Airwaves
2025 was A Good Year For Music™. It was a very metallic one for me, although I can’t say that many new records really stuck out to me—I was revisiting a lot of older releases. It was certainly also a very noisy year, though besides the usual stuff (lots and lots of Merzbow, Incapacitants were on a roll, etc.) I engaged more with industrial and post-industrial traditions. Besides that, I got more into contemporary composition, and there is a surprising amount of what I would consider to be pop and rock records in my EOTY list. My go-to labels this year included zappak, WV Sorcerer, and AD 93. I also feel like my listening has become more global again, and prioritising finding things on my own rather than dutifully listening to every promo certainly helped with that.
Nevertheless, my folder with music that I have downloaded in 2025 has around 1.700 (2024: 1.550) sub-folders for different artists or compilations. According to my last.fm account, which by the way has celebrated its 18th birthday this year, I have listened to around 2.752 (2.652) different music releases by and with around 2.700 (2.623) artists in 2025, and in total roughly 22.700 (18.500) individual pieces of music. The artists whose music I had scrobbled the most—this doesn’t include stuff that I’ve streamed or that I listened to only on physical media—were Merzbow, Nine Inch Nails, Kate Bush, Meredith Monk, and Agalloch. This helpful lil’ tool tells me that according to time spent, it was actually Merzbow, Kevin Drumm, Jakob Ullmann, Agalloch, and The Ruins of Beverast.
Let’s dig in, then. As usual, I have put together a sort of gigantic mixtape, which is a tricky endeavour and very much a vibe-based thing to do, but if you find a record tucked in between some other ones that you liked, perhaps it’ll also be up your alley. Records comprising previously released or archival material are marked with an asterisk [*]. Records in which I was somehow involved or with whose makers I casually hang are marked with a [~pro] or a [~per], or indeed [~pro+per]. If a record was made or released by folks that I consider to be sketch, the Cross of St. Peter [⸸] will let you know that I think you should look into them before giving them your money. Links that are crossed out were detected as broken by WordPress, however all of them should actually work.
Rekerds’n’Choons
It was too hard to pick a or a few favourites this year. I think the one that meant the most to me was ZEA & Drumband Hallelujah Makkum’s in lichem fol beloften on Makkum, though I certainly had a lot of feelings about a lot more records than usual in 2025.
Post-Orientalism Anthology: Sonitus Vol. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 (Post-Orientalism Music[~pro])
Maciej Wirmański – Kruki (Szara Reneta)
Umwelt Vol. 1 (A.T.C.)
Laurent Pernice – presque nature (musiques immobiles 26-30) (taâlem)
Amby Downs – kinjarling studies: soundtracks (five years on) (Room40)
Kevin Drumm – Neither Here Nor There[*] (Vaknar) and Battles in the Snow I & II (DIY)
Katharina Schmidt – Time Images (Discreet Archive)
AOKI Takamasa – Sound for Photo Exhibitions (Muzan Editions)
Mira Rachel – Echoes of Eden (Noorden[~pro])
Banu – Pink Noise (Unrush)
Steve Roden – Forms of Paper (LINE/Aurora Central)[*]
Kunrad – Kleine Geluiden (Crónica)
ささきしおり (Shiori Sasaki) – 描奏をきく (Kiku (sense) the [drawing + sound]) (zappek)
nichijo 日常 – one, two 一，二 (Sub Jam)
Gabi Losoncy & The Rita – Flyers & Blues (Input Error)
liu huirun 刘惠润 – firecracker 鞭炮 (Sub Jam)
The Haters – Puinhoop and Niet Hier (Korm Plastics D)[*]
Merzbow – Collection 001-010 (Urashima)[*]
Network Glass and Two Weeks – funny33.wav (No Rent)
Emil Beaulieau – Memories (Orb Tapes) and Damaged and Destroyed (Freak Animal[⸸])[*]
Incapacitants – Chwalfa (Otoroku), Eternal Paralysis[*] and Peony Crackers[*] (advaita)
Kevin Drumm – Sheer Hellish Miasma[*] (Editions Mego) and Sheer Hellish Miasma 2 (Erstwhile)
