No Expectations 137: Good Friend
Recommended new LPs from Natalie Jane Hill, Dagmar Zuniga, Doll Spirit Vessel, and more. Plus, another book on tennis and a 15-song playlist
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Headline song: Gia Margaret, “Good Friend”
Thanks for being here. Maybe the number one question I get from readers (besides “can you write about my band?”) is “how do you manage to consume so much media every week?” The simplest answer is that this is how I’ve always spent my free time. I like listening to new music, watching movies, and reading books. In fact, I love it so much that I’ve spent most of my adult life trying to finagle a career out of writing about my interests. This is who I am. I can be many things, but I am never bored.
Having this newsletter keeps me honest. I purposely formatted it to include weekly sections about movies and books, along with new LP recommendations, to force me to be more on top of things. Self-imposed deadlines really work. If it’s a Monday evening and I realize I haven’t finished a book or checked out a new movie, I’ll devote time to get that done before I write a No Expectations post on Tuesdays. This is also a way I procrastinate writing while still feeling productive.
This week was a bit of a struggle. While I immediately knew what new albums I was going to write about, every other interest was subsumed by watching tennis. When my friends asked me how my week was going, I had trouble coming up with anything better than “Great! I watched a ton of tennis.” I skipped all movie viewing this week in favor of the Tennis Channel’s broadcast of the Indian Wells Open, where 128 ATP and 128 WTA players head to the Coachella Valley for a two-week-long tournament. It’s arguably the second-most prestigious American competition in the sport, and I’ve been locked in. Even when I wasn’t glued to my couch taking in the matches, I finished two, albeit very short, books on the sport.
Don’t worry, No Expectations is still a blog about new, independent artists. I appreciate your patience here: you sign up for a newsletter to read about indie rock, and you get several weeks of unsolicited thoughts on sports. While I promise there will be less of that in this newsletter going forward, sometimes it’s nice to fully dive into a totally different rabbit hole.
Here’s the spiel for new subscribers: Each week, you get a wildcard main essay (often new album recommendations), a 15-song playlist, as well as updates on what I’m listening to, watching, and reading. Sometimes you’ll get an interview with an artist I love, and other times it’ll be a deep dive into one band’s discography. Since I’m a Chicago-based writer, this newsletter is very Midwest-focused. So, if you live in this city too, you’ll also receive a curated roundup of upcoming local shows to check out.
Here’s where I politely ask for money: This newsletter is something I write in my spare time after work. It does not have a paywall and won’t for the foreseeable future due to the generosity of my readers. I am not in the business of gatekeeping. If you have the means and like what you read, I’d encourage you to sign up for a paid subscription. If your budget is tight, telling a friend about a band you found out about here is just as good. You can also post about No Expectations and say nice things. That works too. It’s still $5 a month—the cost of one Old Style plus tip at Rainbo Club. Every bit helps, keeps this project going, and allows it to stay paywall-free. It’s rough out there, so it means the world you’re reading and supporting this writing project.
4 Albums Worth Your Time This Week
Dagmar Zuniga, in filth your mystery is kingdom / far smile peasant in yellow music
In January last year, the Brooklyn-based artist and NTS Radio curator Dagmar Zuniga uploaded a collection of home-recorded folk songs to Bandcamp and YouTube. It quietly gained an audience, catching the attention of Mount Eerie’s Phil Everum, who took her on tour in 2025 and re-released it to vinyl and streaming last week. At 14 tracks and just a notch over the half-hour mark, in filth your mystery is kingdom / far smile peasant in yellow music is sketchlike as it is immersive, ghostly as it is beautiful, and as unorthodox as it is memorable. While it maintains a delicate whisper throughout its runtime, it never fails to be beguiling and engaging. “Plenty For All The Masses” keeps a propulsive acoustic strum anchoring spectral, loping harmonies while “Photograph the Hard Way” boasts muted synths and a metronomic beat. Few LPs from either last year or this one are as effortless at building an idiosyncratic world that always feels welcoming. While I’m embarrassed that I missed an opportunity to write about it upon its initial release, I’m grateful it’s got a second life in 2026.
