For Trousdale—the trio of Quinn D’Andrea, Georgia Greene, and Lauren Jones—the ache of growing through change resonates deeply. Like certain long nights of childhood where growing pains can feel like every inch is aching, cramping, pinching, Trousdale understands the feeling that comes with facing down existential anxiety, and matters of the heart. “We can acknowledge the strides we’ve made and be grateful, but we’ve talked a lot about how tired we are,” Jones says with a laugh. “We’ve been thinking a lot about the tension that comes with change, wanting it, fighting it, embracing it, but learning to thrive in that moment.” On Trousdale’s upcoming LP, Growing Pains (due April 11th) the band works through those struggles to find strength, courage, and growth in each other. “From what was, something new can always grow.” D’Andrea says.

Opening on a ripping electric guitar and bolstered by their trademark harmonies, the title track and lead single perfectly encapsulates those feelings in the life of Trousdale. “I’m making it through the tough times when it feels like I’ve been burning out/ Trying to build up the muscle so the hustle doesn’t pull me down,” they sing, a limber bass line drawing each new syllable forward. The album was recorded largely live in the room and co-produced by the band and John Mark Nelson, a songwriter who has also co-written and produced songs for Suki Waterhouse and Shaboozey, as well as engineered tracks for the likes of Taylor Swift and Mitski. Songs like “Growing Pains” highlight just how much warmth and depth lent to Trousdale’s already golden tones. “This song was about what we feel every day in this band, what we’re going through as a band,” Greene says. “This is our shared experience, being exhausted but finding beauty together.”

Trousdale’s debut album, 2023’s Out of My Mind, earned raves from the likes of the Boston Globe, Consequence, and Atwood Magazine for its powerful songwriting, immaculate harmonies, and ability to bridge gaps between country and indie pop. The group further honed those strengths on the road, finding deeper grooves and learning how to further highlight each of their voices individually. That process continued when writing Growing Pains, when the three songwriters set off to write rough ideas on their own, then refining and finishing them in the room together. “We can be vulnerable and share our feelings, but none of us has to feel like our heart is on the line alone,” D’Andrea explains. “We’re all adding to each other’s ideas, drawing from personal experiences and then expanding them into something more people can connect with.”

To that end, second single “Secondhand Smoke” feels every ounce of personal specifics in its story of an abusive relationship, but elevates into something far more haunting. There’s an icy chill to the acoustic guitar, the pain ringing softly into the night as the trio take on the perspective of a woman struggling to find hope: “Does it make me a fighter, does it make me a fool?/ Is it a matter of time til I burn with you?” Greene recalls the intense energy in the room as they finished writing the song, the trio and co-writers Mags Duval and Adam Yaron talking through their own experiences with people who have destructive personalities. “As a creative, working with brilliant people like this can make these experiences feel very real,” she says. “It’s easier to get into that space with everyone’s voices ringing out together.”

While those songwriters proved brilliant collaborators, the trio credit John Mark Nelson as a particularly powerful aide in seeing the album through its growing pains. “He’s always thinking about the big picture and staying out of the weeds, but getting in the weeds has always been our bread and butter,” Jones laughs. “We used to live in the weeds. But John Mark helped us focus on the album as a whole.”

That lesson shows both in the totality of Growing Pains and in the summery charm of a track like “Over and Over”. Nelson shared a rough sketch of the track, and Trousdale eagerly carved out their own version: a tale of running into an ex and trying to decipher how you feel about everyone moving on. “There’s never a good time to run into your ex , and it’s even worse when they’re bragging about how well they’re doing now,” Greene explains. D’Andrea points to the way the track leaps between tight-knit harmonies and lead vocal flourishes as emblematic of the new heights Trousdale has reached. “Every time we record and we’re in the vocal booth, we’re all getting better and figuring out what we need,” she says. “We know how to accentuate the writing and make sure we’re hitting a song’s fullest potential.”

Part of that reach came from expanding their sonic palette and using a larger band. “We made charts for a full band and went in with concrete ideas of where each song could go,” Greene says. “We have such incredible musicians on the record and knew they would run with it. It just feels way more organic and fresh than we’ve done before—less takes, less editing, and less chances to overthink things .”

