The newest artists to appear on NME’s The Cover, Mandy, Indiana, have put together a special playlist to celebrate the launch of their feature. You can listen to it below.
The French and Mancunian group feature in this week’s March 9 edition of The Cover, part of NME’s ongoing effort to spotlight rising artists from around the world every week. Each edition highlights a new emerging act. You can read Mandy, Indiana’s profile here, written by Spencer Hughes with photography by Tom Oxley.
To coincide with their The Cover feature, Mandy, Indiana have assembled an exclusive playlist titled ‘The real second album was the friends we made along the way’. The playlist includes songs from past The Cover artists such as Model/Actriz and Lambrini Girls, along with music from PVA and Water From Your Eyes. The full playlist is available to hear on Spotify below and also on Apple Music.
Mandy, Indiana began crafting their intense and chaotic sound shortly before the lockdown period. The band formed after vocalist Valentine Caulfield and guitarist Scott Fair crossed paths while performing on the same lineup with their previous groups. Fair grew up in North Wales and had been involved in DIY bands since his early years. Caulfield, who is originally from Paris, spent much of her childhood singing in choirs and studying opera before eventually discovering what she described as “a lot of really horrible metal bands”.
Their blend of abrasive industrial dance production and Caulfield’s striking French vocals quickly gained attention across music blogs and media outlets. That momentum led to the band being included in the NME 100 list in 2022 and signing with the influential indie label Fire Talk. Their debut album ‘I’ve Seen A Way’, released in 2023, was widely praised as one of the standout indie records of the year and helped take the band on major tours across Europe and the United States.
When the time came to create their next project ‘Urgh’, the group faced the familiar challenge that often comes with making a second album. They headed to a remote studio outside Leeds for a weekend to try and figure out their next direction. Caulfield joked that the building felt like “was a murder house”. The breakthrough came when they wrote the powerful and aggressive track ‘Magazine’, a song that shifts between dark, rising noise and a driving dance rhythm.
“I think what we were noticing when we were touring and playing festivals was that we were attracted to unexpected rhythms. It’s something that you can dance to, but that you don’t normally dance to,” Fair recalls. “You can dance to some experimental noise artist hitting a snare drum at really weird intervals and throwing things around a room. That’s really exciting to dance to.”
Read Mandy, Indiana’s full Cover story here and find out who else has been on The Cover here.
Each year, NME publishes 50 Cover features that highlight the next wave of music talent through detailed interviews and exclusive photo shoots. You can also check out the coffee table book NME The Cover 2024-2025, which includes artists such as Kneecap, Lola Young, Amaarae, LE SSERAFIM, Oklou and many others.
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