With the release of the album imminent on Western Vinyl, Shrunken Elvis have returned with new single ‘Marina Pt. 2’. Representative of the album’s kosmische spirit, the song highlights both the elaborate detail and expansive space of the project, its washes of ambient textures like a canvas across which the intricacies of the sound can play. The result unfurls like a widening spiral, drawing in new energies as it progresses, be that the dappled synths and lucent guitar of the opening minutes or the more discordant, rugged crescendo which starts to build around halfway through. Then, once the climax has passed, the song closes back in on itself along the same orbit. Something coaxed to life by intuition and powered by its own momentum. A moment of wonder, however brief, opened up in the world.

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The recording project of Teague Cullen and various friends, Foot Ox has made a name with an experimental style of folk, exploring age-old themes of love, loss and longing with rich arrangements and surreal storytelling. Written during extensive travels of the West, new album A Lighthouse with Silver Dog Eyes (forthcoming via Ernest Jenning Record Co.) utilises a genre-spanning style to reckon with the past and present of the area, and ultimately how the mythology of the American West shifts and persists. Following previous single ‘Horseshoe‘, new track ‘Bed of Violets’ shows the nuanced, layered nature of the record, able to recognise the beauty of the landscape while confronting the malevolent forces which haunt it. “‘Bed of Violets’ is a pretty dark song for me, even if it doesn’t seem that way on the surface,” Cullen explains. “It’s about the struggle of facing a dark force in life and overcoming it. Even though the lyrics themselves might not be overtly hopeful, I feel like the orchestration and the strings bring a sense of something vast and beautiful.”

A Lighthouse with Silver Dog Eyes out on the 11th August via Ernest Jenning Record Co. and you can pre-order it now.

General Absurdity & the Open Source – Limestone Ghost

A self-described “CommUNITY Psych-Folk Music Rebel, Performance ARTeest, Pre/Post Historic Bluez, Multi-dimensional BEeing,” General Absurdity & the Open Source is the new project/alter ego of  Lexington, Kentucky songwriter Derek Feldman. Long time readers might recognise Feldman as Doc Feldman, who we last wrote about back in 2021 with the release of A Healthy Dose of Anxiety, an album recorded with full band Doc Feldman & the Alt + Cntry + Delete. “Progressing with what might at first seem like pessimism, decrying magic spells and empty prayers, [single ‘‘Receiving (for Rollo May)’] repurposes such disillusionment into human solidarity,” we described. “Clasping hands not in plea to God but to pull another out of the shit. If we have control over anything, it is what happens here around us.” The mystical bent of General Absurdity & the Open Source might indicate a brand new stage for Feldman, yet this core message remains. Folk music which belongs alongside contemporaries like Will Johnson and strives for human connection within this lonely world.

People Mover – Cane Trash

Brisbane trio People Mover—that’s Lu Sergiacomi (vocals, guitar), Dan Sergiacomi (drums) and Billy McCulloch (bass)—are preparing to release their new album Cane Trash via Little Lunch Records next month, and have unveiled the title track as an introduction. It’s an inherently nostalgic track that draws on memories of the ash which filled the air of hometown Bundaberg during the burn-off of sugarcane before harvest, the bright, upbeat surface belying the melancholic weight at it heart. Which isn’t to say the juxtaposition of joy and sadness is in any way peculiar, for what else is fondness but the persistent presence of those very emotions? “‘Cane Trash’ gives into memories of where you came from and how you used to feel,” as Lu Sergiacomi explains. “It analyses where we go when we need to reset. Is it home, or can it be somewhere that reminds you of it? That memory is an analogy for the album—things are fragile, special and fleeting.”

