Margo Cilker has announced her third album, Little White Cross, due October 9th via Fossil Records, the label she co-founded with fellow musician ISMAY (Avery Hellman). Today she shares the album’s title track and lead single, originally written by her friend Christy Hays.
In Cilker’s hands, Little White Cross plays as a country classic, its stark imagery of a roadside car crash carrying the weight of broader reckoning — what we answer for as individuals, as a society, as a species. It’s a telling opener for an album Cilker has half-jokingly described as a concept record: “If that concept is that I got really sad and went to Texas.”
Texas is where the album was made. Cilker travelled to Lockhart to record at The Bunker with Bruce Robison, the writer and producer behind work by Charley Crockett, Lee Ann Womack and The Chicks. It marks a departure from the Pacific Northwest settings of her first two albums, both produced by Sera Cahoone. Robison’s studio band includes pedal steel player Eric Heywood, Geoff Queen, Beth Chrisman, Lisa Pankratz and Scott Davis, among others.
“I had some material so dark I didn’t think I’d show it to Bruce,” Cilker says. “Then I remembered this is the man who wrote ‘Travelin’ Soldier.'” The pair recorded directly to tape in an all-analog setup, situating Cilker’s originals alongside covers she had taken to playing as a way to process her own pain — some sourced from within her immediate music community.
Little White Cross follows 2023’s Valley of Heart’s Delight.
Upon release, Cilker heads out on an East Coast co-headline tour with Lilly Hiatt, followed by headlining shows in Portland and Seattle and a West Coast run supporting The Cactus Blossoms.
Little White Cross (October 9th, 2026) Fossil Records
Margo Cilker On Tour
October 8 – Higher Ground – South Burlington, VT*
October 9 – Iron Horse Music Hall – Northampton, MA*
October 10 – One Longfellow Square – Portland, ME*
October 12 – Baby’s All Right – Brooklyn, NY*
October 13 – MilkBoy – Philadelphia, PA*
October 14 – DC9 – Washington, DC*
October 16 – The Hangar – Troy, NY*
October 17 – Cafe 939 – Boston, MA*
October 28 – Polaris Hall – Portland, OR+
October 29 – Tractor Tavern – Seattle, WA+
November 7 – Globe Hall – Denver, CO^
November 8 – The Marigold Room – Santa Fe, NM^
November 10 – Hotel Congress – Tucson, AZ^
November 12 – Dune Room – Indio, CA^
November 13 – The Roxy Theatre – West Hollywood, CA^
November 14 – The Chapel – San Francisco, CA^
November 15 – Felton Music Hall – Felton, CA^
*co-headline tour with Lilly Hiatt
+headlining album release shows
^supporting The Cactus Blossoms