In recent months on Dazed, we’ve listened to Pa Salieu’s exclusive Glastonbury playlist, documented the Kneecap court demonstration, and let you know Sasha Keable’s time is now. We’ve also explored how Mon Rovia is reinventing Appalachian folk for a new generation, remembered when pop music couldn’t stop going na-na-na? and hosted a Dazed Mix from Surusinghe.

We’re halfway through 2025, and all bets are off. Despite the sometimes unspoken uncertainties that colour the day-to-day realities of many, music continues to offer the potential for shared communal spaces and serve as a source of collective solace. That said, the global music community still faces ongoing economic challenges around touring, releasing and promoting music. Tough conversations are happening, and even more will be had. Regardless of the difficulty setting, however, new and under-discussed talents from the worlds of underground music continue to use community and craft to find a way.

For the second edition of our quarterly roundup for 2025, we’re continuing to reflect and acknowledge musicians, artists, producers and DJs from across the globe, all with strong communities, real visions, and important statements to make. Here are ten essential Q2 releases, all available on Bandcamp. 

HARMONY INDEX, WINTERBREAKS

WHO: The Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist making euphoric dance music with a side serving of dream pop sensibilities.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: In recent years, Nico Leibman, aka Harmony Index, has made her way through the West Coast DIY underground, playing guitar and bass with the likes of Jessica Pratt. Along the way, she reconnected with her teenage love of IDM, dance pop and PS2 video game soundtracks. After a month-long tour with Pratt, Niebman channelled depression and disconnection into the Winterbreaks EP. Over four floaty bangers and an ambient intro, Leibman combines Logic Audio preset sounds and her yearning voice with a misty melange of street soul, piano garage and breakbeat house. “All Around” and “Drifting” really hit the spot.

FOR FANS OF: Alex Kassian, Nick Leon, Cate Le Bon.

DREAMCASTMOE, THE LOST TAPES VOL.3

WHO: A singer-songwriter, producer and DJ from Washington, D.C. who traverses the jazz, soul, funk, R&B, hip-hop and dance spectrum with effortless swagger.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: After cliquing up with US independent music stalwarts Ghostly International, The Lost Tapes Vol.3 sees dreamcastmoe ducking across the Atlantic to reconnect with his Peckham allies, Rhythm Section INTL. Across the project, he turns in a series of thirteen sonic diary entries where the bravado of rap, low-slung beats and the rich traditions of Black music that precede and follow them go hazy-funky-soulful till the wheels fall off. The Lost Tapes Vol.3 is a fun, fresh, and confident project loaded with gems like ‘Flowers’. Heating things up, Ania Hoo, NAPPYNAPPA, Ruqqiyah, and Jelani Kwasi turn in stellar features. 

FOR FANS OF: Mndsgn, Jamma D, Space Ghost.

NADAH EL SHAZLY, LAINI TANI

WHO: The dynamic and expressive Egyptian musician, producer and film composer who resides in Montreál.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: Across her new album, Laini Tani, Nadah El Shazly leads with stargazed dream pop sensibilities, before letting songcraft unfold into a series of rhythmic ambient explorations of Illbient, downtempo and modern classical. Co-produced by 3phaz and featuring harp from El Shazly’s longstanding collaborator Sarah Pagé, Laini Tani’s nine songs marry abrasive industrial aesthetics with soft, spectral sensibilities. From the nocturnal shuffle of ‘Banit’ to the delicate percussive psych folk of the title track, the music reasserts El Shazly’s impressive (and impressionistic) command of mood, tone and atmosphere. Laini Tani is for quiet moments snatched from the hustle and bustle of daily life.

FOR FANS OF: Nettle, Mutamassik, Maurice Louca.

TEETHER & KUYA NEIL, YEARN IV

WHO: Two open-eared hip-hop lovers making regionally-minded abstract rap music that splits the difference between Melbourne and London.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: Vocalist Teether & producer Kuya Neil’s debut album Yearn IV is a glorious confluence of styles, eras and ideas. Across its thirteen songs, abstract and sampledelic beat production, in the same continuum that connects DJ Shadow and The Avalanches, collide with slomo road rap, playful art-prank sensibilities that evoke Dean Blunt, and the autotuned twinkle and bass boom of trap music. Fittingly released through Australian indie musician Guy Blackman’s eccentric Naarm-based record label, Chapter Music, Yearn IV lives in the overlap between hip-hop, club music, and, as Kuya Neil put it in a Mixmag ANZ interview, “Ethnic suburban Australiana.” It’s a sleeper hit.

FOR FANS OF: Coco Solid, Billy Woods, John Glacier.

