Crooks & Nannies return today with “Country Bar,” the third pre-release single from their new record Real Life, which arrives August 25th. The new track builds around a frantic acoustic guitar strum, and as Stereogum says “merges a confessional singer-songwriter approach with the trappings of artsy indie rock, veering from straight-ahead guitars to grand detonations to sparse intimacy and back around to a louder, mildly twangy conclusion.”

Of the song, Max Rafter shares:

“I started to write this song during a budding romance. There were so many secret unspoken feelings. It felt exciting, and I wanted more. I could only meet them as far as they were willing to go. I thought that if I put in enough work, things would click into place. I thought if I wanted something hard enough, there was no reason it couldn’t happen. It’s about being blinded by love, zoomed in, and hopeful. Knowing it won’t work but trying so hard anyway.

I’ve always been a person who wants to fix relationships that aren’t working rather than walk away, at times to my own detriment. “Country Bar” hits on those themes, looking with rose colored glasses at a relationship.”

Last month the band announced a run of tour dates around the album’s release. Flyer below, tickets available in our tour section now.

Today we’re so excited to welcome Arcy Drive to the Grand Jury family.

These four barefoot kids from Northport, NY have spent the last year traversing the US (in a school bus they converted into tour digs themselves!), selling out shows from Bowery Ballroom in NYC to the Moroccan Lounge in LA. There’s an earnest sense of discovery to these rambunctious rock songs, small celebrations of big feelings that can connect with pretty much anyone.

Our first single with the band, “Wicked Styley,” is due August 11th. It’s available for pre-save now. More chances to catch the band live are on the horizon, too – Lollapalooza in Chicago, select dates with Spacey Jane, Goth Babe and our pal Briston Maroney. Hit their artist page for all the dates.

Single number two from the forthcoming Real Life is “Weather,” a Sam song that starts slow before exploding into big fits of chaos and pathos. The dynamic swing is something the band masters with their debut LP, coming in August. The video hints at the story behind the song’s creation, a song written by Huntington during a long bike ride that turned into an even longer walk, and the nights chaos is mirrored in its instrumentation.

She explains: “It was spring of 2020, and despite being the first warm night of the season, the city was eerily empty. After weeks of being cooped up I wanted to see something new and decided to make a rule for myself: If I came across an unfamiliar street I was required to turn down it. Drunk and restless, I biked for hours, until my phone died and I realized I was lost. I was in a non-residential area that I didn’t recognize and it was very late. In Philly many of the major streets are numbered, but I was having difficulty finding one. I seemed to be trapped in a labyrinth of exit ramps, warehouses and negative space. By the time I made it home, I had sweated through my shirt, popped a tire, had a bizarre encounter with a flock of geese, stumbled upon a massive house fire, and written a song. The bike ride felt like some kind of strange upsetting dream and I think deeply informed the tone of Weather. The song is about feeling hollow.”

“The vocals throughout this track are from the original demo. My roommate came home while I was recording them and, feeling self-conscious about the lyrics, I sang the ending section as a whisper. I figured it would be a placeholder but we decided to lean in, emphasizing the fragility in the vocal performance and doing everything in our power to make the instrumental go really fucking hard. There are like 8 layers of guitar feedback. We hit a trash can with a mallet and layered it over the snare. That’s our engineer, Mark Water, screaming. The abrupt ending symbolizes death, perhaps a life cut short.”

In other news, the band just announced a series of dates around the album’s release. Tickets on sale this Friday!

Real Life is available for pre-order now – on highlighter yellow & ultra clear vinyl and limited edition cassette. Purchase links below.

Earlier this week Samia shared a new cover of “Charm You” recorded by Blondshell, the first in a series of single releases dubbed “Honey Reimagined” featuring a variety of artists (including Maya Hawke, Hovvdy, Ruston Kelly + more TBA) reinterpreting songs from Honey.

This collection of singles is inspired by 2021’s The Baby Reimagined, which featured versions of songs from Samia’s breakthrough debut LP, The Baby, recorded by Bartees Strange, Briston Maroney, MICHELLE, Anjimile, Christian Lee Hutson and more.

