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43 results for “buffyleigh”
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@buffyleigh Late offering but I will put this forth as my #AOTY. It’s uhhh progressive melodic blackened death power metal from France:
https://ethmebb.bandcamp.com/album/allo-babar-et-les-caramboleurs
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Orchestra Harlow – Hommy (A Latin Opera) (1973, Puerto Rico/Cuba/US)
Our next spotlight is on number 1039 on The List, submitted by myself (buffyleigh).
Ever wondered what an Afro-Caribbean/salsa version of The Who’s 1969 rock opera Tommy might sound like?
This is a recommendation via a recommendation, as it was found in a book suggested to me on Mastodon. The book: Love Goes to Buildings on Fire: Five Years in New York That Changed Music Forever by Will Hermes, which covers 1973 to 1977 and the half-dozen genres that emerged in NYC at that time, including salsa. This album was mentioned in the first few pages and completely stalled me (full disclosure: I started this book in May 2024 and still haven’t finished, because every time I touch it I have another 5 or 10 new-to-me artists/albums to check out).
And, while we’re at it, full disclosure, part B: I heard this album *before* hearing (or seeing) Tommy for the first time. So, I had no expectations or knowledge of how close it was to the original. And, a year and a half later, I’m not sure I can comfortably comment on this. I did listen to Tommy directly after my first spin of Hommy, but, well, was weirded out by the gross stuff in that storyline, and so I’m only getting back to Tommy for a second spin right now, as I’m typing. I think it’s safe to say though that, rather than a faithful adaptation of Tommy by any means, Hommy is more of an ‘inspired by’ work with a similar narrative framework (e.g., the titular character is deaf and blind, and is a fantastic conga player) but all original songs with lyrics by Puerto Rican composer and singer Genaro “Heny” Álvarez (and without, afaik since I don’t speak Spanish, any of Tommy‘s creepy stuff).
And, as you may have guessed from the group name and title, a few more than just a quartet were involved in Hommy. Headed by American bandleader and producer Larry Harlow (aka “El Judío Maravilloso”), over 60 Puerto Rican, Cuban, and American musicians were in this Fania-released production, including the fabulous Cuban singer who would later be known as the “Queen of Salsa” Celia Cruz (as Gracia Divina, cf. Tommy‘s Acid Queen), José “Cheo” Feliciano, Justo Betancourt, Junior González, Tony Jimenez, Eddie “Guagua” Rivera, Adalberto Santiago, and Pete “El Conde” Rodríguez. With such a number of musicians creating a Latin opera full of spectacular singing, Afro-Caribbean percussion, horns, and strings, you’re sure to enjoy this, whether you know Tommy (or Spanish) or not. The opera also apparently ends with pleas to the forces that be to end suffering on Earth in general and that era’s war (Vietnam) in particular, which I can definitely get behind.
Fwiw, if I had to choose between the two operas, I’d choose Hommy every time.
#1970s #AfroCubanMusic #CeliaCruz #conceptAlbum #Cuba #Fania #LarryHarlow #LatinMusic #ListenToThis #music #musicDiscovery #opera #OrchestraHarlow #OrquestaHarlow #PuertoRico #salsa
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☝️ 🤘
Asking you to help spread the word / boost. Why?Like many others, Stengade is trying to get away from big tech / corporate /fash platforms - but to this day can't.
It s all facebook, instagram, spotify.It would be nice to show the club and ourselves that this can be done differently.
Of course - if you don't like #slow #heavy #heavyasf #loud music, then don't :)
#REH #REHdom #doom #sludge #NorthernHind #metal #DIY @buffyleigh
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☝️ 🤘
Asking you to help spread the word / boost. Why?Like many others, Stengade is trying to get away from big tech / corporate /fash platforms - but to this day can't.
It s all facebook, instagram, spotify.It would be nice to show the club and ourselves that this can be done differently.
Of course - if you don't like #slow #heavy #heavyasf #loud music, then don't :)
#REH #REHdom #doom #sludge #NorthernHind #metal #DIY @buffyleigh
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☝️ 🤘
Asking you to help spread the word / boost. Why?Like many others, Stengade is trying to get away from big tech / corporate /fash platforms - but to this day can't.
It s all facebook, instagram, spotify.It would be nice to show the club and ourselves that this can be done differently.
Of course - if you don't like #slow #heavy #heavyasf #loud music, then don't :)
#REH #REHdom #doom #sludge #NorthernHind #metal #DIY @buffyleigh
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☝️ 🤘
Asking you to help spread the word / boost. Why?Like many others, Stengade is trying to get away from big tech / corporate /fash platforms - but to this day can't.
It s all facebook, instagram, spotify.It would be nice to show the club and ourselves that this can be done differently.
Of course - if you don't like #slow #heavy #heavyasf #loud music, then don't :)
#REH #REHdom #doom #sludge #NorthernHind #metal #DIY @buffyleigh
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☝️ 🤘
Asking you to help spread the word / boost. Why?Like many others, Stengade is trying to get away from big tech / corporate /fash platforms - but to this day can't.
It s all facebook, instagram, spotify.It would be nice to show the club and ourselves that this can be done differently.
Of course - if you don't like #slow #heavy #heavyasf #loud music, then don't :)
#REH #REHdom #doom #sludge #NorthernHind #metal #DIY @buffyleigh
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Psst, do you need some cool music to listen to?
Dig if you will The List of over 1001 albums from 115+ places/peoples, as recommended by 130+ Fedizens (https://1001otheralbums.com/the-list/)! Think "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die", but, like, NOT just Western pop. We chose these albums not because of popularity or sales or reviews by influencers and whatnot, but rather because they’re important to us personally and/or represent bands/genres/peoples not given enough love in 'official' lists.
For the last 2+ years, we've featured an album from The List every few days on the 1001 Other Albums blog (https://1001otheralbums.com/). These spotlights are written by either guest Fedizen contributors or project steward @buffyleigh, and are automatically cross-posted in full to the Fediverse at
@1001otheralbums.com. New spotlights are also summarized and linked here on linernotes.club.The plan is to eventually cover every album on The List, and so far we’ve featured over 230 albums! Sometimes we also do some extra fun things like Fedi-wide AOTY lists, fake festivals, and Fedi-sourced oral history posts, and every once in a while we boost other cool music-related things. Give us a follow here and/or the blog, I bet you'll hear something you dig.
👉 And, if you want to share your thoughts on one of the albums not yet featured via guest post, OR want to add your favourite albums that aren't yet on The List, hmu! 👈
#introduction #music #1001OtherAlbums #MusicDiscovery #ListenToThis
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Beverly Glenn-Copeland – Beverly Copeland (1970, Canada)
I know we just had two spotlights from Canadian artists, but I think we need a bit more Canadian content before moving on. More importantly though, now (as always) is the perfect time to celebrate and support our brilliant trans artists. And so, our next spotlight is on number 478 on The List, submitted by myself (buffyleigh).
I didn’t learn about Glenn Copeland – who records under the name Beverly Glenn-Copeland[1] – until we were compiling The List roughly a year ago. Other Mastodonians, as per usual, were more informed than I, many of them knowing Glenn from either the 2019 documentary Keyboard Fantasies: The Beverly Glenn-Copeland Story, or from his 25 years of acting on the Canadian children’s show, Mr. Dressup (I of course watched that show as a kid, but, what can I say, I only had eyes for Finnegan).
I can’t remember why I first stumbled upon Glenn’s debut album, but I was absolutely blown away by his voice. It’s just so emotive and captivating, with a fantastic classical range (Glenn was trained in the German vocal tradition of Lieder singing, and studied classical vocals at McGill University). The album was an instant purchase for me (as was his newest, the 2023 The Ones Ahead), and I immediately added it to The List. But, as I am unfortunately wont to do, I then failed to check out the rest of Glenn’s discography, and have only been listening to his first and last albums since.
Until now. As I’m writing this, for the first (and second) time I’m listening to Glenn’s most well-known album, Keyboard Fantasies (1986), which is incredibly different from his first and last albums. While the debut lives in the realms of dark folk and modal jazz, Keyboard Fantasies is exactly what it says on the box – beautiful, dreamy keyboard-focused new age/early techno electronic music. Created with a Yamaha DX7 synthesizer, a Roland TR-707 drum machine, and an Atari computer, Glenn self-released the album on cassette in a small run (100 or 200 tapes). It then took nearly 30 years for the album to gain attention.
In 2015 or 2016, Ryota Masuko, owner of a specialty Japanese record store (SHE Ye,Ye Records) in Niigata, somehow stumbled upon Keyboard Fantasies and emailed Glenn to ask if he had any copies left. Glenn sent Ryota all he had and, via promoting on their website and in their shop, Ryota quickly sold all of them. And those copies reached the right hands, as Glenn was soon contacted by various record labels, snowballing into a flurry of activity including the album reissue (which Swedish pop musician Robyn wrote the liner notes for), an international tour, the aforementioned documentary, a remix album called Keyboard Fantasies Reimagined (that includes contributions from artists such as Bon Iver, Arca, and Jeremy Dutcher!), and features in many prominent magazines, etc.
If I had clued in sooner, I perhaps would’ve added Keyboard Fantasies rather than the debut album to The List, given that it has such a great story behind it. But, perhaps not; the debut is and remains an absolute stunner even alongside the somewhat cult-status Keyboard Fantasies, and it encapsulates this beautiful soul so well. But the beauty of The List is that it serves both to highlight fantastic individual albums and to urge those who are curious to dig further into the artist’s discography. And so, here we are, and, after a bit of a delay, my digging has now commenced.
