Saturday, 10 May 2025

The Thing - Pascale Cheron - Cedarsmoke - Bethany Weimers

Photo - Art Davison
The Thing - Mr Useless / The Waltz.

One of NYC’s most vital new rock voices, The Thing have announced their new self-titled album 'The Thing' will be released on 6th August, and also share new double-single 'Mr Useless' / 'The Waltz'. The Thing tour the UK and Europe this summer.

As reverent of the city's gritty past as they are hungry to reinvent it, the new double-single marks the third release from the album rollout — unveiling 'The Thing' in pairs of tracks — recorded entirely analog, self-produced, and tracked live to tape without the use of a computer. The result is The Thing at their most immediate and unfiltered.

'Mr. Useless' brims with Byrds-tinged brightness and angular bite. Guitarist Michael Carter explains: “I used David Bowie’s cut-and-paste method to write the lyrics. The song’s about finding meaning in life, as opposed to sitting and watching and waiting for fate to step in.”

Meanwhile, 'The Waltz' is slow-burning and emotionally raw — a live favourite that builds to a devastating crescendo. Frontman Zane Acord shares: “I wrote it about a toxic relationship: even though it's bad for you, you love it.”

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Pascale Cheron - Anna Called (Album).

After two years of writing, recording, and mixing entirely on her own, Pascale Cheron has released her debut 24-track album Anna Called, now available on Bandcamp. The title single, a soulful, meditative track also named “Anna Called,” is available on all streaming platforms.
 
To celebrate the release, Pascale is embarking on a spring and summer tour across the East and West Coasts alongside longtime friend and collaborator Sophia Eliana. Titled the Experimental Bangs Tour, the run kicks off May 10th in Bar Harbor, ME and culminates at the Underground Music Festival in Denver in late July. Along the way, Pascale will be performing with local bands comprised of both friends and musicians she discovered through TikTok, creating a genre-fluid live experience rooted in connection, improvisation, and discovery.

“My name was Anna, but my mom changed it to Pascale when I was born,” says Pascale. “She tells me my name has a letter for each one of my aunts. A perfectly consonant string of them all. In honor of the women who made me. The sound of my name. I wrote, recorded, and mixed each song on this album over a period of two years,” says Pascale. “This album is for Anna.”

Anna Called moves through serene ambient landscapes, soulful vocal improvisations, and dreamy experimental textures. Its sound is both intimate and expansive, layering meditative rhythms with powerful bursts of emotion. Each track unfolds like a memory—fluid, surprising, and deeply personal—creating a sonic journey that honors identity, reinvention, and the women who shaped her.


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Photo - Thomas Oliver
Cedarsmoke - Kicking Drugs.

As they venture out into a new era, Cedarsmoke extends an invitation to join them, through their latest single ‘Kicking Drugs’, a psychedelic indie-rock exploration of their new dawn.

With years of experience under their belt since their first releases in 2016,  Cedarsmoke has attracted a flurry of attention from Meanjin/Brisbane’s indie scene, radio stations with their hundreds of plays, and iconic music platforms such as Triple J, Triple J Unearthed, Double J, MTV,  Pilerats, The Music, AU Review, AAA Backstage, Hysteria Mag, Scenestr and more.

Their constant evolution, diverse style, and emphasis on storytelling evoke vivid childhood memories, teenage antics, and precious nights out, and this nostalgia will blend together with the rush of something new as they prepare to usher out their third full-length album. ‘Kicking Drugs’ is a genre-fluid fusion: alt rock, pop-electronica, avant-garde psychedelic sounds and the nostalgic charm of folk blend together into something experimental but classic. With cheerful drum loops, acoustic guitars, blown-out synths and whirling keys, this sobering track feels like fresh start after kicking an old habit.

The nostalgia and hope for the future of the song lends itself to the lyrics, all about breaking free of the shackles of life with good times with friends, and sharing these new experiences together. The unbridled, sunlit spirit of the band takes on a new dynamic as Frontman Jon Cloumassis,  Tamala Wright (drums/vocals) and Matt Cloumassis (lead guitar) explore and experiment together, opening portals to new worlds of soundscapes.


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Bethany Weimers - The Wild One.

