Australia’s Spacey Jane returned back to their homeland last December following a successful sold out North American tour (they’ll be Back here in May for Shaky Knees with more festival dates to follow!). With demand so high, the internationally acclaimed band have just released “Lots Of Nothing” (feat. BENEE) – originally on their #1 Australian album “Here Comes Everybody,” the four-piece have join forces here with the alternative pop icon for a dazzling rework of the original, featuring a dreamy new verse from BENEE!

Spacey Jane frontman Caleb Harper has this to say of their very first collaboration, “We’re so excited to have BENEE on this track!  We’ve been fans of Stella for a long time and ever since we played together on Laneway (way back in 2020) she’s been a dream collab for me. Stella really took the lead on her verse, it’s new territory for us so we were lucky to have something we were really happy with from the start.  It’s so cool to see a song that I wrote over two years ago have new life breathed into it like this.  We hope you like it as much as we do!”

BENEE adds, “I love Spacey Jane and it’s always fun collaborating with ma Aussie mates hehe! We all met playing Laneway Fest, pre Covid, so I was stoked to be asked to jump on this track!  I really hope we can perform this remix live together!!”

Taken from the working title of Wilco’s seminal album Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (one of the bands’ favourite albums), Spacey Jane’s “Here Comes Everybody” sounds and feels like an album that has truly been lived in. Every note is imbued with hard-earned wisdom now being passed down to a new generation. “I want it to be a guide to the experiences that are coming for those entering the period of life I’m leaving,” frontman Caleb Harper says of the new album’s aims.

The beginning of Spacey Jane’s astonishing success arrived when the band released debut album “Sunlight” in 2020. Universal adulation followed for the band – vocalist and guitarist Caleb Harper, bassist Peppa Lane, guitarist Ashton Hardman-Le Cornu and drummer and manager Kieran Lama. The album debuted at #2 on the ARIA album chart, was voted Album of the Year in the triple j Listener’s Poll, was nominated for a J Award for Album of the Year and is now certified Gold. The sleeper single-turned-megahit, “Booster Seat” picked up Song Of The Year at the 2021 ARIA’s, the AIR Awards Best Independent Song Of The Year and is certified platinum.

Listen: Spacey Jane – “Lots of Nothing” (feat. BENEE)

Spacey Jane – “Lots of Nothing” (feat. BENEE)

Nigerian-born, Toronto-based DEBBY FRIDAY’s “So Hard To Tell” is the cosmically sublime, “intoxicating” (Stereogum) lead single from the newly signed Sub Pop artist’s upcoming debut album “GOOD LUCK” (out 3/24). Co-Produced alongside Graham Walsh (METZ, Holy F*ck), you can catch her roaming through rocky hillsides, psychedelic forests, and stone temples in the accompanying visuals below for Pitchfork’s ‘Best New Track’!

“I have a lower register and speak with vocal fry so I don’t know what came over me when I made this track. I have never in my life sung like this before and I had no idea I could even make these kinds of sounds with my voice. There’s no pitch effects on ‘SO HARD TO TELL,’ it’s all me.” – DEBBY FRIDAY

“a more grounded and vulnerable side to her music that shows a new side to her personality. Themes of loneliness and a need for emotional support take center stage on this new single. Friday appears to be parenting herself in the lyrics, wiping away tears and offering up heartfelt advise about how ‘big girls don’t cry’.” – TheFADER (’Song You Need’)

“Even a context-free listen to new single ‘So Hard To Tell,’ however, reveals one of the young year’s most audacious bangers, a daring and cacophonous piece of pop that wants to entrance (or maybe pummel) its listener with its percussion.” – Billboard

“As whirring clatter dissolves into bubbling synths, she creates room for private reflection. She rebukes and reminisces, thinking about her stubbornness and past difficulties….the loping beat and looping vocal melodies provide an atmosphere for easy vulnerability.”– NPR Music

Listen: Debby Friday – “So Hard To Tell” (radio edit)

Debby Friday – “So Hard To Tell” (radio edit)

King Tuff shares “Tell Me” the third single from his new album, “Smalltown Stardust”, and this pop gem features backing vocals from the album’s co-writer and co-producer SASAMI, perfectly encapsulating Kyle Thomas’ knack for melody and songwriting prowess.

