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Check out the archives from previous years: 2010 | 2009

The Newport Folk Festival announces stunning lineup. Highlights include: Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, the Decemberists, Emmylou Harris and Elvis Costello.

You wouldn't know it from the SNOMG but spring really is just around the corner. And that means Twangfest.

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The current project of songwriter, singer, guitarist and jack-of-many-trades David Beeman, Old Lights aims for the scraped-up romanticism of American Music Club or the sunny folk pop of Fruit Bats and hits the elusive targets squarely. Hear the band's debut KDHX performance on the Space Parlour.

Celia isn't just a kid's entertainer -- she's fronted rock bands big and small, and also performed solo, acoustic for adult audiences -- but she has a special knack for making a never-condescending connection with children.

When Al Gore invented the Internet, music was probably the last thing on his mind. But the Internet has transformed the way we listen to and think about music, as surely as the first phonographs or border radio stations or the electric guitar. We're as likely to hear music or hear about music via our computers (and phones) as any other medium.

If Beirut blends European folk with pop, and Gogol Bordello blends gypsy with punk, then Yard Dogs Road Show completes this triumvirate straddling old and new worlds with its perfect marriage of wild-west burlesque and 21st century indie rock. A mouthful, indeed! Yet "mouthful" is perhaps fitting for this collective that swallows swords, eats fire and ebulliates with hobo poetry. Experience the live session on the Other One.

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Just when you think you have Midlake pegged, the Denton, Texas band slips away. It took the group three years to reinvent itself, and on 2010's The Courage of Others, the septet has created masterpiece of contemporary folk rock. Hear Midlake perform 3 songs in an acoustic format, plus a conversation with songwriter Tim Smith, on Feel Like Going Home.

Militant and comic at once, TSIGOTI (which means "I see" in Cherokee) is a multi-national collaboration whose musical sensibility is best described as improvisational punk and whose commitment to social change rings out in every inventive tune.

Winners of the 2009 Telluride Bluegrass Competition, the HillBenders are on the leading edge of the "new" newgrass scene. Splitting the difference between polished bluegrass and free-spirited acoustic blues and rock, the Springfield, Mo.-based band journeyed Down Yonder for a live session.

Between bathos and pathos, soul and smarts, rock and folk, the songs and sound of Frightened Rabbit have a tendency to get inside your head and never leave. That's what great pop music does, and the band illustrates the axiom during a live session at KDHX.

Experimenting within the boundaries established by post-rock stalwarts Explosions in the Sky and Godspeed You! Black Emperor, St. Louis band Huntergatherer balances the solemnity of the genre with swelling action and brooding intensity.

Longtime leader of Chicago rock band Dolly Varden, Steve Dawson expanded his sonic and lyrical range with the solo album Sweet Is the Anchor in 2004, and now, with I Will Miss the Trumpets and the Drums, he's continuing to explore the possibilities of solo recording.

Purveyors of sweetly sparse folk, Portland quartet Horse Feathers stir emotions with wispy vocals and a variety of dreamily plucked string instruments. Close your eyes, envision lying supine in a serene meadow, and tune into their transcendent in-studio performance at KDHX.

Reaching younger festival audiences and hardcore traditional bluegrass fans alike, the Steep Canyon Rangers bring a contemporary songwriting sensibility to their gospel harmonies and churning acoustic sound.

With a rock anthem-style that is both catchy and head-bang worthy, the Whigs have rocketed from college band-next door to overnight stardom.

Zach Hill is a self-taught drummer, but his home schooling is insanely advanced. Genres and styles -- from math rock to free jazz to metal to experimental rock -- barely hint at his mad skills. Hill paid a visit to KDHX for a smashing and thrashing live performance.

Texas is known for giving rise to scores of influential artists in a host of genres, but bluegrass isn't among them. Cadillac Sky may be changing all that. Fusing the harmonies and rhythmic power of bluegrass with the reckless drive and expressive songwriting of rock & roll, the band paid a visit to KDHX for a live performance.

Slip into a dreamlike trance to the eerily methodical rhythm of St. Louis artist Cassie Morgan and the Lonely Pine. The duo showcased its distinctive sound and songs from the new album Weathered Hands, Weary Eyes during a live session at KDHX.

Graceful, gentle and yet spirited, 3 Penny Acre combines the unplugged sounds of bluegrass with a slightly more contemporary edge of Americana and singer-songwriter folk.

A veteran progressive pop band from Chicago, Cheer-Accident somehow manage to combine an uptempo, danceable sound, with a post-punk, art-damaged sensibility.

Simon and Garfunkel were one of the most significant pop acts of the '60s, but their influence has waned. Enter the Northwoods, who seem to have an unwritten mission to update the sweet and sensitive pop style.  

There are super groups and then there are superb groups. Consider the Notable Haberdashers both. This 7-piece St. Louis band puts their twang where their ten-gallon hats are. It's the sound of honky tonk, Western Swing and classic hillbilly music as only the veterans can play it.