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Barstool Warmth and 70s-Rock Rapture: Garrett Barbuto’s Lasting On Is Blues-Rock Soul for Anyone Smiling Through the Struggle

Posted on 6 August 2026

Bluesy dive-bar soul radiates from Lasting On, the latest single by the quintessentially magnetic singer-songwriter Garrett Barbuto. Rooted in rock ’n’ roll, blues rock and soul, the track carries the roadworn glow of an artist who learned music through classic-rock radio, forgotten show tunes, glee-club harmonies and the stubborn romance of picking up a guitar at 20 after seeing Glenn Frey command a stage.

With spoken-word intersections that feel like catching a stand-up routine mid-set, Lasting On keeps the audience close before the guitar-driven melodies take hold again, leading into bluesy 70s-rock rapture. Barbuto places communion at the centre of his art, letting the palpable passion for connection consume the release while the melodies stay upbeat and the atmosphere remains infectiously quaint.

The production has a barstool warmth that seems to be fully soul-sourced. Every guitar lick feels scuffed by neon, the vocal sits forward with storyteller ease, and the rhythm section gives the song enough lift to make its harder truths feel strangely generous. Working with producer and songwriter Neil Gunhold, Barbuto has spent years learning how to turn personal geography into songs that feel open-armed, from Northern Ontario roots to Alberta foothills.

As a true-blue troubadour of feel-good, tongue-in-melody folk-rock rapture, Barbuto knows exactly how to make poetry permeate his sessions of soul with easy candour. He has modernised everyman blues for people who need reminding that even those who are smiling are struggling.

Lasting On is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Head Says Leave, Heart Says Rave: melliejellie Put Y2K DnB in Emotional Overdrive with ‘i won’t wait 4 u’

Posted on 3 August 2026

As the electronica world mourns the loss of Kavinsky, independent artists with the same evocative pull as the iconic creator of the nocturnally lit single, Nightcall, are breaking ground; there’s considerable sonic rubble scattered across the airwaves after melliejellie dropped her DnB instant club classic, i won’t wait 4 u, from her EP, all about u.

Hyper-distorted vox land in every punch of Y2K club nostalgia, pushed into a chrome-edged blur that allows vulnerability to survive inside the digital abrasion. The breakbeat programming balances tightly clipped snare transients against restless kick placement, while disciplined sub bass preserves physical weight beneath the upper frequency onslaught. As the arrangement progresses, rhythmic subdivisions tighten and vocal fragments become percussive material, locking listeners into the emotive tumult of the timeless battle between head and heart, freedom and a chance of connection.

Whether i won’t wait 4 u meets you through headphones during sad girl hours or at club volume, the affecting rush of its hyperpop momentum lands with bruising impact. Her classical training reveals itself through structural control: tension accumulates with compositional precision before the release floods the stereo field. The Mozart crowd may reach for another cup of tea, yet melliejellie commands formidable musical intelligence throughout this visceral, empoweringly cathartic ride.

i won’t wait 4 u is now available to stream on all major platforms, including SoundCloud.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Higher Than Material Reality: DaVinci’s Carousel Built a Psychedelically Transcendent Chamber Pop Cathedral with ‘Keep Them Colored’

Posted on 2 August 2026

As metaphysical as a Murakami novel, DaVinci’s Carousel make the lyrics on their debut LP, Lilac Garden Community, even trippier than their kaleidoscopic, psychedelically enchanted chamber pop meets indie rock arrangements. The standout single, Keep Them Colored, is the ultimate introduction to an outfit too cosmically ambitious to settle for breaking new ground or charting fresh territory with a sound you could build a new age cult around.

They tear through the confines of reality with sweet incantations, placing listeners between Legendary Pink Dots and contemporary indietronica avant-garde art, then courting the rebellious abandon through which shoegaze bands weaponised disorientating distortion. The lush choral light within Keep Them Colored is sweetened by vocal harmonies that pour plush soul into the orchestral architecture, raising an aural cathedral of salvation.

Founders Fergujay and Emeraldom spent ten years conducting alchemical songwriting experiments before opening Lilac Garden Community to the world. Guided by producer Narek Arutyunyants, their theatrical absurdity sends emerald tigers wandering through post-apocalyptic visions, framing art as a force capable of transforming a life. The result is a timeless record, wholly committed to its own strange scripture and ready to reward repeat listens.

Keep Them Colored will get you high enough that local dealers will go bust if DaVinci’s Carousel and their talent-drenched whimsy reach the charts. Yeah, I’m gonna say the cliché line, get them on your radar.

Keep Them Colored is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Love at First Cringe: Connor Fischetti and Mya Riche Brought Soul Back to Alt Indie RnB with ‘Don’t Let Me’

Posted on 1 August 2026

Tender indie acoustic folk pop nostalgia in the vein of Jack Johnson brushes against old-school soul and contemporary RnB funk vision in Don’t Let Me by Connor Fischetti featuring Mya Riche. Quirky in the best possible way, Don’t Let Me puts the awkwardness of early days romance front and centre.

