Notable vinyl releases out this Friday - 14 February (2025)

Grammy Award-winning Canadian pop star Alessia Cara releases her 4th studio album, Love & Hyperbole. Alessia has amassed over 12.5B streams across her career and has also secured the #1 spot at U.S. Pop Radio across 3 different singles! Available on vinyl with 12x24 poster included.

As Art d’Ecco puts it, “This is the most important song I have ever written and it stretched my creative and musical abilities to the absolute limit.” A mind-bending 7.5 minute song; his magnum opus. This is the lead single to Art d’Ecco’s highly anticipated 4th LP. North American & UK radio + PR campaigns set. Confirmed coverage already from Paste, NME, Consequence, Exclaim, Brooklyn Vegan & FLOOD. Previous coverage in Rolling Stone, The Guardian, Wonderland, Line of Best Fit, Clash, Billboard, Uncut and many, many others. Currently artist is charting at #12 on Canadian Alt chart for the previous single released in July 2024. Significant ad spends: digital, Youtube, Meta, print, billboards. Touring set in UK, EU, Canada, US. Recent touring with Franz Ferdinand, Dandy Warhols, Hot Chip, Sam Roberts, Temples and many others. This song was used in the season 3 finale of the hit show, Shoresy, several months ago which led it to be trending on Shazam with 20,000 in the first week.

Bartees Strange was raised on fear. His family used scary stories to teach life lessons, and at an early age, Strange started using scary movies to practice being strong. The world can be a terrifying place, and for a young, queer, black person in rural America, that terror can be visceral. Horror is an album about facing those fears and growing to become someone to be feared. Throughout the record, Strange lays down one difficult truth after another, all over a sonic pastiche of music he loved as a kid. His dad hipped him to Parliament Funkadelic, Fleetwood Mac, Teddy Pendergrass, and Neil Young. Those influences merged with Strange’s interest in hip-hop, country, indie rock, and house, culminating in a record that feels completely original. - Follow-up album to Farm to Table, which was released to much critical acclaim earning best-of nods from the likes of The New York Times, Rolling Stone and NPR Music - Co-produced with Jack Antonoff

There is something about the bitter cold in Chicago that unites the city in January— the two weeks in 2024 that Horsegirl spent recording Phonetics On and On were some of the coldest days in Chicago that year. With the heating off in The Loft to avoid sound interference, the band was bundled in multiple sweaters and sitting on their hands between takes. Working closely with musician/producer Cate Le Bon (Deerhunter, Kurt Vile, Wilco) Horsegirl found focus and intimacy in the studio that can only arise when it’s simply too cold to step outside. Abandoning the heavy saturation and character studies of Versions of Modern Performance, Le Bon leads them into new, bright, clear, sonic territories that highlight the inventive nature of these new songs. After playing together for four years, Horsegirl explores the limits of the trio configuration within Phonetics On and On— what if instead of filling out songs with distortion, they utilized the expanse that the three of them didn’t occupy? This question seems to be the motivating force behind the record, and the songs are a testament to experimenting with space and texture while maintaining a pop song at the core. New tools help bring this world to life; violins, synths, and gamelan tiles are all woven into the record with complete effect.

Since 2021’s Shiloh, John Glacier has been an underground icon. Aloof, icy, magnetic. Now, she is ready to take you deeper into her unique world. Following selling out her headline show at London’s iconic ICA, being the face of the new Alexander McQueen campaign, and blowing everyone out the water with a verse on Jamie xx’s new single ‘Dafodil’, John Glacier returns with Found. Released ahead of her debut at Club2Club in Turin, Found is taken from her as-yet unannounced third EP of the ‘Like A Ribbon’ trilogy and showcases the nostalgic side of John’s eclectic lyricism, perfectly laced over distorted drums and uplifting piano riffs.

Limited transparent blue colored vinyl LP pressing. Joining Chad Peck on this flight around is bassist Jim MacAlpine and drummer Michael Catano (both of North of America and the touring Weird Nightmare band). Peck started working on the songs that would become Kestrels' fifth album almost a decade ago; half of the tracks came from a scrapped solo album. He began composing in earnest, though, in the spring of 2021, secreted away in his house in the country. The result is a woozy, disorienting suite of tracks, like finding a secret station between channels on a late-night drive. Take album-opener Lilys, which barnstorms in on a sea of percussion and swirling guitars as the protagonist wrestles with the concept of holding on to someone without letting them know they're clinging. "It's a treatise on how two incompatible ideas can coexist to make something work," Peck says.

If you know Lacuna Coil then you’ll already be aware that every album entry in their storied career is more than just a sound: Each one is a richly textured soundtrack to a specific time and a place. With Sleepless Empire, that place is dark, cinematic, and unmistakably true to the unique characteristics that have given Lacuna Coil such a celebrated entry in the annals of heavy music.

