I already ran down the Best Songs of 2025 and, if you recall, I made a big deal about not featuring any songs off the records to be featured on my Best Albums of 2025 list. Well, here’s the payoff for that: the albums in question. Besides, as in previous entries, including a Worst selection and some Most Anticipated of 2026, I’ve included a tracklist if you want to make a mix of one song from each of the Best Albums. And because I’m so nice, I offered not just one song selection, but an alternate as well.

Ok, prologue over. Time to dive in.

I don’t think I can pull it off myself, but I respect a bold red lip.

Albums

20. Dear Life by David Gray- An odd mix to be sue as this is Gray’s most produced album to date while also being his most down-to-earth. Not that he’s an especially out there singer-songwriter, but this time out he seems at his most specific. There’s nothing like “This Year’s Love” on here for instance, a song that trades specificity for sweet profundity. He’s much more on the ground and getting into it on this release. Oddly enough, with its repeated contemplations of morality, Dear Life reminds me a lot of Paul Simon’s Seven Psalms. While more than 25 years younger than Simon, Gray is in a similar state of mind, aware of the ticking clock while not ready to give up creating.

19. Getting Killed by Geese- Absolutely not a record to put on to unwind by at the end of the day, Getting Killed has anger deep in its bones, and it pours out in each guitar riff and each near-screaming vocal. I’m kind of stunned this has caught on as much as it has.

18. Golliwog by Billy Woods- If you are one of those people who jazzed to proclaim the return of protest music because a couple of aging white artists made some songs (good songs, granted) about Minnesota, Billy Woods is here to remind you hip hop’s been carrying the torch of political music for years. Protest songs aren’t making a comeback; they’ve been here for years.

17. Sharon Van Etten & the Attachment Theory by Sharon Van Etten

16. Revelation by The Knocks and Dragonette- A concept album in the Year of Our Lord 2025? A mid-tempo dance-y concept album? And the concept is grounded in a corporation with 80s ethos, matching the collaboration’s throwback sound? I can hardly believe it myself. But I loved listening to it. Lots of reviews cite Carly Rae Jepsen as a kind of “if you like her, you’ll dig this,” and I 100% endorse that perspective.

15. Automatic by The Lumineers- It can’t be easy to be one of the biggest names in 2010s “indie” folk and releasing an album in 2025, the year someone declared stomp-clap a musical subgenre akin to a crime. Especially when all of TikTok seemed to respond by nodding their heads for two weeks. But whatever, like any subgenre, it is a mistake to define it by its worst moments. The Lumineers seem to have responded to the moment by aggressively being themselves AND refusing to simply recycle their own tropes. That they clearly have a smirk while doing it all works on me, too.

14. onto something by senses- senses (yes, lower case) was an opening act at a concert I attended in 2025, but I sadly arrived too late to catch them. As an act of contrition, I made sure to chase down their EP onto something. Thank goodness I did. Eminently listenable, they call themselves emo curious. You can hear it in the music, but the reflexive cynicism and smarter-than-thou snark of the late 2000s emo era (don’t get me wrong, I also love that kind of shit) is nowhere near this disc.

13. Man’s Best Friend by Sabrina Carpenter- I’m not sure what it says about my consistency—or lack thereof—that this makes this year’s Best Album list, but her album last year, which I think I might like more, didn’t. In any case, when I went to choose a single for the Best Song category I found myself saying, “I like that one. Oh and that one.” so many times I just had to admit I liked the album. I’m still more of a fan of Emails I Can’t Send-era Carpenter. (That’s right, I liked Sabrina as a singer before it was cool. I’m very cutting edge.) But there’s no denying this record.

12. moisturizer by Wet Leg- Love, like happiness, can be a dangerous thing to an artist, by the measure of some. While that debate will never be fully resolved, Wet Leg’s second album is certainly a strike against it. Often just this of gooey, the band (really, frontperson Rhian Teasdale) can’t stop telling us about their new love in a number of different ways. The disc is probably best when Leg steers clear of sentimentality and instead embraces lust or the confusing, intoxicating aspects of infatuation. But even when they’re calling the local emergency line to brag about their new emotional state, it is impossible to begrudge them their joys.

11. Virgin by Lorde

10. Sinners Soundtrack- Will this film also place on my top movie list? Gotta come back tomorrow. But for now, I’ll say it is the best time I had listening to a feature all year.

9. The Life of a Showgirl by Taylor Swift- Much like the Carpenter record above, I was prepared to write this off with a Best Song and call it a day, but then I actually sat down with it. Turns out I like a lot of it. Shouldn’t be a surprise, I have notoriously bad taste when it comes to T. Swift. I ride for BOTH Reputation and Midnights. I agree with all right-thinking people that ME! is probably her songwriting nadir, BUT I’d argue the best part of that song is “Hey kids, spelling is fun!’ and the internet harassed her so bad about that, she officially cut the line. But, ok, whatever. I’ll stand on business for her being weird and messy, and why too disclosive about her sex life and kinks.

