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Betrayal Beckons Redemption in Randy Beth’s Graceful Pop Rush, ‘classy’

Posted on 9 June 2026

Randy Beth belongs to the rare breed of pop artist whose celestial glow of an aura becomes addictive from the first melodic breath of her music. Her latest single, classy, which has racked up almost 50k streams on Spotify alone since its recent launch, exhibits how redemptive it is to move on from heartache and betrayal with class, grace, and the refusal to do anything except put yourself first.

The spirited sense of soul in the production sweeps you up in an arcane arrangement as hazy hues spill around you, while Randy Beth’s cinematically warm vocals keep everything tethered. She reaches the epitome of consolation without sacrificing the infectious melodic propulsion of the release, letting classy feel emotionally generous while still carrying that polished pop voltage needed to make it stick.

Based in New York, Randy Beth began sharing her songs with her 2021 debut single, make a home, and has continued building a catalogue rooted in emotional storytelling and visual world-building. Now on her eighth single, she sharpens her sound around betrayal, ego, and the return of self-worth with the kind of clean-lined pop conviction that feels ready for a much larger audience.

It is about time Taylor Swift ate her heart out to another pop trailblazer’s sound, and with classy, Randy Beth handed her the fork.

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

Follow Randy Beth on Instagram.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Rayrick’s ‘Orbit’ Sends Tenderness Through Cosmically Spaced Electronica and Neon New Wave Desire

Posted on 5 June 2026

On June 5th, Rayrick launched his most intimately interstellar release yet with Orbit. With his unique talent in bringing tenderness into expansive sound design, the Taiwan-born, NYC-based electronica artist has been making all the right waves since his debut; he approaches retro-futurist soundscapes with reverence for past and present, keeping the soul of 80s synth pop alive while exhibiting how attuned he is to the fervour that falls over contemporary dancefloors.

Passion finds its propulsion through the strobing synths, snares, cosmically spacious motifs and vocals, delivered by a guest vocalist whose emotive depth rivals the Grand Canyon, pulling you into a black hole of sticky-sweet progressive pop romanticism glossed with the neon strobe lights of new wave synth pop. Orbit carries melodic dubstep, bass, and progressive house through a clean-lined, emotionally heightened production style that’s built for headphones and rooms where bodies move under ultraviolet light.

As a producer, DJ, and audio engineer, Rayrick brought his technical chops to the single without sterilising its sentiment. His attention to structure, pacing, and atmosphere gives Orbit its sense of lift, letting the track feel expansive, intimate, and ready for late-night surrender.

Orbit 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

Bushwick Princess – Dead/Basic: A Darkwave Synth-Pop Sanctuary for Those on the Edge of Acceptability

Posted on 27 April 2026

Darkwave synth pop got its swagger back in the enigmatic single and debut music video, Dead/Basic by the alt-indie trio, Bushwick Princess, who may not hide their influences, in this case, it’s a mash-up of Thriller-era Michael Jackson and Depeche Mode, but originality still slithers from the single, which gyrates through the shadows of 80s pop and the strobe lights of electronic post-punk.

As an earworm guaranteed to give you hard enough kinetic kicks you’ll be left with bruises, Bushwick Princess, with their deadpan debonair panache, left nothing to be desired. There’s no trace of irony in the mantra “I’d rather be dead than basic”, which could be read as pretentious, but those in the know will resonate with the refrain that highlights the insufferable nature of a world which rejects culture and individuality for hegemony.

It’s the kind of single you could imagine Joe Keery releasing, if he were daring enough to be contrarian in a bid to comfort the other disturbed outliers looking for anthems to dance to on the edge of acceptability; the cinematic music video is effortlessly in that vein. Just don’t ask where they got that coffin.

Based in Brooklyn and led by Matt Francini, Bushwick Princess is setting Dead/Basic up as the opening statement from an EP due later this year, channelling a love for indie dance and post-punk through a sound that also tips its hat to LCD Soundsystem and Hot Chip. If you’re tired of banal and superficial alt-electronica, you’ll want to save a space on your radar for the forthcoming hits from Bushwick Princess, who have more than earned their royal status with their debauched approach to adding a touch of class to the airwaves.

Dead/Basic is now available to stream on all major platforms. For the full experience, stream the official music video on YouTube.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Yolanda Johnson Poured Brooklyn-Born Soul into the Sepia-Soaked Self-Advocacy of STFU

Posted on 4 April 2026

If anyone in the modern era of RnB can be revered as a natural born conduit of old-school soul, it’s the Brooklyn-born singer-songwriter and creative visionary, Yolanda Johnson. As resolving as you’d hope mid-century romanticism would sound, the artist’s latest single, STFU, is filtered through a velvety rich sepia haze, which softens the corners of the instrumentals and the lyrical blows in this thematically fiery release.