RIYL: A music box that’s also haunted, Mount Eerie, Jessica Pratt
Doll Spirit Vessel, Bow
Philadelphia’s Doll Spirit Vessel thrive on making indie rock that’s genuinely unpredictable and interesting. Led by songwriter Kati Malison, whose voice can instantly contort from a throaty snarl to a feathery coo, the band shows tangible range on their sophomore LP, Bow. There are freak-folk dirges (“Gushers”), string-laden stunners (“Godless”), blistering alt-rockers (“Maryland”), and nervy post-punk stompers (“Ordinary Distance”) featured throughout these 10 songs. The energetic tunes are all performed with a galvanizing vigor, while the softer ones receive a patient, thoughtful touch. The winding, cathartic penultimate track “Dumptruck” is the best of the bunch, though. It’s such an immediate gutpunch that you can tell this band is absolutely electric live.
RIYL: Hop Along, Wednesday, Mothers
Natalie Jane Hill, Hopeful Woman
This is an instant album of the year contender. Natalie Jane Hill is a Texas-raised, Western North Carolina-based songwriter who made an impossibly lush, confident, and stunning album in Hopeful Woman. Earlier this year, I was floored when I saw her perform most of the songs totally solo, opening up for Friendship. But on record, the arrangements get a verdant and earthy full-band treatment, and it’s even more awe-inspiring. The cosmic, simmering single “Never Left Me” is hazy with wailing pedal steel and galloping acoustic strums, while the introspective “Colors” gets twinkling pianos and resplendent strings. Hill’s voice is rich, expressive, and piercing when it needs to be, especially when she sings lines as devastating as this from “Blue Is the Color of My Sun:” “And the hardest part of the day / Isn’t when you look away / It’s when you’re right there.” Throughout, every note, arrangement flourish, and lyric is intentional and near-flawless. It’s a record that is overwhelmingly gorgeous on first impression and masterful on each subsequent listen.
RIYL: Sandy Denny, Karen Dalton, timeless songwriting
Symbol Soup, Stepping on the Same Rakes
If you’re ever in a musical rut, one way to discover new-to-you acts is to look at one of your favorite artists’ tour schedules and check out the local openers on that run. Sure, sometimes you’ll think “wow, that’s a weird booking,” but more often than not you’ll find something to really dig into. Symbol Soup, the folk-rock project of the U.K.’s Michael Rea, opened for Lily Seabird last year in London. Even though I was a continent away, seeing the poster on social media made me check out his music. He just put out a new LP earlier in March called Stepping on the Same Rakes, and it’s a charming and conversational batch of understated earworms. Rea excels at an ambling, unhurried pace, like on the woozy and dreamy instrumental “Conversations Halt” and the moody “Rakes.” But the true joys of the record come when he raises the decibels like on the soaring single “Miniatures” and the eight-minute title track “Cardinal,” which features a welcome explosive riff. Operating at the intersection of intimate and inviting, Rea’s breezy melodies will stick with ya.
RIYL: Renny Conti, Villagerr, Pinback
What I listened to:
The No Expectations 137 Playlist: Apple Music // Spotify // Tidal
i26connector, “Cut My Hair”
Doll Spirit Vessel, “Dumptruck”
Gia Margaret, “Good Friend”
Symbol Soup, “Miniatures”
GOON, “Atrium”
youbet, “Receive”
Morgan Nagler, “Hurt”
Dutch Interior, “Go Fuck Yourself”
Angelo De Augustine, “Mirror Mirror”
Thomas Dollbaum, “Dozen Roses”
Cass McCombs, Chris Cohen, “Steel Reserve”
Spencer Cullum, “Jackie Paints”
Lowertown, “Big Thumb”
Natalie Jane Hill, “Blue is the Color of My Sun”
Dagmar Zuniga, “Plenty For All The Masses”
Gig recap: The Dead Bolts, Good Looks at Metro Chicago (3/7)
Before Texas’ Good Looks released their debut album Bummer Year in 2022, I took them out for pizza when they played their first Chicago show at Cole’s. We’ve been close buds ever since, so much so that I make a point to clear my schedule whenever they’re in town. On Saturday, they opened for the rising Chicago alt-rockers the Dead Bolts at Metro, playing a ripping set that included a handful of new tunes. Though I was unfamiliar with the headliners going into it, they put on a fun show: purveyors of raucous, no-frills anthems that evoke Fontaines D.C., Local Natives, and early Kings of Leon. With members from Beverly and Oak Lawn, the gig atmosphere felt like a rowdy South Side high school reunion. I also heard from some Friends of the Newsletter who bartended that night that the crowd punched above their weight class in terms of drink sales. A stellar night of easy-to-root-for rock music.
