Trying to sum up a year’s worth of listening is never easy. I thought I’d get ahead of the curve in 2025 and do a better job of tracking every album that stood out to me throughout the year, but instead of making the job of list-making easier, all that did was give me even more choices than usual.
Which means this year’s AM Gold is even longer than usual—200+ albums, all told—and I’ve gone back to the unranked list because last year’s task of deciding on an order was honestly a nightmare even with 100 albums. Instead, I’ve grouped it into 50 favourites, and 150+ others that are still very much worth a listen.
Bandcamp links are included wherever possible, which is the vast majority of them. I’ve also thrown a track from each album into playlists on Apple Music and Spotify. Throw ’em on shuffle and you’re sure to discover at least a few new favourites.
50 favourites: The AM’s best of 2025
Adrian Younge – Something about April III
Younge’s stunning psych-soul series takes a welcome detour to Brazil.
Alabaster DePlume – A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole
Earnest, soul-searching, ambient-leaning jazz & spoken word.
Anika – Abyss
Stripped-down, grunge-influenced art rock from the former Exploded View singer.
🇨🇦 Avi C. Engel – Mote
Drone-folk, rich and loamy, and my introduction to the haunting tone of the gudok.
Ben Morales Frost, Violetta Vicci – Forest Music EP
Downtempo neo-classical (piano, keyboards, and strings) suited for escaping into imaginary woodlands.
Bertrand Belin – Watt
Belin’s gravelly voice often reminds me of Bryan Ferry’s later work (Avonmore especially), and the music backing him isn’t worlds removed from Roxy either, but the Franco-pop underpinnings give this its own swooning sense of romance.
Black Market Karma – Mellowmaker
Big-beat psychedelia, evoking ’90s Dust Brothers productions as much as the genre’s ’60s heydey with its sing-song melodies, loping rhythms, and looping structures.
Black Taffy – Out Moon
Simple instrumental beats with lush, cinematic production. Heavy on atmosphere and more than willing to tug on the heartstrings.
Blue Lake – The Animal
A wondrous expansion of Blue Lake’s folk-kosmische sound, blending pastoral beauty and ambient folk with some of the playfulness of Pengion Cafe. Organic and unpredictable, whirling and wandering like a wayward breeze.
Brown Fang – Netherfield Lagoons
Autumnal soundscapes, pitched somewhere between the Hardy Tree and Durutti Column.
🇨🇦 Buildings and Food – Provincial Park
Ambient compositions inspired by Canadian landscapes. Not so much about buildings, then, but still nourishing. Don’t miss the excellent remix EP, too.
Cerys Hafana – Angel
A remarkable album from Welsh triple-harpist Cerys Hafana. A beautiful fusion of folk & traditional tunes with neo-classical minimalism.The songs are dynamic, living things, deeply affecting with & without Hafana’s haunting voice.
Essendon Airport – MOR
Charming minimal compositions from a reunited ’70s/’80s Aussie duo; breezy & whimsical with an air of melancholy. Slide guitar, wurlitzer, gently chugging drum machines—everything you need to float through the daily drudgery.
Felbm – winterspring/summerfall
Splitting each season into 6 songs, this 24-track concept album is a pastoral jazz triumph, and a gorgeous blend of Felbm’s interests in natural & musical cycles.
🇨🇦 Fortunato Durutti Marinetti – Bitter Sweet, Sweet Bitter
Marinetti (aka Daniel Colussi) has been planting a flag alongside esoteric Canadian songwriters like Sandro Perri, Dan Bejar, and Leonard Cohen. Storied company, but the vivid arrangements, elliptical lyrics and offbeat delivery make a compelling case.
🇨🇦 Foxwarren – 2
Shauf’s side-project gives him the opportunity for a modest reinvention, sampling and remixing his band’s contributions into wooze indie-pop delights.
Go Kurosawa – Soft Shakes
The former Kikagaku Moyo drummer/ GuruGuruBrain co-founder tackles all the instrumentaiton and production on this one. Gentler and more eclectic than KM, and more rewarding for it, especially on the Kraftwerk-ish “Autowalk.”
