It's hard to believe there was a time when the social media site MySpace ruled the online world, way before Facebook and Twitter. MySpace was especially user-friendly for musicians, which is partly what made its demise so sad (it could automatically play your album on your home page!). Turns out two musical artists named Toni and Jonathan met as part of the emo subculture within MySpace in the mid-2000's, and we're talking Full Emo: black clothes, dark hair, painted finger nails... the works! After a 20-year separation, the two friends reunited to share a split EP titled letters to you / A Rose's Diary, based on the two groups they had back in the day.

To break down the history a bit more: A Rose's Diary was comprised of brothers Jonathan and Tobias Gutmann, then became Jonathan's solo project when based in Frankfurt. They released two LPs, two EPs and two split-EPs of acoustic, emo singer-songwriter music. letters to you was a 3-piece, quieter acoustic trio who released four EPs and were featured on various compilations. The six songs collected here (three each) were recorded between 2007 and 2012, and the two groups have been compared to Dashboard Confessional, Joshua Radin, Kristofer Aström and The Weepies.

We start out with a lovely, all-acoustic prologue from letters to you titled "Prologue." It's built on a basic pattern but is slowly ornamented with different playing styles such as muting the strings or adding echo. It has a crystalline sound quality that does full justice to the music. "Coming Home" has a similar arrangement, while the lead vocalist's pronunciation has that slightly askew quality of a German speaker singing english lyrics. Though obviously a very different artist, this vocalist has the same emotional commitment to his forlorn love story as Ireland's Glen Hansard. The concluding harmonica was a real surprise!

The final "letters" track "Breathe In / Breathe Out" is again acoustic with lots of harmonics, and has more of a monophonic demo feel, until the sudden appearance of a string section that springs the song into Technicolor. The singer is again fully committed to the vocals, and has them move from center to widescreen and even telephone-compressed. The concluding minute is a bracing ambient journey with heartbeat-like bass and reverse-echo acoustic. 

We then switch to A Rose's Diary for their first track "Leave For Good." The acoustic guitars immediately sound different (perhaps steel strings instead of nylon) and present a descending, minor key folky pattern, not too far from a church hymn. The vocals are like a mini-chorale and possibly feature a female vocalist, though I'm pretty sure that's Jonathan Gutmann taking the vocals toward the end. It's a quietly powerful track with minimal changes, so that each new step feels even more powerful. "Homecoming" features acoustic guitar that feels down-tuned, playing behind hushed, interlaced vocals that are lovely in that dark, emo fashion. The addition of a mellotron-like string patch takes us to a whole other level. "Isolated" is a sedate, contemplative conclusion to the set. The vocals have the hoarse yet heartfelt quality of Freedy Johnston, with the overdubbed acoustics creating a lush and powerful backing. The brothers Gutmann deliver stark and melancholic choruses, which is (I guess) where the emo comes in.

Though I wasn't familiar with the original groups, this mini-compilation was a great primer and totally works on its own. Check it out!

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Ani Even, the experimental alter ego of Danish Faroese Greenlandic artist Bror, arrives fully formed on SKINWALKER, an album that treats transformation as a living, breathing act. The record’s eleven tracks move like ceremonies caught between dimensions, where darkwave, industrial grit, and Nordic ritualism blur into a single, charged atmosphere. I could sense how much of this project comes from conflict, identity not as something inherited but as something torn apart and reassembled. The music doesn’t simply blend the organic and the synthetic; it traps them in a loop, forcing both to mutate.

The sound palette is volatile. Haunting piano figures collapse under distorted percussion, while fractured choirs hover at the edges like disembodied spirits. SKINWALKER thrives in these contradictions. It’s mythic and deeply human, primal and futuristic, exploring anger, love, addiction, climate anxiety, fatherhood, and the slow process of self acceptance.

The opener “Be With Me” is intriguing in with its tension and scope. The Scott Walker influence is unmistakable, particularly from The Drift. The piano, guitar, and ambience all seem to strain under invisible pressure. “I Know That You Lie” initially feels more grounded with its 4/4 pulse and synth layering, but as it unfolds, it grows jagged and mechanical, like Ministry at their most severe. The title track “Skinwalker” turns toward experimental electronica, with vocals that reminded me of Anohni. “It’s a Great Deal” leans into ritualistic chanting, while “Rotten to the Core” bends 80s synth pop into something warped and uncanny.

