Who: Both a longtime partner-in-crime to San Francisco garage-rock demon Ty Segall (going back to their high school punk band Epsilons, alongside fellow collaborator Charlie Mootheart) and bassist in his touring outfit, Cronin, a gifted songwriter in his own right, has opted most recently to deviate completely from the devil-horned output of his friends. After a stellar self-titled debut in 2011, the Laguna Beach native is preparing for the release of his Merge debut, MCII, a thoughtfully arranged slab of shimmering, high-grade Californian power-pop that already sounds like one of the year's finest outings. File Next To: Ty Segall, Radish, (Early) WeezerWhere to Start: "Get Along," a standout from 2011's Mikal Cronin that serves as a perfect primer for all that awaits you on MCII.
Who: The Glaswegian trio of Lauren Mayberry, Iain Cook, and Martin Doherty all sing and play synths, though it's mostly Mayberry's Kate Bush-wizened vocals you hear rising through CHVRCHES' misty, outrageously melodic electro-pop. Thanks to a penchant for moving choruses and the sort of Robyn-like honesty required to sell big emotions, CHVRCHES stand out for flirting with pop so unabashedly. For a sense of what's at stake here, consider their cover of Prince's "I Would Die 4 U," which they of course retitled "I Would Die 4 V."File Next To: Boy Friend, Glass Candy, Purity RingWhere to Start: “Recover,” an ode to trying to figure your life out, off the EP of the same name, out on Glassnote, March 26.[videoembed size="full_width" alignment="center"][/videoembed]
Who: Longtime Baton Rouge, Louisiana local hero who languished on Cash Money-Young Money but held steady by releasing emotive and hardened mixtapes. He hit a career high with last month's The Luca Brasi Story, a furious flurry of street rhymes and desperate love songs that likely earned him his new roster spot at Atlantic Records. Gates is about to have a moment and fortunately, it's coinciding with his most accomplished work, yet — that doesn't happen enough in rap these days, where veterans often expend their creativity long before the labels realize what they've got.File Next To: Fiend, Raekwon, Slim ThugWhere to Start: "Just Ride," a moody slow-burner featuring Curren$y off The Luca Brasi Story, out now.[videoembed size="full_width" alignment="center"][/videoembed]
Who: Jack Colleran, an Irish producer of echo-soaked, pop-ambient miniatures whose radiant calm belies his young age. Colleran was just 18 when he released his debut EP last year on Los Angeles' SQE label, interpolating the buoyant tones of Kompakt's electronic lullabies with the shuffle and thump of L.A.'s beat-music scene. Since then, he's toured with the xx and opened for Aphex Twin (and, more strangely, At the Drive-In). MMOTHS' new Diaries EP is intended as a scrapbook of a head-spinning year on the road, but don't expect much in the way of backstage shenanigans; blurry as snapshots from a dime-store camera, the songs' sense of space and stillness suggests distant thunderclouds and passing fields of daisies. Each of the record's short, bittersweet tracks is a postcard loaded with longing.File Next To: Holy Other, James Blake, How to Dress WellWhere to Start: "All These Things," featuring Holly Miranda, which sounds like a cross between Konono No.1 and M83.
Who: A sometimes singing (though it's more like mall-punk screaming) and often rapping (though it's more like chaotic, croaking singing) Auto-Tuned ATL oddball who built his reputation on three volumes of the cult mixtape series I Came From Nothing and is now signed to Gucci Mane's 1017 Brick Squad. Thug is as idiosyncratic as his name is rote and played-out, moving from rubbery rap-pop in the mode of rinky-dink Soulja Boy snap to the dead-eyed d-boy threats of his Brick Squad bros. Though even those songs tend to contain catchy, crazed hooks.File Next To: D4L, Future, Lil WayneWhere to Start: The beyond-weeded “Condo Music” off his new mixtape 1017 Thug, out now.