Ho Ho Ho!
Happy Christmas everyone. Here’s our fave 10 from 2025’s Futureproof Picks. Enjoy and have a fantastic fizz filled Christmas. See you on the other side ready for a wonderful 2026!
With love
Helen (Futureproof) x
Fontaines D.C. – It’s Amazing To Be Young
Dublin’s Fontaines D.C. have shared their heartfelt new single It’s Amazing To Be Young which showcases frontman Grian Chatten’s vocals over an upbeat melody and it features a video from acclaimed BAFTA-winning filmmaker Luna Carmoon (Hoard, Shagbands). Speaking to NME, bassist Conor ‘Deego’ Deegan III explained how the song was inspired by being “in the presence of a newborn child” – the child of guitarist Carlos O’Connell: “It was really heartwarming. Sometimes as people we can be a bit cynical. The world around us can make you that way if you’re paying attention it. Sometimes optimism feels like a necessary delusion, but with the birth of a new child we were introduced to a really pure and deep beauty and hope that can’t be debated away by anyone jaded or even by ourselves.” What a beautiful track.
Perfume Genius – No Front Teeth (ft. Aldous Harding)
Seattle’s Perfume Genius (aka Mike Hadreas) has enlisted Aldous Harding on new single No Front Teeth, taken from his forthcoming album Glory. Both of them—along with band member Alan Wyffels—appear in an epic, unhinged, and hilarious music video directed by Cody Critcheloe – just brilliant! The track is full of tension bolstered by time changes throughout the song and the haunting, ethereal chorus driven by Harding’s vocals. The album contains themes that Hadreas has wrestled with artistically throughout his career – themes of the body and its decay, of domesticity and love, and of inescapable history and damage.
KNEECAP – H.O.O.D
Irish rap trio KNEECAP have dropped a new 2025 mix of their fan favourite banger H.O.O.D. alongside additional remixes from London producer DJ Sam Interface and Working Men’s Club. Sam’s remix sees the heaviness of the backtrack amplified to create a massive drum and bass hit and he states: “I loved the aggression and energy of the original version of KNEECAP’s H.O.O.D. I thought it would be really fun to re-imagine the track as a gritty, lo-fi, dance floor banger.” Working Men’s Club‘s version adds a strobe-flecked feel to the original, putting the track against a relentless, pummelling rhythm track that amplifies the same magic captured in the 2021 version.
Idlewild – Stay Out Of Place
Edinburgh’s Idlewild have shared new single Stay Out Of Place, taken from their upcoming self-titled album, and it’s a big, hearty anthem about life’s temporary nature. Singer Roddy Woomble states: “Walt Whitman was right; we do contain ‘multitudes.’ There is more than one ‘us’ in there — we’re choosing a voice from among the many voices. This is especially interesting in a band context, because it’s not just one voice, but five voices collaborating, over time. We arrange the world in our own order, but sometimes you’ve got to shake up expectations and forget about the instructions. I suppose that’s what I’m getting at with Stay Out Of Place. It felt like a good starting point and (re)introduction to Idlewild 2025.”
GIFTHORSE – 13 Going On 30
North London duo GIFTHORSE are back with a second offering and this time they’re grappling with life stages & personal discovery in the lyric, while delivering yet again a very distinctive sound for a band so early in their story. Possibly aided by the involvement of one Bernard Butler on the production side, its Spectre-sque wall of sound features multiple layered vocals that give the track a depth of character which keeps revealing itself the more you listen. Strident guitar lines, which at times sound like a horn section, sit well with the top-line melody creating a melange of flavours that sit nicely between brash 80s production & dream pop whimsy – or as the band so succinctly describe it “frazzled English pop” – love it!
Ezra Furman – One Hand Free
American singer-songwriter Ezra Furman has shared her new single One Hand Free and describes it as “a jaunty back-porch breakup/depression song about feeling so bad you’re not sure what species you even belong to anymore.” She states: “We left it off Goodbye Small Head because it was too good. It’s better than Jason Aldean. Better than the Barbie movie. Better than Mike’s Hard Lemonade. Cue the sound of one hand clapping, a Zen round of applause.” The track comes accompanied by a video shot by JJ Gonson featuring Ezra accompanied by an assortment of birds, lizards and myriad other species. A heartwarming, melancholic, quick-witted track – beautiful!
The Sophs – DEATH IN THE FAMILY
Los Angeles six-piece The Sophs are back with their emotional new single DEATH IN THE FAMILY. Frontman Ethan Ramon says the track is “one of the most personal songs I’ve ever written. It confronts my complicated relationship with shame, and how, at a certain point, I had convinced myself I’d rather grieve a loved one than take any kind of accountability. Releasing it almost feels like purging those thoughts. Maybe it’s because I finally feel like I’m explaining myself clearly. Maybe I feel protected by my vulnerability. All I know is it means something to me.” Fantastic songwriting on this infectious banger.
Cliffords – My Favourite Monster
Cork’s Cliffords have shared soaring and cinematic new single My Favourite Monster, taken from their upcoming EP Salt of the Lee. Vocalist Iona Lynch states: “My Favourite Monster is a love song to someone you don’t like but feel drawn to. I wrote it about someone in Cork I’d always stop and talk to, even though we didn’t get on. I was reading Frankenstein at the time and thought it would be fun to draw parallels between me and this guy, and Frankenstein and his monster. A lot of the things I didn’t like about him were things I saw in myself. So it became a kind of love letter to someone I’ll never get along with, but in some strange way, we understand each other.” Beautiful vocals on this rousing banger – can’t wait to check ’em out at Glasto this year.
Insecure Men – Alien
South London’s Insecure Men have shared the new single Alien, taken from their upcoming second album A Man For All Seasons – a descending, Sweet Jane influenced riff is augmented by weeping lap steel in one of Adamczewski’s most straightforwardly lovely recordings. A Man For All Seasons is the long-awaited return of Insecure Men, the avant-pop band led by Saul Adamczewski and with a rotating cast of collaborators including Ben Romans-Hopcraft, the Childhood multi-instrumentalist. Adamczewski was out of Fat White Family, out of rehab, and turned in a melodically rich and sonically inventive album that surprised critics with its confident and focused songwriting. This new album fixes its gaze on something no less shocking or ugly: the end of a relationship.
Waxahatchee – Mud
Waxahatchee (aka Katie Crutchfield) has dropped upbeat new single Mud, taken from her latest album Tigers Blood, which explores a tumultuous relationship in all its messy complexity, and also features breakout favourite MJ Lenderman (who Katie previously collaborated with on Tigers Blood single Right Back To It) on guitar and vocals. It’s a vibrant tune fuelled by airy guitars against Americana sonics – pulled together with banjo strings and a steady yet catchy beat. Fantastic vocals on this lively slice of country-rock. It arrives ahead of her stint across the pond this Summer, when she’ll be stopping off in Glasgow, Manchester, Bristol, and London (for her biggest ever UK headliner at Hammersmith Apollo), as well as gracing some sunny festival stages in mainland Europe.
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