With the album now out in the world, we’re pleased to report Songs from the Yellow Couch maintains this level of emotional resonance and sonic experimentation across its length, and thus proves a fitting debut. Take the fluctuation of latest single ‘Roller Coaster’. Clocking in at nearly five minutes, the track represents one of the most expansive and considered Dwi Riana has written to date, its foundations of intimate acoustic guitar built upon with subtle flourishes and heartfelt vocals. This style (not to mention the title) is fitting considering the subject matter, for ‘Roller Coaster’ is a picture of a relationship in all of its ups and downs. Specifically how each party must negotiate the ever-changing needs and desires of the other in order to maintain the bond. Frequent collaborator Julie Meunier lends supporting vocals to further the chemistry and poignancy of the sound, and the result is tender, unguarded and forthright. “I used to feel so resentful singing this song,” Dwi Riana explains, “but in the end, I found it to be a way of understanding, and eventually accepting the nature of some relationships.”

This sentiment holds across the record, Dwi Riana’s ability to combine honesty and self-reflection with genuine tenderness conjuring a sound that speaks harsh truths without sacrificing a sense of compassion. Something apparent from the searching tone of opener ‘Elsewhere’, a drifting, considered number which Connor Bennett’s sax nudges towards almost jazzy territory, or the candid ‘Write Home’, which again builds from an acoustic base to ask difficult questions and confront home truths. There’s a patient longing to ‘Your Girl’, as though spiralling inwards towards the real heart of a desire, while ‘In Between’ possesses a stirring rhythm and poetic clarity which communicates the feeling of exposure while moving through a transitional phase. ‘She/Her’ also displays the vulnerability that runs through these songs, and it comes to seem like this willingness to lower defences is central to the album. As though the only way to really confront something as important as identity or relationships is to bare your heart and endure any pain which might result. But, true to the spirit of Songs from the Yellow Couch, this pain is not the lasting impression. Rather it is the wellspring of gladness which emerges upon finally locating that which has been missing for so long.

Cause nothing
Could ever come close
To the feeling that you get
When you find what you have lost

Songs from the Yellow Couch is out now and available from the Dwi Riana Bandcamp page.

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Featuring Marshall Veroni (second vocals) and Jill Sauerteig (cello), the song is something of a follow-up to the aforementioned ‘Elsewhere’. The thaw after a long winter where the possibility of growth and love becomes real again. “I wrote this song on my classical guitar last spring, and it has evolved quite a bit since then,” Dwi Riana explains. “I have been a fan of Marshall Veroni and Jill Sauerteig for years now through Marshall’s LP In Fields. I’ve listened to this album over and over for the last few years, so Marshall’s vocals and Jill’s cello had become very close to my heart. To be working with them now is such an honour, and they really complete the vision I had for the song.”

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

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“Highlights how grand need not equate to ostentatious.” So we wrote of ‘Cartwheels For Coins‘, a recent single from Way Through by Cici Arthur, the new collaboration between Toronto artists Joseph Shabason, Chris A. Cummings and Thom Gill. “Because for all of the richness of the [project’s] sound, there’s a grounded quality to it too. A kind of attention to detail which allows each track to become its own little slice of life.” With the album out now via Western Vinyl, Cici Arthur are back with the opener and title track as a final single. The perfect encapsulation of the record’s ability to exist as something both cinematic Technicolor and drably human. “What good are dead ends when I’m looking for a way through?” as Cummings sings. ““When the miracle you’d hoped for never comes it’s hard to take, but it’s your fault for hoping.”

Way Through is out now via Western Vinyl and you can get it from Bandcamp.

Dusty Lucite – Old Feelings (feat. D. Crane)

Led by H.L Stratton-Kuhta, Portland, Oregon-based indie outfit Dusty Lucite reach across a whole myriad of genres to bring to life a sound as colourful and idiosyncratic as it is fun. Latest album Normal Harder serves as the ideal introduction for the uninitiated, pitching the listener into a singular world carved from psych-inflected pop and folk. The album is something of a grab bag, mixing raucous garage rock numbers with sedate, dreamy croons, and thus no one single can quite capture the experience, but standout ‘Old Feelings’ is perhaps the best place to dive in. It’s a song which embodies both the playful spirit and emotional depth of the Dusty Lucite sound, enlisting D. Crane (of BOAT, Unlikely Friends) to add to the swirl of melancholic contemplation.

