Seattle folk-pop duo Babes in Canyon release ‘Echo’

Babes in Canyon, the Washington-based duo of Nathan and Sophia Hamer, have released “Echo,” their first new music since their 2025 debut album The New Loud. A U.S. tour in support of the release runs through late May, with a Madison stop on April 22 at The Annex.

Nathan Hamer came to Babes in Canyon after years as a founding member of the indie-pop band Kuinka, with national headlining tours and festival appearances behind him. He wanted a different path.

“I wanted to start a project that explored the outer edges of folk music, that pushed what I love about folk and americana song structures into a new soundscape,” said Hamer. He and Sophia wrote their first song stranded in a remote cabin during a winter storm.

The New Loud, released in September 2025, built on two EPs, Second Cities and Year to Live, released while the duo toured heavily. The record was written in an isolated 1950s cabin on the Washington coast, in winter, with gale-force winds whistling through the walls.

Producer Jerry Streeter, who has worked with Brandi Carlile, The Lumineers, and Vance Joy, joined them to engineer and mix it. Field recordings from their rural Washington farmhouse made it into the mix: tractor engine revs, pond splashes, clanging metal gates and tree frogs.

“Echo” is a step further into electronic territory, but not a departure from the work in the cabin, leaning heavier on synth grooves and pulling rhythms from EDM and house rather than the folk-leaning dynamics of The New Loud. It’s lighter on its feet than the album, airy, built for movement on or off the dance floor.

The hook lands on first listen. The arrangement shifts enough throughout to stay interesting from start to finish without ever dropping the thread, which for a song this deliberately catchy is harder to pull off than it sounds.

Nathan and Sophia trade vocal duties throughout, and the split does more than balance the mix. His verses are feverish, reaching. She comes in from the opposite angle, a feather falling into a desert sprawl. Two people describing the same feeling from different vantage points, with enough space left for the listener to make their own read on it.

It sits comfortably across all listening contexts, the kind of track that works on the main stage or as the soundtrack for your adventures. Taking over the aux with this one on a road trip won’t cost you any friends.

The spring tour runs through late May, spanning the West Coast, Midwest, and East Coast. The Madison show on April 22 at The Annex falls between Chicago (April 23, Schubas) and Milwaukee (April 24, Falcon Bowl). Tickets are available at now.