Few artists would think to put the way we cringe at ourselves so hard that it feels like our souls might collapse into a love song, and that’s just one reason we fell head over heels for the singer-songwriter who wears his heart on his sleeve. There’s honeyed vocal chemistry by the smorgasbord in the emotionally potent delivery, while acoustic warmth slips into a deliciously elastic groove.

Based in East Lansing, Michigan, Fischetti writes for a generation negotiating situationships, sex and emotional turmoil with a cheeky wink glinting through the wreckage. His self-titled album traces young adulthood’s euphoric highs and devastating lows through a multi-instrumental vision.

Influenced by Prince, Paul McCartney and Jeff Buckley, he’s clearly absorbed the best of their songwriting chops to infuse into the alt indie RnB genre, which also finds room for sugared swagger that will throw you right back to when Justin Timberlake was throbbing hearts worldwide; he brought sexy back; Connor Fischetti is bringing soul back.

Don’t Let Me is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Ashley Savage Puts Softness on Notice with I Am Savage, a Luxe RnB-Pop Flex Built Like a Warning Shot

Posted on 30 July 2026

I Am Savage is a strong proclamation to make titularly, but when Ashley Savage’s single fires into hyper-fast, head-spinning flows after the luxe RnB-pop nostalgia that will throw you right back to when TLC’s No Scrubs had the RnB scene in a chokehold, the track title becomes impossible to argue with. This is the defining release of an independent artist entering her cinematic luxury-funk era with blades drawn.

Savage threads cinematic sensuality through a ferociously self-reclamative earworm, letting the track glide first on glossed-up RnB seduction before detonating into chopper-rap velocity. Eminem’s Rap God and Tech N9ne’s Worldwide Choppers sit in the reference field for that tongue-twisting athleticism, yet I Am Savage keeps feminine power centre-stage, sharpened by production that feels expensive, dangerous and built for a bruising impact.

Across eight original singles, Ashley Savage has earned chart momentum with Pressure, recognition for Commandments, Amazing Radio playlist support, editorial attention and a fast-growing TikTok audience. I Am Savage feels primed to convert that traction into something bigger; she’s one of the few artists out there able to put spine behind the spectacle.

For too long, women have been expected to be soft and supplicant, but Savage proves that we are at our best when we are unreckonable. She became an icon in her own unapologetic right through I Am Savage, and it’s easy to see how she will lyrically lift other women to those heights too.

I Am Savage is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Jarju Binks Stripped Back the Swagger of Singlehood in the Subversively Psychedelic Masterstroke of Genre Fusion, Nobody’s Girl

Posted on 29 July 2026

Following a swanky old-school jazz prelude, Nobody’s Girl finds a different semblance of swagger as a new-wave indie-pop earworm with a charged rhythm section, crunchy guitars and sustained vocal notes that resonate with the kind of psychedelia often heard ringing through The Stone Roses’ brand of 90s pop. Jarju Binks, the independent singer-songwriter from Hayes, West London, uses that stylistic looseness with proper purpose.

With a title like Nobody’s Girl, it is easy to brace for a potent dose of pensiveness, but Jarju Binks’ talent in subversion clearly is not contained within genre fusion. He brings empowerment to independence before the track shifts gear into jazzy acid-house electricity, bringing it all full circle through the velvety reverberations of a spoken-word sermon about the self-reclamation of singlehood.

Yet Nobody’s Girl refuses to stop at easy liberation. After a psychedelic-rock interlude, Binks paints the other side of independence, bringing another unexpected curveball and revealing the vulnerability behind self-sufficiency, the loneliness behind the façade. In his verses, two realities can exist at once without contradiction, and each new line has a cerebral way of recontextualising the last.

As he works towards his forthcoming album, Love Ain’t Easy, written from the perspective of a cynical romantic and produced by StudioBlak, Jarju Binks is the epitome of a firebrand of lyrical intellect who deserves to be upheld.

Nobody’s Girl is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Mats Skimmelå’s Jazz Score, Bright Days Delivered Sun-Warmed Saxophones and Synaesthesia for the Soul

Posted on 26 July 2026

Mats Skimmelå aired out the airwaves with the temperate breeze of the melodies in one of his most rejuvenating pieces yet, Bright Days. The Swedish pianist and composer creates warm, melodic instrumental music inspired by jazz, bossa nova and atmospheric soundscapes, and this chill Latin tune brings that sensibility into a beautifully poised quartet setting.

While you cannot replace the real thing, Skimmelå efficaciously visualises the sublimity of strolling through the kind of confluence of scenery, warmth and atmosphere you want to immortalise, something you can feel instilling you with a sense of vitality. Featuring saxophonist Johan Pihlström, Bright Days lets the sax lines carry an unforced lyrical glow, with phrasing that feels conversationally fluid and emotionally astute.

The piano holds the arrangement with its elegant harmonic centre, offering soft movement and tasteful chordal colour. Around it, the rhythm section keeps the release swanky, expressive and uninhibitedly free, letting the Latin jazz aesthetics sway and breathe with sophistication.

