Time Out New York calls the happy problem "a happy-go-lucky Hole." Born from the fighting energy of punk and the love of tuneful pop, and citing influences from Duran Duran to Gogol Bordello, the NYC indiepunk band have just released their first full-length album, Head Case, with 11 melodic punk tunes, including the first single, "Matador," written with impatience about the drunk hipsters crowding the F train on the Lower East Side. The songs have earned placements on ABC, CW, MTV and more and enthusiastic response from bloggers and podcasters alike, (including UK's DarkCompass.com) as well as airplay on tastemaker stations across the US including KROQ in Los Angeles.

The band was founded in Los Angeles by former folkie Samantha 'Sam' Shaber who, after releasing albums and touring the US and UK for several years on her own, got bored with the coffeehouse bean grinders and earnest soul-searching, and wanted to create something more spontaneous, less precious and, well, louder. Shaber approached songwriting from a fresh platform and recruited players from Gnarls Barkley and The Fray to record the eponymous debut EP, quickly landing song placements in film and TV, before packing up and moving home to NYC to find Bronx drummer/guitarist Tony Cortes.

Shaber's booming, raspy voice can also be heard in the upcoming Weinstein release, BUTTER, starring Hugh Jackman and Jennifer Garner, on the song "Harder Deeper Faster" which she cowrote with dance-rock collective The Bashful.

This is indiepunk for a new generation.

ONLY GOOD BANDS HAVE ANIMAL NAMES:

Tiger Waves was birthed on the Internet in the spring of 2011. At that time James worked for NASA in the Department of Theoretical Cosmic Physics in Austin, TX and spent his days paying bills and playing with his little dog Pierre. Meanwhile, Reid studied continental philosophy in Chicago and avoided the cold weather whenever possible by staying inside and deconstructing his experience of the cold. After a freak shuttle accident, James was hit on the head and began believing that he was either Phil Spector (on a good day) or Syd Barrett (on a bad day). To play into these delusions, Reid went along with it claiming that he was in fact Brian Wilson. Then, on a whim, these two friends began emailing each other, in mp3 form, fragments of their songs: half written melodies, chord progressions, drum beats, and so forth. Slowly and surely—as the sonic layers were piled atop one other—the fragments began to take shape and look, each day, less and less like isolated bits of music and more and more like finished songs. Harmonies were added to melodies, distorted slide guitar solos were overdubbed on top of fuzzed out verses, Humphrey Bogart's voice, dripping with delay, was inserted into the background of folksy funeral ballads, stream of consciousness lyrics were quietly sung in dark and sullen dorm rooms in desperate attempts not to wake the roommate. This went on and on, week after week—nearly ad infinitum it seemed. These songs, with all of their chaotic bedlam and wry humor, are the product of that secluded and protracted process. We, of course, hope you enjoy it.