Stream songs from Here’s To Taking It Easy: “If there was a mission statement in Phosphorescent, it would be to follow whatever these songs are becoming on any given day,” says Matthew Houck at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium at the tail end of a long run of shows. For the most part, Phosphorescent has served as [...]

SHEARWATER The Golden Archipelago (MATADOR) Rating: Shearwater is the stuff of lore. Unlike most post-rock outfits of their kind, the Austin five-piece steer clear of long-winded, psychedelic schtick in favor of something far more palpable and if nearly theatric in its approach. Their songs unfold like some lost epic poem, evoking an almost mythic iconography [...]

SHEARWATER The Golden Archipelago (MATADOR) Rating: Shearwater is the stuff of lore. Unlike most post-rock outfits of their kind, the Austin five-piece steer clear of long-winded, psychedelic schtick in favor of something far more palpable and if nearly theatric in its approach. Their songs unfold like some lost epic poem, evoking an almost mythic iconography [...]

MIDLAKE The Courage of Others (BELLA UNION) Rating: Last we heard of Midlake, the band was yearning for simpler times. The lead track “Roscoe” from their 2006 breakthrough, The Trials of Van Occupanther, daydreamed of being born at the tail end of 19th century America, closer to the earth, at at time when they would [...]

VAMPIRE WEEKEND Contra (XL Recordings) Rating: Vampire Weekend are ripe for critical lynching. A welcome debut pulls indie rock out of its self-serious trenches and into the streets of Johannesburg, only to find their audience all but moved on when they stick to format two years later. As odd as it sounds, though, the Ivy [...]

YEASAYER Odd Blood (WE ARE FREE/SECRETLY CANADIAN) Rating: Cribbing tribal beats and exotic instrumentation of non-Western music for modern electronica may be a decades-old tactic, but it’s one that Yeasayer has done particularly well in their few short years on the map. The Brooklyn quartet’s standout single “2080” remains the budding band’s flagship song—a foreboding [...]

PORT O’BRIEN Threadbare (TBD) Rating: Even among indie standards, Port O’Brien have maintained a rather reserved buzz since debuting a couple years back. Though they’ve opened for the likes of Bright Eyes and Modest Mouse, this Southern California four piece’s name has hardly spread past the Pacific environs they hail from, making them seem far [...]

OLA PODRIDA Belly of the Lion (WESTERN VINYL) Rating: For better or worse, Ola Podrida’s reputation will undoubtedly be peppered with name drops intended to pigeonhole the Brooklyn songwriter alongside the likes of Bon Iver or Band of Horses. It partly makes sense, as their second LP Belly of the Lion dabbles in deceptively predictable [...]

Often dismissed as little more than a niche songwriter futzing with the boundaries of his own woodsy, quasi-Americana palate, Ray Raposa (a.k.a. Castanets) has remained a sorely overlooked act.

“When you have a record, you have to figure out how to arrange everything, what your song is about, the idea behind the song,” says Tristen. “So when you’re making a video, it’s really just about a good solid story and then visually capturing it.”

David Bazan, alone and forsaken. If ever there was a spokesman for those suffering from the God-sick blues, David Bazan is it. As the frontman behind Pedro the Lion for nearly a decade, Bazan has created a virtual trademark on doubt-ridden lyrics, sketching characters constantly slipping to-and-fro on a moral slope, or candidly confessing his [...]