Editor’s Picks 108: Bria Salmena, TOLEDO, Mon Rovîa, Mary Eliza, jasmine.4.t, & MEGGO!

Atwood Magazine's 108th Editor's Picks
Atwood Magazine's 108th Editor's Picks
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 Bria Salmena, TOLEDO, Mon Rovîa, Mary Eliza, jasmine.4.t, and MEGGO!

Atwood Magazine Editor's Picks 2020 Mic Mitch

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“Stretch the Struggle”

by Bria Salmena

It was the passionate fire and fervor of “Stretch the Struggle” that instantly caught my ears and pulled me in; you might even call it a “hunger I couldn’t deny.” Released January 14th via Sub Pop, the lead single off Bria Salmena’s upcoming debut album Big Dog roars to life with a seductive sonic heat and emotional intensity that feels as all-consuming as it is undeniable. It’s a fitting reintroduction for Salmena, who has already made her mark as the frontwoman of Canadian post-punk outfit FRIGS and as a vocalist in Orville Peck’s live band; here, the Toronto-based singer/songwriter emerges as a charged, churning, and charming indie rock artist with an unapologetic punk attitude and an uncompromisingly vulnerable disposition.

Stretch the Struggle - Bria Salmena
Stretch the Struggle – Bria Salmena
By now, I should know better
By now, you should be long gone
How I stretch the struggle
for something to suck on
I just need it, need it, need it,
need it, need it, need it

“This song is about being suspended in that moment between knowing something or someone needs to go, and letting them go,” Salmena recently told Atwood Magazine over email. “It’s about knowing that something is bad for you, but you can’t quite let go of it yet. It’s about anguish, pride, and a kind self-sabotage that is almost euphoric. This needed to be the lead single for a couple of reasons. First, it’s a banger. Second, it’s ultimately a song where I am confronting myself and attempting to take control over a situation that I was powerless in. And ultimately, I did take back control – and that’s big dog behavior.”

“Stretch the Struggle” is dynamic, it’s dramatic, it’s provocative, and it’s propulsive. From the moment it begins to the second it ends three and a half minutes later, Salmena commands the spotlight with the finesse of a seasoned professional, rising from the hush of her confessional verses to the explosion of her cathartic, captivating choruses.

By now, you shouldn’t love me so
By now, I shouldn’t care to let you go
How strange the struggle
for something to suck on
I just need it, need it, need it,
need it, need it, need it
I just need it, need it, need it,
need it, need it, need it
The hunger I can’t deny
What scares you babe
A truth or a lie?
You’ll never see my crying eyes
See my (keep going)

“I guess it’s a kind of euphemism,” she says of the titular phrase ‘stretch the struggle.’ “It refers to a lot of things, some of which I don’t even think I can share. It’s like pulling on an elastic band for as long as humanly possible even though you know that thing is gonna snap back right into your eye. But that time pulling that elastic band is a f*ing rush.”

“I think this song overall gives a good first look into what the record sounds like,” she adds. “I think it exemplifies the sound my creative partner Duncan Hay Jennings and I have been crafting and molding over the past couple of years, a sound we feel is unique to us. Vocally, it’s one of my favorites on the album. It was done in a single take and I’m really proud of that.”

I did good, until I didn’t try
You found your way down
Kept your foot in your mouth
And I wrote,
“I hate you, I really couldn’t stand you”
It was all I thought about
I just need it, need it, need it,
need it, need it, need it
I just need it, need it, need it,
need it, need it, need it

“Stretch the Struggle” may be the musical manifestation of her inner turmoil and tension, and yet Bria Salmena is in full control of this tempestuous moment. She succeeds at leaving her audience on the edge of our seats as well – lighting a fire in our ears and our hearts through a powerful, emotional potent performance that hits hard and leaves a lasting mark. Her ferocious, energetic delivery is as inspirational as it is empowering – a kind of invigorating sonic adrenaline that ensures we’ll be paying extra-close attention to the artist throughout the coming year as she treats the world to her debut solo album.

