The best of music in 2025 so far

Let’s start with the medium’s still-peak form, the full length album. It’s been dependably rich in Aotearoa, the nation’s musos still quietly cranking out masterpieces for those who care to listen.

Indie heroes Voom returned after a whopping 19 year absence with another perfect LP, the self-describing Something Good is Happening.

Cosmic in scope, beautifully sung, and with just the right amount of grit in the production, it showed Buzz Moller is still an absolute master at placing chords in the exact right order.

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Te Whanganui-a-Tara rapper-singer-producer MĀ quietly dropped another superb collection, this one tied to her day job as environmental ranger. Blame It On The Weather gets its anger at indifferent politicians out of the way quickly, then focuses on solutions and good vibes, with music that’s irresistibly smooth and welcomely experimental.

Erupting onto the scene with a full-length rap tour-de-force, RNZŌ was ably supported by Church & AP, Dirty, and Dera Meelan. Blunt, celebratory, and aided by playful beat-making, RNZŌ SZN is a wildly impressive debut.

One Is Always Heading Somewhere showed Wellington’s Womb further honing their glacial, beautiful dream-pop stylings, and Salt Water Criminals delivered a second LP of wonderfully scuffed sounds and literate, hooky songcraft called I Believe in Dog.

Another stunner arrived just last week, as Ladi6 released her long-in-the-making La Vā, a tribute to her late mum that moves from bountiful synthscapes to squelchy dance floor boogie.

As far as singles go, Mānuka Recordings continued their stellar run of funk, soul, and disco business, with choice cuts from Kenny Sterling, Julian Lubin, and The Hongi Slicker (Troy Kingi). And Wellington’s Michaela Tempers showcased her remarkably unique singing voice on a string of gorgeous folk tunes.

The year has also seen plenty of great live shows, my favourite taking place at Auckland’s Double Whammy. The aforementioned Voom belted out hits old and new to a rapturous crowd who knew every word and lustily sang them right back.

And American indie veteran Kristin Hersh treated fans to a two-hour one-woman show, reeling through songs from solo records as well as her band Throwing Muses, not to mention reading excerpts from her various novels.

Speaking of books about music, one has been reverberating around my head since I read it. Liz Pelly is a music journalist who’s written for the Guardian, Pitchfork, and NPR, and earlier this year released Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist.

It’s an extensive investigation into the origins of online streaming, the proliferation of ‘fake artists’ on Spotify, and the way these services have changed the way we experience music. Ranging from Pelly door-knocking in Sweden in attempts to uncover anonymous ‘playlist-fillers’, to ruminating on how the push for ‘chillout’ sounds changed whole swathes of the medium, the book emerges as a plea to not relegate the work of dedicated artists to background noise.

Finally, three documentaries used music as their throughline to varying degrees. Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat tells the story of a chapter in the Cold War involving American musicians used as political pawns, and the assassination of Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumbumba. It unfolds at a clip, with a cracking jazz soundtrack including Louis Armstrong, Nina Simone, Dizzy Gillespie and plenty more.

Helmed by Questlove of The Roots, Sly Lives! tells two stories: one about beloved funk musician Sly Stone and his descent into drug use, and the other outlined in its parenthetical (aka The Burden of Black Genius). Here the director interviews modern musicians like André3000 and D’Angelo about their experiences as black men in the spotlight, and the effect fame has had on them.

And closer to home, first-time director Ursula Grace Williams spent years documenting Marlon Williams as he wrote and recorded his first te reo Māori album Te Whare Tīwekaweka. The resulting film, Ngā Ao E Rua - Two Worlds is positively bursting with Williams' familiar charm, with tour footage aplenty as well as thoughtful moments back home.

Anyone who enjoys watching musicians in recording studios as much as I do will be rapt.