Tag: Video Review

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Tinlicker Shares Euphoric “Release”

Acclaimed Utrecht-based electronic music outfit Tinlicker — founding member Micha Heyboer, Jordi van Achthoven and their newest member Hero Baldwin — can trace their origins back to 2012, when the project was founded as a solo project. As a solo project, Heyboer released Tinlicker’s debut EP, 2012’s My First Time Here and the 2012’s Remember The Future demo compilation through his own label, Zero Three Zero. 

Jordi van Achthoven was introduced to Heyboer through a mutual contact in 2014. The pair bonded over their mutual inspirations of Paul Kalkbrenner, Trentemøller and Moderat, and at that point, Tinlicker expanded to a duo, releasing three EPs through Feed Me‘s Sotto Voce, 2014’s Like No Other, 2015’s Into The Open and The Space In Between, which featured “Oudegracht,” a track that amassed significant attention online. 

2017 saw the duo releasing material through Anjunadep, Armada Music and deadmau5′s mau5trap before singing a record deal with Anjunadeep, who released their breakthrough full-length debut, 2019’s This Is Not Our Universe, which featured contributions from alt-J, Run Rivers, Thomas Oliver and Belle Doron. The album reached #1 on the dance charts in the US, Australia, India, Canada and Finland and #2 in the UK, The Netherlands and Poland. 

The duo’s sophomore album In Another Life was released in February 2022. But by November 2023, the duo announced that the third album, 2024’s Cold Enough for Snow would be released through [PIAS] Électronique. The album featured collaborations with Brian Molko, Editors‘ Tom Smith and Circa Waves. The Dutch duo supported the album with sets at Pinkpop Festival, CRSSD Festival, Crystal Palace Bowl, Coachella and Sziget Festival. 

Back in 2020, as the Dutch duo were achieving commercial and critical success, they started a successful collaboration with London-based signer/songwriter and producer Hero Baldwin that has continued through a series of singles including last year’s “I Started A Fire.” Last year, also saw Heyboer and Achthoven inviting Baldwin to be a full-time member of the group. “Jordi and Micha seem to pull something out of me that resonates with my emotional landscape every time we make a song,” the London-based singer/songwriter and producer says. “I think it’s so important to feel creatively and emotionally secure, and Jordi and Micha always afford me that privilege.”

The act’s Melkweg Amsterdam show was their official debut as a trio. She also joined the duo for their biggest live show to date, Tinlicker In The Park at Crystal Palace Bowl. 

Tinlicker’s highly-anticipated fourth album — and first as a trio — Dreams of the Machine is slated for a February 27, 2026 release through [PIAS] Électronique. Dreams of the Machine will feature the previously released singles “I Want My Freedom,” and “Reborn.”

The newly-constituted trio’s third single “Release,” is a lush, euphoria-inducing track anchored around melodic, rippling synth arpeggios, skittering, industrial-inspired breakbeats and reverb-soaked bass paired with Hero Baldwin’s sultry, commanding delivery and the trio’s unerring knack for crafting expansive, club and festival friendly tracks underpinned by a deep soulfulness.

Lyrically, the addresses the modern obsession with our cell phones — to the point that we’re not fully present with ourselves, with others or within the moments we should be enjoying and cherishing. How many times have you attended some event and 98% of the people around you are fixating on their phone — whether to text, instagram or to record every single moment? But the song also focuses on the potential conflict between human and the influence of AI-led algorithms.

“At its heart, ‘Release’ is about how easily we slip out of the moment without noticing. The habit of checking, fixing and responding instantly on our phones and how that slowly takes over our attention to each other,” the members of Tinlicker explain. “We’re not anti-technology, perhaps just quietly aware of what disappears when distraction becomes automatic. ‘Release’ is about pausing and staying in the moment with the people around you.”

The accompanying video by Carl Frazer-Lunn begins in a bustling London with businesspeople, commuters, students and others busily fixating on their phones, completely unaware of their surroundings. The video then quickly turns to live footage of the trio performing at Crystal Palace in front of an enraptured crowd. It’s proof that there are only a few truly transcendent moments in our morally bankrupt world: that moment when our favorite act plays our favorite song live — or that moment when that act gets into an irresistible groove. Put that phone down and dance already.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Bibi Club Shares Dreamy “Washing Machine”

Deriving their name from their living room discotheque, where their “bibis” — or loved ones — come to dance, the Montréal-based duo Bibi Club — Adèle Trottier-Rivard (vocals, keys) and Nicolas Basque (guitar) — earned acclaim across both Québec and Europe with their debut album, 2022’s Le soleil et la mer, an album that won a Most Promising Award at that year’s GAMIQ Awards, a Discovery of the Year at that year’s ADISQ Awards and landed on the Polaris Music Prize long list.

