My Favourite Musical Trends of 2025
Illustration by Baran Forootan.
As it always tends to be, the end of another year offers a beautiful opportunity for reflection. In addition to the beautiful snow, early nights, and colder weather, December also brings out a rather strong urge to make review lists and rankings. Whether it's a Spotify Wrapped or the Billboard Year-End charts, it’s always fun to see the trends that have come in both our own, and the world at large’s, musical taste.
Trend 1: The Golden Year
By far the most shocking entry in the charts this year was the soundtrack to Netflix’s new animated special: KPop Demon Hunters, with its hit track “Golden” rising to the top of the charts, and staying there for 8 non-consecutive weeks. While this was surprising, there were probably some hints that should have predicted this. After all, the track isn’t your typical “movie song”: some of the biggest producers and songwriters in Korea worked on this, and paired with the popularity of the movie as a whole, especially with a younger audience, this song was destined to have strong success in the charts. Interestingly, while they never hit number one, “How It’s Done”, “Soda-Pop”, and “Your Idol”, all from the movie, managed to hit the top 10 of the billboard charts.
I’m personally quite interested in seeing whether this is something we see happening more. With Netflix allowing for movies to be brought into the house and repeated as often as desired, I think the likelihood of getting more hit movie songs akin to “Frozen” or “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” is pretty high, and with the rise of streaming, these songs will most likely have staying power.
Trend 2: A Swift Return
After so many years in the limelight, Taylor Swift’s new release “The Life of a Showgirl” initially did not face the star-studded reception most would have anticipated. However, despite the initial skepticism, one song from the album has managed to, yet again, cement her place as one of the most era-defining stars of this decade. “The Fate of Ophelia” has now sat at the top of the charts for 8 weeks, and seems to show no signs of slowing down.
I think one reason for the initial doubts about the album was a pretty sharp change of background staff: after three albums working almost exclusively with Aaron Dessner and Jack Antonoff, Swift returned to working exclusively with Max Martin on the album, alongside frequent Max Martin collaborator Shellback. Swift famously worked with Martin frequently in the 2010s, churning out singles like “Blank Space” and “Shake It Off”. Interestingly, the tone of this album appears to have fallen somewhere in the middle of 2010s Max Martin pop and the Dessner-Antonoff ambient pop texture that she had embraced so often in the last few years. I do predict that at least one more single from this album will chart as a slow riser early in 2026.
And speaking of slow riser’s…
Trend 3: Kendrick’s Year
By far the most prominent artist in pop culture during the first half of the year, Kendrick Lamar had the song that featured the longest atop the hot 100, working with SZA to make “Luther”. Both artists also featured in the half-time show of the Super Bowl, where they performed some of their old and new
discographies. What is interesting about Luther is that it was released in late 2024, but it feels so emblematic of where music is in 2025, and only rose to the charts in early 2025.
Not to detract from the song too much, as it is a very good song, deserving of being the longest-ranked number one of 2025, it is not the only long-lasting song this year. This to me, is the most interesting trend in music in 2025:
Trend 4: Staying Power
Last year, in 2024, we had 12 songs that reached number one for one week only, never to reappear again. This would often happen when a new album was released, taking advantage of the hype that naturally comes alongside a new release.
This year, that number fell to just 3.
Looking at the tracking of the Hot 100’s number-one singles, you can see that when a song rises to the top, like “Luther”, like “Golden”, like “Ordinary” by Alex Warren, those songs stay for a while. There’s many different ways of thinking about this: could it be a sign that quality music this year was just harder to come by? Or could it be a sign that these songs were so good that they managed to rise above the rest? It will be very interesting to see if this trend continues into 2026, but what is sure is that people sure seem to have their favourites in 2025.
