Category: New Video

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Weird Nightmare Returns with Rousingly Anthemic and Earnest “Where I Belong”

Almost every band that’s worth a damn has had a member, who at some point worked in a record store. With JOVM mainstay acts METZ and Weird Nightmare, it was frontman and creative mastermind Alex Edkins. Slinging indie rock and hardcore records at his hometown record store while attending university, Edkins became an ardent student of rock ‘n’ roll from the psychedelic 1960s to the DIY 1990s and beyond. 

Hoopla, Edkins’ sophomore Weird Nightmare album, which is slated for a May 1, 2026 release through Sub Pop globally and Dine Alone Records in Canada, reportedly sees the JOVM mainstay mixing and matching these wide-ranging influences in fun, exhilarating combinations, showcasing his sophisticated musical mind, while continuing to showcase his unerring knack for ridiculously catchy and rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses.

Co-produced by Edkins and Spoon‘s Jim Eno at Providence‘s world famous Machines With Magnets, Hoopla also sees the acclaimed Canadian artist expanding upon Weird Nightmare’s musical palette with the addition of piano, bells and castanets, which give his long-held straightforward songwriting a shiny luster. 

The album will feature the previously released “Forever Elsewhere,” the Cheap Trick-like “Might See You There,” the punchy punk rock-like “Pay No Mind,” and the album’s third single “Where I Belong.” “Where I Belong” continues to showcase Edkins’ long-held penchant for rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses paired with some of the most introspective and deeply honest songwriting of the JOVM mainstay’s career. The song captures a narrator who’s recognizing that he’s getting older, that the road ain’t what it always is cracked up to be — especially since he has a family. The self-doubt and confusion at the core of the song are real and deeply lived in yet they feel universal and familiar to anyone, who’s inching into middle age.

Directed by boy wonder, the accompanying video for “Where I Belong” features Edkins in a thrift shop, playing his guitar and singing while trying on different outfits and personalties.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstay Alewya Shares Broodingly Cinematic “Eshi”

JOVM mainstay Alewya is an acclaimed London-based singer/songwriter, producer and visual artist. Born in Saudi Arabia to an Egyptian-Sudanese father and an Ethiopian mother, the acclaimed London-based artist has spent her life surrounded by diaspora immigrant communities: She grew up in West London and after a several year stint in New York, she returned to London. Upon her return home, the Saudi-British artist developed and honed her ear for music through the sounds of the Ethiopian and Arabic music of her parents and the ambient and alternative rock albums of her brother.

She’s part of a generation of artists actively redefining global music, a generation that’s generally rooted in heritage, yet unbound by it. Describing herself as a painter, who makes music, Alewya approaches sound as texture and feeling, guided more by intuition than structure. Her sound and story help to widen the Black British frame, bringing the often under heard North and East African perspective into a much-needed focus.

Back in 2020, the JOVM mainstay burst into the scene with an attention grabbing feature on Little Simz‘s “where’s my lighter,” which caught the attention of Because Records, who signed the rising artist and released her critically applauded debut, 2021’s Panther In Mode EP.

Alewya’s highly-anticipated full-length debut, ZERO is slated for a June 26, 2026 release through Because London Records. The album reportedly embodies years of artistic growth into an effort that’s both deeply personal and sonically expansive. But the album also marks a significant milestone, as it sees her boldly stepping into a new creative era, defined by fearless experimentation and cultural fluidity.

ZERO will include the previously released “Night Drive,” feat. Dagmawit Ameha and “City of Symbols,” along with the album’s third and latest single “Eshi.” “Eshi” weaves broodingly atmospheric electronics, shimmering keys thumping beats and gnawa-like percussion with a looping figure played on an Eritrean and Ethiopian instrument, masenqo, a single-stringed bowed lute that features a diamond-shaped resonator. Alewya’s expressive delivery ethereally floats over the song’s widescreen production and instrumentation as it builds up and intensifies to a chant-driven crescendo. The result is a song that feels woozily anachronistic, in the sense that it draws from ancient traditions and pairs them with contemporary, Western/pop-influenced sounds and production techniques. “Eshi is rooted in tradition but unbound by it too, which is one of the pillars of ZERO,” Alewya explains.

The accompanying video was co-directed and co-produced by Yonas Tadesse, Frehiwot Berhane, Tedos Teffera and Alewya, and was shot in Lalibela, Ethiopia, during the celebration of Gena, Ethiopian Orthodox Christmas. The gorgeous, cinematically shot video captures and reinforces a strong sense of community and culture, both of which are central and defining forces in the JOVM mainstay’s work.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: A Place to Bury Strangers Share Mournful “Song for Girl from Macedonia”

New York-based JOVM mainstays  A Place to Bury Strangers — currently Oliver Ackermann (vocals, guitar), John Fedowitz (bass) and Sandra Fedowitz (drums) — will be releasing a rarities album, Rare and Deadly through Dedstrange on April 3, 2026. 

Following 2024’s Synthesizer, Rare and Deadly sees the band cracking open a decade-long vault of raw nerve and sonic chaos. Spanning 2015-2025, this collection of demos, B-sides, abandoned experiments and forgotten fragments reveals the band at their most unfiltered, frequently caught between breakthrough ideas and beautiful mistakes. 

Pulled from Oliver Ackermann’s personal archive of late-night recordings, blown-out tapes and half-finished sessions, the collection’s tracks pulse with the unruly energy that ATPBS has long been known for, but more dangerous with more jagged edges — on purpose. 