As good as Trousdale sounds when they lean into their gold-hued pop, the group work their country flair into the material more masterfully than ever before. There are shades of Leann Rimes to the groovy, swaying “Lonely Night”, a track determined to push any listener out of their solo funk: “A little taste of the high life/ Cause I don’t need another lonely night.” The heartbeat-ballad “Want Me Back”, meanwhile, took inspiration from Lady A and finds the trio hoping that an ex might be regretting the breakup. “I went into our recording session thinking the song would end up straight country, and Quinn and Georgia thought it would be straight pop,” Jones explains. “Our bassist worked some doo-wop into the mix, and we found something really special to lean into.”

Across 12 remarkable tracks, Growing Pains stares down all the weight of its title, a trio of strong, independent women facing the threats of loneliness, broken hearts, loss, and more, and converting it into transformative, uplifting music. And as the album closes on the dazzling “Last Bloom”, Trousdale basks in the light at the end of every tunnel. “What it was will grow into something new,” they sing, radiating at the end of the journey. “It’s a reminder that even in the coldest moments, renewal is always possible,” D’Andrea explains. “The song was inspired by Lauren trimming her houseplants, and I was inspired by the idea that letting go of what no longer serves us can help something new take root.”

with Jenny Owen Youngs
In the decade since Jenny Owen Youngs last released a full-length album, she’s toured the world, co-written a #1 hit single, launched a wildly popular podcast, landed a book deal, placed songs in a slew of films and television series, moved from Brooklyn to Los Angeles to coastal Maine, and gotten married, divorced, and married again. She’s done everything, it seems, except release another album.

“After writing a zillion songs with other artists and immersing myself in other people’s voices for ten years, I finally started to get excited about making my own music again,” she explains. “It was like I took this extended sorbet course, and after that palate cleanser, I was ready to dig back in.”

With her exceptional new Yep Roc debut, Avalanche, Youngs delivers a main course worthy of the wait. Written with a series of friends including S. Carey, Madi Diaz, The Antlers’ Peter Silberman, and Christian Lee Hutson and recorded with producer Josh Kaufman (Bonny Light Horseman, The Hold Steady, Cassandra Jenkins, Josh Ritter), the collection is an achingly beautiful exploration of loss, resilience, and growth from an artist who’s experienced more than her fair share of each in recent years. The songs are deceptively serene here, layering Youngs’ infectious pop sensibilities atop lush, dreamy arrangements that often belie the swift emotional currents lurking underneath. The performances, meanwhile, are riveting and nuanced to match, gentle yet insistent as they reckon with the pain of regret and the joy of redemption, sometimes in the very same breath. The result is the most raw and arresting release of Youngs’ remarkable career, a brutally honest, deeply vulnerable work of self-reflection that learns to make peace with the past as it transforms doubt and grief into hope and transcendence.

“There’s a good deal of heartbreak and disappointment in this music,” Youngs explains, “but it ultimately gives way to excitement and promise, to the incredible, immeasurable bliss of falling in love and finding yourself again. These songs travel the whole emotional spectrum.”

That kind of range has been Youngs’ calling card from the very start. Born and raised in rural New Jersey, she fell in love with The Beatles at an early age before eventually finding her way to The Cranberries and Elliott Smith in high school. Her self-recorded debut, Batten Down The Hatches, landed a high-profile sync in the Showtime series Weeds and led to a deal with Nettwerk Records, which re-released the album along with her 2009 follow-up, Transmitter Failure. Widespread acclaim and dates with the likes of Regina Spektor, Ingrid Michaelson, Frank Turner, and Aimee Mann followed, but by the time Youngs released her third album, 2012’s An Unwavering Band Of Light, she was ready for a change of pace, moving to LA to focus on writing for other artists and for film and TV. In 2016, Youngs co-wrote Pitbull’s “Bad Man,” which debuted at the 58th annual Grammy Awards; in 2017, she co-wrote Shungudzo’s “Come On Back,” which was featured in the Fifty Shades Freed soundtrack; and in 2018, she co-wrote Panic! At The Disco’s smash hit “High Hopes,” which went five-times platinum and broke the record for most weeks atop Billboard’s Hot Rock Songs chart. Along the way, Youngs also launched Buffering The Vampire Slayer, an episode-by-episode podcast devoted to Buffy The Vampire Slayer that attracted more than 160,000 monthly listeners and led to a book deal with St. Martin’s Press. Youngs recently launched a new series with her podcasting partner/ex-wife called The eX-Files and has a narrative fiction podcast due out next year, as well.