10 January 1 - 7, 2026 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents W hat a year it’s been for the Dallas music scene. It would seem that if 2025 as a whole were given a theme, it would be “kaleidoscope of chaos,” sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. Here at home, we watched as some of North Texas’ best skyrock- eted to new heights. BigXthaplug took a break from dominating rap to dominate country music. Mesquite’s Hannah Jadagu made the concept of a sophomore slump seem feeble with her gorgeous sec- ond offering on Sub Pop Records, De- scribe. Dezi 5, one of the hardest working entertainers in the city, blessed us with one of the year’s most electric, unforgetta- ble shows at The Kessler Theater to cele- brate the release of his new album, Dirty Laundry. We were reintroduced to the Vandoliers’ Jenni Rose when she came out as a trans- gender woman, reminding us of the grit that fortifies the honest, transcendent storytell- ing reverberating all over our backyard. Cure for Paranoia’s Cameron McCloud gave us hometown pride every single day of the year as he spent 2025 writing a daily rap verse. He did that between touring, working on a just-released album called Work of A.R.T, and helping launch U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett’s Senate campaign. We’re still trying to work out how it’s possible that we share the same number of hours in a day with him. Meanwhile, Erykah Badu continued teasing us with the promise of new music when she announced (and then delayed) a forthcoming album with The Alchemist. That’s kind of on us, though. It’s well understood that she does whatever the hell she wants whenever she wants. And you know what? We’ll still gladly await her every move regardless. We didn’t go without our fair share of heartbreak in 2025, though. We lost Chris Penn, owner of Good Re- cords, and, to a greater degree, a beloved pillar of the North Texas music scene. Not long after, a light in Deep Ellum extin- guished with the passing of longtime neighborhood fixture “Keyboard Bob” Crawford. Some of our favorite venues faced exis- tential threats in their own right when the city of Dallas tried to ban cover charges at restaurants, which would have effectively prevented some local musicians from earn- ing a living wage. Yella Beezy, one of the city’s most mete- oric successes of the last decade, was charged with capital murder for the 2020 death of fellow Dallas rapper Mo3. He’s cur- rently set to stand trial in February. And there were so many more moments, both fleeting and enduring, that filled the chorus of this year. With that in mind, we find comfort in knowing that, despite the chaos of it all, no matter what’s waiting for us in 2026, we know there’s a constant in the fact that we’ll have a damn good soundtrack to get us through it all. Musical Notes of 2025 Somehow, during a tumultuous year, the beat went on in North Texas’ music scene. ▼ Music Monica Schipper; Juan R. Govea; Andrew Sherman; Jay Martin; Vincent Monsaint Hannah Jadagu, Cameron McCloud, the Vandoliers, Dezi 5 and Esteban Flores all gave us a lot in 2025. Eric Grubbs Chris Penn was a true pillar of Texas music.
