Sextile’s eagerly awaited debut album A Thousand Hands releases tomorrow, but you can still stream it on Line of Best Fit if you can’t wait. That said, it’s an amazing set of songs that blends post-punk with jarring industrial and abrasive surf punk elements. We first caught a glimpse of these guys late-June with the premiere of "Can’t Take It". Signed by local label felte Records, whose international roster also includes Flaamingos, The KVB, and Lushes, Sextile spent the earlier part of their summer supporting Australian dreamgaze Au.Ra for a West Coast tour, giving listeners an early taste of their sonic visions. 

The band will celebrate A Thousand Hands with a Part Time Punks album release party August 27th, supported by Terminal A and Big Debbie at the Non Plus Ultra. Listen to "Visions of You" from the album below. – Ryan Mo

The androgynous alter ego of Andrew Clinco (Marriages, Black Mare), Deb DeMure, is not drag — bluntly put, it’s a genderfuck medium that channels a windfall of ideas. The occult scholar sees DeMure’s physical manifestation as an oracle for Drab Majesty, a growing collection of self-produced music bearing marks of late ’80s dreampop, new wave, and post-punk. The project’s newest album Careless envelops listeners with modulating guitars, grand cathedral reverb, and effected baritone vocals that hearken back to acts like Asylum Party, Xymox, Cocteau Twins — gothically elaborate, it coalesces the masculine and feminine, the Abrahamic and the arcane. And DeMure takes no credit for the songs’ conception.

Says Clinco in a Noisey interview: "We’re just vessels channeling these ideas and making sense of them."

Drab Majesty performs at the LA Psych Fest on September 20th with JJUUJJUU, Earthless, Litronix, and more. Listen to "Everything Is Sentimental" off the newest album Careless, with a second vinyl pressing on Dais Records early October. – Ryan Mo

Surf pop sinew meets Dinosaur Jr. soul in San Fernando Valley’s newest alt-rock incarnation Grave School. Despite making a quiet entrance into the scene, this band has been in the works for a long time: singer/guitarist Gina Almaguer (Sheer) met drummer Aldo Felix (ACxDC, Human Garbage) online through mutual friends about two years ago.

"Grave School has technically been in the making since late 2013, when me and Aldo first started jamming — just the two of us."

Their busy schedules gave the project slow momentum, but patience has its virtues — Aldo and Gina also found able bodies from their circles: Daniel Castro (guitar/vox), Marisa Shirar (bass/vox), and Gilbert "Guzie" Guzman (Nomads, Sleepwalkers). Self-described as a pop-oriented, even cheesy, fun band, the vocals of Marisa, Daniel, and Gina (yes, they all sing) lifts listeners with ’60s guitar jangle before burying them in six feet of dirtbox distortion. 

Grave School released their debut EP via Bandcamp earlier this month, and will play their first show at the Ventura Music Factory on September 17th, supporting Choir Vandals (St. Louis) with Papertowns. (Phoenix) and Living Ghosts (Oxnard). Take note, and check out the first song "Clutch" to their EP below. – Ryan Mo

Itching for a sober trip? Pehrspace is hosting PRISM PIPE, a visual music event curated every third Monday of the month by The Current Sea and Screaming Claws. Since last year, PRISM PIPE has enjoyed moderate success as one of the few audio/visual showcases persisting in LA’s DIY scene — notable artists include: Electric Soundbath, GreyGhost, and Earth Pitch.

This Monday night, [PHYSICS] will be creating stereophonic conjurations live with video art by The Current Sea and Ang Wilson. Since 2011, [PHYSICS] has championed analog atmospherics and retrofuturist synthwave, even venturing into some vaporwave grooves in 2013’s "Not Even Real" EP. His newest album Only Forever is a straight immersive sound art experience, dropping listeners into modular valleys, oscillating caverns, and pulsating cybernetic organisms. Pair this with tagteam visualizations of digital artists Brian Griffith + Sarah Zucker and Ang Wilson (Electric Soundbath) and you have one of the LA’s most pleasurable sensory overloads for the summer. Seriously; you don’t want to miss this. 

