Another year, another list of songs! I had a fun time yapping about music and Kpop on the Untangling Ourselves podcast, and got to enjoy QWER, Purple Kiss, and Hitsujibungaku concerts. But the clear musical highlight of the year was NMIXX's Blue Valentine album and its accompanying promotions (more on that below...).
Please enjoy the playlist in whatever format works for you and let me know what you’ve been listening to!
Youtube Playlist
Youtube Music Playlist
Spotify Playlist
I'll start with the 5 artists that youtube said were my most played of 2025....
Selections From My Top 5
1. Red Velvet - Hit That Drum
Red Velvet was my most-listened artist, and I was in the top 0.1% of listeners of them for the 3rd year in a row, yippee! This was an even more notable accomplishment given that there was no new material from them this year. After last summer’s Cosmic and 10th anniversary single, we had a few months of silence, and then the announcement that Wendy and Yeri were leaving SM Entertainment “but will continue to promote with Red Velvet as a group.” Those who have been around the Kpop block a few times know that this kind of language is often code for “see you in 5 years at the 15 year anniversary,” but hope can always spring eternal… In any case, it was quite a run wasn’t it? For a bit over a year, their 10 years held the record for the longest run of any girl group without losing a member - surpassed by Twice this October - a dubious distinction for the Kpop industry as a whole I might add, given that it’s far more common for boy groups to pass this threshold. My 120-song playlist (in chronological and randomized versions!) and multitude of instances of them in my “Kpop best” playlists will likely ensure many more years to come of finding them in my year-end lists!
This year, the 2017 b-side Hit that Drum settled in as a particular favorite. I’m pretty sure this is the only Kpop song I’ve heard that is based on Brazilian drumming, and it’s impossible to not move while you’re listening to this. The bridge is trademark Red Velvet, building up to Wendy’s insaaaaaane 11-second 3-pitch high note at 2:24 to carry us over the finish line.
2. Red Velvet - Better Be
One time this song came up right after Hit that Drum in a playlist and it seemed to exemplify the versatility of Red Velvet - from their more upbeat “Red” mode to the smooth, mature “Velvet” mode. This song abounds in pretty melodies and delicious harmonies. My opinion is that if you could eat this song it would taste like raspberry gelato with extremely fresh ingredients. I’m not sure why I think that.
3. Hitsujibungaku - Koe
I did a pretty serious binge of Hitsujibungaku leading up to their April concert and kept it going from time to time for the rest of the year. Indeed, 90s rock apparently continues to have a long afterlife in Japan. Hitsujibungaku (“Literature for Sheep”) sound a bit like R.E.M. crossed with the Cranberries with an added teaspoon of noise rock to give it a bit more edge (maybe more like a tablespoon in their early years). I’ve never regretted looking up the translation to their lyrics, and Koe (Voice) is no exception, telling a story of regret with a sliver of hope.
4. NMIXX - Reality Hurts
It’s hard to argue with Lily’s assessment of reality in 2025 or her inclination to “start a new planet.” Her lyrical debut and NMIXX’s first all-English song goes harder than Kpop has in a while, bordering on electro-industrial. NMIXX can often be found running headlong in the opposite direction of prevailing trends, and this song (along with its accompanying album Blue Valentine) provided the dearly needed antidote to the easy listening sound of many newer groups this year.
In terms of my Kpop fandom, NMIXX practically carried the entire year, what with Red Velvet on hiatus, Aespa veering into less agreeable-to-me musical territory, and my fave soloist list of IU/Younha/Taeyeon/Sejeong almost entirely inactive until we finally got a grand total of one new song each from Taeyeon and Kim Sejeong, both in December. Thankfully, I was still in good hands, with Blue Valentine being my clear favorite album of the year. I managed to get all 12 of its songs into my top 100 most-streamed songs of the year between October 13 and whenever in November is the cutoff for the youtube recap. The Korean public recognized it as well, making Blue Valentine the song that finally knocked Kpop Demon Hunters’ “Golden” from its lengthy perch atop the charts and yielding a whole slew of other career milestones and awards for NMIXX. I’d say it was by far my favorite Kpop “era” that I’ve lived through and there’s so much to say about it that I’m going to cut it off here and do a recap post about it some other time!
5. NMIXX - High Horse
Earlier this year, the EP Fe3O4: Forward led with this pre-release single. I correctly predicted back in March that it would be my SOTY (Song of the Year) and this prediction came to pass, with the layered instrumental, big beat-reminiscent drums, and vocal fireworks solidifying its position. Is there anything left to say after Lily and Haewon’s duet in the bridge? The choreography is also quite artistic.
6. Hélène Grimaud - Prelude and Fugue in A Minor BVW 543 (J.S. Bach, Transcribed for Piano by Franz Liszt)
“One of these is not like the others.” Hélène Grimaud was a bit of an aughts-era obsession of mine. I’ll admit it, her face on the cover of the CD is why I tossed it into my pile when digging through the classical section of the New York Public Library in 2005. Her incredible aptitude for interpreting the best works from the romantic era is why I stayed a fan. It was fun seeing her pop up again in my list this year, indicating one of the directions my attention wandered when Kpop was in a lull. This is a Bach piece for organ, reinterpreted for piano by Liszt about 150 years later, reinterpreted by Hélène Grimaud about 150 years after that. 300 years of music history in 9 minutes. It also seemed to flow nicely from High Horse.
