Breaking a habit of working solo, the record was the first in which Kyla Marlena invited outside support, assembling of band from some of the city’s most talented musicians. Ben Whiteley (The Weather Station), Julian Psihoigos (Georgia Harmer, Katie Tupper), Felix Fox (BADBADNOTGOOD, Jonah Yano), Jasper Smith (Benjamin Dakota Rogers), Karen Ng (The Weather Station), Noah Williamson (Sonder) and Jaiden Davis-Jones all contribute, with Jonas Bonnetta (Evening Hymns) mixing and Kevin McPhee mastering the result. The aforementioned energy is amplified by this collaboration, each moving part contributing to the momentum of the sound and its myriad of left turns.

With the album set for release later this week, Kyla Marlena has unveiled latest single ‘In Paint’, and the track speaks to these ideas both stylistically and thematically. A song which not only sits central to the meaning of the album, but also serves as a kind of meta-commentary on its creation. “‘In Paint’ is about the tension between wanting to outgrow our ingrained patterns and fearing the loss of control that comes with that, as well as the added complexity of navigating that alongside another person,” Marlena explains. “There’s a lot of unease and dissonance in that, which the instrumentation mirrors. We rarely play on top of one another, but there’s a constant sense, almost a threat, that we might. When all that tension finally erupts at the end, it acts as a sort of wish fulfilment. The music resolves something the lyrics don’t quite manage to.”

Watch the video below, directed, shot and edited by Jo Hirabayashi, and co-directed by Kyla Marlena:

Hold Time will be released on the 6th November via idée fixe and you can pre-order it now from the Kyla Marlena Bandcamp page.

Photo by Tess Disturnal, cover art by Eric Tkaczyk

The post Kyla Marlena – In Paint appeared first on Various Small Flames.

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.

The post Weekly Listening: October 2026 #1 appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Back in 2021, Brooklyn-based bassist, composer and singer Carmen Quill released Don’t Get Comfy / Nowhere, a debut album which emerged more from personal need than any sense of creative practice. The songs consisted of nothing beyond vocals, upright bass and background noise but were able to tackle the most intimate of subjects, from romantic relationships to the loss of a parent. Quill’s latest full-length Harmless, to be released this November via Ruination Record Co., builds upon this framework, their compositions slowly yet surely blooming from minimalism towards something richer and deeper. As the title track suggests, this is often achieved by way of the mantra or incantation. The song rises out of a simple, repeated set of questions (“Why do I feel so helpless? / Why do I feel so aimless? / Nothing I do is harmless”) towards a considered engagement with themes of agency and complicity in the age of televised genocide and rampant inequality. As Quill explains: “I wrote ‘Harmless’ in a moment when I was feeling acutely the everyday sensation of not knowing what to do with myself when I look around and see so much big shit going wrong.”

Charlotte Greve – Lighter Blue

After ‘Membranes‘ (“considers the multitudes which exist within any one person, and how this array of dimensions is shaped and grown by our immediate surroundings”) and ‘Own Lap‘ (“an eleven-minute epic brought to life with full orchestral grandeur which nevertheless never loses sight of the personal amid the sweeping majesty”), Charlotte Greve continues to introduce her forthcoming album WATERBODIES with the release of latest single, ‘Lighter Blue’. Centering on geological imagery and underlined by a beguilingly rhythmic pull, the track considers the curative potential of art, as though the will to create can illuminate the otherwise shadowy avenues of our lives and allow us to live with newfound meaning. “The silent crater/volcano represents a period of disconnection from making art and feeling out of touch with it,” Greve explains. “Tiptoeing around, feeling lost and ungrounded because something essential is missing. In that state, doubt about all things arises, making space for insecurity to flourish. The moment music arrives again, suddenly everything makes sense, the path is lit and you can just walk on it. The forever torch, showing you the way to live your life, gifting you melodies that carry you through the day with purpose.”

Watch the video, shot, edited, and produced by Annika Nagel, below:

WATERBODIES will be released on the 2nd October via New Amsterdam and you can pre-order it now.

Chloë Ester – Bitter End

Based in Charlottesville, Virginia, Chloë Ester is a songwriter who announced herself back in 2020 with debut EP Dying All The Time, establishing a narrative-led brand of indie rock which was happy to blur genre lines in order to capture a sense of simultaneous vulnerability and empowerment. Now Ester is preparing to return with follow-up EP I Could Be The One to further this style, widening the palette and scope of her sound without sacrificing any of the rawness and heart which makes it so engaging. Single ‘Bitter End’ is an ideal entry point, a reflection on a break-up which pairs personal uncertainty with upbeat brightness to explore the tension between regretful introspection and the desire to let go.

Cloudbelly – Poppa

Described by the band as a “meditation on intimacy, belonging, and the things that complicate them,” Cloudbelly‘s third full-length Throwing The Game promises to take the indie folk formula of its predecessor i know i know i know and push it to the edges of the genre, creating something sprawling and shape-shifting in order to explore the full contours of an emotional landscape which stretches both back into the past and out in the future. After lead single ‘Oh, Antarctica!‘ saw Corey Laitman and co. face down what we called “the dispiriting experience of mourning the future in a present world which seems to be tilting in a bad direction,” follow-up ‘Poppa’ turns its attention in the opposite direction to explore the memories of a loved one, and how dignity can persevere through the trials of later life. Namely Laitman’s grandfather, a man who lived for the wilderness yet ultimately found himself in a high-rise caring for his ailing wife. As the press release puts it: “If there is a contradiction in the coexistence of tenderness and grief, this song doesn’t seek to resolve it. The contradiction itself is the emotional event.”

