Olga Bell bears a lot of talent, a one-woman production team whose ginger ale voice perfectly suits her clever lyrics. Her immaculate electronic beats pit glossy melodies against grainy atmospherics. Joined by Gunnar Olsen, Jason Nazary and Michael Saltsman, Bell released the debut LP Diamonte independently in May of 2011. The Village Voice has jumped on the bandwagon, and Stereogum has labeled the project "Band To Watch."

A cheap Kmart guitar with its guts ripped out, a two-piece drum kit and a keyboard with a mind of its own would all be alone if they weren't all thrown in the mess that PARLOVR got them in when they stumbled together in the wintry months of 2006. Reacting against the multi-instrumental, many-membered orchestral bands that crowded the local Montreal scene at the time, PARLOVR was started with the intention of blowing amps and streamlining pop melodies, bringing back the power-trio of the 90s with an off-the-wall twist.

PARLOVR's upcoming self-titled debut LP (Independent, 2008) was produced and recorded by Martin Horn at Digital Bird Studios over the course of six weeks and brings into focus each of the three members' unique personalities while not losing sight of their pell-mell live show. From the anthemic opener, "Pen to the Paper" to "Palace of Identical Things," Jackson's voice combines a sense of unabashed emotion and bold-faced cheekiness. Cooper bangs out responses with quivering anger and righteous yelping in songs like "Hiccup!" and "All the World is All that is the Case." MacCuish holds up the mayhem on songs like "On the Phone" and gives the percussion a voice of its own on sparser numbers like "Speech Bubble/Thought Cloud."