There’s a strange beauty in “Not My Friend,” which unwraps almost entirely a cappella against birdsong, a moment of uneasy calm before the dark synth pop of “Run.” “A Boy Who’s Crying” stands out as a clear highlight, a shadowy, late night track that recalls the melancholic haze of Burial, pulsing with emotional and physical exhaustion. “Silent Service” injects a ghostly gospel tone, while “Deep Void Visitor” surges forward like a mechanical storm, setting up the closer “Djævlebørn,” which leaves the listener stranded in a haunting, post apocalyptic calm.

There’s a lot happening across this record but that excess is part of its power. SKINWALKER isn’t made for casual listening. It’s for those who find meaning in dissonance, in the collapse and reconstruction of the self. Even’s debut is both confrontation and confession, a work of instability that somehow makes chaos sound sacred.

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Sometimes the indie music I receive comes in waves of similar groupings or styles. For example I've recently heard more than a couple bi-coastal collaborations, as well as music influenced by the glam rock of T. Rex. Electric Angels are two electric warriors collaborating "across the pond" featuring Bob Kingdon in England and Eric Daum in New England (fun how that worked out!). While collating tracks for a multi-disc compilation, the partners realized that some of these older songs deserved release on a stand-alone project... and thus: Resurrection.

The name Electric Angels sounded familiar, and it turns out I reviewed the boys in 2023 and 2024, where I noted their awesome tagline: “Glam Rock for the Future, Power Pop for Progressives, Martinis at 5:00.” The band got its name from the Bill Nelson album "Electricity Made us Angels" and as a BeBop Deluxe fan I found this intriguing. They also point to Bowie, T. Rex, prog, power pop and "girls in short skirts and tight shirts" as influences. England's Bob Kingdon plays lead and rhythm guitars along with lead and backing vocals, while New England's Eric Daum does the same while adding keyboards and percussion loops. The boys record separately and mix using GarageBand. The original tracks were recorded between 2009 and 2019, with remastering in late 2024. Some of the songs stretch back almost to the band's beginning. Guitar callouts include a Yamaha SG2000, and Greco and Gibson Les Pauls using Boss effects. 

"Transistor Tom" has a title like a Bowie-T.Rex hybrid, and the music is similar to those artists as well. It's a fun, upbeat, boppin' track about that crazy neighborhood guy who walks around with a radio stuck to his ear (we called our guy with the boombox "Radiohead"). The mix is a little unusual, with most beats in the background but certain percussive additions popping way out in front. Overall the band sound is pretty cool. "One Day" lays back the tempo for a "hopeful love song" written by Bob Kingdon. I'm a sucker for these kinds of songs and the simple chorus is exactly all you need and nothing more: "When we meet / I'll recognize you, recognize you." 

"Lost Girls" is the T-Rexiest track so far, with those classic boogie fuzz guitars and tribal beats. The lead vocals (Eric Daum, I believe) actually remind me of indie vocalist par excellence Matte Martin, and the song was inspired by the graphic novel by Alan Moore. "Beams of Light" is actually credited to poet Carole Young and sounds like the guitars were recorded under water, with a cool "horror movie narration" vocal. But that turns out only to have been the introduction, as the monster metal guitars return with a vengeance (this might be the result of two songs being ret-conned into one new track!). "Burning" actually has a (very) similar vibe with the spooky vocals and guitars, but this time the awesome lead guitar is played by guest Joey Vela. Eric Daum adds haunted house keyboards. 

"Rosalie" is for me the Hit Single of the collection, the track that jumps out at me like "LuLu" did on "Beautiful Skies." A perfect combination of pop vocals (Eric), retro keys and fuzz guitars. "I Will Never Forget" is described as "a BAD breakup song. Kinda hurts, don't it?" Given the topic, the music is appropriately lush and reverential., with a heartfelt vocal by Eric. "Fallen Angels" is an instrumental, so the boys take the chance to turn up the guitars and keys way past 11, and you can literally hear the circuits straining against the barrage (and there are actually some ephemeral voices in there too!). "The Walls Are Closing In" is another sedate, broken-hearted song with lyrics by poet Carole Young where the wailing guitars match the strings and keys for melancholy. "Sick Sad World Edit" is a new version featuring Jett Farley from Lowartmusic on synths. Proclaimed as a prog track, I find it more 60's psychedelic (though Farley does go a bit crazy toward the end!).

Being a collection of scattered bits, this album is maybe not as cohesive as past Electric Angels releases, but there's plenty of good stuff here and more than enough to whet your appetite!

