Hello secret friends,

I am writing this from Montréal, where the polar cold showed up unusually early this season. A Tuesday morning at -19°C, followed by a full-day blizzard makes it pretty clear that Mother Nature has a score to settle with us this winter.

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The year 2025 is coming to a close, and in the past few days your feeds have been overflowing with end-of-year reviews, top 20s, and lists of the best of the best of the best.

I have huge respect for writers, journalists and critics who can put music into context with real insight. But, true to form, the Secret Ambient Club is not heading in that direction.

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Since day one of this project, I have never wanted to add more noise to the conversation. I only want to add more music to our lives.

Though I spend hundreds of hours listening every year, I don’t claim to be an authority on the ambient music scene. I approach this project with humility, curiosity and a sincere desire to share new sounds.

So today I’m sharing a list, entirely subjective, of albums that resonated with me in 2025. Even though I definitely refuse to be called a ‘music critic,’ I still want to honor the effort and dedication of the artists whose work stood out this year.

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With 37 albums, it’s a fairly generous list. But I didn’t feel like cutting it down.

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For one reason or another (and sometimes I can’t even explain why), these compositions transported me elsewhere with their originality, poetry, richness, beauty, and dissonance.

It’s not perfectly balanced, but it feels coherent. I also take pride in highlighting music coming from contemporary giants and lesser known artists. The idea is that you might discover a few new names along the way.

I can say with absolute certainty that I’ve missed some important albums. Aside from submissions from generous readers, I do all the research myself to find the albums I feature every day.

I’ll keep sharing albums from 2025 (and earlier) until the first exciting releases of 2026 start arriving.

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I would like to thank the artists, again, for continuing to reinvent a genre that is still very much alive.

I appreciate all of you for being part of this growing community.

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37 albums the Secret Ambient Club found noteworthy in 2025

We will stick to our habit of not commenting on the selections. I prefer to let listeners discover these works without any preconceived ideas.

There is no ranking. The albums are presented in the order in which they were originally shared on the site.

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Phew.

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If you’ve made it this far, thank you. I appreciate your support.

Now let’s go get some fresh air.