MIND BATH RELEASES AQUEOUS & DEBUT COMPANION NOVEL

NEW ALBUM, AQUEOUS, VIA LIGHTER THAN AIR AND COMPANION NOVEL VIA METATRON PRESS, BOTH OUT TODAY

BUY / STREAM AQUEOUS HERE

ALBUM FEATURING COLLABORATION WITH BEVERLY GLENN-COPELAND

ALBUM RELEASE PERFORMANCES AND BOOK LAUNCH EVENTS IN MONTREAL AND TORONTO BEGIN SEPTEMBER 23. TICKETS ON SALE HERE, FULL DATES LISTED BELOW

“Mind Bath has always had a literary flair to his work. Crafting immersive alt-R&B journeys through sound, new album ‘Aqueous’ is intended to function on multiple levels. It’s a deeply imaginative, highly creative work, a conceptual literary-musical work that functions both as a full-length album and companion debut novel.” - Clash

Photo Credit: Sara Graorac // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Today, Mind Bath releases Aqueous, a conceptual literary-musical work comprising a full-length album and companion debut novel, via Lighter Than Air and Metatron Press.

Mind Bath’s most ambitious and fully realised work to date, Aqueous was completed during a two-year residency at Camp Flirty, a secluded gay cabin in the woods.

The album features the singles “Acid Nine” and “Seasons Change and So Do I Bitch,” alongside “Dear Friend, Queer Friend,” a collaboration with fellow Canadian Beverly Glenn-Copeland, the acclaimed genre-defying composer, singer and celebrated transgender activist.

BUY / STREAM AQUEOUS HERE

WATCH / SHARE “DEAR FRIEND, QUEER FRIEND” FT. BEVERLY GLENN-COPELAND

Raised in a small town in the BC Rockies, Mind Bath developed a creative voice shaped by solitude, attuned to nature’s divinity and the inner worlds it unlocks. Across lush queer poetry, left-field production, and intimate vocals, his work has cultivated a devoted underground following rooted as much in spiritual devotion as sonic exploration. Expanding his vision into a multidimensional universe, Aqueous invites audiences not only to read and listen, but to experiment, reflect, and evolve.

Aqueous is a psychedelic odyssey through the land of queer fantasy and mysticism. Part auto-fiction, part perverse hero’s journey, where an effervescent stardust boy cuts a hole in the sky and wakes up in a utopic new land, far removed from the oppressive, dusty dominions of the violent world on Earth, in search of healing and liberation.

WATCH / SHARE “SEA JASMINE” LYRIC VIDEO HERE

WATCH / SHARE “ACID NINE” HERE

From radical queer joyous faerie woo to an underground darling’s music career, the abuse of power to vignettes of a sex angel rent boy, Aqueous is healing text. Enriched by a cast of rebellious artists and sublime outsiders in collective search of liberating the core wound in every gay inner child, Aqueous is an evocative and profound meditation on the fragments of a world of trauma and the resilience, humour, and self-interrogation required to see beyond it, right through to the heart.

With Aqueous, Mind Bath deepens his role not just as a musician, but as a world-builder, a world where fantasy is a tool for healing, art is a form of resistance, and imagination opens portals to new ways of being.

WATCH / SHARE “SEASONS CHANGE AND SO DO I BITCH”

MIND BATH AQUEOUS LIVE
Sept 23 - Montreal, QC - POP Montreal - Casa Del Popolo | Album Launch
Sept 27 - Montreal, QC - Librairie Résonance Bookstore | Book Launch & Reading
Sept. 30 - Toronto, ON - Type Queen Street | Book Launch & Reading
Oct. 2 - Toronto, ON - Burdock Music Hall | Album Launch

PRAISE FOR MIND BATH:
“Montreal-based artist making tender, shimmering downtempo R&B” - The FADER

“‘Must Come Spring’ is a triumphant saga of tender poetry, transcendent melodies and textured R&B” - PAPER

“His R&B voice and meditative melodies transport us to a world where spirituality, sensuality, and intensity coexist. It is through his poetic stories that Mind Bath reveals himself in a more vulnerable way.” - VICE

