Cavetown steps into a sharper, bolder chapter on his fourth album Running With Scissors, a record that stretches his soft-spoken, bedroom-pop roots into something wider, louder, and emotionally heavier. The intimacy that first made his music connect is still there, but now it’s framed by fuller indie-rock arrangements, shimmering melodies, and moments that hit with a kind of cathartic force that feels new for him.

Born Robin Skinner in Oxford, Cavetown first began releasing music as a teenager, quietly building a global following through YouTube and Bandcamp with songs that felt like handwritten diary entries set to melody. What started as lo-fi bedroom recordings grew into a deeply loyal fanbase drawn to his openness around mental health, identity, and self-discovery. Over the years, he has evolved from a soft-spoken indie folk presence into an artist capable of filling much larger emotional and musical spaces, while still keeping the vulnerability that made people connect in the first place.

The first glimpse of that shift arrived with the single “Tarmac,” a song that feels like it’s walking a tightrope between tenderness and emotional freefall. It’s raw, unsettled, and honest in a way that doesn’t try to clean up the mess. Written with longtime collaborator Orla, the track came together almost instinctively, with the lyrics spilling out before their meaning fully revealed itself. Cavetown later realized it reflected the kind of overwhelming and intrusive thoughts that can creep in when love and self-doubt collide, and that tension sits at the heart of the album.

Running With Scissors circles around what it means to grow into yourself when nothing about that process feels simple. Cavetown digs into masculinity, vulnerability, and connection with a voice that still feels fragile but now carries more weight. His songs wrestle with anxiety, identity, and the pressure of being seen, especially through the lens of life as a trans artist trying to make sense of who he is in a loud, complicated world.

Musically, the album keeps his gentle acoustic touch but pushes it into a bigger emotional space. There are soft moments that feel like whispered secrets and others that open up into glowing, almost euphoric releases, giving the record a sense of movement that mirrors the push and pull of its themes.

What makes Running With Scissors land is how fearless it feels. Cavetown isn’t smoothing over the hard parts of growing up or becoming yourself. He’s sitting with them, singing through them, and letting the uncertainty stay in the room. It’s a record about finding clarity inside the chaos, and about learning to keep going even when everything feels sharp, fragile, and wide open.