The guys in Milagres belong the the category of musicians who keep at it (while most rock acts fall apart within a few years, in particular in NYC where it’s very hard to find committed band mates). The group has been around for almost a decade under a name or another, and is about to celebrate the release of a new album – their third under this moniker – entitled "Violent Light." Marrying intense emotions with sophisticated arrangements featuring both orchestral and electronic elements, Milagres’ new album touches new production heights while delivering consistently in the songwriting department. Check them out at Bowery Ballroom on April 10 celebrate their album release.

We added this song to The Deli’s playlist of Best songs by emerging NYC artists – check it out!

We’ve been following Leah Siegel’s musical journey  for a while, both during her solo early years and the following Firehorse period, which apparently has just come to an end, since the Brooklyn based songwriter announced yesterday the adoption of a new band moniker, coinciding with the beginning of a new collaboration with Dave Hodge of Canadian collective Broken Social Scene. The project’s new name is Leisure Cruise, and the two electro-pop tracks they  released this far have already grabbed the attention of many bloggers and booking agents, so much so that the duo will celebrate their live debut at the Bowery Ballroom, tomorrow (April 10) – on the bill also Brooklyn bands Milagres and Conveyor.

We added this song to The Deli’s playlist of Best Electronic songs by emerging NYC artists – check it out!

Cinematic and dark, Calla was a rather established NYC band that formed in the early 90s and broke up some time in the mid aughts. The group’s lead singer Aurelio Valle (oh boy… I guess today is the day we exclusively cover artists with Italian origins!) is making a comeback with a self-produced solo album entitled "Acme Power Transmission," composed "after five years of private, contemplative musical experimentation carried on while he worked day jobs in motorcycle repair and in a tailor shop." Preview single "Superhawk" showcases an intriguing mixture of lightly industrial arrangements and exotic rhythmic patterns, reaffirmed later in the song by horn and mallet sections that would make any Afrobeat band proud. But Aurelio’s vocals, tortured and chilled, and the song’s controlled tension, intentionally prevent the party from happening, creating a musical paradox that makes this song stand out for its originality.

There was a time in the 80s when a lot of people enjoyed truly anguishing, borderline funereal music. Bands like Dead Can Dance, This Mortal Coil and to some extent also Japan (and later David Sylvian) who dared to mix sadness with weirdness in their music, actually managed to sell a lot records. We are not sure if the stars will align to favor a similar situation in the near future (although we doubt "lots of records" will ever be sold by anybody again), but if they did, Brooklyn electro-freak band Nicholas Nicholas might benefit from it. The kitchen project of Chris Masullo (that’s where everything is recorded), Nicholas Nicholas makes music that sounds like a bad trip that somehow becomes a surreal adventure: it’s a dense world where dissonances suddenly make perfect sense, and a dreamy stream of consciousness leads to the discovery of new truths through random associations. Check out our favorite track "Pink Contacts" below and see the band live at Pianos tonight for Cosmonaut’s residency.

If it’s true that Italians are notoriously late, it’s as undeniable that New Yorkers have little patience for lateness. It makes sense then for an Italian band in NYC to name itself Late Guest at the Party – which is a little bit like preventing potential complaints by warning about this built in, genetic flaw. (Please note that this writer also hails from that sunny and charmingly bizarre peninsula, although he is a very punctual person). The band has recently unveiled this video for single "Gravel," from their new, full-length album "Repeater," set to drop late this spring, and that features a brand new lead vocalist: producer Caleb Shreve. The song is a mid tempo, melancholic synth pop tune a la` Grandaddy – but a little more dancy – graced by a lazy, stretched melody. So lazy that, as a matter of fact… it may make you late to the party.

Quickly Quietly aren’t your average groove-shaking, alt-dance quartet. This band isn’t afraid to take their music to areas that sultry, laid-back grooves and buzzy analog keyboard-driven bass lines rarely visit: deep guitar based psychedelia. And their latest release, ‘Falling Beams’ EP, builds on this sonic dicotomy to create a sound that’s as much fun as it is heavy.

Latest single ‘Daily Echo’ runs through a continuing process of hazy moog-filled space explorations: at one point sounding close to Godspeed You Black Emperor’s cinematic epic-ness, while at other times cruising at an altitude perfect for laying back and taking it all in. it’s one of the group’s first releases since 2011’s ‘Seven’ EP (other than their fascinating, almost entirely improvised ‘L Sessions’ released last year). See it happen live when they play Spike Hill on Sat, April 19th. – Mike Levine (@Goldnuggets)

The song "Fernseher" from Bed-Stuy-based quartet Adiós Ghost‘s EP is contradictory in an intriguing way. Sunny surf/tropical-infused rock is the backbone for some seriously melancholy themes. The lyrics are similarly gloomy: "The sun is always setting and I don’t know why /To think that I could chase it, just give it a try/You know you can’t erase it just by telling lies.” Take this duality and add in its striking new video (created by Brooklyn filmmaker Nathan Punwar), and the song becomes that much more layered. Armed with a floor lamp, a girl peers into what seems to be an earlier time, literally Illuminating the past. What exactly she’s looking for in this hazy realm is a mystery, but the effect is ghostly and isolating — she’s watching this all unfold from the other side, through a lens of sorts. And that’s appropriate given the song’s name — "Fernseher" means TV or television viewer in German. The solitary observer can’t seem to crack the code, but it’s beautiful to watch her try. See Adiós Ghost live at Littlefield on 04.10. – Corinne Bagish

The Mercury Lounge hosted a show last Saturday (April 05) involving three NYC bands we have been following closely in the last few months – and a fourth one called Jeremy & the Harlequins that (having generated 80k+ views with the recently released video streaming below) SHOULD have been under our radar. Well, better late than never!

