2025 Best Tracks part. 10 (of 10)
We present our favorite tracks from 2025, more or less in a chronological order and finally we are at the last set of 10 tracks.
Maxwell Elemuo Acc. By Friimen Music Coy [AF1013]
Maxwell Elemuo, Nigerian singer and soul provider of twitching funk entertainments, dons again his flares with Maxwell Elemuo Acc By Friimen Music Coy, a long-forgotten Afro-soul record now rereleased through Afrodelic. Backed by the Lagos-based Friimen Musik Company – though he himself was more a fixture of the Aba and Port Harcourt scene – Elemuo delivers seven heavens of late-60s energy despite their mid-70s birthdate: heavy, thudding drums and wah guitar framed aloud in warm, assured vocals. Album hearthstones ‘Love And Happiness’, ‘Let Me Love You’ and ‘People Get Ready’ ride that classic West African blend of American soul influence and local swagger, cementing a lesser-cited strand of southeastern Gulf soul.
FK & DFP – The Nassau Excursion [RH-STOREJAMS033]
Some 30 years after they first met in the DJ booth of Tokyo’s Spacelab Yellow nightclub, close friends François Kevorkian and Dimitri From Paris have finally joined forces in the studio. The result is The Nassau Excursion, a dazzlingly good three-track EP inspired by their joint love of disco and boogie-era dance records made at Island Records’ Compass Point Studio in the Bahamas. Across three essential tracks, François and Dimitri explore and celebrate this distinctive Caribbean post-disco sound – one where weighty basslines and heavy drum machine beats rub shoulders with early ‘80s synths, dub-style production, heady hand percussion patterns and arrangements drenched in space echo and tape delay.
Mystic Jungle & The Igor’s Magic Guitars – Rock The Disco / Shaba Riddim [WHM10183]
West Hill Studio is the place where the sound that has defined all the productions and artistic projects connected to the Periodica Records label was developed. Located in the hills of Naples, it’s a private recording studio immersed in a small woodland and isolated from the city. A small wooden lodge and vintage equipment made it possible to create and convey, through music and ideas, a precise musical aesthetic that transcends contemporaneity and current trends. The catalogue is personally curated by Mystic Jungle – born Dario di Pace – music and executive producer and founder of both Periodica and Futuribile, released exclusively on vinyl and in limited editions. Well known for a distinctive sound that has unpredictably ranged from mutant-disco to soft-rock and reggae-inflected explorations for over a decade, he now presents two new electronic funk/rock tracks in collaboration with Yugoslavian guitarist Igor Sekulović. A pair of deliberately raw cuts, with the B-side conceived as an homage to a seminal 1985 digital reggae riddim built from a preset on the Casiotone MT-40.
Kapote presents Wildstyle House Vol. 1 LP [TOYT180]
Wildstyle House is a new compilation series where Toy Tonics invites producers and DJs that have a very special, funky, unique sound to make one new track. The compilation should show the variability and diversity of house and disco today. Like the wild music mix you can hear at the Toy Tonics events and the way Toy Tonics DJs combine many different styles of “4 to the floor” music into one new soulful, multi-style, and warm-sounding blended “genre.” It’s about the groove, about a new soul sound, the human feel, the organic and Y2K-inspired dance music that is growing and appeals to a new generation of dance music lovers.
Afrobot – Rough Tropical Edits [Afrobotic Musicology]
After years of lighting up dance floors around Europe and beyond, Afrobot it’s finally opening the vault. Dozens of unreleased edits – tested in sweaty rooms, peak-time moments, and long nights between 2009 and 2020 – are coming out at last. This new compilation series will travel through Africa, Disco, New Wave, Pop, Bollywood and electronic mutations. Raw cuts. Heavy grooves. Dance-floor weapons.
Doctor House – Mix To Groove LP [MH002]
The legendary album from South Africa’s House and Kwaito master Doctor House is being reissued for the first time with a full remaster from the original DAT. Nelson Phetole Mohale released a series of albums as Doctor House. Cutting his teeth in the 80s as a session player for a host of big names like Volcano, Senyaka and Obed Ngobeni, he moved on to programming for acts like La Viva and Jivaro, also contributing to Carlos Djedje and others. Still barely out of his teens he became one of South Africa’s first rappers as part of PT House, co-written and produced by Danny Bridgens. Their debut album Big World was released in 1991 and followed by Big City Taste a year later.
Altın Gün – Garip LP [GBLP182]
Altın Gün, the Grammy-nominated Turkish psych-groove quintet from Amsterdam, return with their sixth studio album Garip — their most ambitious and diverse release to date, and a heartfelt tribute to the legendary Turkish folk bard Neşet Ertaş, a beloved icon of Anatolian music. Garip (“Strange” in English) features ten of his compositions, each reimagined and richly expanded through Altın Gün’s distinctive lens. An electrifying live band with an ever-growing global following, Altın Gün push their sonic boundaries even further on Garip — weaving in lush Arabesque string arrangements, bursts of saxophone, glimmering synth balladry, and a fresh surge of tightly wound rock ’n’ roll.