Samia shares: “I’ve always been vocal about community being important to me. I couldn’t do this without my friends. We reimagined The Baby in 2020 because we were all stuck at home during the pandemic but the idea felt so true to the ethos of this project that I wanted to try it again with Honey. It’s always exciting to give songs a new life, especially with such great musicians involved.”

Blondshell shares: “I’ve been inspired by Samia for such a long time. She puts so much of herself into her songs, so much love for people and places. That was one of the things that stood out to me most about Honey – all of the friendship and joy that cut through darkness. I really felt that on ‘Charm You’ and I’m so happy to be part of her project.”

In other news, Samia just announced more dates – a few supporting Noah Kahan, and a headline run with Venus & The Flytraps. Tickets available at samiaband.com.

“Sparks” has been a live staple for Jordana for a while. Anyone who saw her 2021 tour with TV Girl, likely saw her silence rooms with this one late in her set. So to celebrate another upcoming tour (announcing today – details below!), she’s released a studio version of the track. Listen above, or wherever you get music.

Now about that tour: Jordana will be hitting the road this Fall with rising indie pop rebel Dev Lemons. Tickets on sale this Friday at 10am local – you can snag them in our tour section. Flyer below.

It’s rare for things to feel and sound this raw and true. You may have discovered Crooks & Nannies – the West Philly duo of Sam Huntington & Max Rafter — on their early 2023 No Fun EP, a short-player that deserved every plaudit it received. Just last month, Paste proclaimed “what a joy it is to watch a band at the top of their game make such dazzling, singular tracks; how lucky we are that Crooks & Nannies have so, so much left to give.”

Today the band announced exactly what that more-to-give is: a new 10-song record, Real Life.

Alternating between painfully tender and jarringly obtuse, the childhood friends fashion themes of growth, loss, and transformation into off-kilter pop songs that whirr with the unpredictability of a failing engine. In early 2020, just days after Huntington decided to start hormone therapy, her father was diagnosed with terminal cancer. After his passing, she and Rafter retreated to the partially-finished, off-grid cabin that her father had been building prior to his diagnosis. It was the first time either of them had been back to their hometown in upstate NY since transitioning, and it resulted in a distinct contrast between vulnerable, melancholy hush and explosive, confused guitar throughout every fiber of their new record. “Temper” is the first tease, a song that feels like an open wound filled with sugar, a rumination on the difficulties of forgiveness.

You can preorder copies of the album now on limited edition cassette, highlighter yellow vinyl on Bandcamp, or on ultra clear wax anywhere else.

A new era dawns on Wasteland. There’s country twang atop vintage guitar pop and plenty of cathartic rock moments to go around on this new Hippo Campus EP. If the past few releases from the Minneapolis indie rebels have pushed the experimentation envelope, this one feels like a self-assured return to early days form. It’s everywhere you listen to music now.

And we heard y’all loud and clear – *where’s the vinyl?* So we’ve got a limited edition 12″ pressed on Wasteland Smoke available for pre-order right now on Bandcamp. Shipping in late August.

Meanwhile, tour approaches. Get your tickets now while you still can. Lots of dates are already sold out. Get your tickets over in the tour section now.

Anyone who bought a deluxe edition version of Honey earlier this year received a limited edition flexi disc featuring Samia covering Maps by Yeah Yeah Yeahs or Country by Porches. With those copies long gone, today Samia has released both covers digitally and unveiled a limited edition 7″ for purchase on Bandcamp now.

Today Samia shares the new music video for “Amelia,” shot on the road during the first leg of Honey touring by Muriel Margaret. It encapsulates everything that makes a Samia show so special, with a few behind the scenes treats thrown in for good measure.

“This whole crew are like family to me and making this video was the such an honor to do,” says director Margaret. “I just wanted it to feel like what it feels like to be friends with Samia. It’s joyful, and special, and something you want to capture and share with other people.”

In case you missed it, that run of dates also saw Samia stopping by KEXP for a session. She did some Baby classics along with “Dream Song” from Honey. Watch the whole thing, including an interview with Kevin Cole, below.

More dates are on the way, as Samia kicks off the second leg of Honey touring later this month with support from Christian Lee Hutson. Tickets available in the tour section now.