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5. Marsy Won’t Change Their Mind About Dancing

The latest signings to the ever-intriguing Heavenly Recording roster, Marsy started life in the Surrey commuter village of Chipstead. It was there, in her childhood bedroom, that Hannah Rodgers began writing, “on my own, just me and a guitar”. With a backlog of songs, Hannah set about road-testing them under various guises and lineups before settling on the current four-strong lineup that is Marsy as we see them today. Celebrating their signing in style, this week Marsy shared two new singles, both produced by Tunng’s Mike Lindsay, Chance The Dancer and Let No Other Change Your Mind.

This two-track introduction is a lovely way to bring Marsy into your life, showcasing two subtly different sides of the band’s sound. Chance the Dancer is one for those more enamoured with the poppier side of life, it’s pitched somewhere between Carole King labelmates Tapir! as Hannah reflects on, “missed chances in life and love that on reflection were dodged bullets”, ultimately finding reason to celebrate being happier alone than with the wrong person, “to be fair, it’s with myself I’m strong”. Let No Other Change Your Mind dips its toe into expansive psych-folk, as it finds Hannah, “writing about something damaging and finding the good in it”. It’s a track that unfurls slowly, as cleverly layered as a Michelin Star trifle, it swells and breaks throughout, beginning with the pulsing drive of muted guitar chords, which are gradually joined by layered vocals, howling harmonica, and chiming glockenspiel, the clever instrumental choices reminiscent of the likes of Lau or Trembling Bells. Launching yourself into the world with two entirely different tunes is a bold move, the sign of a band who have no interest in being pigeon-holed, and when they’re both this good, long may Marsy roam wherever their hearts desire.

Chance The Dancer / Let No Other Change Your Mind is out now via Heavenly Recordings. For more information on Marsy visit https://linktr.ee/bandmarsy

4. Gaze Upon Tulpa In Wonder

Featured on these pages less than one month ago with their debut single, Tulpa are a hot-off-the-presses quartet hailing from the musical hotbed of Leeds. The band’s debut album, Monster Of The Week, produced by My Mie’s Jamie Lockhart in the rather beautiful setting of Lamigo Bay in the Highlands of Scotland, is set for release at the end of November via Skep Wax. This week, Tulpa shared the second taster of the record, in the shape of their new single, Transfixed Gaze.

Despite its sprightly musical mood, Transfixed Gaze is a song that blurs the lines between real life and a post-apocalyptic Zombie movie, as the band put it, it’s a song, “about a world where everywhere you look people seem to be brainwashed”. To a galloping combination of snare-heavy drums and propulsive guitar chords, even vocalist Josie’s melodic sensibilities aren’t quite enough to hide her growing unease, “can’t understand what they’re talking about, but I know they’re in love because they’re screaming in horror”. Unusually for an indie-pop song, they even throw in a rather excellent instrumental, where the lead-guitar ramps up to a flourishing stomp, it’s a Scottish-accented spoken word section away from Ballboy’s finer moments. Tulpa are one of those rare bands who seem to have arrived fully formed; they slip effortlessly into a lineage of indie-pop greats, while dragging classic sounds into new directions, on the evidence so far, Monster Of The Week might just be an all year round treat.

Monster Of The Week is out November 28th via Skep Wax Records. For more information on Tulpa visit https://tulparockband.bandcamp.com/.

3. Don’t Give Up On Wormy

Although nominally based in New York, you could probably argue that Noah Rauchwerk, the brains behind Wormy, is actually something of a nomad. As a touring drummer for the likes of Samia and Willow Avalon, Noah’s life is one of near-permanent impermanence, a fact he confronts head-on with his upcoming second album, Shark River. Previewing the record, which will arrive in January via Rose Garden, this week Wormy shared the album’s first single, Give Up.

