Of Monsters and Men

Arny Margret has spent the last year making waves, not only in her Icelandic hometown but across Europe and the US, touring extensively, supporting Leif Vollebekk, Passenger, Blake Mills and more, as well as playing the likes of Newport Folk Festival, Reykjavik Calling and Iceland Airwaves. She’s now released her gorgeous sophomore album, ‘I Miss You, I Do’ on One Little Independent Records.

Musically she draws inspiration from folk and blues roots, utilizing a less-is-more approach to convey openness, choosing to rely mostly on the delicate strumming of acoustics and her dulcet voice. She cites influences from the likes of Andy Shauf, Phoebe Bridgers, Bon Iver, and Gregory Alan Isakov. Born and raised in a small town called Ísafjörður, she attended music school from the age of 6 learning to play the piano and gradually taught herself guitar. She recorded the album at studio Hljóðriti in Hafnarfjörður and will continue to make her mark globally with her intimate and affecting live performances.

Alabama Shakes

Soul music from Sydney, Australia.

Angus & Julia Stone

Angus & Julia Stone’s music seems to float on its own dreamy wavelength. Maybe that effect comes from the enigmatic bond of a shared history between brother and sister — or maybe it’s something deeper, something in their DNA that comes through so often in the music of family bands. The duo released their first EP, Chocolates and Cigarettes, before moving to London in 2006, where they recorded Heart Full of Wine and their debut album, A Book Like This. Released in 2007, A Book Like This charted Top 10 in Australia. Two years later they returned with Down the Way — a breakthrough record that earned them their first number one album, five ARIA Awards, and Australia’s Hottest 100 with “Big Jet Plane,” while introducing their music to a global audience. In 2014, they released the Rick Rubin–produced Angus & Julia Stone, followed by the critically acclaimed Snow (2017), the first album they wrote and recorded entirely themselves. Their most recent album, Cape Forestier (2024), was recorded at Sugarcane Mountain Studios and released ahead of one of their biggest global tours to date.

Third Eye Blind

Alice Cooper

In 1975, Alice Cooper joined forces with longtime collaborator and producer Bob Ezrin to record his first solo album Welcome to My Nightmare, a theatrical concept album about the nightmares of a young boy named Steven. Now, he’s followed Steven into adulthood and presents Welcome 2 My Nightmare, a new but familiar concept album about the fear, anxiety and disgust that haunt Alice Cooper’s dreams in an era of Facebook, Lady Gaga, Sketchers and Angry Birds.

“Alice hates technology, disco is still a nightmare for him and working in a cubicle from nine-to-five would give him cold sweats,” Cooper says. “At the same time, this is a nightmare so all these normal life things are thrown into this crazy world that’s only logical when you’re in the nightmare. You could have an elephant in your garage, and you’re on the lawn in a pink tutu cooking hot dogs. And at the time it’s fine. But when you wake up you go, ‘How insane is that? Where did that come from?’ So we realized that having Alice in a modern-world nightmare is a great place to come from theatrically because we can go anywhere we want and make it as insane as possible.”

A wild, surreal odyssey, Welcome 2 My Nightmare provided Cooper and Ezrin the opportunity to work with numerous musicians and experiment with various musical styles. The three surviving members of the original band, guitarist Michael Bruce, bassist Dennis Dunaway and drummer Neal Smith, co-wrote three songs and they all played on “When Hell Comes Home,” a gritty ‘70s-style rock track about the nightmare of domestic abuse. “I wanted the song to feel like it was off of Love it to Death or Killer, Cooper says. “But we never had to talk about playing the song ‘70s-style, they just did it. It was great and there was nothing we could do to make it any more ‘70s ‘cause that’s just the way these guys play.”

The collaborations with his fellow original band members stemmed from their 2010 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, for which they reunited to play four songs. “I was always looking for a logical reason to work with them again,” Cooper says. “When we broke up there was no bad blood. Most bands break up and they start suing each other. We never broke up on that level. We broke up on a very friendly level. ‘You go do what you’re gonna do, I’m gonna do what I’m gonna do. Let’s see what happens.’ When we got in the Hall of Fame I called them up and I said, ‘We have to do four songs. Let’s get together and rehearse.’ And they sounded great. They played great. We did a few projects after that. We played a couple times together. And I said, ‘Let’s keep it going. Let’s get these guys on the album.’ And Bob said, ‘That’s a great idea. Let’s write with these guys.’ It just worked.”