And I hope your digging will now too, if you aren’t yet familiar with this artist! In addition to checking out the various sounds Glenn has put out into the world (see also his tracks on last year’s stunning TRAИƧA compilation!), learning more about him is really an absolutely lovely rabbit hole to go down, so I highly recommend spending some time doing so. Though I’m just getting started myself, so far I’d point to the 2021 Quietus article/interview and the 2023 Walrus article/interview, and also Vinyl Me, Please‘s 2021 “Beverly Glenn-Copeland Primer”.
Happy listening/reading.
- Bandcamp: Beverly Glenn-Copeland – Beverly Copeland
- Discogs: Beverly Glenn-Copeland – Beverly Copeland
- Given the name Beverly Glenn at birth, in 1970 Glenn added “Copeland” to his name as an homage to American composer Aaron Copland, presumably after the release of the debut album. ↩︎
#1970s #BeverlyGlennCopeland #Canada #CanadianMusic #classical #folk #GlennCopeland #jazz #transMusic
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CW: Bowie's Blackstar at 10 - A Fedi-sourced celebration of a masterpiece [CW'd for length]
Bowie’s ★ at 10
Our next spotlight is on number 299 on The List, submitted by HillardHouseDan. And because this is a big anniversary for an even bigger album, some Fedi friends[1] will be joining me today to collectively share our thoughts on its impact, and our memories of its release. For, on January 8, 2016 – David Bowie’s 69th birthday – Bowie released his 26th studio album, making today the 10th anniversary of the experimental jazz/rock masterpiece ★ aka Blackstar.
rothko: “TENTH?!”
daria: “…10 years???? HOW 😭“
blogdiva: “Shit. It’s already been 10 years?!?!?”
austinross: “Hard to believe it’s already been 10 years.”
peach: “As the general quality of modern music has decayed, one of the last great albums has reached a decade.”
And, as we all know, 2 days later, January 10, 2016, Bowie left us, succumbing to a cancer we didn’t know he had been fighting, making Blackstar – whether intentionally crafted to be or not – his swan song.
harriolkn: “I remember reading the news when I was at work and barely kept it together for the rest of the day. When I finally got home, and saw my partner at the time, we both just burst into tears and embraced each other without saying a word.”
buffyleigh: “When KEXP celebrated the release of ★ with ‘Intergalactic Bowie Day’ [on Friday, January 8, 2016], I instantly fell in love with the album, the first entire Bowie album I had listened to from beginning to end…I listened to the entire 12-hour tribute and planned on working my way through his discography, starting with picking up ★ on vinyl as soon as I could get down to my local record store, seeing as it felt wrong listening to the full album on YouTube, which someone had already posted. When I saw the news on Monday morning, I was stunned and disoriented…called in sick and went to my local record store to stand there and be sad with everyone else.”
The summer of 2014 was both when Bowie first received his diagnosis and when he began demoing songs that would appear on Blackstar and in his musical Lazarus. During the 2015 recording sessions, the cancer was treated, went into remission, and – in November, around the making of the music video for “Lazarus” – returned with a status of terminal. And so, though Bowie had continued writing and recording, planning both a follow-up to Blackstar and another musical, he was facing his mortality head-on the entire time he was creating this album, living with the knowledge that this could very well be the last album he made, that it could be the last statement from an artist known for making a statement with everything he did.
Given this context and the fact that many heard the album for the first time literally just before or just after hearing the news, it’s essentially impossible for the listener to separate their experience and interpretation of Blackstar from Bowie’s death. Even without over-analyzing it all, it’s easy to notice that the album’s lyrics are full of references to death and dying, and that its atmosphere is melancholic and existential at the very least, if not downright foreboding. And the brilliant music videos for the singles “Blackstar” (single and video released November 19, 2015) and “Lazarus” (single released December 17, 2015; video released January 7, 2016)? Well, they’re both chock-full of more symbolism and self-referential imagery a Bowie fanatic could shake a stick at, simply encouraging – nay, inviting – the viewer to read absolutely anything and everything into them.
billyjoebowers: “When the ‘Blackstar’ video came out I remember talking with a friend about how interesting but weird it was, and being kind of amused and confused by it. Then he died, and the ‘Lazarus’ video, and it was like ‘Oh shit!’. Like a punch in the gut. An amazing work, I listened to it non-stop for months, but not for several months after, it was too raw.”
Anomnomnomaly: “To me, the album felt like he was writing his obituary in a lot of the lyrics. So when he passed away shortly after, the whole album started to make a lot more sense for me.”
BackFromTheDud: “@Anomnomnomaly Agree. He knew the end was near, and it shows.”
But, even if our experience of the album is coloured by this context, that by no means takes away from the brilliance of this album.
If we had been fortunate enough to get another Bowie album or two or six after it, Blackstar would remain an absolute standout in his eclectic discography. It was unlike anything Bowie had ever done. Even just Bowie’s decision to not have any familiar faces in the backing band but rather to hire a pre-existing group (i.e., Donny McCaslin’s quartet with Jason Lindner, Tim Lefebvre, and Mark Guiliana) – and a jazz quartet at that! – was a stunning move. That move alone, particularly given what must have been a strong sense of urgency to realize the music Bowie still wanted to get out before it was too late, could’ve made them all rush, cut corners, make compromises. But, instead, the gamble of working with musicians who were new to Bowie’s processes and methods – musicians from a corner of the music world that Bowie had not yet visited – paid off in spades. The result was that the album showcased once again Bowie’s awe-inducing drive to always push himself further and further, even when just shy of 70 years old – never afraid to try something new, never calling it in, and never wanting to rest on his long-before well-earned laurels, all for the love of music, art, and artistry.
Its context simply drew deserved attention to Blackstar much sooner than it might’ve in other circumstances, immediately cementing its status as a masterpiece rather than it taking people a beat or two to grasp what this genius had just dropped into our laps. Indeed, its context ultimately made David Bowie-the-performer the most human he had ever been, in some ways making this album – an otherwise rather experimental if not challenging musical work – perhaps the easiest in his entire oeuvre for people to instantly connect with, in one way or another.
AnxietyDescending: “Released at the same time of Bowie’s passing, Blackstar was a bittersweet release. At first listen it was obviously a masterpiece but that joy was tempered by the fact that it would be Bowie’s last.”
mathzy: “It was going to be one of his masterpieces anyway. And then it was released virtually on the date of his death. My reaction was this was a legend and he put all his legendary artistic endeavour into it. Gorgeous, dark, brooding, triumphant.”
soulforgotten: “Blackstar was a really hard one for me to listen to. Bowie passed away before I got the chance to listen to the album and his death was especially crushing for me and my wife. As much as I wanted to take the album for a spin, I just couldn’t at the time. It was years later that I finally took the opportunity to listen to it, and it was an almost 50/50 split of regret (leaving so long to hear it) and admiration for his final album. It is a solid bookend to an amazing legacy.”
okohll: “Bowie at his best, I’m really glad he managed to pull off a master-work to bow out with. Evokes something strange, extra-worldly, profound yet at the same time can’t escape the Bowie-like elements of fun. He had the gift of being able to make something both unique and banging. Mention must be made of the collection of musicians he pulled together – the drumming is absolutely amazing for example. The success is that the whole is even greater than the sum of the parts.”
serpicojam: “I had been a fan of Mark Giuliana’s (and the rest of the folks on the LP who’d worked with Donny McCaslin) long before Blackstar was released, and I really appreciated his influence on the songs. ‘Sue (Or In A Season Of Crime)’ is so dark, but it’s such a masterpiece. I should probably revisit the whole album again.”
evilchili: “Blackstar is astonishing in its ambition: here is a record that is both polemic and meditation, defiantly rejecting endings while saying goodbye, a grand finale and also the start of a new creative direction we will never get to follow. Throughout his career Bowie never told us everything, but he would give us glimpses, and Blackstar is no different: deeply personal, but only to a point. It’s true, but it’s an ambiguous truth. It’s wry and winking and earnest all at once. And full of swagger! It’s a considered, intentional final work by a dying man who is not afraid to remind us precisely how good he is.
‘You’re a flash in the pan
I am the great I AM'”No matter the whys and wherefores, upon its release 10 years ago, Blackstar became an important album for many of us, whether it changed how we approached the rest of Bowie’s discography, how we approached or viewed modern music in general, even how we played our own music.
NoRestfortheWicked: “Personally, it opened for me more of the David Bowie albums like Low. Also I like the aesthetic of this album and videos. ‘Blackstar’ like a sci-fi film, ‘Lazarus’ has an almost prophetic feeling of a dying man on his bed. For me, it was something new to find, and it expanded my musical taste a lot.”
RobeeShepherd: “I know some huge Bowie fans, so I’ve been exposed to his work, but for me whilst I love his earlier stuff he felt irrelevant to me as a music fan after ‘Absolute Beginners’. I’ve dipped in a little since then and nothing grabbed me, until Blackstar. That didn’t pull me in, it sucked me in and I played it on repeat for months.”
buffyleigh: “I became a fan THE DAY Blackstar came out, listened to Bowie all that Friday and weekend. And then Monday happened. So I was a fan of all of 3 entire days and yet it totally knocked the wind out of me. And I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that changed how I approach music. I listened to ONLY Bowie for months after that, only broken by Prince dying and then I only listened to Bowie and Prince for another few months. I never did deep dives before that, or re-evaluated my feeling on artists I had written off long before. And now that’s what takes up most of my listening time.”
billyjoebowers: “I worked with a band and thought I heard something with the drummer. ‘Have you listened to Blackstar?’ He laughed and said ‘Yeah, non stop’. I could hear it in the change in his playing.”
