Memphis-based rock trio Ingram Hill would probably love to have it look as if their latest album, "Look Your Best," was as easy-breezy to create as the lyrics suggest, but lead singer/guitarist Justin Moore says it was made with a great deal of hard work, determination, and grit. "I think it felt like we were in a place in our career where we really were going through a stressful time," says Moore of the period after parting ways with their former major label home, Hollywood Records. "We were trying to get our stuff together, and we spent a lot of time and effort trying to make this as great as possible. It's not like we haven't done that with all of our records, but this one felt like there was a lot more weight on it, on the process of making it. We gave it everything we had. It seemed like an appropriate title. We were putting on our best for our audience, for our fans."

Ingram Hill has toured extensively with bands such as Hootie and the Blowfish, Johnny Lang, Maroon 5, Guster, Better Than Ezra, and Hanson. Says Bogard of their live vibe: "It's a feel-good, good time show. The goal is a good, old-fashioned, rock n' roll show." While they count bands as diverse as Pink Floyd, Elvis Presley, Elton John, and Aerosmith as personal influences, the band's sound is much more current. Rock Ridge Music signed the band to a label and management deal earlier in 2010, with plans to release "Look Your Best" in September 2010.

"I feel like we hit our stride with this record," Bogard says. And Moore concurs. "I think we're really proud of this record and the effort we put into it. We feel good about it. We really do look our best."

Performing over three hundred shows in the last few years, Dan Darrah has established himself as a remarkably unique singer-songwriter, with a soulful distinct voice that captures even the least receptive audiences. Dan has developed a devoted fan base exponentially expanding in Chicago, the Midwest, the United States, and beyond.

In the last year and a half, Dan has shared the stage with the Bo Deans, Sister Hazel, Jesse Harris, Jeffery Gaines, The Samples, Marty Lloyd of The Freddie Jones Band and the 10,000 Maniacs.

We are very sorry to announce that Freesol has canceled their performance for this evening.

Down With Webster(also known as DWW) is a six piece hip-hop band from Toronto, Ontario, Canada made up of Patrick Gillett (Pat) on Vocals and Guitar, Martin Seja (Bucky Buck) and Cameron Hunter (Cam) on Vocals, Tyler Armes on Bass and Keyboards, Andrew Martino (Marty) on Drums, and Dave Ferris (Diggy) as DJ. During live shows the band sometimes uses a three piece horn section.

The band’s debut EP Time to Win Vol. 1 was released on October 6, 2009, and the single “Rich Girl$” debuted on the Canadian Hot 100 at #47 for the week of October 24, 2009, and peaked at #21 on January 9, 2010. The follow-up single “Your Man” was released to Canadian radio stations in January 2010. Since then it has peaked at #12 on the Canadian Hot 100, outperforming their debut single on the chart. In August 2010, the band released “Whoa is Me” as their last single on the “Time to Win, Vol. 1” EP.

From mid-October 2010 through late November, Down with Webster toured with 3oh!3 on the “Streets of Gold” tour. They gained a large American following during this. After the tour, the boys arrived back to Toronto to finish recording their follow-up album, “Time to Win, Vol. 2” before their own headlining tour, “Wintour 2011”.

The band was formed in 2006, when future Guv’nahs bassist Justin Hoskins committed his then non-existent group to perform at a benefit concert. Hoskins immediately began enlisting roommates, friends and friends-of-friends for what quickly became a very real band. Over the past five years, the Dirty Guv’nahs have proved they are a serious concern. The band has gone from being one of the most beloved and exciting groups in East Tennessee to winning fans all over the United States. The release of the band’s self-titled debut (recorded with Drive-By Truckers producer David Barbe) was celebrated with a packed performance at Knoxville’s legendary Bijou Theatre and was followed a few months later by a two-night sold-out run at the venue. The band’s second release, "Youth Is In Our Blood" (produced by Justin Guip at Levon Helm’s studios in Woodstock, N.Y.) has found its way onto radio play lists around the country.

