On Saturday, January 14, Black Taxi celebrated their sophomore album, “We Don’t Know Any Better,” at Bowery Ballroom with the support of The Attic Ends, Austin’s Bright Light Social Hour, Lights Resolve, in a sold out venue. Around midnight, the stage went dark, and the men of the hour snuck on stage. Illumination returned and revealed Ezra Huleatt’s body paint of multi-colored hand prints and glitter, which was later sprinkled over the audience, and feathery accessories, as the band launched into an "oldie but goodie," "Don’t Count Me Out." Black Taxi touched on favorites from their first album, “Things of That Nature,” backed by a full horn section, the highlight being "Up Here for Thinking, Down There for Dancing," during which two generous Kickstarter contributors smashed guitars on stage and Huleatt scaled and leaped off the stage holding an umbrella (Think rock star Mary Poppins.). Frantic dancing, wild jumping, and enthused shouting broke out and escalated with the new record’s electro- breakdown-centric "Friend," perky "Do What you Gotta Do," goosebump-inducing "Vultures," and grooving, must-hear title track. An unforgettable night, Black Taxi outdo themselves every show, and fans can only wait with bated breath ‘til the next one comes around. –Meijin Bruttomesso

After 12 days of voting, the wondrous, female driven, rootsy-pop band Lucius was voted by Deli readers and music fans as The Deli’s Best Emerging NYC Artist of 2011. We’ve been big fans of this group since we first booked them at our B.E.A.F. party in May 2011 – we recommend you to see them live at The Mercury Lounge on January 25, they put together one of the most fun live shows in town.

In the last couple of months we’ve been talking a lot about Stephie Koplan & The Pedestrian, a female fronted pop rock band with tons of potential that recently moved from New England to the NYC area. Their recent video of their power pop single "Jerk!" – inspired to the atmospheres of the TV show "Madmen" – casts singer Stephie as an adorably sassy housewife and was featured by Spinner as their "Video of the Day" in December. They placed second in our fans’ and readers’ poll.

A band we haven’t covered before, Brothers – 3rd in this poll – play Rock’n’Roll drenched in southern twang (and probably also Jack Daniels). The band is currently putting the final touches on their debut full length, but if you are in the mood for an unpretentious and in your face rock party, don’t wait any longer and check them out live – or at least watch this teaser of their single "Real Long Way to Go".

Big kudos also to Futurist and Merrily & the Poison Orchard, respectively 4th and 5th. Here’s the Readers’ and Fans Poll Top 20, full results here.

The overall results of our Year End Poll (including jurors’ and Deli writers’ votes) will be released very soon, stay tuned!

ARTIST VOTES   1 Lucius 1241 2 Stephie Coplan & the Pedestrians 1071 3 Brothers 964 4 Futurist 695 5 Merrily & the Poison Orchard 362 6 Chappo 289 7 Motive 272 8 Sinem Saniye 265 9 Hurrah! A Bolt of Lght! 239 10 Big Wilson River 234 11 Exemption 213 12 Apollo Run 203 13 Mal Blum 196 14 Bugs in the Dark 189 15 Deathrow Tull 170 16 Motherfeather 153 17 My Pet Dragon 150  18 Snowmine 134 19 Monogold 128 20 The Third Wheel Band 115

Instrumental avant-prog NJ based band Delicate Steve are currently putting the final touches on their sophomore album, due out later this year. After playing Webster Hall with Cult on Thursday, they will be playing a number of shows around SXSW and will be joined by Janka Nabay and the Bubu Gang as direct support on most dates.

Oh boy… this friggin’ poll is so much work it becomes almost surreal… know what I mean? But we are getting there folks! We just uploaded the full list of artists nominated for our Best of NYC 2011 Poll for Emerging Artists. It’s in the right column here and also on this beautiful page that sums up what happened in 2011 here at The Deli NYC. Some bands in the list were selected through a submission process (see NYC genre results in the post below) and some others were picked by our jury of local scene-makers (list below), who could freely choose 3 bands each in order of preference. Points were already assigned to each band according to how well they did in the selection process. Now the readers’ and fans’ votes will also influence the final chart. Each vote will count!

THE COVER OF THE DELI IS THE PRIZE
And of course… the winner of the overall poll (i.e. the final chart including the votes from our jury, our writers and the readers and fan’s poll) will be featured on the cover of the spring 2012 issue of The Deli Magazine!

LIST OF JURORS: Alex Rossiter (Webster Hall), Andy Bodor (Cake Shop), Billy Jones (Pianos), Bowery Electric bookers, Brandon Haas (BMI), Carlye Wisel & Donald Rasmussen (Big Yellow Couch), Chris Diaz (Knitting Factory), Christopher R. Weingarten (The Village Voice), Claire McNamara (OhMyRockness), David Teller (Bird Dog Productions), Douglas DeFalco (Southpaw), Heath Miller (Excess db), Heather Dunsmoor (The Bell House) , Jamie Dominguez (SESAC), Jennifer Gilson (The Living Room), Jify Shah (Cameo), John J. Hagan (Sycamore), Karen Soskin (Other Music), Katherine Coates (Delancey), Marc Emert-Hutner (ASCAP), Matt McDonald (CMJ), Max Brennan (Lit Lounge), , Paolo De Gregorio (The Deli), Rami Haykal (Popgun Booking) , Sebastian Freed (Bowery Presents), Steve Trimboli (Goodbye Blue Monday), Zack Dinerstein (Spike Hill).

