Category Archives: Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 22nd June 2026

The Delines – Dilaudid Diane

This features on one of the most quietly enduring albums I have heard this year, The Delines latest ‘The Set Up.’ This is the kind of slow‑burn storytelling only they can pull off, a late‑night vignette steeped in motel‑lamp melancholy and the ache of someone trying to outrun their own history. Amy Boone sings it like she is reading a note left on a bedside table, her voice worn but unwavering, while the band moves with that trademark Delines hush, stripped back to an old pub piano here and ensemble backing singing. It is a character study delivered in half‑shadows, for the full cinematic experience you can get the album here: https://amzn.to/4w64jMP

Alex Amen – Diamonds

This laid back dose of sun drenched, hazy day country is from Alex Amen’s debut album ‘Sun of Amen’ which was released earlier this month. This is built on warm, unhurried production and a vocal delivery that feels both intimate and resolute, as if he is sifting through the pieces of a life that he is finally ready to name. The song moves with a reflective pulse, very tender, clear‑eyed, and edged with just enough grit, marking Amen as a songwriter to keep an ear out for going forwards. You can buy the album via this link: https://amzn.to/4eD4GqQ

The Limiñanas – One Blood Circle

This one is taken from the bands first live album, recorded at the Centre Pompidou during Because Beaubourg (October 24th, 2025) and was released at the end of last week. The Limiñanas have spent the past decade carving out their own corner of the psych‑garage universe, theirs is a world of motorik grooves, noirish melodies, and sun‑bleached French cool. This latest release captures their live atmosphere in full, unfiltered form. Long known for the cinematic sweep of their studio work, their full onstage incarnation feels rawer and more propulsive, all fuzz‑bass swagger and hypnotic repetition. A physical copy of the album can be purchased via this link: https://amzn.to/4vo92Jx

Meredith Moon – Sapphire Blue

This is one of many wonderful tracks available on the latest Meredith Moon album, released earlier this year, ‘From Here To The Sea.’ The songwriter leans into her gift for intimate, unhurried storytelling here, tracing a mood rather than a narrative; the kind of reflective, salt tinged folk that seems to gather its power from open water and long memory. Her voice moves with a gentle resolve, carried by fingerpicked patterns that shimmer like light on the surface, making ‘Sapphire Blue’ one of the record’s most arresting moments. The album can be purchased via this link: https://amzn.to/3QCSe2v

Widowspeak – No Driver

This is a track that sits on ‘Roses,’ Widowspeak’s new album release for Captured Tracks, like a slow exhale. This is a song that drifts in on dusky guitars and that familiar, half‑lit sense of longing they can do better than almost anyone. Molly Hamilton sings with a kind of weightless clarity, tracing the feeling of moving through life on instinct rather than direction, while the arrangement blooms in subtle, shimmering layers. This is one of those Widowspeak tracks where the atmosphere does as much storytelling as the lyrics, all soft edges, open roads, and an aching that lingers. The new album is available through this link: https://amzn.to/4vmXh65

Tomorrow Woman – The Flower

To close this week we have a scorching offering of electro pop taken from the new Tomorrow Woman EP ‘Plays Machines.’ Tomorrow Woman is the project of Betsy Roszko, a California‑born, Paris‑based artist whose work blends electronic introspection with a strong DIY ethos. The project marks her return to releasing music after a seven‑year hiatus, following earlier work with the punk band Gomme. With Tomorrow Woman, Roszko shifts into a more electronic, dance‑oriented palette while carrying over punk’s instinct for disruption and emotional directness. You can get a copy of the EP via this link: https://tomorrowwoman.bandcamp.com/

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 15th June 2026

Yea-Ming And The Rumours – Sweet Opiate

This track is one of the new ‘Residue!’ albums quietest gut‑punches, a song that distils Yea‑Ming Chen’s gift for turning heartbreak into something soft‑glowing and strangely companionable. Where the album leans into late‑night melancholy and sun‑bleached solitude, this track feels like the ache sharpening into clarity, a confession whispered to no one in particular, carried by her feather‑light delivery and the Rumours’ gentle, unhurried sway. This is the kind of song that lingers long after it ends, proof that Chen’s ability to make sorrow feel luminous remains entirely her own. You can get the album here:https://amzn.to/3QdaYFF

Pokey LaFarge – Rent Money

The title track of Pokey LaFarge’s forthcoming album lands with the swagger of someone who’s seen the bottom of the barrel and learned to dance on it anyway. Out September 11th 2026 on Boxer Boy Records, the song distils his gift for turning hard luck into high style: a loose hipped groove, a grin behind the grit, and that unmistakable mix of street corner charm and spiritual reckoning he’s been honing for years. This might just be LaFarge holding a mirror to the scramble of everyday survival but doing it with enough warmth and wit to make the struggle feel strangely buoyant. It is a sharp, soulful teaser for a record which can be downloaded via this link: https://amzn.to/4vc6s9E

The Killing Floors – Se Fue, Se Fue

Well, there is no getting away from the fact that I am a sucker for authentic garage rock sounds and they do not get much more straight down the line, pure and honest as this. Everything is right about the delivery right down to the vintage TV appearance style setting for the video. But something I have said many times with acts that lean into this style, I could not care less for the dressing up box attention to detail if the music is nothing more than pastiche, but when a band gets it right with conviction as the Killing Floors do here, that garage band sound is a thing of ageless beauty. It is from the new album of the same name which can be purchased via this link: https://amzn.to/4fEvs4o

