Remember that one time at band camp? Charlie Gokey and Marie J. Parker do. That’s where this duo met in 2001. The two North Dakotans exchanged mixtapes over the next few years, developing their own brand of psychedelic-influenced mood music. Accompanied by percussionist Alex Abnos, Gokey and Parker renamed White Foliage, their old band, as Secret Cities and released the joyful Pink Graffiti, a quasi-concept album about Brian Wilson and youth.

The opening track, “Pink City,” is like a red-carpet entrance into the whimsical world of Secret Cities, a host of doormen smiling eagerly and lavishing the listener with emotionally ravishing sounds. This brilliantly textured piece of music involves a host of melodies, instrumental accompaniment, and dreamy vocal harmonies. Rhythmic appearances range from cymbals to tambourine to hand claps, while Gokey’s restrained, ethereal voice, paired with the music’s raw beauty, leaves “Pink City” sounding like an American version of the Icelandic band Sigur Rós. Perhaps the commonality of living in an isolated, freezing wasteland has something to do with the bands’ similar approaches to music. It’s as if both Gokey and Jónsi, lead singer of Sigur Rós, learned to love where they were, exploring the depths of joy through creative musical interpretation: “We had a lot to say/ But it would take all day,” Gokey introspectively sings.

“Boyfriend” thumps all the way through, with percussionist Abnos showing his ability to contribute unique rhythmical lines, which both propel and add decorative flourish to an otherwise standard song. A whistled melody periodically rears its uncertain head throughout “Boyfriend.” Now, whistling is always dangerous territory; it precariously balances the line of either strengthening the song or becoming an unnecessary and conceited distraction. The plagued “Aw. Rats” is undoubtedly the only true conceit on Pink Graffiti, because Secret Cities tries to be something it’s not — sad. Whatever these three kooky kids are smoking, it seems to make them generally happy, creative people, and “Aw. Rats” lacks either of these qualities. A partially distorted guitar tries to carry the song, sounding incomplete with a weak riff that simply tries too hard, like a hormonally haywire 13-year-old boy on his first date. Even the song’s name, “Aw. Rats,” seems like a cheap imitation at wit.

But Pink Graffiti spreads a brand of subtle joy seldom found using complex, dynamic, melodic music. Secret Cities also stumbles at times. General rule of thumb for this album: if the song name starts with the word “Pink,” it’s amazing. By Alex Lemonde-Gray

Taking a page from the recent playbook of bands like Liars and Wavves, who dress up and over-produce a once-great style of lo-fi noise pop, Indiana duo House Of Bread de-authenticate their sound, opting for a more accessible approach on their second effort Superhuman Tomb, with the hopes of making it into the Urban Outfitters compilation in their crosshairs, much like many of their contemporaries.

Unfortunately, the glossed-over and clarified sound feels somewhat irrelevant and uninspired, and at times sounds a bit like a Radiohead tribute band. However, there are great moments on Superhuman Tomb, including on songs like “Hazy Boy,” “Flying Nomads,” and “Our Green Plots,” which all feel like fellow noise traffickers Wild Nothing. Meanwhile, other songs are an incantation of Smashing Pumpkin’s Siamese Dream, like “We Built A Mountain To The Sky” and “Monument For A Boy’s Mind,” both boasting a giant wall-of-guitar sound. The most engaging and successful attempts for House Of Bread fall on “Blood Scouts,” “Flying Nomads” and, in particular, “Bunf’s,” which incorporate both electronic and guitar work to create an interesting dynamic and draw from The Flaming Lips’ genre-bending psychedelia.

Indie music in general is no longer a subculture in which people find identity, as they were able to during the Punk, New Wave, No Wave, Hardcore, Post-Punk, and more recent Electro eras (the latter of which is now dead by the way, so move on). For emerging bands, it is seemingly more about trying to sound original with kitschy and cheap devices, without straying too far from a pop feel in order to facilitate their secret hopes of commercial success. Maybe that wasn’t House Of Bread’s approach, but it certainly comes across that way on Superhuman Tomb. It’s not that every band is going to strive for a creative greatness that triggers a subculture or movement. But shouldn’t they want to? By Peter Viele

Dirty Tactics’ new album It Is What It Is starts with two songs titled after very different places — “Arkansas” and “Baltimore.” I figured the best way to review the album was to start by examining the way they describe these dissimilar locations. The first song embodies my idea of Arkansas pretty accurately, with melodic handclapping and a slow piano intro. But then Dirty Tactics start crooning about poetry. I don’t think people write poetry in Arkansas; I think they mostly whitewater raft and climb up things that are sharp and jagged, which is decidedly badass. This being said, “Arkansas” itself is pretty excellent. I just want it to be renamed after a wimpy city like Minneapolis.

Then there is “Baltimore.” On this song, the punk thematic that makes Dirty Tactics a strong Philly-based outfit cometh forward. The band expresses a desire for the offerings of Baltimore, which from my experience are even more dangerous then jagged climbs and category five river runs, because in Baltimore the threats are more like stolen handguns and people using them to steal from you. The idea for naming the song “Arkansas” may be a direct result of Dirty Tactics being from a place like Philly. Spawning from the Eastern Seaboard would probably leave me with the idea that anyone living in Arkansas spends the majority of their beauty-soaked days strolling through prairies and writing sonnets. So I don’t blame Dirty Tactics for the misconception.

From there on out, Carlin, Dan, Chris, and Gary perform the classic punk sucker punch, complete with deceivingly short ballads that lead into perfect guitar speed and equally intense and quick vocals. Dirty Tactics are a grown-up version of that sweet giant kid in your middle school who would give you a great hug but beat the shit out of you if you made fun of him. Loyalty. Oh, and “Secret Lives” is a little Spanish, almost a cappella ballad nestling in a nice little enclave on this record. By Will Tunstall

Left field isn’t a bad place to come from when you’re exploring the tricky territory between outdated forms of music and today’s highly digitized offerings. Lucky for us, UK duo Grasscut map their journey from the wilds of English electro experimentation with the handy scale 1 Inch / 1/2 Mile. Comprised of soundtrack composer Andrew Phillips and classically trained double bassist Marcus O’Dair, Grasscut evokes a distant Victorian past by using ancient vocal snippets on songs like “The Tin Man” and “In Her Pride.” But the band’s daring yet well-executed instrumentation on “High Down” and “Old Machines” — think tender, antiquated blips mixed with jarring, futuristic bloops — truly sets them apart from the electro-noise crowd.

In a way, Grasscut’s superb minimalism seems to borrow from hip American bands like Future Islands, but the mashed-up song-cycle continuity of 1 Inch / 1/2 Mile places the affair in knottier territory. “Meltwater” borrows from the downcast, orchestrated psychedelia of fellow Brit record-spinners like Portishead, while “Muppet” does the potentially unknown by layering samples of gossiping ladies and soaring choirs over jagged Nintendo beats that disorient as much as dumbfound. And “1946” borrows reminisces from Phillips’ own mother about her harrowing experiences with post-war rationing.

“Door In The Wall’s” jaunty atmospherics are infused with chiming percussion and whooping psychedelia — given Phillips’ soundtrack background, I’m surprised it didn’t turn up in the most recent movie version of Alice In Wonderland. That’s what you’ll more than likely take away from 1 Inch / 1/2 Mile: a peculiarly British sense of musical modernity, one that traces a path from heady, intellectual past to deliciously strange present. Something tells me no one could make it as precise and accurate as Grasscut. By Nick McGregor