The Cross Sea isn’t a band you simply listen to—it’s a force you step into, like a shoreline where two oceans collide. Their very name captures the essence of their sound: a hypnotic, unpredictable convergence of paths, lives, and artistic instincts. What began as a blown fuse during an Ace of Wands tour became something far more cosmic. When Anna Mernieks-Duffield met producer Kevin S. McMahon, it felt like two wave systems crashing into each other at exactly the right moment. Her album with Beams, tracked at Kevin’s Marcata Recording studio in the Hudson Valley, was the first spark—an experience so transformative that it blossomed into friendship, collaboration, and eventually an entirely new musical identity.
The Cross Sea took shape in a liminal moment for each member. Kevin was worn thin by the grind of modern music-making; Anna was in the midst of pregnancy, flushed with urgency and the electricity of new life. Both were suspended in that strange, dangerous space between endings and beginnings. When Anna sent Kevin a batch of songs that didn’t quite belong to Beams or Ace of Wands, he heard something raw and flickering—an ember worth breathing into rather than rebuilding from scratch. Instead of re-recording them, he layered instrumentation around her demos, amplifying their immediacy. When Anna traveled to New York to expand the recordings, Kevin’s friend—and serendipitous mountain-swimming companion—Daniel Liss joined them. His presence grounded the project, balancing its wild, churning currents with humility and a gentle creative pulse.
From this unlikely intersection grew a debut album that shapeshifts across textures and moods: buzzing synths collapsing into pastoral banjo, dobros clashing and conversing, lo-fi indie pop dissolving into distortion-drenched riffs. As always with Anna’s songwriting, nothing is simple—unpredictable structures, subtle vocal layers, and instinctive melodic turns turn each track into a small odyssey. Kevin’s production swirls between murky shadows and sudden glints of radiant clarity, invoking touchstones like Kate Bush, PJ Harvey, or Big Thief without echoing them too closely. The album sounds like something dug up and something blooming, something ancient and something not yet fully born.
Their newest single, “Just Like Adrianne,” serves as a vivid initiation into The Cross Sea’s world: intimate, glowing, and trembling at the edges. It’s the second glimpse of their self-titled debut album arriving February 13, 2026—a slow reveal of a project built on timing, turbulence, and trust. “Just Like Adrianne” is a study in contrasts, where shimmering guitars rise like bubbles from the ocean floor and airy vocals twist around a heartbeat-strong bass. The opening verse alone is a cinematic eruption: “Bats and birds are bursting from technicolor explosions in flower form / And just like Adrianne I’m losing my vision / Gasping / Ceding to the storm.” The imagery is lush, surreal, and drenched in emotional clarity—evoking the spirit of artists like Adrianne Lenker or Johanna Warren, yet carving its own storm-path entirely.
Anna describes the song as an exploration of a love so certain it’s almost cruel in its intensity—an experience that shakes the senses while simultaneously illuminating everything. “I set out to explore the process of writing a song that describes, lyrically and musically, the root and the flower of fully fledged adoration,” she explains. And that duality—root and flower, chaos and clarity—runs through every layer of “Just Like Adrianne.” The song swells with both surrender and astonishment, as if the narrator is looking directly into the brilliance of something they can’t fully comprehend.
Following their debut single “The Me That Waits,” this new release deepens the emotional terrain of The Cross Sea’s upcoming album. If the project was born from unpredictability, “Just Like Adrianne” is the point where those crossing waves fuse into something luminous and whole. It’s a testament to urgency, timing, vulnerability, and the unlikely alchemy of three artists meeting exactly where they needed to. And for listeners—new or longtime fans of Anna or Kevin’s past work—it’s a stunning entry point, an invitation to wade deeper into the glimmering and dangerous waters of The Cross Sea.
Socials
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thecrosssea/
Bandcamp: https://thecrosssea.bandcamp.com/