Countless bands have opened up their vaults to fans and others, but Rare and Deadly is truly unprecedented: Every format is different — and as a result, tells a different story. The CD, cassette, vinyl and digital editions each feature their own unique track listing. No single version features the “complete” album. Instead, each format is its own window into Ackermann’s archive, revealing alternate paths, missing links and parallel “what if” versions of the band’s inner life. It’s deliberately unstable with the album shifting depending on how you choose to hear it, mirroring the chaos of its creation. 

Across the collection’s tracks, you can hear the evolution of Ackermann’s restlessly creative mind. Some pieces feel like prototypes for future chaos, seeds that later bloomed on studio albums. Others are dead ends — ideas too volatile, too strange or too personal to ever fit the frame of a proper release. The tracks feature riffs mutated by malfunctioning pedals, songs born from gear pushed past its limits, or delicate melodies overwhelmed by towering walls of feedback. 

Rare and Deadly will include the previously released, “Everyone’s The Same,” “Acid Rain” “Where Are We Now” and the album’s fourth and latest single “Song for Girl From Macedonia.” A brooding motorik pulse and swirling and atmospheric feedback serve as a lush yet mournful bed for Ackermann’s equally mournful delivery expressing a bitter sense of “what if.”

“We played a show in Macedonia anded this girl, who deeply connected with the music. Her brother helped us load gear, pure kindness, no ego. She was killed by a drunk diver, crossing the road,” Ackermann explains. “This song is for her. A small attempt at honoring someone, who deserved more time.”

The accompanying video features some mind-bending animation created by the band’s original projectionist Spencer Bewley.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: La Sécurité Returns with a Breakneck Ode to Food

Acclaimed Montréal-based JOVM mainstay collective La Sécurité — Éliane Viens (vocals, synths, percussion and drums), Félix Bélisle (bass, synths, percussion, piano and production), Kenny Smith (drum, guitar), Laurence Anne Charest-Gagné (guitar, percussion, vocals) and Melissa Di Menna (guitar, synths, vocals, percussion and artwork) — specialize in a brand of art punk that’s equal parts jumpy beats, off-kilter arrangements and minimalistic melodic hooks run through an insomniac filter that’s the result of excessive exposure to the city’s neon-lit late night scene. 

The Canadian art punk collective’s music is about living dangerously and is prefect for being blasted at deafening levels on dance floors. But lyrically, the material is deeply inspired by and shares the ethos of the Riot Grrl movement, celebrating and defiantly advocating for the autonomization of women, friendship and benevolence. 

Since the release of 2023’s full-length debut, Stay Safe!, which landed on the Polaris Music Prize long-list, the Montréal-based art punks have released 2024’s Stay Safe! REMIXED and last year’s “Detour” and “Ketchup.” Along with receiving critical praise both nationally and internationally, the outfit has made the run of the intentional festival circuit, playing sets at M for Montréal, New Colossus Festival, SXSW, End of the Road, The Great Escape, Reeperbahn and Festival International de Jazz de Montréal. They’ve toured as an opener for The Go! Team and The Rapture. And they’ve shared stages with Mauskovic Dance Band and JOVM mainstays Automatic and Death Valley Girls. During that whirlwind period, they also signed with Simon Raymonde‘s label Bella Union. 

The JOVM mainstay act’s highly-anticipated, Emmanuel Éthier and Félix Bélisle co-produced sophomore album Bingo! is slated for a June 12, 2026 release through Mothland in Canada and the States, and Bella Union for the rest of the world. The new album reportedly sees the band continuing to meander in and around the fringes of punk, new wave krautrock and dance punk, while mischievously flouting stylistic form every change they get. While continuing to implement polyrhythm, counterintuitive chord changes and subtle melodic and harmonic dissonance, the album reportedly sees them introducing more New Wave, no wave, noise rock and shoegaze elements to the sound that has won them intentional acclaim. 

The album’s material features songs that tackles knotty themes like mental health, the autonomization of women, dysfunctional relationships with their custom moxie. Other songs playfully muse about food or address everyday mundanity with sarcasm and irony. There’s a song that celebrates unsung heroes, like the elderly. Much like its predecessor, many of the album’s tracks saw the group improvising lyrics in the studio, effectively catching lightning in a bottle. 

The album was recorded with the band playing life off-the-floor, using rare ribbon microphones and vintage compressors. Adding to the overall free-flowing feel and vibe to the album’s material, many of the song’s hooks were improvised through jazz-tinged musical flights during recording sessions. The album was mixed by Bélisle and Étheir before being mastered by Robin Schmidt. 

The result is an album that harnesses the Montréal-based art punks’ natural sound, a sound that fuses calculated musical chaos and musicality with high decibels. 

Bingo! will feature the previously released “Detour” “Ketchup,” and the title track “Bingo,” which was released earlier this year, as well as the album’s latest single “Snack City.” “Snack City” is a breakneck mix of punk rock and post punk with overt nods to Freedom of Choice-era Devo. The result is a mischievously absurdist and fidgety tune about primal, downright glutinous needs and desires.

“We wrote the song when we were hungry,” the band explains. “The segment ‘J’ai faim, j’ai faim, […],’ which translates to: ‘I’m hungry, I’m hungry, […]’ was the basis of the scat singing that remained. We had fun with food anecdotes, food-related puns, etcetera.”

