An Organ Thing of the Day, a rather inticate, rather radiant piece of music for a cold wet Wednesday morning, a first single from Hirta’s new album, Book of Ships is a first rather warm cut from an album titled Soft Peaks, an album to be released in February 2026. Hirta, aka Alistair Paxton, from Nyack, New York, has recorded a rather quiet, rather warm, rather beautifully detailed album. This first taste, Book Of Ships, will give you a rather good idea of where the rest of it goes without ever telling you everything. We’ll be back with more at the start of next year, for now here’s the rather fine first taste…

“Hirta’s Soft Peaks finds solace in the natural world and comforts through an intriguing map of familiar trailheads and newly chartered terrain. The debut official release from Scottish – American multi instrumentalist, Alistair Paxton, Soft Peaks casts a windswept and lonely spell yet retains an air of optimism across its ten warm and desolate tracks. 

This album was self produced and recorded in 2025 in sessions split between the Hudson Valley town of Nyack, NY and rural Bovina in the Western Catskill mountains culminating in both vinyl and digital releases under Paxton’s own imprint, Half Painted Door.

Soft Peaks reveals layers of intricate acoustic fingerstyle guitar and plaintive drums under sparse and tasteful contemporary textures. A subtle and evocative blend of traditional folk voicings and indie rock charm which conjures fleeting nostalgia and offers some hopeful light in a dark time. Through songwriting that crafts propulsive repetition and embraces the power of restraint and economy, Paxton’s vocal harmonies remain unadorned and carry a poetic honesty while delivering elegiacal verses both timeless and universal.”

There isn’t much online presence yet, here’s a rather sparse Instagram page. More soon, watch this space…