ROSE COUSINS RELEASE NEW ALBUM, SHARES VIDEO FOR “NEEDED YOU”

ROSE COUSINS’ NEW ALBUM, CONDITIONS OF LOVE - VOL 1, OUT TODAY VIA NETTWERK

BUY / STREAM CONDITIONS OF LOVE - VOL 1 HERE

WATCH / SHARE “NEEDED YOU” HERE

2025 CANADIAN TOUR DATES BEGIN MARCH 29, MORE TOUR DATES ANNOUNCED TODAY 

“On her new album, Conditions of Love - Vol. 1, Rose Cousins returns to her own first love — the piano — to craft 10 testaments to the human heart in all its glorious, inane complexity. The record delivers Cousins' trademark capacity for wry wit and emotional gravitas, but her archness never serves as a way to keep a distance between herself and her lyrics. Cousins knows how to find the light in the dark, she knows survival, and she's crafting whole worlds here."
CBC Music, Albums We Can’t Wait to Hear in 2025

“Rose Cousins is here to tell us about love. Vol. 1 of that treatise promises more of Cousins's deftly rendered, soul-inflected pop music. Light as air but deep as space, lead single "I Believe in Love (and it's very hard)" makes a simple declaration sound like the bravest thing you could ever admit.” Exclaim!, Most Anticipated Albums of 2025

Photo Credit : Lindsay Duncan // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Today, acclaimed multi-JUNO Award winning singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Rose Cousins releases her new album Conditions of Love - Vol 1. To help celebrate the occasion, Cousins is sharing the video for “Needed You”, a song that “speaks to the scars of childhood,” she says. “A loving lament to those moments when we most needed love and it wasn’t available. Time passes and we figure out how to survive in the world we are born into. Later, out in the world on our own, we begin to see ourselves as two separate people: who we needed to be as a child, and the adult we have become, away from our family dynamic.

“Generational pain is real. You can run screaming from your childhood only to get to midlife and there it is, still waiting to be held, acknowledged. I don’t know that there’s a way to reconcile the emotional past. I know we can get stuck choosing between authenticity and connection. Love is constantly trying to endure and persist in endless conditions, whether our needs are getting met or not. We do the best we can.

“In the end, Conditions of Love - Vol 1  journeys through longing and lands in a place of acceptance, perhaps the only real way forward.”

WATCH / SHARE “NEEDED YOU” HERE

MORE ABOUT CONDITIONS OF LOVE - VOL 1
On her new album, Rose holds her listeners’ hands as she guides them on a journey through the "conditions of love." Ever the emotional explorer, the Nova-Scotia-based artist seeks truth, in all its imperfection, in the depths of humans’ most complicated of emotions: love. The journey results in a striking clarity, and it’s the gift of that clarity that brings on surprising tears.  

Rose shares, “Love feels great and makes us ridiculous. It's tiring and intense, joyful and devastating. Falling in love, being in love and staying in love are all such different things. Being human is emotionally complicated enough without attempting to relate to another who is just as complex, and in the most vulnerable of arenas: romance. Love is wondrous and absurd (and very hard). Humour helps.” 

WATCH / SHARE “K’S WALTZ” HERE
WATCH / SHARE “DENOUEMENT” (LIVE PERFORMANCE VISUALIZER) HERE

Co-produced with trusted friend and longtime bandmate Joshua Van Tassel, Conditions of Love - Vol. 1 sees Rose return to her first love, the piano. “Piano is where I feel the most connected. It’s the best partner in expressing the emotion I’m mining,” she shares. She first introduced the upcoming body of work with the gorgeous, piano-driven ballad “Forget Me Not,” followed by the slow-burning, nostalgic “Borrowed Light,” and the uplifting, “I Believe in Love (and it’s very hard),” which Rose has called the cornerstone of the upcoming album.  

