl” by Moses Sumney and Meshelle Ndgeocello. Good goddamn. Moses Sumney’s voice, with Ndgeocello’s bass and sensibilities … I want this to be a whole album like yesterday. Listen to it loud, on good speakers, at least once.
  2. “Teardrop” by Banks. One of my favorite songs of all time, by my favorite band of all time (Massive Attack), covered by one of my favorite new artists of the 2010s (if you haven’t heard “Goddess,” go listen to it. Great album, front to back, and damned impressive for a first record). I have this not so secret desire for a remix/cover album a la The National’s “Day of the Dead” which is just artists covering/remixing Massive Attack songs.
  3. “Make me Feel” by oskar med k. One of my favorite electronic tracks of the year. Feels very … 2010s to me, in a good way.

Wanted to love, still working on that:

  1. “Thee Black Bolts” by Tunde Adebimpe. Man, I really love TV on the Radio and Tunde’s work beyond the band (he did a phenomenal track with Massive Attack for “Heligoland”) but I just don’t get this album. I’m going to give it a little more time in 2026 though.

2024 in Review

A couple of quick reflections on last year’s list. “No More Water” by Meshelle Ndgeocello, “Saturn Dayz” by Blackstarkids, and “Brat and it’s completely different” by Charlie XCX are the albums that ended up on repeat throughout this last year; “Water” largely via inclusion of “What Did I Do?” on my Transducer Torture Testing List (Apple, Tidal, Spotify).5 I stand by my earlier comparison of “Saturn Dayz” to Tribe or De La; I don’t *actually* expect them to stand the test of time as well as either of those groups, but that album is just … fantastic. Charlie XCX was the biggest surprise to me; I enjoyed hot “brat” summer as much as anyone, but I’m genuinely impressed by this remix album and the growth it demonstrates. I’m … tired of the way media tends to pit young female artists against each other, and I appreciated the messaging6 of the collabs on “Baicdbasb”. Also the remix of “360” reminded me how much I like Robyn, and introduced me to Yung Lean’s … unique delivery. I’d also, in retrospect, probably add Henry Green’s “Familiarity” and Doechi’s “Alligator Bites Never Heal” to the list; the former for it’s incredibly smooth and relaxing vibes, and the latter for … well, the exact opposite.

I should also really fall back down the Haitus Kaiyote rabbithole again.

So, what did I miss in 2025?

  1. Thank you, NPR! ↩︎
  2. Played without amplification, and with every member of the audience wearing a pair of wireless headphones. It’s … pretty cool. https://www.audio-technica.com/en-us/blog/behind-the-sounds-of-snarky-puppy-s-somni-18-years-of-creativity-with-audio-technica ↩︎
  3. To be fair, I’ve been doing a lot of reviews lately and it’s a great track for both guitar/bass timbre AND precision in channel separation with the central guitar riff really two closely matched guitars very close to, but not in, the center. ↩︎
  4. He discussed creating “Free” with both Little Simz and Miles Clinton James, and it’s a fascinating half hour for anyone who cares about the process of creating modern music. It’s also a bop, and probably my favorite song on the album (particularly the last minute or so as she seamlessly swaps from free to three and back). ↩︎
  5. I did a LOT of reviews this year, around 50. I was already on a pretty good pace when I got laid off in 2025, and I may or may not have engaged in some real retail therapy after that happened. ↩︎
  6. See, in particular, “Girl, so confusing” with Lorde. ↩︎
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