 | | The Magnetic Fields may be a bona fide band, but in most essential respects they are the project of studio wunderkind Stephin Merritt, who writes, produces, and (generally) sings all of the material. |
 | | Named for the courier service that allowed them to trade song ideas while living in different locales, the Postal Service were a short-lived supergroup featuring Jimmy Tamborello (leader of the electronica bands Dntel and Figurine) and Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard. |
 | | The idea for Roommate, the alter ego/group of Colorado Springs native Kent Lambert, came about in 2000, after Lambert, a graduate of the University of Iowa who was working in New York City in the acquisitions department of a film distribution company, began writing little songs that his Brooklyn roommate and college friend Noah Minnick suggested he record. |
 | | Headlights are an indie threesome from Champaign, Illinois, made up of members of Kindercore band Maserati and Parasol band Absinthe Blind. |
 | | Formed near Munich as a post-hardcore band, the Notwist gradually began to embrace a fusion of classic '80s indie pop songwriting and scruffy electronic backings indebted to Oval and Autechre. |
 | | Brisa Roché made a name for herself as a sultry indie songstress while she lived in France in the early 2000s. |
 | | Named in honor of a passage from Pauline Reage's infamous novel The Story of O, the melancholy Trembling Blue Stars heralded the return of singer/songwriter Robert Wratten, best known as the frontman of the British indie pop band the Field Mice. |
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 | | Death Cab for Cutie's rise from small-time solo project to Grammy-nominated rock band is one of indie rock's greatest success stories. |
 | | The Blow is really visual artist and performer Khaela Maricich, who formerly released recordings under the name Get the Hell Out of the Way of the Volcano, after which she recorded (with the help of some guests) for K under the name the Blow. |
 | | The celebrated folk-punk singer/songwriter Elliott Smith rose from indie obscurity to mainstream success in 1997 on the strength of "Miss Misery," his Academy Award-nominated song from the film Good Will Hunting. |
 | | Dntel (aka Jimmy Tamborello) produces music that merges the worlds of indie rock and electronica. Tamborello was a guitarist in the emocore group Strictly Ballroom and also a member of techno-poppers Figurine. |
 | | Dan Hunter, the man behind the electronic pop project Playradioplay!, once told an interviewer that he'd been able to score a contract with a major label because "I had already proven that kids want to hear my music before they even came knocking on my door. |
 | | Julie Doiron began her musical career in 1990, singing and playing bass for the Canadian indie rock band Eric's Trip. |
 | | Iceland pop experimentalists Múm were formed by Gunnar Örn Tynes, Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason, and classically trained twin sisters Gyða and Kristín Anna Valtýsdóttir. |
 | | Bristol-based multi-instrumentalist/programmer David Edwards, aka Minotaur Shock, creates pretty, folk-tinged electronica along the lines of Four Tet and Boards of Canada. |
 | | Although many musicians joined the band's rotating lineup, Bright Eyes was primarily the songwriting vehicle of Conor Oberst, a quivery-voiced Nebraska native who first attracted attention in 1994 -- when he was only 14 years old -- as the singer and guitarist for Commander Venus. |
 | | Mirah (pronounced mear-rah) -- full name Mirah Yom Tov Zeitlyn -- was born on her mother's kitchen table. |
 | | Alternative country-rock singer/songwriter Edith Frost was born in San Antonio, TX, on August 18, 1964. |
 | | The IDM meets post-rock collective Nudge feature multi-instrumentalists Brian Foote and Paul Dickow and vocalist Honey Owens as their creative core, and feature members of likeminded bands such as Fontanelle, Jessamine, Sunn, Emergency, and Nice Nice as collaborators. |
 | | After the 1998 breakup of her previous band, the Munich-based L.B. Page, Korea-born vocalist Valerie Trebeljahr formed the experimental electro-pop group Lali Puna. |
 | | Singer/songwriter Eric Elbogen is the mastermind behind Say Hi to Your Mom, an indie rock project formed in 2002 in Elbogen's native New York, NY. |
 | | Electronic pop trio Entre Rios (Between Rivers) is songwriter Sebastian Carreras, programmer Gabriel Lucena, and vocalist Isol. |
 | | During an existence that spanned nearly two decades and produced several albums, Cologne, Germany-based electronic indie pop group Donna Regina -- centered around the breathy vocals of singer Regina Janssen, who worked alongside Günther Janssen, her fellow producer, multi-instrumentalist, and husband -- were initially compared to Saint Etienne and One Dove. |
 | | Contemporary Christian synth pop group Joy Electric is the brainchild of Orange County, CA, native Ronnie Martin, formerly of Rainbow Rider and Dance House Children (which also featured his brother, Jason Martin, of Starflyer 59). |
 | | Leslie Feist -- best known simply as Feist -- was a respected member of the Canadian alternative music community before becoming an international pop sensation with the success for her albums Let It Die and The Reminder. |
 | | Yo La Tengo are in many respects the quintessential critics' band: in addition to their adventurous eclecticism, defiant independence, and restless creative ambition -- three qualities that virtually guarantee music press acclaim -- the group's frontman, Ira Kaplan, even tenured as a rock scribe prior to finding success as a performer. |