“Mind Bath creates melodies as soothing as a long bath by candlelight.” - Red Bull

“Delicate vocals, with shades of spoken word poetry, fade into and resurge from synth-driven groove; visceral emotion echoes from sonic lacunae.” - Wonderland

Album Artwork by Derek Branscombe // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

AQUEOUS TRACKLIST
01 Acid Nine
02 Seasons Change And So Do I Bitch
03 The Idea Of A Wave Ft. Forever
04 Day Of Venus
05 L.A.K.E.
06 Bathe In Love
07 Sea Jasmine
08 The Thawing Of Your Grief
09 Shirtless In Black Wranglers
10 Dear Friend, Queer Friend Ft. Beverly Glenn-Copeland

MIND BATH ONLINE
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JEAN-MICHEL BLAIS SHARES TITLE TRACK FROM UPCOMING LP, MIRADOR

THE MONTREAL PIANIST AND COMPOSER SHARES TITLE TRACK FROM FOURTH ALBUM, MIRADOR, OUT SEPTEMBER 25 VIA ARTS & CRAFTS

BUY / STREAM “MIRADOR” HERE
LISTEN / SHARE “MIRADOR” HERE

PRE-SAVE MIRADOR HERE

CANADA, EUROPE AND UK TOUR DATES BEGIN THIS FALL

"A piece that opens with the full range of a 12-person baroque choir before Blais' piano takes the lead, guiding us through a vibrant dreamscape in just three minutes. ...with Ulysse, Blais is letting us into his inner world."  CBC Music, Songs You Need To Hear on “ulysse”

LISTEN TO JEAN-MICHEL BLAIS ON CBC Q

Photo Credit: Adrian Villagomez // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Today, Montreal pianist and composer Jean-Michel Blais shares “mirador”, the title track from his forthcoming fourth album, released September 25 on Arts & Crafts. Following “ulysse” and “carnavalito”, “mirador” brings Blais to the heart of a record shaped by childhood, imagination and the places we create in order to look out onto the world. Hauntingly beautiful, the piece begins with the pulse and breath of a choir before Blais’ piano slowly emerges, its gentle melody surrounded by voices that gather, dissolve and gather again.

The title track takes its name from the imaginary lookout Blais created for himself as a child in his parents’ basement in Nicolet, Québec. As a musical kid and, even if he wasn’t fully aware of these things yet, as a queer person with Tourette’s, this private world became a place of refuge and possibility: somewhere from which he could dream of everything that might exist beyond it.

On “mirador”, Blais returns to that lookout from the other side of childhood. What was once solitary becomes collective, with piano and human voices moving around one another until they finally converge on a single triad. It captures something central to the album itself: memory not as something fixed, but something that can be revisited, rearranged and shared.

Speaking about “mirador”, Blais says:
“‘mirador’ is at the same time the title of the album and of this single. It’s a Spanish word, with ‘mira’ meaning ‘to look’. So, a ‘mirador’ a lookout or a tower from which you protect a castle… ‘mirador’ for me is this place that as a kid, I would go to travel time and space. I had Tourettes, and as a queer kid I had a hard time, sometimes, to find my way in society. So I would go to the basement, like the one depicted on the album cover, where we had a bunch of VHS, CDs and vinyl, through which I would feel like I could travel the world.”

BUY / STREAM “MIRADOR” HERE
LISTEN / SHARE “MIRADOR” HERE

With more than 375 million streams globally to his name, Blais began mirador by reflecting on childhood memories of building imaginary worlds in his parents’ basement. From there, the record expands far beyond those walls: an odyssey spanning choirs, strings and the music of the Andes, travelling from Spanish caves to Estonian forests and eventually finding its way home to Québec.

Working with composer and arranger William Brittelle (LA Philharmonic, The National), Blais assembled a choir of 12 baroque singers before adding a string quartet of friends. He also enlisted Tulio Velazco Villagra, a master of Andean instruments, while residencies at the Arvo Pärt Centre informed the album’s meditative atmosphere.

