There’s something deeply refreshing about a band that knows exactly who they are, even as they evolve. Melbourne/Naarm’s Folk Bitch Trio comprised of Gracie Sinclair (she/her), Jeanie Pilkington (she/her), and Heide Peverelle (they/them) make their boldest statement yet today with the release of their new single “The Actor”, arriving alongside the announcement that they’ve signed with iconic indie label Jagjaguwar.

With roots that dig into the fertile soil of folk tradition, Folk Bitch Trio aren’t here to simply revive an old form — they’re here to stretch it, scuff it, laugh at it, and give it teeth. The band’s signature three-part harmonies feel both ancestral and urgent, but there’s a current of wit and unpredictability running just beneath the surface. Their arrangements are deceptively intricate — raw in texture, yet polished in intent. It’s music that’s been lived in, worn in, and made wholly their own.

“The Actor” is Folk Bitch Trio at their most unguarded and gloriously complex. The track builds from quiet intimacy to theatrical unraveling, anchored in a narrative that’s at once romantic, chaotic, and painfully funny. “It’s about falling hard and fast and breaking down quick too,” the band share, describing a journey through the rose-tinted mess of new love, messy passion, and eventual emotional catastrophe — culminating, of all places, at a solo theatre performance. The lyrics move with affectionate hyper-focus, the kind that only comes from the dazed middle of heartbreak. There’s poetry in the pettiness.

Directed by Bridgette Winten and the band themselves, the accompanying video is a vivid and campy companion piece — winking at performance art while holding space for the rawness of falling apart under the stage lights. It’s this balance that defines Folk Bitch Trio: the permission to be clever, to be vulnerable, to laugh and cry in the same breath.

If “The Actor” is any indication, this next chapter for Folk Bitch Trio won’t just be one to watch — it’ll be one to feel, in all its messy, melodic glory.