Autumn Mackenzie DeSantis is a very young (just 23) country artist who means to introduce herself to the world with her debut EP titled Hi, My Name is Autumn. It features three songs written between the ages of 13 and 19, and its release also marks her graduation from the famed Berklee College of Music with a degree in songwriting. Her backing players are some of the best musicians from Berklee, including Regan Kulig, Kiara Nothhaft, Soraya Rafat, Jaxon Lane, Matthew "Steady" Ricetti and Matilde Heckler. Mackenzie also helped with shaping the songs in the studio, as she took music production at Berklee's Spain campus. Mackenzie has done an interesting thing with her songs: on Spotify, she's already made a playlist of similar artists and placed her three tracks on top "...to keep my songs in good company. Join the party!"

Right out of the gate, "I've Dated the Devil" is a stone-cold classic, right up there with the best songs I've heard in the country or folk genres. McKenzie's voice and arrangement immediately reminded me of Garfunkel and Oates, a duo whose schtick is to have sweet, soaring voices surprise the listener with the most obscene (but funny) lyrics known to mankind. Mackenzie is totally G-rated, but every bit as witty and creative. The track features guitar, mandolin, fiddle, pedal steel and percussion. Mackenzie weaves a very funny story about having dated the Devil, and how the Devil was not as bad as her current ex-boyfriend: "I've dated the Devil, he's a better man than you are on a good day... he told me to tell you that he'll see you in Hell." It takes some artists their entire career to come up with something this original and engaging!

"Mercy" immediately takes a more contemplative tone, though using the same arrangement. There's a reference to Alice in Wonderland right up front, as our narrator seems to have joined a wild party thrown by The Cheshire Cat. I'm not the quickest study but it feels like Mackenzie begins as the song topic, then switches to a somewhat judgmental observer: "Little Miss Mercy, I can tell you don't feel one bit like yourself / My my Mercy, don't you know what it does to the boys when you dance like that?" At the conclusion, Miss Mercy seems to have been scared enough by her surroundings to run away, proclaiming: "I'm never going back." Though a bit more obtuse than the previous track, it plays beautifully and I very much enjoyed it. 

Interestingly, after "Mercy" taking place in an Alice-adjacent universe, the final track is titled "Rabbit Hole" though clearly it's meant figuratively. Mackenzie startles the listener immediately by comparing drugs and lovers: "Daddy says don't try coke 'cause I'd like it too much / I'd like to think that you gave me that same kind of rush / Nothing was off the table, you got me that high / So I watched myself fall apart over our days and nights." Clearly this is a more regretful tome with a slower beat and minor chords to match, though the chorus is again heartbreakingly beautiful in a way that seems second nature to Mackenzie. These lyrics can be seen as the "serious" side of the Devil song, with yet another Alice reference: "Thank god I caught the last Wonderland train / So I wasn't stuck with you forever, but I still remember..."

Though the Devil song is the clear standout, these three tracks are all of a piece and work beautifully together. With an artist this good, I feel like anything I say will just add to an eventual groundswell of praise and acclaim, but I'll say it anyway: Autumn Mackenzie is the real deal, and I can't recommend her enough!

Brooklyn’s Graham Price Gift Shop returns with Love is Whys, a full-length album that pushes their kaleidoscopic pop sound into a sort of reimagining of 50's pop. The record feels like the culmination of years spent honing a sound that merges vintage pop charm with modern eccentricity. You can hear the fingerprints of The Beach Boys and The Beatles in their melodic architecture, but also the irreverent playfulness of Foxygen and Tele Novella. The title itself, Love is Whys, gestures toward contradiction and curiosity.

The opener, “Cherish Love” featuring Alexx Becker, was enjoyable with its interplay between synths and guitar. I like how the song evolves, growing more playful as it unfolds. The synth melodies, in particular, add a quirky lift that makes it a standout introduction. “Home” follows with a lush, unmistakably 1950s pop feel. The mood recalls Lord Huron’s retro stylization but with a more theatrical bent. That vintage thread continues on “Lonely Too,” which drifts into a light surf groove, and “Blue Hours,” where the flamenco-style guitar and vocal harmonies create a kind of sun-faded teenage daydream.

“Em C” is one of the highlights for me. It sits somewhere between Youth Lagoon’s introspective haze and Panda Bear’s looping psychedelia. “Dolores,” featuring Steve Tarkington, reintroduces a bouncy surf rhythm, while “Come to Me, My Memory” brings in Alyssa Forte and Braulio Lin for a track that feels timeless, its female vocals recalling the golden age of AM radio.

“Chaz Adores,” with Lillian Ruiz, might be the most joyful moment on the record. It’s buoyant, catchy, and unapologetically pop. The penultimate “Oxytocin,” with Becker and Tarkington, plays with its namesake’s chemistry, while “We Fall in Line,” featuring Ben Jaffe, closes the album with a cinematic sweep and great horn work.

