7th Level Music

Hotline TNT release new single, “Julia’s War,” with a full album due this June.

Hotline TNT — the New York-based band fronted by Will Anderson — announce their third album Raspberry Moon, out June 20th via Third Man Records and share its lead single, “Julia’s War.” The follow up to Cartwheel, the band’s “exquisite” (Billboard) 2023 breakthrough, Raspberry Moon is the most sweeping and compelling Hotline TNT album to date and, crucially, the first built by a full band. Funneled into the album are moments of vulnerability and romance, creating a generationally great statement of youthful wistfulness and very adult growth that also happens to be very charming and sometimes funny.

While in the studio of modern D.I.Y. hero Amos Pitsch (Tenement), Anderson found himself in an unusual position. This time, and for the first time, the quartet that had toured for the last 10 months as Hotline TNT had come with Anderson, somewhat unexpectedly. He had intended to make one more album his way—holing up with a producer and building songs piece by piece, as he’d done for Cartwheel—before making Hotline TNT a full-band affair in the future. But there was no avoiding it. Guitarist Lucky Hunter, bassist Haylen Trammel, and drummer Mike Ralston wanted in. Anderson relented.

In making Raspberry Moon, Anderson confronted a burgeoning if occasionally difficult belief: Hotline TNT was now a band, and this was the band. The benefits are self-evident— it is the most texturally rich and energetically nuanced album Hotline TNT has ever made—from start to middle to finish. Some of these 11 songs deal with the sting of regret, of being left or leaving, as Hotline TNT always has. But this is a record animated by a sense of newness and possibility, of pushing back against the global sense that curtains are closing to make room in your own life for new friends. It is perfect music for looking forward, no matter how fucked the past may feel.

Lead single “Julia’s War” is an anthem of nascent affection where a simple and wordless chorus of “na na na nah” paints a horizon of possibility. The guitars are perfectly warm and sharp, cutting into you but simultaneously pulling you into the song. Of the track, whose title is a hat tip to regional contemporary They Are Gutting A Body of Water’s sprawling imprint, Anderson says: “In a world of half-hearted hooks, and buried-in-the-mix vocals, we had to muster the courage to do what the rest of the shoegaze community could not… We looked out to the stadium and reassured the audience: Our voices, together, will be heard. You’ve never heard a TNT chorus this straightforward – when we stress-tested it during the writing process, the ‘try not to sing along challenge’ came back with a 100% fail rate.”

Of the song’s accompanying video directed by Johnny Frohman, Anderson says: “When it came time to cook up the music video, Johnny Frohman created a Full-Metal-Jacket-style shoegaze bootcamp… It’s not the Marine Corps, it’s Slow Corps. Edy Monica, Dan Licata, Peter Mills Weiss, and an ensemble cast of NYC comedy underworld alts rounded out the platoon and drafted us into a world where we could enlist in a strict regimen of pedalboard assembly and underwater vocal lessons.”

Watch the Video for “Julia’s War”

Musical auteurs have been a feature of rock ’n’ roll since its very early days—folks who could imagine a sound and the path to it, largely alone. Something akin to Moore’s Law has made it easier to become exactly that during the subsequent decades, since studios with solid gear are now as accessible as a bedroom. It is increasingly convenient to be solo. The real work, though, is to abandon the ego and singular devotion to your absolute vision and make something better with the people you trust. Hotline TNT has done exactly that on Raspberry Moon, an album where Will Anderson gives himself space to fall in love with the world around him and sing as much in songs so loaded with hooks you’ll need to choose which ones to hum at any given moment.

Hotline TNT will play a series of headline shows in early May and will then embark on a North American Tour supporting Hippo Campus with stops in Seattle, Portland, Las Vegas, Austin, Chicago, and more. A full list of dates can be found below.

Pre-Order Raspberry Moon

Hotline TNT Tour Dates
Thu. May 1 – Louisville, KY @ Mag Bar
Fri. May 2 – Urbana, IL @ Rose Bowl Tavern
Sat. May 3 – St Louis, MO @ Sinkhole
Sun. May 4 – Columbia, MO @ Rose Music Hall
Tue. May 6 – Colorado Springs, CO @ Vultures
Thu. May 8 – Boise, ID @ The Shredder
Fri. May 9 – Sat. May 10 – Portland, OR @ Roseland*
Mon. May 12 – Tue. May 13 – Seattle, WA @ Showbox*
Wed. May 14 – Vancouver, BC @ Vogue*
Fri. May 16 – Sacramento, CA @ Channel 24*
Sat. May 17 – Las Vegas, NV @ Brooklyn Bowl*
Sun. May 18 – Phoenix, AZ @ The Van Buren*
Tue. May 20 – San Antonio, TX @ Aztec*
Wed. May 21 – Austin, TX @ Moody Theater*
Thu. May 22 – Dallas, TX @ Bomb Factory*
Sat. May 24 – Oklahoma City, OK @ Jones Assembly*
Sun. May 25 – Bentonville, AR @ The Momentary*
Tue. May 27 – Columbus, OH @ Kemba Live*
Thu. May 29 – Grand Rapids, MI @ GLC Live at 20 Monroe*
Fri. May 30 – Chicago, IL @ Salt Shed*
Sat. May 31 – Minneapolis, MN @ Surly Brewing*
Sun. June 1 – Milwaukee, WI @ Cactus Club % (early & late shows)
Tue. June 3 – Buffalo, NY @ Rec Room

