Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet to find the ones you need to hear now.

The Band: Hatcham Social
The Buzz: U.K. outfit revives the old sound of Scotland, bringing back clanging chords, loose percussion and loopy vocals.
Listen If: For you, Orange Juice is more than just a morning beverage.
Key Track: "Wild Creatures," where swooping vocals run loop-de-loops around vibrant, violent guitars.

The Band: Benjy Ferree
The Buzz: Weirdo concept rock from D.C., big banging guitars and huff-n-puff vocals, like Broadway gone bonkers.
Listen If: Your chief requirement for pop music is unpredictability.
Key Track: "Dog Killers," a big, noisy rave-up wrapped up in grainy, grimy guitars.

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Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet to find the ones you need to hear now.

The Band: Wavves
The Buzz: What frills? California lo-fi band breaks pop down to a few key ingredients, making for songs with serrated edges.
Listen If: You think recording studios are for suckers.
Key Track: The band's rambunctious theme song "Wavves," smeared with splotches of guitars and wild, wailing vocals.

The Band: N.A.S.A. (pictured above)
The Buzz: California production team use their formidable skills to craft creepy, crawling songs and top them with celebrity vocalists.
Listen If: You feel like you've been waiting forever for a new Avalanches record, or you long for a return of the bygone sample-driven hip-hop aesthetic.
Key Track: "Money," where former Talking Heads frontman David Byrne sounds right at home among clattering percussion and stumbling synths.
Bonus: Read more about the group's mastermind Sam Spiegel (Spike Jonze's bro) here on the Hot List.

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*Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet to find the ones you need to hear now.* **The Band:** The Dodos
**The Buzz:** Rambunctious Californians write speedy, giddy pop songs with big hooks and racing tempos.
**Listen If:** Your problem with most music is that it takes up too much of your day.
**Key Track:** "Fools," a fast-n-frantic sugar rush with tumbling acoustic guitars and a loping, loopy vocal melody.

**The Band:** Titus Andronicus
**The Buzz:** Jersey sad-sacks turn mourning into dancing with broke-down rock songs and quivery, quavering vocals.
**Listen If:** Your problem with punk rock was that it wasn't sad enough, or if you often wish Bright Eyes had a little more attitude.
**Key Track:** Appropriately, "Titus Andronicus," where vocalist Andrew Cedermark pitches and moans over blown-apart guitars and ramrodding drums.

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Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet.

The Band: The Hours
The Buzz: Grand, emotive, pleading pop music from — you guessed it — Britain.
Listen If: You'd like Coldplay if only they were a bit smaller in scale.
Key Track: "The Lights," which shifts from meditative piano to gleaming filigrees of guitar in the space of seven glorious minutes.

The Band: Zomby
The Buzz: London producer revisits the glory days of rave with surprisingly energizing results.
Listen If: You catch yourself sighing wistfully when you spot a baby sucking on a pacifier.
Key Track: "Daft Punk Rave," which cuts up DP's "Technologic" and scatters it across blinking-light keyboards.

The Band: Land Of Talk
The Buzz: Montreal band proves there are bands up north that don't have 900 members or a penchant for high drama.
Listen If: All you need is a cluster of nervous guitar chords and a smartass female vocal to make your afternoon.
Key Track: "Some Are Lakes," where ragged vocals and gritty guitar reveal the hidden intersection between indie and Americana.

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Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet.

The Band: Kooley High
The Buzz: Stunning North Carolina hip-hop group makes grand, thumping tracks from sliced-up soul and shards of R&B. It's like every song should be released on 45.
Listen If: You don't care how cold it is outside — to you, it's always summertime. And 1993.
Key Track: "Too Late," the kind of sizzling all-crew scorcher that would have done Arrested Development proud.

The Band: Iran
The Buzz: TV on the Radio's Kyp Malone flexes his pure pop impulses, writing songs with grand, gliding melodies and strange, sinuous choruses.
Listen If: You wish Bowie sounded a bit more like the bands he palled around with.
Key Track: "Airport '79," Iran's "Five Years" rewrite that scrapes up bright acoustic strumming with scabrous swipes of synth.

