Ranking Everything I Heard: January 2025
Tributes, AOTY contenders and more!
While I never continue a feature based on whether or not it’s popular, it turns out that this series isn’t the vanity project I feared it would be: the debut entry was one of my most read since starting my Substack which is pretty neat!
In case you didn’t check out that post, the concept here is simple. I’ll be reviewing all 26 projects I checked out this past month. The catch? I’ll only be allowed 35 words and a snappy wee score to get my thoughts across!
As always, to keep you in the right, here’s my pathetically patriotic rating scale:
10/10 - YASSSSS (Perfect, impactful)
9/10 - F***ing Spot On (Fantastic)
8/10 - Braw (Great)
7/10 - Quite gid
6/10 - No bad aw aw (Sorta good)
5/10 - Awright (Fine. It’s fineeeee)
4/10 - Wee bit minging (Lil stinky)
3/10 - Awfa' minging (Really stinky)
2/10 - Bowfing (Unbearable)
1/10 - URGHHHHH
So without further ado, let’s kick off yet another self-indulgent post with…
26) Franz Ferdinand - The Human Fear
[2025]
Sometimes being a lil stinky album with a good moment can sting more than if you were just front-to-back ehs. Some old FF magic but clunky songwriting and tepid lyrics made this a disappointing listen.
Best Song: Hooked
4/10
25) Amyl and the Sniffers - Cartoon Darkness
[2024]
This brand of rad, sour pub punk is like having Tangfastics for your tea: seemed cool, was actually cool for a bit but didn't fill me up. Maybe their earlier work will satisfy me more!
Best Song: Chewing Gum
6/10
24) Edward Skeletrix - Museum Music
[2025]
Could be a Die Lit situation where it becomes a real grower and is more than it seems. For now, it's a tentative recommendation but a must for those with a hankering for something experimental.
Best Song: God Made You A Monster
6/10
23) Rose Gray - Louder, Please
[2025]
May have made a mistake listening to this on a Friday morning when it seems much better fit to soundtrack your night out. Admired the more emotional moments like the sapphic saga on Hackney Wick.
Best Song: Everything Changes (But I Won’t)
6/10
22) Crochet - Cherish
[2025]
Something really promising brewing here. No coincidence that the longer songs are the better ones: more time to create some devious atmosphere to envelop you which they do very well!
Best Song: Shadowplay
6/10
21) Doechii- Alligator Bites Never Heal
[2024]
Full of personality and full of potential. Did feel like it would have benefitted from being shorter with some more fleshed-out cuts: a project full of songs on NISSAN ALTIMA's level would be ridiculous.
Best Song: DENIAL IS A RIVER
6/10
20) Confidence Man - 3AM (LA LA LA)
[2024]
A fun party album that plays out like any good one: takes a bit to get going, finds its groove in the middle and makes sure to finish on a bang. Minimal whiteying involved too!
Best Song: SICKO
7/10
19) smoekdope2016 - THE PEAK
[2025]
It's kinda reductive - easy as well- to compare new music to familiar names but if you're a Lil Peep fan and wondered what he'd sound like on Clams Casino-esque production then you're in luck!
Best Song: Trust
7/10
18) Asian Glow - 11100011
[2025]
Dorothee Thines - one of my favourite 2023 tracks - coming in as the closer here was a (delightful) jump scare. With this kind of emo-influenced music, I would love to have the lyrics handy...
Best Song: Dorothee Thines
7/10
17) Lil Peep - Hellboy
[2016]
Revisited this - not that I need an excuse - because I'm reading Hellboy: Seed of Destruction. Can confirm both slap tremendously despite having very little to do with one another!
Best Song: the song they played (when i crashed into the wall)
7/10
16) Bad Bunny - DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS
[2025]
Even as a sun-deficient Scottish lad, I found myself feeling very patriotic listening to this Puerto Rico love letter - granted, with translated lyrics in front of me. Yo soy de P fucking R!