The Fourth Wall – Future Memory

“Combs through the contradictions of the immigrant experience in order to voice feelings otherwise impossible to convey […] a mixture of hope, denial and genuine love which not only subverts expectations but confounds any attempt to properly reassess.” So we wrote of The Fourth Wall‘s Return Forever back in 2024, Stephen Agustin’s ambitious and confronting writing earning the record a place among of favourite albums on the year. Now the Portland-by-way-of-Hawaii project is back with brand new album Memories of the Future, and the release might somehow top its predecessor in terms of depth and scope. Using Mark Fisher’s Capitalist Realism and Frederic Jameson’s work on sci-fi and postmodernism as starting points, Agustin explores the collective failure of the imagination when it comes to dreaming of the future, and the personal and political stasis which results. What emerges is the apocalyptic vision our present time deserves, where the hyperactive stimulation of the digital age masks a fundamental emptiness. “How long will it take / To see the future as a memory,” asks closer ‘Future Memory’, a fitting conclusion to a fatalistic yet clear-eyed album about a world in crisis.

Watch the video by Agustin below:

Memories of the Future is out now via DevilDuck Records and available from The Fourth Wall Bandcamp page.

Hour – Pearls

Last month we introduced Ghost Bridge, the new album from Hour coming soon via Dear Life Records, with the title track. “A song, clocking in at near ten minutes which must rank among [Michael] Cormier-O’Leary’s most ambitious and thematically loaded to date,” as we wrote. “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.” The achievement is made possible by a rich ensemble cast, and William H. Travis’s video for new single ‘Pearls’ manages the unenviable task of catching them all gathered in one place (with the notable exception of flute player Adelyn Strei), offering a rare chance to see Hour in its (almost) complete form. “I think his footage succeeds in demonstrating the love we all share for one another in our large, many-tentacled band,” as Cormier-O’Leary says. “It’s a perfect moment in time, a pearl if you will.”

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

How Strange It Is – Tough Luck

This autumn, Portland, Oregon outfit How Strange It Is will release their new album THERE IS NO EVIL with Disposable America and Pleasure Tapes. Consisting of Jordan Krinsky (vocals, guitar, synth), Caleb Ballard (additional vocals, guitar, clarinet, synth), Annie Miranda (bass), Annie Fifer (additional vocals, guitar) and Kyle Gordon (drums), the band have developed a fuzzy brand of indie rock across a pair of past releases, and the new record only furthers this style. Take latest single ‘Tough Luck’, an atmospheric, almost ethereal track which cycles through the whole gamut of emotions to capture the strange experience of life. “This song leans into the comedy of circumstance,” the band explain. “When you’re going through it and the world keeps throwing cosmic jokes at you. When you meet up to have a post-mortem with your ex and love songs start playing on the radio. It could be a cinematic moment where you realize you’re still in love but its actually over and that’s ok. The rollercoaster of those feelings.”

Watch the video below, directed by Jess Poe and edited by Poe & Jamison Winternintz:

THERE IS NO EVIL will be released on 20th October via Disposable America and Pleasure Tapes and you can pre-order it now.

John Van Deusen – There Is A Way Home

John Van Deusen made a name fronting celebrated Seattle outfit The Lonely Forest for the best part of a decade, releasing two EPs and four full-lengths in the 2000s/2010s. But his solo work is undoubtedly his most ambitious undertaking to date. Released across two years, forty track double album As Long As I Am In The Tent of This Body I Will Make A Joyful Noise confronts Van Deusen’s personal struggles with faith, depression and suicidal ideation, drawing on influences as disparate as The Beach Boys, Deftones, Smashing Pumpkins and Death Cab For Cutie in the process. After the first part was released back in 2025, John Van Deusen is now sharing Pt. 2 to finally complete the project. “What does it mean to be depressed while worshipping God?” he asks in the album notes. “What does it say about being human?” As the title might suggest, As Long As I Am In The Tent of This Body I Will Make A Joyful Noise is able to sit with suffering without reducing the entirety of existence to its confines, and wise enough to contemplate the mystery of God even as the immediacy of pain threatens to obscure our connection to the metaphysical. Listen to single ‘There Is A Way Home’ now:

Kin Hana – Howling World

You might know Hudson Valley songwriter and guitarist Aaron Hodges from his work under the moniker Longshoreman, or as part of the psych-folk band Nighttime, but more recently he has adopted the name Kin Hana to usher in a new era of drone/doom-adjacent folk. Next month, Kin Hana will release Howling World, a new full-length which feels like an embodiment of Hodges’s vision, where personal intimacy is matched by an elemental, almost otherworldly atmosphere (Jason Molina and Béla Tarr are cited as touchstones). The result, as highlighted by the lead single title track, manages to communicate both immediate, instinctive emotion (be that wonder, longing or dread) and genuine thematic depth. “This song came out of René Magritte’s painting Young Girl Eating a Bird,” Hana explains. “I was drawn to the contradiction in the image—she seems to be turning away from the world while at the same time literally devouring a piece of it. There’s something wild and irrational about the act that I felt I understood without being able to fully explain. The ‘howling world’ became both the senseless world she’s turning away from and the one she’s suddenly part of. I realized that feeling ran through much of the record, and the song eventually gave the album its name.”

Kyla Marlena – 21

“To me, this record feels alive. Like it has a pulse,” explains Toronto-based cellist and songwriter Kyla Marlena of her debut album Hold Time. “It’s dynamic within and between songs, it can be unpredictable.” Forthcoming this November via idée fixe, the record is something of a pivot for an artist who started out writing instrumental compositions in relative solitude, offering a rich folk rock sound forged through serious collaboration. Ben Whiteley (The Weather Station), Julian Psihoigos (Georgia Harmer, Katie Tupper), Felix Fox (BADBADNOTGOOD, Jonah Yano), Jasper Smith (Benjamin Dakota Rogers), Karen Ng (The Weather Station) and Noah Williamson (Sonder) all lend their talents, Marlena not so much instructing these musicians as corralling their energies, leading to a sound that’s authentic and organic. Lead single and album opener ’21’ gives an indication of what to expect, showing how 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.

The post Weekly Listening: September 2026 #1 appeared first on Various Small Flames.