Continuing their ongoing collaboration with director Phillipe Beauséjour, the accompanying video for “Snack City” is inspired by snacking and past era cookbooks and features collage animation spliced with imagery and footage of the band on tour — sometimes eating or snacking.  “The band wanted a music video with images taken from their cellphones, including photos and videos from their tours. I found the challenge very fun, considering that the most interesting content was already done,” Beauséjour explains. “So, I created a universe inspired by scrapbooking, using what I could find in my multiple 60s and 90s cookbooks. I still wanted to bring a touch of animation, by constructing Éliane’s face several times with food. A little inspired by Giuseppe Arcimboldo’s ‘Summer.’”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Sunglaciers Shares Meditative “Ballad for Eddy”

With the release of 2019’s Foreign Bodies, 2022’s Subterranea and 2024’s Regular Nature, Calgary-based JOVM mainstays Sunglaciers — founding duo Evan Resnik (vocals, guitar, synths, piano, sampling) and Mathieu Blanchard (drums, percussion, production) along with Nyssa Brown (vocals, guitar) and Kyle Crough (bass) — have firmly cemented a sound that blurs the boundaries between polished melodicism and opaque experimentation, auspicious romanticism and unbridled descent. Though anchored in the strange realties of our time, their songs are laced with a certain optimism through well-placed and well-calculated psych elements and vibrant rhythms. 

The Calgary-based outfit’s highly-anticipated fourth album, Spiritual Content just dropped today through Mothland. The album sees the band further exploring the chiaroscuro depths of post-punk while simultaneously setting out to redefine their sound. Thematically, the album explores modern day life through allegorical songwriting, elevated by genuinely catchy melodies, resolute arrangements and stylish production.

Over the course of its breakneck 35-minute run, the album’s indie rock-meets-post-punk-tinged, nine songs capture fleeting yet endearing moments in time, their narrative bent, twisted and distorted into expansive and highly evocative soundscapes. The album is meant to layout like a psychedelic sequence where grooves dance and wiggle in and out, awaking feelings of wonder and awe, while also trigging emotions like bewilderment, fear and alienation. 

The album sees Resnik and Blanchard turning to their bandmates Brown and Brougham along with acclaimed producer and multi-instrumentalist Chad VanGaalen (synths, vibraphone, electric piano and additional production) to flesh out the album’s material. The band also continued their collaborations with mixing/mastering engineer Mark Lawson and former Besnard Lakes‘ Richard White, who took on vinyl mastering duties. 

Spiritual Content includes the Freedom of Choice-era Devo-inspired “Eye to Eye” the  Heaven Up Here-era Echo and the Bunnymen, early The Cure and Gang of Four-like “Only Love” and the album’s latest single “Ballad for Eddy.”

“Ballad for Eddy” is a meditative sway of a tune, featuring brooding, undulating drum and percussion, gently buzzing synth bass and bursts of twinkling keys serving as a lush bed for Resnik’s dreamy and ethereal melody. Written to pay tribute to the legendary Eddy Grant, “Ballad for Eddy” lyrically touch upon youthful idealism, the search for connection and meaning amidst difficulty and strife. The result leaves the listener to wonder what role — if any — music can play in overcoming adversity.

Featuring footage shot and edited by the band’s Evan Resnik, the accompanying video captures life in the studio and on the road as a DIY band. And at the core of the video is a sweet nostalgia over going on a series of adventures that you and your friends/bandmates can only really understand. It’s a unique, difficult to explain relationship that becomes one of the most important of your life.

“I was struggling to come up with a concept for the video for ‘Ballad for Eddy’ and I came across these old tour clips,” the bands Evan Resnik explains. “We’ve been doing bigger cross-country trips around the US and UK in the last few years so there was a lot of footage. Most of it I forgot I had! It got me a little sentimental, reliving all these great experiences and moments that we’ve shared as a band. It reminded me that all the hard work is worth it for the friendship and camaraderie. 

‘The song is inspired by Eddy Grant—who wrote ‘Electric Avenue’—and how tireless and dedicated to music he was. Sure, being in a band booking DIY tours, recording albums, and sleeping on couches and floors is hard. But we’re also really lucky for the opportunity, and the memories that come out the other side are priceless. I’m even more inspired by Eddy Grant when I think about how much harder it all was for him as a young person of colour in a foreign land. His life story is really interesting, you should check it out!”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Miki Berenyi Trio Shares Breezy “Island of One”

Miki Berenyi Trio features an acclaimed and accomplished group of British artists:

  • Miki Berenyi (vocals/ guitar), a founding member, frontperson and rhythm guitarist of acclaimed and iconic shoegazer outfit Lush — and the founder and frontperson of acclaimed outfit Piroshka

  • Kevin “Moose” McKillop (guitar), a founding member of acclaimed shoegazers Moose, Berenyi’s spouse and Piroshka bandmate 

  • Oliver Cherer (bass)

The band is named after its lead singer — a direct way to convey the presence of former Lush frontperson Miki Berenyi, one of the most beloved figures and recognizable faces of 1990s alternative rock and shoeegaze.