Normal Harder is out now and available from Bandcamp.

Dwi Riana x Julie Meunier – Elsewhere

Back in 2023, songwriters Dwi Riana and Julie Meunier teamed up for single ‘World War X‘. “An exchange between lovers which begins as a seemingly innocuous conversation but ratchets up with every sentence,” as we wrote, “soon precipitating into an argument which draws the relationship’s tensions out into the open.” Now the pair have reunited for brand new track ‘Elsewhere’. What they describe as “a love song for winter,” the single celebrates those cold days that send you into cosy refuge, as well as the self-reflective peace which descends along with the snow. “When it snows here in Toronto, I can’t help but think of where I come from,” Dwi Riana explains. “As each snowflake chaotically float along in the air, I think about all the little choices I’ve made in life to end up here.”

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

Eli Carvajal – Fear of Love

Across a number of albums, London-based songwriter Eli Carvajal has made a name with a markedly unguarded, earnest style, combining folk and pop sensibilities into something at once playful, curious and heartfelt. Following on from 2024 release Eat Shiitake Now, Carvajal is kicking off 2025 with a new single ‘Fear of Love’. It’s a song of two halves which emerged from a period of transition which in turn suggests his next direction. “The first [half] came in March 2022, isolated at home in Watford, aching to start a new life in Japan,” as Carvajal explains. “The second came a year later in Higashikitazawa, Tokyo, surfacing for air after a year afraid. This is a bridge between my last life and this one, my last album and the next. Hydrangeas were harmed.”

Fime – Better Half of a Dollar

Having made waves with 2019 EP Sprawl, the rise of Fime was in many ways derailed just as it was beginning, the LA outfit suffering the consequences of 2020 and everything that time brought with it. A period of mourning and self-reflection followed, before they teamed up with Melina Duterte (Jay Som) to record full-length Sweeter Memory, an album which grappled with nostalgia as the bittersweet, counterproductive force it can so often be. With this context in mind, new single ‘Better Half of a Dollar’ feels like the dawning of a new era. One which has decided to lift itself from beneath the past and all of its unrealised dreams to contend with the present on its own terms. A song as searing and intense as anything Fime have written to date, with lead Beto Brakmo declining the temptation to retreat into nostalgia, instead staring the precarious, volatile present dead in the eye and refusing to blink.

Watch the video directed by Hailey Ruffner below:

‘Better Half of a Dollar’ is out now and available from Bandcamp.

Leoblu – livingroomfloor

“An indie pop song filtered through a digital prism, it combines synths, beats and Carlsson’s signature vocals to create something at once emotional and oddly mesmerising.” So we wrote of ‘PEACHES’ by Åland-born, Berlin-based producer Leoblu last year, the song continuing the artist’s willingness to test genre expectations to reach new ground. Latest single ‘livingroomfloor’ is no different, evoking the intimate space of its title to explore the immediate experience of love, Leoblu creating a beguiling pop soundscape which is at once grounded and ethereal, alluring and strange. “Love is full of contradictions,” as Leoblu puts it. “It can be overwhelming yet fragile, euphoric yet filled with doubt. ‘livingroomfloor’ is about letting yourself feel it all, and trying to stay present in these feelings.”

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

Mumble Tide – Pea Soup

“Grounds both the style and theme of the album, offering a sound undeniably sad yet reaching towards something more uplifting.” That’s how we described ‘Mawpao’ from Mumble Tide‘s forthcoming full-length Might As Well Play Another One on Breakfast Records. The song typified a release written as duo Gina Leonard and Ryan Rogers moved through a break-up to genuine friendship. Latest single ‘Pea Soup’ embraces this space in all of its contradictions, juxtaposing bright power pop tones with morose bedroom pop reflection to emerge with a picture of a moment with all the dark, light and undecided future left intact. “‘Pea Soup’ is one big lumpy splurge, Leonard explains, “scribbled down on a hot day hiding away in my bedroom. It’s a bit of throwback to OG Mumble Tide with a chorus too big to slurp in one go.”