WATCH / SHARE “THAT’S HOW LONG (I’VE WAITED FOR YOUR LOVE)” HERE

Rose Cousins’ songwriting plumbs the depths of the human condition. Her work has garnered her two JUNO Awards (2013’s We Have Made a Spark & 2021’s Bravado), two Canadian Folk Music Awards, eleven East Coast Music Awards and one Grammy Award nomination (2018’s Natural Conclusion), along with praise from the likes of the CBC, No Depression, LA Times, Associated Press, Billboard, Folk Alley, and NPR, who raved “Cousins’ disarmingly fluid vocal tone has the ability to convey the most internalized feelings without an ounce of fuss.” Over the years, she has shared stages with Patty Griffin, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Jann Arden, Kathleen Edwards, Joe Henry and Anais Mitchell, and her music has fittingly underscored scenes from notable TV shows including Grey’s Anatomy, Fire Country, Batwoman and Heartland. 

WATCH / SHARE “I BELIEVE IN LOVE (AND IT’S VERY HARD)” HERE
WATCH / SHARE “BORROWED LIGHT” HERE

ROSE COUSINS CANADIAN TOUR (MORE DATES TBA)
March 29 - Fredericton, NB @ Wilmot United Church
April 1 - Sherwood Park, AB @ Festival Place Theatre
April 2 - Calgary, AB @ National Music Centre
April 3 - Saskatoon, SK @ The Basement
April 5 - Winnipeg, MB @ West End Cultural Centre
April 7 - Montreal, QC @ Bar Le Ritz
April 8 - Kingston, ON @ The Broom Factory
April 9 - Peterborough, ON @ Market Hall Performing Arts Center
April 11 - Toronto, ON @ Masonic Temple - The Concert Hall
April 12 - Hamilton, ON @ The Westdale
April 13 - Ottawa, ON @ National Arts Centre
April 16 - Charlottetown, PE @ Confederation Centre Of The Arts
April 17 - Halifax, NS @ Rebecca Cohn Auditorium
April 18 - Moncton, NB @ Capitol Theatre (Moncton)
April 19 - Saint John, NB @ Imperial Theatre
June 13 - St John's, NL @ Majestic Theatre
October 3 - Pender Island, BC @ Pender Islands Community Hall
October 4 - Victoria, BC @ Capital Ballroom
October 6 - Vancouver, BC @ St. James Community Square, Mel Lehan Hall 
October 8 - Vernon, BC @ Vernon Performing Arts Centre
October 9 - Lake Country, BC @ Creekside Theatre

BUY / STREAM CONDITIONS OF LOVE - VOL 1 HERE

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CONDITIONS OF LOVE - VOL 1 TRACKLIST
01 To Be Born (overture)
02 Forget Me Not
03 I Believe in Love (and it’s very hard)
04 Denouement
05 That’s How Long (I’ve waited for your love)
06 Needed You
07 Wolf and Man
08 K’s Waltz
09 Borrowed Light
10 How is this (the last time)

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HOUSEWIFE RELEASES NEW EP, GIRL OF THE HOUR, ALONGSIDE THE LOFTY NEW SINGLE “MATILDA”

WATCH / SHARE “MATILDA” HERE

BUY / STREAM GIRL OF THE HOUR HERE

PERFORMS IN VANCOUVER AT JUNOFEST ON MARCH 28

"slow-burning, glittery alt-pop " - THE LINE OF BEST FIT

“Housewife is a revelation…A glorious combination of Blondshell, Julia Jacklin and soaring US songwriter charm, it’s an emphatic introduction to an artist already screaming “future favourite”. - DORK
“'Divorce' sees the Toronto-based artist paint a vivid picture of someone whose world has fallen apart due to a break-up, via the mediums of mournful vocals, pensive grunge riffs, and palpable pop hooks.” - DIY MAG

“an addictive alt-pop anthem with shades of nostalgia and melancholia from a promising new talent.” - RECORD OF THE DAY

“ -Child of my own Divorce- That’s the most brilliant lyric I’ve ever heard….The lyrics are incredibly smart.” - LOS ANGELES TIMES

