These ghost sounds from Suzanne Vega's Tom's Diner are the spookiest thing you'll hear today

 

Until now, I have been pretty convinced that ghosts can't make music. Something to do with temporal forms not being able to strum a guitar, or no-one from Rentaghost becoming a chart-topping pop star.

And yet, have a listen to that YouTube video. Ghosts! Actual ghosts!

It's actually a remarkable bit of audio detritus that arose from when Suzanne Vega's 1987 a cappella Tom's Diner got transferred from high-quality audio to MP3.

This may be news to some, but MP3s are low-resolution. They are compressed in size and quality, balancing storage space and audio fidelity. It ensures that your cool and trendy iPod (!) isn't the size of Battersea Power Station.

MP3s are a lossy format, so when converting from a high-quality format, bits of the sound are chopped out. The lost sound has to go somewhere, I guess. There was a terrible Doctor Who episode once in which people lost fat, and the fat formed into blubber aliens that everyone wanted to kick in the face. It's exactly like that. Probably.

In a brilliant feat of reverse-engineered psychoacoustics, that video is the sound of that lost audio when Tom's Diner was converted to MP3. Developer Karlheinz Brandenburg used the song's clean vocals to test the parameters of MP3 compression, and this is the studio offcut.

This also mean that Tom's Diner was the first MP3, christening Vega as the "Mother of MP3". Which is impressive, and a damn sight better than being the Uncle of AIFF or the Second-Cousin of Spotify. 

This is part of the Museum of Portable Sound, which collects non-musical noise. It contains field recordings, old hi-fi gear, 1960s television commercials, urban soundscapes, the sound of Sigmund Freud’s toilet, and the sound of me grunting when I get up from a sofa. Alright, the last one was a lie. But it really does contains Freud's bog.

"This is one of the most revelatory and inspiring things I've heard recently," said Robin Rimbaud, a who releases spectral ambience as Scanner. If Scanner is impress, you know it's brilliant.

Pictured above: Vega in the video for Luka, which is the wrong song, but hey.

Further Fats: Ghost written – podcasts, music, Buffy and emails (2015)

Further Fats: Delia Derbyshire Day – even more original than the Atari (2017)

Best electronic music albums of 2025: all of the featured albums

In the five days it has taken me to post my 2025 albums list, the US has invaded Venezuela, Bulgaria got rid of the lev, and Raye scored the first number one single of the year, something she also did in 2023.

My end-of-year blogging is always intense. I wrote thousands of words about a shedload of electronic music albums, and now my brain is fried. Some of those words were good words, and some of those words were really average words.

A summary might be useful. So here is a list of all of the albums featured in my Best electronic music albums of 2025 blog series. Each one links to the summary it was featured in. The ones labelled "🏆Top 20" have their very own dedicated blog post.

I should do a playlist. Suggestions of good, accesible Spotify alternatives would be welcome.

µ-Ziq: 1979 & Manzana (Balmat)

Adrian Sherwood: The Collapse Of Everything (On-U Sound)

Aleksi Perälä: Vortex 1–4 + Cycles 0 (AP Musik)

Anthony Naples: Scanners (ANS)

Barker: Stochastic Drift (Smalltown Supersound)

Barry Can’t Swim: Loner (Ninja Tune)

Bicep: CHROMA 000 (CHROMA) 🏆Top 20

Biosphere: The Way of Time (AD 96)

The Black Dog: Loud Ambient (Dust Science Recordings) 🏆Top 20

Black Sites: R4 (Tresor Records) 🏆Top 20

Blackploid: Cosmic Drama (Central Processing Unit)

Blawan: Sick Elixir (XL Recordings)

Bogdan Raczynski: Slow Down Stupid (Disciples)

Bruise Blood: You Run Through the World Like An Open Razor (Rocket Recordings) 🏆Top 20

The Bug vs Ghost Dubs: Implosion (Pressure)

Cain: Lineage (Fine Grains) 🏆Top 20

Call Super: A Rhythm Protects One (Dekmantel) 🏆Top 20

Carrier: Rhythm Immortal (Modern Love)

Charles Webster & The South African Connection: From The Hill (Stay True Sounds South Africa)

Charlotte de Witte: Charlotte de Witte (KNTXT)

Clark: Steep Stims (Throttle Records) 🏆Top 20

Cosey Fanni Tutti: 2t2 (Conspiracy International)

Dale Cornish: Altruism (The Death of Rave)

Daniel Avery: Tremor (Domino Recording Co)

Debit: Desaceleradas (Modern Love)

DJ Babatr: Root Echoes (Hakuna Kulala)

DJ Bone: DJ Bone XXXV: The End of Never (Further)

