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Sep 05, 2025 By Mark Redfern

Welcome to the 31st Songs of the Week of 2025. This week Andy Von Pip, Caleb Campbell, and Dom Gourlay helped me decide what should make the list. We considered over 40 songs and narrowed it down to a Top 12.  

Issue 74, The Protest Issue, is out now. It features Kathleen Hannah and Bartees Strange on the two covers and can be bought from us directly here.

In recent weeks we posted interviews with Nova Twins, Modern Nature, Mocky and Feist, Open Mike Eagle, Gwenno (a My Firsts), and more.

In the last week we reviewed some albums.

To help you sort through the multitude of fresh songs released in the last week, we have picked the 12 best the last seven days had to offer, followed by some honorable mentions. Check out the full list below.

1. Saint Etienne and Confidence Man: “Brand New Me”

British indie-pop trio Saint Etienne released a new album, International, which they are describing as their final album, today via Heavenly.

Earlier this week they shared its third single, “Brand New Me,” which is a collaboration with Australian electro-pop band Confidence Man and comes with an animated music video. Kyle Platts and Matt Lloyd directed and animated the video, which was inspired by classic Hanna Barbera cartoons. And is that Jarvis Cocker of Pulp we spot as one of the judges at the talent competition?

Saint Etienne are Sarah Cracknell, Pete Wiggs, and Bob Stanley.

Cracknell had this to say about the new single in a press release: “I got a message from Danny Mitchell at Heavenly Recordings, Saint Etienne’s spiritual home, about an Australian band they had signed called Confidence Man. Danny told me they were fans of our music and would love to meet and chat about a potential collaboration. We met backstage at a festival and immediately hit it off, kindred spirits! Making ‘Brand New Me’ was a lot of fun and I think it’s a perfect mash up of both our band’s styles.”

Confidence Man is fronted by Sugar Bones (aka Aidan Moore) and Janet Planet (aka Grace Stephenson). They put out a new album, 3 AM (LA LA LA), last year via Casablanca.

Previously Saint Etienne shared International’s lead single, “Glad.” “Glad” features Jez Williams of Doves on guitar and was co-written and produced with Tom Rowlands of The Chemical Brothers. It was shared via a music video and was one of our Songs of the Week. Then they shared its second single, “Take Me to the Pilot,” via a music video. Paul Hartnoll of Orbital co-wrote and produced the song, which also made it on Songs of the Week.

The band say they aren’t exactly breaking up and remain best friends, but a press release says “they don’t feel like they want to go on forever and wanted to go out with a bang.” Does this mean they will continue to tour and play shows? Does it really mean that in 10 years they’ll reform and put out a new album? All we know is that the band are calling this their final album and we’ll take them at their word.

International was co-produced with Tim Powell (formerly of Xenomania) and features a slew of other guests, including Confidence Man (whose Janet Planet duets with Cracknell on “Brand New Me”), Erol Alkan, Vince Clarke, Nick Heyward (who duets on “The Go Betweens”), and Paul Hartnoll of Orbital.

The album is the quick follow-up to The Night, which only came out last December but was more of a chillout immersive album intended to be listened to in one sitting than a regular Saint Etienne album. The album before that was 2021’s I’ve Been Trying to Tell You.

Read our 2025 interview with Saint Etienne on The Night.

Read our 2017 print magazine interview with Saint Etienne.

Read our 2017 extended Q&A with Saint Etienne.

2. Suede: “Broken Music for Broken People”

Suede have released a new album, Antidepressants, today via BMG. Stream the whole thing here. Read our review, which we posted today, here.

All of the album’s pre-release singles made our Songs of the Week lists, but “Broken Music for Broken People” is our favorite album track not previously released as a single and it makes this list.

In Dom Gourlay’s rave review, he writes: “On balance, Antidepressants seems to be a record Suede have been aching to make for years, maybe even decades.”

Previously Suede shared its first single, “Disintegrate,” via a music video. It was one of our Songs of the Week.The band also previously released a live video for the album’s title track, recorded last year at their show at London’s Alexandra Palace. Then they shared its second single, “Trance State,” also one of our Songs of the Week. Then they shared its third single, “Dancing With the Europeans,” again one of our Songs of the Week.

