Things get poppin’ both days this weekend beginning at 1 p.m. with sets from dozens of bands, most of which scored around eight points on the Pitchfork scale (seriously, go check the album reviews!). Musicians such as Beirut, Wavves, Cymbals Eat Guitars, Matt and Kim, The Black Lips and The Nationals take the stage Saturday, while M83, The Mae Shi, The Thermals, Pharoahe Monch, Vivian Girls, Frightened Rabbit and The Flaming Lips close it out on Sunday. That’s just a handful of bands, so make sure to wander around and catch artists at other stages.

And if you need tickets, Friday passes are still available, or you better have really nice friends. Check the schedule before you go and remember the El will be packed!

As it turns out, a whole lot of cuteness. The married duo from Lancaster got the idea for their band name while in Paris when they spotted an abandoned pigeon’s nest; soon after, they were jetting across the Atlantic to play their first gig in NYC. Holly and David–while adorable (his drum kit is outfitted with a squeaky horn, and samples of dogs barking and bees humming appear on their records)–can also be dead serious about their music even if they are singing about what to serve mice who come over for tea. (They say they’re influenced by everyone from The Velvet Underground to Bikini Kill to The Beach Boys.)

Their fashion inspirations are equally disparate–part gypsy-goth-punk; part pre-drug addled (and happy) Nico and Lou school-teachers who enjoy the occasional toke.

The Eggs take an equally quasi-serious approach to performance–below, Holly recalls the days way back when playing in an all-girls band as a teenager when overly enthusiastic male concert-goers would encourage her to remove her “tits” from their cotton-polyester blend prisons. She never chose to take them up on the invitation. And luckily these days, their audiences are fem-friendly boys and girls who would never dream of asking Holly or David to reveal their lovely eggs.

For hip-hop heads, Rock the Bells is going down Sunday July 19th, with remaining dates in Canada, Colorado and California. This year’s lineup features Nas and Damien Marley, Cypress Hill, Ice Cube, The Roots, Common, Busta Rhymes, Big Boi, EPMD and dozens more.

Sprinkle in a few Wu-Tang members plus super groups like Slaughterhouse and hosts that include KRS-ONE, Murs, Pete Rock and Supernatural, and they’ve pretty much got every major corner of the last 20 years of hip-hop covered. Different acts will be performing in different cities of course, but no matter who you catch it’s impossible to leave this without nodding your head. You might even catch some of the Siren Fest bands there:

Hook-happy (forgive the bad and totally unintentional pun) Pete and the Pirates definitely reside in popland, but miles away from willy-trilly bubblegum teen rock, they’ve got dirty streaks of garage rock and clever lyrics that joyfully finger the gunk-filled underbelly of sex and love to liven things up.

Compared to Hamburg-era Beatles with “the indie aesthetic of C86 and the dizzy vocal interplay of a more chart-friendly Futureheads,” the no-nonsense Reading, England fivesome doesn’t really have time for a bunch of whiny high schoolers who want to discuss how many times they’ve cried today and whether or not the B6 vitamins they’ve been popping are going to help the sitch.

In other words: emo kids. The Pirates think the movement, genre and probably the kids themselves are actually all “a bit faux” really–producing music that’s little more than contrived chunks of over-produced moaning.

The Pirates look like the kind of guys who may not run up behind the emo kids in the hall and give them wedgies, but maybe the sweet, earnest and helpful types who pull them aside in the bathroom and try to talk ‘em out of applying that third layer of black eyeliner. Yep, they’re your standard hot-to-trot, deep thinking indie boys with the massive vintage collars, ironic V-neck sweaters, thick-rimmed specs and perplexing hairdos to prove it. Definitely not faux.

But don’t expect any drunken antics during his set–that’s reserved for the after-party.

The band is also hitting the road next month, where they’ll play everywhere from Japan’s Summer Sonic Festival and Austin City Limits to headlining a U.S. tour at clubs across the country before returning to New York for the CMJ Music Marathon. Tickets go on sale today.

Here the band recaps where album title came from, and why you’ll probably never go skydiving with them. Sorry to burst your bubble.

Now Sandoval is back with My Bloody Valentine drummer Colm O’Ciosoig as Hope Sandoval & the Warm Inventions. The duo’s sophomore album Through The Devil Softly comes out September 15 and the band is developing plans for a fall tour in the States, with Europe to follow.

Download the first single “Blanchard” right here.

Shootyz Groove is one of the most interesting products of the hip-hop/hardcore/metal fusion movement. And for that, they will always receive considerable props. Their hilarious approach to “maleness” may not win them as many fans, however: Just so ya know, they’re so freakin’ tired of the pussification of the American male, ya know?

What with the whole indoor smoking ban thingamajig, widespread conspiracy to encourage people to eat their vegetables and not beat their children, the implementation of sexual harassment laws, etc. the good ol’ U.S. of A. just ain’t what it used to be.

Much like their so-retro-it-may-be-progressive vision of American Family Life (where women should be women and men should be men), their style embodies that oft imitated, but rarely duplicated Sopranos/Ice T-esque, hirsute, gold-chained, hurly-burly, bad boyz, gangster style that makes fathers lock up their daughters–if they weren’t already reaching for the deadbolt themselves. Stay classy, Shootyz Groove. Stay classy.

