A pair of tracks from Mox bookend the album, an act we’ve described previously as “follow[ing] in the lineage of Alex G, combining boundless creativity with tangible emotion.” Opener ‘Scared’ sets the tone, displaying combination of bruising heft and emotional tenderness, while closer ‘Leaving’ is more restrained and slow building, allowing the warmth of the project more room to shine.

The offerings from Christina’s Trip opt for a more shoegaze-adjacent style, though again the interplay between heaviness and light is an important element. Take ‘F.B.A.T.’ with its mix of shimmer and scuzz and no small amount of energy. Or the squally ‘Sweep Me’, which embraces the chaos of its sound to culminate in a mood almost buoyant.

The songs from Natasha Sandworms are cleaner in style yet just as infectious, be it the retro indie pop bounce of ‘Bird of My Life’ or gradual unfurling of ‘Perfect Feeling’. There’s a wistfulness to both songs, though rather than being stuck looking backwards in self-reflection, they manage to chart a course forward, however uncertain or bittersweet the awaiting future might prove to be.

Lucky Three is out now via Cherub Dream Records and available from Bandcamp.

The post Natasha Sandworms, Christina’s Trip & Mox – Lucky Three appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Minneapolis has a rich heritage in energetic indie rock, so its great to see bands like The Dead Century carrying the flame onwards. First drafted during the pandemic but now equally relevant in light of the city’s occupation, latest single ‘Been Better’ wears its influences proudly, taking the raucousness of The Replacements and some of The Hold Steady‘s buoyant positivity and applying them to the less than positive present. The result, essentially a dispatch from a profoundly difficult time, is propulsive, impassioned and ultimately affirming in spite of everything. One, much like the people on the ground of its home city, willing to confront the gravity of the moment and fight for something better regardless of how far away that might seem.

‘Been Better’ is out now and available from the usual places.

figure eight – hummingbird

Back in 2024 we featured Bay Area outfit figure eight, describing how the project has evolved from the experimental noise project of duo Nash Rood and Abby Goeser into something far more developed, with single ‘1999 (cherry)’ from their self-titled EP highlighting the nuance and balance of the sound. “Twin threads of lightness and weight weave across the track into what appears to be the spirit of this new version of figure eight,” we wrote, “a band aware of the transcendent power available at both ends of the spectrum.” Now they are back with until the sun swallows the earth / hummingbird, a double single on Cherub Dream Records, and you only have to contrast the titles tracks to see the balance between heft and elegance remains. After the slow-burn expanse of ‘until the sun swallows the earth’, ‘hummingbird’ offers something more gauzy and restrained, the sound muted though no less full of atmosphere, and ultimately fulfilling its promise to spill over into something thunderous.

Griffin Brown – DRAW

“I need a hint, like a task, to check off and put behind me,” sings New York‘s Griffin Brown on ‘DRAW’, the first glimpse of his forthcoming album Begriffin. “But I don’t quite know what my success would guarantee.” This marbling of assurance and doubt not only runs through the lyrical aspect of the track, but the woozy sound itself. Brown evokes the feeling of starting something without knowing how it will end with a propulsive chorus that never seems to quite reach its natural conclusion. A joint release between Spread Way Out and Better Company Records, Begriffin itself progresses in such a manner.It is undeniably confident and marked by forward motion, yet unsure of its final destination. As though Brown knows what he needs to do and how to do it, just not what the end result might be.

Watch the video by Brown below:

Begriffen will be released on the 8th May via Spread Way Out and Better Company Records. Get it from Bandcamp.

Little Lungs – Dragonfruit

“Songs personal, compassionate and often affirming, driven by equal parts warmth and energy.” That’s how we described the work of Baltimore folk rock outfit Little Lungs back in February, single ‘The Heat’ introducing the band’s forthcoming album of the same name. “A typically emotive track build around [lead Leena] Rhodes’s vocals,” we wrote, “and the braid of tenderness and strength they are able to evoke.” With The Heat coming later this week, Little Lungs have shared new track ‘Dragonfruit’. An example of the more electronic dimension which exists on the record, the song opens like the soundtrack to long lost videogame but soon blossoms into something charged and sweeping, and again Rhodes’s delivery is placed centre stage. “Standing outside, the middle of fall / Dragonfruit vodka clenched in your palm,” she sings in a verse indicative of the striking image-led style of the track. “You met my eyes / I knew that you changed / I hated you then but I couldn’t escape.”

Watch the visualiser by Zack Willis with clips from Leena Rhodes below [WARNING: contains flashing, high-contrast imagery that may triggering to individuals with photosensitivity or epilepsy]:

The Heat will be released on 12th March. Get a copy from the Little Lungs Bandcamp page.

Lucy Liyou – Babygirl

“Possess[es] both a fragile minimalism and lush melodrama […] The sensation of watching a fond memory fade at the edges as the desire to return to its smallest details only grows.” So we wrote of Lucy Liyou‘s debut Every Video Without Your Face, Every Sound Without Your Name back in 2025, an album that was both an exercise in musical invention and most personal of documents, a description that more than holds true for Liyou forthcoming new album, MR COBRA. A release described by label Orange Milk Records as “a semi-autobiographical solo theater-music piece […] that combines free-jazz, Korean folk opera, musique-concrète, 2000s era pop, text-to-speech recordings, film, comedy, and drag-inspired performance,” the record sees fury, frustration, love and yearning all swirl together with the extravagance and grace of the best stage show, allowing Liyou to explore ideas of transition and identity in ways otherwise out of reach. “I was really inspired by sounds and images that felt satisfyingly ‘false’ or “unclarifyingly” true, whatever that means,” she expands. “I was drawn to Cecil Taylor’s Unit Structures, my favorite drag queens in Los Angeles, who magically bombed every Monday, Ryan Trecartin’s A Family Finds Entertainment, Sunik Kim’s Potential, and so much more. I wanted frenzy that felt disembodying, so disembodying that this time of my life could conjure a laugh.” Check out single ‘Babygirl’ below:

Primula – Cobblestone

Do not be fooled by the title, Primula‘s latest EP Nothing New signals a fresh chapter for the Malmö/Stockholm-based outfit. Having made a name across the Swedish scene with a jazz-inflected sound, the new release sees the band bend more towards folk sensibilities, though without sacrificing the sense of collaboration and invention which made their earlier work so special. Single ‘Cobblestone’ serves as the ideal introduction. It’s a track daring enough to eschew the conventional structures of indie music in order to create a dynamic sound that evokes the nuances of being alive. “‘Cobblestone’ is about the difficult yet comforting realization that you’re just a small piece in a much bigger world,” the band explain. “There’s a freedom in not having to be so significant on your own. Even if you feel insignificant by yourself, you’re still an essential part of making something whole.”

