This is music born between two worlds. And it sounds like exactly that.

Kite Without a String follows a deliberate emotional and sonic journey across its eight tracks — opening with the driving, urgent energy of a world in a kind of muted stupor, and moving gradually toward something more settled, more layered, and ultimately more grounded.

“Hurricane Eyes” opens the album with electric urgency — the outside world pressing in, forward motion shaped by forces beyond the individual’s control.

The title track, “Kite Without a String,” follows with a spacious, mid-tempo arrangement: direct, reflective, and centred on the delicate balance of letting go without losing your core.

“Maksour” — the album’s Arabic-language track and one of its most exposed, emotionally raw moments — is a personal reflection on Beirut, stripped back and unguarded. A quiet anchor at the heart of the record.

“Vermontier (Dusk Edition)” marks the pivot — built around bright 12-string guitars, it shifts the tone outward, moving from heaviness toward direction and release. The landscape brightens.

From here the album turns inward. “Mizuri” — layered, melodic, and centred on faith — features vocal contributions from Matt Deluccia and Gaby Carvajal Poisson. “Petit Pierre” expands the palette into fuller arrangements, finding stability in simple, everyday moments. “Self Made World” — the album’s folktronica peak — reaches an emotional high before settling into a smoother, more connected outlook built on mutual support.

The bonus track, “I Like to Play (17′ Vault)” — a stripped-back archival closer from 2017 — brings the record full circle: a reminder to stay grounded, stay authentic, and return to the simplest version of why any of this began.

The full arc — from inertia to clarity, from muted stupor to light — is both musical and deeply personal. Grit, vice, strength, love, earth, skies, and clouds. All of it.

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John Lebanon began as solitary demos — the project of a songwriter navigating the distance between the underground scenes of Beirut and the alternative rock world of the American Northeast. Over a decade, it matured into a Boston-based ensemble blending the melodic nostalgia of the Levant with the textured grit of indie folk and alternative rock. The music has always been a documentation of two worlds — a search for truth, a guide home, a moral boost, a feeling that grounds expansive arrangements in something tangible and real.

For fans of Vampire Weekend, The Shins, Wilco, and Bibio, Kite Without a String offers exactly that combination of melodic warmth, lyrical depth, and sonic range.

The wait was worth it.

“Working For The Man” pulses with restless desire for independence — a track born from a grey, rainy afternoon in a Portobello Road flat in London, where a nervous teenage Janet sat across from acclaimed singer-songwriter Jack Savoretti during one of her first ever co-writing sessions. Across two days, the pair wrote two songs: “Delicate,” which appeared on her debut album, and “Working For The Man,” which did not. Instead, it became something rarer — a live staple, a fan obsession, and a personal favourite that refused to fade.

“It was so magical to hear the song I’ve loved for so long finally come to fruition,” Janet says. “To go from a little garage band demo on my laptop with Jack, to a full live band in none other than Blackbird Studios. It really felt like a beautiful, full-circle moment. If only 17-year-old me had a crystal ball, she could’ve seen where the song would end up.”

Co-produced by Janet alongside Jurgen Korduletsch and Rick Chambers, mixed by Vance Powell, and mastered by Christian Wright at Abbey Road Studios, “Working For The Man” fuses Janet’s signature country-tinged vocals with a jaunty, gloriously chaotic arrangement of jangling guitars, crashing drums, and spirited piano. Her voice — edged with Americana twang and grit, stronger than ever — guides the song from brooding tension into a soaring crescendo that captures exactly what it has always been about: the restless momentum of reclaiming control, searching for self-identity, and pushing back against a system that asks you to exhaust yourself for someone else’s gain.

The song’s anger is specific and personal. Janet’s parents worked full-time jobs while raising four children under five — she watched their exhaustion, felt her anger at what the system demanded of them, and channelled it into something that still rings as true now as it did when she was a teenager.

“Obviously, that system hasn’t changed since I wrote it,” she says. “It still angers me. That’s why the song still feels so true and relevant to me, all these years on.”

Savoretti, for his part, has never lost his admiration for the artist he wrote it with. “I have always loved Janet’s voice and admired her approach to music. She has always done things her own way.”

“Working For The Man” kicks off what promises to be a busy year on the road for Janet, following a 2025 that included performances at C2C Festival, The Long Road, and The British Country Music Festival. Upcoming dates include:

• April 2 — Camden Club, London (headline show, Chatter Hoochee Podcast)
• May 22 — In It Together Festival
• July 30 — Belladrum Festival (alongside Mika and Callum Beattie)
• August 16 — Country Calling, Essex

“Working For The Man” arrives on the heels of a remarkable recent chapter for Janet Devlin. Her 2024 album Emotional Rodeo reached #1 on the iTunes Country Chart, #4 on the UK Official Country Artists Albums Chart, #5 on the UK Official Indie Breakers Chart, and #21 on the UK Official Independent Albums Chart. Lead single “Houston” was added to the BBC Radio 2 playlist, and an acoustic cover of Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler” — recorded at George Ezra’s studio, Hotel Quebec — showcased the range that has always defined her. The 2025 deluxe edition Not My First Emotional Rodeo extended the album’s reach further still.