Gustaf Ljunggren, Emil de Waal – Mikroklima
A melodic, meandering, and marvelous set of jazz-influenced instrumentals grounded in warm, rustic tones.
Ichiko Aoba – Luminescent Creatures
It’s rare for an album to feel this gentle and this unpredictable at the same time. Chamber folk and dream pop, intricate and delicate in equal measure.
Immersion, Suss Nanocluster, Vol. 3
The gentler of Immersion’s two 2025 albums (both are excellent, but I slightly preferred this one). Suss adds ambient Americana to Immersion’s kosmische strains, the collaboration bringing out the best in both.
🇨🇦 Jairus Sharif – Basis of Unity
Questing and inquisitive spiritual jazz—genuinely spiritual, not just a genre affectation, but a real search for meaning through breath, melody, and sonic texture.
Jilk – Fix Your Heart
The closest thing to pop structures I’ve heard from Jilk, without compromising on the experimentation and musical restlessness that makes the whole project so appealing. A truly gorgeous blend of melancholy French pop, skittering beats, and ambient electronics, easily one of the year’s best releases.
🇨🇦 Laurie Torres – Après coup
Confident and tranquil ambient jazz that rarely rises above a whisper, and is all the more engrossing for it.
Loaded Honey – Love Made Trees
Channeling vintage AM-radio soul: Warm, crackling, with the occasional surprising production choice breaking it out of a nostaglic haze.
M. Sage – Tender / Wading
The audio equivalent of laying down in a bed of leaves warm and soft from the midday sun, rich scent of humus filling your lungs, comforting and consciousness-dissolving in a way I can’t quite articulate.
Magic Fig – Valerian Tea
Starts with Starcastle prog-pop arpeggios, moves through an assortment of Canterbury-adjascent soundscapes, all in all a delightfully trippy slice of warm psychedelia.
🇨🇦 Memory Pearl – Cosmic-Astral
Apparently a re-imagining of a 1970s LSD soundtrack through a nurturing new-age lens; some pronounced jazz and easy listening influences, but still a trip in its own right.
Mess Esque Jay Marie, Comfort Me
Dirty Three guitarist Mick Turner’s latest project is comfortingly off-kilter, preferring to paint around melodies and hint at structures without ever taking the obvious route.
🇨🇦 Moon Apple – Four Pillars
The Montreal musician’s first full-length in five years offers “ritualistic rhythms and tribal soundscapes for a modern era,” an electronic ode to & subversion of traditian & ritual.
Mulatu Astatke Mulatu Plays Mulatu
Astatke helped define Ethio-jazz more than half a century ago and yet this is the first of his albums I’ve heard start to finish. Truly my loss—this is warm, rhythmic, complex, and captivating. Better late than never.
🇨🇦 No Joy – Bugland
Omnivorous shoegaze, with bold production that leaves no sound left unturned. No Joy’s inspirations run from Deftones to Enya, finding no contradiction in all the disparate sources.
🇨🇦 Orbital Ensemble – Live at Gold Standard
This live album and the self-titled debut from the Toronto latin jazz/psych ensemble are both full of groovy magic, but the slightly more muscular sound gives Live at Gold Standard the edge.
Oruã & Reverse Death – Reflectors Vol. 1
A split cassette featuring Reverse Death’s first music since their 2022 debut and demos from Oruã’s Slacker (also excellent). RD’s tracks are blissful slow-flowing psych; Oruã rougher-edged and garage-y, both glorious.
🇨🇦 Patche – Mode
Not sure what to call this outside of invigorating. It reminds me of hearing Holy Fuck’s live electronics for the first time, that mix of energy and possibility. Krautrock, maybe, but aimed at the dance floor, party music refracted into abstraction.
Persica 3 – Beauty in the Noise
Cindy Lee + C86 = jangle-pop bliss. Seems simple enough, but the quality of the songwriting goes well beyond any formula.
Phi-Psonics – Expanding to One
Consciousness-expanding spiritual jazz journeys. Three separate Wurlitzers are credited, which says everything you need to know.
