Hayden has been releasing an emotionally rich and thematically deep style of folk music for the past three decades, mining the ostensibly ordinary moments of life for all of the implicit beauty and meaning. His recently announced tenth album The Recent Past promises to be a worthy contribution to this oeuvre. Lead single ‘Time Has Been More Kind’ gives a hint as to what to expect, a song which took inspiration from musical royalty to become what might be the most country-adjacent Hayden song to date. “One of my favourite concerts was country legend Ray Price opening for Willie Nelson at Massey Hall in 2009,” he explains. “He played with a classic old-school ensemble including pedal steel and double fiddles. It was perfection. To match the regretful, longing, rosy retrospection of the song’s narrative, I tried to channel that feeling and atmosphere on this recording.” Adam Hindle (brushed drums), Miranda Mulholland (fiddles), Matt Kelly (pedal steel) and Ben Whitely (upright bass) also lend their talents, and the result is every bit as rich and wistful as its title suggests.

His His – Carousel

The recording project started by Toronto-based songwriter Aidan Belo upon moving out to his family hobby farm, His His has spent the past few years crafting an unguarded style of folk that blends nostalgia, fondness and warmth into a bucolic present. The 2025 single ‘Hardcore Band‘ sound “His His at its most fuzzy and intimate,” as we wrote, “maintaining the earnest tone which has long marked the project and dialling up the closeness through a gauze of DIY texture,” and new single ‘Carousel’ builds upon these ideas. A track recorded to tape at home and possessing all the heart such a homespun practice entails, and still retaining enough rough edges to lend an emotional authenticity too.

Hour – Sky is Blue

“Nothing is hurried, yet there is nevertheless an urgency to the poignant, curious sound. The level of detail is striking but there is no ounce of ostentation. Lesser acts might be overwhelmed if tasked with exploring concepts of loss and mortality, prone to slipping into maudlin excess, but with a unique blend of compassion and abstraction, it seems Hour are up to the task.” So we wrote in a feature on the project’s new full-length Ghost Bridge back in August, Michael Cormier-O’Leary assembling a talented, diverse team of musicians to explore ideas which might overwhelm the average songwriter or band. Following on from the title track and ‘Pearls‘, Hour are teasing the full release with new song ‘Sky is Blue’ and the track is every bit as poignant and aspiring. A reversal of the typical song about grief, the piece is written from the perspective of the departed rather than the survivor, Heeyoon Won (Boosegumps, 22º Halo) adding vocals which are gentle yet weighted with the responsibility of reassurance. It is often tempting to infantalise the dead, imagine them poor souls succumbed to something final and unexpected, but here the whole concept of mortality is flipped on its head. What if it is us here on earth who are naive, yet to fully appreciate the path we must eventually follow? What if the deceased mourn our confusion and pain?

You will travel the same way
with astonishing speed
like so many have done before

Watch the film by Cormier-O’Leary (though be warned, there are flashing lights):

Ghost Bridge will be released on the 9th October via Dear Life Records and you can pre-0rder it from the Hour Bandcamp page.

Karl Mattar – Light Gleams

After spending the best part of a decade recording under the moniker Interbellum, releasing albums like Our House Is Very Beautiful at Night (which offered a “fluid, collage-like style,” we wrote, “[which] feels at once haunted by the past and permeable to the outside world”), Lebanese songwriter Karl Mattar is reverting to his own name for forthcoming full-length The Weather of the World. Recorded in Beirut amid Israel’s war on Lebanon, the album came to life within the chaotic, cruel centre of our historical moment, and the fundamental uncertainty of Mattar’s position sees him turn to personal emotion in order to evoke the shared grief of the region. Lead single ‘Light Gleams’ is the ideal introduction, a track which details the end of a relationship within a contemporary Beirut marked by bombs and pounding rain.

Light gleams
Across the water
And I’m a stranger
Don’t you know me?
Thunderous and blinding-bright
Explosions in the night
And I’ve been listening to the rain again

Ken Wohlrob – Snowdrift

Back in December we wrote about ‘William‘, a song by musician and composer Ken Wohlrob which showed a more instinctive, meditative side to an artist principally known for work with acts like End of Hope, Swarm of Flies, Northern Heretic and Eternal Black. “A track,” as wrote, “which seemed to repel all attempts to develop it beyond its core guitar riff.” Wohlrob’s new album Forgotten Music doubles down on this style, embracing intuition over laboured craft to evoke a sound analogous to the subconscious. One which might seem mysterious or ambiguous, yet retains a sense of deeper order, as though meaning might be found if only we are prepared to delve far enough into its depths. Take the mantra-like new single ‘Snowdrift’, an ostensibly simple song which creates richness not through intricate musicianship but rather making space for contemplation.