In Mallrat's (aka Grace Shaw's) vision of the world, light is more than photons and electromagnetic radiation hitting the eye it's a moment of divine intervention. A bold swerve into the metaphysical, this is the premise of the prized Brisbane-born, LA-based pop songwriter and producer's 2025 sophomore album: Light hit my face like a straight right. Set against a newly informed backdrop of expressive breakbeats and dance music, it's 12 songs explore the intangible and mysterious allure of human connection, held together by curious investigations into light "the closest thing to a concept this album has," Mallrat says. She reunited with Butterfly Blue producers Styalz Fuego (Troye Sivan, Tate McRae) and Alice Ivy, while bringing into the mix indie electronic producers Chrome Sparks and Casey MQ, whose music - made with French artist Oklou - Grace was listening to a lot at the time. Together, they puzzled out the misty, dance-fueled soundscape that branches out and evolves on her initial references. Mallrat serves up highs like "Hideaway", a song where heart-racing garage clashes with her trademark candor: "I'll be your lucky charm just let me hang around your neck," she sings. Sleek and early standout "Pavement" gets a gritty underlayer with chopped up vocals from DJ Zirk's "Born 2 Lose" and mid-album standout "Hocus Pocus" finds Mallrat singing about being pulled "under the spell" of someone new, borrowing a different part of the same DJ Zirk sample to build it's shimmering, dancefloor-ready facade. It's an endeavor that perhaps reaches a peak on "Horses," the record's gentle and organic closer which Shaw herself calls "objectively the best song." Written after returning home to Brisbane and "feeling like an alien," it gained new meaning in the wake of her late sister's passing. For Shaw, it's the convergence of the song's minimalism, lyrics, space, and the way her voice cracks on the recording as she sings, "Hey, I'm right here, I look different now." After years of solidifying herself as a master of well-crafted, timeless pop - fielding recognition from New York Times, NYLON, Teen Vogue, Billboard, The FADER, NPR, and more - Light hit my face like a straight right is a step into the art of world-building, bolstered by her intuitive songwriting and clever, studied production.

Southern-bred, alternative R&B singer-songwriterMereba artistically embodies self-understanding on The BreezeGrew a Fire, her grandest work and first release on SecretlyCanadian. To hone in on this latest album, it was necessary forMereba to reconnect with her whole many-sided self, from herinner child to her inseparable relationships. Mereba peacefullytransmutes her beginnings, looking upon her closest kinshipsand friendships with a keen understanding of their steadying,inspirational force. Surrounded by the gentle Breeze of theserelationships and recollections, Mereba is empowered as bothan artist and mother, while also being reminded to nurture herchildlike wonder.Mereba gracefully shines on the follow-up to herbounteous 2019 debut, The Jungle Is the Only Way Out. Inescaping the Jungle, Mereba faced the paradigm shift ofbirthing a son in 2021 and getting accustomed to a rapidlychanging self-outlook. Mereba's creative output has alwaysrelied on her innermost reflections and ideas on whatever washappening around her; but in motherhood, the singer'sperspective widened while her inspiration became morefocused, and more individually powerful."Even though I'm fully an adult, I had to grow up in away overnight when he [my son] came," Mereba explains. "Theprocess of watching him open up to the world, learn how toengage with the world, it is very tender. I feel like it's the mostreminded I've ever been of when I was a child and the firstmemories I have of life."The transformation brought Mereba to the intimacy ofDIY recording sessions, providing an honest and organicfoundation to Breeze. Mereba tapped her longtime productioncollaborator Sam Hoffman to co-assemble the album's richproduction, which parallels it's folk-like warmth. AlthoughMereba is a true double Earth sign-Virgo and Virgo rising-thedevelopment of Breeze was anchored by experiences andmemories that span from Atlanta to L.A., Addis Ababa toGreensboro, an intention that speaks to the album's fluidnature. While nowhere near the end of her musical trek, TheBreeze Grew a Fire is a loving, inspiring return to origin, onewhere Mereba frees a painful past, eases into future possibilities,and goes with life's flow

The title of Richard Dawson's new album End of the Middle is a suitably slippery contradiction, one that invites multiple interpretations: Middle-aging? Middle-class? The middle-point of Dawson's career? The centre of a record? Centrism in general? Polarisation? The possibility of having a balanced discussion about anything? Stuck in the middle with you? Middle England? Middling songwriting? End of the Middle is a wonkily beautiful peer into the workings of the family unit, perhaps several generations of the same family: "I wanted this record to be small-scale and very domestic", Dawson explains, "to be stripped back, stark and naked, and let the lyrics and melodies speak for themselves and for the people in the songs". By paring things right back what is revealed is a suite of remarkably poised, oddly elegant, beautiful music.

Since their breakout 2012 self-titled debut album, The Lumineers have achieved some incredible milestones: twenty-four number one hits, billions of streams, packed global arena tours, multi-platinum releases, Grammy nominations, and, most important to core members Jeremiah Fraites and Wesley Schultz, numerous beloved, timeless songs. The band's fifth studio album Automatic out February 14, is being released in a music landscape that has become dominated by solo artists dependent on other writers. Schultz says being one of the few groups touring who write all their own material, is "a unique badge of honor." But that's not to say they won't collaborate with other artists; Schultz and Fraites have recently written and appeared on songs with pop icon P!nk, as well as rising singer-songwriters James Bay and Zach Bryan

The Velveteers bring a visceral energy to their explosive sophomore album, A Million Knives, loaded with blistering rock anthems infused with melodic indie songwriting. With GRAMMY Award-winning producer Dan Auerbach at the helm, the Boulder, CO trio encapsulates the raw, forceful, and profoundly heavy power of their live performances and laser-focuses a spotlight on tightly crafted songs as they carve out their own distinctive niche.