Yes, it’s only March, but we wouldn’t be collecting the best songs of the young year if there weren’t heaps of great music to spotlight. From Bad Bunny to Bon Iver, our inaugural round includes the expected hodgepodge of genres — pulsing guitar rock, Nelly Furtado–era pop, lean pop-punk, Puerto Rican folk — with most loosely centered around the idea of comfort. Whether that’s because of what’s emanating from the White House on an hourly basis or because we all have seasonal depression (or both!), there’s a sound here for everyone.
“Prodigal Daughter,” Hailey Whitters featuring Molly Tuttle
There’s usually a sharp edge hiding somewhere under midwestern charm — even for Iowa-raised Hailey Whitters, who once laughed at the Nashville game on her song “Ten-Year Town.” That irreverence comes to the forefront again on “Prodigal Daughter,” her riotous, rootsy anthem with bluegrass picker Molly Tuttle. That titular daughter is “saccharine as sugarcane” before she meets a bad boy and leaves her mother “sweatin’ bullets,” worried for her soul. Between the devil’s mention in the chorus and Justin Moses’s scorching fiddle, it all plays a bit like a 21st-century “Devil Went Down to Georgia.” The daughter comes home, of course, but Whitters leaves her fate more open-ended. “Still somewhere in between,” she sings in the bridge with a smirk. —Justin Curto
“Forever Yung,” Yung Lean
The Swedish shapeshifter follows his full-length 2024 Bladee team-up with a pulsing track about trying and failing to push a relationship to the next stage. “I wonder where you’re at / I wonder where you go,” he says, flipping between singing and spoken-word delivery. “You’re inside that mask of yours / Take it off and let it show.” —Alex Suskind
“Teethsucker (Yea3x),” Rico Nasty
Rico Nasty is one of the only rappers for whom signing to storied pop-punk label Fueled by Ramen is a totally reasonable career move. But the blaring guitars and Warped Tour–ready “Yeah-yeahee-yeah!” hook that open “Teethsucker (Yea3x)” make a convincing case on their own. Nasty is her usual overcaffeinated self on the lean track, sneering at her doubters: “You did it worse / I did it first.” —J.C.
“Everything Is Peaceful Love,” Bon Iver
With “Everything Is Peaceful Love,” the new single off a forthcoming full-length, Bon Iver makes clear that the pared-back sound of 2024’s EP Sable was only momentary. Justin Vernon’s vision is expansive as ever, pairing a pensive drum track with country guitar strumming (reminiscent of his early band DeYarmond Edison) and pristine, silvery synthesizers. Gone is the glitchy anxiety of his 2019 album, i,i. “And I know that we may go and change someday,” Vernon sings. “I couldn’t rightly say / That’s for parting days.” He’d rather stay in the moment, and it sounds serene. —J.C.
“Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World,” Destroyer
Often, in his project Destroyer, Dan Bejar plays the world-weary nihilist. On “Hydroplaning Off the Edge of the World,” though, the singer takes on life wide-eyed. He goes for a walk in the park, talks to the wind, gets mistaken for a priest (by another priest). And he narrates it all over a radiant burst of synths with la-la-las in the background. The moments of inscrutability that define Destroyer are still here too: “Fools rush in, but they’re the only ones with guts,” Bejar notes. Really, he’s still no optimist, but he’s found freedom in some acceptance. —J.C.
“Besties,” Black Country, New Road
The departure of singer Isaac Wood in 2022 only brought the remaining six members of Black Country, New Road closer. Where Wood was the singular, brooding baritone voice of the band before, now three of the members are splitting vocal duties — including violinist Georgia Ellery.” “Besties” introduces a brighter, more approachable band from the opening clangs of harpsichord before the entire sextet crashes in on top. The melody goes down easier than ever; Ellery, too, is more conversational than in her synthpop project Jockstrap as she struggles through a crush on a friend. But many of the band’s old sensibilities remain, like a penchant for of-the-moment one-liners, as Ellery calls herself “a walking TikTok trend.” —J.C.