Following praise for At Dawn, Skimmelå continues to prove his gift for instrumental storytelling, turning melodic clarity into something restorative rather than merely pretty. Bright Days is the release your mind, body and soul never knew they needed, but the weightlessness it leaves you with, how it loosens all of those psychological knots, is profoundly, holistically medicinal.

Bright Days is now available to stream on all major platforms, including SoundCloud.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Leavell’s ‘Spotlight’ Turned Funk-Licked Indie Pop into a Mirror for Digital Exposure

Posted on 26 July 2026

Leavell held a groove-locked indie-pop mirror to the modern malaise of living in a digital panopticon; a world which views our every move as we increasingly see the value of keeping slivers of reality for ourselves. The Kentucky-based singer, songwriter and rapper traded his usual hip-hop weight to animate a summer-ready indie-pop earworm on Spotlight, one of three singles released in a single-day showcase of his range.

The single stands as definitive proof that he’s up there as one of the greatest thematic contemporary lyricists. “She don’t want the spotlight, her flaws will show” is a flooringly ingenious lyrical hook in the context of the feel-good, radio-ready release. Held against warm, mellifluous, guitar-led melodies and conveyed through a honeyed-with-charisma vocal range, it is all too efficacious in exhibiting how we are held hostage to the expectation of being seen. It’s the kind of funk-licked indie-pop hit you can imagine coming out of Daft Punk’s arsenal, but there is no replicating the temperate glow of Leavell’s soul.

Leavell’s own description of popularity as a job of hiding flaws gives the single its cultural bite. He understands that curated glamour often becomes its own cage, where the fear of judgement is dressed up as aspiration. But, sonically, Spotlight is a far cry from a dystopian flare gun; the production carries enough funk-slick lift to make the track feel playlist-ready, while the lyric keeps it grounded in the exhaustion of being perceived. Regardless of how much we want the heart reacts, I’m pretty sure we can all agree.

After building an independent catalogue across relationships, perseverance, accountability and everyday life, Leavell is more than ready to step far beyond “Kentucky’s Best Kept Secret”.

Spotlight is now available to stream on all major platforms. Find your preferred way of listening via this link.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Nimzinoo and ItsAngelBaby blazed across the North-South divide with their seductively dominant drill track, BAD ONE

Posted on 25 July 2026

The collaborative chemistry between Nimzinoo and ItsAngelBaby in their drill drop, BAD ONE, is hot enough to leave fourth-degree burns on the airwaves. The independent South London artist, Nimzinoo, brought his signature high-energy rap, commercial appeal and confident lyricism into a bold radio-ready record that understands exactly how to make drill feel anthemic for the underground and beyond without diluting its bite.

Nimzinoo’s rapid-fire bars blaze against mind-bending instrumentals that swathe lush melodic layers around the dominant tempo of the beat. The sample gives BAD ONE instant familiarity, while the rhythmic pressure keeps the track firmly rooted in contemporary UK rap. Every hook feels built for social media clips, car speakers and late-night rotation, giving the single the kind of reach that could carry it well beyond underground drill circles.

ItsAngelBaby breezes seductively witty wordplay into the production, perfectly balanced between siren-esque smouldering energy and the sharp lyrical charisma needed to hold her own in such a darkly electric hit. Few rising emcees can wax lyrical as magnetically as the Manchester breakthrough artist, who is fully capable of making major strides in UK rap as a standalone entity.

With BAD ONE already under consideration by BBC Introducing and Amazing Radio ahead of release, Nimzinoo’s networking, visual storytelling and independent momentum are clearly paying off.

BAD ONE is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Apple Music and YouTube.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Beth Miller and Harold MacCallum Made ‘Time Machine’ an Acoustic Folk Keepsake for the Last Lover Left Alive

Posted on 24 July 2026

With a crystalline voice that almost carries the warm static of time and love-worn vinyl LPs, Beth Miller made her latest single, Time Machine, feel recovered from a drawer full of unsent letters. Featuring Harold MacCallum, the single takes rose-tinted mementoes and opens them up to the world, allowing the Scottish acoustic-folk singer-songwriter’s fans to live vicariously within the lush romanticism of the love-letter-esque poetry.

There is a beautifully old-fashioned patience in the arrangement: nylon-string guitar, soft vocal phrasing and enough space between the lines for memory to do its worst. Miller has been described as a singer of wee Scottish-sounding songs, but Time Machine proves how far that smallness can travel when the emotional detail is this sharply held. Her voice has a tear-glazed clarity while her writing remains earthy and witty in its amorously imaginative introspection.

The lyrics voiced between the two artists could have been exchanged between Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald. As the outro arrives, the longing between the lovers becomes devastatingly sweet, broadsiding with the same kind of tragic finality as Nick Cave and Kylie’s Where the Wild Roses Grow. Time Machine captures the raw pain of reality, when there is only one lover left alive. One thing is for sure: after the final lyric has recontextualised the entire arrangement and narrative, you won’t stop at first listen. You’ll want to consume Time Machine again in it’s complete bittersweet beauty.

Time Machine is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

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