Le soleil et la mer received praise by a number of French outfits including Les Inrocks, Magic Magazine, Libération and France Inter and landed on Le Devoir, Les Inrocks‘ and Tsugi’s Best Albums of 2022 lists. And adding to a rapidly growing international profile, the album received airplay from BBC 6 Music’s Steve Lamacq.

Their sophomore album, 2024’s Feu de garde saw the band expanding upon their sound with darker textures and luminous synths. The album earned several nominations at that year’s ADISQ Awards and landed on the Polaris Music Prize short ling. The album was FNAC‘s album of the month for May and received praise from MOJO, Télérama, Record Collector, Uncut and many more.

Building upon a growing profile, the Montréal-based duo have begun making a run of the international festival circuit with sets at SXSW, The Great Escape, FOCUS Wales, MaMA Festival, Osheaga, The New Colossus Festival, as well as clubs in Brazil, Germany and Canada. They’ve also opened for Blonde Redhead, Circuit des Yuex and a list of others.

Bibi Club’s highly-anticipated third album Amaro is slated for a February 27, 2026 release through Secret City Records. The album sees the acclaimed French Canadian duo inviting the listener to brave the dark beasts that shadow us beneath the surface, and to devote ourselves to the healing power of a fierce will to live. It explores the liminal spectrum between the here and beyond, pointing to love, nature and community as the deeply unifying purpose. The album’s material reportedly draw a detailed map of a world completely of its own, following the trajectory traced by the pair in recent years.

Now, out of the living room, we dance in a mental space overloaded with grief and fear in their most rawest forms. Following the death of two dear, loved ones in the last year, the mantra “I want to love, I want to live,” resonates intensely in each song’s melody, underlined by the belief that if the heart is a place that never dies, we must reach it as quickly as possible.

Inspired by their tours with Blonde Redhead and Circuit des Yeux and a collaboration with Calvin Johnson, the duo’s sound now incorporates elements of avant pop, electronic body music, dark wave and neo-folk while simultaneously borrowing from baroque sounds with harpsichord, trumpet and ritual chants. The album also features contributions from saxophonist Dimitri Milbrun and singer/songwriter Helena Deland, who help contribute to its overall sound.

“Washing Machine,” Amaro‘s second and latest single, as well as the album’s first English language single is a breakneck churn of a song that’s one-part shoegaze, one-part dream pop, one-part post punk that evokes a complicated yet lived-in mix of joy and sorrow that often coexists throughout our lives — if we pay attention.

The duo say of the album’s new single: “The anomaly. This song is a homage to Tobie, who loved washing machines, the way they rush in and spin in every direction. It’s also a reflection on our experience as parents and the visceral bonds that connect us to our children. The song is full of light and life despite its underlying grief, the guitars dance together, the keyboard pulses with life, it’s energetic, even danceable. It evokes the short passage on Earth of a child who left a vivid, powerful mark on everyone who loved him.” 

Directed by Anna Arrobas and featuring sculptures by Anna Arrobas and Marin McMillan, the accompanying video for “Washing Machine” features various sculpted pieces meant to look like ancient symbols. “For ‘Washing Machine,’ I wanted to explore symbols of life, death and reincarnation,” Arrobas explains. “Marin and I sculpted them to look like ancient relics and I filmed them in flickering light in front of a black backdrop to make them look suspended and floating.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Tinariwen Shares Breathtakingly Gorgeous “Sagherat Assan”

Pioneering Grammy Award-winning, Tuareg musical pioneers and JOVM mainstays Tinariwen just announced that their tenth studio album Hoggar is slated for a March 13, 2026 release through their own label, Wedge. The album derives itself from the Hoggar mountains, a defiant marker of presence visible for miles and a symbol of a homeland for 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 passing the torch onto a younger generation of featured musicians, who can continue to keep their culture’s flame of rebellion and defiance alive.

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.

Hoggar’s first single “Sagherat Assan,” is a gorgeous, soulful rendition of a traditional Sudanese song anchored around shimmering and expressive acoustic guitar, syncopated handclap-driven rhythm and yearning harmonies. The song also features mesmerizing, melismatic vocals from Sudanese artist Sulafa Elyas. Much like the bulk of the JOVM mainstays acclaimed work, at the core of “Sagherat Assan” is a deep sense of longing for the homeland — and a sense of responsibility of passing the culture onward to the next generation, before it disappears.

