Westside Cowboy and Star Moles have little in common aside from being two of the buzziest breakout indie acts of 2026 and sharing a sold-out bill at the Foundry in Philadelphia on an October evening. Philly’s Star Moles is soulful and sultry; Manchester U.K.’s Westside Cowboy is revved-up and cathartic. But the pairing was a fortuitous event. When Star Moles guitarist Kevin Basko asked the crowd if anyone had come from out of town, he got answers from travelers from upstate New York, Boston, San Francisco and Canada. I’m guessing that most of them would say it was worth it.
Westside Cowboy was playing the second gig of its first U.S. tour, on the heels of debut album It Goes On. They’re a band on the rise: They won the Glastonbury Festival’s Emerging Talent Competition for unsigned groups last year, scored the opening slot on Geese’s European tour early this year and signed to Island Records for It Goes On, which came out in August after a handful of singles and two EPs. They won’t be playing small clubs like the Foundry for long; they’re already booked to open for Fontaines D.C. on its U.S. tour in the spring.
Like many of the best debut albums by young bands (the Cowboys are all in their early twenties), It Goes On doesn’t conceal its influences but does recombine and reinvigorate them in ways that seem as fresh as they are familiar. Album and show opener “Kick Stones (The Boys)” unapologetically cribs from the Velvet Underground’s “What Goes On” (and its numerous riff-happy progeny such as the Feelies and the Wedding Present, plus contemporaries such as Ducks Ltd.). But it’s also got some of the disaffected sneer and precision fine-tuning of the first Strokes album. “What Goes On” + Is This It = It Goes On would be a facile oversimplification, however, especially given Westside Cowboy’s interplay of three lead vocalists and its occasional hints of a fondness for traditional British folk music. (To avoid letting the band get pigeonholed by a genre label, drummer Paddy Murphy facetiously coined “Britainicana,” something the band laughs off now.)
“Paperchains” and “Drunk Surfer” (the latter from the Cowboys’ presciently titled debut EP, This Better Be Something Great) barreled forward with buzzsaw guitars and dramatic pauses. “Worried Age” and “Pin-Up Boys” started stripped down, with Reuben Haycocks singing with a casual restraint that brought to mind Will Toledo of Car Seat Headrest, but then as the tempos accelerated and bassist Aoife Anson O’Connell jumped in with shouted wordless counterpoint vocals, they reached Arcade Fire-like climaxes. O’Connell’s lead vocals on “Strange Taxidermy” (from January’s So Much Country ‘Til We Get There EP) and environmentalist anthem “Coyote” had some of the cadences of old British folk ballads, before the songs shifted—“Strange Taxidermy” into a heavy, dark drone; “Coyote” into a zippy, angry condemnation. O’Connell’s full-throated backing vocals were highlights throughout the set.
Guitarist Jimmy Bradbury took the lead on songs that often began softly (“Patchwork” and “Big Wheels,” for instance), but then they turned into something communal when O’Connell and Haycocks joined in. Those moments on “Dobro” and “Don’t Throw Stones” when all three vocalists sang cheerfully wide-mouthed at the front of the stage were thrilling.
The band members often smiled at one another, obviously happy to be playing together before an excited audience, and that joy was infectious. They didn’t say much to the crowd—although Haycocks did muster a tentative “Go Birds” that got the predictably appreciative Philly response. (“I was told to say that,” he said afterwards, with a bemused look.) And their 15-song, 60-minute set was swift but satisfying—even if, like the Wedding Present, Westside Cowboy avoids encores.
A half-hour of Star Moles to start the evening seemed too short, however. Star Moles is the solo project of Philadelphia’s Emily Moales, and she’s released a lot of genre-blending, lo-fi, bedroom-pop, indie-folk music over the last several years before finally getting wider notice with this year’s Highway To Hell. (She’s called it her ninth album, but that math is fuzzy.) It’s a self-assured set that blends soulful country with sharply observed introspection, and it’s made fans of Wilco (who invited her to this summer’s Solid Sound Festival), Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield and others.
Moales played keyboards for the first half of the set, backed by a guitar/bass/drums trio. The newly released “Born Again” (now appended to the digital versions of Highway To Hell) sounded a bit like something from Cat Power’s Memphis-flavored albums The Greatest and Jukebox, especially with Kevin Basko’s Stonesy guitar. (Basko produced Highway To Hell as well.) At other times, Moales conjured the spookier edge of early-2000s alt-country artists like Virginia Dare and Edith Frost, with her gentle alto rising with to an upper register with a lovely, warbly crack in it. She shifted to electric guitar for the second half, and songs such as “Real Magic” (which Jeff Tweedy has covered) and, especially, “Halo” became much more emphatic and powerful recast for the live band. More, please.
Musically, Star Moles and Westside Cowboy made for strange bedfellows, but the evening at the Foundry had the exciting vibe of an insider’s showcase of on-the-verge “new” artists on their way to larger acclaim. And bigger venues.
—Steve Klinge