Raised in a deeply musical household as the daughter of 1970s recording artist Samuel Jonathan Johnson, and writing songs since the age of five, Johnson brings a lived-in sense of soul to a track that feels deeply rooted in feeling and memory. What makes STFU land so powerfully is the luxuriant way it illustrates how self-empowerment, advocacy and diehard romanticism fit hand in hand. Johnson flipped the proverbial script by writing this love letter to herself and every other woman out there who needs reminding that suffering fools in the name of love is a sacrifice of your own power. Her delivery carries warmth, poise and emotional clarity, while the arrangement keeps everything wrapped in that rich sepia glow.

From Sweet Yesterday to Violet Flower and Breathing, which featured work with Grammy-winning producer Symbolyc One (S1), Johnson has sustained a gift for soulful storytelling, and STFU feels like a fiercely assured return.

Until STFU drops, follow Yolanda Johnson on Facebook and Instagram to keep up to date with news of the release.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Jake Marsh reached the epitome of sublimity the indie pop boy-next-door bubble of candour, ‘edge of the bed’

Posted on 5 March 2026

Being a bedroom pop artist never used to be a badge of honour, yet Jake Marsh has helped elevate the intimate genre with his debut album, edge of the bed. The record ticks every box for that candour-by-candlelight immersion, or the blue glow of a screen at 2 a.m., carrying the familiar sensation of a diary entry drifting across the airwaves. Marsh’s songwriting leans fully into that closeness, allowing listeners to sit in the quiet of his thoughts rather than merely observe them from afar.

The album opens confidently with magnets, where Marsh fuses his cultivated command of a fretboard with the humility that defines his lyrical presence. There’s a disarming sincerity in the way he lets the listener wander through the dreamy hues of infatuation. The grooves lock the opening track firmly into a new-wave pop lane, while the soft sonorous production constructs a weightless corridor of reverie to stroll through.

Across the record, Marsh reveals an eclectically constraint-less songwriting approach, guided by vocal melodies that feel effortlessly mellifluous. It’s the sort of LP that provides refuge when the weight of reality becomes too loud, wrapping you inside a bubble of boy-next-door charm and understated warmth. Rather than glorifying heartbreak theatrics, the debut encourages listeners to pay attention to the delicate tug of sincerity that pulls far deeper.

Originally from New York City, Marsh wrote and produced the album in his bedroom studio, penning over 40 tracks before curating the LP into 11 tracks which (subjectively) peak with ‘medusa’; a track that glows with diaphanous dream-pop textures and transcendental timbre, revealing the honeyed sincerity that has already attracted more than 36,000 monthly Spotify listeners worldwide.

edge of the bed is now available on all major streaming platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

The Going Rate – Road to Nowhere: A New-Wave Ska Riot Fueled by Iridescent Horns

Posted on 10 February 2026

Road to Nowhere by The Going Rate

In The Going Rate’s Road to Nowhere, the galloping guitars rush forward with a momentum, carrying iridescent-with-euphoria horns that flare against the rapturously zealous vocal delivery. There is no separation between voice and instrumentation; they surge together as a single ecstatic force, turning the age-old idiom at the track’s core into a spark of renewal capable of tilting a worldview back toward possibility.

The slightly surrealist middle eight deepens the sense that stepping into The Going Rate’s whirling dervish of a ska world comes with its own rites. Expectation becomes irrelevant when uncertainty is greeted with a smorgasbord of talent, zero restraint, and a vitality that very few outfits inside or outside the ska zeitgeist have the audacity to carry. The vocals act as a steadying force within this sunny side up burst of serotonin, radiating the kind of exhilaration that would surface if Debbie Harry had steered Blondie headfirst into ska. It’s a new-wave riot with its blood up.

The narrative behind the brightness reaches further than the thrill of the arrangement. Road to Nowhere was shaped as an anthem for reclaiming your own direction through doubt, obstacles, and the weight that gathers when you forget your own agency. The horn-heavy progressions and fast-paced guitars pull that intention into physical motion, sending the listener through winding harmonies and straight into an uplifting final chorus. The unresolved closing chord leaves the question hanging in the air, nudging the listener toward whatever comes next.

As a collective, The Going Rate fold their multi gender, multi racial line up into a sound driven by unity, exuberance, and an unwavering support of original music across Long Island, New York City, and the broader Northeast.

