Now Hear This! June 2026

I'm With Her
Sing Me Alive
Rounder

Fresh from their Grammy sweep (Best Folk Album and Best American Roots Performance) Aoife O'Donovan, Sarah Jarosz, and Sara Watkins release this live document from their 2025 tour. The 13th Floor calls it 'a masterclass in precision.' A pure and joyful record from three musicians whose ensemble playing deepens with every outing.

Vienna Vienna
Entertain Me
Pulse

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Six-track debut EP from 'glimmer rock' artist Vienna Vienna, whose viral protest anthem 'God Save the Queens' built a grassroots following ahead of this physical release. Blending cinematic production with razor-sharp lyricism, Entertain Me is confident and hook-forward indie-pop delivered with the swagger of an artist who knows exactly who he is.

Little Barrie
Gravity Freeze
Easy Eye Sound

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The British trio's sixth studio album - first under their own name since drummer Virgil Howe's 2017 death - is a warm, spacious collection of psychedelic rock and soul. Frontman Barrie Cadogan and bassist Lewis Wharton recruited drummer Tony Coote, and the results crackle with renewed energy. Genre-defying and intuitive, the trio at their most confident.

Manchester Orchestra
Union Chapel
Loma Vista Recordings

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Andy Hull and Robert McDowell's stripped duo performances at London's gothic Union Chapel - three sold-out nights in fall 2023 - receive full vinyl release. The 21-track set reframes the band's catalog through space, silence, and the building's natural resonance. An extraordinary live document from one of indie rock's most emotionally demanding bands.

John R. Miller
The Great Unknowing
Rounder

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Miller's fourth album was recorded at Leon Russell's legendary Church Studio in Tulsa, co-produced with Adam Meisterhans and Tulsa players including John Fullbright. Bandcamp Album of the Day calls it 'a killer batch of Americana songs that reflect turmoil both internal and external.' His most spacious and textured record yet, and his best since Depreciated.

Jeff Goldblum and the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra
Night Blooms
Verve

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Companion to 2025's chart-topping Still Blooming, Night Blooms features Charlie Puth on 'Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered,' Melody Gardot on 'Misty,' Cynthia Erivo on 'If I Only Had A Brain,' and four intimate Late Night Sessions. Goldblum's conversational piano and conspiratorial charm continue to make his jazz project one of the year's more genuinely delightful experiences.

Sparklmami
in this body
Verve

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Sparklmami's Verve debut draws from Brazilian jazz, experimental soul, Mexican bolero, and funk, woven together with a communal spirit. Features contributions from Nico Segal and Alex Santilli of Thee Sacred Souls. JAZZ.FM91 calls it 'a lush world of nostalgia and possibility.' Clash praises the single 'no te vayas' as 'a dusky, feel-good funk offering.' A standout debut.

Violet Grohl
Be Sweet To Me
Republic Records

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Dave Grohl's eldest daughter makes a compelling debut shaped by '80s and '90s alternative heroes - PJ Harvey, Soundgarden, Pixies, the Breeders. Recorded with producer Justin Raisen alongside a Wrecking Crew-style session ensemble, Be Sweet To Me has an immediately convincing live energy. With fuzz-toned rock, spacey shoegaze and snarky pop charm, Violet blazes her own trail.

Gnarls Barkley
Atlanta
Ten Thousand Projects

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Eighteen years after The Odd Couple, CeeLo Green and Danger Mouse close the book with their third and final album. Atlanta is more stripped-back than earlier work, but CeeLo's gospel-trained voice still packs a soulful kick. "Pictures" could be an Al Green classic in the making,' while the duo's chemistry on "Turn Your Heart Back On" remains unmistakable.

Don Toliver
OCTANE
Atlantic

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Toliver's fifth album, recorded with Travis Scott producing much of the material, is 49 minutes of melodic trap and atmospheric R&B. Guests include Rema, the aforementioned Scott, and Teezo Touchdown. Houston's most psychedelic rapper continues refining his singular voice.

Caleb Caudle
Heavy Thrill
Thirty Tigers/Handplow Records

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Caudle's self-produced debut on his own Handplow Records label was recorded at Johnny Cash's cabin studio in Hendersonville and mixed by Jacquire King (Tom Waits, Modest Mouse). A co-write with Natalie Hemby anchors a record that's rooted yet restless, aware of its lineage but unafraid to wander. Intimate portraits of American working life, beautifully crafted.

Bedouine
Neon Summer Skin
Thirty Tigers/Bedouine Music

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Azniv Korkejian's fourth album was written after visiting family in Saudi Arabia and confronting her longing for childhood safety. Co-produced with Gus Seyffert with touches from Jonathan Rado and the Lemon Twigs, it adds valved brass and orchestral flourishes to her signature folk-pop intimacy. Her most emotionally complex and musically expansive record.

