Strung Out's current tour is dedicated to revisiting those solidly melodic, Heavy Metal-influenced albums, as they'll be playing both front to back nightly — a performance that's sure to fill every thirtysomething dude who still wears cargo shorts and oversized Pulley T-shirts with gooey nostalgia.  

Chicago’s Krewella represents another faction within the Electronic Dance community with its cross-pollination of Dubstep, House, Electronica and pure Pop.  

The Black Shades are the kind of high-energy band you can’t help but love. With songs that are catchy and performances that are electrifying, The Black Shades have an image and sound akin to The Hives.
  

To a certain extent, once you dive into each musical genre or subgenre, all bands start to sound alike. That goes for Australia’s Indie/Pop/Alternative group The Temper Trap, too. But just because everything “new” has already been discovered doesn’t mean that something old/overplayed can’t be enjoyable, right? The Temper Trap is definitely enjoyable. Plus, the band has the bonus secret weapon of lead singer Dougie Mandagi’s voice, which is quite unique.    

When I told a friend via cell phone that a band called A Lull was about to take the stage at the recently completed Pitchfork Music Festival his response was, “A what?” Possibly uninspired moniker aside, Chicago’s A Lull went on to deliver a dynamic, percussively driven set that drew heavily from the band’s 2011 full-length, Confetti, and this year’s EP, Meat Mountain.
  

Post Rock Brooklyn quartet Bear Hand's sense of humor is bannered up front with their name and extends through their playfully weird lyrical content, which often addresses serious subjects from a skewed perspective (or vice versa).
  

Perhaps it’s too prosaic to continue to believe that Stuart Baker created the persona of Unknown Hinson for a North Carolina public access show 20 years ago and thus began his Whackabilly onslaught of stages and studios. It may be convenient to imagine that Hinson blacks out his front teeth, glues on some cheesy sideburns and assaults his audiences with a raucous musical hybrid of Country and Rock.
  

 Born in Lake Charles, La., Lucinda Williams has the keen ability to craft Southern tinged Country songs that attract both AltRock and Country fans. In her 30-year career she’s become known as a deft lyricist, which is appropriate because her father, Miller Williams, was a well-known poet. Most recently, in 2011, she released the album Blessed, which reflected upon her growth as a musician.   

Having friends in high places never hurts and Kendrick Lamar has the fascinating fortune to boast a friend in a really high place. In a recent interview, the Compton, Calif.-cultivated rapper described Lady Gaga as “a good friend” — a connection solidified by the Pop bigwig making an appearance during Lamar's set at the recent Pitchfork Music Festival in Chicago.  

In the ’30s, German scientist Wilhelm Reich proposed the existence of orgone, a biophysical life force that he postulated was at the root of sexual energy and later conceived as a subliminal living essence connecting everything in the universe.That explanation makes a perfect case for a quintet of talented Los Angeles musicians to have christened their highly charged and deeply grooved Funk outfit after Wilhelm’s fringe theory.   

Exitmusic’s recent Tiny Desk Concert for NPR, in which artists literally perform live amid desks in the media outlet’s office, was anything but tiny. The New York City-based quartet, led by husband-and-wife duo Devon Church and Aleska Palladino, played four songs from the band’s recently released full-length debut, Passage (on Secretly Canadian), all of which were delivered with a majestic sweep — both sonically and emotionally — that belied the modest surroundings that housed them.   

It’s not hard to believe that Hayes Carll is from Houston; it seems he embodies so many great things about the music of Texas. A country drawl mixed with Rock & Roll, Carll’s most recent album, KMAG YOYO, was the Americana Music Association’s No. 1 album in 2011. His strength really lies within his songwriting; his song “Another Like You” won the American Songwriter’s No. 1 last year.   

If you’re looking to dust off your dancing Keds or run a diagnostic test on your pacemaker or combine your aerobic activities with your club regimen, Izzy and the Catastrophics, the pride of Brooklyn, N.Y., should be your soundtrack of choice.   

In the swelling tide of Dance producers with great ears, a metric ton of talent and the laser-focused potential to take Electronic Dance music to an exponentially higher level, few stars shine as bright as Pierce Fulton. Recently spotlighted by genre bible Mixmag in their “Keep An Eye On” column, Fulton is one of the most gifted boardsmen among the Dance scene’s Nu Skool producers, an amazing accomplishment for the 19-year-old Vermont native.   

There isn’t much about Cleveland that Cincinnatians will admit to liking — it’s a bitter rivalry we just can’t move past. Cleveland did, however, offer us one very good reason to love them.Raised in Cleveland, singer-songwriter Joshua Radin quickly rose to success with his soft-spoken lyrics and acoustic guitar.