Piotr Kurek – Songs and Bodies
Should be instantly adopted into the space rock/post-rock canon. Floyd at their most cosmic with vocals courtesy of a garbled voicemail—and I mean that as the highest compliment.
Pneumatic Tubes – Runner’s High
A fine follow-up to 2022’s A Letter from TreeTops, bringing together kosmische synths, warm woodwinds, and new age bliss.
Polypores – Cosmically a Shambles
December’s Hungry Vortex is a bit more brash, but Cosmically a Shambles was my favourite of 2025’s Polypores releases, a masterful analog workout, clattering, whirling, and playful.
🇨🇦 Population II – Maintenant Jamais
The evolution of this Montreal trio from their initial space rock odysseys to the concise but still ambitious psych-prog of Maintenant Jamais still blows me away.
Rachel Kitchlew – Flirty Ghost
A must-listen for fans of Dorothy Ashby and the more groove-based, less celestial side of jazz harp. Elegant stuff that manages to stay on just the right side of easy listening.
Rival Consoles – Landscape from Memory
I’m never sure how to describe the Erased Tapes aesthetic, but Rival Consoles must be its apex; synthetic but deeply affecting, overwhelming in the best sort of way.
Rural Tapes – Oneiric
“Flower Labs” is pure Clay Pipe, bursting with pastoral bliss, but Oneiric roams wider grounds—”Fantasia” with its swooning vocoder, “Hypermnesia” evoking early 2000s post rock, “Lingering Souls” pure paisley pop, just wonderful.
Sanam – Sametou Sawtan
Unexpected and unpredictable, dream pop in its more jagged original form filtered through Arabic musical traditions and a drive to create new sounds. If it’s ok to call this rock then it’s one of the more vital rock records of 2025.
Sessa – Pequena Vertigem de Amor
An evolution of the impeccably arranged MPB on 2022’s Estrela Acesa, laid back grooves and unafraid of a good hook. Fans of Arthur Verocai take note.
Sewell and the Gong – Patron Saint of Elsewhere
I’m such a sucker for pastoral British electronics. Pure contentment, and followed up by a solid remix EP.
Shrunken Elvis – Shrunken Elvis
A collaboration between Spencer Cullum, Sean Thompson, and Rich Ruth that doesn’t sound much like any of them, instead drawing from krautrock and ambient jazz for something fresh and open, with an easy, unflashy virtuosity.
🇨🇦 T Gowdy – Trill Scan
Prog-influenced electronics that draw surprising connections between medieval European music, contemporary electronic sounds, and artful experimentation.
🇨🇦 Thanya Iyer – Tide/Tied
Iyer’s jazz-and-soul-inflected pop is a warm breeze: nourishing and refreshing but also a force of nature. Healing sounds for a broken age.
🇨🇦 Viviane Audet – Le piano et le torrent
Solo piano compositions, quiet and unadorned. Songs like Barlicoco evoke Satie (at least to my untrained ear), and that strain of haunting minimalism is always welcome.
Another 150 or so albums you really can’t go wrong with, especially if you’re into the general genre
Apologies for the lack of blurbs/notes on many of these, but (and I insist this is true) there is simply too much good music out there, and more keeps getting made every year. The writing may be half-baked, but the music certainly isn’t.
Aaron Fisher and Rob Stephenson – Actual Place (Ambient folk)
Action & Tension & Space – New Dimensions (Kosmische)
Spaced-out Norwegian instrumentals with strains of psych, post-rock & jazz
Akasha System – Heliocene (Electronic)
A blend of Balearic beats, breathy synths and cosmic-minded new age atmosphere; too propulsive to really be called ambient, but definitely aimed at the chillout room more than the dancefloor.
Alex Albrecht – The Arboretum (Electronic)
🇨🇦 Alex Stevens and Ethan Levy – Two Silent Passengers (Instrumental folk)
🇨🇦 Altus – Terraform (Electronic)
Ami Taf Ra – The Prophet and the Madman (Soul, art-pop)
Maximalist jazz-prog, high-concept, played without a whiff of restraint but who needs it.
