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PVA: No More Like This
New album: Inventive, alluring, sensual, mysterious, minimalistic electronica, trip-hop and experimental pop by the London trio of Ella Harris, Joshua Baxter and Louis Satchell, in this second album following 2022’s Blush, boosted by the creativity of producer and instrumentalist Kwake Bass
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Various Artists: ICELOCK CONTINUUM
New album: An inspiring, evocative, sensual and sonically tactile experimental compilation from the fabulously named underground French label Camembert Électrique, with range of international electronic artists capturing cold winter weather’s many textures - cracking, delicate crunchy ice, snow, electric fog, and frost in many fierce and fragile forms across 98 adventurous tracks
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Part Two favourite albums of 2025 collage
Welcome to the second part of Song Bar favourite albums of 2025. There is also a first part and a third part this week. There is no countdown nor describing these necessarily as “best” albums of the year, but they are chosen by their quality, originality and reader popularity
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First selection of 25 favourite albums in no particular order …
Welcome to the first part of Song Bar favourite albums of 2025. There will also be a second and third part this week. There is no countdown nor describing these necessarily as “best” albums of the year, but they are chosen by their quality, originality and reader popularity
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The Mountain Goats: Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan
New album: An evocative musical journey of a concept album by the indie-folk band from Claremont, California, fronted by singer-songwriter John Darnielle, based on a dream of his in 2023 about a voyage to a fictional island by the titular captain, charting adventure, wonder and tragedy
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Allie X - Happiness Is Going To Get You
New album: A hugely entertaining, witty, droll, inventive, chamber and synth-pop fourth LP with a goth twist by the charismatic and theatrical Canadian artist Alexandra Hughes, who brings paradox and dark themes through sounds that include string quartet, harpsichord, classical and pure pop piano with killer lyrics
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Tortoise: Touch
New album: A welcome return with a cinematic and mesmeric groove-filled first studio LP in nine years, and the eighth over all by the eclectic Chicago post-rock/jazz/krautrock multi-instrumentalists Dan Bitney, John Herndon, Douglas McCombs, John McEntire and Jeff Parker
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Oneohtrix Point Never: Tranquilizer
New album: Ambient, otherworldly, cinematic, mesmeric, and at times very odd, the Brooklyn-based electronic artist and producer Daniel Lopatin returns with a new nostalgia-based concept – constructing tracks from lost-then-refound Y2K CDs of 1990s and early 2000s royalty-free sample electronic sounds
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Painfully uplifting: Austra’s Chin Up Buttercup
New album: This fifth studio LP as Austra by the Canadian classically trained vocalist and composer Katie Stelmanis brings beautiful electronica-pop and dance music, and has a bittersweet ironic title – a caustically witty reference to societal pressure to keep smiling despite a devastating breakup
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FKA Twigs: EUSEXUA Afterglow
New album: Springing from her much lauded third LP Eusexua, out in January this year, and following a hugely successful and spectacular tour, the innovative British experimental pop artist, dancer and producer extends her palette of ethereal, otherworldly and sensual creations in this new, more carnal, harder, beat-filled parallel release
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Clark: Steep Stims
New album: The prolific British experimental electronica artist, Christopher Stephen Clark, who works on film and games music as well as albums, returns with a collection capturing the sprit of making music on old samplers and equipment, whipping up the rising, whooshing wave and piano styles of 90s dance music as well as more intricate sounds
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Danny Brown: Stardust
New album: The seventh album by the Detroit experimental, eclectic hip-hop and hyper-pop artist pushes the envelope with some extraordinary, dynamic sounds, dance music with warp-speed, slick rapping and multiple guests through an invented “90s-era pop star” persona called Dusty Star
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Juana Molina: DOGA
New album: A wondrously mesmeric, clever and quirky eighth album of experimental pop by the Argentinian singer, musician and comedian composed largely of analogue synths, originally from improvisations and recorded over several years in her home studio surrounded by her pets
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ROSALÍA: LUX
New album: Grandiose, dramatic, passionate, with extraordinary soaring vocals, melodies and string arrangements, multi-lingual lyrics, the London Symphony Orchestra and with guests including Björk, the Catalan superstar’s fourth LP is a fabulous extravaganza, broadly themed around female saints through history, religion, sex and violence
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Anna von Hausswolff - Iconoclasts
New album: Perfectly timed for an autumnal Halloween, the Swedish experimental composer’s sixth LP is devilishly haunting, complex, dark and beautiful, featuring a range of dynamic, glittering and drone sounds with woodwind, strings, her soaring voice, as well as guest appearances by Ethel Cain and Iggy Pop
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Hannah Jadagu: Describe
New album: Following her 2023 debut Aperture, the Texas-born, New York artist returns with a lusher, more expanded sound on this second LP, with synth layers added to her guitar, a sense of yearning for her home and missing a partner she left behind during a summer move to write and record in California, delivering some delicious sonic textures and reflections
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Home Counties: Humdrum
New album: The east London band fronted by dual vocalists Will Harrison and Lois Kelly return with a sophomore album of striking, catchy, witty, synth-heavy postpunk-indie-pop, themed about the messiness of communication other modern absurdities, produced by Al Doyle of Hot Chip and LCD Soundsystem
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Sudan Archives: The BPM
New album: Following 2022’s Natural Brown Prom Queen, the American violinist and innovative singer-songwriter Brittney Denise Parks returns with a more electronica-based and hip-hop LP with eclectic beats and beeps, RnB and soul, presenting here the alter-ego of Gadget Girl, a sexualised tech-augmented avatar
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Soulwax: All Systems Are Lying
New album: The Ghent-based, Belgian electronica-dance and acclaimed remix maestro brothers David and Stephen Dewaele and co return with a catchy, quirky, witty, droll new LP, thematically about society’s fragile state, and their first new music in seven years, mischievously described as “a rock album made without any electric guitars”
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Tame Impala: Deadbeat
New album: This fifth LP and first in five years by the Australian multi-instrumentalist Kevin Parker sees him go down a more a more dance-electronica route, mixing psych, techno, reggaeton, and the heavy drum kicks of the western Australia’s “bush doof” rave scene, but as ever with the distinctive yearning of his falsetto voice
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