* w/ Hippo Campus
% w/ Slow Pulp

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[Thanks to Jacob at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: Acid Rooster – Hall of Mirrors

You might think Acid Rooster‘s Hall of Mirrors album was an EP by looking at the track listing, as it’s only four songs, but the shortest one is nearly six minutes in length.

Those four songs are are excellent cosmic rock tracks perfect for either tripping out inside the album’s namesake at your local county fair or surfing around the universe as a herald of Galactus. “Automat” (the five-minute-fifty-second song) has Joe Satriani-like riffs from Sebastian Väth and enough psychedelic synths from Maximilian Leicht to melt your mind and then reform it into something capable of clairvoyance. “Chandelier Arp” first sounds like the pulse and happy sighs of an android receiving a massage in zero gravity. Then, Steffen Schmidt comes in on drums and the android starts some form of astral projection or perhaps a digital upload to some giant connected mind. Leicht’s saxophone work on this put you in orbit about an emerging white sun.

“Confidence of Ignorance” brings in Middle Eastern desert rock flavor, which is fine by me. The sound takes on a heavier tone and reminds you of scantily clad, scimitar-wielding maidens emerging from the desert to either cut you down, cast spells on you, or both. “When Clouds Part” beautifully ends Side B with a gentle float back down to Earth, nicely landing us on a warm, green cliff overlooking the ocean.

Did I mention it’s an instrumental album? It’s a trip-tastic bit of space rock that you’ll want for times you need to float away for a bit.

Keep your mind open.

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Thor & Friends share their new single — “Anne Sexton’s Monocle.”

Today Thor & Friends announced their upcoming album, Heathen Spirituals, set for release on May 16, 2025, via Joyful Noise Recordings. Led by the legendary Austin-based percussionist Thor Harris (best known for his work with Swans and Shearwater), the project also shared a preview from the album — an excerpt titled “Anne Sexton’s Monocle” — accompanied by a new video.

Thor Harris is a prolific collaborator, having worked with an array of influential artists, including Bill Callahan, Devendra Banhart, and Shahzad Ismaily. Most recently, he toured with the experimental-rock supergroup Water Damage and performed at the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville—both as a solo artist and as part of various group projects. Thor & Friends embodies this intense spirit of collaboration; since we last heard them the adventurous instrumental project has grown from an intimate trio of mallet players to a minimalist orchestra.

The curious marimba rhythm that sets up “Anne Sexton’s Monocle” invites you in like a call to prayer, then puts you in a trance. As a variety of instruments weave in and out of the sonic spotlight, the constant melodic pulse propels into a cognitive crescendo of french horn, cello, violin clarinet, pedal steel, and more. Has everything changed or nothing at all? The enchanting instrumental, tracked live in an empty orchestra hall, seems a fitting tribute to Sexton, poet known for brave confessional verse.

About the excerpt and its full track “Anne Sexton’s Glasses,” Harris says:

Anne Sexton’s actual glasses are housed in a museum on the UT campus next to the auditorium where we recorded this album. This monstrous piece is a 10-note percussion exercise over a pentatonic scale. I play in odd meters because I am a child of prog rock. I apologize.

Like a scene from a dream, Thor Harris stood upon a crowded stage, 13 players deep: tapping, plucking, bowing, blowing lyric-less love songs to a grand auditorium of 325 shining red seats – without a soul sitting in any of them. This was the creation of Heathen Spirituals, the fifth recorded work by Harris’ adventurous instrumental ensemble Thor & Friends and the first that accurately resembles the skyward repetition of the Austin-based group’s live performances.

It’s a century-old concept: cutting a record in an empty music hall. Masterminded by intrepid producer and lifelong Harris collaborator Craig Ross (Patty Griffin, Spoon), Thor & Friends’ roster of musically accomplished misfits spent two days wired up, playing free-flowing meditational pieces on unamplified orchestral instruments inside Jessen Auditorium, a stunning Art Deco relic from the early days of the University of Texas’ Butler School of Music – the esteemed institution that Harris dropped out from decades ago.