And, for some, it remains an album that still profoundly affects us in one way or another, even when it’s not playing. It’s approached reverentially, not just as a memorial for its artist but perhaps of something larger that we’ve all lost.
daria: “I can’t remember when I heard it last time, it’s an emotionally difficult album for me.”
avi_miller: “Blackstar is an album like no other. It will forever be tinged with emotions for me from Bowie’s passing, and I don’t think that is a bad thing. Sometimes I put it on and cry a little.”
harriolkn: “Blackstar is probably my favourite Bowie album but I can’t listen to it very often because it makes me feel more sad than any other music.”
buffyleigh: “I will never get over this album, and feel like every single note of it is totally ingrained in my brain. I literally have never listened to this without crying…is perhaps the first/only record in my collection I would consider sacred (in a non-religious sense). It’s also my least listened to favourite album because I never want it to become background music, and each listen is almost a rite. I essentially only put it on for Bowiemas/Bowienalia.”
austinross: “It is a life-changing album.”
theotherbrook: “I wish I could come up with something meaningful to say, but when I think about that album the nerves are still too raw for me to touch. I know I’m not alone in having an irrational sense that our collective orbit entered a state of rapid decay with Bowie’s death. It is — it must be — coincidental. But still. Leaving us Blackstar wasn’t just writing his own epitaph, but also leaving us a marker for that moment when we could no longer ignore how unstable the trajectory we were on had become. I don’t know… I meant to say I have nothing to say but then I said that.”
At the very least, whether Blackstar is among your favourite Bowie albums (or favourite albums, period) or not, for 40+ years the release of a new Bowie album was a cultural event, and this album was certainly among the biggest of them all if not THE biggest. In the age of the Internet (and so, Bowie’s last five albums, starting with the 1999 release ‘hours…’), such events have brought together people from literally all over the world, from all walks of life, to share in a piece of sonic art that brought beauty, comfort, wonder, and escape. Given the times we live in, where connection is perhaps more important than ever, that this was the last Bowie event we could ever share in, could bond over, could disappear into, is in itself something to be remembered and mourned.
satsuma: “Back in the day, Twitter used to be a friendly place where you could connect with a group of friends to chat about anything that took your fancy. You would accumulate loose networks of common interests with people across the internet, and occasionally closer bonds would form. One such group consisted of people who had realised that if we picked an album and all hit play at the agreed time, then that meant we could share our experiences of listening to music together, even though we might be worlds apart. We started with the odd album at lunchtime, then came up with some rules to add to our choices – the idea was to pick 5 albums by the same artist (their first, their last, the fans choice, the controversial choice and the wild card) and I coined the hashtag ‘5×1’ (for five by one) as a way of tying everything together. The comedian Michael Legge then suggested listening to every album by a particular group or artist at the rate of one a day, so we went through the discographies of Sparks, Gary Numan, Queen and eventually David Bowie, with the tag ‘BowieADay’ starting with ‘David Bowie’ and ending with ‘The Next Day’, the final album at the time.
We all loved Bowie, and so when we heard rumours that a new album was coming out we made plans to stay up after midnight to listen to it as soon as it was released. We laughed, we made jokes, we appreciated the joy of hearing something new and important from our Hero for the first time – it felt like a message from him straight to us and we all knew that we would be puzzling over the lyrics for a long time to come. What was with all of the references to him dying? What was a Blackstar anyway?
We went to bed happy that night, and then woke up two days later to the awful news that David Bowie was gone. We were numb with grief and clung together virtually to process how we felt.
I couldn’t face listening to Blackstar again for a long time – it was simply too painful to think that he knew he was dying as he wrote it. It took almost a year before we undertook another ‘BowieADay’ journey, knowing that this one had a final ending point.
The second time around was more poignant than the first, and I saw more of the connections that had always been there right from the very beginning to the bitter end. Of course there were Low points on the way and the second hearing of Blackstar was both agonising and cathartic, and the beginning of appreciating how much we lost on the day he died.
Of course, I’ve listened to Blackstar again in the ten years since then, but every time has felt like an occasion. It’s not an album to be streamed at random or added to playlists. It demands attention and ritual. To be listened to on the best speakers, with the lights dimmed and with full attention.
Our original ‘5×1’ group is now dispersed across different platforms, only sometimes reconnecting, but it’s not quite the same now. I have new friends in different places, but we still have common bonds in a love of music, and especially with this album that still holds a special place in my heart.
Rest in peace, Starman.”
If you haven’t yet heard this album, it’s waiting for you, whenever you’re ready. And, if you haven’t yet listened to Bowie’s full discography and aren’t sure where to start, perhaps check out our continuation of satsuma’s BowieADay that a few of us did last year, complete with a suggested schedule for what to listen to from January 8 through to the end of the month, including all the studio albums and some extras. I, for one, will be hiding in my Bowie playlist for the remainder of the month.
Thank you, Bowie.
- Mastodon/Fediverse usernames shown alongside their quotes. Nearly each participant submitted a single blurb, so some quotes have been split up to fit sections, and some have been very lightly edited for spelling/punctuation/capitalization. Many thanks again to the 20 Fedizens who took part (in alphabetical order): Anomnomnomaly, AnxietyDescending, austinross, avi_miller, BackFromTheDud, billyjoebowers, blogdiva, daria, evilchili, harriolkn, mathzy, NoRestfortheWicked, okohll, peach, RobeeShepherd, rothko, satsuma, serpicojam, soulforgotten, and theotherbrook. (For those with keen eyes but who may not know who is behind the keyboard, I don’t thank buffyleigh simply because that is me. And I know quoting myself is a bit hokey, but I am quoting what I’ve written elsewhere.) ↩︎
#Bowie #DavidBowie #DonnyMcCaslin #experimental #JasonLindner #jazz #ListenToThis #MarkGuiliana #music #musicDiscovery #rock #TimLefebvre
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CW: Bowie's Blackstar at 10 - A Fedi-sourced celebration of a masterpiece [CW'd for length]
Bowie’s ★ at 10
Our next spotlight is on number 299 on The List, submitted by HillardHouseDan. And because this is a big anniversary for an even bigger album, some Fedi friends[1] will be joining me today to collectively share our thoughts on its impact, and our memories of its release. For, on January 8, 2016 – David Bowie’s 69th birthday – Bowie released his 26th studio album, making today the 10th anniversary of the experimental jazz/rock masterpiece ★ aka Blackstar.
rothko: “TENTH?!”
daria: “…10 years???? HOW 😭“
blogdiva: “Shit. It’s already been 10 years?!?!?”
austinross: “Hard to believe it’s already been 10 years.”
peach: “As the general quality of modern music has decayed, one of the last great albums has reached a decade.”
And, as we all know, 2 days later, January 10, 2016, Bowie left us, succumbing to a cancer we didn’t know he had been fighting, making Blackstar – whether intentionally crafted to be or not – his swan song.
harriolkn: “I remember reading the news when I was at work and barely kept it together for the rest of the day. When I finally got home, and saw my partner at the time, we both just burst into tears and embraced each other without saying a word.”
buffyleigh: “When KEXP celebrated the release of ★ with ‘Intergalactic Bowie Day’ [on Friday, January 8, 2016], I instantly fell in love with the album, the first entire Bowie album I had listened to from beginning to end…I listened to the entire 12-hour tribute and planned on working my way through his discography, starting with picking up ★ on vinyl as soon as I could get down to my local record store, seeing as it felt wrong listening to the full album on YouTube, which someone had already posted. When I saw the news on Monday morning, I was stunned and disoriented…called in sick and went to my local record store to stand there and be sad with everyone else.”
The summer of 2014 was both when Bowie first received his diagnosis and when he began demoing songs that would appear on Blackstar and in his musical Lazarus. During the 2015 recording sessions, the cancer was treated, went into remission, and – in November, around the making of the music video for “Lazarus” – returned with a status of terminal. And so, though Bowie had continued writing and recording, planning both a follow-up to Blackstar and another musical, he was facing his mortality head-on the entire time he was creating this album, living with the knowledge that this could very well be the last album he made, that it could be the last statement from an artist known for making a statement with everything he did.
Given this context and the fact that many heard the album for the first time literally just before or just after hearing the news, it’s essentially impossible for the listener to separate their experience and interpretation of Blackstar from Bowie’s death. Even without over-analyzing it all, it’s easy to notice that the album’s lyrics are full of references to death and dying, and that its atmosphere is melancholic and existential at the very least, if not downright foreboding. And the brilliant music videos for the singles “Blackstar” (single and video released November 19, 2015) and “Lazarus” (single released December 17, 2015; video released January 7, 2016)? Well, they’re both chock-full of more symbolism and self-referential imagery a Bowie fanatic could shake a stick at, simply encouraging – nay, inviting – the viewer to read absolutely anything and everything into them.
billyjoebowers: “When the ‘Blackstar’ video came out I remember talking with a friend about how interesting but weird it was, and being kind of amused and confused by it. Then he died, and the ‘Lazarus’ video, and it was like ‘Oh shit!’. Like a punch in the gut. An amazing work, I listened to it non-stop for months, but not for several months after, it was too raw.”
Anomnomnomaly: “To me, the album felt like he was writing his obituary in a lot of the lyrics. So when he passed away shortly after, the whole album started to make a lot more sense for me.”
