Don’t Miss New Albums From Soccer Mommy, Amythyst Kiah, Pixies, Little Moon & More

Soccer Mommy, Nashville-based singer-songwriter Sophie Allison, released a new album entitled Evergreen via Loma Vista Recordings. Allison recorded the follow-up to her 2022 album, Sometimes, Forever, with producer Ben H. Allen III at Maze Studios in Atlanta. After the release of her previous LP, “Allison experienced a profound and also very personal loss” that informed the 11-song Evergreen. According to a press release:

The mission for the album was to take life’s moments, frame them without obfuscating the emotional burdens or gifts that anchored them, and to let the lyrics and moods speak for themselves. Allison rendezvoused in Atlanta with producer Ben H. Allen III and told him she wanted to elide synthesizers and digital flourishes this time, favoring acoustic guitars, rich drums, and interweaving flutes.

They built basic tracks for half the album as a pair in Allen’s Maze Studios before ushering in her touring band to add more. There were real flutes and real strings, just as Allison had imagined. As the layers and ideas mounted, Allen and Allison focused on peeling them back, on leaving subtle touches that never crowded the sentiments. The songs retain the spirit of the demos, candid and direct.

“I wanted to change things up a bit on this one and play around with some more organic textures,” Allison explained. “It was really important for me that the songwriting shone through everything and came to the forefront. These songs are very close to my heart and I hope they become close to some of yours as well!”

Amythyst Kiah issued a new album, Still + Bright, today through Rounder Records. Still + Bright follows Kiah’s 2021 breakthrough LP, Wary + Strange. The new LP sees guest turns from Billy Strings, Avi Kaplan and S.G. Goodman. Kiah captured Still + Bright with producer/contributor Butch Walker at his Nashville studio. Still + Bright saw the singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist working with outside writers for the first time. Kiah collaborated with Walker, Kaplan Tim Armstrong (Rancid), Sadler Vaden (Jason Isbell and The 400 Unit) and Sean McConnell (Brittney Spencer, Bethany Cosentino).

“On the last record it felt so cathartic to write about all the pain I was dealing with, but this time the songs came from a place of finding joy in the music,” Kiah said of Still + Bright. “In the past I felt so mired down with anxiety that I sometimes held back from what I really wanted to write about; I felt like I needed to play it safe and keep certain thoughts to myself. But now I’m at a point where I’m confident in what I value and love, and because of that I’ve made the album I’ve always wanted to make.”

The Night The Zombies Came is the ninth studio album from veteran alt punk rockers Pixies. The album is the first to feature the band’s third bassist, former Band of Skulls member Emma Richardson, who assumed the role previously held by Paz Lenchantin and co-founder Kim Deal. Guitarist/vocalist Black Francis (Charles Thompson), drummer David Lovering, guitarist Joey Santiago and Richardson recorded The Night The Zombies Came with Tom Dalgety, who also produced the last three Pixies records. Speaking to Rolling Stone, Black Francis discussed what the band described as “the most cinematic record of their career” and its title, stating:

“It’s not like I wrote a bunch of songs about zombies or that we tried to make the album sound scary or anything like that. ‘Zombie’ is just an associative word. You can do with it what you like. And it’s not a concept record, but that word kept popping up in the lyrics. When I combed through all the other lyrics for a title, they just sounded corny as shit. The only thing that made sense was The Night the Zombies Came. And I was like, ‘You know what? That’s a pretty good title. I’d go see that movie.’”

Little Moon put out their new new album, Dear Divine, today on Joyful Noise. The Provo, Utah-based, avant-folk band is led by singer-songwriter Emma Hardyman who co-produced Dear Divine with bandmate Bly Wallentine who also contributed banjo, horns, melodica and more. The album that would become Dear Divine initially began as a love letter from Emma to her newlywed husband and bandmate Nathan Hardyman. But as is often the case, life had other plans. Nathan’s mother passed away and he also informed Emma that he was leaving the Mormon Church, a transition she had also undertaken. “Hardyman recalibrated her vision and started work on a love-as-grief, grief-as-love album titled Dear Divine,” press materials for the record noted.

“I wanted to play with the imaginative realms of fantasy, as well as imaginative realms of the sacred, like Gregorian choral hymnal music,” Emma Hardyman stated. “But I wanted to reimagine the sacred so it’s not ‘I must be righteous to please God,’ and instead more like, ‘You are who you are and that’s beautiful—not because you’re righteous, but because you’re a sinner and you mess up a lot, and you’re held in reverence for that.’”