This summer, a special version of Advance Base went on tour with Pedro the Lion, Owen Ashworth joined by Moontype to give his songs a rare full band treatment. Thanks to the technical wizardry of front of house engineer Milwaukee Mark Sullivan, the Milwaukee show was recorded well enough that Ashworth decided to release an impromtu live album, hence In Milwaukee is available to download for free today. The set includes tracks from Horrible Occurrances, Animal Companionship, Nephew in the Wild and A Shut-In’s Prayer, as well as recent single ‘Movie Theater Manager‘ and even a few Casiotone For The Painfully Alone numbers too, though it is perhaps the newer tracks which stand out the most in this arrangement. Take ‘Brian’s Golden Hour’, a fitting closer that is charged with extra intensity with a full band behind it, which in our opinion serves as an encapsulation of Ashworth’s stellar career thus far. As we concluded in our review of Horrible Occurrences:

“You’ll be fine,” a paramedic tells the titular character in ‘Brian’s Golden Hour’, a teen skater and would-be Days of Heaven-era Malick who plans to film himself dropping in on a homemade ramp from the roof of his parents house only to bail and shatter his spine. “You’re 15 & paralyzed / & lucky to be alive,” as the refrain goes. But Brian doesn’t actually commit to the trick. His only paralysis is a hesitation at the top of the ramp. This horrible occurrence takes place entirely in his head. Yet the paramedic’s words echo all the same. Kind, if slightly hollow. What they want to be true, or need to be true. Or rather what might as well be true inside that moment, until the opposite is confirmed. You’ll be fine. Words so brittle and tender and heartfelt. Somehow the epitome of both security and vulnerability. The essence of not only Horrible Occurrences but perhaps Ashworth’s entire body of work. Voices heard from beneath the weight of all that has happened, and all that possibly could. You might be dying. The darkness might all be in your head. You’ll be fine.

In Milwaukee is out now and available as a free download from Bandcamp. Moontype are also on Bandcamp, as are Pedro the Lion. Advance Base will play a few solo shows soon: Sept 6th in Chicago, IL (@ Sound & Gravity Festival), Sept 9th in Ann Arbor, MI (@ Funhouse) and Sept 10th in Toronto, ON (@ St Stephen’s). More tickets and information can be found here.

Caleb Elliott – Without Warning

With 2019 debut Forever to Fade and 2023 follow-up Weed, Wine & Time, songwriter, guitarist and cellist Caleb Elliott established vivid, widescreen style of folk rock, his work incorporating sleek grooves and rich string arrangements to elevate the sound. Fast forward a few years and the Florence, Alabama artist is returning with new singles. The latest ‘Without Warning’ suggests he has further honed this style in the intervening period. Moving with an understated grace and blooming gradually in something almost cinematic, the track sits comfortably next to later-era Damien Jurado. Able to offer genuine emotional intimacy while transporting the listener into its own hyperreal world.

‘Without Warning’ is out now and available from the usual places.

Eric Angelo Bessel – Pathways

Fresh off the back of 2025 LP Mirror At Night and its b-side sister release earlier this year, Eric Angelo Bessel is already preparing a brand new full-length, and the quick turnaround has done nothing to dampen the record’s ambition or scope. Consisting of eighteen interlinked compositions, Illusion of an Inland Ocean plays like an exercise in cartography, mapping the contours of a mysterious location which exists just beyond the ordinary confines of the world, inviting the listener along for the expedition so that we too might wander in our own act of discovery. The songs of Mirror At Night sounded like “dispatches from some strange otherworld” as we wrote, Bessel probing the line between the real and unreal, organic and digital, dreams, memory and waking life, and Illusion… pushes this style further than ever. An effort to conjure a sense of place which goes beyond traditional world-building, working to not merely create something new but evoke the sense of revealing something which has always been present, waiting for someone with the patience and attention to bring them to light. Listen to lead track ‘Pathways’ now.

Lamplight – Clover

We last featured Lamplight back in February with the release of ‘Year 2083‘, a stand alone single featuring hemlock which marked the crossover from the project’s 2024 self-titled album and whatever was to come next. What was to come, it now turns out, was Lick The Spoon, Let It Soften, a brand new full-length with Western Vinyl which sees Ian Williams paint a picture of life in all of its uncertainty and with both the love and the grief left intact. Single ‘Clover’ introduces the themes of the record, a track which seems suspended between the retrospection of mourning and a look towards future dreams, turning to the small certainties of the present as a kind of balm against the otherwise debilitating doubt which might set in when asking life’s big questions. “Lick the spoon and let it soften, it’ll melt,” as Williams sings in the verse which give the album its title, “you don’t need another mouthful, draw it out / all you need you’ve already gotten.”

Rayland Baxter – Better Man

After losing his father Bucky Baxter back in 2020, Rayland Baxter found his attempts at songwriting falling flat no matter how much effort he put it, only for a conversation with his sister to change his perspective. “We talked about life and family and love and heartache, and our individual experiences with all of that,” he explains. “She simply encouraged me to write about what I was feeling, something I was avoiding in the early stages of writing.” Baxter’s new full-length True Violet emerged from this inflection point, an album “personal and bloody” attuned to both the immediate pain of suffering and the enlightenment which slowly seeps in. Lead single and opening track ‘Better Man’ functions as a prologue for this story, the first step in a journey through grief from one stage of life to another.

Watch the video directed by Joshua Shoemaker below:

True Violet will be released on the 23rd October via ATO Records and you can pre-order it now.

Spring Colours – Femur In The Dust (Who Told You There’s A Better Life!?)

After putting in the hard yards on tour and building up a fanbase the old-fashioned way, Toronto “digital-punk” outfit Spring Colours finally released their anticipated debut full-length The Courage Cloak this year, a bold, cathartic album which rails against the masks and armour society demands we wear in order to stand out. “The ‘Courage Cloak’ we put on is red and angry, a symbol of the patriarchal need to perform and to be seen,” Lukas Lyjak explains, “and hides the simple need for genuine connection we all have. It is that cloak that we explore across the album, and more than anything, are striving to shake off.” There’s no better place to dive into the record than the snappily titled focus track ‘Femur In The Dust (Who Told You There’s A Better Life!?)’, a song which channels everything from Tokyo Police Club and Foxing to the hyperactive indie rock of Johnny Foreigner to create a sound that’s simultaneously fatalistic and defiant (As Lyjak puts it: “It’s that Slavic state of mind I grew up with—life’s unfair and tiring, get over it”).

