Last month we previewed Anniversary & More Songs About Love, the deluxe version of Abigail Lapell‘s recent full-length which expands the album with eight additional songs. Alongside more intimate, acoustic versions of tracks from the original, Lapell also offers a handful of additional songs, and has now released a cover of Tame Impala’s Feels ‘Like We Only Go Backwards’ as part of the package. A minimal, electrified version of which mines the song for all of its stark weight, adding yet another dimension to the diverse picture of love and relationships which the album brings to life.

Anniversary & More Songs About Love will be released via Outside Music on 2nd May. Pre-order it now from the Abigail Lapell Bandcamp page.

Casper Skulls – Numbing Mind

The new album from Sudbury/Toronto indie rock outfit Casper Skulls, Kit-Cat is the product of a band confident enough to spread their wings. From the moody ‘Spindletop‘ and energetic ‘Roddy Piper’ to bittersweet Dylan-esque narrative ‘Dying in Eight Verses‘, each single offered a different style and set of influences, and culminated in a mosaic-like album able to confront a wide range of themes. With the release out now via Next Door Records, Casper Skulls have shared final single ‘Numbing Mind’ to further deepen the picture, exploring the vast media landscape of distractions into which we can retreat from contemporary existence. The song is itself a microcosm of the wider Casper Skulls style, presenting a collage of references (Ms. Rachel, Bob Ross, Macho Man, Rugrats, South Park, ASMR and Antique Roadshow and more) to paint the vast network of small comforts to which we turn.

Watch the video directed and edited by Bosmo below:

Kit-Cat is out now via Next Door Records and you can get it from the Casper Skulls Bandcamp page.

Classic Trucks – Oil

“Pairs a rich, warm sound with Jarman’s approachable, near-spoken vocals and a dark, distressed lyrical style. But instead of playing as a contradiction, the resulting track looks to solve the concern at its heart in real time, fashioning a cure to the complaint itself.” So we wrote of ‘Letting In Too Much Light’ by Classic Trucks last month, the first single from the new solo venture of Langkamer‘s Josh Jarman which introduced the empathetic nature of the project. With EP Century Songs set for release in late May, Classic Trucks are back with new single, ‘Oil’. A meditation on some of the grandest existential questions—free will, nature vs. nurture, the apparent futility of life—housed in a bright, pop-inflected brand of folk, again highlighting Jarman’s ability to approach difficult subjects without being overwhelmed by their weight.

Gay Meat – Champaign Ill

The recording project of producer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Karl Kuehn, Gay Meat has made a name in recent years with a distinctive blend of self-deprecation and sincerity, something embodied by 2022 EP Bed of Every. Mixing indie pop, rock and emo sensibilities, the release clocked in at barely thirteen minutes but managed to evoke a compelling inner world all the same. Recent single ‘Champaign Ill’ builds upon the style, a wistful lo-fi ode to the ways in which people change over time, as well as those who stay the same despite everything. Again the tone possesses a wry edge, but one which does nothing to limit the unguarded earnestness at its heart.

Gum Parker – Crocodile

“Draws on the considerable DIY history of its members to create good old-fashioned indie rock.” That’s how we described the debut album from Portland, Maine outfit Gum Parker, with singles ‘Two Subarus‘ and ‘Hive‘ packing a real punch despite the vastly different moods which underpinned them. With the album out now via Repeating Cloud, the outfit have shared final single ‘Crocodile’, and the song again embraces the chaotic, irrepressible energy of the do-it-yourself aesthetic to find joyous momentum within ordinary life. “Lately I’m trying to just write down phrases or bits of language that I like and scrape together a song from them,” as lead Galen Richmond explains. “It seems to have worked out for this joyful mess. The chorus is sorta a half-joke about how I couldn’t write a chorus for this one.”

Jangus Kangus – No Future In This

Christened by Emerson Dameron as “LA’s foremost purveyor of imagist garage surf,” Jangus Kangus is making a name with a sound at once hazy and raw, with debut album Fortune Cookie highlighting how evocative and playful such a contradictory style can be. Lead Jasmine Sankaran is joined by Steph Anderson (keys/backing vocals), Antonio White (lead guitar/backing vocals), Dan Perdomo (drums) and Ryan Kellis (bass), and together the band eschew genre convention in favour of instinct experimentation. Single ‘No Future In This’ serves as an ideal introduction, a track which preserves some of the DIY spirit of the project’s previous releases yet comes wrapped in a golden retro hue.

LEYA – Corners (Chanel Beads Rework)

Last year we wrote about ‘Corners’ by LEYA, a single from their EP I Forget Everything on NNA Tapes which displayed how harpist Marilu Donovan and vocalist/violinist Adam Markiewicz create “evocative and ambiguous” soundscapes, as we put it, which “explore the avenues open to us in the face of catastrophe.” Like much of LEYA’s work, the song occupied a strange space between medieval and futuristic tones, feeling like both a throwback and a promise of something new. Now rising pop favourite Chanel Beads has reworked the track to further deepen this contradictory tension. With additional layers of lush sonic textures and extra pop polish, the new interpretation serves as a heightened version of the original, playing like the interstitial space between the Now and the Then with all the instinctive longing left intact.

Watch the self-directed video starring model Mariah Morvant below:

‘Corners (Chanel Beads Rework)’ is out now via NNA Tapes and available from Bandcamp.

LUCKY – Traveler

LUCKY are a new Bay Area supergroup featuring Half Stack‘s Peter Kegler, Andrew St James, Marika Christine and Zach Elsasser (Affectionately). A slice of upbeat country rock that also provides the obligatory shadow to its light, debut single ‘Traveler’ gives an indication of what to expect from the project. A song full of backward looking despite its forward motion, resulting in a mood at once wistful and affirming. Produced and mixed by Joe Santarpia (Mac DeMarco) and mastered by Timothy Stollenwerk (Kevin Morby, Woods, Rose City Band), there’s real talent behind the project too, making for a polished, accomplished sound that retains its authenticity via a subtle lo-fi edge.

Maryse Smith – Freedom

This May sees the release of Transience, the new full-length from Massachusetts songwriter Maryse Smith, via Ghost Mountain Records, and latest single ‘Freedom’ both introduces the album’s warm folk rock sound and furthers the thematic resonance of the its title. It’s a song about regaining a sense of ownership and agency in the face of apparent restriction, placing trust in the transience of any condition in the way all longing must. Fittingly, the track is the product of one such process of overcoming. “‘Freedom’ was written upon returning from a festival that friends put on every year in Vermont,” as Smith explains. “I didn’t play that year, I was feeling bummed about being in a long writing dry-spell and couldn’t bear the thought of playing songs I had written years prior. But I felt so inspired after seeing so much good music I pretty much came home, sat at the piano and wrote this. I remember feeling afterwards, on a deep level, that the dry spell was broken and it was.”

