Dylan Forshner's new EP, “Hopeless Optimism,” presents itself not so much as a collection of songs but as a series of candid diary entries set to intricately picked acoustic strings. This five-song journey from the Welland, Canada artist begins in a place of palpable internal wrestling, where the lyrics – and Forshner’s delivery – map out the grim territories of being overwhelmed, using substances...

Golden Alliance's new single, "Cruise," lands with the kind of revving immediacy that makes you instinctively check if you’ve left the car keys somewhere obvious. This Sussex-based studio artist isn't just plotting a holiday; "Cruise" maps out a profound, almost spiritual, desire to get under the skin of Route 66 – to understand its faded glories, those sun-bleached fragments of chrome and neon, its...