Nothing New will be released later this year.

Stephen Becker – Bad Idea

Back in 2024, Stephen Becker released Middle Child Syndrome, an album we described as “an effort, at least in part, to rise above the mundane present, as though to be trapped within conventions is to be restricted by the same inability to communicate effectively that haunts our everyday lives.” Now Becker is set to return with new full-length Gravity Blanket, and the record is no less thoughtful or ambitious. It sees him sift through the ostensibly banal details of memories in order to excavate a deeper human meaning with an otherwise unsatisfying present. As with Middle Child Syndrome, the result is forthright and unguarded, willing to open itself up to vulnerability in order to make progress, as highlighted by opener and lead single ‘Bad Idea’. “‘Bad Idea’ is about a breakup I went through after seeing the ballet,” as Becker explains. “The haunting feeling of the dancers’ movements lingering in my mind, the sad-sweet taste of spiked lemonade on the train ride home. I was thinking about, and trying to manifest, change with a newfound determination to break free from unhealthy routines and patterns in life and in love.”

Watch the video directed by Haoyan of America below:

Gravity Blanket will be released on the 24th April and you can pre-order it now.

True Green – Bindi Sue

True Green, the project of Minneapolis songwriter Dan Hornsby, is named after “medieval nun Hildegard of Bingen’s idea of viriditas, and also a lawn care company.” This combination goes some way towards capturing the project’s style, which uses a laidback, often irreverent tone to tell stories with real feeling. Later this month, True Green will release sophomore album Hail Disaster, a record which, as its title suggests, explores “tragedies real and imagined”. New single ‘Bindi Sue’ is one last glimpse before the big day. A tribute to everyone’s favourite Aussie naturalist Steve Irwin, the song is wryly funny and genuinely poignant. It evokes both the loss felt by an entire generation following Irwin’s untimely death, and the joy of his good-natured relationship with the natural world. “He didn’t hunt them,” as the song begins, “they were his friends”.

Where’s Beth – Ache Is A Cricket In The Night

‘Ache Is A Cricket In The Night’ is the title track from the new record by Where’s Beth, the recording project of Seattle-based Sarabeth Weszely. The follow up to 2024 debut Bone Broth, the album “draw[s] on apparently mundane moments from every day life,” as we put it previously, “to chart the universal experiences of love, grief and longing,” building upon the style of its predecessor in the process. The album is now out, and the title track is an ideal entry point for those unfamiliar with the Where’s Beth project, looking for a place to dive in. “I can feel your heart beat like a candleflame / Fingers stretching out, flicker in the rain,” Weszely sings in the opening lines, immediately evoking the intimacy and compassion of the record. “Wind blows, I want to tell you it’s okay / To let in.” The rest of the track unfolds within the warmth of this beginning, a safe harbour from the outside world and its accumulation of difficulties, but importantly not a total escape. For, as the title suggests, Where’s Beth is not interested in blocking out sadness or suffering but rather creating enough distance that we might examine them in the context of everything else.

The post Weekly Listening: March 2026 #2 appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Which is not to say Slake is an entirely solo endeavour. Single ‘Bonecollector’ represented “both a window into the singular vision of the Californian artist and an embodiment of the collaborative spirit which brings their work to life,” we wrote in a preview, showing off the work of musicians Bridge Gamble (bass), Ryan Albert (additional guitar), Lil Spakoski (synth/theremin), Oona Albertson (drums) and Maya Bon (additional vocals) as well as a whole crew of directors, editors, camera crew and performers on the accompanying video. But it is Claire’s vocals to which all of these elements are in service, something apparent from opener ‘Bauhaus the Dog’, a slow-building song where the delivery is at once haunting and cathartic.

You know I think Bauhaus can hear me thinking about him,
he’s sending all his friends to do his sleuthing.
Cause when I’m porchin’, stoop-sittin’ all alone
the dogs that cross my path are darker than
obsidian.

The rest of the album unfolds in this manner, walking a porous line between sincere emotion and something more foreboding, as though each moment holds both intrinsic beauty and its own latent dread. Take the striking details of songs like ‘Go Fish’ (“eating dinner that’s wrapped up like a present / opening fish bones all folded in parchment) and ‘Big Gray Marbles’ (“Open mouth / I’m looking in / Yours is different than his / you’ve got bright pink, blood-filled skin”). Or the way songs like ‘Back and Forth’ provide heartbreaking tenderness while upending the superficial epiphanies so common in confessional art. “Telling them that I / don’t know if I / can do this much longer / Whatever this in that statement meant,” Claire sings on the latter, before describing the moment of silence before the sister answers. “When you open your heart to the world it opens itself right back up to you.” Yet, unlike the Hollywood version of such a scene, the moment continues beyond this nugget of wisdom. “It’s not what I wanted to hear / because that’s something that I already knew that I knew,” Claire continues. “Isn’t it so unfortunate that we always gotta be the ones to make the first move?”

Coming near the end of the record, ‘1026’ is perhaps a standout. A perfect example of how Slake manages to transform an otherwise mundane moment into something sacred. Or rather, restore the sacredness latent in every moment to its full luster. And by sacred, we mean something beautiful, yes, but also serious, daunting, even scary. Reflecting on both the past and present via everything from framed photos and accumulated possessions to strange dreams, ‘1026’ treats the present as a flat plane facing in two directions. Look one way and we see everything which makes us who we are, look the other for something even more terrifying.

I’ve got this framed picture of us three – my grandma with my name, my daddy, and me.
In it I am a few hours old
my first day in the world.
The longer I look at it the worse it gets, I own this image that reverses death.
Well that Virgin Mary statue looks just like my mom, I guess that makes me her son –
I didn’t mean that at all.

Let’s Get Married is out now via Cherub Dream Records and available from the Slake Bandcamp page.

