motel void

Harry Nagle is a New York–based songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. He also fronts the electro-rock band Monday Favors and was previously a member of Itchy Trigger Finger, who toured with Lollapalooza and opened for Ben Folds Five. On August 22, Nagle will release The Songbird Chokes, his starkest and most lyrically intimate concept album to date. Opening with the echo of a child’s voice and closing in drowning silence, the record charts an inward descent shaped by trauma, shame, and longing.

Nagle has been releasing solo music since 1997, and the very first track, Dreaming and Awake, instantly transported me back in time – but in a good way. Lately, I often find myself revisiting older records, and here the piano and an overall sense of calm remind me of Elton John’s most beloved work.

What strikes me most about Nagle’s music is its sincerity. It doesn’t chase trends or microtrends but feels created purely for the joy of making music. You can hear this in The Light Under the Door, where the vocals are even more emotive – again carried mostly by piano – before an electric solo in the second half heightens the intensity. The following track, Teach Me, begins with the sound of thunder and rain before shifting into an indie singer-songwriter mode, with warm drums, guitars tinged with Americana and country, and a steady, natural vocal line that floats lightly above it all.

At the album’s midpoint comes perhaps its most ambitious piece: the nearly seven-minute Kiss Me Until I’m Gone. It shifts through multiple phases, at times evoking The Beatles, then hints of art rock, then shades of Elton John, before building into a full-blown rock climax that eventually dissolves back into a piano-driven close.

In the second half, Nothing stands out – a five-minute meditation on feeling unloved and unseen. The vocals are more distorted here, layered over piano, giving the song a raw, dark edge. Yet flashes of hope emerge, especially in the sweeping instrumental section of the second half. For me, this is the album’s peak. Nothing leads into The Dream, where Nagle shows the full force of his voice, including a mid-song shouting passage that feels brutally, beautifully raw.

In the end, The Songbird Chokes feels like a deeply personal journey – one that is at once heavy and intimate, yet never loses sight of melody or emotion.

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