Browsing Tag

Acoustic Indie

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

Maisy Grace Let Hymnal Harmonies and Hypnotic Acoustic Strings Carry ‘stepping stone’ into the Reverie of Indie Melancholy

Posted on 16 March 2026
Maisy Grace

If any new artist deserves to reign alongside revered indie icons in the vein of Lorde, London Grammar, Tom Odell and Lucy Dacus, it’s Maisy Grace. On her latest single, stepping stone, she delivers a warmth that feels almost hauntingly spectral, drawing listeners into an intimate sonic space where quiet reflection carries the emotional gravity.

Her vocal inflexions cut deeper than any superficial hook ever could, holding the listener in place through a performance that feels delicately commanding, and the artistic depth within the textures of the arrangement reaches a place beyond beguiling. Acoustic guitar strings sit front and centre in the mix as a metronomically hypnotic presence, their resonance allowed to ring above hymnally lush harmonies, which render melancholy into forlorn self-doubt that becomes a strange sense of comfort.

There is space in the production, space for breath, space for the listener to linger in the ache that Grace communicates so instinctively. Within that openness, the single exhibits the ocean of depth inside her voice, both in tone and in the all-consuming wistfully matured presence she carries across the airwaves.

Grace’s songwriting sensibilities grew between the Cornish coast and the creative swirl of London life, grounding her music in lived experience rather than performative sentiment. A recent pause from releasing music appears to have sharpened her perspective; stepping stone carries the clarity of an artist who has returned with renewed focus on storytelling and emotional honesty.

Within the track, motifs from jazz-inclined easy listening drift through the flotsam of mainstream indie. Listeners quickly find themselves caught in the undercurrent of one of the most affecting indie releases set to surface in 2026.

stepping stone is now available on all major streaming platforms, including YouTube Music.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Michael Louis Austin – Hearts on Sleeves: Indie Americana Folk to Ache and Ascend With

Posted on 25 December 2025
Michael Louis Austin

Michael Louis Austin lets his sonic signature resound as an artful indie spin on Americana folk in Hearts on Sleeves, an LP that proves how cerebral immersivity can meet absolute accessibility without losing emotional weight. Across these tracks, he becomes one of the most magnetic troubadours of our times. The way he lights the fuse of his melancholic vignettes with arrangements that spark with joviality turns the record into a quiet triumph of resistance. He harnesses the pain of the protagonists in his panoramas, caressing them with empathy, and lets anyone listening find comfort and inspiration in the way he searches for the lightest lens to view the world through.

The emotional palette never settles. One moment the album drifts through art indie art folk, the next it grows into rugged country rock crescendos before sinking into Elliott Smith-esque introspection or sticky-sweet odes to Southern country. Hearts on Sleeves carries it all with fluidity, finding ways to make your heart ache before offering a salve that stays long after the last chord fades. It is a tour de force that exemplifies what it means for a singer-songwriter to let his soul lead the way through his arrangements.

Produced in Las Vegas by Thaddeus Corea, the LP sits comfortably within the alt country rock lineage while still feeling unmistakably his. With one of the most affecting voices heard this year, Austin keeps each song rooted in sincerity rather than spectacle. As Christmas approaches, Hearts on Sleeves feels like a gift worth unwrapping the moment it reaches the airwaves.

Hearts on Sleeves is now available on all major streaming platforms Find your preferred way to listen on the artist’s website. 
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Review by Amelia Vandergast

Joshua Wales – Don’t Worry: Sublimely Seraphic Indie Folk

Posted on 13 November 2024

If The National veered into acoustic indie folk territory and took a few leaves from Cigarettes After Sex’s intimately expansive book, the result would echo the same affectingly tender alchemy which drifts through Joshua Wales’ latest single, Don’t Worry.

The indie folk singer-songwriter’s sombrely honeyed, low-timbered vocal register subdues you into the melodious sentimentality of the acoustic guitar-driven single, which sees quiescent swells of orchestral strings brush past the plaintively warm guitar notes.

With “Don’t worry, we’ve got all the time in the world” reprising throughout the sublimely seraphic release, listeners are reminded that pace is the trick as Joshua Wales issues a reminder to his frenetically minded younger self.

The reflectively sonorous score features in Joshua Wales’ discography as a standalone entity and as the opening title single to his debut EP which you will need little convincing to devour in full after bearing witness to the introspective magnetism in the opening salvo.

Stream Joshua Wales’ latest single, Don’t Worry, on all major platforms, including Spotify, now.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Gaze into the introspective kaleidoscope of leo hc’s seminal indie folk release, the shades EP

Posted on 23 August 2024

leo hc’s debut release, ‘the shades EP’, elegantly strips music back to its most elemental form, serving as a pure conduit for emotion which resonates through the instrumental textures and the lyrical narratives.

The opening track, the aptly named ‘the shades’, introduces us to a semi-lucid reverie where the angular, fingerpicked guitar notes intertwine with leo’s reticent, whispered vocals. Each motif transcends sound to become experiences shaded in deep introspection, allowing listeners to immerse their own melancholic emotions into the abstract depths of the production.

The subsequent track, ‘two wrongs’, transitions into a more indie folk aura, with vocals that echo Elliott Smith, soaring within a seraphically toned lo-fi backdrop. This piece epitomises intimacy, transforming the listening space into a personal enclave of reflective peace.

Track three, ‘i’m the man’, continues the narrative with a progressively gratifying indie lullaby. It allows for a dynamic interplay of intensity, with artful flourishes that let emotional currents ebb and flow, underscoring leo’s mastery in balancing sonic peaks and valleys.