The trio’s full-length debut, last year’s Tripla derives its name from the Hungarian word for “triple,” acknowledging the band’s songwriting is entirely a three-way collaboration. The album sonically was a rich, lushly layered, imaginative and uniquely slanted take on dream pop that features at points euphoric and other points melancholy guitars and electronics paired with Berenyi’s imitative vocal. The album’s material is anchored around a worldview that vacillates between profound, yearning and abrasive — seemingly informed by their lived-in experiences and hard-won wisdom,

Although the album’s material features a sophisticated sound, Berenyi, McKillop and Cherer have done so with a focus on the basics, not only recording at home, but driving around in a car packed with their gear, loading in and out of venues themselves, much like they did when they first started out. “There is something very ‘grass roots’ about what we’re doing,” Miki Berenyi Trio’s Miki Berenyi says.  “There’s no point following the ‘announce the album, then tour, then record the next album’ route – we just want to wring as much enjoyment out of this as we can, and hope that it resonates somewhere!”

Since the release of Tripla, the trio have released a limited edition 7 inch single of “Doldrum Days“/”Touché,” which sold out during their October 2025 Stateside tour. Yesterday, the band shared the standalone single “Island of One.” Released through Bella Union, “Island of One” is anchored around a flamenco-meets yé-yé-inspired rhythm and a remarkably catchy hook, making it arguably one of the breeziest songs of their lengthy individual catalogs — and of their growing, collective catalog.

“’Island of One’ took shape because I became quite obsessed with the track ‘Just A Western’ by Nilüfer Yanya last year, and the Latin-y beat got me inspired”, Miki Berenyi says. “But I wanted a lively, catchy song to add to our live set, so it ended up less laidback and more 60s-breezy with some driving, scratchy guitars – once all three MB3 members pile in on the embellishments, a song ends up a fair distance from where it started! As ever, recording and production took place in our various home-studio set-ups, and the song was mixed by our brilliant Bella Union labelmate, Paul Gregory.” 

Berenyi adds, “Lyrically, I’m at the age where a lot of my friends have elderly parents who are increasingly reliant on their help. It’s a new phase in a life relationship and can throw up a lot of emotions. But the words apply as much to all manner of family break-ups and the fraying of long-standing friendships. When you’re young, it’s much easier to justify walking away, but I’m acutely aware, as I get older, of how important even a thread of connection with people who have shared our lives can be, however difficult those relationships can be to maintain!”

The accompanying live performance-based video for “Island of One” was shot in Northwest London by longtime visual collaborator Sébastian Faits-Divers.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: London’s deary Shares Lush, Shimmering “Alma”

Rising London-based shoegazers deary — Rebecca “Dottie” Cockram (guitar, vocals), Ben Easton (guitar) and Harry Catchpole (drums) — formed back in 2020 over their shared love of Cocteau Twins, Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine.

The band’s debut single, 2023’s “Fairground” landed at #1 on the UK Vinyl Singles Chart and led to opening slots with Slowdive and Cranes, as well as collaborations with Saint Etienne, The Murder Capital and Lush‘s Emma Anderson. Building upon a growing profile in the UK, the London-based trio’s highly-anticipated, self-produced full-length debut, Birding is slated for an April 3, 2026 release through Bella Union.

Birding reportedly sees the band proudly wearing their long-held influences on their collective sleeve, pairing dreamy shoegaze beauty with trip-hop influenced beats, incorporating their unique, modern touch to make something completely their own.

Thematically, the album aims to draw attention to the direct impact that we humans have on the world around us, whether that’s nature or just ourselves. The album also touches upon the importance of protecting the inner child or someone more vulnerable, holding hands and learning from past mistakes. “I was writing the record in one of the worst periods of my life,” deary’s Ben Easton explains. “I was not in a good space at all. Our last EP, Aurelia, was about transition, and how it’s cool to change. And Birding is, ‘Oh no, I‘ve made some really disruptive life decisions.’ The album came from an isolated, almost hopeless space, and you can hear that in parts of the record. But there are also moments that are very self-loving and meditative, and a bit more uplifting.”

Birding will include the previously released, critically applauded tracks “Seabird” and “Alfie,” as well as the album’s latest single, “Alma.” Deriving its title for the Spanish word for “soul” and the Latin word associated with kindness and nourishment, Birding‘s third single is a blend of The Sundays-era dream pop with Slowdive and Cocteau Twins-inspired shoegaze: swirling and shimmering guitars serve as a lush bed for Cockram’s ethereal cooing and some remarkably catchy, well-placed hooks.

“I see ‘Alma’ as an embodiment of our band,” deary’s Dottie Cockram explains. “It has been with us for a long time and changed with us along the way. In the past 4 years, we have grown into ourselves and have a much clearer idea of what deary is. In this song, I am talking to my younger self who made the decision to look after us and become a better person.”

Directed by Limb, the accompanying video features twin siblings Robin and Charly Faye. Appearing as though it was a meeting of past and future selves, the siblings — one initially blindfolded until it’s removed — meet each other with deeply knowing love and kindness.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Atsuko Chiba Shares Hypnotic “Torn”

With the release of 2013’s Jinn, 2019’s Trace and 2023’s Water, It Feels Like It’s Growing, 2016’s Figure and Ground EP and The Memory Empire EP, as well as a handful of singles, all which were self-produced and recorded at their Room 11 Studio, Montréal-based outfit Atsuko Chiba — Karim Lakhdar (vocals, guitar, synths), Kevin McDonald (synths, guitar), Eric Schafhauser (guitar, synths), David Palumbo (bass, bass VI, vocals) and Anthony Piazza (drums, electronic drums, percussion) — have firmly established a sound that’s a cohesive and hypnotic blend of post-rock, prog and krautock paired with offbeat songwriting.

