Jon Gold’s new single, "Lullaby for a Dream," is an act of gorgeous disorientation. You see the name—a pianist rooted in the intricate soils of jazz—and you prepare for one thing, but what arrives is a mist-laden skiff drifting from an entirely different shore. Gold, a Delaware musician, has composed a piece of British-Gaelic folk, and the cognitive dissonance is half the immediate magic....

Allan Jamisen’s new single, “Living the Dream,” settles in not with a shout, but with the unsettling quiet of finding oneself utterly lost in familiar territory. It’s pop-rock, sure, the label fits loosely enough, but the air hangs thick with something else. Jamisen’s vocals, subterranean and strangely calm, anchor the track. They don't soar; they resonate, like the hum you feel through the floorboards...