Shrunken Elvis – K-House

Spencer Cullum, Sean Thompson, and Michael Ruth (AKA Rich Ruth) are all renowned musicians in their own right, be that with their own work—Cullum releasing solo material via Full Time Hobby, Thompson forming bands like Gnarwhal and Promised Land Sound, and Rich Ruth putting out acclaimed albums with Third Man Records—or supporting a wide range of well-known artists in recording and touring. So bringing the three together was always going to be a recipe for success. Under the moniker Shrunken Elvis, they have united to explore their shared passion for experimental music, merging their talents in order to transcend genre and create something new. The project “represents a rare opportunity to create purely for the sake of collaboration and curiosity,” as the album notes put it, the trio drawing on everything from Michael Rother, Alice Coltrane, and Pat Metheny to Can, Ashra and KLF to inform their sound, not to mention inspiration beyond music, be that visual art or the films of Akira Kurosawa and Ingmar Bergman. A self-titled album is on the way via Western Vinyl, and you can listen to single ‘K-House’ now. A track which takes something of the nocturnal urgency of eighties cop show theme tunes then expands its horizons with lush psych and cosmic tones.

Stella Donnelly – Baths

Three years after the release of her last full length, Flood, Naarm/Melbourne songwriter Stella Donnelly has returned with a new double A-side single, Baths / Standing Ovation. Both songs are stripped back relative to her previous work (at least until the back half of ‘Standing Ovation’), with a patience and stillness that gives them a sense of meditative clarity. ‘Baths’ in particular stands out, almost acapella as Donnelly’s vocals stand front and centre over barely-there keyboard notes. The music has the effect of incidental ambient noise and this is no accident, as the track was conceived as the sounds of the world seeped in. “I came up with this melody while I was swimming laps at the Brunswick Baths,” Donnelly explains. “The pool filter was making a humming sound on one note which allowed me to sing a melody over the top. “It then continued when I got home and had a shower with the bathroom fan on… I finally sat with a keyboard and held a note and it all just came together.”

Tim Carr – Alone Playing Piano

Though Tim Carr has made a name as part of other projects, be that Perfume Genius, Hand Habits or collaborating on records like Rebecca Schiffman‘s recent LP, Before the Future, he also has a rich solo career too. His debut release might have followed a folk tradition, but Carr’s sound is one in constant evolution, and new full-length Pleaure Drives leans into digital pop and electronic music. Recorded in the Crescenta Valley, the album draws on the LA golden hour in its romance and mystery, Carr intentionally working from a position of celebration rather than melancholy. “Pleasure drove this album to completion,” as he explains, “as it was made from a playful place as opposed to a melancholic state or being smothered by perfectionism.” Latest single ‘Alone Playing Piano’ encapsulates this spirit both in terms of lyrics (“Alone playing piano / getting into it / hitting wrong notes / trying to find the right ones / let it happen when the time comes”) and sound, the track not living up to the apparent austerity of its title but instead offering a shadowy Lynchian waltz.

villagerrr – Ride Or Die w/ Lydia

“Zeroing in on life’s small, ostensibly ordinary moments to find the meaning within.” So we wrote of villagerrr‘s Tear Your Heart Out in a list of our favourite albums of 2024, a record which saw songwriter Mark Scott embrace his Midwestern roots with a country-inflected brand of indie rock. “The result is a decidedly empathetic collection of songs able to zoom close to the smallest details of small town life,” we continued, “be it light through a sunroof, the smell of cut grass or pencil drawings made in an effort to preserve memories.” Having now signed with Winspear, villagerrr is releasing a new deluxe version of the album featuring a handful of previously unreleased bonus tracks, including new single ‘Ride Or Die w/ Lydia’. Featuring feeble little horse‘s Lydia Slocum, the track is characteristically fond and compassionate, sitting in that liminal space between summer and autumn, where the shadows grow long and the colours tend towards a sepia glow.

Watch the video edited by Trevor Hock below:

Tear Your Heart Out [Deluxe Edition] will be released via Winspear on the 10th October and you can pre-order it now.