Coup Dur – Mon Amie

This ear-worm tune opens Coup Dur’s debut EP with a jolt of immediacy; the kind of first track that makes clear this new project arrives dressed for success. Released on 62 Records and Precious Recordings of London, the song lays out the duo’s aesthetic in sharp relief, a lean, melodic, and charged sense of intimacy that has the effect of being both inviting and slightly off kilter. It is an arresting introduction, the sound of a band stepping into the light with purpose and this stylised video serves their aesthetic well. You can get the five-song album featured in the video via this link: https://amzn.to/4e81VPl

Wooden Overcoat – Finally Arrived

This track gives the first real glimpse of Wooden Overcoat’s dream drenched interior world, a slow motion swirl of gooey guitars and deliberate, heartbeat heavy drums that pull the listener into a trance. Francesca Bonci’s accompanying video deepens the spell, her distinctive visual language amplifying the song’s mix of personal mourning, romantic tension and a wry side eye at the myths of stardom. It is a modestly gripping moment of intimate disorientation, steeped in the fragile beauty of human connection. The bands debut ‘Hello Sunbeam’ EP is available through this link: https://wooden-overcoat.bandcamp.com/album/hello-sunbeam

Knats – Never Gonna Be A Boxer

This track shines on the ‘A Great Day In Newcastle’ album with the kind of kinetic confidence that has made Knats one of the UK’s most talked‑about new jazz outfits. Led by bassist Stan Woodward and drummer King David‑Ike Elechi, the track channels the band’s live‑wire energy into a sharp, swaggering statement of intent. This is rhythmically restless, melodically sly, and presents with a sound that is entirely their own. This is a standout moment from a group already earning serious acclaim, and a reminder of why their rise has felt so rapid and so deserved. You can get your hands on the CD via this link: https://amzn.to/446iW6F

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 1st June 2026

The Coral – Let The Music Play

It is always a welcome return when The Coral announce new music and their latest album ‘388’ was officially released last week, following a low‑key, physical‑only rollout through independent record shops across the UK. It is the band’s thirteenth studio album, led by this single ‘Let The Music Play.’ The record draws heavily on the sound and spirit of vintage reggae and dub cassette tapes, while still carrying the group’s familiar blend of psychedelic rock, melody, and wistful escapism. Frontman James Skelly describes the single as an ode to the battered Wailers and Lee “Scratch” Perry tapes they used to pick up in second‑hand shops, music that made sense when the world did not. You can buy the album via this link: https://amzn.to/4wY12jF

Trashcan Sinatras (featuring Tracyanne Campbell) – Bad Husband

This bittersweet ballad brilliantly pairs the vocal of Camera Obscura’s Tracyanne with Francis Reader’s tender phrasing on a lead single from the band’s first album in a decade entitled ‘Ever The Optimist,’ due on the 31st July. The song finds Trashcan Sinatras in wry, melodic form illuminating a relationship wobbling between regret and reluctant hope. Their voices intertwine with a lightness that belies the song’s catalogue of missteps, turning self‑reproach into something unexpectedly buoyant. As bright guitars and primary‑coloured pop flourishes lift the mood, the track reveals its true charm: a heavy hearted duet that treats emotional weather systems with humour and grace, not to mention a defiant sense of joy. You can order yourself a copy of the album here: https://amzn.to/4u7yZfh

Lime Garden – All Bad Parts

This is a live clip from last year but the song has very much been making its mark this year, especially with strong radio airplay, especially on 6Music. It was a standout track on the bands second album ‘Maybe Not Tonight’ and found them distilling a turbulent stretch of life into a sharp, hook‑bright pop song that masks its bruises beneath a restless bounce. The track moves with the jittery energy of someone trying to outrun their own worst impulses, its melodies tugging between exhilaration and unease. As the band lean into the tension between surface gloss and inner turmoil, the song becomes a portrait of coping through motion; dancing through the mess, even when every step threatens to give something away. You can order the album via this link: https://amzn.to/4wRjc6F

Mclusky – As A Dad

Mclusky released the mini‑album ‘I Sure Am Getting Sick Of This Bowling Alley’ digitally on the 20th March via Ipecac Recordings, with vinyl editions arriving this month. This song barrels forward with the kind of crooked swagger only Mclusky can muster, turning domestic absurdity into something loud but also oddly triumphant. The track lurches between sardonic self‑assessment and full‑throttle riffing, as if trying to make sense of the roles we inherit and the ones we blunder into. Beneath the noise and the grin, there is a flicker of recognition, an acknowledgement that growing older does not necessarily mean growing wiser, but it does give you better material to shout about. The physical (or digital) version of this release is available to buy here: https://amzn.to/4uz69oZ

Lambrini Girls – Cult Of Celebrity

More high energy and crunching guitar work is to be found in this next track, which the Lambrini Girls recently released as a stand alone, download only release. It finds them sharpening their already feral punk instincts into something even more caustic and theatrical. ‘Cult Of Celebrity’ tears into the grotesque spectacle of fame with the band’s trademark mix of humour, fury, and razor‑edged social commentary. Its two‑minute blast of noise‑punk feels like a pressure valve snapping or an attack on the hollow rituals of modern notoriety delivered with the Brighton trio’s unfiltered bite. There is a sense that they are pushing their sound into even bolder, more confrontational territory. You can get the download right now via this link: https://amzn.to/4xeTQ35

Chloé Antoniotti – Mangata

We close with a sharp change of pace and turn to some pastoral, melodic beauty in the shape of this ice cool instrumental serenity. Antoniotti is a French composer and pianist who released the EP ‘Mana’ on Cinq 7 / Wagram Music earlier this year. The piano lines in this piece seem to shimmer and recede like moonlit water. Antoniotti’s compositional clarity is front and centre: she favours restraint over flourish, letting harmonic shifts and subtle textural details carry the emotional weight. The result is a work that contains both intimacy and expansiveness, a small, self‑contained world shaped with precision and a painter’s sense of light. You can download the EP via this link: https://amzn.to/4a3vjnp

