Softmax Confronts Mortality with Daring Dual Singles

New releases "Anaesthesia” and “Ghost In The Shell” are two deeply personal explorations of loss.

Chicago artist and producer Softmax releases her boldest work yet with the A/B side singles 'Anaesthesia' and 'Ghost In The Shell', out now via Psychotic Reaction.

Co-produced with Berlin-based collaborator Gabriel Gifford, the songs grapple with death and grief from opposing angles - one panicked and resisting, the other eerily accepting.

An intensely personal experience sparked the singles: witnessing a family member’s final days in hospice care with dementia. 'Anaesthesia' captures the desperation of denial through jagged, pulsing electronics, while 'Ghost In The Shell' floats in ambient resignation, like a final breath exhaled into the void.

These tracks follow the success of Softmax’s December 2023 EP, 'Any Minute Now', a dystopian and emotionally raw body of work chronicling the peak of her battle with OCD. That release earned wide acclaim: lead single 'Swishers' topped Hype Machine’s chart and drew support from BBC Radio’s Tom Ravenscroft and Deb Grant, David Dean Burkhart, and Secretly Canadian, alongside appearances at SXSW and shows with Lola Young and Mary Jane Dunphy.

A singular voice in the alt-pop landscape, Softmax draws from Chicago’s blues and soul legacy, filtered through the avant-pop lens of Arthur Russell, Swamp Dogg, and Roxy Music. With more music on the way—including collaborations with LYAM, Harvey Causon, and Darkstar—2025 is shaping up to be a breakthrough year.

On 'Anaesthesia' and 'Ghost In The Shell', Softmax sonically stages death, making grief feel cinematic, visceral, and wholly alive.