Andy Bell – Pinball Wanderer (Psychedelic)
Andy Boay – You Took That Walk For The Two Of Us (Psychedelic)
Solo offshoot of the always-brilliant Tonstartssbandht
Applesauce Tears – Balcony Confidential (Dream pop)
Apta – The Pool (Electronic)
Playful, soul-soothing modular synthesis.
Astrobal – L’uomo e la natura (Psychedelic)
Modern multicultural lounge-pop, for fans of Stereolab’s kitschier side
Automatic – Is It Now? (Art-rock)
Deceptively catchy synth-driven post-punk. At times sounds like a less haunted Broadcast, thanks to the band’s ear for distorted sonic textures and hypnotic melodies, but the killer basslines and off-kilter hooks are all their own.
Babe Rainbow – Slipper Imp and Shakaerator (Psychedelic)
Effortless bubblegum psych-pop—all mild highs and sunny days
🇨🇦 Badge Epoch – Furry Worried Ape (Groove)
Solo-leaning effort from Badge Epoque Enemble’s Max Turnbull (hence the slightly different name, but thankfully very much in the same vein)
Barker – Stochastic Drift (Electronic)
Experimental electronics inspired by the chaos and randomness of the universe
Basic – Dream City EP (Art-rock)
A bit like if Durutti Column listened to more Kraftwerk but also wanted to embrace more groove
🇨🇦 Beat Sexü – Dernière Chance (Electronic)
🇨🇦 Bells Larsen – Blurring Time (Indie folk)
An indie-folk album recorded both pre- and post-transition, allowing Larsen to harmonize their past voice with their present.
Ben Lamar Gay – Yowzers (Jazz)
The title track is the apocalyptic climate change anthem I didn’t know we needed.
Bitchin Bajas – Inland See (Ambient)
Four songs, 40 minutes, and every bit as immersive as you’d hope from these BBs. A wonderfully confident album, willing to let each track unfurl, patient and unforced.
Black Milk & Fat Ray – Food from the Gods (Hip hop)
Brown Spirits – Cosmic Seeds (Kosmische)
Bryan Ferry – Loose Talk (Art pop)
Spoken-word poetry over remixed Roxy demos; surprising and mysterious
C.R. Gillespie – Island of Women (Ambient)
Warm & balmy ambient sounds, gently percussive & consistently inventive.
Cate Francesca Brooks – Lofoten (Ambient / Electronic)
Charif Megarbane – Hawalat (Psychedelic / Library groove)
Charles Webster & the South African Connection – From the Hill (Electronic / Deep house)
Chloé Antoniotti – Bouquet II EP (Ambient / Neo-classical)
🇨🇦 Cris Derksen – The Visit (Neo-classical, Indigenous)
Cristina Lord – If It All Falls (Electronic)
“Genre-fluid electroacoustic works that explores concepts of texture and identity,” per Bandcamp. Headphone candy for those of us who revel in clicks and buzzes, in other words, but also unafraid of pure melody.
Dalham – Cobra / And The Sun (Electronic)
Speculative sci-fi soundscapes that have caught the ear of Ridley Scott.
Damon Locks – List of Demands (Jazz)
Dania – Listless (Electronic / Trip Hop)
A fusion of dream pop and trip hop, with a darkness rich as black velvet. Vocals echo and dissolve, the lyrics often indiscernable or oblique, the meaning coming through in sonic textures evoking 3am streetscapes and starless nights.
🇨🇦 Daphne’s Demise – The Heart is a Garden (Psychedelic)
Cosmic Canadiana with a pleasant lofi jangle.
Deradoorian – Ready for Heaven (Psychedelic)
Pop-infused psychedelia bringing together the best elements of Deradoorian’s various musical personae.
Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek – Yarın Yoksa (Psychedelic)
“Outernational” psych-pop & Anatollian folk songs
🇨🇦 Destroyer – Dan’s Boogie (Art-rock)
As evocative as you’d hope, another fine extension of the Destroyer mythos
Diablo in Alpujarras – Diablo in Alpujarras (Psychedelic)
Guitar-forward psych, groovier than the constellation over at El Paraiso but just as dedicated to the expressive potential of extended jams. Inspired by mountain hikes, and as soaring as that implies.
