Pop quartet The Aces returned this summer with Gold Star Baby, released on August 15th, marking a confident and compelling new chapter for the band. The record positions itself as a celebration of queerness, self-expression, and the exhilaration that comes with fully inhabiting one’s identity. It channels the unmistakable energy of stepping out with close friends, buoyed by the easy confidence of a night where everything seems to align.

Gold Star Baby arrives as a notable shift from the band’s previous release, I’ve Loved You For So Long, which explored themes of vulnerability, heartbreak, and emotional excavation. Their latest record offers the opposite perspective: a brighter, liberated sound that reflects a group emerging from the shadows of their own past work. Largely self-produced, the album underscores a sense of clarity and agency, not a reinvention, but the natural destination of a trajectory they’ve been carving for years.

The Aces recently concluded the North American leg of their world tour, which began November 4th in Minneapolis and wrapped on December 7th in San Francisco. Their second-to-last stop brought the band to Los Angeles, now their home base, where the performance at The Bellwether carried the energy of both a homecoming and a milestone.
Looking ahead, 2026 is already shaping up to be a significant year for the band. February will see the release of the Deluxe edition of Gold Star Baby, you can listen to the albums first bonus track, “Step One,” here. Later that month, the group will launch the second leg of their tour across the UK and Europe, before joining Louis Tomlinson on select summer dates, a pairing poised to introduce their evolving sound to an even wider audience.

Here are a few images of The Aces captured from their Los Angeles show at The Bellwether.