5. Eat Your Greens and Learn To Love Your Peas

Rosie Smith aka Oh Peas! may have exhibited one of our pet hates by putting punctuation in her band name, but luckily the music she makes more than makes up for it. When Rosie’s not making music with the likes of Totem Terrors, Trust Fund and Pheenus, she makes wonky bedroom, indie-pop recordings that walk the never before-explored middle ground of Elliot Smith and The Lovely Eggs.

This week Oh Peas! shared a brand new single, Learning To Love You Less, and being suckers for spoken word vocals and wood blocks, we were unsurprisingly charmed. The song is the first taster of her upcoming record, Difficult Second Chair, which is released next week, and we can only hope the album is as odd and brilliant as ever.

Difficult Second Chair is out October 23rd via Time Of Asking and Diet Pop Records. Oh Peas! have plenty of live dates coming up, see Facebook for details.

4. Emotional Bruising

The latest great act off the successful Leeds’ production line, Bruising, have this week shared the video for their debut single, Emo Friends. The band formed less than a year ago when singer Naomi Baguley spotted guitarist Ben Lewis wearing a Perfect Pussy t-shirt in a Leeds nightclub, and never looked back. They apparently sold-out their debut show at Oporto in Leeds, which would be more note-worthy if that place wasn’t absolutely tiny, none the less what’s happened next is far more impressive.

Recorded, as is traditional, with MJ from Hookworms, Emo Friends is a blast of pop-tinged punk. Showcasing shades of the likes of Joanna Gruesome or Veronica Falls, it’s that always enticing blend of gorgeous vocals and grubby guitar lines that never fails to excite, and the track bodes very well for wherever Bruising take their music next.

‘Emo Friends’ / ‘Honey’ is released November 20th via Beech Coma. Bruising tour the UK with Los Campesinos! in November, with a headline date in London, November 23rd.

3. Say So Long To Martha Ffion

Rather confusingly, Martha Ffion is actually called Claire Martha Ffion McKay but for her musical endeavours decided to chop the ends of her name and stick with the middle ones, which are taken from members of her family. Whatever name she decided to record under, the idea of recording was a very good one indeed.

Glasgow-based Martha has recently signed to the ever brilliant Turnstile (home to the likes of Perfume Genius, Los Campesinos! and Trust Fund) and this week revealed the first fruits of that collaboration in the shape of new single, So Long. Inspired in equal measures by the loss of a childhood friendship and The Everly Brothers, it’s a smooth slice of 1950’s balladry without forgetting her folk-pop routes. It’s also the first in a series of singles Martha’s going to be releasing over the next few months, which we’re sure will be well worth keeping an eye on.

So Long is out now via Turnstile. Martha Ffion play a smattering of dates across the UK next month.

2. Noisy Fields and Commontime Music

Remarkably, it’s been four years since Field Music last released a record. Not that they haven’t been busy with the likes of Frozen By Sight, School Of Language, Slug and a host of other extra-curricular activities. As good as all those projects were, there’s still something very special that happens when the brothers Brewis get in the studio together, and new single The Noisy Days Are Over is no exception.

The Noisy Days Are Over is probably the poppiest Field Music have ever sounded, embracing hooks and choruses, as well as some serious Sax-soloing, all without foregoing their trademark interwoven vocals or arresting changes in pace. The first track to be lifted from the fifth studio album, Commontime, it’s a tantalising teaser for the album to come, which is already one of 2016’s most anticipated releases.

Commontime is out February 5th via Memphis Industries. Field Music’s UK tour kicks off at the end of February next year.

1. Steady Start for Cross Record

Cross Record is the frankly rather odd pseudonym for the work of Texas-based songwriter Emily Cross. This week she shared Steady Waves, the lead single from her upcoming record Wabi-Sabi, which will see the light of day next year. The title Wabi-Sabi is a Japanese aesthetic centred on the acceptance of transience and beauties ability to be imperfect, impermanent and incomplete.

Emily studied at art-college in Ireland, and only got into music via a cocktail of encouragement and Guinness. We can thank the black stuff for that, because Steady Wave is just a magical thing, a blend of cyclical guitar patterns and low-bass rumblings, her light vocals a perfect contrast to the brooding darkness of the music she makes. It’s a sound that recalls the likes of Torres and Angel Olsen and one that’s got us impatient for next year’s full album.

Wabi-Sabi is out January 29th via Ba Da Bing Records. If you happen to live in Austin, Texas, Cross Records play shows there on both the 21st and 23rd of October.