BackFromTheDud: “@Anomnomnomaly Agree. He knew the end was near, and it shows.”
But, even if our experience of the album is coloured by this context, that by no means takes away from the brilliance of this album.
If we had been fortunate enough to get another Bowie album or two or six after it, Blackstar would remain an absolute standout in his eclectic discography. It was unlike anything Bowie had ever done. Even just Bowie’s decision to not have any familiar faces in the backing band but rather to hire a pre-existing group (i.e., Donny McCaslin’s quartet with Jason Lindner, Tim Lefebvre, and Mark Guiliana) – and a jazz quartet at that! – was a stunning move. That move alone, particularly given what must have been a strong sense of urgency to realize the music Bowie still wanted to get out before it was too late, could’ve made them all rush, cut corners, make compromises. But, instead, the gamble of working with musicians who were new to Bowie’s processes and methods – musicians from a corner of the music world that Bowie had not yet visited – paid off in spades. The result was that the album showcased once again Bowie’s awe-inducing drive to always push himself further and further, even when just shy of 70 years old – never afraid to try something new, never calling it in, and never wanting to rest on his long-before well-earned laurels, all for the love of music, art, and artistry.
Its context simply drew deserved attention to Blackstar much sooner than it might’ve in other circumstances, immediately cementing its status as a masterpiece rather than it taking people a beat or two to grasp what this genius had just dropped into our laps. Indeed, its context ultimately made David Bowie-the-performer the most human he had ever been, in some ways making this album – an otherwise rather experimental if not challenging musical work – perhaps the easiest in his entire oeuvre for people to instantly connect with, in one way or another.
AnxietyDescending: “Released at the same time of Bowie’s passing, Blackstar was a bittersweet release. At first listen it was obviously a masterpiece but that joy was tempered by the fact that it would be Bowie’s last.”
mathzy: “It was going to be one of his masterpieces anyway. And then it was released virtually on the date of his death. My reaction was this was a legend and he put all his legendary artistic endeavour into it. Gorgeous, dark, brooding, triumphant.”
soulforgotten: “Blackstar was a really hard one for me to listen to. Bowie passed away before I got the chance to listen to the album and his death was especially crushing for me and my wife. As much as I wanted to take the album for a spin, I just couldn’t at the time. It was years later that I finally took the opportunity to listen to it, and it was an almost 50/50 split of regret (leaving so long to hear it) and admiration for his final album. It is a solid bookend to an amazing legacy.”
okohll: “Bowie at his best, I’m really glad he managed to pull off a master-work to bow out with. Evokes something strange, extra-worldly, profound yet at the same time can’t escape the Bowie-like elements of fun. He had the gift of being able to make something both unique and banging. Mention must be made of the collection of musicians he pulled together – the drumming is absolutely amazing for example. The success is that the whole is even greater than the sum of the parts.”
serpicojam: “I had been a fan of Mark Giuliana’s (and the rest of the folks on the LP who’d worked with Donny McCaslin) long before Blackstar was released, and I really appreciated his influence on the songs. ‘Sue (Or In A Season Of Crime)’ is so dark, but it’s such a masterpiece. I should probably revisit the whole album again.”
evilchili: “Blackstar is astonishing in its ambition: here is a record that is both polemic and meditation, defiantly rejecting endings while saying goodbye, a grand finale and also the start of a new creative direction we will never get to follow. Throughout his career Bowie never told us everything, but he would give us glimpses, and Blackstar is no different: deeply personal, but only to a point. It’s true, but it’s an ambiguous truth. It’s wry and winking and earnest all at once. And full of swagger! It’s a considered, intentional final work by a dying man who is not afraid to remind us precisely how good he is.
‘You’re a flash in the pan
I am the great I AM'”No matter the whys and wherefores, upon its release 10 years ago, Blackstar became an important album for many of us, whether it changed how we approached the rest of Bowie’s discography, how we approached or viewed modern music in general, even how we played our own music.
NoRestfortheWicked: “Personally, it opened for me more of the David Bowie albums like Low. Also I like the aesthetic of this album and videos. ‘Blackstar’ like a sci-fi film, ‘Lazarus’ has an almost prophetic feeling of a dying man on his bed. For me, it was something new to find, and it expanded my musical taste a lot.”
RobeeShepherd: “I know some huge Bowie fans, so I’ve been exposed to his work, but for me whilst I love his earlier stuff he felt irrelevant to me as a music fan after ‘Absolute Beginners’. I’ve dipped in a little since then and nothing grabbed me, until Blackstar. That didn’t pull me in, it sucked me in and I played it on repeat for months.”
buffyleigh: “I became a fan THE DAY Blackstar came out, listened to Bowie all that Friday and weekend. And then Monday happened. So I was a fan of all of 3 entire days and yet it totally knocked the wind out of me. And I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that changed how I approach music. I listened to ONLY Bowie for months after that, only broken by Prince dying and then I only listened to Bowie and Prince for another few months. I never did deep dives before that, or re-evaluated my feeling on artists I had written off long before. And now that’s what takes up most of my listening time.”
billyjoebowers: “I worked with a band and thought I heard something with the drummer. ‘Have you listened to Blackstar?’ He laughed and said ‘Yeah, non stop’. I could hear it in the change in his playing.”
And, for some, it remains an album that still profoundly affects us in one way or another, even when it’s not playing. It’s approached reverentially, not just as a memorial for its artist but perhaps of something larger that we’ve all lost.
daria: “I can’t remember when I heard it last time, it’s an emotionally difficult album for me.”
avi_miller: “Blackstar is an album like no other. It will forever be tinged with emotions for me from Bowie’s passing, and I don’t think that is a bad thing. Sometimes I put it on and cry a little.”
harriolkn: “Blackstar is probably my favourite Bowie album but I can’t listen to it very often because it makes me feel more sad than any other music.”
buffyleigh: “I will never get over this album, and feel like every single note of it is totally ingrained in my brain. I literally have never listened to this without crying…is perhaps the first/only record in my collection I would consider sacred (in a non-religious sense). It’s also my least listened to favourite album because I never want it to become background music, and each listen is almost a rite. I essentially only put it on for Bowiemas/Bowienalia.”
austinross: “It is a life-changing album.”
theotherbrook: “I wish I could come up with something meaningful to say, but when I think about that album the nerves are still too raw for me to touch. I know I’m not alone in having an irrational sense that our collective orbit entered a state of rapid decay with Bowie’s death. It is — it must be — coincidental. But still. Leaving us Blackstar wasn’t just writing his own epitaph, but also leaving us a marker for that moment when we could no longer ignore how unstable the trajectory we were on had become. I don’t know… I meant to say I have nothing to say but then I said that.”
At the very least, whether Blackstar is among your favourite Bowie albums (or favourite albums, period) or not, for 40+ years the release of a new Bowie album was a cultural event, and this album was certainly among the biggest of them all if not THE biggest. In the age of the Internet (and so, Bowie’s last five albums, starting with the 1999 release ‘hours…’), such events have brought together people from literally all over the world, from all walks of life, to share in a piece of sonic art that brought beauty, comfort, wonder, and escape. Given the times we live in, where connection is perhaps more important than ever, that this was the last Bowie event we could ever share in, could bond over, could disappear into, is in itself something to be remembered and mourned.
satsuma: “Back in the day, Twitter used to be a friendly place where you could connect with a group of friends to chat about anything that took your fancy. You would accumulate loose networks of common interests with people across the internet, and occasionally closer bonds would form. One such group consisted of people who had realised that if we picked an album and all hit play at the agreed time, then that meant we could share our experiences of listening to music together, even though we might be worlds apart. We started with the odd album at lunchtime, then came up with some rules to add to our choices – the idea was to pick 5 albums by the same artist (their first, their last, the fans choice, the controversial choice and the wild card) and I coined the hashtag ‘5×1’ (for five by one) as a way of tying everything together. The comedian Michael Legge then suggested listening to every album by a particular group or artist at the rate of one a day, so we went through the discographies of Sparks, Gary Numan, Queen and eventually David Bowie, with the tag ‘BowieADay’ starting with ‘David Bowie’ and ending with ‘The Next Day’, the final album at the time.
We all loved Bowie, and so when we heard rumours that a new album was coming out we made plans to stay up after midnight to listen to it as soon as it was released. We laughed, we made jokes, we appreciated the joy of hearing something new and important from our Hero for the first time – it felt like a message from him straight to us and we all knew that we would be puzzling over the lyrics for a long time to come. What was with all of the references to him dying? What was a Blackstar anyway?
We went to bed happy that night, and then woke up two days later to the awful news that David Bowie was gone. We were numb with grief and clung together virtually to process how we felt.
I couldn’t face listening to Blackstar again for a long time – it was simply too painful to think that he knew he was dying as he wrote it. It took almost a year before we undertook another ‘BowieADay’ journey, knowing that this one had a final ending point.
The second time around was more poignant than the first, and I saw more of the connections that had always been there right from the very beginning to the bitter end. Of course there were Low points on the way and the second hearing of Blackstar was both agonising and cathartic, and the beginning of appreciating how much we lost on the day he died.
Of course, I’ve listened to Blackstar again in the ten years since then, but every time has felt like an occasion. It’s not an album to be streamed at random or added to playlists. It demands attention and ritual. To be listened to on the best speakers, with the lights dimmed and with full attention.
Our original ‘5×1’ group is now dispersed across different platforms, only sometimes reconnecting, but it’s not quite the same now. I have new friends in different places, but we still have common bonds in a love of music, and especially with this album that still holds a special place in my heart.
