Do you like breakfast food? Of course you do; you’re not a monster. How much do you like it? I mean, do you like bacon enough to wish you could chop out rails of it and take a hit of brekkie straight to the brain? Guess what? Now you can! Or, at least, Austin’s Hundred Visions can.

This is the most manic food prep scene this side of a Gordon Ramsay reality show (full disclosure, I started writing this while watching DVR’d Master Chef Junior, because I like food and making children cry), If you haven’t pushed play yet, for some reason, expect equally manic garage punk with singalongy choruses and a beat that makes you wish you had a tambourine to slap your hip with.

So maybe the food they’re cooking up might not be delicious, but the song is. Also, I’m hungry now.

New music from North Carolina’s Mandolin Orange, the duo of Andrew Marlin and Emily Frantz. Old Ties and Companions is a graceful, mandolin ballad that reminds us to acknowledge the special things in life because they don’t last forever, an important reminder for folks that travel as much as Mandolin Orange has. A perfect morning jam on this bright sunny, freezing cold morning here in Boston, grab a cup of coffee and spin this twice.

Look for “Old Ties and Companions,” to appear on Mandolin Orange’s upcoming record, Such Jubilee, out May 5th.

Before we go any further, allow me to point out the most important thing you’re going to learn today: PANTHAR is named after a taxidermied bobcat. I can’t decide whether I love more that this is how they named the band, or that the taxidermied bobcat is named PANTHAR in the first place.

PANTHAR sounds like LA if LA was in space. On a planet where it was perpetually the 80s (I think Hampton Beach is on that planet, too). Naturally, they will have a song called “Ghost Rocket.” The video features psychedelic laser beams, questionable eyeshadow choices, and a hairless cat who doesn’t speak English. Although I don’t think any cats speak English. I’ve heard some people suggest they all speak French; I’m not sure about that, either. The video has a retro-future aesthetic and so does the song, and it’s very easy to believe that this is more or less what frontwoman Shelina Louise’s actual life looks like. When your own life looks like snow upon snow upon more stupid snow, a neon palm-tree freakout seems pretty fantastic. Oh, I’m sorry, a neon palm-tree freakout… from space.

Brooklyn’s The Lone Bellow kicked off their 2015 tour right here in Boston on Thursday, February 12th at the Paradise Rock Club. The sold-out crowd was rewarded for finding a way to the venue through the arctic tundra with a barnburner of a show that melted the hearts and minds of even the most frozen of souls. The trio recently released their fantastic sophomore LP, Then Came The Morning, and it has taken the Americana music world by storm.

One thing you can expect from a Lone Bellow show is that the audience will already know all the words to the new material despite having only been released for a few weeks. Another thing you can expect is a rowdy, rambunctious, ridiculously good time. Zach Williams, Kanene Pipkin, and Brian Elmquist are true performers in every sense of the word. Their rapport with the audience is astounding and their ability to transform every song into an event makes them one of the best live acts around.

Boston’s very own Will Dailey got the rock n’ roll fires burning early as he took to the stage promising to heat things up enough to melt the snow and bring on spring. Dailey’s latest album, National Throat, was released in August 2014, earning him Album of the Year and Artist of the Year wins from the Boston Music Awards. The singer-songwriter got the Paradise moving with songs spanning his nearly 10+ years on the local music scene. If you aren’t familiar with his work do yourself a huge favor and check him out.

London indie-rock quartet Life In Film will release their debut LP this Spring and to celebrate the accomplishment the band have released one of the catchiest damn singles I have heard in quite some time. “Get Closer” is classic Britpop at its finest! Packed to the brim with dance hooks, quick tempo beats, and melancholy lyrics masked by jangly guitars, it pays homage to that Cool Britannia sound of the UK in the early 90’s.

Life in Film are Samuel Fry (lead vocals, guitar), Edward Ibbotson (vocals, guitar), Dominic Sennett (vocals, bass), and Micky Osment (vocals, drums). The lads worked with legendary producer Stephen Street (Smiths, Blur, Morrissey, Kaiser Chiefs) on “Get Closer” and it’s easy to hear his influence in the track, and hard to stand still while listening.

Press play and see how long it takes before you are bouncing along to that boisterous British beat.