Click Here to listen to Jessie Baylin's interview on NPR's All Things Considered

When you hear Jessie Baylin sing for the first time, it takes a matter of moments to realize that she’s intimately familiar with pop’s history – but not at all interested in repeating it. Her songs—and her plangent voice—carry a classic pop tone that evoke memories of the Brill Building and Laurel Canyon in the ‘70s while retaining a decidedly modern, empowered worldview.

“I drew a lot from people like Burt Bacharach and Dionne Warwick, the Brill Building writers,” says the New Jersey-born, Nashville-based singer-songwriter. “But I didn’t want to make a retro, throwback kind of album. Nostalgia is fine, I have a definite fondness for that, but I didn’t want people to listen and think I was trying to recapture something from the past.”That’s exactly the vibe one gets when immersed in Baylin’s third album Little Spark, a recording that emerged after negotiating her way out of a major label deal that was threatening to mar the clarity of her singular artistic vision. Rather than go with the flow, she went with her gut.

Baylin’s ability to listen is palpable, in her mellifluous phrasing, the gentle twang that’s crept into her voice in recent years. But even more tangible is her ability to feel—and make her listeners feel. Listen to a song like “Joy Is Suspicious,” a starkly vulnerable self-assessment about learning to love against some pretty strong odds, and try to remain unmoved.

Memoryhouse didn’t actually set out to be a band. It took form as a collaborative project meant to serve as an artistic outlet for composer Evan Abeele and photographer Denise Nouvion. Evan, a dedicated student of classical music and a pop-music encyclopedist, intended Memoryhouse to be a multimedia art project, pairing his instrumental compositions with Denise’s photographs and short films.

Where Evan and Denise took their own music was a quick distance from where they began, recording, refining, and conceptualizing their aural-visual collage in the bedroom of a suburban family home. Individually and together, they experimented with themes, lyrics and multiple layers of instrumentation, with Nouvion’s soft, ethereal voice anchoring the frozen textures of Abeele’s compositions with frank sentimentality—a uniqure approach towards humanizing the electro-pop compositions they were creating.

The new album is titled The Slideshow Effect. The title speaks to what hasn’t changed for Memoryhouse: their continuing interest in the synthesis of the aural and the visual. It refers to the photographic/cinematic technique of zooming and panning to animate still images, often used in documentary film making to give movement to archival photographs. The Slideshow Effect will be released on Sub Pop Records on February 28, 2012.

For years, Kyle Andrews has struggled with a dirty secret. He was, in the eyes of so many, a "singer-songwriter", his past pockmarked with words like "sweet," "catchy," and perhaps most often of all, "bedroom." However, according to Kyle, his latest full-length release Robot Learn Love only sounds like a bedroom pop album if your bedroom happens to be on an escape shuttle hurtling towards an exploding star.

Robot Learn Love is probably the closest Kyle Andrews has come to a concept album. Throughout, he explores themes of modern life -- love, heartbreak, hurt, and longing-- experienced through the filter of technology. The album itself is a product of its theme: from the album art, inspired by a cellphone snapshot sent from the other side of the world, to the instant message abbreviations in song titles.

Genre seems to shift between dance, pop-rock and indie electro-pop more effortlessly than Andrews' previous albums, and even when fully synthesized, feels more "live" and fierce than ever. Full band in tow, the live show exudes an energetic, rock 'n roll vibe that is twice as loud as anything he has managed to capture in the studio until now. If Kyle Andrews is the robot who has learned to love, he has also learned to rock.

It was nearly 10 years ago that the four members of The Brew, then high school students, first created music together.It wasn't long before collaborations became songs, jams became rehearsals, and dreams were realized as the group began producing their own shows in local venues; First for friends, and then for the people that the word had spread to.

The first of the three albums, "A Garden in the Snow," represents the band in its purest form. The selfproduced, impressionistic, indie-rock album explores the possibilities of song craft without restrictions.

"Light From Below," the heaviest component of the project, expresses The Brew's unconditional commitment to live music and improvisational rock. Concise and sprawling arrangements pay tribute to the pop form, but still with The Brew's attention to honest music.

Together, these 3 albums create the Triptych experience. Enter this gallery of a decade of influence and inspiration created by The Brew.

