For the second consecutive year, here is Pitchfork’s staff list of 101 bad, troubling, goofy, heartwarming, terrific moments in and around music culture.
Check out all of Pitchfork’s 2025 wrap-up coverage here.
ICE uses Sabrina Carpenter song in recruitment video
“We Are Charlie Kirk” AI song
YoungBoy pardoned by Donald Trump, pays respects by naming album Make America Slime Again, rapping in front of “All Hail Trump” graffiti
VTuber Ironmouse performs at the Streamer Awards, in partnership with Warzone and MarcoMeatball
Drake rebrands as streamer, lets Adin Ross call him “Aubs”
Tekashi 6ix9ine rebrands as a streamer, also hangs with Adin Ross
Jojo Siwa covers “Bette Davis Eyes”
–Carlos Santana
Justin Bieber thanks Druski for saying he has “a Black soul”
Shortest-ever song to hit the Billboard Hot 100 is 34-second song from the Minecraft movie
Mark Zuckerberg impersonates Benson Boone
Nick Cave’s AI music video for “Tupelo”
Katy Perry hard launches with Justin Trudeau
Will Smith comeback tour a tough hang
–Pharrell
Guy who organized “Watch me eat cheese balls in Union Square” and “Timothee Lookalike contest” gimmicks orchestrates convoluted scheme to hijack Billboard charts, fails
Rihanna’s Smurfs song
Autechre live show sensory overload
SoundCloud rapper Comethazine rebrands as the jazz musician Frank Kole
The Spirit Tunnel
“I got the whole block looking like you”
–Taylor Swift
“Ethel Cain hated my Instagram post”
–Lana Del Rey
Rod Stewart pays tribute to Ozzy Osbourne with AI Ozzy Osbourne taking selfies in heaven
Grimes DJs biohacker Brian Johnsons’ mushroom trip
NLE Choppa rebrands as Christian rapper NLE The Great, does roundtable talk with Jonathan Majors and Kirk Franklin
–Lorde, on the incest storyline in White Lotus
The phrase “reheating nachos” is born
FattMack beefs with Fattmacc over who gets to call themselves FattMack-macc
Gelo Ball
Jack White hard launches new cellular telephone
Coldplay kiss cam imbroglio
The Dare attempts to crowdsurf, no one catches him
The Slick Rick song about how hard it is to be a landlord
Cameron Winter covers “Dancing in the Dark” for Xbox
PinkPanthress’ lock screen is photo of her and Nathan Fielder
Pain rapper Toosii commits to Syracuse’s college football team at 25 years old
Stereogum publishes the Zohran Mamdani emails
Teaching Lazer Dim 700 the London Way
Haim’s paparazzi-inspired single covers
Bob Dylan narrates mgk album trailer
What if Adrienne Lenker was drill?
The “6 7 kid” meets Skrilla at the Hyperpop Daily basketball tournament
Garbage selector
underscores’ puts headphones on her hair
Two million attend Lady Gaga show in Brazil
Julie Doiron finds new audience
Swamp Izzo finds new audience
Charli XCX collaborates with John Cale
Monaleo and Stunna4Vegas’ livestream wedding, with performances by Bun B and BunnaB
–Justin Bieber
—Morgan Wallen
“And who’s Madeline?”
–Lily Allen
Oklou performs on ice skating rink
Miniature horse wakes children up from anesthesia with keyboard solo
Deerhoof, Xiu Xiu, King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Hotline TNT, Massive Attack, and Sylvan Esso remove their music from Spotify
