Béla Anton Leoš Fleck is an American banjo player. An acclaimed virtuoso, he is an innovative and technically proficient pioneer and ambassador of the banjo, bringing the instrument from its bluegrass roots to jazz, classical, rock and various world music genres. He is best known for his work with the bands New Grass Revival and Béla Fleck and the Flecktones. Fleck has won 14 Grammy Awards and been nominated 33 times.
Blonde Redhead is an American alternative rock band composed of Kazu Makino and twin brothers Simone and Amedeo Pace that formed in New York City in 1993. The band's earliest albums were noted for their noise rock influences, though their sound evolved by the early 2000s with the releases of Misery is a Butterfly (2004) and 23 (2007), which both incorporated elements of dream pop, shoegaze and other genres. They have released nine regular studio albums and have toured internationally.
Tender Prey is the fifth studio album by Australian rock band Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, released on 19 September 1988 on Mute Records. Produced by Flood, the album was recorded during several sessions over the course of four months in West Berlin—where the band were based at the time of its release—and London and dedicated to Fernando Ramos da Silva.
Beach House is the debut studio album by American dream pop duo Beach House. It was released on October 3, 2006, by Carpark Records and in Europe by Bella Union. The album received mostly positive reviews from music critics.
Cosa Brava is an experimental rock and free improvisation group formed in March 2008 in Oakland, California by multi-instrumentalist and composer Fred Frith. The band comprises Frith on guitar, Zeena Parkins on keyboards and accordion, Carla Kihlstedt on violin, Matthias Bossi on drums, and The Norman Conquest on sound manipulation. All About Jazz described their music as "somewhere between folk, Celtic, modern chamber, Latin, funk, Eastern, and prog-rock".
jj n° 2 is the debut studio album by Swedish indie pop band JJ. It was released on the Swedish record label Sincerely Yours on 1 July 2009. A vinyl edition, titled jj n° 2.1, was released in late December 2009.
Local Natives is an American indie rock band based in Silver Lake, Los Angeles. The band consists of Taylor Rice, Kelcey Ayer, Ryan Hahn, Matt Frazier (drums) and Nik Ewing (bass).
Earl is the debut mixtape by American rapper Earl Sweatshirt. It was released as a free digital download on March 31, 2010, on the Odd Future website.
Braids is a Canadian art rock band from Calgary, Alberta. Braids currently consists of Raphaelle Standell-Preston, Austin Tufts and Taylor Smith. The band met at a young age and began collaborating in high school. Their debut album, Native Speaker, was released on January 18, 2011 in Canada and the United States to generally positive reviews. The album was shortlisted for the 2011 Polaris Music Prize. The band's second album, Flourish // Perish, was released on August 20, 2013. Their third, Deep in the Iris, was released on April 28, 2015, and was awarded the 2015 Juno Award for Alternative Album of the Year.
Alex Zhang Hungtai is a Taiwanese-born Canadian musician and actor. In addition to his given name, he makes music under the names Last Lizard and Dirty Beaches.
Typhoon is an American indie rock band based in Portland, Oregon. Noted for its many members, the band was founded in Salem, Oregon in 2005. Typhoon have released five albums, two EPs, and have contributed to a number of compilations. The band's most recent album Sympathetic Magic was released on January 22nd, 2021.
Arbutus Records is a Montreal based record label and management company founded by Sebastian Cowan in 2009. The label is named after the street by the same name in Vancouver, where Cowan grew up. The label have also begun expanding outside of Montreal, signing international artist Σtella, from Athens, Greece, on April 16, 2019, and Toronto-based trio Rapport on August 28, 2019.
Visions is the third studio album by Canadian singer Grimes. It was released on January 31, 2012, by 4AD. Her first since signing with 4AD, the album was recorded entirely on Apple's GarageBand software in Grimes' apartment over a three-week period. It was mixed by Grimes and her manager, Sebastian Cowan, at their La Brique Studio Space in Montreal. Visions was streamed on the NPR website a week before it was released in the United States.
HMV's Poll of Polls was an annual list of albums compiled by British music retailer HMV from 1998 to 2012. The listing was created each December by collating year-end polls from approximately 30 music magazines, newspapers and guides to determine the most critically acclaimed albums of the year. An album's placing in the list was determined by the number of different polls in which it was included. In the event of two records featuring in the same number of polls, the album with the highest combined placings was given the higher position on the Poll of Polls. In 2011, Let England Shake by PJ Harvey was named the best album of the year after receiving 21 nominations – the following year, Channel Orange by Frank Ocean topped the poll with 22 nominations.
Arthur Ashin, better known by his stage name Autre Ne Veut, is an American singer-songwriter and musician from New York City.
Haerts is a German indie pop music duo, formed in 2011 in New York. The band consists of Nini Fabi (vocals) and Ben Gebert.
Beverly is an American, Brooklyn-based band that formed in 2013. They began recording their debut LP, Careers, in 2013 and finished in early 2014. It was released on July 1, 2014 on Williamsburg-based Kanine Records.
Ryan DeRobertis is an American electronic musician and singer who grew up in Farmingville, New York and attended Boston College for two years studying music. His electronic music project Saint Pepsi began in December 2012. As Saint Pepsi, he released his ninth studio album Hit Vibes in May 2013. He is a current resident of Brooklyn, New York.
Sugar at the Gate is the third studio album of Canadian indie group TOPS, consisting of vocalist Jane Penny, guitarist David Carriere, drummer Riley Fleck, and bassist Jackson MacIntosh. It was released on June 2, 2017 by Arbutus Records. For making the album, the group lived in Los Angeles in order to have the music reflect experiencing a "teenage fantasy" in the city; it was tracked in a Glendale, California-based mansion named Glamdale.
Picture You Staring is the second studio album of Canadian indie group TOPS; Dazed debuted the album for streaming on August 28, 2014 before Arbutus Records released it to other formats on September 2, 2014. It was the fourth best album of 2014 according to Gorilla vs. Bear, the seventh best according to Dummy magazine, the 48th best per Stereogum, and 93rd as ranked by Crack Magazine.
