A photo series of emily w dogs & beer. Happy birthday @_e_r_o_s_e xx

Another December, another AOTY season. Like last year, I decided to add to the heap by writing about my five favourite albums of 2025. I don’t claim that these are the ‘best’ releases, rather these are just the ones that have personally resonated with me over the course of this year. More than anything, it is a chance to go a little deeper and at least attempt to engage with music in the kinds of ways that are disincentivized in a streaming era geared towards comfort, passivity and shortening attention spans 🔊 Los Thuthanaka (@chuquimamani_condori x @j_chuquimia_crampton ) - Los Thuthanaka (self-released) @djharam - Beside Myself (@hyperdubrecords ) @lyra.pramuk - Hymnal (@pop.soil ) @deliabeat - Desaceleradas (@ourmodernlove ) @rainymiller_ - Joseph, What Have You Done? (@fixedabode_ )

As if you needed another reason to come, @metaxis_ will be liberating the IKO from the ivory towers of the academy to debut their work ‘Can You Hear Invisible Worlds?’ This will probably be the only chance to experience it in this format so don’t miss out 🦇 ‘Can You Hear Invisible Worlds? explores themes of liminality, transformation and the unknown. A 12 second recording of bat echolocation has been transposed into human-audible ranges and warped, stretched and fragmented to craft an evolving sonic timescape that speaks to the current conjuncture. A time ‘where the old is dying and the new cannot yet be born.’ It insists that alternative worlds can be accessed not through abstract futurism, but careful attunement to residual and emergent potentials living within the present.’ @metaxis_ is one half of live electronic duo @c_r_o_n_e & founding member of @dirt_x_mesh

Wrote this a few months back in a bout of hyperfocus but forgot to post. It’s a summary & response to an incredible article written by @ramiabadir for @cartographyofdarkness on the fetishisation of dystopian aesthetics & narratives in western electronic music. It kinda goes all over the place, touching on jungle, Palestine, the CCRU, Burial, pop edits, Berghain, Afro-futurism, ‘post-internet’ music, Te Tiriti & more. If music holds political power, and I think it does, then it is important that we are more intentional with how we think about and engage with it. The original article is linked at the beginning of the post & I definitely recommend that everyone check it out 💜

Sick sets, great vibes. Thanks to artists, crew & @nic_sandflower for capturing it all 💖

Line up drop for @duncansbrewing gordon place stage @newtownfestnz 🔊🔊 Have had the pleasure of playing here a couple times over the years so has been sweet to co-programme with Emi this time around. We’ve pulled together a stacked line up of cross-genre live electronic music with the exception of our resident dj and a mystery guest dj who you won’t wanna miss.. It really is a blessing to have a free community festival of this scale in times of funding cuts to arts and culture so be sure to come through 💕 @babyzionov @bodybeatritual @djkerb1972 @dreamchambers @jhlofficixl @junipermay_ @kolyamuzak @mauri.aura

A bunch of people said it would be helpful to have an explanation around the recent overhaul of the Waitangi Tribunal membership so here it is. Hmu if you have any pātai (and I will try my best to answer). Toitū Te Tiriti!

If I had to choose one album released this year I think everyone should listen to with undivided attention, it would definitely be The Great Bailout. On her ninth album, Moor Mother takes British colonialism and enslavement as her subject matter, with help from a strong cast of collaborators. By no means an easy listen, she channels grief and fury in equal measure, weaving noise, free jazz and poetry in ‘a call to knowing through a sonic scene that is unafraid to look a violent legacy in the eye.’ The Great Bailout itself is a reference to one of the biggest loans in history, namely the one granted by the British government to former slave owners in the Caribbean following the 1833 Slavery Abolition Act. This debt wasn’t paid off until 2015, partly at the expense of unwitting ‘taxpayers of erasure’ in the UK. The enslaved, meanwhile, have never received any compensation. The album is clear to not only draw attention to an overlooked history, but crucially how that history continues to shape social, economic and political realities today. ‘The storm keep raging’. You can’t help but think about the complicity of Western governments in ongoing genocides in Gaza, Sudan and the Congo (almongst others) when she laments ‘who builds death like this?’ on the chilling Death by Longitude. The horror is palpable, but Moor Mother is ‘not a pessimist’, as I heard her exclaim during an artist talk at Sonar last year. She reminds us however that in order to have any glimmer of hope for building a truly equitable future, we must first reckon with the colossal injustices that haunt the fabric of our collective existence. In a year where the mask of empire is falling and the hypocrisy of liberal democracy is being utterly exposed, I can’t think of a better accompaniment. Essential listening.

Emily said it’s time we both get our own ig accounts lol so I decided to join the club and make a substack while I’m at it. Find me @metaxis_ for occasional ramblings on sound and politics. Will see if it lasts. As a long-time nerd for EOY lists, I thought what better way to start than by giving some love to my five favourite albums of 2024. There is also a playlist featuring tracks from my top 20 releases (plus 2 that came out late last year). Hope you enjoy them as much as I do x