“‘King of Wands’ finds Fry once again showing off their layered songwriting and infectious melodicism, hitting on a careful combination of rollicking indie rock guitars and earworm hooks.” - UNDER THE RADAR MAGAZINE

“Toronto-based rising star Brighid Fry under her musical moniker consistently delivers pop-tinged indie-rock productions that weave through everything from messy situationships to climate change in empowering yet grounding tones.” - EARMILK

Photo Credit : Carly Boomer  // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

After an incredible run of widely-praised releases including “I Lied”, “Wasn’t You”, “Life of the Party”, “Work Song” and “Divorce”, Housewife (Brighid Fry) has now released her eagerly-awaited new EP, Girl Of The Hour, highlighted by the lofty new single “Matilda”.

Girl Of The Hour follows the 2022 EP You’ll Be Forgiven continuing the sprawling indie-pop energy Housewife has become known for. Cementing the broad and immersive approach she has taken this past year, her newest collection continues to establish her as one of the more compelling voices in the modern alt-pop arena.

Rooted in both personal loss and universal grief, the lead offering “Matilda” is a song that transforms a seemingly simple event into a deeply emotional allegory. Inspired by the theft of her beloved bike, affectionately nicknamed Matilda, Housewife channels the bittersweet feeling of missing something that once brought freedom and joy.

Reflecting on the song’s meaning, she shares, “‘Matilda’ was inspired by my bike getting stolen a couple years ago. I was an avid cyclist for years and really loved that bike (and had nicknamed it Matilda). I remember a while after it got stolen, I was out on a day that was perfect biking weather and just getting hit with how much I miss cycling. Obviously, the song isn’t just about a bike, but also an allegory for grief and loss, and missing something or someone you can’t have anymore. I think everyone, cyclists or not, can relate to that grief, and the struggle of moving on from things in their past, as I still haven’t replaced the bike to this day.” 

WATCH / SHARE “MATILDA” HERE

MORE ABOUT HOUSEWIFE + GIRL OF THE HOUR
Filled with curiosity and questions of identity, Toronto’s Brighid Fry (she/ they) makes the sort of indie-leaning, exploratory music that it’s taken several years of early success and subsequent growth to reach. First breaking through in her teens as one half of Moscow Apartment, the duo swiftly won a Canadian Folk Music Award for their self-titled debut EP before changing their name and then becoming a solo project in 2022. As Brighid hit her twenties and stepped front and centre, the material that she was writing became increasingly more self-aware and personal, too.

Still only 22, Brighid credits her liberal upbringing as helping to make this process of both artistic and self-discovery as seamless as possible. Having recently been diagnosed as autistic, she jokes that her neurodivergence was on display and understood from the first moments music entered her life as a child when, unlike most three-year-olds, she became obsessed with classical composers and begged her parents not just for a kid’s violin, but also a collection of busts of Bach, Beethoven and co. When the classical music fixation gave way to more contemporary tastes, she would join her family at the folk festivals they regularly attended, playing her first non-classical performance at a Greenpeace fundraiser.

WATCH / SHARE “DIVORCE” LYRIC VIDEO HERE

As well as offering Brighid an early introduction to the community that music can provide and the climate activism that would go on to become a big part of her life (in 2021, she helped to set up the Canadian branch of Music Declares Emergency), her family also provided a completely accepting place to explore her wider identity. As a “third generation queer”, she’s felt confident and comfortable with her own bisexuality since the age of 12. “My parents are bisexual; my grandma’s a lesbian; I grew up going to Pride so I never had a teary coming out,” she notes. In the two years since Housewife’s previous EP You’ll Be Forgiven, meanwhile, Brighid has spent time understanding that she is non-binary. “It took longer to figure that bit out, but I’ve never struggled with my identity,” she says.

