To cover "Jolene" is to stand in a very long, very deep shadow, yet with their new single, Sugarfoot have brought their own strange and compelling light. This isn't the familiar, simmering confrontation we know. Stripped of its country gallop and rebuilt around the stark, lonely-sounding architecture of Graeme Park's piano, the song is transformed from a desperate challenge into a haunting, prayer-like surrender. https://open.spotify.com/track/4P53bty0Ik9kgTfvMjqiIG?si=7e611d085f2f41c4 The...

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...