Atwood Magazine is excited to share our Editor’s Picks column, written and curated by Editor-in-Chief Mitch Mosk. Every week, Mitch will share a collection of songs, albums, and artists who have caught his ears, eyes, and heart. There is so much incredible music out there just waiting to be heard, and all it takes from us is an open mind and a willingness to listen. Through our Editor’s Picks, we hope to shine a light on our own music discoveries and showcase a diverse array of new and recent releases.

This week’s Editor’s Picks features Olivia Dean, Ken Yates, Flock of Dimes, Angelsaur, Little Dog Star, and Glom!

 follow EDITOR’S PICKS on Spotify

There’s an ease to Olivia Dean’s “Nice to Each Other” that I’ve found myself chasing all summer long. It’s light and lilting, suave and smoldering – the kind of song that settles into your bones without asking too much from you. Dean’s voice is effortlessly radiant as she sings over pulsing bass and dreamy guitars, capturing the magic of being present with someone – whether it’s a friend, a lover, or someone somewhere in between. Released as the lead single off her upcoming album The Art of Loving (out September 26^th via Island Records), “Nice to Each Other” feels like a warm breeze through an open window: A gentle reminder to stop worrying so much, and just enjoy the moment.

Here we are, back again
Fighting what’s in front of me
There’s so much to unpack again
But if I come to Italy

We could be nice to each other
Nice to each other
Wrong for each other
Right for each other
And rise to each other
Rise to each other
Mm-mm-mm

“‘Nice To Each Other’ is a song about the push and pull of exploring your independence in dating,” Dean explains. “It’s about enjoying someone in the present and allowing it to be both light and meaningful. I think this song and video represents a playfulness in me that I’m excited for people to see.”

That sense of playful honesty pulses through every line of the track, especially in its chorus: “‘Cause you know, I’ve done all the classic stuff and it never works, you know it. So can we say we’ll never say the classic stuff? Just show it now and know it.” It’s a simple, radical rejection of pressure, of expectations, of tired dating scripts – an invitation to try something simpler and more honest instead.

And while her lyrics flirt with contradiction (“I’ll probably crash your stupid car and make your life a misery”), Dean never loses that undercurrent of warmth. Even at her most chaotic, she’s not out to hurt anyone – she just wants something real, whatever form that takes. And that’s what makes this song so special: It doesn’t demand clarity or commitment. It simply asks for kindness, for warmth, for presence, and for connection.

For a track about not needing the answers, “Nice to Each Other” feels utterly profound and beautifully, breathtakingly powerful. It’s Olivia Dean at her most relaxed, most self-assured, and most emotionally open – and the perfect soundtrack for the sun-soaked summer.

There’s something about Ken Yates’ songwriting that, for me, always feels like home. His is the kind of music and lyricism that, while so rich in melody and poetry alike, inevitably breaks down into explorations of life’s raw, simple truths – and finding the beauty in them. “Total Cinema,” the title track off his latest album, is one of those songs that hits hard for all its softness: A sweet, soul-stirring reflection on love, life, partnership, and perspective that hits especially deep if, like me, you’ve recently found yourself reflecting on what it means to live with intention – to be present, to be grateful, and to really take stock of the life you’ve built.

You said man it’s been so fun
Changing with someone
Wake me up in solidarity
I keep the lights off when inside
To preserve the natural light
It’s the halogen severity

Yates is a master of restraint – his lead guitar riff glistens like early morning light as his voice gently spills into focus, warm and worn and wise. His lyrics are deceptively straightforward, but they hold multitudes: “These little movies in my mind / they’re still playing all the time / but you know all the darkest corners of myself / and if I’m lucky when I’m done / I’ll have an audience of one.”

These little movies in my mind
They’re still playing all the time
But you know all the
darkest corners of myself
And if I’m lucky when I’m done
I’ll have an audience of one
That’s what we call total cinema baby

“I think it was looking at my career and doing a little self-assessment, a little check-in, looking forward,” Yates explains. “I think when you start a career as a songwriter, when you’re young, the only metrics you have for success are fame and fortune, and those are the goals. So even if they’re subconscious, those are the goals you set out with when you start a career as a songwriter. And somewhere along the way, I realized, those actually aren’t the goals. The goals were to write songs for a living and have meaningful relationships with people and be happy, for lack of a better word. I think sometimes those grandiose goals get in the way of actual happiness and fulfillment and actually working on your relationships.”