Watch the video by Mumble Tide, with colour and title card by Steph Dutton, below:

Might As Well Play Another One will be released via Breakfast Records on the 1st May and you can pre-order it now from the Mumble Tide Bandcamp page.

naya mö – reverb boy

We’ve featured a number of singles from naya mö‘s forthcoming debut EP Dealing With Ghosts in recent months, with ‘wanderlust‘ “draw[ing] on the grunge and alt-pop of the nineties and the soaring indie rock of the mid 00s [to create] something that sparkles with possibility despite being coated in gritty fuzz and shadowy reverb” and ‘outsider‘ “tap[ping] into a gauzy shoegaze style to create an enveloping sense of loneliness, though [one] charged with enough energy to face this darkness with a steely defiance.” Latest track ‘reverb boy’ continues the dreamy aesthetic to offer a picture of the titular character—a figure adrift from everything yet able to make his voice heard around the world. “The EP is about the ghosts that haunt my mind and body—good and bad, dark and light, love and fear,” Mö explains. “Shadows of memories, ideas, regret, and people linger in my head. I wrote songs about them and drenched them in distortion, reverb, and fuzz.”

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

Palmyra – Arizona

Emerging from the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia, Palmyra is a folk rock outfit consisting of trio Teddy Chipouras, Mānoa Bell and Sasha Landon. Next month sees the release of new full-length album Restless on Hey Boy Records, and the band have shared new single ‘Arizona’. Described as “a little dose of summer in the dead of winter,” the song evokes the affirming joy of a road trip with a fresh, vivid Americana style, where everyday worries seem to evaporate within the languid rhythms of easy forward motion. “I was in a haze in Arizona come back won’t it come back,” as the opening lines detail:

Hours felt like days and I was happy for the first time in a while
I was at a payphone in Sedona calling someone falling
Up over my head and back to Boston leave me in the desert please

Leave me open
Arizona

Restless is out on the 28th March via Hey Boy Records and you can pre-order it now.

Triathalon – RIP

It is not every day you come across an album built around the maxim ‘play this at my funeral,’ but Triathalon’s forthcoming full-length Funeral Music is exactly that. The New York trio (Adam Intrator, Chad Chilton and Hunter Jayne) thought long and hard about what might soundtrack their respective requiems when writing their fifth record, and the result is perhaps their darkest and most unguarded collection of songs to date. Ahead of its release in May on Lex Records, Triathlon have shared single ‘RIP’ to give an indication of the mood. A song so shadowy and dramatic is sounds almost sublime. “The aim for ‘RIP’ was to kick start feelings on what it felt like to listen to a late 90s rock song for the first time as a kid in your parents car in the backseat and asking to hear it louder,” as Intrator explains. “‘RIP’ has a double meaning; it’s about both dying and being reborn.”

Wishy – Fly

Back in January we featured ‘Planet Popstar’, a single by Wishy from the Triple Seven sessions which saw Kevin Krauter’s vocals “[land] somewhere between impassioned and laconic, while supporting harmonies from Nina Pitchkites work to leaven the heavy thicket of guitar to create something almost ethereal,” as we wrote. “And this otherworldly tone is a fitting match for the track’s themes, something of a message beamed into space into the hope it might be received, no matter how far away from earth the recipient might be.” The Indianapolis outfit have now announced the Planet Popstar EP, coming this spring on Winspear, and latest single ‘Fly’ is everything fans of the band have come to love. This time Pitchkites takes lead vocals for a song that looks to move beyond heartbreak with a mix of affirming energy and wistful longing.

Someday, babe, I don’t wanna feel the way
I don’t need to know the taste
Of not being with you

Watch the video below, filmed by Wishy themselves with editing, color grading and title card by Bobby Sheppard:

Planet Popstar is out on the 25th April via Winspear and you can pre-order it now.

