The Casket Lottery is an emo/post-hardcore band from Kansas City, MO formed in 1997. The band released its first three LPs on Second Nature Recordings, a fourth LP on No Sleep Records, and reunited for a 5th LP in 2020 on Wiretap Records. The band are now signed to Iodine Records and will release it's 6th LP titled "Feel The Teeth" in August of 2025.

Hailing from Long Island, NY, Somerset Thrower was founded by four friends who share a love of all things rock and roll. Built on punk and hardcore roots, the four-piece blends raw energy with melody-soaked textures to create something both urgent and timeless. Fans of bands like Seaweed, Jawbreaker, Samiam, Jimmy Eat World and more recent bands like Drug Church, Taking Meds, Praise and the like will enjoy their sound. The band has signed to Smart Punk Records and will release their third album, Take Only What You Need to Survive in July 2025.

Slow Joy is a Dallas-based Chicano artist, leading a solo project that delves into loud, fuzzy alternative rock. With a series of singles and EPs, Slow Joy's music resonates well within the Texas nugaze music scene.

Touch the Clouds are an alternative rock band from Michigan featuring members from emo veterans Few and Far Between. The band write emotionally charged anthemic rock songs that hearken back to the post-hardcore and emo of the late 90s and early 2000s, which big layered guitars and melodies, and explosive hooks. The are gearing up to release their debut self titled LP on Elkion Records/The Orchard.

Hailing from Tulsa, Oklahoma, Downward offers an inspiring take on alternative, emo, shoegaze, and post-hardcore influences to create a unique sonic experience with no boundaries. They've released a self-titled debut LP in 2018, followed by a two-track 7" in 2020 and an outstanding EP titled "The Brass Tax" in 2022 and a split EP with Trauma Ray in 2024. Their latest work, a sophomore self-titled album (LP2), showcases the band's evolution and commitment to pushing genre boundaries, with a mix of light and airy elements combined with powerful and emotive sounds, showcasing their place as a standout force in modern alternative music. The band continues to tow the line between what is seemingly light and airy (reminiscent of Radiohead) and at the same time beautifully crushing (akin to modern luminaries Nothing).

RIYL Moving Mountains, Gleemer, Keep, Trauma Ray, Nothing, All Under Heaven.

Dead History is a Minneapolis-based emo/post-hardcore quintet, whose members include stalwarts of the formative emo/hardcore years in various scenes across the Upper Midwest. Their sound unapologetically pays homage to the likes of Quicksand, Texas is the Reason, Hum, Far, Jawbox, Swervedriver and Sparkmarker among others. They released their self titled LP in 2020 and will release their sophomore LP "Departures" in June 2025.

Greet Death, from Flint, Michigan, is a four piece shoegaze band filled with sludge and melancholy. Since 2011, elementary school friends Logan Gaval and Harper Boyhtari have been writing songs full of big ideas and everyday details. Their music, loud and full of melodic sensibility, draws from shoegaze, doomgaze, and a little-bit-of-everything-gaze, creating an emotionally maximalist palette. Writing separately but playing together (think of them as small-town Michigan’s Tom DeLonge and Mark Hoppus), they’ve been drawing in a devoted crowd ever since their unexpectedly successful debut Dixieland in 2017, followed by their next-level opus New Hell in 2019. You’d be hard-pressed to find albums with such heart: ones flooded both with full-bloom feelings and the dumb stories we tell ourselves in order to get through the day. The band is currently signed to Deathwish Inc. and are gearing up to release their 3rd LP "Die In Love" in June 2025.

Bantom Woods are an Alternative Indie Rock band from Austin, Texas who released their debut EP "With All Due Respect" in summer 2023. The band will return with their latest single "Lotteries & Lightning Strikes" taken from their forthcoming album to be released later this year via Shifting Sounds. Although the band is rather new, all of the members are Indie rock royalty in Austin - all playing in multiple bands spanning over 2 decades, including bands like Silver Scooter. They combine Alt Rock, Dream Pop, Post Punk, and early 90's underground College Rock to create their own signature sound that is very unique and ultra catchy. RIYL The Replacements, Sonic Youth, Ride, The Hold Steady

Hailing from Fresno, California, Chain is a band rooted in friendship, raw energy, and a love for alternative rock. Chain was created in 2024 by Bart, his friends, and fellow bandmates in Mom Jeans, Just Friends, ane Grad Life, Driven by Bart’s songwriting, blending influences from 90s alternative rock icons like Smashing Pumpkins, their sound is characterized by thunderous guitars, infectious melodies, and an undeniable punk rock spirit. Chain was formed with a simple goal: to have fun with his friends, create music that resonates, and play as many shows as possible. At its core, Chain’s music is about embracing authenticity and breaking through the glass walls of the world to discover yourself. Whether you’re moshing in a packed room or driving with the windows down, Chain delivers a cathartic experience that’s equal parts nostalgic and refreshing.