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Back in March we wrote about ‘Hold On’, a single from LA’s Bouquet which teased the duo’s first full-length album in a decade, Spellbreaker. The song was a slice of dream pop “rich and romantic [in] style,” as we put it, that “championed restraint within a genre often prone to excesses.” Now Bouquet are back with new track ‘Moon Was Made’, offering a further glimpse at the record. A vintage Linn Drum machine is paired with the hi-hats of an old Roland rhythm box to weave a sound almost ethereal in its analog charm, all supporting lyrics which push and probe for answers amid an enveloping sense of uncertainty.

Watch the video shot and directed by Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs below:

‘Moon Was Made’ is out now and available from the Bouquet Bandcamp page.

Bug Crush – Mikey Told Me

With a new four-song EP Somehow I go in circles all the time set for release next month, Brooklyn-based songwriter Carolyn Fahrner, AKA Bug Crush, has unveiled new single, ‘Mikey Told Me’. Written after first moving to the city and living in less than perfect housing conditions, the track finds Fahrner tapping into the universal, slightly surreal experience of discomfort in a new place, where everything feels a little hazy and out of sync. “I wasn’t sleeping well because my bedroom floors were three inches uneven. In my groggy waking hours, I wandered around Brooklyn and frequently passed by a store called Mikey’s Hook Up. I thought it was a funny name and it stuck in my head. I wanted to write a song that wasn’t really about me, or anyone I knew, but I think it inevitably ended up being a reflection of my experiences in the world.”

‘Mikey Told Me’ is out now and available from the usual places, Somehow I go in circles all the time will be released on the 16th May.

JLJR – Thumbtack

“Adopts a tone both reflective and defiant to chart the end of a distinctive kind of relationship. One troubled and difficult to live through, yet equally one whose closure takes something from you too.” That’s how we described ‘Arms For Eyes’, the lead single from JLJR new EP The Rest of Your Life, coming soon on Paper Moon Records. Latest single ‘Thumbtack’ is no less reflective in style. A mosaic of iPhone takes and tape loops which weaves a lo-fi representation of memory itself, while the disarmingly sincere vocals meditate on grief to give the ostensibly inviting sound a real emotional edge.

The Rest of Your Life is out via Paper Moon Records.

Myriads – Call It Quits

Described as “a study of love, happiness, depression, and the search for meaning in these universal human experiences,” Find Ourselves Again is the new EP from Portland, OR-based outfit, Myriads. The work of frontperson Maria DeHart has morphed over the years, evolving from a solo endeavour built upon acoustic and later loop pedal foundations into the full band which would become Myriads, though has maintained a sincere, confronting tone throughout the arc. The new EP represents the next step in this process, blending elements of bedroom and dream pop with the heft and energy of indie rock to communicate in a typically unguarded, empathetic manner. Single ‘Call It Quits’ embodies the style, its wistful fondness counterbalanced with fuzzy weight, capturing the experience of a break-up in all of its conflict and longing.

Old Man of the Woods – Anticipating

“Tendrils is a collection of devotionals, written at a yearning distance from their beloveds. It’s the recognition of the vines that bind us to all we adore, at times only felt once they become taut, begin to quiver, reverberate, fray, snap, curl.” So describes Miranda Elliott of the new album from Old Man of the Woods, set for release this June. Recorded during a residency at the Culterim Gallery in an abandoned German sanatorium, the album explores the close relationship of preservation and decomposition, evolving the goth pop of previous releases like Votives and Triptych I to increasingly evocative results. Lead single ‘Anticipating’ provides a hint of the haunted vibe therein, playing like a private party for one held in memory of all that came before which nevertheless, as per its title, holds hope in the possibility that that which has been lost might be accessible some way down the line.

Tendrils will be released this June.

Penny & the Pits – Pool Party

“Lacks none of the mood or bite of the Motherhood sound, [Penelope] Stevens matching head-banging heft with an abstract, poetic lyricism which plays like a personal journey into the strange currents and slacks of this thing we call life.” So we wrote of ‘Montenegro on Ice’, the first single from Penny & the Pits‘ debut album Liquid Compactor, forthcoming this summer via Forward Music Group. Described as “a gritty, adventurous punk-rock album that processes feminist joy, rage and revenge,” the record harnesses this energy for both fun and fury, something exemplified by latest single, ‘Pool Party’. A surf punk number full of playfulness and bite which again highlights the imagination of the project, telling the delightfully dark story of a girl gang hell bent on revenge against the men who have wronged them.

Watch the video by director of photography Amelia Bailey below, with art direction by Audrey Kirk and Penelope Stevens and editing/colouring by Nicole Cecile Holland:

Liquid Compactor is out on the 27th June via Forward Music Group and you can pre-order it now.

Rose Haven Motor Hotel – Trasig

If any one feature marked Things Don’t Stay, the 2024 EP by Jackson-based project Rose Haven Motor Hotel, it was a sense of perpetual change, the style switching from traditional folk to alt-country swagger and back again on a whim. The release was “appropriately titled,” as we put it, “not only evoking the overarching wistfulness which marks the release, but also speaking to the stylistic fluidity which occurs across the five songs.” Released in preview of a forthcoming EP, latest single ‘Trasig’ sees Ben Atkinson continues to push the project towards new styles and influences. An instrumental guitar track he describes as “George Harrison meets Delicate Steve meets a biker gang.” A song of retro richness and a notable mean streak which refuses to outstay its welcome and maintains an air of mysterious cool as a result.

Slake – Votive

Back in March we introduced Slake, the recording project of self-described ‘lesbian doom folk’ songwriter Mary Claire, with single ‘Bonecollector’. Serving as “both a window into the singular vision of the Californian artist and an embodiment of the collaborative spirit which brings their work to life” as we put it, the track was the first glimpse of Slake’s new album Let’s Get Married, coming this June with Cherub Dream Records. New single ‘Votive’ further grounds this style and suggests all of the album is delivered with the same shadowy atmosphere and intimacy that made its predecessor so striking. Against the backdrop of a subtle yet poignant arrangement, it is Claire’s vocals which represent the heart of the track. A voice that plays as both a plea and a prayer, looking for a way to move beyond present suffering or else come to understand the purpose of the pain in order to better withstand it.