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 8th June 2026

Bedouine – Long Way To Fall

‘Long Way To Fall,’ is one of the standout moments on Bedouine’s new album ‘Neon Summer Skin.’ It arrives as the record’s first true exhale, a gorgeously gliding, quietly devastating song that gathers all the album’s themes of memory, yearning, and emotional inheritance into one graceful sweep. Initially the record has a sense of someone moving through the half‑lit corridors of childhood, before ‘Long Way To Fall’ steps forward with this blue-sky melancholy: piano flourishes that seem to hover in mid‑air, guitar lines bending with George Harrison‑like tenderness, and a vocal performance that feels both weightless and full of ache. Bedouine’s reflections on family, distance, and the slow realisation that childhood does not end cleanly crystallise into something approaching the devotional. You can buy the album via this link: https://amzn.to/434ckFA

The Giant Robots – Spooky Signs

This is the new single from long‑running Lausanne garage‑rock outfit The Giant Robots, arrives as a limited‑edition 7″ on Rogue Records, released in May and pressed in an edition of 500 copies on black vinyl. Backed with the B‑side ‘Goodbye,’ it continues the fardisa organ drenched, fuzz guitar assault on the classic garage band that they have been plugging into since the mid-1990s. In the Fruit Tree Records universe it is also an out-and-out pop banger, but then we live in a place where distortion is welcomed when delivered with this kind of intensity and being slightly out of time with the masses is positively celebrated too. Just follow the link: https://roguerecords.bandcamp.com/album/spooky-signs

Mama’s Broke – The Nameless

This is the lead single from Mama’s Broke’s forthcoming album ‘Reunion,’ which is going to be released on Free Dirt Records and Forward Music Group with an accompanying 16mm video filmed in Halifax by Nicole Cecile Holland. The track also appears as an advance digital single on Bandcamp ahead of the album’s 21st August release, continues the Nova Scotian duo’s tradition of stark, unflinching folk storytelling. They have been on my radar for a number of years now and with new work like this arriving, it stands as a positive affirmation that all their early promise really is growing into something with depth, nuance and above all, a natural musicality. Check them out this way: https://mamasbroke.bandcamp.com/album/reunion

Konyikeh – Jealous

This superb track released on FAMM as part of Konyikeh’s EP ‘Cinere,’ stands out as one of the project’s most tightly wound emotional snapshots. Issued alongside this official video, the track arrives in the same burst of creative renewal that shapes the EP’s broader palette, a blend of R&B and soul inflections with the sharper rhythmic edges Konyikeh has been exploring in recent years. On ‘Jealous,’ she channels that mix into something lean but also intense, her voice cutting through the arrangement with a clarity that mirrors the EP’s theme of rebuilding from the ground up. It is a compact but potent piece of songwriting that signals how confidently she is moving into this new phase of her work. You can find the EP to download here: https://amzn.to/3Qb0ztW

Joel Ross – Trinity (Father, Son And Holy Spirit)

Originally featured on Joel Ross’s album ‘Gospel Music,’ released on Blue Note Records earlier this year, it is a 17‑track project that marks the vibraphonist’s fifth release for the label and features his expanded Good Vibes ensemble. The album frames Ross’s writing within a spiritual and narrative arc, drawing on the musical language he absorbed in church and filtering it through his increasingly intricate, conversational jazz vocabulary. Within that context, ‘Trinity’ functions as one of the record’s central pillars: a piece built around interlocking lines and shifting harmonic light, shaped by the sextet’s responsiveness and Ross’s instinct for letting melody and rhythm bloom together. Heard inside the album’s broader exploration of faith, community, and musical inheritance, the track becomes a kind of structural hinge, setting the emotional and thematic tone for everything that follows. You can get the album via this link: https://amzn.to/4o05uug

Visible Cloaks (feat. Ioana Șelaru) – Intarsia

This is one of the most arresting moments on Visible Cloaks’ long‑awaited return ‘Paradessence,’ it distils everything strange, inviting, and quietly disorienting about the duo’s world‑building into a single, shape‑shifting piece. After an album that drifts like a weightless suite of experimental ambience, dissolving familiar song structures, bending time, and slipping between warmth and alienness, ‘Intarsia’ plays like the point where their decade of digital craft and imagined ecologies reaches a kind of fevered clarity. Scraping violin textures, uncanny vocal bursts, and the sense of something pressing against the edges of the mix make it feel as though another dimension is trying to break through, echoing the album’s broader fascination with memory, futurity, and sonic habitats that reorganise themselves as you listen. It is a track that captures the duo at their most transportive, reminding you why their music rewards the kind of deep, curious listening that reveals new contours each time. You can buy the album via this link: https://amzn.to/4uLaF3O

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 25th May 2026

Alela Diane – Dusty Roses

On her new album, ‘Who’s Keeping Time?’ which was written in the quiet daytime hours of her 1892 Victorian attic, Alela Diane carries the unhurried clarity that arrived when domestic life finally softened around her. Reconnecting with Portland’s creative community, trading guitar lessons with Peter Lalish, sharing tea with Anna Tivel, she found herself easing back into music with a renewed sense of intuition and belonging. That spirit of stillness and rediscovery runs through ‘Dusty Roses,’ just as the accompanying video leans into the family relations that have shaped Alela’s life and progression towards the creation of this wonderful latest record. You can read the Fruit Tree Records full length review here: https://fruit-tree-records.com/2026/05/21/alela-diane-whos-keeping-time/ The album is available to purchase here: https://amzn.to/49NjIc0

