Welcome to the January edition of Beats Per Minute’s monthly playlist BPM Curates.

It’s been a, well, turbulent start to 2025 to say the least – interesting, you might say if you were being diplomatic. One thing that’s certainly been interesting – and has aided in distracting from all of that other stuff – is the amount of amazing new music we’ve already been gifted. If it were piled together, it could probably be seen from space. Fortunately, we’re here to pick out the cream of the crop with our latest monthly playlist.

Below is the track list and some notes from our team about why they’ve selected them for this month’s playlist.

Bria Salmena – “Stretch The Struggle”

Bria Salmena refuses to cling to anything that doesn’t further her own interests — anything that seems to be holding her back is cast aside and left to disappear beyond the horizon. Her upcoming album, Big Dog, is focused on transformation, on the loosening of unnecessary restraints, creative and emotional that weigh down the advances of her own unique musical vision. “Stretch the Struggle” finds her channeling a danceable ferociousness, seeking independence from restriction as she treads the line between stark introspection and cathartic bombast. Her voice casts a heavy shadow across the track, a powerful surge of emotion and experience expressed through melody and linguistic broadsides. It maintains a minimal electro-pop framework for a time, patiently waiting to reveal its secrets —and then, in a burst of dense gravimetric guitarwork, she offers her perspective on how best to confront hard truths and break free of the daily numbing routines that threaten to extinguish the fire from your life. – Joshua Pickard

Darkside – “S.N.C.”

Its bassline recalls Talking Heads’ “Girlfriend Is Better”, but this is no funk. It glides into “Superstition” under grey skies and nostalgia for The Beta Band. Darkside – the its-no-longer-a-side-project side-project for Nicolás Jaar – has crafted “S.N.C.” into something that wouldn’t have been out of place on the (Clooney/Pitt) Ocean’s 11 soundtrack: a  late-90s/early-00s homage that never breaks a sweat. Released as a preview to the release of Nothing (February 28 via Matador), “S.N.C.” has smoother edges than the Tom Waits-meets-Super Furries energy of prior single “Graucha Max”. – Steve Forstneger

Deafheaven – “Magnolia”

See what you all did? You bullied Deafheaven so much for going the melodic shoegaze route on Infinite Granite that they retreated into their shells for two years without a peep. How dare you! But also… thank you – because what did it all yield? Well, they’ve emerged fueled by a fire that burns with an insatiable hunger for everything in its path on “Magnolia” — the scorching first taste off their upcoming record. Now, I stand firm in my defense of the very misunderstood Infinite Granite, but hearing Deafheaven rip themselves open with vivid, unrestrained ferocity again? That’s always been something to behold. “Magnolia” is a return to their heavier beginnings, though textured with a thrashier wrinkle, proving they’re still evolving while reminding us why we fell in love with the band in the first place. – Kyle Kohner

Ethel Cain – “Amber Waves”

Addiction is so insidious because it can shapeshift into any form: a drug, a substance, a behaviour, a person. Ethel Cain’s new album Perverts is, in parts, an album about the relationships that addictions fester within, and the toll this takes on body and soul. On the glacial, sun drenched “Amber Waves”, Cain births painful images of absence, longing, dependency and self mutilation. The strange glow that the track emits perfectly communicates the awareness of loneliness – of the inability to communicate or connect with others. In the end, the addiction triumphs, as the protagonist disconnects from the outside world completely. Cain finds poetry within this story that might be her very best, drenched in sorrow: “Yеt here I am empty / Watching lovе of mine leave / But I’ll be alright / Me and my amber waves”. Anyone familiar with those great junkies whose spirit lost to turmoil, the Zoe Lunds and Layne Staleys of this world, or has wrestled with an emptiness only quelched through the abandonment of their selves, will see the pumping scarlet rivers within this track: a revelation! – John Wohlmacher

FKA twigs – “Room of Fools”

