SEVEN soft 2026 songs
pillows under heads and hands through hair
As participants of a heartbreaking world, in an era when billions of dollars are constantly funding as much distraction from that pain as possible, it’s healthy to let our hearts break as often as they need. Here are some songs from the last six months that have helped me fall and get back up again, over and over.
Quiet Light - “Berlin”
Quiet Light is a uniquely 21st century artist, arranging soft textures and speech samples in an enigmatic yet targeted way, songs rearranged. These loops build into songs in ways that most wouldn’t even consider, but make obvious sense in hindsight. Her latest, Blue Angel Sparkling Silver 2, is her best yet, a frontrunning candidate for album of the year, and in her own words: “ruleless and dreamy.” “Berlin” is an easy recommendation, a stained glass mosaic of deconstructed indie pop, intensely special.
Babyfather - “bono talk”
Fans of Babyfather are certainly well aware of the elusive, shifting nature of not only the band but the music. At the risk of sounding like every other critic since Tinymixtapes’ heyday, it often feels simultaneously confused, distant, and essential, like a tangled mess of truths hidden in daydreams, or the restless ghosts of uncertain thoughts. “bono talk” is nothing new in that regard - a 45 second beat with five bars, it’s barely even there. What is there tickles the brain, beautiful keys complimented by a typically understated vocal performance, enough to make one reflect, if only for a moment.
username - “CC house”
I’ve advocated for username’s music here before, and if they continue at this rate, I imagine I will for years to come. “CC house” is a high point on yet another great footwork project (password 2), not only for its playful and true-to-form rhythmic tension, some of the best in the genre, but for its pillowy, sample-led beauty. It would have likely been more straightforward to make something that’s less gentle in a genre driven by drums that are often so frantic they’re not humanly possible. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate tracks in footwork or other genres that aren’t just the sweet, delicate extremes, but it’s hard not to fall in love with something like this, a crystal so stunning it ends up more serene than sharp.
Ana Roxanne - “One Shall Sleep”
Despite its reputation as a melatonin substitute, ambient music can exude maybe the widest range of feelings of any music I know. Distilling down other songs into just their most definitive elements, it dismisses all the bullshit and gets right down to the core of sound, atmosphere, and emotion itself; in this example, poignant delicacy. It’s tender, sad to the point of breaking into tears at any moment, yet unshakably grateful, like hugging a loved one goodbye as they move on to a better stage in their life. “One Shall Sleep,” despite its name, could have been a ballad that millions sang along to at the top of their lungs. It’s just too focused for that.
Lauren Auder - “say nothing”
As music writers, the expectation on us, whether we admit it or not, is that we are never supposed to be anything but early or fashionably late to a party. Either we can heap praise (or better yet, hot takes) on a widely known artist, or we should act like we’re breaking them to the world for the first time. In an effort to fight that urge, I’ll admit that The Avalanches (my favorite band) in the production credits was the primary reason I hit play on this song, but hearing this song made me instantly interested in anything Lauren Auder has to offer. Every element here works perfectly together, from Auder’s lyrics (“The lack is all I have”...“I wanna life I would die for, to smile till it comes”) to the subtle harmonizing of the introductory vocal samples and her background vocals. Intense drums and touching pianos, empty moments and walls of sound, these extremes work not in spite of each other but because of each other. Where the other songs here are soft in ways that coax responses, “say nothing” is the sound of the question and the response all at once, quiet in a way that feels like turning it up.
Olivia Rodrigo - “the cure”
Rodrigo has a lot of range to her music, as her excitingly unfamiliar new album proves once again, but if her discography had to have one thematic definition, it would be bitter insecurity. Personal life aside, her music clearly jabs at betrayal and expresses trauma, creating a pattern of frustratedly picking oneself up. Various related hits later, she’s rethinking it now, facing it for what it is - a mood that can turn to habit that can turn to toxin. At its most confessional moment, she processes a quietly popular self-destructive routine:
“Used to play a game in my head when I’d date a guy
Tally up the girls that he fucked ‘til I start to cry”
Repeatedly declaring her instability and listing each issue she faces, the song takes off, launching straight into the sky, until she’s soaring to her conclusion - that nobody else can love her pain away.
underscores - “The Peace”
As contenders on her best and least conceptual album yet, it’s surprising that the song that fits most on this list is not the one about falling in love with feeling in sync or the one about letting go of closure. Even though both of those are surefire recommendations for the tenderhearted, the softest song here is the one about cyclical harm in relationships. There are hints here of something much harsher (the title’s irony, the repeated line “I don’t speak unless I’m spoken to”), and it could have been a fitting dynamic to pair acapella-stacking Imogen Heap worship with lyrics about the elephant in the room. In typical underscores fashion, though, it’s sneakier than that, kindness and good faith pretending to be bitter self-loathing pretending to be sweet nothing.