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New single ‘Arga’ is no exception. The song combines bossa nova sensibilities with elements of jazz and dance, conjuring a sound playful, nostalgic and fond, which proves fitting for its intentions. Because ‘Arga’ is written to their two brothers, as well as the childhood they shared together. “I tell them that I hope they have found love in their lives and that they are loved as they are,” as Riana explains. “In return, I hope that they are able to love me as I am, as the person that I’ve become. Because as much as I’ve changed, at my very core, I’m still the person that they grew up with.”

This is delivered with a real sense of fun, with percussion adding a tangible energy which brings to mind the relationship shared between children, though the underpinning emotion has considerable depth too. “Arga is a name that I use to refer to both my brothers at once,” as Dwi Riana continues. “It was the name of our mother’s first born, our older brother, who passed away as a baby. Even though they’re not with us anymore, we always talked about them as if he was still around. Arga is a Javanese word that translates to “tall mountain”, so for me this name represents a strong and constant presence. I always have this feeling that this name will come back into our lives in some way.

‘Arga’ is out now and available from streaming services.

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New single ‘World War X’ is no less evocative, though this time turns from the personal in favour of more narrative storytelling form. An exchange between lovers which begins as a seemingly innocuous conversation but ratchets up with every sentence, soon precipitating into an argument which draws the relationship’s tensions out into the open. Julie Meunier joins the track to really capture the sense of two personalities in a room, and the chemistry between the voices serves to underline the building mood of the sound.

“I wrote the second half of the song with Julie in mind,” Riana explains. “She has a voice that really catches your attention and keeps you listening. As soon as I heard Julie sing her part, I knew that she was an integral part of the story. Whenever I play this song on my own, it feels lonely, and almost blasphemous to sing her parts.”

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Last month Indonesia-born, Toronto-based songwriter Dwi Riana released their new EP, Jambu Tree, a bilingual release which draws on everything from folk to hip hop to realise its distinctive exploration of the immigrant experience. Single ‘WTFAI’ is a perfect introduction, a love-hate ode to their new home which does for Toronto what The Weakerthans’ ‘One Great City!’ did for Winnipeg. “My first winter in Toronto, it got down to minus forty degrees,” Dwi Riana explains. “People told me that it was the worst winter they’ve had in twenty five years. The next winter, it was the worst in twenty six years, and so on… I thought to myself ‘Where the fuck am I?'”

Jambu Tree is out now and available from the usual places.

ghost orchard – Sweet Song

Last month we wrote about ghost orchard, the project of Sam Hall from Grand Rapids, Michigan, describing single ‘rest’ as “a picture of calm and patience amid loss, where the quiet stillness holds the latent warmth of things now gone.” The song was the opener from the debut ghost orchard LP, rainbow music, which came out last week via Winspear. The album is a meditation on themes of home and change and the tangible echoes that remain when people move on, preaching patience and acceptance in a world that seems determined to rush by. This atmosphere is captured nicely on penultimate track ‘Sweet Song’, a bittersweet bedroom pop song that holds much tenderness and feeling in its sub two minute runtime.

g. spinn – We Might

Based in Tucson, AZ, g. spinn is a recording project unafraid to push the boundaries of genre. Since its formation in 2018, he has released music across the spectrum, from meditative ambient album summer’s long gone to singles more at home in hip hop, pop and indie rock brackets. New EP Nostalgia Melancholy draws from various points of this oeuvre, with single ‘We Might’ showing off the hybrid ambient-folk style. Wistful field recordings and warm acoustic guitar paint a mood fitting for the EP’s title, and the track’s pivot to lush ambient tones in its middle section only further cements the sound’s reflective quality.

Joan Kelsey – Survivor

“In a time of tremendous difficulty I tried to make something life-affirming: grieving songs which look toward joy.” So explains Seattle songwriter Joan Kelsey of new album Standing Out On The Grass, out later this week on Dear Life Records. A collection of songs written in the aftermath of loss, the days and months when grief arrives fresh with each moment, a thing at once personal and universal and impossible to ever quite overcome. But as single ‘Survivor’ shows, Kelsey does not try to conquer this sadness but instead place it within a wider context. Layer death into a larger, interconnected picture where the cruel linearity of time and space is upended, and nothing is ever really gone. Watch the video by John Desousa below:

Standing Out On The Grass is out on the 11th November via Dear Life Records and you can pre-order it now.

