Touch and Go Records
Touch and Go is a family. In the increasingly fragmented and commercialized world of independent music, they have stood firm as the home of integrity, credibility, and damn good music. From Big Black to Blonde Redhead, Urge Overkill to Shellac, Touch and Go has always represented rock and respect in equal measure.
Arcwelder
Dynamic, coherent, and full of raw rock and roll power, Minneapolis's Arcwelder knows how to mix chunky instrumentation with spot-on pop hooks and thrilling harmonies. Fans of Jawbox, Hüsker Dü, or the Poster Children, download away!
Everest
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1999
The Black Heart Procession
San Diego's Black Heart Procession creates joyfully melancholy, haunting, broken-hearted music that defies categorization. The band's black-and-blue gloom is like a liquid thing, flowing into those hollow spaces that open up inside when those you're closest to leave you behind.
Che Fest 1999
2
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2000
Three
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2000
Amore Del Tropico
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2002
The Spell
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2006
Brick Layer Cake
Shellac drummer Todd Trainer succeeds in his mission to make the darkest albums since The Swans walked on this planet. Brick Layer Cake is pure evil, so make sure you're in good mental health before you take a listen.
Whatchamacallit
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2002
Cash Audio
Thick and tasty Chicago blues, Touch and Go style. Cash Audio makes slippery, smoky, stinky music, the kind that makes you dance with strangers or clutch your drink a little bit tighter.
Green Bullet
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2000
CocoRosie
Mixing up nostalgic yearning with experimental artsiness, CocoRosie trades on the tension between forward-looking and bacward-looking sounds. At its best, their experimetnal folk blues possesses a cracked, frayed beauty that's both poignant and provocative.
La Maison de mon Reve
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2004
Noah's Ark
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2005
The Delta 72
After numerous lineup changes, this quartet is back and badder than ever, serving forth their patented blend of soul grooves and punk rock energy. Dim the lights, grab your lover, and get with it, child, cuz you're gonna dig this groove all the way.
Sorega Doushita
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1999
000
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2000
Dirty Three
The Dirty Three are all about sadness. With nothing but the swoon and brood of violin, guitar, and gentle percussion, they plumb the interstices of consciousness, seeking out the underground rivers of melancholy that run through us all.
In The Fishtank
Whatever You Love You Are
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2000
Cinder
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2005
Enon
Enon sounds so different and so good, its easy to imagine history viewing them as progenitors of a whole new popular music movement with a name like "New New Wave" or "Millennial Pop." Their blending of college rock and collage rock is one of the more exciting developments in independent music in recent memory.
Believo!
High Society
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2002
Hocus Pocus
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2004
The Ex
For more than two decades, Dutch anarcho-punk musical collective The Ex has been playing explosive lefty rock that has only grown tighter, more complex, and more avant-garde with the passing of the years. More proof that the Netherlands has plenty to offer the world besides tulips, wooden shoes, and psychotropic substances.
Starters Alternators
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1998
Dizzy Spells
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2001
Girls Against Boys
This is ultrarock, powerful beyond the realm of normal bands. GVSB combines guitar, drums, two big fat basses, and a ton of attitude in a way that positively oozes with teasing, suggestive musical power.
House of GVSB
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1996
The Jesus Lizard
If that kid who stuck peas up his nose in the school cafeteria started a band with the neighborhood bully and the crazy old man next door, this would be the perverse result. Chicago's The Jesus Lizard transcends even legendary status. They wrote the book on the way rock and roll destroys people's ability to act civil.
Head
Pure
Goat
Liar
Lash
Down
Bang
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2000
The Monorchid
Between Circus Lupus and Skull Kontrol came the mighty Monorchid. All three bands were products of Chris Thompson's classic snotty and angry take on DC punk rock. The Monorchid was perhaps the most sonically overwhelming, with a vicious two-guitar onslaught.
Who Put Out The Fire?
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1998
New Wet Kojak
Swaggering through a cognac-soaked red velvet lounge as the saxophone talks and the smoke rings rise, Scott McCloud and Johnny Temple from Girls Against Boys get even sexier than usual with this slick, prowling beast of a band.
New Wet Kojak
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1995
Do Things
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2000
No. 4 EP
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2001
The New Year
If you cried when Bedhead broke up, dry your eyes. Principal members Matt and Bubba Kadane are back -- with members of Codeine -- and continue to create their elliptically beautiful guitar rock.
Newness Ends
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2001
The End Is Near
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2004
Shellac
Take three talented musicians, two acclaimed producers, and one brilliantly, famously acerbic personality. Stir. What do you get? You get some highly original, uncompromising, intelligent, and generally all-around ass-kicking music. You get Shellac.
1000 Hurts
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2000
Skull Kontrol
Skull Kontrol is a raygun set on "full attitude" that destroys every shred of your dignity. With former members of Circus Lupus, Monorchid, Cupid Car Club, The Delta 72, and Universal Order of Armageddon, the band hisses at you like a pissed-off cobra.
Deviate By All Means Of Capture
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1999
The Standard
Oregon's The Standard is yet another brilliantly twisted art-rock band from the Pacific Northwest, specializing in spacey, effects- and keyboard-embroidered guitar strangeness. Not really anything standard about 'em, but they sure are good.
The Standard
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2001
August
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2002
Storm and Stress
Deconstructions and improvisations fly in every direction like bullets from a broken machine gun, defying logic completely. Members of Don Caballero explore the nether regions of melody and structure with this gloriously obtuse project recorded by Jim O'Rourke.
Under Thunder and Fluorescent Lights
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2000
TV on the Radio
Brooklyn trio TV on the Radio sculpts fascinating, propulsive sonic collages that marry post-punk dynamics, experimental energy, hints of spirituals and African music, and an unusual amount of tender, thoughtful soul. Their arrival is one of the happier developments for underground music in recent memory.
Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes
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2004
Uzeda
Angular, muscular, bass-heavy rock that's as powerful and amazing as a herd of charging elephants. Uzeda won't squash you flat, however: they'll just leave you breathless and wanting to hear more. Fans of Blonde Redhead or The Jesus Lizard should not pass up this band!
Different Section Wires
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1998
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
The Yeah Yeah Yeahs' trashy punk shares the sound and aesthetic of new wonder kids like the White Stripes and Strokes. But they shoot for sexier punk rock, thanks to a frontwoman who could be the second coming of Joan Jett, Kathleen Hanna, or Siouxsie Sioux.
Yeah Yeah Yeahs EP
Machine EP
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2002
Fever to Tell
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2003