The Deli’s Staff

We are getting there folks! We just uploaded the full list of artists nominated for our Best of Nashville 2011 Poll for Emerging Artists. It’s in the right column on this same page and also HERE, where you can actually vote. Some bands in the list were selected through a submission process and some others were picked by our jury of local scene-makers, who could freely choose 3 bands each in order of preference. Points were already assigned to each band according to how well they did in the selection process. Now the readers’ and fans’ votes will also influence the final chart. Each vote will count!

The Deli’s Staff

Paradox has always been a main ingredient in rock music – a genre always flirting with both punk rebellion and the "conformity" of pop culture. NY/NJ based band Candy Hearts perfectly embodies this dichotomy through a punkish, gritty power trio sound, sweetened by Mariel Loveland’s adorable girlish voice. The band released its debut full length "Everything’s Amazing & Nobody’s Happy" in 2011 and it’s been touring extensively since then. They just announced a February tour with Man Overboard.

On Matt Cranstoun‘s The Last Drop of Color, you’ll learn a lot about trains. From describing the exits in New Jersey in ‘These Tires,’ to the righteous indignation of ‘Disgrace,’ there’s a lot of comings and goings throughout. But all of these trains find their way back up to Cranstoun’s adopted city of Brooklyn eventually. A homespun poet with a gift for the kind of Americana that Springsteen used to bring, Cranstoun is etching the gospel to New York’s buildings and leaving us with some endearing experiences as naked as his revealing shot on the album’s cover. This is an artist whose power comes from his range, showing on ‘Aint Dead Yet’ that he can handle funk and blues as well as he tears down the rafters in album opener ‘5th Street Lights.’ Get Matt’s latest at his bandcamp and you’ll find yourself traveling too. – Mike Levine

Having resided in New York City for the better part of ten years now, it was a triumphant homecoming for the sister duo known as The Pierces as they played two sold out shows at The Mercury Lounge last week. Allison and Catherine Pierce (and their band) presented a set that was weighted more heavily with songs from their most recent release, "You & I." Sprinkled amongst those, however, were a number of classic tracks from earlier albums as well. Opening Thursday’s show with Catherine’s "Love You More," they hit the ground running, delivering those trademark harmonies on the rising chorus. Working their way through an hour long set, other highlights included Catherine’s "Drag You Down," which weaves a lyrical tale of excessive weekends, poorly matched lovers and "just another role that you do." Allison introduced her heart tugging song about "dating another musician" stating that "we don’t really recommend that" which elicited audience chuckles – before launching into the stark, haunting, acoustic guitar driven "I Put Your Records On." Naturally the co-written single "Kissing You Goodbye" was very well received, as was their Pretty Little Liars TV show theme song "Secret." For the two song encore, the singers took the stage minus any instruments at all and delivered a perfect acapella version of Simon & Garfunkel’s "Cathy’s Song," which they stated they’ve been singing together since their early youth. They followed that will a full band version of the vampish, going-out-on-the-town but nothing satisfies showstopper "Boring." A fitting, if somewhat inaccurate closer, as these artists are anything but that. – Dave Cromwell

We are getting there folks! We just uploaded the full list of artists nominated for our Best of New England 2011 Poll for Emerging Artists. It’s in the right column on this same page and also HERE, where you can actually vote. Some bands in the list were selected through a submission process and some others were picked by our jury of local scene-makers, who could freely choose 3 bands each in order of preference. Points were already assigned to each band according to how well they did in the selection process. Now the readers’ and fans’ votes will also influence the final chart. Each vote will count!

The Deli’s Staff

We are getting there folks! We just uploaded the full list of artists nominated for our Best of DC Area 2011 Poll for Emerging Artists. It’s in the right column on this same page and also on this beautiful page that sums up what happened in 2011 here at The Deli DC. Some bands in the list were selected through a submission process (see previous post about it) and some others were picked by our jury of local scene-makers (list below), who could freely choose 3 bands each in order of preference. Points were already assigned to each band according to how well they did in the selection process. Now the readers’ and fans’ votes will also influence the final chart. Each vote will count!

This year’s awesome jury consists of Crooked Beat’s Bill, Cale Jr., Catherine Lewis, David Hintz, Denman Anderson, He Wang, Jimmy Rhodes, Josh Sisk, Kelly Green, Mark Mangold, Megan Petty, Metal Chris, Nestor Diaz, Shauna Alexander, and Will McCrory.

The Deli’s Staff