C.C.C.C. – Live at Club Lower Links October 13th, 1992 (Tribe Tapes)[*]
Merzbow – Magpie (freizumabriss) / Merzbow & licht-ung – merzlicht (licht-ung) / Merzbow – Animal Magnetism[*] (Urashima) / Merzbow – The Prosperity Of Vice, The Misfortune Of Virtue[*] (Room40)
Michael Vorfeld – Glühlampenmusik (Karlrecords[~per])
Nails ov Christ – Dark Night of the Soul (Disabuse Transmission)[*]
David Wallraf – everything
Merzbow – Aka Meme (Old Europa Café)[*]
Seymour Glass – The Grudgery Of Drucks (No Rent)
Nicolussi – Fairly Used (epileptic media/FALT)[~per+pro]
Robert Turman – A Day in the Life (Hanson)
P’derrigerreo – A/Version (zappak)
Gufo Mangiasale – Le disavventure dello Gufo Mangiasale, ovverossia sette anni nello deserto di sale, mangiando et suculando lo sale stesso (epileptic)
Organ of Corti – Insania (Philatélie)
Läuten der Seele – Unterhaltungen mit Larven und Überresten (World of Echo)
Henning Christiansen – Übersinnliches Gelächter (Youdonthavetocallitmusic/Harlekin Art)[*]
Philip Jeck – The Classic: Live in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland 23.05.2008 (Touch)
Ayami Suzuki – Invisible Guest (zappak)
Civilistjävel! x Mayssa Jallad – Marjaa: The Battle Of The Hotels Versions (Six of Swords)
Dorothy Carlos – Ear World (29 Speedway)
Demdike Stare & Kristen Pilon – To Cut & Shoot (DDS)
Richard Youngs – Zerkelus and Zulaqrex (Fourth Dimension)
Buck Moon & licht-ung – 35 Blumen (Econore)
Amelia Cuni – Melopea (Black Truffle)
Greet – I Know How to Die (Dry Cough/Fiadh)
Slow Reading Club and Charlie Usher – LEARNING (Edições CN)
Mariolina Zitta – Concert for Bats, Voices and Natural Sounds (Black Sweat)
yan jun – the return of stupidity (No Rent) / Yan Jun & Eric Wong – rely[*~per] (Infant Tree)
Darja Kazimira & Zura Makharadze – Minotaur – Ananke (Cyclic Law)
Saadet Türköz + Anaïs Tuerlinckx – le chant des noiseuses (scatterArchive)
Meredith Monk – Cellular Songs (ECM)
Iva Bittová – Songs of Tomorrow (Old Heaven Books)[*]
Raven Chacon – Voiceless Mass (New World)
Sarah Nemtsov – Tzimtzum (bastille musique)
Bridget Ferrill – Domschatzkammer (Subtext)
Cergio Prudencio – Antología 2 : Obras para la Orquesta Experimental de Instrumentos Nativos (Buh)[*]
Reigakusha – Gagaku Suites (Black Sweat)
Amosphère – Cosmogonical Ears (Hallow Ground)
Catherine Lamb x Ghost Ensemble – interius/exterius (greyfade)
Jakob Ullmann – Solo I / Solo IV (Another Timbre)
Samuel Reinhard – For 10 Musicians (elsewhere)
Kai Fagaschinski – Aerodynamics (Ni Vu Ni Connu[~pro])
FUJI|||||||||||TA – Live at Epsilon Spires (Feeding Tube)
Claire M Singer – Gleann Ciùin (Touch)
Idim Samimi Mofakham – Abjad Dream (Piano and Electronics) (Noise à Noise)
Liz Allbee – Breath Vessels (Ni Vu Ni Connu[~pro])
Kenneth Kirschner – everything
Felicity Mangan – String Figures (Elevator Bath)
Judith Hamann – Aunes (Shelter Press)
Lucy Railton – Blue Veil (Ideologic Organ)
Peter Rehberg – Liminal States (Editions Mego)[*]
Martina Berther & Philipp Schlotter – Silence Will Never Die (Hallow Ground)[~pro]
Sage Martens – Chamber Music for Lawn Mowers (Edições CN)
Atsuko Hatano & Joe Talia – Black Spur (zappak)
Hekla – Turnar (Phantom Limb)
Hesam Kardan – Harvest (Noise à Noise)
Drones for Drones, Volume 4 (КИЇВПАСТРАНС)
Arash Azadi – Universe in Prayer – فَلَک در ذِکْر (Structured Experience)
Ehsan Saboohi – Politics-Aesthetics No. V: Sonus Autonomy II (Post-Orientalism[~pro])
Cedrik Fermont – Es könnte der Anfang sein (Syrphe)
Holger Czukay – Gvoon – Brennung 1 (Grönland)[*]
Costin Miereanu – Poly-Art Recordings 1976-1982 (Auryfa)[*]
Else Marie Pade – EMP – Complete Electronic Works 1955-2012 (Dacapo)[*]
Matthias Puech – La Traversée (Hallow Ground)[~pro]
Lukas Moritz Wegscheider – fo:hn (epileptic)
Concepción Huerta – El Sol de los Muertos (Umor Rex)
Lea Bertucci – The Oracle (Cibachrome Editions)
