Africa's great husband-wife duo bring their trance vocals and shredding guitar grooves to Brooklyn, where they rock out with Santigold, members of TV on the Radio and others. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Nick Zinner adds guitar squall, and U.K. prog-soul diva Ebony Bones makes the line "But she's got too much melanin" into a giddy party chant. The result is cultural exchange with ears pricked high.

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• Photos: Random Notes

“Too Close”

Next was formed in Minneapolis when the uncle of Terry "T-Low" and Raphael "Tweety" Brown, who was a gospel choir director, introduced the brothers to Robert Lavelle "R.L." Huggar. Sounds of Blackness singer Ann Nesby groomed the R&B group before handing them over to Naughty by Nature's KayGee, who wrote and produced "Too Close." The idea for the song was sparked "from a conversation we had with several girls at a nightclub," explained T-Low. "It's talking about the club scene, with guys getting out of hand and the female telling him to back up, asking, 'What are you doing?'"