No, you didn’t just turn the dial to a Malian pop station. This is Outside, a collective heavily in debt to many of the once regional, now internationally-borrowed styles hailing from Africa’s fertile Ivory Coast. Now among Tanlines and Restless People, you can count Outside among the adherents. With a persistent bounce directing the way forward in summery jams like ‘Solarize’ and ‘Portals,’ Outside’s newly minted EP marks an easy vibe to dance to, with songs large enough to match the energy.

This band submitted their music digitally here.

Mike Levine (@Goldnuggets)

Oh, the things we’ll do for women. Lines like this: "I’ll remember the summer as the summer I was taking steroids cuz you like a man with muscles," speaks to the travails of a man in love, set to a cringe-worthy degree of honesty. But The Front Bottoms make it work on a level of nerdiness that most guys can (sadly) relate to all too easily. Like a cross between They Might Be Giants and Why?, Childhood friends guitarist/singer Brian Sella and drummer-bullhornist Mathew Uychich tear across a range of emotional outbursts on tracks like ‘Father’ and ‘Looking Like You Just Woke Up.’ Their self-titled debut (Bar/None) exposes these ups and downs through a maze of punk and folk influences easy to approach, but difficult to wrap your head around. These competing influences might be best on display in their video for ‘Maps,’ which includes hometown NJ farm scenery, Williamsburg street corners, and the band’s Econoline tour bus, all placed next to one another as fodder for noisy tantrums and undeniably catchy keyboard riffs. Self-destructive and assuredly creative, this band just might be their own steroids. See them at the Knitting Factory April 22nd with The Menzingers.

Mike Levine (@Goldnuggets)

Electro-Rock NYC duo Tiny Victories is throwing a party on April 19th at Williamsburg’s Public Assembly to celebrate the release of the "Those of Us Still Alive" EP (streaming below). The show features some other bright NYC bands, all flirting to some extent with electronic sounds, including North Highlands, Dinowalrus, and Slam Donahue. Get your tickets in advance here and get ready to party the night away! – Amanda Dissinger

Seasons come, seasons go… and Jesse B Marchant (JBM) weathers the storms of them all. After returning from a long tour abroad, Merchant decided to let loose his growing disillusionment with ‘Stray Ashes,’ a sober meditation on winter’s pain in stark contrast to the fireworks of his summery debut, ‘Not Even in July.’ With his chilling baritone and campfire-ready guitar, this record could only have been put together in a cabin in the Catskills, where he built an impressive record of new material with only his instrument, his muse to guide him… And a few hundred geese to keep him company. Songs like ‘Ferry’ and ‘Only Now’ connect his new path to the somber trail he’s carved out so far, and the percussive accents on new single ‘Winter Ghosts’ offer a glimpse at a new direction for an artist discovering a voice built for all seasons. First single ‘Winter Ghosts’ is available now from NPR. Stream it here and see him when he plays Mercury Lounge with Damien Jurado on May 19th.

Mike Levine (@Goldnuggets)

Some artists take years to finally reach a point where they’re ready to handle a headlining tour. But for Rachel Platten, it took the success of just one single, her ultra-catchy ‘1000 Ships,’ to catch the ears of her growing audience. This earned her slots opening for artists like David Cook and The Fray. Now after supporting these big acts in their national tours, Platten is headlining her own sojourn across the states. With the catchy wistfulness of songs like ‘Overwhelmed’ and ‘Nothing Ever Happens,’ Rachel aims to spread the love of her debut ‘Be Here’ over the next several months. Opening will be the mysterious and sensuous Madi Diaz. No New York dates have been announced yet, but she’ll be heading back home in June, so be sure and catch her then.

Mike Levine (@Goldnuggets)

Not Blood Paint might be The Beatles of glam rock. Seth, Mark, George and Joe can each claim equal credit when it comes to the toothy electricity of their cultish and creepy dance rock. See them live and you feel your eyes pulled from one member’s blood-soaked choreography to the next, never quite deciding who the leader is… which is exactly how some of the best cults function. This kind of representative democracy, a liability in local acts with less personality, is a major asset on NBP’s self-released debut full-length.

Taken together, the sum of their parts means full-throttle vocals, dueling guitar lines, and inspirational one-liners like ‘I want your daughter’ from opener ‘Maxwell’s Daughter.’ But that’s not all they want.’ ‘La Normalidad’ is about as epic as you could reasonably expect a record to climb. ‘Watch Your Mouth’ propels you headfirst into their demented little world, before leaving you to wander alone in its wilderness. ‘The Shape of a Brain’ and the 9 minute ‘Triple bypass’ similarly compete for interesting ways to trick metalheads into dancing.