“Almost every song in the world is about love, yet somehow there’s still not enough love songs,” says Thomas. “And if you took all the love songs in the world and added them to all the love songs that haven’t been written yet, well, there still wouldn’t be enough. There’s always room for more love and there’s always room for more love songs. Love is an endless well, you can do love songs about people, nature, passion, frustration, animals, joy, madness. Most of my songs are love songs, and I like it that way. But I’m still not satisfied! I want more! I want more love! And I want you to have more love! So here’s ‘Tell Me,’ a love song.”

“Smalltown Stardust,” is “an album about love and nature and youth” Thomas explains. It’s a spiritual, tender and ultimately joyous record that might come as a shock to those with only a passing knowledge of the artist’s back catalog, as evidenced by the album’s new single “Tell Me.” On “Smalltown Stardust,” Thomas takes us on his journey to a place where past and present collide, where he can be a dreamer in love with all that he sees. Images of his youth abound.

Listen: King Tuff – “Tell Me”

King Tuff – “Tell Me”

Following up their multi-week Top 10 Single run at specialty end of 2022 (“Kool Aid”), Sydney’s Royel Otis return—not only with a brilliant new single/video combo in the immediate “I Wanna Dance With You,” but with news of a sunny, forthcoming EP from the duo it’s pulled from–“Sofa Kings” (out 3/31)!

“Gather the courage to tell someone how you feel but muck it up like Frank Spencer on roller skates. Put that image to the banjo scene from Deliverance and you have yourself the recipe for ‘I Wanna Dance With You’. Just play it all off as intentional and you’ll be alright.” – Royel Otis

Indie-pop belter, “I Wanna Dance With You” is the second single off “Sofa Kings.” Colored with twinkling piano runs, shimmering guitar licks, and Otis’ lead, layered vocals, a fast-paced tempo sends the sweetness of yearning into overdrive, convincing their significant other to dance.

The forthcoming EP spans seven tracks of sunny alt-pop, and is a progressive step forward from the infectious melodies and quick-witted songwriting the pair are known for. Produced by Chris Collins and Royel Otis, the EP promises to continue captivating fans with visceral stories atop blissful guitar-fuzzed haze.

In October 2022, Royel Otis unveiled “Kool Aid,” the first single off “Sofa Kings.” The widely beloved, summery-leaning dose of perfection earned both local and international praise from the likes of BBC Radio 1, Apple Music 1, TheFADER, and FLOOD Magazine. The track received playlisting support from Spotify (Ultimate Indie, Feel-Good Indie Rock, Best Indie Songs of 2022) and Apple (All new Indie, INDIA, Indie + Chill).

The song followed the release of the duo’s sophomore EP, “Bar ‘N Grill” earlier that year. They have since amassed over 10 million streams, and garnered widespread playlisting support across community radio, US college radio and BBC Radio 6. Capping off a career-high year, the duo have also been named in Matt Wilkinson’s (Apple Music 1) ‘Ones To Watch’ list for 2023, after also featuring in his 2022 ‘Hidden Gems’ list with fan favorite, “Oysters In My Pocket”.

Listen: Royel Otis – “I Wanna Dance With You”

Royel Otis – “I Wanna Dance With You”

Coming off a string of show placements across FOX, NBC, and CW, Fort Frances’ newly released “Look At What Tomorrow Brought Us” is “a beacon of optimism amid a storm of global worries” (Chicago Tribune). Following last quarter’s Top 10 Single at SubModern “Seven Days Straight” comes the new single “Parentheses.” Perfectly apropos to the New Year just entered, it’s a memorable sing-a-long, urging our leaning into living in the moment.

“Parentheses is a song about focusing on the moment you’re living in — not the moment you’re missing or the moment you’re waiting for. The past few years have been a reminder that what’s ahead and what’s behind simply don’t matter at all. As we emerge from this weird period in our lives, I’m trying to keep that truth at the center of my mind.” – David McMillin (Fort Frances)

When you press play on Fort Frances’ “Look At What Tomorrow Brought Us,” you will hear David McMillin and Aaron Kiser having the time of their lives. Spending the past 10 years creating music about fears that the universe is teetering on the edge of doomsday, even if that’s true, the band figures we all may as well just enjoy it all while we can.

On the new album Fort Frances leans into the thinking that if you look for the problems in the world, you will find them. But if you look for the things that are worth smiling about, you will find those too — it just takes a bit more work.