Watch the video directed by Riley Campbell with director of photography Spencer Campbell below:

The Courage Cloak is out now and available from Bandcamp.

Stephen Steinbrink – Magic Mirror

“The spirit [of the record] is captured in the conjurer’s trick of the title, where reality is ruptured by a brief spark of magic. Buoyed by the experience and wisdom gleaned from outside activities, Steinbrink returns to music as a kind of magician himself. A figure who, guided by invention and playfulness, looks to use mastery of a physical craft in order to open the door to small, intangible miracles.” So we wrote of Stephen Steinbrink‘s 2023 LP Disappearing Coin, an album which made the list of our favourites released that year in no small part thanks to its willingness to look for freshness and curiosity so far into a career. In a Split Mirror, Steinbrink’s latest full-length coming via Mansions and Millions this autumn, functions as a direct continuation of this mission, not because if its stylistic similarities to its predecessor, but because of its differences. There’s a newfound openness to these songs, a colour and clarity which might at first appear at odds with the imagery of mirrors, doubles and distortions, but which ultimately makes perfect sense. Because, as lead single ‘Magic Mirror’ displays, this is an album about the ever-changing nature of identity which embraces instability not as some exercises in postmodern slipperiness but rather a firm, confident grasp of human truth.

Watch the video directed, shot and edited by Steinbrink himself below:

In a Split Mirror will be released on the 30th October via Mansions and Millions and you can pre-order it now.

Tasha – Quick!

“Finds an artist embracing the pace and breadth of their new life. Confronting each day with a sense of defiance rather than looking for somewhere to hide.” So we wrote of Tasha‘s 2024 full-length All This and So Much More, the New York-based songwriter emerging from a whirlwind period of experiences both thrilling and painful with a freshly honed appreciation of the possibilities of life. Released this June via Bayonet Records, follow-up You Are Spring! carried this spirit to new heights, channelling the season of its title to offer a warm and colourful sound pregnant with the promise of new growth. Undeterred by the present tip towards autumn, Tasha is preparing to head out on tour and has released a brand new video for single and closer ‘Quick!’ in celebration, along with a roundtable discussion with Taja Cheek (AKA L’Rain) and Jamila Woods (who both feature on the record) for Talkhouse. But listen to ‘Quick!’ and the rest of the record and it becomes clear autumn might in fact be a perfect time to dive into You Are Spring!, because more than a celebration of the season, it is an ode to all that we endure in order to enjoy the fruitful periods when they finally arrive. “Quick! See how this beauty rushes by?” as Tasha asks on the track. Let this be a reminder for us to concentrate on what we have in front of us before the wheel turns again.

Watch the video by V.E. Haddad (along with Annie Klebano) below:

You Are Spring! is out now via Bayonet Records and available from Bandcamp.

Tough Old Bird – Come Back, Come Back

The Buffalo, New York outfit Tough Old Bird have released a steady stream of singles across this summer, with tracks like ‘Wednesday’s Child‘, ‘Shape Of Our Love‘ and ‘I Was a Giant‘ highlighting how evocative and versatile the project has become. “Tough Old Bird have not pivoted to a new sound so much as expanded their armoury,” as we wrote, “and are now equipped to tackle whatever emotional palette any given song demands.” Latest track ‘Come Back, Come Back’ provides yet further evidence of the promise of this new era, its sound electrified but lacking none of the patience as a result, telling a poetic narrative that’s at once brooding and compassionate and little world weary too. “Well, it was such a long way to go / To come back, come back alone,” as Corrigan sings around halfway through, two lines which embody the solitude which marks the track, though from that point things tilt towards something more intense, allowing for a final sense of catharsis with the reflection.

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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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The result is conflicted, reflective, braided from the twin threads of love and loss. A style captured by the ambiguous image of the title itself. Shadow Child refers to ultrasound scanning, that picture of “a liminal person that doesn’t quite exist yet,” as Lapell puts it. “Their status is ontologically blurry.” But across the nine songs, Lapell places this existenial uncertainty into a wider context, drawing on everything from personal experience and medical jargon to maritime myth, and in doing so allows the full spectrum of experience that is pregnancy the space it deserves.

Featuring fellow Canadian songwriter Jill Barber, lead single ‘Hazel’ introduces this nuanced style. What label Outside Music describe as “part lullaby and part elegy” which soothes and mourns in equal measure, addressed to the existentially vague child, be they in the womb, the future or memory. The single comes complete with a video by Lapell herself, cut from old super 8 footage filmed as a teenager and unearthed in the present. “Shot at a melancholy yet hopeful time in my life,” she explains, “the film features birds in flight and at rest, often shaky, scratchy or out of focus. I feel like this stuttering footage has its own fragile beauty that resonates with the song’s sweet message of a nascent love, half-formed but all-consuming.”

Watch the video by Abigail Lapell herself below:

Shadow Child will be released on the 8th May via Outside Music and you can pre-order it now from the Abigail Lapell Bandcamp page.

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“Employ[s] the apocalyptic tones of Waits and Cohen at their darkest to explore the dangerous present. A world that feels unwell, with climate collapse, rising fascism, televised genocide and a whole manner of other symptoms racking a planet in the vice grip of whatever stage of capitalism we’ve passed into now.” So we wrote last month of All That’s Solid Melts Into Air, the forthcoming album from Winnipeg-born, New York-based songwriter Devon Church. The title track paired stark Biblical imagery with earnest emotion, and latest single ‘Fall Like Lightning’ continues the style. One which sees pessimism and hope exist simultaneously, a spirit tied to the overtly leftist position of the record as whole. The album notes aptly describe the song as “a kind of ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’ for dejected denizens of the internet,” railing against the myriad of contemporary curses brought forth by capitalism’s iron grip, as well as the false prophets who have risen within this milieu, promising the world while grinding us under their boots.

The track also comes with a video, filmed by Ada Roth, edited by Danny Scales and directed by Church himself. Watch it below:

All That’s Solid Melts Into Air will be released on the 7th November and you can pre-order it from the Devon Church Bandcamp page.