Steel Wool – Fading

What the band describe as “a collision of sound experiments wearing the borrowed work uniform of rock music,” the self-titled debut EP from LA shoegaze outfit Steel Wool brings together the varying tastes of each of its four members. Shoegaze fuzziness meets not only its natural bedfellows in dream pop and indie rock, but also folk and screamo too, resulting in something that uses familiar ingredients in a fresh and innovative way. “The band has always been more of a sonic game of tug-of-war than a regiment in lockstep,” Steel Wool continue. “Stepping outside these orthogonal backgrounds in search of common ground, we’ve ended up somewhere that isn’t quite home turf for any of us.” Opener ‘Fading’ is the best place to start, a hazy and soaring dream pop song that eventually boils over in a snarl of feedback and wailing vocals.

Yuno – Massive

Having won acclaim with 2018 EP Moodie and a number of subsequent singles, Jacksonville-based pop visionary Yuno is releasing debut full-length Blest this May with Sub Pop. An artist in constant flux, Yuno has moved from skate punk and Johnstonian anti-folk to downbeat pop across his career to date, and the new album not only continues this evolution but pushes the sound to its most expansive, inventive spaces to date. Latest single ‘Massive’ embodies the sound’s widescreen richness, pairing languid pop confidence with fuzzy rock sensibilities to create a rueful backdrop for what is a reflection on the passing of time.

Watch the video directed and Edited by Yuno himself below:

Blest will be released on the 16th May via Sub Pop and you can pre-order it now.

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San Diego-based songwriter Bella Cloud sits somewhere between contemporaries like Phoebe Bridgers and Merce Lemon, grafting pop and shoegaze sensibilities onto an indie folk style to create something both emotionally charged and richly immersive. With new EP The Limerence on the horizon, Cloud has shared new single ‘The Littlest Death’, and the track is the ideal entry point for newcomers. Spencer Dugan (guitar), Jeremy Field (viola) and Rebecca Sykes (drums) lend their talents too, helping to create a sound vivid enough to match the sense of reflection and longing which runs through the vocals.

The Limerent is coming soon and you can find Bella Cloud in the usual places.

Green Gardens – Year of Love

“Combining swaying, laidback harmonies with fuzzy guitars and an almost Medieval preoccupation with heavy themes and gothic imagery.” That’s how we depicted the work of Leeds outfit Green Gardens when writing of their album This Is Not Your Fault back in 2023. The self-described feudal post-rock outfit are back with new single ‘Years of Love’ with Tiny Library Records, a song which both continues this style and makes certain alterations, swapping out some of the grand scale in favour of increased intimacy. “’Year of Love’ is a step away from the live room,” the band explain. “The guitars and drums suddenly felt too far away, so we brought them and the small room where we recorded them right in to our ears. It’s about the dogs, and it’s about the flies, and it’s about the trees. I’m happy this song is out while the winter closes, and those things grow again.”

Helena Deland – Silver and Red / Bigger Pieces

“When I finished recording what I thought would be my first album, I was faced with a miscellaneous bunch of songs,” describes Montreal singer songwriter Helena Deland. “Instead of wiggling them into the expected format, I released them as a series of short EPs called Altogether Unaccompanied.” Several years since the previous instalments, Deland has released the fifth volume of Altogether Unaccompanied, two songs that very much deserve to see the light of day. ‘Silver and Red’ is wan and wintry, a lo-fi acoustic track that put’s Deland’s vocals at the forefront, while ‘Bigger Pieces’ fleshes things out with contributions from Alexandre Larin (guitar), Francis Ledoux (percussion) and Cédric Martel (bass). Check out Nik Arthur’s video for ‘Silver and Red’ and listen to ‘Bigger Pieces’ below:

Altogether Unaccompanied, Vol. V is out now via the Helena Deland Bandcamp page.

Joni – Things I Left Behind

Having spent the best part of a decade writing songs for other people in New York and Los Angeles, a move to London, a difficult break up and feelings of pandemic-based isolation pushed Joni back to making music of her own. In April she releases Things I Left Behind, her debut LP, via Keeled Scales and Hand in Hive, a collection of ten songs that look backwards in order to move forwards. The latest single and title track is a good example, exploring life’s ever shifting nature via those pieces of oneself cast overboard in the name of pressing on ahead.

Lavender Blue – Scarlet Blood

Next month sees the release of The In Between, the new album from Asheville, NC artist Lavender Blue on Ghost Mountain Records. Previous single ‘Wishbone’ offered what we described as “a sound that owes as much to emo as it does folk or dream pop, combining sharp and smooth textures to evoke the duality at the track’s heart,” and though latest offering ‘Scarlet Blood’ opens with a far more restrained, acoustic style, it sacrifices none of the emotional intensity. For while the initial mood is one of numbness and stasis, but the sensation is not lasting. Instead Kayla Zuskin and co. push through to something more keenly felt, and the track settles into a kind of ebb and flow between subdued quiet and rising intensity, accepting such patterns as the natural state of things. As the repeated refrain goes: “What goes around comes back again.”

MAN LEE – Wind

Back in October we wrote about MAN LEE, the recording project of Brooklyn-based duo Sam Reichman and Tim Lee, as single ‘Best Ones’ tapping into the pair’s close-knit connection to evoke “the sense of solidarity between close friends after a challenging break-up with something between open compassion, droll humour and languid cool.” With full-length album Hefty Wimpy coming next month, new single ‘Wind’ offers another look at the distinctive personality of the MAN LEE sound. A nostalgically fuzzy track which reflects on the formative events of life, resisting the urge to revaluate memories with the new perspective of later years to instead inhabit the magic and mystery of the original moment.

Meagre Martin – Comfort Food

We’ve mentioned Up To Snuff, the new EP from Berlin-based project Meagre Martin, several times in recent months. Single ‘Frankie‘ “pair[ed] gauzy shoegaze textures with a persistent rhythm…embrac[ing] a bright spirit of playfulness and curiosity” and ‘In The Room‘ used a “slow, sludgy style to take on the cloying weight of toxic masculinity, opening up a space in which such forces can be acknowledged and confronted once and for all.” With the EP out now via Mansions and Millions, the outfit is back with final single ‘Comfort Food’. It’s the release’s closing track, which puts a peppy, affirming rhythm behind what might otherwise be a wistful sound, powering through the daunting or melancholic aspects of change with a sense of sheer motion, emerging on the other side with something like positivity.

Moontype – Long Country

Led by singer and bassist Margaret McCarthy, Chicago indie rock outfit Moontype won acclaim with their debut full-length Bodies of Water back in 2021, a record which felt like the final painting after the series of sketch-like releases (like ‘The Great Ohio / Not That Easy‘) which preceded it. But if Bodies of Water was the culmination of something, it was not the Moontype project in its entirety but merely one iteration of it. Now it appears a new cycle is beginning, the outfit signing to Orindal Records and unveiling new single ‘Long Country’. The first taste of the fruits of a new gestation period in which McCarthy has both altered the line-up and grown as a songwriter and musician, and a kind of stepping stone between the old version and the new. “I would never leave you without saying goodbye,” as McCarthy sings in the opening line, but every farewell leads to new beginnings.

Watch the video directed and edited by Ian Kelly below:

‘Long Country’ is out now via Orindal Records and available via Bandcamp.

