Brendan Canning
“Hit the Wall” (Arts & Crafts)
Despite getting help from many of his fellow Broken Social Scenesters, Canning delivers a tight chunk of propulsive indie rock that avoids the chaotic excess that has become the BSS signature.

Mudcrutch
“Six Days on the Road” (Reprise/Warner)
Mudcrutch is the Florida group Tom Petty played with in the early ’70s. The reunited unit’s cover of Dave Dudley’s supercool highway anthem of 1963 proves you can’t keep a good band down.

Tokyo Police Club
“The Harrowing Adventures of...” (Mean Beard)
For three mournful minutes, Tokyo Police Club abandons bass-buzzed new wave in favour of groaning cellos, acoustic guitars, and vocals more melancholy than the Cure getting drunk with the Smiths.

Stereolab
“Three Women” (4AD)
With recent Portishead and Spiritualized tracks on our iPods, we’re starting to have ’90s flashbacks, and this new Stereolab tune—complete with xylophones, soft-pop trumpets, and Laetitia Sadier’s sleepy French crooning—is a natural fit.

Popa Chubby
“Theme From The Godfather” (Blind Pig)
The mountain-man blues-rocker from New York City lays a Ventures-style surf vibe on the familiar strains of the Mob-movie theme song, tossing in some wild “Pipeline” licks for good measure.

Duchess Says
“Cut Up” (Alien8 Recordings)
Imagine a riotously agitated Le Tigre fucking with a Commodore 64 that’s been programmed to approximate an electroclash party curated by the criminally underappreciated artist known as shiverhead.

Rebuilding the Rights of Statues
“TV Show (Hang the Police)” (Tag Team)
Beijing today brings to mind furtive Olympic-torch relays and determinedly cheerful athletes. For a sense of the underground angst felt among Chinese youth, check out this nihilistic anthem by the neo-punk Beijing rockers also known as Re-TROS.

The Slackers
“Dont Have To” (Red Eye)
NYC ska revivalists the Slackers have always kicked it old-school, but never with as much style as on “Dont Have To”. If Elvis had grown up dreadlocked in a shack behind Studio One, this would have been the result.

Coldplay
“Violet Hill” (Capitol)
Producer Brian Eno has done the unthinkable in coaxing from Coldplay a song that we might actually want to hear more than once, a rousing anthem complete with the band’s coolest-ever guitar solo.

Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
“Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!” (Anti-)
For sheer swagger alone, Nick Cave deserves props for this organ-drenched, porno-soundtrack-indebted ode to a doomed Lothario with a taste for yellow-haired women, high-powered weapons, and sick-city dope.

Santogold
“L.E.S. Artistes” (Downtown)
M.I.A. Brooklyn’s Santogold takes girl-group platinum and mashes it with slow-jam new wave, vintage dancehall, and, most bizarrely, postmath rock. The result is something as magical as it is unclassifiable.