Soot Sprite – Vicious Cycles

With the release of new album Wield Your Hope Like A Weapon fast approaching on Specialist Subject Records, Soot Sprite have shared final single ‘Vicious Cycles’ to further whet appetites. We’ve previously described the album as “a call to arms to fight against the forces that make contemporary life so difficult, and a reminder of the radical potential within empathy and community,” and the new single zooms in on the most personal experiences to explore how such a mission might look on an individual level. “‘Vicious Cycles’ is about addressing your patterns of behaviour and the damage done in previous relationships,” as lead Elise Cook explains. “The fear of retribution for the smallest of hiccups that sticks with you long after the impacting relationship is done. The thought that you’ll never fully shake it off.”

I can’t wash off the oil from your spill
Part of me is always blackened by your will
Try to leave it in the years
But I still shake with fear
The eggshells stab like little spears

Sucker Crush – Stranger

Echoqualia is the latest EP from Sucker Crush, the recording project of Oakland-based songwriter Marissa Deitz. Built from a myriad of home recordings made between 2016 and 2021 and elevated beyond the sum of its parts with extra work in the subsequent years, the release has been long in the making, and this extended gestation period only served to add to its richness and weight. “A lot has happened in that time (personally, politically, pandemically…),” as Deitz says, “and it’s a strange and beautiful thing to hold these songs as they are now.” Lead single ‘Stranger’ highlights the signature blend of chamber pop and electronic sensibilities of the EP, its gentle, airy style belying the orchestral depth of the sound, and Deitz’s vocals equally notable for their simultaneously hushed and powerful tone.

Yoshika Colwell – There’s Got To Be A Loser Babe

“Pushing the folk sound into ethereal, almost cosmic territory, the song again embraces the satisfying weirdness of dreams, where logic might not adhere to the ordinary laws of such things, yet feels like logic all the same.” So we wrote of Yoshika Colwell‘s ‘Last Night’ back in February, but despite the single’s dreamy aesthetic, its heart was firmly rooted in the physical world. The track features on Colwell’s debut full-length On The Wing, an album coming this summer on Blue Flowers which further mines the more ethereal territories of folk to explore real life experiences. “This album is a bit of a shrine I suppose to all of the pivotal experiences that shaped me during my twenties and it’s also, I feel, a tentative lean towards hopefulness for the future,” Colwell explains. “It is, at its core, an album about acceptance and release, and freedom from old binds […] The process felt quite ritualistic, akin to writing down the things you know you need to let go of on a piece of paper and burning it.” Watch the video for latest single ‘There’s Got To Be A Loser Babe’ by Tilly Wace below:

On The Wing is out on the 25th July via Blue Flowers and you can pre-order it now.

The post Weekly Listening: April 2025 #3 appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Last May, Toronto songwriter  and multi-instrumentalist Abigail Lapell released Anniversary, an album of love songs that explored the L-word in a variety of its many guises. Now, almost a year on, Lapell has announced More Songs About Love, an extended version of the record that adds eight extra tracks, including acoustic versions and French translations of some of Anniversary‘s standouts. Lapell made the album with the help of Tony Dekker (of Great Lake Swimmers), and he lends his vocals to the lead single, an acoustic duet version of ‘Wait Up’. “I feel like it brings out such a different, more intimate side of the song,” Lapell describes, “and was super fun to play and sing live together.”

Amiture Music – Mountain

Jack Whitescarver’s Amiture might be a thing of the past, but a new project has risen from the ashes. Amiture Music sees Whitescarver enlist drummer Justin Fossella, bassist Max Berine Shafer and multi-instrumentalist and percussionist Allie Wrubel to push into a style of experimental rock unreachable to a solo artist. “As musicians, the four of us are able to access an unspoken knowing, a shared voice,” Whitescarver says, “and this intimate understanding has allowed us to blend and mold our distinct approaches and styles into a unified, total sound.” The first taste of this new beginning, single ‘Mountain’ embodies the deep sincerity which underpins Amiture Music, forgoing any conceits or flashy gimmicks in favour of open collaboration and good old fashioned craft.

Domino Lewis – Do It All

Described as a songwriter “born in France but raised on Gordon Lightfoot and Joan Baez,” Domino Lewis crafts a timeless style of folk which owes equal debts to the classics and contemporaries of the genre. Ahead of a new EP scheduled for release sometime later this year, Lewis has shared brand new single, ‘Do It All’. A song which draws on a quote by Sylvia Plath—”I want to live and feel all the shades, tones and variations possible in my life. And I am horribly limited”—to form a sound at once affirming and shot through by melancholy. An apparent contradiction embraced throughout the track, as though to fully inhabit one’s life is to grasp both sides of the coin with identical curiousity. “I wanna see a morning /and moonlight just the same,” as the opening lines assert. “I wanna burn the sunshine / wanna drown the rain.”

Lewis joined up with Western AF on their European tour to record a version of the track. Watch the video recorded and mixed by Will Ross and edited by Manuel Deakins below:

‘Do It All’ is out now and available from the Domino Lewis Bandcamp page.

Foxtails Brigade – Forevermore

Described as “a lonely, bedroom anthem for the lost and forgotten,” ‘Forevermore’ is the latest single from San Francisco‘s Foxtails Brigade, and the first taste of their upcoming new full-length Red Album. Led by Laura Weinbach, the project has long made what we’ve called previously “a peculiar brand of Gothic folk-pop which embraces the weirder side of life,” and the new single is no exception. A poignant ode to those who exist at some kind of angle to the conventional modes of living, too often shunned by the cultural and political gatekeepers of their time.

‘Forevermore’ is out now. You can sign up for early access of Red Album on the Foxtails Brigade website.

Hectorine – Is Love An Illusion?

Bay Area-based songwriter Sarah Gagnon, AKA Hectorine, is preparing to release thrid album Arrow of Love later this spring with Take a Turn Records, an album which invoked the Sumerian goddess Inanna in its conception. Mesopotamian myth tells of Inanna descending into the underworld, giving up clothing and possessions at each of the gates of hell to finally arrive naked, and Gagnon followed the analogy to trace a path through a period of intense change during the pandemic, stripping away all protections to confront demons unguarded. Single and opener ‘Is Love An Illusion’ signals the start of this journey, with flitting marimba and dramatic vocals drawing the listener into dark, alluring netherworld.

Arrow of Love is out on the 23rd May on Take a Turn Records and you can pre-order it now.