ARMOR – La Balade de Misrakis Feat. Feras Turk [PINKMAN] [FREE DOWNLOAD]
ARMOR, a new alias from Pascal Pinkert (Ambassade / Dollkraut). La Balade de Misrakis is the first single from the upcoming album Love Chaos, out this spring. A few years ago he visited Turkey and Lebanon to collaborate with artists such as trip-hop legend Zeid Hamdan and Egyptian singer Maii. While many of these recordings found their way into Dollkraut releases, revisiting the material sparked the need for a new outlet. With ARMOR, Pinkert dives deeper into the space between folk traditions and electronic experimentation. Hypnotic drones merge with Middle Eastern percussion, while subtle rhythmic structures fuse with immersive soundscapes.
Smackos – Come for the Universe Stay for the Clowns LP [NW048] [FREE DOWNLOAD]
Danny Wolfers presents a brand new Smackos album as name-your-price on his bandcamp page. ‘Come for the Universe Stay for the Clowns’ is dedicated to the memory of Koen van Someren Gréve and includes nine synthetic hardcore ambient synth folk ballads.
Sun Electric – Episodes LP [ASGDE055]
Sun Electric — the legendary Berlin duo of Tom Thiel and Max Loderbauer — returns with Episodes, an enticing new album. While the pair has been active and creating over the years, Episodes marks their first album of original material in nearly 20 years. Now, with a renewed way of working together, they present fresh and captivating music on the Belgian De:tuned label, built from recordings made with the vintage 1960s Subharchord Synthesizer. Across 6 tracks, Sun Electric takes listeners on a strange yet wonderful journey through shifting moods and sonic textures, capturing their unmistakable sense of exploration and atmosphere.
DYL – Achordat 002 [Achr-002]
Achordat returns with its second release, continuing its commitment to experimental sound explorations. This chapter comes from DYL, who weaves dub textures with jazz inflected elements, moving fluidly between 170 and 140 BPM. On the journey of the second track, DYL is joined by Roberta, adding another layer of depth to the release. Shaped by the arrival of the cold season, the record embraces melancholic moods and raw, sometimes harsh atmospheres, reflecting winters introspective and uncompromising edge.
Second Storey – Descend To Ascend [FR062]
Descend To Ascend brings back our favorite drummer boy with more of his signature hyper-advanced beat physics. And if you don’t understand any of this, please take a step back and try again.
Der Zyklus – Truth Matrix [CAL-X]
Kidnap Syndicate – Direct Target [PANZERKREUZ SPACE WAR 2019]
US based Oliver Vereker’s debut on Bunker under the Kidnap Syndicate moniker. Harsh and disturbing psychotic industrial soundscape music telling tales of terror. Originally released on Endangered Species as a limited cassette in 2024. Remastered by Guy Tavares.
Damage Code LIVE @ Ombra Festival 2025
Filmmaker – Diffractions LP
“Diffractions” is a new album by Colombian artist Filmmaker AKA Faunes Efe, self-released on his bandcamp page.
Mule Driver – Stone Pine Nut / When Does the Everyday Become History? [CM28]
Mule Driver returns with his yearly 303 Day ritual release – a tradition dropped in acid. Leading the charge is “Stone Pine Nut”, an unfiltered acid banger recorded live, capturing the raw voltage and untamed pressure of his performances. No polish, no safety net, just the pure, driving force pushed to its limits. It’s sweat, pulse, and machine energy locked in the moment. Alongside it, “When Does the Everyday Become History” shifts the perspective inward. A contemplative 303 vamp circling themes of inner gaze and suspended time, it stretches and breathes while never losing its grip on the floor. Hypnotic, restrained, yet fully capable of holding dancers in its spell. Two movements within the same frequency – instinct and introspection.
Ali Renault – Circle Of Sins EP [VIVOD026]
Ali Renault re ignites the Vivod catalogue after a four year hiatus with Circle of Sins a solo EP built for italo fiends, horror romantics, and synth obsessives alike. You already know the vibe: detective-noir disco, low-slung BPM swagger, basslines that churn like midnight fog, and those unmistakably icy Renault melodies slithering through the mix.
Dream Days – Liberate Your Body EP [NOP020]
With Liberate Your Body, Dream Days charts a new course within the label’s catalog, shifting the focus from the celestial void to the atomic vibration of matter. While previous releases explored the solitude of the stars, this EP is a brutal and necessary invitation to reclaim the only territory that still belongs to us: our biological shell.
Delkom – Sexploitation (Facets Edit) [AUFO017] [FREE DOWNLOAD]
Dark Synth aficionado and renowned New York City party starter Facets lands on our ‘A UFO’ free edit series with an energetic rework of Delkom’s “Sexploitation.” He preserves the entrancing vocals from the seminal 1990 release, keeping them loose and sultry while infusing the percussion with his signature snap.Facets mindfully rearranges the track, bringing the groundbreaking instrumentation to the forefront and letting the lyrics pierce. By maintaining the commanding essence of the original, this Serbian native revitalizes the track, allowing it to soar once again on today’s dancefloors. Facets continues to enhance his impressive collection of reworks, leaving his uniquely forward-thinking mark on a classic from another golden era.
The Hipodrome Of Music 