Trash Panda

Trash Panda began in 2015 as the pet recording project of songwriter/producer/multi-instrumentalist Patrick Taylor, expanding into a duo then a trio in 2016. Pulling from influences as wide as neopsychedelia, soul, indie rock and pop music, the band considers themselves somewhat post-genre. Darlings of the indie scene, Trash Panda tapped into both the perils of modern dating and the existential questions of dark nights of the soul. Their 2016 EP Off features crowd-favorites “Aging Out of the 20th Century,” “Off,” and “Check Please.” Trash Panda’s 2018 album The Starclimber made a splash with tongue-in-cheek banger “Atlanta Girls” and the psychedelic groove of “Heartbreak Pulsar.” After the album the band went on hiatus and pursued other projects, emerging four years later in 2022 with several new members, releasing two singles “Things Will Never Change” and “Doin’ Fine Today” which are quickly gaining attention, featured in their first weeks on more than 10 of Spotify’s editorial playlists. In its first wave, only two years of frenzied creativity, the band made a regional splash touring small and mid-sized venues and during its four year hiatus reached a certain level of global cult status, with passionate fans spanning the globe. Autumn of 2022 brought the band their first nationwide tour as support for Ceramic Animal. Trash Panda plans to release their second full length album in 2023 coinciding with an extensive album support tour in the spring and summer. Website | Instagram | YouTube

Molly Tuttle – The Highway Knows Tour

On the heels of two Grammy-winning albums in succession, with her band Golden Highway—2022’s Crooked Tree and 2023’s City of Gold—plus a nomination for Best New Artist, Molly Tuttle returns with a solo album that’s her most dazzling to date: So Long Little Miss Sunshine. Recorded in Nashville with producer Jay Joyce (Orville Peck, Miranda Lambert, Lainey Wilson, Eric Church, Cage the Elephant), the fifth full album from the California-born, Nashville-based singer, songwriter, and virtuoso guitarist features twelve new songs—eleven originals and one highly unexpected cover of Icona Pop and Charli xcx’s “I Love It.” Tuttle’s career, which began at age fifteen, has charted a course between honoring bluegrass and stretching its boundaries. On this album—a hybrid of pop, country, rock, and flat-picking, plus one murder ballad—she goes to a whole new place. Her stunning guitar work is more up-front on this album than ever before. (One of the most decorated female guitarist alive, Tuttle was the first woman to win the prestigious International Bluegrass Music Award’s Guitar Player of the Year in 2017, at age twenty-four, and won again the following year, with nominations nearly every year since; she has also won Americana Music Association’s Instrumentalist of the Year award.) So Long Little Miss Sunshine also features Tuttle playing banjo, something she’s never done on one of her albums before. “I like to be a bit of a chameleon with my music,” she says. “Keep people guessing and keep it full of surprises.” Tuttle has been slowly building this collection of songs over the last five years, while also writing and releasing two hugely successful albums and a six-song EP (last year’s Into the Wild) and playing more than 100 shows each year with Golden Highway. Along the way she’d send songs to Joyce, who she first started talking to about collaborating on the album a few years ago. “I’ve been wanting to make this record for such a long time. Part of me was scared to do such a big departure, and that went into the album title So Long Little Miss Sunshine. It’s like, ‘You know what? I’m just not going to care what people think. I’m going to do what I want.’” The album was recorded with a group of musicians that includes drummer/percussionists Jay Bellerose and Fred Eltringham, bassist Byron House, and Joyce on multiple instruments. Ketch Secor (Old Crow Medicine Show) also plays banjo, fiddle, and harmonica, as well as singing harmony. Tuttle also conceived the artwork for So Long Little Miss Sunshine, which features multiple Mollys, each wearing a different wig except for one with nothing on her head at all. (“I probably own as many wigs as I own guitars,” she says.) Tuttle has been bald since she was three years old due to the autoimmune condition alopecia areata; she acts as a spokesperson for the National Alopecia Areata Foundation. Website | Instagram | TikTok | Facebook | YouTube | Spotify

