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Soul

Kobie’s ‘Main Thang’ Carried the Airwaves into a Love Bubble of Retro RnB and Indie-Tinted Soul

Posted on 9 June 2026

Kobie’s Just Friends is the ultimate debut album drop for the true romantics; boundaries blur, steam rises, senses are lost, and soul dominates in the smooth, slow-burning album, which reflects contemporary dynamics through the lens of retro RnB aesthetics. That sensibility reaches its most affecting point in the standout single, Main Thang, written for anyone tired of playing it cool and ready for unconditional, undivided connection.

The Latin guitar flourishes turn up the fire that simmers from Kobie’s harmonies, taking impassioned and pure desire to new euphonic heights. As he visualises the transcendence of letting your heart rule your head, you can feel the hazy love bubble wrap around you, softening the edges of hesitation until surrender starts to sound inevitable.

Built from underground culture and internet-era artistry, Kobie moves with the awareness of an independent artist, curator, and creative entrepreneur shaping more than a release cycle. His world spans music, visuals, live experiences, digital storytelling, and direct audience connection, giving Main Thang a sense of intimacy with serious cultural reach. Hip-hop, alternative textures, and modern youth culture ripple beneath the RnB romance, while the production keeps the focus on emotional immediacy.

Main Thang is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Terrence Lamar’s Calvary Carries Inspirational Soul into the Sacred Architecture of Survival

Posted on 7 June 2026
Terrence Lamar

If resilience feels hard to find, fall into Terrence Lamar’s LP, HELP OTW, which blurs the lines between RnB and gospel, using the arcane choral timbres of gospel and the sweet, affectionate soul of RnB to sign, seal, and deliver pure transcendence from the weight you are trying to outrun. In the standout single, Calvary, the independent Michigan inspirational soul artist becomes a brother in arms to each soul searching for a salve.

His sense of soul defies placement between old-school and contemporary; Terrence Lamar is a timeless conduit of feel-good finesse. Even if the euphonic production exhibits him as a cinematically graceful contemporary artist whose career carries the scope to reign across the airwaves, stand at the vanguard of a prestigious choir, and rack up sync deals as he steals hearts beyond his nation.

Rooted in faith, perseverance, and overcoming difficult seasons, Calvary turns spiritual endurance into something tactile. Lamar’s voice holds the maturity and consolation of someone who understands the valley without surrendering the promise of ascent. Across HELP OTW, he writes from the place where hardship becomes testimony and melody becomes shelter, leaving enough room for wounded listeners to recognise their own fight without feeling preached at.

Calvary is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Apple Music.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Gloria – To Be Loved: Old-School RnB Gospel for Romance-Weary Souls

Posted on 5 June 2026

To Be Loved, the latest slow-burning session of old-school RnB from Swedish-British singer-songwriter Gloria, is gospel for the romance weary. Passion shimmers through the minimalist production, where the snares keep their veracity and the harmonies smooth over each note, aiding the overall sense of transcendence within a release that visualises the sublimity of true love with striking clarity.

Gloria clearly has a natural talent for orchestrating sonic worlds from our most visceral sensations. In To Be Loved, that ability glows through restraint; each melodic phrase is placed with intuitive tenderness, amplifying the devotional weight of the single which carries an old-school RnB softness, yet its tenderness feels entirely present, shaped by an artist who understands how intimacy can become its own form of grandeur.

Based in London and creating heartfelt R&B-influenced pop, Gloria Musique is building an ambitious catalogue of 50 songs by the end of 2026. That dedication already feels embedded in To Be Loved, a single that exhibits a songwriter refining her own emotional language with patience, grace, and quiet conviction.

To Be Loved is now available to stream on all major platforms via this link.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Micah Marine’s second eponymous album allows pop to walk barefoot through blues, soul and Americana fantasy

Posted on 2 June 2026

Micah Marine brought a burst of authenticity back to pop with his second eponymous album, Micah Marine 2. The expansively styled LP traverses the entire pop spectrum, travelling further across the span of one single than many pop artists do in a lifetime. The second track on the LP, Daddy, is the ultimate introduction to Micah Marine’s soul-pop fusionist style.

The way he brings blues beyond genre and into an art form that reverberates with mainstream appeal is almost as affecting as the experience of the single itself. As acoustic guitar strings twang and the percussion is kept traditional, Micah uses his voice to push the arbitrary parameters of blues, allowing it to shine with brand new warmth while pop adopts the salacious-to-the-soul grooves.