The first single from Welcome 2 My Nightmare, “I’ll Bite Your Face Off,” is about a gorgeous but deadly female who takes Alice by the hand and guides him through the various scenes of his nightmare. The song was co-written by Neal Smith and features a swaggering ‘60s British rock rhythm, brash, bluesy guitars and sneering, seductive vocals. “We tried to make this sound as much like early Rolling Stones as possible and we really did capture that,” Cooper says. “We’ve been doing it onstage and the audience sings along without knowing the song.”

On “Disco Bloodbath Boogie Fever,” Cooper combines a tongue-in-cheek disco beat and rhythm with near-rap vocals and lyrics about taking a machine gun to zombie disco dancers who refuse to die. Then there’s the zany surf rock of “Ghoul’s Gone Wild,” the derelict down-on-his-luck slur of “The Last Man on Earth,” and the Beatles meet Gary Glitter show tune “The Congregation,” which stars Rob Zombie as a narrator describing such modern-day nightmares as telemarketers, lawyers, pimps, mariachi bands and mimes.

One of the highlights for Cooper is the throbbing, modern rocker “What Baby Wants,” which stars Ke$ha as the devil. “Some people thought I was crazy to have Ke$ha on the record, but I never saw her as one of these Britney Spears diva girls. I saw her more as a rock singer. So I said, ‘Let’s present you not as a diva, but as a rock singer on this.’ We wrote the song together and in the end the darker lyrics were hers.”

Like The original Welcome To My Nightmare, which was highlighted by “Only Women Bleed,” Welcome 2 My Nightmare also features a lovelorn ballad, “Something to Remember Me By,” which was written with Dick Wagner back when they released “I Never Cry” in 1976. “We never used it on an album before because I never felt I was good enough to sing that song,” Cooper reflects. “It was never in my key, I could never get it right. Finally, we got it where my voice is in the right place so we included it and it may be the prettiest ballad we ever wrote. Steve Hunter played guitar on it and we really got a nice Beatles-y sound out of it. So when you’re listening to it you hear this really pretty romantic song and then you realize that in the Nightmare Alice is singing to a pile of bones that used to be a girl.”

Fans of the first Welcome To My Nightmare will recognize melodic references to the original woven throughout the new record. For example, in the cinematic minor-key song “The Nightmare Returns,” Ezrin plays the theme from “Steven” when Cooper sings, “I think we’ve heard that song before.”

“I really like the idea of having some of the musical identity of the first album showing up in the second album,” Cooper says. “It really connects the two and if you’re a real Alice fan and you hear those themes it makes you feel comfortable.”

Welcome To My Nightmare, which came out in 1975, was a landmark album for Cooper. It was his first solo release, following a historic string of anthems written and recorded by the original band between 1971 and 1974, including “School’s Out,” “No More Mr. Nice Guy,” “Elected,” and “I’m Eighteen.” A multimedia smash long before the dawn of music television, Welcome To My Nightmare proved that Cooper could remain popular musically and could take theatricality to an entirely new level of dream by exposing audiences to the crippling fears of a seven-year-old child with an active imagination.

Welcome To My Nightmare spawned two major singles, the ominous, anthemic title track and the beautiful, melancholy acoustic ballad “Only Women Bleed,” and featured narration by horror movie icon Vincent Price. In addition to touring the live “Welcome To My Nightmare” show, Cooper created the prime time special The Nightmare, which was essentially the first long form music video. The program debuted in April 1975. In September he shot the concert film “Welcome To My Nightmare” at London’s Wembley Arena.

“A seven-year-old kid is pretty sure there’s something living in the closet and thinks that something is waiting for him under his bed,” Cooper says. “His toys are probably coming to life and trying to kill him. And I thought, ‘Well, that’s a good general approach for the album because we’ve all been kids and we’ve all had those nightmares.’”

From his first solo album, 1975's Welcome to My Nightmare through releases such as 1994's The Last Temptation and 2000's Brutal Planet, concept albums have been a specialty of Alice's, and this time he spins the story of a serial killer who imagines himself as the most predatory of all insects, trapping his prey, killing them, then enveloping his eight victims in silk, taking a leg from each of them. A web of intrigue, wrapped around some serious hard rock.

Co-produced by Alice with the team of Danny Saber [Black Grape, Rolling Stones, Ozzy Osbourne, David Bowie] and Greg Hampton [Bootsy Collins, Buckethead], songs like the opening "I Know Where You Live" and "Vengeance Is Mine," featuring a snaking metal guitar solo from Slash himself, evoke such classic Alice anthems as "Is it My Body," and "Under My Wheels" along with landmark albums like Love It To Death, Killer and School's Out. There's also a patented rock ballad in the tradition of "Only Women Bleed" and "I Never Cry" with "Killed by Love." Along Came a Spider features Cooper's touring band of drummer Eric Singer, bassist Chuck Garric and guitarists Keri Kelli and Jason Hook. Songwriting was handled by Alice with Saber, Hampton, Garric, Kelli and a few friends including former band member Damon Johnson and Warrant's Jani Lane.