The Montréal-based quintet’s self-titled fourth album is slated for an April 24, 2026 release through Mothland. The album reportedly sees the band rethinking their sound and approach, drawing inspiration from the likes of Mark Lanegan, Beak>, Talk Talk, Can and Portishead, all while retaining elements of their long-established post-punk fueled psychedelia.

Though the band has been introducing more vocals and lyrics with every subsequent release, their fourth album sees the band further wielding vocals and lyrics as a well to delve deeper into their intrinsic meta. The result is an album that’s one-part gritty post-rock and one-part intimate hymn to self-reflection with its moodiness amplifying a communal desire to eschew recurrent patterns for the sake of comfort, approval and longevity. 

The band decided upon a freeform creative process, which could only be achieved by pursuing a hands-on approach, and with each member sharing the roles of engineer and producer, 

“Overall, Atsuko Chiba is an exercise in patience and restraint. The mood of the album is melancholic, at times feeling optimistic, while other times feeling almost hopeless—there’s a sense of loss and disconnect, but also a glimmer of hope,” the band explains. “It is the most vulnerable and stripped down music we have ever made. It is a departure from the aggressive and distorted guitar sound we’ve relied on over the years. We also chose to make it a self-titled record which is something we battled with. We went with Atsuko Chiba because its overarching themes relate to us in a deep way. The material on this album presents itself as a mosaic of our interests and experiences as a band. We let the music guide us every step of the way, never forcing our will upon it, instead paying attention to what it was telling us and what we could do to further support it.

At first, we would come into the studio without a plan, just playing and recording the entire time, with no pressure as to a specific outcome: free jams during which we were just generating grooves, parts, and moments that felt good to us. We also put limitations, cutting out certain instruments from session to session, opening us to new options and pathways, generating new sound palettes. A lot of attention was put into creating space and holding back from always going for big epic moments. We focussed on keeping things simple and using dynamics to create exciting moments instead of relying on loud guitars to get us there. This album features a lot of auxiliary percussion, synthesizers, and keyboards, and places a strong emphasis on vocals. We explored acoustic guitars and created many custom percussive sounds by layering two or three sources together, also programming rhythms using samplers and drum machines.”

Atsuko Chiba will include the previously released, album opening track “Retention” and the album’s second and latest single “Torn.” “Torn” is a hypnotic, brooding tune anchored around a looping synth and guitar melody paired with reverb-drenched vocals. The song manages to be expansive yet introspective, while conveying a sense of unease and distrust.

“‘Torn’ explores the struggle with anxiety through the lens of overconfidence, transforming imposter syndrome from a state of paralysis into propulsion. By constructing a false reality, the protagonist earns the trust of those around him through promises he can not keep,” the band explains. “He embarks on a quest to control the world around him, while gradually losing himself in the deception of others—and his own. Eventually, he stares into the mirror and no longer recognizes the person looking back. Over time, he becomes a composite of the characters and narratives he has invented, dissolving into his own fiction. The game becomes indistinguishable from reality, breeding a deep and growing unease. Panic attacks and episodes of depersonalization follow, each one pushing him further, eroding sleep, stretching time, tightening the tension in his chest. At the edge of a cliff—unsure how long he has been awake—he searches for release as the pressure becomes unbearable. This release is marked by the shift at the end of the song. What happens next remains unresolved: does he jump, or does an old photograph—himself beside his father—surface from his wallet, pulling him back toward the memory of who he once was? We don’t know. . . “

The visualizer for “Torn” features footage of the band shot by the band and edited by the band’s Anthony Piazza that captures the band in the studio, working on the new album and traveling snow-covered roads.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: A Place to Bury Strangers Returns with Broodingly Atmospheric “Where Are We Now”

New York-based JOVM mainstays  A Place to Bury Strangers — currently Oliver Ackermann (vocals, guitar), John Fedowitz (bass) and Sandra Fedowitz (drums) — will be releasing a rarities album, Rare and Deadly through Dedstrange on April 3, 2026. 

Following 2024’s Synthesizer, Rare and Deadly sees the band cracking open a decade-long vault of raw nerve and sonic chaos. Spanning 2015-2025, this collection of demos, B-sides, abandoned experiments and forgotten fragments reveals the band at their most unfiltered, frequently caught between breakthrough ideas and beautiful mistakes. 

Pulled from Oliver Ackermann’s personal archive of late-night recordings, blown-out tapes and half-finished sessions, the collection’s tracks pulse with the unruly energy that ATPBS has long been known for, but more dangerous with more jagged edges — on purpose. 

Countless bands have opened up their vaults to fans and others, but Rare and Deadly is truly unprecedented: Every format is different — and as a result, tells a different story. The CD, cassette, vinyl and digital editions each feature their own unique track listing. No single version features the “complete” album. Instead, each format is its own window into Ackermann’s archive, revealing alternate paths, missing links and parallel “what if” versions of the band’s inner life. It’s deliberately unstable with the album shifting depending on how you choose to hear it, mirroring the chaos of its creation. 

Across the collection’s tracks, you can hear the evolution of Ackermann’s restlessly creative mind. Some pieces feel like prototypes for future chaos, seeds that later bloomed on studio albums. Others are dead ends — ideas too volatile, too strange or too personal to ever fit the frame of a proper release. The tracks feature riffs mutated by malfunctioning pedals, songs born from gear pushed past its limits, or delicate melodies overwhelmed by towering walls of feedback. 

