British Birds - Sébastien De Francesco - Rachel Cribby - Next Week’s Washing

British Birds - Stuck In A Room.

Just ahead of the forthcoming new album (Murmurate, Oscillate) from British Birds the group share another new single which from Beehive Candy's perspective confirms we are in for a very special collection of new songs. The single is called 'Stuck In A Room'. Of it, singer Bobby Townson says "'There are days where you can't be bothered socialising or achieving anything at all. Put some crap on the TV, open a bottle of wine and write off whatever’s happening, I think it’s healthy to have those days."

As a reminder: ‘Murmuration’ is the low hum made by those vast, beautifully choreographed flocks of starlings as they simultaneously flap their wings and take to the sky.  Some people say that the frequency of this unique, rumbling, oscillating sound can cure diseases...  

One of the most exciting live bands in the UK, British Birds combine the garage-punk energy of Billy Childish, the wry English sophistication of XTC and the witty pop inventiveness of The Lovely Eggs.  Like the murmurating flocks of starlings, they create a unique sound, and might even be able to cure diseases.

Based in Chorley, Lancashire, British Birds are a resolutely DIY band.  Bobby records and mixes all the music; Emma creates all the artwork.  Their first two albums were self-released, selling hundreds of copies at gigs and at a few chosen record stores.   British Birds didn’t wait for permission to take flight.  They just got on with it.  

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Sébastien De Francesco - Leaving Now.

Following “Fleury Street” and “Love on the Way Down,” Québec-based singer-songwriter Sébastien De Francesco shares “Leaving Now,” an intimate and bittersweet folk-rock single that imagines the final moments between two close friends from the perspective of the person preparing to leave. Moving between companionship, reassurance and acceptance, the song finds tenderness within loss while holding onto the belief that love and connection continue after someone is gone.

Inspired by the final afternoon Sébastien spent with a close friend who was dying of cancer, “Leaving Now” gradually became an imagined conversation between the two. Some lines are voiced from his friend’s perspective, asking for companionship as his memory and strength begin to fade, while others capture Sébastien’s instinct to comfort and protect him.

“The shifting point of view makes the song feel like an intimate conversation between two friends rather than simply a song about grief,” Sébastien shares. The song’s title arrives only at its conclusion. Sébastien spent nearly an entire day working on the ending, knowing the conversation needed to reach its final goodbye without becoming overly dramatic. Eventually, the words “But I’m leaving now” emerged, as though his friend were gently acknowledging that it was time to go. “‘Leaving Now’ expresses the immediacy of that goodbye, but the song also suggests that love and connection remain after someone leaves,” Sébastien explains.

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Photo - Kelsey Gale

Rachel Cribby - Rich Boy Luck.

Rachel Cribby has announced her debut album ‘I Can’t Wait To Forget This Later,’ to be released November 20 on First City Artists (Coco, Alexa Rose, Eliza Edens). Produced by Daniel Ledwell (Jenn Grant, Oh Pep, Ken Yates), the album shimmers with early aughts alt pop appeal—brisk melodies laden with sharp, darkly comical lyricism reminiscent of Aimee Mann, Rilo Kiley, or Liz Phair. 

This week, she shares lead single “Rich Boy Luck,” a zipping and incisive assessment of a young love’s implosion. “Have you ever seen that meme that’s like, ‘who is the worst person you’ve ever met and why was it the guy you dated when you were 19?’” shares Cribby. “That’s what this song is about!”  She continues, “The emotion that I cathartically ejected from this song is RAGE, which is a tough emotion for me. Feels good.”

"Rich boys never know what they want - What’s there to get when all the getting’s been got? - Rich boys don’t know anything about luck".