Martina Bertoni – Electroacoustic Works for Halldorophone (Karlrecords) [~per+pro]
Jasmine Guffond – Muzak for the Encouragement of Unproductivity (LINE)
Raphael Loher – Hug of Gravity (Hallow Ground)[~pro]
licht-ung – merzt (Kringloop)
Quentin Tolimieri / Eric Wong – Erasures (Ftarri)[~per] / Ian Douglas-Moore / Dominic Coles / Eric Wong – under under hill (aloe)[~per]
Nijiumu – When I sing, I slip into the microphone. Into that void, I bring comrade „prayers“, then, turning to face the outside, together we explode. (Black Truffle)[*]
Burkhard Beins & Angharad Davies – Meshes of the Evening / Burkhard Beins – eight duos (Ni Vu Ni Connu)[~pro]
Giuseppe Ielasi & Riccardo D. Wanke – with time, we learned to ask less (Hallow Ground)[~pro]
Macie Stewart – When the Distance Is Blue (International Anthem) and The World Doubles in Size (DIY)
Meros – Magʻoki Attori (ТОПОТ Ʇ TOPOT)
Raed Yassin – Phantom Orchestra (Morphine)
Das B – Love (thanatosis)
أحمد [Ahmed] – سماع [Sama’a] (Audition) (Otoroku)
The Necks – Disquiet (Northern Spy)
Sarah Hennies — SOVT (elsewhere)
JJJJJerome Ellis – Vesper Sparrow (Shelter Press)
Jefre Cantu-Ledesma – Gift Songs (Mexican Summer)
Sary Moussa – Wind, Again (Other People)
ioa beduneau – Mélodies pour Clairons (Marionette)
GUU – GUU (Tax Free)
Kim Hiorthøy – Ghost Note (Blickwinkel)
Mohammad Reza Mortazavi – Nexus (Latency)
Wukir Suryadi – Human Minds (DIY)
Joss Turnbull – TURMOIL (Boomslang)
Zhu Wenbo – GRADO (Marginal Frequency)
Charles Dubois – Seize frictions (Econore)
Simon Popp – Trio (Squama)
Paal Nilssen-Love – 5th Of March 2021 and 15th Of December 2024 (PNL)
Nilufar Habibian – The Cultural Sound Blocks of Humanity Vol. 7 – Radif of Iranian Music for Qanun (Post-Orientalism[~pro])
Gūsū – The Ending Was a Typical Part (Subject to Restrictions)
Elisabeth Klinck – Chronotopia (Hallow Ground)[~pro]
Vashti Bunyan – Lookaftering (20th Anniversary Edition) (FatCat)[*]
Eddie Marcon – Carpet of Fallen Leaves (Morr Music)
Songs: Ohia – Impala (Secretly Canadian)[*]
ZEA & Drumband Hallelujah Makkum – in lichem fol beloften (Makkum)
ZÖJ – Give Water to Birds (Parenthèses)
Maurice Louca – Barĩy (Fera) برٌِي (Simsara)
IZ – 回忆 Memory (Old Heaven Books)[*]
Širom – In the Wind of Night, Hard-Fallen Incantations Whisper (Glitterbeat)
Senyawa – Membaladakan Keselamatan (Ballads for the Survivors) (WV Sorcerer)
Mohammad Mostafa Heydarian = محمد مصطفی هایداریان – Noor-e Vojood (Radio Khiyaban)
Aly Eissa – The Fruit Fly (Feral Note)
Christer Bothén – Donso N’Goni (Black Truffle)
Noor Zehra Kazim – The Sound of Sagar Veena (Old Heaven Books)
Gnäw – II (Radio Khiyaban)
Ruhiges Gewerbe – Estate Moments (Tax Free)
Lonnie Holley – Tonky (Jagjaguwar)
Moin – Belly Up (AD 93)
Damon Locks – List of Demands (International Anthem)
Annahstasia – Tether (drinksumwtr)
Building Instrument – Månen, Armadillo (Hubro)
Daniel Ögren – Pine (Playground)
K. Yoshimatsu – Zentai: The Collected Works of K. Yoshimatsu 1, 2, and 3 (Phantom Limb)[*]
Disk Musik: A DD. Records Compilation (Phantom Limb)[*]
Mansur – Pentatonic Ruins (Denovali)
Samuel Savenberg – As Bright as a Burning Star – Live at B-Sides 2024 (Präsens Editionen)[~per]
Rosa Anschütz – Sabbatical (Heartworm Press)
Baths – Gut (Basement’s Basement)
Tujiko Noriko & AOKI Takamasa – 28 (KeplarRev)[~pro]
The Marx Trukker – On Cue to Conclusion (Noorden)[~pro+per]
Morgan Sully – Phone Recordings (DIY)
Arthur Itis – QUADRAPOLITAN (DIY)
Lolina – gg ep (Relaxin)
Nic Krog – Perfect Pattern (Psychic Liberation)[~per]
Anysia Kym x Loraine James – Clandestine (10k)
OHYUNG – You Are Always on My Mind (Phantom Limb)
Raisa K – Affectionately (15 love)
O$VMV$M – SHROUD OF FEAR II (DIY)
John Glacier – Like a Ribbon (Young)
Backxwash – »Dissociation«
Nazar – Demilitarize (Hyperdub)
DJ Python – i was put on this earth (XL)
Xexa – Kissom (Príncipe Discos)
Lyra Pramuk – Hymnal (pop.soil)
Marta Forsberg – Archeology of Intimacy (Warm Winters Ltd.)