A craftsman, artistically and otherwise, Thor Harris is master plumber, carpenter, and woodworker. In musical contexts, his name is often followed by the five words: “known for his work with,” having been a member of avant rock godheads Swans and high-minded indie favorites Shearwater, while also factoring into important recordings by Bill Callahan, Devendra Banhart, and Shahzad Ismaily. In many circles, Harris is equally well-known for being an openhearted mental health advocate with a devilish sense of humor and a penchant for entertaining social commentary (Harris’ “How to Punch a Nazi” instructional video got him famously banned from Twitter in 2017).

Heathen Spirituals, arriving May 16th, 2025, on Joyful Noise Recordings, contains three original pieces with a 35-minute runtime. The rhythmic repetition of opening seance “Anne Sexton’s Glasses” evokes a cognitive crescendo, while the spellbinding “Christmas Eve at the Wizard’s House” evokes a sense of weightlessness, sucking the listener up into the firmament then floating them back down. The crashing, choir-backed “Heathen Spiritual,” meanwhile, stirs a gorgeous requiem for a dying planet. In glorious fidelity, the sessions capture the instinctual purity of Thor & Friends’ live performances, which thrive on skyward repetition.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Helly at Joyful Noise Recordings.]

Sparks release new single and new tour dates.

Sparks, brothers Ron and Russell Mael, release “Drowned In A Sea Of Tears,” the new single from their upcoming album, MAD!, out May 23rd via Transgressive Records. Having recently added more dates to their European tour they now announce a North American tour in September, kicking off in Atlanta and wrapping in Los Angeles with stops along the way including Boston, New York, Seattle, San Francisco, and more. Tickets go on general sale Friday, April 11th at 10am local time. A full list of dates is below with tickets and further information available here.

On the heels of the “sweeping, theatrical breakup tune” (Stereogum) “JanSport Backpack,” “Drowned In A Sea Of Tears” is a minor key mini-tragedy about the perils of emotional continence, of the stiff upper lip, of keeping it all in. The protagonist keeps her emotional landscape guarded behind high walls, and the narrator is unable to be her saviour. Unusually, for a Sparks song, there is no punchline, no twist in the tale. The accompanying video is a visual theater piece about a woman succumbing to her tears of grief.

Watch the Video for “Drowned In A Sea Of Tears”
Despite the efforts of Edgar Wright’s superb 2021 documentary The Sparks Brothers, which introduced the duo to a wider audience than ever before, the exact creative dynamic between Ron and Russell Mael remains inscrutable, as mysterious and unknowable as their private lives.

The one thing we know for certain is that Ron Mael is one of our most acutely perceptive observers of social mores. In a different discipline – dramaturg, cartoonist, novelist, cineaste, chronicler – he’d be a Moliere, a Hogarth, a Fitzgerald, an Altman, a Swift. He just happens to work within the medium of popular song. His brother Russell Mael has the asset of a talent to put those observations across in a uniquely arresting manner, captivating as a frontman and gifted with a countertenor voice of extraordinary range. The alchemy between Ron on keys and Russell on vocals is simply what they do. And they’ve rarely done it better than on MAD!.

MAD! finds Ron and Russell examining cultural phenomena such as branded backpacks, tattoos, performative devotion (whether to a God, a lover, a celebrity or a sports team), the hegemony of banter, and the rise of influencers. The satire is never on-the-nose, always retaining enough ambiguity for the listener to fill in the blanks. And the exquisitely unusual lexicon (you won’t hear the word “epistemology” on many other albums this year) and cultural references leap out on every listen.

Musically there are nods to New Wave, Synthpop, Art Rock and Electronic Opera – all genres Sparks had hands in pioneering, or straight-up invented. When you hear echoes of other artists, from Air to Shostakovich, you remind yourself that they’re all people who Sparks influenced in the first place. (Well, maybe not Shostakovich.) Ultimately, however, MAD! is a modern record, which belongs in, and speaks to, the modern world. Which is all the more remarkable when you consider the vintage of its creators.

Further information on MAD! and background on Sparks is available here.

Pre-order MAD!