The Kickback is comprised of brothers Billy and Danny Yost, guitarist Tyler Zee, and bassist Eamonn Donnelly. Following the brothers’ emigration from rural South Dakota to Chicago in late 2009, the group received acclaim from Rolling Stone’s Hype Monitor, Sound Opinion’s Jim Derogatis, numerous blogs including You Ain’t No Picasso, and the Chicago Sun Times for their 2010 and 2011 EP releases, Great Self Love and Mea Culpa Mea Culpa, respectively.

The group is currently writing and recording what will mark their first full-length release. A task that will be tracked and mixed by the Yost brothers, the record has been pledged to be a rawer yet more musically ambitious effort than the group’s two EPs. Influences for the project include the recent addition of Donnelly on bass and vocals, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, the dissolution of the Yost brothers parents' marriage, an intense and occasionally all-consuming fear of death, and the sunny and smiling sounds of mid-to-late 1960s Top 40 radio, including Zee's insatiable appetite for all-things-Roy Orbison. The new year saw the introduction of the band's own weekly podcast, Diary of a Disas-tour, as well as a healthy bout of nation-wide touring. 2011 also marked the band's first appearance at the SXSW Music Festival in Austin, TX, a headlining slot on the premier Midwest festival, Saturday in the Park, and an increasingly difficult time getting off work without getting fired.

Click Here to Download the song Four Days Straight by Scattered Trees

For Scattered Trees, Sympathy is a labor of love that almost didn't happen. The band grew up together in the outskirts of Chicago, playing music together in various groups over the years. They became a family in more ways than one, with some of the members sharing last names -albeit for different reasons. Scattered Trees became a staple of Chicago clubs, but as time passed, the band's members were drawn to various parts of the country. Scattered Trees as a band looked all but over. And then, tragedy struck. Lead singer Nate Eiesland's father passed away, and while mourning, Nate picked up his guitar again and started penning a record dedicated to his memory. Those songs became Sympathy.

The album is a focused, deeply personal collection of songs that finds Scattered Trees experimenting with lush multi-part harmonies, constructing dynamic builds, and exploring the intricacies of love and loss. Opening with "Bury the Floors," Nate sings "It's the house that I built you to fall / We started to walk then we stood up to crawl / So bury the floors and burn down the walls / to find ourselves by morning." Driving rock epics like "Four Days Straight" rub shoulders with melancholic elegies like "Where You Came From." The album's title track starts with a stripped-down plaintive mandolin, ultimately fading into a slow-burning orchestral groove. Melting into "Five Minutes," Scattered Trees continues the build until the track bursts forth. The band rounds out the record with the mournful acoustic closer "On Your Side," a fitting tribute for a deeply heartfelt and therapeutic album.

Santah formed while students at the University of Illinois, with their feet planted firmly in the dirty ground and their heads in the clouds. Luckily, before they grew up for good, Stanton McConnell (guitar/vocals), Ste- ven Plock (drums), Otto Stuparitz (bass), and Tommy Trafton (keyboards) took their blend of summery pop and atmospheric folk-rock to the late Jay Bennett’s Pieholden Studios, where the band found a home amidst the studio’s legacy of psychedelic Americana. The resulting White Noise Bed is a rambunctious re-imagining of ‘70s pop rock -- often sunny and sometimes shady. After finishing the record last May, Vivian McConnell (guitar/vocals/Stan’s sister) joined the group, and the quintet set out to tour the country. They have per- formed at festivals such as CMJ, SXSW, 35 Conferette, and the Pygmalion Music Festival; and have shared the stage with the likes of Surfer Blood, Cults, Margot and the Nuclear So & So’s, Company of Thieves, Young the Giant, Pomegranates, David Vandervelde, and Wave Machines. Santah is currently recording new material and anticipating the release of White Noise Bed, out this summer on No Sleep Records.

Native New Yorker, London resident, former Kindergarten Gym Teacher and one-time Parisian Street Sweeper, Julian Velard is a true original. The kind of character in a Wes Anderson or Quentin Tarintino film you’d like to grab a drink with. A real-life, musical version of Philip Marlowe (more Elliot Gould than Bogart) fusing the effortless cool of Robert Downey Jr. with the self-depreciating humor of Woody Allen, serving up slices of old-school Pop perfection with a raised eyebrow.