Teddy Thompson – Come Back

For Teddy Thompson, songwriting is a kind of magic, the truth in a line either resonates or it does not, and on his new album he writes with a candour that leaves little doubt about its source. These songs have a conviction, as if pulled straight from lived experience, heartbreak sketched in real time as he tries to stay afloat in shifting emotional tides. Opener ‘Come Back’ sets the scene with stark immediacy: a folk‑rock plea from a man reckoning with absence, its lonely verses breaking open into a burst of conflicted longing that captures love’s contradictions with disarming clarity. You can read the Fruit Tree Records full length review of the album here: https://fruit-tree-records.com/2026/05/14/teddy-thompson-never-be-the-same/ You can buy the album here: https://amzn.to/4wOAMIy

Aja Monet – Working Class Musicians

There are a multitude of overlapping tones and templates enveloping the music of Aja Monet, who has just released a wonderful new album called ‘The Color Of Rain.’ She has the pizazz of a street poet lyrically navigating a sound that flies between avant-garde jazz to bluesy soul without ever truly settling in one place, Aja’s style is free in the most literal musical sense of the word. She emerged from New York’s Lower East Side spoken‑word scene as a prodigious talent, later becoming a Grammy‑nominated poet and a genre‑defying artist capable of incorporating improvisation, and political imagination. Now, with years of global performance, acclaimed writing, and community‑rooted activism feeding her muse we encounter ‘Working Class Musician,’ another testament to her commitment to resistance, collective memory, and the lived realities that inform her art. You can buy the album here: https://amzn.to/4dYQlWF

Kelley Stoltz – Not Gone

Kelley Stoltz has long carved his own lane in American underground pop, a DIY lifer whose refusal to play the industry game only adds to the mans appeal. His nineteenth album, ‘If You Don’t Know Me, Buy Now,’ leans into that maverick streak, hook‑laden and witty in a way that is unmistakably Kelley’s. ‘Not Gone’ channels the muscular pulse of his Echo & the Bunnymen years, its pounding drive a reminder of how deftly he reshapes his influences into something singular. This is Stoltz at full voltage: sharp‑edged, melodic, and proof that his creative spark remains alive and kicking. You can read the full Fruit Tree Records review at: https://fruit-tree-records.com/2026/05/15/kelley-stoltz-if-you-dont-know-me-buy-now/ The album will be purchasable, when it gets a full release, from this link: https://amzn.to/4nMYAsd

Jasmine Myra – Likeness And Shadow

Jasmine Myra’s music on new album ‘Where Light Settles’ is built on duality; precision and fluidity, complexity and immediacy, pain and growth. It is her third album and finds the artist fully stepping into her own orbit, expanding her ensemble language into something more cinematic and deeply attuned to life’s bruises and revelations. ‘Likeness and Shadow’ captures that balance beautifully: a piece that blooms from propulsive bass into sun‑dappled movement, its sax and piano lines gliding like light through trees. It is Myra displaying assuredness, translating emotional weather into sound with grace, clarity, and a radiant sense of hope. You can read the full Fruit Tree Records album review here: https://fruit-tree-records.com/2026/05/19/jasmine-myra-where-light-settles/ You can buy the album via this link: https://amzn.to/4dJzHsK

The Waterboys – Don’t Even Have To Say His Name

This is a brilliant new stand alone single from The Waterboys, released on Chrysalis Records, finding Mike Scott in fiercely political form. Written as a direct response to the current U.S. climate, Scott calls it a stand against bullying and a contribution to the wider struggle for decency and democracy. Produced by Puck Fingers and Famous James, the track pairs Scott’s targeted vocal assault with piano, organ, bass, and drums, building a sharp, urgent critique without needing to name its all too obvious target. Arriving ahead of the archival ‘Atlantic Rain’ set and a major arena tour, it is the sound of The Waterboys still burning in 2026. Find the new track here: https://amzn.to/4a5MvZm

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 18th May 2026

Angine de Poitrine – Sarniezz

First up this week are a Canadian duo who are one of the buzz names in music right now, having become a viral sensation in 2026 leading to sell out shows and massive intrigue. They are an anonymous duo performing as Khn de Poitrine and Klek de Poitrine who claim to be 333 year old time travellers whose music is a melange of stiff‑limbed rhythms with a wink of absurdist performance art. But I am launching with them this week simply because, and unusually for something that has gone viral primarily on an eccentricity ticket, their music is really very good. They say that it is worked up over hours of improvised jamming before developing the ideas that work like microtonal rock missionairies, excavating for those underplayed and rarely heard notes between the notes. There is much here to hook the prog heads for sure, not simply that seventies throwback double necked guitar but the bold spirit of instrumental exploration that gives a nod to both the frenzied psych thrills of King Gizzard and the stricter genre lacerations of King Crimson. Not that they arrived here with anything like that level of pre-planning, even the outfits were an off-the-cuff idea after their main band were booked for a local gig too close in time to a recently played venue, so the hidden identity began as a necessity to bag another paid gig that ended up sticking. The main thing is the music is superb and, if you have suffered the misfortune of being exposed to any of the Eurovision Song Contest this weekend, now might be a good time to remember not all hype it tripe. Buy the album here: https://amzn.to/3Rv7qyB

Irma – Black Sun

Next we turn to another act whose popularity has been boosted by positive internet exposure, this time a singer who in the late 2000’s gained attention by uploading a series of cover version performances on YouTube. Nowadays, Cameroon‑born, Paris‑raised songwriter Irma Pany channels her guitar-driven, soul-pop style into her own compositions as heard here with ‘Black Sun,’ a track with intimacy and confident expression in equal measure. Her early candour is still there and the song’s stripped arrangement leaves her voice to do the heavy lifting, carrying a bright and engaging resilience that has become Irma’s signature. It is a reminder that sometimes just getting the basics right can deliver something that feels massive and widescreen. You can buy Irma’s ‘The Dawn’ album via this link: https://amzn.to/49W3Dke

