 | | Unlike the several heavy metal bands that share the same name, the Canadian indie group Zeus forgoes doom and gloom to make music with three-part harmonies, Americana sensibilities, and sunny power pop hooks. |
 | | Montreal-based indie rock trio Plants and Animals formed in 2004 around the talents of Warren Spicer (guitar, vocals), Matthew Woodley (drums, percussion, vocals), and Nicolas Basque (guitar, bass, vocals). |
 | | The Berlin-based Brandt Brauer Frick (Daniel Brandt, Jan Brauer, and Paul Frick) make what they call "emotional body music," or lean techno with supple and primarily acoustic instrumentation. |
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 | | Though Beau Velasco and Johnny Siera were both aware of one another growing up in Gold Coast, Australia's relatively small music scene, it wasn't until Siera saw Velasco playing his guitar and thrashing about in the local band Black Panda that he knew he wanted to be friends. |
 | | Since they emerged at a time when C-86-inspired acts like Vivian Girls and the Pains of Being Pure at Heart were in vogue, it’s little wonder that California’s Dum Dum Girls -- a group whose '60s-inflected lo-fi pop brings to mind acts like Black Tambourine and Dolly Mixture -- became something of a sensation on the indie circuit soon after the release of their first single. |
 | | Broken Social Scene materialized in 1999 when K.C. Accidental's Kevin Drew and Brendan Canning, formerly of By Divine Right, bonded their friendship into a band. |
 | | Formed in St. John's, Newfoundland, in 2005 around the talents of Tim Baker (vocals, piano, guitar), Adam Hogan (guitar), Josh Ward (bass), Phil Maloney (drums), Kinley Dowling (violin), and Romesh Thavanathan (cello), explosive indie rock sextet Hey Rosetta! craft emotionally resonant rock anthems that echo Brit-pop outfits like Hope of the States and the Veils while channeling the orchestral rock of Arcade Fire and Broken Social Scene. |
 | | In 2003, Frenchmen Anthony Gonzalez and Nicolas Fromageau enjoyed international acclaim for the album Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts, a luscious blend of shoegaze aesthetics, ambient pop, and progressive textures. |
 | | Dan Snaith's early recordings as Manitoba underlined his status among the chattering electronic classes as one of the brightest talents to emerge during the early 2000s. |
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 | | A self-taught producer, London’s SBTRKT -- aka Aaron Jerome -- mixes elements of dubstep, 2-step, garage, house, soul, and techno into a bass-heavy blend of flowing melodies and intricate percussion. |
 | | Named for the Latvian goddess of light, Toronto's Austra feature singer/keyboardist Katie Stelmanis, drummer Maya Postepski, and bassist Dorian Wolf. |
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 | | Australian quartet the Jezabels shimmer with their anthemic, empowering approach to indie pop. Comprised of singer Hayley Mary, guitarist Samuel Lockwood, pianist/keyboardist Heather Shannon, and drummer Nik Kaloper, the group formed in 2007 after meeting at the University of Sydney, though Mary and Lockwood knew each other previously, having both grown up in Byron Bay. |
 | | The New York contingent of the grand Francophone pop revitalization -- Les Sans Culottes, their offshoot Nous Non Plus, and, of course, scene godmother April March -- favor an overtly ironic, heavily kitschy updating of the great French pop music of the 1960s, as performed by Françoise Hardy, France Gall, and the like. |
 | | The Walkmen feature three members from Jonathan Fire*Eater and two from the Recoys. When Jonathan Fire*Eater disbanded in 1998, the group took the remainder of their Dreamworks funding and established an uptown rehearsal space in New York City that doubled as a 24-track recording studio where they use a wide variety of vintage equipment. |
 | | Named in part after a sister of one of the bandmembers, Reykjavik, Iceland's Sigur Rós (Victory Rose) was formed by guitarist and vocalist Jon Thor Birgisson (who later went by the name Jónsi), bassist Georg Holm, and drummer Agust. |
 | | Metric are a band with an eclectic, adventurous outlook, whose music encompasses elements of synth pop, new wave, dance-rock, and electronica and whose hometown has vacillated between Toronto, Montreal, New York, Los Angeles, and London over the course of the group's existence. |
 | | Hailing from South London, Florence Mary Leontine Welch writes songs that occupy the same confessional territory as gossip-loving, genre-bending contemporaries like Amy Winehouse, Kate Nash, Adele, and Lily Allen and the moody, classic art rock of Kate Bush, blending pop, soul, and baroque arrangements into a sound that earned the young artist considerable buzz in 2007. |
 | | An enticing blend of indie pop hooks and crisp electronic beats in the style first perfected by Saint Etienne's Foxbase Alpha, Little Dragon are a showcase for Swedish-Japanese singer Yukimi Nagano, a mainstay of the European downtempo and lounge scenes. |
 | | The Brooklyn-based group TV on the Radio mix post-punk, electronic, and other atmospheric elements in such a creative way that it only makes sense that their core duo, vocalist Tunde Adebimpe and multi-instrumentalist/producer David Andrew Sitek, are both visual artists as well as musicians. |
 | | After winning the nationwide 2010 battle-of-the-bands competition Musiktilraunir in their native Iceland, six-piece chamber pop group Of Monsters and Men were hailed as "the new Arcade Fire" in Rolling Stone magazine. |
