Thank you for reading (and listening to) Evil Speakers. Look for my weekly column on Friday. And don’t forget to check in on the latest installment of Catalog Club: Ramones (1976-1984). To all my paying subscribers — thank you for making this newsletter viable.
Can you believe that 2026 is close to already being one-quarter finished? While it’s too early to make any sweeping music-related judgements on the year so far, I will say that a lot of my early favorites are from new (or new to me) artists. At the top of that list is Owen Burton, a singer-songwriter from Chicago currently based in Nashville who records under the name Ovven. (It’s pronounced like “oven” and not like “Owen,” for reasons he explained during our recent Zoom conversation.) Ovven’s debut Gnawing At The Cord, released in February, is “riff-y, feel-good indie rock,” I wrote last month, made in Asheville, N.C. with producer Alex Farrar, the buzzy studio maestro famous for working with MJ Lenderman, Wednesday, and Wild Pink.
Like those artists, Burton writes guitar-heavy alt-country songs from a solidly working class point of view. (The fuzz-rock opener “Thermal Fuse” references Burton’s day job as a dryer machine repairman, though he also does occasional session work in his adopted hometown.) I wanted to talk to him because Gnawing At The Cord is my favorite album of early 2026. And I’ve also noticed that the record isn’t being talked about much elsewhere. It still hasn’t been reviewed by any of the big media outlets that cover indie music, a symptom (perhaps) of dwindling resources at those places. Though Burton also pointed out that Gnawing At The Cord is self-released (meaning no record label) with a promotional budget of exactly $0. Personally, I heard about the album from readers and listeners who insisted that I would love it. And they were right! It’s a true word-of-mouth proposition! If one were to call it “2026’s answer to Manning Fireworks,” I would not object!
