#NewMusicFriday: August 29th 2025

As a busy August comes to an end, the final #NewMusicFriday of the month is once again packed with new releases.

You can read about new albums from Nova Twins, Pinkshift, Slow Crush, and lowheaven below. However, there are plenty of releases I’ve not had the chance to truly take in to share my thoughts on.

Among them is ‘Straight Line Was a Lie’ from New Zealand’s The Beths. Their fourth album promises to be a delightful power-pop indie record, arriving just in time for the late summer evenings. In a similar soft skin, LA-based singer-songwriter Runnner (Noah Weinman) delivers his second album. ‘A Welcome Kind of Weakness’ builds on his lo-fi aesthetic to produce lush and layered songs of reflection.

If you want some in-your-face hardcore to kickstart your weekend, then look no further than End It. ‘Wrong Side Of Heaven’ sees the Baltimore group team up with producer Brian McTernan (Turnstile, Snapcase, Hot Water Music). It’s relentless 15 tracks pull from classic hardcore, thrash, and soul music, as the quartet preach “awareness of the change that’s coming to Americans, personal growth, and maintaining the ethics and integrity of hardcore.”

Italian progressive metal duo Asymmetric Universe look to leave their mark in the instrumental sphere with ‘A Memory And What Came After’. Utilising a broad sound palette, the sibling pair weave in jazz passages to their dynamic progressive numbers.

There are also new releases from queercore duo Death Goals, riff-heavy noisemakers Sisters, Sydney hardcore titans No Apologies, rising metalcore group Kingdom Of Giants, German power metal icons Helloween, and more.

Nova Twins – Parasites & Butterflies

The rise of Nova Twins has been somewhat astronomical. Critically acclaimed albums, major festival appearances, and shows supporting the likes of Bring Me The Horizon, Foo Fighters, and Muse are some of the highlights on Amy Love and Georgia South’s growing resumé. There is a handful of awards on there, too. In short, they’ve achieved quite a lot in their young career. Yet with success comes expectation. Therefore, the duo retreated to Vermont with producer Rich Costey to create what would become their third album, ‘Parasites & Butterflies’.

Taking the opportunity to decompress and assess how far they’ve come has allowed. However, ‘Parasites & Butterflies’ doesn’t abandon the genre-fluid brand of alt rock. If anything, they’ve embraced it and paired it with a narrative of vulnerability and optimism. The buzzy basslines of ‘Piranha’ complement a confident swagger from the duo, before ‘Monsters’ sees their masks slip, yet deliver one of the album’s biggest hooks. Along with the opening track, ‘Glory’ with its operatic refrain of “Glory, Hallelujah, Save you from yourself,” Nova Twins set the bar high early on.

Read the full review here.

Pinkshift – Earthkeeper

When the Baltimore group Pinkshift emerged with their 2022 debut album, ‘Love Me Forever,’ they were tarnished with the pop-punk brush. Although if you dug deeper, you’d hear alt-rock, emo, and grunge on it. Nonetheless, its follow-up, ‘Earthkeeper,’ is sure to surprise some. For the most part, they’ve grown as musicians and as songwriters. The trio of vocalist Ashrita Kumar (they/them), guitarist Paul Vallejo (he/him) and drummer Myron Houngbedji (he/him) have somewhat tossed aside what’s expected and delivered a collection of personal songs with musical depth.

From the outset, there is a grittiness as Kumar rages with “fuck your guns and fuck your violence, while we all bleed and you stay silent” on the punk-fueled opener, ‘Love It Here’. It’s followed by ‘Anita Ride’s sturdy groove and desperate screams to escape and “to feel alive”. ‘Evil Eye’ maintains the intensity, anchoring down with (nu-)metal riffs, wrapping themselves around a punchy chorus.

Read the full review here.

Slow Crush – Thirst

Slow Crush‘s aim for their third album was to grow and be pushed sonically. Aided by producer Lewis Johns, the Belgian group has returned with a record that embraces the dark as much as it does the light. On the surface, ‘Thirst’ shows little progression from the ethereal shoegaze we’ve come to expect. However, if you dig a little deeper, there’s a hard interior to the dreamy soundscapes.

The titular track sees Frederik Meeuwis’s drums pierce through the reverb-drenched sound, before ‘Covet’ rushes through with an alluring urgency (and a saxophone in its final moments). As a collective, Slow Crush has constantly shown a flair for producing textured sounds that merely envelop you as a listener. Moments like ‘Cherry’ and ‘Hollow’s atmospherics are transformative, comfortably welcoming you into Slow Crush‘s hazy world.

