12/21/12 is the last day on the Mayan calendar, and if that isn’t startling enough, we recently realized our desk calendars all stop at December 31^st this year as well, so things are looking pretty bleak.

You can either fear the end, or you can blow it out with a bang. “Love Me Like It’s the End of the World,” votes for the latter. With a radio-ready hook, and the vocal chops to back it up, the appropriately named Grace Danger throws caution to the wind and bets it all on tonight.

You can download the track for free through Friday below:

If for some reason the Mayan calendar is wrong and our desk calendars are right, and we’re still around on the 22^nd, you can purchase the song on Amazon. Grace Danger has a full album on the way next year (if both calendars are somehow inaccurate). You can keep up with the news on that and other songs on Danger’s Facebook page.

“Half a Heart” sounds like a tell-off from a morphine numbed broken heart, coming across appropriately fuzzed and strung out. It’s that combination of sad, angry,  f#cking done with it, and melting into whatever. Download the track for free below:

You can keep up with Evil Eyes on their webpage and Facebook, or check out more of their music on bandcamp.

Yes, bentcousin is made up of two actual twins: Amelia and Pat Innit. In “Think I Like Your Girlfriend More Than You,” they take a light and casual angle on that horrible, gut-wrenching feeling you get when you realize you’re into a person who has a significant other who sucks in general. We’ve all be there. Download the song below to take the sting off it.

bentcousin’s full length, Everybody’s Got One will be out February 19, 2013. Until then, you can catch them on tour all over the US and keep up with the band on Facebook .

When you think of songs dedicated to marriage equality, the first thing that comes to mind may not be massive rock anthems, but, now it will be. From the moment the track opens with ringing feedback and a single organ note fading into high pulse drums and sweeping “Whoa Oh Oh Oh Oh’s” you know you’re in for a big ride that could easily fill an arena.

You can get more from CHURCHES on Bandcamp and keep up with them on Tumblr, Twitter, and Facebook.

The beauty of a cover like this is, (other than it obviously being a beautiful song in it’s own right) is the gender twist takes away any notion of a competition between the two recordings. No one is going to argue about which is better, but rather with Zoe singing the song, you see if from a completely different angle. It’s not a replication of the original, it’s a reconsidering.

Download Zoe Boekbinder’s cover of “I’m Your Man” below:

Get Sister Scarecrow here and keep up with Zoe on her webpage and Facebook

“Everybody Knows” is a dank and dirty rock and roll song that bubbled out of the swamps of… wait, San Francisco? Well yeah, The Stone Foxes are from San Francisco, but their sound is pulled from the early days of rock and roll in the deep South– back before the baby boomers claimed to invent something that’s been around forever in one form or another. It jumps, it swings, it cuts, it’ll steal your girl, bust your nose, and still make you smile. This is the kind of stuff we get excited about around here.

You can grab “Everybody Knows” here:

You can keep up with The Stone Foxes on their webpage and on Facebook.

The Memphis trio’s EP is about as eclectic as a four song collection can be. It’s pensive, it’s poppy, it’s folky (admittedly, that’s a horrible word in general), and it’s straight up rock and roll that smacks you in the face. Speaking of which, check out the video for “I Can’t Wait.”

As far as we’re concerned, Star & Micey are 4 for 4 on this EP. If you need further proof, you can stream the whole thing on their site, and then you can pick it up here. Plus, we’ve got the stellar acoustic version of “I Can’t Wait” for you right here:

See? Today is a good day.

Creating a hooky, upbeat, danceable rock and roll song about the repetitive drudgery of life isn’t exactly easy, but Archie Powell & The Exports manage to pull it off with “Metronome.” Life may be a bitch and “ticking away like beats from a metronome,” but at least with this song, you’ll have a fun soundtrack to the backbreaking grind, slowly wearing you down until you die, most likely alone. Yay!

Download “Metronome” for free below.

You can pick up the full album here, and keep up with Archie Powell & The Exports on their webpage and Facebook.

The Chicago (yes, Chicago– not California) band has a distinctive yet familiar sound melded from New Wave and early Alternative influences with some fairly highbrow hooks thrown in. Check out the video for “Purple” below.

You can grab your free download of the track here.

Pickup Art History on iTunes, and keep up with California Wives on their webpage and Facebook.

In case you forgot, or missed it, the story goes something like this: Lee Grace Dougherty was a stripper in Central Florida, and her two younger brothers had fairly substantial criminal records. Apparently one of the brothers was set to register as sex offender because he had sent some dirty texts to an 11 year-old. (Stellar human, yes). But also, his girlfriend (not the 11 year-old, apparently) had a baby on the way, so he was worried he wouldn’t be able to see his kid, on account of the sex offender thing.

So, one thing leads to another, as it often does, and the three siblings find themselves shooting at some police officers during a high speed chase in Florida. It’s hard to say when they were officially on the lam, but a couple of hours later the Dougherty Gang were robbing a bank in South Georgia. Nine days later, they were spotted at a Walmart in Colorado. Eventually the cops found them, there was more shooting, the stripper took a bullet in the leg, and they all went to jail, then their mom said the stripper deserved to get shot.

That’s the story, more or less, however, Wooden Wand’s song does a hell of a lot better job capturing the mood and details in “Southern Colorado Song.” You can download it for free below:

“Southern Colorado Song” will be on Wooden Wand’s forthcoming album, Blood Oaths of the New Blues, out January 8. You can pre-order the album from Fire Records and keep up with the band on Facebook or on their dot org… what, don’t you have a dot org?