We’ve been fans of the bluegrass stylings of Trampled By Turtles since Ryan first wrote about the Duluth, Minn.-based act all the way back in December of 2009, as they were gearing up to release their “breakthrough” studio album, Palomino. The record debuted at number one on Billboard’s bluegrass charts, and remained in their top ten for well over a year, while also charting not only on the industry reporting rag’s Heatseekers’ chart, but also on their Indie one as well, peaking at number 11 and 46, respectively. That’s quite a feat for any band, let alone one that plays bluegrass music.

The origins of Trampled By Turtles goes back to 2003, when after most of his gear was stolen while playing a gig, Dave Simonett decided to put together a band that could play live with little or no amplification, drawing inspiration from the acoustic traditions of folk and bluegrass music. With a background in the rock , Simonett’s  new band mates were also relative newcomers to the genre, with a fiddle player who logged time as a drummer in a speed metal band and a bassist who came from the jamband world. All those factors helped Trampled By Turtles find their own take on bluegrass that they have fine tuned over the course of nearly a decade. Last week, the five-piece band released their sixth studio album, Stars and Satellites, which features some stunning plaintive ballads that showcase the band’s fantastic vocal harmonies as well as high quality breakneck picking that would have made Bill Monroe & His Bluegrass Boys proud. Let’s check out the music video for the record’s lead single, Alone…

Trampled By Turtles are currently on the road, and will hit the music festival circuit this summer in a major way, making high profile appearances at Sasquatch, Bonnaroo, All Good, Firefly, RockyGrass, Newport Folk and Lollapalooza.

Over the five and half years that we’ve doing Hidden Track, we’ve had a lot of people contribute to the site that much like college athletics we still consider “friends of the program.” So it’s with great pride that today we bring you the debut music video from the up-and-coming Brooklyn act King Stork, whose singer-guitarist Daniel Schneier we consider an alum. The four-piece band plays a mix of psychedelic surf-rock, with a healthy dose of lo-fi indie – think Pavement. King Stork recently released their debut four-track EP, Summer Rental, which you can download for free here, and yesterday dropped the music video for the album’s title-track.

The video is an acid-drenched tribute to the aesthetic of Wes Anderson’s movies and the sheer absurdity of The Monkees television show. Let’s check it out…

King Stork – Summer Rental

Move over indie bands, legacy acts are trying to make sure that you don’t forget about them in 2012. This year we’ve already seen high quality releases from the likes of Bruce Springsteen, Van Halen and Leonard Cohen, and tomorrow we’ll see that trend continue as Bonnie Raitt will put out her latest studio album Slipstream. The 12-track covers-heavy affair will be Rock & Roll Hall Of Famer’s first new record in seven years, and will also serve as the debut album for her own label, Redwing Records. Late last week Raitt released the music video for that album’s first single, a cover of the Gerry Raftery classic Right Down The Line. Let’s check it out…

Bonnie Raitt – Right Down The Line

Bonnie Raitt will make a slew of national television appearances this week, and will officially kick off the first leg of her North American tour on Tuesday, May 1, at the Events Center at the First Council Casino in Newkirk, Oklahoma.

The story of Regina Spektor’s rise to pop stardom is something that you might find as the plot to a Disney movie. The quirky piano-pop queen was born and raised in Moscow, learning about Western rock and pop music from her father’s bootleg cassette tapes, while becoming quite adept at playing the piano. At the age of nine, Spektor’s family emigrated to the United States, during Russia’s period of Perestroika, landing in the Bronx. Without access to a piano of their own right away, Spektor practiced anywhere she could, which included playing a piano in the basement of her synagogue, while other times meant just pretending on play on tabletops, until her family could get one of their own.

Fast forward several years later. After discovering a knack for songwriting on a trip to Israel, Spektor became a fixture of the Lower East Side’s anti-folk scene (which included acts like The Moldy Peaches) in the early part of the aughts, where she was introduced to Gordon Raphael, who produced The Strokes first two albums.

It was through Raphael, who produced Spektor’s third studio album Soviet Kitsch, that Spetkor wound up on her first nationwide tour as the opening act for The Strokes, for their Room On Fire tour, which also included the Kings Of Leon as the middle act on the bill. It was also during this tour that Spektor recorded Modern Girls & Old Fashion Men, the B-side to The Strokes’ track Reptilia, and was invited nightly during the tour to play it with them, introducing the then virtually unknown singer-songwriter to a wider audience.

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Last year Ryan profiled up and comers Caveman, who were gaining some substantial and well-deserved buzz, while on the verge of dropping their debut full-length album Coco Beware. Last week the Brooklyn-based act, a band recommended for fans of the lo-fi psych-rock of Real Estate, Woods and The War On Drugs, released their first music video for the track Thankful. The clip embraces Caveman’s wrestling referencing album title, thanks in part to help of the fine folks at the New York Wrestling Connection. Let’s check it out…

Caveman – Thankful

Caveman currently has a few days off from their lengthy spring tour that picks up again on April 9 with a gig at The Red Palace in Washington, DC and concludes with a high profile appearance at the Crossing Brooklyn Ferry festival on May 3.

