Former Deli NYC Best Emerging Artist James A. M. Downes — known under the moniker Haunted Continents — has released a new track called "What Were You Born For?", along with a lyric video. In the description of the video, Downes mentions that the song’s inspiration — as well as its soaring sound — come from his experience stumbling around a New York bookstore and reading about the Left Hand Path, along with those who envision a daemon helping them down that path to answer the question asked in the title of Downes’s new song. Downes and friends shot the video in different areas of New York City, on Brooklyn rooftops and in Manhattan crosswalks, on empty trains and in busy intersections – you can stream it below. – Will Sisskind

NYC quartet Coco Verde will headline Baby’s All Right on September 19th to celebrate the release of their debut EP Marathon. The two singles available online, the title track (streaming below) and Cinnamon Peaches, showcase a band able to work within the sonic realms of both indie rock and folky pop, adopting tense vocals and distorted guitars in the latter track, and a more melodic and lyrical approach for the former. NYC bands Roya and The Muckers will also perform that same night.

The project of glamorous alt rock vocalist Ann Courtney and keyboardist/singer Elizabeth Carena, Mother Feather is a band born to be on a stage. Active since 2009, the group is approaching their ten year anniversary with a new single entitled "Red Hot Metal" (streaming below) and a show at Brooklyn Bazaar on September 29th. The song, a tense yet sparse post-grunge track resting on Ann Courtney’s solid alto, is among the best material the band has released so far, and will hopefully be followed by a full album (no mention of it at this stage). The band will perform live at Brooklyn Bazaar on September 29th.

A staple of the NYC resurging soul scene, Sister Sparrow and the Dirty Birds have been churning out soul music in all its possible variations for almost two decades now. After two live albums that are a testament to the group’s fierce live performances, the group returns with a shortened moniker (just Sister Sparrow) and a new sound that takes their nu-soul in a more produced and sophisticated direction. Single Gold (streaming) is a preview of the artist’s upcoming album, scheduled for an October 12th release, and it makes the most of Arleigh Kincheloe’s larger than life vocals, carving space around them with shrewdly sparse production by Carter Matschullat.
In support of "Gold," Sister Sparrow is currently on a major U.S. tour, including several festivals and an appearance supporting Nathaniel Rateliff. New Yorkers will have a chance to see them live at Irving Plaza on December 1st. 

Boston’s The Woolly Mammoths — made up of New Hampshire natives Connor Bailey, Nathan Arsenault, Connor Kennedy, Jake Lennon, and Sam Routhier — create tongue-in-cheek indie dance-rock tracks for music nerds. Their forthcoming LP C I T Y Z E N may be a response to the everyday coming of age story, but the music is anything but average. The Deli Magazine is happy to be premiering lead single “No Confidence Man” (streaming below), an exuberant art-rock track that’s one of C I T Y Z E N’s many intricate highlights.

Of the track, Kennedy said, ”The ‘no confidence man’ is a male archetype that crops up in the independent music industry too frequently. He comes off as sincere and self aware in his music, but is really abusing these emotional connections to serve himself. I wrote the song through a real first person/dirt-bag-romantic lens, trying to be a bit boisterous instead of deep and melancholy.”

Stream “No Confidence Man” below, and celebrate the release of the track with The Woolly Mammoths at O’Brien’s Pub tonight at 8 pm. – Lilly Milman 

Watch out, Austin – Much 2 Much is coming out to play. Originally born as a duo, Erin Thelen and Angie Holliday formed the band in 2015 during a trip to Asia, and has since taken Austin by storm as a four-piece. Their music is soulful and ethereal, full of evocative, intricate harmonies and fluid songwriting that hearkens to R&B, folk and jazz. The full band’s musicianship is a force to be reckoned with, and they’re guaranteed to move you. Don’t miss Much 2 Much at Mohawk on September 12th, with support from Pauline and The Seventh Circuit. Check out a live-in-the-studio performance of "Who" below! – Ethan Ames

