The Kabbs / Down This Road

The Kabbs are a band from San Diego that make country-garage rock tunes. It kind of sounds like cowboy punk, maybe if punks invaded mining towns in the gold rush era.

Trailer Trash Tracys / Turkish Heights

Okay, let’s be real, Trailer Trash Tracys might be one of the worst band names of 2k12, or possibly one of the worst band names ever. They popped into the music world with one of the most banging debut singles of any dreamy synth pop blog band. Their new LP, Ester, throws down more hits and continues to expand the superstar legacy of this fresh UK act. At the tail-end of Ester, the Tracys throw down a slow one that will definitely melt your heart. Turkish Heights oozes with dreamy shoe-gazey synth notes bleeding into drowsy vocals, making sense with a bass line so damn simple, yet mind-blowing with every note. #ooze

Pokey LaFarge / Pack It Up

For the last year or so, Third Man has been pouring out brilliant 7” singles from an incredibly diverse range of artists. Jack White deserves a hell of a lot more praise from finding artists from so many different locations, genres, and levels of success. Anyway, recently I’ve been really excited by Pokey LaFarge’s addition to the Third Man singles collection. LaFarge, hailing from St. Louis, sounds like the celebration of traditional America as we know it from movies and stories from American history textbooks circa high school. It’s so distant and almost confusing in a time where music has become something temporary, something that has to defy everything else happening at the moment, something that creates a new sound with an influx of trendy bands to follow. LaFarge has a sound that is timeless and almost isolated from a music industry that feasts on the wires of the world wide web. Even his biography reads like the tale of a hero from some film based on a younger America. LaFarge doesn’t simply settle for being incredibly unique at a time when everyone else is trying so hard; he is also exceptionally talented, carrying terrific effortless vocals and an immaculate talent for song writing. His old school traditional American blue grass that carries imagery of lazy rivers and folks swing dancing late at night in the town pub is probably the punkest, most bad ass thing I’ve heard from any musician in the last decade. The upbeat B-side of LaFarge’s new single, Pack it Up, opens with a sweet little guitar rhythm that gets swept up with LaFarge’s modest vocals met by wonderful harmonies during the chorus. It’s all carried by the rhythm of a stand up base and becomes perfect with LaFarge’s epic guitar solo towards the end. Pokey LaFarge; the punkest thing in America.

Davila 666 / Diablo

Tan Bajo is full of fuzzy raunchy bad ass rock numbers, but there are some warm heart melting gems hidden beneath the fuzz. I have no idea what they’re saying, but it feels sweet and the guitar hooks coated in sugary vocal melodies will tickle you in all the right places. Check them out in NYC this week!

Family Portrait / Wait

For the last few years, I’ve been sucking the life out of my limited collection of Family Portrait tracks stripped away from compilations and singles. Those few tracks in themselves were enough to credit the band with, but nothing feels as perfect as their debut record. I’ve been anticipating this explosion of sound of my entire life. I was born into this beautiful world searching for this LP and I’ve finally found it. The final result, the gift we’ve all been searching for, is finally here and it’s fucking incredible. Warm sounds bloom into crystal psychedelic melodies that melt and swell and bleed into each other like puddles. Puddles of rainbow liquid. It’s like Alex Mac took acid and went for a puddle-adventure from Munckin Land to the land of Oz, referencing decades of music along the way. Aside from the brilliant song writing, the production is fucking fantastic. It consumes the world around you and sweeps through every crevice of your body, the fullest, most wonderful sound you could possibly imagine. Everything about the record is perfect and it was totally 100% worth the life-long wait. The brilliance manifests itself in every second, every sound, every melodic swell, every munchkin you pass along the way. One of the most mind-blowing records I’ve ever experienced in my long reign as music director. How can you expect anything less from the royal court of the Underwater Peoples Kingdom? YOU CAN’T. It’s the incestuous family affair that Jerry Springer never showed you. Get it via Underwater Peoples here.

