Ghost We Keep, the latest release from Austin based independent artist HOXSEY feels like a place rather than just a record. It’s the kind of Album that seems to open a door and asks you to step inside without giving you a glimpse of what you will find there. There are dirt roads. disappearing into the dark, old carnivals, forgotten towns and ghosts that seem less interested in frightening you than in reminding you of something you thought you had left behind.
Released on August 24, 2026, Ghost We Keep is an 11-track album built around a travelling circus theme, but it is much more than a Halloween record. Hoxsey has somehow created a world where the strange and the familiar sit beside each other. Beneath the old tents, haunted spaces and unusual characters is a story about mortality, memories, identity and parts of your past that quietly follow us into the present.
Hoxsey has always approached music form a personal perspective, almost like keeping a diary. Every moment. experience and feeling that might otherwise disappear are turned into songs and preserved. This idea is what carries Ghost We Keep. The album dresses itself in ghosts and carnival imagery but the real subject is what people carry.
The people we remember. The places we leave. The mistakes we make. And the memories that refuse to stay where we place them.
This is exactly what gives the album the emotional weight it carries. The artist simply uses this album to convey a spooky story. Musically, the album is just as restless as it’s story. Hoxsey moves freely between alternative rock, indie rock, gothic sounds, punk, acoustic music and experimental textures. Nothing stays in one shape for too long. Guitars could feel rough and lively in one moment, while synths, drums and darker tones can suddenly pull the music somewhere else.
It makes sense why the album doesn’t feel like a straight road. It feels more like wandering through a strange town at night. You turn one corner and the scenery has changed.
The first track, Skeleton Key is such an unsettling entrance. The sounds and vocals create an uneasy opening before the rattling drums begin to push the song forward. Hoxsey’s vocals add this strong theatrical quality to the song making it feel like something being played right in front of you.
Then comes The Road, and suddenly the album starts moving. The contrast here is key. The darkness doesn’t become heavy in one direction and there’s movement, energy and a sense of playfulness hiding inside the gloom.
Josaphina brings the listener closer to the emotional heart of the album. Here, the larger world of traveling performers gives way to something more intimate. It is one of the moments where the fantasy surrounding the album feels closest to real life.
With Charm Cider, the artist finds an interesting meeting point between dark wave and alternative folk. The expressive vocals carry lyrics that feel almost like pictures being drawn in sound. Hoxsey doesn’t want you to just hear the songs; he wants you to feel them.
The introduction of Sgt Capone adds another character to the album’s strange little universe. The guitars, marching drums, backdrop and vocals give the track that feeling of an introduction to someone you probably should be paying attention to.
Every track on this album just takes you somewhere more electronic. Pixelated Whorror is a good example of how freely the album moves between styles without losing it’s personality.
The remaining tracks help fill out the world around the album. They add more names, places and fragments to the story, making the album feel less like a collection of unrelated songs and more like pieces of something much bigger.
And the closing track Corpses Ball Room, feels like the lights slowly going out after the carnival has emptied. The atmosphere is still dark but the energy has shifted. After all the movement and strange encounters of the album, there is finally room to sit with what has happened.
Hoxsey describes Ghost We Keep as the classic Halloween album for the next 50 years. It is certainly an ambitious statement, but the album itself explains why Hoxsey sees it that way. There is a clear world here, a strong visual identity and a story that reaches beyond the usual Halloween themes.
We all have Ghosts.
Some have names.
Some have places attached to them.
Some are mistakes.
Some are simply memories of who we used to be.
And some remain without explanation.
LISTEN TO THE TRACK:
SOCIAL LINKS:
English