Dwi Riana – Dysphoria

Next year Dwi Riana will release her debut full-length Songs from the Yellow Couch, and the Toronto-based songwriter has been releasing singles in recent weeks to offer a preview. Most recently ‘Springtime‘, a song which evoked, as we put it, “the thaw after a long winter where the possibility of growth and love becomes real again.” Now Riana has returned with ‘Dysphoria’, a track which explores the ongoing experience of gender dysphoria via a mix of bossa-nova, indie jazz and folk influences. “I initially wrote this song as a very short interlude for my album, with no hook, just the bossa guitar and one verse. After playing it more, I developed it into a full song and it turned into this indie-jazz version,” Riana explains. “We wanted to create a feeling of controlled chaos, using dissonance and blending differing sounds together to add to the theme of dysphoria.”

Fealty – Walking on Hands

Thad Kopec has been putting out music for years under his own name, the Nashville artist flitting between styles and genres with each passing release and slowly building up a significant back catalogue that covers everything from ornate indie rock to hushed folk and digital pop. However, such a history gets heavy after a while, and Kopec found himself itching for the freedom of a fresh start. Hence Fealty, a brand new project which sees him turn over production duties for the first time as Bennett Littlejohn takes the reins, allowing for a newfound focus solely on performance. After a self-titled EP earlier in the year, Fealty is now back with new single ‘Walking on Hands’. A song of equal parts intimacy and invention, where Kopec’s renewed drive and curiosity are on full show for all to see.

‘Walking on Hands’ is out now and available from the usual places.

Howling Bells – Heavy Lifting

Hailing from Sydney and now based in London, Howling Bells made a name for themselves in the mid-aughties with a dark, brooding and often cinematic style of indie rock, releasing a string of albums which reached out towards folk, krautrock and various other influences too. After the release of Heartstrings back in 2014, the band went quiet for over a decade, but have now announced their return in 2026 with new full-length, Strange Life. The album not only breaks the hiatus but reflects on it, as shown by latest single ‘Heavy Lifting’. “A hazy and grunge-fuelled declaration,” as lead Juanita Stein puts it. “Like anyone who’s worked at the thing they love tirelessly, you build up great resilience. The callouses on your hands, the muscles you’ve strengthened, the swagger in your stride. ‘Heavy Lifting’ is a song about the thousands of miles you walk to acquire this kind of confidence; this is not anything that can be stripped away from you.” Watch the video directed by Orlando Cubitt below:

Strange Life will be released on the 13th February via Nude Records.

Living Hour – Texting

“A song, like The Weakerthans’ ‘One Great City!’ before it, which uses the dismal skies and cityscape of Winnipeg as a kind of mirror, evoking a personal lethargy and lack of colour […] But for all of its sombre gloom, the track refuses to settle within the leaden environment, each chorus like an upward grasp towards something brighter in the hope of piercing the clouds.” So we wrote of ‘Best I Did It’ from Living Hour‘s new album Internal Drone Infinity a few weeks ago, a song indicative of the band’s ability to excavate the magical from the mundane. With the album out now via Keeled Scales (US), Paper Bag Records (Canada) and Beloved Records (Australia), the outfit have unveiled a video for the track ‘Texting’, a track which continues the mood. “‘Texting’ is written from this really mundane but intimate point of view of trying to explain Winnipeg to someone over text,” explains lyricist Sam Sarty. “In the winter, everything disappears in the snow, but when the snow melts, we’re left with the mosaic of shit. I keep a list on my phone of things I see on the sidewalk: garbage that breaks my heart or situations that I try to explain, either to myself or over text—that blue bubble carrying my thoughts somewhere else.”

Watch the video filmed by Eden Carter below:

Internal Drone Infinity is out now via Keeled Scales, Paper Bag Records (Canada) and Beloved Records (Australia). Order a copy now from the Living Hour Bandcamp page.

The Michigans – Spring Ahead (Fall In Line)

Consisting of Jeff Mensch (guitar, vocals), Jessica Keuskamp (drums, vocals) and Patrick Greer (bass), The Michigans are a brand new indie rock outfit out of New Jersey channelling the spirit of their Northeastern forebears. As debut single ‘Spring Ahead (Fall In Line)’ attests, fans of the like of Yo La Tengo, Dinosaur Jr. and our old favourites Oxford Collapse would be advised to take notice. The track is executed with the kind of confidence most new projects could only dream of, slowly shapeshifting from the jangling brightness of the front half into something heavier and hazier as psych influences descend like a fog. But regardless of where you find yourself in the song, you can bet on the thrilling sense of forward motion to be barrelling onwards, giving everything an infectious, affirming tone that’s only elevated by the singalong vocals.

More Like Shadows – Hive Mind

Recording under the moniker More Like Shadows, Toronto‘s Jordan Allen combines music and visual art to form his own unique aesthetic. Raw, lo-fi indie rock and collage-based visuals meet and intertwine, each element as playful and inventive as the other. New album Vacation Mode was released earlier this month, and single ‘Hive Mind’ serves as the perfect intro to the project for anyone unfamiliar. What Allen describes as “a song about the mindsets and 10-step programs of media addiction, the collective yearning for uprising, and the job market economy comment section wishlists of now,” it manages to capture the wiry spirit of classic post-punk while offering a more muscular dimension too, all tied together by vocals which phase between sardonic and sincere. “Can we eat the rich? / I just think we’ve had enough of their bullshit,” as Allen asks in one verse, a line wryly humorous for sure, but not without its hopeful sentiment.

Pearla – To Love Something

We last featured Pearla back in 2023, including the album Oh Glistening Onion, The Nighttime Is Coming among our favourite releases of the year. A record where “playful whimsy and unfiltered introspection are kept in check by a certain self-awareness,” as we wrote, “though cannot help but tend towards the potential of some higher mystery,” and thus marking the project as one which “works in awe of life’s mysteries, determined to see the beautiful and the surreal rise above the grind of the everyday.” The first new release since Oh Glistening Onion, new single ‘To Love Something’ builds upon this style with care and grace, again searching for those small details which lift an otherwise mundane existence into something significant. The track is the first taste of a promised full-length set for release sometime next year, and everything points to the record being one to watch out for over the coming months.