Mui Zyu – Ghost with a Peach Skin

Next February sees the release of Rotten Bun for an Eggless Century, a brand new album from London‘s Mui Zyu (AKA Eva Liu of Dama Scout) on Father/Daughter Records, and lead single ‘Ghost with a Peach Skin’ gives a hint as to what to expect. “This song is about leaving your former self and entering your new peach skin,” as Mui Zyu explains. “Peaches are considered a symbol of longevity and even immortality in Chinese culture. The protagonist has overcome enemies and has bruises to prove the damage.” The track achieves the effect sonically, the sound itself bruised by distortion even as Zyu’s vocals progress with a calm confidence, the voice of a protagonist who is stepping out from the past and into something new. Check out the video directed and edited by CLUMP Collective below:

Rotten Bun for an Eggless Century is out via Father/Daughter Records on the 24th February and you can pre-order it now.

Philippa Zawe – Would You Lean

Ahead of upcoming EP Shudder Pt. I, Philippa Zawe has shared brand new single, ‘Would You Lean.’  Writing of previous release Road of Hope, we described Zawe’s work as a combination of “folk and soul… built around her versatile voice,” the delivery “switching from casual conversational comments to strikingly effecting croons to produce something that ebbs and flows with human warmth.” The new track is no less impressive in this regard, though builds on previous releases with an increasingly rich arrangement of instruments. A sound capable of exploring themes of loss, friendship and faith with a decidedly compassionate tone.

Sassyhiya – I had a thought

Rising from the ashes of cult LGBTQ punks Barry, Sassyhiya is the project of London-based partners Kathy Wright and Helen Skinner. Recorded during lockdown, their debut EP gum demos introduced the irreverent charm of their punky, poppy sound. But now with the addition of Pablo Paganotto of Punching Swans (drums) and Neiloy Mookherjee (guitar), Sissyhiya are now a full fledged live band. New EP Live at Paper Dress Vintage captures this newly charged form in all its idiosyncratic fun. Opener ‘I had a thought’ is as good an introduction as any, adding scrappy attitude to the original, taking the angles of post-punk and bending them into off-kilter shapes, leading to something somehow both laidback and volatile.

Thavoron – Twin Sized Bed

Back in April, Seattle-based songwriter Thavoron shared single ’18’ on Trailing Twelve Records, a tender and intimate track which explored the queer experience with dreamlike warmth. The song was relatively stripped back with its careful arrangement of flute, saxophone and guitar, but latest single ‘Twin Sized Bed’ leans more fully into the minimalist folk style. Built on stark guitar and gently emotive vocals, it’s a song concerning the often difficult process of coming to understand and accept yourself brought to life with all the stark solitude of such an experience.

‘Twin Sized Bed’ is out now via Trailing Twelve Records.

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The album is a departure from his previous release, with increased layering leading to complex arrangements that are far more nuanced than Raj’s attempts to convey a simpler, more primal emotion. Tempatempat also sees Piotr sing for the first time, a striking change from his previous instrumental work.

‘Tempatempat’ is a word chosen ‘both for its repetition and meaning.’ In Indonesian, the word could have two meanings depending on where it is broken, with “tempa tempat” meaning ‘foraging place,’ and “tempat empat” meaning ‘forth place’. Indeed, much of the album is infused with Indonesian and Sufi imagery. Piotr sings in both English and Indonesian, and the tracks ’Bhadrakali’ and ‘Yogyakarta’ are apparently the product of a possession he experienced (!), with the Indonesian ‘lyrics’ only translated months later.

Reading this short description of the album, you could be forgiven for thinking the album is a dense maze of spiritual references, inaccessible without some form of chemical aid. While there are elements of this, some of the tracks do stray remarkably close to what could be labelled pop music. If you took the Dirty Projectors avant garde pop sound, and made it marginally weirder by the slowing bits down and speeding bits up and emphasizing the wrong notes, you would probably be left with something similar to Tempatempat. Listen to ‘Rift’ or ‘Terminal’ if you don’t believe me.

You can buy the album via Monotype Records, or directly from Piotr himself.

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