Ailise Blake – Soave (These Hands Melt)
Sophia Djebel Rose – Sécheresse (WV Sorcerer)
Gerstein – Sucker – Expanded, Remixed And Remastered (Der Klang/Heretiche Elettriche Divisioni)[*]
Joanne Robertson – Blurrr (AD 93)
Grouper – Way Their Crept (kranky)[*]
Spiracle – Ossiphage (Rope or Guillotine)
Quade – The Foel Tower (AD 93)
Clock DVA – White Souls in Black Suits (Mute)[*]
Sequence of Events – The Art of Memory (Subject to Restrictions)
Jugoslavia Wave: Yugoslavian New Wave & Post Punk, 1980-1989 (Death Is Not the End)[*]
Q Lazzarus – Goodbye Horses (Dark Entries)[*]
Tóxico Tapes (Subject to Restrictions)[*]
Painting – Snapshot of Pure Attention (Sinnbus)[~pro+per]
Kara Delik – Kara Delik (DIY)
Celine Dessberg – Сэлэнгэ „Selenge“ / Чинтамани „Chintamani“ (That’s Love)
Sweet Rebels – The Golden Era of Algerian Pop-Raï (WeWantSounds)[*]
A Selection of Music from Libyan Tapes (Habibi Funk)[*]
Thailand’s Golden Sounds 80s Synth Pop & Disco (Baa)[*]
Oberkas Travel – Oberkas Travel (Tańce)
Natsume – Marrakesh No Hara (Sad Disco)[*]
Kuunatic – Wheels of Ömon (Glitterbeat)
Francesca Remigi – WITCHESS (Hora)
Al Karpenter – Greatest Heads (Hegoa/Night School)
Church Car – Church Of (Island House)[~per]
Sanam – Sametou Sawtan (Constellation)
Mess Esque – Jay Marie, Comfort Me (Drag City)
Lungfish – 10 East and Feral Hymns (Dischord)[*]
Raein – Forme Sommerse / La Quiete – La fine non è la fine[*] (Persistent Vision)
Kleistwahr – The Battlefield Is Everywhere (Fourth Dimension)
Naemi – breathless, shorn (DIY)
Bill Orcutt Guitar Quartet – HausLive 4 (Hausu Mountain)
Les Rallizés Dénudés – Jittoku ’76 and 屋根裏 YaneUra Sept. ’80 (Temporal Drift)[*]
Dope Purple – Children in the Darkness (WV Sorcerer/Riot Season)
Kuntari – Mutu Beton (99Chants) and Lahar (Artetetra)
Smiqra – Rɡyaɡ̇dźé! (DIY)
Imperial Triumphant – Goldstar (Century Media)
Noise Trail Immersion – Tutta la Morte in un solo punto (I, Voidhanger)
Locusts & Honey – Shadow of My End (Hypaethral)
Divide and Dissolve – Insatiable (Bella Union)
Ragana & Drowse – Ash Souvenir (The Flenser)
Hell – Submersus (Sentient Ruin Laboratories) / Hell & Mizmor – Alluvion (Gilead Media)
Bell Witch & Aerial Ruin – Stygian Bough: Volume II (Profound Lore)
Coltsblood – Obscure into Nebulous Dusk (Dry Cough)
Nortt – Dødssang (Avantgarde)
QRIXKUOR – The Womb of the World (Dark Descent/Invictus)
Impetuous Ritual – Relentless Execution of Ceremonial Excrescence (Blood Harvest)[*]
Ritual Mess – Cascading Misery (20 Buck Spin)
Mutagenic Host – The Diseased Machine (Dry Cough/Gurgling Gore)
Крик – Крик (AbArt Corruption/Sonic Raid)
Dolchstoß – Propaganda der Tat (AbArt Corruption/Breaking the Chains/Fucking Kill)
Winselmutter – Schattentod in der Leibeswelt (Sapvion/Fucking Kill)
LVTHN – The Devil’s Bridge (Amor Fati)
اکوان (Akvan) – »آیینهی دق (Mirror of Decay)«
Sumerian Tombs – Age of Eternal Night (Ván)
Yellow Eyes – Confusion Gate (Gilead Media)
Eudaemon – Spiritual Anguish (Riff Merchant/Fiadh)
Vëlhtrhaq – everything
coffret de bijoux – qunaiqû nèjautsè (Canti Eretici) and everything else
Agriculture – The Spiritual Sound (The Flenser)
Agalloch – Ashes Against the Grain (Eisenwald)[*]
All Men Unto Me – Requiem (The Lavarium)
Locrian – The Crystal World 15th Anniversary Remaster (Utech)[*]
von jeglichem wort – everything
Sum of R – Spectral (WV Sorcerer)
Klyvr – Black Mountain Ambience (Enchanted Silver)[*]
Mike Majkowski – Invisible (Hands in the Dark) and Tide (Room40)
Katatonic Silentio – Water Dubs (A Walking Contradiction)
Kobermann – Unterland (A.T.C.)