‘To Love Something’ is out now and available from Bandcamp.

since torino – reunion dinner

Earlier in the year we let you know Sheffield‘s since torino were preparing to release their debut EP, describing ‘transatlantic flight song’ as the perfect entry point to the project. “Opening with a restrained hush, the song sets out a quiet, reflective mood, combining organ and murmured vocals to create an easy meandering fondness, and gradually develops to push the mood further,” we wrote. “First with glitched guitars and eventually sweeps of violin, all working together to create a song which aches with the fondness of nostalgic contemplation.” The EP, which it turns out is titled reunion dinner, is now available, and the title track embodies its ornate literary folk rock style. Another slow burner, the song draws the audience in with the muted quiet of the opening before blooming with the introduction of horns and strings. But it resists the temptation to puncture the overriding restraint to create a wistful, decidedly autumnal air.

Sweet Nobody – Forget Me

“Embraces the twin joys of melody and noise, utilising both pop and garage rock aesthetics to write songs for the meek and modest among us.” So we wrote back in September of the Long Beach, California-based band Sweet Nobody, single ‘Revenge‘ giving a glimpse at new full-length Driving Off to Nowhere. With the album’s release only weeks away via Repeating Cloud, Sweet Nobody are back with new track ‘Forget Me’. The song is heavier and darker than its predecessor, switching out the sunny indie pop energy for something more clouded and stormy. But for all of its shadowy tones and brooding weight, the prevailing mood is one of catharsis. As though across the track a sense of conviction develops, a decision to voice those things unsaid and let go of the past.

Tara Kannangara – Here We Are Again (From Alice Is Fine)

Back in 2024, we wrote about Extraordinary People, the EP by Sri Lankan–Canadian songwriter and musician Tara Kannangara, describing how the JUNO-nominated artist draws on classical training and jazz sensibilities to push synth pop in new directions. Written for the short film Alice Is Fine, new single ‘Here We Are Again’ is no less evocative or inventive. A track Kannangara describes as “an indie pop song about the repressed rage of not being believed,” able to offer both intimate hush and big, bold defiance. The film follows a female protagonist who decides to stand up for herself against a doctor who dismisses her pain, and ‘Here We Are Again’ gives the scenario all the fury and catharsis it warrants.

‘Here We Are Again’ is out now and available from the usual places.

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The entirety of Afterglades unfolds in this manner. A release as capable of tender emotion as it is scorching rage, and furthermore one unwilling to settle for half measures when the stakes of the moment are so high. Take latest single ‘Obsoloscenic’, written during the earlier days of the mass force feeding of AI, Meikle feeling understandably downbeat about a future. “This song came from trying to find a way to reckon with it, but still see hope through it,” Meikle explains. “It’s still a condemnation of humanity’s choices and our treatment of the earth and its creatures, but there is a through line of optimism in it somewhere. There’s just no other option than to be optimistic in my mind, naive and difficult as it may be.” But make no mistake, this is not an acquiescence to the false promises of the tech industry but something wider and deeper. As Meikle concludes: “Maybe there’s something beautiful about humankind relinquishing control of our machinations and reverting to some purer version of biological existence.”

As I’m watching that red sun a’rising
Beyond horizons
Brushing off a teary cheek
Guess there’s beauty in being obsolete

Watch a live version of the track recorded at Catherine North Studios in Hamilton and directed and edited by Cameron Veitch (Black Lake) below:

Afterglades is out now via Paper Bag Records and available from the Mappe Of Bandcamp page.

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Recording under the moniker Bernardo, vocalist, guitarist and producer Sonia Bernardo combines elements of jazz, indie rock and alt-soul to create songs which owe equal debts to her Portuguese and British heritage. Last week saw the release of Secrets Of Six-Figure Women, Bernardo’s debut full-length album which builds upon the promise of early releases to realise this sound fully—a record packed with confidence and sophistication which meditates on what it means to strive and desire within contemporary society. Single ‘Bobby’s Song’ serves as an ideal entry for the uninitiated, highlighting the sleek mood, intricate detail and assured attitude of the release as a whole.

EERA – Honey, do you see me

The recording project of Berlin-based Norwegian artist Anna Lena Kirsten Bruland, EERA has made a mark in recent years with a moody brand of dream pop. New full-length I’ll stop when I’m done, coming soon via Test Card Recordings, has picked a suitably evocative subject to further the style. Taking its title from a quote by Marilyn Monroe, the album explores the lives of the iconic starlets of Hollywood’s Golden Era, as well as those of the characters they brought to life on the silver screen. Ahead of the album’s release, EERA has shared new single ‘Honey, do you see me’, a track inspired by Billy Wilder’s sixties classic The Apartment. “I was fascinated by the fact that the main character (an intelligent and beautiful woman) is madly in love with a man who has a wife and the boss of a big company,” Bruland explains. “It affected her self-confidence with this man playing with her feelings, promising her the ‘world’ etc. I wanted to write a song from her side of the story but also exaggerate these types of feelings in the song, where you almost feel a bit mad. The desperation of trying to be loved by someone who really doesn’t want to be with you takes over your self-worth. You forget about yourself, and all the focus is on him.”

I’ll Stop When I’m Done will be released on the 26th September via Test Card Recordings.

ear – Ceremony

The project of Yaelle Avtan and Jonah Paz, ear make glitchy collages of indie pop and electronic music that draw on the duo’s background in “experimental electronic hardcore” and twee folk. Following some near-viral success on streaming services with early singles, ear recently released their debut album The Most Dear and the Future, which presents their unique and oddly compelling style to the world proper. Each of the eight songs are short and sweet, slipping effortlessly from gentle, near-whispered pop to headphone-shaking electronica in the blink of an eye. It all feels very now. Like indie pop for the age of short form video, kind of wild and hyperactive but also sad and lonely in a way that’s not easy to describe, nostalgic for something that has never existed. It would fit on the soundtrack to the next Jane Schoenbrun film for sure. You could really start anywhere, but ‘Ceremony’s is my current favourite, so check it out below.