English singer-songwriter Laura Marling released her eighth album, Patterns In Repeat, today through Chrysalis Records/Partisan Records. Patterns In Repeat was recorded by Marling at her studio in London with co-producer Dom Monks. Rob Moose also contributed to the album. Patterns In Repeat, the follow-up to Marling’s 2020 album Song For Our Daughter, was informed by Marling becoming a mother in 2023. Marling shared a note describing the new album, stating:

“Over the course of nine months, I had happily prepared myself for the fact that my life as a songwriter would be put on hold while I adjusted to life as a new parent. How delighted then was I to discover that for the first few months of a baby’s life, you can bounce them in a bouncer and play guitar all day. For the first time in my life, I was able to gaze into another human’s eyes as I wrote.

“Of course, new parents feel like they discovered that feeling—one of the very finest that life has to offer, of looking into the eyes of your child and feeling the enormity of the picture as a whole, the enormity of a precarious life, celestial, fragile, and extraordinary, taking its place among the comparatively banal constellation of a family. This banal constellation seems to have dominated the writing of Patterns in Repeat—the drama of the domestic sphere, the frail threads that bind a family together, the good intentions we hold onto for our progeny and the many and various ways they get lost in time. So much complexity in the banal, the caged, the everyday.

“Being as I am, 34 years old, now 15 years and eight albums into a life in song, I am unable to escape the fact that each record has served as a time-stamped chapter of my life (though some have appeared more a premonition). Now, here we are, following a youth spent desperately trying to understand what it is to be a woman, I am at the brow of the hill, with an entirely new and enormous perspective surrounding me.”

Halsey released their new album entitled The Great Impersonator. The record comes after Halsey detailed their health struggles in June, revealing “In 2022, I was first diagnosed with Lupus SLE and then a rare T-cell lymphoproliferative disorder. Both of which are currently being managed or in remission; and both of which I will likely have for the duration of my life.” The pop star’s fifth studio album is the follow-up to 2021’s If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power. The new 18-track LP finds the vocalist exploring sounds from the 1970s through the present day.

“I think there is a little bit of a grand narrative about me that’s like, ‘I don’t know what she looks like. I couldn’t recognize her on the street because she looks different every time I see her,’” Halsey told Apple Music’s Zane Lowe. “Some people get into a creative medium and have a very specific style: ‘This is what works for me, this is who I am and what I’m comfortable with.’ And for me, I just don’t know that it’s fun unless I’m reinventing. I think a lot of people see that and get the sense that I don’t have a very secure sense of self.”

The Jamie McLean Band issued their new album, One Step Forward, via Harmonized Records. The eight-track LP sees former Dirty Dozen Brass Band guitarist Jamie McLean joined by a JMB lineup featuring keyboardist Jon Solo, drummer Brian Griffin and bassist Chris Anderson. Solo, an original member, returned to the group for the LP. The album came together at Brooklyn’s Grand Street Recording. Ken Rich mixed and engineered the record, which was mastered by Whynot Jansveld. Dealing with highly personal issues on One Step Forward, McLean’s follow-up to 2022’s Paradise Found incorporates themes of “life, loss, and love.”

“The things that inspire us and keep us going,” McLean said. “The things we’ve lost. The people we love the most. Positivity. I’m recently engaged and want to share that happiness.”

Amyl and The Sniffers released their third album, Cartoon Darkness, today through B2B Records/Virgin Music Group. The Australian band, who opened for Foo Fighters on tour this summer, recorded Cartoon Darkness in early 2024 at Foo Fighters’ 606 Studios in Los Angeles with producer Nick Launay. The follow-up to their 2021 sophomore album features lead singer Amy Taylor, guitarist Declan Martens, bassist Gus Romer and drummer Bryce Wilson. Taylor shared the below statement regarding the new album.

“Cartoon Darkness is about climate crisis, war, AI, tiptoeing on the eggshells of politics, and people feeling like they’re helping by having a voice online when we’re all just feeding the data beast of Big Tech, our modern-day god. It’s about the fact that our generation is spoon-fed information. We look like adults, but we’re children forever cocooned in a shell. We’re all passively gulping up distractions that don’t even cause pleasure, sensation or joy, they just cause numbness.

“Cartoon Darkness is driving headfirst into the unknown, into this looming sketch of the future that feels terrible but doesn’t even exist yet. A childlike darkness. I don’t want to meet the devil half-way and mourn what we have right now. The future is cartoon, the prescription is dark, but it’s novelty. It’s just a joke. It’s fun.”

