Category: Indie Vibes
Ersin Secrin Returns With New Single “Replay”
Ersin Secrin occupies a slightly unusual position, and it’s worth understanding before pressing play on anything he releases. He works first and foremost as a songwriter and lyricist rather than…
Ilya Levinson Brings Bosnian Sevdah Into the Concert Hall
Plenty of composers borrow from folk traditions. Far fewer have a working relationship with the place the tradition actually comes from. Ilya Levinson’s music has been performed by the Sarajevo…
Guyver7x3 Sits With Uncertainty on “Slowly Ready”
Guyver7x3’s “Slowly Ready” is built around a specific, hard-to-name feeling: the stretch of time when you’re moving forward without any real clarity about where you’re headed, still second-guessing every decision,…
Xavier Bryant Carries Classic Soul Forward on “All On My Grind”
Xavier Bryant works out of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in R&B and soul, and he’s picked a demanding set of ancestors to stand alongside. Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, Teddy Pendergrass, that’s the…
Blake Baker Strips Down “Simply the Best” on “The Best”
Some songs are so tied to their original arrangement that stripping them back feels like a genuine risk. Blake Baker takes that risk on “The Best,” his reworking of Tina…
50mething Turns Cancer Recovery Into Quiet Encouragement on “Slowly Through the Night”
50mething is the project of Paul Jenner, a 58-year-old independent musician, composer, and producer based in Ealing, West London who came to music after careers as a dancer and a…
50mething Writes About Love the Second Time Around on “These Fine Lines”
50mething, the project of Paul Jenner, came to music later in life after years working as a dancer and a garden builder, and “These Fine Lines” finds him turning that…
Grey & Purple Songbook Turns Stage Fright Into Triumph on “This Is My Crescendo”
Grey & Purple Songbook works backward from most bands. Rather than writing music first and fitting words to it, this Oslo-based creative duo starts with a narrative, a theme, a…
Ronald Hage Builds “Paragliding” From the Piano Up
Ronald Hage doesn’t start his tracks in a DAW. He starts at an acoustic piano, working out a melody by hand before any software gets involved, and everything else, drums,…
Ryan Yingst Puts a Number on the Overlooked Work of Being a Musician on “Ordinary Means”
Ryan Yingst’s “Ordinary Means,” isn’t chasing anything grand. It’s a folk single built around the unglamorous parts of trying to make a living as a musician, and it earns its…