Dirty Projectors – Song of the Earth (Art pop, Neo-classical)
A little overstuffed and overambitious, but gorgeous nonetheless
Disiniblud – Disiniblud (Dream pop / Experimental)
Rachika Nayar, Nina Keith, and a range of collaborators creating glitchy, fractured pop soundscapes.
Dissolve in Sepia – And Also (Ambient)
Moody but optimistic ambient out of Brazil
🇨🇦 drummachinemike – I Hope This Never Finds You (Electronic)
Dark, minimal, but oddly reassuring. Has grown on me significantly with each listen.
Edena Gardens – Dispossessed (Psychedelic)
More sprawling psych jams from the good folks at El Paraiso Records.
🇨🇦 Eiyn Sof – Empyrean Death Rites (Psychedelic)
Mystical & mythical psychedelic folk
🇨🇦 Elyot – Small Dances (Experimental)
Fabiano do Nascimento – Cavejaz (Jazz)
Falls – nothing but the best for everyone (Electronic / Electroacoustic)
A four-track EP that doesn’t even hit the 10-minute mark, but still manages to be everything I want in a hit of folktronica. A bit like Bibio before Ambivalence Avenue, tape warped, beautifully played & atmospheric.
Flur – Plunge (Jazz)
Harp jazz is having a moment right now (see also: Rachel Kitchlew, Brandee Younger, a plethora of Dorothy Ashby reissues). Flur mostly land on the more spiritual/abstract side of the genre; the GoGo Penguin-ish “Bolete” being a pleasant exception.
🇨🇦 Full Moon Bummer – First Night of Summer (Indie Rock)
A new alias from Chad VanGaalen, for a more off-the-cuff creative outlet
Futuropaco – Fortezza Di Vetro Vol. II (Psychedelic)
Fuzzy & beat-driven psych-funk instrumentals
Fuubutsushi – Columbia Deluxe (Ambient / Jazz)
Golden Brown – Patterner (Cosmic American Music)
Greg Foat – 6 Days in Leysin (Jazz)
Gwenifer Raymond – Last Night I Heard The Dog Star Bark (Folk)
The British folk-horror version of Fahey’s American primitivism. A track title nodding to Jack Parsons hints at the occult atmosphere Raymond creates with tangled knots of melody & plenty of buzz.
Gwenno – Utopia (Pop)
Heal Mura – The Limited Repetition of Pleasure (Electronic)
🇨🇦 Hélène Barbier – Panorama (Indie rock)
🇨🇦 Hermitess – Death and the Fool (Psychedelic)
Heady, thoughtful freak-folk bursting with vitality. Love that cover, too.
Hilary Woods – Night CRIÚ (Dream pop)
Folk noir that fits perfectly with the Sacred Bones roster. Rarely rising above a whisper, Woods has perfected the sort of hushed that inspires you to lean in, an album witnessed through a keyhole or across a vast empty hall.
Hollie Kenniff – For Forever – The Reworks (Ambient)
Inspired ambient reworkings of an already lovely late-2024 release
Ian Boddy, Harold Grosskopf – Doppelgänger (Electronic)
Tangerine daydreams expanding the possibilities of kosmische
IE – Reverse Earth (Psychedelic)
Immersion – WTF?? (Kosmische)
Never quite matches their collaboration with SUSS from February, but by trading that album’s ambient-folk trappings for motorik jams and semi-spoken vocals, it’s easily the more instantly accessible of the two releases.
Ivan the Tolerable & Hawksmoor – Atoms in the Void (Psychedelic)
Haunted jazz, ASMR, cosmic jazz—trippy in all the right ways.
JB Dunckel, Jonathan Fitoussi – Mirages 2 (Electronic)
Mostly meditative, with some appropriately Air-y grooves along the way
Jeff Greinke – Late Rain (Experimental)
Textured & atmospheric electroacoustic compositions
Jefre Cantu-Ledesma – Gift Songs (Ambient)
Compositions so gentle they nearly don’t exist
Jelena Ćirić, Snorri Hallgrímsson, Cécile Lacharme and Oliver Patrice Weder – Tramuntana Tapes I (Art pop)
Patiently improvised dream-pop digressions
Jenny Hval – Iris Silver Mist (Art pop)
Experimental pop’s finest lyricist, in one of her more musically adventurous moods.