“I think with a music career, especially if it takes off, it makes it easy to sort of ignore your relationships and ignore nurturing them because you don’t have to, because you’re on paper ‘successful’ – and I think the best part of not being ‘successful,’ for me, is it forced me to nurture my relationships because the career side of it wasn’t going well. So, what else can you do, right? You have to look at the rest of your life and go, ‘Well, let’s make that part good.’ That is that song in a nutshell: I think I’ve really nurtured the rest of my life to the point where I’m really happy with it. If that’s all it is going forward, then great. If I died today, then I’ve accomplished a lot in not just my career, but my whole life. It feels like I really worked on a lot of those things.”

You said man it’s been so nice
Leaning into archetypes
I’m not missing out on anything
And in the theatre of living
There’s a superficial prison
Of the things we try not to become

This is the kind of song that doesn’t need a grand declaration to leave its mark. It’s clear-eyed and deeply felt – a tender acknowledgment that fulfillment isn’t always loud or cinematic. Sometimes it’s just about sharing your real self with someone who sees you clearly, and staying present in the everyday moments that matter most.

“The path to get here didn’t look like I thought it would,” Yates says of his life and career. “But I always wanted to write songs for a living. I always wanted to live where I live right now. I have a great relationship with my wife, we’re starting a family – it’s all good.” That clarity radiates throughout “Total Cinema,” which doubles as both a love letter to his partner and a meditation on the way we dramatize our lives. It’s about letting go of the tortured artist myth, and choosing gratitude over grandeur.

As a songwriter myself – or at least, someone who thinks about words more than is probably healthy – I’m constantly struck by how much heart Ken Yates packs into his music. “Total Cinema” is a standout not because it tries to be, but because it knows exactly what it is: Grounded, graceful, and brimming with heart.

These little movies in my mind
They’re still playing all the time
But you know all the darkest corners of myself
And if I’m lucky when I’m done
I’ll have an audience of one
That’s what we call total cinema baby

There’s a soul-stirring ache to Flock of Dimes’ “Long After Midnight” that just doesn’t let go. It lingers – soft, slow-burning, and full of feeling – long after the last note fades. I’ve returned to this song countless times already, not just because it’s incredibly beautiful (though it is), but because it captures something I’ve felt deeply in my bones: The need to be strong for the people you love most – even when you’re not sure you can hold it all together yourself.

All the money I gave to you
I know I will never get it back
Don’t be sad and don’t be sorry
I don’t care about the money like that
And when I say I don’t care about the money
I mean you know I wouldn’t let you starve
You know I couldn’t let that happen
Please take the keys to my car

Released July 30th via Sub Pop Records, “Long After Midnight” is the lead single off Flock of Dimes’ forthcoming third album The Life You Save, out October 10th. Flock of Dimes is the solo project of singer, songwriter, and producer Jenn Wasner, best known as one-half of beloved indie duo Wye Oak and a frequent collaborator with Bon Iver, Sylvan Esso, and others. Across her extensive catalog, Wasner has long been a master of introspective songwriting and unorthodox, emotionally immersive sound design – and The Life You Save promises to be her most honest, exposed, and personally revealing record to date.

Wasner’s voice is everything in “Long After Midnight”: Soulful, warm, unflinchingly candid, and impossibly full – full of compassion, full of weariness, full of a desperate kind of love. Her acoustic guitar is rich and resonant, wrapping around each lyric like a blanket. The song is a gentle act of self-sacrifice and confession; a bittersweet meditation on what it means to give and give, without expecting anything back.