Oxford-based independent artist Bethany Weimers’ new single The Wild One is an alt-pop delight that combines her folk-influenced narrative style with pulsating synths and drums, vivid lyrics and a hypnotic chorus. It’s the second track to be released from her upcoming EP The Story I Breathe, and explores themes of hope, self-discovery, and freedom.

“I wrote The Wild One at a time when life as I knew it had disappeared over night. I found myself in this magical state of heightened awareness where anything seemed possible. ‘Gilded in the heat of the wild one’ as I rebuilt my life one adventure at a time.”

With the aid of funding from Help Musicians, Bethany was able to further develop her production and mixing skills allowing the record to be self-produced and mixed in her home studio, with mastering done by 5x MPG Awards nominee Katie Tavini. A testament to perseverance and creative determination, and a powerful anthem for endings and new beginnings.

Bethany’s music has been heard on radio stations such 6 Music, Amazing Radio and BBC Introducing Oxford; and she has toured in both the UK and Europe. Performance highlights include a packed-out show at the National Portrait Gallery in London and an intimate house concert tour in Germany. She has shared bills with artists such as Aoife O’Donovan and Eliza Carthy, and co-written songs for other artists with writers in South Africa and USA. She has a Masters Degree in Composition from Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and combines her solo music career with work as a songwriter/producer for a global education publisher, alongside directing full-cast audio dramas.

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Friday, 9 May 2025

Moving Into Tucson - Sofia Sampaio - Lupus J - Ruth Lyon - Alison Clancy

Moving Into Tucson - People Of The World (Album).

Indie Rock formation Moving Into Tucson is back with their highly anticipated second album, People Of The World, a record that seamlessly blends melody, raw energy, and emotional depth. With 12 diverse tracks, the album moves effortlessly between upbeat Pop anthems, introspective ballads, and electrifying Rock moments.

The title track, People Of The World, is an undeniable anthem of unity, while Are You Ready sets the tone with infectious energy. Songs like Run & Hide and Heart & Soul bring heartfelt emotion, while Everybody Knows and Come On Back To Me inject an irresistible drive. From the playful charm of Stand By Me to the thought-provoking You’re Right, I'm Wrong, every track tells its own compelling story.

Whether you want to dance, reflect, or sing your heart out, People Of The World has it all. The album captures the essence of Indie Rock, melodic, catchy, and deeply moving, while pushing the boundaries with Rock influences and lyrical depth. With unforgettable hooks and dynamic arrangements, Moving Into Tucson proves once again why they are a band to watch. This is more than an album; it’s an experience. Are you ready?


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Sofia Sampaio - Better Off Bored.

We have to say this is a beautifully layered and textured song from Sofia Sampaio. Her dreamy melodic vocals are fabulously placed above a musical backdrop that builds from acoustic to something more powerful but never overwhelming, Beehive Candy love it! 

Sofia Sampaio is a 21-year-old alternative singer-songwriter blending the rich rhythms of her Brazilian roots with the emotional grit of 90s rock. Born in Brazil and raised in Texas, Sofia began writing songs at the age of seven, inspired by her musically inclined parents. At 17, she taught herself guitar and began developing her distinctive voice as a songwriter.

A transformative move to London at 18 led her to study at the Institute of Contemporary Music Performance, where she honed her craft and embraced music as her true path. Now based in Houston and continuing her studies in songwriting and production at Berklee Online, Sofia brings introspective lyricism and global influences to her growing body of work.

About Better Off Bored: Better Off Bored is the dreamy, emotionally charged debut single from alternative singer-songwriter Sofia Sampaio. Blending ambient rock textures with intimate storytelling, the track explores the push-pull of infatuation and emotional detachment through spacious chords, raw lyrics, and ethereal melodies. Inspired by personal confusion and vulnerability, Sofia captures the bittersweet realization that sometimes, solitude feels safer than obsession.

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Lupus J - Beautiful Smile.

Beautiful Smile gently works it's way into our day, with soft yet refined and definitive vocals, whilst the flowing soundtrack ebbs and flows adding depth and an engaging atmosphere, this is one very fine song.

Behind Lupus J. we find Jan Nilsson, a songwriter who bases his songs on melodies. We asked him about his music and got this fantastic answer back: "The most important thing for me is that the melody is felt in the heart. My music is straightforward and actually quite simple.