Acid Baby Jesus / Losing It

How can I express the excitement one experiences when they realize that Acid Baby Jesus can now be played from a music circle? It’s like the time they turned a scoop of ice cream into a thousand tiny balls. You just can’t explain that shit. Acid Baby Jesus is a Linkin Park inspired filthy garage act hailing from the great land of Athens, GR. A while back, they released a tape that made the good folks of WUSB pee themselves with joy and here they are again, but on a music circle! The b-side explores a side of Acid Baby Jesus that we’ve never experienced before, a sludgier, darker slow jam that sounds like it was born in some musty deserted bar in a desolate ghost town down south. I think I just described a scene from Scooby-Doo, so maybe just ignore the strange visual reference and click the play button.

You can get the music circle here from the good folks at Slovenly.

Shannon & The Clams / Old Man Winter

Why haven’t you listened to this record yet?! Shannon Shaw has the voice of a god. Ranging from deep sultry roughness to smooth buttery melodic sweetness and back to an angrier deeper rawness, all glued together with warm guitar work that screams 60’s beach rock vibes. Old Man Winter is one of the weirder tracks on the record, a sugary pop number where Shaw really displays the incredible versatility of her vocals. Sleep Talk is full of quirky funky garage pop confection that will leave you falling in love with The Clams. It’s so good, it might be one of the best records that 2011 has offered thus far. Shannon Shaw, I love you.

Jib Kidder / Epiphany 1

For the last year or so, WUSB has been turned onto the really incredible experimental projects released by Asthmatic Kitty via the Library Catalog Music Series. The most recent fixation has been the result of California’s Jib Kidder. The mastermind behind the project, Sean Schuster-Craig, used the effects of recho, reverb, EQ and splicing to manipulate the existing sounds of the Asthmatic Kitty catalog. Music For Hypnotized Minds is a combination of hip hop and experimental noise psychedelia that results in layers of moody mellow trippy sonic adventures. Epiphany 1 has a playful warped nostalgia vibe that erupts towards the end with eclectic percussion and quicker bursts of the looped melody and it’s all pretty fantastic.

Two Tears / Senso Unico

Senso Unico is the filthy b-side from Kerry Davis’ one woman band, Two Tears. The intensity and rawness of Davis’ vocals feels like acid eating your flesh, melting with brilliantly stripped down instrumentals. The track is beautifully exposed with Davis’ vocals and guitar work stinging like you were dragged across a highway. A side is killer, too, but not nearly as dirty. Get it via Kind Turkey Records.

Rainbow Arabia / Nothin' Gunna Be Undone

Other people have already said it. There’s not even a point in trying to describe the wildly unique sound of California’s monstrous “fourth-world” power duo, Rainbow Arabia. The more I listen to their newest record, Boys and Diamonds, the more “globe-trekking, kaleidoscopic dance music” makes perfect sense. Their tracks have a playfulness that hints at Matt & Kim with deep rooted synth and guitar melodies that scream Rainbow Arabia tied together with an insanely wide array of worldly percussion topped off reggae inspired vocals. Matt & Kim seems totally far fetched, especially if you’re familiar with both artists, but when you jam the second track on this record; it’s like Matt & Kim went around the world in 80 days and wrote good a song. Or maybe they made a baby with MIA?

Mind Spiders / Going Away Tonite

I really don’t want to write about music, but luckily you can just hit the play button above and ignore the rest. Mind Spiders make addictive feel good garage pop out of the great state of Texas. Their new LP is full of brilliant rock jams smothered in a smokey cloud of pop pollution. Going Away Tonite is kind of a perfect jam and the perfect gateway jam to send you away into your long awaited musical journey with Mind Spiders.

A Classic Education / Devilish Coast Sway

A Classic Education make wonderful pop jams straight out of the great European motherland. Devilish Coast Sway is a delicately woven pop number that will leave you feeling warm with breezy guitar melodies and sweet charming vocals. The band will be hitting up the US with British Sea Power following some SXSW shows. Check them out in NYC on March 22nd and April 21st!

Ringo Deathstarr / You Don't Listen

When I first listened to Colour Trip, I was kind of expecting the worst, but instead I was wonderfully surprised by brilliant fuzzy guitar driven power anthems with hazy vocals that make me feel overwhelmingly happy inside. There’s something about this time of year when I push away the genius singer song writers that write dark depressing lyrics and break out the sugary upbeat pop anthems that make me feel all warm inside and Colour Trip is totally perfect for that.