Set to release March 28th via Sub Pop, Big Dog “chronicles a story of transformation – a deeply personal exploration of resilience and a declaration of artistic independence forged through collaboration.” As the first look at this story, “Stretch the Struggle” does more than set the tone: It establishes Bria Salmena as a definitive artist-to-watch in 2025 and beyond.

The hunger I can’t deny
What scares you babe
A truth or a lie?
I need to eat
You’ll never see my
You’ll never see my
Oh, crying eyеs
See my crying eyes



“Zelda”

by TOLEDO

They absolutely fooled me with a fake “breakup” post at last year’s end, and while that certainly got me thinking about appreciating artists during, and not just after their time, I’d already had “Zelda” playing more or less on repeat by then. The first in a string of late 2024 singles released by Brooklyn duo TOLEDO sees Daniel Alvarez de Toledo and Jordan Dunn-Pilz going back to their ‘roots,’ in a sense, by embracing the hushed vocals and dreamy, jangling instruments that featured so prominently in their sophomore EP Jockeys of Love – a record I’ve personally cherished ever since I first heard it four years ago.

Zelda - TOLEDO
Zelda – TOLEDO
i showed you my teeth
in anger when you left

been barely a week
you’re moving on to someone better

now all of my friends
are calling me old friend

and every new street
just looks like a dead end
but it helps me to think
maybe you are listening now

Released on October 29th, “Zelda” is a sonically sweet surrender of the soul – a lush and tender reverie dwelling in the depths of self-reflection and vulnerability. A trumpet, a saxophone, and a mandolin join the glistening guitar strums and radiant keyboard swells that make up TOLEDO’s ‘signature,’ but it’s Alvarez de Toledo’s soft and sentimental vocal performance that ultimately takes center stage: His voice aches as he delves deep down the rabbit-hole of his own mind, singing in the wake of loss and longing, change and churn. “Now all of my friends are calling me old friend, and every new street just looks like a dead end,” he observes in the first verse, pausing to add, “but it helps me to think, maybe you are listening now.”

I know I certainly am.

well I couldn’t tell
the waking from the dream

thought i saw you last
in plastic covered angel wings

i bury my face
in black until it ends

the weight of your shadow
hovering over my bed
but it helps me to think
maybe you are listening now

A longtime Atwood artist-to-watch and former Editor’s Pick, TOLEDO always find a way to make me smile. “Zelda” – just like the Popped Heart EP that came before it, and the other two singles that came after it – left me feeling lighter, brighter, better about myself and about the world around me. TOLEDO’s music is not inherently happy-go-lucky – far from it, in fact – yet such is the power of music, that even a sad song can make you feel good. “Zelda” is a warm light manifest in song, its rich harmonies and cathartic melodies unlocking something within that leaves listeners with a sense of heartfelt hope and poignant possibility.



Act 4: Atonement

by Mon Rovîa

When I met with Mon Rovîa late last year, he described his Act 4: Atonement EP as a moment of confrontation and reconciliation within, “where transformation begins through self-acceptance” – and true to his word, the record is as sonically soothing as its lyrics are breathtakingly human. Released January 10th via Nettwerk Music Group, the final of a four-part EP series centered around the Hero’s Journey finds the Liberia-born, Chattanooga-based singer/songwriter solidifying his place as an artist-to-watch in the contemporary American folk space, all while singing stories filled with personal struggle and self-reflection. The six songs are intimate, relatable, and achingly beautiful – each one another piece of the artist’s soul, brought to life through warm, lilting melodies and dreamy instrumentations.

Act 4: Atonement - Mon Rovîa
Act 4: Atonement – Mon Rovîa

“The final chapter of the Mon Rovîa Folk Saga, ‘Act 4: Atonement,’ brings the hero’s transformative journey to a powerful conclusion,” Mon Rovîa tells Atwood Magazine. “Tempered by trials and revelations, the hero returns to his people seeking reconciliation, healing the wounds of the past, and mending the fractures within himself.”