Best Song: DtMF
7/10
15) Panic! At The Disco - A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out
[2005]
Totally get why they decided to get Beatles-pilled after this: the scenario of them replicating this precise, pretty and odd mix of new-rave x emo was as likely as a good P!ATD song post 2020.
Best Song: I Write Sins Not Tragedies
7/10
14) Gumshoes - Bugs Forever
[2025]
The coolest concept you'll hear all year: how have we not had an album from the perspective of bugs already? Some interesting angles and - just as importantly - lovely chamber-pop production.
Best Song: Playing Pretend
7/10
13) Justice- †
[2007]
Nothing will make me fully come to terms with Daft Punk breaking up but knowing a duo like Justice are still about and can make tracks that get close to Discovery-level electronic helps a bunch.
Best Song: Waters of Nazareth
7/10
12) Mac Miller - Balloonerism
[2025]
Is Mac the only artist to get the respectful treatment posthumously, the kind that they didn't get when they were with us? An impressive jam session with enough career highlights to justify a proper release.
Best Song: Funny Papers
7/10
11) Los Campesinos! - All Hell
[2024]
Every bit as melancholic, moody and insightful as I remember them being when I discovered Romance Is Boring all those years ago. More bands need to use football metaphors to describe their mental wounds IMO!
Best Song: A Psychic Wound
8/10
10) Jane Remover - Teen Week
[2021]
Wild that this was Jane Remover's debut and it still sounds so impressive. Even wilder that everything she's done since makes this sound relatively tame: still, an early 2020s treat.
Best Song: homeswitcher
8/10
09) Knocked Loose - A Tear in the Fabric of Life
[2021]
Fair to say Knocked Loose are modern-day metalcore masters: the weightiness here, both from the visceral instrumentation and the lyrics, easily make this one of the most memorable EPs of the decade.
Best Song: God Knows
8/10
08) Tyler, The Creator - CHROMAKOPIA
[2024]
Wild that a weighty, emotional track about coming to terms with an absentee parent can be followed by a song with the line "air this bitch out like a queef". What. An. Album.
Best Song: Like Him
8/10
07) Chat Pile - God’s Country
[2022]
The stories Chat Pile explore here to help weave a chilling tapestry of America is just awe-inspiring. Band for band the most ominous record I've heard this decade.
Best Song: Slaughterhouse
9/10
06) Adrianne Lenker - Bright Future
[2024]
Lenker is the kind of performer where something as simple as a slight pivot of her pipes feels like the satisfying array of clicks of the front door as your partner returns home. Generational talent.
Best Song: sadness as a gift
9/10
05) Chat Pile - Cool World
[2024]
Chat Pile have adopted a creed I can only compare to stunt performers where how seemingly hard the punch doesn’t matter: it’s how you react. Those wispy backing vocals on the chorus are haunting...
Best Song: Masc
9/10
04) Charli XCX - BRAT
[2024]
The club bathroom philosophy Charli explores here - one second erratic, the next existential - adds to my enjoyment as much as the phenomenal production. Serving Immanuel Kant and serving cun- you get it.
Best Song: Everything is romantic
9/10
03) Knocked Loose - You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To
[2024]
So cathartic, so guttural and so bloody addictive: listening to this makes me feel what my radiators must go through whenever I bleed them. We've all thought about how satisfying that would be, right? Right...?
Best Song: Suffocate
9/10
02) Magdalena Bay - Imaginal Disk
[2024]
When an album has you googling "magical synonyms" then you know you've just found something special. Can confidently say they will be regarded as an all-time pop GOAT given an apt amount of time.
Best Song: Death & Romance
9/10
01) Angelo Badalamenti - Soundtrack From Twin Peaks
[1990]
I hope/know Badalamenti, Cruise and now David Lynch are all having a well-deserved rest in the big Red Room way up...somewhere! An absolutely other-worldly experience that will always be part of my soundtrack Mt. Rushmore.
Best Song: Twin Peaks Theme
10/10
And there we have it: my January ranking!
If you’ve liked what you’ve read then I’d appreciate it if you subscribed - you can do it for free btw - and let me know what you make of my takes in the comments! See you in a bit to discuss the best songs February had to offer…