 | | Singer/songwriter Keren Ann Zeidel, who records bilingual neo-folk music under the name Keren Ann, was born in Israel in 1974 to a Dutch-Javanese mother and a Russian-Israeli father. |
 | | Alex Germains, Ceri James, and Tomas Kelar produce the stylish electronic beats of the Mountaineers. |
 | | Coming up strong behind R. Stevie Moore as the most talented singer/songwriter to be based in the nondescript bedroom community of Montclair, NJ, Jenny Owen Youngs fuses Liz Phair's perceptive and brashly funny lyrics with the orchestrated folk-pop of Regina Spektor and Erin McKeown, adding just a hint of Nellie McKay's jazzy cabaret leanings and Cat Power's throaty, confessional angst. |
 | | Penning songs that are offbeat in narrative, but literate and emotionally revealing, and performing them in a soulful, idiosyncratic style that reveals both strength and fragility, Cat Power was one of the most acclaimed singer/songwriters to emerge from the 1990s indie rock scene, a one of a kind artist unafraid to reveal her inner self in her music and follow her muse in a variety of different directions. |
 | | Combining an inclination for melodic '60s pop with an art rock aesthetic borrowed from Krautrock bands like Faust and Neu!, Stereolab were one of the most influential alternative bands of the '90s. |
 | | Milwaukee-based producer Erik Kowalski produces tracks of gorgeous listening techno, with baroque, haunting melodies, and distorted trip-hop beats. |
 | | Blending digital-age pop/rock with ambient electronics, the Nashville-based Paper Route had their start in the summer of 2004, when Chad Howat began staying up all night in his apartment while making music with a variety of instruments and programmed samples. |
 | | An always intimate-sounding blend of indie pop and electronics, Christchurch, New Zealand's Shocking Pinks are the project of singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Nick Harte. |
 | | The folk delight that is Lavender Diamond originally came to life in Bird Songs of the Bauharoque, a punk operetta inspired by the work of American painter/architect Paul Laffoley. |
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 | | After Rilo Kiley released The Execution of All Things in October 2002, the band's two co-founders took some time off to focus on different side projects. |
 | | A band that takes its name from a French children's television series about a boy and his dog would almost have to be precious, and to be certain, Belle & Sebastian are precious. |
 | | She's the daughter of Arne Naess, former husband of Supreme Diana Ross. Born and raised in England but presently based in New York, Leona Naess is an introspective singer/songwriter whose alternative pop-rock draws on influences ranging from Edie Brickell, Tori Amos and Joni Mitchell to the Cure, David Bowie and Joy Division. |
 | | Mixing synth pop, shoegaze, and indie pop into a sound all their own, Ladytron formed in mid-1999. Keyboardists/programmers Daniel Hunt and Reuben Wu settled in Liverpool after a spate of traveling and DJ work in Japan. |
 | | Several bands over the course of rock & roll history have worked an ongoing mythology into their records: Jamie Hewlett's elliptical story line told within and between the albums and videos by Gorillaz, for example, or the freaky apocalyptic science fiction plot line, complete with lyrics in a made-up language, that was at the heart of French prog rock outfit Magma. |
 | | Although Joanna Newsom's Appalachian-meets-avant-garde take on folk music is her most celebrated work, her range is even more inclusive than her solo career suggests: the classically trained harpist adds a decidedly different, textural sound to Nervous Cop, the noise rock trio that also features Deerhoof's Greg Saunier and Hella's Zach Hill, and she also plays keyboards for the Pleased, another San Francisco-area band more akin to Blondie or Television than her other projects. |
 | | A singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, Detroit-born Sufjan Stevens started venturing into the music world while attending Hope College as a member of Marzuki, a folk-rock band based in Holland, Michigan. |
 | | Originally called the Ladies and Gentlemen, Small Sins were initially a solo project for Thomas d'Arcy, conceived as a way to guide him back to the music he truly wanted to write after his old group, the Carnations, broke up. |
 | | After his stints performing as Palace, Palace Songs, Palace Brothers, and under his own name throughout the '90s, by the end of the decade Will Oldham seemed to finally settle on the Bonnie "Prince" Billy moniker as the main outlet for his work. |
 | | Mac McCaughan became an indie rock hero while fronting Superchunk and by founding and managing the successful Merge Records -- Portastatic was the outlet for his solo recordings and songs that didn't quite fit his day job band. |
 | | Modest Mouse were one of the most surprising commercial success stories of the new millennium -- while their music was by turns taut and elliptical, and the lyrics sometimes cryptic and introspective, the band broke through to the mainstream audience with the platinum-selling Good News for People Who Love Bad News, and they became genuine rock stars at a time when their musical peers remained cult figures. |
 | | After spending a few years playing in his brother Ed Baluyut's band, Versus, James Baluyut opted to go solo in 2001. |
 | | With their fractured songs, unexpected blasts of feedback, laconic vocals, cryptic literate lyrics, and defiant low-fidelity, Pavement were one of the most influential and distinctive bands to emerge from the American underground in the '90s. |
