Top 10 Indie Songs of the Week – Sufjan Stevens, Crate, Superchunk, smush

1. Sufjan Stevens — “On This Christmas (It Only Gets Better)”

Location: Brooklyn, New York, United States · Asthmatic Kitty · Compilation “Worst Christmas Ever!” out Nov. 6, 2026

It has been about 15 years since Sufjan Stevens last wrote a new Christmas song, and he has written well over a hundred of them. “On This Christmas (It Only Gets Better)” is the single brand-new track on the compilation “Worst Christmas Ever!” which gathers 15 holiday recordings from 2001 to 2012.

Stereogum’s staff made it the No. 1 song of the week and called it bittersweet, with tender vocals over a flickering guitar figure and a few light glitchy effects.^[1] Stevens describes it as a “Christmas apology,” and Line of Best Fit notes that it deals with remorse and with things getting better.^[2]

The older tracks come from the box sets “Songs for Christmas” (2006) and “Silver & Gold” (2012), which began as gifts for friends and family. IRC reviewed the second of those box sets back in 2012 as an Album of the Week, and you can browse everything we have written on him in our Sufjan Stevens archive.

Listen: Spotify

2. Crate — “Crushed to Nothing”

Location: Brooklyn, New York, United States · Self-titled debut album due Nov. 13, 2026, on Good English

This shoegaze power ballad from Brooklyn band Crate is an elegantly trippy, fuzz-pedal-driven song that closes the band’s self-titled debut. Ezra Engler says the lyrics are about caring deeply for someone in a bad position while knowing that, in the end, the only person who can help them is themselves. He has been on both sides of that dynamic, and he calls it his most personal song. A spoken-word outro looks back and wishes for a different choice.^[3]

The album also includes “Julia,” “Necklace” and “Not My Song (Mine to Keep).”^[4]

Listen: Bandcamp

3. Chastity Belt — “Friends for This”

Location: Seattle, Washington, United States · “All My Friends” · Album out Nov. 6, 2026, on Suicide Squeeze

“Friends for This” from Seattle band Chastity Belt was the last single released before “All My Friends” arrived.^[5][6] Lydia Lund wrote the lyrics shortly after returning to Seattle from England, when she was reconnecting with old friends, and she says it felt great to be back with them. Her vocals were recorded in her own basement, and Gretchen Grimm contributes wailing vocals near the end. Stereogum calls the song lovely.

We covered the band in 2013, when their album “No Regerts” and its single “Black Sail” landed in our Best Singles & Albums, August 2013 roundup.

Listen: Spotify

4. Superchunk — “Shortest Day of the Year”

Location: Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States · “Wintry Mix” EP · Surprise release Nov. 6, 2026, on Merge

Superchunk dropped a surprise winter EP with one original and four covers.^[7] The original, “Shortest Day of the Year,” is what Stereogum calls a classic-style Superchunk basher, with a few sleigh bells tossed in.^[8] The covers are Wham!’s “Last Christmas,” two songs from The Magnetic Fields’ “50 Song Memoir” (“The Blizzard of ’78” and “Have You Seen It in the Snow”) and Galaxie 500’s “Snowstorm.” Stereogum’s verdict: they make all of them sound like Superchunk songs.

IRC has followed the band for a long time. See our 2009 post on the “Leaves in the Gutter” EP and our 2013 pick of “Me & You & Jackie Mittoo.”

Listen: Bandcamp (the embedded version is the “No Tinsel Mix”)

5. bloodsports — “Ten Thousand Feet”

Location: New York City, New York, United States · Single released Oct. 30, 2026 · Follows the 2025 debut “Anything Can Be a Hammer”

New York band bloodsports released this one right before Halloween, and it makes a good Halloween song. The lyrics draw on Joe Sprinz, a 1939 baseball player who was injured trying to catch a ball dropped from a blimp about 800 feet up.^[9] Stereogum says it takes the creeping dread the band shares with Truth Club and stretches it out like a haunted house, with Sam Murphy’s dragging vocals distorting time over a hypnotic, slithering melody before a cathartic collapse.

The band says it was a very collaborative effort, with parts written at different times or built up through group jamming. The feeling underneath, they say, is malaise and boredom along with a restless, bird’s-eye-view anger.^[10]

Listen: Spotify

6. smush — “john dearly”

Location: Brooklyn, New York, United States (formed in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) · “i’ll always wish,,” · Album due Jan. 22, 2027

Singer and bassist Emily Borrowman says the song is about being in early adulthood and still feeling like a child, repeating the same mistakes and feeling stuck. Stereogum describes it as fuzzy and euphoric, brighter and more energetic than most of what gets called shoegaze these days, with a glitchy sense of motion that breaks into a frenetic finale.^[11]

It follows the lead single “milkweed butterfly” and an all-covers EP, “standards,” earlier this year.^[12]

Listen: Spotify

7. Kiwi jr. — “Something Wicked”

Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada · Outtake from the “Blowin’ Up” sessions · Released Nov. 4, 2026

Stereogum calls this a sparkling indie-pop jam, and it comes with an unusually good guest list. Kiwi jr. recorded “Blowin’ Up” in Detroit with Graham Walsh of Holy Fuck, and Michigan artists Stef Chura, Fred Thomas and Protomartyr’s Joe Casey and Greg Ahee took part, along with Kerri Maclellan of Alvvays and Margaux Bouchaudon of En Attendant Ana.^[13]

Frontman Jeremy Gaudet says it was one of the first songs written for the album, but it stopped fitting as the record took shape, even though it remains one of the band’s favorites to play live. The lyrics borrow Shakespearean witches brewing trouble, with danger arriving from unexpected directions.

Listen: Spotify

8. Django Django — “Cameos”

Location: London, England, United Kingdom · “Doveland” · Sixth album out Nov. 6, 2026, on Clouds Hill

“Cameos” was the first single from “Doveland,” and its inspiration is J.G. Ballard’s 1974 novel “Concrete Island.” Bassist Jimmy Dixon says the title describes a person with a role in a larger story, which fits an album about someone searching for an idea of a place. After four albums where anything went, drummer Dave Maclean says, the band got bored and went back to basics.^[14]

Django Django recorded in the German countryside with former Franz Ferdinand guitarist Nick McCarthy producing alongside Pollyester.^[15] Lyrically, the record deals with memory, isolation and fleeting human connection, and it was made during a period of personal loss for two members of the band. We have been following them since their debut: see our September 2012 roundup and our May 2015 roundup.

Listen: Spotify

9. Oso Oso — “know you know me better”

Location: Long Beach, New York, United States · “an exchange of information” · Sixth album out Nov. 6, 2026, on Feral Twin

The lead single opens with a string arrangement that may or may not be synthetic, then settles into the polished, emo-tinged guitar pop Jade Lilitri has made his trademark. The album is the first release on Feral Twin, a new label started by Hop Along drummer Mark Quinlan, and it has 12 songs. Lilitri says that after this many records, your earlier work becomes an influence, so the goal was to figure out where to go that he had not been before.^[16]

Listen: Spotify

10. Turtle Club — “Cheers”

Location: Milan, Lombardy, Italy · Single released Nov. 5, 2026

Turtle Club is a Milan project that blends jangly melodic rock with shoegaze and garage pop, according to Obscure Sound, which flagged the song this week.^[17] Details on the band are thin, so this one is best approached the old IRC way: press play and decide for yourself.

Listen: Spotify