Born in the heart of Martin Scorsese’s Big Apple to a Queen-sized legs model/4-time Jeopardy champion mother and a French ex-patriot/ATM designer Father, Velard attended Laguardia High School for the Performing Arts, immortalized in the movie Fame. His first job was delivering videos to the likes of Cyndi Lauper and The Coen Brothers. It was during those after-school afternoons Velard devoured the albums that would form his musical landscape for years to come – Stevie Wonder’s Talking Book, Elvis Costello’s Armed Forces, Billy Joel’s The Stranger, and Elton John’s Tumbleweed Connection.

Velard spent his young adulthood paying his dues, living in an efficiency apartment literally in the shadow of Manhattan, in Red Hook, Brooklyn. He supported himself with some very odd jobs (including the afore mentioned “Hungover with Hula-hoops” episode) and touring the U.S., playing shows anywhere and everywhere, from rock clubs to cabarets to bar-mitzvahs and back again, honing his quirky brand of Pop all the while. After releasing three records independently, in 2007 Velard was plucked from relative obscurity off of Myspace, the source of well deserved UK Major Label attention. He signed a record deal and promptly moved to England.

Since then, Velard has straddled both sides of the Atlantic, writing songs for himself and others, and playing shows alongside Jamie Cullum, Goldfrapp, Shelby Lynne, Amy McDonald, Kate Nash, Jose Gonzalez, Marc Broussard, Tom Baxter, Horatio Sanz, Ben Kweller, Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals and others, and is currently working towards the release of his label debut.

Part indie-rock preacher, part wonder-kind, Aucoin's We’re All Dying To Live (Sonic Records), is a musical scrapbook compiling over 500 musicians, friends and fans from across Canada. Produced by Rich Aucoin and Joel Waddell, mixed by David Wrench (Caribou) and mastered by Nilesh Patel (Daft Punk, Justice), We’re All Dying To Live is a testament to the metamorphic magic of music.

Unlike his debut Personal Publication (2007), an EP that synchs to Dr. Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas, We’re All Dying To Live is a very public affair. From St. John’s, NL to Dawson City, YK, Rich invited everyone and anyone who wanted to be on the record. From multiple choirs to some of Canada's finest musicians, we were all dying to sing.

Six years spent on the emcee battle circuit wasn’t enough to get Astronautalis to shake his indie rock roots. The grind of defending his freestyle chops across the nation from high school lunchrooms in Florida, to bus stops in Dallas, and on to secret skate spots in Brooklyn, leading ultimately to the world famous Scribble Jam stage in Cincinnati just gave Astronautalis the mastery over the English language necessary to tell the tales trapped inside his brain all along. For when the battle ended, and the mics were cut off, Astronautalis (born Andy Bothwell) would tuck his trophy under his arm, pull his headphones back on, and head home as the walkman filled his ears with everything from Neutral Milk Hotel and The Halo Benders to Tom Waits and The Band. It has been almost 6 years since Astronautalis has entered an emcee battle, but by no means has this wordsmith been in hibernation. With three full length albums under his belt, over 1,250 shows on his vocal chords, and almost 350,000 miles of touring on his Honda, he has been busy crafting his calculated balance between hip hop, folk, and American indie rock, both in the studio and out on the road.

Coming from a long line of soldiers, spies, rapscallions, and railroad men, the life of a drifter came naturally to Bothwell; and it was there, out on the road, that Astronautalis honed his craft. Shaping the spoken swagger and acerbic aggressions of his old life as a battle rapper into a silver-tongued sweet talk that is as much a sermon as it is a seduction. Taking the stage with nothing more than a mic, a laptop, and his requisite handkerchief, Astronautalis has sweat out stories for crowds across North America and Europe, slinging snake-oil in support of artists as diverse as Atmosphere, Daniel Johnston, 2 Live Crew, Bill Callahan, Why?, Gym Class Heroes, P.O.S and more.