IE – Simplify

Later this spring, Minneapolis quintet IE are releasing their latest album Reverse Earth on Quindi Records. The release draws upon kosmische, lounge pop and psychedelica in its sound, though with an intentional style which prioritises intuitive flow. There’s sizeable variation across the five songs, but lead single and centrepiece ‘Simplfy’ shows off the evocative patience of the outfit. A song which seems to raise itself from minimal beginnings, stirring with an almost organic logic, like the mysterious mechanical movements of subcellular particules, or else the heavenly bodies burning bright through outer space.

Mae Powell – Rope You In

Having signed with Karma Chief and Colemine Records, self-described “songstress and rainbow entity” Mae Powell is preparing to release a second album this summer, and latest single ‘Rope You In’ introduces the audience to the ethereal atmosphere and emotional clarity of the Bay Area artist’s work. The song was essentially the origin point of the record, the first steps of a challenging journey through a myriad of emotions, though step into the lush sound and crooned vocals and you’ll soon discover the experience to be one which places comfort front and centre. “I feel grateful for the way writing songs helps me make sense of and process emotions while I’m in the thick of them,” as Powell explains, and now the songs exist as something which might help listeners too.

Mourning [A] BLKstar – Stop Lion 2

Following on from 2024’s stellar Ancient//Future, Mourning [A] BLKstar are already on their way back with Flowers of the Living, a brand new full-length to be released by Don Giovanni Records to coincide with the Afrofuturist collective’s ten-year anniversary. And, if lead single ‘Stop Lion 2’ is indicative of the album in its entirety, MAB draw on the full breadth of creativity and expertise gained across this decade, bringing to life a sound packed with detail yet unafraid to spread its wings and take its time. Indeed, this is a song where space is given equal footing next to any instrument or vocal. “Not only does space represent stillness, contentment, and mindfulness, it’s also the fulcrum of collectivism and free expression, and a key tenet of the Black ecstatic lineage,” as the press release puts it. “Space has always been politicized, and to view it from a place of abundance rather than scarcity, even in a conceptual sense, is a rebuke of fascist oppressors and an affirmation of love and self-belief.” The result is every bit as defiant, moody and assured as this suggests, and primes the canvas ready for a blockbuster album. Watch the video below:

Flowers of the Living is coming soon via Don Giovanni Records and you can pre-order it now.

nina gala – honey

Back in 2022 we wrote about swan heart by Baltimore-based songwriter nina gala, an album we described as “reflecting on what was and what might have been with an almost reverent tone. One which explores feelings of longing, anger and despair yet descends fully into none, instead suspended in the strange wonder that things such as love could ever happen at all.” Now nina gala is back with ‘honey’, a brand new single which further descends into a shimmering world of romance and fear. “do you still wanna taste my honey? / do you miss my touch? / do you love my body?” as the opening lines ask, gala’s vocals soaring over a sparse arrangement like concerned thoughts filling an empty room at the dead of night.

Penny & the Pits – Montenegro on Ice

Penelope Stevens is perhaps best known as part of New Brunswick alt-rock outfit Motherhood, but is now ready to introduce a new project to the world—Penny & the Pits. Out via Forward Music Group, first single ‘Montenegro on Ice’ lacks none of the mood or bite of the Motherhood sound, Stevens matching head-banging heft with an abstract, poetic lyricism which plays like a personal journey into the strange currents and slacks of this thing we call life. A song “about letting your memories overwhelm your life,” as Stevens explains, “and about using any ol’ thing to avoid confronting your trauma.”

Laps like milk, with my mind like silt,
I underwent the kind of thing you can’t forget,
Unbroken, but not unbent
full eclipse
I was held up, transfixed
I was looking for some kind of sign I can’t ignore
But I found no sign I can’t ignore.

‘Montenegro on Ice’ is out now via Forward Music Group.

Slake – Bonecollector

Written to christen their new project, Mary Claire has just released the single ‘Bonecollector’ under the moniker Slake via Cherub Dream Records. Produced by Ryan Albert (Babehoven) and mixed by Melina Duterte (Jay Som), the song is both a window into the singular vision of the Californian artist and an embodiment of the collaborative spirit which brings their work to life. Bridge Gamble (bass), Ryan Albert (additional guitar), Lil Spakoski (synth/theremin), Oona Albertson (drums) and Maya Bon (additional vocals) all lend their talents, as too do a whole crew of directors, editors, camera crew and performers for the track’s accompanying, suitably commited, video filmed at the Padma Yoga Studio and Kilowatt Bar. Watch below:

‘Bonecollector’ is out now via Cherub Dream Records.

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Based in Brooklyn, Ben Van Bonn has made a name combining the traditional and the contemporary, taking a classic American fingerpicked style and reaching in new directions. Debut album Myth of the Middle Rung displayed how evocative this style could be, with singles like ‘Concord, MA’ highlighting a distinctive combination of archaic and digital sensibilities which created something delicate, spacious and shot through with some cryptic ancient power. Now Van Bonn is back with Further Than Thought, a new full-length which strips things back further, forgoing any vocals and removing all instruments but guitar and electric bass. Named after an aquatic portal in the Farallon Islands, first single ‘Great West Arch’ doubles down on intricate fingerpicking to transport the audience to the Californian coast, and serves as a timely reminder that less is often more.

Further Than Thought is out on the 29th November and available to pre-order via Bandcamp.

Blue Deputy – Cypress

Blue Deputy was formed by Andy Bunting in Philadelphia in 2020, and immediately won fans with the self-produced single ‘New Jersey’. Since then, Bunting has moved to Belfast and recruited Caoilfhinn McFadden (bass) and Cathal Francis (guitar and vocals) to form the current Blue Deputy lineup. The band are currently working on their debut EP, and new single ‘Cypress’ is perhaps our first taste of that. Released via new Dalliance Recordings imprint Under The Rolling Y, the song combines everything from soft bedroom pop and lyrical folk rock to the emotional intensity of Midwest emo. Bunting’s vocals smoulder and sway over steady percussion, subtle synths and wistful slide guitar, all coming together to from something that feels soft and raw with a clear-eyed clarity.

Daughter of Swords – Alone Together

Daughter of Swords is the solo project of North Carolina‘s Alex Sauser-Monnig, who you may also know as one third of Mountain Man and one half of The A’s. Their debut album, Dawnbreaker, came out in 2019, and followed a similar folk blueprint to those other projects. But the last few years have been ones of great personal change for Sauser-Monnig, and new single ‘Alone Together’ very much reflects that. Created with help from log-time pals Jenn Wasner (Wye Oak, Flock of Dimes), Nick Sanborn (Sylvan Esso), and TJ Maiani (Weyes Blood, Neneh Cherry), the song pulses with synths and blossoming electronics, driven forward on a stream of potent guitar and muscular percussion. It’s a dispatch from what label Psychic Hotline describe as “[a] fresh chapter of exploration and liberation,” exuding a buoyant confidence as we all trudge on through the barrage of bad news and complicated feelings.