Big Hands – Thauma (Marionette)
Oneohtrix Point Never – Tranquilizer (Warp)
Toada – ~maresia (DIY)
Kristoffer Lislegaard – Bootleg: Live at Ekko 2025 (DIY)
Water Bodies (Gravity Pleasure)
Benjamin Brunn – Swan Lake (Chrome Plated Diamonds)[*]
Seekersinternational – TheWhereBetweenYou&Me (Bokeh Versions)[*]
Barker – Stochastic Drift (Smalltown Supersound)
Carrier – Rhythm Immortal (Modern Love)
Burial – »Comafields«
Significant Other – Live at Sustain Release (Pain Management)
Lamin Fofana – Tidal Dub (DIY)
Adam Feingold – Nothing Is a Field (Temple)
The Marx Trukker – The Constantly Inevitable (Noorden)[*~pro+per]
Ben Kaczor – To Baby Bones (Small Steps)
Efdemin – Poly (Ostgut Ton)
Black Sites – R4 (Tresor)
Marcel Dettmann – »Suffice to Predict (L.B. Dub Corp Remix)« (Dekmantel)
Dreamlogicc – everything
Polygonia – Upside Down (mulemusiq)
Viola Klein – New Chapter (Meakusma)
Steven Julien – »UP« (Apron)
Marie Tjong-Ayong – Motherland (QEONE)
Raissa Febriani – Hutan Timur (Human Pitch)
Emily Jeanne – Call of the Sea (quỳnh)
Djrum – Under Tangled Silence (Houndstooth)
Slikback – Attrition (Planet Mu)
Traxman – Da Mind of Traxman Vol. 3 (Planet Mu)
Sunden – Minor Coda (Loose Lips)
Impérieux – everything
Muskila – JAH1 NAM (YUKU)
Kalabash – »Major ft. Jelani Blackman« (Tropopause)
Trim – No Caller ID (Tectonic)
REDUCER – Sleng Teng (’86 Discomix Version) (Bokeh Versions)
And yes, I have once more forgotten about 30 to 40 more records and pieces of music that would have been worth including. I am very sorry that I haven’t mentioned yours.
((Belated (Re-))Discoveries
Tim Olive
Anthony Green, especially »Dear Child (I’ve Been Dying to Reach You)«
Les Rallizés Dénudés
Läuten der Seele
Jakob Ullmann
Aube
Manuel Zurria’s Fame di Vento
toe + Pele + Collections of Colonies of Bees
Katalin Ladik
Éliane Radigue’s »Île re-sonante« and »Ψ 847« and more generally her early work
Kara-Lis Coverdale’s early work
Slime’s »Deutschland muss sterben« in conjunction with this ruling by the German constitutional court
Incapacitants’ Extreme Gospel Nights
Lungfish, one record at a time
Wolvennest’s Vortex
Macronympha
Rosa Extra
DJ Python’s Mas Amable
Bill Orcutt’s The Anxiety of Symmetry
Mariah Carey
Ulthar
Crippling Alcoholism’s With Love from a Padded Room
Julius Eastman
Organ Of Corti and Sewer Election
Sven-Åke Johansson’s Seewetter and Johansson / Fite / Grip’s Swinging at Topsi’s
The Drones For Drones series
U.S. Steel Cello Ensemble’s Noise in the Library
Nine Inch Nails’s »Sin« as heard on And All That Could Have Been
Theo Parrish
Ranola’s »Blumen«
Blood Spore‘ –’s Fungal Warfare Upon All Life
Kate Bush’s »My Lagan Love«
Meredith Monk
Ánde Somby’s Yoiking with the Winged Ones
The Gordons, especially »Spik and Span«
Xiu Xiu’s Women as Lovers
Grouper’s Nivhek side project
Gutvoid
Maurice Louca
Chantal Acda & Eric Thielemans‘ Koyaanisqatsi, a New Score
Raein’s Sulla linea d’orizzonte tra questa mia vita e quella di tutti
Arthur Itis (or Arthuritis, whatever)
Nalan (or slimgirlfat, whatever)
P.A. Hülsenbeck’s Garden of Stone
Richard Skelton’s Landings
Spectralism, I guess
A bunch of older Hallow Ground releases
Andy Guthrie’s Brass Orchids
Catherine Lamb
Black to Comm
Akio Suzuki’s Mu Ro Bi Ko
Live and Alive
Well, this is embarrassing. I entered this year with the declared intention to attend more concerts, club nights, and open-air raves, and then I … Well, I didn’t see many performances, and went dancing only a handful of times this year. Will 2026 be different, will I be different in 2026? We’ll see about that. These ones definitely reignited my passion for and enjoyment of people musicking in front of an audience.
— Saadet Türköz / Eldar Tagi @ CTM Festival – silent green Kuppelhalle, January 25th
CTM Festival is always a must, but I didn’t catch many performances that really left an impression on me this year—which, admittedly, might have been a me problem. It started off promisingly enough with this wonderful improvised duo performance led by Saadet Türköz, one of the most interesting vocal artists around, and Eldar Tagi, who weaved a web of sounds around her. It was captivating.
— Finom @ Kantine am Berghain, February 2nd
After a week or so of Very Serious Music at CTM Festival, N. convinced me to skip the festival’s final show and instead go to an underattended gig of a band she loves—for all the right reasons, as it turned out. They even played an above-average cover of »Cloudbusting,« the best song in a discography full of best songs. This was the most fun I’ve had at a concert in a few years or so. Coincidentally, the promo for member Macie Stewart’s second solo album landed in my inbox a day or so afterwards, and also that one didn’t disappoint.
— Moin @ silent green Betonhalle, February 26th
I loved, loved, loved Moin’s debut EP when it came out in 2013, so I greeted their return with open arms. It was interesting to see that they draw such a big crowd, and while I still would say that their magic primarily takes place in the studio rather than on stage, I was absolutely hypnotised for a good 20 minutes or so. Granted, a few glasses of wine and some very good company helped make this a night to remember.