Astronautalis finally took a reprieve from the road last year to record his third and most refined album to date, “Pomegranate”. A treasury of tracks that is equal parts folk, hip-hop, and historical fiction; composed under the guidance of Grammy nominated producer and engineer John Congleton (Explosions in the Sky, The Thermals, Modest Mouse) and backed up by the most unlikely band musicians to ever collaborate on a hip-hop record (featuring P.O.S and members of The Polyphonic Spree, Midlake, and The Paperchase). “Pomegranate”, plays out like a collection of short stories, each song as varied in style and sound as they are in subject and character. One moment Astronautalis plays a sweet talking con-man seducing you out of house and home on the dark piano driven, “The Wondersmith and his Sons”; next he is a crossing the Delaware with George Washington himself in “The Trouble Hunters”, an epic fight song that somehow seems to channel the story telling spirits of Bruce Springsteen and Against Me! over funk drums and Miami bass. Each song spins a unique tale of love in the face of obligation and obstacle, told through the eyes of white-collar criminals, haggard opium runners, beleaguered farmers, and noble alpine mountaineers. With such a scope of subjects spanning over the colorful cadre of characters, it seems as if Astronautalis must have lived a thousand lives in his 27 years.

This is where it all comes together, where Astronautalis hits his stride, and those years of battling blend seamless with that endless highway, the pugilist becomes the poet, the storyteller becomes showman, and somehow, strangely, the idea of indie-folk-historical-fiction-hip-hop starts to actually make sense.

The Kickback is comprised of brothers Billy and Danny Yost, guitarist Tyler Zee, and bassist Eamonn Donnelly. Following the brothers’ emigration from rural South Dakota to Chicago in late 2009, the group received acclaim from Rolling Stone’s Hype Monitor, Sound Opinion’s Jim Derogatis, numerous blogs including You Ain’t No Picasso, and the Chicago Sun Times for their 2010 and 2011 EP releases, Great Self Love and Mea Culpa Mea Culpa, respectively.

The group is currently writing and recording what will mark their first full-length release. A task that will be tracked and mixed by the Yost brothers, the record has been pledged to be a rawer yet more musically ambitious effort than the group’s two EPs. Influences for the project include the recent addition of Donnelly on bass and vocals, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, the dissolution of the Yost brothers parents' marriage, an intense and occasionally all-consuming fear of death, and the sunny and smiling sounds of mid-to-late 1960s Top 40 radio, including Zee's insatiable appetite for all-things-Roy Orbison. The new year saw the introduction of the band's own weekly podcast, Diary of a Disas-tour, as well as a healthy bout of nation-wide touring. 2011 also marked the band's first appearance at the SXSW Music Festival in Austin, TX, a headlining slot on the premier Midwest festival, Saturday in the Park, and an increasingly difficult time getting off work without getting fired.

The Kickback is comprised of brothers Billy and Danny Yost, guitarist Tyler Zee, and bassist Eamonn Donnelly. Following the brothers’ emigration from rural South Dakota to Chicago in late 2009, the group received acclaim from Rolling Stone’s Hype Monitor, Sound Opinion’s Jim Derogatis, numerous blogs including You Ain’t No Picasso, and the Chicago Sun Times for their 2010 and 2011 EP releases, Great Self Love and Mea Culpa Mea Culpa, respectively.

The group is currently writing and recording what will mark their first full-length release. A task that will be tracked and mixed by the Yost brothers, the record has been pledged to be a rawer yet more musically ambitious effort than the group’s two EPs. Influences for the project include the recent addition of Donnelly on bass and vocals, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, the dissolution of the Yost brothers parents' marriage, an intense and occasionally all-consuming fear of death, and the sunny and smiling sounds of mid-to-late 1960s Top 40 radio, including Zee's insatiable appetite for all-things-Roy Orbison. The new year saw the introduction of the band's own weekly podcast, Diary of a Disas-tour, as well as a healthy bout of nation-wide touring. 2011 also marked the band's first appearance at the SXSW Music Festival in Austin, TX, a headlining slot on the premier Midwest festival, Saturday in the Park, and an increasingly difficult time getting off work without getting fired.

