Tagged: artistspotlight

A household name in their native Norway and a fair section of Europe, sassy 4-piece Katzenjammer hit the UK festival circuit earlier this year at Glastonbury, Cambridge Folk Festival and Bestival, becoming Steve Lamacq favourites and enticing a whole new horde of admirers along the way. Word must have gotten out, because fans squashed into [...]

Mutemath, Photo Credit: Colin Gray Armed with their new full-length album Odd Soul, Mutemath have been taking venues stages across the U.S. by storm with their captivating live performances and new electro-rock sound. We caught up with frontman Paul Meany to discuss the new record, lineup changes and remix contests. You guys released your third full-length album Odd Soul in October 2011 – how did the material change with the lineup change of guitarist Greg Hill leaving the band and Todd Gummerman replacing him? [...]

The Black Keys - El Camino Made the Cougar Microbes Top Albums of 2011 list here The Decemberists - The King Is Dead Made the Cougar Microbes Top Albums of 2011 list here Ryan Adams - Ashes & Fire As a die-hard Ryan Adams fan – hello! – I have nothing bad to say about his latest creation. He can do [...]

1. Bon Iver - Bon Iver Made the Cougar Microbes Top Albums of 2011 list here 2. M83- Hurry Up, We're Dreaming Made the Cougar Microbes Top Albums of 2011 list here 3. The Strokes - Angeles On their latest album, The Strokes never promised to be anything other than themselves. Although rarely wandering from their earnest and melodic rock and [...]

In a growing music festival scene, the lineup for the Hangout Festival has been announced. This year's lineup includes Jack White, Skrillex, Dave Matthews Band, Wilco, String Cheese Incident, The Flaming Lips performing Dark Side of the Moon, Alabama Shakes, Dispatch, Steve Winwood, Chris Cornell, Gogol Bordello, Michael Franti & Spearhead, Mac Miller, Flogging Molly, Coheed & Cambria, Paul Oakenfold, G. Love and Special Sauce, Randy Newman, Dr. Dog, Young the Giant, Cage the Elephant, Dawes, M. Ward, Yelawolf, Switchfoot and many more acts. The Hangout Festival will take place from May 18 to 20 in [...]

Born to Die Lana Del Rey After grabbing the attention of the music industry with tracks like Video Games and Born to Die , Lana Del Rey's (real name Elizabeth Grant) debut album was one of the most anticipated of the year – and it's only February! Born to Die features a unique blend of 60's pop, old Hollywood Glamour and urban beats that Del Rey herself describes as "Gangster Nancy Sinatra." While "Video Games" may have launched Lana Del Rey into mainstream media, " Born to Die" [...]

Photo by Jeff Snow When Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. revs up their indie band engine, do not be surprised if they leave you in the dust. Similar to the race-car driver their name is derived from, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. moves with precision and fearlessness, creating walls of melodic synths and guitar that crescendo wildly, resulting in near-euphoria. Their music most times, is unpredictable: one moment they will be exploring Beach Boys-like territory, with wavy synths crashing down on a soothing shoreline. Others, the group experiments with atmospheric sounds, as jangling percussion accompanies layers upon layers [...]

1 - Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will Mogwai yet again releases an amazingly ambient yet centrally driving album filled with anticpatory progressions and songs that blend sonically disparate sections as if they were just one melodic chorus. 2 - Yeasayer - End Blood Yeasayer's 'End Blood' EP made the list thanks to [...]

After a successful jaunt of New York City (5 gigs in 5 days to be exact) in promotion of their Rough Trade debut album America Give Up , Minneapolis's Howler have launched forth into their very first headlining world tour. I caught the band's gig at Pianos, which turned out to be a huge draw (more so than the headlining act!) Definitely a band to look out for. Howler's first single Back of Your Neck is available as a free download, and you can watch the video below. See [...]

Jordan Atkins-Loria, better known as Lucky Date, is a 21 year old producer and DJ originally from San Francisco, now living in Chicago. He has been garnering some major buzz in the EDM scene including the support of major artists such as Excision, Datsik, Zed, Porter Robinson, David Guetta, Tommy Lee, Spencer & Hill, and Chuckie. This week Lucky Date just released "Six 16" which you can check out here: Lucky Date will be supporting Excision [...]

1) Gotye - Making Mirrors Made the Cougar Microbes Top Albums of 2011 list here 2. Adele - 21 Made the Cougar Microbes Top Albums of 2011 list here 3. The Decemberists - The King is Dead Made the Cougar Microbes Top Albums of 2011 list here 4. Rufus Wainwright - House of Rufus A massive 19-disc box set of [...]

Tv On The Radio didn't take too long to follow up 20092s brilliant 'Dear Science,' and as usual didn't disappoint. This time the Brooklyn outfit set up camp on the West Coast and the sunnier climate appears to have seeped through to these tracks. With another mild change of direction the tracks on 'Nine Types Of Light' [...]

M.I.A. has released an official version of her 2010 track, "Bad Girls" that was part of her mixtape, "Vicki Leekx". Produced by Danja, the accompanying video is said to be produced by Romain Gavras, who also directed the controversial, "Born Free," slated to be released on Friday. M.I.A.'s fourth album is still under works and is scheduled to be released sometime this summer. Check out "Bad Girls":

The good folks at Kevin Nottingham recently dropped one of their first Artist Spotlight interviews in 2012 with Boston up and coming MC Charmingly Ghetto. The eager talent's November release of Study A'Broad: The International Project was one of the best mixtapes of the last quarter, and CG has much more under his sleeve. Check out some highlights from the interview after the jump. Full Feature at KN : "My name is derived from W.E.B. Dubois' social theory of double consciousness. It [...]

Last year I sat through a blogger and A&R roundtable organized by one of the majors in London. In between talk of "organic artist growth" and "breakout singles" The name of the Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All, and more specifically Tyler, The Creator's 'Yonkers' video, came up several times as the label people seemed genuinely baffled by the success [...]

The musical superduo Ashtar Command, composed of Chris Holmes (Sir Paul McCartney's go to DJ) and Brian Liesegang (Founding member of Filter) first showed up on our radar with a track on the PS3 game 'Red Dead Redemption'. Their debut album 'American Sunshine' was an unexpected and delightful revelation. Chief Cougar Microbes collaborator Kyle hailed it [...]

It feels like it was only yesterday that we started hearing about The Decemberists. It amazes me to think that the band has released six official studio albums earning a spot amongst indie rocks biggest success stories. Cougar writer Emily added them to her list describing 'The King Is Dead' as "A folky album with [...]

A double album in this day and age is perhaps a tad over ambitious but if anyone could have pulled it off it had to be monsieur Anthony Gonzalez of M83 fame. For his sixth album outing Gonzalez succeeding in making an album that would satisfy his loyal internet following as well as imprinting itself [...]

With "Swag" seemingly chosen as the buzz word for 2011 it was appropriate that Jay-Z and Kanye West's long rumored collaboration had tons of it. . Having set the bar very high with last year's 'My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy' it seems anything Kanye touches turns to gold and Jay-Z also has the midas touch [...]

Band of Skulls manages to maintain a balance between being pervasive enough in pop culture while remaining respectably incognito. Especially considering that multiple songs from their debut album, Baby Darling Doll Face Honey , have appeared in shows such as Gossip Girl, Skins, True Blood , movies like Twilight: New Moon and The Hangover II , as well as their single "I Know What I Am" a playable track on Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock . For those who've let this indie gem of a band slip through their playlists here's [...]