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

Having formed back in 2000, Prewar Yardsale surely earned the title of mainstays of NYC’s often overlooked anti-folk movement, and their latest release keeps faith to their aesthetics. Earlier this summer they released the ‘Black and Blue’ EP (streaming below), a five track sampling of eccentric lo-fi folk songs. The record channels Prewar Yardsale’s punk, folk, and psych-rock influences all over the tracks, and has its grungiest peak in the titular opener, "black and blue", and perhaps its folkiest one in "where did you go". Next week (Sunday, August 9th) you can catch them live at Pianos along with fellow grunge alt-rock acts Jackal Onassis, The Dirty Blondes, Baby Acid, and Second Still. – Sam O’Hara

The project of Gabe Smoller and Freddie Wyss, Trash Gendar is a Brooklyn based band with a puzzling and probably questionable name (in particular for a country that’s been growing super-oversensitive like ours) and a very interesting sound. In debut EP ‘Mass Canon,’ released in March of 2015, you’ll find something new (in the shape of inventive, atmospheric elec-tric/tronic arrangements) and something old (in the shape of recurring Americana influences). In the record’s six songs, various genres, ranging from psych rock to country, math rock and ambient, are combined to create that new, modern, ‘melting pot’ music that we at The Deli – for lack of a better word – call ‘Avant-Indie.’ The experiment reaches remarkable results with single ‘Tunnel,’ streaming below, which sounds a little like the (hot) bastard child of Tortoise and Radiohead. Trash Gendar will be playing The Cobra Club (6 Wyckoff Ave) on August 6. (Don’t tell your trash, it may not like that moniker).

This artist submitted music for coverage here.

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

Now in its 6th year, Out In the Streets Festival is back in action to bring your favorite indie bands to Queens for a weekend of art, food, fun, and music. Hosted at the historic Onderdonk House in Ridgewood, the outdoor fest is the smaller, DIY version of all the big summer music festivals that have competed for your attention and presence in the past few months. Since it began on a street corner in Bushwick in 2009, Out In the Streets has kept itself homegrown and independent but continues to grow every year, celebrating local artists and eateries in this two-day multimedia festival. The lineup includes bands like Mr Twin Sister, Total Slacker, The Love Supreme, Wild Yaks, Salt Cathedral and many more. The bands performing this weekend are all mostly NYC-based, and the lineup on Sunday is featuring local bands from Bushwick and Ridgewood. Full weekend passes are still available for only $35, with one day tickets going for $20, on sale here. Check out a Spotify compilation of all the performing bands here, or streaming below. – Sam O’Hara

Alex Rehberg has been gaining steam in the world of hybrid bass music. His sound delves into the dark textures of drum and bass. Though it is at similar tempos to DnB, much of his work actually explores the half time rhythms. What he creates is sonically vast while maintaining a brooding minimalism. As one of the founding members of Sublimate, a local DJ collective, you can catch him playing live at various venues in town. The next Sublimate show coming up July 30th at The Branx features another PDX resident and crowd favorite, EPROM, as well as Charleroi based producer Alix Perez. This is sure to be a party so don’t miss out! – Nathaniel Clubine

On Thursday July 23rd, The Deli sponsored and helped book a Sofarsounds.com show in NYC. Since the Sofar Sounds shows are always secret, we couldn’t promote the participating bands, therefore we’ll take the opportunity to blog about them today.

The show was hosted in a beautiful apartment in Manhattan’s Battery City by the west river, with gorgeous view of New Jersey. NYC’s folk duo Laura & Greg – pictured above minutes before their performance – opened the show with their delicate and intimate songs, featuring a simple acoustic guitar and two way harmonies that took us back to the glorious days of Simon & Garfunkel. The band released a full length album entitled ‘Forever For Sure’ – you can stream the title track below.

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We were very familiar with the second band on the bill, since they performed at our Best of NYC Fest in June. The Cabana Kids played a stripped down set without giving up the electric guitar, a signature instrument of their dreamy, surf influenced sound. The absence of drums conveied a more folky vibe to their song, allowing their catchy melodies and harmonies to shine.