You say you can’t afford your medication
Too many hoops they’re gonna put you through
You can’t waste another moment
Not for the life of you
I know the rules, but I ignore them
I think I’m good enough to pull this off
You be hell and I’ll be hеaven
I’ll be your shot in the dark

“This is the story of the helper, the fixer, the hero who’s always there and never lets on how much they’re hurting,” Wasner tells Atwood Magazine. “It’s for anyone who’s inherited the false belief that, in order to be loveable, they have to sacrifice their own peace in service of others. It might sound bright and cheery, but underneath the surface there is something darker: the desperation of knowing you don’t have the answers, the loneliness of knowing you’ve got to try to keep it all together anyway.”

That darkness glows throughout “Long After Midnight,” tucked inside her sweetly lilting verses about money, medication, silence, and survival. “You say you can’t afford your medication / too many hoops they’re gonna put you through… I know the rules, but I ignore them / I think I’m good enough to pull this off.” Wasner’s lyrics are tender and devastating, and they only land harder when paired with the warmth of her delivery. It’s that duality that gives this song its power: A deep sadness wrapped in empathy, care, and an abiding sense of love.

“I’ll be your shot in the dark,” she sings – and I believe her. I feel it.

With her new album The Life You Save out this October, Flock of Dimes is stepping into her most vulnerable, revelatory, and emotionally raw era yet. If this song is any indication, we’re in for a soul-stirring reckoning – one that honors pain without glorifying it, and leaves room for healing on the other side.

I livе my life among the lucky ones
When things are bad I never let them know
When you come from where I come from
There’s only so far you can go
And when we’re sitting trapped in silence
And I can tell I’m not who you want me to be
To be honest it would break you
Only to lie would break me
People say it’s not my problem
They say that actions have a consequence
If you call me I would answer
I’m the last line of defense

There’s a raw, unfiltered energy coursing through Angelsaur’s “Around You” that I just can’t get enough of. Kind of ragged, yet undeniably polished at the same time, this song feels alive – pulsing with jangly guitars, candid lyrics, and vocals that ache with inner churn. There’s charm in its chaos, heart in its mess, and a beautifully human sense of unraveling at its core. From the wiry, Beatles-esque guitar soloing to the breathless chorus cries of “I’ve been digging every night,” Angelsaur’s latest offering radiates uncontainable feeling and urgency – and somehow, in its turbulence, finds a center of gravity in longing, devotion, and desire.

I hope I might find
Myself in you
I’m picking at your bones
With all of my tools
The truth is a
Thought that hurts
I’m out of my mind
But I’m living in yours
I’m looking out your eyes
Right back at you

I’ve been digging
Every night

Released as the fourth single off Angelsaur’s sophomore album The Girls Are Stressed (out August 13^th), “Around You” is the cathartic album closer – and perhaps its most emotionally bare offering. The Los Angeles–based duo of singer/bassist Logan McQuade and guitarist Jonah Feingold are no strangers to the stage: McQuade currently plays bass for King Princess (he co-wrote two songs on her upcoming album Girl Violence), and has toured as a live member with Del Water Gap, Omar Apollo, and Fiji Blue. Feingold has played guitar on records by Del Water Gap and Mark Ronson, and performed with Omar Apollo during his NPR Tiny Desk Concert. Angelsaur’s music blends glam, grit, and grunge into a bold and brutally honest soundscape. Their second LP, co-produced and mixed by Andy Baldwin (Björk), leans into themes of heartbreak, aging, and self-worth – a coming-of-age record for the 30s, built to feel like a live show and made with heart-on-sleeve intensity.

“I sat down and wrote the main guitar line and the lyrics for ‘Around You’ in one sitting,” McQuade tells Atwood Magazine. “We knew pretty quickly that this would be the album closer… I think it’s my favorite song I’ve ever written.”

You’re the only thing
I can’t ever loose
I’m a tough guy
And you’re my tattoos
Time spilling out my purse
I spend it on you
‘Cause you give me worth
I’m pulling out my heart
For you to use

I’ve been
Digging
Every night

At once tender and intense, “Around You” was born out of stillness – after years on the road, McQuade found himself suddenly grounded in 2024, navigating a long touring break and the unraveling of a seven-year relationship.