He continues, “This chapter embodies themes of Guilt, forgiveness, accountability, and the courage to confront one’s missteps. It is a symphony of amends – a testament to the hero’s growth and a reflection on the strength found in vulnerability and connection. ‘Act 4: Atonement’ reminds us that true heroism lies in restoration and the power of collective healing.”

Highlights range from EP opener “crooked the road.” – which Atwood Magazine previously called “a blanket of musical and emotional warmth ready to envelop our ears and comfort our restless souls” – to “Winter Wash 24,” a deeply personal song about confronting those uncomfortable truths we so often avoid, and “Dead Man Walking,” a seductive reverie that blends evocative imagery around darkness, fate, and doom together with an infectious, light-filled sense of hope and rebirth: “Rise me from my own grave.”

Dead man coming down
Too soon
Dead man walk around
It’s your doom
Dead man coming down
Too soon
Dead man walk around
It’s your doom
Wait for days
Cover me if it gets late
Side with me on the side
Rise me from my own grave
Jordan was a real man
Shook hands ’cause I had a plan
In the valley with the lights dimmed
Peace within, like water through a dam

A wondrous world in its own right, Act 4: Atonement is a fitting cap (both musically and emotionally) to the ambitious folk project Mon Rovîa embarked on two years ago. It’s also the marker of bold new beginning for him, as he told Atwood last year that he’s working on a full-length album that he hopes to release later in 2025.

With so much music of his to listen to, and even more to look forward to, I’m willing to bet that 2025 becomes the year of Mon Rovîa.

You came out last evening
Couldn’t believe you’re still breathing
You stood in the fire, you stood in the fire
Things fall to the side, I’m feeling your fire
You tried to put the ocean on me
I did time, still waters are cheap
Cheek turn to another
I learned to face the mirror
Too soon…
Dead man coming down (On the side)
Too soon (I)
Dead man walk around (On the side)
Too soon (I)



“Dogs”

by Mary Eliza

An intense, unrelenting emotional heat ripples throughout Mary Eliza’s “Dogs.” It’s the intimate, visceral fervor of inner turmoil, unrelenting angst, and raw heartache; the breathtaking churn of romantic uncertainty and instability, of a cherished love’s fragility and fracture – and it all comes to the surface through a warm wash of heavy, effect-laden guitars and stirring, unfiltered vocals.

Spider - Mary Eliza
Spider – Mary Eliza
Every time I look at you
it’s like we’ve just begun

You’re grinning and you’re whispering
“it’s like we’ve just begun”

Even though the dogs
are ripping trash up in the street

It doesn’t have to feel like that
when you’re with me

It doesn’t have to feel like that
when you’re with me

“‘Dogs’ started out as an unfinished voice memo in my phone, written mainly about a fear that I was experiencing surrounding the longevity of love,” the Portland, Oregon-based singer/songwriter tells Atwood Magazine. “I wanted it to last, the love that I had created with someone at the time, and felt that if I could just piece them back together, and be strong for them, then I could build the lasting love that I wanted for myself. But you can’t carry a relationship on your own, and in the end it didn’t work out.”

In a way, “Dogs” feels like her relationship’s pre-post-mortem; Eliza is clinging to a sinking ship, knowing full well the whole thing is going under. Her lyrics may indicate a last-ditch effort at survival, but everything from her plaintive vocal melodies to her gut-wrenching instrumental work points to the looming, inevitable end in sight.

And while this entire experience is, by default, painfully bittersweet, there’s also something very beautiful about Eliza embracing her love for what it is: A fleeting thing, doomed to end, but still meaningful for her right now while it’s still around.

Somehow everything still hurts
like every other day

I wish that I could use it more,
I wish it’d go away

But maybe the same brokenness
is why I ever stayed

Maybe you’ll still love me anyway
Maybe you’ll still love me anyway

She explains, “As I sat with the song in the following months, and brought it into the studio, it turned into something that is really close to my heart. When I wrote it, it felt that the focus in the song was scratching at an end goal, a lasting love, but I now feel that it holds a light to the existence of love that I was experiencing at the time, and the beauty of caring so deeply for someone, regardless of the outcome. It’s incredible to me that a song can greet you just as kindly in such different phases of life.”