“Sagherat Assan” is a traditional song carried from Sudan to the Sahara, Japonais (one of the band founders who died in 2021) and I were in Al Kufrah (a city at the border between Sudan and Libya) in 1989, when I was beginning to learn the guitar,” the band’s Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni explains. “We met a musician who was playing this song and loved it so much that  Japonais learned it and began performing it again and again, allowing it to travel and endure. This version features Sulafa Elyas, an extraordinary Sudanese singer and oud player now living in exile in France.” 

“The female voice is very important in traditional Tuareg music but it is increasingly hard to find female singers today owing to restrictions placed on them being allowed to sing and train,” the band’s longtime collaborator and producer Patrick Votan adds. “We were lucky to find singers like Sulafa as well as Wonou Walet Sidati, who used to record and tour with Tinariwen in the past, and Nounou Kaola, who also feature on this album.”

The equally gorgeous, animated video by Axel Digoix features the band and their collaborators performing and recording the song in the expanse of the Sahara Desert as the sun sets and the stars come out. The video captures deep bonds of friendship and a passing of the torch to a younger generation.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Hot Garbage Shares Bruising and Uneasy “Wewu”

Back in 2020, the members of Toronto-based psych outfit Hot Garbage — Alex Carlevaris (lead vocals, guitar), Juliana Carlevaris (bass, vocals), Dylan Gamble (keys, synths) and Mark Henin (drums) — went into the studio with Juno-nominated producer and Holy Fuck‘s Graham Walsh to cut a selection of tracks live and off-the-floor. The result was the blazing standalone single “Easy Believer,” and their full-length debut, 2021’s RIDE.

RIDE received regular rotation on SiriusXM, CBC Radio 3 and The Verge while climbing to #3 on the Earshot Top 50 and #82 on the NACC Top 200. The album also received praise internationally from outlets like Aquarium Drunkard and Louder Than War. 

The Toronto-based outfit has made their run of the international festival circuit, playing sets at LEVITATION, SXSW, Treefort Music Fest, Freakout Fest, Sled Island, Sappyfest, FME, M for Montréal, Pop Montréal. And building upon a growing international profile, they’ve opened of the likes of L.A. Witch and Frankie and The Witch Fingers, and they’ve shared stages with Osees, Ty Segall,  JJUUJJUU, Mdou Moctar, Wand, Kikagaku Moyo and Dead Meadow.

2024’s sophomore album Precious Dream saw the band continuing ongoing collaboration with Graham Walsh. Written during pandemic-era isolation, the album was recorded in late 2023, their sophomore album’s sprawling material saw them retaining their signature tinge of moody psychedelia while careening into darker, searing, post-punk-inspired riffage. Thematically, the album grappled with and touched upon dread, loss, the resilience of the human spirit and the highs and lows of solitude. The result was an album that was equally introspective, cathartic and bruising.

The Toronto-based quartet begin 2026 with “Wewu,” their first bit of new material since 2024’s Precious Dream. The single, which sees them continuing their ongoing collaboration with Graham Walsh is a dissonant, uneasy scorcher featuring overdriven guitar, woozy synths are paired with a frenetic and off-kilter rhythm section. Sonically, the song kind of evokes the claustrophobia of entrapment, and the desperate urgent need to escape. And fittingly, the song’s cryptic lyrics hint at an escape plan.

The accompanying video by the band’s Alex Carlevaris is a mind-bending and uneasy visual that feels and looks like a psilocybin trip gone horrendously wrong.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Torus Shares Frenetic and Mischievous Visual for Bruising “Ruby Red”

With the release of 2024’s critically self-titled full-length debut, Milton Keynes, UK-based indie outfit Torus — currently Alfie Glass (vocals, guitar) and Jack Orr (drums) — quickly built a profile both nationally and internationally: The album was praised for its “immediately accessible tunes,” by Kerrang!, and that lead to tours with South Arcade, Skindred, Fu Manchu, The Entitled Sons, and Soap, as well as a set at Desertfest London.

Last year, the rising British outfit embarked on a new era with the departure of Harry Quinn (bass) and the decision, for now at least, to continue as a duo. Glass and Orr quickly got to work on new songs and jams as duo, and fittingly, this period of intense creativity has resulted in a batch of new material that the and will be releasing over the course of the year.

Torus begins 2026 with “Ruby Red,” a bruising, Songs for the Deaf-era Queens of the Stone Age-like ripper, anchored around fuzzy power chords, thunderous drumming, a relentless and hypnotic groove and some rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses.

