The moment the jaunty guitar kicks in on John Smyths’ new single, "Now I'm Wiser", you feel a familiar, comfortable warmth. It’s the sound of a good chair in a bar where the floor is sticky with spilled truths. And then the story starts, a classic yarn of a hard-living past yielding to a peaceful present. Smyths, a Dutch ex-metalhead singing country out of...

Listening to Amy Jay’s latest album "MNEMONICS" is a bit like discovering a stack of sticky notes you wrote to yourself during a fever dream, only to find they make perfect, terrifying sense in the cold light of a Tuesday morning. It’s a record that doesn't just ask for your attention; it pulls up a chair, sits remarkably close, and asks why you’ve been...