Brooklyn-based trio A Great Big Pile of Leaves originated in 2007 when guitarist/singer Peter Weiland and drummer Tyler Soucy took time from their prior projects to start writing material together. The first six songs came together as the self-released EP The Fiery Works, which the duo put out as a free download on the band’s official website. As word spread online, the band’s fanbase grew - along with Weiland and Soucy's excitement to get back to recording. Taking advantage of the positive word-of-mouth, A Great Big Pile of Leaves released another self-produced EP - The Fiery Works II - again as a free online download. Within the next year, both digital releases accumulated over 12,000 downloads and the group prepared for a live setting with the addition of bassist Tucker Yaro. After playing several shows and writing a batch of new songs over the next few months, the newfound trio geared up to record the full-length album Have You Seen My Perfrontal Cortex?. Each member took on engineering, production, mixing and mastering duties during the recording process; the record became a full collaboration of each member’s respective influences and knowledge. "We don't like to set up any boundaries when writing; we don't consciously come into it with any walls up" says Soucy. "The three of us have a rather eclectic background of musical influences and we like to explore that and have a good time. The only thing we knew coming into this record, is that we were in control and that we wanted to make the best record we could; something we would enjoy from beginning to end with no sense of filler." Since the release of Have You Seen My Prefrontal Cortex? in summer 2010, the group has seen a rapidly growing fanbase as well as praise on influential sites like absolutepunk.net - where the record was reviewed with a 93% approval rating. The momentum continues in the rest of 2010 with a vinyl release of the album and a large-scale fall tour to showcase A Great Big Pile of Leaves’ powerful live set to a wider audience. “The positive reactions to our music have been pretty overwhelming so far, especially in a day and age when the Internet seems to be filled with a lot of negativity on message boards,” explains Soucy, “we haven't really gotten much of that yet.” A Great Big Pile of Leaves will be hitting the road this fall on their first national tour - opening for Motion City Soundtrack, Say Anything, and Saves the Day. “This fall tour is exactly what our band needs to be doing and at the perfect time so we're extremely grateful for the opportunity,” Soucy continues. “I spent most of high school listening to these three bands, so it's going to be pretty surreal to walk off stage every night and watch the rest of the line-up,” he adds, “it's going to be a great time.”

Rachael Yamagata has reunited with Happenstance producer, John Alagia (Dave Matthews Band, Jason Mraz, Liz Phair) and is putting the finishing touches on her new studio album, the follow up to her heralded 2 CD Set Elephants...Teeth Sinking Into Heart. Yamagata will self release the album this Fall.

Yamagata recruited her "dream team" consisting of Victor Indrizzo (Sheryl Crow) on drums, guitarists Mike Viola (Candy Butchers), Michael Chaves (John Mayer), and Kevin Salem, (Dump Truck, Yo La Tengo), cellist Oli Kraus (Sia, Duffy) and Tom Freund on the upright bass.

Praised by critics for her intimately confessional songwriting and arrangements, Rachael released her last album, Elephants...Teeth Sinking Into Heart on Warner Bros. Records in October of 2008. Entertainment Weekly called her delivery "Gorgeous" and Rolling Stone said her "soulful, cigarette-scratched voice and melancholy lyrics recall Fiona Apple and PJ Harvey." She toured extensively in support of the album playing to crowds throughout the United States, Europe and Asia. Songs from the album appeared in various television programs and films including Greys Anatomy, Private Practice, Brothers and Sisters and more. She also made an appearance in the season finale of 30 Rock in 2009.

Yamagata emerged in 2005 when songs from Happenstance and her self-titled debut EP, turned up in such films and television shows as Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, In Her Shoes, Prime, How I Met Your Mother, Nip/Tuck, One Tree Hill, and The O.C., on which she made a guest performance. The single "Worn Me Down" was a Top 5 Hit at AAA Radio. She also appeared on albums by Ryan Adams, Ray LaMontagne, Jason Mraz, Bright Eyes, and Mandy Moore. Her tours have included runs with Adams, LaMontagne, Moore, Liz Phair, Gomez, and Sara Bareilles, as well as playing shows with Pete Townsend, Aimee Mann, David Gray, Damien Rice, and Air.

Rachael Yamagata has reunited with Happenstance producer, John Alagia (Dave Matthews Band, Jason Mraz, Liz Phair) and is putting the finishing touches on her new studio album, the follow up to her heralded 2 CD Set Elephants...Teeth Sinking Into Heart. Yamagata will self release the album this Fall.