Janet has been praised by Russell Crowe — who previously took her on tour and has compared her to Stevie Nicks, admiring her ability to be both “ethereal” and “very direct” on stage. She appeared on The Scott Mills Radio 2 Breakfast Show ahead of C2C Festival. And through it all, she has remained exactly what “Working For The Man” celebrates: an independent artist, living and dying by her own sword.

The song is built around a beautifully bittersweet idea: living inside a moment while already feeling the future ache of missing it. That emotional tension becomes especially powerful through the line: “My tomorrow is already missing you today.” It is simple, yet deeply affecting. The lyric captures the quiet contradiction many parents experience, the awareness that ordinary days, often overlooked in real time, eventually become the memories we hold closest.

The track blends folk pop, indie folk, and acoustic singer-songwriter influences into a warm and inviting soundscape. Gentle melodies, layered harmonies, subtle strings, and organic instrumentation create an atmosphere that feels intimate without becoming overly dramatic. The arrangement moves with patience, allowing both the story and emotions to unfold naturally.

There is also a cinematic quality to the songwriting. Listening feels like opening a drawer of old polaroids, each image carrying fragments of laughter, cluttered rooms, shared meals, and life’s beautifully imperfect details. Collins transforms these everyday scenes into something quietly meaningful.

The sincerity in the vocal performance adds another layer of warmth. Collins leans into honesty, giving the song a comforting, heartfelt, and reflective presence.

With “My Tomorrow Is Already Missing You Today,” George Collins Band offers a gentle reminder to slow down, notice the moments that often pass unnoticed, and appreciate the ordinary days that one day may mean everything..

Produced by Alexander Hulme, “Better In Fiction” captures the emotional split second that exists between attraction and action, that fleeting moment where fantasy and reality briefly collide. Inspired by a real-life encounter during a particularly cynical chapter in Harrison Rimmer’s life, the track leans into uncertainty rather than resolution. Instead of turning romance into something dramatic or idealized, the song focuses on the tension of almost-connection: the possibility of approaching someone, or choosing instead to quietly walk away and let the imagined version remain untouched.

The track unfolds through warm acoustic textures and spacious instrumentation that give the songwriting room to breathe. Harrison’s vocal delivery feels conversational and unguarded, carrying an honesty that makes every lyric land naturally. While traces of his punk-rock roots still linger beneath the surface, they appear here more as emotional weight than explosive energy. The vulnerability feels intentional but never overstated.

Harrison Rimmer understands that not every meaningful connection becomes a love story, and the track embraces that emotional ambiguity rather than trying to resolve it neatly. There’s a quiet melancholy running through the song, balanced carefully against moments of hope and curiosity.

“Better In Fiction” by Harrison Rimmer delivers a beautifully restrained indie folk release. One that finds meaning in hesitation, imagination, and the feelings people leave unsaid..

Created during Tim Camrose’s final overseas journey to New York City with his late wife, Deb, the single carries profound emotional weight. Yet what makes “Break The Chains” particularly compelling is its balance. The song acknowledges absence without surrendering entirely to it, allowing reflection and healing to exist side by side.

The song unfolds through an Americana-inspired palette enriched by acoustic warmth and folk influences. Inspired in part by “Father & Son” by Cat Stevens, the track embraces storytelling as its emotional centre, letting melody and lyricism move together with quiet sincerity.

Rather than pursuing dramatic peaks, the arrangement chooses subtlety and emotional patience. This restraint becomes one of the song’s greatest strengths, allowing its themes to surface gradually and naturally. Every instrumental layer feels intentional, giving the narrative enough space to breathe.

Further emotional depth arrives through the expressive guitar work of Jim Kirkpatrick. His solo adds another dimension to the composition, functioning less as a showcase moment and more as an extension of the song’s reflective voice.

Equally compelling is the journey that led Tim Camrose back to music itself. After decades spent building a career in surgery and academia, his return to songwriting brings a perspective shaped by experience, travel, and years of quiet observation.

Serving as an introduction to the forthcoming album American Stories, “Break The Chains” opens a deeply personal chapter. Through CAMROSE, Tim Camrose transforms remembrance into song, offering listeners a moving reflection on enduring love and the strength that can emerge far beyond loss..

