FAM - Volume 1 - Issue 1 by AHSC Publications

Welcome to FAM, my name is Darby. I'm in my third year of my B.A. at Western, doing a major in Creative writing—I'm also a musician and mixed media designer; the most FAM-est FAM student ever. I often find myself split between the three faculties in terms of courses I enjoy; switching between doing a double major in Writing and Pop Music, to now, with a minor in Media studies. I've always had spaces, but I never felt like they were mine.

came up during Orientation Week with FAM Open Mics and other creative endeavours... but after that, it seemed to fade. From the music students I've spoken with, they often feel disconnected from creative expression and claim they don't have many opportunites to highlight their work, as mentioned in the February 2025 issue of Opus Magazine, "Our Call to (McKenzie 18). As a student who wanted to write freely about and within music and art, I've felt like this too. , which I now work as Deputy Editor on and am soon set to be Editor-in-Chief of, allows me to branch between these three disciplines without constraint. However, they struggle to fill positions like editors, because of music's minimal education within those categories. By FAM expanding Opus' reach, they aim to provide hiring opportunities to Arts and Fims students to help them gain experience being onapublicationteamandcollaboratingwithotherstudents;whilesimultaneously, providing guidance for music students to develop interdisciplinary skills.

FAM was originally facilitated by Opus as a means to integrate these opportunites into the feeds of students in these faculties, highlighting work of any format, including less common forms like lyrics, collages, and other . With this issue, Opus hopes to inspire students to branch out and go beyond their comfort zone with art to challenge societal expectations

THANKS FOR BEING HERE, DARBY XO

CHRIS SWYER

OPUSFACILITATOR,EDITING

JULIA STÖLZEL

COVERART,CONTRIBUTOR

DARBY MACS

OPUSFACILITATOR,DESIGN,

MADE BY FAM, FOR FAM.

NICOLE HENNIGAR

PUBSFACILITATOR

ELLIE MISENER

OPENWIDEFACILITATOR

EMMA MARIE

OPENWIDEFACILITATOR

Amelia Avdoulos

Four months in, this year is shaping up to be jam-packed with music. From exciting comebacks to rising stars, or bands continuing to redefine their sound, these releases offer incredibly worthy additions to your playlist. Here are three of the names you should be paying attention to in 2026.

BLEACHERS

Bleachers blends energetic pop-rock with deeply personal lyrics and big, anthemic hooks. Even as their style has changed over the years, many listeners still connect with the emotional highs and lows in their songs; it feels both nostalgic and fresh.

As the band’s frontman and main creative force, Jack Antonoff has grown into one of the most respected writers and producers in pop music, even though a lot of listers do not care for his production outside of what he does with Bleachers.

Whether you love big pop records or indietinged rock, Antonoff’s knack for turning real feelings into memorable anthems is a major reason people still enjoy Bleachers.

So far this year, the band has released their lead single “You and Forever,” off their upcoming album everyone for 10 minutes, which releases May 22. Setting the tone for the album, it seems that “You and Forever” is building on the success of their track “Merry Christmas, Please Don’t Call” as the arrangement and production carry a similar feel of nostalgia.

HOLLY HUMBERSTONE

When you hear the name The Fray, it’s easy to just think about the song “How to Save a Life.” But after a 12-year hiatus, they started releasing music again with their 2024 EP The Fray Is Back

Even if they aren’t always topping charts, The Fray helped shape the sound of the 2000s and early 2010s pop-rock, a sound that lots of newer artists still draw inspiration from.

You should also definitely be listening to Holly Humberstone if you care about authentic, emotionally honest music and rising artists shaping the future of indie-pop. Humberstone is a critically acclaimed songwriter; she won the BRITs Rising Star award early in her career, an honour that has previously spotlighted artists like Adele and Sam Fender.

Humberstone is known for honest storytelling that connects personal experience with universal feelings of love, loneliness, growing up, and self-reflection. “To Love Somebody,” a track praised for its lyrical depth and emotional

Many of their songs feature memorable piano parts and sing-along choruses, such as “How to Save a Life” and “Over My Head (Cable Car),” which easily became ear worm classics that are impossible to forget. Just recently, they released their new album, A Light That Waits, built off danceable nostalgia.

2026 is shaping up to be a year where nostalgia meets reinvention, there’s no shortage of meaningful, memorable music to explore. So, if you’re looking to refresh your playlists this year, these artists are the perfect place to start.

OBJECTS OF DESIRE

JANINE SARKANY

Cipher

When the world has gone up in flames, We can no longer remember our names, But we remember each other.

There’s a wasteland of people with blank stares

We used to run away from them, but now we don’t care, We used to wait by the telephone for friends to call, Now there’s a broken radio, the static says it all.

The ground leeched up all the poisonous thoughts, Spit them back at us, wars had to be fought

Now we’re living underground, communicating frequently, until the radio breaks, now there’s only one frequency.

We used to be friends, we hung out all the time, Back when the grass was green, Back when the sky was sublime The vastness of it all made me feel so free Now I’m stuck underground with junk and old batteries.

I see your silhouette sometimes in the corner of my eye

When I’m scavenging for food or contemplating life, Dirty shoes from running in the mud that you lent me After I tripped and sprained my ankle in my old ones, And you healed me.

And the worst part is, I don’t really know if you’re dead or alive. You left to find some others, some more who could have survived, Handed me a radio to keep in touch with, and said ‘I’ll be fine’when I asked to come with,

There’s a broken radio in my room, I don’t even remember my name, but I remember you.

Men up front

Women in the back

Boyfriends crowding Girlfriends

just so they can say they were there

That they saw with their eyes what they recorded on their phones

Man spills his beer on the crowd

(he gropes me later in the night)

Now we’re all sticky

Still moshing

I am offered a chair to stand on

The chair is gone next set

The moshing continues

The drumming gets louder

I sign a table with my name in sharpie

Paper cranes line the floor

It stinks in here

NOTES FROM A HOUSE VENUE

I am watching through the camera lens of another man’s cellphone

The drums get louder still

Cellular devices wait in the air with bated breath

The performer flails

Makes his way to the floor

He’s dry humping his drum

On the table with my name on it

Dr. Kiyasu

Thank you, Thank you

Fortitude

JULIA STÖLZEL

degrading or hypersexualized way, but in an empowering way.

This representation of female sexuality arguably changed the construction of women in society and provided them a diversemodeltofindtheirownsexualdesiresin.Thepower in this is – and was – phenomenal. By the women on the show “confessing” these desires, they are producing a subjectthatwomenaudiencescanfindthemselvesin.From Carrie “having sex like a man” in the pilot episode, to Charlottelettinggoofher“perfectman”overnotwantingto give him head, these women create incredibly powerful

thatsexwasnotnecessarilyrepressed,itjustwasnottalked about as openly. But, the more discourse that’s created, the morenormalizeditbecomes.Thisshowcreatedadiscursive explosion about women’s sexuality at the turn of the century, and I believe changed, or at least started conversations, about women taking back the power in their own sexuality—something that has continued to impactwomen27yearsafteritsrelease.

References

Foucault, Michel. “Power”. TheNewPress, 2000. Star, Darren. “Sex and TheCity”. HBO,1999.

TOMORROW AND TOMORROW AND TOMORROW

I dream of owlsand owlsand owlsand owls, Until my tattered curtains sealno light. Jackhammer howls and howlsand howls and howls; Serenademe in mywaking night! No muscle moves,and yetI’m in the shower— I’m dead;the rigor mortis lasts eight hours.