Drake Baer

Crystal Castles have made a career of virulent, opaque electro. Their first two albums earned high praise, and their live shows gave them a reputation for causing riots. Their third full-length, 'III,' is not as blindsiding as their earlier work, but the Canadian duo once again create an i…

Nostalgia, guitar solos, slacker jams, introspection, depression, hope: It's the stuff of youth, and it all fits into ‘Our House on the Hill,’ the second album from the Babies, a peanut butter sandwich of a record that is delicious in its familiarity. And perhaps a little …

What must it be like in the mind of David Longstreth? The frontman of the Dirty Projectors leads one of our era's most beloved bands, and the lush strings and interlocking vocals of ‘Bitte Orca’ and ‘Swing Lo Magellan’ have become as familiar to listeners as well-loved furniture. An EP, then, consti…

There's a good chance you already love one-half of the twin creative force behind the Crystal Ark. Gavin Russom was a member of a little band called LCD Soundsystem, which popularized a particular Nu-Disco-meets-New Order sound endemic to New York-based boutique label DFA. As you may know, LCD has s…

As virtuostic as he is proflific, the Chicago-born Andrew Bird has been giving us slices of baroque gorgeousness every year for a decade. At 39, he's established a unique, signature sound, a pastiche of a fragile violin, earnest lyricism and clever arrangements, somewhere in the environs of fellow i…

Canadian surreal pop, whispered French nothings, British New Wave, Japanese undead: It's all there in the sexual Frankenstein cabaret of Harouki Zombi, the shared project of Nina Barnes and Orenda Fink. The duo mark their first release with ‘Objet Petit A,’ a danceable, st…

With their outrageous band name, gruesome-cute album art and endlessly vocodered vocals, Black Moth Super Rainbow do not lend themselves to accessibility. At first blush, the Pittsburghian maniacs seem like less-literate cousins of Animal Collective, a drop in the psychoactive bucket. However, after…

It's been a crazy 21st century for Benjamin Gibbard, whose soft-spoken voice has permeated the era, and whose Death Cab for Cutie and Postal Service projects have left an indelible mark on listeners' lives. Along the way, he married indie princess Zooey Deschanel, though the two have since split up.…

On ‘Allelujah! Don’t Bend! Ascend!’ their first album in a decade, Godspeed You! Black Emperor deliver a post-rock protest record that speaks and plays at the highest of volumes -- even though they never say a thing.

The word, concept and phase of life that saturates Freelance Whales is youth. Not in an M83, babies-of-the-'80s nostalgic way, but rather in real-time, doe-eyed expressions of their still-going salad days. The Whales are a quintet from Queens -- which counts as contrarian, given all the Brooklyn ban…