What can be said of 2025? Over the past few weeks, I’ve contemplated long and hard about how to summarize the year without getting too political; I’m afraid that the best I can do is to pilfer a quote from the noted philosopher-poet Rayanne Graff: “We had a time.” 2025 had its share of good, bad, happy and sad moments, in other words, not to mention plenty of frustrating and maddening ones. As Paul McCartney sings in “Tug of War,” “In years to come/They may discover/What the air we breathe, the life we lead/Are all about/But it won’t be soon enough/Soon enough for me.”
So it goes.
Along the way, as my recent Album(s) of the Year post shows, I discovered a wealth of great music. (To borrow a lyric from Kassi Valazza, “And like a long lost friend, you came/A melody calling my name.”) Too, I wrote a truck-load of posts. This is my 255th missive of the year, for instance—and I still have several more planned, including my Top 25 Albums of the New Millennium (though I’ll likely tweak the title).
About this blog: While I didn’t reach my goal, which was to double last year’s numbers, The Old Grey Cat attracted more views and visitors than ever. It boggles my mind, really, to think that it’s grown from 1,761 views in 2014 to 106,188 views in 2025 (with five days left in the year, no less). Most folks are drawn to legacy posts and/or posts about legacy artists, especially Neil Young; they land on the blog via search engines, though various AI tools have begun to direct traffic this way, too.
And, with the preamble done, here are my Top 25 posts of 2025; I’ve placed the year of origin in parentheses.
- First Impressions: Coastal Soundtrack by Neil Young (2025)
- First Impressions: Sunset Boulevard by Elvis Presley (2025)
- First Impressions: Archives Vol. III by Neil Young (2024)
- First Impressions: The Legendary 1979 No Nukes Concert by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band (2021)
- The Fogelberg Files: Nether Lands (2021)
- Neil Young with Booker T & the MGs, 7/11/1993 – A “Timeline Concert” Review (2022)
- First Impressions: Flying with Angels by Suzanne Vega (2025)
- The Essentials: Crosby, Stills & Nash’s Daylight Again (2020)
- First Impressions: Wine on Venus by Grace Bowers & the Hodge Podge (2024)
- The Essentials: Neil Young’s Harvest Moon (2019)
- Today’s Top 5: Linda Ronstadt – Duets (2017)
- A Song Roundup: The First Cut Is the Deepest (2025)
- The Essentials: Wind on the Water by Crosby & Nash (2023)
- The Essentials: There’s a Light Beyond These Woods by Nanci Griffith (2024)
- First Impressions: Memphis by Elvis Presley (2024)
- First Impressions: Citizen Kane Jr. Blues by Neil Young (2022)
- The Essentials: One for the Road by the Kinks (2023)
- The Fogelberg Files: The Innocent Age (2021)
- The Essentials: Déjà Vu by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (2021)
- First Impressions: Early Daze by Neil Young With Crazy Horse (2024)
- First Impressions: Nude #9 by Camille Schmidt (2025)
- Neil Young: The Best of the Unofficial Canon (2015)
- First Impressions: Archives Vol. III Takes by Neil Young (2024)
- First Impressions: The Lost Record by Susanna Hoffs (2024)
- First Impressions: Portrait by Samara Joy (2024)
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