Warm, honest and quietly devastating in places: this week’s indie folk bops are the kind of songs that make you stop what you’re doing and actually listen.
Foxy Leopard – Same Old Sermon
Foxy Leopard’s “Same Old Sermon” is a stunning piece of cinematic alt-country: raw resonator guitar, sparse instrumentation and wonderfully well-observed lyrics
“Same Old Sermon” is part of the concept album Before, a prequel project exploring how ordinary lives drift apart before conflict makes the division official. The track is built around a single lyric: “North heard mercy, South heard wrong,” an observation about how the same message produces completely different convictions depending on who is listening. The production is deliberately stripped back: raw resonator guitar with metal cone, sparse harmonica and banjo and intimate vocals. It is Americana that earns the word cinematic through it’s atmosphere, grit and groove.
Foxy Leopard is a cinematic alt-country project from Quebec, Canada, building a narrative world set against the emotional backdrop of the American Civil War. Rather than focusing on battles or politics, the project explores what comes before: the quiet shifts in belief and identity that lead people toward irreversible division. The sound sits somewhere between 1860s folk, modern outlaw storytelling and minimalist alt-country. It’s a compelling mix, and definitely worth of your ears this month.
Kitty O’Neal – Headspace
Kitty O’Neal serves up a gorgeous piano-led indie folk stunner: contemplative, unhurried and perfect to sit with
“Headspace” is built on piano and sparse, thoughtful instrumentation that keeps the emotional weight in the vocal and the lyric rather than the production. The subject is emotional numbness and self-observation, the feeling of watching your own life from a slight remove. It’s a compelling subject matter, and the song delivers it in style. The chorus is great, and it really soars, in a kind of ‘The National’-esque way. Kitty’s vocal is my fave though, it’s beautiful.
O’Neal is a London-based singer-songwriter who received Help Musicians funding in 2025 to record her debut album. She has played over 75 venues across the UK and Ireland including Glastonbury Festival, and has supported Rae Morris, Rozi Plain and Band of Skulls. Her 2024 EP Cross St Demos launched with sold-out shows and radio support from BBC 5 Live, Times Radio, BBC Ulster, BBC Introducing and Soho Radio. It’s an impressive CV, but the best thing here is this song. A really great single, and I can’t wait to hear more.
Goldschatz – We Got Love
Goldschatz deliver a brilliant piece of groovy Swiss-Canadian Americana: honest, warm and recorded beautifully
“We Got Love” was produced and recorded by Eric Nielsen in Vancouver, whose credits include Frazey Ford and The Deep Dark Woods, and the production carries that West Coast warmth and attention to live feel. It’s got a tasty mix of Americana, 60s soul and uplifting harmonies, and the result is just lovely. Smooth like butter, vocally tight and best of all? The song at the heart of this is a real triumph.
Goldschatz are Rykka and Timothy Jaromir, a Swiss-Canadian duo who have been travelling the world and making music together for over a decade. Rykka began busking in Vancouver at 15 and won the Canadian Peak Performance Project award in 2013; Jaromir released his debut album in 2010 and has played Gurten Festival and the Montreux Jazz Festival. Impressive CVs, but the main event here is this song; it’s a stunner and we can’t wait for more.
Jonathan Lobo – Hero
Jonathan Lobo gives us a standout piano-led ballad about legacy and memory: warm, thoughtful and with bags of character
“Hero” is a reflective track about how we hope to be remembered by the people we love, and the arrangement matches the weight of that subject: intimate piano at the foundation, with live drums, slide guitar, mellotron and layered harmonies building the emotional scale without overloading it. The production is really, really lovely and it grooves along in style. Since release the track has found listeners through Spotify Radio, Release Radar, Daylist and independent playlist support, and we’re not surprised at all.
Lobo is a Dubai-born and raised lawyer and independent singer-songwriter whose music functions, by his own description, as therapy for himself first and for anyone else who needs it. His songwriting circles real-life questions that do not resolve neatly: memory, regret, growing older, and the strange ways people make sense of their lives. He draws from John Mayer, Elton John, the Beatles and Tom Odell, and the influence of all four is audible without any of them crowding the track. This is a beauty, and should go on every sunday afternoon playlist out there.