Margo Cilker Sets LITTLE WHITE CROSS LP for Oct. 9, Announces Fall Tour

Margo Cilker has announced her third studio album, LITTLE WHITE CROSS, set for release October 9 via Fossil Records, the label she recently launched with fellow musician ISMAY. The 10-song follow-up to 2023's VALLEY OF HEART'S DELIGHT arrives alongside the release of its title track and lead single, also called LITTLE WHITE CROSS, out now on streaming platforms. Cilker plans to tour upon the album's release, including an East Coast co-headline run with Lilly Hiatt, headlining shows in Portland and Seattle, and West Coast dates supporting THE CACTUS BLOSSOMS.

The upcoming album follows VALLEY OF HEART'S DELIGHT, which was nominated for International Album of the Year at the 2024 UK Americana Music Awards and received Best of the Year nods from NPR Music, Rolling Stone, Stereogum, Bandcamp Daily, Paste, No Depression, Uncut, Mojo, BrooklynVegan, and more.

Cilker is sharing the album's title track and lead single 'Little White Cross,' available now on all platforms. Originally written and recorded by her friend Christy Hays, it feels country-classic in Cilker's hands as she allows the stark imagery of a car crash to carry the grander context of repercussions—what we'll answer for as individuals, as a society, as a species. It's a song that Cilker gravitated toward for its masterful blend of realism and poetry: Little white cross on the side of the road / Little fake flower and a crown of gold / They were going so fast how were they to know / They'd be a little white cross on the side of the road.

'You could definitely call it a concept record. If that concept is that I got really sad and went to Texas,' she says. 'I had some material so dark I didn't think I'd show it to [Bruce]. Then I remembered this is the man who wrote 'Travelin' Soldier.''

When Cilker revealed to Robison the saddest of her songs, the pair made a conscious choice to let despair lead, recording directly to tape in an all-analog setup with a studio band comprising her 'pedal steel secret weapon' Eric Heywood, Geoff Queen (Hayes Carll), Beth Chrisman (John C. Reilly), Lisa Pankratz (Dave Alvin), and Scott Davis (Band of Heathens), among others. They situated Cilker's originals among a selection of covers that she had taken to playing as a way to process her own pain, some sourced from within her immediate music community. The choice embraces the longtime tradition of Texas troubadours trading tunes and the art of transforming one work into something distinct, while honoring its soul.

'When I find a song that really speaks to me, it helps me make sense of things,' she says. 'Writing can be a lonely affair. But that exchange, that open spirit, it feels essential to art for me.'

The process of writing her own songs, on the other hand, can be intense, almost supernatural. 'I often feel haunted by stories, kept up at night by a kind of external pressure to tell them,' says Cilker. 'I'll write a song just to alleviate the grip it has on me.'

Album standout and upcoming single 'Molly and Me' emerged from that unconscious urgency. Written about the teenage sister of an armed suspect in a mass shooting, from the perspective of her best friend, it's an artful and affecting display of human complexity: And her mom did what she could to listen / And it's true that we sincerely miss him / It's just a shame they had to die when he did / None of this will ever be undone. Cilker withholds no nuance in conveying the unthinkable, allowing human suffering its due specificity. 'Just because something horrible happens time and time again, that doesn't make it any less horrible.'

For Cilker, songwriting is a contribution to humanity, a way of making the world a better place. 'You don't know what people have lived through, what another person is carrying with them,' she says. 'Every time I've written something about hardship, or gone to a place people don't want to go, there has been someone who tells me they needed it.'

LITTLE WHITE CROSS will arrive on October 9, 2026 via Fossil Records.

Tracklist

1. Little White Cross

2. Ladybug

3. Molly and Me

4. State Line

5. Walls

6. Pauline

7. Road to Las Cruces

8. The Money

9. Maryhill Peaches, Goodnoe Pears

10. Wolves

Margo Cilker On Tour

October 8 - Higher Ground - South Burlington, VT*

October 9 - Iron Horse Music Hall - Northampton, MA*

October 10 - One Longfellow Square - Portland, ME*

October 12 - Baby's All Right - Brooklyn, NY*

October 13 - MilkBoy - Philadelphia, PA*

October 14 - DC9 - Washington, DC*

October 16 - The Hangar - Troy, NY*

October 17 - Cafe 939 - Boston, MA*

October 28 - Polaris Hall - Portland, OR+

October 29 - Tractor Tavern - Seattle, WA+

November 7 - Globe Hall - Denver, CO^

November 8 - The Marigold Room - Santa Fe, NM^

November 10 - Hotel Congress - Tucson, AZ^

November 12 - Dune Room - Indio, CA^

November 13 - The Roxy Theatre - West Hollywood, CA^

November 14 - The Chapel - San Francisco, CA^

November 15 - Felton Music Hall - Felton, CA^

*co-headline tour with Lilly Hiatt

+headlining album release shows

^supporting THE CACTUS BLOSSOMS

Cilker recorded LITTLE WHITE CROSS at The Bunker in Lockhart, Texas, with producer Bruce Robison, who has worked with Charley Crockett, Lee Ann Womack, George Strait, and The Chicks. The sessions, cut to tape in an all-analog setup, featured a studio band including pedal steel player Eric Heywood, Geoff Queen, Beth Chrisman, Lisa Pankratz, and Scott Davis, with Cilker's original songs placed alongside a selection of covers, including the title track, originally written and recorded by Christy Hays.

Photo Credit: Jon Moore

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