Rest in peace, Starman.”
If you haven’t yet heard this album, it’s waiting for you, whenever you’re ready. And, if you haven’t yet listened to Bowie’s full discography and aren’t sure where to start, perhaps check out our continuation of satsuma’s BowieADay that a few of us did last year, complete with a suggested schedule for what to listen to from January 8 through to the end of the month, including all the studio albums and some extras. I, for one, will be hiding in my Bowie playlist for the remainder of the month.
Thank you, Bowie.
- Mastodon/Fediverse usernames shown alongside their quotes. Nearly each participant submitted a single blurb, so some quotes have been split up to fit sections, and some have been very lightly edited for spelling/punctuation/capitalization. Many thanks again to the 20 Fedizens who took part (in alphabetical order): Anomnomnomaly, AnxietyDescending, austinross, avi_miller, BackFromTheDud, billyjoebowers, blogdiva, daria, evilchili, harriolkn, mathzy, NoRestfortheWicked, okohll, peach, RobeeShepherd, rothko, satsuma, serpicojam, soulforgotten, and theotherbrook. (For those with keen eyes but who may not know who is behind the keyboard, I don’t thank buffyleigh simply because that is me. And I know quoting myself is a bit hokey, but I am quoting what I’ve written elsewhere.) ↩︎
#Bowie #DavidBowie #DonnyMcCaslin #experimental #JasonLindner #jazz #ListenToThis #MarkGuiliana #music #musicDiscovery #rock #TimLefebvre
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Fediverse AOTY List – So Fedi, what albums got your attention in 2025?
Edit: The deadline has now passed and the final group list is now up, here. Enjoy!
Hey, so once again we’re compiling a Fediverse-wide, community-sourced Albums-of-The-Year (AOTY) list, of the albums – from any year – that rocked our worlds and got us through the last 12 months!
About 60 of us joined in last year and people seemed to like the idea of doing another round this year, so here we are! The call is open from now until the end of the year, then around New Years I’ll do up a blog post here with the final list, complete with links to find the albums. You in?
The Rules:
- Anyone with an account in the Fediverse (e.g., Mastodon) can participate. I’ll include each submitter’s username in the final list, leaving off the instance unless asked to keep it in (e.g., mine will be tagged just “buffyleigh”).
- Reply to this post (or the parallel toot on the 1001 Other Albums linernotes.club account) with your top album(s) of the year, to a maximum of 3 per person. I also accept emails ([email protected]) if you include your Fediverse username, or DMs to the linernotes.club account. (Note that, if you’re reading this in the Fediverse, this automated account cannot accept DMs.)
- “Top” is absolutely however you want to define it – favourite, most listened to, most personally important, most thought about, most surprising find, representative of an artist you really got into, etc.
- “Of the year” does not have to mean the album was released in 2025. Your submissions can come from any year, so long as it was key in your 2025 listening.
- The final list won’t be ranked or voted on, and will simply be ordered alphabetically. Multiple entries for the same album are most welcome and will be noted in the final list.
- Notes/reasons for your picks aren’t necessary but totally welcome, and if included with your submission, I’ll probably put them in the footnotes like last year.
We’ll see you back here in a couple weeks! Until then, hope you’re all enjoying AOTY season and (re)finding some great albums to get you through the rest of the year.
P.S. Unfamiliar with the 1001 Other Albums project? Check out this post, and The List. We’re still taking submissions for The List, so if there’s an album you feel everyone should hear that isn’t yet included, please let me know!
#Musodon #AOTY #AOTY2025 #AskFedi #BestOf2025 #ListenToThis #music #musicDiscovery #YearInReview
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CW: Albums the Fediverse Loved in 2025 (CW'd because it's a looooooong post)
Albums the Fediverse Loved in 2025
And here we have it: a list of 151 albums (plus a few artists/labels in general) that kept 64 of us going in 2025, nearly 75% of those 2025 releases and the rest earlier gems! Given our collective eclectic tastes, voting/ranking was not attempted, but bolded titles and post tags indicate albums that were submitted by multiple Fedizens. Genre tags are included as tasting notes (apologies if I got any wrong), each title is linked to its Bandcamp/Songlink when possible, and footnotes list who submitted each album along with extra comments they included (warning: comments may include MOAR ALBUMS; also note: footnotes look way better on the blog). So, click and listen away – perhaps you’ll find a new-to-you album that gets you through 2026!
Thanks so much to the Fedizens who joined in, it’s so nice to see familiar faces from the 1001 Other Albums project as well as some new ones! And, as always, it’s lovely to get a glimpse of how diverse our tastes in music are, and to see people trying something new solely based on a random Fedi recommendation. The Fedi music community truly is a bright spot, and I personally am immensely grateful for it. 🙏🏻
Band – Title (year released, place of origin; genre)footnote
Action/Adventure – Ever After (2025, US; pop-punk)1
AFI – Silver Bleeds the Black Sun… (2025, US; post-punk, gothic rock)2
Against Me! – White Crosses (2010, US; punk rock)3
Alkaline Trio – Blood, Hair, and Eyeballs (2024, US; punk rock)4
Am I in Trouble? – Spectrum (2025, US; avant-garde black metal)5
Ami Taf Ra – The Prophet and the Madman (2025, US/Morocco; Moroccan gnawa, gospel, jazz)6
An Abstract Illusion – Woe (2022, Sweden; atmospheric black/death/prog metal)7
Analog Africa (label, in general) (1960s-80s, Africa; reissues)8
Anna Tivel – Animal Poem (2025, US; indie folk)9
Archon Satani – The Righteous Way to Completion (1997, Sweden; death ambient/black industrial)10
Ashbreather – La Grande Bouffe (2025, Canada; progressive sludge/death metal)11
Au4 – …And Down Goes The Sky (2013, Canada; prog rock)12
aya – hexed! (2025, UK; electronic, noise)13
Bad Cop/Bad Cop – Lighten Up (2025, US; punk rock)14
Baghed – Smear Campaign (2025, US; punk rock)15
Bank Myna – Eimuria (2025, France; post-rock/metal, doom gaze, slow core)16
Belle and Sebastian – Push Barman to Open Old Wounds (2005, Scotland; indie pop)17
Benedicte Maurseth – Mirra (2025, Norway; folk, jazz)18
Bill Frisell – Harmony (2019, US; folk-jazz)19
Black Flower – Kinetic (2025, Belgium; Ethio-jazz, Afrobeat, dub)20
Bon Iver – SABLE, fABLE (2025, US; indie folk/pop)21
Brittany Davis – Black Thunder (2025, US; cosmic jazz, r&b/soul, singer-songwriter)22
CA7RIEL & Paco Amoroso – Papota (2025, Argentina; experimental trap, hip-hop, EDM, jazz, Latin pop)23
Caroline Shaw / Attacca Quartet – Orange (2019, US; classical, ambient, folk)24
Castle Rat – The Bestiary (2025, US; fantasy heavy metal)25
Causa Sui – Pewt’r Sessions 1 (2011, Denmark; psych/stoner rock)26
Celeste – Woman of Faces (2025, UK; neo-soul, jazz, singer-songwriter)27
Charlie Hunter, Carter McLean featuring Silvana Estrada – s/t (2018, US/Mexico; jazz)28
Circuit des Yeux – Halo on the Inside (2025, US; singer-songwriter, experimental)29
Civic – Chrome Dipped (2025, Australia; punk)30
clipping – Dead Channel Sky (2025, US; hip-hop)31
Dan Mangan – Natural Light (2025, Canada; indie rock/folk)32
Daniela Pas – Spira (2023, Italy; singer-songwriter, electronic, experimental)33
Data Rebel – Single Cell (2025, UK; electronic, IDM, ambient)34
Dax Riggs – 7 Songs for Spiders (2025, US; blues metal/shoegaze blues)35
Deafheaven – Lonely People With Power (2025, US; blackgaze, metal)36
Degraved – Spectral Realm of Ruin (2025, US; death metal)37
Delobos – Cabal (2025, Spain; post-alt rock, post-rock, psychedelia)38
Devil ANTHEM. – Profound Rebuild (2025, Japan; J-pop)39
Die Spitz – Something to Consume (2025, US; punk, alt rock)40
Divide and Dissolve – Insatiable (2025, Australia; doom, drone, neo classical)41
Dödsrit – Mortal Coil (2021, Sweden; atmospheric/melodic black metal, blackened crust)42
Dool – The Shape of Fluidity (2024, Netherlands; rock, alternative)43
downy – 8th Album/Untitled (2025, Japan; math rock/post-rock)44
Drab Majesty – Completely Careless (2012-2015) (2016, US; darkwave, shoegaze, dream pop)45
Dropkick Murphy – For The People (2025, US; Celtic punk)46
Eikichi Yazawa – I believe (2025, Japan; rock)47
El Pino & The Volunteers – The Long-lost Art of Becoming Invisible (2009, Netherlands; alt country/folk)48
Elli De Mon – Raìse (2025, Italy; blues, dialect, garage, psychedelic)49
Eric Church – Evangeline vs. The Machine (2025, US; country)50
Ethmebb – Allo Babar et les Caramboleurs (2025, France; progressive melodic blackened death power metal)51
Ex-Vöid – In Love Again (2025, UK; indie pop/rock)52