Along Came a Spider has elements of serial killers such as Hannibal Lecter, Son of Sam, Ted Bundy, Jack the Ripper, Sweeney Todd and Psycho's Norman Bates with Alice himself taking the central part, acting out the murderer's diary -- challenging reality by Alice Cooper inhabiting the identity of a serial killer who imagines himself a spider. As he has in the past, Alice chronicles a classic battle between good and evil, with inevitable results.

"Evil should get punished," says Alice. "It should never win. And that, to me, is what's most satisfying. I may love Darth Vader when I watch Star Wars, but I feel relief when he finally gets what's coming to him."

...Read Alice's full biography @ AliceCooper.com

Switchfoot

West Coast Rock ‘N Roll

Sex Pistols

The White Buffalo

Year of the Dark Horse Premiere Event (9/29): https://thewhitebuffalo.veeps.com/

Cameron Whitcomb

One of the most captivating new songwriters of his generation, Cameron Whitcomb turns the most candid details of his real-life experience into songs with a strangely exhilarating power. Recently named to coveted lists including both Spotify and Amazon Music’s 2025 Artists To Watch and featured globally on the cover of Apple Music’s Today Country, the 21-year-old musician earned major acclaim with last year’s Quitter EP, a boldly autobiographical collection partly inspired by his journey in overcoming addiction with its standout soul-searching title track, and his spellbinding follow-up single, “Medusa” (both hits on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100). As he launches into his most dynamic chapter to date, Whitcomb now shares a larger-than-life single called “Hundred Mile High”: a breakneck-paced anthem that brings a frenetic new energy to his wildly colorful yet deeply lived-in storytelling.

Hailing from British Columbia’s Vancouver Island, Whitcomb left home at age 17 and got a job working on a pipeline, later spending much of his downtime singing karaoke and posting covers on Reddit. When an American Idol executive took note of his undeniable vocal talent, he landed a spot on the show’s 20th season and emerged as a top 20 finalist, then immersed himself in learning to write songs while deep in the process of getting sober. After making his label debut with “Rocking Chair” (a spring 2024 release that amassed over 40 million combined views across socials prior to its premiere), Whitcomb took off on a fast ascent that soon found him embarking on his first-ever headline run, the sold-out Quitter Tour. Along with gearing up for the Hundred Mile High Tour—his biggest headline run to date, including stops at iconic venues like New York City’s Bowery Ballroom—he’s now at work on more new music spotlighting the raw emotional honesty of his one-of-a-kind songwriting.

Bad Nerves

jazz band from skid row

bobby bird

will power

jon poulton

sam thompson

george berry

The Marcus King Band

Julia Stone

http://www.juliastonemusic.com

Pokey Lafarge

Pokey LaFarge was ready to move forward.

In March 2020, the veteran singer-songwriter packed up and left his Los Angeles abode behind, putting his belongings in storage in anticipation of spending extensive time on the road in support of his then-forthcoming album, Rock Bottom Rhapsody. He couldn’t wait to head down to Austin a few weeks later to showcase those songs and launch the album with his band at South-by-Southwest. Then the pandemic hit and all of LaFarge’s well-laid plans went into thin air.

Stuck in East Austin with nowhere to go, LaFarge did what he does best: he got to work. Throughout his career, nine albums to date including a stint on Jack White’s Third Man Records, the singer-songwriter has never been one to look back in anger or disappointment. LaFarge used the sudden change in plans to his advantage, having perhaps his greatest period of personal growth in the midst of this crippling pandemic.

It came as no surprise that the songs instantly started to flow out of him. LaFarge is an artist who refuses to rest on his laurels and compromise. He’s always motivated and ready to create — and when he’s at peace in isolation like he was here, the results can be magical. Looking in, inspired by the deep soul not just from these shores, but from distant geographical places like Africa or South America, LaFarge set out to create a body of work that paired emotional lyrics with a killer groove and grabby melodies.

Written by LaFarge and co-produced with Chris Seefried, the album is one of LaFarge’s strongest and most mature lyrical efforts to date. The album’s title, In the Blossom of Their Shade, is taken from a lyric in the stunning, yet dusty “Mi Ideal.” That song sonically draws influences from the Southwest, South America and Caribbean. The distant warmth of the music, especially rhythmically, adeptly coincides with the longing that's expressed in the lyrics.