“I was at a pretty strange place in my life,” he explains. “I had been consistently touring since I got out of college, but for reasons out of my control, I was home for most of 2024. It gave us time to make this record, but it also made me reconsider a lot of things about my career and I lost some confidence and missed a lot of the validation of playing shows and traveling off of music. I really turned to my relationship for happiness, and this song explores the repercussions associated with that.”

The result is a dramatic, dynamic love song steeped in both beauty and desperation – one that seeks stability in a person when everything else feels uncertain. “I’m looking out your eyes / right back at you,” he sings, clinging to connection. “I’m pulling out my heart / for you to use.”

“When I wrote that song in the ending months of my relationship, I wrote it as a declaration of love,” McQuade shares. “Expressing the hope of finding yourself through another’s love and attention seemed, at the time, to be an accurate depiction of how important she is to me… Now on the other side of the breakup, I realize that it’s almost a declaration of dependence. I still love her, but I realize the detriment in relying on someone for the totality of your happiness and identity.”

That complex emotional evolution is embedded in the music itself, which builds from quiet intimacy into a soaring wall of sound. The final section of “Around You” is awash with layered harmonies, strings, and interwoven guitar textures – a sweeping crescendo of feeling that hits like catharsis. “Plant a little garden around you, let myself get tangled in the roots,” McQuade sings on repeat, letting go without ever fully releasing.

Plant a little garden around you
Let myself get tangled in the roots
Plant a little garden around you
Let myself get tangled in the roots
Plant a little garden around you
(I’ve been digging, I’ve been digging)
Let myself get tangled in the roots
(I’ve been digging)
Plant a little garden around you
Digging digging
Let myself get tangled in the roots
I’ve been digging

“We felt like ending on the idea that love is at the core of our identity was the perfect way to close the story of the album,” the band explain. “The track teeters between joy and despair and wrestles with the need for validation – an emotional thread that runs throughout the entire record.”

“Around You” may be a song about losing yourself in someone else, but it’s also about coming out the other side with a clearer view of who you are. It’s messy, magnetic, full of contradictions – and that’s exactly what makes it so special.

I’ve been digging
Every night
I’ve been digging
Every night

Manchester-born, London-based indie artist Little Dog Star has made a dazzling entrance with her debut single “It’s you,” a dreamy, glistening indie pop reverie dressed in alternative garb. Her voice is radiant, the guitars shimmer like city lights after rain, and the emotion – raw and unfiltered – pulses through every beat. It’s the kind of debut that stops you in your tracks, aches just a little, and still leaves you smiling by the final chorus. Equal parts charming and charged, “It’s you” is a love song, a homesick song, and a coming-of-age anthem wrapped into one.

Inspired by a moment of reflection and emotional recalibration, Little Dog Star (aka Isobel Steele) traces the challenges of starting over in a new city and the grounding power of love. “I first went into the studio with Manta Tatton and Jamie Stewart back in February,” she tells Atwood Magazine. “At the time I’d been listening to a lot of MOIO, Beabadoobee and The Japanese House and thinking a lot about my experience moving to London from Manchester and how hard it was at times. I often wondered how it was ever going to feel the way I wanted it to. Ultimately, the reason I pushed through that time, and remembered what I was here to do, was my girlfriend. Having something stable when everything else felt ever-changing was so necessary.”

“In the studio, the song came together in a few hours, and we had it basically finished by the end of the night. I wanted where I am from to shine through the music. It’s important to lean into what sets you apart rather than trying to blend in, sonically and lyrically. I remember playing it on loop for days after so when it came to finishing the song I tried to keep it as close to the original demo as possible, it had an energy that I didn’t want to lose.”

That energy lives in every second – from the soft swirl of the opening lines to the gut-punch refrain “Wait! wait! wait! wait! / Don’t leave me / Say you love me / ‘Cause I can’t be something without you.” It’s a song about holding on – to love, to purpose, to the reasons we stay when everything in us wants to run. You can hear the static of a phone call from a train platform, the tension of being torn between leaving and longing: “I called my mum / From a southeast station / Say I wanna be there / Told me take your time, dear.”

