Indie Rockers Who Pine, baby!
Whether Voxtrot is the greatest band of all time would depend on who you asked, and since I am in charge of this keyboard the answer is: abso-fucking-lutely. An indie-pop band from Austin Texas formed in the early 2000’s. Hi-hats and subtle synth merging with playful and rolling melodies; their music is often soft yet dance-able. If we were to treat the bodies of work by The Shins and Metric respectively like the bodies of my barbie’s in 1996 and smash them together we would hear something akin to Voxtrot. Their musicality is somehow perfect for the melancholy moments staring blankly at the ceiling, and simultaneously the moments dancing around the kitchen with a glass of dry rose’ in hand throwing herbs into something simmering on the stovetop. The easy listening versatility this band has to offer is praiseworthy yet the element that sets them at the top of my list is the poetry of their lyricism. Their early work is dripping with all the unrequited salivating heartache of a deeply feeling youth.
“I'll raise a glass to being no one else's fool
Raise some question to the rule, who says you'd have to lose a love to find one”
-Mothers, Sisters, Daugthers & Wives By: Voxtrot
They are the Darcy hand flex of music; The relentless dedication of Noah to build the provincial white house long after Ally is gone; The ghost turned real boy for just one dance. These are indie rockers who pine, baby!
“First you fade into the background
Wouldn’t even call me
Had the nerve to leave me
Go ahead and love me
I’m a hungry man ever since you went away”
-Raised by Wolves By: Voxtrot
You can hear Casper whispering in your heart a request to keep you as their lyrics mollify the soup of your brain and remind you of the 16 year old you once were; full of monstrous feelings built on too little foundation. Every song is a rekindling of “But Daddy, I love him!” when you had logged every detail of “him” away in your heart-shaped box just to be some fish in the ocean of his world.
So many of us grow up and we settle. If we’re lucky it is a settling into a sweetness of our own making. But whether we are content or comatose in our lived reality our adulthood has brought many of us a separation from our playful vitality. Our hunger for heart. Here is where the importance of finding artists who speak to something deep within us comes in. In turn finding a way to create from that place deep within. The artists who call to us and inspire us are vital.
Listening to Voxtrot is a reminder that you are capable of FEELING and LONGING and PASSION. Lucky for us who have grown up as fans, who still hold that kernel of the lover and the fool we once were, their new album released this year (2026) after almost 20 years since their last. “Dreamers in Exile” is more maturely hopeful and less hopeless romantic while still maintaining everything we have always loved about this band.
“It’s a beautiful world, can I please stay in it?
Life it goes by in a New York minute
There’s wild roses still blooming in me”
-New World Romance By: Voxtrot
Ruminating on this new album I find it calls to a synchronicity between the girl I was and the woman I’ve become. All the ways I want for the same things I always have, and all the ways I am now confident in my ability to provide. I am a source and a creator. I am not just the open mouth of the child I was. I am the mother creating the food to fill the ache.
“I’m not your puppet, I’m not your good boy
I have lust and I have rage
I wanna build my house and raise my children
In a soft and tender place”
-Rock and Roll Jesus By: Voxtrot
Listen to their new album on spotify here: https://open.spotify.com/album/7xeo24FBX2dE8HCPGtxTQb