Weakened Friends – NPC (feat. Buckethead)

Ever feel like life isn’t quite as real as many like to believe? That unfolding events are predestined, not so much by cosmic fate but something more computational? These are the ideas worrying Weakened Friends on new single ‘NPC’, a decidedly existential track featuring guitarist Buckethead inspired by the reality-bending simulation theory. But far from some exercise in idle sci-fi daydreaming, the song is urgent, defiant and cathartic. Fatalistic, but delivered with the kind of full-throated passion that can only exist in those still with the spirit to fight. This tone runs through Feels Like Hell, the Portland, Maine outfit’s new album coming soon on Don Giovanni Records, where every soul-destroying facet of our present moment is used as fuel on the fire. The hegemony of global capitalism, complete with its mass surveillance, environmental destruction and rampant inequality, is enough to drive anyone to despair, but Weakened Friends are determined to deny it that one last victory. Better to scream, yell, bring the whole thing crumbling down with us.

Maybe I’m just fucked in the head
Here daydreaming of annihilation
Maybe we should just hit reset
It’d be the best thing

Watch the video by SunBronx & Olise Forel below:

Feels Like Hell will be released on the 9th October via Don Giovanni and you can pre-order it now.

Wombo – S.T. Tilted

We’ve covered a number of singles from Wombo‘s new full-length Danger in Fives in recent months, noting how the release sees the Louisville outfit push the envelope rather than resting on their laurels. “I don’t want to be in a band that’s confined to one form of writing,” as vocalist and bassist Sydney Chadwick says. “Where’s the fun and the creativity and the exploration in that? You have to push yourself and try something new.” With the album out now via Fire Talk Records, Wombo have shared new single, ‘S.T. Tilted’ as if to prove this sentiment. “It’s the first song we wrote after the Slab EP that made it on Danger in Fives,” as guitarist Cameron Lowe explains. “We weren’t sure it was going to work, but all the contrasting parts ended up being cool. It’s rare for a Wombo song to be written on guitar first like this one, with some of the bass and drum parts jammed out in the basement afterwards. The wacky guitar part came last.”

Watch Lowe’s video below:

Danger in Fives is out now via Fire Talk and available from the Wombo Bandcamp page.

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Ahead of a second full-length record due sometime in the near future, Pittsburgh‘s Animal Scream have released brand new single, ‘Fires After Dark’, released via American Hermitage as a 7″ vinyl along with b-side ‘Cinnamon Blue’. The song was written during 2020’s turbulent summer of protest, with duo Chad Monticue and Josh Sickels describing the track as concerning “the essence of creating art during twisted up days, even when you feel out of place and at your most insignificant.” What results is something which lives up to its title, a sound undoubtedly dark and a little chaotic, though its energies are channelled into bright sparks of defiant feeling.

‘Fires After Dark’ is out now via American Hermitage and available as a 7″ single from Bandcamp.

Astra Forward – There, There, Here Is Here

Astra Forward is a singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer based in London who makes what she describes as “dreamy and intimate songs about the enchantment of nature and the power of human connection.” Latest single ‘There, There, Here is Here’ captures this ethos beautifully, with classic folk stylings as well as a timeless ethereal atmosphere channeling a bond between human emotion and the natural world that feels somehow ancient. It is at once delicate and powerful, existing in a barely-there hush before Pascal Colman’s guitar comes winding out of the shadows with ominous strength. “It feels like this song was written for me, not by me,” Astra Forward describes, “because when my world collapsed, ‘There, There, Here is Here’ was what I needed to hear. My hope is that it can be your medicine too.”

Girlpuppy – I Want To Be There

The recording moniker of Atlanta‘s Becca Harvey, girlpuppy is gearing up to release new album When I’m Alone this autumn on Royal Mountain Records. The involvement of Marshall Vore (Phoebe Bridgers) on debut EP Swan led some to label girlpuppy the heir apparent to the sad girl indie folk crown, and latest single ‘I Want To Be There’ does little to dispel the tag. Centring on the time a landlord kicked Harvey and three friends out of the dream home, only for the friends to up and leave for New York, the song paints a self-deprecating picture of emotional distress. “I felt like I had no friends which made me wonder what was wrong with me,” she explains, “which kind of made me spiral into self-hatred. I like to call this one the ‘self-hate anthem’ of the album.”

