5 Best Rap Albums of March 2025

So much rap music comes out all the time, and especially with frequent surprise releases, it can be hard to keep track of it all. So, as a way to help keep up with all of it, here’s a roundup of the 5 rap albums from March 2025 that stood out to us most. We also probably still missed or haven’t spent enough time with some great March rap albums that aren’t on this list, and we’ve got a list of honorable mentions with more albums at the bottom of this post. What were some of your favorites of last month? Let us know, and read on for the list (unranked, in no particular order).

Backxwash – Only Dust Remains (self-released/Ugly Hag)

After wrapping up a trilogy of industrial-tinged rap albums, Backxwash was ready to change it up, and Only Dust Remains couldn’t be more of a bold new direction. As fierce as she sounded over the jagged, abrasive noise of her recent trilogy, she sounds even more powerful on Only Dust Remains, with self-production that favors the lush, soulful, organic backdrop of albums like To Pimp A Butterfly and Electric Circus. Having already referred to the trilogy as “autobiographical,” Only Dust Remains just might be even more devastatingly personal–or at least Backxwash’s ruminations on depression, faith, and personal tragedies as a trans woman come through more loudly and clearly in this setting. But Only Dust Remains doesn’t stop at introspection. On one of its most show-stopping songs, “History of Violence,” Backxwash looks at war, terrorism, and fascism, and calls for the day that Palestine is free. She raps about the suffering of others with the same raw passion as when she raps about her own, her delivery serving as a reminder that the personal and the political are truly never separable. As grand and fleshed-out as its arrangements are, Only Dust Remains retains the grit that Backxwash has always had. It’s elegant but rough around the edges. It reminds me that Backxwash once tweeted “Hoping we can get Kendrick/Trent Reznor one day.” Until then, Only Dust Remains already captures a version of what that might sound like.

Only Dust Remains by Backxwash

PremRock – Did You Enjoy Your Time Here…? (Backwoodz)

If you’ve caught on to NYC-via-Pennsylvania rapper PremRock in the past few years, it might be because of the rise of ShrapKnel, his duo with Curly Castro. But he’s been putting out solo albums for much longer than that, and this week he returns with his first one since 2021’s Load Bearing Crow’s Feet. Prem packs so much into his lyricism–wordplay, double and triple entendres, tongue-twisters, grin-inducing references–so Did You Enjoy Your Time Here…? isn’t the kind of album that’s built to be digested quickly, but even after just a few listens, it’s clear that this is up there with any of his best work. The psychedelic, post-boom bap production is immaculate (with beats from Blockhead, YUNGMORPHEUS, Child Actor, Controller 7, ELUCID, Willie Green, and more), and Prem’s nearly-endless arsenal of thought-provoking bars are matched in impact by a very impressive cast of guests, including Pink Siifu, Cavalier, Nappy Nina, Illogic, AJ Suede, Prem’s Backwoodz label boss billy woods, and his aforementioned ShrapKnel partner Curly Castro. Prem namedrops the Wayne Shorter classic Speak No Evil near the start of this album, and it’s fitting because there are some parallels to be drawn between present-day Backwoodz and the heyday of Blue Note. Each album has its leader, but it’s the whole community of artists that comes together on album after album that makes the whole catalog so strong and unique.

Did You Enjoy Your Time Here…? by PremRock

Saba & No ID – From The Private Collection of Saba and No ID (self-released)

Chicago rap as we know it wouldn’t sound the way it does without No ID, who produced the first three Common albums in the ’90s and mentored a young Kanye West before going on to work with rappers from all over, including Jay-Z, Drake, Vince Staples, and countless others. Chicago rapper Saba has been a staple of the city’s newer generation for the past decade-plus, and now the two have teamed up for a long-in-the-works collaborative album. No ID crafts an organic backdrop of soul/jazz/funk-inspired instrumentals, and the comparatively-younger Saba is an old-soul rapper that’s perfect for this kind of thing. (It’s fitting that he’s celebrating the album with live-band shows at NYC’s Blue Note Jazz Club.) There’s also a series of soulful singers on the album, including BJ the Chicago Kid, Raphael Saadiq, Kelly Rowland, Madison McFerrin, Ibeyi, Eryn Allen Kane, and others, who help add to the lush warmth of it all. It’s a love letter to a long history of Chicago rap, and it’s also a unique record in the context of where rap in general is at today. Speaking to Billboard about if the album has a theme, Saba said, “The concept is just me and No ID having fun through the artform, showcasing how we hear hip-hop in 2025.”

clipping. – Dead Channel Sky (Sub Pop)

Since forming over a decade ago, clipping. have launched themselves into the forefront of futuristic space-age rap, a lineage that stretches back over 40 years, from the days of Afrika Bambaataa to Aquemini-era OutKast, Deltron 3030, and clipping.’s Sub Pop labelmates Shabazz Palaces. The trio’s new LP shares DNA with all of those artists, and it also takes a lot of inspiration from something outside of rap: cyberpunk, the sci-fi subgenre made famous by Blade Runner, William Gibson’s Neuromancer, and The Matrix. Dead Channel Sky is a 20-song concept album that’s cinematic in scope and full of production that sounds like it could score an actual cyberpunk film, like hip hop’s answer to Nine Inch Nails’ Year Zero. The whole thing is a total head-trip, and they’ve got some interesting guests along for the ride, including fellow rap weirdo Aesop Rock, guitarist (and album release day buddy) Nels Cline, Sub Pop labelmates Cartel Madras, rapper/actress Tia Nomore, and “computer music collective” Bitpanic. Even decades removed from the inception of cyberpunk, Dead Channel Sky‘s sonic choices scan as futuristic and science “fiction,” but the album doesn’t require much suspension of disbelief. The dystopian setting that clipping. leader Daveed Diggs paints looks a whole lot like the real-life present.

Dead Channel Sky by clipping.

Curren$y & Harry Fraud – Never Catch Us (Jet Life/SRFSCHL)

For the past 15+ years, nobody has done laid-back, permastoned rap like Curren$y. You know what you’re getting from the prolific rapper at this point, and he never fails to deliver. In recent years, he’s put out several collaborative projects with producer Harry Fraud, whose knack for slowed-down boom bap fits Curren$y’s voice perfectly, and Never Catch Us is another great one. It’s also guest-heavy, with features that keep you on your toes like Conway the Machine, Rome Streetz, Bruiser Wolf, Babyface Ray, Styles P, 03 Greedo, Jay Worthy, DRAM, and more.

Honorable Mentions
Boldy James – Hommage (his fourth album of 2025, with Antt Beatz)
Che Noir & Superior – Seeds in Babylon
Cookin Soul & ANKHLEJOHN – The Michelin Man
ILL Tone Beats & Black Soprano Family – The Outcome
Mike Shabb – Shabbvangogh
Playboi Carti – Music
Termanology & Bronze Nazareth – Things I Seen
Willie The Kid & Real Bad Man – Midnight