Spacemoth Inward Eye CD (2026) - Pre-Order - out June 26, 2026 on Greenway Records.
 
As Maryam Qudus was writing and recording what would become Inward Eye, the new record by Spacemoth, she was in the midst of another deeply personal project: digitally archiving her family’s extensive collection of home movies with a VCR left constantly running in her living room. Walking in and out of her home studio while working on the new album, Qudus would randomly catch footage of her younger self captured at a moment in time, the ephemeral images flickering across the screen transporting her back to childhood and acting as a portal to the core of herself: a kid making weird loops with a guitar and pedal in her bedroom, now a professional musician still making weird loops with the same pedal she’s owned since she was a teenager.
 
The years preceding the making of Inward Eye had been busy ones for Qudus. As an engineer and producer at Oakland’s Tiny Telephone Recording, Qudus worked with an eclectic range of artists such as Toro y Moi, Spellling and Frankie and the Witch Fingers. Following the release of Spacemoth’s 2022 debut, No Past No Future, Qudus took Spacemoth on the road as the support act for Tortoise, Spellling, Speedy Ortiz and others. In 2024, Qudus was behind the board for psych rock band La Luz’s News of the Universe LP, a collaboration that led to her joining the group on the road over the last few years. While criss-crossing the country on various tours, Qudus ensconced herself in the back of the van with a tiny synthesizer and started piecing together the songs that became Inward Eye as the world rolled by outside the window in hypnagogic motion. She began looking forward to the longer drives “because it meant I could really dive in deep. I would sit in the back of the van, stare out the window and add parts and ideas to songs that I’d started, or I’d write brand new songs. Being on the road ended up being an inspiration.”
 
These are the experiences that inform Inward Eye, a collection of cosmic psychedelic pop documenting a spiritual journey through both the inner and outer worlds. It’s tightly arranged layers of pulsating rhythms and loops of sounds inspired by cycles of nature and the way they refract into the cycles of life as they roll with a momentum all their own. “It’s a metaphor for the mind’s eye, your imagination and memory, your ability to visualize experiences and emotions,” says Qudus. “When I think about the happiest moments in life, it’s like this perfect light at sunset and you're a kid running around in a field and you're just so happy, or you’re with a person you love—it’s those moments.”
 
The record establishes a bigger vision for Spacemoth’s sound, one charged with groove and motion. It’s instantly audible on opener “Do We Exist?” a spacey pop banger that begins with a lone repeating bassline and slowly builds to a galactic cacophony, Qudus adding and subtracting elements as she goes: a twinkly synth arpeggio here, a crunchy sampled guitar there, her own undulating vocals repeating the phrase “we’re all alone in this world” in different cadences until it sounds less like a declaration and more like a question—are we all alone in this world?
 
“Do We Exist?” serves as a statement of intent for Inward Eye, as it was “one of the first songs where the sonic concept for the record came into view,” says Qudus. “Creating drum parts, bass lines and sequences that coexist tightly, loop around and morph as the song goes on. How tightly wound those parts intertwine and loop together connects to how tightly wound life can be and how we’re constantly running in these little circles.”
 
Finding focus in a world of distraction is a theme throughout Inward Eye, as is the importance of cherishing love and cultivating happiness. On “Internet Fantasy,” Qudus explores the idea of “trying to be present and appreciating your own reality. We’re all addicted and consumed by the Internet in a way where you’re constantly in someone else's world.” Here again Qudus expertly constructs and dissolves distinct musical motifs to hypnotic effect, a droning organ and modulated vocals overlaid on a bouncing bassline and crisp drum pattern that soothes in their repetition and predictability—before blasting into another dimension with a shower of synthesized stardust as the song builds to an epic close. “North Star” is the record’s most straightforward love song, an ode to connection over time and distance, while “Flower Memory” reflects the nostalgic glow of the family movies that played while she was making the record.
 
Sonically, Inward Eye is indebted to the interplay inherent to bands with multiple players: the masterful intricacy of Can, the layered post-rock of Tortoise, the colorful avant-pop of Stereolab. The cool self-command of Kraftwerk and Cluster were also huge influences. Qudus points out that krautrock as a genre is “emotionally ambiguous. It’s an open canvas, but still very controlled.” On Inward Eye, Qudus extends a similar invitation with exquisitely patterned, cyclical music that still feels loose and imaginative, arranged to evoke positivity while allowing space for listeners to map out their own emotional journeys through their inner worlds. The people we once were and the experiences we’ve had may recede into the rearview, but remain visible forever within the mind’s eye, playing on in an endless loop.