— Shibaali @ Xelor Kesselhaus, March 21st
I think I have always been fascinated by ritual because I have never felt much of a connection to the traditions established in the environments in which I grew up. (Yes, that’s probably very much a Central European white person’s problem.) Anyhow, once more N. dragged me along to one of the most joyful events I have ever attended in my life. People from all walks of life and social strata, united under one groove. A beautiful Nowruz celebration.
— Limpe Fuchs @ Kiezsalon – Kleiner Wasserspeicher, July 25th
I’ve missed way too many Kiezsalon gigs this year, but I’m glad to have made it to this one. At this point, I’m very bored with artists who build their own instruments, but do not use them in interesting ways. Limpe Fuchs is not one of them. I wouldn’t even be able to describe the oversized … things with which she was working, but she got the most overtone-rich sounds out of them, sounds that perfectly resonated with the space. This was a performance full of gripping dynamics and twists as well as—a main differentiator—lots of humour. One of my fondest Kiezsalon memories so far.
— Natural Realms & Church Car @ ausland, October 19th
Every music venue is 95 % people and 5 % space, and most of the people that made ausland for me have left the space in recent years. For this evening, a few of them were there again, and I was in my favourite spot. The performances were excellent. The music of Natural Realms—Bryan Eubanks and Xavier Lopez—can only be described as »peak ausland,« and Church Car positively reminded me of Pele, if Pele had ever included folks who studied with David First and/or had a thing for showmanship and the avant-garde. I of course drank more wine than I should have had.
Pages
According to my Goodreads account, I’ve read 37 (2024: 24) books with a total page count of around 9.000 (~ 9.400) this year, though I think I couldn’t find a few books in the database and, contrary to what many might think, don’t actually read apparatuses. For perhaps a decade or so, I was always roughly a year behind on my Wire subscription, but in 2025 finally managed to catch up. I simply found more time to read this year because sometimes I wasn’t doing much else. I mainly focused on music, its history, and the industries behind as well as adjacent to it. I stayed on top of current events throughout this terrible year, so I think I was allowed to indulge in something that occasionally felt escapist.
— Angelika Meier – Die Auflösung des Hauses Decker (2021)
Something that not many people know is that I used to be a literary guy. I originally came to Berlin to study comparative literature and ended up organising readings, even publishing a few poems along the way. There were a few reasons for why I left that world behind me, and none of them are particularly interesting, however they resulted in me abandoning literature as an artform as well. In the past twelve years or so, I have read maybe a handful of poems, short stories, and four novels at best. Die Auflösung des Hauses Decker was, fortunately, one of them. T. loves it so much that he has purchased multiple copies to give it to people who he thinks might appreciate it, N. being one of them. She loved it, too, and compelled me to read it while we were on holiday. I am thankful to both of them, because this is one of the best novels I have ever read—full of playful references to Franz Kafka, full of humour and mystique, full of themes that Meier treats essayistically instead of using them as plot devices, and so much more. It is a masterpiece, perhaps even a definitive one. N. and I have since purchased multiple copies to give it to people who we think might appreciate it.
— Chris L. Terry and James Spooner (eds.) – Black Punk Now (2023)
Another thing that not many people know is that I used to be a punk guy. Before I came to Berlin to study comparative literature and ended up organising readings, even publishing a few poems along the way, I was regularly hanging out at squats for some volxküche grub and a hardcore matinee show with 38 bands on the bill and about as many attendants. There were a few reasons for why I left that world behind me, and none of them are particularly interesting, but one of the major ones was however that the scene felt very homogenous: Most people looked like me, wore better shoes than I did, and had roughly the same opinions as I did. Reading the cunningly curated, edited, and most of all designed Black Punk Now, it felt like opening a window to a world that had always been a little out of sight when I was still in the thick of it. There are a few duds here or there, but with its mix of fact and fiction, interviews and roundtables as well as comic art, this anthology was an absolute joy to read.
— Mark Mulligan – Awakening: The Music Industry in the Digital Age (2015), Eric Drott – Streaming Music, Streaming Capital (2024), and Andy Crysell – Selling the Night: When Club Culture Meets Brands, Advertising and the Creative Industries (2025)
As a music journalist, I prefer to talk shop, so I read a lot of shop-talking books. MIDiA’s Mark Mulligan with his meticulous account of what happened to the music industry after the Napster fallout filled some gaps, Eric Drott’s more general, schematic analysis of what streaming is and how it works became a valuable resource, and Andy Crysell’s admittedly excessive overview on how dance music and big business have always kind of tango’d were the three best ones in that area—though I must hasten to add that I had already read Liz Pelly’s Mood Machine in late 2024, and that this was of course the most important and indeed best music industry book all year.