Cole Berliner – The Black Door

A dose of acoustic springtime promise now with some delightfully shifting tones in this second instrumental piece of the week. This is the first single and title track of Cole Berliner’s album ‘The Black Door,’ out on Drag City on May 29th and if the lilting 1970 era McCartney-esque guitar weaving does not grab hold of you, then the dusty analogue textures surely will. Cole Berliner is a San Francisco born, Los Angeles based guitarist, composer and arranger, long recognised for his work in avant‑rock outfits Kamikaze Palm Tree and Sharpie Smile. Now stepping out under his own name, he brings that same fluid, acoustic‑electric sensibility to his solo work and if you like what you hear, you can get a copy of the album via this link: https://amzn.to/3PrbPCc

Ruti – I’ll Be Your Friend

The opening bars might fool you into believing we have some more acoustic introspection with this one but no, this zinger has an infectious build in momentum before erupting into the most glorious of pop-song chorus lines. Raised in Essex with Nigerian and English roots, Ruti has always had a gift for unforced melody, and here that instinct is paired with a production that plays right into that strength. The track moves with an easy, open‑hearted pulse, part folk glow, part modern pop shimmer, with Ruti’s vocal assured in a way only hinted at before with their more minimal piano-led work. It is the kind of song that suggests a writer growing and finding their voice, pointing to exciting potential going forward. ‘I’ll Be Your Friend’ is available as a download via this link: https://amzn.to/4dNKraO

Brother Wallace – Gone With The Wind

This finds Brother Wallace folding his gospel‑trained power into a smoother soul glide without losing any of the momentum that drives his debut. The Georgia‑born singer and pianist, a lifelong musician who was directing choirs by fourteen and later teaching music, brings the same rhythmic command to this track that animates the album’s harder‑hitting moments. What begins as a softer detour soon reveals its own pulse: a groovy piano break that nods to northern soul footwork and keeps the energy simmering beneath the surface. Wallace’s voice, rich with lived‑in grit and conviction, anchors the whole thing, reminding you that even at his most restrained he still pushes forward with purpose. It is a sleek, infectious highlight from an artist whose late‑blooming debut lands with the confidence of someone ready for this stage all along. Get yourself a copy of his ‘Electric Love’ album via this link: https://amzn.to/4eTdevI

Josienne Clarke – Banks Of The Sweet Primroses

Following up her potent re-working of ‘Katie Cruel’, Josienne Clarke is pushing onwards with her 21st century shakedown of traditional folk material. It is in the bloodline of folk song to be passed forward then re-interpreted with fresh resonance and in the hands of a switched on, emotionally connected artist like Josienne, this music is in safe hands. The video turns a simple stills session into a wry study of how performance erodes privacy, following a musician caught between sincerity and self‑presentation as she tries to decide what version of herself can withstand being framed. Its looping circular motif, part portrait, part trap, underlines the humour and the fatigue, leaving a small, stubborn triumph in the fact that something true survives the machinery of visibility. You can download the track via this link: https://amzn.to/4tGPPBk

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 11th May 2026

Ray Bull – All That You Are

I have been reading a lot in recent weeks about how there is an uprising in pop music of new young acts who are doing it right. They are leaning in to the performing and production aesthetics that gave the form such potency and variety in its sixties and seventies heyday, as well as placing emphasis on musicality, style and non-generic personality. In other words they are rejecting the formulaeric tropes that makes so much of the current chart music landscape a bland, uninspired and largely unloveable environment. That it is a young persons movement is welcome because, so often when similar groundswells of resistence have appeared, you look at the actual people involved and it always seems to comprise of former members of bands from earlier decades or seniors having a belated roll of the dice. Which is all perfectly valid and often delivers some magic, but that this latest unconnected collective appears to be populated by the youth, that does give me hope for the years ahead. The art of the pop song pioneered by the Beatles, Kinks and Rolling Stones etc will have a future if this kind of forward flow can still occur at ground level. America’s Ray Bull are one such example of a band that are treating the form with the respect and craftsmanlike quality it deserves. If you want to know more we have just published a review of their new album on this site and furthermore, you can get a copy of that album here: https://amzn.to/42Z18d1

Eel Men – When I Get Rich

In the UK the mod sounds of popular music as minted in the sixties, re-positioned in the punk years then persuasuvely re-sharpened by Blur’s British music manifesto ahead of the Britpop boom is another design classic that never dies out. Not that it troubles the charts much these days but all the same, it is exciting to come across a band like Eel Men and hear that the energy and the attitude, not to mention the thrill of a bangin’ new single with a snotty cutting edge, still exists among what is left of the grass roots music scene. They are a North London band about to release a 10″ EP called ‘Glass Hammers’ which includes this track. It is a middle finger to the ludicrousness of the never-ending quest for more, the thought that life might suddenly make sense once a certain threshold is reached, and the quiet realisation that it rarely resolves that way. Check out the forthcoming new release here: https://eelmen.bandcamp.com/album/glass-hammers-ep

Sharp Class – Faith In The Brakes

Drinking from a similar fountain of inspiration are Sharp Class who, with this driving slice of three minute perfection, are proudly wearing their allegiances on their made to measure sleeves. I have no issue with a band giving such an up front nod to The Jam because, ultimately, what they are showing loyalty to is an attitude and a lifestyle that has music high, or even top, on the list of priorities. That was all Paul Weller’s breakthrough band were doing and he did not hold back on proudly displaying the effects Steve Marriott and Pete Townshend had on his sound and look. ‘Faith In The Brakes’ is the first single and title track from the bands upcoming third album. It is said to be a song about someone stuck in an extreme tunnel vision mentality but whether or not it was insipred by personal experience, it is that very focus and assuredness in what they are about that makes Sharp Class such a hot proposition. Get ready to buy the album via this link: https://amzn.to/4uHoD6p

