Having recently signed to Nils Frahm‘s LEITER imprint, New York-based saxophonist and composer Alden Hellmuth has announced new full-length Tether. The album builds upon 2024’s punk-inflected jazz record Good Intentions to explore the creative potential of an ensemble embracing the tension between composition and improvisation. Tether is a fitting name for the release, speaking to both the connection between Hellmuth and her supporting cast—bassists Logan Kane and Miller Wrenn and drummer Justin Brown (Thundercat, Aja Monet)—and how group, and indeed the audience, act something like a leash within the spontaneity of improvisation. The musicians might play themselves out into unexpected territory, but there’s always a line to bring them back into the heart of the group. Lead single ‘Face The Wall’ is available now, and shows just how raucous and visionary the Alden Hellmuth sound can be.

Alice Bradley – Seismic

Per her bio, Asheville-based songwriter Alice Bradley “sees songwriting a way to grow words past the point of logic into catharsis,” and latest EP Seismic certainly lives up to this intention. Take the title track, woven from a layered, almost meditative arrangement of fingerpicked guitar, though one always led forwards by the underlying groove. The style is matched by Bradley’s vocals, both in tone and substance, the rhythmic ease of her delivery belying the difficult grapple presented in the lyrics. “There’s a face looking back / and a face looking forward / the space between that / i gotta move toward,” as she sings. “And the waves want to crash / to talk with the shore / future and past / converse at the door.” But by the close, something of a slow epiphany seems to have occurred. The acknowledgement that perhaps words aren’t best suited to pick at such complicated knots, and instead it is best to lean into the flow.

maybe this is something i cannot talk through
maybe this is something i must dance to

Atta Boy – Oh, Mama

Since their inception back in 2012, LA-based indie pop outfit Atta Boy have amassed a following with a sound that’s bright, sometimes whimsical and always compassionate, driven by a sense of curiosity shared by core members Dashel Thompson (piano), Eden Brolin (vocals), Freddy Reish (guitar), and Lewis Pullman (drums). The band are preparing to release their new album Lilt this June, and new single ‘Oh, Mama’ embodies the spirit of their work. A song which holds up the unique force that is motherly love as something as organic and ever-present as the natural world itself. “When I was growing up (and still today) my mom was so amazing at inspiring a sense of wonder at our natural world,” Brolin explains. “She is intensely nurturing and there for me, no matter what. I could say a billion things about why I think my mom is the shit, but as far as the song goes, I just wanted to paint a picture of how grand I see her love and her motherhood. This idea can be applied to anyone whose support feels like relief and respite when life is sideways. I think it’s a testament to how meaningful and necessary human connection is.” Watch the video for the track directed by Michael Rees with cinematography by Sarah Penson:

Silt will be released on the 26th June and you can pre-order it now.

Brenna Bruce – Something Gold

Brenna Bruce “brings to life a serene sound shadowed by a certain mournfulness,” we wrote of the Seattle-based songwriter when covering her 2024 EP Honest Bloom, “evoking the way even the most tranquil environment is in some way made poignant by the latent promise of its own end.” The release, put out via Ghost Mountain Records, placed emotional states within the context of the larger cycles of the natural world, and came to find beauty within an embrace of transience. Now Bruce is preparing to release Light Catcher, a brand new EP no less ambitious or emotionally astute, and latest single ‘Something Gold’ hints at what to expect. The song asks whether mourning is a strange form of alchemy, charting how moving through the end of a relationship can so often elevate the mundane into something precious, at least in one’s memories. Although, whether this process is legitimately capable of creating treasured material is open to interpretation. Every alchemist is shadowed by the possibility of their folly, coming to see (or wish for) cherished things which cannot, and never will, exist.

Light Catcher will be released on the 12th June via Ghost Mountain Records and you can pre-order it now.

Darren Hayman – Hotter Than Mojave in My Heart (Iris DeMent cover)

Way back in 2008, Darren Hayman (Hefner / New Starts), Dan May (Owl & Mouse / Field Glass), David Watkins and David Tattersall (The Wave Pictures) released a self-titled bluegrass album under the name Hayman, Watkins, Trout And Lee, winning acclaim with a mixture of originals and rearrangements of songs from the likes of Townes Van Zandt and The Mountain Goats. Now Hayman is re-releasing the album and has provided two new covers in support, including a take on Iris DeMent‘s ‘Hotter Than Mojave in My Heart’. Leaning into the playful side of the original, the song not only offers solid evidence for diving back into Hayman, Watkins, Trout And Lee, it also hints at the depth of Hayman’s back catalogue, which has remained more or less missing despite his position as one of the most creative and distinctive voices in UK music.

