8 New Albums That Quiet My Monkey Mind

I'm finding myself gravitating toward quieter, contemplative fare in 2025

It’s been a strange year for me.

Moving to a new house has been more challenging than I expected. Much of my time has been swallowed up managing home repair and improvement projects, and I’ve struggled to fit writing and music playing/listening into my schedule.

But it’s also been rewarding. Similar to the pride I often feel creating a story or essay out of what was previously a blank page, watching my house become a home, witnessing it form a unique personality shaped from the input of me, my wife, and my dog Bernie (and now, new snake Esme), has made me feel both lucky and proud.

The longer, warmer days of spring have also played a big role in my improved attitude and outlook. The hundreds of hours I’ve spent getting the yard/garden in tip-top veggie shape are paying off right now as all 7 raised beds are filled with tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, corn, peppers, watermelon, snap peas, lettuces, and greens.

One of the garden beds. It’s got lettuce, kale, chard, and a little patch that hopefully will soon have carrots. So far, no wild critters. The fence is to keep out Bernie and his canine friends.

During March and April, I listened mostly to podcasts while gardening, but for the past month, I’ve been listening almost exclusively to new music.

I’ve enjoyed several albums from the rock and alternative scenes (The Tubs, Deep Sea Diver, and Henge are three standouts), but what has truly resonated with me so far in 2025 leans in a more contemplative, quieter direction.

My nerves are still a couple of steps behind the rest of my body in terms of adjusting to all the changes the year has brought. So, loud, aggressive music isn’t doing it for me lately.

Each of the following eight artists and albums may be new to you. Several were new to me as well. Only Edith Frost and Tunng were familiar to me before this year.

In the list below, I’ll explain why I chose each album, but I’ll also include excerpts from reviews and articles, as I know very little about any of them and don’t want to pretend to be an expert.

I’ve chosen a song from each album that I particularly loved (included in a playlist at the bottom of the piece), along with an accompanying YouTube link.

I’d love to hear from you in the comments. Let me know which songs/albums from my short list stood out for you. And I would love to learn about your recommendations for other quiet, contemplative albums that have been released in 2025.

Edith Frost - In Space

I’ve been a fan of Edith Frost and her unique blend of singer-songwriter, Americana rock for decades. This is her first full-length album in 20 years, and I can say that it’s more than worth the wait.

There’s an unhurried wisdom in each of the 12 tracks on In Space. “Hold On” is perhaps the album’s most upbeat tune, containing melodies that weave and bob in ways perfect and unexpected.

If I had to make a comparison, I’d say In Space fits in the space between Neko Case and Lera Lynn.

From Sun13.com:

Frost’s songs are like long lost friends. Her voice, leaking out of the speakers like tears, the Austin, Texas-based songwriter has always dealt exclusively in a specific kind of heartbreak; there’s a strange comfort in it in her songs.

The stories dotted throughout In Space are just as emotionally vexing. Frost’s songwriting, like a flow-state, carefully sculpt her songs around soft inflections of psychedelia. They feel aligned to the world now more than ever.

Will Stratton - Points of Origin

I gravitate toward storytellers. People who can uniquely capture characters and places with an economy of language. When the storyteller is also a songwriter of immense talent, my pleasure sensors are heightened tenfold. Listening to these songs, all set in California, where I’ve lived most of my life, is like reading a favorite collection of short stories.

I was not familiar with Will Stratton before listening to Points of Origin, but I have a feeling I’ll soon be deep-diving into his catalog of 6 albums. He’s got one of those voices that sounds lived-in. A comfortable, smooth energy with just a twinge of grit.

From Pop Matters:

One can always expect strong melodies, lush arrangements, and novelistic lyrics in Stratton’s work, but on this new one, all of the things that make an excellent Will Stratton record – not to mention an interesting concept, rife with possibilities – are at their absolute peak.

From his Bandcamp page:

“The puny, sun-bleached lives of truckers, surfers, runaways, drunks, thieves, CIA operatives, foresters, arsonists, lawyers, and painters intertwine, fall apart, and are ultimately reduced to dust in the 10,000 year-long span of Points of Origin… set in the freeway wilds of California.”

Lawrence English - Even the Horizon Knows Its Bounds

Sometimes I discover an artist with a vast catalog of acclaimed work and wonder how I had never known of them before. Lawrence English is one such artist. He works mostly in the experimental/ambient arena and has collaborated with dozens of renowned and respected composers and musicians. I looked him up online and learned he’s recorded or collaborated on more than 25 albums! Unlike Will Stratton, I’m unlikely to become fluent in English’s vast musical vocabulary. But I intend to Duolingo some of his work!

When I listen to his 2025 release, Even the Horizon Knows Its Bounds, I am transported to a place, perhaps the boundless horizon, where breaths are deep, the sky is a perpetual sunset, and rumination and worry no longer exist.

Will’s Bandcamp page explains the origins and collaborative process behind this album, which I highly recommend you check out. Here’s an excerpt from his description:

Place is an evolving, subjective experience of space. Spaces hold the opportunity for place, which we create moment to moment, shaped by our ways of sense-making.

Whilst the architectural and material features of space might remain somewhat constant, the people, objects, atmospheres, and encounters that fill them are forever collapsing into memory.

Walt McClements - On a Painted Ocean

People often ask me where I discover new music. Often, it’s from recommendations and reviews from other Substack writers. Or music magazines. But sometimes I simply type in a browser bar: “list of the most inventive instrumental music 2025.”