Listen to “JanSport Backpack”

Watch the Video for “Do Things My Own Way”

MAD! Tour Dates:
(New Dates in Bold)
Sun. June 8 – Kyoto, JP @ ROHM Theatre
Tue. June 10 – Osaka, JP @ Zepp Namba
Thu. June 12 – Fri. June 13 – Tokyo, JP @ EX Theater
Wed. June 18 – Thu. June 19 – London, UK @ Eventim Apollo
Sat. June 21 – Sun. June 22 – Manchester, UK @ O2 Apollo
Tue. June 24 – Glasgow, UK @ Royal Concert Hall
Thu. June 26 – Haarlem, NL @ PHIL Haarlem
Sat. June 28 – Brussels, BE @ Cirque Royal
Mon. June 30 – Paris, FR @ La Salle Pleyel
Tue. July 1 – Cologne, DE @ Live Music Hall (venue upscale)
Thu. July 3 – Copenhagen, DK @ The Koncerthuset
Fri. July 4 – Stockholm, SE @ Grona Lund Tivoli
Sun. July 6 – Berlin, DE @ Uber Eats
Tue. July 8 – Milan, IT @ Teatro degli Arcimboldi
Sat. July 12 – Bilbao, ES @ Bilbao BBK
Tue. July 15 – Dublin, IE @ National Stadium
Wed. July 16 – Dublin, IE @ National Stadium
Fri. July 18 – Edinburgh, UK @ Edinburgh Playhouse
Sat. July 19 – Wolverhampton, UK @ The Halls
Fri. Sept. 5 – Atlanta, GA @ Tabernacle
Mon. Sept. 8 – Philadelphia, PA @ Keswick Theatre
Tue. Sept. 9 – Washington, DC @ Lincoln Theatre
Thu. Sept. 11 – Boston, MA @ Berklee Performance Center
Fri. Sept. 12 – Brooklyn, NY @ Kings Theatre
Sun. Sept. 14 – Columbus, OH @ The Athenaeum Theatre
Mon. Sept. 15 – Cleveland, OH @ TempleLive at Cleveland Masonic
Wed. Sept. 17 – Toronto, On @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre
Sat. Sept. 20 – St. Paul, MN @ Fitzgerald Theater
Tue. Sept. 23 – Vancouver, BC @ Vogue Theatre
Wed. Sept. 24 – Seattle, WA @ Moore Theatre
Fri. Sept. 26 – Portland, OR @ Revolution Hall
Sat. Sept. 27 – San Francisco, CA @ Golden Gate Theatre
Mon. Sept. 29 – El Cajon, CA @ The Magnolia
Tue. Sept. 30 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Greek Theatre

Keep your mind open.

[I might drown in a sea of tears if you don’t subscribe.]

[Thanks to Jessica at Pitch Perfect PR.]

The Brian Jonestown Massacre announce new single and U.S. tour dates.

THE BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRE announce a new single, ‘Makes Me Great / Out Of Body’, on red transparent 10” vinyl, released April 25th via Anton Newcombe’s record label A Recordings. Pre-save here. Following a hugely successful UK and Europe tour earlier this year, the band will return to North America this fall for an extensive run of live shows, including two dates with special guests, Cast, making their first US appearance in nearly 30 years. Tickets on sale now.

It is over 30 years since Anton Newcombe – frontman, songwriter, composer, studio owner, multi-instrumentalist, producer, engineer, father, force of nature – and his band The Brian Jonestown Massacre released their first single She Made Me / Evergreen. Released in 1992, as the British music press descended on the US to anoint the next US guitar band as flavour of the month and major labels were on the hunt for the compliant hopefuls to be their latest quick fix, Anton Newcombe had an idea: say no. As leader of the Brian Jonestown Massacre, Newcombe had already established himself as a visionary songwriter, a man to whom making music wasn’t a lifestyle choice or a hipster haircut but the very fabric of existence itself, and he had observed in silent horror as his peers meekly acquiesced to everything – yes to contracts, yes to management, yes to suggestions, yes to this, yes to that, yes, yes, yes. But he was different. Anton Newcombe was going to say no to everything. “I just knew I would be more successful in a certain way by saying no, just being contrary because I figured that if people liked me they were gonna like me anyway,” he says. “Or dislike me. It doesn’t matter.”

Much of this was documented on the controversial documentary ‘Dig!’, which is still hailed as one of the best rock documentaries ever made, and celebrates its 20th Anniversary this year with the remastered, expanded version “Dig! XX.”

Brian Jonestown Massacre’s shoegazing-tinged debut album Methodrone was released in 1995 and since then numerous band members have joined Newcombe on his sonic escapades, but he has remained the sole constant, the creative mastermind at the centre of one of music’s most fascinating bands. There have been a further 20 albums under the Brian Jonestown Massacre moniker since then, each embarking on their own mind-expanding adventure and exploring the outer realms of rock’n’roll; psychedelic rock, country-blues, snarling rock’n’roll, blissed-out noise-pop and more.