There’s no shortage of bands reinterpreting the nostalgia of 1950s pop, but Graham Price Gift Shop do a good job creating some variety. The arrangements are intricate without being fussy, and the songwriting carries real emotional weight beneath all the sparkle. Love is Why's is a solid and thoughtful album. Take a listen.

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The Connecting Dots’ Sweet Debauchery opens like a wake-up call, an album that stares directly into the world’s chaos and dares to find rhythm in the disorder. It’s the Swedish band’s third release and easily their most assertive, shedding the cinematic haze of their earlier work for something more deliberate and alive. Helena Sundström’s voice, luminous and wounded, anchors the record as it moves through synth-driven corridors and guitar-streaked horizons, carrying both melody and unease in equal measure.

Sundström has said the album was born from “a harsh social climate,” and I can hear that urgency in every layer. There’s a sense that the group has grown weary of escapism. Where their earlier work drifted inward, Sweet Debauchery pushes outward, confronting a world fraying at its edges. Even the title hints at contradiction, pleasure intertwined with collapse. What results is a collection of songs that pair elegance with decay, poetry with pulse, reflection with defiance.

“Modern Shapes” immediately sets the tone with a nod to 1980s synth pop, complete with shimmering keys and crisp guitars that ring against a steady 4/4 heartbeat. The band sounds revitalized here, letting nostalgia coexist with forward momentum. “Weekend” leans darker, its piano and electronic textures circling introspection before opening just enough to let light in. “Dominoes,” easily one of the most immediate tracks, channels early shoegaze energy, a hazy, reverb-soaked shimmer that recalls Psychocandy era Jesus and Mary Chain but lands with its own playful charm.

“Ends Meet” takes a gothic turn that I found especially compelling, while “The Final Song” could soundtrack an 80s school dance if it weren’t for the sleek, modern production pulling it toward the present. “Morning Disco” hums with Blondie-esque cool, and “The Sweet Life” strips away the gloss for a piano-led meditation on impermanence. When the record swings back into kinetic pop with “Jupiter Falling” and “Something Out of Nothing,” it feels like a reminder that joy and anxiety can occupy the same space. The closer, “Leave All That Glitters Behind,” is an explosive ballad that earns its catharsis.

​The Connecting Dots manage to honor the past while articulating something novel, music that mirrors the times not through cynicism but through clarity. It’s a record that hums with nostalgia yet insists on being heard right now.

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Bianca Nisha’s Blood&Sugar marks a deepening of her world, a space where restraint meets rapture and every sound hovers between light and shadow. The Danish singer-songwriter, whose name translates to “white night,” leans into the dualities that defined her debut but widens the aperture. The piano remains her anchor, the cello her most expressive voice, yet she stretches both across a more cinematic frame. It’s an album that explores fragility not as weakness but as intensity, letting moments of stillness glow against lush, symphonic backdrops.

The opening track “Blood&Sugar” introduces faint piano chords, upright bass, and softly bowed cello. Her vocals drift with air and resonance, dissolving into layers of reverb and swelling harmonies. “Heavy” expands that language, fusing orchestral gravity with palm-muted guitar and subtle rhythmic tension.

​“Tremble My Heart” turns contemplative, its piano and strings converging into something meditative and luminous. “River” emerges as a clear centerpiece, joyful, cathartic, and radiant in motion. “Eavesdropping” pares things back, unfolding as a seamless, living structure, while “Frozen Freedom” introduces a regal tone that heightens her compositional precision.

The shift arrives with “Cheater,” where the percussion strikes harder and a faint electronic pulse threads through the mix, hinting at pop sensibility without betraying the album’s organic core. “Crystalline” returns to classical form, elegant and poised, before “Symphony of Silence” ventures into more cerebral territory. By the time “Weeping Willow” closes the record, the pieces interlock like reflections in still water, emotive yet contained, intimate yet expansive.

​Every track carries its own gravity while contributing to a unified whole. The orchestral palette feels organic and human, and the interplay between voice, piano, and cello remains the album’s emotional current. Blood&Sugar is a work of balance where composition meets instinct and intimacy meets grandeur, and Bianca Nisha delivers it with uncommon clarity and grace.

From the northern reaches of Sweden, Purple Stone, the duo of Johan Hansson and David Skog, sculpt music that bends the line between propulsion and dream. Their sound glows with analog warmth, filled with reverb-soaked guitars and the steady pulse of rhythm that keeps their cosmic leanings grounded. Spacetime builds on that foundation and stretches it into something more expansive, a playful collision of psychedelia and wonder. It’s an album that treats the universe as both a playground and a mirror, where celestial metaphors disguise human curiosity.