Admittedly, they are stylistically restricted, but with patience, ‘Thirst’ can be rewarding. ‘While You Dream Vividly’ melts with vulnerability, highlighting Isa Holliday’s cathartic outpouring. Bordering on rapturous post-rock territory, it delicately evolves to compelling new heights. If that track is supposed to represent the light, ‘Bloodmoon’ is the dark. Twisting, reverberating guitars and distant vocals paint a hypnotic picture of dissent. Furthermore, ‘ Ógilt’s glistening ambience sears towards ‘Hlýtt’s crescendoing finale. Wrapped in a blur of emotional melodies, dense percussion, and towering guitars, it’s Slow Crush at their most effective. It then crashes down with screaming vocals and a fury of drums.

Steeped in fragility, ‘Thirst’ just about achieves its purpose in developing Slow Crush‘s sound.

lowheaven – Ritual Decay

Toronto newcomers, lowheaven‘s intentions aren’t just to be heavy, they’re here to “obliterate”. It’s something that debut album, ‘Ritual Decay’, confidently does in abundance. Taking in an array of sounds from the rock and metal spectrum, it’s a brash and raw first outing.

Rooted in lyrical and musical intensity, its 10 tracks are designed to hit you wave after wave. It’s a record full of twists and turns, sometimes in the same song. ‘Chemical Pattern’ barges in with brazen distortion, shifting in dynamics between Glassjaw-like post-hardcore and demonic breakdowns. Meanwhile, ‘Cancer Sleep’ introduces a sense of melody alongside its bludgeoning heaviness. The crushingness continues on the riveting ‘Nothing Else Fails,’ while slipping in ringing guitars amongst its wall of noise.

lowheaven‘s tonal scope proves to be wider, even ambitious. ‘Amherst’ paints an immersive soundcape, momentarily reining in the abrasive dependency. It allows the quartet to be dynamic and layered, yet the torment that is threaded through ‘Ritual Decay’ still looms over.

The relentless dense blasts of ‘Mercy Death’ and ‘Violence’ are countered by ‘Fighter Valley’s weaving melodies and overarching crushing weight. Sandwiched between them is the favourable ‘Fucking Hell’. Boiling with feverish hunger, it entwines soaring melodies around the band’s sonically muscle.

As you reach ‘Manic Grace’ with its overarching sense of finality, lowheaven leaves you exhausted. Its unrelenting magnetism is elevated by its lyrical theme, one that dissects the experience of complete social isolation and the loss of self-belief. It adds to the often bleak sound that songwriter Dan Thomson and his bandmates provide.

What is out on #NewMusicFriday?

Nova Twins – Parasites & Butterflies
Hayley Williams – Death At A Bachelorette Party
The Hives – The Hives Forever Forever The Hives
Slow Crush – Thirst
Pinkshift – Earthkeeper
lowheaven – Ritual Decay
The Beths – Straight Line Was A Lie
Runnner – A Welcome Kind Of Weakness
Brutus – 2015 Collected (Bandcamp)
Have Mercy – the loneliest place i’ve ever been
Helloween – Giants & Monsters
Sabrina Carpenter – Man’s Best Friend
End It – Wrong Side Of Heaven
Retirement Party – Nothing To Hear Without A Sound
The Casket Lottery – Feel The Teeth
Asymmetric Universe – A Memory And What Came After
Death Goals – Survival Is An Act Of Defiance
Sisters – Wings of Deliverance
Wucan – Axioms
Kingdom of Giants – Burning Chrome
No Apologies – Life
Bryan Adams – Roll With The Punches
Mélancolia – random.access.misery
Survivalist – Radio Bleed
Joe and The Shitboys – Greatest Shits
Wisdom In Chains & Evergreen Terrace – Split
Two Sides Of Me – Clinging To The Edge Of Life
Ihlo – Legacy
Case Oats – Last Missouri Exit
Ganser – Animal Hospital
Zatokrev – Bring Mirrors To The Surface
Beth Seymour & The Lizzies – You Wouldn’t Like It Inside My Head
TRUDGER – Void Quest
Whitehorse / UBOA – The Dissolution of Eternity
Sleep Pod Two – Rehearse Your Future
Dribbler – Dribbler Is Cursed
New Medicine – Die Trying: The Double Album

If you think I’ve missed something or have a new album/EP/song to tell us about, tell us about it here.

If you’re looking for the latest tracks focusing on rock, punk, hardcore, metal, emo, and everything in between, then check out our ‘Newish Music’ playlist on Spotify or Apple Music.