The sheer volume of this album is bound to be a deal-breaker for some listeners; it may even serve to deflect some of the musical variety on offer for those seeking simple guitar rock. Yet for the thoughtful listener there is much to appreciate here. “Saturn,” its opening track,” flutters and screeches, hanging in suspension as any good intro might. “Hypnagog” is the album’s full-scale launch, however, pitched somewhere between the muscular metal of the Melvins and the more orthodox hardcore-punk from which this band is clearly spawned. The hybridity is escalated by the song’s modulating sections, which shift in rhythm and intensity throughout (and revel in acid-laced deviations of noise and lyrics). “End Times” is built on a minor chord guitar dirge and pounding rhythm, each taken from the Black Sabbath playbook, yet juxtaposed by screamed vocals meant more to confront than to articulate. “Gille de Rais,” a song one assumes is about the French hero of the Hundred Years’ War (15th Century), is the closest Conduit comes to modern psychedelic music. Its menacing rhythm gives rise to a thick wall of guitar pedal distortion which skirts the line between post-rock and metal. (The album cover even looks like one by Godspeed! You Black Emperor.) “Parasites” is the closest to straight-up hardcore; yet even here the tension felt in its combination of instruments seems less message-driven, more about the experience. “Zero Days” finishes the LP with a clear almost direct incantation—an oddity in terms of strategy (yet not out of place in the greater context). Shouts of “We cannibalize ourselves!” and “Nature breeds in a vacuum!” seem like surmising statements in what has become, by the end, a visceral expression of the world as it tumbles towards apocalypse. It can be taken as topical—the depressing state of politics; the system as bubonic plague. Yet that would limit the message to politicians and people in power, whereas this seems generally more bleak to me, as if to say: the heart of darkness is an endless well. And if such thoughts make you shudder then be forewarned. Drowning World is not for the faint of heart. But if straight-up truth is your poison then here’s the antidote. – Brian Chidester

GABI is an artist that can be easily described with a quick descriptor, but it takes dedication to her music to fully appreciate how evocative and moving her compositions can be. While the “opera pop” tag on her Bandcamp page sufficiently describes her sound, taking the time to hear how this translates into a three-minute song can be infinitely rewarding, and her latest single “Sleep” highlights the simple grandeur of that experience. Utilizing relatively barebones instrumentation, including fragile synths, harps, clarinets and pianos, the track builds upon loops that evolve into almost celestial revolutions, like GABI is creating the universe by having the production orbit her masterful and heavenly voice. And instead of ending with a crescendo, the song simply fades once its reached its apex, concluding like a storm finally letting up. Her album Empty Me will release October 5 via Double Double Whammy, and you can catch her live at The Park Church Co-Op on October 3 and stream “Sleep” below. – Tucker Pennington

The electro-pop trio of Culture Wars has released a new music video, "Bones." Although the band’s based out of Austin, the video was shot in Los Angeles. Directed by Phillip Lopez (Kygo, Cold War Kids), the video for "Bones" is vaguely post-apocalyptic, with much of it set in and around an abandoned bowling alley. The characters alternatingly wear gas masks, futuristic-looking helmets and cowboy attire (yes, sawed-off shotguns and pistols included). The video is several homages blended into one – "Mad Max: Fury Road" and "Westworld" come to mind – and it effectively syncs up well with the doom-laced, electro-pop feel of the song itself. Check out the video for "Bones" below! – Ethan Ames

It can be difficult to add grit to R&B these days when the current trends rely on an intense devotion to the ethereal ambient music that is borderline new-age. But Brooks Thomas are determined to grind together sounds until they reach a satisfying balance on their latest album Poison. The use of live drums with surging synths and oddball instrumentation makes songs like “Fade to Black” wholly unsettling experiences. That’s not to say that there aren’t moments of clarity and pathos; the vocal harmonies on “Darkness” are sweet and melancholic as the lyrics paint a picture of unfulfilled desire, without sacrificing the dynamic collision of sounds that endlessly crawl under your skin. Poison will be released September 21, and the experimental R&B group will be playing a celebratory show the following day at Mercury Lounge. –Tucker Pennington

Psych-rock outlet Ritual Talk have a new single coming out on September 7th called "Something To Look Forward To". We’ve highlighted the group before for their layered harmonies and lush soundscapes; "Something To Look Forward To" brings those in full force, backed by the power of Alex DeSimine’s voice and his and Dylan Gleit’s Frippertronics-style guitars. The synths on the new track create a space-age atmosphere that will carry you away with each listen. To celebrate the new track, the trio performed a release show at Mercury Lounge last night (September 6th); they’ll set out on a nationwide tour afterwards which will take them through the next few months. Listen to "Something To Look Forward To" below. – Will Sisskind

Among the tracks on Kissing Is A Crime’s self-titled LP, released by Don Giovani in 2017, “Noise At Night” stands out among the jangly, punk-tinged guitar pop for it’s dark minimalism. The verses are driven by bass and a simple drum beat while lead vocalist Matt Molnar steps back to allow bassist/vocalist Beatrice Rothbaum to take the reins. Kissing Is A Crime’s new video for the single matches the mood of the track perfectly, with director Assal Ghawami providing a dark affair intentionally reminiscent of work by Luis Buñuel and David Lynch. Among the surrealist, frequently black and white imagery Ghawami fits a cameo by Sunflower Bean’s Julia Cumming, who’s been known to join the band from time to time in recordings and live performances. Watch the video for “Noise At Night” below. – Cameron Carr