THE NEW CLASS

Valleyview

This list focuses on the young talent cropping up around the city, though it also includes an older force new to the scene, a three-year-old trio forging inclusive spaces under the radar, and a band keeping their Pittsburgh roots despite a fan base stretching to the West Coast.

The abundance of talent also means an abundance of omissions — this list easily could have stretched to 20 bands forging paths in Pittsburgh, representing genres such as hardcore, experimental acoustic, and power-pop.

With that in mind, the following six artists serve as a sample of some of the noteworthy, surprising, and innovative music happening in Pittsburgh right now. Want to support them? See them live and buy their music.

The four guys — Jesse Farine (vocals, guitars), Benjamin Volk (drums), Ethan Herring (bass), and Jared Anderson (guitar) — who comprise Valleyview are all in their early-20s, some in school, others college dropouts. Give their song “Nevermind” a spin and Farine’s sonorous voice and strident guitar playing will have you thinking you’re hearing a late-30s Paul Banks.

Valleyview’s debut five-track EP I Feel Like You’re Haunting Me , released March 17, is a showcase of the members’ musical chemistry and a confident indicator of the band’s potential. While they aren’t reinventing the wheel, the surprisingly catchy riffs and vocals that lurk underneath the mix — warm and glazy on “Cure Song” and fuzzed-out on

“Television”— have a way of sticking in your head longer than the average collegiate post-punk outfit.

The Valleyview Bandcamp page defines its sound as “American Windmill Music,” a reference to a wave of contemporary English post-punk bands including Black Midi, Squid, and Black Country, New Road, that got their start at the pub/oddball-music venue The Windmill in London. Farine cites those groups and indie touchstones like The Strokes as inspiration for Valleyview’s music, an influence apparent in the driving bass lines on the EP’s closing track “Hiding.” Combine that with the song’s sad-quirky lyrics (“I don’t care as long as it feels like fate”) and you’ve got a band worth sweating in a dusty South Oakland basement for.

Malcolm Threat

Tune into Carnegie Mellon University’s college radio station WRCT 88.3 on a Friday at 4 p.m. and you’ll hear the house and techno tunes of the affable Malcolm Threat, aka Charlotte Lamm. A Cognitive Science major by day and emerging DJ by night, Lamm takes inspiration from English electronic groups like The Orb, Prodigy, and Orbital, as well as CMU grad Yaeji, who also got her start at WRCT.

Malcolm Threat DJ sets combine the headrush of chronically online tunes with house-music staples. That is, you’re as likely to hear a nightcore version of

Taylor Swift’s “Romeo and Juliet” as you are a UK drum-and-bass sample.

Originally from the California Bay Area, Lamm has found a home among other WRCT DJs and in Pittsburgh’s thriving underground electronic scene. She’s made the rounds at Oakland venues, playing to a packed house at a memorable costumed Halloween show at DIY venue The Deli last year. Lamm tells Pittsburgh City Paper that she enjoys the intimate, ego-less environment of these shows, where the crowd’s vibe is easier to gauge.

Lamm’s weekly radio show, called Back2Businness, sees her spinning live tracks each Friday with other DJs, including CMU contemporaries Mushu (Mike Xu) and Big Cashew (Kingston Cox), and older DJs like Ron Mist (Dylan Kersten).

Earlier this month, Mist tapped Lamm, along with Royal Haunts and DJ Shoe, to be a part of the first installment of Roundhouse, a Boiler-Room style dance night at Bottlerocket Social Hall. Lamm also plans on forming a CMU DJ trio with Big Cashew and Lotusland called The Muck ahead of outdoor shows this summer.

Wanna listen to Lamm’s music? When City Paper asked why she only has a few mixes on her SoundCloud, she gave a very DJ response. In short, you had to be there, man.

“I prefer the ephemeral stuff where it’s just on the radio and if you happen to hear it, you hear it,” Lamm tells City Paper. “Sometimes, when you’re DJing, the thing you’re creating only matters in the moment, when everything’s coming together live.”