“Artist of the Century,” MIKE
The syrupy vocal-ed MC stuffs as many truth nuggets as he can into this whistle-y cut off Showbiz!, his latest full-length. “Proud of me, workin’ ‘gainst the odds and the ugly / It’s comedy, the hurtin’ be disguised as a subtweet,” he says, before ending it all with a cleverly worded warning: “The prize isn’t much, but the price is abundant.” —A.S.
“Rabbitbrush 2,” A.L. West
A.L. West turns his pretty but rote acoustic yarn from 2023 into a thudding stomper of a sequel. “Rabbitbrush 2” pulls just a handful of lyrics from the original before ditching the rest and infusing what’s left with a gnarly guitar riff and solo. I have already added this to my “things to see played live in 2025” list. —A.S.
“I Want You (Fever),” Momma
For all the talk about their ’90s rock influences, the Brooklyn band Momma aren’t mere nostalgists — the mid-20s members weren’t even alive for most of the decade — they’re revivalists. Their best songs, like “I Want You (Fever),” prize the energy of the decade over dutiful re-creation, sounding thoroughly alive and of the moment. From the opening screech of distorted guitar, “I Want You” crackles with youthful excitement, a sugar rush toward a pithy, perfect earworm: “Wake up and leave her / I want you, fever.” Unrequited love couldn’t sound more satisfying. —J.C.
“Sports Car,” Tate McRae
Stop it with the Britney comparisons — on “Sports Car,” Tate McRae is channeling her fellow Canadian Nelly Furtado. Ryan Tedder and Grant Boutin crafted a beat with the hip-hop stomp of Imperial-era Timbaland, and on it, McRae exudes Furtado’s same seductive swagger. From the opening lines, McRae knows what she wants. “Hey cute jeans / Take mine off me,” she purrs. The one-time So You Think You Can Dance contestant doesn’t have Furtado’s vocal range, but McRae is just as dangerous of a maneater when she whispers the hook. —J.C.
“21st Century Cool Girl,” Chloe Qisha
A tightly wound pop anthem from rising act Chloe Qisha, who combines a commanding hook with humor (“Now this could be hyperbole / but I’m afraid I might die / If I’m not here by your side”), fantasy (“If you want to get freaky on hotel floors …” ), and pop-culture bonafides (“… straight out the set of Dawson’s Creek”). —A.S.
“Ankles,” Lucy Dacus
The lead single from Lucy Dacus’s Forever Is a Feeling is one of tender negotiation, breaking the mold on what to expect in a song about sex by discussing the act rather than jumping right in. “What if we only talk / About what we want and cannot have?” she asks over gorgeous staccato strings, before pivoting to a more explicit direction: “Pull me by the ankles to the edge of the bed / And take me like you do in your dreams.” —A.S.
“Switch Over,” Horsegirl
It’s great to have Horsegirl back. Three years after their auspicious debut, the young Chicago rock trio’s new album features this insatiable lead single — a quick, crunchy guitar track that’s been putting me in a trance for months. It’s always a little hard to tell what the group is singing about — there are only a handful of words on this one, and they’re pretty inscrutable! — but that makes decoding it half the fun. —A.S.
“Café Con Ron,” Bad Bunny with Los Pleneros de la Cresta
Bad Bunny is an enthusiastic ambassador for his home of Puerto Rico on Debí Tirar Más Fotos. The album is alive with the sound of different eras, regions, and genres — nowhere more than the plena song “Café Con Ron.” Benito finds community with the like-minded Pleneros de la Cresta, who have been playing the island’s pattering folk music for over a decade. This joyous drinking song begins with pep before slowing down and giving the musicians room to stretch out. One moment, they’re referencing a classic plena (“Ven subiendo …”); the next, they’re slipping modern slang into the lyrics as one of MAG’s chirpy synths sneaks in behind the band. That’s the island as Benito hears it. —J.C.