7. Taeyeon - Four Seasons
I give Taeyeon the “breadth award” for managing to hold a spot on my top 5 artists despite not having a single song in my top 100 songs. I think this speaks to my primary way of listening to her, which is playing full albums across her vast discography without strongly favoring particular songs. I do, however, have favorites, and I thought this would be as good a time as any to highlight Four Seasons, a sweet reggae-ish number that was one of the first Kpop songs I learned on bass. I also have to give recognition to the gorgeous music video. It wins the “You could print out literally any frame of this and hang it in an art gallery and no one would question it” award.
Kpop in 2025
8. ARTMS - Butterfly Effect
Kind of odd of me to start a section called “Kpop in 2025” with a song that came out in 2024, but look, I'll explain. This year’s “Icarus” by ARTMS was my fourth most-listened song of 2025, but if I’m being honest it got a boost from the number of times I watched the live stages, which are counted by youtube (they’re indeed gorgeous). The Club Icarus album eventually led me to revisit DALL, their 2024 album, and this song came out the winner. Jaden Jeong’s encyclopedic knowledge of electronic music abounds in the production, topped off by ARTMS’ ethereal vocals.
9. Purple Kiss - Lost & Found
It was tragic that Purple Kiss disbanded this year, but at least we got a final single and tour. This b-side has a driving rhythm, a dark pop-punk-ish feel, and a haunting production effect that makes it sound like it was recorded in a tunnel (in a good way).
10. Taemin - Guilty
Snubbed in my 2024 list, Guilty is finally getting its due in 2025. Taemin dials up the drama to 11 here, with intriguing lyrics about a forbidden love. His choreo includes movements I did not think were possible for a human body, and is always fascinating to watch.
11. QWER - Overdrive
My favorite Twitch-streamers-turned-rock-band graced California with their presence this fall! They didn’t play this song, my favorite of 2025 from them, but I’ll forgive them. This song has a high energy, all-electronic drum and bass instrumental in the studio version and an equally awesome adaptation for rock instruments in the live version, which I included in the youtube playlist. So whether you click one of the audio-only options or the video option, you’re set.
12. Chung Ha - Stress
Chung Ha brings a welcome message to destress, if one that isn’t easy to put into practice. Does this pretty much sound like 90s Madonna crossed with Ariana Grande? Well… yes. But there are times to reinvent the wheel, and other times to just put a really damn good wheel out into the world.
Jpop in 2025
13. Hana Hope - Leave Me Blind
Hana Hope’s album Between the Stars is one I put on every morning while I made coffee for a chunk of the year, and like Blue Valentine, it ended up with all 13 of its songs in my top 100 list. Her voice has a deep, smoky quality that reminds me of a somewhat happier version of Fiona Apple, and the instrumentals are simple and effective, generally taking a backseat to let her voice shine. Leave Me Blind is one of the more upbeat tracks on the album, with quite possibly the cutest music video I’ve ever seen.
14. Tomoo - Present
Time to get happy! That’s it. That’s all I have to say about this one.
15. Phantom Siita - Noah
Kpop is generally willing to dial the weird factor farther up than western pop, and Jpop will travel to places of weirdness where even Kpop fears to tread. Case in point: Phantom Siita, with a song that sounds like a psycho carnival run through an electronic meat grinder and a video that pushes the limits of surreal visuals. It’s even more fascinating from a performance standpoint to watch their dance practices (example), where it is apparent that even without all the animation, special effects, and costumes they are able to convey so much dark emotion through movement alone.
16. ME:I - Ready Go
One day when I was a kid I went quietly into the kitchen when no one was looking, stuck a spoon right in the sugar container and filled my mouth with pure sickening sweetness. Listening to ME:I is something like the auditory equivalent of that experience (I mean they even have a song called “Sugar Bomb”), and I’m never quite sure when the sheer explosion of delight is going to tip over into “too much.” To be honest about half their songs hit me on the wrong side of that fulcrum but the ones that stay on the right side of it sure are fun as hell. With all the glitch IDM electronic influences in the backing music and the fun bouncy bass line, this song had to be my pick from them for this list.
Music from West of Korea, or East of Japan, Depending on Your Perspective
19. Siouxsie and the Banshees - Face to Face
Get
in the time machine and head back to 1991. My otherwise ho-hum
experience at a goth night was redeemed when the DJ decided to play this
song instead of my request of Slowdive, thus turning my early Siouxsie
kick into a full blown all-eras Siouxsie kick.
17. Camilla Sparksss - Damage
Synthpop goes ballistic. That breakdown starting around 1:30 goes soooo hard I just couldn’t leave this one out.
18. Igorrr - Camel Dancefloor
What’s with the names that end in triple consonants? Anyway, Igorrr is certainly all over the place as a one-man avante-garde metal project with all variety of guests. This track, which somehow combines metal, funk, drum and bass, and middle eastern music without anything sounding out of place, hit me just right. There’s even some guitar shredding before it ends!
20. Richie Hawtin - Marbles
I'm always a sucker for polymeters, and a hypnotic 3-over-4 pattern carries this track from the opening beat through all the twists and turns and layering and modulations until it fades out 9 minutes layer. Hawtin is somewhat the godfather of minimal techno, and his Musik album got the 30th anniversary reissue treatment last year, bringing it back into my consciousness.
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