For anyone who’s left home, fallen hard, or simply needed something – or someone – to hold onto, “It’s you” hits where it hurts, then helps you through it. It’s the sound of a young artist finding her voice and letting it ring out, bright and bold and beautifully unafraid. Little Dog Star may be just beginning, but she’s already shining.

Glom’s “Glass” is as instantly addictive as it is unapologetically alternative. The melody is magnetic, the guitars are woozy and warped in all the right ways, and the lyrics hit like a punch to the gut. I’ve been singing along to this track all summer long – especially that cathartic climax: “Oh I saw it every time, I want to feel alive. I can’t do it anymore, I want to live my life. A part of me wants to be the one to tell you everything is not okay…” It’s catchy, yes, but it’s also deeply emotional – dreamy and aching, pulsing and sleek, with disarming chord choices that make you lean in. Glom are masters of balancing brightness with burnout, of marrying joy with anxiety, and nowhere is that more apparent than on this song.

Ranney’s got a piece of glass
Found it on the beach
She was digging in the sand
Right in front of me
Ranney’s got it in a stack
Right within her reach
Later on tonight I’m wishing
I’d be still at peace

Released as the latest single off their upcoming album Below (out in January 2026), “Glass” captures the core of Glom’s ethos: Raw, relatable, and profoundly human indie rock. The project of Brooklyn-based songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Sean Dunnevant, Glom has evolved from a collaborative band into a solo endeavor and now into its most fully realized form yet – a “highly potent mixture of indelible, infectious melodic rock and lyrical introspection,” as their bio puts it. Below is Glom’s third album, following 2020’s Merit and 2019’s Bond, and it marks a new era of unfiltered songwriting from Dunnevant, who stopped hiding behind metaphor in favor of emotional transparency.

Oh I saw it every time
I want to feel alive
I can’t do it anymore
I want to live my life

(A part of me) Wants to be the one to tell you
Everything is not okay
Honestly for me I’m almost certain
Everyone’s afraid

“‘Glass’ is a song about momentary bliss being overshadowed by debilitating anxiety,” Dunnevant tells Atwood Magazine. “I spent a lot of time with my girlfriend at the beach in 2020 and 2021. On one of these beach trips, she spent the whole time rummaging through the sand in search of sea glass. The sight of watching her methodically procure and stack these beautiful pieces of time-worn relics was marred by calls and text messages flooding my phone informing me that something was going wrong at the store where I work. I was taken out of the moment despite my attempts to resist.”

That tension – between stillness and stress, presence and panic – pulses through the track like an undercurrent, subtle but inescapable. “Glass” is a song about trying to be okay when you’re not, about holding on to beauty even as your mind betrays you. “The beach day was perfect – weather, we had the right snacks and beverages, the water was warm – yet I couldn’t not be anxious,” Dunnevant recalls. “I wasn’t even anxious about anything necessarily. It’s just an overarching problem I’ve dealt with my whole life. ‘Glass’ is about trying to cope with it.”

Finally took the trip out west
Actually not yet
I tried hard to make ends meet
It’s harder than it seems
Keep in touch with all my friends
See them on the plane
Having deja vu again
Migraine’s setting in

There’s a bittersweetness to the whole thing – nostalgic and sad, but not hopeless. It’s about feeling the weight of everything and still choosing to keep going. “I hope that ‘Glass’ brings listeners the right amount of joy and the right amount of nostalgia,” Dunnevant reflects. “And I also hope that the song helps listeners realize it’s okay to feel anxious! It’s a part of life! Some people have more than others, and that’s okay too.”

In a world that moves too fast and expects too much, “Glass” feels like a permission slip to pause, to feel, and to fall apart just a little. It’s an anthem for the overthinkers, the worriers, and the people who are just trying to hold it together – and it’s also a damn good time.

Oh the engine’s setting fire
My arms are feeling weak
Buying things won’t hide you from
The feelings you can’t speak

(A part of me) Wants to be the one to tell you
Everything is not okay
Honestly for me I’m almost certain
Everyone’s afraid

— — — —

Connect to us on
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram

Discover new music on Atwood Magazine

Editor’s Picks

 follow EDITOR’S PICKS on Spotify