Queer music has been on my mind a lot this year. Today's the ideal day to actually write something about it, so here are some of my favourites that have dropped over the last twelve months. Presented in no particular order.
Note: I am using queer in a very broad sense here. Everything between artists whose art centres queer experiences to those who simply have queer vibes. I'm not a fan of pressuring public profiles to disclose their sexuality or identity, nor do I care to dig deeply into people's social media to find out whether this one person in a band I listen to is queer or not.
Very little music hits this close to home for me. A beautiful expression of the Swedish trans experience, with all the rage, love, joy, and sorrow it carries. Katta threw some amazing shows during Pride and I was so glad I got to see her and her friends perform.
Stand-out track: BRIANNA (BRÄNN!) was amazing to scream along to live. It filled me with a great resolve to support my trans peers. That flame still burns bright half a year later.
Freja Karolina - Den enda vägen ut / Min lilla Hutbert
Two catchy bangers & brilliant satirical songs about contemporary politics, both Swedish and international.
Stand-out track: between the two, I think Den enda vägen ut is the one I like better, but why pick? They blend together beautifully.
Ragana & Drowse - Ash Souvenir
I finally gave Ragana a proper listen this year as a friend offhandedly mentioned their 2023 album Desolation's Flower, and I remembered I'd had it on my to-listen list for a good while. No regrets, amazing stuff, I listened to it a huge amount during the summer particularly. Ash Souvenir is more of that good stuff. It makes me feel like there really is space for queer art in doom metal.
Stand-out track: the continuous re-assurance of the title track, "there is nothing to lose", fills me with determination and almost brings me to tears.
Transgressive - Not Like This
Alicia is a big inspiration to me, I'm so glad to see Transgressive continue. Extreme Transgression blew my tits away when I first heard it. Not Like This is more refined and pulls more broadly. The raw crossover/thrash aggression is somewhat tamed, leaving room for a whole lot of exploration. There's a lot of influences from death and power metal and amazing, more technically advanced parts.
Stand-out track: All We Are Is All We Have is the platonic ideal of a metal opening track. It hits hard, fast, it's catchy, it showcases every member of the band excellently. As a bassist I'm partial to Leona's tech-y bass lines in some of the sections.
Fairy doom is an excellent self-chosen genre descriptor. The combination of some of the heaviest timbres around and haunting, feminine beauty is a thing to be treasured. Faetooth manage to pull off a wide variety of intensity and style in their songs despite their choice of timbres. There's riffs, atmosphere, and melody to be had all over.
Stand-out tracks: Iron Gate has such a wonderful groove and alluring melodies. October is the hit, and a damn good one at that.
I can't remember how I found this album, but I am damn glad I did. Some of the greatest pop I've ever heard, pulling from a huge range of styles, beautifully executed on all fronts with wonderful lyrics.
Stand-out tracks: it's hard to pick just one or even two from this album. passion has such a good build up into some of the most gorgeously distorted bass I've ever heard, making for a stellar album opener. good blood is an amazingly cosy, romantic track. two of swords and blood in the sink are just bangers through and through. school pool, california rolling stop, and pink are all amazing, emotionally heavy b-sides to close out the album.
Castle Rat - The Bestiary
Into The Realm was an amazing debut album and the follow up is at least as great. Castle Rat are musically very much in the tradition of Sabbath worship, but their production and execution is on point, something most similar bands fail. As a result, I think they're among the best stoner/doom bands of the 2020's. The embrace of super-campy sword and sorcery just screams love and joy. As a feminist, the band's use of sex appeal pissing off chuds in the scene will never not be funny, as if no band in doom metal history has ever released an album with a scantily clad woman on the cover before. As a mouse girl and a lesbian, you can imagine how I feel about a woman calling herself the Rat Queen wielding a sword and fighting another woman called The Rat Reapress on stage. I missed their show in Stockholm this year due to illness, and that's one of my biggest concert L's ever, right up there with sitting out Sunn O))) due to anxiety and the great 100 gecs cancellation of '22. I will definitely have to get some proper mouse ears before the next one, just for the bit.
Stand-out track: the syncopated groove of WIZARD combined with Riley's vocals soaring above is the kinda shit that makes a girl scream "hell yeag" while headbanging a little bit too hard for sitting in an office chair at home.
Uboa & Whitehorse - The Dissolution of Eternity
Whitehorse's half is absolutely great, but I'll be focusing on Uboa's.
