Hayden – Time Has Been More Kind
Hayden has been releasing an emotionally rich and thematically deep style of folk music for the past three decades, mining the ostensibly ordinary moments of life for all of the implicit beauty and meaning. His recently announced tenth album The Recent Past promises to be a worthy contribution to this oeuvre. Lead single ‘Time Has Been More Kind’ gives a hint as to what to expect, a song which took inspiration from musical royalty to become what might be the most country-adjacent Hayden song to date. “One of my favourite concerts was country legend Ray Price opening for Willie Nelson at Massey Hall in 2009,” he explains. “He played with a classic old-school ensemble including pedal steel and double fiddles. It was perfection. To match the regretful, longing, rosy retrospection of the song’s narrative, I tried to channel that feeling and atmosphere on this recording.” Adam Hindle (brushed drums), Miranda Mulholland (fiddles), Matt Kelly (pedal steel) and Ben Whitely (upright bass) also lend their talents, and the result is every bit as rich and wistful as its title suggests.
His His – Carousel
The recording project started by Toronto-based songwriter Aidan Belo upon moving out to his family hobby farm, His His has spent the past few years crafting an unguarded style of folk that blends nostalgia, fondness and warmth into a bucolic present. The 2025 single ‘Hardcore Band‘ sound “His His at its most fuzzy and intimate,” as we wrote, “maintaining the earnest tone which has long marked the project and dialling up the closeness through a gauze of DIY texture,” and new single ‘Carousel’ builds upon these ideas. A track recorded to tape at home and possessing all the heart such a homespun practice entails, and still retaining enough rough edges to lend an emotional authenticity too.
Hour – Sky is Blue
“Nothing is hurried, yet there is nevertheless an urgency to the poignant, curious sound. The level of detail is striking but there is no ounce of ostentation. Lesser acts might be overwhelmed if tasked with exploring concepts of loss and mortality, prone to slipping into maudlin excess, but with a unique blend of compassion and abstraction, it seems Hour are up to the task.” So we wrote in a feature on the project’s new full-length Ghost Bridge back in August, Michael Cormier-O’Leary assembling a talented, diverse team of musicians to explore ideas which might overwhelm the average songwriter or band. Following on from the title track and ‘Pearls‘, Hour are teasing the full release with new song ‘Sky is Blue’ and the track is every bit as poignant and aspiring. A reversal of the typical song about grief, the piece is written from the perspective of the departed rather than the survivor, Heeyoon Won (Boosegumps, 22º Halo) adding vocals which are gentle yet weighted with the responsibility of reassurance. It is often tempting to infantalise the dead, imagine them poor souls succumbed to something final and unexpected, but here the whole concept of mortality is flipped on its head. What if it is us here on earth who are naive, yet to fully appreciate the path we must eventually follow? What if the deceased mourn our confusion and pain?
You will travel the same way
with astonishing speed
like so many have done before
Watch the film by Cormier-O’Leary (though be warned, there are flashing lights):
Ghost Bridge will be released on the 9th October via Dear Life Records and you can pre-0rder it from the Hour Bandcamp page.
Karl Mattar – Light Gleams
After spending the best part of a decade recording under the moniker Interbellum, releasing albums like Our House Is Very Beautiful at Night (which offered a “fluid, collage-like style,” we wrote, “[which] feels at once haunted by the past and permeable to the outside world”), Lebanese songwriter Karl Mattar is reverting to his own name for forthcoming full-length The Weather of the World. Recorded in Beirut amid Israel’s war on Lebanon, the album came to life within the chaotic, cruel centre of our historical moment, and the fundamental uncertainty of Mattar’s position sees him turn to personal emotion in order to evoke the shared grief of the region. Lead single ‘Light Gleams’ is the ideal introduction, a track which details the end of a relationship within a contemporary Beirut marked by bombs and pounding rain.
Light gleams
Across the water
And I’m a stranger
Don’t you know me?
Thunderous and blinding-bright
Explosions in the night
And I’ve been listening to the rain again
Ken Wohlrob – Snowdrift
Back in December we wrote about ‘William‘, a song by musician and composer Ken Wohlrob which showed a more instinctive, meditative side to an artist principally known for work with acts like End of Hope, Swarm of Flies, Northern Heretic and Eternal Black. “A track,” as wrote, “which seemed to repel all attempts to develop it beyond its core guitar riff.” Wohlrob’s new album Forgotten Music doubles down on this style, embracing intuition over laboured craft to evoke a sound analogous to the subconscious. One which might seem mysterious or ambiguous, yet retains a sense of deeper order, as though meaning might be found if only we are prepared to delve far enough into its depths. Take the mantra-like new single ‘Snowdrift’, an ostensibly simple song which creates richness not through intricate musicianship but rather making space for contemplation.
