If we read one more article about how My Education sounds a bit like a certain currently famous Austin instrumental four piece but-seriously-they're-really-good-too we're going to throw up in our mouths. They don't. Yes, you are correct in assessing that they both play music that lacks vocals - which are simply another instrument, not the defining taxonomic characteristic by which we categorize bands - but they are distinct entities making distinct music....

Knob-twiddling German indie rockers The Notwist have come a long way since their eponymous punk-rock-metalhead debut. A looooong way. Unless you have a copy of their first LP, it's hard to imagine singer/guitarist Markus Acher's gentle vocals and plaintive lyrics - almost naive in their simple English - being hassled by shred....

You just want My Morning Jacket to rock forever. Assuming you've been lucky enough to catch their live show, you know it seems like they almost do. If any group has the raw, sculpted tenacity that hints at a longevity, it's them. Marathon performers hawking an inscrutable brand of Bonnaroo-blessed prog-psych-pop with the indie world's tacit nod, they seem poised for success long after we all stop wearing Chuck Taylors. ...

Whether it's love, death, or racing down the night highway in a blind panic, no musician can pull off the electro-melodrama like Anthony Gonzales, otherwise known as M83, the undisputed king of sensational, overwrought shoegaze. With 2005's Before the Dawn Heals Us, M83 veered a wild right away from its beginnings in otherwise humble ambience and synth-heavy noodling, catapulting over a dead-man's curve and emerging from the wreckage rejuvenated. From curb to coma, BTDHS was a thrilling experience. Unabashedly incorporating dramatic vocal samples and recursive opacity a la David Lynch's Mulholland Drive by way of the hard obsidian aesthetic of DePalma's Heat, the album went for broke on every track. It wasn't surprising to find one's self panting heavily after a listen-through....

There seemed to be a collective groan when Mark Kozelek, the lead singer/songwriter and driving force behind Sun Kil Moon, released his second album under that moniker. Consisting exclusively of Modest Mouse covers, completely rearranged and Kozelek-ified, it hearkened back to his earlier remake experiment wherein he tamed old AC/DC tracks, infusing them with a subtle new lustiness. Regardless of whether you think Tiny Cities pulled it off (we kinda did), the reason people continue love this guy is his solid catalog of self-penned tunes. Well, we bitched and moaned that we wanted more real deal Koz-rock, and all of a sudden April came around. ...

Of all the Godspeed! You Black Emperor side projects, Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band -- which, heretofore, we will call ASMZ, based on their band name's first incarnation -- has attracted the most significant following of all the 'spin-off' bands laboring in the absence of GYBE output. ...

Though wholly deserved, it was a little surprising to find our favorite bedroom nerd-rockers Hot Chip on the cusp of huge fame last year. Their album The Warning went gold in the UK, a Mercury Music Prize nomination followed, and sold-out shows across the US and Europe became the norm. This from fellows who record in a London bedsit and look like they walked out of the Dell engineer's cafeteria. As a sold-out crowd at Antone's last May attested to, the group's unique mix of electronics, blue-eyed soul, club bangers, and indie-rock captivated many worldwide searching for a new voice. Hot Chip have always claimed that they loved lots of music, but that nobody made the exact music that they wanted to listen to. And their pastiche of their influences backed the statement up - critics weren't sure what to compare them to. But they sure loved them....