Along the way, Newcombe has established himself as a once-in-a-lifetime talent who saw the direction in which mainstream indie-rock was heading and opted to take the long way round. He’s emerged as a revolutionary force in modern music, an underground hero. There was no other way, this was how it had to be. “My only option with everything in life has always been that you just jump into the fire,” he declared. “It doesn’t matter what it is.”

It’s with that spirit that he’s hopped around the globe, from the West Coast to New York, from Manhattan to Iceland, and then to Berlin, where he’s lived for 15 years and has two flats, one to live in and one that’s been converted into his studio.

After a hugely prolific 2010s that saw the release of eight long-players and one mini-album, Newcombe had been going through a period of writer’s block when one day he picked up his 12-string guitar and The Real (the opening track on previous album Fire Doesn’t Grow on Trees) came out of him. Like the kraken, it was as if he’d summoned it. “All of a sudden, I just heard something,” he says. “And then it just didn’t stop. We tracked a whole song every single day for 70 days in a row.” By the end of it they had 2 albums ready to go. Joining Newcombe in the studio for The Future Is Your Past were Hakon Adalsteinsson (guitar) and Uri Rennert (drums).

Brian Jonestown Massacre released their 20^th full-length studio album The Future Is Your Past, in February 2023 on Anton’s record label, A Recordings. In 2022 / 2023, they completed a massive world tour that saw them play 34 dates in North America, 25 dates across Europe and 16 dates in the UK. Towards the end of 2024, they released ‘Don’t Look At Me’ ft. Aimee Nash. It is a delicious slice of hypnotic shoegaze with Nash lyrically casting a spell with the mantra “Do No Harm.”

There is no such thing as a defining statement in Anton Newcombe’s world anymore, just more chapters that contribute to the tale. “Nobody can stop me, I’m not asking somebody, I’m not making the rounds at Warners, saying ‘please put out my record!’. It’s just for me,” he says. He hopes he can be an inspiration to others. “I would love to see more groups, people playing music in the UK and everywhere else because I really enjoy it. That’s the only reason I need. It’s the only reason to do stuff.” That hits to the core of what makes Anton Newcombe and Brian Jonestown Massacre tick. He’ll keep jumping in that fire. That’s how he rolls. Savor it.

LIVE SHOWS:

Sept. 3 – Cat’s Cradle – Carrboro, NC
Sept. 4 – Variety Playhouse – Atlanta, GA
Sept. 5 – Basement East – Nashville, TN
Sept. 6 – Orange Peel – Asheville, NC
Sept. 8 – 9:30 Club – Washington, D.C.
Sept. 9 – Webster Hall – New York, NY – with special guests, Cast
Sept. 10 – Union Transfer – Philadelphia, PA – with special guests, Cast
Sept. 12 – The Sinclair – Cambridge, MA
Sept. 13 – Beanfield Theatre – Montreal, QC
Sept. 14 – Danforth Music Hall – Toronto, ON
Sept. 16 – Globe Iron – Cleveland, OH
Sept. 17 – Majestic Theatre – Detroit, MI
Sept. 18 – Mercury Ballroom – Louisville, KY
Sept. 19 – Hi-Fi Annex – Indianapolis, IN
Sept. 20 – Majestic Theatre – Madison, WI
Sept. 22 – Metro – Chicago, IL
Sept. 23 – Slowdown – Omaha, NE
Sept. 24 – recordBar – Kansas City, MO
Sept. 26 – Studio at The Factory – Dallas, TX
Sept. 28 – White Oak Music Hall – Houston, TX
Oct. 31 – Music Box – San Diego, CA
Nov. 1 – Pappy and Harriet’s – Pioneertown, CA

Nov. 2 – Observatory OC – Santa Ana, CA
Nov. 4 – SLO Brew – San Luis Obispo, CA
Nov. 6 – Swan Dive – Las Vegas, NV
Nov. 7 – The Van Buren – Phoenix, AZ
Nov. 8 – Tumbleroot – Santa Fe, NM
Nov. 10 – Gothic Theatre – Englewood, CO
Nov. 11 – Fox Theatre – Boulder, CO
Nov. 13 – Metro Music Hall – Salt Lake City, UT
Nov. 14 – Shrine Social Club – Boise, ID
Nov. 15 – The Showbox – Seattle, WA
Nov. 16 – The Pearl – Vancouver, B.C
Nov. 18 – Revolution Hall – Portland, OR
Nov. 20 – Regency Ballroom – San Francisco, CA
Nov. 21 – Rio Theatre – Santa Cruz, CA
Nov. 22 – Teragram Ballroom – Los Angeles, CA
Nov. 23 – Teragram Ballroom – Los Angeles, CA

TICKETS

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[Thanks to Jo Murray!]