What I watched:
The 2026 Indian Wells Open (streamed via Tennis Channel)
Few things this year have captured my attention and imagination more acutely than tennis. The latest tournament has been the 2026 Indian Wells Open. It’s like March Madness in the sense that the games start at 1 p.m. my time and usually end around midnight. There are ample upsets, thrilling contests, and a lot of drama. I’ve been locked in from round one to, by the time this newsletter runs, the quarterfinals. Most of the sports I love are team-based. While there’s individual flair and talent in soccer and basketball, it’s all in the service of the unit. Even in NASCAR, something I unironically love, a bad pit stop can ruin a driver’s best-ever run.
With singles tennis, it’s just two people facing off on the court. Sure, it’s a battle of talent, tactics, and training, but it’s also character and temperament. “A person’s tennis game begins with his nature and background and comes out through his motor mechanisms into shot patterns and characteristics of play,” wrote John McPhee in his 1969 classic New Yorker cover stories turned book, Levels of the Game. “If he is deliberate, he is a deliberate tennis player; and if he is flamboyant, his game probably is, too.” Almost six decades later, this is still true: Alcaraz and Sinner couldn’t be more different, and that reflects in their games.
Watching this year’s tournament, I’ve fallen in love with the playing of rising Brazilian star João Fonseca, who lost to Jannik Sinner on Tuesday in a riotous match that featured two sets of tiebreak tennis. His forehand is unreal, and I bet he will be a top 10 player by the end of 2026. I’ve also been impressed by American Learner Tien, who himself faces Sinner today, and Colombian women’s player Camila Osorio, who upset Americans Sloane Stephens and Iva Jovic before falling to Naomi Osaka in three sets. If you watch the sport’s biggest stars, it’s transcendent, but it’s just as fun to witness a young player rise through the rankings.
What I read:
Levels of the Game (by John McPhee)*
In 1969, New Yorker writer John McPhee published two cover stories for the magazine that served as a two-part profile of 1968 U.S. Open semifinalists Arthur Ashe and Clark Graebner. His piece documents the thrilling four-set match as well as the two competitors’ disparate backgrounds and dispositions. McPhee’s prose is engaging whether he’s talking about the on-court action or the sociopolitical contexts at play between Ashe, a Black player who growing up in Jim Crow Virginia could not compete against white players, and Graebner, a straight-laced Republican from Ohio who was also a paper salesman before turning pro. There’s a reason this is considered one of the major classics of sportswriting.
*The other tennis book I finished this week is Racquet: The Book, a collection of essays and articles that originally ran in Racquet Magazine. I enjoyed it a lot, but won’t write about it here since I think that’s enough tennis at No Expectations (for now).
The Weekly Chicago Show Calendar:
The gig calendar lives on the WTTW News website. You can also subscribe to the newsletter I produce there called Daily Chicagoan to get it in your inbox a day early.
Levels of the Game is an all-timer. I have another Racket to recommend, "The Racket: On Tour with Tennis’s Golden Generation – and the other 99%" by Conor Niland. Niland is Ireland's most successful tennis player, and its an account of him trying to climb the rankings. Grim, intense, but funny like Agassi's Open.
I for one, appreciate the inclusion of tennis in the post. This is the first year I haven’t gone in person to Indian Wells. And I’m too cheap to pay for the tennis channel. So I’ve been listening to play-by-play on YouTube. And watching the highlights later. Like the epic match between Djokovic and Draper.
Also, if you hadn’t mentioned tennis, I might not know about the book that Jared recommended in the comments.
I’ll check out the music recommendations later today, but wanted to encourage more tennis tidbits in the future.