Los Angeles quartet untitled (halo) have been on our radar since their promising debut EP towncryer landed back in 2023. Made up of longtime friends Ariana Mamnoon, Jack Dione, Jay Are and Nicholas Noneman, the band grew out of LA’s DIY community, partly in response to what they felt was a “lack of a scene or music in LA.” Rather than simply complain about it, they started building their own, organizing parties, curating events and slowly shaping a world around their woozy, hard to pin down sound. A second EP, headbanger, followed in 2024, alongside a run of singles that kept stretching their mix of shoegaze haze, electronic production, pop and stranger impulses. Now signed to Dirty Hit, they are finally ready to take that world into full album territory.
Their self titled debut, untitled (halo), arrives November 6 and was written over the course of a year at the band’s Glassell Park studio. The record took shape during a particularly messy period of heartbreak, unstable relationships, isolation and existential spirals, with the four describing themselves at the time as “emotional people in need of sonic catharsis.” Those experiences feed into what they have dubbed “California Melancholia,” a feeling of emotional stagnation underneath all the sunshine, beauty and constant promise of reinvention.
The lead single, “aimee lou wood freestyle”, actually began as the very first demo written for the record and came together almost instinctively, with each member leaving a distinct mark on it, from Nick’s spiralling synths and Ari’s dreamy melodies to Jay’s trap beat and Jack’s detached rap verse. As expected, it is super hazy, but there is also something slightly disorienting about the way it keeps building tension without ever fully releasing it. Watch the self-directed video below.
- Jam City announces new album My World, shares title track - August 27, 2026
- Jespfur returns with the uncanny, impressionistic “O, Wind” - August 27, 2026
- Sarah Meth takes on music industry power dynamics with “Don’t Touch Me You’re My Hero” - August 27, 2026