“On this new single we explore themes of obsession, emotional damage and losing control when you love too hard,” Torus’ Jack Orr explains. “The lyrics are raw and direct, channelling desert rock weight with modern grungy tension. This release continues our run of singles leading into our next EP, pushing the darker, heavier side of Torus.”

Co-directed by their former bandmate Harry Quinn and the band, and shot and edited by Quinn, the accompanying video is a much more light-hearted juxtaposition to the song’s brooding, much more heartfelt vibe, while matching the song’s frantic pace. “After throwing ideas around with our ex bassist Harry Quinn who filmed the video, we decided to lean into the wacky old Beatles short film vibe and do something fun that would show off our personalities a bit more, with the ridiculous quest of trying to find the magic milk from the sacred cow that would heal us from all of our wrongdoings mixed with a brutally honest relationship driven song that had to be made in that moment heading towards a slightly darker side,” the band’s Alfie Glass explains.

“Ruby Red” was recently released through the duo’s own label, Headcharge Records. The band also founded Headcharge Club to support and uplift the music scene in Milton Keynes, Northampton and the surrounding area. Since its formation, it has b been driving a grassroots movement locally by putting on DIY events and festivals, helping to build and strengthen the local music community.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Errol Eats Everything Teams Up With Statik Selektah and Rome Streetz on a Swaggering and Soulful Remix of “Round and Round”

Errol Eats Everything is an emcee and Black entrepreneur, who’s actively trying to reshape the music landscape while enacting positive change in the community.

Last year’s self-titled album is a bold manifesto, which saw him addressing systemic injustices, personal struggle and the continuing fight for freedom and equality with the album’s material voicing the bitter frustrations of a society that routinely fails its marginalized and struggling. His work demands that listeners confront the harsh realities of their lives, and then asks them to find the strength and resilience to rise about them, proudly reaffirming hip-hop’s enduring power to educate, challenge, uplift and eventually transform.

Errol Eats Everything closed out last year with the Beyond Yonder Remixes EP. Beyond Yonder Remixes EP saw the emcee and entrepreneur collaboration with Blu, Don Von Jovi, Rome Streetz, Planet Asia, Brother Ali and a lengthy list of others on a series of remixes of Errol Eats Everything LP track “Beyond Yonder.” 

The emcee and entrepreneur begins 2026 with a remix of Beyond Yonder track “Round and Round” that sees him collaborating with Rome Streez and Statik Selektah. The album version of the track features Errol Eats Everything spit bruising Kool G. Rap-like bars over a woozy, old-timey jazz sample paired with DJ Premier-like boom bap. The remix flips the song on its head while retaining its spirit: Errol Eats Everything’s bruising Kool G. Rap-like bars are placed on a cinematic, soulful production that reminds of Statik Selektah’s mind-bending work on Strong Arm Steady‘s 2012 effort Stereotype. Rome Streetz delivers a swaggering street shit verse that in my opinion helps to boldly push the song into a new stratosphere.

Directed by Coach Bombay 3000, the accompanying video for “Round and Round (Statik Selektah Remix)” features the pair driving around New York while movie-styled violence erupts around them while illustrating the essential themes and imagery at the heart of the song.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: clubdrugs Return with Yearning, Club Friendly “Heart 2 Break”

clubdrugs are a Chicago-based, self-described goth pop duo that has developed a reputation and profile both locally and regionally for a genre-defying sound and for captivating live shows.

The duo begin 2026 with their latest single “Heart 2 Break,” an electro goth bop anchored around buzzing and wobbling bass synths, angular bursts of feedback-fueled guitars and thumping, industrial-like beats paired with the duo’s uncanny knack for catchy hooks. Maria dreamily yearning coos ethereally float over the brooding, club friendly production. Much like the previously released “Waiting,” “Heart 2 Break” is a dance song for the lovelorn, the heartbroken and the perpetually unrequited to dance to, in between their tears.

Directed by the Chicago-based duo, the accompanying video for “Heart 2 Break” is a hallucinogen-fueled dream that features the pair performing the song in a studio in front of trippy projections that manages to capture the yearning at the core of the song.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Kim Gordon Shares Woozy “NOT TODAY”

The legendary Kim Gordon will be releasing her third solo album, the Justin Raisen-produced PLAY ME on March 13, 2026 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’s lead single “NOT TODAY” pairs Gordon’s imitable croon with woozily dreamy production anchored around a motorik-like groove, bursts of feedback-driven shoegazer guitar textures, glitchy electronics and driving beats. “I started singing in a way I hadn’t sung in a long time,” Gordon says. “This other voice came out.”