Pink Must – Karaoke of the Bends

“Establishes an interplay between polish and dissonance, as well as an often wryly sardonic vocal style and conscious resistance to easy labelling at every turn.” That’s how we introduced the self-titled album from Brooklyn-based duo Pink Must back in January, with single ‘Morphe Sun’ embodying the ambitious and idiosyncratic vision Mari Rubio (More Eaze) and Lynn Avery bring to the life via the project. With the album coming later this month on Copenhagen label 15 Love, Pink Must have released new single ‘Karaoke of the Bends’. The song highlights both the strange and heartfelt dimensions of the the record, and is unique for being the only track on the record where Avery takes over vocal duties. “It’s that kind of corny ‘I know I’ll see you soon, but I want to see you tonight’ feeling,” they explain, “and doing karaoke of songs from The Bends by Radiohead.”

TOM LARK – Rock & Roll Baby

The recording project of New Zealand songwriter Shannon Fowler, Tom Lark is preparing to release new full-length Moonlight Hotel this spring. An album which spans almost a hundred years to link two experiences of displacement in the wake of natural disasters—that of Shannon’s family after the 1929 earthquake in the pioneer town of Murchison on the South Island, and his own in 2011 following the earthquakes which struck Ōtautahi. Latest single ‘Rock & Roll Baby’ embraces a psych-inflected folk rock sound to lean into the volatility inherent with such themes, facing down the peaks and troughs of life with an easygoing acceptance.

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Writing of Astra Forward back in 2022, we described how the London-based artist combines “classic folk stylings as well as a timeless ethereal atmosphere channeling a bond between human emotion and the natural world that feels somehow ancient.” New single ‘Ben’s Birds’ again possesses a link to nature, though this time the real focus is memory. Joe Taylor (drums/percussion), Callum McGuinness (production/bass/nylon strung guitar) and Laura Hussey (violin) help create a sound capable of conjuring thoughts of a past friendship in vivid detail, and thus breath new life into something precious. “With writing ‘Ben’s Birds’, I hoped to bring into colour ageing memories that felt like they were fading,” the artist explains. “The song seeks to reflect something of this gentle soul’s beauty and our connection, while expressing broader themes of memory, endurance and grief.”

Bennett Heidelberger – Eater of God/100usd

Having been around the Nashville music scene for a number of years, Bennett Heidelberger finally decided to release some songs of his own in 2024, starting with EP Wood Ducks. That record was a collection of small, tender tracks which centred on loss in various guises, from bereavement to the end of a romantic relationship. Now Heidelberger is back with new double single ‘Eater of God/100usd’, a pair of songs no less heartfelt in their execution yet showing a newfound sense of scale and weight. The former opens in a sincere hush before developing into something bigger and bolder, and ‘100usd’ follows suit with Heidelberger’s weightiest sound to date, the tone slightly more wry but lacking none of the emotion.

boyhood. – looking for you

Back in August we wrote about boyhood., a project which represents “an attempt […] to consider what has been gained and lost through the slow process of self-actualisation,” as we put it. “To save the parts worth saving, and potentially fill in the gaps.” Like previous single ‘wes anderson (your dog)’, new track ‘looking for you’ rises from restrained, downbeat beginnings into something richly affirming, as though the track’s confessional tone coaxes the sound to life. An exploration of love and grief most striking for its authenticity, delivered with the ambience of the moment left intact. “I recorded dozens of ‘clean’ vocal takes between October and now, and ended up just keeping the crude demo and bringing in friends to help me build around it,” boyhood. explains, “keeping the imperfections and clicks and bits of conversation to maintain the emotional space I wrote it in.”

‘looking for you’ is out now and available from the usual places.

Lavender Blue – Wishbone

Based in the mountains of Asheville, NC, Lavender Blue is the recording project of Kayla Zuskin. Following on from 2022 EP Slow Down, Lavender Blue is back with new singles on Ghost Mountain Records. The latest of which, ‘Wishbone’, takes inspiration from the image of a tree split in two yet continuing to grow, something moving in different directions but fundamentally united at the root. “[The song is] about the cognitive dissonance we all can experience when people or places inherently grow apart but alas remain connected,” as Zuskin puts it. Mary Steinbrecher (bass, vocals) and Jack Victor (drums) lend the talents to bring to life a sound that owes as much to emo as it does folk or dream pop, combining sharp and smooth textures to evoke the duality at the track’s heart.

Lofi Legs – Chain

With a new album on the way, San Francisco indie rockers Lofi Legs have returned with the single ‘Chain’. We previously wrote about how they melded “garage rock and bedroom pop with psych and surf sensibilities […] to capture the highs and lows of life,” and the new track builds upon the vibe to gloriously hazy results. Harking back to the buzz bands of the early 00s, ‘Chain’ delivers a brightly carefree spirit within a bundle of scrappy energy and fuzzed-out textures, leading to a sound that is entirely committed despite not taking itself too seriously. Watch the suitably surreal video below:

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

Matthew Squires – Song of a Cactus

‘Song of a Cactus’, the latest single from Matthew Squires, was penned during the pandemic, though its sense of lost direction was familiar before the virus, and has persisted to the present day. “I have that annoying songwriter habit of wanting to defer to the work itself rather than my explanation of it,” Squires says, “but I’d say it’s about finding some quiet sense of desperate hope in an apocalypse.” Fans of the Texas songwriter will recognise the idiosyncratic and heartfelt tone, with a newfound use of synths deepening the mood without sacrificing the raw immediacy so key to Squires’s work. The result feels like an urgent dispatch from within an uncertain present. As Squires concludes: “I wanted to make sure I released it before the election as my little quixotic attempt at creating a psychical place of refuge in anticipation of whatever direction the world might lurch.”

Routine Caffeine – Philodendron

We first wrote about Routine Caffeine at the beginning of the year, describing how single ‘In The End Now’ embodied the Louisville outfit’s “penchant for rich, bittersweet soundscapes” and introduced their EP, Weeds Under Concrete Stones. With the full release now out in the world, Routine Caffeine have shared new single and opener ‘Philodendron’. It’s a track which marries a taut central rhythm with a dreamy haze, and hints at a sharp bite too, all highlighting just how much control Katie O’Brien Kelley (vocals, guitar), Madison Elizabeth Case (bass, synth, background vocals) and Emma Treganowan (drums) have over the mood of their work.

Sarah Swire – Tight!

Recording under the moniker Sister Swire, Toronto songwriter and actor Sarah Swire has caught our attention with with a delightfully idiosyncratic brand of art rock, from the nuanced, ominous take on psychosis on ‘I Shot the President’ to the unapologetically malicious fun of ‘Pulleys and Gears‘. Released under her own name, new single ‘Tight!’ is every bit as inventive as its predecessors, and has no less force in its bite. Owing as much to the weird fiction of Joy Williams as it does Captain Beefhart or Nick Cave, the track is a monologue delivered in the manner of a wound spring, twisting tighter and tighter until it unravels in a moment of chaotic release. The video—directed by Swire and shot by Nicole Cecile Holland, with animations and editing by Eric Stephen Martin—only furthers the surreal intensity of the track, Swire’s movements charged and contorted by her words as if not so much speaking or singing as channelling a deeper energy.

