“Twin Lakes” by Dust Cwaine

Vancouver drag performer and indie-pop rocker Dust Cwaine just dropped the second single off their upcoming album with the title track, “Twin Lakes”

With a frenetic urgency to it, the new song is about Dust growing up in the Kootenays & the passing of their father, as they explain: “I wrote this song about growing up in an isolated community, and the pain of being further isolated from the people within it. I realized that in death, my father had bypassed any chance to be held accountable for the things he put me through. This song imagines what it might have been like to finally say what needed to be said.”

Still no release date for the album, but you can check out the video below — directed by Luke Beach Brown & filmed at the Britannia Mine Museum — below!

Kirk

“Caught Light” by Great Lake Swimmers

The new album from Great Lake Swimmers, Caught Light, officially has a released date of October 10th - just in time to kick off their tour with Elliott BROOD!

Last week they released the title track “Caught Light”, which might be my favourite of the new music so far. The press release makes reference to photography (quite literally catching light), which as the photographer around here I can appreciate.

As for the song itself, singer Tony Dekker says it is about “a skydiver who strays off course while in the air, and then takes stock of his surroundings while on the ground in unfamiliar territory. The ‘caught light’ of the song has multiple meanings, in that it implies the metaphor of a mirror reflecting one’s life back to one’s self; the photographic aspect of light being ‘caught’ on paper and creating a physical document of the ephemeral; and also the discovery of a lack or a low reservoir, being ‘light’ on what is needed to make meaningful sense of the predicament of being lost.”

More songs with photography metaphors please!

Christine

“Lost Without You” by Luca Fogale

I have a playlist that is simply called “Morning” that I listen to almost every morning when I’m camping, and when Luca’s song “I Don’t Want To Lose You” comes on I stop whatever I’m doing and just listen to it.

When I saw the words “Luca Fogale” and “Piano Ballad” I knew I was going to love this new track immediately and I wasn’t wrong.

“Lost Without You” is beautiful, elegant and heartfelt - it tugs at my imposter-syndrome when it comes to relationships. Luca says: “I wrote ‘Lost Without You’ as honestly as I possibly could and the result was a song about accepting love at a time when I was not fully able to accept some parts of myself, in the hopes of finding a way to dismantle the patterns of thought that have held me down.”

This is his third single of 2025, so I’m hoping that means even more is coming out soon!

Christine

“midnight magic” by Ada Lea

We’re only a couple weeks away from the release of Ada Lea’s new album, when i paint my masterpiece, as she releases the third single from it with “midnight magic”.

The ethereal song is is accompanied not only by a surreal video, but a painting as well. Alexandra Levy painted it herself, and then collaborated with visual artist Clarice Hana to bring it to life in a video where “a giant creature woman births a candlestick holder, a cloud-sized egg, a piano, an enormous tube of paint and finally, she gives birth to me,” Levy explains. “The OBGYN has 4 eyes and uses 3-foot scissors to cut the cord.”

You are definitely going to need to check out the video below, and then keep a look out for when i paint my masterpiece on August 8th. Ada Lea is also hitting the road this fall for a massive tour, which includes a stop here in Vancouver on October 25th at the Kingsway Club!

Kirk

“itero” by bloom effect

Last week the Vancouver-based transatlantic trio bloom effect announced their upcoming EP oscilón, with the release of the first single, “itero”

The track is an instantly catchy, fuzzy shoegaze jam, which is described as “a melancholic anthem for love that could’ve been.”

Check it out below & let it wash over you, and you can pick up their new EP oscilón on September 19 via Kingfisher Bluez.

Kirk

“Eddie Vedder” by The Matinee

The Matinee just wants to be friends with “Eddie Vedder”.

On their new tune, named for the grunge icon, singer Matt Layzell shares: “We grew up listening to Pearl Jam. Their album TEN came out at a formative time in our lives, and watching the band continue to evolve and stick it out together has always been something to aspire to. I was in a bit of a rut, feeling like I was attracting nothing but bad luck. The kicker was my car breaking down after a road trip and having to fork out my whole tax return. I took a walk with my dog to the dog beach here in Vancouver and remembered the moment the trouble light came on, which was around the Vedder River. Vedder. Eddie Vedder. I don’t know why, but I just said it out loud, “I wish Eddie Vedder was a friend of mine”. I perked up quite a bit as I realized my day wasn’t so bad sitting on a log, watching the waves. I started thinking about the things I’d ask Eddie if he was there, just chewing the fat with me. Eddie, if you hear this song, let’s grab a coffee sometime—it’s on me.”

The new song is the kind of catchy, roots-rock jam you would expect from the band (and I’ll bet they’re currently pretty happy they didn’t pick the frontman to another ground-breaking 90s Seattle grunge band to sing about).