Rare and Deadly will include the previously released, tense and menacing “Everyone’s The Same,” “Acid Rain” and the album’s third and latest single “Where Are We Now.” “Where Are We Now” features Ackermann’s reverb-drenched vocal paired with broodingly atmospheric, throbbing motorik pulse. But more than any other previously released APTBS track, “Where Are We Now” conveys an uneasy sense of what if-fueled regret.

Ackermann says that the song is about “looking back at friends you lost touch with. Wondering where they ended up. Remembering when everything felt possible.”

The accompanying video features footage Ackermann edited from footage from the Library of Congress National Archives. Ackermann says he made the video because “I think we need to look at people more and see the value and wonder of life so we can be compassionate towards others.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: POND Shares Rousingly Anthemic Yet Existential “Terrestrials”

Today, Perth-based JOVM mainstays POND — currently, Nicholas Allbrook (lead vocals, guitar, keys, bass, flute, slide guitar and drums); singer/songwriter and producer Jay Watson (vocals, guitar, keys, drums, synths and bass), who’s also the creative mastermind of acclaimed JOVM mainstay outfit GUM and a touring member of acclaimed, Grammy Award-nominated JOVM mainstays Tame Impala; Joe Ryan (vocals, guitar, bass, 12 string guitar, slide guitar); Jamie Terry (keys, bass, synths, organs, guitar); and Jamie Ireland (drums, keys) — have shared a new single, “Terrestrials,” the first bit o new material from the Aussie outfit since 2024’s Stung!

“Terrestrials” begins with a meditative and slow-burning intro, before quickly morphing into a bombastic rocker, anchored around fuzz and phased out guitars, glistening synths that showcases the band’s unerring knack for incredibly catchy hooks and rousingly anthemic choruses. Thematically, the song is a meditation on the great mystery and contradiction of humanity, a species capable of great love and great cruelty — often simultaneously.

“Gum wrote the music for this one and we recorded this in Mullumbimby with Julian Abbott at Nowave studio,” POND’s Nicholas Allbrook explains. “This song is about the weirdest of all the terrestrials, people. Hellbent on flying away from or killing our home soil, with a big appetite for destruction, guns, roses. We can love and connect and nurture and inflict unbearable cruelty. You all know this but, yeah, it’s kind of a great mystery isn’t it? It’s almost more supernatural than extraterrestrials. Which is probably why we wrote this song. There aren’t many of us who can forget for even a second about the unborn tomorrows and dead yesterdays but among them are, apparently, kids and people in love. My cousin Iz helped write this with our chats.” 

Directed by Jesse Taylor Smith, the accompanying video is a mix of live performance footage and trippy animation.

Along with the new single and video, POND announced that they will be opening for Djo — the musical project of producer, singer/songwriter, musician and actor, Joe Kerry, best known for his roles in Stranger Things and Fargo for a handful of East Coast dates, including a July 17, 2026 stop at Forest Hills Stadium. Tour dates are below. Tickets will go on sale Friday, March 20, 2026 at 10:00am local time.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Love Ghost Shares Bruising and Anthemic “Revolution Evolution”

Tim Skold is a singer/songwriter, musician and producer, best known for his work producing and playing with Marilyn Manson. Skold is also the creative mastermind behind the industrial/electro rock recording project Love Ghost.

Skold has one proper Love Ghost studio album under his belt, last year’s Gas Mask Wedding. And adding to a busy year, he collaborated with The Skinner Brothers on last year’s Soul Boy V. His sophomore album, Anarchy and Ashes is slated for a March 27, 2026 release and will include the previously released “Rock Me Amadeus,” an industrial cover of Falco‘s 1985 smash hit, “Vengeance,” and the album’s third and latest single “Revolution Evolution.”

“Revolution Evolution” is an urgent, industrial rock ripper that showcases Skold’s ability to pair arena rock bombastic riffs and thunderous beats with rousingly anthemic and enormous hooks and choruses. But under the arena rock bombast is a rebellious spirit that channels rage and frustration into a much needed roar with a community of like-minded folks. It may seem overwhelming to the individual but man, together, we can start to bring about a brand new world.

The accompanying video by King Zabb sees Skold in military fatigues creating violent war-like cartoons. But eventually, the cartoons realize, who their real enemy is.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Tinariwen Shares Urgent “Erghad Afewo”

Pioneering Grammy Award-winning, Tuareg musical pioneers and JOVM mainstays Tinariwen released their tenth studio album Hoggar last week through their own label, Wedge. The album derives its name from the Hoggar mountains, a defiant marker of presence visible for miles and a symbol of a homeland for their displaced people. 

Long known for being fierce advocates for their people’s nomadic culture that exists in the desert borderlands between Mail and Algeria, the acclaimed JOVM mainstays bluesy, guitar-driven music has found global acclaim for its blend of dexterous, Western rock-styled guitar work, Tamasheq language-driven political bent, syncopated rhythms and soaring melodies. 

More than 45 years into their lengthy and storied career, Hoggar reportedly sees the acclaimed masters of the desert blues returning to the foundations of their sound with the band returning to their early years of songwriting with acoustic guitars and communal singing around the desert campfire. The album also sees the band staking their claim as elders of the Tuareg musical tradition while also proudly passing the torch onto a younger generation of featured musicians, who can continue to keep their culture’s flame of rebellion and defiance alive. 