This isn’t the first time that we’ve written about today’s Pullin’ ‘Tubes subject, The White Buffalo. Last year, Ryan joking referred to the alter ego of Jake Smith as Mr. Irrelevant, for holding the distinction of being the last act listed on Bonnaroo’s 2011 lineup. While it’s safe to say that the distinction probably did hold true, as most ‘roo attendees probably had never heard a note from the singer-songwriter, those that did show up to his two scheduled sets at Bonnaroo’s two smallest stages – the On Tap Lounge and Sonic Stage – most likely walked away mightily impressed from his much buzzed about performances. With the recent of release of Once Upon a Time in the West, it’s now time for a wider audience to sit up and take notice of the music of The White Buffalo.

What will immediately will stand out when you first sit down and listen to the music of The White Buffalo is Mr. Smith’s voice. There is no avoiding it, so let’s just get it out of the way, he’s a dead ringer to Eddie Vedder, possessing the same croaky, whiskey-drenched growl of the Pearl Jam front man. Once you put that behind you, there isn’t much of a similarity with the seminal grunge act, as The White Buffalo plays a gutsy brand of country-rock that owes a great debt to Neil Young and evokes imagery of a dusty rough and tumble border town. The White Buffalo have a handful of a spring dates scheduled, which includes a stop at the Fox Theatre in Boulder on March 24. Let’s check out the music video for the album’s lead single, Wish It Was True…

Earlier this year Andy Kahn threw down a B List that featured his Top 8 Upcoming Albums For 2012. Among the crop of records he highlighted, which included the likes of The Shins, of Montreal and Paul McCartney, was Break It Yourself, the seventh studio album from Andrew Bird. The violin playing-whistling enthusiast has had an interesting path that led to his recent critically acclaimed success. Graduating with a degree in violin performance from Northwestern in 1996, Bird’s self-released first solo album Music of Hair that year was steeped in sounds of traditional American and European folk music – that included nods to bluegrass, klezmer and jazz. Following a stint collaborating with the Squirrel Nut Zippers (who deserve credit as the forerunners to the current Gypsy punk movement) on two studio albums, Bird formed his own band aptly named Andrew Bird’s Bowl Of Fire. The band, which included members of Squirrel Nut Zippers, put out three albums full of the pre-war jazz and swing influenced music, with doses of everything from zydeco to folk to blues to Latin music thrown in.

After disbanding with Bowl Of Fire in 2003, Bird signed to Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records, putting out his first true solo album since the mid-90s with Weather Systems. The album saw a rather radical shift in Bird’s approach as he began to move towards, for lack of a better term, an indie-folk sound that favored lush, densely-layered, dreamy melodic arrangements, which featured his now trademark whistling throughout, and one that has carried him through a string of releases ever since. For his latest studio effort, Bird headed to his studio barn in Western Illinois, recording most of Break Your Self live with a full band, giving the record a bit more of an organic feel. Let’s check out this live in-studio performance of the album’s first single Eyeoneye…

Andrew Bird will kick off the U.S. leg of his world tour on March 14, with an appearance at NPR Music’s SXSW Showcase at Stubb’s BBQ in Austin, Texas. The tour also will include a two-night stand at New York City’s Beacon Theatre on May 4 and 5.

In the early part of the aughts The Secret Machines, with their psychedelic hard-rock sounds, seemed poised to become the next big thing. Then in 2007, after the release of two studio albums and a couple of EPs, their guitarist Benjamin Curtis decided to part ways with the band, which included his brother Brandon, in order to form a new group with the identical twin sister tandem of Alejandra and Claudia Deheza of On!Air!Library! The trio met when their respective bands were on tour together opening for Interpol. Curtis and the Dehezas decided to leave their previous bands behind them to form a new group they dubbed School Of Seven Bells. The band, who’s named after a mythical South American pickpocket training academy, lived and recorded together in a shared space, releasing their first album of ethereal, shoegaze-influenced dream pop back  in 2008.