The accompanying video was directed by Rodarte fashion label founders and filmmakers Kate and Laura Mulleavy with director of photography Christopher Blauvelt. Throughout the video, Gordon wears a hand-dyed silk tulle dress from an early Rodarte collection, that was custom-made for her by the Mulleavys. “She was our idol and we vividly remember fitting the dress with her in NYC,” the Mulleavys said. “When we started to conceptualize the video, Kim brought up wearing the dress, which we knew was perfect for the video idea.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Sylvia Black Shares Broodingly Hypnotic “The Snake”

Los Angeles-based multifaceted producer, singer/songwriter, bassist, performer, restless performer and JOVM mainstay Sylvia Black will be releasing her long-awaited new album, the 11-song Shadowtime on Friday, January 16, 2026.

The album reportedly sees Black continuing her long-held approach of songwriting from the bottom up. “I find a beat that I’m in love with and go forward,” Black says. “The bass provides the floor, but as a singer, I’m also coming in with the roof. If you can write a beautiful song with just those two elements, bass notes and the voice, that’s a job well done.”

Written, produced and performed primarily by the JOVM mainstay, the album was crafted with support from longtime mix engineer and creative foil Ruddy Lee Cullers. The album’s material is a haunting exploration of nostalgia and futurism that also sees the Los Angeles-based artist body pushing her sound in new directions by weaving hypnotic rhythms, cinematic layers and raw, visceral emotion, while moving effortlessly from dance floor anthems to atmospheric meditations on love, loss and transcendence. “This album is about finding beauty in ruins,” Black says. “About letting the shadows speak through me. Returning to California brought out the memory and soul of my goth days gone by.” 

Shadowtime will feature the album singles “Talking in Tongues,” and “Long Gone Gardens,” both of which were released last year. The JOVM mainstay begins 2026 with album opening track “The Snake,” a synth-driven song anchored around a motorik groove and industrial thump paired with Black’s beguiling vocal and hypnotic countermelodies. The result is song that sounds much like a sultry, club friendly take on the likes of Suicide that showcases Black’s unerring knack for razor sharp, remarkably catchy hooks.

“The album opens with the fall of mankind or the awakening and the struggle with the birth pangs to traverse into a new paradigm for better or worse. You decide,” Black explains. “Apparently it’s a choose your own adventure and this is the story of those and their choice.”

The accompanying video was shot and edited by Black, and features mind-bending animation that ties into the album’s overall themes and zeitgeist. “A deadline, no plan, a green sheet sloppily tacked to the side of a barn way out in Virginia, and some holiday time with my fussy old laptop,” Black says of the video.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Ulrika Spacek Shares Feverish “Picto”

London-based art rock outfit and JOVM mainstays Ulrika Spacek — founding members Rhys Edwards (vocals, guitar) and Rhys Williams (guitar) , alongside Joseph Stone (guitar, keys), Callum Brown (drums), Syd Kemp (bass) — will be releasing their highly-anticipated fourth album EXPO through  Full Time Hobby on February 6, 2026.

Unlike its predecessors, which looked within, EXPO reportedly holds a mirror up to the world and captures a warped reflection. The material was deeply informed by the band’s most recent American tour and was written while the band’s Rhys Edwards was awaiting the birth of his daughter, and started to wonder what kind of future world she’d inherit. 

Although their foundations have long been in art rock, they’ve been increasingly drawing from electronic elements. But as a band, they’re interested in the glitchy space that exists between the two. And as a result, their most recent work reckons with human warmth and digital isolation, while being welcoming and alienating, exploring the uneasy tension of modern life as we know it. “Our music has always been a collage – a bit patchwork, sonically – but what makes this album a landmark for us is that we went one step further and made our own sound bank and essentially sampled ourselves,” the band says. 

The album sees the band creating their own doppelgängers in a world of almost-real, where the band appears as if they’re in a funhouse hall of mirrors. Digital drums are sampled and layered over real drums and the like, creating an eerie, spectral vibe. Sonically, the album’s material grapples with the organic and the digital while dancing across musical languages. 

The album will feature the previously released tracks:

EXPO‘s third and final single “Picto” is a cold-sweat fever dream of a song anchored around angular bursts of guitar, an angular and driving bass line, skittering boom bap serving as an uneasy bed for Edwards’ remarkably Thom Yorke-like delivery. The song helps establish a sort of manifesto for the record — “It’s back to strength in numbers/ Count in fives.”

