Serengeti’s solo debut Family and Friends is due out on July 19th from Anticon. The album finds Serengeti moving away from the style and sound he created with Polyphonic and now working closely with musicians like Yoni Wolf of Why?, Owen Ashworth (Advanced Base, Casiotone For The Painfully Alone), and Otouto as in the track below "Ha-Ha".

Their Ocean is a new indie soul group from Chicago consisting of Keith Kreuser aka K-Kruz and Jason Hunt. Jason and Keith met in marching band in 1991 at Evanston Township High School. Keith had a Living Colour tee shirt on and an alto saxaphone strapped around his skinny neck, Jason an INXS or They Might Be Giants shirt, therefore Keith will forever be cooler. They formed a bond musically and have written approximately 1 million songs, now they intend to share as many as possible with you.

The Hit Back’s session for Couch House Sounds was released today, and you can check it out here. The duo also did a great interview with CHIRP.

The band will be performing a live in-store at Saki (3716 W. Fullerton Ave) tomorrow at Saki with Fall Fox at 4pm.

Well it didn’t take long for Owen Ashworth (Casiotone for the Painfully Alone) to get back into the game. His new project is called Advance Base, and from the sounds of his first released track "Whirlaway The Horse" the sound is not drastically different. The song is courtesy the Chicago Mixtape Vol 13, and if you have not subscribed to that yet you need to today.

Advance Base will be performing at Schubas on May 18th with California’s The Donkeys and Algerbro.

The latest videos on Small Chicago come form The Heavy Bombers. They are such a solid live band and it shows in the three video posted over at Small Chicago. Punks not dead!

Our big Deli show is tomorrow night at Empty Bottle with Secret Colours, Dastardly, Soft Speaker, and Canasta. Matt Priest of Canasta was kind enough to answer a few of our questions and he promoted the show and prepared to rock the Empty Bottle. You can read our interview here and order your tickets for the show here.

Company of Thieves perform their new single, "Death of Communication" (3/15), live at Navy Pier in this new video. They also have an interview up at Filter Magazine. Their new album, Running From A Gamble, comes out May 17th.

The band is performing a live in-store at the downtown FYE (26 East Randolph St) on May 17th. For fans that attend that performing FYE is giving the album away for free if you can find the coupon.

Jon Drake & The Shakes are performing with The Singleman Affair and Holly Golightly and the Brokeoffs this Friday, May 13th at Beat Kitchen. The band will be releasing their debut LP this fall on Grape Juice Records so you can expect to hear some new tunes. The put together the video below to promote the show.

Gyspyblood recently appeared on New York’s Breakthrough Radio prior to their performance at Bowery Ballroom with Maps and Atlases. The band performed several tracks from their debut album Cold In The Guestway.

I just stumbled upon this band, and I really enjoy what they put up on their bandcamp page. A little garage, a little, and really enjoyable.

You can check out Box Jellyfish at The Whistler on May 26th.

The day is finally here, and Urge Overkill has released Rock & Roll Submarine their first album in over 15 years. To celebrate the band has released a new track from the album for us to stream. "Mason/Dixon” is the first track from the new album. The band has announced their partnership with Groupees, who will be selling the Rock&Roll Submarine with a “pay what you want” model ($2 min, $7 suggested) for the next 72 hours – click HERE to take advantage of the offer. 10% of all donations will go to MusiCares.

Urge Overkill will be performing at Bottom Lounge on May 20th.