On new EP, Girl Of The Hour, Housewife is addressing these facets more than ever - be that on the friend crush dilemma of first single “I Lied” or the musings on social perceptions that run through “Life of the Party”. But although these six tracks of earworm grunge-pop are a real time document of an artist growing and changing - figuring out some vital parts of themself along the way - the predominant vibe is one that’s playful and inquisitive. “Sometimes your friends are hot and that can get more complicated when there are no hard lines on what you are,” Brighid suggests. “That’s how my queerness ends up coming out in my music.”

WATCH / SHARE “WORK SONG” HERE

“Wasn’t You” laces fuzzy guitars with a relatable tale about fancying someone you wish you didn’t. “My problem with being bisexual isn’t about being attracted to women, it’s being attracted to men,” Brighid laughs - an idea intertwined with an acute awareness of the gender imbalance of prospective partners who “have been raised and socialised in a completely different way than me, and don’t have to deal with sexism and misogyny in the same way I do.”

On the aforementioned “I Lied”, she addresses another hurdle of being bisexual over the sort of buoyant indie-pop that nods to fellow queer heroes MUNA. “I’m always interested in this idea that straight men and women can’t be friends, or that you can’t be friends with someone you could be attracted to,” Brighid notes, “because if you’re bi then well, shit! Can’t I have any friends?!” Meanwhile, for the melancholy heartbreak of “Divorce”, Brighid sought out fellow songwriter Hank Compton during a writing session in order to make “the most devastating shit” they could.

WATCH / SHARE “LIFE OF THE PARTY” (LYRIC VIDEO) HERE

Largely moving away from the lighter folk of her early output and leaning into the more alternative influences that have been part of her life since attending a formative Girls Rock camp aged eight, “Life of the Party” fuses pop hooks with a grungey, cathartic musicality; a duality that fits the song perfectly. “People don’t pick up on the fact that I’m autistic automatically so they’ll think I'm this aloof, weird bitch,” Brighid says. “But then people also assume I’m this confident person who knows what they’re doing [because of my career]. I wanted to write a song about all these misconceptions about me and how hard it is to set people straight. People see me on stage and think that’s me, but it just never has been.”

“Matilda” is a song about losing her bike that’s also, of course, not just about losing her bike. “It’s about the aspect of needing to move on and dealing with loss that was informed by this other big loss in my life. But,” she notes, “I genuinely cried when I lost that bike.” Meanwhile “Work Song” - written with regular collaborator and JUNO Award winner Derek Hoffman - takes an upbeat, glass-half-full approach to self improvement, morphing dissatisfaction into a pop about getting better, both as a performer and a person.

On Girl Of The Hour, Brighid is fully leaning into the fresh territory she’s opened up as Housewife - from the newly limitless genre scope she’s allowing herself to explore to the increasingly personal, nuanced and curious topics that permeate the lyrics within them. More than ever, Brighid Fry knows herself and the result is a project that’s getting more confident in the idiosyncrasies of its own skin by the day. “Some people say that this music is political or it has very strong messaging and I think that’s great,” she says, “but really for me, it’s just a way to process life.”

HOUSEWIFE LIVE
March 28 - Vancouver, BC | JUNOfest | The Red Gate

BUY / STREAM GIRL OF THE HOUR HERE

DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

GIRL OF THE HOUR EP TRACK LISTING:
01 I Lied
02 Work Song
03 Life Of The Party
04 Matilda
05 Divorce
06 Wasn’t You

HOUSEWIFE ONLINE
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DAN MANGAN RETURNS TO HIS ROOTS ON NEW ALBUM NATURAL LIGHT

Photo Credit : Zachary Vague // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Before a single note of Dan Mangan’s 7th LP Natural Light was recorded he listened through a series of song demos and sincerely considered the title Schminger Schmongwriter. After years of rolling his eyes at the genre, there is poetry in accepting that the two best words to describe him may in fact be “singer” and “songwriter”.