‘Tight! is out now and available from the usual places.

Shady Baby – Held In

Released to celebrate a successful year including a performance on the main stage at Y Not Festival and shows with Malice K, Shady Baby‘s new single ‘Held In’ is a fitting way to cap off 2024. With the Brighton outfit leaning further than ever into the bittersweet drama of nineties alt rock, the song finds Sam Leaver and co. pairing weighty crescendos with emotional depth, leading to what might be their most assured, evocative sound to date. A sense of control binds the majority of the track, though the constant simmer of its energies pays off in the soaring conclusion. Watch the video filmed by Meg Sweeney and directed and edited by Leaver below:

‘Held In’ is out now and available from the usual places.

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The Silverware sound is held together in this way, and One True Light shows how varied and inventive a style can be when supported by the common thread of vocals and production. The title track opener is almost a microcosm of this, with poignant piano giving way to a thumping full band arrangement which sacrifices no level of detail in conjuring its driving forward motion. Songs like ‘New Bright Room’ present something lighter, its diaphanous air fitting for the searching tone of the vocals, as though their uncertainty is reflected in the music itself. ‘Longer’ positions itself towards the folk end of the spectrum, a tender daydream of a song, while ‘Search’ continues the mood in a very different way, reaching towards art pop with its glitched tones and leftfield turns.

And so the Silverware sound keeps changing. ‘DWBK’ exists at a tangent from its predecessor, a branch of the pop line which heads in a dreamier direction. ‘Tell Yourself’ returns to a more momentous indie rock style which sits adjacent to acts like The Weather Station. ‘Gloria’ is back to folk, playing like some electrically charged hymn. The record’s ever-shifting nature brings the title into relief, One True Light—suggestive of something perpetual and unchanging—perhaps at odds with the sound it offers. But on closer focus and repeated listens, the name’s relevance continues to grow. Because however different each of the songs might appear, there is a sense of light running through them. A common creative sensibility. A spirit or voice. As though each track is a glass vessel blown to a specific shape and size, but the same light is shone through them to illuminate their most interesting dimensions.

One True Light is out now via Ghost Mountain Records and available from the Silverware Bandcamp page.

Cover photograph by Marisa Bazan

The post Silverware – One True Light appeared first on Various Small Flames.

The first glimpse of her debut full-length Swirl which is coming later this year on 22Twenty, ‘Auto Icon’ is the latest single from London-born, Paris-based songwriter Flora Hibberd. Recorded at the Bungaleau in Eau Claire, WI with Shane Leonard, the track pairs assured confidence with a certain ambiguity, Hibberd’s assured composed guiding the listener beyond the bright rhythm towards something more uncanny. Indeed, the album has been described as “a cycle of songs about codes and decoding,” with Hibberd drawing on her background as a translator of art history texts to seek out those instances where errors and happenstance come to take on a deeper level of meaning.

Watch the video by Victor Claass and Hibberd herself below, with cinematography by Lola Hewison:

‘Auto Icon’ is out now and available from Bandcamp. Swirl will be released via 22TWENTY on the 15th November.

Guidon Bear – Animal Child

Back in 2022 we wrote about Unravel, an album by Olympia-based folk pop duo Guidon Bear on Antiquated Future which saw Mary Water (Little Red Car Wreck) and Pat Maley (Lois, Courtney Love) continue a collaboration now in its third decade. The album offered a realistic, refreshing take on time passing and everyday suffering, “striving forward not out of some misplaced romanticism,” as we put it, “but the mundane and often painful process of simply continuing on.” Now the pair are back with Internal Systems as if to prove the determination of this spirit, an album “about trying to stay well in an unwell world,” as the label put it. Single ‘Animal Child’ taps into this spirit with all the invention and heart we’ve come to expect from Guidon Bear, capturing the experience of real life with a unique sound somewhere between twee folk and indie pop.

Kishi Bashi – Make Believe (feat. Linqua Franqa)

“This song started as a beat that reminded me of that proto-funk-rap from the early ‘80s,” explains Kishi Bashi‘s Kaoru Ishibashi of ‘Make Believe’, the latest single from upcoming LP Kantos. “The only way the verse vocals sounded appropriate was if there was that kind of rapping, so I gave it a go!” Inviting friend and collaborator Mariah Parker, AKA Linqua Franqa, to help, Ishibashi set to creating a song which combines hip hop and psych rock sensibilities to hint at the stylistic depth of the album. Because Kantos is an ambitious release, drawing on both cult sci-fi series Hyperion Cantos and the work of Immanuel Kant to produce something of an apocalyptic party album. When so many threats appear to be coalescing over humanity’s head, Kishi Bashi has returned with a timely reminder of how good old fashioned fun might be the key to fostering the kind of connection we need to escape intact.

Watch the video directed by Ryan Hover below:

Kantos is out on the 23rd August via Joyful Noise Recordings and you can pre-order it now.

knitting – Sleeper

This September, Montreal‘s knitting will release their debut album Some Kind of Heaven via Mint Records, the outfit working with Scott Munro of Preoccupations to bring their nineties-inflected alt-rock sound to life. The result is every bit as dense and noisy as you might expect from such an arrangement, but latest single ‘Sleeper’ offers a more restrained cut from the record. A meditation on Mischa Dempsey’s experience growing into their trans identity, the song maintains a hazy style but swaps out some of the usual knitting intensity to offer more intimate, earnest emotion.

Lia Kohl – Car Alarm, Turn Signal

Chicago-based cellist, composer and multidisciplinary artist Lia Kohl has made a name blurring the borders between music and sound art, utilising an array of media and styles to create soundscapes able to evoke existence in all of its magic and mundanity. Which is to say, new record Normal Sounds is at once normal and very much not, or else it is extraordinarily normal—with Kohl turning her attention to the acoustics of everyday living and presenting them back to the listener as something as something new. The titles give a clue as to what each track offers (‘Tennis Court Light, Snow’, ‘Ice Cream Truck, Tornado Siren,’ ‘Airport Fridge, Self Checkout’) but the first single turns towards the road. ‘Car Alarm, Turn Signal’ represents “an attempt to capture the overlapping polyrhythms of the streets around my house,” as Kohl explains, with Ka Baird joining on flute to bring the soundscape to life.

The video by Kohl herself performs the same action as the song itself, focusing on a seemingly mundane aspect of a street with such attention that its strange beauty is revealed.

Normal Sounds is out on the 30th August via Moon Glyph and available to pre-order from Bandcamp.

lots of hands – rosie

lots of hands have kept audiences on their toes since their inception in 2019, releasing a string of albums, EPs and singles which float between rock, folk and electronic sensibilities without a care for typical genre conventions. The inventive, shapeshifting style has led to tour slots with the likes of Deerhoof, Cola and Claire Rousay, and live shows only see them push their sound further with sax and flute elevating it towards almost orchestral territory. Which is to say, it can be difficult to know what to expect from a new lots of hands release in the best way possible, and latest single ‘rosie’ is every bit as idiosyncratic and interesting as you might anticipate. Released via Fire Talk Records, the single opens as an intimate bedroom pop with melancholic textures and acoustic guitar before lifting towards something altogether more charged and weighty.

rosie walks in from the rain
with her lips she said
i don’t want no pain
i don’t mean any harm
i just wanna know
where i’m from

‘rosie’ is out now via Fire Talk and you can get it from Bandcamp.