Kathleen Halloran – Showstopper

We are moving into a rootsier rock sound with this one as Kathleen Halloran shows some love for the scuzzy glam and decadence of the early seventies. It is available on her debut solo album ‘Nobody’s Baby’ which represents the moment she is stepping out of the shadows, having been an in demand touring guitarist, and finally forging a musical identity of her own. It is a debut built on clarity of purpose: sharp songwriting, unforced emotional weight, and a refusal to hide behind virtuosity even though she easily could. Roscoe James Irwin’s production gives the record its warm, lived‑in glow, but the spine is Halloran’s own. You can get the album via this link: https://amzn.to/435JCnr

The Black Keys – She Does It Right

This is a track from the new Black Keys ‘Peaches!’ album which sees them turning their hands to a set of covers. It was cut live in the room while Dan Auerbach was caring for his father during his final illness. What began as friends jamming to lift the weight off his shoulders hardened into a raw, unvarnished document of the band reconnecting with the blues that first lit the fuse. Across these reinterpretations (from George Thorogood to Junior Kimbrough) you can hear the duo shedding polish, chasing feel over finesse, and rediscovering the grit that once defined them. That is especially evident on this Dr Feelgood cover, a jerky stimulant fuelled thrash in its original form, it is now a “let’s spend the night together” piece of cranked up blues rock filth – and I mean that as a compliment. You can get yourself the album via this link: https://amzn.to/3OVurKt

Tidetied – First Of Spring

Finally this week another new band that I strongly urge you to keep an eye on. I featured their superb song ‘Valley’ in the third volume of our ‘Fresh Juice New Releases’ Mixcloud shows (see the Music Mixes page on this site) and now this newly available live performance further enhances the evidence that there might be something pretty damn good going on here. They came together a couple of years ago from the debris of Thomas Haywood’s post‑Blinders project Whitehorse, whilst John McCullagh and Nathan Keeble joined from other Sheffield loose fits. For now they have been finding their footing on the live circuit but the music coming out has moodiness, poetry, dynamics and some handsome melodic flashes so keep a watch in this direction https://tidetied.com/

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 4th May 2026

Gun Outfit – Teardrops (Classic Hell On Earth)

Soon to return on 8th May with a double album, ‘Process And Reality,’ that marks twenty years of Gun Outfit, this is a sneak preview of a track from the record that was made amidst the heat and uncertainty of wildfires. Something in the warm sounds capture that contrast of the familiar and the unknown, just as our senses open out like a valley appearing ahead evoke a sense of wonder and trepidation at the ever changing natural world. Of the song, the bands Dylan Sharp says it was “written in the wake of one of the endless iterations of fire, prior to the one that burned Altadena. It is not about the fires though. It’s about the futility of caring.” So, maybe this is the sound of a band retreating into their music if that be so, at least Gun Outfit appear to be in fine command of the one element in their lives that they do have some control over. The album can be found here: https://amzn.to/49n30Qp

Mod Lang – Try Your Love

It feels strange but also rather pleasing that one of the bands being touted as the bright young hopes in the pop world are making music essentially identifiable as sixties flavoured folk-rock. Or jingle-jangle guitar pop, or even classic Britpop leaning indie but whichever way you identify it, this is pop music that would do the music world a whole lot of good if it became, well, massively popular. But lets not get ahead of ourselves and besides, when did becoming massively popular ever do any band a lot of good? The really promising thing is this, for all the retro signposting of their clothes and style, the feeling you get when listening to Mod Lang is that it is the music they are really throwing creativity into, which means they have their priorities bang on. Keep an eye on them, or jump right in immediately and get the ‘Borrowed Time’ album, available here today: https://amzn.to/4uqHT88

Khun Narin Electric Phin Band – Sut Sanaen

The Khun Narin Electric Phin Band are about to return with their first new album in a decade, ‘III,’ which is due out on 15th May via Innovative Leisure. These exotic psychedelia merchants are a multi-generational ensemble from rural Thailand whose ecstatic performances have quietly become a global cult phenomenon. This is their take on one of the foundational melodic patterns in the musical tradition of the Isan people from Northeastern Thailand. The band originated as a celebration ensemble for rural ceremonies, particularly pre-ordination fire rituals. What begins as a spiritual procession often transforms into something more transcendent, musicians of all ages locked into spiralling repetition, rhythms surging forward, the entire village pulled into a shared state of euphoria. Obviously to English ears psychedelia is a fairly loose musical reference point, but it is hard to argue that the hypnotic sound does not take you on a head spinning trip just as the best music falling under that general umbrella can often do. Find out more about the forthcoming album here: https://www.innovativeleisure.net

Jason Joshua – A Real Good Woman

The first out and out soul music I am offering you this week and it is a really great one. Jason is a Miami born soul singer with the appropriate nickname ‘The Golden Voice.’ His is a classic sound that is undeniably fine in the authentic way it combines Latin Soul, classic R&B, Boogaloo and a true funk heartbeat that has the patina of something matured and refined. This single arrives ahead of a forthcoming album from Jason called ‘Terapia’ and it is high on my list of future releases to make sure I do not miss out on. Find out more via the link: https://mangohillrecords.bandcamp.com/album/terapia