What I strive for is that the music should convey joy and other positive emotions. Then whether it's pop, rock or whatever you want to call the genre - it doesn't matter much. The reason I make music is because it's fun. The creation itself is so fun.

It has also become a way for me to disconnect from everyday life. I dream in the form of music. What sparked my interest in music from the very beginning, a long time ago, was Deep Purple. Today, it's still the melodies of the 80s that inspire me!"


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Photo - Sel Maclean
Ruth Lyon - Perfect.

Newcastle indie-folk singer-songwriter Ruth Lyon just released her new single ‘Perfect’. Released today alongside a new video directed by Sel Maclean, 'Perfect' is the latest compelling glimpse of Lyon's forthcoming debut album 'Poems & Non-Fiction' - out 13th June on Pink Lane Records and available to pre-order here. The track follows earlier singles ‘Books’ and ‘Wickerman’.

Produced by John Parish (PJ Harvey, Aldous Harding), 'Poems & Non-Fiction' draws on influences from Adrienne Lenker, Fiona Apple, and Moondog, combining analogue textures and angular indie-folk sensibilities. Lyon’s songwriting gives as much weight to silence as to sound, with poetic nuance and muscular understatement. Her voice floats between the abstract, the archetypal, and raw vulnerability, inviting the listener to both reach out and dig deep.

New single ‘Perfect’ is the album’s most pop-adjacent moment: a sharp indie-pop that critiques the cult of curated living. The sardonic hook: “Isn’t it all so perfect / Sundays were made for worship”, sits uneasily against Lyon’s deadpan admission: “my skin is crawling / I want to shout.” As the production closes in during the middle eight, her voice sounds buried beneath the surface: “I can’t leave.”

On the release of 'Perfect', Ruth said: “It’s about how modern life traps us in a toxic pursuit of perfection – we’re all celebrities of our own life, worshipping at the altar of our egos. It’s kind of infected us all, I think. The perfect mother, the perfect wife, the perfect health and a perfect body flaunting perfect hair/skin/tits/bum blah blah blah.”


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Alison Clancy - The Valley.

Alison Clancy's haunting new track reflects the questions and ambiguities that just keep coming. Co-written and co-produced with Stephen Masucci of The Lost Patrol and engineered by Larry Alexander (David Bowie, Lou Reed, Diana Ross), the single is an expansive soundscape that shimmers with the melodic nostalgia of a rainy day, laced with a twinge of foreboding strangeness. 

Clancy's voice sounds fragile as it drifts along the razor's edge between vulnerability and power. Are her words questions or statements? Tension hums like a storm on the horizon, but pain, pleasure and release are washed over with piano cascading into misted fantasy.
 
A multi-gifted artist, when she’s not weaving adventurous sounds, Alison is busy dancing with New York’s Metropolitan Opera, where she wrote this song in the basement rehearsal rooms. Alison Clancy released her IPR debut, 3-song EP Mutant Gifts in 2022. Composed and recorded when Clancy was invited to live as an artist in residence in St. John’s Church in NYC’s West Village, the EP was mixed by Noah Georgeson (producer for artists such as Joanna Newsom and Devendra Banhart). Of Mutant Gifts, Backseat Mafia said it’s “expansive, avant-garde, brooding, it’s a helluva way to announce your arrival.”

Independent Project Records (IPR) and singer-songwriter Alison Clancy announced that her latest single, “The Valley,” is released this week via MRI & Proper Music to all digital music platforms.

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Wednesday, 7 May 2025

Gwenno - Josienne Clarke - Lou-Adriane Cassidy - The Slackers

Gwenno - War.

'War' is the brand new single from Gwenno's new album 'Utopia.'which is set for release on July 11th, 2025. Having released three albums in Welsh and Cornish, 'Utopia' is Gwenno Saunders’ first album recorded predominantly in English, and presents a very different side to her life and songwriting.

Forty-three years into her life, Saunders has been many people. The disaffected Cardiff schoolgirl; the teenage Las Vegas dancer; the singer in indie pop group The Pipettes. There was a turn in a Bollywood film, a nightclub tour, a stint cleaning floors in an East London pub. Long before she would become an acclaimed solo songwriter in both Welsh and Cornish, a winner of the Welsh Music Prize, a nominee for the Mercury, a Bard of the Cornish Gorsedh, there were the days of Nevada, London, Brighton; of Irish dancing, techno clubs, messiness and chaos.