“There is no better way to describe the process other than fun. It felt great to be working as a collective again and ultimately the music we were making felt fresh,” the JOVM mainstays explain. “There was a lot of optimism about what music we would make after working on this song and lyrically it celebrates making art as a collective as opposed to constant individual expression.”

The accompanying video is fittingly a surrealistic fever dream split between footage of the band performing in the song in a studio and a dentist doing dental work on a woman in the studio and other dental procedures.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Mariachi El Bronx Shares Battle Cry “Bandoleros”

Started back in 2008 as both a side project and creative experiment for the members of Los Angeles-based punk rock outfit The Bronx, Mariachi El Bronx — Matt Caughthran (vocals), Joby J. Ford (guitar, vihuela, accordion), Jared Shavelson (drums), Keith Douglas (trumpet), Ray Suen (violin), Brad Magers (trumpet), Ken Horne (jarana), and Vincent Hidalgo (guitarrón)– has long been deeply rooted in their deep connection to the Hispanic music and culture of their hometown. Although seemingly different, the band doesn’t see punk and mariachi as mutually exclusive. Instead, they view both genres as spiritually entwined forces anchored in resilient storytelling. “Punk rock and mariachi music are very similar in soul,” The Bronx’s and Mariachi El Bronx’s Matt Caughthran says. “It’s working class music. It’s real music.” 

Despite almost two decades of success, that has included sharing stages with Foo Fighters and The Killers; sets across the global festival circuit, including Coachella and Glastonbury; performances on Late Show with David Letterman to NPR’s Tiny Desk; and theme songs for shows like Weeds and Aqua Teen Hunger Force, the members of Mariachi El Bronx still consider themselves lifelong students of the art form. That reverence carries over to their charro suits, which often attract as much attention as the music itself. The band has long turned to Boyle Heights-based Casa del Mariachi, a historic Los Angeles area landmark, where Jorge “Mr. George” Tello has been handcrafting the traditional suits for over 50 years. “This band has always been about learning and exchanging culture through music and art,” says Caughthran. “That’s what it’s all about! Everything we do comes from the heart and soul.”

Mariachi El Bronx’s long-awaited fourth album, the John Avila-produced Mariachi El Bronx IV is slated for a February 13, 2026 release through ATO Records. The album, which is the first album from the project in a decade, sees the trailblazing alter-egos of The Bronx continuing to embody the same ethos that sparked their creation — honoring the rich Hispanic music and culture that has always surrounded them in their hometown, while pushing creative boundaries. 

Clashing emotions of profound loss and overwhelming love shaped the album’s themes. The songwriting “started as a battle between love and death but became a way to process all the chaos of the world,” Caughthtran explains. Throughout the run of the album’s 12-tracks, the band documents the stories of gamblers, former playboys, warriors and lovers — characters that became vessels for the specific pressures of modern life. 

Returning after a decade away felt “joyous and familiar from the jump,” the band’s Joby J. Ford says. But the album’s recording process proved to be much more complex than expected. Within the year that he began writing the album’s lyrics, Caughthran contended with the deaths of several loved ones. And as they tracked the album’s material at producer John Avila’s San Gabriel Valley studio, the Eaton Canyon wildfires blazed across East L.A. “We came out of the studio one night, the entire side of the hill was just on fire,” Ford recalls. 

While dealing with grief in his personal life and within Los Angeles, Caughthran also got married in the same year. All of these very profoundly human experiences and feelings have informed what may arguably be Mariachi El Bronx’s most emotionally resonate work to date. 

Mariachi El Bronx IV will feature the previously released album opener, “Forgive or Forget,” and “RIP Romeo,” tracks which, feature acclaimed violinist Ray Suen that tackle nostalgia, heartache and longing — in the way that only mariachi could.

Mariachi El Bronx begins 2026 with Mariachi El Bronx‘s third and latest single “Bandoleros,” a Norteño-charged tune that the band describes as the album’s “battle cry,” and features a narrator channeling courage, indignation and defiance in the face of mounting chaos and unfairness both locally and and globally.

Directed by legendary Los Angeles-based street photographer, director and longtime friend of the band, Estevan Oriol, the accompanying video is a proud and defiant love letter to the city’s Mexican and Latino culture, that features Jorge Tello’s Casa del Mariachi, and his gorgeously detailed handcrafted charro suits, the small, sweaty beer soaked clubs where you’d catch mariachis, while you drunkenly sway and cry along. But the video ends with a stark and familiar warning: Gentrification and development often endanger the bedrock culture and soul of any place it touches.

“I’ve been working with these guys for years and this version of the band is unstoppable,” Estevan Oriol says. ““I’m proud to of been given creative freedom to match their massive sound with this video that visually matches the GIANT they’ve become.’”