Elori Saxl – Grows Along The River Fast

“Arrangements which combine digitally processed recordings of natural phenomena with analogue synths, MIDI samples and woodwind by Stuart Bogie, evoking not only the interplay between geography, ecology and human development in the area, but also the emotional landscape which results.” So we wrote last month when introducing Earth Focus, the new album from  New York-based composer Elori Saxl on Western Vinyl. A soundtrack to the PBS documentary of the same name, the record evokes the Southern Californian topography, especially along the LA River, highlighting the environment’s rhythms and changes, so it is fitting latest single ‘Grows Along The River Fast’ offers a different take to first single ‘Grows Along The River Slow’. A variation which switches up the length and tempo to offer a different picture of the same waterway, susceptible as it is to the varying conditions of the land.

Max García Conover – coming up low

A new month, a new single from Max García Conover, and this time he has company. ‘coming up low’ sees Buenos Aires’ Paula Prieto and New England’s Ben Cosgrove lend their talents, joining Conover on what is a characteristically sincere and tender track. Because while there are more voices in the mix, the song is a lesson in understatement. Mining the image of the moon in all of its isolation and pale sympathy, not to mention the way it encapsulates the stark power of a simple image. “I watched you dress in the soft light of the moon,” as one verse goes, “I was desperate and I was hopeless except for hoping that you wouldnt notice / I watched you dress in the soft light of the moon.” Elsewhere the night comes crashing down, and worst fears are realised, yet the lasting impression is that familiar blend of melancholy and hope experienced when looking up to see the moon rising again.

All month the moon coming up low coming up low coming up low
I awoke and you were missing and you left me a letter in the kitchen

Pocket Full of Crumbs – Ice Water

This summer, San Francisco outfit Pocket Full of Crumbs released In My Hands I Hold A Lucky Cricket, a full-length album on Cherub Dream Records. With its marriage of post-punk, alt rock and shoegaze, the record embraces the twin forces of gauzy texture and crushing weight to create something which nods to the nineties while keeping its eye fixed firmly forward. It saw an admirable degree of variation across the songs—from the twitchy energy of tracks like ‘Blink’ to the altogether heftier ‘In My Home’. Fan favourite ‘Ice Water’ offers yet another dimension, where increased clarity grounds a downbeat and ambiguous sound which threatens to spill over into dark chaos but never quite does, highlighting an understanding of mood and sense of control which is sometimes lacking within the genre.

Sonya – Inside & Out

Sonya released their debut At What Cost? earlier this year, a succinct collection of songs as comfortable offering late-night emotion as it was an upbeat swagger. If this duality marked the album, then new single ‘Inside & Out’ confronts such an idea head on. Another example of Sonya’s fantastic ability to sound at once confessional and carefree, intimate feelings communicated without sacrificing any of sense of confidence or attitude. With a taut rhythm that pulls the audience in and a singalong finale keeping them there until the close, the song is yet more evidence that the star of Sonya is rising and one to watch in the coming months.

‘Inside & Out’ is now available via streaming services.

Steph Cameron – Today

Having just announced a UK and European tour along with fellow Canadian songwriter Abigail Lapell, Saskatoon’s Steph Cameron has shared new single, ‘Today’. Her first new release in seven years, the single offers a glimpse of a full-length forthcoming next year on Neon Moon Records, and sees Cameron build upon the atmospheric and thematically charged style of folk which made previous records Sad-Eyed Lonesome Lady and Daybreak Over Jackson Street so special. A song as assured as it is emotive, simmering with brooding longing as it contemplates complex ideas of identity and history with a straightforward confidence. “’Today’ is a song about reconnecting with both our living and ancestral communities,” she explains. “It is about the pain of turning away from your identity and the strength and pride found in turning toward it.”

‘Today’ is out now via Neon Moon Records. You can find the dates of the Steph Cameron and Abigail Lapell tour here. 

Stephen Becker – Range

The forthcoming album from  LA-born, Brooklyn-based songwriter Stephen Becker, Middle Child Syndrome is a record concerned with change in all its guises, exploring the duality of permanence and decay inherent within existence itself with a distinctively personal slant. “The album sees Becker lean into this unorthodox style with an almost stream-of-consciousness immediacy,” we wrote in a preview, “as though the audience is given a direct invitation into his daily existence.” With vocals from Alena Spanger, latest single ‘Range’ puts forward a more subdued, restrained aspect of the record, the absence of drums creating a kind of torpor into which anxious thoughts inevitably seep, and the slow drift of time offers not peace but unease.

Microcosm of your parents, brother left LA
By this age you already had Michael I was late
Melody recycled wind me up and watch me spin

I’m not lost, I’m just outside my range
I’m not lost, I’m just a little spaced

This Lonesome Paradise – Into the Ether

Led by E. Ray Béchard, This Lonesome Paradise specialise in a dark and mysterious brand of Western noir. Last week they released a new record, Luna Nocturna, via Bad Vibes Good Friends, a collection of eight songs that we previously described as “a meditation on the American Dream with all its brutality, broken promises and betrayals.” Likening it to a Cormac McCarthy novel, the label describe the album as “an evocative journey through desolate landscapes and haunting narratives, capturing the raw essence of the American West.” This is very much apparent on centrepiece and standout track ‘Into the Ether’, a slinky and surreal slow-burn rock song that feels like a midnight cruise along a desert highway, taking us deep into the shadowy heart of the nation.

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A song that she says “comes from acknowledging the type of magic that exists all around us and yearning to get a taste of it,” ‘rosemary’ is the new single from addy (the project led by Philadelphia’s Addy Watkins). Her first new music since last year’s temperance, the song takes indie pop and stripped-back folk and refracts them into a new shape entirely, something warm and fond and all-enveloping.  “I was in love with a witch once,” Watkins describes of the song’s inspiration, “who taught me rosemary hung over my bed would help with my crippling nightmares. which it did and still does whenever I remember to hang it.”

