It’s time to reflect on the year in music! This month, we’ll be highlighting Jam of Today’s favourite albums of 2025. Working our way up to the #1 album, which will be revealed on the 31st of December, we’ll go one by one past this year’s favourites. Today, our #2: ‘cut. turn. fade. back.‘ by Hail The Sun.

Another special Jam of Today moment for Hail The Sun! Back in 2023, I highlighted their song ‘Under The Floor’ as the final Jam of that year due to their influence on the genre I listened to most. Fast forward almost two full years and yet again, the Donovan Melero fronted band has claimed an important milestone in probably not their but definitely this blog’s life: their seventh album ‘cut. turn. fade. back.’ is Jam of Today’s second favourite album of 2025.

And to be fair, I kind of knew it the day I first listened to it. In fact, it took me a single playthrough to send it flying to the top of my End of the Year list. Of course, many plays followed and not much later, the album had reached this highly respectable #2 spot. Unlike their previous albums, ‘cut. turn. fade. back.’ is almost perfect for me in ways that each and every song hits hard. Each of the band members’ technical abilities and qualities are exploited to the max resulting in an album that nears perfection on the swancore-scale.

Though, I feel like Hail The Sun touches upon more than just the acclaimed subgenre. There’s emo, screamo, metalcore, and a strong sense of punk mentality, too. Songs like ‘The Drooling Class’ and ‘War Crimes’ are obviously targeting a certain elite and throughout the entirety of this album, it’s clear that Donovan Melero’s songwriting reaches highs like it hasn’t done before. Of course, I bombarded ‘Consumed With You’ with nothing but praise back in October already but months later, nothing has changed. I still adore this song and I’m convinced this might be one of my favourite Hail The Sun songs of all time.

Shifting the spotlight onto the other tunes on ‘cut. turn. fade. back.’, it’s worth mentioning the uniqueness of every single song. Even though none have an excessive length whatsoever, due to the amount of rhythms and variety in playing styles, it makes you wonder how tightly Hail The Sun was able to squeeze it all into a mere 3,5 minutes or so per song. It certainly doesn’t make choosing one or two favourites any easier. ‘cut. turn. fade. back.’ confirms why I love this kind of music so much: it’s enormously captivating and challenges you to stay focused and concentrated each time you listen. No slacking off! As a bonus, it results into hearing something new and beautiful each time you play the album.