Fox Run Sounds – Shake a Shoe

“But I don’t think you’re hearing me / I don’t think you’re hearing me / If I don’t feel you here with me.” So sings Fox Run Sounds on ‘Shake a Shoe’, a short verse indicative of the mood and tone of the new track. The project’s previous EP Yuh, O! probed at the tension between interior feelings and exterior appearances, utilising a bright sound to explore dark themes so that the form mirrored the duality of the content, and the new single is no less thoughtful in execution. More downbeat on the surface yet leavened by the hope that’s inherent within any sense of longing, the track ebbs and flows between hushed despondency and naked yearning, that latter marked by a lift in the instrumentation as though towards some promised epiphany. The enlightenment might never quite be granted, but the very act of continually reaching towards it seems to hold some wisdom of its own.

The Hobknobs – Easier Listening

“Helmets Off can be described as an honest attempt at honesty.” So describes the press release for the debut album of The Hobknobs, a new project featuring Arie van Vliet (Lewsberg) and Yaël Dekker (The Klittens), though anyone expecting something earnest and sentimental will quickly find they have misunderstood. Because the honesty of The Hobknobs is something purer than the usual meaning of the word. Purer and therefore stranger. Honesty as delivered by a pair of songwriters who aren’t overly convinced by the goodness of humanity or even the meaning of language. Lead single ‘Easier Listening’ might be the poppiest track on the album, and on the surface gestures towards a nostalgic sort of twee, but is in fact very much its own animal. “’Easier Listening’ is about people who consciously choose to be less intelligent, in order to be able to understand so much more” Dekker explains. People who are faithful yet have no faith, enlightened and underestimated, presented here without judgement. Should we surrender and join their ranks?

The Huntress and Holder of Hands – Doctrine

Rising from the ashes of folk duo Brown Bird after the death of creative partner and husband Dave Lamb, MorganEve Swain’s The Huntress and Holder of Hands is both a vehicle to explore grief in its full spectrum of emotions and a way to continue the spirit of its predecessor. The result is a sound that holds space for anger, confusion, sadness and compassion, as well as an inherent sense of hope that’s built into the very fact of its existence. Set for release next month, new album Babylon is the perfect example of this nuanced style, confronting the corrupt and violent present without forgetting ideas of redemption and sanctuary too. Single ‘Doctrine’ was written in 2017 but is more relevant than ever, a taut and haunting slice of country rock which simmers with fury even it is quietest moments. “Honestly I was hoping it would be obsolete by now,” Swain explains, “but instead these words now feel like an incantation we need more than ever.”

Babylon will be released on the 5th June and you can pre-order it now.

lots of hands – grapevine

Newcastle upon Tyne duo lots of hands (that’s Billy Woodhouse and Elliot Dryden) last released new music at the beginning of 2025 with Fire Talk debut into a pretty room. Since then, the band have gone from strength to strength, finding lots of new fans and going on tour across the US in support of Lala Lala. Now they are back with a new single ‘grapevine’, a song which harks back to their nostalgia-laced lo-fi roots with a stark, stripped-back atmosphere. It’s dark and shadowy, squealing guitar and repetitive loops undulating over electronic percussion, Woodhouse and Dryden both contributing soft, understated vocals that deliver lyrics both opaque and suggestive. “Oh I feel it pulling me away, some sort of magnetic wave,” Woodhouse sings, “I’m finding myself upstate.”

Scott C Park – Marlene

Last year, Stornoway-based songwriter Scott C Park released his debut album Crossing The Line, establishing a rich and introspective brand of folk rock able to probe deep into the uncertainties of young adult life. Not one to rest on his laurels, Park is preparing another full-length for later this year, and has unveiled lead single ‘Marlene’ to whet appetites in the meantime. A track which again possesses the authenticity of its predecessor, pairing an almost twee level of sincerity with a rougher edge, resulting in something heartfelt but never cloying. This is achieved in no small part via the wry humour which runs through its heart, a feature which ultimately grants an affirming conclusion. “The song spends a whole lot of time where the protagonist is like, ‘Woe is me’… his world is kind of grey and drab,” Park explains. “And then in the last half he just rips the piss out of himself for being such a depressed guy.”