Legendarily known for recording amid the windswept expanse of the Central Saharan desert, the acclaimed JOVM mainstays have long drawn inspiration from the rhythms of nature. With political unrest in Mali prompting the band to seek new spaces, the founding members, who are now based in Algeria recorded the album in studio set up by young Tuareg band and mentees Imarhan in Tamanrasset, which continues their legacy of innovation and collaboration. 

While previously released albums like 2023’s Amatssou saw Tinariwen collaborating with acclaimed producer Daniel Lanois, on Hoggar the band looked closer to home. Gathering with the local Tuareg musical community for a month, founding members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni and Touhami Ag Alhassane began writing songs fueled by political unrest alongside young artists like Imarhan’s Iyad Moussa Ben Abderrahmane, Hicham Bouhasse  and Haiballah Akhamouk. The band also collaborated with Terekaft‘s Sanou Ag Hamed and Tinariwen co-founder Liya ag Abill, a.k.a. Diarra for the first time in 25 years. 

The album also marks some other firsts: The band’s lead vocalist Ibrahim and Abdallah sing together for the first time in over 30 years, breaking their long-held tradition of each songwriting performing only their own compositions. And there’s a guest spot from acclaimed longtime fan José González. 

Lyrically, Hoggar explores urgent and timely themes, addressing the social and political challenges facing the Tuareg people and northern Mali. The band continues their long tradition of bearing witness through their work, balancing the joy of their celebrated lie shows with reflections on community struggles, resilience and the need for cultural preservation. 

The album will include the previously released “Sagherat Assan,” “Imidiwan Takyadam” featuring acclaimed singer/songwriter and longtime fan Jose Gonzalez, “Amidinim Ehaf Solan,” and the album’s fourth and latest single, “Erghad Afewo.”

Anchored around the collective’s gorgeous, effortlessly bluesy guitar work and call and response-driven melodicism, “Erghad Afewo” is an urgent song calling out those who have sold out their people to fill their empty bellies and a little bit of cash and/or provisions while accurately describing an increasingly impending hellscape.

Continuing an ongoing collaboration with director and animator Axel Digoix, the accompanying video is a gorgeously animated visual that captures the pride, defiance and joy of the Tamashek that includes a fearsome night-time chase through the desert.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Total Fucking Darkness Shares Deceptively Upbeat “Beaten to Write”

Electronic music outfit and JOVM mainstays Total Fucking Darkness features: 

Over the past year or so, the trio have released a handful of standalone singles, including four that I’ve written about, “Desolation Boys,” “Take It Easy,” “Give Me Everything You Own” and “Horizontal Rain.”  

The trio’s latest single, “Beaten to Write” is a world weary tune paired with a deceptively bright, playful and hook-driven production that seemingly channels mid 80s New Order. Anchored around a relentless motorik pulse, the song is perfectly designed for getting your energy up for another day of drudgery at a soul-sucking day job. And its core, the song seems to suggest that as adults, we have to find ways to accept and deal with drudgery and bullshit, and then push past it — as much as possible.

Continuing the visual approach of its immediate predecessor, the accompanying visualizer/video for “Beaten to Write” features a masked man in a hoodie dancing and shadow boxing an abandoned factory space, with glitchy imagery projected around him.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: EYRE LLEW Shares Painterly “Miningsby”

Initially conceived as a studio project back in 2014, Nottingham, UK-based trio EYRE LLEW — Sam Heaton (vocals, guitar), Jack Clark (drums, piano) and Jack Bennett (guitar, piano) — have developed and honed a sound that meshes elements of shoegaze, post rock and dream pop and channels influences like Sigur Rós, Frightened Rabbit, Bon Iver and The National into cinematic, emotionally overwhelming soundscapes.

2017’s debut album, Atelo was released to widespread critical acclaim with the album landing at #25 on Drowned in Sound‘s Top 100 Albums List of 2017.

And during that same period, the Nottingham-based trio have also established themselves as a compelling live act, playing over 300 independently booked shows across 23 countries, including sold-out shows across the UK, Europe, The Baltics (Latvia and Lithuania) and the Far East. The trio have also made the rounds of both the national and international festival circuit, playing sets at Glastonbury‘s John Peel Stage, The Great Escape, Dot to Dot, FOCUS Wales, Y Not Festival, Ritual Union, Rockaway Beach, Alternative Escape, Handmade, Glastonbury’s Shagrai La, Icebreaker, Perth Music Expo, 110 Above, Beat The Streets, Splendour, Riverside, On The Waterfront, Farm Fest, A Carefully Planned, Hockley Hustle, and others. Internationally, they’ve played sets at Singapore’s Music Matters, Taiwan’s Beastie Rock, South Korea’s Zandari Festa, Germany’s Umsonst Und Dresden, France’s FIMU, Belgium’s Fifty Lab, Sweden’s Future Echoes, Lithuania’s Zagare Fringe Festival and What’s Next In Music, Hungary’s HOTS Outbreakers Lab, Latvia’s Riga Music Week, Estonia’s POFF Shorts, Poland’s Seazone Music Festival and Conference and SpaceFest.

Building upon a growing profile, EYRE LLEW’s highly anticipated sophomore album Bloom is deeply informed and influenced by pandemic-enforced lockdowns. For the bulk of their history, the band defined themselves by seemingly constant motion: Cities blurred into one another. Border crossings were routine. Their lives revolved around airports, late night drives, ferry ports, backstage rooms, festival fields, hotel corridors and long-distance journeys.