Harpo Marx
Harpo Speaks! - The Riverside Symphony Concert Featuring Peter And The Wolf
Thirty Tigers/Ramseur Records

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The most remarkable archival release of 2026: an unheard 1964 concert in which the silent Marx Brother spoke publicly for the only recorded time, narrating Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf alongside the Riverside Symphony. Recorded six months before Harpo's death, his son Bill calls the release 'an honor.'

Ren�e Fleming wigh Bela Fleck
The Fiddle And The Drum
Thirty Tigers/Ren�e Fleming Records

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Five-time Grammy soprano Fleming and 19-time Grammy banjo virtuoso Bela Fleck unite for an Appalachian folk and bluegrass album timed to America's 250th anniversary. Dolly Parton guests on "In The Pines," Vince Gill on "The Scarlet Tide," and Jerry Douglas throughout. Recorded in Nashville with Fleck producing, it pairs Fleming's operatic voice with traditional American music to remarkable effect.

Fantastic Cat
Cat Out Of Hell
Missing Piece Records

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Atwood Magazine awards the quartet's third album 9.4/10: 'everything clicks.' Anthony D'Amato, Brian Dunne, Don DiLego, and Mike Montali recorded in Virginia in ten days, mixed by D. James Goodwin (Kevin Morby, The Hold Steady). Lead single 'Donnie Takes the Bus' is their first to chart on Billboard Adult Alternative Airplay. Folk rock from four singer-songwriters at their most cohesive.

Aaron Lee Tasjan
Get Over It, Underdog
Blue Elan Records Llc

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This emotionally complex album is also an elegy: the late Todd Snider co-wrote "The Real" and his mentorship produced the creative burst behind the record. Eleven songs interrogating the mythology of the American underdog - with wit, weariness, and the Americana credentials Tasjan has been building for years. Glide praises it as immediate but nuanced. A record shadowed beautifully by loss.

Joshua Ray Walker
Ain't Dead Yet
Thirty Tigers/East Dallas Records

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The final chapter in Walker's cancer-recovery trilogy, begun before his Stage 3B colon cancer diagnosis and completed during treatment. That dark pre-awareness colors every song - Walker notes the prescience of material written when he 'felt awful and like I was dying' without knowing why. Standout "Capital Letters" mourns two mentors. The closing "Thank You For Listening" was his first message to fans after diagnosis.

Deer Tick
Coin-O-Matic
ATO Records

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John McCauley and the Providence four-piece's ninth album takes its name from the cigarette company fronting Raymond Patriarca's mob operations. A love letter to Rhode Island's seedy underworld mythology and Irish-Catholic working-class identity, with guest baritone sax from Los Lobos' Steve Berlin. McCauley: 'I hope people see themselves in it.' Hooky, cinematic, and deeply lived-in.

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The Red Clay Strays
Grateful
RCA

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The Mobile, Alabama six-piece's third Dave Cobb-produced album is their most spiritually grounded yet. Recorded between Cobb's Savannah studio and historic RCA Studio A in Nashville, Grateful moves from the gospel-charged stomp of "Demons In Your Choir" through the churning "People Hatin'" to the tender "If I Didn't Know You." Eleven songs equally at home in dance halls and church steeples.

Vince Staples
Cry Baby
Loma Vista

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Staples' first Loma Vista album is 35 minutes of tightly coiled West Coast rap - spare, unsettling, and precisely engineered. Boom-bap beats underpin candid reckoning with fame, survival, and visibility. His third consecutive album to refine a vision with the confidence of someone with nothing left to prove and every reason to keep going.

MUNA
Gets So Hot Tour

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MUNA is coming and they are not here to play it safe. Fueled by their new album, Dancing on the Wall, and years of anthems built for sweaty, cathartic release, the Gets So Hot Tour is exactly what it sounds like. Loud, euphoric, and completely unhinged in the best way possible. Show up ready to lose yourself and find everyone else on the dance floor.

The Red Clay Strays
The Grateful Tour

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The Red Clay Strays have never needed much more than raw conviction and a room full of believers. With their new album Grateful as the foundation, The Grateful Tour is a revival meeting, a rock show, and a gut-punch all rolled into one. Real, raw, Southern rock that offers something you didn't know you were missing.

The Coalition of Independent Music Stores (CIMS) is a national level organization comprised of the best independent record stores in America. CIMS was founded in 1995 with the goal of uniting like minded independent store owners, giving them a more powerful voice in the music industry. The stores that make up CIMS are all very different, but we share the same desires � to be the heart of our communities, to super-serve our customers, to support and develop artists, and to share our love of music.

For more information about CIMS and the stores in our organization, please visit cimsmusic.com or find us through social media with the #cimsmusic hashtag. And please remember to always shop local by supporting your neighborhood record store.

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Now Hear This! June 2026