His His – Hardcore Band

We last wrote about His His, AKA Toronto-based songwriter Aidan Belo, back in October 2024 with the release of EP Good Gold, with songs like ‘My Friend Wants to be a Freemason‘ offering “a gentle and folk-inflected [sound] that wears an air of weary wistfulness like the grain in an old film photograph.” Now Belo is returning with brand new EP ’25 via Victory Pool, and single ‘Hardcore Band’ indicates the direction of the release. Recorded entirely to a Tascam cassette deck, the track finds His His at its most fuzzy and intimate, maintaining the earnest tone which has long marked the project and dialling up the closeness through a gauze of DIY texture. Lyrically, the song takes on the age old problem of any folk songwriter. Namely, all of your friends wishing you were in something cooler like a hardcore band instead.

Jamie Lidell & Luke Schneider – The Passing

Fans of experimental music will no doubt be familiar with Jamie Lidell and Luke Schneider, the former one of the UK’s premier practitioners of neo-soul, the latter a renowned pedal steel player pioneering within the genre of ambient country. But their new collaborative album is something different. One designed to aid in the inner explorations brought about by Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy, and awake to the true depths of art’s potential. “A mind is often found more exposed during psychedelic experiences,” Lidell explains. “Specifically in a therapeutic setting, where trust is key to approach issues and work through events in the way of growth. This is music to support and guide the listening with or without psychedelic sensory heightening.” Single ‘The Passing’ is a suitably immersive introduction, regardless of whether you go in sober or substance-assisted.

Jonny Tex – Heifer

Hailing from Boston, MA, Jonny Tex is a youth pastor turned songwriter who makes what has been described as “post-faith slacker rock.” Out via Happene Twice, debut single Heifer / Cherubhead welcomes listeners into this distinctive style, with the lead track pairing playfulness, peculiarity and something more grievous. A song inspired by “Texas floods and Southern dread” which twists the easygoing rhythms and droll swagger of the slacker genre into strange shapes, a sense of desperation needling beneath the surface as the clatter of percussion veers between roguish and unnerving. “I don’t wanna be / Cattle in a flash flood where I’m / Tangled in the trees,” as Tex sings in one verse. “Sucking on salinity for all eternity / Buried by the water that just washes over me / Everything i had / I’d give it all away.”

Mia Wilson – Face To Face

Southern California singer-songwriter Mia Wilson is preparing to release her self-titled debut full-length via Royal Oakie Records this November. The album continues the lineage of LA records from the sixties and seventies, taking inspiration from released like Tapestry by Carole King, Heart Food by Judee Sill and Jackson Browne’s Late For the Sky. Latest single ‘Face To Face’ embodies the lush, honeyed light of this sound, not to mention Wilson’s warm and wistful croon. What results is something rich and welcoming and charged with longing, Wilson’s piano, Wurlitzer and Rhodes accentuated by further instrumentation from Skyler Lusteg (bass buitar, acoustic guitar) and Tim Ramsey (acoustic and electric guitars, organ, percussion, bass VI, Mellotron, pedal steel, bass harmonica, string).

Watch the video filmed by Julia Schwebel and edited by Skyler Lusteg below:

Mia Wilson will be released on the 14th November via Royal Oakie and you can pre-order it now.

Petey USA – Anything In Between

Earlier in the year, Petey USA released The Yips, a concept album set within the fictional dive bar The Yips Tavern, imagining a series of interactions between the diverse clientele who all, in one way or another, struggle through life and experience the dreaded titular phenomenon. Ahead of a fall headline tour, Petey is releasing A Case of The Yips, a new extended version of the record complete with three bonus tracks, one of which is being released now as a single. Described by the artist as “a song about being scared about any possible outcome,” ‘Anything In Between’ was written as a b-side to album favourite ‘Ask Someone Else’ though is far more than a handmaid. Better to think of it as the small devil on the shoulder versus the angel of ‘Ask Someone Else’, corrupting the encouragement of the previous track with a creeping sense of doubt. But, true to the Petey USA sound, the result burns through its anxious concern with equal parts unguarded sincerity and cathartic momentum, making for a worthy addition to barstools at The Yips.

A Case Of Yips will be released later this year.

Weirs – Everlasting

“To ponder whether Weirs exist in defiance or deference of their forebears is to miss the point completely. This is not an attempt to raze conventions, nor reproduce them. But rather imagine how folk could and should sound today.” So we wrote of the North Carolina outfit’s new album Diamond Grove, coming next month via Dear Life Records. Lead single ‘‘I Want to Die Easy’ introduced the style. “A hymn” as we continued, “delivered not from the still air and stone of a cathedral but God’s own Earth,” and now Weirs have returned with new track ‘Everlasting’ to further ground the album’s terrestrial textures. It’s an instrumental recorded during a late night improvisation session and furthered with layers of field recordings. These additional sounds range from drain grates at wastewater plants and street preachers in bus terminals to a walk the old “cow cemetery” in the woods at Diamond Grove farm and scooping cheese curd from the vat in Cedar Grove. The result feels like an accumulation of the area’s history, years superimposed to create something able to transcend the ordinary flow of time.

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Decribed as “an anthology-like collection” which displays wide-ranging influences including everything from jangle pop and art rock to tin pan alley, americana and progressive folk, Deep Country is the forthcoming album from Albany outfit Bruiser and Bicycle, to be released this autumn. Lead single ‘Waterfight’ shows how this myriad of inspiration registers within songs as well as between them, pairing retro folk with ample melodies and art pop sensibilities to create something inventive and dynamic. But don’t mistake variation for overabundance, because for all the innovation, the track sees Bruiser and Bicycle dial back the maximalist approach that marked their previous record Holy Red Wagon. The result is rich, endlessly surprising and grounded within the natural experimentation inherent to any collaborative act.

Watch the video filmed and edited by Derick Noetzel and directed by Keegan Graziane below:

Deep Country is out on the 8th October and available to pre-order now.

