Just a couple of weeks back we notched up 21 years of running Music Farmers, it’s wild I’ve been selling records for that long! This year has been one of the strongest for the shop, so I thank everyone who has come through and look forward to seeing a lot of you over the holiday season. For most of the time running the shop I’ve also been running record labels alongside it and this year has been no different, it has however been a little quieter than other years. There are a few factors around this that have made the indie label world more of a challenge in the last couple of years but I’m excited for the future with plenty of great new artists around and new approaches to what an indie label is. A great example is the Silhouette Label which I kicked off last year alongside Russell Webster & James Kates from Shining Bird. This year we managed to release full length albums from Steve Bourk, Cheap Gloomer and Blistar, as well as singles by Tropical Strength, Russell W and Alara Livingstone.
My main label for the last decade has been Farmer & The Owl, and while it was probably our most low-key year, we have spent plenty of time structuring the label for the future. While releasing singles from DCN, Private Wives, Cool Jumper and Totally Unicorn, we also launched the heavy music imprint Fowl Taste, run by Angus Black and featuring releases from L.O.W. and Death Proof. We start 2026 off quickly with the release of the debut full length album from Private Wives on January 9th. I just closed out the year with the release of The New Christs selected works release The Burning Of Rome, this one is a stepping stone to a couple of new projects I’m launching early next year in the reissue world.
I’ve spent a lot of weekend evenings this year behind the decks spinning records for DJ sets, mainly at Howlin Wolf but at some of other venues as well. One of my favourite days of 2025 was Triple J’s Australian Music Hottest 100, it was an amazing celebration of Australian music and via Sultans Of Spin we hosted a party at La La La’s that featured a DJ set from The Presets. I’ll be spinning records at the following venues over the holiday season.
I managed to get to some other parts of the world seeking out records across the year as well. I made it over to Japan twice and the USA once, you can read the Record Stores Of The World feature on that on here. I also recently headed to Melbourne for a long overdue visit of record stores there as well. While a lot of these trips involved digging for older records and compilations, I have still listened to a lot of new music this year. My role as a judge on the Australian Music Prize means I get to hear a lot of music from this country, while behind the shop counter I’ve been checking out new releases from all over the world. Below you check out my favourite albums of 2025 and listen to a playlist featuring tracks from these albums, artists I worked with and some of my favourite singles of the year.
1. Hotline TNT – Raspberry Moon
2. Bridge Dog – Auto Fictions
3. Ruby Gill – Some Kind Of Control
4. Folk Bitch Trio – Now Would Be A Good Time
5. Surprise Chef - Superb
6. Dust – The Sky Is Falling
7. Lilly Allen – West End Girl
8. Belair Lip Bombs - Again
9. Wet Leg - Moisturizer
10. Placement - Insect
11. Olivia Dean – The Art Of Loving
12. Delivery – Force Majeure
Thanks to everyone who has supported my various ventures across the year, I’ll be in th shop regularly over the holiday season so I hope to see some of you here (Philter and Heaps Normal have even stocked our fridge if you want to drop by for a drink). Have a great holiday season and best wished for 2026. If you happen to be in Milton tomorrow, go and see Shining Bird!