Glare

When you hear music like this — the wild, loose and woozy drags of guitar; the impossible beauty of it all — what kind of landscape presents itself in your mind? Vistas big enough to be forgotten in. Deserts which stretch back to the beginning of time. Infinite horizons melting into pink bokehs. It’s Texas, isn’t it? Formed in 2017 in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, Glare aren’t so much genre traditionalists as they are painters of wide realms and intense moods. The four-piece band has already accumulated a large audience, both in the flesh with their reputation for sell-out shows, and on the internet, a place where people go to short-circuit feelings through their screens. Sunset Funeral, the band’s debut LP, is a fog of dreamy grief, where feeling supersedes language. It’s music, as guitarist Toni Ordaz puts it, “for people who don’t know how to talk about how they feel.” An album that’s been years in the making, Sunset Funeral is a document of unspeakable grief, charting the process of mourning and how it travels through our subconscious and dreams. One of the great charms of Sunset Funeral, and of Glare overall, is how they approach such a large, celestial sound with humble materials. Among the shoegaze revivalists, Glare come to the canvas with a more resourceful, DIY perspective than many of their peers. Glare’s music is too sublime, too huge to sound like it came from any kind of manmade instrument, tiny amp box or otherwise. On first listen, Sunset Funeral — which scans as vast as desert sand — may overwhelm the senses. But look closer, and you’ll find a multiplicity of heavily crushed textures, treasures. ‘Guts,’ with its sweetly chugging guitar line, dissolves the borders between bliss and despair. ‘2 Soon 2 Tell,’ one of the album’s most gauzily romantic tracks, is both tense and transcendent. Nü Burn, a crunchy and lilting number, harkens back to the band’s grittier hardcore roots. But even when they deign to go hard, you can hear a softening in Glare’s sound compared to any of their previous releases, as well as an attempt to lean into more traditional pop song structures. The music drifts heavenward, to be sure, though it’s still tethered down by steady foundations. It’s beautiful. It’s humid. It’s delirious. It’s music made by people whose feelings speak louder than their words. Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Spotify

Maris x Caroline Kingsbury

LIFEBEAT, a program of The Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation, mobilizes the music and entertainment industry to provide the resources and support needed to take control of your sexual health and prevent HIV. On the ground at music tours, festivals, and special events, LIFEBEAT engages youth in discussions about HIV prevention, safe sex practices, and available support services regardless of status, gender, or sexuality. Through partnerships and community engagement, LIFEBEAT utilizes in-person outreach, broadcast, social media, and print campaigns to promote HIV/STI testing, prevention and treatment, and sexual health education. Maris Spotify | Instagram | YouTube | TikTok Caroline Kingsbury Spotify | Instagram | YouTube | TikTok

Xana

Xana is an independent Queer artist emerging from the West Coast with a gritty dark pop rock sound. Known for her ferocious honesty and relatable subject matter, Xana has taken the world by storm with the release of countless singles, her debut album Tantrums in April 2022 and her initial North American tour in 2023. Xana creates worlds that bring listeners on adventures with explosive arrangements, heartfelt moments, and bright, courageous attitude. Her high energy tracks are unapologetic, relatable, and intimately revealing. She has built an incredibly passionate fanbase that connects with her openness on her sexuality and her self-discovery journey. Xana looks to be the role model she couldn’t find in her youth with her openness, using her music as an outlet to share the life experiences that many can relate to. Xana’s music encompasses themes of LGBTQ romance, female empowerment, sex positivity, self-reflection and discovery. Instagram | TikTok | YouTube.| Facebook | Spotify

Confetti

Cafuné

Four years ago, in a vastly different context, Cafuné—the indie-pop powerhouse of Noah Yoo and Sedona Schat—released Running, a bionic debut album that soundtracked a collective urge for post-pandemic escapism. That record, Schat says, “is literally all about running away.” But as the duo enters its tenth year, their foundational questions—of authenticity, artificiality, and the existential tension between the two—feel more pressing than ever. “The entire time that the band has existed,” Schat says, “it’s always been about negotiating between digital manipulation and raw realness.” This moment—one increasingly defined by AI, algorithms, and artificial intimacy—is very much a bastion of “digital manipulation” in itself. Recorded in 2024, their new record finds the band at a familiar crossroads, reckoning between real and fake. The difference, this time around, is that they’re doing it in the real world, too. And it sounds like it. Bite Reality captures Cafuné in a confrontational state, no longer running from the bite of reality, but biting reality back. Their guitars growl; their vocals snarl; their lyrics teem with brutal honesty, not avoidant analogy. “Self-flagellation is not cute after a certain point,” Yoo says, with a laugh. “That’s not even helpful,” Schat adds. “What helps you to be better is actually facing: What is really wrong, and how do I work through it?” Bite Reality is about the fine line between documenting your existence and doing the work to actually exist. What does humanity look, sound, and feel like in a dehumanizing era? Why prove that you’re alive when you can just live? Website | Instagram | Facebook | Youtube | Spotify | Bandcamp | TikTok

East Forest

This is a seated show. East Forest is a multidisciplinary artist, producer, speaker, and ceremony guide. Since 2008, East Forest’s “lush” (Rolling Stone) and “blissful” (NPR) music has blended ambient, neoclassical, electronic, and avant-pop to explore sound as a tool for inner journeys and consciousness expansion. The project’s latest endeavor is “Music for Mushrooms,” a feature-length narrative documentary showcasing the transformative power of psychedelics, music, and community. East Forest’s most recent musical release, “Lovingly: A Soundtrack For The Psychedelic Practitioner, vol. III” is an immersive long-form live album, over six hours in length, and intended to guide journeys of deep introspection from start to finish. The third volume of his Soundtrack For The Psychedelic Practitioner series, the music was recorded and improvised live inside psilocybin ceremonies facilitated between 2020 and 2024. East Forest’s extensive catalog includes over 30 albums and notable collaborations with artists such as Ram Dass, Jon Hopkins, Laraaji, Dead Prez, Nick Mulvey, Peter Broderick, Max Cooper, and DJ ANNA. The project has performed at major festivals and venues internationally. As a trailblazer in meditation and inner resilience, East Forest offers guided meditations, retreats, and a podcast (“Ten Laws w/East Forest”). His approach promotes non-religious, accessible spirituality. He’s a faculty member at the Esalen Institute and has collaborated with institutions across social justice, mental health, science, music, and creative fields, including Google, Johns Hopkins, UCSF, Stanford, and TED. His work has appeared on Bright Antenna, Domino, Mercury KX, Aquilo, Ghostly, as well as Tender Loving Empire & Universal/Decca. Website | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Spotify | Soundcloud | TikTok

