Notable vinyl releases out this Friday - November 07, 2025

Armand Hammer and The Alchemist build worlds. Their first was Haram and it remains locked in orbit, equal parts lush and foreboding. Their new one is called Mercy and it’s made out of blood and empire, children’s laughter, unpaid parking tickets, and unkept secrets. Rappers ELUCID and billy woods are joined on the mic by Earl Sweatshirt, Quelle Chris, Cleo Reed, Pink Siifu, Kapwani, and Silka. The Alchemist did everything else.

“Chasing The Chimera” follows 2023 LP I Miss You Already + I Haven’t Left Yet, which featured contributions from Arlo Parks and Clairo, and was produced by Sammy Witte (Harry Styles) – it earned critical praise from Rolling Stone, Vogue, GQ, Esquire, W and more. This was followed by tours with Niall Horan, Halsey and festival plays at All Things Go, Lollapalooza, Electric Picnic, Newport Folk Festival and more.

Finger Eleven enthusiastically completed their first new studio album, Last Night On Earth, in a decade. The band has always amalgamated their musical influences from the 1960s forward into their rock mix. They acknowledge that Phil Collins and Genesis were a big melodic influence on Last Night On Earth. And the new tunes explore time-honored Finger Eleven concepts with fresh twists. While "Adrenaline" is a rousing, intense anthem about pushing forward against adversity, "Blue Sky Mystery," featuring Richard Patrick from Filter, is another hard-hitting rocker about being beguiled by something just out of reach. Further into the album, "The Mountain" rides musical peaks and valleys in it's quest to chase the song, about the creative process expressed in a fantasy setting. Then there is the acoustic number "Last Night On Earth," which tackles relationship turmoil. It's the most personal new track for frontman Scott Anderson. 

The cover of Liquorice, the third album from Australian indie popartist Hatchie, features a closely cropped portrait of HarriettePilbeam laughing, her smudged red lipstick suggesting the gloriousaftermath of a kiss. Captured during a spontaneous backyard photoshoot using a dinky digital camera, the image encapsulates arecord that is rough around the edges and joyfully undone withthemes of longing, lust, and regret.Pilbeam began writing Liquorice in earnest while living in Brisbaneover 2022-2023, and later at a home shared with Agius inMelbourne, ultimately completing the demos in mid-2024. As amusician who has previously worn her influences on her sleeve,Pilbeam strove to write from scratch without any specific musicalinfluences in mind; allowing songs to breathe for weeks, rather thanrushing ideas. She found herself drawn to the melodic simplicity ofher early songs and embraced her musical insecurities: "I wanted tosee my limitations as strengths that inform my style."After working with producers Jorge Elbrecht (Caroline Polachek,Japanese Breakfast, Sky Ferreira) and Dan Nigro (Olivia Rodrigo,Chappell Roan) on Giving the World Away, Pilbeam wanted tocomplete Liquorice with a single collaborator, ideally a non-maleproducer who also fronts their own musical project. In September2024, Pilbeam and Agius returned to Los Angeles to work withMelina Duterte, who records indie rock under the name Jay Somand has production credits on an assortment of projects includingthe GRAMMY-winning boygenius album the record."My last album ended up being really dark and introspective andthat is one part of me, but there was this whole other side that I feltlike I wasn't expressing," Pilbeam says. "I'm a hopeless romanticand a very silly person, sometimes to a fault." Now 32 and married,Pilbeam found that "eternal feelings" of yearning and heartachequickly rushed back as she reflected on her experiences as ayounger woman. At the same time, she channeled her fondness fortragic romance movies where the characters do not necessarily finda happy ending together.Liquorice is preoccupied with the finite forever. These songs capturethe overwhelming, exhilarating, and transforming side-effects ofinfatuation, even if the entirety of the love story only lasts for onemagical night. Like the rich flavors of the twisty, titularcandy-sweet, salty, and bitter all in one bite-Liquorice validateshow longing and obsession are intertwined in the self-discovery ofyoung womanhood.