When I’m Alone is out on 28th October via Royal Mountain Records and you can pre-order it now.

The Human Fly – A New Perspective

Philadelphia/New York outfit The Human Fly have recently released Thrill of Living, a new album on Dead Definition. Opener ‘A New Perspective’ introduces their blend of alt-country and indie rock, as well as the distinctive delivery and lyricism of lead Robert Mathis. A search for a home, or even just a clearer definition of exactly what that might mean. “I need a new perspective / I need a new directive / been nameless as a comet,” he sings, his tone finding a line somewhere between heartfelt sincerity and Berman-esque wryness. Moving through states, seeking something which might not exist.

Maybe home is just perpetually chasing peacefulness
or maybe home is when you find it
and if I do, I can send you the address

Izzy Oram Brown – Mess

Having spent years honing her craft, be it studying musical history or supporting other musicians, Brooklyn‘s Izzy Oram Brown has recently unveiled her debut album, Mess. Despite being Oram Brown’s first real foray into songwriting and production, and irrespective of the title, the album is a careful, finely-tuned collection. The product of time dedicated to music, all the prior learning put to new use. The title track introduces the record’s themes and narrative, and in turn signals the relevance of the title. The inherent messiness of life, be that within the tangled desires and hang-ups of a relationship or a person’s connection to the wider world.

And the birds they sang, their final breaths
And the Tennessee heat pressed down on my chest
I do not remember making this mess
I do not remember making this mess

Pet Owner – Hi-Res

The recording project of Lucerne, Switzerland’s Lea Mathis, Pet Owner combines pop, folk and electronic styles into a transportive, idiosyncratic sound. Ahead of upcoming debut Natural Behaviour on Red Brick Chapel, new single, ‘Hi-Res’ introduces the inventive shapes such a combination can take. Mathis’s vocals skate over a bed of playful electronics, the whole thing ebbing and flowing to add an organic air to the otherwise digital soundscape.

Rachel Angel – Closer to Myself

Miami’s Rachel Angel is set to release new album Midnite Heart Attack next month on Ruzafa Records, an album born of a difficult time spent abroad. The title refers to “a defining moment of reckoning,” Angel explains, “upon which one is confronted with the decision to change or die,” and single ‘Closer to Myself’ goes some way to delineating the result of such an epiphany. A classic country pop song describing a moment of movement from uprooted confusion to the solid foundation of self-assurance. “Roll around in circles feeling lost,” Angel sings, “Got stuck in the britches on a cross / Ring around the rosie / Paint me true,” though soon a direction forms and with it understand:

I’m getting closer to myself
And less to you

And when I finally close my eyes and see
I find that it was always in front of me

Rich Ruth – Older But Not Less Confused

Earlier this summer, Rich Ruth released I Survived, It’s Over, a brand new album on Third Man Records written at home in Tennessee “amidst the quiet and tumult” of a tornado’s aftermath. This juxtaposition informs the near endlessly inventive sound, the record challenging any distinction between order and chaos, hush and noise, and indeed that between humble domestic beauty and the massive sublime. No one track can be representative of a record so adventurous, but ‘Older But Not Less Confused’ is as good a diving in point as any, and the video directed by Brook Linder goes some way to capturing Rich Ruth’s ability to knit seemingly disparate elements into a cohesive system far larger than its constituent parts.

I Survived, It’s Over is out now via Third Man Records and you can get it from the Rich Ruth Bandcamp page.

Sonic Løland & Simen Mitlid – Everything at Once

Back in February we wrote of And Then the Sun Came Up, the debut album Sonic Løland coming later this autumn on Koke Plate. New single ‘Everything at Once’ invites Simen Mitlid to help create something delicate and heartfelt, though the soft indie folk sound of the first half is changed midway through. The sound suddenly becomes distorted, feedback coming from the guitars, as though some alteration has occurred from which there is no return.

And Then the Sun Came Up is out via Koke Plate in September.

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