EYES – Spinner(2025, Denmark; hardcore, noise rock)53
FACS – Wish Defense (2025, US; noise rock, neo-post-punk)54
Faetooth – Labrynthine (2025, US; fairy doom/stoner metal)55
False Aralia (label) – ALL the new 12-inch singles (2025, US; abstract electronic)56
Fever Ray – The Year of the Radical Romantics (2025, Sweden; experimental, electronic, pop)57
FOKALITE – Fokas, Lite & Four Shooting Riddles (2025, Japan; J-pop)58
Françoise Hardy – La question (1971, France; French pop, Brazilian saudade/bossa nova)59
Fust – Big Ugly (2025, US; rock)60
Geese – Getting Killed (2025, US; art/experimental rock)61
Gnome – King (2022, Belgium; stoner/prog/hard rock)62
Habak – Mil orquídeas en medio del desierto (2025, Mexico; melodic crust)63
Hallelujah the Hills – DECK (2025, US; indie rock)64
HANABIE – Bucchigiri Tokyo (2024, Japan; metalcore)65
Hatchie – Liquorice (2025, Australia; indie/dream pop)66
Hole – Live Through This (1994, US; alt rock)67
IAN – Come On Everybody, Let’s Do Nothing! (2025, UK; experimental, post-rock/metal)68
Igorrr – Amen (2025, France; experimental/avant-garde metal)69
Imperial Triumphant – Goldstar (2025, US; experimental metal)70
In the Womb of the Universe – Searching for Sunrise (2024, US; electronic, synthpop)71
In the Woods… – Otra (2025, Norway; avant-garde metal)72
Insomnium – Shadows of the Dying Sun (2014, Finland; melodic death metal)73
Jade Bird – Who Wants to Talk About Love (2025, UK; folk rock, singer-songwriter)74
JER – Death of the Heart (2025, US; ska punk)75
Jethro Tull – Thick as a Brick (1972, UK; prog rock)76
Judas Priest – Invincible Shield (2024, UK; heavy metal)77
Just Mustard – We Were Just Here (2025, Ireland; post-punk, noise, shoegaze, trip hop)78
Kaku P-Model – unZIP (2025, Japan; experimental, electronic)79
Kieran Hebden and William Tyler – 41 Longfield Street Late ‘80s (2025, UK; electronic)80
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Float Along – Fill Your Lungs (2013, Australia; psychedelic pop)81
Kostnatění – Přílišnost (2025, US; avant-garde black metal)82
Küenring – In Search of Paradise (2025, Austria; heavy metal/hard rock)83
L.A. Salami (artist, in general) (UK; folk, post-modern blues, acoustic, rock)84
Labyrinthus Stellarum – Rift in Reality (2025, Ukraine; atmospheric/cosmic black metal)85
Lorien Testard – Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Original Soundtrack) (2025, France; soundtrack)86
Lorna Shore – I Feel The Everblack Festering Within Me (2025, US; death metal/deathcore)87
Lucy Dacus – Forever is a Feeling (2025, US; indie rock, folk-pop, singer-songwriter)88
Maeror Tri – Multiple Personality Disorder (1993, Germany; ambient, noise, drone)89
Mark Ernestus’ Ndagga Rhythm Force – Khadim (2025, Germany/Senegal; mbalax, experimental, dub techno)90
Marshall Allen – New Dawn (2025, US; avant-garde jazz)91
Max Cooper – On Being (2025, UK; electronic, ambient, avant-garde)92
Messa – The Spin (2025, Italy; doom metal)93
Michel Legrand – The Essential Michel Legrand Film Music Collection (2005, France; soundtrack, compilation)94
MIKE – Showbiz! (2025, US; hip-hop/rap)95
Miynt – Rain Money Dogs (2025, Sweden; indie/bedroom rock)96
Modern English – Mesh & Lace (1981, UK; post-punk)97
Momma – Welcome to My Blue Sky (2025, US; alt/indie rock)98
more eaze & claire rousay – no floor (2025, US; experimental, ambient, avant-pop, sound collage)99
Moron Police – Pachinko (2025, Norway; concept album)100
Morris Kolontyrsky – Origination (2025, US; ambient, drone, experimental)101
Nærværet – Når Man Ser Inn I En Annens Hjerte (2024, Sweden/Norway; experimental, field recording, tape manipulation/loops)102
Nailed to Obscurity – Generation of The Void (2025, Germany; melodic/prog death/doom metal)103
Nicolas Gombert & James Weeks / Apartment House – G O M B E R T (2025, Flanders/UK; contemporary classical)104
Nora Brown and Stephanie Coleman – Lady of the Lake (2023, US; folk)105
Nout – Live Album (2024, France; alternative, punk, rock, jazz, noise)106
Olga Anna Markowska – Iskra (2025, Poland; modern classical, ambient)107
Ozzy Osbourne – Ozzmosis (1995, UK; heavy metal)108
Pino Palladino & Blake Mills – That Wasn’t a Dream (2025, Wales/US; experimental jazz)109
Point Mort – Le Point de Non-retour (2025, France; blackened crust postcore)110
Plague of Carcosa – In The Dreamless Deep (2025, US; doomnoise, experimental metal)111
Population II – Maintenant Jamais (2025, Canada; art/prog/psychedelic rock)112
Primal Scream – XTRMNTR (2000, Scotland; experimental electro-rock)113
Priscilla Block – Things You Didn’t See (2025, US; country, singer-songwriter)114
Psychonaut – World Maker (2025, Belgium; post-metal)115
Queens of the Stone Age – Alive in the Catacombs (2025, US; rock)116
Radiopuhelimet – Kosminen Tiedottomuus (2020, Finland; alt rock)117
Rebecca Foon & Aliayta Foon-Dancoes – Reverie (2025, Canada; modern classical)118
Rivers of Nihil – s/t (2025, US; death/prog metal)119
Rogue Jones – Dos Bebés (2023, Wales; folk, indie pop)120
Shayfer James – Summoning (2025, US; noir-pop, dark cabaret)121
Shedfromthebody – Whisper and Wane (2025, Finland; doomgaze, [post-]metal)122
Shepherds of Cassini – In Thrall to Heresy (2025, New Zealand; prog metal)123
Silvana Estrada – Vendrán Suaves Lluvias (2025, Mexico; singer-songwriter)124
Silvana Estrada (with Charlie Hunter) – Lo Sagrado (2017, Mexico/US; singer-songwriter)125
Širom – In the Wind of Night, Hard-Fallen Incantations Whisper (2025, Slovenia; instrumental avant-garde imaginary folk)126
SKC & The Poem – s/t (2025, Belgium; alt/folk rock)127
SKLOSS – The Pattern Speaks (2025, US/Scotland; space gaze, post-metal)128
Soulwax – All Systems Are Lying (2025, Belgium; electronic alt rock)129
Spiritbox – Tsunami Sea (2025, Canada; metalcore)130
State Azure – The Light That Remains (2025, UK; electronica, ambient, downtempo)131
Stereolab – Switched On Volumes 1-5 (2024, UK/France; avant-pop)132
Steve Tibbetts – Close (2025, US; jazz fusion)133
Stick To Your Guns – Keep Planting Flowers (2025, US; hardcore)134
Suede – Antidepressants (2025, UK; post-punk, gothic rock)135
Summer Walker – Finally Over It (2025, US; R&B, singer-songwriter)136
Susan Bear – Algorithmic Mood Music (2024, Scotland; electronic, alt-pop)137
Swansea Sound – Twentieth Century (2023, Wales; indie pop)138
TDJ (artist, in general) (Canada; electronic)139
Terveet Kädet – Lapin Helvetti (2015, Finland; hardcore punk)140
Tool – Lateralus (2001, US; prog rock/metal, art rock)141
The Bug Club – “Have U Ever Been 2 Wales” (2025, Wales; indie rock)142
The New Eves – The New Eve Is Rising (2025, UK; avant-garde/art rock)143
Trio del Mango – Cómelo (2025, US/Puerto Rico; experimental, noise)144
Turnstile – Never Enough (2025, US; alt rock)145
UNIVERSITY – McCartney, It’ll Be OK (2025, UK; punk, noise rock)146
Water Damage – Instruments (2025, US; experimental psych/drone-rock)147
Weakened Friends – Feels Like Hell (2025, US; indie rock)148
Weirs – Diamond Grove (2025, US; trad folk, experimental noise)149
Wet Leg – moisturizer (2025, UK; indie rock)150
White Lies – Five V2 (2019, UK; post-punk)151
X-Cetra – Summer 2000 (Y2K 25th Anniversary Edition) (2025, US; sleepover core, dance-pop)152
Yara Asmar – everyone I love is sleeping and I love them so so much (2025, Lebanon; modern classical/ambient)153
Yugen Blakrok – Anima Mysterium (2019, South Africa; hip-hop)154
Yws Gwynedd – Codi/ \Cysgu (2014, Wales; indie rock)155
Footnote Number. Fediverse username(s): Comments
- poisonous ↩︎
- buffyleigh: My emotional support album of the year. I’ve been a fan of AFI since 2000 but haven’t liked an album since 2006. The second I heard the first single “Behind The Clock”, my expectations for this album skyrocketed, and they were absolutely exceeded. It sounds nothing like anything they’ve ever done, and yet it feels like this was the album they’ve always been moving towards. Song of the year goes to the entirety of side A, and Davey Havok’s unexpectedly different sound on this album is my overall favourite vocal performance of year. ↩︎
- Braininabowl ↩︎
- umrk: top album requested by my kids in the car this year ↩︎
- brh ↩︎
- RolloTreadway: The most gloriously unhinged album I’ve heard this year. Twists together ideas from everywhere without the slightest consideration of whether doing so might be normal or accepted. The kind of album where a classic French chanson or some deep filthy funk just appears out of nowhere and then is never referred to again. It shouldn’t work but it absolutely does. ↩︎
- gavin57: That last one is an all-timer. It’s astonishing. ↩︎
- platenworm ↩︎
- rachelcholst ↩︎
- 3rik: This has been a year for nighttime music and music for trying to sleep. ↩︎
- swampgas: definitely my most played this year. A sludgy, deathdoom concept album about greed and gluttony and corruption thats riffy and groovy af. These are driving rhythms that chug hard! ↩︎