Joan As Police Woman – Anyone

The more Joan keeps drip feeding teasers for her 12th June release of the re-worked, re-imagined and newly recorded take on classic debut album ‘Real Life,’ the more excited I am becoming to hear it. It is so rare for any artist to revisit older material, especially in a recording studio, and produce something that can bare any comparison to the original but you know what, she might just have done it with ‘Real Life Evolution.’ And I absolutely love the original. It is hard to pinpoint exactly what is elevating these versions beyond a nostaligic re-run but I suspect a big factor is this, Joan still sounds wholly connected to the material emotionally. I will leave it at that for now as I suspect a full length review on these pages will follow nearer the time but still, you have got to admit this is gorgeous haven’t you? Pre-order via this link: https://amzn.to/3PgZGj0

Gabrielle Cavassa – Diavola

Let us conclude this weeks ‘Fresh Juice’ with some sumptuous Jazz on the ever reliable Blue Note label. Here Gabrielle is accompanied in a live take by Gabe Schneider on guitar and it is one of those hypnotic takes where two musical performers lock into an impenetrable zone and seem to play as one. This is the title track from the singers debut album that is produced by a couple of Blue Note heavyweights in Joshua Redman and Don Was. The album stands as a textbook calling card first release for an artist that a label clearly has high hopes for. It balances original material with re-arrangements of other titles that emphasise the artists range and individualist style. Redman’s part in Cavassa’s career runs deep, for it was his manager a few years ago who first came across her singing at a New Orleans wedding. That it should lead to a debut like ‘Diavola’ makes it one of those magical stories in music that is usually left in the hands of fiction. This could be the launch of something very real indeed. You can buy the album via the link: https://amzn.to/3QUDMT9

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 27th April 2026

Michael Stipe – The Rest Of Ever

This week’s half dozen new music recommendations seems to have settled around a theme of historically much-loved artists stepping back into the spotlight. I think it was sometime around 1991 when I first read Michael Stipe in an interview talking about how he was planning a solo album. Now, fifteen years on from R.E.M.s split he is still building up to releasing that solo debut. This might suggest to some he is not too worried about it or, equally, may point to his compiling a work of such high quality that there is no intention of putting it out until it is perfect. Luckily, the evidence available on this new TV performance speaks to a slow paced creation being more likely thanks to the latter. There is still no release date available other than Michael’s prediction it would come out before the end of 2026 and sharing that he is now in the “final stages” of the recording and writing process.

Graham Coxon – Billy Says

When not tied up with Blur reunions Graham has spent a large part of his music life focusing on The Waeve with partner Rose in recent years. This forthcoming solo release does not indicate a shift back to working under his own name, it is actually from a previously unissued record recorded in 2011 and set for full release on 19 June, 2026; part of a comprehensive reissue of Coxon’s complete solo catalogue, spanning 9 studio albums and 3 original soundtracks, across the next 12 months. ‘Castle Park’ was recorded in 2011 as part of the ‘A+E’ (2012) sessions. Originally intended as a follow up to ‘A+E,’ the release was postponed due to Blur activity in 2012, before Coxon moved on to other projects. The album is a collection of 10 songs that lean into Graham’s classic mod sound, with lead single ‘Billy Says’ – a longtime feature of Coxon’s live set – already familiar to fans and now finally available for the first time. Get yourself on the pre-order list here: https://amzn.to/4eLro1H

Tift Merritt – Someone To Watch The Band With Me

Here is another falling firmly into the long overdue category. Back in the early years of the 21st century Tift was one of the most exhilarating, engaging and deliriously infectious performers on the Americana circuit. Then she put out world weary records like ‘Travelling Alone’ proving she was not limited to the rhythm and the sawdust but was also capable of writing in the country style with real emotional clout and authenticity. Put simply, she has long been one of the most dependably brilliant artists to come out of America in modern times and so with ‘Someone To Watch The Band With Me’ showing no loss of cutting edge, taken from the album ‘Sugar’ due out June 26th via One Riot Records, it already sounds like one of the releases of the summer is on the horizon. Pre-order here: https://amzn.to/4d8WNd6

Ringo Starr – Long Long Road

That Beatles magic still holds me under a spell in 2026, I make no apologies for that. Ringo Starr’s new album, from which this is the title track, is already out and it feeds into his long declared love of country music. I think the thing that I enjoy best is simply that this comes out because Ringo still has the hunger to make a great album. There is enough care and attention on display, an incredible array of modern Americana talent contributing and the whole affair is coated with that unmistakable Ringo, peace and love, personality that remains impossible to get cynical about. And for Beatles trainspotters this video, and indeed the album cover, has a real improbable gem of a detail. That purple ruffled shirt Ringo wears is the very same shirt that he is pictured wearing in the inner photos of ‘The White Album’ in 1968. This is a garment older than me that means. Altogether now, Ringo Starr is making Ringo sounding music and there are fresh Paul McCartney sounds just around the corner too. The dream may have been over yesterday, but with fading sunshine like this still pushing through the cracks in the concrete, perhaps there is something to be said for still treasuring a fantastic thing while we can. The album is available here: https://amzn.to/3R42ccT

Beth Orton – The Ground Above

This is the lead title track from a new album that is due to arrive in July. It should come as no surprise to anyone following Beth’s career over the past thirty years that she continues pushing boundaries with her sound and craft. From the beginning she was so much more than an acoustic troubadour, Beth was an alchemist fusing the rougher textures of organic sounds with forward reaching loops, electronics with an ear for the DJ wizardry of dance music. Beth has never been overly earnest or a muso and she instinctively avoids a comfort zone like the plague. And so it is right here, where we find her making music that is immediately of another plane. Not quite Scott Walker in the latter part of his career but this is a step towards it, the form is free and the singing a ghostly echo, the textures shift and it is hard to tell if we are moving towards a diffident dance motion or free jazz. But Beth always had soul too and in among the unsettling audio movements the human touch of her vulnerable voice cuts through. Should be an interesting album so get yourself a pre-order here: https://amzn.to/421arc7