Naming your debut single after one of the most mythologised figures in American frontier history is a statement of intent. Wyatt Earp was a lawman – a marshal who became famous partly through the gunfight at the O.K. Corral – while Jesse James, who gets namechecked in the same tradition, was the outlaw on the other side of that cultural equation. These are the folk heroes that American country music has been drawing on for over a century, the kind of names that carry instant weight and moral symbolism. What Devan is doing with “Wyatt Earp” is rooting himself in that lineage while coming at it from rural Cambridgeshire, which is an unusual angle. The song sits in that space where classic country’s storytelling instincts meet a cleaner, more polished modern production – the kind of sound that has become standard in the post-Morgan Wallen wave of country pop crossover – and it manages to feel personal rather than derivative. The choice of Wyatt Earp as a frame isn’t just a nod to genre convention; it’s Devan signalling what kind of artist he wants to be – someone who values the mythology, the grit, and the moral clarity that those old American folk tales carried.

The single has already picked up radio play on CountryLine Homegrown with Tim Prottey-Jones, which is a solid early platform for a debut. Devan has a planned EP launch at Rockin’ the Country festival later this year, and with a track like “Better Man” – written about his grandfather – still to come, there’s clearly more emotional material in the pipeline. “Wyatt Earp” is a promising start from someone who, by his own account, had never written or recorded before any of this. That’s either a remarkable natural instinct or very good collaborators. Probably both.

Built around warm acoustic guitars, restrained vocals, and a gradual piano-led expansion, the track feels like an internal monologue unfolding in real time. Wesley David captures a very specific kind of exhaustion, the quiet frustration of repeating old cycles while realizing life never magically turns into certainty. There’s a heaviness running through the lyrics, but the song never sinks completely into defeat. Even at its most melancholic, it still reaches outward for something lighter.

The pacing plays a huge role in that emotional payoff. “Stop Sign” starts small and intimate, almost hesitant in its delivery, before slowly opening into something fuller and more cathartic. The shift is subtle but effective. Layer by layer, the instrumentation grows wider, the vocals become more emotionally charged, and suddenly the track transforms from reflective indie folk into something closer to an understated anthem for anyone trying to move through disappointment without losing themselves completely.

There are shades of Elliott Smith in the vulnerability, hints of Oasis and Coldplay in the melodic warmth, but Wesley David never feels trapped inside those comparisons. The songwriting carries too much personal weight for that. You can hear lived experience all over this record: grief, reinvention, creative restlessness, and the strange tension between wanting to let go and still stubbornly holding on.

What makes “Stop Sign” work so well is that it understands hope isn’t always inspiring or cinematic. Sometimes hope sounds tired. Sometimes it arrives with sarcasm, hesitation, and doubt attached to it. Wesley David embraces that contradiction beautifully, allowing the song to sit in emotional uncertainty rather than forcing resolution too quickly.

“Stop Sign” by Wesley David turns introspection into quiet resilience. It’s reflective without becoming self-indulgent, emotional without collapsing into despair. More than anything, it feels human: flawed, searching, weary, but still moving forward anyway..

The origins of “Travelin’ Heart” are as nomadic as its title. Initial ideas were captured on a mobile phone during a road trip along the U.S. East Coast. These sketches were later meticulously developed in Turner’s home studio before being brought to life by a collaborative effort across multiple locations.

The track features live drums and soaring pedal steel contributions, culminating in a final master completed in Nashville. This multi-city production process mirrors the song’s core theme: the physical and emotional journey of leaving weight behind to find a new perspective.

Built on a foundation of acoustic guitar, mandolin, and pedal steel, “Travelin’ Heart” moves from intimate, atmospheric verses into a dynamic, melodic chorus. It is a track designed for fans of artists like Noah Kahan, Zach Top, and Riley Green, bridging the gap between raw, organic instrumentation and polished indie-pop hooks.

“The song explores travel as both a physical escape and an inner journey,” says Turner. “It’s about that moment when you shift your perspective and let the change come from within.”

The song sits comfortably in the territory between Noah Kahan’s modern folk-pop and the more traditional Americana lineage of Willie Nelson and John Denver, which is exactly where Turner is aiming. What keeps it from feeling derivative is the production approach: intimate and spacious at the same time, built on acoustic guitar and mandolin with Schuck’s pedal steel doing a lot of the emotional heavy lifting in the verses and bridge. The track breathes differently than most indie folk releases precisely because it was built across multiple rooms and locations rather than tracked in one session. That distance is audible in the arrangement in a good way.

Lyrically, it works on two levels without overexplaining either. On the surface, it’s a road song. Underneath, it’s about shedding weight, resetting perspective, and the particular clarity that only arrives when you put enough miles between yourself and whatever was dragging you down. The bridge handles that plainly without tipping into self-help territory, and the outro resolves the whole thing with a lightness that feels earned rather than forced. For a debut single, “Travelin’ Heart” is a confident statement of direction. Turner knows what kind of artist he wants to be, and the bones of something genuinely worth following are already here.