American Spirit is the sophomore album by singer-songwriter Fancy Hagood. The self-released follow-up to 2021’s Southern Curiosity was produced by John Osborne of the Brothers Osborne, Jarrad K and Jeremy Lutito. Hagood worked with prominent co-writers including Caitlyn Smith, Mindy Smith, Sean McConnell, and Mary Steenburgen. American Spirit features Michelle Branch on the track “Isn’t That Life” and Nickel Creek’s Sean Watkins and Sara Watkins contributed to “The Chase.” Hagood shared the message below regarding American Spirit:

“This album came together at a time when I needed these songs the most. I think at first I thought I was going to be in my breakup album era but I quickly learned that American Spirit is not about breaking up. It’s about leaning in. It’s about finding joy. It’s about community. THIS IS MY REVIVAL HONEY!!!! Writing and recording this album was therapy and everyone involved I can truly say I hold near and dear to my heart. I feel like this album is the reason 17 year old me packed up my Dodge Nitro and moved to Nashville. It might have taken me 16 years but my dream of making a country album has come true. These melodies and lyrics were forged from a lot of life lessons, though painful at times, I have the utmost gratitude for. They have made me the man and artist I am today. My hope is that when you hear this album, you hear my heart.”

311’s first full length album in five years, Full Bloom, came out today on SKP, the label co-founded by frontman Nick Hexum. Described as “a huge step forward” and “311 on steroids,” the Omaha-born band’s 14th album marked their first time working with producers Colin “Doc” Brittain and Tim Pagnotta. Hexum, and his bandmates — Chad Sexton (drums), Tim Mahoney (guitar), SA Martinez (vocals/DJ) and P-Nut (bass) — also sought frequent producer Scotch Ralston to contribute to the 10 track LP. 311 shared the statement below regarding Full Bloom:

“We hope fans can take from this album 311’s message of positivity and unity. In today’s world it’s so easy to become alienated by the pressures of everyday life. Whether it’s social media, stress at work, an illness, the list goes on … It’s so important to stay open with your loved ones and community so we can all thrive in full bloom.”

The Allman Brothers Band commemorate the 10th anniversary of their last show with the live album, Final Concert 10-28-14, released digitally today via Peach Records. The legendary band said farewell after a 45-year career with a marathon three-set concert at The Beacon Theatre in New York City on October 28, 2014. At the time, the ABB lineup, its longest-running, consisted of founding members Gregg Allman (Hammond B-3 organ, piano, acoustic guitar, vocals), Butch Trucks (drums, tympani) and Jaimoe (drums) along with their longtime bandmates Warren Haynes (lead and slide guitar, vocals), Derek Trucks (lead and slide guitar), Marc Quinones (congas, percussion, vocals) and Oteil Burbridge (bass, vocals).

“There was a spirit and reverence they brought to it,” Derek Trucks said in a 2015 interview with Rolling Stone. “I hoped it would be that way, but I didn’t know how it would turn out. People have a tendency — you let your ego get in the way of the big moments. That night everybody got out of the way. [We] were all thinking about those first days in Jacksonville when they formed the band. I could see my uncle between sets — you could see the wheels turning. It was all in the right spirit. That night was one of the few times you got off stage and feel, ‘That’s how it was supposed to go down.’”

“We were all walking on air. Thankfully, that last show was all we hoped it would be — a real representation of what that band was capable of,” Haynes told Rolling Stone in 2015. “Everybody was communicating and listening, more deeply entwined in the music than we had been in quite some time. I was proud of everyone, individually and collectively.”

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young released a previously unheard recording from their first tour, Live At The Fillmore East, 1969, via Rhino. The double album documents the supergroup’s September 20, 1969 concert at the famed New York City concert venue.

Neil Young joined David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash‘s earlier in 1969 to form CSNY. The quartet made its live debut on August 16 in Chicago and played Woodstock the next day. CSNY embarked on their first tour on August 25 and visited NYC for two shows each night on September 19 and 20, 1969. A freshly-discovered multi-track recording from September 20, 1969 was used to create the chronicle of the never-before-heard live show. The collection includes both the acoustic and electric sets. Material from CSN’s self-titled debut, Young’s Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere and early versions of tracks that would appear on 1970’s Déjà Vu formed the bulk of the setlist.

“Hearing the music again after all these years, I can tell how much we loved each other and loved the music that we were creating,” Nash said. “We were four people reveling in the different sounds we were producing, quietly singing together on the one hand, then rocking like f**k for the rest of the concert.”