Alice Hebborn – Saisons – Movement 2

December sees the release of Saisons, the debut album from Belgian composer Alice Hebborn on Western Vinyl. Created following a move to the countryside, the record draws inspiration from theories of ecofeminism and environmental harmony and presents a world cast volatile and disordered in the wake of human impacts. Across seven movements, built of piano and electronics, Hebborn imagines a different future. One in which humans cease to throw the natural balance and instead become a key link in a harmonious web of reciprocal relationships. Lead single ‘Movement 2’ is “the starting point of Saisons,” Hebborn describes. “It was written in the spring and draws its inspiration from the captivating images of this season: the awakening of nature and our senses, the great activity of all living things.”

Banti Buli – Hennessy Song

“Refusing to commit fully to irony or sincerity […] as though a song about relationships couldn’t really function without equal doses of heartfelt emotion and tongue-in-cheek humour.” So we wrote of Banti Buli‘s ‘Something Like a Honda Odyssey’ last year, a song which mixed languid rhythms with a distinctively verbose lyricism. Ahead of an album due next spring, Banti Gheneti is now back with ‘Hennessy Song’, a track which see the US-based Dutch-Oromo artist take samples from his surroundings to build an earnest soundscape exploring the transience of even the most steadfast habits. “The closest thing to a home (the Ethiopian corner store) becomes a hole in the ground and your lover leaves you,” as Gheneti says. “Even routines and promises are ephemeral.”

figure eight – 1999 (cherry)

A mainstay of the Bay Area scene, figure eight originated as the experimental noise project of duo Nash Rood and Abby Goeser, starting out with nothing but a distorted synthesizer and acoustic drum kit. However, on welcoming a number of additional members in recent years (including Nicholas Coleman on bass and Nicky Esparza on drums), the band has now evolved into something altogether more full-bodied. Take new single ‘1999 (cherry)’, a song with finds the outfit at their most boisterous and reserved within the same three minutes. The searing opening is indebted to hardcore, though the crushing momentum soon breaks into something almost delicate. These twin threads of lightness and weight weave across the track into what appears to be the spirit of this new version of figure eight—a band aware of the transcendent power available at both ends of the spectrum.

His His – My Friend Wants to be a Freemason

We last featured Aidan Belo’s His His project almost exactly a year ago when we covered the single ‘Ford Econoline’, a song about life in a tour van that we said felt “like the sensation of returning home in your mind as you cruise down an unfamiliar stretch of highway in some faraway city.” The Toronto-based artist returns with a new EP, Good Gold, coming out next month, and has just released the final single ahead of the release. Informatively titled ‘My Friend Wants to be a Freemason’, it’s a track about a childhood friend who became obsessed with joining a masonic lodge. “The idea of joining this secret society consumed my friend, and for a couple of months it was all that he’d talk about,” as Belo describes. Musically the song follows a familiar His His formula, a gentle and folk-inflected indie pop song that wears an air of weary wistfulness like the grain in an old film photograph.

Good Gold is due to be released on 15th November via Victory Pool Records. You can pre-save it now on streaming services.

Kassie Krut – Reckless

Kassie Krut are wasting no time introducing themselves. “K / A / S / S / I / E / K / R / U / T / T / T / T,” goes the opening line of new single ‘Reckless’, a de facto theme song for the new project of Kasra Kurt, Eve Alpert (formerly of Palm) and Matt Anderegg (Mothers, Body Meat). The band have just signed to Fire Talk Records, and new single offers a glimpse at the core of the project. Something undoubtedly contemporary yet possessing a rawer dimension too, as though through the idiosyncratic art pop style comes an altogether more atavistic, primal energy. Directed by Guy Kozak, the video for the song was filmed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and offers a visual representation of the sound’s frantic playfulness.

‘Reckless’ is out now and available via the Kassie Krut Bandcamp page.

Mark Trecka – Witch’s Hat (ft. Midwife & An Heap)

The work of Mark Trecka never sits still, the Chicago-born artist and activist utilising sound to explore a diverse set of styles and themes in a practice as inventive as it is ambitious. More recent work has turned towards post-punk as an avenue of exploration, and latest single ‘Witch’s Hat’ continues to plough that same furrow. Recorded between Paris and Colorado, the track is described as Trecka’s “Halloween song,” existing with the common ground between that which is haunting and beautiful. Midwife joins on backing vocals and An Heap on synths to further elevate the dynamic, the song moving from apparent minimalism into a gauzy atmosphere as though pushing through the layers of time itself.

Michael Younker – Bad News

Michael Younker is a Detroit-born, Brooklyn-based production designer who also makes rock & roll music that he says “melds lighthearted cynicism with unashamed big rock motifs.” He has just released his debut EP, Sweet Things, a four-song record that’s brash and chaotic and amped up with bratty energy. “Sonically & lyrically, Sweet Things feels like the kid who ate too much sugar, bounced off walls, and passed out on the floor,” Younker describes. “Music of obsession, excess, indulgence, and…consequences?” ‘Bad News’ is perhaps the best place to start, capturing the EP’s manic motion and carefree bravado. “I can’t make you love me,” Younker sings, before snottily trying his best anyway in the following line – “C’mon, give it a go!”

Old Man of the Woods – Ghost

“A visceral exploration of a villain’s arc, tracing her devolution from possession to obsession to dissolution.” So reads the album notes for Triptych I: Devolve, the latest release from Seattle-based project Old Man of the Woods. The first in a series of EPs, the three-song collection offers a self-described “goth ethereal mycelial” sound to chart a fall from grace in all of its tragedy, majesty and strange avenues of agency. Such as with single ‘Ghost’, where the central character moves from resentment to something closer to power with the realisation that the ability to haunt can represent its own form of control.

Orchid Mantis – Dead Malls (feat. Cathedral Bells)

Following a collaboration with Sign Crushes Motorist earlier this year, not to mention several more singles in the meantime, Orchid Mantis (the recording project of Atlanta‘s Thomas Howard) has returned with a new single ‘Dead Malls’. This time featuring Orlando, Florida shoegazey bedroom pop act Cathedral Bells, the track uses imagery of an abandoned shopping mall to explore emotions altogether more personal. Where past hopes, once bright and shiny and full of promise, have withered on the vine, now little more than empty husks. But the atmosphere is not downbeat, rather wistful and hazy, looking back on old memories as though flickering warm and grainy from an old film projector.