SHANTI CELESTE, ROMANCE

WHO: The Chilean house/techno producer, DJ and vocalist bringing a loved-up vibe from the Bristol scene to the world.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: Front to back, Romance by Shanti Celeste is a rich, multi-layered experience. A mélange of fourth world slanted new age/ambient and euphoric dance pop, the album bubbles and blooms, revealing a rose-tinted dreamscape where vulnerable emotional honesty is buoyed by the transformative power of love. Opening with the syncopated rhythms, glossy harp and Spanish utterances of ‘Butterflies’, Romance hits an early peak on the misty uptempo R&B number ‘Note To Self’, before locking in for a run of club tracks and downbeat numbers that deserve choreographed dance routines. This is pop music as reimagined through the lens of the underground.

FOR FANS OF: Jayda G, Erykah Badu, Romy.

INFINITY KNIVES & BRIAN ENNALS, A CITY DROWNED IN GOD’S BLACK TEARS

WHO: A Baltimore hip-hop duo making abstract hip-hop with staggering storytelling and a weighty command of mood and tone.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: In 2022, producer Infinity Knives and rapper Brian Ennals were cruising up your block on DMT and proclaiming themselves “the post-apocalyptic version of Run DMC.” Three years after unveiling their breakout album, King Cobra, 2025 finds the dynamic duo playing shows with Kneecap, Dry Cleaning and Tropical Fuck Storm and solidfying their reputation with A City Drowned in God's Black Tears. Across its eleven songs, Knives, one of the most gifted experimental hip-hop musicians of today, lays down note-perfect backdrops for Ennals’ unvarnished storytelling. It’s literary fiction, street-level reporting and heartfelt reflection all delivered like an uppercut.

FOR FANS OF: Kneecap, Chris Crack, Open Mike Eagle.

LADI6, LE VĀ

WHO: The Aotearoa neo soul linchpins who continue to remake themselves as the world changes around them.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: Since stepping onto the international stage via her debut album Time Is Not Much…, and live performances across Europe opening for Erykah Badu, Mos Def and the late Gil Scott-Heron, Ladi6 has maintained a reputation as one of the most significant South Pacific soul/RnB artists. Dedicated to her dearly departed mother Fuarosa, Le Vā captures Ladi and her collaborators, Parks and B.Haru’s latest stylistic evolution. Balancing her smoky tone with heartfelt spoken word passages, she hits new heights over glossy instrumentals inspired by modular synthesis and the rhythms and tempos of the tastier sides of house and techno.

FOR FANS OF: Solange, Erykah Badu, Aaradhna.

TENNISCOATS, ZENVU YUME

WHO: A longstanding Japanese duo that folds together indie pop, psychedelic folk, and the avant-garde with whimsical charm.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: At the end of a recent live show in Melbourne, Saya and Takashi Ueno, the Japanese “avant pops” duo better known as Tenniscoats, unplugged their microphones and guitar. Performing acoustically, they brought the full room to a pin-drop silence with their charismatic charm. Zenvu Yume, the latest addition to a catalogue of material spanning over two decades, captures Tenniscoats' restless spirit. From the lounge grooves of “Pearl” to the 90s global dance sensibilities and the steelpan folk of “World NeW”, Zenvu Yume reveals itself as another embarrassment of riches from one of Japan’s most consistent 21st-century acts.

FOR FANS OF: The Pastels, Tape, Guy Blackman.

STEREOLAB, INSTANT HOLOGRAMS ON METAL FILM

WHO: The French avant-pop legends who still have things left to say.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: Across Instant Holograms on Metal Film, Stereolab split the difference between the motorik-meets-lounge aesthetic they’re often associated with and ideas cribbed from disco, proto-techno and late 20th century garden shed electronics. When you haven’t released a new studio album in 15 years, the stakes are always going to be high. Nevertheless, Instant Holograms on Metal Film delivers, oddly enough, gifting us an album that could have arguably been recorded at any point in the last fifteen years (at least). Like the sci-fi surrealists Sapphire & Steel, Stereolab now seems to exist outside of time and space. Long may the music flow.

FOR FANS OF: Broadcast, The Durutti Column, Arthur Russell.

DJ DADAMAN & MOSCOW DOLLAR, KA GAZA

WHO: A crucial mid-2000s Bacardi Music duo finally getting their flowers outside South Africa.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING: Before a generation of South African producer-DJs took amapiano and gqom to the world, the townships outside Pretoria were moving joyfully to Bacardi music. In the mid-2000s, Atteridgeville’s DJ Dadaman, known locally as “MabaShghubu” (the hitmaker), lit up the scene by splitting the difference between kwaito, house, and synth-pop. One of his key collaborators was the syrupy-voiced vocalist, DJ and songwriter Moscow Dollar, who graced some of Dadaman’s most crucial beats. Two decades on, Nyege Nyege Tapes has curated a six-song EP of crucial material from these Bacardi house pioneers. Give it a listen. Ka Gaza will set your body free.

FOR FANS OF: DJ Spoko, Kapa Kapa, Sueño Latino.