MF Tomlinson – Mary (Big Thief Cover)

We’ve covered the work of MF Tomlinson several times in recent years, with album We Are Still Wild Horses winning us over with its attention to detail and bittersweet emotional landscapes. A style which makes the songwriter the ideal candidate to cover something like ‘Mary’ by Big Thief, a song which feels very much in line with the tone and themes Tomlinson and his band reach for. “I first heard Big Thief’s ‘Mary’ whilst on tour with Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever,” Tomlinson explains. “Late night driving, hyperfocused on the road appearing and disappearing in the narrow headlights, I was swallowed up by the quiet and immense power of the piece—an enormous turning wheel of emotion that summons your earliest and most fundamental places. It just felt fucking huge and at the same time incredibly close and tender. That feeling never left me, and so here we are with this recording.”

Silverware – No Expectations

The recording project of San Francisco-based artist, producer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Ainsley Wagoner, Silverware has long been something of a shapeshifting entity. Previous LP No Plans might have been best described as art pop, though drew from an array of different genres. Follow-up One True Light, coming later this summer on Ghost Mountain Records, appears equally uninterested in simple stylistic conventions. The result is fluid, unpredictable yet always finely crafted, with fittingly titled lead single ‘No Expectations’ introducing the spirit of the record. A vivid pop soundscape precisely mapped but intuitive in style, all anchored around the rich depth of Wagoner’s delivery.

Talk Bazaar – quiet yr mind

Talk Bazaar is the recording project of Brooklyn‘s Alex DeSimine, self confessed “multi-instrumentalist, big pillowy softie, film composer, collaborator [and] confidante.” Upcoming album WHATSPACE? takes all of these facets to capture what DeSimine describes as “the frenetic feeling of both isolation and community, of always trying to slow down and not knowing how to stop.” A whole host of guest musicians lend their talents to better achieve this aim, the wide collaboration a fitting feature of an artist always reaching for new sounds. The record’s closing track, latest single ‘quiet yr mind’ winds things down with an air of soft and smoky contemplation, with contributions from Rebecca El-Saleh (aka Kitba) and Mike Haldeman (Moses Sumney, altopalo, Mk.gee) encapsulating the richness of an album crafted with the kind of care and invention only possible with equal doses of isolation and community.

This Frontier Needs Heroes – Carolina Peaches

Hailing from Brooklyn, NY, but having spent time in Nashville and Jacksonville, FL and Barcelona among other places, Brad Lauretti of This Frontier Needs Heroes has written, recorded and performed music quite literally all over the world. A folk artist in the traditional sense, wandering and entertaining audiences with equal parts playfulness, protest and heartbreak while always pining for places left in the rear view mirror. Latest single ‘Carolina Peaches’ charts such an experience directly, portraying a life on the move in all of its ups and downs, and always haunted by that old love never quite bettered no matter how many miles of road pass beneath the wheels.

I want to live 1000 lives, but where do I want to die?
Somewhere where the peaches are falling from the sky
When I got back on that train lord I knew I wanted to cry
Was that my biggest mistake I guess i’ll always wonder why

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The album sees a whole host of guests elevate the Alex Barkats sound. Emmett Moskowitz (bass, guitars) and David Mandle (drums) make up the core band, but Tacie Moskowitz (singing), Geoff Saba (synths, electric guitar), Travis Snyder (pedal steel), Lizzy Dutton (violin), Artur Friedhoff (violin), Nansamba Ssensalo (viola), Abe Finkelstein (cello) and Ben Hartman (saxophones) all lend their talents too. This arrangement is apparent in all its glory on latest single ‘Butter’. Folk in its warmest, brightest form, channelling the sun-glazed seventies style in its easygoing spirit, though with enough jangle to get those toes tapping too. “It’s all about goodness and light,” as Barkats explains. “Basking in the artificial glow of TV, consuming pop music, the open road forever. No thinking. No nothing. Just enjoying.”

Oh It’s magic
When you turn the dial of the radio
Our feet succumb to your finger and thumb
And there’s butter on every note
Yeah there’s butter on every note

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Philly songwriter Alex Barkats is releasing new album Here we are in the garden later this summer via Ghost Mountain Records, and lead single and opening track ‘Jewels’ gives a window into what to expect from the release. A song of conflicted feelings, where the bright folk sound is shaded by something more melancholic. As though every good moment will also be shadowed by the understanding such a time can only be temporary. But Barkats works against this mood in an effort to carve out a more fulfilling frame of mind. “It’s about finding comfort in routine,” he explains. “Especially when the world is still crumbling. You have to go through so much trial and error to know how to build joy for yourself.”

Antonia Estelle – Don’t Know Why

Back in 2023 we wrote about the Edmonton-based songwriter Antonia Estelle with the EP Poser, describing how the title track embellished acoustic guitar with “syrup-heavy drums,” “gusts of distorted guitar,” and “vocals swaying with quiet intensity like a flickering flame” to explore “the strange balance of a dysfunctional relationship and the ultimate unknowability of selfhood.” Now based in Berlin to study Audio Production at Funkhaus, Estelle is gearing up to release her debut full length, and latest single ‘Don’t Know Why’ introduces the idiosyncratic yet intuitive nature of her work. A sleek pop song which embraces a sense of movement and flow. “My goal while creating this piece was to lean into freedom and playfulness,” Estelle explains. “In the past, I have relied heavily on words and finding meaning in music, but with this song, I wanted to let go of meaning and rather create something that made me want to move my body.”

Blaine Todd – Everyman

Based on Alameda, a former naval base and island in the San Francisco Bay, Blaine Todd is a folk artist in the wanderer tradition. The songwriter as a kind of outlaw perpetually passing through. New album Goodbye ‘Til I Do Good By You follows Todd on this journey, its authentic country sound having an eye on the stars as well as the road, its subtly cosmic style charged with equal parts melancholy and wry humour. “Well, my days go like smoke,” as he sings at the beginning of opener ‘Everyman’, I want to laugh but I choke / Must I be the punchline in some cosmic joke / While just around the bend / Another fire starts smoldering / It flummoxes my ass to no end.” What results is a jaunt to the heart of the human condition, as well as the picture of the beauty and cruelty of the world we’re made to walk.