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You’re probably thinking “We have literally 6 feet of snow outside and you want me to listen to a band from Canada??” But hold your horses. NEEDS are from Vancouver, my hometown, and I can tell you that we don’t actually all have pet polar bears there or commute via dogsled. They don’t even get snow every winter there! Now can you see why they are a good snow-banishing choice? And if there’s anything that can blast the snow off your roof, it’s loud, fast rock, which these gentlemen graciously provide. So, you can see why I’m writing about it. They are “my people” in at least two ways already.

But even if you are not always listening to bands who play fast and scream louder, this is hard to resist. First off, the title. Any evidence of smart-mouthery is a good sign in anyone, and in rock it’s no different. For that matter, bands admitting to screwups or – as the first lines of the song make clear – to not really knowing what they’re doing is not only charming, it’s refreshing. Did you not expect to hear “charming” and “refreshing” about a punk band?

Then, the song itself, interspersed with asides (I bet this works even better live) and oh-yeahs, switching speeds on us and keeping us on our toes – well. I am looking forward to the album, which comes out May 12th, in hopes of more of the same.

P.S., that thing they are standing in, in the picture? That’s called a parkade. Not a parking garage or a “parking ramp” (what?). Parkade. At least, that is its name among my people. You’re welcome for your BC lexical fact of the day.

Nashville musician Natalie Prass has begun the next phase of her musical journey with the recent release of her self-titled debut album, via Spacebomb records. The Cleveland born singer-songwriter cut her chops playing shows in and around the Virginia beach area, attended Berklee College of Music here in Boston, became a back-up singer for Jenny Lewis, and moved to “Music City” in 2006 to hone her skills.

The album was just released on January 27th and the accolades are already raining down on Prass from all over the music blogosphere, and it was named the Best New Album by Pitchfork. Now that’s something! We here at Music Savage have fallen in love with this record as well and I’m excited to share the gorgeous single, “My Baby Don’t Understand Me,” which is the opening track. Filled with sweeping horns and vibrant strings, along with that dazzling voice, the song begs to make you weep while gently lifting you up.

Natalie Prass will be in town Friday, May 8th to open for Sam Fermin at my favorite venue in the city, The Sinclair. Get your tickets here.

We will have more from her here so do stay tuned.

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London based Welsh-French folk quintet Shake Shake Go are set to release their debut EP titled, England Skies, on March 9th (via Beaucoup Music) and we are excited to share the band’s first single, which is the title-track, for your listening delight. Filled to the brim with light airy vocals, beautiful harmonies, and sparkling guitars, the song captures a feeling of wandering the lush English countryside in search of warmer days and sunnier thoughts. Something all of us New Englanders can use right now.

“England Skies” definitely has all the makings of becoming an alternative radio hit, so it’s only a matter of time before the name Shake Shake Go comes up when discussing the time before bands like Of Monsters and Men, Mumford & Sons, and The Lumineers were a big deal.

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Did you, like me, spend an hour and a half shoveling hip-high snow this morning? And that was just round one? Then what you need is this video (and perhaps also hot chocolate with booze in it).  It’s literally the opposite of 3 feet of snow. It’s a surf extravaganza about Starship Troopers.

You heard me.

I’ve talked about Brooklyn buddies The Nuclears before, and this video is for a song off their 2014 album This Is How We Party. It’s also an amazing B-movie-looking beach party, complete with surfing, babes, and plastic insects fighting (or possibly having sex?). So why are you still reading this? Watch the video! Then go out and finish shoveling, already. And come see them when they come up to Boston next, probably in late February.

Would you like to know more? The Nuclears website | Facebook | Twitter

I am not alone, at this fine publication, in liking Ex Hex a lot. Myself, I first encountered them when they opened for Rocket from the Crypt on their reunion tour last summer. One of the things that instantly endears a live band to me is stage moves. Rock moves and synchronized moves and dance moves, anything you’ve got, I am on board. And these 3 ladies were having a very party time onstage and dancing at each other, and on top of their moves, they had catchy, bouncy rock! Well, that was it for me, I was sold.

So when I saw that they had a video out that plays on Ladies and Gentlemen, The Fabulous Stains!, I knew we were in for more sweet moves, and I was not wrong. The funny thing is, it’s a takeoff on a movie from 1982 (a great year, but I may be biased), but absolutely none of it looks out of place.

Enjoy the video, and if you want to see moves in person, you can catch them at Great Scott on April 24. That may seem far, but their last show sold out, so don’t sleep.