Robin James Hurt’s “A Song, A Story Told” arrives with a sound you can almost run a thumb over, like worn corduroy. In an age of sterile, diamond-polished productions, this album is a defiantly handmade thing, tracked onto vintage cassette machines. The result is not a flaw, but an ingredient. A faint, persistent hiss breathes alongside the instruments, a ghost in the machine who...

With Stone Deaf's well-anticipated single "Joculator", the atmosphere shifts; the air suddenly feels thinner, charged with static and the sweet promise of bad decisions. Coming out of Swansea, these guys Michael Pole, Benjamin Lake, and Charlie Ridgway seem intent on resurrecting the ghost of every raucous basement party you vaguely remember leaving long after you should have gone home. > Pre-save here! < The sound doesn't...