In context, the nod to Harry Nilsson’s landmark album Nilsson Schmilsson is not out of place. There’s a feeling of timelessness to Natural Light – to be released May 16, 2025, via Arts & Crafts – in the curiosity, the wit, and the playfulness in Dan’s voice, through his words, and the vibrancy of the music. The analog patina and subtle reminders that this tender, funny and devastating work was made by humans together in a room. Mangan’s newest offering bears the the poise of a modern classic, seeded by Dan’s singular lyricism and forged unexpectedly by four best buds over six days in a cabin in the woods.

Today, Dan Mangan shares the first glimpse of Natural Light with the single “Melody,” a gentle, rousing, irrepressible tune that chimes with slide guitar, and flourishes with saxophone and clarinet. Through a musical mindframe, “Melody” is a dedication to the fleeting moments of beauty that compel life, as Dan sings: ‘I should be over it now / but I ain’t over it now.’ 

Natural Light is an album filled with love songs about a society on the brink of collapse. No longer the hopeful young upstart or a stubborn folk-punk, Dan Mangan emerges as a voice to articulate our troubled times with tenderness and humour. Love songs about a planet on the brink of collapse. Campfire songs for a world on fire.

"Contentment is a slippery fish, and the harder we squeeze it, the quicker it’s gone,” says Mangan. “‘Melody’ is about needing affirmation from something over which you have no control. It’s about the grief of having something special and then losing it – about getting the benefit of the doubt, and then no longer getting the benefit of the doubt. It’s about love, or society, or the music industry, or a brief moment above par on the existential rollercoaster."

There is a sense of returning throughout Natural Light. A return to folk music’s classic underpinnings of political resistance. A return to writing “song songs” with nothing but a notebook and an acoustic guitar. Mangan has experimented rigorously with his sound over the years, but resting in his roots may be where he operates most effortlessly.

WATCH / SHARE “MELODY” HERE
BUY / STREAM “MELODY” HERE

Single Art // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

MORE ABOUT NATURAL LIGHT
There is something fitting in Mangan hitting this high watermark at this stage of his life and career. You can trace the chapters of his story in the fabric of Natural Light. You’ll find remnants of the tenacious young artist who booked tours of Europe via Myspace in the mid 2000s. The emergent songwriter who hibernated into fatherhood just as arena-folk exploded in the early 2010s. The genre-bender who has subtly challenged his audience with each album, tracing a unique trajectory of confronting and eclipsing his own art. Over two decades, Mangan has managed an enviably strong creative ethic, and his integrity as both a singer and songwriter has only strengthened with age. The big picture cohesiveness of Natural Light harkens to a pre-streaming, album-focused sensibility. Songs bleed together through focused transitions and overlapping interludes. Mangan’s lyrics act as gondolier for the journey, reassuring the listener that it’s cool to care. Dan sings for his kids, for his wife, and for a society in existential crisis. 

Following several studio-centric albums with esteemed producer Drew Brown (Radiohead, Beck), Dan secluded himself deep in the woods of southern Ontario for a week with long-time bandmates Jason Haberman, Mike O’Brien and Don Kerr. They had intended to workshop existing songs, maybe write some new ones, and generally impose zero pressure to accomplish much at all. They pooled recording gear and turned Haberman’s rustic cottage (coined SOUVENIR) into a makeshift studio.

“This entire album feels like one big happy accident. A gift from the ether,” says Mangan from his home in Vancouver. “Even if it was never to be released, I can’t fully articulate how grateful I am to have had such a cosmic and charged creative experience with these three people I love so dearly. We were completely locked in. I get choked up just thinking about it.”

The evening they arrived, Dan introduced the band to a song he’d written for his sons - a meandering stream of consciousness lamenting how their modern adolescences might pose challenges from which he cannot spare them. Lightning struck and in three quick takes, the framework for the song was complete, and the table had been set. “It Might Be Raining” was the first song recorded, is the first song on Natural Light, and was the catalyst for six days of jubilant creative frenzy. Between lake jumps and egg scrambles, the crew brought to life 13 songs, many of which had been stewing in Dan’s head for years.