A Man For All Seasons is the long-awaited return of Insecure Men, the avant-pop band led by Saul Adamczewski and with a rotating cast of collaborators including Ben Romans-Hopcraft, the Childhood multi-instrumentalist who went to primary school with Adamczewski. It was recorded at Konk Studios in North London as trees blossomed in Spring this year. Brilliant songwriter, unlikely auteur, serious maverick: a man for all seasons.

Grim days call for fierce love. And Mavis Staples, one of the most enduring figures in American music, is laying it down. Sad And Beautiful World is the latest solo album from a national treasure and multigenerational talent. Produced by Brad Cook, Sad And Beautiful World spans seven decades of the American songbook - a range nearly as vast as Mavis' career - and includes reinventions of timeless songs by Tom Waits, Sparklehorse, Gillian Welch, Frank Ocean and more. Cook imagined an album in the tradition of Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's Will the Circle Be Unbroken, a group of artists coming together to celebrate community - in this case, one centered on Mavis. Collaborators include Buddy Guy, Bonnie Raitt, Jeff Tweedy, Derek Trucks, Katie Crutchfield, MJ Lenderman, and Justin Vernon. Inducted into several halls of fame (Blues, Rock, and Gospel), a Kennedy Center Honoree, a winner of multiple GRAMMYs (including a Lifetime Achievement Award), Mavis is musical history. She's collaborated with nearly every major figure of her era(s), from Bob Dylan to Prince, Aretha Franklin, and Willie Nelson - not to mention countless stars from subsequent generations.

LUX — The New Album, from ROSALÍA LUX vinyl features three additional songs which are exclusive to the physical format. LUX is the fourth studio album from GRAMMY Award winning singer, songwriter, and producer ROSALÍA. This is her most groundbreaking & global release to date. LUX is a monumental achievement in vision and craft. 

“We died when we started writing this album,” declare Sorry, the London-based five-piece preparing to release COSPLAY, their third studio album. But if Sorry did, indeed, die before a note had been recorded, before a single word had even been jotted down, who the hell are this bunch now masquerading as Sorry? Who has donned the Sorry outfits so convincingly? Who is it that has recorded COSPLAY, this album that first meticulously erases and then extravagantly redraws the perimeters of what a contemporary rock’n’roll band can achieve? Welcome to the world of COSPLAY, where anyone can be anyone, past or present, real or imaginary, dead or alive.

Stella Donnelly returns with a deeply personal and anchored album, a body of work that traces the journey back to herself after a period of profound change. Recorded in Naarm/Melbourne, the album carries the grounding energy of place, offering a sonic landscape that feels both intimate and expansive. Joining Donnelly on the record are longtime collaborators and friends Marcel Tussie, Sophie Ozard, Julia Wallace, Timothy Harvey, and Ellie Mason, whose playing brings a looseness and vitality to the music, holding space for Donnelly's voice to shine in it's most tender and unguarded forms.

American singer Steve Gunn has been at the vanguard of American experimental / guitar-oriented rock music for over a decade. After a trio of acclaimed albums recorded for Matador, Gunn recorded his 7th studio album in Chicago with producer James Elkington (whom also produced his 2019 record "The Unseen In Between"). Gunn opted for a more stripped back approach on Daylight Daylight, with the primary performances coming from Gunn and Elkington with additional contributions from: Nick Macri, Hunter Diamond, Ben Whiteley and Macie Stewart.