Micah Marine’s wider world is rooted in cinematic pop, alternative pop, dream-pop aesthetics, Americana fantasy, and emotional storytelling, yet Daddy proves the mythology works because the feeling comes first.

His music moves between the spaces of intimate confessionalism and movie-soundtrack resonance, where heartbreak is gold-shimmered theatre, and reinvention becomes survival. Across Micah Marine 2, he folds healing, ambition, memory, identity, and escapism into songs that reach for something larger than life. Daddy gives that universe its most tactile pulse, all bluesy intimacy, soul-pop glow, and a fearless emotional core.

Micah Marine 2 is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Apple Music.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Chanteuse Aura, Latin Soul and Cinematic Strings Glow Through Princess Luminous’ Dance Forever

Posted on 2 June 2026

Princess Luminous stayed true to her moniker in her latest release, Dance Forever; luxe Latin luminosity glows through the sensual production, bringing cinematic grace to a chanteuse-esque vocal-led performance. Written by Princess Luminous and co-produced with Phillip B, the single moves with the timeless elegance of rumba, sweeping cello, and cinematic strings while carrying the yearning romance of Bésame Mucho into a dance-floor setting.

The way she teases the promise of passion in perpetuity through the complex rhythmic arrangement leaves your senses in flux as you are drawn into her timelessly ensnaring aura. Dance Forever feels like the dancefloor has been transformed into a grand ballroom, where desire is choreographed through each turn of the rhythm as each string phrase glints with old-world glamour.

Inspired by Princess Luminous’ childhood in Mexico, the track carries warm Latin soul through its melodic architecture, keeping the passion refined rather than overplayed. Following her critically praised cover of Moon River, which earned Song of the Day recognition from All About Jazz, Dance Forever shows an artist who can make sophistication feel sensual, theatrical, and deeply alive. A forthcoming London live performance and debut album should only deepen the spell around her cinematic Latin-pop world, with more velvet-footed drama waiting in the wings.

Dance Forever is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Carver Jones Turned BEST FRIEND into a Soft-Focus Indie Rock Hymn for People Still Chasing Feeling

Posted on 30 May 2026

In the same way Jack Johnson hypnotised acoustic indie fans in the 00s, Carver Jones possesses that seraphic sweet sensibility that makes even the edges he etches into BEST FRIEND feel like dreamy incantations of pure soul. The 22-year-old Omaha singer-songwriter repurposes folksy indie pop rock melodies to orchestrate semi-lucid escapism for anyone seeking the softer side of the human experience.

Carver Jones is superlative when it comes to lulling his expansive international fanbase into a catatonic state of pure serene sublimity with his soprano harmonies and Y2K pop lyrical waxing, making proclamations of passion that dig deeper into emotion than most. BEST FRIEND carries that open-road ache with sun-warmed intimacy, as though the track was written somewhere between a van door left open, a street-corner performance, and the kind of late-night confession that changes the temperature of a friendship.

After turning down a college basketball scholarship, Jones spent three years travelling America with his two best friends, performing from street corners to packed venues, experiences that now live inside the grain of his songwriting. Following CARV, the AMERICAN DREAMERS series, a sold-out US tour with 54 Ultra, and LIVE FROM MOHAWK, BEST FRIEND continues the rollout for his forthcoming 8 EP with wide-eyed nostalgia, emotional nerve, and folk-pop sincerity.

BEST FRIEND is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Jack Rush Turned Surfy 60s Pop and 90s Indie Swagger into Solstice Gold with ‘Dreaming Again (Here Comes Summer)

Posted on 22 May 2026

If any single can make the summer solstice sweeter, it is the saturated, surfy, and sun-bleached earworm, Dreaming Again (Here Comes Summer) by Jack Rush, an accomplished singer-songwriter whose sound refines the jangly, psychedelically nuanced essence of 60s and 70s pop and rock by rooting it in 90s indie rock swagger.

Far from Oasis-esque posturing associated with 90s indie, this temperate dream of a release practically demands radio A-list placement with its sticky-sweet soul and tender swells of organic euphoria.

