Dance-punk duo Matt & Kim might as well be re-dubbed Hubba Bubba. Their music’s as bubbly, buoyant and carefree as bubble gum, sponsoring a sunny joyful experience like a summer pool party. Kim Schifino’s drums offer Rice Krispies crackle for keyboardist Matt Johnson’s bounding keyboards and keening tenor. And it’s…

Over the course of thousands of years, music hasn’t really changed all that much. It still consists of sound shaped by rhythm, melody and perhaps a groove, same as ever. But the tools and manner with which it’s made has very much changed—exponentially so in recent years—and, with each leap…

Manchester Orchestra have always possessed the balls, beauty and ambition to create a great album. Their first two albums, 2006’s I’m Like a Virgin Losing a Child and 2009’s Mean Everything to Nothing, had the right elements and fine songs, but overall they struggled to balance the bombast, extravagance and…

Just as Sinatra was synonymous with nightclubs, you imagine John Vanderslice in a wine bar. His music lingers like smoke, its pretty orchestral overtones gently spiraling upward with cinematic grace and understated sophistication. It’s not so much grand as refined. He’s careful not to overplay his hand; the music’s measured…

From their name (lifted from “The Black Angel’s Death Song”) to their sound, there’s little doubt that Austin’s The Black Angels adore the Velvet Underground. Indeed, the first song childhood chums frontman Alex Maas and guitarist Christian Bland ever performed together live was “I’m Waiting for the Man.” And, while…

Ray Wylie Hubbard’s making up for lost time. After frittering away his youth chasing women and a never-ending buzz, Hubbard got sober (with Stevie Ray Vaughan’s help), then got to work. Over the last 17 years he’s released eight uniformly terrific studio albums traversing the Texas country landscape from parched…

Matthew Houck’s Phosphorescent is the kind of act whose albums receive 25 reviews from music publications on MetaCritic and nary a user rating. The talent’s there. Houck’s roots predilections draw inspiration from familiar touchstones such as The Band, Gram Parsons and Willie Nelson, to whom he dedicated his 2009 covers…

Raised in the Catskills of Upstate New York, the Felice Brothers grew up in the shadow of Woodstock, spiritually as well as geographically. Their boisterous Americana bears the deep imprint of classic ’60s roots acts The Band, CSN and Neil Young, while Ian Felice’s raspy drawl invokes Bob Dylan. Just…

Some bands content themselves with girls. Their songs are a predictable patter of love and heartache, finding, losing or leaving their beloved to music driven by commensurate conventionality. Akron/Family are the other end of the spectrum. Their songs dig toward the core of human experience and spirituality—not with a shovel,…

You know Todd Snider. He’s the inveterate joker cracking wise from the back of the classroom. Or, as he describes himself in his satirical broadside “Conservative Christian, Right Wing, Republican, Straight White American Males,” a tree-hugging, peace-loving, pot-smoking, barefoot, folk-singing hippy. Cut from similar cloth as John Prine and Jimmy…

Toronto trio Rural Alberta Advantage’s breakout 2009 debut, Hometowns, was surprisingly muscular for all its folk undertones and atmospheric sheen. Sound swirls like flurries about frontman Nils Edenloff’s nasal, impassioned croon, which recalls Jeff Mangum’s craggy vocals. The warm textures and anxious bristle are keyed to extraordinary drummer Paul Banwatt,…

Ignore that this band’s name has the word twilight in it. The moody, seductive sound Civil Twilight crafts has a romance all its own—one that blissfully has nothing to do with vampires. Steven McKellar’s willowy tenor dips and flutters against moody backdrops, recalling Thom Yorke. But despite Civil Twilight’s penchant…

It’s not clear where Javelin belongs. The Brooklyn duo’s part of the indietronic underground but hardly fits within any of the established rubrics, instead carving out a space of their own with an exceptionally effective mishmash of stylistic elements. While their self-released 2008 collection of demos, Jamz n Jemz, moved…

Royal Bangs frontman Ryan Schaefer once expressed his bewilderment that any artist would want to plant themselves in the middle of an already well-defined genre and regurgitate music that’s already been made. It’s not a novel observation, but it’s definitely emblematic of the Knoxville combo’s difficult-to-pigeonhole sound. Their two albums—2008’s…

While some acts emerge full-grown and spend a career exploring variations on a theme, the more intriguing trajectories often belong to those bands that spend their lifetimes in a variety of guises, expanding and subtracting from their sound. Blonde Redhead hail from the latter camp, after having spent their early…

Black Mountain may be hirsute hippies with a groovy melodic touch, but they’re not so stoned that they’ll pass up an opportunity to knock you on your ass. They’re reminiscent of My Morning Jacket, only with Jethro Tull and Blue Cheer overshadowing Neil Young’s influence. And, like Jim James, Black…

As the leader of Miniature Tigers, Charlie Brand crafts infectious pop with reckless emotional abandon at its center. Big, generous hooks convey somewhat fantastical metaphors about girls whose “Hot Venom” frightens and excites, a soul-devouring “Cannibal Queen,” or a pretty “Lolita” spotted in a “gypsy crystal ball wet dream.” On…

Embodying the implicitly dangerous recreation expressed by their name, power trio High on Fire deliver savage chronic metal thunder with pecs-flexing panache blending portentous chug and pyrotechnic flash. Singer/guitarist Matt Pike growls with feral ferocity like Lemmy’s long-lost twin over fluid fever-blister leads chasing locomotive rhythms on the rails of…

Magic Kids belong to the legion of young artists sucking inspiration from ’60s pop—Phil Spector’s horn-and string-laden symphonies, two-minute Brill Building paeans and the Beach Boys’ harmonies. The band’s full-length debut from earlier this year, Memphis, takes its name from the band’s hometown, following up on a pair of buzzworthy…

Valient Thorr infused their first four albums with heady rhetoric about work, life and political duplicity, under the cover of balls-out rock. Informed by a Tao of searing Iron Maiden licks and MC5’s revolutionary zeal, these North Carolina hair farmers emanate adrenaline-spiked fury. The music suggests an extreme sport involving…

Reaching the top isn’t nearly as hard as staying there. The Bone Thugs crew can attest to that. The quintet’s blend of gangsta rigor and R&B smoothness revolutionized the rap landscape when it emerged in the mid-’90s. But their friendship wasn’t as tight as their harmonies, and the group fractured…

Raise your fist, stomp the accelerator and crank out the hooks. It ain’t rocket science, but neither is most heart-pumping rock’n’roll. Wyoming’s Teenage Bottlerocket takes their cue from the Ramones and Screeching Weasel, specializing in catchy, high-energy irreverence delivered over a fiery backbeat and guitar crunches crackling like peanut brittle…