DJ Koze: Music Can Hear Us (Pampa)

Djrum: Under Tangled Silence (Houndstooth)

Ehua: Panta Rei (3024)

Facta: Gulp (Wisdom Teeth) 🏆Top 20

FKA Twigs: EUSEXUA (Young)

The Flashbulb: Papillon (self-released)

Hieroglyphic Being: Dance Music 4 Bad People (Smalltown Supersound)

Hieroglyphic Being: The Sound Of Something Ending (Mathematics)

Ikonika: SAD (Hyperdub)

In Transit: In Transit (Felt)

Introspekt: Moving The Center (Tempa)

James Holden & Waclaw Zimpel: The Universe Will Take Care Of You (Border Community)

Jeremy Hyman: Low Air (JH Recordings)

John Tejada: The Watchline (Palette Recordings) 🏆Top 20

Josef Tumari: JANNAT YURTIM (DSL System)

Kaytranada: Ain't No Damn Way! (RCA)

K-LONE: sorry i thought you were someone else (Incienso)

Lila Tirando a Violeta: Dream of Snakes (Unguarded) 🏆Top 20

Lindstrøm: Sirius Syntoms (Feedelity Recordings)

Los Thuthanaka: Los Thuthanaka (self-released)

Loscil: Lake Fire (Kranky)

Low End Activist: Airdrop II (Peak Oil)

Lynyn: Ixona (Sooper Records) 🏆Top 20

Lyra Pramuk: Hymnal (7K!)

Marie Davidson: City Of Clowns (Deewee)

Mark Pritchard & Thom Yorke: Tall Tales (Warp Records)

Mark Van Hoen: The Eternal Present (Dell'Orso Records)

Nadah El Shazly: Laini Tani (One Little Independent) 🏆Top 20

Nazar: Demilitarize (Hyperdub)

Nick León: A Tropical Entropy (TraTraTrax)

Noumen: Altum (Central Processing Unit) 🏆Top 20

Ø: Sysivalo (Sahko Recordings)

Oneohtrix Point Never: Tranquilizer (Warp Records)

The Orb: Buddhist Hipsters (Cooking Vinyl) 🏆Top 20

Paul St. Hilaire: w/ The Producers (Kynant Records)

Ploy: It's Later Than You Think (Dekmantel)

Polygonia: Dream Horizons (Dekmantel)

Powell: We Do Recover (Diagonal Records)

Purelink: Faith (Peak Oil)

Pye Corner Audio: Lake Deep Memory (Quiet Details)

Rainy Miller: Joseph, What Have You Done? (Fixed Abode) 🏆Top 20

Real Lies: We Will Annihilate Our Enemies (Tonal)

Rian Treanor & Cara Tolmie: Body Lapse (Planet Mu Records Ltd)

Rival Consoles: Landscape From Memory (Erased Tapes) 🏆Top 20

rRoxymore: Juggling Dualities (!K7 Recordings)

Sandwell District: End Beginnings (Point Of Departure)

Shed: Towards East (The Final Experiment)

Sherelle: With A Vengeance (Impressed Recordings) 🏆Top 20

Ship Sket: InitiatriX (Planet Mu)

Slikback: Attrition (Planet Mu)

Soulwax: All Systems Are Lying (Soulwax) 🏆Top 20

Squarepusher: Stereotype (Warp Records) 🏆Top 20

Steve Hauschildt: Aeropsia (Simul Records)

Surgeon: Shell~Wave (Tresor Records)

Tim Reaper: sfs (self-released) 🏆Top 20

TurquoiseDeath: Guardian (Phantasia)

Valesuchi: Futuro Cercano (Discos Nutabe)

Verses GT: Verses GT (LuckyMe)

Voice Actor & Squu: Lust (1) (Stroom)

Wagon Christ: Planet Roll (De:tuned)

Whatever The Weather: Whatever The Weather II (Ghostly International)

Top 20 electronic music albums of 2025: Squarepusher plays to (Stereo)type

This is part of a series, posting between 30th December 2025 and 3rd January 2026

Squarepusher: Stereotype (Warp Records)

80-plus albums later – probably closer to 90 but no-one’s counting – and we finally come to my last entry of Fat Roland’s Best Electronic Music of 2025, subsection Top 20 Bangers. Except this next album is not from 2025. It’s a cheat. Don’t tell anyone.

In July 1994, Wet Wet Wet were wedged at the top of the UK singles chart with Love Is All Around. Somewhere in the Essex suburbs, Tom ‘Squarepusher’ Jenkinson was recording two albums. One of them was Feed Me Weird Things which would be released on Rephlex Records two years later. The other one, originally released under the artist name Stereotype, was this.