Tomorrow is here. And it brought so many reasons to smile.

Listen: Fort Frances – “Parentheses”

Fort Frances – “Parentheses”

Sub Pop has released the astonishing new Weyes Blood full-length “And In The Darkness, Hearts Aglow”, with ten new tracks written by Natalie Mering, and album production from Mering along with Jonathan Rado (all songs except for “A Given Thing,” produced by Mering and Rodaidh McDonald).

The release is her follow-up to the acclaimed “Titanic Rising,” the first album of three in a special trilogy. Where “Titanic” was an observation of doom to come, “And In The Darkness, Hearts Aglow” is about being in the thick of it: a search for an escape hatch to liberate us from algorithms and ideological chaos (spoiler alert: the next one will be about “hope”). “We’re in a fully functional shit show,” Mering says. “My heart is a glow stick that’s been cracked, lighting up my chest in an explosion of earnestness.”

The album was mixed by Kenny Gilmore at 101 Studio, mastered by Emily Lazar and Chris Allgood at The Lodge, and features guest appearances from Meg Duffy, Daniel Lopatin, and Mary Lattimore.

Listen: Weyes Blood – “Grapevine” (radio edit)

Weyes Blood – “Grapevine” (radio edit)

Not Only has indie dynamo Windser (neé Jordan Topf) released his highly anticipated EP “Where the Redwoods Meet the Sea,” but shares that he’s signed to Bright Antenna Records (home to Sports Team, Wilderado, Fana Hues)! The newly unveiled “Paris” off the new EP continues the theme of longing for something far away, but this time it’s a person, rather the past.

“I am thrilled to be signing with the Bright Antenna Records family.  I can already tell they’ll be handling my records with love and care, and continuing to nurture my creativity as an artist/songwriter/producer. This project began in the Bay Area so there is no question that signing to a Bay Area label was fate.” – Windser

“Where the Redwoods Meet the Sea” is a stunning collection of breezy tracks imbued with the well-worn indie rock tenderness and beguiling songwriting for which Topf and producer Jackson Phillips are best-known. Windser effortlessly captures the sound of his California roots with his coastal sound yet despite the carefree sonic world he’s created, there’s an immediacy woven throughout the threads of each track. The EP is a gorgeous sonic representation of both the heavy and light moments one endures and Windser’s captivating storytelling is evident throughout. Topf finds bleary-eyed beauty in joyful memories and painful loss, in the littlest experiences and the life-altering events.

Adds Topf on the EP, “It was 2020 when I returned to Northern California to recount the past times and make a record that reflected the nostalgia of my early life. You can hear the reverberations of the waves against the cliffs, the darkness in the redwoods, and the fading feeling of youth. When I was a kid growing up in Santa Cruz, my dad used to romanticize where we lived. The fog that rolls in every morning through the woods and across the glowing pacific ocean. It was a sleepy, haunting, trippy little beach town which he often described as ‘Where the Redwoods Meet the Sea.’ The memories and echoes of my past never left me.”

Listen: Windser – “Friends I Barely Know”

Windser – “Friends I Barely Know”

Following A Pair of fave singles of SubModern specialty shows, including the #1 “Bones (God Like You),” and the #2 “I’m Spent,” upon recent release of their new EP “You’ll Be Forgiven,” Toronto duo Housewife have revealed the habit-forming “You’re Not The Worst,” which came out of the gate Fast this week to nab #1s on Both Single AND Album charts this week!

“This song is one of the more direct and honest songs we’ve written. It’s about undervaluing yourself and allowing people who are overbearing and arrogant to affect you emotionally. Why am I spending time with someone who doesn’t respect me or my time? Then finally working up the courage to cut them out of your life when you’ve had enough.” – Housewife

At 19 and 20 years old, Housewife are quite simply the future. Brighid Fry (she/they) and Pascale Padilla (they/she) are queer and allies, activists and co-founders of the climate initiative Music Declares Emergency and while to be sure their Twitter sums ‘em up concisely as “Opinionated feminist indie band,” We say they they epitomize one of our favorite discoveries this year!

Though Housewife began with folksier roots, their newest music showcases the friends’ experiences living and writing through the end of high school and the pandemic, as well as navigating the life changes that come with growing up. Their joy pervades though, even as Fry says, “we’re figuring out relationships and where we stand in the world.”