Eliza rises to a gentle, dramatic fever pitch in the song’s achingly vulnerable third stanza – a pseudo “chorus” that amplifies the already present instruments, doubling her voice and intensifying the bass so that listeners feel the weight of the moment as intimately and as passionately as she does:

I know what I said, but I don’t want you to go
If everything is changing maybe I don’t wanna know
I’ll drive you to the hospital I’ll pick out all the glass
I’d do anything to let you know that this time it will last
This time it will last, babe
This time it will last, last

As the opening track off Mary Eliza’s recently-released debut LP Spider, “Dogs” sets an undeniably powerful tone for the full album – which itself is a fiery, feverish record, introducing the singer/songwriter herself as a tender tempest. Atwood Magazine previously praised Eliza’s ability to bring to life the “tension and turmoil so many of us feel within,” and perhaps therein lies the key not just to appreciating (and understanding) her song “Dogs,” but the entirety of her artistry: Through her songwriting, Mary Eliza channels both the pain and the beauty, the high points and the low points of the human experience.



“You Are the Morning”

by jasmine.4.t

The sun shines through the cracks in “You Are the Morning,” the glistening, golden-hued title track off jasmine.4.t’s recently-released debut album (January 17th via Saddest Factory). An ode to one of the artist’s closest friends, who was a source of constant love and support for her throughout her transition, “You Are the Morning” is a beacon of light, love, hope, and healing; though sweet melodies, light, lilting acoustic guitar patterns, enchanting violin strums, and her own tender, evocative vocals, Jasmine delivers four minutes of soul-stirring, smile-inducing inspiration and wonderment.

You Are the Morning - jasmine.4.t
You Are the Morning – jasmine.4.t
You are the morning, you make the grass grow
You are the hawthorn tangled in dog-rose
The open window with the curtains closed
Hearing your pulse between your breaths
Hearing the trees when the wind blows

“One of my oldest and closest friends, Han, supported me through my transition,” Jasmine tells Atwood Magazine. “She would put me up regularly when I had nowhere to stay. She helped me sort through the pain I had left behind, then find the strength to fight for my life and the lives of those around me. This fight is urgent, as on Trans Day of Remembrance (20th November), we named 427 trans people who have died violently this past year.”

“This song is about the healing found in queer friendship. It is about queer people’s resilience in the face of violence. It is about our potential to bring about change within ourselves, those around us, and the world at large. I think trans people in particular have an incredible ability to change this world. Of course, we are challenging norms of gender/sex. Beyond that, this year we have seen trans people dismantling violent machines of all forms to help manifest a bright future. This is what ‘you are the morning’ has come to mean – it is an awakening to our power, and a call to action.”

A Manchester-based singer/songwriter, jasmine.4.t was the first UK-based signee to Phoebe Bridgers’ indie label, Saddest Factory Records; her debut album was produced by Julien Baker, Lucy Dacus, and Bridgers, and recorded in Los Angeles at Sound City Studios “across twelve days in a highly collaborative and emotional process.” You Are The Morning came about during a time of considerable personal upheaval and strife for the artist, who cites a divorce, family estrangement, and homelessness, amongst other traumas; nevertheless, thirteen songs on her album are heartfelt, hopeful, warm, and welcoming, like the first kiss from the sun’s rays when you rise out of bed each day. Jasmine describes the album as an uplifting look at t4t (trans-for-trans) love, and we feel that love firsthand in the radiant melodies, the rich chordal structures, the poetic language, and the myriad colors of “You Are the Morning” – a song that, despite hardship and pain, manages to look up and see the light in this dark world.