Antidepressants is the Britpop band’s 10th album and follows their 2022 album, Autofiction. Suede are Brett Anderson (vocals), Mat Osman (bass), Simon Gilbert (drums), Richard Oakes (guitars), and Neil Codling (keyboards).

Anderson had this to say about the album in a previous press release: “If Autofiction was our punk record, Antidepressants is our post-punk record. It’s about the tensions of modern life, the paranoia, the anxiety, the neurosis. We are all striving for connection in a disconnected world. This was the feel I wanted the songs to have. The album is called Antidepressants. This is broken music for broken people.”

Suede recorded the album live in the studio with longtime producer Ed Buller, who they first worked with on their debut single, “The Drowners,” way back in 1992. The band recorded at Belgium’s ICP Studios, in London at both RAK and Sleeper Sounds, and at RMV in Sweden.

“It is genuinely exciting being in this band. It feels like we’re still pushing creatively,” says Anderson of the new album.

Osman adds: “This is a widescreen and ambitious record. It’s a big stage record and it’s taking it up a gear.”

Read our rave review of Autofiction here.

Read our interview with Suede on The Blue Hour.

Read our 2013 interview with Suede’s Brett Anderson on Bloodsports.

In 2019 we reflected on the 25th anniversary of Suede’s second album, Dog Man Star, and you read that retrospective here.

3. The Last Dinner Party: “The Scythe”

The Last Dinner Party are releasing their second album From the Pyre, on October 17 on Island. Today they shared its second single, “The Scythe,” via a music video. Fiona Jane Burgess directed the video.

The band’s Abigail Morris initially wrote “The Scythe” as a teenager dealing with a breakup. Morris had this to say about the song in a press release:

“This song began nine years ago, like a prophecy. I wrote it before I had known anything of grief or heartbreak, how a relationship ending feels exactly the same as that person dying. Once you know how it feels to lose someone you enter a new realm from which you can never return. You’re trying to reach them telepathically through psychics or song lyrics (sometimes those two become the same) and sometimes they give you a reply. It can take nine years to realise you’re even grieving at all but once you do you see them everywhere—in a robin, in a street fox, in a Wim Wenders film. ‘The Scythe’ comes for everyone and you shouldn’t be afraid about what’s on the other side.”

Of the video, Morris adds: “The music video for ‘The Scythe’ is one of our proudest and most intimate. From one angle it’s a celebration of all the relationships that make it so far you both feel like you can live forever, from another it’s the fantasy of imagining what it would look like if your parents had been able to grow old together.”

Previously the band shared From the Pyre’s first single, “This Is the Killer Speaking.” It was one of our Songs of the Week.

From the Pyre is the quick follow-up to the band’s 2024 released debut album, Prelude to Ecstasy, which was one of our Top 100 Albums of 2024.

You can read our album review here, and very likely their first interview with an American publication here.

4. Ladytron: “I Believe in You”

Liverpool-formed electro-pop band Ladytron returned today with a new single, “I Believe in You,” released via a music video. The single is out now on Nettwerk. The band have also announced some new 2026 UK shows. Check out the tour dates here.

Ladytron is Helen Marnie, Daniel Hunt, and Mira Aroyo. Fellow founding member Reuben Wu left the band in 2023. Hunt directed the “I Believe in You” video.

Ladyton’s last studio album, Time’s Arrow, came out in 2023 via Cooking Vinyl. Around the same time “Destroy Everything You Touch,” originally released on Ladytron’s 2005 LP Witching Hour, found new life yet again after being featured in Emerald Fennell’s film, Saltburn. In 2023 they also released a new Christmas song, “All Over By Xmas.”

Read our 2019 interview with Ladytron on their self-titled album.

Read our First Issue Revisited interview with Ladytron on their debut album, 604, from our 20th Anniversary Issue.

Read our review of Time’s Arrow.

5. Hatchie: “Lose It Again”

This week, Hatchie, the shoegaze/dream pop project of Australian musician Harriette Pilbeam, announced a new album, Liquorice, and shared its first single, “Lose It Again,” via a music video. Melina Duterte (aka Jay Som) helped produce the album, which is due out November 7 via Secretly Canadian.

Liquorice is Hatchie’s third full-length album and follows Giving the World Away, which was one of our Top 100 Albums of 2022.

