Stefanie Drootin and Chris Senseney have formed a new apathetic project, appropriately called Umm, with a full-length LP due out next week. The two of them have been playing in bands for over a decade, separately when they were younger and more recently together, with drummer Daniel Ocanto, in Big Harp. Their origins lie in […]

Eat Your Fill On Gothic Tropic’s Debut LP, Fast or Feast Cecilia Della Peruti has more in common with Father John Misty than meets the eye. It may have only dawned on her while we lounged at Echo Park Lake, as the Santa Ana winds ruined a family picnic nearby. After shamefully admitting I hadn’t […]

Hidden in the niche of bedroom folk pop is a new Australian outfit, The Royal Parks, who have just released their debut album, Suburb Home. The group is from Melbourne, which is also home to the national park that doubles as their namesake. The band explains that they chose this moniker because of its connection […]

There exists a bit of a trope in music that deals with the haunting wails of a generously ranged vocalist singing over blackened synths, eerie atmospherics, and those tell-tale drum machine claps. A few names immediately come to mind: Lykke Li, Phantogram, Lapsley, etc. Every one of them very much different than the other, but […]

How many artists start shaking things up eight albums into an already fruitful career? Austin indie rockers Spoon have always been on the experimental side – their deconstructed garage rock has given birth to underground classics (“The Way We Get By,, “Jonathon Fisk”) as well as bona fide hits (“I Turn My Camera On,” “The […]

Jay Som’s Everybody Works — a personal collage made from beautifully disparate pieces of sound   In a legend that’s become her version of Bon Iver’s fabled forest retreat, Jay Som – aka SF songwriter Melina Duterte – debuted her first full-length after “a few too many glasses of wine on Thanksgiving.” Turn Into consisted of […]

Cloud Nothings will Perform at Teragram Ballroom Los Angeles Feb. 22   For Cleveland quartet Cloud Nothings, a new album is more than just a collection of songs. Over the past few years, bandleader Dylan Baldi has used each of his former solo project’s documents as a turning point for its sound, adding a full […]

Japandroids to Headline Two Los Angeles Dates at Fonda Theatre in Support of New Album ‘Near To The Wild Heart Of Life’   Hit or stand? It’s a question that’s plagued more gamblers than rock bands, but it feels like something Japandroids members Brian King and Dave Prowse might’ve asked themselves before crafting Near To […]

Von Sell is Your New Favorite Electronic Purveyor of Sound — Debut EP is an Addictive Symbiosis of Synths, Drum Machines and Those Titillating Vocals Words: Zoë Elaine You may have heard of the up-and-coming Brooklyn artist Von Sell through his dominance on Hype Machine, or some other outlet of the blogosphere. His sound is […]

Hot New Music: Air Traffic Controller Drop “Black Box” Words: Steven Ward When it comes to the early-beginnings for any band or artist, there are always the few outlying but common stories of adopting nomadic lifestyles, sleeping in cars, selling their belongings, and generally what has become a cliche of the “struggling artist” model. Yet, […]