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

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The release of Avery Friedman‘s forthcoming album New Thing is fast-approaching on Audio Antihero. Previous singles ‘Flowers Fell’ and ‘Photo Booth’ introduced a sound which, as we put it, “seems to sit in the interstitial space between trauma and growth,” and if these two states exist at opposite ends of a continuum, then latest single and title track sees Friedman dig further back in her personal history towards the difficult end. “I wrote ‘New Thing’ in one sitting after riding the subway home alone at night for the first time since being mugged at knifepoint months prior,” as she explains. “I was shocked and disoriented by the anxiety I experienced doing something so routine—I felt foreign to myself.” But however directly the song confronts this upsetting experience, it also represents the beginning of the path forward, allowing Friedman a method by which to return to her body and start the process of becoming whole again.

Hallelujah The Hills – Fake Flowers at Sunset

Boston indie rock royalty Hallelujah The Hills have never been ones to shy away from a challenge, Ryan H. Walsh and co. have released a plethora of idiosyncratic albums across their near two-decade career. But their latest project DECK pushes the boat out even for them. A joint release between Discrete Pageantry Records and Best Brother Records, DECK is a something of a magnum opus—a quadruple album two-and-a-half years in the making which maps entirely to a deck of cards. That’s four LPs (fittingly titled CLUBS, DIAMONDS, HEARTS and SPADES) and fifty-two songs, all brought to life with an enviable supporting cast which includes Craig Finn (The Hold Steady), Patrick Stickles (Titus Andronicus), Sadie Dupuis (Speedy Ortiz), Tanya Donelly (Belly, Breeders), Clint Conley (Mission of Burma), Ezra Furman and Cassie Berman (Silver Jews). It is Berman who appears on new single ‘Fake Flowers at Sunset’ (that’s three of diamonds within the pack), providing supporting vocals to a song which evokes the push and pull of love in its combination of mournful folk and pressing disco beat.

Honey I’m Home – Wishful Thinking

Dutch outfit Honey I’m Home might have already supported the likes of Goat Girl, The Buoys, Blood Wizard and Hotline TNT, but have only now released their debut single, ‘Wishful Thinking’. Operating at the intersection of shoegaze, indie rock and post-punk, the song introduces the band’s penchant for shadowy textures and visceral energy, tapping into ethereal moods without sacrificing a certain emotional immediacy to achieve a cathartic sound. “‘Wishful Thinking’ explores the longing to reconnect with people no longer in your life, whether it’s a lost love or a departed family member,” as vocalist and guitarist Thom Schotanus explains. “We tried to capture the intensity of that unfulfilled desire with a layered, dreamlike soundscape.”

‘Wishful Thinking’ is out now via streaming services.

Jahnah Camille – what do you do?

Writing last May, we described how Jahnah Camille‘s album i tried to freeze light, but only remember a girl used a number of different styles and genres to “offer a picture of late adolescence in all of its bittersweet nuance, its introspective contemplation matched only by its bold confessional attitude.” The record, released via Winspear, made the list of our favourite releases of 2024, so it is very much welcome news that Camille is returning with a new EP, My sunny oath! As lead single ‘what do you do?’ shows, the six-song release sees a newfound focus on the louder, stormier end of the spectrum, Camille working with producer Alex Farrar (Wednesday, Indigo De Souza, MJ Lenderman) to explore grunge and shoegaze-inflected styles of indie rock. Exploding into life from the off, the song packs a newfound punch without sacrificing the heart which marked previous releases, and emerges with an affirming sense of forward motion.

Watch the video below, directed by Harrison Shook with assistance from Polycarpe Ancelet and Ava Cavasos:

My sunny oath! is out on the 13th June via Winspear and you can pre-order it now.

Ruby Gill – The Flood

We’ve featured a couple of songs from Ruby Gill‘s forthcoming album Some Kind of Control in recent months, with both the title track and ‘Touch Me There‘ highlighting what the artist describes as a “cheekier, looser, gayer and even more raw” style. Both singles explored ideas of agency and control in various guises, from the experience of lockdown to the empowerment found in the queer community, and latest track ‘The Flood’ is no different. A song inspired by Gill’s experience of being trapped in the cyclone which struck eThekwini/Durban in 2023 which questions just who possesses power in a contemporary society facing a worsening environment year upon year. Watch the video directed by Emily Dynes below:

Some Kind of Control is out now and available to purchase.