Hotline TNT is a New York based noise-pop band that play their own brand of melodic shoegaze and grunge pop combined with elements of dream-pop and loud fuzzed out anthemic alternative rock. Laying out sheets of buzzy guitar sounds over simple, forceful melodies, Hotline TNT take their shoegaze influences and meld them with a pop undertow and personal lyrics about life and relationships. Founded and led by guitarist and songwriter Will Anderson (of former band Weed), the group started as a one-man-band in the studio, with Anderson calling all the shots, and expanding into a quartet or quintet on-stage. Anderson established Hotline TNT's sound and style with the 2021 indie release Nineteen in Love, and made their music sound bigger and bolder on 2023's Cartwheel, their debut for Third Man Records. Now the band is back with "Rasberry Moon" their first album built as a full band and follow up LP to 2023s Cartwheel set for release June of 2025 via Third Man Records.

MS PAINT is an American rock band from Hattiesburg, Mississippi, known for their experimental synth-punk sound. The band consists of Deedee (vocals), Nick Panella (synthesizers), Quinn Mackey (drums), and Randy Riley (bass). They are known for their guitar-less approach and blend of punk, industrial, and electronic elements.

Turnstile, a hardcore punk band from Baltimore, formed in 2010, draws heavy influence from NYHC bands like Madball, Leeway, Judge, Bold, Gorilla Biscuits, and Orange 9MM along with 90s bands like Rage Against the Machine, 311, and Jane’s Addiction. Their music blends elements of hardcore, alternative metal, alternative rock, grunge, soul, R&B, pop punk and art rock, creating a unique groovy sound.

Keep is an alternative rock band from Richmond, VA that was formed in 2013 and who's sound is heavily rooted in shoegaze, dream pop, 80s new wave, and 90s inspired alternative rock. They are heavily influenced by the likes of The Cure, The Smashing Pumpkins, and Slowdive, but that only scratches the surface. In a review of their second album, Happy In Here, it is stated that “even with these comparisons and any accuracy they could possess, Keep are a band that’s not only cut their own sort of path, but have become quite seasoned at it.” Their music has spanned a number of genres over the years, but most often falls under the banner of shoegaze. Regardless of specific distinctions, Keep sits firmly in the web of alternative rock music. Audiotree aptly described the sound as “grand and majestic”, adding that it is “ensconced in an all consuming mist of heavy noise.” The band is gearing up to release their new LP "Almost Static" in May of 2025.

Bleed are an alternative metal/rock band from Dallas, Texas combining elements of 90s and early 2000s alt rock, grunge, metal and shoegaze. The band comprised of former and current members of Narrow Head at the time of their formation. On September 12, 2021 they dropped the 4-track EP Somebody's Closer. The band takes inspiration from Alice in Chains, Helmet, and Deftones as evident by their sound, and fit right in with the new crop of "grungegaze" bands like Soul Blind, Narrow Head, Trauma Ray and many others.

Formed by multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Sonia Weber in 2015, Alien Boy has steadily evolved from a plucky punk band in the Portland, Oregon, DIY scene into one of the most reliably satisfying rock bands in modern guitar music. The group, whose lineup is rounded out by drummer Derek McNeil along with guitarists Caleb Misclevitz and A.P. Fiedler, solidified their sound on 2021’s acclaimed Don’t Know What I Am, and now on their upcoming third LP "You Wanna Fade?" do May 2025 takes all of the best parts of that pop-rock-by-way-of-shoegaze concoction and amplifies them to their most widescreen version. “I wanted to go as big as possible and I really didn’t want to rush,” Weber says of the album’s sound and four-year gestation. “When I first started the band I was trying to keep the songs as short as possible, but I sort of realized that that’s not actually what I like. I was looking at the records that I turn to the most–Third Eye Blind’s self-titled and Smashing Pumpkins’ Siamese Dream–and I really wanted to capture that kind of grandness, the kind of thing that has a lot of dimension and isn’t actually that concise.”