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Last on the bill, a duo we wrote about a few years ago and we recently re-discovered: Gracie and Rachel (in the top picture). After two guitar based, drumless acts, the two ladies switched things up a little, introducing the audience to their instruments: a piano, a violin, and a kick drum turned on its back, and taken care of by a (charming) dude. What followed could be described as some kind of avant-orchestral bliss: in this music, Gracie Coates’s peculiarly moody songwriting and percussive piano style feeds the imagination of Rachel Ruggles’ classically trained violin. The two also harmonized flawlessly on occasion, displaying an impressively well-rounded talent. Check out their latest single ‘Tiptoe,’ streaming below.

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

Nick Kinsey is the kind of musician who’s worn many hats throughout his career; he’s been a member of Diamond Doves, A.C. Newman, and AA Bondy, and has performed and recorded with the likes of My Morning Jacket, Bon Iver, and Cold War Kids. But the latest outfit from this multi-instrumentalist is a solo project simply called Kinsey, whose anticipated first album is very aptly titled, ‘My Loneliest Debut’. The first taste of the record – recorded in a chicken shack in upstate New York – was released through the single, "Get Lost" (streaming below), a psychedelic indie-pop tune with surprisingly confessional lyrics. The record will be released on September 18th, but in the meantime, you can catch him playing the (early) release show at Shea Stadium on August 6th.

Emerging in 2011 and sporting both stylish remixes and catchy originals, Operation Dankstar is dropping its newest album #Friendshipisthebestship this Friday, 7/24. The act comprises Michael Klicos and Corey King and the pair fully embrace their self-acknowleged genre of galactic disco, creating sounds running a veritable gamut of possibility. Playing with jazzy brass pieces, bass-laden dance beats, and crooning voice work, the tracks from the new album impress and surprise in tandem, making for a great release. –Jonathan Goodwin 

Brooklyn psych rockers Weird Owl (who’ve been around long enough to earn the title of "pillar of the local psychedelic scene") recently released their fourth album “Interstellar Skeletal.” Throughout the 9 tracks and nearly 45 minutes of music, the band covers an extensive range of neo-psychedelia, post-rock and alternative/indie. Highlight track “God” pulls a number of these elements together in the best possible way. Initially establishing an electro chill groove, the track’s pace moves along in ways reminiscent of Washed Out’s “Feel It All Around” (a track popularized as the theme song to Portlandia). A big, majestic guitar hook emerges, anchoring the track with an extra dose of memorability, while lyrics like “Can’t get any sleep – there’s noises and this heat” – quite relatable in this NYC summer – contribute to the song’s lynchian haziness. After one more ambient plateau the track continues to build towards a crescendo of snare shots, cymbal crashes and guitar blasts, creating a mayhem effect of epic proportions. The band is now preparing for a mid-September European tour. – Dave Cromwell

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

Though they coalesced in an unlikely way, the three-piece Puff Pieces has become quite a fixture in the DC noise and punk scenes, jamming their unusual lyrics and distortion straight to the joy centers of their fans’ brains. Rocking out together only for the last two years, their sound is crisp and coordinated and will certainly provide new listeners with an awesome live experience. You can catch them pursuing their energetically counterculture tack as the headliners at Union Arts on 8/12. -Jonathan Goodwin

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

This past spring, Brooklyn duo The Bright Smoke released their sophomore LP ‘Terrible Towns.’ Upon listening to the ominous, beat-stuttered opener “Hard Pander” and the church bell wistaria of second song “Like Video” (streaming below), we wereinstantly intrigued and quickly hooked. Band founder Mia Wilson’s brusque yet sonorous timbre pleasantly recalls both Portishead’s Beth Gibbons and Florence and the Machine’s titular singer while her lyrics strike of their own sharp beauty. “I don’t wear the sun so well these days/So never mind,” she sings on “Hard Pander,” displaying songwriting that is simultaneously elegant and moving. The Bright Smoke plays at The Mercury Lounge tonight (7/25). – Zach Weg

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