The Canadian-born, Detroit-based songwriter’s sardonic style is for more than listener’s amusement; it’s her healing method of choice. And in recent years, she’s needed one, having lost her father and left her beloved Montreal in quick succession. “It’s not like my twenties weren’t tumultuous,” shares Cribby. “I had plenty to sing about. I was dumped more than I can count and maybe did a bit of dumping myself. But something has happened to me in my thirties, where all of the big life stuff that I thought I could ignore by moving away, by trying to become a completely independent and self-assured person, smacked me in the face. And then it promptly started to eat me alive.”

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Photo - Hayden Armstrong

Next Week’s Washing - Clear Eyes.

Continuing to push beyond the sound established on their breakout debut EP, Toronto indie quintet Next Week’s Washing shares “Clear Eyes,” a massive, dreamy, and cinematic new single that brings alternative rock energy together with densely layered shoegaze. Taken from the band’s forthcoming second EP, the track represents their most expansive recording yet, combining walls of textured instrumentation with upfront vocals and a growing confidence in the sound they can distinctly call their own.

“Clear Eyes” was the first song Next Week’s Washing wrote after completing their debut EP. Rather than starting over, the band approached the track as an opportunity to take the foundations they had already established and push them somewhere bigger.

“We wanted to take the sound we had begun to develop with the first six songs and push it forward,” the band explains. “We took a lot more time building layers into the recording, and the result is our biggest (sonically) sounding song yet.”

That progression can be heard throughout the track. While the instrumentation leans heavily into the band’s shoegaze influences, Next Week’s Washing deliberately pushed the vocals forward in the mix, allowing the songwriting to remain present within the song’s towering layers of guitars. The result lands somewhere between the immersive atmosphere of shoegaze and the immediacy of alternative and indie rock, bringing the different sides of the band’s identity into sharper focus.

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Kate Prascher - Nicole Atkins - Earthquake Lights - Next Week’s Washing - beabadoobee - Kelly Hunt - Baileigh Jane - The Spongetones

Photo - Sander Randall

Kate Prascher - Retrograde.

Kate Prascher has released the final single from her highly anticipated sophomore album ‘Sunday Afternoon,’ out August 28 on First City Artists (Alexa Rose, Carly King). On “Retrograde,” Prascher’s delicate howl is comforting and consuming as ever. She shares, “‘Retrograde’ is a kind of lullaby and spell for the times when things seem to be moving backwards. True to its name, this song took reflection and patience to get right in the studio, but the addition of Ben Garnett and his resonant guitar licks, pointed the track in the right direction.”

Co-produced by Diana Walsh (Amanda Shires, Jason Isbell, Wild Rivers), Prascher’s new album boasts the eerie elegance she’s known for, while calling esteemed comparisons to mind—the classic country soprano of Allison Krauss; the dark, dusty Americana of Gillian Welch; the bright melodicism of Madison Cunningham. Prascher will perform her new material at Big Lawn Festival in Poughkeepsie on August 22, and at O+ Festival in Kingston October 9-11. 

Prascher was raised in Memphis, a childhood steeped in spiritual storytelling. “Where I’m from, it’s expected for the people in your life who’ve passed to show up again, one way or another,” she says. In adulthood, she carried that experience to New York City and embraced the lively vibrance of the city’s Bluegrass scene, taking mandolin lessons from Michael Daves and joining open sessions at staple venues like The Jalopy, Mona's, Sunny's. Prascher wrote about half the songs on ‘Sunday Afternoon’ while she was living in Brooklyn—the rest, after she left. 

“I’m interested in how environment informs identity,” she shares. “Leaving New York was a reckoning for me. I moved there out of ambition. If I left, could I still consider myself ambitious?” Now based upstate, she’s grateful for the opportunity to answer that question. “My life is less about chasing one thing, and more about grounded rituals, the practices of work and creation. I can hear myself more clearly. I know what I want to say.” 

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Photo - Barbara FG

Nicole Atkins - Trippin’ on Teardrops.