The result is Blais’ most adventurous and transportive work yet, exchanging contemporary minimalism for a light and generous maximalism while retaining the intimacy that has always sat at the centre of his music. If the childhood mirador was somewhere Blais could retreat to and imagine the world beyond him, the album that bears its name finds him opening that space up: looking backwards, outwards and towards the future.

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

MORE ABOUT JEAN-MICHEL BLAIS
Jean-Michel Blais is a Montreal based pianist, composer and performer signed to Arts & Crafts and Mercury KX (Decca). In the first decade since the release of his landmark 2016 debut album, II, the classically trained Blais has defined his music through the reverent intimacy he shares with his instrument, the piano. Named in TIME’s Top 10 Best Albums of the Year, the magazine described his improvisation inspired debut as “music that breathes, invites one to take a moment, and acknowledges that there is still much beauty in the world.”

Through this connection with the piano, the multiple Polaris Music Prize shortlisted and two time JUNO Award nominated artist has reached audiences around the world. He has performed one of the largest neoclassical concerts in history to nearly 40,000 people at the Montreal Jazz Festival, collaborated with the Orchestre de l’Agora and the Orchestre symphonique de Québec, and amassed more than 397 million streams across a catalogue that includes the ambient and new age inspired Dans ma main (2018), which drew influence from the music that soothed his Tourette syndrome as a child, the Félix Award winning aubades (2022), his first exploration of composition for chamber orchestra, and désert (2025), a collaborative album with American harpist Lara Somogyi.

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

His diverse résumé also encompasses the Cannes Award winning Matthias & Maxime (2019) soundtrack, the twilight inspired serenades EP (2023), and Cascades (2017), created with producer CFCF. Together, these works continue Pitchfork’s observation of the “thrilling synchronization of piano and electronics” that has become a defining thread throughout his catalogue.

On mirador, his fourth studio album, released in September 2026, Blais embarks on an expansive, beneath the surface odyssey spanning choirs, strings and the music of the Andes. Travelling from Spanish caves to Estonian forests before returning home to tiny Nicolet, Québec, mirador opens listeners’ eyes onto Blais’ wide, wondrous and deeply personal world. It is an aspirational journey that exchanges contemporary minimalism for a light, generous maximalism.

Throughout his discography, Blais has used instrumentation and composition as tools of personal expression, subtly revealing different facets of his identity as a queer artist, perpetual traveller, student and caregiver, often through the lens of his upbringing. Four albums into his career, Jean-Michel Blais is no longer simply charting the map of his grown up heart. On mirador, he offers a new perspective on childhood: a vivid and vicarious invitation to listen again, gazing ahead into the imaginary.

PRE-SAVE MIRADOR HERE

JEAN-MICHEL BLAIS PERFORMANCES

2026
09.24 — WATERLOO, QC — Maison de la culture de Waterloo
09.27 — STE-GENEVIÈ— VE, QC — Salle Pauline Julien
10.03 — VAL-MORIN, QC — Théâtre du Marais
10.19 —  TROIS RIVIÈRE - Salle J.-Antonio-Thompson
10.23 — BERLIN, DE — Felt Room
10.26 — LONDON, UK — World Heart Beat
10.27 — UTRECHT, NL — TivoliVredenburg
10.28 — PARIS, FR — La Piccola Scala
11.28 — TORONTO, ON — Koerner Hall

