Localized Appreesh is our thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

I first learned of Oakland's Kacey Johansing through another post here at Noise headquarters. The singer-songwriter – who also has played with Geographer and Yesway – played a private mini concert for SFBG videographer Ariel Soto-Suver's occasional feature, Telegenic Band Check. Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

The Mallard seems to be everywhere right now; opening up shows for Shonen Knife or Hot Snakes, topping MTV Hive's list of “overlooked garage rock albums of 2012.”

Which, yeah. We somehow overlooked the band's record, Yes on Blood (Castle Face Records), at first too. It's a Nuggets-worthy, hair-shaking gem ran through a modern fuzz machine. And live, it's even better. The so-called “inside-out-echo-laser-garage-psych-rock” four-piece takes elements of the past and tweaks them like they're unspooling a tape, letting elements of retro sound slowly drop away and bunch up on the floor. So here we are, jumping on the bandwagon with our tail between our legs, not to mix idioms or whatever. Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

As is often the case these days, the Seshen grabbed attention with a video. The Bay Area band's first official music video – for its song “Oblivion” off the self-titled LP released earlier this year –  has gained more than 10,000 views since it went up in June.

The black and white clip is like a mini art film, with a fuzzy countdown clock ticking off cerebral scenes of shadowy figures, singer Lalin St. Juste in an abandoned alleyway, and close ups of blinking eyes. Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

On the new seven-inch, Crimes, the persistent flow of Seatraffic feels like it's washing over you like warm bath water. The San Francisco electronic pop duo takes a page out of the 1980s synth playbook, and executes it with a shiny modern gleam, incorporating dreamy reverb, and heavy, shoe-gazing beats. Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

San Francisco's Rin Tin Tiger does it raw. The alt-folk trio just wrapped up recording an organic (no vocal editing here) live album at Tiny Telephone Studios.

The resulting record, Toxic Pocketbook, roars like the soul of a wild cat trapped in a faithful pup's skin. It scoots along with twangy riffs infused with a rough rock'n'roll edge, and “a good thump” (as the band describes it below), with untouched – and gleefully twangy – vocals pumping up the natural energy.  Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

Gypsy punk, that wild pluck-pluck-pluck of flamenco guitar, that bombastic percussion and brass, it all makes for a rather frenetic if sultry affair when bands such as Gogol Bordello do it well. And in our midst, there lives a gifted bunch of musicians – pulled together to form Diego's Umbrella – that does it well too. Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

Sun Hop Fat is a local 12-piece inspired by the ecstatic late 1960s Swinging Addis period of Ethio-pop, which itself was at least partially inspired by James Brown. The modern band lays out that inspiration groundwork in each track, building off the legacy and adding its own grooves, coming off like a jazzy Ethio-pop orchestra.

Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

At its core, good pop music simply pleases the senses. Billy & Dolly should be pleased as punch right about now: the SF act's charming sophomore LP, Dally Bon Idyll, is finally here. The power-pop duo of Bill Rousseau and Dahlia Gallin grew from another well-regarded local band, mid-Aughts act the Monolith, and released their debut as Billy & Dolly three years back (2009's In the Beginning), so this record is a long time in the making. Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

Drop Lemmy Kilmister in a whirling vat of hallucinogenic acid, and you may start to hear San Francisco's Pins of Light emerge. The Alternative Tentacles band is made up of hard rocking, black metal-dipped cogs: scratchy-throated singer-bassist Shane Baker, brutal guitarists Jake Palladino and Ravi Durbeej, and pummeling drummer Phil Becker, who are also current and former members of Dead and Gone, Hightower, and Triclops. Read more »

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

What if the glory days of 1990s MTV beyond-video programming never faded into preggers teens and a never-ending onslaught of reality blech?  Those days, the dial – and we still had dials then kids –  remained fixed on the televised revolution when Liquid Television, Beavis and Butthead, and even Daria ruled space between vids. Read more »