Audiences will be promptly saturated with color and sound at 9:00 pm for one solid hour, so come early TONIGHT (doors open at 8:30 pm). Listen to "Only Forever", the first track off [PHYSICS]’ album below. – Ryan Mo

From down the end of Los Angeles, the barebones gravepunk duo Band Aparte strips down and combines elements of gothic rock, synthpunk, and beachy lo-fi as macabré appreciation simmers in the gut of the city.

Vocalist Brian Mendoza effortlessly channels Joy Division and Nick Cave, crooning into a death bouquet with his shirt unbuttoned. But he’s not doing it to imitate Morrissey’s aesthetic — Band Aparte’s shows are fast and fierce, and the crowd works up a sweat at every venue they play. Josh Hensley’s psychotic textures gnaw and bite at the ears, from sharp velcro fuzz to buoyant modulations that pair with relentless drum machine beats like deliriants to narcotics. It’s a dangerous mixture that has crushed nights alongside Cruelty Code, Roses, Ghost Noise, and Terminal A.

Find Band Aparte this Saturday at Echo Park Rising — playing 4:30pm at Lot 1 Café. Listen to their eponymous track from their EP "Enter" below. – Ryan Mo

Sacred Destinies‘s dulcet boy-girl harmonies come as a surprise to many, even the duo. The band’s origin: Charlyne Yi and Jet Elfman were previously of far more aggressive bands — she was the singer of garage-punk outfit The Rangdangs, and he was guitarist/vocalist in the Angelean experimental indie flavored Wide Streets. They both yelled. A lot.

"I had no idea that he had the most angelic voice in the whole world till we jammed one night," says Charlyne.

Soon after a new band was formed. Synth and guitar intertwined as voice carried voice into the beginnings of a folk sound far different from the duo’s previous bands. Jet already knew their name.

"I had so much fun playing music with him, I jokingly asked, "What’s our band called?" And without any hesitation he looked back at me and answered, "Sacred Destinies," like he had known for an eternity."

With only one song finished and a gig set in Colorado, Jet and Charlyne threw together a ragtag tour, pushing themselves to write more songs together. Somewhere along the way, things got weird and magical.

"Jet also found a glowing sword at the bottom of a swamp where I was drowning, he taught me to swim, we used the magic sword to slay some monsters and save a sandwich from an evil sorcerer, which we shared after our great adventure."

Sacred Destinies are currently in recording sessions, having played on numerous occasions at The Smell and Pehrspace. Their prowess is also featured in the musical score for Bobcat Goldthwait’s recent documentary of comedian Barry Crimmins: Call Me Lucky. Listen to the hauntingly beautiful demo "Storks and Mosquitos", a first taste of more to come. – Ryan Mo, photo credit: Melissa Ramirez

Cindy Sukrattawong is one integral third of surfpunky Dustin and the Explosions. She causes a ruckus on the regular, trading dirty guitar licks and bass fills with Mike Trejo. But on her spare time, Cindy is strips down the guitar tone to its most basic form, harvesting acoustic timbres for her instrumental project Littlest Sister. Backed by drummer Evan Piehler (also part of D & the E’s), the duo’s sounds rolls like a summer wind with its rising and falling rhythms, with cascading strums that ease into a soft lull. Emotionally dynamic, Littlest Sister offers listeners a peak of the greatest heights for the heart to soar in the intimate expanse of its wordless narratives.

Watch their first official music video "Begin Again" below, and find the song on their self-titled debut, available on local microlabel Bed Weather Records. – Ryan Mo

Angel Deradoorian’s bass, keys and vocals have notably lifted the Brooklyn-based experimental outfit Dirty Projectors and Avey Tare’s Slasher Flicks, not to mention the songs she’s collab’d with Vampire Weekend, Flying Lotus, Matmos, and on. She’s oft seen live performing the duties of two or more musicians, a real testament to her skill as musician.

Her new project, christened Deradoorian, is a several-year long craft first received in 2009’s Mind Raft EP. It was lauded by tastemakers for its sensuality and adept layering. Almost six years later, the fruits of her labor are ripe for the picking. Listen to Deradoorian’s newest track "Komodo", off her debut album The Expanding Flower Planet. Organs, clavichords, brass patches and vocal overdubs join, depart, and reconcile in this cautionary song about the komodo dragon fusing worldly styles with harmonic artifice. 

