AUDIO – HOT and SOBER –
Jan. 15, 2026 – As Nick Carpenter looked back on the biggest year yet for his solo music project Medium Build, he also admits that, before 2025 concluded, he had “hit this giant spiritual wall.”
Carpenter, 34, had been on a three-year hot streak: after years of refining his sound and grinding out gigs, a deal with Island/Slowplay in 2023 had yielded a major-label debut, prime festival gigs (including at Coachella). “From 2023 to 2025, we were just saying yes to everything,” he tells Billboard. “It doesn’t feel too long ago that I was afraid that it was all just a flash in the pan, and that I had to take advantage of different opportunities. But then eventually you’re like, ‘Well, I’m gonna burn out.’” To that end, the past month has played out perfectly for Carpenter — who’s been able to decompress at home in Nashville at the same time as a recent single has become a surprise, momentum-building hit. “Last Time,” a lilting, lightly funky slice of romantic melancholy, gave Medium Build his Billboard chart debut in December, and in six weeks has climbed to No. 30 on the Adult Alternative Airplay chart.