I don't think Uboa's influence on trans women's underground music can be overstated. There's a playful stereotype of trans women making noise music that is owed at least in part to her. Unfortunately, she's been struggling with her health over this last year and went on hiatus shortly after this release. I am glad that we can enjoy her art, but I truly wish the world was a kinder place.
It is my view that oppressed groups make art not because of our struggles, nor despite our struggles, but rather in spite of our struggles, in direct defiance to the systems that oppress us. The Dissolution of Eternity exemplifies this as a meticulously crafted mirror to modern fascism and hatred. It depicts a near future dystopia, one that feels like it's inching closer by the day. The record is a kind of post-cyberpunk to me, it's what cyberpunk must become when it has been claimed by commercial interests: so brutally honest with our living conditions and prospects that it cannot be censored and reduced into a product for the masses. So refined and focused that there's no one family-friendly aspect to extract and appropriate.
In this album, I feel there's a sense of morbid humour to mask the anxieties surrounding growing fascism. Perhaps that is is just my own projection though, trying to find a light in the darkness. I really want to close this out on a positive note, but I think that's ultimately a disservice and a refusal to truly engage with this masterpiece. It's horrifying. All we can do is fight the fuck back.
Stand-out track: Wasted Potential features some amazing Borisian droning guitars accompanied by a dense percussive wall and some of the fiercest screams I've ever heard. Xandra is peerless in her mastery of timbre and texture, and I don't say that lightly. She makes Hollywood sound designers look like amateurs. She makes modern metal production sound flat. This album is really best enjoyed from start to finish, studied and contextualised though.
Messa have only continued to get better with each release. The Spin seems to be a strong contender for doom metal album of the year. Their stylistic influences in this album, much like previous ones, are all over the place yet beautifully blended. The core is of course rock and metal. You still have some of the jazz undertones heard in earlier albums. Sara cited Sade as a big influence on her vocal performance on this one. I hear a lot of influences from mid-1900's afro-american genres. I don't know them well enough to place them, but there's the same gospel influences heard in so much of pop and some of the characteristics I heard in the disco that my mum had playing on the radio all the time when I grew up.
The Spin is an amazing feat by its authors, but perhaps even more importantly a testament to how much richer life is for having each other and cultural exchange.
Stand-out track: Thicker Blood is the perfect kind of closing track with a long, emotionally heavy second half with beautiful leads bursting into an explosive finale.
I haven't listened to Druid Stone yet, but I've seen her working her ass off for months making a name for herself and she seems pretty cool. I need to give her material a proper listen already.
2025 has been an amazing year for queer music and a rough year for queer life. 2026 is an election year and a lot could happen, but I am more tired of electoral politics than I've ever been before. I've been trying to focus on the smaller scale, making a difference where I can through mutual aid and community building and it has been a winning concept that I hope to continue. I remember going into the 2020's when Deerhoof's Future Teenage Cave Artists had just released. The title track left a mark on me with its almost carefree attitude, the idea that the downfall of fascism is simply inevitable. I still try to carry that with me, no matter how things grim get, and I think there's a great truth to it. As a trans woman, my options are to continue fighting or to die trying.
Books aren’t just commodities; the profit motive is often in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism, its power seems inescapable – but then, so did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art. Very often in our art, the art of words.
- Ursula K. Le Guin
Musically, I've been able to grow and I hope to continue doing so. If I continue getting my shit together I might even have something to show for it at some point. I had goals of making releases this year, but I ultimately did not take the time to see them through. I still aim to, and a lot of material is well on its way. I think I've successfully dropped the notion of judging myself by my creative output, especially given other preoccupations. With the AI bubble's slop flooding the internet, it has become even clearer to me that the process and context of art is just as important, if not more important, than the finished product.
My hopes for queer music in the coming year, or whenever, because years are very arbitrary:
I really hope King Woman make another album. Both Celestial Blues and Created in the Image of Suffering are some of my most heavily played albums of all time. I saw I Saw The TV Glow this year and was glad to hear their contributions to the soundtrack.
Kattatonika has gotta keep going, holy shit she's so good.
Hyperschlager still needs to happen and it's definitely up to the Swedish queer community to see it through. Carola was not the pinnacle, she was merely the foundation.
I keep thinking to myself, we have got to get collectively angrier and hornier and louder, and I've yet to change my mind on that front.
My personal musical goals for the coming year:
Continue to make more music with others
Release something I can be proud of
Get more comfortable with my own voice
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