It looks like the 1.21 Gigawatts crew managed to grab every single decent to good to great indie rock band that’s up and coming in Brooklyn today for their upcoming 4 day yearly festival at Radio Bushwick on July 17-20: Bluffing, Big Neck Police, Infinity Shred, Sunflower Bean, Shark?, Tonstartsbandht, Celestial Shore, The Gradients, hell they even got Fiasco on the bill?! I remember listening to Fiasco in high school wishing I was cool enough to go to their shows, but back then I wasn’t in it for the music as much as trying to find an identity in this fucked up city we call home (calling all high school indie rockers: don’t be ashamed, you may not be old enough to drink yet but you are allowed to fuck up as many times as you want, so go to these shows, maybe you’ll get lucky and they won’t draw the X’s on your hand too deep!)

There will be also teen indie folk talent and recent Deli Record of the Month Frankie Cosmos. I could keep going, but the bottom line is that 1.21 Gigawatts is having a fun party with lots of talented NYC artist - I'll be there! - Jake Saunders

Featured on the cover of this mag's summer 2013 issue, Celestial Shore is a band that - at this stage of their career - chooses to clip its own wings for the sake of doing what they want to do, which is experimenting. But in doing so, they produce the kind of music we want NYC bands to make: adventurous, even quirky at times, but without compromising quality on the songwriting side of things. This being said, Celestial Shore's songwriting is so good that sometimes we are tempted to think they should tame the craziness and let us enjoy those gorgeous melodies without interference... We noticed the trio back in 2011, when they released debut EP "California Eden," where stunning opener 'Pals' already displayed the band's schizophrenic dual identity: angelic pop melodies, often flawlessly sung in three-way harmonies, get interrupted - and also a little bit raped, if you wish - by nerdy explosions of the most radical math rock. They found a perfect ally in Deerhoof: Greg Saunier mixed their album, and took them on tour around the US earlier this year. Now, that's a match.

EVENTS: See Celestial Shore Live at Silent Barn on Sunday 06.15 with a gazillion of other NYC based bands.

"Avant Indie" is a term we coined to avoid the temptation of calling some rock bands "experimental," since we see experimental music as a separate genre from rock. Therefore in this list you'll find edgy bands that like to try new things - fun!

Total submissions in this category: 21

Artists Qualified to the next stage (Readers' Poll, starting soon):

1. Celestial Shore - 8.66 (out of 10)
2. Julia Easterlin - 8.5
3. No Shoes - 8.33
3. Christine Hoberg - 8.33

Honorable Mentions (scores above 7.16):

Tiny Hazard, The Beriberi, Pass Kontrol, Passenger Peru, Tauk, Andrew Rosciszewski, Throw Vision.

Jurors: Jason Behrends (Deli Chicago), Ben Toledo (Deli Portland), PDG (Deli NYC).

THIS IS THE LAST BATCH OF RESULTS FROM THE OPEN SUBMISSIONS, READERS POLL'S NEXT!!!

The Deli's Staff

Tonight Silent Barn will host the first farewell party for Big Snow Buffalo Lodge, a small Bushwick DIY venue whose life was abruptly cut short this July by a freaky shooting accident involving co-owner Yoni David. The lineup is nothing short of breathtaking, with adorable electro pop Brooklynites Twin Sister, two bands previously featured on the cover of our mag (Ava Luna and Celestial Shore), and two very interesting up and comers we recently covered (Zula and Leapling). Empress of is DJing.

A second farewell party is scheduled for December 5th at Shea Stadium with a bunch of cool newer bands we'll cover very soon.