Nicole Atkins has shared the official music video for her latest single, 'Trippin’ on Teardrops.' Filmed on location in a historic turn-of-the-century mansion in her home state of New Jersey, 'Trippin’ on Teardrops' marks the opening track on Atkins’ eagerly awaited new album 'Drama', arriving via Sun Records/Wicked Game Records on 18th September.
 
“I wrote ‘Trippin’ on Teardrops’ during a long period of time where I was having all these insane sleep issues,” Nicole Atkins says. “Never being able to fall asleep and then waking up sometimes after two days of sleep. It was like a nightmare that I couldn’t wake up from. Burnout? Maybe. Depression? Mostly because of sleep issues. And it was at a time where it seemed like the world was business as usual and I was watching it all go by in my dreams".   
 
“After wrestling with what this song wanted to be for a while, I had the chorus. Like an SOS. Then my good old pal Peter Morén from Peter Bjorn and John was visiting Nashville, and we were writing, and I showed him this chorus, which he loved, and I just put down the verse words which I thought I’d replace because I was almost embarrassed at how pitiful they sounded but that was just the state of my life at that time. Lonely and dreaming and wishing things were different. The person I was missing most was myself, but sometimes it just takes a good friend to shine a light to get ya through it.” 

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Earthquake Lights - Too Late feat. Nicole Zuraitis.

Ahead of their upcoming fourth studio album’s 2027 arrival, New York’s Earthquake Lights share “Too Late” (feat. Nicole Zuraitis), a soulful, sophisticated new single that pairs timeless songwriting with modern alternative rock production. Drawing equally from classic soul, neo-classical composition, and contemporary rock, the track tells the story of two people drifting apart, with each voice offering a different perspective on the same relationship. The result is a poignant meditation on longing, regret, and the quiet realization that some moments cannot be reclaimed.

Inspired by the music of Norah Jones and vintage soul records, “Too Late” began as a melody at the piano before gradually revealing the emotional story it wanted to tell. Rather than approaching the lyrics first, the band allowed the music to dictate the narrative, ultimately shaping a duet that feels both intimate and universal.

“We always write the music first and fit the lyrics into the melody,” vocalist/pianist Myles Rodenhouse explains. “This one started at the piano, sung to gibberish and the phrase ‘It's too late.’ I further fleshed it out with the band before we asked Nicole to collaborate and sing on the track.”

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Next Week’s Washing - Where Did I Go Wrong.

Toronto indie quintet Next Week’s Washing share “Where Did I Go Wrong,” an exhilarating new single that pairs soaring shoegaze textures with driving alternative rock. Serving as the latest preview of the band’s forthcoming second EP, the track captures the uncertainty of growing up in a rapidly changing world, exploring the self-doubt, anxiety, and search for identity that define a generation growing up in unprecedented times.

“It’s about trying to find yourself and becoming the person you want to be at a strange time in the world,” explains singer Miles Duffy. “There’s a level of anxiety and self-doubt that comes with being young nowadays, and we felt like it’s an important thing to write about because we’re all experiencing this culture firsthand.”

Written from the perspective of young people navigating an increasingly uncertain future, “Where Did I Go Wrong” reflects the quiet internal questions that often accompany growing older. Rather than offering easy answers, the song embraces uncertainty itself, examining what it means to search for purpose while constantly questioning your place in the world. That perspective has become a defining principle behind the band’s songwriting, as they continue documenting the emotional realities of their generation through honest, relatable storytelling.

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Photo - Erika Kamano

beabadoobee - Memories.

beabadoobee has released “Memories,” the latest song from her hugely anticipated forthcoming album Pylon, due for release on September 18, 2026 via Dirty Hit / Interscope Records. beabadoobee recently gave “Memories” its live debut during a short run of US shows that included talked-about performances at Lollapalooza and Hinterland festivals, as well as a headline show at the legendary Red Rocks Amphitheatre.

Bea describes “Memories” as “one of the happiest songs on the album,” but one where she falls deep into a spiral of romanticizing bygone moments, “clinging onto ideas that should make me happy but actually make me feel sad, because I wish they were just moments I lived in forever.”