As a touring band, success, such as it existed, was often measured in miles traveled, crowd size and momentum developed and sustained. The band kept moving because that’s just how it always was. Slowing down would mean — on some level, at least — slowed momentum. Stopping would mean accepting failure, when “making it” was just a little bit out of reach.

Like countless touring acts, the pandemic managed to dismantle their trajectory. That relentless forward motion that shaped their identity for the better part of a decade just suddenly stopped. Tours vanished. Plans dissolved. The result was an uneasy silence. Understandably, for the trio, it all felt devastating.

But in the stillness, something else emerged for the band — space: The space to rest, reflect, recover, feel and importantly, to make different choices. The band made a quieter, more human recalibration, shifting away from survival to towards sustainability. Rather than constantly feeling that they had to prove something, they moved towards building something — and choosing meaning over the endless chase of momentum.

The result was Bloom. Written during lockdown and the subsequent years, the album is about several things simultaneously: presence, the love that feels like home, stillness as strength, devotion without spectacle, grief without melodrama, healing without performative optimism, growth that happens slowly, privately and honestly.

Wher eas previously released material was frequently defined by scale and endurance, Bloom‘s material is defined by intimacy and grounding. Its songs are built from small moments rather than big, grand statements. It’s about choosing to stay. Not just in relationships but in places, in moments, in emotions and in identity.

The shift in the band’s approach, fittingly lead to a shift in their sound. While the album’s material continues to carry the vastness they’re known for, it lives alongside of a sense fragility and restraint. Instead of actively attempting to overwhelm the listener, the band is trying to meet the listener where they are right now.

The album’s first single “Miningsby” is a slow-burning and atmospheric tune that’s simultaneously cinematic and intimate, while evoking a loving, patient calmness. The track is about something that’s somehow both difficult and easy — being present when your loved one is struggling with anxiety, depression or something else.

“Rather than trying to dramatise that experience, ‘Miningsby’ is about something quieter and harder: staying, listening, and offering warmth,” the band explains. “It’s a love letter to emotional endurance, grounded in small moments and the hope of better days ahead.”

The song’s title came from a bit of serendipitous happenstance. When the original demo files were saved in an old, rural Lincolnshire studio, they were geolocated to Miningsby, a tiny nearby village. For the band, the title — and in turn, the town’s name — became an unintended marker for a place and time that no longer exists, but continues to resonate through the music, much like the fleeting yet beautiful moments the song memorializes.

The song’s origins manage to mirror its themes. The song was recorded on a baby grand piano that the band no longer owns, in a studio they’ve since left behind. The song captures something gone yet the feeling of being held through it all.

The song sees the band framing love through tangible, physical moments and sensations — breath, warm, light. But along with that, there’s a sense of calm, loving patience and the belief that things can get better with love and through time.

The accompanying video, shot in black and white features the band performing the song in studio.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Kim Gordon Shares Jazzy “PLAY ME”

The legendary Kim Gordon will be releasing her third solo album, the Justin Raisen-produced PLAY ME on Friday through Matador Records. PLAY ME is reportedly distilled and immediate, and sees Gordon expanding on her sonic palette to include more melodic beats and the motorik drive of krautock. 

“We wanted the songs to be short,” Gordon says of her continued collaboration with acclaimed, Los Angeles-based producer Justin Raisen. “We wanted to do it really fast. It’s more focused, and maybe more confident. I always kind of work off of rhythms, and I knew I wanted it to be even more beat-oriented than the last one. Justin really gets my voice and my lyrics and he understands how I work—that came forth even more on this record.” 

PLAY ME is the follow-up to 2024’s critically applauded sophomore album The Collective, which featured the two-time Grammy-nominated single “BYE BYE.”  PLAY ME sees Gordon processing in her imitable way, the collateral damage of the billionaire class: the demolition of democracy, technocratic end-times-like fascism, the A.I.-fueled chill vibes flattering of culture — where dark humor voices the absurdity of our moment. But despite its frequent outward gave, the album is essentially an interior effort, one in which heightened emotionality pulses through physical jams, while rejecting definitive statements in favor of an inquisitiveness and curiosity that keeps Gordon searching — and ever in process. 

Amid PLAY ME’s rabbit-hole reality bricolage, pitch-shifted vocals and shadowy layers of dissonance, the album’s material are clear-eyed about the attention they pay to a world that would rather you be distracted and rage-baited into oblivion. “I have to say, the thing that influenced me most was the news. We are in some kind of ‘post empire’ now, where people just disappear,” Gordon says, echoing the title of one of PLAY ME’s tracks.

PLAY ME will feature the previously released “NOT TODAY,” and “DIRTY TECH,” as well as the album’s third single, album title track “PLAY ME.” “PLAY ME” may arguably be the most hip-hop influenced track of the entire album with the song anchored around a swaggering DJ Premier-like production tweeter and woofer rattling beats paired with a meditative, modal jazz trumpet line. Gordon’s imitable croon takes on a subtle staccato, hipKhop like flow to match.

Directed by Barney Clay, the accompanying video for “PLAY ME” is grainy, security camera-like footage that follows a stylish Gordon in a mall. It’s a forceful and uneasy bit of commentary on our Big Brother-esque surveillance world.