On the Beat: New Releases From Vermont Musicians

After going on hiatus in 2023, one of Vermont’s most successful hip-hop exports, 99 Neighbors, has largely transitioned into operating as an indie record label. On it, former members conswank, maari, Nadia Nygaard-Ostby and HANKNATIVE have all dropped new solo music since the Green Mountain collective took a step back.

Now the band’s producer and instrumentalist, Julian Segar-Reid, aka Anteneh, has released a new solo record. Written, recorded and produced entirely in Anteneh’s garage studio in Burlington’s Old North End, IT WAS YOU wades into indie-soul, new wave, and R&B terrain. Former bandmate maari and Florida rapper Wahid lend some bars to the slow-burn track “fossils.”

Anteneh has also dropped a music video for the single “joy, deferred.” A moody clip filmed in a fog-filled attic, the tune shows off his melodic range and evocative, genre-blending songwriting. Find the video on YouTube and IT WAS YOU on major streaming services.

Burlington’s Mavstar has teamed up with Ferrisburgh-via-Brooklyn MC Boxguts and fellow 802 rep DJ Kanga on the rather spicy “Berzerkers.” The two rappers trade bars over a skittering beat and subtle waves of synth pads, and Kanga mans the decks. The track was all mixed and mastered by Burlington producer SkySplitterInk.

The duo released a suitably Vermonty hip-hop-esque music video to accompany it. Mavstar and Boxguts mean-mug the camera while they rap in snow-covered woods. No one is colder than Vermont MCs!

Check out “Berzerkers,” streaming now on YouTube.

Moira Smiley Credit: Courtesy of Fiona Small

New Haven singer-songwriter Moira Smiley has released a gorgeous new collaboration with composer and singer Craig Hella Johnson (Conspirare) and My Brightest Diamond lead singer Shara Nova. Titled “Haiku,” the song begins by quoting Japanese poet Kobayashi Issa: “In this world / We walk on the roof of hell / Gazing at flowers.”

The music video for “Haiku” was hand-painted by artist and animator Christine Banna. It depicts a woman sitting amid rubble as missiles fly overhead, interspersed with images of her walking through flower-strewn meadows. The video shows the dichotomy of living in peace while war and devastation rage in the same world.

“Haiku lives inside contradiction,” Smiley wrote on her website. “The compound lenses of Issa’s haiku, Christine’s images and the voices of my friends reminds me that art can hold ethical (humane) attention amid devastation.”

The track dropped on February 20, the United Nations’ World Day of Social Justice. Watch “Haiku” on YouTube.

Brattleboro’s Emily Margaret Band have a new track titled “Breakfast in Spain.” At only 15 years old, Margaret cowrote the jazzy indie-folk number with another young songwriter, Liara Neha Torres, when attending a songwriting workshop as part of the BrattRock annual youth music series.

Margaret, now 18, wrote to Seven Days that the release is “a celebration of women in music. It was recorded live during the ‘GRRRLS to the Front’ graduation party and was mixed by ‘GRRRLS to the Front’ graduates.”

The GRRRLS program, hosted by the Stone Church and spearheaded by Erin Scaggs, aims to address the music industry’s gender disparity by training women and gender-expansive people to work in sound production, lighting design and live music in general.

“To date, we’ve graduated 14 sound tech and light design students,” Scaggs said. “Each has gone on to make their own unique impact on the music scene in their community … Emily Margaret is a fantastic example of that.”

Listen to “Breakfast in Spain” now, streaming on major platforms.

Five recent or upcoming releases from Vermont artists