2027
01.23 — NOMININGUE, QC — Espace Saint-Ignace
01.28 — SAINTE-THÉRÈSE, QC — Théâtre Lionel Groulx
01.29 — ST-HYACINTHE, QC — Centre des arts Juliette Lassonde
01.30 — BAIE-DU-FEBVRE, QC — Théâtre Belcourt
01.31 — VICTORIAVILLE, QC — Le Carré 150
02.05 — SHAWINIGAN, QC — Centre des Arts
02.06 — SHERBROOKE, QC — Théâtre Granada
02.07 — SALABERRY-DE-VALLEYFIELD, QC — Salle Albert Dumouchel
02.10 — DRUMMONDVILLE, QC — Maison des arts Desjardins Drummondville
02.12 — JOLIETTE, QC — Centre Culturel Desjardins
02.13 — MONTMAGNY, QC — Salle Edwin-Bélanger
02.14 — QUÉBEC, QC — Grand Théâtre de Québec
02.17 — BROSSARD, QC — Théâtre Manuvie
02.18 — L’ASSOMPTION, QC — Théâtre Hector Charland
02.19 — ST-MARIE-DE-BEAUCE, QC — Salle Méchatigan
02.20 — THETFORD MINES, QC — Salle Dussault
02.21 — TERREBONNE, QC — Théâtre du Vieux-Terrebonne
02.25 — LONGUEUIL, QC — Théâtre de la Ville
02.26 — LAVAL, QC — Salle André-Mathieu
02.27 — ST-EUSTACHE, QC — Le Zénith
03.05 — OTTAWA, ON — National Arts Centre
04.30 — VANCOUVER, BC — Chan Centre for the Performing Arts
05.20 — EDMUNDSTON, NB — Salle Léo-Poulin
05.21 — CARAQUET, NB — Centre Culturel de Caraquet
05.22 — MONCTON, NB — Capitol Theatre
10.01 — BROMONT, QC — Espace Culturel St-John
10.02 — CHÂTEAUGUAY, QC — Château Scènes
10.03 — LÉVIS, QC — L’Anglicane
10.07 — ST-JEAN-SUR-RICHELIEU, QC — Théâtre des Deux-Rives
10.08 — MONTRÉAL (LASALLE), QC — Théâtre Desjardins
10.10 — GATINEAU, QC — Salle Odyssée
10.12 — ST-JÉRÔME, QC — Théâtre Gilles Vigneault
10.13 — VAL-D’OR, QC — Théâtre Télébec
10.14 — ROUYN-NORANDA, QC — Théâtre du Cuivre
10.15 — AMOS, QC — Théâtre des Eskers
10.19 — TROIS RIVIÈRES, QC    Salle J.-Antonio-Thompson
10.20 — SAGUENAY, QC — Théâtre C
10.21 — RIMOUSKI, QC — Salle de Spectacles Desjardins
10.22 — CARLETON-SUR-MER, QC — Studio du Quai des Arts

DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

mirador TRACKLIST
1. muses
2. ulysse
3. pavane
4. carnavalito
5. mirador
6. quwi
7. granada
8. kyrie
9. laulasmaa
10. silhouettes
11. querelle
12. a chambre des possibles

JEAN-MICHEL BLAIS ONLINE
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YOUNG FRIEND SHARES THE TENDER NEW SONG “ANYTHING ANYTHING” FROM UPCOMING LP

YOUNG FRIEND’S UPCOMING ALBUM, NEW ENTERTAINMENT, OUT NOVEMBER 6, 2026 VIA NETTWERK

BUY / STREAM “ANYTHING ANYTHING” HERE
LISTEN / SHARE “ANYTHING ANYTHING” HERE

‘THE HARD ROCK TOUR’ DATES IN VANCOUVER, TORONTO, LA, AND NYC, ARE ON SALE NOW

Photo Credit: Zachary Vague // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

Today, Vancouver indie songwriter Drew Tarves, aka young friend, shares the tender new song “Anything Anything” from his forthcoming full-length album, New Entertainment, due out November 6 via Nettwerk. Throughout his career, Tarves has had a penchant for twangy songs about love (see “soft light,” “the real deal,” and “met this girl on the internet”), and on “Anything Anything,” he distills his earnest lyricism and warm arrangements down to a pure declaration of devotion.

Tarves elaborates: “One of the only proper love songs on the record. This one is about commitment. Loving someone so much that you really feel like you could do the impossible if it would make them happy. It’s about showing up for someone, about consistency.”