Though these songs were written over the last half-decade, the timing of Natural Light feels urgent. The power and the beauty of this music, as well as its sadness, are imbued with the present political and social zeitgeist. If there exists a need for creative voices to cut through the world’s deafening static with eloquence and honesty, this work is an undeniable candidate.

Dan’s voice and songs have the power to unite and silence a concert hall. A centrepiece of his lyrical prowess is “Soapbox”, a Guthrie-esq rip into “the lie” of modern society. Though he considers it his preachiest song, Mangan’s determined stanzas unfold like a close friend helping to untangle the complexities of our collective struggle. “I hate that, so often, the thing that is most infuriating about society is also the hardest to explain,” he says.

The band’s contributions are paramount to Natural Light’s charm and vitality, effortlessly elevating Mangan’s offerings without ever getting in the way. The recordings capture the foursome’s brotherly intuitions, as each note feels responsive, spontaneous, and serendipitous. Jason, Mike and Don buoyantly propel Dan’s melancholic lyrics with assurance and whimsy - a glorious juxtaposition perhaps best demonstrated by Natural Light’s first single “Melody”. Clarinets and slide guitars dance like drunken fools to his elegy about unrequited love.

All four musicians are credited as producers on the album. While O’Brien did the heavy lifting on lead guitar and Kerr on drums, the whole cast shuffled between instruments frequently as the recordings took shape. Minimal time was given to working out “parts”, and they allowed first impulses to direct the process, tracking the songs together “live off the floor”. Back in their respective cities and studios, the foursome continued to hone the recordings over the following months, adding subtle overdubs such as horns, strings and woodwinds.

What cannot be understated here is the creative input from bassist Jason Haberman, who engineered the recordings and even took the photos adorning the LP’s front and back covers. Jason also mixed the album from his Toronto studio. Though several other renowned engineers were initially considered, every step of the process had been intimately tied to the quartet's experience at the cabin, and it felt important to keep the project in the family, so to speak.

Natural Light is a natural resolution for Mangan as a scene-survivor. Dan has emerged as a politically-conscious family man with the maturity and wherewithal to articulate our troubled times with tenderness, intelligence and humour. There is luck involved too - this perfect storm of creativity was not so much conjured as ridden like a wave by four friends with a century of collective experience making records.

Mangan has often described songwriting as a way to articulate his anxieties and unburden his mind. This particular collection of recordings explores the darkness of our time, but embraces the listener like a weighted blanket. Sewn into the fabric, in a secret language, are the words instructions for survival. Dan reminds us that the pain of living frees us. That there are those who leave a light on in case another needs to see. That the feeling will go on. That we should seek the natural light, and when we find it, bask in it like a cat.

MORE ABOUT DAN MANGAN
Dan Mangan is a two time JUNO Award-winning and three time Polaris Music Prize-nominated musician and songwriter. He lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with his wife and two sons. For decades, Dan has brought signature wit, sonic innovation and lyrical insight to the indie/folk community, garnering him a fiercely dedicated and deeply involved audience. He has played Glastonbury and Jimmy Kimmel Live, sold out Massey Hall and scored acclaimed soundtracks for television and feature film. In 2017, he co-founded Side Door, a community marketplace platform for the arts that seeks to democratize and decentralize the entertainment industry by connecting artists with alternative venue spaces.

PRE-ORDER & PRE-SAVE NATURAL LIGHT HERE

TOUR DATES  
March 6 - Casselberry, Florida - Casselberry Arts Center
March 7 - Jacksonville, Florida - Blue Jay Listening Room
March 8 - St-Augustine, Florida - Spinster Abbott’s
March 9 - Gainesville, Florida - Gainesville Fine Arts Association

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NATURAL LIGHT TRACKLIST
01 It Might Be Raining
02 Diminishing Returns
03 I Hated Love Songs
04 Contained Free (Interlude)
05 No Such Thing As Wasted Love
06 Melody
07 My Dreams Are Getting Weirder
08 Soapbox
09 Cut The Brakes
10 For Him
11 Sound The Alarm
12 Proximity
13 Hit The Wall

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