Review: Anika – Abyss

Anika is fed up and, frankly, bored with the world right now. It can be a soulless place sometimes…and a soulless time in some places. It can feel like everything is teetering on the edge of the album’s title, Abyss. Recorded in just ten days with a live band, Anika pulls no punches and channels her confusion, frustration, and distrust into a powerful record.

“I’m tired of all this game-playing,” she sings on the opening track, “Hearsay” – a wicked track about media manipulation, romantic manipulation (“You’re telling me tales to get your own way.”), and the vicious divides a rumor mill can cause. The title track roars with Lawrence Goodwin‘s metal-cutting guitars and then Tomas Nochteff drops sexy, heavy bass on you. “Honey” is a tale of Anika walking away from a lover who has become too much like her. Is it a coincidence, then, that the next track is the Velvet Underground-like “Walk Away,” in which Anika admits, “The truth is that I’d rather be alone, than with you.” Don’t feel bad, though. Anika doesn’t have much feeling for anyone in this glossy fake world. It’s not just you. It’s everyone. She doesn’t even trust herself or believe that she wants to spend lonely nights in her house, or if she wants the world to burn up or not.

“Into the Fire” is another hypnotizing track that Anika does so well as she longs for someone to take her off this planet we’re destroying and to somewhere quiet for a change. On “Oxygen,” Anika lets us know that she’s interested in trying something new, in exploring dark places, in finding breath amid the choking clouds of noise and limitations being put on our methods of expression and even our own bodies. “Out of the Shadows” is a rocker, with Anika putting divisive politicians in their place using fierce words (“Full of opinions, full of hot air. Am I supposed to fall before you?”) and fiercer riffs.

“It’s a one-way ticket, and I’m not on it,” she sings on “One-Way Ticket” — a song about the growth of fascism (“This city didn’t learn the lessons from its past, making deals with the snakes and the sharks.”). She tries to warn us about the growth of idiocracy and screen addiction on “Last Song” with lyrics like, “The robots are ruling, the logic is drooling, dripping out your open mouth.” By the time we get to the last track, “Buttercups,” Anika is “thinking of the simpler days” and wishing she (and we) could escape from the unrelenting pressures of this age of constant stimulation. Wouldn’t it be nicer to just lounge in a field of flowers for a while?

Abyss is a powerful record with multiple layers, each one getting darker as you go deeper into it. Anika is mad right now, righteously mad, and she’s trying to pull us out of the darkness, even if only for a little while.

Keep your mind open.

[I’ll breathe easier if you subscribe.]

[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Lockstep churn up thick riffs on their new single – “Drag Along.”

Lockstep, the Nashville-based trio of Austin Rolison (drums, vox), Matt Schumacher (guitar, vox) and Tanner Ihrie (bass), “make[s] doomy, heavy shoegaze in the vein of bands like Cloakroom and Jesu” (Brooklyn Vegan). Today, they present “Drag Along,” their first new single in nearly two years and a heavy-hitting “hello.” It screeches into existence with a squall of feedback and Rolison’s swirling vocals: “Collapse into you // Won’t avoid it // Everything you wait for // On display // The helpless weeping // Uninvited // Forever remain // In the grey.” As the song reaches its peak, massive waves of guitar and crashing percussion come together in a shuddering wall of noise. In the band’s words, “Drag Along” “touches on the passage of life and the things left in its wake.”
Watch Lockstep’s Video for “Drag Along”

Lockstep first formed in 2021. Since then, they’ve released two EPs, “Lockstep 1” and “Arrival,” both of which earned significant interest in Reddit forums and on Bandcamp. These EPS expertly weave heavier, more abrasive elements into a melodic/gazey sound to be “as enveloping as possible.” As New Noise praises, “pulling from post-rock, shoegaze, doom, and noise-rock, Lockstep creates a sonic output that is both punishing and atmospheric.”

Although they began primarily as a recording project, they’ve evolved into an active touring pursuit. Lockstep has played shows with notable bands and peers in hardcore, punk, and shoegaze, including The Armed, Wisp, Doused, REZN, Gumm, Prize Horse, and others. “When we were first writing as a group, we weren’t considering how or if these songs were going to be played as a trio and in front of people,” says the band. “Which allowed for a little more freedom when thinking of composition. We’ve tried to keep that spirit present when we write now.”

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t drag along to the subscription box. Zip over there now.]

[Thanks to Jaycee at Pitch Perfect PR.]

JAWNY is in “Control” on his new single.

JAWNY (aka Jacob Sullenger) returns with the new single “Control,” from a forthcoming release out later this year. “Control” follows JAWNY’s debut album, It’s Never Fair, Always True, on which he “showcased his sonic experimentation, hopeless romantic-tinged songwriting and indie pop ethos” (Alternative Press), and a series of singles across 2023-2024 including “Boy Scout,” “Running” and “MAGIC.”

