Alex Gallacher

This week’s KLOF mixtape features Fust and Sluice, who share band members – Sluice’s exceptional Companion comes highly recommended. Brown Wimpenny get a double ahead of their debut album, while Wendy Eisenberg — whom Thomas Blake recently called “one of the most talented musical artists of their generation” — previews their self-titled, out tomorrow on Joyful Noise. Plus Plankton Wat, Brown Horse, Big Thief, Steve Gunn, and more.

Jesca Hoop has shared “Big Storm”, a propulsive new single and video from her forthcoming album “Long Wave Home.” Born from a moment of near-total flight — a plan to disappear, upended by the biggest storm in recent history — the track is a reckoning with the impossibility of escape. Watch the video now and pre-order the album ahead of its 1st May release.

Big Potato Records have announced Dream Me A Dream, the final studio album from Tucker Zimmerman, out June 19th. Listen to the first single Sun In Scorpio now. Pairing banjo, violin and swirling organ with orchestral Moog and analogue synths, Zimmerman leapt into textures recalling the electronica adventures of his earlier work. He was in his eighties, and it sounds like nothing else he recorded.

Watch the video for The Roustabout Song by Old Spot, taken from their new album “Old Spot (II),” out April 24th on Scribe Records. First encountered at a Morris festival singing session, the track traces a transatlantic thread from English folklorist Sandy Paton to songwriter Dillon Bustin, rendered here as a joyful fiddle-and-banjo reimagining with deep political undertones.

Manchester/Liverpool/London folk collective Brown Wimpenny announce their debut album Long Live Brown Wimpenny, due 5th June via Broadside Hacks Recordings, alongside new single Old Molly Metcalfe — a cinematic reinvention of Jake Thackray’s bleak tale of a North Yorkshire shepherdess. Enriching Thackray’s a cappella melody with an eerie, enchanting arrangement, the track opens with a live archive performance from the songwriter himself.

We’re premiering the video for “King Orfeo,” the debut single from Birdvox — the new project from Sarah Hayes, Inge Thomson, Jenny Sturgeon and Charlotte Printer. An adaptation of a traditional Orpheus myth with a refrain in the now extinct Scandinavian language of Norn, it’s the first taste of their forthcoming album “Shamming The Drama,” due on Hudson Records later this year.

Alongside this week’s Monday Morning Brew Playlist, our Substack Subscribers get to read an advance copy of an upcoming Off the Shelf feature from Natalie Wildgoose, whose new EP, Rural Hours, is due April 15th via state51. The Brew includes new tunes from Juni Habel, Magic Tuber Stringband, The Deslondes, Lemoncello, Dead Goat, Andrew Wasylyk, Mike Tod, Kris Drever, Emily Portman, Alela Diane, Sluice, tofusmell, Joshua Burnside and more.

The latest KLOF Mixtape moves from Félicia Atkinson & Christina Vantzou’s dreamlike soundscapes anchored in sea, sky and stone to the airy, pastoral improvisations of Prymek & Sage. Alongside new offerings from Sam Grassie, Magic Tuber Stringband, Juni Habel, Pan•American, Buck Meek and more, ancient folk recordings from Tibet and Greece complete a collection for unhurried listening.

Durham, NC quartet Sluice release Companion, their third album and Mtn Laurel Recording Co. debut, on March 27th. Recorded at Sylvan Esso’s studio Betty’s and tended over two years, the album finds frontman Justin Morris reckoning with disillusionment, a violent robbery, and the long road back to music — framing companionship, in love and in community, as worth the struggle.

Juni Habel releases ‘Pearl Cloud Song,’ a lush instrumental from her forthcoming album “Evergreen In Your Mind,” out 10th April on Basin Rock. Born from an open tuning discovery, the track layers steel-string guitar with Herman Wildhagen’s pedal steel and distant vocal traces — a beautiful, unhurried piece from one of folk’s most compelling new voices.

Magic Tuber Stringband share “Where the Place Becomes Forgetting,” a gorgeous single from their upcoming album “Heavy Water”. Featuring field recordings from a pond on the edge of a nuclear site in Northern Georgia, the track layers steady banjo and guitar riffing with fraught fiddle swoops — watch the intimate live performance video now.

The Huntress and Holder of Hands have announced ‘Babylon’, their second album, due June 5th. A decade on from their debut ‘Avalon’, MorganEve Swain’s project — born from the loss of her husband and musical partner, Dave Lamb (Brown Bird) — returns heavier and fuller, grappling with corruption, redemption and hope. Dark-hued new single Promethean is out now.