Jeremiah Chiu & Marta Sofia Honer – Different Rooms (Ambient / Jazz)
🇨🇦 Jonathan Personne – Nouveau Monde (Psych-pop)
Lighter/poppier psych-rock from the Corridor singer/guitarist
🇨🇦 Joni Void – Every Life is a Light (Electronic)
Given the subject matter, Void’s pedigree, and Constellation’s general vibe, this is urprisingly welcoming, but unsurprisingly idiosyncratic
🇨🇦 Joseph Shabason, Thom Gil – Mississippi River Styx (Indie / Ambient)
Juana Molina – Doga (Indie rock)
Junk Drawer – Days of Heaven (Psychedelic)
🇨🇦 Kara-Lis Coverdale – A Series of Actions in a Sphere Forever (Experimental)
Her second of three albums of 2025 is a collection of piano nocturns for the darkest hours. Elegant use of sustain and decay, notes and chords overlap, ripple, and evaporate in patient combinations.
🇨🇦 Khotin – Peace Portal (Electronic)
Glistening downtempo compositions from one of Canada’s finest producers
Kibrom Birhane – Lisané Bahir (Jazz / Experimental)
🇨🇦 King Khan and Wolf Clan Jo – Wolf Clan Jo & King Khan (Psychedelic)
Sitar-and-flute-based spiritual protest songs.
🇨🇦 Kogane, Thomas White – tomkog (Electronic)
Vibrant, bouncy, off-kilter electronic instrumentals.
Korb – Korb IV (Psychedelic)
Soundtracky psych that’s willing to get wonky, but never loses sight of the groove.
Kronstad 23 – Sommermørket (Psychedelic)
Lael Neale – Altogether Stranger (Indie rock)
Nobody else today is this good at taking rock’n’roll into the mystic.
Lake Ruth – Hawking Radiation (Dream pop)
Le Motel – Odd Numbers / Số Lẻ (Ambient)
Light-Space Modulator – The Rising Wave (Psych-pop)
Limiñanas – Faded (Psych / Dirty French Pop)
Lord of the Isles – Signals Aligned (Ambient)
I miss the poetry from 2023’s My Noise is Nothing, but the textures on this one are pure ear candy for those who like their synths hazy and distorted. “United Wire” is its best moment and mission statement; start there.
Lorelle Meets the Obsolete – Corporal (Psychedelic)
Cavernous drums, walls of feedback, towering synths, thick to the point of oppression, the production on LMtO’s latest is massive. That heft insists on your attention, a counter to the weightless algorithmic cloud.
Loula Yorke – Hydrology (Ambient)
🇨🇦 Made-Up – World Making (Art-pop)
Makaya McCraven – Off the Record (Jazz)
Four EPs recorded at different times with different lineups. PopUp Shop is the most immediately appealing to me, Techno Logic the most intriguing. Only a few songs each, but still too much to absorb in an easy sitting.
Mansur Brown – Rihla (Dream pop)
The AR Kane school of dream pop—at turns silky, noisy, hushed & grand. Rainy city streets & existential angst.
Marshall Allen – New Dawn (Jazz)
The Arkestra leader makes his solo debut at 100. Wise, radiant, masterful
Mary Sue and the Clementi Sound Appreciation Club – Porcelain Shield, Paper Sword (Jazz)
Matt McBane – Buoy (Ambient)
A buoyant balance of synthesis and strings
Mattias Uneback – Harry Garth Jones Presents Music for Love (Exotica)
Effortless pop exotica conjuring tropical expanses and easy living.
🇨🇦 Men I Trust – Equus Caballas (Indie pop)
Their second album of the year, dreamier than the first and every bit as accomplished.
Milkweed – Remscéla (Folk)
If this is folk (and they say it is), it’s one of the most unique spins on the genre you’re likely to find this year.
