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| Photo - Smiles Meyer |
Brooklyn-based artist Rachel Bochner has built a reputation for sharp, emotionally charged indie-pop that cuts straight to the core. Since her debut, she’s carved out a space defined by candid lyricism and an unflinching willingness to explore the messier edges of love, identity and self-discovery. Now, she brings those ideas together on her new album, I Guess A Sure Thing Couldn’t Go Down Gently, a deeply personal dissection of a relationship ending and everything that surfaced in its aftermath.
“In short, ‘I Guess A Sure Thing Couldn’t Go Down Gently’ is a break up album and my dissection of how it happened. As break ups tend to be, the record is complicated and far from concise (very in line with its mouthful of a title),” Bochner explains. “Written after the implosion of my long term relationship with a man, the album orbits my queer identity’s entanglement with insurmountable guilt, revelatory grief, and the start of complex acceptance.”
That period brought two seemingly opposing experiences into Bochner’s life at once. The devastation of losing a relationship existed alongside the excitement of beginning to recognize herself more fully. She shares, “In the midst of this devastating dissolution, I was experiencing a paradoxical truth: immense grief and immense joy. For the first time in my life, I had a glimpse of my authentic self: a euphoric revelation, entirely magnetic and addictive. But how long can one dance around the dissonance until it becomes deafening?”
Those contradictions run throughout I Guess A Sure Thing Couldn’t Go Down Gently, with Bochner examining not only what happened, but the stories we tell ourselves when trying to make sense of the damage left behind.
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After teasing her forthcoming album Leather & Denim in 2025 with the wistful single “Storyteller,” followed this past summer with the cheeky “God’s Problem,” featuring acoustic duo The Western Thistles, Tanjeryne once again displays her distinctive musical vision on "City Girls," out today as a single on Bandcamp and streaming services.
The smokey atmosphere on "City Girls" is accentuated by Dave Babcock’s sultry saxophone and underscores the timeless sound of Leather & Denim, which blends classic country with hints of jazz, soul and folk-pop. The album will be out on Oct. 23. As a singer-songwriter who has emerged from Edmonton, Alberta’s vibrant music scene, Tanjeryne teamed up with producer Mallory Chipman and some of the city’s most accomplished musicians to create the nostalgic feel of Leather & Denim, although a deeper listen reveals messages of women’s empowerment that directly reflect our current times.
Tanjeryne says, “I wrote ‘City Girls’ 10 years ago when I was going to university, living alone for the first time. I had some really inspiring, dedicated women around me. We were all living downtown, going to school and working part-time jobs. We were passionate about making the world a better place and seeing real change, and we felt like we could be a part of that change.
"‘City Girls’ is a celebration of the fact that, as women, we have so many opportunities in this modern world to make an impact and live beyond the norms that our grandmothers did. I’ve been humbled and jaded since writing it, but the sentiment remains. I hope that when girls hear it, they’re inspired to dare to dream.”
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Full Flower Moon Band - Endless Summer.
Full Flower Moon Band, the project of Australian songwriter, guitarist and frontwoman Kate ‘Babyshakes’ Dillon, returned with a new single “Endless Summer” a few days ago, ahead of two major stadium appearances supporting Foo Fighters in Australia this November. Beginning life as Dillon’s bedroom project before expanding into a formidable live band around her, Full Flower Moon Band has become one of the most distinctive names in contemporary Australian rock. Built around Dillon’s songwriting and singular stage presence, the project draws together heavy guitars, psych-rock swagger and sharp, often darkly comic lyricism.
That momentum now sees Full Flower Moon Band join Foo Fighters at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on November 5 and Queensland Country Bank Stadium in Townsville on November 7. Their first new music of 2026, “Endless Summer” is a much darker proposition than its title initially suggests. Driven by an insistent riff and a sense of increasingly frantic optimism, the track captures the unstable conviction of a manic episode, turning the promise of permanent sunshine into something altogether more unnerving.
“A much darker anthem than the title suggests — ‘Endless Summer’ is the voice of a manic episode. This hopeless, frantic optimism is summarised in the chorus lyric, ‘you can have an endless summer, anytime the sun comes out’. What began as a simple instrumental track is now an unnerving battle cry.” — Kate ‘Babyshakes’ Dillon
The single follows a breakthrough period for Dillon and Full Flower Moon Band. Third album Megaflower debuted at #1 on the ARIA Australian Album Chart and #6 on the ARIA Vinyl Chart, selling out its initial vinyl pressing in just one week.
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This week, legendary singer, songwriter, musician, producer and activist Stevie Wonder celebrates the 50th anniversary of Songs in the Key of Life with a four-song EP featuring previously unreleased recordings from the album’s sessions: “It’s Easier,” “My Life Story of Love,” “I Can See the Sun In Late December,” and “I’m Into Livin’.” The release opens a new chapter in the story of a landmark album that reshaped modern music, offering listeners a deeper look into the imagination and musical exploration behind one of Wonder’s defining creative periods.
Personally curated by Stevie Wonder, the recordings were recently mixed for this EP by the album’s original recording and mixing engineers, John Fischbach and Gary O Adante. Adante was credited on the original LP as Gary Olazabal.
At 4:54 a.m., as the final studio session for Songs in the Key of Life came to a close, Nathan Watts, Stevie’s longtime bassist, exclaimed, “Fo’FiftyFo’!” From then on, the phrase signaled the end of a session and became an inside joke for anyone in Stevie’s circle. Now, that hour marks a new beginning as four previously unreleased recordings reach the world, connecting the album’s creation with its next chapter.
“We’ve lived with Songs in the Key of Life for fifty years, but there’s still more to hear,” says Wonder. “We didn’t add these songs to the album, but they were part of what I was feeling and discovering as we made it. They bring me back to that time in my life, and now they get to become part of yours.”