“This album feels like the culmination of everything I’ve wanted to do with this project since I first started it,” says Pilbeam in a press release. “I focused on the finer details of the trajectory of love found and lost, inspired by my favorite tragic romance films. I’ve never felt more aligned with an album and can’t wait to share the experience with everyone.”

Pilbeam and her longtime bandmate/romantic partner Joe Agius were based in Los Angeles for a time, but decided to stop touring and return to Australia.

“Ultimately, the inspiration for the album came from living a very simple life and having time to reconnect with myself and be alone with my thoughts,” says Pilbeam.

The album was recorded at Duterte’s home studio and features Stella Mozgawa (Warpaint, Courtney Barnett) on drums. Alex Farrar (Wednesday, MJ Lenderman) mixed the album, which was mastered by Greg Obis (Dutch Interior, Slow Pulp, Wishy).

Jeremy McLennan (Orchin) co-wrote “Lose It Again” and Agius directed its video.

“I wanted to see my limitations as strengths that inform my style,” Pilbeam says about embracing her influences on Liquorice.

Read our interview with Hatchie on Giving the World Away here.

Read our rave review of Giving the World Away here.

Giving the World Away is Hatchie’s second full-length album, the follow-up to her acclaimed debut album, Keepsake, which came out in 2019 via Double Double Whammy.

Hatchie was featured on Under the Radar’s 20th anniversary compilation album, Covers of Covers, where she covers HAIM’s “FUBT.”

Read our rave 8.5/10 review of Keepsake here.

Read our 2018 interview with Hatchie on her EP Sugar & Spice.

Read our My Favorite Album interview with Hatchie on Carole King’s Tapestry.

6. Cate Le Bon: “About Time”

Cate Le Bon is releasing a new album, Michelangelo Dying, on September 26 via Mexican Summer. This week she shared its third single, “About Time,” via a music video. Fellow Welsh musician/regular collaborator H. Hawkline directed the video..

Le Bon previously shared Michelangelo Dying’s lead single “Heaven Is No Feeling.” It was one of our Songs of the Week. Then she shared its second single, “Is It Worth It (Happy Birthday)?,” via a music video. It also landed on Songs of the Week.

Michelangelo Dying is Le Bon’s seventh full-length and the follow-up to Pompeii, which landed on our Top 100 Albums of 2022 list.

Le Bon produced Michelangelo Dying with collaborator Samur Khouja.

Le Bon, who has worked as a producer with St. Vincent, Wilco, and others, said in a previous press release: “There’s this idea that you could do everything yourself, but the value of having someone you completely trust, as I do Samur, be your co-pilot allows you to get completely lost knowing you’ll get pulled back in at the right moment. We have come to quietly move as one in the studio.”

Read our interview with her about her 2022 album Pompeii here.

7. Kneecap: “Sayōnara” (Feat. Paul Hartnoll)

8. Softcult: “16/25”

9. Vona Vella: “Bear Trap”

10. Steve Gunn: “Nearly There”

11. The Divine Comedy: “Invisible Thread”

12. David Byrne: “What Is The Reason For It?” (Feat. Hayley Williams)

Honorable Mentions:

These songs almost made the Top 12.

The Antlers: “Something in the Air”

The Belair Lip Bombs: “Don’t Let Them Tell You (It’s Fair)”

Blue Bendy: “Poke”

Billy Bragg: “Hundred Year Hunger”

Clark: “Blowtorch Thimble”

Cut Copy: “Belong to You” (Feat. Kate Bollinger)

Daphni: “Eleven”

Eades: “Outside Nothing”

Field Music: “I Need to Get Sick on You Now”

Jane Inc.: “freefall”

Knitting: “Fold”

Kelly Moran: “Echo in the Field”

John Maus: “Pick It Up”

The Mynabirds: “Ramona, Patron Saint of Silence”

Sparks: “Porcupine”

Tame Impala: “Loser”

Whitmer Thomas: “On a Roll”

Here’s a handy Spotify playlist featuring the Top 12 in order, followed by all the honorable mentions:

(Note: The songs by Billy Bragg, Field Music, and The Mynabirds are not on Spotify and so aren’t on the playlist.)

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