The Band: Fire on Fire
The Buzz: Maine collective plays sprawling, haunted Appalachian folk, stacking grainy layers of acoustic guitars, mandolins and harmonium for a new spin on old-timey death ballads.
Listen If: Your beard is bigger than most babies, or you have an abiding fascination in ghost stories of the old American West.
Key Track: "Heavy D," which has nothing to do with '80s hip-hop and everything to do with the great existential weight.

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Photo:Adriana Jovanovic

Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet.

The Band: She Keeps Bees
The Buzz: Dark rock from Brooklyn that recalls Rid of Me-era PJ Harvey, ignited by the rich, soulful vocals of Jess Larrabee.
Listen If: You're a teeth grinder or a fist shaker, or you like the sound of grimy, primal blues.
Key Track: "Gimmie," where Larrabee pours her rich voice over a grizzled guitar strum.

The Band: Fredrik
The Buzz: Swedish collective disappears into the woods, writes airy songs built from thumping percussion and fluttering acoustic guitars.
Listen If: You're looking for the perfect soundtrack for a long hike in a dark woods.
Key Track: "Black Fur," a lonesome, loping number boasting a gently pleading vocal melody.

The Band: Kissey Asplund
The Buzz: Swedish soul singer — really! — whose eccentricities make Erykah Badu look like Roberta Flack.
Listen If: You have a hard time believing there's such a thing as Swedish soul, or like to spend long hour in basement rooms surrounded by smoke.
Key Track: "Fuss 'n' Fight," where Asplund recites blank verse over a flat, fitful electronic backbeat.

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Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet.

The Band: Illa J
The Buzz: Brother of legendary hip-hop producer J Dilla salvages some of his brother's unused beats and uses them to build an album of relaxed R&B.
Listen If: You (rightfully!) have no fear of the phrase "late-period De La Soul."
Key Track: "R U Listenin'?", where rapper Guilty Simpson joins Illa for a laid-back track specifically engineered for head-bobbing.

The Band: The Foreign Exchange
The Buzz: Dutch producer Nicolay gets Little Brother's Phonte to trade rhymes for serenades, resulting in a record of smooth, silky grooves.
Listen If: You've got an impatient lady in the next room and you're sick and tired of waiting for a new D'Angelo record.
Key Track: "Daykeeper," a dusky number lit up by powder blue piano and Phonte's aching croon.

The Band: French Miami
The Buzz: San Fran psychopaths craft skull-collapsing post-punk, wiry (and Wire-y) guitars twitching over steady chugging rhythms.
Listen If: You never saw any reason why math rockers couldn't cut a rug every now and then.
Key Track: "The God Damn Best," whose cockeyed guitars and pummeling rhythm feel like industrial-strength Polvo — even after it hits the part that seems to paraphrase "My Humps."

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Photograph by Arion Doerr for RollingStone.Com

Every week, Hype Monitor wades through the most buzzed-about bands all across the Internet.

The Band: Passion Pit
The Buzz: Squirrely electropop where speedy beats carry high, girlish vocals across bands of synthesizer.
Listen If: You wonder what Built to Spill might sound like if someone stole all of Doug Martsch's guitars.
Key Track: "Cuddle Fuddle," which uses a plinking piano loop to singlehandedly invent 25th century ragtime.

The Band: FM Belfast
The Buzz: It's electric! Stern, keyboard-driven robopop — the sound of a zillion traffic lights blinking above empty streets.
Listen If: You find the Knife a bit too cheerful, or think big beats are better for brooding than grooving.
Key Track: "Lotus," which flash-freezes Rage Against the Machine's "Killing in the Name" in shivery synths.

The Band: The High Wire
The Buzz: Spacious, somber indie rock that shrouds broad guitar strumming and long, languid keyboard lines in warm, gentle mist.
Listen If: You always liked Slowdive a little more than My Bloody Valentine.
Key Track: "Saint Bees," where a curlicue melodica turns tricks over whispery vocals.

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