That’s exactly how I discovered Walt McClements. Though I learned that I was sort of familiar with him without realizing it. He’s collaborated with Hurray For the Riff Raff and Weyes Blood, just to name two.

I believe the description of On A Painted Ocean said something along the lines of: “When you think of ambient music instruments, the accordion is probably the last instrument you imagine.” McClements gets sounds out of his squeezebox that I’ve never heard before. He plays with other musicians here (on keyboards, trumpet, organ, etc.), but the accordion is the base, and listening to McClements’ brilliant compositions, I’m left exhilarated, knowing that what’s possible is impossible to fathom.

From Pitchfork:

Like so much of McClements’ past work, On a Painted Ocean remains wide-eyed and big-hearted, bound together by an unflagging sense of candor that makes these seven pieces about much more than what he can do to, or pair with, his accordion.

Clara Mann - Rift

I’m not sure how I found Clara Mann. I think her song “Stadiums” appeared on autoplay after listening to Florist’s Jellywish album (my next pick). But that might simply be me acting cute and trying to tie this list together with a cosmic bow.

How it happened doesn’t matter as long as it did, which it did. I got goosebumps after hearing “Stadiums,” and the bumps continued while listening to the rest of her 2025 album, Rift.

If I have to compare her to anyone else, I would say Adrianne Lenker (Big Thief), at least in terms of the minimal musical accompaniment and raw, almost whispered vocals. For some reason, some reviews cite influences such as Jacques Brel and Edith Piaf, but that, to me, seems more because Clara is French.

Here’s what Pop Matters has to say:

Mann’s music makes you feel as if years—even a lifetime—have elapsed in a three-minute track. Moreover, her songs play out like memories, a mix of clarity and nebulosity. They rush back to you in finer details, before gradually retreating, as if a tracking shot pulling away from the subject and, instead, captures the mise-en-scène: rain-soaked roads, empty skies, crimson sunrises, and sleepy suburbs. Put differently, Mann is a writer of scenery, not action.

Florist - Jellywish

I was familiar with Florist before their latest, Jellywish, but I want to thank

Jeremy Shatan

who writes the great AnEarful newsletter for alerting me to the existence of a new album from the band.

The entire album feels of a singular piece; not necessarily in a concept record sort of way, but more in terms of emotional flow. I am not entirely sure what Emily Sprague is singing (I tend to zone out lyrics unless super up front in the mix), but when I listen to her voice blended with the music, I feel somehow cleansed and cleared out. Like a psychic colonic.

I’ll let Jeremy tell a bit about this wonderful Brooklyn quartet:

“…Each of the ten perfect songs presented here creates its own impossibly light and tiny universe, with acoustic guitars (Jonnie Baker), bass, organ (both Rick Spataro), and drums (Felix Walworth) wrapping themselves around the airy yet conversational soprano of Emily Sprague…All the songs will reward your patient attention, gradually revealing more riches with each listen.”

Denison Witmer - Anything At All

Denison Witmer is yet another artist that I am shocked I did not know about before discovering his latest album, Anything At All.

Sufjan Stevens (one of my favorites) collaborated with Witmer here, and also produced the album, which was released on Stevens’ Asthmatic Kitty label. If I didn’t know any better and you had told me this was a Sufjan album, I probably would have believed you. Several songs flow with similar lush, gorgeous orchestration, and the open-hearted vulnerability found in much of Stevens’ work is found here as well.

But Witmer seems less wracked with turmoil. Anything At All isn’t all skipping through the daisies (though it is often in the sky — lots of depictions of birds), it’s quite earthbound. There is a general theme throughout of slowing down, of appreciating the small things. And with Witmer’s delicate yet assured vocals guiding the way, it’s hard not to relax and unwind listening to these fantastic songs. Which is big praise coming from an anxiety stress case like me.

AmericanHighways.org says:

Denison Witmer has crafted an album of songs that reverberate with spacious refrain while being grounded in simplicity and directness at the same time. It’s truly unique and well worth the listen.

Tunng - Love You All Over Again

I discovered English folktronica band Tunng a few years ago when I read about their creation of a multi-media project exploring death, incorporating interviews, a podcast (with experts in a variety of death-related fields), and original songs. I listened to the music and podcast and was blown away.

Tunng are veterans of the music world, having recorded music for more than 20 years. They had a bit of a popularity moment in the mid-Aughts when their cover of Bloc Party’s “The Pioneers” was featured in the TV show The O.C.

The Dead Club (album and podcast) came out at the end of 2020, when death was extra present in most of our lives, with the pandemic in full throttle, pre-vaccine. The 8-part podcast is worth checking out and is just as relevant today.

Here’s more info about the Dead Club project on Bandcamp.

Their latest, Love You All Over Again, is less heavy, but no less emotionally rich. I especially love the way the vocals interweave in the track “Everything Else.”

From Dusted magazine:

…and perhaps that’s why it seems both astonishing and completely logical that Tunng has been around for so long. Their music tootles and lilts and swells with an artless gracefulness, and their lyrics tend towards archetypes that belong to every time and no time at all. When you slip through the door to the green, magic woods of Tunng, you never know what year it will be when you come out.

• I know it takes a bit more time, effort, and attention to listen to these listicle posts, so I want to thank you for doing so, even if you haven’t done so yet!😀

• I’m curious if you are familiar with any of these songs/albums, and if so, or even if not, what your impressions are. Leave a note in the comments

• Which contemplative, quieter albums from the first 5 months of the year have made you stop and take notice?

• As always, thanks for reading and for clicking links and leaving comments!