— S. Alexander Reed – Assimilate: A Critical History of Industrial Music (2013) and Stephan Wuthe – Swingtime in Deutschland (2012)
These two books have nothing in common besides dealing with musical subcultures of which I previously had only passing knowledge. Despite being a lil’ noisenik, I never cared much for industrial, hence the only thing I knew was that there were the Gristle and the Cabs, and then Trent Reznor came along and now everyone is wearing those freakishly baggy pants and neon-coloured faux-dreadlocks. And everything I knew about swing music and early jazz in the first half of the century in the Weimar Republic/Nazi Germany was a) very little and b) the little information that I picked up while preparing a uni radio project during which I—coincidentally!?—interviewed the very author of the second book. I won’t get into much detail about the books here, but both opened new worlds to me and provided me with a lot of information about these musical styles and the subcultures that formed around them as well as, most importantly, their place in history and their relationship with the world at large. Music is never about music, someone once said to me, and these two books attest to that in different ways.
— Also worth mentioning:
George Lipsitz – Dangerous Crossroads. Popular Music, Postmodernism and the Poetics of Place (1995)
Harry Vogt and Martina Seeber (eds.) – Radio Cologne Sound. Das Studio für Elektronische Musik des WDR (2024) and Paul Purgas (ed.) – Subcontinental Synthesis Electronic Music at the National Institute of Design, India 1969–1972 (2024)
Simon Napier-Bell – Black Vinyl White Powder (2002) and Ta-Ra-Ra-Boom-De-Ay: The Dodgy Business of Popular Music (2014)
Leah Kardos – Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love (2024)
Frans de Waard – America’s Greatest Noise (2024)
Screens
I have maybe watched more movies in 2025 than in any previous year of my life. According to my Letterboxd account, I have seen about 141 (2024: 109) while I have only watched half a dozen or so TV series according to my IMDB one. I simply love going to the cinema with friends like R., L., S., and/or of course N. as well as, occasionally, alone. Also shoutout to VÖBB for offering three different video streaming platforms for the meagre price of € 10 a year, especially filmfriend was a veritable treasure trove at times. I did watch a lot of trash and subpar stuff, but have very few regrets. Something that did bother me immensely is that someone has apparently passed some law according to which every movie with 60 minutes worth of plot needs to be more than two hours long. I think the success of Ruben Östlund, Giorgos Lanthimos, and Ari Aster (or A24, or Paul Thomas Anderson, Luca Guadagnino …) are to be blamed for this. I’d like to see less of that in the future. I think I have watched more non-Anglophonic movies this year than usual, which is cool. When it comes to TV shows, there weren’t many that really excited me. 2025 was more of a comfort-watching year in that regard.
Liked those (the most):
— Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat (2024)
I still can’t believe I hadn’t heard about this movie at all before M. pointed me to it on a rainy Summer day. I immediately bought the DVD and was not disappointed. One of the best documentary films I have ever seen, both in terms of what it talks about and how it talks about it. A mind-blowing masterpiece.
— Les Glaneurs & La Glaneuse (2000) and Les glaneurs et la glaneuse… deux ans après (2002)
For the longest time, I only had an ambient awareness of Agnès Varda as someone who has made some iconic movies that I definitely should watch, and MUBI consistently reminded me of that. I finally, finally watched Les Glaneurs & La Glaneuse on a lazy Sunday morning, and immediately afterwards tried to find more of her stuff, stat. I have barely ever been moved this much by a simple documentary film, never quite felt as gutted and hopeful after watching something on my fucking laptop.
It’s Not Just You: Music Streaming Is Broken Now (2025)
Everybody loves to talk about how music streaming sucks, but few people really manage to concisely explain what some of the biggest issues are—which also has to do with the fact that a lot of people reporting on these issues in a professional or semi-professional capacity make a fucktonne of mistakes. This YouTube video by composer and producer Venus Theory was different, and it was the most important video on the fucking state of fucking things to come out this year.
Liked those (a lot):
3 Faces (2018)
That one scene in the otherwise tedious and pointless Queer (2024) in which Daniel Craig shoots up and New Order starts playing
Frank (2014)
A Real Pain (2024)
Severance (2022—)
Silo (2023—)
Heretic (2024)
Heldin (2025)
Adolescence (2025)
The Graduate (1967)
Allégorie Citadine (2024)
Naissance des pieuvres (2007)
Whiplash (2014)
The Ballad of Wallis Island (2025)
Monk in Pieces (2025)
Animale (2024)
Parks & Recreation (2009-2015)
Brooklyn Nine-Nine (2013-2021)
Persepolis (2007)
À qui veut bien l’entendre (2021)
タンポポ (1985)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Disliked those (a lot):
Babygirl (2024), Bird (2024), The Electric State (2025), Parthenope (2024), Die My Love (2025)
Work
I had already gone fully freelance in 2024, however I continued to have a few regular gigs until mid-2025 or so. I left behind one of those on my own accord, while another one fell victim to a frankly idiotic restructuring process. Hence, this was the first (half) year in which I truly worked freelance. It went so-so. There were stretches during which I had zero commissions and received no responses to my pitches while my more-profitable-but-less-visibile side-gig was also not bringing in as much as it could. I panicked a bit in these—luckily brief—periods. All in all, it has been a messy year, and I am wondering about my long-term prospects. It did feel like the last year in which I could write the kind of in-depth pieces on niche subjects that truly interest me and that in my opinion should be discussed more often. I made sure to tackle some issues that had been on the back of my mind for literally years because I knew I wouldn’t get another chance. I feel immensely privileged to have been given many chances to explore special interest subjects and never took that for granted, but I do think we still need pieces that explore quote-unquote fringe and/or complicated topics to have a nuanced discussion around culture. With that being said, here are some personal highlights from this year.
