Crystal Stilts

Proffering something darker and edgier than their Brooklyn warehouse peers, Crystal Stilts never completely fit in with the indie-pop revival that swept together so many other bands with sunnier dispositions. The band’s 2008 debut, Alight Of Night, employed would-be hooks and organ riffs in service of dark rock dirges, and all the songs came buried in fuzz. But they were fine songs—and all the finer when delivered via Brad Hargett’s low growl, which sounds great with lots of reverb. While Night was the studio project of Hargett and guitarist J.B. Townshend, the songs on their second record, In Love With Oblivion, were written and recorded as a band, an energizing move echoed throughout Crystal Stilts’ solid follow-up. The band’s latest, the EP Radiant Door, was released Nov. 15.

Updated 11/21/2011