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Talkhouse

Basia Bulat is a three-time Polaris Music Prize finalist and has been nominated for three JUNO Awards. She is known for her extensive touring and vibrant live shows that feature her powerful voice and multi-instrument skills – switching from piano, to autoharp, to charango, to guitar. She has performed at such festivals as Montreux Jazz Festival, Austin City Limits and Newport Folk Festival and has performed for audiences at venues like Carnegie Hall, Royal Theater Carré and headlined at Massey Hall. In addition to releasing her own album in 2020—the Jim James-produced Are You In Love?—Bulat co-produced and co-wrote songs with Meg Remy for the new U.S. Girls album, Heavy Light, and co-produced the soon to be released debut album from Kass Richards, The Language Shadow.

Basia Bulat

Music

Best of 2020: Basia Bulat on U.S. Girls’ Heavy Light

SSION is Cody Critcheloe, a New York City-based songwriter, musician, visual artist, and director.

SSION

Best of 2020: Cody Critcheloe (SSION) Thinks Róisín Machine is Perfection

Oceanator’s debut full-length, Things I Never Said, sees NYC multi-instrumentalist Elise Okusami hyperbolically equating early adulthood malaise with apocalyptic destruction. The type of anxieties that form when thoughts bottle up and stress gets the best of you. Throughout the record, allusions to intrusive thoughts and depression-induced stasis are weaved in between references to falling skies, rolling fires, and the possibility of the world literally falling apart.
However, while Okusami’s emotional and physical solitude makes for a resilient foe, Things I Never Said is ultimately a record about finding comfort in the face of destruction, whether it be through appreciating the little things or forming a bond with someone you can mutually confide in about mental afflictions. There’s no concrete resolution to the album, but rather a vital reminder that love and friendship, both with others and herself, will always reign victorious in our darkest moments

Oceanator

Best of 2020: Oceanator Talks Jeff Rosenstock’s NO DREAM

Honus Honus (aka Ryan Kattner) has devoted his career to exploring the uncertainty between life’s extremes: beauty and ugliness, order and chaos. The songs on Dream Hunting in the Valley of the In-Between, Man Man’s first album in over six years and his Sub Pop debut, are as intimate, soulful, and timeless as they are audaciously inventive and daring.
(Photo Credit: Dan Monick)

Man Man

Best of 2020: Man Man’s Honus Honus Makes a Controversial Choice

Alex Edkins is the guitarist and vocalist of the Toronto-based punk band METZ. Their fourth album Atlas Vending is out now via Sub Pop.
(Photo Credit: Norman Wong)

Alex Edkins

Best of 2020: Alex Edkins (METZ) Loves Cindy Lee

Evan Weiss is a prolific Chicago-based musician, songwriter and producer known for his work performing and recording as Into It. Over It., and well as the bands Their/They&rsquo;re/There (featuring American Football and Owen&rsquo;s Mike Kinsella) and punk act Pet Symmetry. You can follow Into It. Over It. on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/intoitoverit" target="_blank">here.</a>
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Evan Weiss

Best of 2020: Into It. Over It Biked All Over Chicago This Year

LOMA is Emily Cross, Dan Duszynski, and Jonathan Meiburg.
(Photo Credit: Bryan C. Parker)

Loma

Best of 2020: Loma Got Really Into This Is England This Year

Black Pumas — the duo of frontman/songwriter Eric Burton and producer/guitarist Adrian Quesada — received three 2021 Grammy nominations recently, including two in the ceremony’s biggest categories, Album of the Year (for Black Pumas (Deluxe Edition)) and Record of the Year (for “Colors”). “Colors” was additionally nominated for Best American Roots Performance. The nominations are a thrilling culmination to a year that began with the duo attending the 2020 Grammys as Best New Artist nominees and has seen their star rise through massive streaming and radio success, multiple high-profile TV performances, and a passionate and ever-growing fanbase.

Black Pumas

Best of 2020: Eric Burton (Black Pumas) Loves Moses Sumney’s Grae

In 2015, the beloved Boston indie-rock band Krill broke-up. Actually, hold on, broke-up may be too intense of a phrase. They did stop playing shows in the fall of 2015, but by 2016, they put out a posthumous five-song EP, and a couple years after that, Krill reunited for a one-off show supporting their friends in LVL UP. So, there was no acrimony, Krill just kind of ended. But in 2019, Knot was born, which, depending on how you look at it, is kind of Krill and also kind of not at all Krill.
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In the simplest terms, Knot is effectively Krill’s final lineup with an additional musician added in, but it’s the particulars that highlight the differences between the two bands. In Knot, Krill bassist and vocalist Jonah Furman switches to guitar, Krill guitarist Aaron Ratoff handles both guitar and bass, Ian Becker is still on drums, and Joe DeManuelle-Hall, the relative newcomer, also plays guitar. In essence, Knot is a bigger, more ruminative version of Krill, but it’s also something that’s distinct unto itself. And on the band’s debut album, which is called Knot, too, it’s easy to see that Knot has a perspective all its own.
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Knot

Best of 2020: Knot Was Super Into Guitar Records This Year

Deeper&#8216;s Shiraz Bhatti, Nic Gohl, and Drew McBride take a thoughtful and direct approach with their songwriting, yielding spry melodies and inventive structures. It’s a clever combination of jagged post-punk and refined indie rock. A tightly wound rhythm section teeters on the edge, but is anchored by intricate guitar interplay and saturated with an enigmatic spirit. Their first album, 2018’s Deeper channeled the anxiety of change in everyday life and navigating the unhinged political atmosphere. Run takes a more existential approach, reaching down past the emotion and staring back at the inner.
Backed by an astutely scientific cover of the John Maus rarity “Bennington”, Deeper sheds the searching bottled up in previous material, carving out an ambit distinctly their own. Brisk, pointed and efficient, and no note wasted, Run b/w Bennington, a new 7 Inch out in October 2019, sets the stage for the Chicago trio’s sophomore LP.
(Photo Credit: Brendan Carroll)

Deeper

Best of 2020: Deeper Talks the New Yves Tumor Record

Rahill Jamalifard is a DJ and the vocalist for the Brooklyn-based band Habibi. Her debut solo record, Flowers At your Feet, is out now on Big Dada.

Rahill Jamalifard

Best of 2020: Rahill Jamalifard Talks Jasper Marsalis and Jack Name

Mamalarky is down to water your houseplants while you&#8217;re out of town and plot an elaborate revenge on your high school bully. Mamalarky could very well be the cure for depression or the cause of all universal sadness. Mamalarky is a campfire song for American Idol rejects and a somber soundtrack for the months leading up to your next breakup. They are exactly what you would expect to see in an increasingly sentient robot&#8217;s dream journal.
Mamalarky started in Austin, TX and now resides in Atlanta, GA. The band combines doe-eyed vocal melodies, cerebral keys, dynamic finger-picked guitar, ebullient bass lines, and hard hitting drums to create an intoxicating elixir, entirely their own.
Their self-titled debut album Mamalarky is out November 2020 via Fire Talk Records.

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