As much of a visual experience as an aural one, Dreaming Again leaves you with woozy, sepia-tinged Polaroids of oceanscapes, top-down car rides, and Woodstock-esque festival joy breezing by on the melodies, implanting idyllic faux memories in your mind that you will be determined to replicate as soon as the mercury starts to rise.

Underpinning the reel of picturesque summer escapades, there is the bitterness of mourning connections that dissipated in spite of lingering affection; the ultimate reminder to keep hold of what matters when it grows cold.

Dreaming Again (Here Comes Summer) is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Every Kind of Way Carries the Smoke of Stephània’s Slow-Burning R&B Single, into Velvety Cinematic Soul

Posted on 22 May 2026

RnB singer, songwriter, and producer Stephània is a siren of slow-burning soul, and through her delicately diaphanous command over complex emotion, she places herself firmly within the pantheon of modern RnB. In the smooth, cinematic sheen of her latest single, Every Kind of Way, echoes of 90s RnB reverberate through production polished to a crystalline finish.

The momentum never slips as Stephània uses unflinching desire to drive the release, grounding the emotional core of the single in passion rather than possession, giving Every Kind of Way its sense of resolute resonance. The velvety richness wraps around her warm vocal tone with total elegance, while the bluesy guitar solo rounds out the single with a final flare of grown, sensual soul.

Raised in Cyprus by an Irish mother and Cypriot father, the Los Angeles-based artist carries the influence of Michael Jackson, Earth, Wind & Fire, Etta James, Lalah Hathaway, and H.E.R. through a sound rooted in personal storytelling and polished vocal command. After touring with Disney Concerts in China, performing on the Life & Music of George Michael tour, and sharing stages connected to major soul and rock legacies, Stephània possesses the presence of an artist ready for wider recognition.

Every Kind of Way is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify. 

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Mosquito by Toria Rainey Lets Sepia-Hued Soul and Y2K Pop Bite Back

Posted on 21 May 2026

Toria Rainey possesses the kind of hypnotic magnetism that instantly transfixes. In her latest single, Mosquito, the saturated and indie nostalgia-slicked bassline pulls you right into the atmosphere of the slow-burning sepia-hued soul. Even if she was singing acapella, her voice would leave no void to fill in a production; the honeyed warmth swarms through the groove-driven alt-indie RnB pop synthesis, which carries Rainey’s resolving harmonies and bursts of fiery conviction.

There are echoes of Y2K pop in the vein of Natasha Bedingfield reverberating through the smoky production, which uses moody nuances to balance the style with substance. Using mosquitoes as the perfect parable for how some relationships suck you dry, Rainey turns the average redemption RnB pop single that scathes in the rubble of a relationship into a cathartically empowering revolution, serving as the ultimate reminder that martyrdom has no place in relationships.

The Brooklyn-based artist writes through identity, trauma, desire, blurred boundaries, and self-reinvention without sanding down the sharp edges. As part of her forthcoming EP, Muscle Memories, Mosquito sits inside a wider exploration of autonomy, the body’s memory, and the daily decision to choose yourself after damage has tried to define you. She should be an icon in everyone’s book.

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

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Indie Folk Pop Drift into Tender Rebirth in Jemerine Chan’s Pensive Lullaby, ‘Let Go’

Posted on 17 May 2026

Jemerine Chan is unrivalled in her ability to take raw reflections of pain and alchemise them into tenderly diaphanous indie folk pop lullabies which drift through the soul as semi-lucid pensive poetry. With her latest single, Let Go, the Malaysian-born, London-based singer-songwriter and producer reaches an affecting zenith, nestling into the arcane edges of indie dream pop with a release that feels weightlessly emotionally loaded.

Let Go demands you lean into the contours, embrace the accordantly caressive atmosphere, and feel the melodies rise like tendrils of smoke around you. Graceful candour has become the cornerstone of Chan’s song-stitching, and here, in a relinquishing of the demons that keep you chained to what you have outgrown, she visualises a tender, tentative rebirth, humanising the experience into one that reflects the anxious reality of renewal.

Her momentum has been steadily gathering force, with BBC Introducing in Kent supporting Adrenaline Rush, over 25K organic streams in 2025, seven Spotify editorial playlist placements, and performances across festivals and venues including O2 Academy Islington and Outernet London. Her award-winning single Black Rose also earned a Silver Medal at the Global Asian Creative Awards, further affirming the depth behind her ascent.

Let Go is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify. 

Review by Amelia Vandergast