3 Anticipated Albums Due in 2025

As we say goodbye to 2024, there’s plenty of great music to look forward to in the coming year.

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Here are three of the most-anticipated albums due in 2025. “Next year” sounds like a long time from now, but these excellent releases drop in just a couple of months.

Until then, stay warm, safe, and kind. Happy New Year!

Wilco: A Ghost Is Born – Expanded Edition (February 7)

Wilco will reissue A Ghost Is Born on February 7. The expanded edition includes 65 unreleased tracks. Rock historian Bob Mehr wrote the liner notes and Jeff Tweedy told him, “I was worried the album was going to feel like something dark and not me anymore. But the album was ahead of me as a person. It was the part of me that I was trying to preserve—enthusiastic and furious about the world, as well as open and loving. I reached that in the music before I could get there emotionally on my own.”

Tweedy’s band was still in flux following Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Producer Jim O’Rourke guided Tweedy through the absence of Jay Bennett—transforming the songwriter into an avant-garde lead guitarist. It wasn’t long before Tweedy had help from virtuoso guitarist Nels Cline and multi-instrumentalist Pat Sansone, both of whom made their studio debut on Sky Blue Sky.

Sharon Van Etten & The Attachment Theory: Sharon Van Etten & The Attachment Theory (February 7)

Sharon Van Etten was rehearsing with her touring band and became bored with her own voice. So she asked the others if they could just jam. They did, and the jam led to a full-fledged album. The Attachment Theory features Van Etten with drummer Jorge Balbi, bassist Devra Hoff, and multi-instrumentalist Teeny Lieberson.

Van Etten continues her turn toward dark post-punk. She explained the writing process in a statement: “Sometimes it’s exciting, sometimes it’s scary, sometimes you feel stuck. It’s like every day feels a little different—just being at peace with whatever you’re feeling and whoever you are and how you relate to people in that moment. If I can just keep a sense of openness while knowing that my feelings change every day, that is all I can do right now. That and try to be the best person I can be while letting other people be who they are and not taking it personally and just being. I’m not there, but I’m trying to be there every day.”

Sam Fender: People Watching (February 21)

The title track to Sam Fender’s upcoming album continues with his familiar cinematic approach to storytelling. This is Fender’s third studio release as he finds his place among the great English songwriters. His songs are constructed with vivid descriptions of location, putting listeners at the scene of the action.

Fender’s previous album, Seventeen Going Under, became his second to reach No. 1 in the UK, and NME named it the best album of 2021. The new LP features co-production from The War on Drugs’ Adam Granduciel. Though Granduciel and Fender worked in Los Angeles, judging by the album artwork and preceding singles, this collection is wholly British.

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