Club culture is an odd thing, because so few are actually able to experience the intrinsic necessities of what clubbing means: the darkness, the danger, the excitement and euphoria have become marketing tools by gigantic church-like institutions that promise transgressions on platters like candy corn. Yet there still are these rare moments, in tiny spaces with low ceilings, when the alchemy of the room creates an almost ritualistic experience that explodes the possibilities of being alive! “Room of Fools” perfectly encapsulates this feeling, and sound. With its even, crystalline instrumentation, carried by twigs’ incredible vocal performance, it takes listeners back to the late 90s, when the British avant-garde of ambient house pioneers like Underworld or Future Sounds of London found new figurations of dance. It’s a blessing to have this sprawling, optimistic, colourful song, an antidote to the faux grit of the brutalist pessimism that the scene is now mostly characterised by. Like Kelela’s Raven, “Room of Fools” proposes an alternative to the white, masculine dance culture of Berghain techno and jetlagged EDM: vibrant and addictive. – John Wohlmacher

Great Grandpa – “Junior”

Great Grandpa released one of the sleeper albums of 2019 with Four Of Arrows – but it gradually caught the hearts and minds of so many people that you wanted them to release a quick follow-up to capitalise on the hard-earned attention. Well, it took them almost five years – and an existential crisis about the band’s future – to get here, but we’ve finally got a new Great Grandpa record on the calendar. While they might not have struck while the iron was hot, “Junior” – as well as previously released singles “Doom” and “Kid” – make it clear that they’re not going to have much difficulty rekindling that slow-burning flame once again. “Junior” sits in the perfect middle realm between indie, emo and folk that they’ve basically made their own; a perfect place to relay tales of normal people – deeply flawed but eminently lovable. – Rob Hakimian

OHYUNG – “no good”

Metamorphosis is at the heart of Brooklyn artist OHYUNG’s — aka Lia Ouyang Rusli — latest single, “no good”, an exploration of the contradictory internal conversations they had with themselves during their gender transition. Opening with what sounds like a mutated “Billy Jean” drumbeat, the track focuses on orchestral pulses and the various bodily movements that a dancefloor might inspire. Swooning strings lope around within an impressive electronic synthesis, using the persistent beat as a platform for lacerative soliloquies filled with doubt and overt negativity. The track is propulsive, but what it’s driving you towards isn’t always something good. These are the darker thoughts and meditations that shaped their early ideas of identity, and they now look back and realize the harm they were inflicting upon themselves without realizing it. – Joshua Pickard

Palmyra – “Shape I’m In”

Have you ever wished that the devastating heartache of Bright Eyes’ Fever and Mirrors and Mineral’s End Serenading might somehow find a new outlet in which to reflect the current tragedies of our times? Well, look no further than Virginia trio Palmyra and their new single, “Shape I’m In” — a throwback to the heart-on-sleeve catharses that bands like Sunny Day Real Estate and Texas is the Reason were able to so successfully mine in the 90s. Definitely inspired by those bands but not beholden to the occasionally trite platitudes common to emo, the band rides on waves of jagged guitars, shivering strings, and thumping percussive echoes. The song deals with the effects of band member Sasha Landon’s bipolar disorder diagnosis and the ways in which they had to accept the truth of their reality and find comfort in the company of their friends and bandmates. It’s a volatile and open look into the grief and eventual affirmation that comes from working through terrible circumstances to find the light on the other side. – Joshua Pickard

Samia – “Bovine Excision”

As a songwriter, Samia has always excelled at combining small intimacies with existential musings. It was there on 2020’s “Is There Something in The Movies”, where a stuffed pig plushie became a stand-in for reflections on fame and the untimely demise of late family friend Brittany Murphy (“I got it from someone who died of attention / and lived an extraordinary life”).

On “Bovine Excision”, Samia does it again. For a song whose title derives from the bloodless mutilation of cattle – and uses it as a metaphor for the “clinical pursuit of emptiness” – it begins humbly enough: drinking Dr Pepper and reading Raymond Carver in the bath. A guitar and drum-driven indie rocker that expertly utilities dynamic contrast, the lead single to upcoming LP Bloodless quickly finds Samia examining ideas of purity, with allusions to bloodsucking leeches and the Princess and the Pea.

Dissatisfaction and an unquenchable desire for more continually build in disquieting fashion, as Samia laments “passing go to sit in driveways” and introduces us to a bartender who has to remind a customer she may be “old but not dead”. Eventually the disquiet becoming deafening, “I just wanted to be your friend,” she opines shortly before giving way to mantra-like decelerations of her desire to be “drained bloodless”.