Beck – Ride Lonesome

And so we wind things up this week with one more legend still proving they have the quality in their work to stay relevant. This is a taste of the mellow, introspective Beck that arguably has overshadowed his hip-hop tendencies this century, at least in terms of reception. Still, it is very exciting to hear that he can still do this so well and the man himself has described to DIY Magazine that it as the “first indication of a different yet familiar direction” for his music in the year ahead. The standalone new single is available via this link: https://amzn.to/4tBuOIU

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 20th April 2026

Tom Waits & Massive Attack – Boots On The Ground

New music from Tom Waits seemed to have totally dried up after his wonderful 2011 album ‘Bad As Me’ so anything fresh from the man was always going to grab some attention. Massive Attack too have been quiet since 2020 but here they are, both working together, on a song with subject matter that could not be any less a cause for celebration. Instead, these musical heavy weights are reacting in audio to the devastating emphasis our modern world has placed on waging war and disregarding the precious nature of human existence. At least they are picking up the baton visionaries like Bob Dylan previously carried in reacting to the horrors of the present time in song but typically for these artists, there is no sugar coating the terror of the situation. Luckily, Tom has not limited his resurrection to this one track, a twelve inch single of the release will follow that also has a new and exclusive Waits b-side entitled ‘The Fly.’ The man himself says this. “One day many years ago, I accepted an invitation from Massive Attack to collaborate. Their long release delay never worried me. Today, as in all of mankind’s yesterdays, guarantees this type of song will never go out of style. Man’s folly of fiascos is a feast for the flies. Hence, the b-side of Massive Attack’s upcoming 12 inch features my appreciation for the winged nuisance.” You can get yourself a copy of the record via this link: https://amzn.to/4sKPA7N

Johanna Samuels – White Limousine

Johanna Samuels has kicked off her next chapter with ‘White Limousine,’ a crisp, beautifully measured single marking her arrival on the Odd Man Out label. It is the first taste of a new album currently being readied for release, though specifics are still to come. If this track is any indication, Samuels is gearing up to deliver a record that will be getting a lot of the right kind of attention. For now, get going in this ‘White Limousine’ and enjoy an excursion that takes in suspence and an aching longing all wrapped up in warm hazy sounds that find room for sun-drenched guitar solos, yearning vocals and a Mercury Rev ‘Deserters Songs’ style eeriness. The video is pretty spectacular too, especially that fading in and out radio signal effect. Keep an eye out for the album, I am sure to be on it here at Fruit Tree Records upon arrival but for now you can download the single via this link: https://amzn.to/4tYcgCD

Parlor Greens – Eat Your Greens

This is a scorching live in the studio version of the lead track from the Parlor Green’s new sophomore album ‘Emeralds.’ The nuts and bolts of the band are Tim Carman holding down the beat on drums, Jimmy James who, in a heartbeat, can take us to funky town then back to soul city via his electric guitar and Adam Scone, who can spray paint the room in the most vibrant of moddish colours on that fruity organ and keys. The album is a soul-jazz joyride from start to finish and will be covered in greater depth on these pages very soon but for now, get some of the good stuff down with ‘Eat Your Greens’ and if this one tune is enough to convince, and why wouldn’t it be after all, you can get straight onto the new album via the link right here: https://amzn.to/4cuYXT2

Gorillaz featuring Sparks – The Happy Dictator

For over twenty five years now Gorillaz has proven to be the perfect situation for Damon Albarn to paint his musical visions and realize his bountiful supply of ideas and inspirations. Clearly he needed something fluid and widescreen enough to explore, without boundaries, his open eared approach to music with freedom and rather satisfying mainstream success. His feel for a commercial hook is beyond doubt at this point and the thing I enjoy the most is how he almost smuggles quite mature art-rock into the mainstream through the back door. Of course, Sparks were a band who did the very same thing, blessed as they were with a gift for timeless melody, eye catching presentation and a flare for absurdist, head scratching delivery in the way the Mael brothers performed. And here they are with an outstanding track from new album ‘The Mountain,’ working together and proving that this town actually is big enough for the both of them. You can get the latest release this way: https://amzn.to/41IIYvO

Fruit Bats – The Landfill

Fruit Bats make a welcome return on June 12th with ‘The Landfill’ album, the title track of which is presented here. It is a vibrant full‑band project released via Merge Records. The record finds Eric D. Johnson in a prolific streak following 2025’s intimate ‘Baby Man,’ expanding his palette with renewed energy. ‘The Landfill’ anchors the album’s central metaphor: surveying the future from atop the accumulated layers of personal and cultural history. The accompanying video, directed by longtime collaborator Adam Willis, playfully riffs on cult‑band mythology and the strange double life of an artist both celebrated and obscure. You can pre-order yourself a copy via this link: https://amzn.to/3OtaHO0

SPELLLING featuring Jean Dawson – Ammunition

And finally for this week, some rousing new music from an artist who has long been highly rated on these pages. SPELLLING continues to expand the world of her last album ‘Portrait Of My Heart’ with a new version of ‘Ammunition,’ this time reimagined as a duet with Jean Dawson. The track follows recent remixes featuring Weyes Blood and Turnstile’s Brendan Yates, extending the original album’s collaborative afterlife. Cabral recasts the song’s romantic R&B core into a darker, synth‑lit fairytale, leaning into the outsider sensibilities that define her latest work. It arrives as the release on which it originally appeared continues to draw widespread acclaim, praised for its raw self‑reflection and its bold, genre‑bending emotional clarity. Head to Bandcamp for more on the latest single and the original album is still available for purchase via this link: https://amzn.to/487Kc7l

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