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Dear listeners,
I’m back!
Thank you to the many guest writers who took over Amplifying duties for the past several months, while I was taking some much-needed time off to work on a book. I must admit that I did not listen to a whole lot of popular music during that time: My writing soundtrack was heavy on Robert Schumann piano works and ambient Japanese electronic music. Perhaps that odd combination will inspire a playlist for another day.
Today’s, however, reflects my first few weeks back at my day job, which I spent voraciously catching up on all the new music I’d missed during my time off. Quite a few recently released albums caught my ear: the shape-shifting “Baby,” from the suddenly ubiquitous avant-R&B musician Dijon; the droll indie-rocker Greg Freeman’s latest LP, “Burnover”; and the healing two-part release “Sable, Fable,” my favorite Bon Iver album in at least a decade.
If, like me, you haven’t been paying particularly close attention to new releases this year, let this playlist help you catch up. And even if you have been keeping up with 2025 music, I hope that at least one of these artists will be new to you. I always test out my playlists one last time before posting them, so I know that this one runs the exact duration it took me to untangle the disastrously knotted chain of a beloved necklace — and was an excellent soundtrack for successfully completing that task. May it accompany you on a similarly gratifying endeavor.
Airmailing you strength,
Lindsay
Listen along while you read.
1. Bon Iver: “From”
As far back as his 2011 easy-listening ballad “Beth/Rest,” Justin Vernon of Bon Iver has been a man unafraid to get in touch with his inner Bruce Hornsby — and for that he is to be commended. (Vernon and Hornsby have even collaborated on several occasions.) Like many of the tracks on Bon Iver’s bittersweet new album “Sable, Fable,” the soulful “From” fearlessly skirts the edge of schmaltz to arrive at a greater vulnerability.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
2. Water From Your Eyes: “Born 2”
“Everybody’s Crushed,” from the art-rock duo Water From Your Eyes, was one of my favorite releases of 2023, but I think I like its new album, “It’s a Beautiful Place,” even better. Rachel Brown and Nate Amos enliven seemingly stale alternative-rock tropes with an irreverent sensibility and serious chops, as heard on this distortion-drenched banger.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
3. Dijon: “Higher!”
Suddenly, the 33-year-old musician and producer Dijon Duenas is everywhere: guest-starring on Bon Iver’s aforementioned “Sable, Fable,” co-producing Justin Bieber’s sleek pair of “Swag” albums, and garnering acclaim for his own wonderfully warped solo album, “Baby.” The hiccuping “Higher!” exemplifies Dijon’s fragmented approach, which often gives the impression that he’s shattered a more conventional pop song with his bare hands and let the shards scatter into satisfying new shapes. Hop aboard the bandwagon: This is clearly Dijon’s breakout year.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
4. Karol G: “Ivonny Bonita”
On Sept. 5, a pop star not named Taylor stole the show at a Kansas City Chiefs game when the Colombian musician Karol G performed during the N.F.L.’s first-ever game in Brazil. Karol has said that the sultry “Ivonny Bonita” is “probably the most important song on ‘Tropicoqueta,’” her playful and eclectic new album. Written and produced with Pharrell Williams, and featuring contributions from the Cuban American musician Arturo Sandoval, this track has been described by Karol G as the theme song of her Sasha Fierce-like alter ego Ivonny, a woman who disregards the naysayers and lives life on her own terms.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
5. Sharp Pins: “If I Was Ever Lonely”
Kai Slater, 20, is young enough to be Robert Pollard’s grandson, and yet he nails the early Guided by Voices aesthetic of lo-fi buzz and killer hooks on this track from his latest LP as Sharp Pins, “Radio DDR.” Like GBV, the Chicago singer-songwriter also understands a thing or two about prolificacy: In addition to releasing a very good album with his other band, Lifeguard, this year, he’ll be putting out the second Sharp Pins record of 2025, “Balloon Balloon Balloon,” on Nov. 21.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
6. Greg Freeman: “Salesman”
A friend who, like me, self-identifies as an “MJ Lenderman bro” had intended to recommend Greg Freeman’s music to me, but before he even could I fell in love with the Vermont singer-songwriter’s latest album, “Burnover,” of my own volition. Like Lenderman, the 27-year-old Freeman sounds uncannily like a slacker-poet who has time-traveled here from the early ’90s and remains befuddled about how that happened; there’s more than a little Stephen Malkmus in his lackadaisical yowl. But the rollicking “Salesman,” a standout on the new LP, also displays an idiosyncratic sensibility that differentiates him from even his more obvious influences. He also gets extra Vermonter points for featuring, in its music video, one of the great state’s signature oddities: The world’s tallest filing cabinet.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
7. Kathleen Edwards: “Need a Ride”
The Canadian singer-songwriter Kathleen Edwards is a perennial favorite of mine, and it was a joy to interview her five years ago about her blessedly fleeting hiatus from the music scene, during which she opened a coffee shop called, cheekily, Quitters. Over the past two decades, going all the way back to her excellent 2002 debut “Failer,” Edwards has put together a formidable catalog that pairs her wool-warm voice with biting lyricism. On this highlight from her latest album, “Billionaire,” she channels righteous indignation worthy of her fellow countryman Neil Young and unfurls a slow-burning screed against intolerance, hypocrisy and other forms of modern malfeasance.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
8. Earl Sweatshirt: “Exhaust”
Several lines from this closing track on Earl Sweatshirt’s latest album, “Live Laugh Love,” are in the running to be my new mantra, but for now I’ll settle on this one: “More power to you / but it’s no flowers in your vase.” Throughout yet another inventively surreal release, Earl continues to treat language the way Dalí treated clocks: seemingly solid material to liquefy, distort and render gloriously strange.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
The Amplifier Playlist
“8 Songs That Will Catch You Up on This Year’s Music” track list
Track 1: Bon Iver, “From”
Track 2: Water From Your Eyes, “Born 2”
Track 3: Dijon, “Higher!”
Track 4: Karol G, “Ivonny Bonita”
Track 5: Sharp Pins, “If I Was Ever Lonely”
Track 6: Greg Freeman, “Salesman”
Track 7: Kathleen Edwards, “Need a Ride”
Track 8: Earl Sweatshirt, “Exhaust”
Bonus Tracks
I’ve also been catching up on episodes of Popcast, the show hosted by my colleagues (and substitute Amplifier writers) Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli. I especially enjoyed their interview with Bon Iver, which I listened to right after checking out “Sable, Fable.” It gave me plenty of insight into the album, but my favorite part was when the musician recounted the particularly Midwestern bit of tough love a friend once gave him: “False modesty looks ugly on you.” Phew! Who needs therapy when you have Popcast?
Lindsay Zoladz is a pop music critic for The Times and writes the subscriber-only music newsletter The Amplifier.
The post 8 Songs That Will Catch You Up on This Year’s Music appeared first on New York Times.