- MichaelMcWilliams: The one album that tops my list this year also appears in the 1001 Other Albums list. Band website offering free download of the album: https://au4.ca ↩︎
- brh ↩︎
- poisonous ↩︎
- jake4480 ↩︎
- mbr ↩︎
- riff: Most “Wait why did i never listen to this band before ?” of the year. ↩︎
- keefeglise ↩︎
- eamonn ↩︎
- _slotek_ ↩︎
- onuryasar: My kind of, very balanced Indie Pop: just the right amount of Indie but not too much and just the right amount of Pop but not too much 🙂 ↩︎
- icastico ↩︎
- santialone ↩︎
- eamonn ↩︎
- burnitdown || MetalheadDana ↩︎
- cloudtripper: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_e5kKzlFqU&list=RD8_e5kKzlFqU&start_radio=1 ↩︎
- nevar23 ↩︎
- debonaire: Recency bias is pushing me to three Silvana Estrada albums. I love her voice, I love the music, I love her with Charlie Hunter. ↩︎
- otherdog ↩︎
- fistfulofdave: Aussie punk in the vein of The Saints and Radio Birdman. ↩︎
- rothko ↩︎
- Chigaze: what happens when four guys to go a cottage in Ontario, find a flow state, and record an album over a few days. I got to see them play the album through at the Winspear in Edmonton and it’s way up there on my concert experience list. ↩︎
- evilchili: The Italian singer and composer’s debut is a hypnotic journey of loops, bloops, and dramatic and impassioned vocalizations. ↩︎
- nellie_m ↩︎
- fistfulofdave: Blues metal? Shoegaze blues? I don’t know or care, I like it. ↩︎
- tym || niels ↩︎
- jake4480 ↩︎
- santialone ↩︎
- Kingu ↩︎
- tym || demon6 ↩︎
- otherdog ↩︎
- MetalheadDana: I listened to this album when it first came out in 2021 but for some reason it didn’t click with me. But apparently 2021 Dana had horrible taste in music, because in early 2025 I randomly tried Dodsrit – Mortal Coil again and fell in love and have been obsessed with it all year, it’s the perfect blend of crust punk and black metal and I love it. ↩︎
- TG_Esq ↩︎
- rustynail ↩︎
- alicemcalicepants ↩︎
- Chigaze: nails it just as a solid Dropkick’s album but goes farther with songs made for the times. “Who’ll Stand With Us” and “School Days Over” are amazing workers songs while “Chesterfields and Aftershave” takes me back to my own grandfather. ↩︎
- thesinkingbelle ↩︎
- Braininabowl ↩︎
- riff: Most listened this year. ↩︎
- Mark52 ↩︎
- Moss ↩︎
- e (eva) ↩︎
- steveroyle: Leaving out Never Enough by Turnstile as I’m sure that’ll get plenty of votes. ↩︎
- fistfulofdave: Angular, noise rock, neo-post punk. Unsettling, laid-back, yet aggressive. And yes it was the last album Steve Albini recorded. ↩︎
- MetalheadDana || demon6 ↩︎
- soundclamp: Runner-ups – https://lineimprint.bandcamp.com/album/muzak-for-the-encouragement-of-unproductivity; https://myheartaninvertedflame.bandcamp.com/album/my-heart-an-inverted-flame-apparitions-split; https://timbarnes.bandcamp.com/album/lost-words-1 ↩︎
- buffyleigh: I’ve known of Fever Ray since first seeing the TV show Vikings, but I for some reason didn’t check them out further until this year, when their s/t album came up for a blog post. I was floored. As it happens, their kinda sorta live album was set to come out soon after my first listen of the s/t, so I got caught up on the full Karin Dreijer discography, got super duper obsessed with their spectacular ARTE concert (which is essentially the same versions performed on the new album), and proceeded to be immensely inspired – nay, awakened – by this artist. ↩︎
- Kingu ↩︎
- onuryasar: I’ve first discovered the song Apocalypse by Cigarettes After Sex (I know, late comer), which brought me to Greg Gonzalez’s Wikipedia page, that says “Gonzalez was heavily inspired by French singer Françoise Hardy and her album La question”. I remember this album being mentioned in my Fedi timeline recently, so I gave it a spin and it turned on and on for the remainder of the year. [Editor’s note: Also see the 1001 OA spotlight on this album from earlier this year!] ↩︎
- rachelcholst ↩︎
- mynameistillian ↩︎
- burnitdown ↩︎
- demon6 ↩︎
- donutage: I was a bit skeptical of this, and sure, in a 52-song project there’s some unevenness, but between the sheer audacity of the attempt & the frequent successes it scores, definitely one of the more remarkable records of the year. ↩︎
- Tak ↩︎
- e (eva) ↩︎
- Lizahadiz ↩︎
- mbr ↩︎
- brh ↩︎
- umrk: my fav album released in 2025 ↩︎
- superflippy ↩︎
- raisedfist ↩︎
- gavin57 ↩︎
- Mark52: Jade Bird has been by far my most listened to album this year. ↩︎
- poisonous ↩︎
- derthomas: I kept coming back to this album because it just fits every mood. It’s peak Jethro Tull if you ask me, it’s perfect in any way. Also the Steven Wilson Remaster sounds incredible. ↩︎
- burnitdown ↩︎
- jebeyer: a longer list is here – https://www.buymusic.club/list/whistlingkitty-some-of-my-favorite-2025-releases ↩︎
- thesinkingbelle: honorable mentions – Scare – In The End, Was It Worth It; Creatvre – Toujours Humain ; Guck – Gucked Up ; AVTT/PTTN – AVTT/PTTN; Saor – Amidst the Ruins ; Jessica93 – 666 tours de periph’ ; Deadguy – Near-Death Travel Services; LS Dunes – Violet; Aesop Rock – I Heard It’s A Mess There Too ; Fishbone – Stockholm Syndrome ; Dead Pioneers – Po$t American ; Ethereal Wound – Defile | Demise; Sci Fi Industries – Initial States ↩︎
- soundclamp ↩︎
- cloudtripper ↩︎
- rustynail ↩︎
- derthomas: My AOTY from a very underground Heavy Metal band from Austria. ↩︎
- platenworm ↩︎
- raisedfist ↩︎
- thesinkingbelle ↩︎
- t4s: Honorable mentions – The Halo Effect, Machine Head, Heaven Shall Burn, Spiritbox, Jinjer, Allegaeon ↩︎
- rachelcholst ↩︎
- 3rik ↩︎
- Wintergr33n: Percussion-driven music from Senegal on a self-released album: https://ra.co/news/82509. ↩︎
- platenworm: 5 things that ruled my world musically this year:
– The Analog Africa Label
– The Artist L.A. Salami
– The knowledge that you can have too much music
– The knowledge that you can make your solo debut album when you are 100 years old……Hail Hail Marshall Allen
– And that everybody loved Ozzy ↩︎ - nellie_m: The music project that somehow touched me most deeply was the result of two years of work by Max Cooper. „Powerful works of art have traditionally sprung from some source deep within an artist and, if they strike the right tone, resonate with an audience to leave a lasting mark. But what if that equation were reversed: what if an artist were to draw their inspiration from deep within their audience, and use that to reflect those ideas, emotions, hopes, fears, pains and aspirations back to us?…“ ↩︎
- niels || TG_Esq || sentynel || otherdog || umrk ↩︎
- eamonn ↩︎
- jake4480 ↩︎
- steveroyle ↩︎
- alicemcalicepants ↩︎
- BramMeehan ↩︎
- avi_miller: All three fall into the more ambient realm, and they all are absolutely phenomenal. I love music that is based more around textures and creating a mood than creating a melody, and this year had some really good ones. ↩︎
- niels ↩︎
- TG_Esq ↩︎
- 3rik ↩︎
- raisedfist ↩︎
- keefeglise: Compositions by Nicholas Gombert and James Weeks. Performed by Apartment House. Flanders/UK. Contemporary Classical (Debatable! Gombert died in 1560.) ↩︎
- evilchili: Two hipster kids from Brooklyn play 100 year old Appalachian folk tunes and make them come alive. Honest, reverential, and true. ↩︎
- riff: “Instantly burned in my brain” this year (well, it was actually their KEXP session from april that blew my mind, but since i have to submit an album, it’ll do nicely 🙂 ). ↩︎
- avi_miller ↩︎
- derthomas: I discovered this album this year on a metal journey (yeah, late to the party) and I loved it. It’s my favourite Ozzy album. ↩︎
- _slotek_ ↩︎
- mbr ↩︎
- tym: Oh and not a brand new release, but the remaster and new tracks for the 20th anniversary reissue of ‘Takk…’ by Sigur Rós are pretty great. That and ( ) are still what I listen to the most, this year and apparently every year. ↩︎
- Kingu ↩︎
- epu: I had all but forgotten party drug enthusiasm tracks like ‘higher than the sun’ from 1991, and it turns out they made so many albums since I last tuned in. This one really resonates with my reaction to USpol this year. It rekindled my love for this band; I bought Evil Heat import on CD, my first physical purchase since last year. ↩︎
- Mark52 ↩︎
- sentynel ↩︎
- Braininabowl ↩︎
- jiiruu ↩︎
- avi_miller ↩︎
- jiiruu || t4s || gavin57 ↩︎
- Steffi ↩︎
- superflippy ↩︎
- rustynail: most played ↩︎
- sentynel ↩︎
- debonaire ↩︎
- debonaire ↩︎
- TwoClownsEating: I discovered this band in 2025. Absolutely incredible, I’ve bought their entire catalogue and had the privilege to see them live a few months ago. Unbelievably good musicians. Magical music. ↩︎
- jomel: 2025 was a great year for Belgian music. Stef Kamil Carlens, co-founder of dEUS has released a gem with his new band The Poem. I have seen SKC twice this year, once in a solo gig, and the second time (in less then 2 weeks) for the “worst Case scenario” rewind from (and so with) dEUS, those two concerts were fabulous, and at the time, I wasn’t expecting this release.
