Recess of My Mind Finds xskarma Layering One Voice Into Harmonies, and How to Hear It

A Bristol Producer, Drummer and Songwriter Turns Memory, Love and Loss Into Downtempo Pop

Listen to the voices first. Recess of My Mind is the new single from Bristol producer, drummer and songwriter xskarma, out since 11 September 2026. The artist sings it too, building that one voice into layers and harmonies. Around them sits downtempo alternative pop: slow, dark and made for headphones.

xskarma’s new single is in the playlist below, alongside this desk’s dark pop, alt-pop and coldwave picks, and everything written about them is gathered on the xskarma profile. Recess of My Mind reached ElectroPop.News through PopHits.Co Music Charts, which verifies independent artists and places their releases across its network of music news desks. Press play on the layered voices, then read on for the dream at the centre of the song.

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How xskarma Built Recess of My Mind From Layered Vocal Harmonies and an Inside-Out Piano

xskarma is open about where the song began. On their website, they call themselves a big Bon Iver fan and name the band’s track PDLIF as a huge inspiration. Singing is always a challenge for them, they admit. Still, they had great fun building the vocal layers and harmonies. That is the technique at the centre of the record: one voice, stacked in layers until it sounds like several.

The second ingredient is the piano. xskarma leans heavily on the Inside-Out Piano, a virtual instrument from Song Athletics. It is sampled from pianist and composer Sarah Nicolls’s re-shaped Érard grand. That piano stands its soundboard upright, so the strings can be played directly. According to xskarma, it gives the track its rather lo-fi, cinematic vibe, and they love the instrument.

So that is how to hear it: follow the stacked voices first, then listen underneath them for that piano.

Then there is the city. Bristol gave the world trip-hop in the 1990s: slow beats, heavy atmosphere and songs that felt half awake. The sound keeps coming back because it suits the late-night mind so well. Meanwhile, xskarma has worked in its long shadow for years. In 2022, The Wild Is Calling heard Sacrifice You Make as rooted in the urban trip-hop feel of the 90s. Likewise, France’s IGGY Magazine described the same song as trip-hop pop.

Recess of My Mind Follows Unresolved Feelings Back Into Dreams Where They Return Distorted

Over four minutes and four seconds, the song explores the strange ground between memory, love and loss. It follows the way unresolved feelings come back in dreams, in distorted and sometimes nightmarish forms. Some feelings never get resolved while we are awake, so they wait. Then they return at night, bent out of shape. They come back as half-remembered people and scenes that feel wrong in a way you cannot explain.

A recess is a hidden corner, a space set back from the main room. The title puts those unresolved memories in exactly that place. In other words, they sit tucked away in a corner of the mind, out of sight until sleep opens the door. The phrase also has a history in xskarma’s catalogue. In fact, their earlier single Black Crow got there first. Its hook, as xskarma explains on their website, has a black crow singing in the recess of the mind.

That framing explains why the single leans dark rather than sad. A breakup song looks back at loss directly. By contrast, Recess of My Mind watches loss keep returning in disguise. That is a stranger and more interesting place to stand.

A Drummer’s Morning Grooves and a Long Run of Collaborations Shape xskarma’s Downtempo Pop

xskarma describes themselves first as a music producer working across genres and helping emerging artists find their sound. They are also a songwriter and a drummer who calls the drums their passion. Indeed, the notes on their website show how often a track starts behind the kit. Thousand Words grew from a drum groove found in one of their morning beat sessions. Similarly, Tears in My Eyes began with a drum groove, which they call typical. On a downtempo record that habit matters, because slow music lives or dies on the beat.

A Catalogue Built on Collaboration Since 2020

The catalogue shows a working producer’s rhythm. Your Eyes arrived in February 2020, followed that November by the album Glory in Numbers. Since then, a long run of singles has brought in guest vocalists. They include Tammy Roylance, glasscat, Maria Milewska, Frannie B and Aalisha Riya. Sacrifice You Make, with Frannie B, drew coverage in 2022. The Wild Is Calling, IGGY Magazine, Tape Ranger, TJPL News and FVMusicBlog all wrote about it.

Recent releases have come through SpaceInTime Records, including Lost My Way and Black Crow. Now Recess of My Mind is the latest, credited to xskarma alone.

Three Bristol and Trip-Hop Reference Points for New Listeners

Three names help place it. Massive Attack are the obvious starting point, the Bristol collective whose slow, heavy records defined the sound in the 1990s. Portishead, also from Bristol, showed how dark and dreamlike that tempo could get. Finally, The Wild Is Calling named Sneaker Pimps when it wrote about xskarma. That band carried trip-hop towards the alternative pop that sits closer to this single.

ElectroPop.News’s curator team: “Recess of My Mind puts xskarma’s own voice at the centre and lets the layers talk. It gives a half-remembered feeling room to turn strange, which is what a good night-time record should do. It also sounds like a producer who knows where Bristol’s late-night sound came from.”

Where to Stream Recess of My Mind and Follow xskarma Across Streaming and Social Platforms

Stream Recess of My Mind on Spotify, and go back to Sacrifice You Make on Spotify as well. Then follow xskarma on Spotify, Apple Music, SoundCloud, TIDAL, their YouTube channel, Instagram and Facebook. News and releases are on the official website.

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