Hold onto your flannel shirts, we’re moving into the ’90s-drenched soundscape. UK duo Lost Velvet— that’s multi-instrumentalist Robert Butcher and vocalist Melissa Morris—just dropped “Make It Alright”. Released August 22nd as the big finale of their debut EP trilogy, this song glues what these two are all about: music that’s “shadow and shimmer.”
“Make It Alright” sets up this slow-burn tension you can’t shake off. Butcher’s showing off his skills here, dropping guitar work that’ll remind you of the best ’90s alternative rock without ever sounding like a cheap imitation. The arrangement is good in dynamics, building with this unhurried confidence, like it knows you’re gonna lean in and listen. We mean art-rock structures that shrink down to intimate whispers, then explode into these massive walls of textured sound. And hey, this isn’t your typical loud-quiet-loud formula. It’s more like an emotional tide—ebbing and flowing in a way that feels totally inevitable. A person can make out the internal turmoil and release playing out right there in the music.
Melissa Morris’s vocals are the beating heart of this absolute storm of a track. She’s got this way of switching from vulnerable to powerful—sometimes in the same breath—that’ll stop you dead in your tracks. For a fleeting instant she seems fragile as glass, the very next breath she shifts to commanding the whole room. When the duo’s voices layer together, it’s like listening to someone’s inner thoughts battling it out. They’re singing about getting swept up in someone else’s emotional whirlwind, and you can sense every bit of that surrender in their harmonies.
This is the final track on their EP, coming after “Endless” and “Wasted”—both of which caught BBC Introducing’s attention, by the way. “Make It Alright” hits different though. It’s got that last-song-of-the-night feeling, you know? Hopeful but with a touch of melancholy that sticks with you. It wraps up their musical journey perfectly and has us counting down the days until their debut album, Dark Cells, drops. Lost Velvet has built this whole world, so get ready to be caught in their pull.