Ethan Regan: I Almost Graduated Tour

Music goes beyond skin deep for Ethan Regan. Piercing the surface, he’s not just singing and playing guitar; he’s laying his emotions bare, getting out those words that we don’t always say when we should, and practicing the best kind of therapy—out loud. As a vocalist, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer, the North Carolina native shapes each facet of his artistry, architecting soundscapes, performing every part, and belting right from the soul. Sonically, he fuses gentle, yet heartfelt folk with alternative experimentation, going as far as to pull inspiration from rock, hip-hop, and funk. Born in Raleigh, his family settled in Charlotte by the time he turned five-years-old. Even though mom and dad encouraged him to learn guitar with lessons, his interest in the instrument waivered until he stumbled upon a YouTube clip of Damien Rice at a festival. During freshman year of high school, Ethan learned how to produce on Ableton and started to drop D.I.Y. projects. Attending Penn State for college, he constantly posted music on TikTok. Eventually, “Durham” incited a viral frenzy. Its popularity crossed over to DSPs, amassing several million Spotify streams at the start. Meanwhile, “My Fault” and “Secrecy” sparked the same result and saw streams grow rapidly. Simultaneously, he progressed into a formidable performer on stage galvanized by hundreds of shows and dates with everyone from Rainbow Kitten Surprise to Chelsea Cutler and Jeremy Zucker. Building on this foundation, he packed houses on his first headline run in 2025. Once again, Ethan connects at a core level through a series of singles for Columbia Records and more to come. Website | Instagram | TikTok | YouTube | Spotify | Soundcloud

Mipso

Mipso formed in 2012 as an excuse to play together between classes in Chapel Hill. Joseph Terrell came from a family of banjo-playing uncles and a guitarist grandma, and he’d gotten curious again about the string band music he’d heard as a kid. Jacob Sharp was raised on equal parts Doc Watson and Avett Brothers in the N.C. mountains and was hunting for a chance to sing harmonies. Wood Robinson added a Charlie Haden-esque interest in bridging jazz and grass sensibilities on the double bass, and Libby Rodenbough soon joined on fiddle, unsatisfied by her classical violin training but drawn like a moth toward the glow of old, weird Americana.Their first album, “Dark Holler Pop,” produced by Andrew Marlin (Watchhouse), included Terrell-penned fan favorites “Louise” and “Couple Acres Greener” and turned the recent grads into a full-blown touring band. Although it hung out on the Billboard Bluegrass top 10, its sonic mission statement was in the name: “Dark Holler Pop” was groovier and catchier than its string band contemporaries.2015’s “Old Time Reverie” earned them an invitation to perform in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade wherein they rolled down 5th Avenue on a 12-foot bucket of fried chicken. They doubled down on touring, honing a telepathic, sibling-esque connection onstage.2017’s “Coming Down The Mountain,” produced by Brad Cook (Bon Iver, Waxahatchee), added drums and pedal steel and put the band on bigger stages with an expanded Americana sound, including the Rodenbough-fronted title track, another streaming hit and live staple.Mipso considered hanging up their hats in 2018 while recording “Edges Run” with Todd Sickafoose (Ani DiFranco, Anais Mitchell). After five years of near-constant touring, they had started to wake up in hotel rooms wondering what state they were in; they’d never had pets. The album took off. Sharp’s intimate vocal on “People Change” floated into dorm rooms and coffee shops across America, cementing Mipso as a bona fide streaming success across four albums and placing them in that rarefied strata of bands with three distinct lead singers. 2020’s self-titled start-fresh album on Rounder Records brought experimental Canadian producer Sandro Perri into the mix and minted a collection with moodier landscapes and unexpected textures.Post-pandemic Mipso is starting fresh again with “Book of Fools.” The songs might be their best yet. “Carolina Rolling By” shows Terrell at his most relaxed and confident—it’s a meditative cosmic country-tinged head bopper. “The Numbers” flirts with 60s surf rock while Rodenbough winks and wags a finger at our market-obsessed culture, and “Broken Heart/Open Heart” features Sharp at his most heart-wrenching and earnest. Other standouts “East” and “Radio Hell” will infect you with earworms made of guitar riffs, Robinson’s pretzel-twisted upright bass lines, and saturated “ooohs” drifting in as if on AM radio waves. Website | Instagram | Facebook | Spotify | YouTube

Genre: Miscellaneous