You can check out the lyric video below, and find the song on their upcoming End of Scene EP — featuring B-Sides to their latest album Change of Scene — which is out November 1st.

Kirk

“If God Is A Woman” by Larkin Poe

I first heard of Georgia-bred, Nashville-based Larkin Poe at the Vancouver Folk Music Festival in 2019 and was instantly hooked.
This week they put out a new single titled “If God Is A Woman” and announced a new album Bloom, to be released in January.

Of the bluesy new track, Rebecca Lovell says “If God Is A Woman’ was written as a reminder to resist the typecasting of women, both conscious and unconscious. There are many shades of existence, and we had fun painting abstract with this sardonic blues.”

I hope we get more soon from these Grammy winners!

Christine

“Life of the Party” by Housewife

With their third release of the year, Toronto’s Housewife is looking to be the “Life of the Party”.

Though despite the name, the haunting ear-worm is a little on the darker side compared to their latest songs, with Brighid Fry explaining, “’Life of the Party’ is the closest I’ll ever get to making the music 13 year old emo me wanted to make. It’s a totally self pity fest, which is sometimes exactly what you need! I made this song with Mikky Ekko and Aaron C Harmon, and we wrote it about the cognitive dissonance you get between people’s perception of how your life is going versus how you actually feel it's going. I totally love my job, but I think sometimes people make a lot of assumptions about me based on the fact that I’m a musician. People see me on stage and assume that I’m this super confident person living a super glamorous life, and that is just not the case. Once I get off stage, I am a very anxious person who doesn’t like being the center of attention - so I wanted to write a song about balancing people’s opinions of me with how I actually feel about myself.”

No word on a full album from Housewife, but you can watch the lyric video below.

Kirk

“Candles” by Sunset Rubdown

I still sorta can’t believe that we have new music from Sunset Rubdown, but this past Friday, the Vancouver band released their first album in 15(!) years, Always Happy To Explode.

And to celebrate, they dropped their latest single, “Candles”, an upbeat song that started as one of Spencer Krug’s song-a-month project on Patreon in 2020, it was rediscovered and reworked by the band for the new album.

Always Happy To Explode is available now, and you can see Sunset Rubdown as they strike out on tour, starting October 10 here in Vancouver at the Rickshaw Theatre

Kirk

“All Bets Are Off” by Japandroids

It’s less than a month until the final album from Japandroids - with Fate & Alcohol being released on October 18th.

It is bittersweet getting new music from the band but knowing that it’s the end and we won’t be getting a tour for it, but I will take whatever they give me!

The latest track release is titled “All Bets Are Off” and singer/guitarist Brian King shared his journaling/thoughts on the night that inspired the closing track of the album:

“Night off. I could have rested though (of course) I didn't. The crew were on one and the party was well underway when I arrived. The other patrons didn't seem to appreciate our noisy and colourful presence (squares), but the boys were blissfully unaware, hurling hot words at one another and making absurd bets with their per diems, like whether it was possible to light a cigarette with a pistol shot. I knew where this was going and wanted no part of it.

I slunk to a shadowy corner and ordered a cocktail, spur to my jaded spirits. I was gathering material for a book on bar life and it was the perfect place to watch the hungry hearts of Saturday twist towards the blue emptiness of Sunday morning. Poolroom tigers and nightclub kittens, on the prowl for a piece of anything. Cups and lips, quips and quirks, I frantically jotted it all down sparing no detail. Another cocktail? Don't mind if I do! The night was primed and I felt punk.

Seeing her immediately stripped me of my powers. A thousand thoughts, frozen and kept in cold storage, thawed all at once. She was not the same woman I had known, exuding a subtle elegance and sensuality I had never seen before; she looked breathtaking. Every exquisite nuance like salt on old love-cuts. Chicly dressed too, which added to my agony. The imbalance between us was obvious, making me self-conscious. Still, I decided to let it play out. Cue the music.”

Christine

“Fear it comes in waves” by Sunnsetter

Sunnsetter is the latest music project from multi-instrumentalist, composer, and mixing engineer Andrew McLeod, and last week they released their latest single, “Fear it comes in waves”.

The new tune is a raucous song that Andrew says is an examination of “the daily dread or anxiety that just finds its way into your everyday life, in waves, even when you find ways to cope with it.”

Along with the new single, the band announced their upcoming album, Heaven Hang Over Me, which is out November 15!

Kirk

“Armour” by bloom effect

bloom effect is a Vancouver trio made up of members from Argentina and UK, and last week they released the first taste of their upcoming EP Portents,

“Armour” is a shoegaze- y dream-pop vibe, with ethereal vocals from singer Jula Lafit, and you can have a listen below!

Kirk

Songs of the Week: July 21 - 27, 2025