Kyla Marlena – Bit the Bullet

“Marlena explores themes of memory and time in a manner which subverts expectations, forgoing the hazy dreaminess which so often accompanies such ideas in favour of something more immediate, scrappy and raw.” So we wrote of ‘21‘, the opening track from Kyla Marlena‘s forthcoming album Hold Time back in September, the Toronto-based songwriter introducing an album charged with dynamism and a sense of life. With the record coming next month via idée fixe, Marlena has now shared new single ‘Bit the Bullet’ to further establish the tone. The song embraces a slightly less mature take on the end of a relationship to harness the energies which stem from immediate reactions. “A lyric like ‘guess that I’m the winner / I had the final say’ is not a real belief I hold. There are no winners and losers,” Marlena explains. “But it felt liberating to express ‘forbidden’ thoughts. The energy in the studio was especially high for this one and it felt important to keep in idiosyncratic moments captured in the recording. Playful moments caught by room mics, for example, felt integral to the song by the end.”

Max Bien Kahn – List II

With a couple of recent singles, Max Bien Kahn has introduced his forthcoming new album Baby Green, “a record which,” as we wrote in a preview, “takes a big swing in order to capture the full spectrum of human experience as witnessed from one person’s perspective.” The result takes mundane encounters and makes them into something poignant, be that something as simple as conversing with a neighbour (‘Neighbours‘) or something even more incidental (‘Skipping Stones‘). Latest track ‘List II’ is no exception to this style, using a shopping list as a starting point to sketch a relationship and the longing which underpins it, painting a picture that is fond and romantic yet shaded by something else too. As though every magical thing is haunted by the possibility of its eventual loss.

partygirl – scars

With lead by Pagona Kytzidis supported by Francesca Pastore’s (guitar), Jonathan Ashley (drums), Claire Lin Jenkins (violin), Andrew Jordan’s (bass), and Jenna Love (sax), it is fair to say Brooklyn’s partygirl is a maximalist affair. Having won a fanbase with a striking live show, the six-piece are now preparing to release their debut full-length, and the album promises to possess every bit of the bombast and catharsis that has made their sets so special. Never one to pull any punches, Kytzidis uses the record to confront the tumultuous in all of its violence, injustice and strangeness, and soaring single ‘scars’ embodies the energy and weight with which partygirl commit to the mission. Watch the video directed and edited by Jenna Love below:

‘scars’ is out now via streaming services.

Robbie Bennett – Sister b/w The Light on Your Face

You might know Robbie Bennett as the keyboardist and multi-instrumentalist for rock royalty The War on Drugs, though in 2020 he set off on a solo career too. Self-released debut Permanent World introduced a rich and personal style of composition, and this December, Bennett is following up with not one but two new full-lengths on American Dreams. Both albums are crafted from layered arrangements of piano and various keyboards and synths which sound decidedly curious in their approach, designed, as he puts it, to feel like you are “walking through an unfamiliar place you want to keep exploring and never have to circle back to where you started.” A sense of progression and discovery exists between the records themselves, with Steloken offering warm and fond soundscapes before Circulation pushes deeper into a more improvised, abstract state, the twin releases playing like a real statement of intent from an artist looking to wide the frame of their work. Listen to singles ‘Sister’ and ‘The Light on Your Face’ now:

Steloken and Circulation will both be released on the 11th December via American Dreams. Pre-order both from the Robbie Bennett Bandcamp page.

This Frontier Needs Heroes – Cadaques Cowboy

Brooklyn-born, Barcelona-based songwriter Bradley Lauretti, better known as This Frontier Needs Heroes, has made a name over the last fifteen years with a diverse and unapologetically DIY style of folk that champions both storytelling and emotional authenticity. Latest album Homage to Catalonia promises to further this body of work, as highlighted by new single and album opener ‘Cadaques Cowboy’. It’s a song about Salvador Dalí’s alleged encounter with a UFO on the Costa Brava which paints its central character as something between Don Quixote and a hero from a Spaghetti Western. A man in search of metaphysical possibility within the legends of Cadaqués, though finding more confusion than anything else.

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Next month sees Interbellum return with a brand new record, Our House Is Very Beautiful at Night, which continues the exploration of such themes with an ever-evolving style. Where the previous album leant toward pop sensibilities, Our House turns toward what Mattar calls a “more organic and anarchic sound.” One crafted around acoustic guitar but fleshed out with a myriad of supporting elements from densely layered instrumentation to sound samples and field recordings, with drummer Pascal Semerdjian (of Lebanese dream pop outfit Postcards) offering contributions from his hometown of Ain Aar. The fluid, collage-like style which emerges feels at once haunted by the past and permeable to the outside world. One singularly geared towards evoking the complex manifestations of memory and trauma with which the album deals.

