Elanor Moss has shared Fixer, the last single before her debut album The Knife, The Needle, out 21st August on Merge Records.
Fixer opens the album, and it is where the title comes from. Moss’s guitar and vocal sit inside another of Matthew Herd’s arrangements — Herd on saxophone, Marcus Hamblett on flugel horn, Jools Owen on tenor horn, Reid Jenkins on fiddle and Andrew Stuart-Buttle on violin — recorded with producer Pete Miles. The chorus sets up an image and then dismantles it: “I’m afraid that if you show me the knife / I might use it on you babe” gives way to “That maybe what we thought of as a knife / Is just a needle we could use / To stitch the wound?”
Moss explains:
“‘Fixer’ came out all in one sitting one night at the kitchen table. It’s where the name of the album is taken from. Although it came out all at once, it took two attempts to fit the idea into a song in a way that felt satisfying. The first time, the song was called The Knife, and I wasn’t happy with it. It was not optimistic enough. Months later I sat down to write and this came out. And so the album is called The Knife, The Needle.
“It turns out, in retrospect, that I was very interested in how one thing can become another the longer you look at it. I guess it’s like the word ‘tender’ in ‘The Way That it Feels’ — most things contain shadow and light, and everything changes and is changed by so many different things. Sometimes for the better, like in this song.
“After Huw (H. Hawkline) and I shot the artwork and album photos, we drove back to Cardiff so I could catch my train home. We got the video on the drive back…”
Fixer follows Sarah Waiting in the Car and The Way That it Feels, and Again, My Love, which announced Moss’s signing to Merge in November 2025. The nine songs took three years. Moss recorded a version of the album in New York, set it aside, and went to a cabin near her parents’ house in the Scottish highlands chasing something “quieter, weirder, more English”, re-recording it with Miles. Fixer is streaming now.
The Knife, The Needle (August 21st, 2026) Merge Records
Pre-Order The Knife, The Needle
UK/US Dates:
Tue. Aug. 11 – Santa Barbara, CA @ SOhO*
Wed. Aug. 12 – Santa Cruz, CA @ Kuumbwa Jazz Center*
Thu. Aug. 13 – Sonoma, CA @ Sebastiani Theatre*
Fri. Aug. 21 – London, UK @ Rough Trade Denmark St (In-store)
Sat. Aug. 22 – Oxford, UK @ Truck (In-store)
Tue. Aug. 25 – Canterbury, UK @ Vinylstore Jr (In-store)
Sat. Aug. 29 – Little Mongeham, UK @ Smugglers Festival
Thu. Oct. 1 – Glasgow, UK @ The Poetry Club
Fri. Oct. 2 – Leeds, UK @ The Attic
Sat. Oct. 3 – Manchester, UK @ Low Four Studio
Sun. Oct. 4 – Stroud, UK @ The Prince Albert
Tue. Oct. 6 – Birmingham, UK @ Hare & Hounds
Wed. Oct. 7 – Bristol, UK @ The Jam Jar
Thu. Oct. 8 – Cardiff, UK @ Chapter Arts Centre
Fri. Oct. 9 – Oxford, UK @ Common Ground
Sat. Oct. 10 – Ashburton, UK @ Field System
Sun. Oct. 11 – Brighton, UK @ The Folklore Rooms
Mon. Oct. 19 – New York, NY @ Nightclub 101
Wed. Oct. 21 – Washington, DC @ Pie Shop
Fri. Oct. 23 – Harrisonburg, VA @ Sage Bird
Sat. Oct. 24 – Durham, NC @ The Pinhook
Sun. Oct. 25 – Richmond, VA @ Spacebomb Studio
Tue. Oct. 27 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Mr Small’s Funhouse
Thu. Oct. 29 – Detroit, MI @ Moondog Cafe
Sun. Nov. 1 – Chicago, IL @ Tack Room
Wed. Nov. 4 – Bloomington, IN @ The Bishop
Fri. Nov. 13 – Seattle, WA @ Ballard Homestead
Sat. Nov. 14 – Portland, OR @ Turn Turn Turn
Mon. Nov. 16 – San Francisco, CA @ 4 Star Theater
Tue. Nov. 17 – Los Angeles, CA @ Moroccan Lounge
Thu. Dec. 3 – London, UK @ Cecil Sharp House
*supporting Angelo de Augustine
The Knife, The Needle (August 21st, 2026) Merge Records
Pre-Order: https://lnk.to/TheKnifeTheNeedle