America Today

It's a vast land, with a sonic landscape to match . . . welcome to America, one decade into the 21st Century, as we hang-glide over its grand canyon of musical creativity, pointing out various highlights here and there, including the strangely hypnotic "Helicopter" from Deerhunter's fourth album Halcyon Digest (2010), Avi Buffalo's delicate and slightly disconcerting West Coast noodlings on "Summer Cum", the energized garage fuzz of fellow Golden Staters (and Sub Pop label mates) No Age ("Depletion"), and a splendid cover of David Bowie's "Memory of a Free Festival" by Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros.

The Texan lobby turns it up, in Next Steps.

Any stroll along the cutting edge of American rock is sure to take you through Austin, Texas, not just because the city plays host to the annual South By Southwest (SXSW) festival, but also because it's home to the likes of Woven Bones and the Black Angels — the former outfit, led by transplanted Floridian Andrew Burr, surfs a wild, molten, apocalyptic wave through "I've Gotta Get", passing signposts left by Spacemen 3 and the Jesus and Mary Chain, and the latter proves itself a kindred spirit with "Yellow Elevator #2" from 2010's Phosphene Dream. Head further West, to San Francisco, and you'll find Papercuts ("White Are the Waves").

Take a sonic trip from Portland to Brooklyn, in Deep Cuts.

Here we head off the highways and onto the back roads of America, where some of the nation's strangest, wildest and most enchanting sounds are being made. Occupying a space all his own is Matt Mondanile who, in addition to his guitar duties for the Garden State's Real Estate, uses the moniker Ducktails as a means to explore the bizarre margins of psychedelic pop — check out "Apple Walk". There's something disarmingly bright about "Shake the Shackles" by Brooklyn-based NY nu-gaze scenesters Crystal Stilts, while at the opposite end of the continent, up there in Portland, OR, Blitzen Trapper finds rustic bliss with Alela Diane on "The Tree".

Stuffed with sonic goodness from sea to shining sea, America is still the world's biggest, boldest music laboratory — an experimental wonderland where new sounds are forged on a daily basis, and new bands arise from a talent pool deeper than the Atlantic Ocean. Because the continent is so massive, it would take the mother of all road trips to seek out the best of the current bunch, so we've made that journey for you . . . and brought back these thrilling mementoes. It makes for one comprehensive guide to the modern American music scene, as the 21st Century ambles into its second decade, taking in the full range of genres and scenes, from freak folk to nu-gaze, noise pop to math rock, post-post-punk to dream pop . . . and all variations thereof. So follow your ears from the back alleys of Williamsburg to the underpasses of Echo Park, and live in America Today.