Sea Lemon – Stay

After the success of 2023 EP Stop At Nothing (an evocative release populated by protagonists, as we put it, which “feel at once fearful and dangerous, some absence at the heart of their existence pushing them toward the darkest of places”) and subsequent singles like ‘Crystals‘ and ‘Sweet Anecdote‘, Natalie Lew’s Sea Lemon is preparing to release debut full-length Diving For A Prize this June via Luminelle Recordings. As the prior singles suggested, the album looks to broaden the dream pop and shoegaze styles which inform the Sea Lemon sound, pushing towards increasingly fantastical directions. And new single ‘Stay’ is no different. Suspended in gauzy textures, the track weaves a warm, enveloping space into which the listener is invited, then reflects the world back to us at odd angles to more fully reveal the strangeness at its core. “‘Stay’ […] is a little vignette of a man I saw in a local thrift store,” Lew explains. “This older guy, probably in his 70s or 80s, was acting as a security guard at this thrift store near my house, but he was basically asleep on the couch the entire time I was there. I couldn’t stop thinking about him after I left, and wrote Stay as a reaction to seeing this guy who I felt deserved to take a break.”

Watch video by Otium with styling by Greta Akopov below:

Diving For A Prize is out on the 13th June via Luminelle Recordings and you can pre-order it now.

So It Was – In a Rose

We first covered Daniel Lobb’s So It Was back in 2023 with the release of full-length Round the Mountain, an album which ranged from the “combination of earnest heart and laidback charm” of singles like ‘Speak Now!‘ and “something altogether more taut and building” in the case of ‘Dance Now!‘, a song which “confront[ed] the uneasy truth of change with as much positivity as it can muster.” Now So It Was has returned with ‘In a Rose’, a new single which combines the ornate detail of acts like Beirut, a Vampire Weekend-style playfulness, and some of the indie rock attitude of The Strokes to take on the modern blight of consumerism. “Aaa-ccumulation / Is such a silly pose,” as Lobb sings. “We countin’ on our fingers / We countin’ on our toes.”

Soot Sprite – Days After Days

Writing back in February, we introduced Wield Your Hope Like A Weapon, the new album from Exeter-based emos Soot Sprite, calling it “a call to arms to fight against the forces that make contemporary life so difficult, and a reminder of the radical potential within empathy and community.” With the release via Specialist Subject Records on the horizon, Soot Sprite have now shared new single, ‘Days After Days’. The album’s opener, the song acts as a mission statement, not only raising awareness of the stakes at hand but also the importance of celebrating every inch of ground won. “It’s about facing the endless horrors of the world and remembering to pay attention to the good,” as lead Elise Cook explains. “People on the ground, activism, and remembering that we shouldn’t be hardened by everything we witness or we can lose empathy. And it feels like without empathy we’ll never be able to achieve class consciousness, and lose our sense of community.”

Uncanny Valet – Almost Island

The recording project of New York-based electronic musician and producer David Queen, Uncanny Valet is a descendant of the likes of Oneohtrix Point Never and Ryuichi Sakamoto, marrying precise production with an unbridled creative vision in effort to push electronic music into uncharted territory. New album Almost Island carries the mission further, taking elements of eighties pop, ambient, dub and even Saturday morning cartoons and recombining them into something new. The result rarely sits still (just listen to the stylistics differences between the sleek sophisti-pop grooves of ‘Cameo Glass’ and melancholic drift of ‘Archway’), not only straddling the nostalgic and the contemporary but mining this juxtaposition for all of its thematic resonance, making for a sound that wouldn’t be out of place in an Adam Curtis documentary. Nowhere is that more obvious than on the closer and title track, a graceful and thickly-textured piece of ambient beauty.

Almost Island is out now and available from the Uncanny Valet Bandcamp page.