Whooshki is a beefy 16-minute opener, gliding from silky, spiralling IDM into a clumping 909 tantrum. 1994, which I suspect is named after the year 1994, is a scratchy home-knit of tangled hi-hats and dystopian ambience. O'Brien sounds like Clark slipping off a cliff.

There’s early Aphex feel to Greenwidth, with its muffled rhythmic charge drizzled in oily ambience. Falling is drum ‘n bass compacted and tarnished by weighty, wistful analogue chords. We finish with O’Brien again, this time remixed and sounding like it’s come back for a sulk.

I don’t know how people remaster old tapes to make them sound better. I asked William Basinski this about his remaster of The Disintegration Loops. Surely a muffled old analogue tape is a muffled old analogue tape. Anyway, I’m none the wiser, but thank the gods for 1990s Squarepusher, redone and refreshed 32 years later. Old is the new new.

If you've been reading along, this is the last blog post for my 2025 album highlights. Excellent reading, well done. Someone tell Jools Holland that 2026 can now officially start.

See all of my Best electronic music albums of 2025

Top 20 electronic music albums of 2025: Central Processing Unit do it again with Noumen

This is part of a series, posting between 30th December 2025 and 3rd January 2026

Noumen: Altum (Central Processing Unit)

My top 20 albums of the year wouldn’t be a top 20 albums of the year without an album from those ever-reliable electro selectors Central Processing Unit. In previous annual lists, I have featured their artists Maelstrom, Silicon Scally, S>>D, Nadia Struiwigh and Proswell.

So here we have Noumen from Ukraine, who returns to CPU with an album of scrummy ambient techno. Let’s get the obvious out of the way first: There are definitely nods to old Autechre, particularly on the clatter of Telemask, the dark musicality of Fate Carette, and in the concrete snares of Far Wind.

With that out of the way, let’s see what makes Noumen so Noumen. On that latter track, the cold mechanics of the rhythm section are joined by layers of shiny synths until it becomes more about the melody than the Ae (it's what the cool kids call Autechre). And tracks like Splutter and Centrip are so brilliantly detailed and spidery.

The opening track Oion – and this is bold – runs for 15 minutes. It’s an airy ambient dub chug-a-long, really wonderful, its endless electro rhythm never giving up. It’s a real statement starting with a track that long. The message is clear: strap in or bugger off.

Can I just say, by the way, that I love Central Processing Unit’s commitment to binary. The catalogue number for this record is 10000010, binary for 130, and you’ll notice elsewhere in my end-of-year list Blackploid’s Cosmic Drama, which was their release before this one (10000001, or 129). I give then 1010 out of 1010.

See all of my Best electronic music albums of 2025

Top 20 electronic music albums of 2025: snake-charming Lila Tirando a Violeta channels her inner Cronenberg

This is part of a series, posting between 30th December 2025 and 3rd January 2026

Lila Tirando a Violeta: Dream of Snakes (Unguarded)

Here is another electronic music album highlight of 2025. Make sure to read the rest of the series, although it may take you the rest of 2026 to read it all.

Here comes Lila Tirando a Violeta, Hyperdub artist and created of audio-visual treats for people like Primavera and Boiler Room.

We start across the Irish sea. The last time I was in Ireland, I encountered the New York–Dublin Portal, a high street video sculpture where people could wave, jump and generally play with their cross-Atlantic counterparts. When I think of Ireland, I think of this joyful connection.

When producer Lila Tirando moved from the Netherlands to Ireland, she thought of snakes. Not a video sculpture of snakes, but actual proper wriggly tongue-flicking snakes. They kept popping up in her dreams.

For her, though, her recurring snake dreams were comforting. They connected her to her childhood, to her grandparents, and to memories of her native Uruguay. And she is expressing that memory with Dream Of Snakes, a collection of wild, upfront and sometimes venomous industrial techno.

On Heavy Is The Soul, processed vocals attempt hyperpop over a clattering barrel of unruly beats. Eye Slice is a floor-stomper so pounding, you can barely hear the accompanying synths fireworking into fractals. New Flesh sees sci-fi keyboards accompany her whispered recitation of dialogue from David Cronenberg’s film Videodrome. Inventive all the way, and well worthy of my top 20 list.

“I wanted to feel the music coursing through my nervous system, that same adrenaline rush I get when watching a David Cronenberg film,” she said in an interview with Ransom Note. There are no FLIES on her. Geddit? No? Oh suit yerself.

See all of my Best electronic music albums of 2025

Top 20 electronic music albums of 2025: Bruise Blood is dirtier than a ketchup-splashed pop shirt

This is part of a series, posting between 30th December 2025 and 3rd January 2026

Bruise Blood: You Run Through the World Like an Open Razor (Rocket Recordings)

Welcome to more highlights of 2025. I banged on about dozens of best-of-2025 albums, and now we’re into the Top 20 Bangers. The very best electronic music releases of 2025. With Bandcamp embeds and everything.