'Utopia', Saunders’ fourth solo album, is an extraordinary exploration of all of these selves. If the singer regards her first three solo records — 2014’s Y Dydd Olaf, 2018’s Le Kov and 2022’s Tresor as “childhood records”, rooted in her upbringing, her parents, her formative identity, then Utopia captures a time of self-determination and experimentation. These are songs of discovery, of the years between being someone’s daughter and becoming someone’s wife and someone’s mother. They range from floor-fillers to piano ballads, via contributions from Cate Le Bon and H. Hawkline, and encompass William Blake, a favourite Edrica Huws poem, and the Number 73 bus. It is her finest work to date.


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Josienne Clarke - Tiny Bird’s Lament.

Critically acclaimed singer, songwriter and guitarist Josienne Clarke announces her raw and intimate new album Far From Nowhere, due out this autumn via Corduroy Punk. Alongside the album announcement, Clarke shares the first single ‘Tiny Bird’s Lament’, a haunting, minimalist track recorded direct to tape in a remote Scottish cabin. The single offers the first glimpse into the stripped-back sound and emotional clarity that define the new record.

The album will be accompanied by a short film titled Deluded, directed by Alec Bowman_Clarke, offering a candid, behind-the-scenes portrait of the album’s creation. Currently screening at festivals, the film will be shown throughout Clarke’s UK tour this October - full dates now announced - before its general release on November 30th.

Long admired for her crystalline voice and unflinching lyrical gaze, Clarke has always had an ability to evoke a communal melancholy. But with this LP, recorded at a remote Scottish cabin, she’s achieved the feat of stripping away the barriers between artist and listener. What emerges is a record of remarkable intimacy and integrity as Clarke embraces stillness and vulnerability. She sought total isolation but ended up creating something even more profoundly connective.

Also born of practical constraint, Far From Nowhere is a natural step and defiant response to the logistical and emotional tolls of trying to eke out a living in the music industry in 2025. “Making music today, for me, often feels like an exercise in retreat,” Clarke says. “The structure of the industry slowly suffocates the spirit of artists, starving them of the self-esteem that comes from remuneration for a job well done, so retreating to a cabin in the woods to make my album made sense.”


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Lou-Adriane Cassidy - Triste Animal (Album)

Yesterday, fresh off the critical acclaim of her last project, Journal d’un loup-garou, Canadian singer-songwriter Lou-Adriane Cassidy returns with a bold and unexpected follow-up: Triste Animal. A raw, genre-defying album recorded entirely live to tape with zero edits, the album arrives just three months after her previous release, and marks a daring turn toward spontaneity and artistic freedom.

While wrapping up Journal d’un loup-garou, an album celebrated in Quebec for its cinematic scale and theatrical live shows, Cassidy found herself craving something looser, more instinctive. "After two years of deep focus on that project, I just needed to let go," she explains. That urgency led to Triste Animal: eight songs captured live over four days by eight musicians, with no overdubs or polish. The only exception? A guitar solo on “Adieu”, because, as Cassidy puts it, “our guitarist couldn’t make it that day.”

The result is a stripped-down, emotionally potent record that foregrounds Cassidy’s mesmerizing voice and sharp compositional instincts. Backed by some of Quebec’s top musicians (Alexandre Martel, Thierry Larose, Vincent Gagnon, PE Beaudoin), and with vocal arrangements crafted and sung alongside her longtime collaborators Odile Marmet-Rochefort, Ariane Roy, and Lysandre Ménard, the album captures lightning in a bottle: real-time performances that breathe and bleed.

Stylistically, Triste Animal is Cassidy’s most eclectic effort yet, weaving together threads of folk, soul, West Coast country, chamber pop, samba, jazz, and even traces of acoustic grunge. Tracks like “Tout le monde dans autour” (penned by filmmaker-musician Stéphane Lafleur) showcase heart-wrenching tenderness, while the brooding intensity of “Adieu” and the driving, dissonant “Valse frustrée” highlight her dynamic vocal range and emotional grit.
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The Slackers - My Last Star.

New York City’s longtime ska/reggae legends The Slackers have released their newest single “My Last Star,” now available everywhere fine records are sold as a 12” UV Printed Single from Pirates Press Records.