Why Dogs Why – Clunkers

Los Angeles-based project Why Dogs Why are preparing to release brand new EP Play The Hits this May, and have shared lead single ‘Clunkers’ by way of introduction. Writing back in 2023, we described previous EP Homebody as “full of buoyant energy and wacky lyricism, anchored by an underlying volatility and unease,” and the ‘Clunkers’ is no different. It’s a song which embraces both scrappy indie rock sensibilities and the smooth surf pop of yesteryear to explore themes of idealism and disappointment, the sound filled with brightness and forward motion but again troubled by the possibility of a less than perfect reality. “We’ll book a tour up the coast / And drive right through the bay,” as lead Alex Johnson sings, “When no one comes out to see us / We’ll hit the motel bedbug hay.” But however disheartening real life might prove, Why Dogs Why champion committing to your dreams if only for the romantic hell of it.

Let’s write some clunkers together, baby,
Some songs we’ll sing for fourteen fans.
Let’s write some clunkers together, baby.
Our dads will never understand.

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Last month Library Card returned with brand new single ‘Sunflowers’, a song about being overwhelmed by the present and wanting to escape to the countryside. “I just want to get in a car and slam the door shut and not even take anything with me,” van Teylingen sings, “but drive hours and hours and hours to see sunflowers.” But true to the Library Card style, things are not quite as earnest as that might sound, the breezy carefree style undercut by sardonic lyrics and vocal delivery. What results works both on the immediate level (i.e. its lots of fun), but is also a pretty scathing commentary on contemporary existence too. As the band describe:

“We keep rushing through life, trying our very best to keep up with everything and everyone, feeding into our conditioned ambition and internalised capitalism, but because we try to do everything all at once, nothing really gets done. Nothing is in our control, nothing will happen the way you intend it to happen, nothing is set in stone. It’s okay. It is what it is.”

Watch the video by van Teylingen and Kalkman below:

‘Sunflowers’ is out now and available via streaming services and to download from the Library Card Bandcamp page.

Photo by Jade Sastropawiro

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The EP opens with ‘Pretty Bad, Man’, which serves as a great introduction—an indie rock song with some sunny pop thrown in for good measure. Lyrically, the track exists in that space after a breakup, and although our narrator seems to be doing well (“My skin is cleared and I am cured / I’m getting ten hours of sleep at night”), there’s still a lingering sense of yearning.

‘Say No’ is equally fun, despite its talk of faked suicides and graveside flowers, while ‘The Princess and the Queen’ offers a twist on the lovesick pop trope. ‘Clueless Vibes’ is tinged with disappointment, a lean indie pop song where van Kampen’s lines are laced with previous hurt, before finale ‘Somewhere’ looks back on a tumultuous relationship and forward to a better future.

“Somewhere
It’s better
Somewhere”

You can get Dinner Party on cassette via Z Tapes or a name your price download from the Elsa Lester Bandcamp page.

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Sparse guitar and piano act as a backdrop to Scheltinga’s vocals, producing songs as quiet and unassuming as they are heartfelt and melodious. Most are short and sweet, all offering a different take on the basic blueprint. Take for example ‘Clown’, which begins with delicate finger-picked guitar and breathy vocals, before spiking in peaks of passion.

“The night saw the candles
The evening, dry
She holds her dreams so tight
But we are not asleep”

‘Master’ introduces piano and skittering percussion, sounding part age-old folk song, part stripped down jazz track, like a languorous tune being played from the corner of a smoky cafe. ‘Tomorrow’ is tautly emotional, dealing with being separated from a loved one (“You’ve got to go, got a plane to board, headed home”), and another great example of how Scheltinga creates real feeling using minimal ingredients. If you’re still not sold, try the opening track ‘I’ve Come To Know You Well’, which is perhaps the most sparse and delicate on the record.

As Drunk With Love describe in their bio of Maud Scheltinga: “Over the past couple of years, Maud has interpreted and re-interpreted the world around her by means of her songs, which act as short stories. Listening to her music feels like listening to a bookshop owner taking different (but equally beloved) books off the shelf and dazzling you with short and direct anecdotes that offer you a peek inside.”

This literary theme is continued in the very special CD package put together by Drunk With Love. The music will come in a second hand book, with spaces carved out for sheet music and the CD. You can order it now from Drunk With Love Records, or digitally form the Maud Scheltinga Bandcamp page.

Maud Scheltinga is currently on a European tour with Jake Bellissimo. There are several dates left, so go check them out if you’re in The Netherlands or Germany!

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