Official Charts Ones To Watch 2025: Lola Young, Addison Rae, Myles Smith

Pop music survives by constantly looking forward.

In 2024, one of the defining characteristics of pop music was that artists who had been working hard for their commercial breakout moment - Charli xcx, Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan - found that playing the long game paid off.

But what does 2025 hold?

Here, Official Charts is happy to announce our trio of Ones To Watch for 2025; three acts who we think will continue to define and evolve pop music throughout the next 12 months.

They are Lola Young, Addison Rae and Myles Smith. 

Let's find out a bit more about them.

Lola Young

The last few weeks have been very exciting for Lola Young. Another artist who has been working away in the margins of pop for a few years now, the firebrand singer-songwriter from London finally experienced a true breakthrough moment with her new single, Messy.

That rare non-Christmas song to become a quantifiable hit over the festive period, Messy reached Number 7 in the same week WHAM! made history with their second Official Christmas Number 1 single - giving Lola her first ever UK Top 10 single as a result. 

It's the pay-off for an intense period of realignment for the London-born star, who first came to attention in the dying days of the last decade making booming, champer-pop inspired by the likes of Adele and Amy Winehouse. 

But over the last year, Lola has leant into well...messier instincts. Now, her music fizzes with the experimentation of genre, just look at the tender soul influences on Messy, or the dramatic flair of guitar-inflected ballad Flicker Of Light. 

2024 saw Lola release her second studio album This Wasn't Meant For You Anyway, and Messy's long-awaited success on the Official Chart (it was originally released in May) heralds a bold new chapter for Lola in 2025.

What will she do next? We don't know, but we're excited to find out.

Addison Rae

The clues that Addison Rae were a pop superstar in the making were always there, people just simply chose to ignore them. 

Breaking through as a TikTok star during the pandemic (and Addison still holds a vice-like grip on the video-sharing platform, she's still its fifth-most followed user) she could have very easily rested on her influencer laurels, but she wanted something more.

Despite her early music being largely derided, there were intense flashes of brilliance; debut single Obsessed sounds like something Britney would come out with today, while 2023 track I Got It Bad sounds like the perfect melting point between Charli xcx and Rihanna. 

But this last year, Addison really showed us what she could do. Signing with Columbia, her first release under that label, Diet Pepsi, became a low-key critical sensation, and became her first ever UK Top 10 single. 

Feather-light and seductive, its influences (Lana Del Rey's Ultraviolence, Selena Gomez's 2017 single Bad Liar) were clear, but striking. This girl has taste. Second release Aquamarine was arguably even better, a melismatic electronica hymn that, honestly, was giving Rae Of Light.

The stage is now set for Addison's debut studio album in 2025. Charli xcx once said that she was one of the best pop writers she'd ever worked with, and her material is currently being made by an all-female cohort of Swedish pop geniuses under the tutelage of Max Martin.

Are the other girls scared yet? They should be!

Myles Smith

Luton's own Myles Smith was one of the great British homegrown success stories of the last year. 

Signing with Sony label RCA, Myles's emotion-led material helped breakout single, Stargazing, becoming his first UK Top 10 hit - and one of the biggest tracks of the year to boot. 

But this success wasn't just a flash in the pan; follow-up track Nice To Meet Ya (think The Lumineers meets Ed Sheeran) earned Myles the highest debut of his career thus far (Number 12) but greater things were still on the horizon...

Yes, with December came the news that Myles had been named the BRITS Rising Star of 2025, one of the most prestigious accolades an emerging act can be given in the UK; previous winners include Sam Fender, FLO and...uh...actual Adele. 

It obviously cannot be overstated; expect big things from Myles in 2025.

Picture: Press/JMEntertainment