🇨🇦 Moat Bells – Nap Bud (Ambient)
Inspired by animal naps, Moat Bells’ latest is a bit of a snooze, but in a pleasant way. Grounding, restful, and always imaginative.
Modern Nature – The Heat Warps (Indie rock)
After a few albums seeing how diffuse their sound could get (to brilliant effect), this probably counts as forceful?
Monde UFO – Flamingo Tower (Psychedelic)
More polished than 2023’s Vandalized Statues, but still like a fractured art-pop radio transmisssion
Morgan Szymanski / Tommy Perman – Songs for the Mist Forest (Jazz)
🇨🇦 Mount Maxwell – Birds of Paradise (Ambient)
Nyron Higor – Nyron Higor (MPB / Brazilian pop)
Okonski – Entrance Music (Jazz)
Oneohtrixpointnever – Tranquilizer (Electronic)
Oono Yuuki Band – Mawari – michi, Kaze no (Post Rock)
🇨🇦 Ora Cogan – Bury Me EP (Psychedelic)
Organic Pulse Ensemble – Oppression is Nine Tenths of the Law (Jazz)
Worth it for the title alone. Fortunately the one-man spiritual jazz band is also soul-affirming.
🇨🇦 Pacific Coliseum – Voice Wave (Electronic)
Balearic/deep house from the always excellent Teen Daze
Papir – IX (Psychedelic)
Park Jiha – All Living Things (Ambient)
Patricia Brennan – Of The Near And Far (Jazz)
Jazz improvisation, new music inventiveness, neo-classical melodicism, embracing dissonance & discord but just short of outright chaos. There’s always a through-line, an inner symmetry to keep from falling apart.
🇨🇦 Peace Flag Ensemble – Everything is Possible (Jazz)
Ambient prairie jazz & post-rock for fans of Fuubutsushi
Pedro Mizutani & Skinshape – Mostrando os Dentes (Psychedelic, MPB)
Peel Dream Magazine – Taurus (Indie-pop)
Opener “Venus in Nadir” is spot-on Belle and Sebastian, but while those twee influences persist, so does the dronier indie-pop that endeared PDM in the first place. Immaculate melodies played with appealing restraing.
🇨🇦 Postnamers – City Songs (Art-pop)
Post-goth cut & paste compositions. Often discordant and unsettling, but also strangely captivating—and at times hauntingly beautiful.
Prepared – Module (Neo-classical))
Project Gemini & Wendy Martinez – Time Stands Still / Le temps s’arrête (Psychedelic)
PG always sounds like the score to an excellent forgotten film; Martinez (of Gloria) brings a different melodic sensibility, a bit like a gentler, folkier Limiñanas. Groovy Franco-psych.
🇨🇦 Proxima Psychoacoustics – Whynott (Ambient)
Nature-inspired Canadian electronics: Proxima’s most varied album to date draws from a youth spent in rural Nova Scotia, evoking the wonder of forest walks and bike rides under endless skies.
Ray Barbee – Little Postcards From Home (Kosmische)
A more mellow set from Barbee, but his albums are so sporadic I’ll take whatever I can get.
Resonating With Life – Resonating With Life (Electronic)
Space synths turned inwards, meditation aimed not at quieting the mind but opening it to the breadth of existence. That’s a lot to put on an instrumental synth album, but its optimism is very welcome right now.
Salami Rose Joe Louis – Lorings (Art-pop)
More grounded than you might expect from such a proud pop-art weirdo—but still one of the oddest pop releases of the year
Sam Prekop – Open Close (Electronic)
When it comes to modular synth, Prekop is one of the finest, and Open Close is up there with his best. Just the right balance of patience and payoff, endlessly evolving variations aiming for transcendence.
Sankt Otten – Tote Winkel (Kosmische)
Satomimagae – Taba (Folktronic)
Scholars of the Peak – Transmissions from Mother Hill (Electronic)
Sharp Pins – Balloon Balloon Balloon (Jangle pop)
SHOLTO – The Sirens (Psych / Library Groove)
Simon Pyke – Aurelume (Experimental)
Snails – Just Look Around (Indie rock)
Snakeskin – We live in sand (Dream pop)
The 2nd Beirut-based act to catch my ear this year after SANAM. Snakeskin is similarly experimental in its textures, though often brighter & more indebted to dream pop. Not all sunshine, but even at its darkest, hope remains.