Bonus Albums: The live album from Depeche Mode – Memento Mori: Mexico City; Arvo Pârt – Credo (released Alpha Classics label) which includes his “hits” – Credo , Fratres , Cantus in memory of Benjamin Britten (my favourite one) https://outhere-music.com/en/albums/arvo-part-credo; 2025 Bryan Ferry release, with Amelia Barrat as female lead singer/speaker. Some of his material came from the 70’s and were updated, it’s a timeless album, and elegant as always https://soundcloud.com/bryanferry/sets/loose-talk-4 ↩︎ - jebeyer ↩︎
- jomel: (AKA 2manydj’s) Yep, those guys will make you dance, and rock, I guess they’ve listened to Kraftwerk & Front242. ↩︎
- Tak ↩︎
- nellie_m ↩︎
- cloudtripper ↩︎
- _slotek_ ↩︎
- t4s ↩︎
- Lizahadiz ↩︎
- slamma ↩︎
- e (eva): algorithmic mood music was my fav last year! but i’m still listening to it and i didn’t submit anything then. ↩︎
- Steffi ↩︎
- BramMeehan: I’ve listened to so much TDJ, though no one release in particular. ↩︎
- jiiruu ↩︎
- buffyleigh: There’s so many other albums I’d love to list here for exposure, but it feels more honest to list this masterpiece, my first obsession of the year, courtesy of catching their amazing set at the big Black Sabbath/Ozzy send-off concert. I mean, I even titled my AOTY list “Forty Six & 2”, since that was the first song Tool played there and got my attention. Said list is here. ↩︎
- epu: Ok, this one’s kind of a cheat, it’s an EP.
2024, my friend turned me on to Bug Club for its lo-fi production aesthetic, humor and infectious fun/dark undertones. Marriage from 2023 album ‘Rare Birds: Hour of Song’ was the hook.
You can get this band straight into your heart and mind with this EP. And it takes me back to that one time I did go to Wales. ↩︎ - jomel: This newcomer British female band has written the ultimate feminist anthem as opening track. || RolloTreadway: I don’t tend to be very much of a rock person, so for a big brash rock record to have such an impact on me must say something. It’s noisy and it’s loud and it has guitars and drums and punkiness. And, er, flutes. Harmonicas. Cellos. Weird interpretations of bible stories. All chaos and absurdity and celebration and being absolutely done with the patriarchy and above all else fun. So much fun. ↩︎
- soundclamp ↩︎
- santialone ↩︎
- steveroyle ↩︎
- jebeyer ↩︎
- donutage: far & away my number 1; an angry & desperate neo-grunge banger. Sonia Sturino is a force of nature. ↩︎
- RolloTreadway: In parts weird and experimental, in others traditional. Here there’s strange droney noise, and then there’s some light, old-fashioned fiddle playing. Electronic distortion, a choir recorded live outdoors singing a simple hymn. It’s an astonishingly creative and unique folk record. ↩︎
- donutage: not as jaw-dropping as their debut (my runaway 2022 fave), but with a lot of the same qualities. It’s dancy, smart, & sexy, without ever once being submissive. || slamma ↩︎
- alicemcalicepants ↩︎
- slamma ↩︎
- keefeglise ↩︎
- evilchili: Afro-futurist South African Hip-Hop Mysticism. Blakrok instantly became my favourite female MC. ↩︎
- Steffi ↩︎
#AOTY #AOTY2025 #CastleRat #Deafheaven #DieSpitz #Faetooth #ListenToThis #Messa #music #musicDiscovery #RiversOfNihil #TheNewEves #WetLeg
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I feel like this album should've been on some AOTY lists last year, but I don't recall seeing it. Collab between Polish cellist/composer Karolina Rec aka Resina and Paris-based electronic musician Niamké Désiré aka Aho Ssan. Very brooding and cinematic.
Aho Ssan and Resina - Ego Death (2025)
-
Following that up with another album recommended in that BC feature on contemporary Polish composers. This had me at the comparison with Jóhann Jóhannsson, and the description also name-drops Hildur Guðnadóttir, Gyða Valtýsdóttir, and GY!BE. I.e., buffy catnip.
Resina - Speechless (2021)
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Found via the recent BC feature on Polish composers/classical music, this is a really gorgeous, moody experimental album, mixes Polish and Japanese elements. I might just have to get the album on cassette, I want to listen to it huddled in a dark closet with my walkman...
Magda Drozd - Divided by Dusk (2026)
https://praesenseditionen.bandcamp.com/album/divided-by-dusk
https://daily.bandcamp.com/lists/contemporary-polish-classical-album-guide
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First time listening to this, strapping young lad more like angy young lad, amirite.
Strapping Young Lad - City (1997)
https://centurymedia.bandcamp.com/album/city-remastered-demo-versions
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Ooo yeah, this is hitting the spot this morning! Boris' debut, because Absolutego is considered a (1-hr long) single, lolz.
Not gods, no masters, only amplifiers. 🤘🏻
Boris - Amplifier Worship (1998)
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Going to test my pupper's patience with 2 hours 23 minutes of Keiji Haino and Boris live. Avi included the live album that came out of this show in her main discography list for Boris, but I could only find this YT with the bootlegged audio of the full show.
-
Okay, finished Mark Lanegan's discography, now going to take a bit of a break from sad bastard music and am going to start working my way through Boris' main discography. I'll be following the fantastic list put together by @avi_miller as part of her upcoming larger project writing up each main Boris album. The list includes studio releases plus a few extra goodies (47 in total), and notes different and preferred versions. Let's go! 🤘🏻
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Whoa, this is possibly the first/only black metal album in the Kurdish language, and it kicks ass. There's a great interview about it on Salvo with Hêlîn, the woman behind Xwîn (and many other projects), linked below too.
Xwîn - Xwîn Bi Xwînê Tê Şûştin (2024)
https://xwin.bandcamp.com/album/xw-n-bi-xw-n-t-tin
https://salvo.ghost.io/xwin-raw-kurdish-black-metal-rooted-in-rebellion/
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Following the last boost, #NowPlaying (and then hitting repeat on) this funky number from Glenn Copeland, from his 1980 EP "At Last!". :ablobjam:
https://beverlyglenn-copeland.bandcamp.com/track/montreal-main-the-buddha-in-the-palm
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Holyforkingshirtballs things suck, but at least Matt Berry continues making music. New album released a couple days ago. :ablobjam:
-
Bits of RÓIS reminds me of Eivør Pálsdóttir, which reminded me that I meant to post this video a while ago, because it's one of the coolest performances, musically and venue-wise.
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With a bunch of talk on the timeline about AOTY lists, I'm revisiting the albums on my preliminary list (up on Album Whale) that I haven't listened to all that many times, to see if they should stay and where they might end up if I bother with any sorting. Starting with this gem, which I believe was an instant add after a single listen. Excellent choice, on my part, this one definitely stays.
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With a bunch of talk on the timeline about AOTY lists, I'm revisiting the albums on my preliminary list (up on Album Whale) that I haven't listened to all that many times, to see if they should stay and where they might end up if I bother with any sorting. Starting with this gem, which I believe was an instant add after a single listen. Excellent choice, on my part, this one definitely stays.
-
With a bunch of talk on the timeline about AOTY lists, I'm revisiting the albums on my preliminary list (up on Album Whale) that I haven't listened to all that many times, to see if they should stay and where they might end up if I bother with any sorting. Starting with this gem, which I believe was an instant add after a single listen. Excellent choice, on my part, this one definitely stays.
-
With a bunch of talk on the timeline about AOTY lists, I'm revisiting the albums on my preliminary list (up on Album Whale) that I haven't listened to all that many times, to see if they should stay and where they might end up if I bother with any sorting. Starting with this gem, which I believe was an instant add after a single listen. Excellent choice, on my part, this one definitely stays.
-
With a bunch of talk on the timeline about AOTY lists, I'm revisiting the albums on my preliminary list (up on Album Whale) that I haven't listened to all that many times, to see if they should stay and where they might end up if I bother with any sorting. Starting with this gem, which I believe was an instant add after a single listen. Excellent choice, on my part, this one definitely stays.
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Thanks to whoever here that recommended I read Harold Pinter's Proust Screenplay if I continued having trouble reading Proust. I've been stalled on vol. 2 forever but I just devoured the screenplay in less than a day. I think I shall continue trudging through the novel. (Also, I very much appreciated the lack of the madeleine in the screenplay.)