— Melting Plastic. A Cultural History of the Playlist (Up Until 2020) / Schmelzendes Plastik. Eine Kulturgeschichte der Playlist (bis zum Jahr 2020)
I was very surprised to find out that Liz Pelly had quoted me in her widely successful Mood Machine, but it was also a little awkward. I was not exactly super happy with the final published version of the essay referenced by her in passing. Hence, I went back to the version I had originally submitted, reworked and massively expanded it, translated it into English, and published it on my own website because I had nothing better to do. I am happy with this version now.
— An Introduction to Yugoslav Music History, Part 1: Music and Market Socialism (German version) / An Introduction to Yugoslav Music History, Part 2: Liberalism and Disintegration (German version), HHV-Mag
My two-part introduction to the Yugoslav music industry and culture had been brewing since 2018, when I picked up a copy of the fourth instalment of the Ex-Yu Electronica series during a brief stint in Ljubljana. A lot of work went into this, and the responses seemed positive. It was a nice follow-up to my pieces about music in Japan (Part 1, Part 2—the English version was lost) and Anadolu rock/pop and the history of Turkish gastarbeiter music in the FRG (Part 1, Part 2—same, sadly), I think.
— Szene am Tropf. Clubkultur und Alkohol, Teil 1: An der Bar und hinter den Kulissen / Szene am Tropf. Clubkultur und Alkohol, Teil 2: Eine Szene als Werbefläche, DJ LAB
This was another two-part article that had been coming for a long, long time: I drew on background interviews about club culture’s entanglement with the alcohol industry that I had conducted in late 2020. I am happy it finally saw the light of day, but it also felt like a farewell note of sorts after my Quartalsbericht column had been axed and my series of club portraits for DJ LAB was discontinued around the same time. Nevertheless, I was able to provide a sort of coda to the latter one with a piece about the »clubsterben« in Germany.
— Bonus 1: True Hipsterian Black Metal (Mixtape)
In February, I put out an annotated mixtape with some black metal(-adjacent) cuts that has received a staggering four plays so far. This is not surprising at all, but who knows—maybe someone reading this might be interested.
— Bonus 2: Feature 50 | Ist das noch Musik? – Krach, Kunst und Kontext, Track 17 – Der Musikpodcast
This was the third time that Christopher Hunold invited me to appear on the wonderful German-language Track 17 podcast to talk about a niche subject we had previously discussed on Discord. This time, we tackled the mother of all questions: What even is music!? And yes, we used that as an excuse to gush about Gabi Losoncy at length.
If you’d like to keeps tabs on my work—I have left most social networks—please shoot me an email at kricorn@konkrit.de and I will add you to my mailing list. You can find all previous mail-outs here. It has been quite rewarding to start and even grow this mailing list. Getting direct responses from people once in a while brings me a lot of joy.
Food, in no particular order
Dinkelseele from Bäckerei Roth
Hellmann’s Vegan Mayo
The Hausbrot by Zeit für Brot as bought at Denn’s
Peanuts (roasted, salted/unsalted)
Dao Thai
Fried noodles at Red Dragon even though the tofu was a little charred
The first strawberries of the season
My own pasta alla lenticchie recipe
Stuffed vine leaves
Fava
Grilled oyster mushroom
Green bell peppers
Those mulberries from V. and M.’s garden
Cherries
Pommes nachm Schwümm
Figs, once more
Bäckerei Kroll
Borani kadoo and soup-e-pesteh
Vitamin water for some dumb fucking reason
Walnuts
That blanc de noir at my mother’s place
Chili beans
Beans in all shapes and forms, really
Hafer/Dinkel Crunch
The alcohol-free wine by Doppio Passo
That chocolate with cranberries and nuts from ALDI
Falafel at Nabil’s
The winning combination of red lentils and cauliflower
Thai-Food Hamburg
The REWE ginger shots, the best flavour being maracujá
Kaiserbrötchen zum Aufbacken, for some reason
Thai aubergine
Those cheap vegan LIDL protein bars because I’m that person now
Garten-Limonade
And of course at least once a week or so, our »spicy soup«
Spaces, in chronological order (yes)
Filmtheater am Friedrichshain, Saal 2, to the left (iykyk)
b-ware!
Kantstraße, somehow
The saddle of my bicycle
Moabit once more
Freibad Pankow before 10 a.m.
That secluded little water basin, and the beach in front of our house
Brotfabrik
I. and D.’s living room
So many lakes
A playground in a suburb of Frankfurt am Main
Jonny Knüppel on a very hot day
The river Main on a very hot day
Dallenbergbad
That quick getaway with all those cows
The staircase of ausland
My mum’s winter garden on a winter morning
The moor a short walk from there
Hamburg, especially Doppelschicht and Fischkopp Records
Every body of water in which I have been, or to which I have been close
Life
Chi va piano, va sano e va fuori raramente.
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Previous editions: 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019. The others have either never been finished or were lost in the blogosphere.