FEATURED ARTISTS

The English singer/songwriter released his first studio album in 1993 and received worldwide attention after the release of White Ladder six years later. Gray’s early music was in a contemporary folk-rock, singer-songwriter mode; his primary instrument was acoustic guitar, with occasional piano. Starting with the release of White Ladder, Gray began to make significant use of computer-generated music to accompany his voice and acoustic instrumentation, a technique which differentiates him from many of his peers.

“In many ways, Jack Peñate is Lily Allen minus the sarcasm and the party frocks. The South Londoner’s music is slick, radio-ready pop, but its heart is rooted in the Two-Tone ska revival and the more soulful end of ’80s pop, along the lines of the Style Council and the Housemartins. Add in Peñate’s striking vocal resemblance to the young Billy Bragg and he’s like the post-millennial equivalent to the U.K. student discos of two decades previously.” -Starpulse.com

After fronting several rock bands in his native Idaho, singer/songwriter Justin Ringle moved to Portland, OR in 2004 and began focusing on acoustic music, playing open mics regularly under the moniker Horse Feathers. In 2005, multi-instrumentalist Peter Broderick heard a couple of Justin’s demos and offered to help flesh them out. In February 2006 the duo went into Skyler Norwood’s Miracle Lake studios and recorded their debut album, ‘Words are Dead,’ which was released that September on Portland label, Lucky Madison. Later that year, Peter’s sister Heather Broderick joined the group on cello and by 2007, Horse Feathers began featuring a rotating cast of instrumentalists backing Justin’s guitar and vocals.

Formed in 2007 after a brief existential crisis of frontman Alex Ebert, this 11-piece ensemble is a tight-knit, music-making indie band reminiscent of musical communes of the 60s. “The absolute best place to take in the band’s gloriously uplifting ruckus is on the concert stage, where the music takes on the celebratory and intense air of a revival show. When singers Edward Sharpe (a.k.a. Alex Ebert) and Jade Castrinos lock eyes and sing to each other, it conjures images of Johnny and June, if Johnny Cash were a towering figure with dreadlocks and no undershirt” (NPR).

Freelance Whales found one another in late 2008, in Queens, amidst a strange amalgam of unfamiliar instruments, and precariously arranged pop songs. Using whatever musical gadgets they happened upon (mostly harmonium, banjo, glockenspiel, synthesizers, guitars, bass, drums, waterphone), the five members worked at crafting songs with interlocking rhythmic patterns, lush textural layering, and an engaged group-vocal energy. The result is “like someone wired their heart to a synthesizer.”