“Housewife have been perfecting the type of indie that is at once ’90s inspired and intensely modern, the type that comes across as both expertly crafted and seemingly effortless. …it’s not surprising that ‘You’re Not The Worst’ so perfectly strikes this indie balance. Bouncy, infectious, and honest, the Toronto-based duo have made yet another case for why they’re an act to watch.” — Consequence Of Sound

Listen: Housewife – “You’re Not The Worst” (clean edit)

Housewife – “You’re Not The Worst” (clean edit)

Homes at Night’s newly revealed single “Wasted On You” comes from the Nashville-based duo’s debut EP ‘If You Were A Stranger’, and the band’s latest Alt Anthem centers on filling the void of missing someone you love with substance.

“Wasted on You is a song that we wrote with JT Daly and Sad Penny. The inspiration of the song came from spending time away from who I was dating at the time. The whole idea of “wish I was wasted on you” came from me being tired of spending my nights in bars and not with them.” – Hank Compton/Homes at Night

“This EP feels more like the mark of an era in our lives instead of just a batch of songs we wrote,” says Homes at Night. “The whole thing was made in the midst of massive changes in both of our worlds ranging from relationships dissolving to moving out of places that made an imprint on us, and on top of that we were in the heat of a pandemic. Reflecting on the creation of it feels like a fever dream, but a very nostalgic one to say the least.”

The band continues, “It was like the whole world was falling apart but having this to work on created so many incredible memories. Creating this felt confessional, like it was our own little world that we could hide in but looking back it was probably getting these thoughts and emotions on paper that helped us heal and move on.”

Homes at Night —made up of songwriters Hank Compton and Aksel Coe — create alt/rock anthems that blur the boundaries between genre and generation. It’s a sound that’s both nostalgic and modern, layered with organic instruments, synth-driven soundscapes, cinematic hooks, and a percussive pulse. On their debut EP ‘If You Were A Stranger’, the bandmates blend their sensibilities with story-driven songcraft, nodding to their Nashville roots while simultaneously pushing far beyond them.

Listen: Homes At Night – “Wasted On You”

Homes At Night – “Wasted On You”

After feeling the audience reaction to “A Line Of Shots” during The Afghan Whigs’ May U.S. tour, it was clear the new single needed its moment in the sun! The new reveal is pulled from “How Do You Burn?,” one of the most anticipated of Summer 2022 (Pitchfork, Forbes, Brooklyn Vegan, etc)!

“a reminder to embrace the competing fear and freedom that comes with facing a critical moment. Its adrenaline-boosting build and invigorating production echo the simmering anticipation of lyrics…a storm of sirens, shoegaze distortion, overlayed vocals, and the rapturous refrain” – Consequence Of Sound

“a shimmering, swaying midtempo rocker with the very Greg Dulli-esque title ‘A Line Of Shots’” – Stereogum

“their most direct presentation of abstract passion ever” – Rolling Stone  

“Three decades after forming, the Afghan Whigs remain vital for its willingness to ignore boundaries” – New York Times

“How Do You Burn?” is The Afghan Whigs ninth album overall and following on from the brace of widely acclaimed records they’ve made previously since re-grouping in 2012, “Do to the Beast” (2014) and “In Spades” (2017). “How Do You Burn?” picks up the baton laid down by each of those records and runs it to the horizon.

Work on it was begun in September 2020 – the COVID pandemic having forced Whigs frontman/songwriter Greg Dulli to abandon plans to tour his highly praised solo album, ‘Random Desire’ – and continued over the next 14 months.

The global pandemic dictated also that the band record largely apart from, and in different locations to, each other: Dulli, his co-producer Christopher Thorn and drummer Patrick Keeler together in California; bassist John Curley, guitarist Jon Skibic and strings man Rick Nelson laying down and engineering their own parts in Cincinnati, New Jersey and New Orleans, respectively.

“Once we got the system down, we started flying,” says Dulli.

For his supporting cast, Dulli called upon several serial collaborators including the late Mark Lanegan, who was a regular in Dulli’s Twilight Singers, a partner in The Gutter Twins and a close friend.  Lanegan makes his The Afghan Whigs debut singing backup vocals on two tracks.  “It was Mark who named the album,” Dulli remarked.

Listen: The Afghan Whigs – “A Line Of Shots”

The Afghan Whigs – “A Line Of Shots”