“Come On Come On Come On” opens the record with a confident stride. The crunchy guitars and grounded drums instantly set a tone that is both retro and alive. It recalls the kaleidoscopic swirl of late 1960s rock, but the duo gives it their own sense of lift and control. The vocals glide through the haze with smooth assurance, setting up a record that refuses to sit still.

“I’m The One” pivots into a looser, early 1970s inspired groove. The synths shimmer like sunlight through tinted glass, and I was drawn to how the vocal melody moves in tandem with the rhythm, always pressing forward, never looping in place. “Alright” keeps that momentum, with ascending synths that crackle with energy and a guitar tone that sparkles around the edges.

“Get High” channels the psych pop headspace of early Tame Impala, a slow drift that still carries a pulse underneath. “Moods” lives up to its name, lush, weightless, and serene, a soft landing in the middle of the record. “Adrift” brings the percussion back into orbit, the 4/4 beat surrounded by spiraling guitar textures. Then comes “Unidentified Flying Space Machine,” the album’s gravitational center. The groove is infectious, the vocal hook instantly memorable, and the interplay between synth and guitar locks into something close to hypnosis.

“Late Night” glows like its title suggests, a slow motion drift perfect for stargazing. The closer, “Spacetime,” stretches outward until it breaks free, a dreamlike finale that evokes the feeling of true escape.

Spacetime had some really cool songs,  great production and never felt like it was taking itself too seriously. There's a lot to appreciate here. Take a listen.

Building on the meditative pulse of his debut project Textbook Maneuver, composer Michael Keane returns under his Distance Major moniker with a self-titled album that expands his fascination with texture, rhythm, and tone. Released through Life Science Records, it’s a record that feels both patient and purposeful, moving away from the ambient drift of his earlier work toward a more structured synthesis of electronic precision and jazz spontaneity.

Keane described the album as an attempt to “incorporate many aspects of synthesizer rock along with chill modern jazz,” and I can hear that balance throughout. The pieces, written between trace a subtle dialogue between movement and stillness. There is a sense of restraint in how he layers rhythm and melody, with glowing synth lines brushing against muted percussion, patterns forming and dissolving before they settle into something deeply human.

The opener, “Finish to Start Again,” recalls the exploratory spirit of early Brian Eno. The synths sound deceptively simple, but there is a nostalgic warmth to their tone that draws you in. That aesthetic continues with the more kinetic “Distance Major Distance Minor,” where pulsing pads and hybrid drums find a hypnotic groove. “Distance Echoes” shifts through multiple transitions, while “With You” stood out to me for its playful, almost whimsical character.

“Bumper” relies on drones and white noise to create a hazy sense of tension, and “NYC 1970s Cinema” stands out with its horn flourishes and one of the album’s most memorable beats. “Heading In Now” explores a stranger, more alien soundscape, stretching the edges of Keane’s sonic palette. “A Simple Thought (Peace)” introduces a gentle piano motif that grounds the record before the closer “Old Shirt” ties it all together with a burst of rhythmic energy that feels like a well-earned exhale.

I thought this was a cohesive album. The album holds together like a single continuous arc. The older electronic aesthetic gives it a timeless quality, echoing an era when analog imperfection was part of the allure. Distance Major is a solid album from beginning to end. Take a listen.

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“Better Days” begins with restraint, with bass, guitar, and a steady kick drum setting the stage for something quietly confident. Within seconds, the groove snaps into focus, and I found myself thinking of My Morning Jacket’s brand of rootsy expansiveness. The song walks that fine line between Americana, rock, and folk, never leaning too hard on any single genre. What makes it work is the sense of balance. It’s grounded, but it moves. It’s familiar, but it still surprises.

From the first listen, “Better Days” already felt like a song I’d known for years. Elise understands how to use dynamics not just as volume shifts but as emotional punctuation. Around the two and a half minute mark, the band locks in completely, and her voice soars without losing its warmth. It’s that rare moment when everything clicks, when tone, timing, and delivery all align. The production is clean but human, with enough space in the mix to let every instrument breathe. I kept coming back to the song later in the day, and it held up each time.

Elise has been quietly building a catalog that rewards close listening. Each new release expands her range without abandoning the heart that defines her writing. “Better Days” continues that streak, a reminder that great songwriting doesn’t need embellishment; it just needs honesty.

If this track draws you in, it’s worth exploring her other recent singles which we have also reviewed. I get the sense this is just the beginning of a much larger story, and Elise seems fully ready to tell it.

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