The Expanding Flower Planet is set to release August 21 via Anticon Records. Get a live taste on September 22nd when she performs at the Echo with Stereolab’s Laetitia Sadier. – Ryan Mo, photo credit: Bennet Perez

Linafornia is the pseudonym of a stalwart beat maker from Leimert Park who’s been at it since 2014, earning her stripes from the revered Beat Cinema and open mic workshop Project Blowed. Raised in a city of musical innovators like Nocando and Open Mike Eagle, the bar is set high for any musician making a name out of the culturally rich LA neighborhood.

But lo-fi elbow grease and deep cuts of soul & funk are the marks of LP talent, and Linafornia’s got all the makings of a producer, hitting the ground running with shows at the Low End Theory and PasswordLA. In her growing repertoire you’ll find cloudy, washed-out abstractions alongside jazz flows, inspired by Ras G, Dibiase, and Samiyam. Her recent collab with Compton’s geekster rapper DeviWonder is just a sampling of the magic this woman is capable of, and we can’t wait to hear more! Linafornia’s first major project, code-named YUNG, is currently underway and will be out in the future by Dome of Doom (Alpha Pup Records).

Listen to her newest track, "Wetttt" on Soundcloud below, and see her live on August 10th at Silverlake’s Hyperion Tavern. – Ryan Mo

The Mynabirds‘ third album Lovers Know is set for a summer release, and it’s a miles away from what you’d expect of singer/multi-instrumentalist Laura Burhenn. Seven years out from her indie pop stint as Georgie James, Burhenn’s newest art rock exploration, Lovers Know, melds her love for ’60s psych with the found stylings of her musical sojourn.

Her first step as The Mynabirds carried the spirit of her 2004 debut: 2010’s What We Lose In The Fire We Gain In The Flood was a hearty bite of lyricism and melody, carefully propped by acousmatic flakes. Two years after, the sophomore GENERALS mixed Arcade Fire/Vampire Weekend textures and rhythms with 80’s synth soundscapes. Now, the songs of Lovers Know effortlessly weave pop truths through all-manner of effects, with a strong affection for brisk percussion and yesteryear frequencies.

Lovers Know will be out August 7th on Saddle Creek Records — get a first-listen on NPR Music and pre-order your copy now. Burhenn and the gang are playing a free show at the Santa Monica Pier with Ariel Pink on August 20th, too. – Ryan Mo

You’re invited to celebrate Electro-house producers Bee’s Knees "Variety Pack" EP release party this Thursday at Hollywood’s Sound Nightclub with Ardency and Shaun Frank, presented by apparel and promotions company EFE — $1 of each ticket sale goes directly to Education Through Music-Los Angeles to help keep music programs in LA schools.

Bee’s Knees members Aaron Spiro and Adam Novodor have a long history dating back to their teenage years. "We met in highschool and just started making music together for fun. It then just felt like we should make music together more and more…it was pretty natural." Their influences scale nu-disco and electro-funk — fans of the DFA Records roster will find Bee’s Knees irresistible.

"Variety Pack", released by record label Sexy Electric, includes the newest song "Old School" which features vocals from Los Angeles’ nu-disco wunderkind MONOGEM. Listen to it below and download it for free on Soundcloud. – Ryan Mo

The extremely chill volunteer-run collective OC DIY is throwing an early evening show tonight as Seattle’s grungy/gazey trio Where My Bones Rest Easy make their way through Fullerton with their newest 12" Exercises In Futility. On support: the extremely loud, extremely brutal Hemet outfit Crisis Arm and the feedback junkies Airs, who are both playing early on. Punk from the Uplands MAMMOTH warm up the stage for WMBRE, with Long Beach’s kawaii post-hardcore quartet Struckout closing the night. It’s gonna get heavy tonight at Fullerton’s skate shop Programme HQ with all kinds of Fugazi/Smashing Pumpkins/MBV-inspired sounds — remember to respect the space and respect the bands. 5bux cover to support the touring band, flyer art by Sophia Zarders. – Ryan Mo