If you like your EBM, you may well adore this album from Teeth Of The Sea’s Mike Bourne. It’s industrial, crunchy synthwave noisecore kind of thing, splattered with acid and shoegaze and ‘orrible grubbiness.

I’m behind schedule with writing these blog posts, so forgive me for a moment of laziness. Here is an extract of me talking about the album when I interviewed Bruise Blood for Electronic Sound magazine. This was published a couple of months ago:

“This is a dirty album. Not the sanitised kind of dirty you get in detergent commercials in which a child splats ketchup onto their impossibly white polo shirt. This EBM-inspired workout is the filth of electronic aeons, riven with analogue grime and the leaking pneumatics of old studio hardware.

“For example, Cede leads with an impossibly dented bass rhythm while a rusty sawtooth yowl cuts through a splatter of vinegary ambience. And the scuzz of the title piece is so mesmerizingly broken, your inner cave-dweller will be bashing rocks to its 85bpm stomp.”

That pretty much sums it up. Thanks, past me. A doff of the cap should go to music magazine The Quietus for giving 'Blood the impetus to create this album, and to make our world a whole lot grubbier. I love it.

See all of my Best electronic music albums of 2025

Top 20 electronic music albums of 2025: bassoons, neuroscience and fine-tuned Lynyn loops

This is part of a series, posting between 30th December 2025 and 3rd January 2026

Lynyn: Ixona (Sooper Records)

Despite all the letters of complaint, my 2025 album series continues. Only a few more entries to go, and then we can start our 2026 properly. 

Lynyn’s first album Lexicon was in my 2022 end-of-year list. My review for Electronic Sound magazine called it “the brain half of braindance”. Intelligent beats and all that. And now, like a very good football team scoring two goals in the space of three years, he’s back in my end-of-year list.

It’s still brainy. Lynyn is one of those clever people. He’s a proper academic and probably has, like, all 26 letters after his name. And some Greek ones too. He’s classically-trained in composition, plays guitar in an avant-jazz band, and knows a lot about bassoons and neuroscience. No really. He knows a lot about bassoons and neuroscience.

However, this second album, released by Sooper Records based in his hometown of Chicago, is a spookier affair. Gloops of haunting ambience. Pin-point drum clicks. He gets the big guns out on Versilitude, a grizzly roller that, still, finds itself entangled in a web of intricate, cocooning electronics. It’s like Burial covering Squarepusher. Squarial.

As inspiration for Ixona, he listened to dub techno pioneers like Pole and Basic Channel. Pole was first featured on this blog in August 2007, dontcha know. An especial inspiration was the speckled static of Jan Jelinek’s 2001 masterpiece Loop-Finding-Jazz-Records. That would be a great companion listen to Ixona.

The closing piece Pad 4 U is a lovely palate cleanser. A trombone skips merrily over a beanbag-flopped dubstep rhythm. Is there anything this man’s brain can’t do?

See all of my Best electronic music albums of 2025

Top 20 electronic music albums of 2025: E's aren't good – Clark is back at his best

This is part of a series, posting between 30th December 2025 and 3rd January 2026

Clark: Steep Sims (Throttle)

Can I please get something off my chest? In their write-up for this album, Boomkat compare one of Clark’s tracks to “his namesake Vince Clarke”. This is wrong. Clarke cannot be a namesake for Clark, nor vice versa. One has an E and the other doesn’t. It’s like saying Iain and Ian are the same name. Absolutely not. Iains with two i’s are salt of the earth, their hearts pure. Ians with one solitary i are all sub-human scum. Namesake indeed. Pah.

Clark had this album without fuss and in record time. He relied on a Virus synthesiser for a dancefloor feel – you’ll know its sound: think of the Prodigy in full techno mode. The result is Clark at his most ravey and most rebelliously bleepy.

The start is brilliant: on Gift And Wound, ghostly chords glow as the rave synths line-up for a full-on assault. The words bumps and goose come to mind, not necessarily in that order. The middle is brilliant too: on Globecore Flats, a fussy breakbeat leads the saddest detuned rave in history. And the end is brilliant: the fuzz of Micro Lyf is Clark at his most emotional.

No rich soundtracking or obtuse electronics here. Clark has gifted us perhaps his most in-your-face work on Steep Sims. Reducing his toolbox of available gear has clearly worked. He says his Virus synth was awkward to program, as a lot of old gear would be. You wouldn’t think it. This is Clark-with-no-e at his natural best.

See all of my Best electronic music albums of 2025