Big World

Hovvdy — 2026

“Big World sounds like Hovvdy trusting instinct over perfection, and the record gets better the longer you sit with it.”

Will Taylor and Charlie Martin have spent more than a decade carving out their own niche little corner of indie rock, and Big World sounds like two guys who finally stopped explaining themselves. Their last record, 2024’s self titled Hovvdy, was a sprawling double album that kept the tone down and more mellow for sure. This sixth record goes the opposite direction. These twelve songs are leaner and quicker on their feet. Now settled in Nashville and working as songwriters, Taylor and Martin walked into these sessions with producer Ben Littlejohn bringing only instrumentals into the sessions, with no finished demos, and wrote in the moment. I think that approach, and the risk that came with it, is the whole story. There’s a looseness here their more labored records never had, a sense that the songs are working themselves out in real time, giving the whole record a more lived in feel.

The sound stays warm and hints at Nashville without ever tipping fully into country. “Life So Wide” opens on stripped guitar and Martin’s double tracked vocals, and it sets a tone where the writing moves with loose thoughts instead of a straight line. “Junk” is a track I really liked. Taylor’s lyrics hold you in place (“Dozens of fireworks / Sleep on the hitch”) before a synth warble slides in and he starts repeating “I don’t know why” like a man who has made peace with not knowing. Stray harmonica and little violin bursts wander through the mix, giving the album its MJ Lenderman moment. Closer “Wannabe (Radio Queen)” starts as a hushed acoustic thing before detonating into pedal steel, big drums, and some of the most upbeat vocals I have heard from the band. This album might not hold you all the way through on the first spin, but give it several chances because the earworms start to take hold. Big World is the sound of Hovvdy simply trusting the process and themselves.