For Our House Is Very Beautiful at Night is a record of intergenerational reach. A story of violence and ghosts in the aftermath of a civil war, where the lingering vibrations of the past are not only felt in the present but actively shaping the world as it exists today. “Within this framework, ghosts represent trauma,” Mattar explains. “The intergenerational transmission of the phantom—a loss that is untellable and therefore inaccessible to the gradual assimilative work of mourning.” The collective trauma of a country still submerged beneath its history.

Today we have the pleasure of sharing lead single, ‘Partners’. A single which serves as the ideal introduction to the new Interbellum sound. Because for all its ambition and scope, the record foregoes none of the intimacy which lends such concepts their weight. ‘Partners’ offers a glimpse of human life as lived from within the sweep of history, where people not only continue despite the uncertainty and spectres and troubling signs but look for order within the apparent chaos. Any way to square the political whole with their own small lives. Watch the video by Camille Cabbabé below:

I tried to remind you, you couldn’t recall
Did it happen that way? Did it happen at all?
So I do the remembering
Give names to nameless things
I’ve got archiving fever and I’m feeling for walls

But the light is still on in the hall

Our House Is Very Beautiful at Night is set for release on April 7th and you can pre-order it now from the Interbellum Bandcamp page.

Photo by Rachel Tabet

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Tracklisting:

Restorations – Nonbeliever
Goshen Electric Co. – The Grey Tower
Horse Culture – Follow
Yowler – Where Is My Light?
Desert Liminal – Gauze Cave
Anamon – In 3
Adeline Hotel – Lightning
Lea Thomas – Upstream
Scott Orr – No Phone
Advance Base – Christmas in Nightmare City
Blue Wilson – Golden Eyes
The Sofas – Nothing Major
Lazy Legs – Nosebleed
All Boy/All Girl – Bomb
Strange Ranger – New Hair
Elly Swope – Idea
Dweller – Running
Will Henriksen – Halo
Knuckle Pups – Bottom Baby
Ian Wayne – Guessing
Massage – Crying Out Loud
Recluse Raccoon – Mother America
Interbellum – Ink
Marc Ferrino – Like a Spark
Katie Kuffel – As the Crow Flies
Emily Brown – Sometimes
KASHKA – Holding Steady
Philippe Bronchtein – Me and the Moon
Spencer Segelov – Sacred Songs
Annie Dressner – Fades Away
Belaver – Grave Robber
Of The Valley – Ride Alone
Hour – Give thanks in a special way

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Fittingly for such weighty themes, Interbellum takes an experimental route, the sound operating as a kind of analogy for the complexity and strangeness of human experience. “Apocalyptic imagery—real, imagined and figurative—permeates the album, and the instrumentation follows suit, warping, distorting and folding on itself,” Mattar explains. “The record plays like a broken music box, its kaleidoscopic melodic songs disjointed and smeared by noise, dissonance and processed sounds.”

Opening track ‘Distortion’ makes this clear both in sound and lyrics, opening with intimate, stripped back folk that grows misshapen, ending as distorted drone. “Feel it all slipping,” Mattar sings, and it is easy to follow him. “Unraveling once again.” The idea of deterioration is one of the persistent features of what is an otherwise diverse album, from the upbeat indie rock swagger of ‘Another Day’ and ‘It’s All Over’ to the nostalgic ‘Ready to Dissolve’ and morose ‘First Light’, the songs continually threaten to break apart and denature, as though some great force is straining their very structure.

‘Ink’ opens like a toy-box lullaby, kicking into slow, shuffled life with a near clockwork rhythm. The effect is that of a music box grown sentient, breaking from the programmed jingle to communicate more sincerely, with human heart. The lyrics deal with the accumulation of the past—items and objects, images and snippets of remembered moments—a mass of discrete things with which we must build the mosaic of our memory.

“well that’s where it started
and I guess that’s how it ends
rummaging through mystical ruins
rescuing tokens of friendships lost

if the past is a jigsaw puzzle
these are its pieces lying about
I’ve kept restaurant bills and ticket stubs
but most of the ink has rubbed out”

‘PQRST’ is a sweeping example of pop-inspired drone, not unlike the warm melancholy of Talons’, before ‘For Air’ emerges from within its own cloud of reverb as something more assertive, the vocals remaining simple as the drums and synths drive on with newfound energy. ‘Some Ghosts’ reverts to a more traditional folk sound, with it’s patient cadence and earnest vocals, before closing track, ‘Weight of Winter’ ties things together with a wistful indie rock ramble.

“we swear not to speak of the past in present tense
there are no new ways of living
there’s only new mornings to set our lives against

gathering our loose ends
we plotted our escape
and spoke of our dreams again
but they’ve had patents pending
since they’ve started taking shape”

Dead Pets, Old Griefs is out now via Ruptured and you can grab it from the Interbellum Bandcamp page.

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