I nearly found it just today
Held hysteria at bay
But all I can recall is my mother sayin:
Every man rides the horse that he deserves

Jack Gaby – Young Adult

Naarm / Melbourne-based songwriter Jack Gaby has made a name with a bright and jangly brand of indie pop, but there’s more to his work than sunbleached positivity. New single ‘Young Adult’ shows an altogether more contemplative dimension to Gaby’s sound, drifting with a slack rhythm as he considers the wonders and pitfalls of early adulthood. “I went through a period at this age when I was a mess,” as Gaby puts it. “This track is about the tumultuous emotions I experienced at the time.” But rather than present this headspace as a chaotic sound, the sluggish momentum makes for a different kind of experience. One suggestive of the real kicker of such periods, where it feels like you might never gather enough energy to escape the pull of negative feelings, and instead drift within their circular currents forever.

Las Nubes – Enredados (Misty’s Mix)

“Deals with the ways in which activism can be co-opted and exploited,” we wrote of ‘Pesada‘, the recent single from Las Nubes‘ new album Tormentas Malsanas, “the sound [as] tumultuous and hefty as you might expect for such a subject, taking no prisoners with its crushing weight.” With the album now out, the Miami, Florida duo have released one final single, ‘Enredados (Misty’s Mix)’. Not sacrificing one iota of the raucous spirit which marks the work of Ale Campos and Emile Milgrim, the song ramps up the rhythm underpinning the sound to offer something more energetic, grabbing the listener and pulling them along for the ride with all the uncompromising attitude they’ve made their own.

Mary Ocher – The Rubaiyat Medley

To say Mary Ocher’s latest album Your Guide to Revolution is ambitious in its intentions is to risk understatement. A kaleidoscopic and politically charged collection of songs which draws on Ocher’s childhood (born in Moscow to Jewish-Ukrainian parents before emigrating to Tel Aviv during the Gulf War) as a way into wider themes of resistance and civil disobedience. A huge array of styles and influences are utilised across the record, both to evoke the gamut of emotions triggered within the contemporary struggle and to ground the release within a wider history of such subversive art. A central part of the album is a series of three tracks which rework pieces by harpist Dorothy Ashby based on the Rubaiyat of Omar Khyyam, a triptych of songs which Ocher has collected into a short film which echoes The Color of Pomegranates by Sergei Parajanov. Watch it below:

Your Guide to Revolution is out now via the Underground Institute and available from Bandcamp.

Narwhals – Moor Fires

Based between Manchester and the West Yorkshire borough of Calderdale, Narwhals is an indie rock/shoegaze project led by singer-songwriter Jacob Patrick. Drawing on The North’s rich post-punk history, the Narwhals style combines needling guitar and dynamic percussion with Patrick’s signature deep and morose vocals to craft something that sounds big and rich and poignant. Nowhere is this more apparent than on new single ‘Moor Fires’, what the press release calls “a track about grief and heartbreak […] about rebirth and finding peace.” It displays everything that’s great about the Narwhals sound, somber and sonorous but full of energy. Perhaps most impressive is the composure and poise that sits at its centre like the tranquil eye of of a gigantic storm. Frequent collaborator Thē Jaffa also makes an appearance, their backing vocals bringing a lighter counterpoint to Patrick’s and thereby leavening the song as a whole.

Peiriant – Taflu Dŵr

With an experimental sound that draws on everything from folk and post-rock to classical and sound art, mid Wales duo Peiriant combine traditional and electronic styles with samples and found objects for semi-improvised pieces. What results is an almost sculptural approach to music, with Rose and Dan Linn-Pearl building out from a skeleton of an idea with layers of drone and dissonance. One which relies on the push and pull between the main components of violin and electric guitar. New single ‘Taflu Dŵr’ is the perfect introduction for the uninitiated, encapsulating both the detail of the Peiriant sound and the duo’s expert ability to utilise space.

Where’s Beth – Quiet

Writing of single ‘Wide Eyes’ back in March, we described how New York’s Where’s Beth channelled the likes of Sufjan Stevens and Connie Converse in embracing and “idiosyncratic style with conviction and grace to create a sense of authenticity.” Ahead of the debut Where’s Beth full-length Bone Broth, Sarabeth Weszely is back with new single ‘Quiet’. The song again uses a fond, intimate sound to explore wider themes. Written during a trip to Romania where she was struck by the low cost of living and wide open spaces in comparison to New York, the song charts the difficulties of urban living with a tangible warmth. “I was thinking about my relationship to land in the context of a competitive capitalist market (realizing how wild the cost of “air-space” in my home city was compared to the fertile and beautiful land I was spending a few dollars a day to live on),”  This song gives voice to a tension that is familiar to many people who choose to live in cities, whether for career goals or the intoxicating thrill of a crowd.”

Wishy – Triple Seven

With the release of Wishy‘s Triple Seven looming next month on Winspear, the  Indianapolis band have unveiled the title track to allow audiences to get a little more acquainted with the forthcoming full-length. A slice of lush dream pop which both pays homage to forebears likes The Cranberries and Cocteau Twins while fashioning the nineties-nostalgic sound into something entirely their own. “A little bit uncertain / I wasn’t really sure / I walked out in silence / I shut that door,” Nina Pitchkites sings in the opening, but the bright sound soon smothers any sense of doubt, instead offering an affirming if slightly wistful track to soundtrack your later summer evenings as the sun dips below the horizon.

Watch the video directed, filmed and edited by Haoyan of America below:

Triple Seven is out on the 16th August via Winspear and you can pre-order it now.

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“I’ve got too much on my plate / I’ve got too much in my brain,” sings Brighton‘s alx frncs on new single ‘i can’t do anything right’. The track is an attempt to process an extremely difficult period via an intimate, gentle sound. “I wrote ‘i can’t do anything right’ after coming out of a deep depression,” frncs describes. “Personal situations were beginning to change and it finally felt like I could process what had happened to me both physically and mentally during the second half of the pandemic.” What results is confessional in tone yet empathetic in nature, serving as both an expression of gratitude to those who helped keep frncs afloat during those intensely difficult months, as well as a comforting hand extended backwards through time as a gesture of self-love and understanding.

you may think i’m lazy
when i fail to wash up dishes daily
hardly got a grasp on life
when death is constant on my mind

Anna Erhard – Botanical Garden

“I read this Google review from a guy who complained about the bad parking situation in the middle of the Atlantic,” explains Swiss indie pop artist Anna Erhard of the inspiration behind her latest single ‘Botanical Garden’. “Eventually this person who is incredibly judgmental and won’t be pleased by anything, not even by the flowers in the Botanical Garden, came to life.” The result is as sardonic as you’d imagine, skewering a specific brand of impossible-to-please (most often) man that seems so prevalent. But it’s full of a strange joy too. Erhard’s deadpan delivery only heightens the song’s humour, and the chorus is as catchy as anything you will hear all year.

they would not allow us
to pick our favorite flowers
kids were singing happy birthday
too close to the highway

Brenna Bruce – Kite and the Line

Taken from her forthcoming debut EP Honest Bloom on Ghost Mountain Records, ‘Kite and The Line’ is the new single from Brenna Bruce. With help from Taylor Heath (piano), Keith Lowe (bass), Trevor Church (drums), Lane King (pedal steel), Chris Coleman (synth) and Abby Gunderson (strings), Bruce brings to life a serene sound shadowed by a certain mournfulness, evoking the way even the most tranquil environment is in some way made poignant by the latent promise of its own end. Such ideas are central to Honest Bloom, where every emotional state is but part of a larger cycle, and beauty can be found in the acceptance of life’s ephemeral nature.

