Even before the clock struck midnight on January 1, 2025 was already packed with exciting new projects. Across 2024, thousands of artists from the underground to the height of the mainstream announced new albums to be released in 2025, and with that kind of volume, it's tough to separate the music that will likely define the year from the stuff that will simply come and go.

But we've gone though a flood of press releases, Instagram announcements, and news articles to narrow them down to a couple (big) handfuls of albums we can't wait to hear. They're split into four categories: The Heavy Hitters (Billboard chart titans and Vogue cover stars), FADER Favorites (indie and underground-adjacent artists we've been following), Comebacks We Need (new projects after a lengthy hiatus) and Wishful Thinking (albums we'd love to hear, but probably won't). Take a look at the full list below.

1. Lana Del Rey got married to a crocodile tour guide, so we expect The Right Person Will Stay, out May 21, to be duly unforgettable.

2. FKA twigs's singles from Eusexua (January 24) have us enraptured with her new progressive pop vision.

3. Few have matched Rosalía's 2022 album MOTOMAMI in terms of sheer boldness, cohesion, and accessibility. She wants to release the follow-up this year.

4. We loved The Weeknd's concept album Dawn FM, which sported co-production from Oneohtrix Point Never and Max Martin (plus a couple of Jim Carrey features). That project was the second album in a trilogy and Hurry Up Tomorrow (January 24) concludes that three-album arc.

5. Doechii will share her debut project this year after the rapper's deservedly massive 2024. She's already got Kendrick gassing her up.

6. Young Thug doesn't have anything officially announced, but after his unexpected release late last year (and an appearance on Lil Baby's new album) it's reasonable to assume that a new project will be out before year's end.

1. It's been too long since Oklou shared her debut album Galore, but luckily, the trance-pop artist's new singles from her upcoming sophomore LP choke enough have been bangers. You'll hear the full thing on February 7.

2. After a decade pushing the boundaries of underground rap (and releasing one of the best punk records of 2020), Pink Siifu will team up with Roc Nation Distribution for his new album BLACK'!ANTIQUE (January 27).

3. Reliably great N.Y.C. rapper/producer MIKE will follow his poppier 2024 heel turn Pinball with Showbiz!, out on January 31 via his own label, 10k.

4. Jane Remover kicked off 2025 with the announcement of their new album Revengeseekerz ("coming soon") and the great single "JRJRJR." It's an intense and emotional cut of rage-inspired pop, more frenzied than anything they've released in a minute.

5. FADER cover star Michelle Zauner a.k.a. Japanese Breakfast teams up with producer Blake Mills for the new 10-track project For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women), out March 21.

6. Bartees Strange is also teaming up with some A-list producer talent, enlisting Jack Antonoff to co-produce his sophomore album Horror, dropping February 14 via 4AD.

7. Tamara Lindeman's acclaimed project The Weather Station returns on January 17 with Humanhood. The singer-songwriter began dropping singles like "Neon Signs" late last year, suggesting a jazzier, poppier direction in the new project's sound.

8. Tuareg rock outfit Mdou Moctar began work on Tears of Injustice (February 28) after Niger's president Mohamed Bazoum was deposed in a military coup in January 2023. The songs are rearrangements of music from their 2022 album Fears of Injustice.

9. Jim Legxacy's forthcoming record Black British Music will be his first for XL Recordings. Hopefully that translates to a bigger audience for his pioneering grime-pop-Afrobeats experiments.

10. Spellling's 2021 project The Turning Wheel was an impressive and singular avant-pop opus. Chrystia Cabral returns this year with Portrait of My Heart, out March 28 via Sacred Bones.

11. They Are Gutting A Body of Water are frequently boxed in with the new wave of shoegaze bands, but really, the Philly rockers are more curious and playful than your average revivalists. Expect a new album from them this year.

12. Dan Bejar's long-running Destroyer project still feels as fresh as ever, simply because the Canadian singer-songwriter has cornered the market in genre-spanning, heartfelt character studies seemingly delivered from the end of a long bar. Dan's Boogie comes out March 28 via Merge.

13. Momma's 2022 album Household Name brought the Brooklyn-based band new levels of success, including a sold-out tour opening for beabadobee. Their next full-length project is expected before year's end.

1. Welsh rockers mclusky returned in 2024, 20 years after their debut The Difference Between Me and You Is That I'm Not on Fire, for their first-ever stateside tour. A new album on Ipacec, hopefully with an even longer title, is promised this year.

2. 14 years after her last studio album New Amerykah Part Two (Return of the Ankh), Erykah Badu is due to release another one this year, a collab album with an unidentified male artist.

3. It wasn't too long ago that a Clipse reunion was totally out of the question as Malice's strict embrace of Christianity after 2009's Til The Casket Drops did not fit with the coke raps he spit with brother Pusha T. And yet, after getting back together for some shows, Clipse have signed to Def Jam for the Pharrell-produced Let God Sort 'Em Out that's hopefully arriving this year.

4. At the top of 2024, The xx's Romy said that her band were working on a new album, and Jamie xx confirmed that they'd entered the studio that summer. It's not announced, but there's a decent chance we'll be hearing a new project from the trio soon.

5. Out of nowhere in 2024, Britpop veterans Pulp revealed that they'd signed to Rough Trade. That only stoked rumors of a new album to come from the Jarvis Cocker-led group, who have been touring consistently over the last few years.

1. One show in Ireland this year qualifies as eating good for fans of My Bloody Valentine, who haven't played live in seven years and released their last project, mbv, in 2013. Considering the two-decades between that album and Loveless, we probably won't be getting that long-promised new music, but we can dream.

2. How long can Playboi Carti keep this up? Part of me admires how he's stubbornly refused to release the follow-up to 2020's Whole Lotta Red, considering how entitled most rap fans are. Then again, leaks have prevented him from moving the way he wants. The long-promised I Am Music may have to drop this year, when all is said and done.

3. Capitol Records unceremoniously dropped Sky Ferreira last year, ending a fractious relationship that saw one classic pop record (2014's Night Time, My Time) and a lot of questions around its delayed follow-up, Masochism. Ferreira swears it'll drop this year, but we've been burned too many times before.

4. Massive Attack haven't released an album since 2010's Heligoland, and a purported label dispute has prevented the release of an LP completed four years ago. "Hopefully," frontman Robert Del Naja says, they'll release it this year. Hopefully, indeed!

5. D’Angelo collaborator Raphael Saadiq said last year that the reclusive R&B genius is working on the follow-up to 2014's Black Messiah. D'Angelo's known to take his time, though, so who knows...