An extraordinary exploration of the human condition deliverd in a pop-forward, indie-rock package that clocks in at less than three minutes, “Bovine Excision” is Samia’s most impressive statement to date; a staggering testament to her economy of words. – Tom Williams

Sedona – “Best Kept Secret”

Sometimes simplicity can be deceiving — just look at the new single from Los Angeles musician Sedona, who also spends her time as the lead singer for Drugdealer. She molds acoustic guitar, woodwinds, and pedal steel into an airy tribute to the small moments that fill our lives and nourish our memories. It’s dreamy pop music that speaks honestly and without reservation, the kind of song that slips under your radar, gently working its way deeper into the furthest reaches of your subconscious. We’re invited to reflect on evenings spent with friends, intimate moments spent with those we love, and moments where we wish time would simply come to a complete stop. The music slowly infiltrates your senses, biding its time until you fully succumb to its secret persuasions, and then, in that moment of acceptance, it unveils the grand emotional architecture it has assembled in our hearts. – Joshua Pickard

Self Esteem – “Focus Is Power”

At first listen, there’s something unmistakably on-the-nose about “Focus Is Power”, the first single from Self Esteem’s forthcoming album – it’s life-giving pop, lifted into the stratosphere by unbridled optimism and the blood-rushing power of Rebecca Lucy Taylor’s richly dramatic voice. It wouldn’t feel out of place on her highly-beloved 2021 record, Prioritise Pleasure – and really, who wouldn’t want more of that? With each replay, the track’s relentlessly positive bent, which is often a tough pill to swallow these days, feels less like a cheesy overstatement and more like an embrace that you eventually endear yourself to. It’s infectious and impossible to ignore. – Kyle Kohner

Sophia Kennedy – “Rodeo”

Germany-based Baltimore native Sophia Kennedy is the ultimate alt-pop trickster, pinching pieces (aural, visual, lyrical) from here and there and combining them into tracks that are uniquely her own. “Rodeo” is her first to be shared from upcoming album Squeeze Me, a title that suggests a playfulness – but one that is not without its slightly uneasy undercurrent. That latter feeling is accentuated in the single, which is based around familiar-sounding piano and is built up with layers of off kilter vocals, diverse electronic instrumentation, psychedelic guitar and Kennedy’s unapologetic personality. – Rob Hakimian

SPELLLING – “Portrait Of My Heat”

The title track and lead single from SPELLLING’s (aka Chrystia Cabral) upcoming album, “Portrait Of My Heart” is a straight up alt-rock cruiser. Driving percussion, propulsive guitar and even some fantasy-like strings give this a bit of a 90s-throwback feel. However, Cabral’s voice – with a distinct witchy power – deliver her words about escape and individuality in a way that keeps this firmly in the world she has created across her work as SPELLLING to date. It’s an intriguing glimpse of how she might expand that universe on the upcoming full-length. – Rob Hakimian

Tiagz & Victor Mendivil – “You”

Over Tiagz’s human bass drum and a familiar, house-music xylo-synth melody, Victor Mendivil weaves through the minimalist’s nominee for club-hit of the new year. Both the Canadian/Belgian producer and the Mexican singer have dabbled in trap recently and – while the beat is anything but – Mendivil calls on it with his sing/songy hook. The joke is that some woman has gotten him so obsessed that he can hardly deal (exploring her body like Dora), which you wouldn’t realize from the demo-style performance. Collaborating with Tiagz says a lot about Mendivil, who has already worked with the likes of Oscar Maydon and Luis R Conriquez; this outing maybe foretells plenty of range in store after his quick ascent. – Steve Forstneger

Whirr – “Enjoy Everything”

It’s a little surreal that Whirr are back in full force, with an incredible new album and tour to boot, accompanied by an insightful interview of lead guitarist Nick Bassett that finally sheds light on (and hopefully heals) the controversies of the past. The new album, Raw Blue, manages to be the band’s standout statement so far, an evolution of sound and form, with enhanced dynamics and clever sonic experimentation highlighting a new maturity within the group. “Enjoy Everything” is the standout: a lush break-up ballad that progresses like an early Slowdive song, until finally erupting in a jazzy trumpet solo. A brazen shoegaze innovation, the track shows how flexible the genre is, proving we might yet hear Whirr’s best material. – John Wohlmacher


Listen to our BPM Curates: January 2025 playlist here.