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Despite having been together for more than a decade and releasing a plethora of singles and EPs, Brisbane‘s Babaganouj had never put out a full-length album. That is, until Jumbo Pets dropped via Coolin’ By Sound last week. And the long gestation period shows in the vivid confidence of the dream pop/indie rock hybrid sound. Take single ‘She Wears Velvet’, a collision of hypnotic rhythms, playful details and cathartic peaks, all tied together by lead vocals from Harriette Pilbeam (AKA Hatchie). A song which captures the Babaganouj spirit in its ability to offer vulnerability and affirmation simultaneously.

Cosmo Sheldrake – Bathed in Sound

London-based multi-instrumentalist, composer and producer Cosmo Sheldrake has made a name crafting inventive and endlessly curious soundscapes which draw upon inspirations from across the natural world. Previous album Wake Up Calls was built around recordings of British birds on the red and amber endangered lists, but forthcoming record Wild Wet World pushes deeper into nature, quite literally. An album of aquatic environments which promises everything from plaintive whale song to clicking parrotfish and snapping shrimp. Lead single ‘Bathed in Sound’, which is being released as part of Brian Eno’s EarthPercent Charity campaign, welcomes the listener into the world of its title—an ancient place of great majesty which seems to be already in mourning. As though feeling the consequences of human activity within the very water, and the slow drift toward a silence they did not choose.

glow in the dark flowers – Stay Close to Me

With their self-titled album coming coming later this month on Born Yesterday Records, New Douglas, Illinois duo glow in the dark flowers have unveiled latest single ‘Stay Close to Me’ to welcome us to the newest iteration of their sound. Having started collaborating back in the late 00s and developing a scuzzy garage rock style with their band The Funs, the pair have continually reinvented their work while staying true to their spirit, and the latest single signals a further step in this evolution. With its fuzzy textures and buoyant rhythm, the track is evidently born from The Funs DNA, but offers a more mature and poetic vision too.

Lila Tristram – shelter

Next month, Where It’s At Is Where You Are (wiaiwya) will release home, the new album by East London singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, artist and writer Lila Tristram. It’s the follow-up to 2020’s sister EPs Our Friends pt. I & II, promising a continuation of Tristram’s distinctively delicate brand of folk, combining intricate fingerpicking with gently melancholic vocals. First two singles ‘january’ and ‘caravan’ captured this tone perfectly and the latest, ‘shelter’, is no different. At its core a piece of timeless British folk music, all misty moors and rolling green hills, it’s elevated with gentle atmospherics which add a glowing ethereal layer that rises to the surface across the two minute runtime.

Lucy Liyou – Dog Dreams (개꿈)

Lucy Liyou is a San Francisco-based songwriter and composer who draws upon ambient, jazz and sound poetry to create impressionistic, collage-like soundscapes. Described as “a rumination on the doublesidedness of trauma and love,” forthcoming album Dog Dreams (개꿈) utilises such a style to explore the nuances and contradictions of life, looking to broach the big questions not so much with straightforward answers but something more ambiguous. This extends right to the record’s title, because though the Korean term 개꿈 downplays the significance of dreams, Liyou takes them seriously. “‘Dog Dreams’ is about desire,” they explain. “It is about naively rejecting “dog dreams” (개꿈)—a Korean term used to dismiss and diminish dreams as nonsensical impossibilities—and endlessly searching the mercurial “face” of desire.” This is explored further through a music video and interactive video game, further manifesting this abstract sense within aural, visual and tactile fields.

Mox – 4lilmonkeys

With LP Heart coming in a few weeks on Cherub Dream Records, Merced, California‘s Mox has unveiled new single ‘4lilmonkeys’ to give further insight into her sound. The record promises to follow in the lineage of Alex G, combining boundless creativity with tangible emotion, and the new track shows just how effective the mix can be. A song that might be about the titular monkeys making residence in Mox’s brain, or perhaps serves a metaphorical view of her childhood as a little monkey herself, starting as a woozy childlike hallucination and escalating into something with real weight.

The National Park Service – What is the sound?

Rochester, NY label (and VSF favs) Lily Tapes & Discs are kicking off the year with two reissues. Last summer’s sold out Jason Calhoun release ben c, this is for you is getting another run, complete with new artwork by Jeremy Ferris, and Room For Love by Lily Tapes staple The National Park Service is getting its first ever physical release. Originally released digitally in March 2019, Room For Love is what the label describe as “a massive statement built of meditations from the brink of parenthood,” a patient, gentle and deeply personal collage of guitars, keys, drums, samples, field recordings. Second track ‘What is the sound?’ captures the atmosphere beautifully, meditative guitar sliding across subtle percussion and ambient textures.

Stuck – The Punisher

“They’ve got good news / it’s so sick living in a fanfic” reveal Stuck on ‘The Punisher’, opening track from the upcoming LP Freak Frequency on Born Yesterday Records. “They’ve got good news / There’s new life springing from a death cult.” Politically-charged post-punk might be a dime a dozen these days, but rarely does a band commit to their ideas so completely. Drawing on everything from Mark Fisher’s Capitalist Realism to the mindless cycles of bombast and ruin portrayed by FromSoftware’s Dark Souls and Bloodborne, Stuck offer an image of the West in its crazed death-throe contortions, a public driven mad at the intersection of violent history and bleak (non-)future. As ‘The Punisher’ demonstrates, the result leans on neither sneering humour nor all-out gloom, but a darkly incandescent sound born of the contradictions of our age.

A whole new dark age!
It’s burning bright with a hot white rage!
What did we do before light?

Watch the video directed by Zack Shorrosh below:

Freak Frequency is out on the 26th May via Born Yesterday Records and available to pre-order now.

Tom Lark – Radio Blaster

Shannon Fowler had parked his Tom Lark moniker for the past seven years, favouring instead the more pop-centric style of alternate project Shannon Matthew Vanya, but the Ōtautahi-born, Auckland-based songwriter has returned to Tom Lark for his first full-length album, Brave Star, out later this year on Winegum Records. Lead single ‘Radio Blaster’ gives an insight into the psych-inflected folk style of the record, a patient and thoughtful introduction which shimmers with a desert heat and the slightest cosmic overlay. “Sunburnt psychedelic folk fit for sensitive cowboys to meander and philosophise to,” as the artist describes it, like staring off at the horizon as the sun dips and the sky reveals its real depth.

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