The Black Keys’ highly anticipated sixth new album, Brothers is due out in early 2010. Of the band, Rolling Stone says “rock of this caliber is really timeless.” The Black Keys are Dan Auerbach on guitar/vocals and Patrick Carney on drums. The new album was recorded at the legendary Muscle Shoals Studios in Alabama. The New York Times has called The Black Keys’ music “tough-minded, blues haunted songs,” and the ghosts of Muscle Shoals inhabit Brothers’ 15 tracks. Of the album, Auerbach says, “We like spooky sounds… like Alice Coltrane, where a dark groove is laid down. That’s the headspace we tried to get into for this record.”

The Morning Benders are fast gaining indie fame with a distinctive sound, featuring a plethora of instruments and skillful multi-layered vocals. This year saw the release of Big Echo which has garnered a myriad of amazing press. It was produced by the band’s Christopher Chu and Grizzly Bear’s Chris Taylor. The New York Times said of the pairing, “their shared fondness for California pop gloss with experimental underpinnings, from Brian Wilson and psychedelia to Fleetwood Mac, has transformed a straightforward, 1960s-loving, folk-rock and Merseybeat band into one whose songs exult in texture… It’s a splendid transformation.” Pitchfork gave the album an 8.2 and said “Morning Benders (have a) stylistic transition, one any band would envy and many listeners will love.”

Hailing from London, Hot Chip have proven to be one of the longest-lasting, prolific and talented electropop groups of the new millennium. With a truly unique vocal signature and a penchant for complex orchestration, Hot Chip’s music is intellectual without ever losing a step on the dance floor and deeply, artfully human. The band’s newest album, One Life Stand was described by The Guardian as “their best work, paring down past excesses and unifying them into an extraordinarily lovely whole.”

Hercules and Love Affair is a collective of likeminded disco/electroclash/glam artists led by DFA Records’ DJ Andy Butler. The band’s 2008 song “Blind” was named Song of the Year by Pitchfork. The band’s eponymous freshman album was critically regaled both in the US and abroad with prominent electronic/dance critic Philip Sherburne calling it “lush, melancholic, gregarious, generous, both precise and a little bit unhinged… the most original American dance album in a long while.” Now they return to the live circuit with a brand new line up of vocalists and fresh material.

Holy Ghost! are born and bred New Yorkers Alex Frankel and Nick Millhiser. The two disco/hot sauce enthusiasts met in elementary school and have been playing in bands together ever since. After working as musicians for many DFA studio recordings, they formed Holy Ghost! over a shared love of analog synthesizers, Larry Levan era-disco, and the cheap thrills of pop. The duo released their first original song “Hold On,” which iTunes named “Single of The Week.” Remixes for artists like MGMT, Cut Copy, Phoenix, and Moby soon followed. The duo will simultaneously release an EP in 2010 and unveil their live show, opening up for LCD Soundsystem, in the USA and in Europe.