Yamagata recruited her "dream team" consisting of Victor Indrizzo (Sheryl Crow) on drums, guitarists Mike Viola (Candy Butchers), Michael Chaves (John Mayer), and Kevin Salem, (Dump Truck, Yo La Tengo), cellist Oli Kraus (Sia, Duffy) and Tom Freund on the upright bass.

Praised by critics for her intimately confessional songwriting and arrangements, Rachael released her last album, Elephants...Teeth Sinking Into Heart on Warner Bros. Records in October of 2008. Entertainment Weekly called her delivery "Gorgeous" and Rolling Stone said her "soulful, cigarette-scratched voice and melancholy lyrics recall Fiona Apple and PJ Harvey." She toured extensively in support of the album playing to crowds throughout the United States, Europe and Asia. Songs from the album appeared in various television programs and films including Greys Anatomy, Private Practice, Brothers and Sisters and more. She also made an appearance in the season finale of 30 Rock in 2009.

Yamagata emerged in 2005 when songs from Happenstance and her self-titled debut EP, turned up in such films and television shows as Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, In Her Shoes, Prime, How I Met Your Mother, Nip/Tuck, One Tree Hill, and The O.C., on which she made a guest performance. The single "Worn Me Down" was a Top 5 Hit at AAA Radio. She also appeared on albums by Ryan Adams, Ray LaMontagne, Jason Mraz, Bright Eyes, and Mandy Moore. Her tours have included runs with Adams, LaMontagne, Moore, Liz Phair, Gomez, and Sara Bareilles, as well as playing shows with Pete Townsend, Aimee Mann, David Gray, Damien Rice, and Air.

The Kickback is comprised of brothers Billy and Danny Yost, guitarist Tyler Zee, and bassist Eamonn Donnelly. Following the brothers’ emigration from rural South Dakota to Chicago in late 2009, the group received acclaim from Rolling Stone’s Hype Monitor, Sound Opinion’s Jim Derogatis, numerous blogs including You Ain’t No Picasso, and the Chicago Sun Times for their 2010 and 2011 EP releases, Great Self Love and Mea Culpa Mea Culpa, respectively.

The group is currently writing and recording what will mark their first full-length release. A task that will be tracked and mixed by the Yost brothers, the record has been pledged to be a rawer yet more musically ambitious effort than the group’s two EPs. Influences for the project include the recent addition of Donnelly on bass and vocals, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, the dissolution of the Yost brothers parents' marriage, an intense and occasionally all-consuming fear of death, and the sunny and smiling sounds of mid-to-late 1960s Top 40 radio, including Zee's insatiable appetite for all-things-Roy Orbison. The new year saw the introduction of the band's own weekly podcast, Diary of a Disas-tour, as well as a healthy bout of nation-wide touring. 2011 also marked the band's first appearance at the SXSW Music Festival in Austin, TX, a headlining slot on the premier Midwest festival, Saturday in the Park, and an increasingly difficult time getting off work without getting fired.

Hmm, where should we start here? The part where Miniature Tigers stay up all night with Neon Indian, fine-tuning the laser-like synths of their new single, "Gold Skull?" Yeah, that sounds about right.

"I won't forget that experience," says frontman Charlie Brand. "I remember the sun coming up and everyone in the room singing along. [Drummer] Rick [Schaier] was almost asleep on the floor as he did harmonies."

While that part was captured during the Manhattan-bound mixing stages of Miniature Tigers' second album (Fortress, out July 27 on Modern Art Records), the rest of the record was tackled at Dreamland, a converted 19th-century church that's hosted everyone from Beach House to the B-52s. As you might imagine given its location -- deep in the woods of Upstate New York -- this led to some other late nights, ones that involved abject terror. But hey, that's what happens when you decide to watch The Shining in a place that could double as a Friday the 13th set.

"That movie put us in a weird headspace," explains Brand, "so we decided to go nuts on 'Mansion of Misery', starting with the drums. We also wailed on the guitars, making everything as loud as we possibly could."

