Knitting Returns with Sophomore Record "Souvenir"
Knitting, the indie rock band that originated during covid by songwriter Mischa Dempsey in Montreal, has returned for their sophomore album release.
Released on June 26, 2026, Souvenir is a return after two years since the group’s debut project Some Kind Of Heaven. A project that unapologetically introduced the internal world of these artists, capturing the transition into early adulthood and the changes that come with it, including breakups and isolation after leaving home, can take the stage.
Coupled with the vulnerability of exploring non-binary identity and what it means to express this transition openly, the projects became known for more than just their slacker rock style, and sure, they provided easy listening, but they also went much deeper than the textures that make them addicting to listen to.
In knitting fashion, this new project, Souvenir, upholds that same level of introspection that has become so loved, capturing the need to hold on to things and carry them close. Described by the band as opening up a locket to look back at a specific moment, the album very much feels this way on an emotional and sonic level, feeling very grounded in particular feelings rather than a large span of topics.
The album opens with the track "I Want to Remember Everything” and quickly digs into both visceral language and this feeling of losing home that began on the first project. Coupled with the soft and fuzzy electric guitars, the track allows itself to stay liminal like the very space it describes, leaving the listener with a sense of longing that rests like a pit in your chest and carries itself to the end.
Yeah, you found me, standing in a doorframe, resonating deep inside my ribcage, nauseated. You know I tried to rearrange what I hated, and I never noticed my mistake.
Tracks like “Sunrise” and “I Wasn’t Fully Cooked” echo this feeling of being lost and yet deeply wanting to search for yourself in any way that you can find consistency. It's a deeply honest snapshot of the struggle with productivity as a measure of worthiness in young adult lives, reflecting growing pains that have not fully healed and the challenge of accepting oneself for who you are inside your body.
Unlike the debut record, however, the band has beautifully light moments sonically that don't feel quite as heavy as the sounds they leaned into before. Despite having moments of this, the album allows itself to settle into the soft and slow moments that come with feeling trapped in the in-between, still providing an easy listening experience that one can find themselves settling themselves down to listen to.
Instead of the lo-fi feeling that was cultivated in their early start the band has been able to mature their sound by leaning into a new wave of shoegaze, and highlighting the vulnerability that Dempsey settles into so deeply within a new Sonic landscape to find its footing within.
Only spanning nine tracks, the album stays true to that feeling of capturing a very specific moment and lands beautifully on its final track, “Exit Desire." Despite its darkness and at times cold acceptance, the cyclical nature of life can carry Dempsy to a positive note of wanting to win the war with life and with yourself.
Close my eyes and hope for the bird to see the screen door. / The days all blur into a cold war, / But I know I’ve won it before.
This album truly excels in the trust that the band has in their listeners, who have already been introduced to their identity. They've gotten to see the broad strokes that make up the emotional complexity the band is circling around and now get to see the more minute details haunting their minds.
This trust spreads to their sound as the band was able to become more experimental and allow themselves to expand this complexity in their arrangements. It feels like the band has truly broken the seal on who they want to be and what they wish to say to the world, and as a result, there is still more to be said.
Offering a window into very singular experiences that are able to be put under a microscope, the band is offering you their hand into a world that they have closed into the space of this record, and it is up to you whether you decide to step inside the capsule they’ve created; if you decide to, you might find that you resonate with the themes somewhere deep within yourself even when on the surface it's an unexpected feeling.
Overall, the return is a very welcomed one that truly showcases what the group is able to do when they focus their minds on a specific intention, leading to a shoegaze listen that is perfect to kick off the summer and will transition into the following seasons with ease.