Road to Nowhere is now available on all major streaming platforms via this link.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Banipreet – Bit More Than I Could Chew: A Chanteuse-Tinged Folk Unravelling Steeped in Pain, Volition and Era-Shifting Alchemy

Posted on 7 February 2026

Banipreet opens Bit More Than I Could Chew by tipping Americana Folk into a cauldron of chanteuse-esque soaring vocals that chameleonically flirt with artful histrionics, 60s pop harmonies, contemporary indie confessionalism and cabaret magnetism.

It is a swirl of eras and emotions delivered with such natural ease that you barely notice how many stylistic worlds she threads through in a single breath. The angst, pain and soulful fortitude running through her lyricism set the tone early, and as the layers unfold, she triumphs with a release that feels almost Oscar-worthy in how she slips between tonal modes to perform each line with full-bodied conviction. You taste the alchemy. You feel the weight of what she bit off. You hear the way she spits it back out as something melodic, tender and bruisingly self-aware.

The independent singer-songwriter’s distinction is not only in the sound she conjures but in the instinctive way she channels lived experience into performance. Raised between hymns at her local Sikh temple, Bollywood, Punjabi folk and the Western songwriting traditions she later sought out for herself, her voice carries a lifetime of musical crossings.

After drifting through chapters as varied as flight attendant work, floristry study, henna artistry, van life and caregiving, she stepped away from music entirely until heartbreak sharpened her need to write. Those songs became her lifeline, pulling together threads of folk, pop and acoustic introspection with a rawness she refuses to mute. Now based in New York, and with a debut album on the horizon, Bit More Than I Could Chew feels like a pivotal moment where all the fragments of her life finally converge into a sound that is fiercely her own.

Bit More Than I Could Chew is now available on all major streaming platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Firebranded avant-garde post-punk swagger surges through Roaches, All the Way Up’s standout release

Posted on 1 February 2026

Roaches, All the Way Up are primed to rip through the alt-punk threshold with Roaches, the standout cut from their debut LP, KILL BUGS DEAD, arriving February 20th. The Boston gutterblazers set out to pierce the veil of punk on their own terms, and in this track, they channel the cacophonous fervour of post-hardcore while wrapping it around organic avant-garde motifs.

From the moment the first percussive hit lands, their sound sprawls with hedonistically reckless abandon, letting their sound writhe within their authenticity. The firebranded vocal aesthetic is teasingly ensnaring, playful in the unfuckwithably accessible Kathleen-Hanna way, while the tumultuous rolls of percussive time signatures are wild enough to leave Tool perplexed. It’s a feral introduction that makes their mission unmistakable.

As the chaos sharpens into form, the five friends at the core of RATWU show how naturally they slip into unfiltered expression. Their guitars scrape through oddball theatrics, their rhythmic shifts twist on instinct, and their whole presence feels born from the backrooms and basements that shaped them. The new-wave tinges and post-hardcore bite sit together in a shape that feels self-made rather than borrowed, giving Roaches a boldness that hints at a band intent on building something unruly from the ground up.

The LP was three years in the making, stitched together by a group who treat experimentation as second nature, and this single barely scratches the surface of what they’re gearing up to hurl into the world.

Connect with Roaches, All the Way Up via Instagram and stay tuned for news of their album drop.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

JOHNNY E SULLIVAN mapped Manhattan’s emotional undercurrent in the pop earwom, ‘New York Nights’

Posted on 12 January 2026

Pop rarely sounds as alive as it does in Johnny E Sullivan’s latest single, New York Nights. The 16-year-old New York City native sharpened the edges of metropolitan pop by lacing it with Latin rhythm and late-night pulse, setting a new standard for sonic storytelling from the Gen Z perspective. From the moment the beat kicks in, the earworm writhes with superlative style, echoing the city’s relentless buzz through his impassioned kaleidoscope of layered instrumentals.

Sullivan paints the already relentlessly storied streets with emotional precision. With charisma that’s a gravitational force in itself, he reimagines the cityscape as a place of possibility, fuelled by longing, energy, and creative ambition. Every cadence carries the kind of youthful verve that refuses to settle for the well-trodden path, channelling his reality as a competitive athlete turned songwriter into a pop anthem that speaks volumes.

Since making waves with rooftop sets and unfiltered songwriting clips across social media, he’s rapidly etched out a place in the NYC pop scene with his melodic vulnerability and fresh honesty. Influences from The Kid Laroi, Lauv, and Bazzi are present, but it’s his ability to shape raw experience into something cinematic that’s setting him apart.

New York Nights marks a confident new chapter following the release of ‘It Is What It Is’, teasing a 2026 packed with promise and more emotionally charged singles from one of the city’s brightest young voices.

New York Nights is now available on all major streaming platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

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