Jon Campbell – Arrow

“Depression dog / lead me to where / I can thrive.” So sings Jon Campbell on ‘Arrow’, the latest single from forthcoming album Still Life With Motion Sickness. Set against a backdrop of sparse piano and ambience, the words sound like a gentle plea as voiced to an empty room. The US-born, Berlin-based artist’s croon murmured as though not to puncture the stillness of the moment. But as the track develops, the vocals grow in desperation or conviction and the sound follows suit. A gradual blossom around Campbell’s increasingly impassioned voice as he airs frustrations, summoning strength from some inner well so as to draw the fortitude to face down one’s demons.

depression, dog!
try seein’ things from my eyes
you wouldn’t dare to try
you wouldn’t have the balls

Still Life With Motion Sickness is out on the 22nd March and you can pre-order it now.

Laurel Bluffs – Block 4

Back in November we introduced  Phoenix, Arizona-based project Laurel Bluffs with single ‘Richmond’. The story of a hungover drive to the titular location where a “folk rock sound and unadorned delivery [lent] an intimacy to the track, where fondness and longing are present without spilling into sugary sentiment.” Latest single ‘Block 4’ follows the same formula, another narrative-based track which blurs the line between fondness and regret in its recollections, told with unerring detail yet never anything other than earnest in tone. Echoes of Andy Hull’s Right Away, Great Captain! are present in the tales of love and violence, and the manner these stories of vengeance and punishment are told with the ache of remove.

‘Block 4’ is out now and available from the usual places.

Nico Paulo – Learning My Ways

This time last year, Portuguese-Canadian songwriter Nico Paulo released her self-titled album on Forward Music Group, a release we described as “marked in its ability to broach weighty topics with a sense of lightness and grace, all tied together by a vocal style at once compassionate and unerring in its focus.” To celebrate the record’s first birthday, Paulo has returned with a brand new video for the single ‘Learning My Ways’, a sweet and impassioned love song that isn’t afraid to explore the less idyllic side to relationships. Featuring tour footage shot and edited by Sarah Kierstead, the film is the ideal commemoration of everything which goes into making an album a success, as well as the singular joy of taking that music to different people every evening.

Nico Paulo is out now via Forward Music Group and you can get it from Bandcamp page.

SUB*T – Unearthly

This June will see the release of Spring Skin, the fittingly titled new EP from Brooklyn alt-rockers SUB*T which sees duo Jade Alcantara and Grace Bennett step firmly into the next stage of their growth. Lead single ‘Unearthly’ hints at what this might sound like, taking the nineties-inspired fuzzy rock energy of debut So Green and adding a darker edge to create something full of brooding swagger. “‘Unearthly’ is a song that’s been in our arsenal for a while,” the band explain. “We chose this as the first single off the EP because the taste of it is a little moodier than the other music we’ve put out […] It feels like a dark fairytale journey, and intentionally leaning into an image like that was new for us when writing this song.” Check out the video directed by Alcantara and Bennett themselves below:

Spring Skin is out in June via If This Then Records and you can pre-order it now.

Tara Kannangara – Apartment

Last week saw the release of Extraordinary People, the new EP from Sri Lankan-Canadian songwriter and musician Tara Kannangara. The Juno Award-nominated artist has long won acclaim for her inventive combinations of genres, drawing on classical training and jazz sensibilities to push synth pop to new heights. Extraordinary People is no less ambitious in its sound, as lead single and opening track ‘Apartment’ attests. A song which embraces the thrill of an early relationship where everything is undecided and the possibilities are endless, packed full of tender details yet blown up to epic proportions in a manner sure to win over fans of early Mitski. But as the track progresses and its full cathartic heft reveals itself, such comparisons are rendered insufficient, failing to suggest the scope of styles which knit into the finished whole.

youbet – Nurture

Walking a tightrope between self-love and self-loathing, ‘Nurture’ is a new single from Way To Be, the upcoming album by Brooklyn’s youbet on Hardly Art. The track’s bittersweet mood is a fitting introduction to a record crafted in the aftermath of a period doubt and disillusionment, a spell broken by a chance encounter at Penn Station with Patti Smith. “She wished me luck,” Nick Llobet explains, “and said, ‘Practice hard, Nick.'” Heeding the advice, Llobet pushed ahead with the new record with a newfound energy, meeting any doubts with curiosity and playfulness instead of succumbing to them. So while tracks like ‘Nurture’ might sound bummed out on the surface, their very existence is a testament to the value of keeping on in spite of things.

Watch the video below animated by Sabrina Nichols:

Way To Be is out on the 10th May via Hardly Art and you can pre-order it now.

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Hamilton, Ontario indie rock outfit Dark Mean have been making music for well over a decade now, introducing themselves with a self-titled album back in 2011 and returning every few years with new songs to prove the project is still alive and kicking. Their first release since 2016, ‘Working Hard’ feels like a dispatch from a reality faced by a huge number of acts these days, where cycles of inspiration and hiatus are governed by work schedules and personal responsibilities. A song fired by the twin forces of frustration and passion and driven by the urgency of the ticking clock.  “I haven’t forgot your name / I’d give it to you if you ever came,” as one verse plays. “I’ve still got a lot to say / I’ll tell you about it someday.”

Grocer – Caterpillar Pilled

“‘Packrat’ finds Grocer at their most collaborative, trusting in the bonds which have now developed between the members to make something far greater than the sum of its parts.” So we wrote of the first single from the Philly band’s new album Bless Me, coming later this spring on Grind Select, which promises to elevate Grocer’s trademark volatility to new heights. Latest single ‘Caterpillar Pilled’ embodies this spirit, possessing both brash energy and off-the-wall charm. With constant changes of speed, the song is always on the verge of unravelling into chaos but manages to cling on by its fingertips, emerging all the more triumphant as a result. Watch the video by Nicholas Rahn below:

Bless Me is out on the 19th April via Grind Select and you can pre-order it now.

hemlock – Garbage Truck

Back in 2022 we mentioned talk soon by Chicago’s hemlock, describing single ‘to carry’ as “a song of hushed yet heartfelt vignettes which rises toward an impassioned finale, providing snapshots of love in its various guises.” The project has since gone on to put out several further releases, including the single ‘monarch‘, a month-long song-a-day challenge album and a live session, but now hemlock is teaming up with the good folks at Ghost Mountain Records to celebrate the second anniversary of the talk soon release with the album’s first ever vinyl run. To mark the occasion, hemlock has unveiled a video for the single ‘Garbage Truck’ directed and edited by lead Carolina Chauffe and filmed along with Daniel Joseph and Reed Everette. Check it out below:

The talk soon vinyl is out on the 10th May via Ghost Mountain Records and you can pre-order it now.

