‘Tis the season for year-end lists, together with people who opine on who gained and who misplaced throughout 2025. Listed below are my picks for the winners and losers in music for the 12 months.
Winner: Oasis
Someway, the Oasis reunion labored past anybody’s wildest predictions. Liam and Noel hung collectively for 41 reveals throughout 5 continents, drawing 2.89 million followers and grossing CAD$734.8 million on the field workplace, with untallied tens of millions in merchandising gross sales. They — nicely, their followers — additionally set a report at Wembley Stadium by consuming a median of 250,000 pints of beer (value greater than two million kilos) on every evening throughout their seven-show run. It’s potential (however not confirmed) that Oasis could have had a meals and beverage clause of their contract, entitling them to a proportion of concession gross sales, together with beer. Sensible transfer in the event that they did.
Winner: Coldplay
The unending Music of the Spheres tour has pushed Coldplay to the highest of the listing of the highest-grossing touring acts of the millennium. Between 2001 and the tip of this 12 months, they’ve introduced in US$2.48 billion and bought 24.8 million tickets, according to Pollstar, the dwell music bible. U2 is second, adopted by Ed Sheeran and The Dave Matthews Band. Taylor Swift is down in fifth place, however she began touring later.
Winner:
Not solely did she choose up seven American Music Awards, however Billie Eilish additionally managed to get underneath Elon Musk’s pores and skin by calling him a “p—y b-tch coward” on the Wall Road Journal Innovators Award in November for hoarding a lot wealth within the midst of a worldwide financial disaster. He responded by suggesting she was “not the sharpest software within the shed.” Ooo, good one.
(L-R:) Billie Eilish attends the WSJ. Journal Innovator Awards at The Museum of Fashionable Artwork on Oct. 29, 2025, in New York and Elon Musk on the tenth Annual Breakthrough Prize Ceremony on the Academy Museum of Movement Photos on April 13, 2024.
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP/Jeffrey Mayer/MediaPunch
Winner: TikTok
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TikTok continues to create viral hits, usually with surprising songs and artists. The platform now influences all the pieces from chart positions and streams to music gross sales and awards nominations. It’ll be attention-grabbing to see what occurs with TikTok when (if) the sale of its U.S.-based belongings to American pursuits is finalized.
Winner: Wired headphones
After years of forcing wi-fi headphones and earbuds on individuals who wish to hearken to music on their telephones (howdy, Apple), wired headphones are making one thing of a comeback for a wide range of causes. Movie star endorsements assist, however being seen with a wire dangling out of your headphones is as soon as once more making a trend assertion, exhibiting that you simply’ve opted out of a minimum of a few of the digital world. As soon as telephones begin dealing with lossless recordsdata (ie, better-than-CD uncompressed music), wired headphones will change into important as a result of Bluetooth connections don’t provide sufficient bandwidth. It’s a development to look at in 2026. Subplot: Bodily music magazines may be making a comeback. SPIN, NME and Creem are printing points once more, whereas Mojo, Rolling Stone, Report Collector and Various Press are maintaining the battle.
File photograph/Getty Pictures.
Getty Pictures
Winner: Rock
After years within the wilderness behind hip-hop and pop, rock is making a comeback. It was the second most-streamed style within the U.S. and Canada, pushed by younger individuals discovering older songs through streaming and social media. Collectively, rock acts are promoting extra live performance tickets than anybody else, too. Will the political scenario within the U.S. drive extra individuals to loud, aggressive, offended music in 2026? We’ll see.
Winner: Vinyl
For the second 12 months in a row, vinyl outsold compact discs by a big margin — 200,000 items — in Canada, and posted a year-over-year enhance of about 20 per cent. This hasn’t occurred for the reason that early ’90s, and the vinyl resurrection reveals no indicators of slowing down. Sub-winner: Turntables.
A vinyl report performs on a turntable. – Getty photographs.
Getty Pictures
Loser: Drake
Not solely did he get snubbed in all the massive classes on the Grammys, however Drake additionally went head-to-head with Kendrick Lamar and his personal report label, Common Music, over the insult and defamation he alleged with Lamar’s music, Not Like Us, which was launched in 2024. Champagne Papi didn’t prevail. The excellent news for him is that he was nonetheless the fourth most-streamed artist on Spotify this 12 months, two locations forward of Lamar.
Loser: Flesh-and-blood musicians
Tensions proceed over the usage of AI in making music. Whereas AI is right here to remain, its position in music creation remains to be being decided through lawsuits and adjustments in copyright laws. In the meantime, streaming platforms are being inundated with AI-generated music. In September, Paris-based streamer Deezer announced that 28 per cent of all new uploads had been, in reality, AI in origin. They know this as a result of Deezer has among the best AI detection software program applications within the enterprise. In the meantime, AI “artists” like Xania Monet, Breaking Rust, Cain Walker and Velvet Sunset — none of which comprise actual individuals — had been listened to tens of tens of millions of instances.
Loser: Spotify
Earlier this month, there was a security breach at Spotify by which a gaggle of hackers gained entry to the metadata of 256 million songs (ie, Spotify’s total library). And it acquired worse. About 15.43 million artists, 58.6 million albums and roughly 300 terabytes of music had been stolen. Or, because the hackers say, “backed up.” Spotify needed to transfer quick to attempt to comprise the issue. Keep tuned.
Loser: Taylor Swift
Don’t hate me as a result of I’m simply reporting the info. Taylor Swift had seven Grammy nominations however gained nothing. She additionally didn’t win something on the American Music Awards. However Swifties aren’t involved. They know she’ll be again.
Loser: Katy Perry
What was alleged to be her comeback album, 1432, was a catastrophe from a streaming, gross sales and PR viewpoint. It additionally didn’t assist that she was slammed after profitable a US$1.8 million payout from a dying army veteran in an actual property dispute. This got here after her battle with a convent full of nuns and an look on the TV present Elsbeth, where her character killed a nun. I hope Justin Trudeau is aware of what he’s moving into.
Loser: Apple Podcasts
After inventing your entire idea of mass distribution of podcasts nearly 20 years in the past, Apple has squandered its lead within the area to Spotify and YouTube, largely due to the rising prevalence of video podcasts. Can they catch up? Have they got the desire?
Coming subsequent week: Predictions for 2026 …
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