RIP WINTER 2010-2011. Too anxious.

IsIs / Eating Hourglasses

Guilt Ridden Pop just released the sweetest EP you’ll ever hear from the Minneapolis three piece called Is/Is. Every track is sugary hazy shoe gazey pop bliss that will melt your little heart. Every track is absolutely killer, but only one could be WUSB’s jam of the day. Eating Hourglasses has the fuzzy pop vibes of Black Tambourine but with the rough edge of Dum Dum Girls. I hate comparing bands to each other, but it felt right this time. Eating Hourglasses is kind of a perfect song. When ever you likeeee.

Len Guardino / I'm a Man Baby, Yes I Am

When I first opened this package, I really thought this would be some kind of terrible home-made music project by some 40 year old dude going through his mid-life crisis in the suburbs of Long Island, but it ended up being this jam with really cheesy retro 80’s pop vibes and a terribly sexist narrative. “I’m a man babyyyy let me set you free.” Totally fucked up, but there’s something undeniably awesome about it. It’s like watching a mom hitting her wailing 3 year old in the cereal section of Walmart. It’s so terrible and wrong, but you can’t help but watch the woman violently discipline the innocent baby in public.

Big Search / Getting Warm

I’m still confused as to what the difference is between White Iris and Black Iris Records. Nonetheless, White Iris just released the very excellent and under-appreciated single from Los Angeles’ Big Search, the project of Foreign Born’s co-mastermind, Matt Popieluch. The A Side, “Getting Warm,” is a super catchy stripped down pop number. Definitely a solid springtime jammer. It fucking rules and maybe it doesn’t matter that I can’t describe it to you in words. Lucky for Tumblr technology, you can just click the link above. Oh how I love technology.

Dizzy Eyes / Let's Break Up The Band

Hardly Art is becoming a monstrous beast at producing some pretty fantastic singles. They're continuing the trend into the new year with some pretty amazing releases from Boston's Colleen Green and some Canadian band I'd never heard of called Dizzy Eyes. Colleen Green I'm still on the fence with, but this single from Dizzy Eyes is an obvious gold nugget. Check out their new single, "Let's Break Up The Band," coming soon to a 7" near you. It's straight up great pop music. Feels good. Definitely going to be my thawing out anthem for the Spring.

Seefeel / Aug30

I know it’s been a while. I’ve been plagued and bed ridden, but I promise there will be a jam of the day everyday for the rest of the week! Anyway, somehow I didn’t know about the existence of London’s Seefeel until now. I feel a bit stupid about it all, but I’m redeeming myself by really getting into their newest LP. Despite the redundancy of sounds from track to track, it’s still a pretty sick record. Aug30 sounds like the way that city from the film AI looked; lost, timeless, and maybe a bit neglected. There’s no melody or guitars, but a distance faded memory that’s lost and colorless. Always writing about tracks out of my ass. Listen to this. It’s going to melt your mind. Melting is pretty great.

Fergus & Geronimo / Michael Kelly

Not really in the mood to write, but I’ve been meaning to post something from Unlearn for a while now. I think I’m mostly afraid I’ll get it all wrong like the NY Times or something. Fergus & Geronimo makes music that feels really good that totally confuses me when it comes to genre-fying it. Michael Kelly is a kind of mellow, terribly depressing jam that feels like an entirely different beast than the other tracks. Totally rules, but I have no idea how to describe it. Anyway, there’s such a sweet variety of vibes from track to track, that something on Unlearn is bound to make you pee yourself. It’s mostly just good, so ignore what I’ve written and just jam the track. Feeling too good right now.

Sticky Fruitman Has Faith

Last year, White Fence released their debut self titled LP via Woodsist and it was absolutely one my favorite records of the year. They're back again with their newest creation, Is Growing Faith, which continues the warped fuzzy bedroom pop sound of their debut. Every track on this kind of rules, but one my favorites is Stranger Things Have Happened (To You). It's rockin' the 60's pop vibes like no other, but with the playfulness of something you'd hear on White Fence's S/T, which this record lacks a bit of. Nonetheless, this record sustains the huge range of variety & all the magical brilliance you heard on the first record. Definitely give it a listen, you're bound to like something on there!