Kyla Marlena – Bit the Bullet
“Marlena explores themes of memory and time in a manner which subverts expectations, forgoing the hazy dreaminess which so often accompanies such ideas in favour of something more immediate, scrappy and raw.” So we wrote of ’21’, the opening track from Kyla Marlena‘s forthcoming album Hold Time back in September, the Toronto-based songwriter introducing an album charged with dynamism and a sense of life. With the record coming next month via idée fixe, Marlena has now shared new single ‘Bit the Bullet’ to further establish the tone. The song embraces a slightly less mature take on the end of a relationship to harness the energies which stem from immediate reactions. “A lyric like ‘guess that I’m the winner / I had the final say’ is not a real belief I hold. There are no winners and losers,” Marlena explains. “But it felt liberating to express ‘forbidden’ thoughts. The energy in the studio was especially high for this one and it felt important to keep in idiosyncratic moments captured in the recording. Playful moments caught by room mics, for example, felt integral to the song by the end.”
Max Bien Kahn – List II
With a couple of recent singles, Max Bien Kahn has introduced his forthcoming new album Baby Green, “a record which,” as we wrote in a preview, “takes a big swing in order to capture the full spectrum of human experience as witnessed from one person’s perspective.” The result takes mundane encounters and makes them into something poignant, be that something as simple as conversing with a neighbour (‘Neighbours‘) or something even more incidental (‘Skipping Stones‘). Latest track ‘List II’ is no exception to this style, using a shopping list as a starting point to sketch a relationship and the longing which underpins it, painting a picture that is fond and romantic yet shaded by something else too. As though every magical thing is haunted by the possibility of its eventual loss.
partygirl – scars
With lead by Pagona Kytzidis supported by Francesca Pastore’s (guitar), Jonathan Ashley (drums), Claire Lin Jenkins (violin), Andrew Jordan’s (bass), and Jenna Love (sax), it is fair to say Brooklyn’s partygirl is a maximalist affair. Having won a fanbase with a striking live show, the six-piece are now preparing to release their debut full-length, and the album promises to possess every bit of the bombast and catharsis that has made their sets so special. Never one to pull any punches, Kytzidis uses the record to confront the tumultuous in all of its violence, injustice and strangeness, and soaring single ‘scars’ embodies the energy and weight with which partygirl commit to the mission. Watch the video directed and edited by Jenna Love below:
‘scars’ is out now via streaming services.
Robbie Bennett – Sister b/w The Light on Your Face
You might know Robbie Bennett as the keyboardist and multi-instrumentalist for rock royalty The War on Drugs, though in 2020 he set off on a solo career too. Self-released debut Permanent World introduced a rich and personal style of composition, and this December, Bennett is following up with not one but two new full-lengths on American Dreams. Both albums are crafted from layered arrangements of piano and various keyboards and synths which sound decidedly curious in their approach, designed, as he puts it, to feel like you are “walking through an unfamiliar place you want to keep exploring and never have to circle back to where you started.” A sense of progression and discovery exists between the records themselves, with Steloken offering warm and fond soundscapes before Circulation pushes deeper into a more improvised, abstract state, the twin releases playing like a real statement of intent from an artist looking to wide the frame of their work. Listen to singles ‘Sister’ and ‘The Light on Your Face’ now:
Steloken and Circulation will both be released on the 11th December via American Dreams. Pre-order both from the Robbie Bennett Bandcamp page.
This Frontier Needs Heroes – Cadaques Cowboy
Brooklyn-born, Barcelona-based songwriter Bradley Lauretti, better known as This Frontier Needs Heroes, has made a name over the last fifteen years with a diverse and unapologetically DIY style of folk that champions both storytelling and emotional authenticity. Latest album Homage to Catalonia promises to further this body of work, as highlighted by new single and album opener ‘Cadaques Cowboy’. It’s a song about Salvador Dalí’s alleged encounter with a UFO on the Costa Brava which paints its central character as something between Don Quixote and a hero from a Spaghetti Western. A man in search of metaphysical possibility within the legends of Cadaqués, though finding more confusion than anything else.