The song is indicative of the raw and sometimes uncomfortably real songwriting on Pylon, a record that’s more wide-ranging and complex than anything that she has ever put out—a tannic rock record that is, at various points, angry, lonesome, ecstatic, depressed and deeply, pathologically in love. Laus, who poured her life into songs as a teenager for the world to hear, says the album is the result of writing alone in hotel rooms, which “reminded me a lot of how I wrote songs at 17, alone in my bedroom, feeling sad.

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Photo - makemade

Kelly Hunt - All The King’s Horses.

Memphis artist Kelly Hunt has shared the second single from her forthcoming album, 'Requiem for a Sleepless Night,' out September 18 on Compass Records. Gentle and melodically surprising, “All The King’s Horses” takes an alternative angle on a classic tale, with Hunt’s fluttering vocals as emotionally arresting as her lyrical premise. 

“The Humpty Dumpty nursery rhyme popped into my head one day out of the blue,” she shares. “It had always struck me as a cautionary tale: this is what happens when you take risks—you end up in pieces, beyond repair. But the more I pondered, the more I wondered...what if he had a very good reason to climb that wall? What if whatever was on the other side was well worth the risk? What if he’s a hero, not a fool?” 

…a heart is better busted wide
Than a wall that you just hide behind 
Better to climb and take the fall 
Than to never love no one at all. 

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Baileigh Jane - Smash Your TV.

Baileigh Jane returns with “Smash Your TV,” a breezy, soulfully psychedelic slice of beach rock arriving Friday, August 21. Coastal without feeling escapist, “Smash Your TV” is rooted in the idea that sometimes freedom is remarkably simple: turn down the noise, step outside and pay attention.
  
At its heart, “Smash Your TV” serves as a reminder that life is taking place beyond the screen and beyond the stories we construct inside our own heads — somewhere physical, strange, multidimensional, and alive. Baileigh Jane’s answer is simple: go meet it. Rather than offering another version of digital-age cynicism, Baileigh approaches the sentiment with lightness. The song finds its optimism in presence — in reconnecting with the body, the natural world and the parts of ourselves that can become harder to hear beneath the constant hum of everyday life.

Dreamy guitars and twang-tinged riffs drift through a loose, soulful groove, giving “Smash Your TV” the feeling of an afternoon near the water with nowhere particularly urgent to be. Its laid-back exterior carries a deeper undercurrent: an invitation to let go of rigid thinking, rediscover wonder in small things and become more receptive to the world as it is happening.

For Baileigh, that balance between introspection and ease is increasingly becoming a defining part of their sound. Recent releases have drawn more visibly from their Florida roots, bringing the coast into both the music and the world surrounding it. Where previous single “Do You Feel the Same Way” began establishing that landscape, “Smash Your TV” sinks further into it, embracing the unhurried spirit of shore life.

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The Spongetones - The Music At The Close.

Power Pop Hall Of Famers The Spongetones continue their 2026 series of all new singles with the latest installment: the darkly cautionary tale "The Music At The Close." In true Spongetones style, the tune packs hooks and harmonies galore into a three-minute pop gem telling the tale of a doomed voyage that may just be a metaphor for modern times. 

A thrilling change of pace from the hits that have preceded it on the indie airwaves this year ("Lifetimeline," "(I Really Need) To Kiss You" and "So Long"), it's out August 21 on all digital platforms.

“The Music At The Close” makes it four. Kicking of with minor key guitar arpeggios and the tellingly timely lyrics “Ignorance and innocence, the belles of last year's ball / Look on in consternation as we play the hand they dealt,” it's a distinctly different animal from the last few singles. Where “So Long” boasted Zombies-like whimsy, “(I Really Need) To Kiss You” radiated youthful exuberance, and “Lifetimeline” floated on sweetly psychedelic swirls of sound, the new song bespeaks a kind of tensely apocalyptic resignation. 

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