Twintapes got the Mercury Lounge audience to put on dancing shoes at their show this Friday, with another Deli favorite, paris_monster as the opener. Both bands pride themselves on playing rather complex electronic music without relying on the help of onstage laptops – although paris_monster’s “third member,” a sultry analog sequencer, often fills out their sound with an arpeggiator pulsing behind their live drums. Twintapes transported the audience with their peculiar tunes that sound a little like a chilled-out version of disco, drenching their synths in effects, and combining them with soulful, wise sounding melodies and up-tempo but sparse drum grooves.

After the synth bands had their say, a radical change of scenario: two groups of guys with slick back hair, aviators, leather jackets and plain white T-s (recent Deli Artist of The Month The Bothers and Jeremy & the Harlequins) strolled in and begun to set up for their anachronistic set. Both devoted to revisiting the Rock & Roll and Rockabilly sounds and antics, the bands recycled the genres’ signature tricks, stop-times and familiar chord progressions, revitalizing them with a punk-esque attitude in the drumming and vocal departments. For those who like me stayed through the night, the aforementioned dancing shoes came handy for a friendly round of moshing! – Paul Jordan Talbot

We added this song to The Deli’s playlist of Best Alt Rock/Revival Rock songs by emerging NYC artists – check it out!

Christine Hoberg impressed mightily on her 2011 release "Moonlight Never Shined So Bright" with its bluesy, minimalist instrumentation showcasing her considerable songwriting chops and fragile-but-effective vocals. Having spent the intervening period collaborating with artists such as Flight Facilities and Kiings (she describes the last year as a huge learning curve), this February she released follow-up and fourth album overall, "World Within," which stretched the Brooklyn resident’s sound, testing new areas ranging from ambient to soul. You can experience her sparse, intimately experimental music at Cake Shop on April 7

LINKS: Dean Van Nguyen’s interview with Christine Hoberg.

Blues rock duo Slim Wray, which is Ryan Houser (guitar/vocals) and Chris Moran (drums/backing vocals), is all about reviving what rock is supposed to be. Their debut album "Sack Lunch" was released late in 2013, featuring their rockin’, grungy single ‘Bear,’ which was enough to get our attention. Their sound mimics that of what would be an early Nirvana/Jack White mix with a little more positivity. For a two-piece garage band, their loud energy can transform a live venue into an atomic explosion of punk, power-blues and grunge. You can experience this at Hank’s Saloon on April 16.

LINKS – Michael Haskoor interview with Slim Wray.

With charm, sophistication, and epic runs as bold as any Classical chamber ensemble, guitar duo Threefifty have managed to carve out a unique world entirely their own. It can be difficult to think of an instrument that’s been explored as thoroughly as the acoustic guitar, but this group has somehow found new frontiers to open up on their latest record ‘collapses,’ merging minimalism with EDM and bluegress together like they were there all the time. It’s a surprising journey into a secret world, occupied with lush textures and unexpected harmonic exchanges between two kindred spirits. Check out the video for ‘Drive (feat. Cuso Fresh)’ below. – Mike Levine (@Goldnuggets)

This band submitted their music for coverage here.

There must be a reason why electronic bands are more prone to embrace dark and mysterious atmospheres than – say – acoustic ones. Maybe it’s a legacy of the feelings most humans experienced when they heard electronic instruments for the first time: puzzlement, incredulity, fear of a future dominated by robots! Of course, in the new millennium nobody reacts that way to even the most sophisticated of electronic devices, but tons of electro bands keep making music that ranges from the suspenseful to the apocalyptic. That’s exactly the range where Brooklyn’s WOLVVES find their comfort zone, and the band has no problem admitting it, stating on their bandcamp page that their debut 2013 EP ‘Feed the Hand that Bites’ is "Inspired by darkness, predators, loneliness, ghost twins and the eternal wistfulness of platonic love." Single "It Speaks" is a rather terrifying track where whispered vocals are stalked by unsettling electronic parts, something that "speaks," and – appropriately enough – howling wolves. "A Breath Away" (streaming) is a less bizarre, beautifully written and executed electro-pop-goth song, that illustrates how this band might actually go places without the need of too many gimmicks. Check them out live if you like theatrical sets.

We added this song to The Deli’s playlist of Best Electronic songs by emerging NYC artists – check it out!