“brooklyn pt. 1”

by MEGGO

MEGGO’s “brooklyn pt. 1” is dreamy, jazzy, and gently soothing; a tender indie rock song that instantly fills the airwaves with a summery, seductive warmth. Featured on the Montreal-based indie rock artist’s recently-released debut EP eavesdropper ;; death stories (January 22nd), the song – a poetic and vulnerable snapshot of intimate inner monologues and moments in singer/songwriter Megan Ennenberg’s life – feels a bit like a musical carousel, ready to take us on a kaleidoscopic ride ‘round the block through sultry piano chords and runs, stirring acoustic guitar strums, mesmerizing drum beats, and deeply expressive, achingly emotive vocals.

eavesdropper ;; death stories - MEGGO
eavesdropper ;; death stories – MEGGO
I’ll stay, I’ll stay here
Wandering through the forest
but I couldn’t see the world

Just a mass mush of colour,
just a pretty living blur

All is all inside it
For a minute in the middle
I could take away the time

Let it really only be whatever’s
shining through the eyes

All is all around me here

“Coming up with the sonic world of ‘brooklyn pt. 1,’ it’s been a long journey of experimentation and trial and error,” says Ennenberg, who came up in Montreal’s alternative music scene as a member of indie rock band (and queer cult group) FLEECE. “I had to convince myself many times that it was worth it to challenge my own expectations of what music had to sound like, and that I was allowed to make mistakes in order to get there. At the end of ‘brooklyn pt. 1,’ you’ll hear a really raw sample of me working out the chords and melody of the song; a lens into what the creative process looks like sometimes. It’s exciting to me to release a song that has an obvious mistake in it. That part makes people squirm in their seats sometimes, and I kinda love that.”

“I want people to ask themselves, ‘Why does hearing someone make a mistake make me uncomfortable?’ There have been so many times in my career as a musician, especially as a female touring musician, where I’ve felt so afraid to make any mistakes or take risks for fear that someone would jump to correct me, as happened often as a reflex for many around me in this male dominated industry. MEGGO is about taking risks and being raw, and sharing what that looks like. It’s thrilling to be real!”

When I see, I see I disappear
In the middle, in the rise,
in it every little thing

In the light, feeling light,
subtle sounding like a spring,

All is all around me

Ennenberg goes on to cite two particularly special, choice lyrics that resonate with her: “‘When I see, I see I disappear’ – You know that feeling when you’re paying such deep close attention to something, that it’s almost as if the more you observe, your sense of self starts to dissolve? It’s the boundary between the ego and world blurs. Where you observe so closely that you almost become part of what you’re observing. The self feels less distinct, swallowed up by the experience. That’s what this is. ‘Start to find a little pace, find my place, now, here, the middle of it.’ About figuring it out, finding momentum, building a nest, finding your corner amidst this big world and everything in it.”

She continues, “The bed tracks of this song were made using an iPhone voice-memo of the exact moment when I was writing the song two years ago on a trip through Brooklyn, visiting friends and playing guitar on a rooftop. The sample was fragmented and re-assembled and layered upon to make the song that you hear now. There are sounds of a bustling bar, mind-bending chords from a Jazz-Club musician opening the show, the sound of a busy street, the sounds of me making mistakes as I figure out how the song goes. These moments felt significant to me, but each sample captures a glitch in the mundaneness of life – a sliver of timelessness in an otherwise ordinary moment. These sounds became music by being witnessed, as if noticing alone makes them sing.”

“As you listen, you too become the eavesdropper. The world around you will blend with the album’s sounds, sneaking into your listening space, like whispers or half-forgotten memories. I hope that by the end, you’ll start to notice music in the world around you – the hum of everyday life transforming into something rare, something intimate, and something that feels so special like it wasn’t quite meant to be overheard.”

Singing soft, don’t disturb,
deeper breathing, see her world

Eee it coming in the waves,
Start to find a little pace
Find my place, now, here,
the middle of it
I wonder if you’ll ever know

An utterly enchanting three minutes, “brooklyn pt. 1” is a world unto itself, and one that I could listen to on repeat all day long. Thankfully, I don’t have to – as through eavesdropper ;; death stories, MEGGO has delivered fifteen minutes of fragile beauty manifest in music.



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Editor’s Picks

Atwood Magazine Editor's Picks 2020 Mic Mitch

 follow EDITOR’S PICKS on Spotify



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