Most of these are songs forged in the fire of their tremendous live performances, so you’ll be sure to hear previously released crowd favorites ‘Tommy’ and ‘Army’ on here as well. The album has a very live sound in fact. Guitarist Joe Stratton kept the focus on the band with his production, and things don’t depart much from what this band usually brings directly from their amps, with certain exceptions. ‘Birdstrike,’ somewhat a departure from the rest of the record, takes the listener to a space between Strawberry Fields and Marc Bolan with it’s swirling echoes and cross-talk banter, and the anthemic ‘Shooter’ gets re-made to sound like you’re overhearing a private conversation from the band while attending some late night dance party in hell (trust me).

This is a band that firmly occupies their own space, and apparently they have the money to stay there. Evidenced by their Spanish-speaking billionaire philanthropist Poncio Vicario, who alone funded their album premiere show last weekend. Apparently, ‘La Normalidad’ is named for a research center of the same name that is investigating the power of orgones as a means to fuel clean energy. So ummm….. try thinking about all that next time you trip out to ‘Solar Body.’

See them when you can (next show at The Studio on April 11th) and check out their record here. – Mike Levine (@goldnuggets)

For their full-length debut “Dare Me,” Oh! My Blackbird explore sweet folk pop melodies, creating a sound that’s inspired without being referential. “Dare Me” is not only both brooding and upbeat, but simple while still carrying the weight of heartache and let downs. And the NYC trio’s musical background of jazz, classical, and, of course, folk is manifested throughout each song. Oh! My Blackbird’s force comes through the sincerity in the vocals of Annie Sullivan and Verionca Kohl, which play agaisnt the energy of bassist and cellist Nick Jozwiak. The band will next appear at the “Dare Me” release party at Pete’s Candy Shop of April 7. – Devon Anotnetti

Brooklyn based “pop cock-rock” band, Mother Feather, played Santos Party House on March 28^th, along with a number of unconventional groups. The openers for the evening, Dolchnakov Brigade, set a wild tone for the night, handing out onions while having a gas masked man rub the pungent vegetables against members of the audience. When Mother Feather took the stage the crowd was ready for anything and Ann Courtney’s sequined and flower-chested dress kept the audience hypnotized.  The third song of the night, “Beach House” off their recently released EP displayed a softer and more pop-driven side to the group, but Courtney made sure to complement every moment of vulnerability with raw energy and spit water into the audience twice, screaming and writhing. The song “Trampoline” had the crowd jumping and dancing (rare for a NYC show) and mimicking the singers’ dance moves. The power, precision, punk and glam of this group makes their live performance incredible, but manages to also translate well to their studio polished EP because of such insatiably catchy vocals and beats. – Chelsea Eriksen

MP3: Mother Feather – Trampoline

Crafting catchy lo-fi indie rock songs in the vein of Pavement and Lemonheads, recent Deli Artist of the Month The Can’t Tells released their latest self-titled album in February via their bandcamp and since then have been performing all over Manhattan and Brooklyn. The trio’s simple approach to indie rock music (and killer live show) makes them easy to instantly connect with and get excited by, which is rare for a new band. Their newest EP will be self-released later in the year, but the band put out the single from it, entitled "Lying to Myself, streaming below. See these at The Delancey on April 4th with Boveda, Zula, The Regulars, or at The Deli’s B.E.A.F. fest in late May. – Read Amanda Dissinger’s interview with the band here.

There was a time, largely consigned to memory now, when lead guitar players were not like the rest of us. They were gods; long-haired supermen who strode over the sod with giant platform shoes, despoiling women and melting faces with equal impunity. Thunder crashed in their wake and lightning burst forth from their guitars. The plucking of but a few mere notes by an experienced lead guitarist was enough to summon beasts to defy description, demons from the very banks of the River Styx, and, in some cases, The Devil himself. In recent times, the role of the lead guitarist has dwindled in much of popular music. Pot-luck dinners and intimate evenings have taken the place of conquest and pillage, and a typical axeman these days is undoubtedly more comfortable ordering a cup of organic fair-trade coffee than shredding for the future of mankind, atop a snow-covered mountain peak somewhere deep in the former Soviet Union. It’s deplorable. That’s where Ellis Ashbrook comes into the fold… – Andrew Jeromski. – Read Meijin Bruttomesso’s interview with the band here.

Anyone out there who remembers those fantastic voyages Thom Yorke used to take in his vocalized trances on ‘Kid A’ and ‘Amnesiac’ will appreciate hearing the journeys Public Speaking is planning on taking you on.
This is soul music functioning as 21st century meditation. Jason Anthony Harris has taken the defining objects of our modern age, and imported hidden meaning to their status. From re-purposed kitchen utensils in ‘Funny You Ask,’ to the percussive cold comfort of ‘Isn’t Fair,’ to the chilling range of the processed harmonium in album closer ‘Subtraction,’ Public Speaking is what happens when an artist personally realizes the sound of his environment, and puts it to use. For everyone a little tired of James Blake, come back home to Brooklyn and experience the intimate soul croon of Public Speaking, and see him when he plays at Theaterlab March 31st. – Mike Levine