Sounds of New Soma – The Story of Sam Buckett (Kosmische)
Stereolab – Instant Holograms on Metal Film (Art-pop)
Plenty of others have taken inspiration, but no one else does it quite like them.
Steve Hauschildt – Aeropsia (Electronic)
Six years and one transcontinental migration since his last release, Hauschildt’s latest picks up right where 2019’s Nonlin left off, maybe a little hazier and more ambiguous, but as rich & rewarding as anything he’s released.
Sulk Rooms – Rewilding (Electronic)
Sven Wunder – Daybreak (Easy listening)
Somewhere between library groove and easy listening (not that those poles are particularly far apart). Too sophisticated to be written off as schmaltz, but let’s say it’s at least conversant. Cinematic, openhearted, and uncynical.
🇨🇦 Teen Daze – Splashes of Colour (Electronic)
🇨🇦 Test Card – Signals (Electronic)
The Baker Fields – Frankley My Dear (Electronic)
Another dose of pastoral bliss from the label that does it best.
The Circling Sun – Orbits (Jazz)
The Cords – The Cords (Jangle pop)
Precocious talent—two teen sisters tossing out some of the best jangle-pop this side of the 1980s like it was nothing. “Yes It’s True” adds some shoegaze warble to the production, hinting at new directions yet to come.
The Cosmic Tones Research Trio – The Cosmic Tones Research Trio (Jazz)
Spiritual jazz explorations and incantations, confidently balancing invention with reassurance. The energetic “Sankofa” is the standout, but there isn’t a track here that isn’t worth some concentrated reflection.
The Laughing Chimes – Whispers in the Speech Machine (Jangle pop)
The New Eves – The New Eve is Rising (Post-punk)
The Sorcerers – Other Worlds And Habitats (Jazz)
The Sure Fire Soul Ensemble – Gemini (Soul)
🇨🇦 The World Next Door – Chaotic Mixing (Ambient)
Don’t let the title throw you, these are absolutely meticulous soundscapes (in the best way).
Thought Bubble – Mostly True (Psychedelic / Trip hop)
thruoutin – A Desolate Hue (Ambient)
Mellow, abstract, downcast
Titanic – HAGEN (Art rock)
Calling this art rock because I don’t know what else to say, but that doesn’t begin to touch on the drama, the dynamics, the effortless shifts from abrasive noise to harmonic bliss. I feel like I’ve barely begun digesting this one.
Tony Molina – On This Day (Jangle pop)
Uh – pleroma EP (Experimental)
A “wondrous coalescence of rave, pastoralism and futurism” resolving as Eno-ish pop. “I Want My Life Back” pops into my head regularly.
Vanbur – Of Becoming (Dream pop)
Vega Trails – Sierra Tracks (Jazz)
Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan – Public Works and Utilities (Electronic)
WRNTDP’s urban synthscapes are never less than excellent; the optimistic “Renewal and Regenration” & the sprawling “The People Matter” are welcome additions to the plan.
🇨🇦 Wihtikow – ᐊᐦᒐᕽ (Electronic)
Darkly beat-driven shoegaze, or distorted BoC-ish electronica, or both at the same time.
Winter – Adult Romantix (Indie rock)
More muscular than her usual gossamer-gaze, but no less considered & intricate.
Woo – Music to Watch Seeds Grow By 001: Woo (Sweet Peas) (Experimental)
Patient as the title impies, one of the cult duo’s most consistent releases.
🇨🇦 Yoo Doo Right, 🇨🇦 Population II, Nolan Potter – Yoo II avec Nolan Potter (Psychedelic / Space Rock)
Space rock, psych, Zappa-esque jams, free jazz skronk — everything you want when it’s time to crank the volume and hide in a wall of sound. The kind of noisy that loops back to soothing.
Wander Lines 