Lamplight – S/T

Back in January we previewed the self-titled album Ian Hatcher-Williams’s Lamplight on Western Vinyl, what we called “an exploration of how one’s sense of identity shifts and changes according to any number of present conditions, not least the place we call home at any given time.” With the record now out, Lamplight has shared the title track as a final single, which serves to not only underline the intentions behind the album but the Lamplight project as a whole. After experiencing a profound mixture of love and grief on contemplating the inevitable end of an intimate relationship, Hatcher-Williams found comfort in the concept of reincarnation, as well as a poem by Mark Strand titled ‘Love Silhouetted by Lamplight’ (from which Lamplight would come to take its name). “I’m too high
the lamp light, you’ve / caught me crying,” as he sings:

now we’re laying here uncovered
our legs braided around each other

i’m fixated on the future
that one day we lose the other

come back to, for a moment
that’s just long enough notice

we’re cosmically together
a bond older than each other

The song comes complete with a video which further develops these themes:

Lamplight is out on now via Western Vinyl and available from the Lamplight Bandcamp page.

Margaux – DNA

Back in 2019 we wrote about More Brilliant Is The Hand That Throws The Coin, the debut EP by Margaux released via Massif Records, describing how the juxtaposition of bright energy and syrupy dreamscape on single ‘Palm’ “serve[d] to bring to the life to duality of people too, as though beneath the outward face of our feelings lies depth more expansive and strange.” With a debut full-length on the way later this year, The Brooklyn singer-songwriter has now returned with ‘DNA’, another nuanced picture where longing and confrontation can occur simultaneously, and a floating drift can quickly escalate towards a cathartic climax. It’s apparently the first song from an album due later in the year, so be sure to keep your eyes peeled for more info.

The debut Margaux full-length will be released later this year via Massif Records.

May Rio – Fun!

Stretching the definition of a solo project, New York‘s May Rio sometimes plays with a classic guitar/drums band, and others an arrangement of cello, piano and saxophone. The latter, what she calls the Elegant Ensemble, gives its name to the new May Rio album. A collection of rearrangements of previously released tracks, scrubbed clean of the gloss of studio production and presented anew as an assemblage of their essential parts. There is one brand new track too though. Titled ‘Fun!’ it’s a song about a teenage car accident delivered with the idiosyncratic blend of playfulness and grace which runs through Rio’s work. “The day I got my driver’s permit, aged sixteen,” she describes, “I borrowed my mother’s forest-green Isuzu Trooper for a trip to a new movie showing at the mall,” only the adventure was cut short at a junction.

Sweet sixteen I get to take a spin
Windows rolled down wind’s all on my skin
T-boned by a speeding stoner hard
Momma’s Trooper’s totaled but what’s worse
Is it was fun

Watch the video directed by Ben Gordon below:

Elegant Ensemble is out on the 3rd May.

Meagre Martin – Malcolm

Meagre Martin‘s Gut Punch, released last year on Mansions and Millions introduced the Berlin-based band’s ability to broach the most pressing social themes of the moment with both confidence, fire and relatability. “The gut punch of the title therefore refers not so much to the Meagre Martin sound but rather the subject matter they take on,” as we put it in a preview. “The world as a series of debilitating blows.” New single ‘Malcolm’ continues this style to great effect, leaning into a more guitar-led sound to better evoke the track’s rebellious nature. An ode to Malcolm in the Middle at once fond and discordant, teasing out themes of precarity and generational trauma from within nostalgic memories of the show.

I’m human too,
We break the rules
That’s nothing new
Why settle down
You start to drown
So pull me out

Robert Ouyang Rusli – Elizabeth’s Voicemail

Brooklyn-based composer and artist Robert Ouyang Rusli took on their most ambitious project to date with the soundtrack for Julio Torres’s Problemista, a new film coming later this month via A24, starring Torres alongside the likes of Tilda Swinton. The artist, who also records under the moniker Ohyung, created over fifty songs for the score, looking to match the surreal world Torres has created with something just as agile and inventive. Single ‘Elizabeth’s Voicemail’ serves as an enticing glimpse of the project’s full scope, the film bleeding into the soundtrack in the same manner the music pours into the film. Orchestral arrangements of synths and choral vocals are accentuated with sounds from the colourfully whimsical film-world, creating what the press release describes as “rhythmic backdrops for the bureaucratic nightmares of the American immigration system.”

The Problemista soundtrack will be released on the 15th March, and the film itself on the 22nd.

W. Y. Huang – Life Just Lately (feat. Granata)

Facing the sudden onset of chronic pain, Singapore-born, New York-based singer-songwriter W. Y. Huang turned to music as an outlet. His new EP Knots, coming later this spring, serves as an exploration of pain and healing, as well as the more general transience of things and the ebb and flow of hope. First single ‘Life Just Lately’ introduces this with a bright and breezy indie pop style, welcoming New York rap artist Granata to further the track’s unguarded tone and capture the mood of the release as a whole. “This EP was a deeply personal endeavour, both in how the songs came together and the writing process,” as Huang explains. “It all blossomed from a very vulnerable place.”

‘Life Just Lately’ is out now and available from the W. Y. Huang Bandcamp page. Knots will be released in May.

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We introduced the record back in October with ‘De Algo Hay Que Morirse‘, a song about Craig’s habit of dreaming of accidently driving people to their doom which captures this spirit. “I used to drive people off of cliffs, bridges, etc to our deaths and wake up,” she describes. “When I dreamt the dream with my Argentine partner, he responded, ‘You have to die of something–De algo hay que morirse.'” As the song built from its gentle beginnings, it overcame the sense of loss and guilt. “I’m alive and I can’t believe my luck,” as Craig sings around the halfway mark, finding “a carefree joy in accepting her own mortality.”

‘Of Least Resistance’ follows a similar pattern. A song delivered half in English, half in Spanish where Weeper probe at the possibility of a freedom achieved via radical acceptance. The sense that a certain degree of surrender might encourage rather than limit agency. Allow one to shake free of the stifling attempt at control.

Working through such questions is central to the Weeper project. As though the camaraderie of the band members helps them extend a similar fondness and kindness to their selves. “I can’t seem to stop singing about being a friend to myself,” as Craig explains. “I have always been interested in what friendship is made of. As a band, Weeper has gotten to know itself through making this album—and like many bands, at the heart of what we do is a deep friendship.” The result is a tangible sense of trust and confidence which allows Weeper to push into difficult spaces—often within themselves. As highlighted on opener ‘Vipassana’, which confronts situations in which words perhaps fail, though music perhaps conveys what needs to be said.

All of this is aided by Weeper’s willingness to move with such fluidity. Be that between folk and rock styles, upbeat and melancholic moods, or indeed English and Spanish lyrics. “Weeper is down to move and be moved,” as their bio puts it, capturing the diversity of their aims. If the goal of their songs is to explore what friendship is made of, then the answer seems to be a little bit of everything. The fun moments, the dark, the times they show up for you and you them, and even those occasions where things are less than perfect. “Friends aren’t good or bad,” Craig as sings on the reflective pop of ‘Hard Friend’, “you show them what you have / and you give the benefit / of your doubt when you can.”

Weeper is out now via Ghost Mountain Records and available from Bandcamp.

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