 | | Bombay Bicycle Club is a melodic, guitar-driven indie rock outfit from North London, comprised of frontman Jack Steadman, guitarist Jamie MacColl, drummer Suren de Saram, and bassist Ed Nash. |
 | | Born to Panamanian parents in Los Angeles in 1979, E. Nathaniel Dawkins (aka Aloe Blacc) first began playing trumpet in elementary school, and continued with the instrument throughout high school. |
 | | Jack Tatum, formerly of Jack and the Whale and Facepaint, began making his shimmery, synth-washed indie pop recordings under the name Wild Nothing in the summer of 2009. |
 | | City and Colour was the solo acoustic project of Dallas Green, best known as the singer/guitarist for the Canadian post-hardcore band Alexisonfire. |
 | | Singer/songwriter Samuel Beam, who rose to prominence with a blend of whispered vocals and softly homespun indie folk, chose the moniker Iron & Wine after coming across a dietary supplement named "Beef Iron & Wine" while working on a film. |
 | | Sharing a fondness for sophisticated soul and pop artists like the Smiths, New Order, and Marvin Gaye, vocalist Torquil Campbell and keyboardist Chris Seligman formed Stars in Toronto. |
 | | Kevin Parker (vocals/guitar) and Dominic Simper (bass) formed Tame Impala as 13 year olds in Perth in 1999, sticking to bedroom recordings until 2007, when Jay Watson joined them on drums and backing vocals. |
 | | Ernest Greene had been involved in a number of musical endeavors by the time he started putting together a series of recordings as Washed Out. |
 | | With his acoustic blues-folk sound and timeless soulful voice, singer/songwriter Michael Kiwanuka has been favorably compared with the likes of Curtis Mayfield, Terry Callier, and Van Morrison. |
 | | Playing garage-flavored punk rock with a Southern accent, a messed-up and bluesy undertow, and the gleefully destructive impact of a 15-year-old with a bag of firecrackers, the Black Lips are an Atlanta-based combo who after their debut in 2000 soon developed a reputation as one of the Peach State's wildest bands. |
 | | Toronto-based dubstep/house act Zeds Dead -- named after a line from Quentin Tarantino's 1994 film Pulp Fiction -- are a production duo consisting of DC and Hooks. |
 | | Zola Jesus is the project of Madison, Wisconsin’s Nika Roza Danilova, who crafts dark music dominated by her operatic vocals and keyboards. |
 | | The Radio Dept. were one of the more successful shoegaze-influenced indie rock bands to come out of Sweden in the early 2000s, making waves among indie aficionados on the strength of their critically acclaimed first release, Lesser Matters. |
 | | Toronto's quirky, high-energy indie rock outfit Tokyo Police Club features vocalist/bassist Dave Monks, keyboardist/vocalist Graham Wright, guitarist/percussionist Josh Hook, and drummer/percussionist Greg Alsop. |
 | | Folk-rock duo Tegan and Sara first burst onto the Canadian music scene in 1998, when they earned the highest score in history at Calgary's "Garage Warz" competition; their quick rise didn't stop, for their melodic acoustics and charming stage personas led to a slew of dates with Sarah McLachlan's Lilith Fair that same year and a record deal with Neil Young's Vapor Records in April 2000. |
 | | Irish singer/songwriter James Vincent McMorrow didn't begin his musical life until he was well into his teens. |
 | | Combining the noisy swells of the Jesus and Mary Chain with melodic elements of '50s rock & roll, the Raveonettes formed in Copenhagen during the early 2000s. |
 | | First Aid Kit are a Swedish duo comprised of sisters Johanna and Klara Söderberg, whose vocal harmonies and woodsy, folk-influenced songwriting take influence from the likes of Fleet Foxes and Joanna Newsom. |
 | | Although formed during the post-punk revival of the late '90s, the National took inspiration from a wider set of influences, including country-rock, Americana, indie rock, and Brit-pop. |
 | | Canadian roots rocker Matt Mays has become one of the nation's most popular new artists since hitting the road with his backing band, El Torpedo. |
 | | Nodding to bands like Yo La Tengo, the Cure, and the Flaming Lips with their cerebral, reverb-heavy brand of indie pop, the Foundry Field Recordings formed in the early 2000's as a vehicle for songwriter Billy Schuh. |
 | | Atlas Sound is the solo project of Bradford Cox, the striking and eccentric vocalist for experimental indie rocker act Deerhunter. |
 | | Despite its summery name, Beach House creates music that is dark, dreamy, and alluringly hypnotic. Baltimore residents Alex Scally and Victoria Legrand (the niece of French composer Michel Legrand) formed the duo in 2005, with Legrand's hushed, Nico-like vocals and Scally's delicate instrumentation paving the way for their first batch of songs. |
 | | The Swedish indie pop artist Lykke Li Zachrisson (better known as Lykke Li) grabbed the attention of international bloggers in the early 2000s with a handful of catchy, retro-chic singles made available on her MySpace profile. |
 | | The music of Brooklyn's Yeasayer is an eclectic, genre-bending journey into pop, rock, Middle Eastern and African musics, folk, and dub. |
 | | In 2010, at the ripe age of 16, nu-disco/dubstep producer Hugo Leclercq, aka Madeon, started becoming largely popular for his remixes, including his versions of songs by the Killers and Pendulum. |