The band adds, “we’ve been working with Estevan since the early 2000’s. His talent and style is unmatched. Over the years we’ve become friends so linking up for the ‘Bandoleros’ video was a no brainer.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Seattle’s Filth Is Eternal Shares a Bruising Ripper

Formed back in 2020, Seattle-based quartet Filth Is Eternal — Lis DiAngelo (vocals), Brian McClelland (guitar), Logan Miller (bass) and Josh Pehrson (drums) — was initially inspired by the raw, impulsive ethos of punk. The band quickly developed a reputation for a frenetic live set, which they brought to DIY venues across the country. “Filth has always been about energy at the heart of things since the earliest recordings,” the band’s Lis DiAngelo says. “We wanted to leave our blood and guts out on the floor,” Brian McClelland adds. 

Filth Is Eternal’s third album, Impossible World is slated for a March 17, 2026 release through MNRK Heavy. The highly-anticipated follow up to the band’s acclaimed 2023 sophomore effort Find Out was written against a backdrop of accelerating gentrification, unchecked technology and the slow — but quickening — creep of authoritarianism and fascism. So the album thematically confronts life in our present dystopian hellscape. And yet, rather than surrounding to despair and hopelessness, the band push forward with a defiant clarity, while asking difficult questions about survival, humanity and resistance in a world increasingly shaped without anyone’s consent.

Despite the album’s overall heavy subject matter, Impossible World has many soaring moments throughout — flashes of light that give fans a sense of possibility midst the brutal toils of contemporary life. The album is a salve in hard times, reminding the listener that art has the radical potential to enliven us, to connect us with others and to keep us holding on, as we wait out and plan through the darkest hours.

Sonically, the album reportedly sees the band balancing hardcore urgency with a sharpened melodic sensibility. The result is an effort that draws from punk’s immediacy while seeing the band push their sound towards something much more deliberate and expansive. “I think the biggest changes from LP1 to now is that we’ve upped the intention by using more melody, harmony, and singing in general. We’re working with aggression, but moving toward something beautiful and true,” DiAngelo says. 

The album also features collaborations with The Blood Brothers‘ Johnny Whitney, Fall Out Boy‘s Joe Trohman, Gina Gleason and Lauren Lavin, alongside their use of the FILTH EQ+, a pedal they crafted that helped shaped the album’s overall sound.

Impossible World‘s first single, “Stay Melted,” is a bruising ripper that seemingly channels Dirt-era Alice in Chains, Badmotorfinger-era Soundgarden and Live Through This-era Hole, anchored by DiAngelo’s most incisive and forceful songwriting of their growing catalog. Thematically, the song exposes and critiques the hypocrisy at the heart of the rise of Christofascism here in the States with a brutally clear-eyed honesty.

“The world can feel like a total trash fire to the point where we become lethargic,” the band says. “Lethargy makes us our own worst enemy; sometimes you have to kill a thing before you lose yourself to it completely.” 

Directed by Sebastian Deramat, the accompanying video for “Stay Melted” fittingly brings back memories of 120 Minutes-era MTV.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Mute Swan Teams Up with Sonoda on Intergalactic “Phantasms of the Living”

With the release of their debut EP, 2016’s Ultraviolet and their full-length debut, 2021’s Only Ever, Tucson-based shoegaze/dream pop outfit Mute Swan — currently, Mike Barnett (guitar/vocals), Prabjit Virdee (bass, vocals), and Gilbert Flores (drums) — quickly established a swirling, densely layered take on psych rock that some critics and others have compared to Of Montreal and Soft Bulletin-era Flaming Lips. 

2021’s Only Ever was released to praise from The FADER, Merry-Go-Round Magazine and several others, as well as airplay on KEXP.

Earlier this year, the band signed to Hit The North Records/Wooden Tooth Records, who will be releasing their long-awaited sophomore album Skin Slip on March 6, 2026. The album will feature a batch of material that will be posthumously released after the death of founding member Thomas Sloane, including the previously released “Hypnosis Tapes,” and “Cocteau Swan,” which featured Citrus Clouds‘ Stacie Huttleson.

The Tucson-based outfit begin 2026 with Skin Slip‘s third and latest single, “Phantasms of the Living,” featuring Sonoda. “Phantasms of the Living” is a dreamy, intergalactic tune anchored around the sort of dense layers of guitars that may remind some of Siamese Dream-era Smashing Pumpkins paired with razor sharp hooks.