“My Last Star” began as a dream that Greg Lee of Los Angeles’s Hepcat had the week before his death in March of 2024. Greg dreamed of a Slackers song. The Slackers have completed this song, and released it into the world.

Now that the song is finally out for all to hear, and The Slackers, along with a team of close associates head up by writer/direct Pat Byrne, have crafted a poignant music video to accompany this beautiful collaboration with - and tribute to - their longtime friend.

The Slackers are currently stationed in the Los Angeles County area, where they are gearing up to perform five shows in six nights from May 7th through the 11th. These shows in Hepcat’s hometown will function as the record release for “My Last Star,” and they will be playing the song every night.

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Monday, 5 May 2025

The Northern Territories - Seasurfer - Frankie Wesson

Photo - Chris Ruiz
The Northern Territories - Arizona.

The Northern Territories reveal the final advance single 'Arizona', which is taken from the forthcoming new full-length "A Star in Orbit Still". The fourth album of the Swedish melancholic synth duo has been chalked up for release on May 23, 2025.

The Northern Territories comment: "As the title suggests, this song was started in Arizona, on a road trip through the desert on the way to Mexico, while passing cities like Sedona and Tucson on the way to Puerto Peñasco, on the Gulf of California", singer Stefan Sääf writes on behalf of the duo.

"Following our return to Europe, the working title 'Arizona' remained although the song changed somewhat. The idea to start the song a cappella was a last minute thought when we were mixing the track. We had just watched Bon Iver's amazing live version of 'Heavenly Father' and that might have inspired the idea to start with only vocals."


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Seasurfer - Collapsing.

Collapsing is the first single taken from the fourth Seasurfer album Electronic Monsters, which will be released on May 30th, 2025. The main single track is a remix by M!R!M, the solo project of Jack Milwaukee, Italian producer & multi-instrumental artist based in East London. Jack is one of Seasurfer's favorite musicians and the band is very proud about the dark, hypnotic twist he gave to the track.

The single also features Dirk Knight's own Seasurfer single mix and another remix by M/A/T, the electronic music project of Matthias Bischoff, a founding member of the former Hamburg SynthPop band Cyber, who's also been active as a DJ for many years.

Collapsing is an anti-war song. Seasurfer singer Apolonia, who wrote the lyrics, recalls: "When Dirk first sent me the track, the war in Ukraine just started. It was heart breaking to see yet again another useless war, destroying innocent people’s home’s, which could also be my or your home and how it was presented on television like entertainment… 'Watching our own demise'...In the song I ask the question again and again: why?"

Electronic Monsters is the fourth Seasurfer full-length and, after the Zombies album, the second with the current Seasurfer singer Apolonia. Other guest singers can also be heard on the album: the wonderful Gloria Endres de Oliveira, a multidisciplinary visual artist from Berlin with Brazilian origins, the singers Jana Marie and Jade from Hamburg, with ethereal voices and long reverb tails.


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Frankie Wesson - This is Motion (Album).

Singer-songwriter Frankie Wesson’s third studio album ‘This is Motion’ has been years in the making. This coming-of-age record, although boasting two award-winning singles, is more than just a collection of songs. From start to finish it takes you on a journey through periods of Wesson’s life, loves, losses and coming to terms with what never was. A present theme throughout this album is nostalgia in motion, moving from time to place, visiting and revisiting memories and relationships through an older and more grounded lens.

Not only does Wesson explore time in this way through her songwriting on this record but also genre. From soft, folky, almost orchestral soundscapes in songs like Delicate and Valentines. She continues to move through her emotions leaning into country, ambient pop and heavier pop/rock sounds, showcasing her songwriting skills in a range of ways throughout.

Swansea’s Soundboard magazine described Wesson’s music as ‘timeless; appealing to fans of Fleetwood Mac and Paramore alike without compromising or diluting any of the style that makes Wesson’s music her own’.
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Victoria Akua - Eve Goodman & SERA - McCabe - Jonathan Jeremiah - Lloyd & The Leftovers - Maygen & The Birdwatcher

Photo -  Camilla Vodstrup Øverup Victoria Akua - You Remind Me. Victoria Akua from Copenhagen, Denmark, releases her new single „You Remind...