Eric Angelo Bessel – Scavengers

“Plays with our understandings of reality, presenting a version of physical existence which bends toward the esoteric.” That’s how we described the work of American-German visual artist and musician Eric Angelo Bessel back in 2023. Album Visitation offered what we called “spacious soundscape[s] loaded with the weight of reflection yet simmering with a certain foreboding too, the past and future weighing on the present as shadows, echoes emerging from within a granular fog.” This autumn will see Bessel return with Mirror at Night, a brand new album on Lore City Records which again collapses the distinction between the past and the future into something flat and beguiling. Listen to the nocturnal, ambiguous lead single ‘Scavengers’ below:

FONTINE – Home Right Here

Back in July we previewed Good Buddy, the new album from Winnipeg-based songwriter FONTINE forthcoming via Birthday Cake Records, with the lead single and title track. A song which sat “at the intersection of big rig bravado and unashamed sentimentality,” as we put it, “using a blend of good time rock and bedroom pop sensibilities to explore ideas of love, friendship and self-actualisation.” With the record’s release edging closer, FONTINE is back with new single, ‘Home Right Here’, and the song is no less emotive in style. As the title suggests, the track is a meditation on home in all of its dimensions, be it specific locations, special people or even particular times of life. “Running down to the well, through the forests and the fields, with my cousins at my heels,” as the first verse opens. “In the garden with my mom, pulling weeds all day long, picking sweetgrass from the lawn.”

Heaven For Real – Hold Me Back

Hailing from Halifax, Nova Scotia and now based in Toronto, Heaven For Real is the brainchild of twins Mark and J. Scott Grundy, offering a genre-bending style of music that draws on everything from post-punk and art rock to psych, ambient, electronic and jazz. The project’s most collaborative release to date, new album Who Died & Made You The Dream pushes this swirl of influences further than ever before, stylistically mirroring the dream logic of its themes to moves between genres with fluidity and subconscious intention. Ahead of release this November via Mint Records, Heaven For Real have unveiled single ‘Hold Me Back’ by way of introduction. A song decidedly dreamlike in style, both in terms of its slightly off-kilter haze and the coiled cryptic meaning which seems to edge closer with every repeated listen.

on relinquishment, I remember the cycle
pinwheel of interest
gone with the wind my genoa sail
on relinquishment;
I surrender to the cycle
fixed on the distance
cured through imagination
on relinquishment;
I remember the cycle

Watch the video by Jordan Minkoff below, though those with a sensitive disposition be warned, it features haunted hair:

Who Died & Made You The Dream? will be released on the 7th November via Mint Records and you can pre-order it now.

Jackie West – Offer

“Content to understand change as a kind of potential, and occupy the present in all of its fluctuating strangeness.” That’s how we described Jackie West‘s Close To The Mystery last year, a full-length which followed its lead character “through a city in the aftermath of a relationship,” as we continued, “the various rented rooms in which they find themselves representative of those liminal days between what was and what will be.” Now the NYC/Hudson-based artist is back with ‘Offer’, a brand new single on Ruination Record Co. which is perhaps simultaneously the most ambitious and laid-back song West has written to date. An almost ten-minute epic that pairs conversational spoken word vocals with a warm and catchy melody, unfolding like an internal monologue as it moves between casual observations, quantum theory, Socrates and a hundred other subjects. “‘Offer’ is about many things,” as West explains:

It’s about propaganda—how it’s difficult to trace a message back to its source; how there’s never been much room to ask why and what do you mean by that? We tend to take things at face value and then wonder why all we see is a mask. Offer is about learning to accept your blindspots and realizing we all have them/ how we see someone is generally how we see ourselves, so we must have compassion for ourselves first—real forgiveness and letting go—to see another clearly. Offer is about being attached to the story, generational trauma, seeing it and loving it enough to say, “you’ve been with me, my mother, grandmother and great grandmother for so long,” now you can go back to them—”I don’t need to live according to your script anymore.

Lefty Parker – Illusions

Taking inspiration from titans like Townes Van Zandt, New York-based troubadour Lefty Parker has released a number of records over recent years, establishing a hushed and heartfelt style tuned to the key of classic folk. Often beset by the weight of loss and longing, yet never quite ready to surrender its romantic hope. Next month sees the release of Ark, Parker’s brand new full-length album produced by Buck Meek and put out by Airloom, and single ‘Illusions’ gives an indication of what to expect. With Meek joining too, the song is restrained yet all the more striking for it, delivered from a state of chronic uncertainty familiar to those down on their luck, though shot through too with a kind of heartbroken fondness for life, no matter how cruel or uncaring it might sometimes be.

Ark will be released on the 21st October via Airloom.

Neti-Neti – Grace In Rot

The self-described “lo-fi ritual project” of vocalist Amirtha Kidambi (Elder Ones, Mary Halvorson) and percussionist Matt Evans (OHYUNG, Ben Seretan), experimental duo Neti-Neti aims to collapse the distinction between the personal and the political via improvision and collaboration. Forthcoming release Echo of Being / Grace in Rot was recorded over a single day, Kidambi and Evans tapping into both individual grief, collective trauma and well-worn traditions to charge the process with a sense of momentum and fluency. Single ‘Grace in Rot’ highlights the palpable energy of the sound and the emotional urgency which follows. “‘Grace in Rot’ heaved its way out of us during the last take of the session,” the pair explain, “an unexpected flame of physicality that came after a long day and a deep discussion about the evil and cruelty we witness daily in the world.” The result is visceral, cathartic and transportive, threatening to unravel under its own chaotic impetus while always reaching towards transcendence.

vireo – catching minnows

Following on from single ‘Cloudgazers’ released back in 2024, a single we described as “a soft and gauzy song that evokes the act of the title with warm textures, gentle electronics and little squiggly guitar lines,” Pittsburgh-based indie pop outfit vireo are gearing up to release a brand new full-length later this year. For now, single ‘catching minnows’ serves as a curtain raiser to the release. Turning to the natural world in the face of personal challenges, the track could be said to embody the vireo project as a whole. One attuned to the curative power of the environment and the small beauties therein, packed full of brightness and wonder as though written in honour of the joy of being alive.

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