Give Up lives up to its title, as Noah explains, “it’s about giving up…and how sometimes you feel the most hopeful in the darkest times”. The song has a similar scene-setting feel to Andy Shauf’s more recent work. We find Noah, “laughing in the corner booth”, feeling oddly content as he notes, “if I die here, that won’t be so bad, at least I won’t have to pay my tab”. Musically, with its gently unwinding guitar lines and flourishes of sepia-tinged slide, the track walks the line between Elvis Depressedly-esque slow-core and the country-tinged emo of Pinegrove or Slaughter Beach, Dog. Despite its theme of total surrender, there’s a certain positivity here, revelling in the acceptance that all of this might mean nothing, “if my whole life’s a bender, at least I spent it all with you”. As the song progresses, we find Noah slowly dipping his defences, letting us see the cause of his nihilism, “sitting in the car, thinking about True Love by Hovvdy, how they wrote the perfect song, and I just want someone to love me”. For all the repetition of the fact, “we might as well give up”, there’s the odd flicker to suggest he’s not quite done yet, and when, like Wormy, you’re writing the best music of your career, this would be the worst possible time to quit.

Shark River is out January 16th via Rose Garden. For more information on Wormy visit https://www.wormymusic.com/.

2. Lande Hekt’s A Perfect Fit

First coming to my attention with 2019’s excellent EP, Gigantic Disappointment, Lande Hekt has gone out to carve a prime spot in the UK’s DIY scene. With both her 2021 debut Going To Hell and the follow-up House Without A View, Lande’s combination of honest self-exploration and indie-pop won her plenty of admirers, including spots opening for the likes of Alvvays and The Beths. For her next move, January will see Lande share a brand new album, Lucky Now, a record that came from trying, “to think less about how things are coming across, and just write songs that make me feel connected to myself and what I value”. Ahead of the release this week, Lande shared a new single, Favourite Pair Of Shoes.

Favourite Pair Of Shoes finds Lande leaning into her jangle pop influences, “I was listening to a lot of The Bats and The Chills,  it probably sounds nothing like any of that Flying Nun stuff, but that was what was inspiring me at the time”. The influence might not be entirely obvious, it’s a track that still has Lande’s own musical DNA all over it, yet you can definitely feel a kinship to her Kiwi influences, from the rhythmic guitar chords through to the steady drive of the drum rhythm. Lyrically, the song walks a line between hope and despair, as Lande explains, “it’s about rising out of a pit of hopelessness and doing something really positive”. It’s the sound of finding re-connection at your lowest ebb, “we both feel this coming together. Unless we ruin it, it could be forever”. Written shortly after moving back to her native Exeter, Lucky Now is an album about returns, about rediscovering places, joy, and the parts of yourself you thought you’d left behind. Like sinking into your favourite shoes and revelling in their embrace, Lande’s music has never felt so comforting.

Lucky Now is out January 30th via Tapete Records. For more information on Lande Hekt visit https://www.landehekt.co.uk/.

1. Step Into My Office Hadda Be

Long-term favourites around these parts, South London’s Hadda Be made quite the splash back in 2021 with their well-received debut album, Another Life. After hinting at what might come next with the subtle direction change that was the 2022 single, Mercurial, the band has largely been keeping their music on the road, working out what comes next from stages on both sides of the Atlantic. Earlier this year, the band decamped to the studio with Stereolab’s Andy Ramsay, and it’s from those sessions that they share the fabulous single, New To The Office, their first new material in three years.

New To The Office is not a song that eases Hadda Be back into our lives; it’s a contemptuous snarl, vocalist Amber Price yelping out about, “the absurdities of day-to-day life through the anxious hallucinations of a Sunday night fever dream”. Beneath the fizzing energy of the vocal, Amber’s bandmates have never sounded more fiery. The bass is a menacing finger in the chest, the drums a pumelling primal wake-up call, and the guitars a scything buzz-saw aimed at anyone who dares stand in their way. Amid the storm, Amber asks us to question everything we know about working week, “pull the trigger and the glimmer of hope it fades, I saw two lights shine overhead, they’ll fill the world or break it”. This is a return that’s not just welcome but utterly thrilling. Hadda Be are primed and ready for a real break through moment.

New To The Office is out now via Last Night From Glasgow / Ba Da Bing. For more information on Hadda Be visit https://linktr.ee/HaddaBe

Header photo is Hadda Be by Hannah Murrell

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