The 10 best albums of 2025

Best of 2025 | | | | |

Can a 2025 album roundup be complete without mention of Taylor Swift’s perfectly entertaining but unmemorable pop album The Life of a Showgirl? Apparently not.

What we can say about the chart-topper is that it was made by human beings. Which is more than we can say about the two retro hippie-rock albums released this summer by the Velvet Sundown, whose synthetic music, images and backstory were created by AI.

Fake artists are landing on Billboard charts and racking up millions of online streams. But we don’t even know if streams are real any more (if we ever did).

On Nov. 2, a class-action lawsuit was filed against Spotify for the alleged artificial inflation of music streams for both flesh-and-blood artists and robot songwriters. It is claimed the Swedish streaming behemoth turned a “blind eye” to “mass-scale fraudulent streaming” on its platform.

The suit filed in a California district court singled out Canadian rap superstar Drake as someone who has benefited from the royalties generated by “billions” of phony streams. Though Drake is not being sued himself, it’s been a tough year for the beleaguered God’s Plan artist.

Judge rejects Drake’s defamation lawsuit over Kendrick Lamar’s diss track Not Like Us

On Feb. 2, his nemesis Kendrick Lamar swept all five of the Grammy nominations for his diss-Drake track Not Like Us, taking home trophies for record of the year and song of the year in particular.

On Oct. 9, a defamation lawsuit Drake had brought against Universal Music Group was rejected by a U.S. federal judge, who said the lyrics of Not Like Us were opinion, not libel. Judge Jeannette A. Vargas noted that Lamar was rapping “hyperbolic vituperations.”

I don’t think I’ve ever heard the hip-hop genre defined any better.

Turning to the classical music world, Canada’s Kevin Chen finished second behind Eric Lu of the United States at the 19th International Fryderyk Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, a gruelling but prestigious three-week contest.

Canadian pianist Kevin Chen takes silver at international Chopin competition

Among the music artists who died in 2025 were Roy Ayers, jazz vibraphonist; Clem Burke, Blondie drummer; Jimmy Cliff, reggae superstar; Steve Cropper, Booker T. & the M.G.’s guitarist; D’Angelo, neo-soul icon; Rick Davies, Supertramp co-founder; Jack DeJohnette, jazz drummer; Marianne Faithfull, singer/muse; Serge Fiori, Harmonium singer-songwriter; Roberta Flack, singer (The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face); Connie Francis, country music star (Who’s Sorry Now?); Ace Frehley, Kiss guitarist; Harvey Glatt, Ottawa impresario; Garth Hudson, the Band organist; David Johansen, New York Dolls singer; Sheila Jordan, scat jazzer; Cleo Laine, jazz singer; Tom Lehrer, musical satirist; Chuck Mangione, soft-jazz flugelhornist; George Olliver, Mandala singer; Ozzy Osbourne, heavy metal pioneer; Hermeto Pascoal, Brazilian composer/multi-instrumentalist; Todd Snider, Americana singer-songwriter; Angie Stone, hip-hop pioneer; Sly Stone, Family Stone front man; Brian Wilson, Beach Boys visionary.

The following is a list of my 10 favourite albums released in 2025.

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Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party, by Hayley Williams

The best thing about the vital third solo effort from the Paramore singer is that Taylor Swift knows she’ll never, ever come up with a better album title.

All Cylinders, by Yves Jarvis

The Polaris Music Prize juries have made more than a few curious choices over the years, but they got it right in 2025. Groovy psychedelic-pop brilliance.

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Golliwog, by Billy Woods

Spoiler alert: This fright-night masterpiece by the prolific American rapper kicks off with Jumpscare. Trigger warning: There’s an insensitive Sylvia Plath reference. Hot tip: Don’t miss the cameo − “Fiends is the zombies; opening scene, armed robberies” − on BLK XMAS by my new favourite rapper, Detroit’s Bruiser Wolf.

Getting Killed, by Geese

The best thing about this off-kilter alt-rock curiosity from the mewling Cameron Winter and his Brooklyn weirdos is that AI will never, ever come up with anything as brilliantly chaotic and unanticipated.

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Lux, by Rosalía

Backed by the London Symphony Orchestra, the Spanish avant-pop goddess has produced an arresting soundtrack to a film that does not exist (and does not need to).

Bleeds, by Wednesday

Eruptive shoe gaze rock and southern-fried pedal steel guitar should not work. Fortunately, these alt-rock North Carolinians led by Karly Hartzman and MJ Lenderman are guided by angst and not by algorithms.

Hallelujah! Don’t Let The Devil Fool Ya, by Robert Finley

Gospel-influenced soul-rock for fans of the late, great Charles Bradley, with backing vocals by Finley’s daughter, Christy Johnson, and production by his long-time collaborator, the Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach.

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Humanhood, by the Weather Station

“Now you got me, this broken prize, clinging to you but blank in the eyes/ want is a feeling you can’t take alive.” No other songwriter can devastate with just one line as sublimely as soft-rock siren Tamara Lindeman (a.k.a. the Weather Station).

Life, Death and Dennis Hopper, by the Waterboys

The best thing about Mike Scott’s song Dennis Hopper on the Waterboys’ 2020 album Good Luck, Seeker is that he was just getting started. Behold, an oddball 25-track conceptual album inspired by the freaked-out life and times of the Easy Rider director/actor that includes guest appearances by Bruce Springsteen, Fiona Apple and Steve Earle, along with a song named after Terry Southern and a spoken-word piece about 1967’s Monterey International Pop Festival.

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Weirdo, by Emma-Jean Thackray

The mellow-funk follow-up to the British jazz wunderkind’s celebrated 2021 album Yellow, a melodic investigation into her neurodivergence.