The Dears have made some of the most beautiful music of the past quarter century, but also some of the most defiant, with an attitude and emphasis that seems to blend the operatic with a punk sensibility. On their new album, Life Is Beautiful! Life Is Beautiful! Life Is Beautiful!, The Dears are again at the top of their form, coming back with passionate, compassionate, urgent music that uplifts, explores dark corners, and ultimately shines out in a way that's absolutely gorgeous, with an edge. ""Life Is Beautiful! Life Is Beautiful! Life is Beautiful!" feels like a new masterpiece and provides further evidence that The Dears are a vital part of the musical landscape, and also just completely doing their own thing, as ever." "If I love The Dears, if you love The Dears, it's because that orchestral, symphonic feel, those gorgeous melodies, are grounded in a gritty, gonna-die-on-this hill mentality and a heady intellectualism." "[...] my heart skipped a beat from the opening chords of "Gotta Get My Head Right"—a masterpiece of rising tension and killer melodies, layered and precise and yet roving and wild, with changes in the music and the progressions that alter your brain while listening. What follows is an album that's as various and yet as unified as that first track. Few bands can achieve this kind of complexity while also making it seem timeless and so very perfect." "There's no one like The Dears and there never will be, and I really appreciate that so very much." - excerpts from the album bio, written by New York Times bestselling author Jeff VanderMeer The Dears' 9th studio album, "Life Is Beautiful! Life Is Beautiful! Life Is Beautiful", pressed on gold vinyl in a limited edition of 1000, will release worldwide 11/7 via Next Door Records.

The Mountain Goats, led by singer-songwriter John Darnielle, have built a prolific and influential career in indie music since the early 1990s. Known for their vast discography of storytelling and literary lyricism, Darnielle is regarded as one of the most distinctive voices in modern songwriting. Their work has a deep emotional resonance with their avid and loyal fanbase, built over the past 30 years. Today, we find Darnielle awoken from a dream where he titled an album Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan, with no sense of sonic direction in the dream, then proceeded to write the entire album based off of this arbitrary title. Produced by the Mountain Goats’ multi-instrumentalist Matt Douglas, who also co-wrote several songs, the record is embracing, inviting, and overflowing with melody and orchestration that extends far beyond the boundaries of their past work. 

Westerman's 3rd album, A Jackal's Wedding, is a document of leaving and arriving, ongoing transformation, and the liminal spaces between shadows and the lights that cast them. The collaboration with producer Marta Salogni (who mastered An Inbuilt Fault) created a woozy and dreamier work than the 2 previous Westerman albums. Recorded in a 17th century mansion, converted into an art space on the island of Hydra; the album reflects the chaos and limits of the space and uses it as a collaborator.

The seventh studio album from UK alt-rock trio White Lies sees the band at their most confident and creatively fulfilled. Night Light was written and rehearsed live before hitting the studio, capturing the energy and chemistry that's defined their two-decade career. Determined to flip their usual process, White Lies - Harry McVeigh, Charles Cave, and Jack Lawrence-Brown - entered London's Church Studios to record the album live, inspired by the raw performances of The Midnight Special. The result is a dynamic collection that mixes muscular post-punk, progressive textures, and cinematic balladry, underscoring the trio's evolution while staying true to their anthemic roots. Standout tracks include the driving lead single "Nothing On Me," the synth-disco shimmer of "I Love(d) New York," the Springsteen-tinged "Everything Is OK," and the widescreen closer "In The Middle." Guest contributions from Black Midi's Seth Evans and production from Riley MacIntyre (Ezra Collective, Arlo Parks) further elevate the record's bold sonic palette. With Night Light, White Lies reaffirm their place as one of the UK's most enduring and adventurous bands - still pushing boundaries, still writing songs meant to be played loud.

Small Talk is Chicago duo Whitney’s fourth and unequivocally best and most affecting album. After a decade of being roommates and bandmates, first in Smith Westerns and then in Whitney, Julien Ehrlich and Max Kakacek entered the studio in the Summer of 2024, sans-producer, with assorted pals dropping into add parts. The result is 11 incandescent songs that delight on two levels. There are instant classic Whitney songs here, tunes that tug at the same heartfelt melodic strings they’ve always pulled, and still other moments that speak to how much room they gave themselves to evolve. 01. Silent Exchange 02. Won’t You Speak Your Mind 03. The Thread 04. Damage 05. Dandelions Side B: 01. Islands (Really Something) 02. In the Saddle 03. Evangeline (ft. Madison Cunningham) 04. Back to the Wind 05. Small Talk 06. Darling