Man From The Woods – We Live In These Woods
Man From The Woods crafts a gorgeous alt-folk meditation that ranks among the more immersive recordings we've heard this year
Man From The Woods invites you to step into the undergrowth with 'We Live In These Woods'. This short, immersive track builds itself from layered voices and field recordings captures the forest itself. There's trees, creatures, and all those lovely breathing things that surround his remote cabin. The production is deliberately simple, allowing the organic textures to kinda grow rather than compete. As a huge Sparklehorse fan, there's a lot for me to enjoy here. I particularly love the ambient textures, but it's really the song that shines here. Lovely, evocative alt-folk, atmospheric and a banger of a vocal too.
Man From The Woods is an anonymous artist working from a secluded cabin somewhere in the English countryside. His music draws on the introspective songwriting of Elliott Smith, Jason Molina, and Bonnie Prince Billy, alongside the textural experiments of Four Tet. He first reached a wider audience when 'Migration Song' featured on the soundtrack of Channel 4's Skins series 2, and he has since built a devoted cult following among those who seek something slower and more contemplative. We're on board now, and are very glad to have this one on our radar.
Noel Johnson NDJ – Lord Look After Me
Noel Johnson NDJ's 'Lord Look After Me' is a breathtaking alt-country meditation on faith and doubt, a hymn for the lost that deserves to be heard far and wide
This one sounds like a heartbeat you're not sure will keep going. The drums on 'Lord Look After Me' were recorded one strike at a time, hands and atypical tools building something deliberately uncertain. Johnson calls it a dark anthem of spiritual alienation, and that's exactly right: swirling echo effects pull you under while southern-gospel harmonies lift you just enough to keep breathing. The whole thing sits in that moment before dawn, when you're still driving through the dark and the engine's making sounds you'd rather not think about. There's desolation here, real and genuinely earned, but also something kinda reaching upward. It's that balance that makes this one land. Stunning alt-country songwriting, raw and utterly haunting.
Johnson is a Birmingham, Alabama multi-instrumentalist who does everything himself: writing, arranging, recording, performing, mixing. He built this track in the windowless basement of an old church while constructing his home studio, and you can hear that isolation in every note. His touchstones run from Tom Waits to Fleet Foxes to Nina Simone, and the range makes sense once you've sat with this. A full album is due early 2027. We're genuinely excited to hear where he takes this next. It's a beauty.
Karen Miller – Working Girl
Karen Miller's 'Working Girl' is a brilliant slice of acoustic rock from Tacoma, witty, warm, and irresistibly sharp.
Karen Miller opens 'Working Girl' with a guitar line that sticks around all day. The track moves with easy shuffling confidence, acoustic textures sitting right alongside Miller's warm, knowing vocal. There's wit here, genuine wit, the sort that lands because the delivery never oversells it. She draws from the John Prine school of saying serious things sideways, and the Weird Al school of having fun while you do it. The arrangement stays lean, letting the wordplay breathe, and there's a hook in the chorus that will definitely stick around. Sharp acoustic rock, witty and wonderfully playful.
Karen Miller is a singer-songwriter based in Tacoma, Washington. She's equally at home playing a coffee shop solo or fronting a full band, and that versatility shows in how confidently she moves through the material. 'Working Girl' features on her debut studio album, Call On Me. When she's not writing, she's practicing in her retired parents' garage, picking up random instruments, and reading horror movie plot summaries so she doesn't have to sit through the films themselves. Love the vibe, and we're excited to hear what else that album has in store.
Christ and The Machines – To Live Unaffected
Christ and The Machines turns fragile hope into something luminous on 'To Live Unaffected', a tender indie folk gem.
A gentle acoustic guitar opens 'To Live Unaffected', patient and unhurried. Christ and The Machines builds the track around space letting the whole thing sing before the next one arrives. There's a conversational tone to the lyrics, carrying lyrics about searching for light when everything feels dim. And a definite warmth to the production with a kind of weary grace, rising just enough to suggest belief without forcing it. 'Love it can shine, through the worst of our lives' is a touching line; captures a particular ache of holding onto faith when the evidence for it feels thin. Tender indie folk, warm and deeply affecting.
Christ and The Machines is the project of a Blackpool songwriter whose work has previously earned support from BBC Radio 1 and BBC Introducing. His creative process often begins in dreams, melodies and lyrics arriving before waking, then captured and shaped into finished songs. It's a cool approach, that's working here. His songs return again and again to love, memory, faith and the natural world. A fascinating project with a genuinely unusual story behind it, and we are very keen to hear what comes next.
Dante Shivers – Changes
Dante Shivers' 'Changes' is a beautifully patient indie folk single from Asheville, fifteen years in the making and worth every moment of the wait.
This one takes its time. 'Changes' opens up with guitars, falling strings and some great chord changes. The song is about those late-night conversations where you admit what you actually want from life. And whether you will ever be brave enough to chase it. There is a weariness in the verses, but the chorus lifts, and you hear the hope underneath. The production works in an almost folk-like, storytelling kinda way. The vocal's the standout here, and when that chorus hits. Damn. Gorgeous indie folk songwriting, tender and surprisingly soulful.
Shivers is an American singer-songwriter and producer based in Asheville, North Carolina, though this particular track has travelled. He started writing it in London after a chance meeting with a ballerina, finished the lyrics back in New York, then shelved the whole thing for nearly fifteen years. He finally completed the recording in Thailand while travelling the world on a journey to rediscover himself. It's quite the journey, but often the best songs take their time. It's a gem.