“Anything Anything” provides a welcome moment of solace on New Entertainment, highlighting young friend’s dynamic range. The album was recorded live off the floor, fully analog, channeling rock albums of the past. It’s a celebration of the slow process and the inevitable mistakes. It’s taking the scenic route every time. It’s running headfirst at life with your eyes wide open, getting your hands dirty, feeling it all. 

Tarves brought the song structures into rehearsals, allowing the band to flesh out arrangements organically – resulting in a tactile sound that nods to classic influences like Wilco and Neil Young. The album was produced by Tarves’ longtime collaborator David Marinelli (FINNEAS, Wallice, spill tab), and the two recently connected for an artist-on-artist interview for Talkhouse.

young friend is excited to bring these songs to life on “The Hard Rock Tour,” which kicks off with a special hometown show in Vancouver on November 4 at The Hollywood Theatre, where fans can get a live glimpse of the new album ahead of its release. From there, young friend will head to Los Angeles, New York, and Toronto, with more to come. Find the full list of dates and details below!

BUY / STREAM “ANYTHING ANYTHING” HERE
LISTEN / SHARE “ANYTHING ANYTHING” HERE

ABOUT YOUNG FRIEND
Drew Tarves' music as young friend feels classic and immediate all at once, capturing the nostalgia of post-adolescence while diving deep into a pool of self-reflection. His sophomore album, New Entertainment, is about fear and love in equal measure. An exploration of the ways AI and new technology are infiltrating our lives, but also a celebration of friendship and family, and genuine time spent. Of the slow process, the inevitable mistakes. 

A trained dancer for most of his adolescence, the 26-year-old Vancouver native switched artistic disciplines after spending time jamming with his musician friends. "I found out very quickly that I loved it," he recalls. "It was my favorite thing to do." Armed with a guitar and a laptop, Tarves started hashing out early songwriting attempts in GarageBand as he found his own style: "It was all about experimenting while trying to find what worked for me."

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

 In 2022, Tarves released his indie-pop debut EP HOW DID WE GET HERE? and quickly followed it up with a sophomore in 2023 titled scaredy cat. 2024 brought in his first Canadian and international touring as well as a JUNO Award nomination. His debut full-length, motorcycle sound effects, was released in 2025. New Entertainment, produced by friend and frequent collaborator David Marinelli (Wallice, Finneas, spill tab), was recorded entirely in the studio, live off the floor. It’s solid, tactile, nostalgic in a way that hits you right in the chest. 

A true rock record, New Entertainment is asking to be played on your old record player or the tape deck of Joni, Drew’s 2001 Mazda pickup. 

YOUNG FRIEND ‘THE HARD ROCK TOUR’ DATES:
November 4 – Vancouver, BC @ The Hollywood Theatre
November 25 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Echo LA
November 27 – New York, NY @ Nightclub 101
November 28 – Toronto, ON @ Baby G

YOUNG FRIEND IN THE PRESS…

"...fuzzy, jangly and all kinds of refreshing, sauntering through glitzy indie-rock riffs and headstrong, energetic rhythms." – Paste Magazine

“His music breathes with the same effortless wit as his personality, laced with a conversational intimacy that mirrors the kind of ease you’d find in a late-night chat with a close friend.” – RANGE

"...young friend has established himself as a rising act in heartfelt pop, building an expansive sonic world brimming warm nostalgia and self-reflection."– EARMILK

"young friend keeps it casual and cheeky, but can’t help but charm listeners as the chorus melts into an earnest admission." – Ones to Watch

"One remarkable aspect of songwriting is the ability to paint a picture. It’s a rare talent, being able to use words to create a visceral image within the mind of a listener. With his slow-burn acoustic pop hits, young friends has mastered this art." – V Magazine

 Album Art // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES

NEW ENTERTAINMENT TRACK LIST
01 Hard Rock
02 Miracle
03 The Yard
04 Dad’s Garage
05 Grand Canyon
06 New Entertainment
07 2 Birds
08 Anything Anything
09 Everything The Light Touches
10 What’s Mine Is Yours
11 Michael Wakes Up
12 If You See It On The News

 YOUNG FRIEND ONLINE 
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