The EP rounds off with ‘lovers hilltop’, a stunning demonstration of acoustic indie songwriting. Here, the poignant strains of coming-of-age yearning are captured through evocative fingerpicked guitars, drawing influences from classical Spanish guitarists while paying homage to artists like Jose Gonzalez and Hot Left Pole.

Overall, ‘the shades EP’ by leo hc is a pacifying synthesis of introspection and musicality, offering a sanctuary where each track invites personal reflection amidst evocatively crafted soundscapes.

Stream the shades EP on Spotify now. 

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Make your soul whole with Mark Braham’s introspectively compassionate indie single, Somebody’s Pain

Posted on 4 November 2023

Taken from his debut LP, After a While, the standout single, Somebody’s Pain, from the indie rock singer-songwriter Mark Braham seduces the listener into an Elliott Smith-esque tender sequence of compassionate consolation.

With the raggedly euphonic acoustic guitar chords flowing in complete synergy with the melodic lines projected through his hushed, honeyed and harmonic vocal range, Somebody’s Pain is a deeply affecting, artfully enticing score which unravels as a viscerally resonant exhibition of ennui and painfully conscious introspection of how we all have the potential to become someone else’s pain. From the first experience with Somebody’s Pain, you’ll stop, think, and feel the compulsion to hit repeat.

The Darwin, Australia-born artist has had music in his blood since a young age; his creative journey began by writing melodies on a cheap classical guitar before he joined a band. With enough talent to become a one-man powerhouse, he released his debut LP in 2019, opened his recording studio, Freestone Productions, in Canberra and turned his delectable talent to producing, mixing and mastering for other artists.

We can’t wait for the sophomore release, Authenticity, which is currently in the works. His ability to make your soul feel warm and whole is unrivalled.

Stream Somebody’s Pain on Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

BLOCKED personified stoicism in her ethereal alt-indie single, I Don’t Mind

Posted on 3 November 2023
BLOCKED

The Melbourne-based Singaporean singer-songwriter BLOCKED reached the epitome of ethereal magnetism in her artfully quiescent self-produced single, I Don’t Mind.

After some of the most accordant and assured acoustic guitar chord progressions I have ever aurally bore witness to in the intro, the single intensifies in ornate beguile through the introduction of quiescent chamber strings which swell around the shoegaze-y vocal lines, which will captivate fans of Cigarettes After Sex and Elliott Smith.

I Don’t Mind is just one chapter in the four-part story of growth and resilience told through the artist’s forthcoming EP, which encapsulates mastering the art of letting go. Socrates couldn’t have said it better himself.

I Don’t Mind will be released ahead of the highly-anticipated 4-track EP, no worries, which is due for release on November 17th. Stream I Don’t Mind on all major platforms via this link.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Peter Beatty unveiled a wanderlust dreamscape with his acoustic indie folk single, Tell Me Where To Go

Posted on 13 October 2023

After picking up the best song award from the Cannes World Film Festival in 2023 and picking up more awards for his music and accompanying music videos from The London Independent Film Awards and The Independent Shorts Awards, the critically acclaimed and endlessly accoladed UK singer-songwriter Peter Beatty has unanchored his nautically meta single, Tell Me Where To Go.

With layered vocal harmonies as magnetically compelling as Jack Johnson’s and Richard Hawley’s atop honeyed and intricate acoustic instrumentation, listening to the organically resolving orchestration will set your imagination alight, awaken even the most dormant of wanderlust proclivities, and unequivocally convince you that in this generation of singer-songwriters, few can infuse their elysian soundscapes with a paralleled shot of alchemy.

I couldn’t think of a more stunning way of attesting to the fact that life is little more than a collection of explorations, whether that’s inwards, towards another, or into territories that will show us pieces of ourselves we never knew existed. Great songs stir emotions; superlative ones have what it takes to reconceptualise your take on existence in a few lyrical lines. Beatty is definitively in the latter camp. Someone exhume and tell Sartre I’ve just found the cure for existentialism.

Tell Me Where To Go hit the airwaves on September 29; stream it on Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Culture Bloom harmonised to the nines in their spectrally raw acoustic indie & alt-rock synthesis, Nightmare

Posted on 8 October 2023

‘Nightmare’ is the first synthesis of acoustic indie and alt-rock to spill from the debut EP, Aren’t You Proud?, from Denver Colorado’s most nostalgically euphonic drop-dead stunning duo, Culture Bloom.

If Placebo penned bitter-sweet symphonies in the same vein as The Verve and mainlined a little Death Cab for Cutie into that vein, the alt-90s melodiousness would hit with exactly the same force of impact as Nightmare.

The emotional weight carried within the harrowed and haunted layers of vocal harmonies as they collide with the stabbing guitar lines resonates as infinitely more than the sum of all parts, allowing Nightmare to stand as a testament to the song-crafting capacities of the duo that should be on every alt indie fan’s radar.

Stream Nightmare on Spotify and stay tuned for the EP release on October 20th.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Stu Daniels – Enemies: Achingly Soulful Acoustic Indie-Rock

Posted on 22 September 2022
Enemies by Stu Daniels

With all of the evocative gravitas of Eddie Vedder’s aching soul, Stu Daniels’ latest single, Enemies, compels you to surrender to the acoustic indie rock plaintiveness, which is all too easy to relate to from the first immersion. Beyond the sobering overtones of the emotionally crafted and reverbed guitars is a lyrical extension of salvation with the poignant and powerful reminder that enmities will always do their best to strip your power and use it for their gain.

The singer-songwriter and guitarist fronts the Adelaide band, Already Gone, but notably, standing alone, his sound is equally as sonorous. Watch this space for more compellingly tenacious expositions of the human condition.

Enemies was officially released on September 16th. Check it out for yourselves on Bandcamp.

Review by Amelia Vandergast