On This Track: Weekend Listening #10
- Raven
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
Five new releases about desire, identity, change, heartbreak and finding your way forward.
Some songs pull you in straight away. Others take a little longer, and sometimes it's the detail that makes you stay. This week's On This Track Weekend Listening 10 moves from complicated desire and Korean indie pop to finding confidence, looking back after thirty years and making peace with a difficult past. Five very different songs, but each one has something personal at its centre.
Rachel Bochner - “Collar”
“Collar” sits in that uncomfortable space between attraction and knowing better. Rachel Bochner doesn't try to make the situation sound innocent. Instead, she lets the song stay right there in the tension: wanting someone who is already with somebody else, wondering whether they feel the same and knowing exactly how complicated that could become. The track builds gradually, with crunchy guitars giving the song a slightly uneasy edge. It never turns the desire into a huge dramatic moment. That restraint actually makes it feel more believable. The questions keep circling in your head because there isn't an easy answer to them. “Collar” also hints at something much bigger in Bochner's upcoming album. The record comes out of the end of a long-term relationship and the process of figuring out who she was after leaving a life that no longer felt like her own. Her queer identity sits at the centre of that story, alongside grief, guilt and the difficult process of acceptance. What makes “Collar” interesting is that it doesn't separate desire from all of those other feelings. Sometimes figuring yourself out means admitting what you want, even when the answer makes everything more complicated.
🎧 Stream “Collar” on Apple Music
inaekkum - “Yips”
At first, “Yips” sounds almost too easy to like. The beat has a nice bounce to it, the guitars shimmer and Min Wooseok's vocals sit somewhere between dreamy and slightly detached. It's the kind of indie-pop song that can slip into your head before you realize there's something much heavier underneath it. That contrast is what makes the track interesting. “Yips” uses a baseball game as a metaphor for failure, embarrassment and the feeling of not living up to what you're supposed to be. There is also the character of Van Ji Chook, the dissociative persona Wooseok created as part of the story behind the upcoming album "MY". So even when the music feels light, the song isn't really carefree. The more I read about ”MY”, the more that contrast made sense. Wooseok is writing about childhood trauma, healing and learning to accept himself, but he isn't turning the album into something sonically heavy all the time. Instead, those subjects sit underneath pop melodies, synths and elastic basslines. “Yips” feels like a good introduction to that world. It gives you something catchy first, then slowly makes you wonder what exactly you've been singing along to.
🎧 Stream “Yips” on Apple Music
Sarah Louise - “Different Kind of Girl”
“Different Kind of Girl” is about that strange moment when someone else sees something in you before you can see it yourself. Sarah Louise turns that idea into a warm, polished pop song without making it feel like a standard love story. The song grew out of a period when she was questioning herself as both an artist and a person. Instead of changing for someone else, she describes discovering the confidence to become more comfortable with who she already was. That gives the lyrics a little more weight than the upbeat production might suggest. Warm synths, organic instrumentation and a strong melodic hook keep the track light on its feet. There is optimism here, but it doesn't feel forced. The song is more interested in the small shift that happens when self-doubt starts giving way to confidence. “Different Kind of Girl” feels like a genuine new chapter for Sarah Louise. The sound has moved forward, but the storytelling that sits at the centre of her music is still there.
🎧 Stream “Different Kind of Girl” on Apple Music
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Donna Lewis – “Fall Back Girl (Radio Mix)”
“Fall Back Girl” has a familiar feeling at its centre: realizing that someone you care about doesn't feel the same way anymore. Donna Lewis doesn't turn that moment into a dramatic breakup song. Instead, the track gradually shifts from vulnerability towards something closer to self-respect. The production helps with that change. Shimmering synths, a steady bassline and crisp drums give the song a gentle forward motion, while the atmospheric layers keep it from becoming too polished or purely dance-pop. Lewis' voice remains the emotional centre, giving the track a warmth that connects it to her earlier work without trying to recreate it. That balance is probably what makes the song work three decades into her career. “Fall Back Girl” sounds contemporary, but the songwriting is still rooted in the kind of direct emotional observation that has always suited Lewis. Released as part of "Wanderlust", the track also marks another collaboration with longtime creative partner David Lowe. Thirty years after "I Love You Always Forever", Lewis isn't looking backwards here. She's taking the same instinct for melody and emotional detail somewhere new.
🎧 Stream “Fall Back Girl” on Apple Music
J. Killen – “Cold Winds”
“Cold Winds” is a pretty quiet song, but it doesn't feel empty. The acoustic guitar does most of the work at first, with pedal steel coming in around it and a banjo sitting somewhere in the background. Nothing feels overdone. There’s a lot of history behind the song. J. Killen has been through a period of drinking and drug use that nearly ended his music career and the upcoming album "Depression Dollars" comes from the other side of that. He describes the album as being about love, loss and depression and “Cold Winds” feels like one of those songs where he is simply taking stock of what happened. I especially like the line about the broken road behind him. It isn't trying to turn the past into something beautiful. It's more like: this happened, it hurt and I learned from it. The song was recorded during a grey, wet winter in Portland and somehow that fits. “Cold Winds” has that late-afternoon feeling to it - a little sad, a little worn out, but not without hope.
🎧 Stream “Cold Winds” on Apple Music
Five songs, five very different ways of dealing with what life throws at you. Desire, self-doubt, change, heartbreak and the past all find their way into this week's selection, but none of these artists tells the same story twice. That's probably what kept me listening.
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