Each release has added new wrinkles to his already ornate sound—which helped him grow from a maker of pristine pop songs to a thoughtful songwriter with his eyes on intricate stories and life’s big questions. All the while, he’s never lost touch with the technicolor melodies that fans fell in love with in the first place. He’s learned to write with real empathy and depth—the mark of a songwriter who remains more wise and gifted than his years suggest.

Born out of a period in which Sullenger spent time exploring interests beyond music (i.e. writing screenplays, painting, traveling), “Control” reflects his return to music with, as he puts it, “a renewed sense of purpose.” He elaborates: “After spending six years immersed in a world I created—both visually and sonically—it felt like time to move forward. Over the last year and a half, I stepped away from the stage, the public eye, and releasing music to explore what’s next for me. I needed that space to rediscover my creative direction, and I realized that meant stepping away from music for a while to gain a fresh perspective on where JAWNY should go.

‘Control’ is the perfect representation of this new chapter. The song embodies the idea that you can’t keep doing the same thing forever. I hope people connect with it as much as I do.”

Stream “Control”
With over two billion streams globally, JAWNY has built his career by intuition, allowing his music to evolve naturally as he grows personally. Instead of chasing the high of past successes, he’s following his gut and tapping into a childlike wonder that’s wide-eyed and widescreen. Born in the Bay Area, and raised in Philadelphia, JAWNY first picked up a guitar at age 6 after watching his dad jam to the Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd, and Led Zeppelin. At 13, he began making beats with his brother, eventually landing placements with rappers on SoundCloud.

In his early 20s, he began writing his own songs, and started to gain buzz with his 2018 debut EP under the name Johnny Utah, landing placements on critically acclaimed shows like the HBO series, High Maintenance. JAWNY followed that up with a handful of buzzworthy singles, including “Honeypie,” garnering millions of streams. In 2020, JAWNY signed to Interscope Records and soon released a pair of vibrant, critically acclaimed projects, For Abby and The Story of Hugo, which further showcased his sharp storytelling and sonic experimentation. Upon releasing The Story of Hugo, JAWNY headlined a U.S. tour, selling out shows across the country. With career highs under his belt, JAWNY remained steadfastly in the moment, reaching a wider audience with the release of It’s Never Fair, Always True.

JAWNY’s songs continue to grow in scope and scale—elevating him from songwriter to indie-pop auteur with a kaleidoscopic vision and rich sense of narrative that informs everything he does.

Keep your mind open.

[You’re in control of subscribing.]

[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: Blackwater Holylight – If You Only Knew EP

Blackwater Holylight excel at writing, singing, and playing haunting songs that take doom rock into spectral places. Now, with their new EP If You Only Knew, the band take their doom rock into the shoegaze realm and the results are excellent.

Sarah McKenna‘s rainfall-like electric piano opens the EP on “Wandering Lost.” It matches the sorrowful guitar from Mikayla Mayhew as lead singer / bassist Sunny Faris reminds us that we all suffer at some point, and we can sometimes find solace in that. The song kicks into grand metal riffs in the second half, with drummer Eliese Dorsay putting down beats that Nordic metal bands would love.

“Torn Reckless” is a gorgeous shoegaze track that caught me by surprise. Faris sings about standing on the precipice of a relationship and not sure if plunging off it or backing away is the right decision. Mayhew’s guitar sounds like its being pumped through a dozen half-blown amplifiers.

“Fate Is Forward” is pure 1990s (good) alt-rock with its bursting guitars and quiet-loud-quiet verses and chorus. It’s almost a forgotten Failure track, and it’s impossible to choose who shines the most on it, but why should you bother? Just let it wash over you like a rolling thunderstorm.

Finally, I did not have “Blackwater Holylight covers Radiohead.” on my 2025 bingo card, but they’ve done it with a beautiful version of “All I Need.” They keep the buzzing synths and add more guitar fuzz. Faris’ version of Thom Yorke‘s vocals make the song open its heart a bit more and, yes, make it sexier.

This is one of Blackwater Holylight’s best records, and a great sign of good things to come as they continue to explore and expand their sound.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Andi at Terrorbird Media!]

“Stay” for a while with Sea Lemon’s new single.

Natalie Lew’s Sea Lemon project uses dreamy tones to mimic natural wonder. Today, the Seattle Songwriter announces her full-length debut, Diving For A Prize, out June 13, 2025 via Luminelle Recordings. The record is fantastical and shaped by life in the Pacific Northwest, fleshed out by collaborator Andy Park (Death Cab For Cutie, Deftones). Today, Lew Shares the single “Stay,” which expands on the gauzy Sea Lemon formula. “Handle all customers between the leather couches where the concrete starts to drip I think there’s something someone listening,” Lew sings in the final lines, over fuzzy guitars and a loping drum groove. In true Sea Lemon fashion, “Stay” is enveloping and cloudy.

