Rain City on Record: Five Great Local Music Releases You Gotta Hear

We’re blessed with a ton of great musical talent in this city. There are tons of excellent live bands playing all around Vancouver every week, across genres, across venues across the city. Despite that, you might be surprised how few have genuinely great recordings that capture their essence and the feel of their live sound. Here are five recent releases from local musicians that are well worth throwing in the headphones! 

Hillsboro - A Party in Your Name

While Hillsboro’s shoegaze-inflected emo rock sound draws natural sonic comparisons to some of the best 90s and 2000s guitar bands you can think of, the essence of their 2026 EP A Party in Your Name is a wholly unique one. The songs glide through playfully odd warping production and unconventional song structures, carried by rich, fuzzed out guitar lines and a deep undercurrent of emotion, tackling regret, malaise, depression and, of course, lovesickness. Over a brief twenty three minute runtime, the EP runs through emo, shoegaze, pop, rock, and flirts with metal, electronica and ambient tones in moments. An emotionally acute wrecking ball of an EP, A Party in Your Name might not be on the Friday night get-together playlist, but it’s a perfect late night drive or autumn morning record in equal measure.

Standout Tracks: Woah, HotGirlTM, Acid Horror

For Fans Of: Yuck, Land of Talk, Girls

Deaf Dogs - Play Deaf

Since well before the release of their debut record, I’ve maintained that Deaf Dogs are probably the single most underrated band in Vancouver. Their sound may not be re-inventing the wheel - if anything, the band is more of a continuance of a long lineage of blues and surf rock obsessed garage rock bands incorporating blues and psychedelia into their scuzzy, raw, louder-than-hell tunes - see Oh Sees, Ty Segall, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, and their ancestors The Mummies, The Gories, Billy Childish. Deaf Dogs proudly wear their influences on their sleeve, but with chops and taste like theirs, they’re all the better for it. While the record lacks a bit of muscle in the production, it more than makes up for it with a more nimble, light-on-it’s-feet tonality, allowing for the lightning quick riffs, down and dirty basslines and melodic drum grooves to coalesce around each other while still maintaining the open space and jammy feel their live show delivers. The record has an impressive range of dynamics for such a tried and true subgenre, with some of the standouts being the cool, mid-tempo and effortlessly earworm-y Yves Klein Blue and its preceding track, the bonafide psychedelic disco-punk banger Domination. If you want a record that will consistently surprise you while still delivering the fast and furious fun you need from a garage rock record, give this one a look! 

Standout Tracks: Domination, Lovely Day, Yves Klein Blue

For Fans Of: Oh Sees, Cage The Elephant, Muppet Boys

La Haine - I Think You Know

You might be surprised to hear this, but among a slew of punk, hardcore and rock bands, post-punk band La Haine is one of the loudest local bands I’ve seen in Vancouver. Listening to their two singles I Think You Know and Chameleons paired with this fact - or this experience, if you’ve been so fortunate - may feel oxymoronic, but while these two debut singles from the Vancouver based quintet aren’t explosive, they contain a barely reserved power begging to be unleashed. Backed by thrumming, driving basslines and relentless drums, the group’s swirling keys and sharp, livewire guitarwork provide an intricate and moody nocturnal atmosphere, a perfect canvas for soaring vocals that somehow feel both intimate and immediate, soft and cool but with a deep undercurrent of urgency. The songs ride along with quick pace and momentum, particularly Chameleons - a rousing, dark and intense gem of a track that packs a heavy punch and doesn’t let up for a second. If the goal was to leave me wanting more, well…yeah, you got me. I’m ready for some more tracks. Let’s hear it. 

Standout Track: Chameleons

For Fans Of: Joy Division, Home Front, She Past Away

Shimbashi Station - Takeoff!

It’s rare to find an artist who’s album art so perfectly represents the sound and feel of their music, but it’s a feat Shimbashi Station have accomplished perfectly. One look at the hazy purple and pink anime-inspired cover and you know exactly what this record sounds like. And yes, it’s as good as you imagine. Drawing from city pop, electronica, vaporwave, funk, dance and rock in equal measure, this is a dopamine hit of an album, straight to the brain. Full to the brim with infectious hooks, snappy dance grooves and technicolour riffs, this album just feels like everything that feels good. It’s a sunset on the beach, a fruity cocktail, fireworks in the evening. Shimmering guitars and vibrant keyboards fill the record with warmth, and a low-end heavy rhythm section gives the record a weight and pulse that’s hard to deny. It’s just a contagiously feel-good record, with a sugary sound you’re sure to get addicted to. 

Standout Tracks: Bloom, Low, Pantone Eyes

For Fans Of: Sports, Sunset Rollercoaster, Chopping Spree

Infidelity - The Swan

These days, it’s easy for bands to genre hop, easier for them to claim a myriad of influences within and well beyond their genre, and easier still for anyone to claim to “listen to anything.” In the curious case of Infidelity, these things really ring truer than for most. The group, initially a duo with a more electronic bend to their live show, now filled out as a quintet with live drums, bass and sax, has been putting out exciting and challenging music consistently for years. Be it the lo-fi pop of no place like home, the jammy, warped punky sound of Leech or the kaleidoscopic dreamy sounds of fly, summer dragon, the group has always found a way to take traditional songwriting and twist and mold it into something so singular and specific it could only be made by them. The Swan, their most recent record, to me is their best and most fully realized work to date. Across just nine tracks, the album tears across experimental rock, noise, idm, house music, hip-hop and just about anything else you can think of. The record is constantly shifting tonally, both from song to song and within the tracks themselves, never letting the listener get too comfortable in a groove or vibe. In less clever hands, this could make for a frustrating listen, but Infidelity’s attention to pacing across the record allows for these changes to feel organic, exciting and considered rather than random and rambling. The record is a challenging but engaging listen, and feels like pure expression, unburdened by expectation or a willingness to soften any artistic impulses for the sake of being easier to digest, comprehend, or passively experienced. It’s heady, unwavering and in your face, but also kinetic, full of hard hitting hooks and an absolute blast to rip through, especially loud. It’s an oxymoron, but that’s what’s so interesting and exciting about it. Description will only get you so far on this one, you just gotta see (or hear) for yourself. 

Standout Tracks: Towers, Bailout, If (Hold On)

For Fans Of: Alt-J, 100 gecs, Le Tigre