Janet Devlin’s new single, “Houston,” arrives as a gleeful contradiction, a two-stepping Americana anthem for the sovereign state of one. It has all the upbeat, country-rock fixings for a roadside sing-along, yet its heart is miles away, floating in a self-imposed, wonderfully stubborn vacuum. The track opens, and you’re ready for a communal good time; instead, you find yourself at a party where the...

When the lone-wolf empath Thomas, recording under the Beyond Signal moniker, finally unleashed his debut album “Gaia Algorithmica”, it forced an immediate confrontation with the digital glare constantly humming in our periphery. Thomas approaches his craft as a solo singer-songwriter championing neurodivergence and existential authenticity, weaving his lifelong angst into a self-invented genre he dubs Transcendental Indie Music. This blend of post-punk, electronica, and...