With their gentle lo-fi waltzes and sparse crooner-less country-ish ballads, Brooklyn's own Backwords are bringing back optimistic atmospheres reminiscent of Camper Van Beethoven's unforgettable record Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart - minus that band's legendary violin of course. Shots in the Dark in particular - with its lack of pretension, pleasant crooked melody, and lyrics about friendship - is a song that has the rare power to keep you company. The band is currrently working on their upcoming album in their house/studio, and will be performing live at Pianos on March 3 and at Sycamore on March 5.

Some songs sound like they were made for a windless and intense snowy day like today - Christy and Emily's Little World" is one of them (listen to it here). The duo plays elegant, contained, slow pop songs with a classical and experimental edge. The song will be included in the band's third full length, entitled No Rest, recorded in Germany and released in April on Klangbad Records. For reasons beyond us this kind of gorgeous, sophisticated, introspective soft music (here we call it "mellow core") has way more following in Europe than in the States - some attribute this to the "European decadence". But dudes, Rock'n'Roll decadence started with the Velvet Underground, and Christy and Emily's music shares many ingredients with the Banana Album, so it may be time for NYC to embrace its own. See them live at Monster Island on March 13.

Extra Life is one of those bands noisy engough to scandalize our friend and ex reader April (see her comment about Talk Normal here). But surprisingly enough, the video they recently premiered on stereogum.com is pretty much the exact opposit of noisy (are the dudes getting older? That's what happens to musicians when they get older, they play less noisy, more structured stuff - the only exception is a Canadian band called Anvil). Anyway, whatever the reason behind this welcome surprise, the important thing is that the dudes haven't lost their interest in experimenting, creating here a track that sounds like some sort of avant-pastoral music with disturbing imagery, very well transposed to video by director Peking. The Deli likes it!

French Horn Rebellion entertained us last year with their electronic dancey songs and a goofy video that recreated Saturday Night Fever style wooing in hypster Williamsburg, 2009 circa. The duo is back with a new EP entitled Beaches and Friends that will be released on March 1st. This Spring they'll join Little Boots and Dragonette on their US tour. FHR will also be making appearances at this years SXSW, Bestival, and Oxygen Festival. These guys are entertaining, don't miss their live performances.

Scrambler Seequill is a Brooklyn duo full of sonic surprises. Ethereal atmoshpheres, crunchy distorted beats, sudden reggae-ish breaks, zappian guitar solos, weird samples and loops coexist in a unique hodgepodge of music influences. The combined sounds of Mike Gamble's (Scrambler) deft guitar arrangements and loop wizardry with Devin Febbroriello's (Seequill) rhythmic compositions and ghostly vocals, create a colorful palette in which they nonchalantly mess with our minds and ears.Their live performances introduce extra improvisation when joined by drummer Conor Elmes and bass player Ari Folman Cohen. Their debut CD "Secret Passageways", recorded mostly in an abandoned house and yes, their bathroom, is out now digitally worldwide. They will be playing a free all ages show March 6th at The Tea Lounge in Brooklyn at 9 pm.