Unlike its melancholy predecessor, In the Blossom of Their Shade showcases the positivity of coming out of the darkness and into the light. The record was nearly titled Siesta Love since it captures the thematic notion of being the perfect summer afternoon soundtrack...the type of music you want to listen to while having a cocktail with your significant other. It makes sense musically as well — LaFarge intentionally crafted songs that created space and have melodies that can glide throughout a composition that’s a far cry from the swing and blues-infused songs of his earlier work.

LaFarge’s rigorous work ethic powered him through this potentially challenging creative period. As days became a couple months, songs blossomed from embryonic ideas into full-formed ones and he was ready to move on, which typified his mindset as a working artist.

After he left Austin, he headed up north to Chicago for two-and-a-half months to record In the Blossom of Their Shade. At home in the city two hours north of where he grew up and became a die-hard Chicago Cubs fan, LaFarge rigorously and meticulously recorded the songs (half of which he wrote with his best friend Nick Africano over FaceTime) in the Windy City.

Thematically, LaFarge, in a way only he can, tackles a wide gamut of emotions. On “Rotterdam,” it’s easy to hear how the dreamy song encapsulates a notion of a Shangri-La even in the most unusual of places.

Look no further than album closer, the twangy “Goodnight, Goodbye (Hope Not Forever).” The song neatly ties the past year along with a universal longing that brighter days are on the horizon, even if it doesn’t seem so right now.

Pokey LaFarge never wanted to be an artist that had one gigantic record and was then lost to the annals of history. As for now? He’s back to where the whole odyssey began over a year ago: Los Angeles. Even with In The Blossom of Their Shade on the horizon, LaFarge hasn’t put down his pen. You can’t keep a great songwriter idle.

Dope Lemon

Born and raised in Sydney, Australia, singer/songwriter Angus Stone first garnered the public's attention as one half of the internationally successful sibling folk duo Angus & Julia Stone. With their distinctive vocal styles, Julia's breathy and ethereal and Angus' smoky and confident, the siblings released their debut album, A Book Like This, to critical acclaim in 2007. After the release of 2010's Down the Way, the pair began working on solo projects, with Julia issuing Memory Machine (2010) and By the Horns (2012), and Angus unveiling the feisty and rollicking Smoking Gun under the pseudonym Lady of the Sunshine before returning to more traditional country-folk-inflected territory with 2012's Broken Brights, which was released under his birth name. A third Angus & Julia Stone LP, produced by Rick Rubin and titled simply Angus & Julia Stone, arrived in 2014. Angus then retreated to his farm house and put together an album with a more electric, '90s slacker rock sound than on prior projects, born of jamming with friends in his recording studio on the property. Using the pseudonym Dope Lemon, he released Honey Bones in the spring of 2016. ~ James Christopher Monger & Marcy Donelson, Rovi

Amigo The Devil

www.amigothedevil.com

Booking:

ROpaleski.assistant@WMEAgency.com

General:

info@regimeinc.com

Thanks for all your support.

Jensen McRae

My name is Jensen McRae. I’m 27 & I'm a Virgo. I write songs about mental illness, being brown, fearing adulthood, and falling in love with every boy who’s ever been nice to me. I am probably writing about you in my journal.

Panic Shack

BOOKING: sophie.roberts@unitedtalent.com

ross.warnock@unitedtalent.com

PR: alex@braceyourselfpr.com

Steph Strings

Steph Strings is a 24 year-old guitarist/singer-songwriter based in Melbourne, Australia.

Ashley MacIsaac

Gwenifer Raymond

Guitar convincer. Banjo thumber. American Primitive musician.

EU/UK bookings: andrew@phantom-limb.co.uk

All other bookings: agents@thekurlandagency.com

Jobi Riccio

Born and raised in Morrison, Colorado - a tourist town in the foothills outside of Denver that’s home to Red Rocks Amphitheater - Jobi Riccio grew up surrounded by music and found inspiration in artists ranging from Sheryl Crow to Joni Mitchell. Sonically, Jobi’s music exists between worlds, melding the classic craftsmanship of her songwriting with modern indie-leaning production to forge a lush, expansive sound that feels traditional and experimental all at once. She has received acclaim for her songwriting, including winning the 2019 NewSong Music Competition, performing at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, receiving the 2019 Lee Villiare Scholarship from her alma mater Berklee College of Music, and being named a finalist in the 2018 Rocky Mountain Folks Festival Songwriters Showcase. In 2023 Jobi was awarded the Newport Folk Festival John Prine Fellowship.

Her debut album, "Whiplash" (out September 2023 on Yep Roc) introduces influences from a variety of genres, while still holding space for Riccio's love for all decades of country and americana music.

Sam Drysdale

Ken Presse

Frank Carter & the Sex Pistols