Alex Gallacher

“Allison de Groot & Rich Ruth” started as a plan for Rich Ruth to produce a solo banjo record for de Groot. Over a year in his Nashville studio, it became something else — a collaborative debut where clawhammer banjo runs through loops and delay into synthesizers. Acoustic tradition and electronic texture are inseparable from the first note.

Carson McHone is our latest “Off the Shelf” guest, picking ten objects from home ahead of her UK and European tour. From a Langston Hughes poetry book held together by duct tape to a Robin Williamson painting and a Swedish flea-market tambourine that sounds terrible — stories of travel, family and creative life.

Setting have shared “Your Destiny Distresses Me,” a Bandcamp-exclusive single from the same Drop of Sun sessions in Asheville that produced their self-titled album for Thrill Jockey. The nearly eight-minute track draws on acoustic sound sources and dense binaural synth — a piece the trio recognised early as belonging in its own isolated context.

Lael Neale has shared “Slip Away,” the first single from her new album “As Killers Do,” out November 20th on her own new label, Consensual Sound. The song comes with a stop-motion video built from her own paintings, and the album was recorded on a cassette 8-track in an Echo Park kitchen. She tours through September, including Green Man Festival.

Bill Baird shares “Karma Loan,” the latest single from forthcoming album “Life Creates Itself,” due September 25th on Royal Oakie Records. Recorded at Sear Sound in New York City in a single day, produced by Jasper Leach and mastered by KRAMER, the album draws on Doug Sahm, Roky Erickson, Arthur Russell and Captain Beefheart, marking Baird’s return to San Antonio after years of wandering.

Black Duck and Elena Setién share “Funeral in My Brain,” the final single from “Black Duck with Elena Setién,” their collaborative debut out August 28th via Thrill Jockey. The track draws on Emily Dickinson’s 1862 poem. The quartet came together on shared Spanish tour dates in early 2025 and recorded at Palisade Studio in Chicago.

Steven R. Smith will release “Half Light Unfolding” on September 4th via Eiderdown Records. A departure from three decades of dense psychedelia and layered overdubs, the album is built around Spanish guitar and piano — ten tracks recorded at his Los Angeles studio. Music journalist Marc Masters calls it “a true landmark” in Smith’s career.

Nick Jonah Davis will release “Rose Delta Rising” on 4th September via Eiderdown Records and Cardinal Fuzz Records. His most collaborative album yet, it opens solo guitar pieces to drums, bass and strings, recorded at Black Bay Studio in the Outer Hebrides. Some compositions date back years, finding new life in the company of fellow musicians.

Babehoven share “Three Reds,” the latest single and video from their third album “I See Them, I See Me,” due September 18th via Double Double Whammy. The Hudson, New York duo opened up their process this time, recording across four studios and live-tracking with a six-person ensemble. The album follows 2024’s “Water’s Here In You.”

Our latest Monday Morning Brew playlist is out, featuring new music from The Furrow Collective, MF Tomlinson, Sir Richard Bishop, a new Blaze Foley tribute album, Margaret Glaspy, Kam Franklin and more, along with a stack of new music recommendations ranging from English Psych Folk to an album inspired by Southern Africa’s indigenous guitar traditions.

Joshua Van Tassel’s “Yearner” is a standalone single on which, alongside the composer’s much-loved Ondea, a modern Ondes Martenot, features Afie Jurvanen (of Bahamas) on bass, Joseph Shabason on woodwinds and Rose Cousins on wordless vocals; the piece moves through feelings of loss, yearning, memory and beauty.

This week’s Mixtape opens with our Artists of the Month, Mama’s Broke. We’ve also got new music from Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Julia Holter, BJ Cole & Secondson, Sir Richard Bishop, Blake Hornsby, Mcdara Yeates, Eliana Glass, Julia Holter and more, plus archive gems from Joanna Newsom, Harvey Lord, Alasdair Roberts & James Green, Olivia Chaney, Amiina, The Memory Band and more.