Scattergood’s self-titled debut, which dropped in the States earlier this spring, skitters from fragile confessional asides to abrasive challenges that are as blunt as a Sylvia Plath verse. Though there’s a breathy, girlish piquancy to her voice, Scattergood, 22, utilizes it with precocious confidence, hurtling from ebullient pop gems (“Please Don’t Touch”) to eviscerated lullabies (“Poem Song”) to heart-on-my-bloody-fucking-sleeve anthems (“Unforgiving Arms”).

Whittled down from an estimated 800 songs that Scattergood has written since her early teens, there’s a distorted, cinematic texture to the ten songs on the debut, a quality that Scattergood told Uncensored Interview, via email, likely reflects how her peripatetic mind works, awash with fragments of music, film and art that she’s encountered. She cites influences as diverse as This is England director Shane Meadows (“I love the lighting he uses”) and Leonard Cohen.

“I see things that inspire me to write,” says Scattergood, “and sometimes I write things that spark off images in my head. I love artists like Gregory Crewdson. People often say his images have a very cinematic quality to them; they are certainly very dark and surreal. My dream is to score a film. I would love to work on any Meadows film…I also love the work of Tim Burton and David Lynch.”

The daughter of an actor and visual artist, Scattergood, who grew up in Wivenhoe, Essex, attended London’s acclaimed Brit School in Croyden, known for producing ambitious alumni like Kate Nash, Adele, Amy Winehouse, the Kooks’ Luke Pritchard and Leona Lewis. Scattergood admits to being an outsider in that milieu. On her own since 16 years old and supporting herself with odd jobs, she applied to the Brit School when, unable to read music, she was turned down by her local sixth form college.

“The Brit School is a free school [and they didn’t care] if I could or couldn’t read music,” Scattergood explained. “They just want to see a passion for music, and I had that, so I got in. I found it an interesting experience. I enjoyed being around other creative people, and I made full use of having access to a piano and other instruments. I didn’t totally fit in, as writing was where my heart was.”

While songs like the single “Nitrogen Pink,” its surreal lyrics growling with images of “sweet rotting memories,” are refuted as being autobiographical–that track is based on a distant acquaintance’s battle with cancer–Scattergood explains that music was the way she expressed herself as a teenager. Now as a young adult, that need has become a sort of “addiction.”

“When I write a song, I never think ‘this could be heard by someone,’” says Scattergood, whose fey surname is a pseudonym. “I just write it for myself, and I try and take that attitude with me when I am on stage. Ultimately I do it for myself because it is what I do. I think if I started thinking that other people were watching me or listening, it would really effect me, and probably be quite destructive.”

Working with producer Simon Fisher Turner, a former teen heartthrob turned musician, Scattergood cobbled together the songs for her debut album from the hundreds she had penned, songs she views as “a journey.” And she vividly remembers the seed of every composition:

“‘I Hate The Way’ was written when I was 17 on a toy keyboard in a bedsit in Selhurst,” she recalls. “’Nitrogen Pink’ was written on a piano in a white box in Streatham, ‘Untitled 27’ was written in the [Mute Records] studio on the Harrow Road. I am the constant but they are all different, some good and some not so good. But the fact they are all together sitting on a record, that’s something I feel quite proud of I suppose.”

Scattergood is spending the summer close to home; she plays the iTunes Festival in London on July 19^th and will travel to the Isle of Wright for BBC Radio 1 DJ Rob da Bank’s Bestival in mid-September. Looking ahead to the autumn, the slight blonde singer, who travels on tour with a bottle of brandy to soothe her insomnia and a radio (“I find the sound of a radio really comforting”), dreams of touring the States:

“I once set foot in Newark for about a hour whilst ‘in transit’ to Costa Rica! As a child I would see films set in America on the TV, and it was this far away land that always seems so full of adventures. So many people say I will love it. I just can’t wait for the day I get to come over and see it with my own eyes.”

Polly Scattergood’s eponymous debut is available now on Mute Records

First things first (Rod Stewart 1984-style hairdos aside), let’s face it: These guys could hop into bed with pretty much any unfettered chick they set their bedroom eyes on–with or without their considerable music chops to back them up.

With help from Tommy Lee, Twiggy Ramirez, Joey Santiago, Tony Bevilacqua, Kurt Baumann, Brody Dalle and Gerald V. Casale,  it’s like the ’80s made love to the ’90s and gave birth to the aughts all on one record described as “bold, dark, and entertaining, with some truly electrifying moments.”

And speaking of making love, unless they’re totally fucking with us (which is totally possible), the men of Freeland are all about you, baby. Despite what the evil overlords in the media, Cosmo, your own deeply paranoid inner monologue (wait, is that just me?) may tell you, not every musician sets out to hit every easy, breezy, beautiful Cover Girl they meet on the road. Freelanders are into the deeper things in life. They actually believe in doing things that are real, have a foundation and are genuine. Because what else is there?

Well, there is fashion. But much like their existential humanism fetish, again, unless they’re fucking with us, Freeland is the rare, real, deep music-fashion deal. They’re twig thin, adorably (just shy of cheesily) coordinated, sunglassed, belted, blazered, skinny-pantsed and white-shirted blazes of glory. Shine on, Freeland, shine on, you crazy diamonds.