On the single, Lew Shares: “Stay was the first track I actively wrote for my record, and is a little vignette of a man I saw in a local thrift store. This older guy, probably in his 70s or 80s, was acting as a security guard at this thrift store near my house, but he was basically asleep on the couch the entire time I was there. I couldn’t stop thinking about him after I left, and wrote Stay as a reaction to seeing this guy who I felt deserved to take a break. The song became a short story about him, and about how important I feel it can be to have someone in your life willing to telling you to take a step back and just relax.”

Natalie Lew grew up by the ocean, always harboring a fascination with the strange universes bubbling right below the surface. Born and raised in the Pacific Northwest (she currently resides in Seattle), the peculiar and miraculous environment around her, filled with tide pools and marine life, has seeped into her worldview and the music she makes as Sea Lemon. Imbued by both a sense of wonder and trepidation, debut full length Diving For A Prize is a haunting vision of Lew’s own creation, a vividly assembled snapshot of a place that is both fantastical and deeply curious.

The result of eight months of writing, Diving For A Prize was mainly produced and fleshed out in the studio with Lew’s collaborator Andy Park (Death Cab For Cutie, Deftones) in Park’s home studio in Seattle. Lew herself grew up playing piano, but became more actively engaged with music when she joined the programming board of her college at the University of Washington where she was studying design. Always consuming new music, it wasn’t until a stint in New York where she picked up a guitar for the first time, briefly joining a band with her roommates before moving back to the West Coast in 2020. This newfound period of isolation allowed her to experiment with Logic and create music on her own. “I never heard myself sing until 2020,” she admits. The resulting EPs Close Up and Stop At Nothing represent these first forays as a solo musician, but although Lew has always highlighted the intentional departure between the sonic semi-brightness of her music and its darker subject matter, Diving For A Prize fully submerges into fuzzier territory and murkier impulses.

“When I make a song I think of it as its own little universe,” Lew explains. Inspired by artists like Enya, Caroline Palochek, Air and My Bloody Valentine, Lew’s “shoegaze but with pop structures” songs have a knack to be earworm-y when you least expect it, embedding themselves in the listener’s psyche. Intentionally amorphous, often what seems like a straightforward chord progression dissolves into something more insidious after multiple listens. Her voice can sound sweetly saccharine until you listen to the lyrics, which often tell vaguely sinister tales and reflect scenes where the mundane takes a turn. Lew writes short stories in her spare time, and her eye for curious vignettes is reflected in Diving For A Prize, which often sees her characters going through minute challenges or uncomfortable scenarios, like in the disarmingly ominous “Rear View,” which features a baseball player who is on the periphery of not making the next season. For this is what life is like – “tragic, sweet, comedic,” Lew says: all of the things at once.

As much as Lew excels as a storyteller, she at the same time warns against hinging too much on one person’s version of events. She’s her own unreliable narrator, blinded by emotion and the fleeting memory of the moment. It’s prevalent in the eerie naiveté of the otherwise dreamily cloying “Sweet Anecdote”: “you were the one / knew from the start / God I was so sure when I saw you.” Just as songs fossilize and preserve a specific feeling, time ushers on the inevitability of change. Lew often imagines what has become of these people. “Stay,” which memorializes an old security guard asleep in a thrift store, lends melodrama and cinema to the idea of the man finally leaving work and never coming back: a happy, albeit imagined ending.

The twelve songs of the album often operate in this sphere between fantasy and real life, where it is easy to dream, almost desperately, that something out of the ordinary might occur, even if it means ignoring your gut instinct. Lew reiterates this in the gleaming “Blue Moon,” which signifies “nature giving you signs that you should stop doing something,” while in the heavier “Give In,” she paints a scene where the light of an abandoned house draws the listener in. The name Diving For A Prize signifies taking this leap, often with the clouded judgment and despite the clues and warning signs that suggest otherwise. Lew has long been enamored by the horror trope of a fork in the road, and the presiding obsession that comes from wanting to make something, anything happen, at any cost.

But part of risk is also reward, and each track is its own portal filled with both yearning and self discovery. The luminescent “Silver,” which is about “being a kid and my mom telling me the world is your oyster,” holds both this disillusionment as well as hope that comes with growing into the person you are. It’s this constant desire for more which pushes us forward, towards whatever destiny awaits us. “With these songs, I wanted to find a place for myself in the world.”

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Andi at Terrorbird Media.]