The result is one hell of an curtain-raising cut, as heavenly harmonies and tension-building effects segue into a sudden explosion of crushed cymbals and powder keg chords. So while it'd be easy to draw the usual reference points here (the two B's: Brian Wilson and the Beatles), something's a little off about Miniature Tigers' indie pop presentations, whether we're talking about the delirious chorus lines of "Bullfighter Jacket," the hooting and hollering of "Lolita," or the 'shroom-munching waking dream of "Coyote Enchantment." And reigning in all the chaos, why, it's none other than Chris Chu of the Morning Benders, applying the same widescreen approach that worked wonders on his own Big Echo LP.

"We like to push what doesn't work sometimes," says Brand, "and he helped balance that out for us. Chris is also very organized, focused and serious, which is nice, because we aren't at all."

That's not totally true. After all, the band's come a long way since Rolling Stone named them one of MySpace's 25 best artists in late 2006. For one thing, Brand and Schaier finally have a steady lineup now, rounded out by guitarist Algernon Quashie and bassist Alex Gerber. The band played over 200 dates last year supporting their debut album Tell It To the Volcano with the likes of The Morning Benders, Bishop Allen, The Spinto Band and then there was the Ben Folds tour where Brand figured out what not to say onstage in front of their biggest crowds yet.

"I made a weird joke about being on acid at this college basketball arena," he says. "I don't even remember what I was talking about. I was dying up there."

He won't be any longer.

It’s been a crazy year for Cloud Nothings since they burst onto the music scene last winter. At the time main man Dylan Baldi was eighteen, living at home, and making lo-fi indie rock on a crappy computer in his parent’s suburban basement outside Cleveland. Since then, Cloud Nothings has released an EP and a handful of singles, and the band has put a few North American tours under its belt. With all the internet notoriety and their recent signing with Carpark, Cloud Nothings are now able to record somewhere besides the basement. For a producer, Dylan chose Baltimore’s Chester Gwazda, known for his work with Dan Deacon and Future Islands. Recorded this past August in a warehouse studio in Baltimore’s famed Copycat Building (home to the original Wham City and many of the city’s best musicians and artists), the self-titled Cloud Nothings album shines through with a crispness and boldness that Dylan has always envisioned. The songs now sound as they do live: full of energy, precision, and catchy bits. Dylan plays all the instruments on the album, but this time without the lo-fi scuzz. The excitement and emotion are practically jumping off the grooves.

Allo Darlin’ is the music of Australian-born, London-based songwriter Elizabeth Morris. Originally from a country town in Queensland, Elizabeth moved to London in 2005 and, inspired to write songs by her purchase of a ukulele from the famous Duke of Uke shop in Brick Lane, began to make music.

Early in 2009, augmented by Terry Edwards of Tindersticks / Gallon Drunk fame on trumpet and sax, Allo Darlin’ cut their first single, “Henry Rollins Don’t Dance,” released in 2009 on the cult WeePOP label. Much to their surprise, “Henry Rollins” started getting airplay on BBC Radio 1, 6 Music and XFM and the like, and received glowing reviews in places such as the Metro, The Fly and The Guardian, the latter calling it “the best indiepop song for years”. The band’s single that followed, “The Polaroid Song,” was named as one of Drowned In Sound’s Top 50 singles of 2009, while their latest single “Dreaming” was voted Single Of The Week by Jarvis Cocker, Peter Hook and Huw Stephens on Steve Lamacq’s BBC 6music round table (beating MGMT, The Radio Dept. and Kate Nash in the process!).

In their brief lifetime Allo Darlin’ have been interviewed (three times) by Steve Lamacq on BBC 6 Music and also recorded live session for John Kennedy on XFM and Lauren Laverne on 6 Music. They’ve played Indietracks Festival, stealing the show with their impromptu station platform performance two years ago and this year playing on Friday’s main stage, have toured in Sweden and Germany, and appeared at the prestigious Swn Festival in Cardiff promoted by BBC Radio 1 DJ Huw Stephens. In March of this year they headed out on their first major UK tour as support to The School, followed by trips to the States for SXSW festival, NY Popfest and an East Coast tour, the appearance at NY Popfest leading to a glowing review on the front page of The New York Times website! Steve Lamacq also selected them as his choice for BBC’s Introducing week, resulting in a session at Maida Vale and a filmed interview for the BBC, and they’ll shortly be returning to XFM for a full electric session.