“Several years ago I got into reading books about non-duality. The lyrics of this song were inspired by a British non-dualist named Tony Parsons but the title actually comes from a 19th century book about ghosts of people who are still alive,” Mute Swan’s Mike Barnett explains. “There’s a connection there but, anyway, we were very excited after writing this song together. This song is one of our favorites. And Lisa (Sonoda) singing on it was the absolute cherry on top.”

Directed by the band’s Mike Barnett, the accompanying video for “Phantasms of the Living” is a deliriously odd DIY effort that’s split between a house gathering watching an old movie “Phantasms of the Living,” followed by a ouija board that seemingly opens a portal into the murder and mayhem of the movie they were originally watching.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Howling Bells Shares Bittersweet “Melbourne”

Since their beginnings, London-based, Aussie trio Howling Bells — siblings Juanita Stein (vocals, guitar) and Joel Stein (guitar) and Glenn Moule (drums) — have been a bit of anomaly: They relocated to the UK to pursue their dreams of making it. And then, they broke through a British indie scene of three-and-four-dude-wearing-skinny-jeans bands with their acclaimed, self-titled 2006 full-length debut. 

Those dreams of making it big actually became real: They played an NME Tour and then in stadiums opening for a Coldplay, while winning acclaim from the UK music press. 

Throughout their nearly two decade history, the band has gone through a series of lineup changes but some things have remained the same: the core trio’s deep, unbreakable bond and their hypnotic sound, influenced by Tom Waits, Sonic Youth, Nirvana, Fleetwood Mac and Björk. 

Howling Bells’ fifth album, Strange Life is slated for a February 13, 2026 release through Nude Records. The long-awaited album is the band’s first album of new material in over 12 years and was recorded with their longtime friend and collaborator Ben Hillier at Agricultural Audio Studios. The new album is reportedly both a vibrant document of and an exploratory testament to the alchemical magic between its core members. 

Late last year, I wrote about album single “Chimera,” a song that showcases Juanita Stein’s gorgeous and expressive vocal and the band’s knack for big hooks and choruses. Strange Life‘s latest single “Melbourne” continues a run of jangle pop-like indie rock with big hooks — but at its core is a confusing and familiar mix of yearning for the familiar and the grief over the tacit acknowledgement that the familiar can no longer be had. You can’t go back home again, as the novel says — and that’s often more true than not. And it’s all anchored in bitter, lived-in experience.

“‘Melbourne’ is a song about deep yearning and ultimately grief. It explores a unique inner conflict many of us feel when we leave our homes and families to start anew somewhere else,” Howling Bells’ Juanita Stein explains. “This aching can be especially intense when we’re faced with something traumatic and all we want is the safety and warm embrace of the familiar. I experienced a heightened version of this when I returned to Melbourne a few years ago to play some shows, having not been back for a while. It felt slightly surreal and tragic being there without any family to share this with, as they had also left Australia over the years. Then, within 24 hours of touchdown, I got a call from a hospital in England telling me that my father, who was ill, had taken a turn for the worse, and so I had to pack up and return to the UK before I’d even played a show. It was brutal. I felt a thousand things that day, from the physical weight of having to lug around 2 huge suitcases full of merch I was planning to unload, to sitting alone in tears at the airport in Singapore during the layover. All these experiences left me with a deep well of sadness and a longing to return to my homeland to find what it is I’d now lost forever. This is something I carry around with me every day. All it takes is the glimmer of the sun at a certain time of day, or the occasional scent of an eucalyptus tree, or the sharp twinge of nostalgia when I hear the melody of a particular song, to remind me of the sadness and beauty that is now my Australia,”

Directed by Safiyya Lea, the accompanying video for “Melbourne” stars a beanie-wearing Tilly Woodward, driving down a country road before she pulls over to get out of her truck and expressively dance by a tree.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Total Fucking Darkness Returns with Club Banging “Horizontal Rain”

Electronic music outfit and JOVM mainstays Total Fucking Darkness features: 

Last year, the trio released have released a handful of standalone singles, including three I wrote about on this site, “Desolation Boys,” “Take It Easy” and “Give Me Everything You Own.”

The trio begin 2026 with “Horizontal Rain,” an off-kilter, propulsive, hook-driven banger that recalls the days of sweaty, illegal basement raves. (Those who know, know, you know?) But underneath the good times, is the feverish unease, the sickening sense of sliding into a totalitarian and fascistic hellscape and the desire to connect to others. This is the party music of a dying world.

The accompanying video is a mind-bending blend of a middle aged guy dancing in various locations with video glitch, edited stock footage and more.