Last week School Of Seven Bells dropped their third studio album, Ghostory, via Vagrant Records. Ghostory is the group’s first without founding member Claudia Deheza, who left the band for personal reasons in 2010. The record is a thematic song cycle telling the tale of a young girl named Lafaye and the ghosts that surround her life. The band, which is now down to a duo, will kick off their world tour in support of the new LP on March 8 at The Garage in London, but prior to all that they released the haunting music video for the record’s first single, Lafaye. Here’s what they came up with…

If you’re not 100% sure why the name Nick Lowe rings a bell it’s because you are probably familiar with two of his songs, but might not be aware that he’s the one that wrote them. Lowe originally had a hit with Cruel To Be Kind all the way back in 1979, which peaked at #12 on the Billboard charts some 30+ years ago. He is also the guy responsible for (What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace Love & Understanding, a tune that he wrote, but Elvis Costello made famous. Lowe, who can easily be labeled as a “musician’s musician,” put out his 13th studio album, The Old Magic, last year via venerable indie label Yep Roc Records. Last week the singer-songwriter released a music video for the track Sensitive Man that stars comedian and WTF host Marc Maron, as well as appearances from a slew of other musicians, actors and comedians including singer-songwriter Robyn Hitchcock, Tim Heidecker (Tim & Eric), even and former touring mates Wilco, who make a brief cameo. Check it out…

Nick Lowe – Sensitive Man

Nick Lowe will head out of a 12-date spring tour with a full band, that kicks off on April 18 at the First Avenue in Minneapolis, Minn., and recently appeared on an episode of Maron’s highly recommended podcast WTF, where the two chatted about Lowe’s career.

While we first fell in love with Lissie’s brand of soulful, sun-baked folk-rock all the way back in December of 2009, the singer-songwriter seemed to really grab people’s attention with a series of diverse and radically rearranged cover songs from the likes of Kid Cudi, Metallica and Lady Gaga. Last week, Lissie released the six-song EP, Covered Up With Flowers via Fat Possum, and dropped the video for her slow burner take on the Fleetwood Mac break up classic – Go Your Own Way.

Lissie – Go Your Own Way (Fleetwood Mac Cover)

Lissie has a handful of upcoming live dates, which includes a high profile appearance at the newly expanded Coachella Music & Arts Festival in Indio, Calif.

Plenty has changed with The Shins in the five years since the release of their last studio album. The Portland-via-New Mexico-based act, has essentially become the sole property of lead singer James Mercer, who replaced the rest of the band with all new members. On March 20, Mercer & Co. will release their fifth studio album, Port of Morrow, which coincidentally will also be their major label debut. Earlier this week The Shins released the Wes Anderson-inspired music video for the album’s first single – Simple Song. Let’s check it out…

The Shins – Simple Song

The Shins will head out on a lengthy world tour on March 22, which includes high profile festival stops at Coachella, Sasquatch! and Bonnaroo, but prior to all of that they will be the musical guest on the March 10 episode of Saturday Night Live, which will be hosted by Jonah Hill.

Back in December we pointed you in the direction of an unearthed Christmas tune from the Polyphonic Spree, that dated back to the recording sessions for their 2004 sophomore album Together We’re Heavy. The psychedelic choral-rock act, who haven’t put out an album of new material since 2007, look like they may be gearing up for a big 2012 with a 10-date spring tour lined up and last week releasing an animated music video for the brand new track What Would You Do? The song, which features the band’s signature lush vocal sound, also has a bit of a hard edge courtesy of a healthy dose of Flaming Lips-influence acid-rock guitar sounds. Let’s check it out…

When The White Stripes officially decided to call it quits roughly a year ago, the big question on everyone’s mind was what would Jack White’s next move be? The singer-songwriter-guitarist-producer-record label owner, who could have gone back to recording with either The Raconteurs or The Dead Weather, has instead decided to go it alone and will release his solo debut, Blunderbuss, on April 24 via his Third Man Records.

Late last month White offered up the album’s first single Love Interruption for download, now the country-soul tune has an official music video, which features back-up vocalist Ruby Amanfu, clarinet/bass clarinet player Emily Bowland and Brooke Waggoner on Wurlitzer electric piano.

Jack White – Love Interruption

At the moment Jack White only has a handful of shows currently scheduled, including headlining slots at both the Hangout Music Festival and Sasquatch!.

While their Sub Pop self-titled debut album came out roughly a year ago, The Head and The Heart are still hard at work promoting the record that landed at number nine on our Top 25 list. The Seattle-based indie-folk group, who toured relentlessly in 2011, are once again set to bring their exuberant live show on the road, when they kick off a lengthy North American tour with an appearance at the Snow Fall Music Festival in Aspen, Colorado on March 3. With that in mind, it’s really no surprise that for their latest music video, Down In The Valley, the band turned in a clip that highlighted their road warrior ways. Let’s check it out…

The Head and The Heart – Down In The Valley

Four years may seem like a lot of time between records, but since the release of Hold Time in 2009, M. Ward hasn’t been a stranger to the recording studio choosing to spend his time on collaborative projects both with the Monsters Of Folk and She & Him. On April 10 the singer-songwriter will return to being a solo act, as he will release his latest studio album, A Wasteland Companion, via his longtime label Merge Records. Last week Matt released the animated music video for the record’s first single – The First Time I Ran Away – which is full of everything we’ve come to love from his patina-drenched sound – smokey vocals, John Fahey-inspired guitar sounds and layers of Phil Spector-esque production. Let’s check it out…

M. Ward - The First Time I Ran Away