8. Perverts by Ethel Cain- Along with Golliwog (at 18) and Dead Channel Sky (at 6), this is an album that seems ready-made to be the musical accompaniment for a horror film. Anxious, doomsaying, and claustrophobic, this is one to listen to on the headphones in a dark room on a windy night.

7. Girl Violence by King Princess- Mark Ronson is a great producer, but leaving him behind does wonders for King Princess’s new disc. Animated by breakup angst, Princess isn’t hurting anyone physically, but her vocals—frequently dropping into a growl—suggest she just might. I’ve liked her work previously, but this is the first time it leaves bruises, and I’m here for that.

6. Dead Channel Sky by clipping- Messy, almost aggressively so, and humming with sci-fi on its mind. I love a transition record that reaches for something that it can’t quite grasp yet, so this album’s mess is to its credit for me.

5. Butter Miracle, The Complete Sweets! by Counting Crows- Nostalgia? Perhaps? As I’ve noted elsewhere, Adam Duritz is probably my first big-time interview (I also sat down with Jason Robards around the same time, so I can’t swear Duritz came first), so in my between-jobs state, perhaps I’m also looking back on better times. Regardless, though, this record was a welcome addition to the year. Not as tight as August and Everything After and Recovering the Satellites and perhaps a bit more willing to just be happy with who they are than their mid-period records, Butter Miracle still feels like the Crows, and I’m happy for that. If you think I’m taking it too easy on them, let me politely suggest that this year was a tough one. A little easy is perhaps what’s called for.

4. I Quit by HAIM

3. Straight Line Was a Lie by The Beths- I loved their previous album, Expert in a Dying Field, so much that this album initially suffered in comparison. However, I put it down for a month or two and came back to it. I “got” it much more after that. Sharper musically with a hint of gravel under the skin, it is, again, a transition record. It’s great fun to hear the band finding their next selves.

2. Everybody Scream by Florence + The Machine- What if Florence et al somehow got angrier and mixed in a taste of IDLES into their sound? That’s this record. And it rules.

1. Ego Death At A Bachelorette Party by Hayley Williams- Filled with sly wit, nasty barbs, and a general refusal to be one thing, this is a beautiful capper to the past five years, which arguably represent Williams’ best musical period. With interpolations of a song from the unambiguously Christian bad she started with (in “Ice in My OJ”) and the Bloodhound Gang (“Discovery Channel”) and songs that sound like tracks from a Paramore album (“Love Me Different”) or her solo effort Petals for Armor (the title track), this feels like a summary of what’s come before and a hint at so much more she has to offer.

Worst

I’m the Problem by Morgan Wallen- It is so long. And, despite the title, so devoid of self-reflection or insight.

Most Anticipated of 2026 (in no particular order)

Porcelain by Peach PRC- I’ve loved a lot of her singles, but never undertook a full album. Looking forward to seeing if my appreciation of her will sustain itself over the course of an entire LP.

There Will Be Joy by Tessa Violet- My God!, her previous album, was wildly addictive and wonderfully high on its own supply. Early singles from this one suggest something far more earnest and down-to-earth. Very exciting to enjoy the changeup.

Build Your Own Mix Track Suggestions (and Alts!)

Fighting Talk by David Gray (Alt: Eyes Made Rain)

Long Island City Here I Come by Geese (Alt: Taxes)

Corinthians by Billy Wood (Alt: A Doll Fulla Pins)

Southern Life (What It Must Be Like) by Sharon Van Etten (Alt: Trouble)

Revelation by The Knocks & Dragonette (Alt: Love Me Alive)

You’re All I Got by The Lumineers (Alt: Same Old Song)

tiptoeing by senses (Alt: obsessed)

House Tour by Sabrina Carpenter (Alt: Tears)

liquidize by Wet Leg (Alt: CPR)

Broken Glass by Lorde (Alt: Current Affairs)

I Lied to You by Miles Caton (Alt: Dangerous by Hailee Steinfeld)

Father Figure by Taylor Swift (Alt: Opalite)

Punish by Ethel Cain (Alt: Perverts)

RIP KP by King Princess (Alt: Girls)

Change the Channel by clipping (Alt: Mirrorshades pt. 2)

Spaceman in Tulsa by Counting Crows (Alt: The Tall Grass)

Relationships by HAIM (Alt: All Over Me)

Mother, Pray for Me by The Beths (Alt: Straight Line Was a Lie)

Everybody Scream by Florence + The Machine (Alt: The Old Religion)

True Believer by Haley Williams (Alt: Ice in My OJ)