DCist spends a lot of time following local bands. Additionally, it seems like we spend a lot of time defending our local music scene since the lack of a breakout buzz act on a national scale seems to have naysayers (most of them within city lines) saying that there’s nothing going on musically in this town. Not only is that trope boring, it’s just untrue. We can easily point to acts like Oddisee, Deleted Scenes, The Evens, Title Tracks, Fat Trel and E.D. Sedgwick that have been receiving press all over the country. But D.C. still has plenty of hidden gems that are starting to pop up and that we suspect won’t stay hidden that much longer.

Foul Swoops (Photo by Nestor Diaz)

FOUL SWOOPS: Technically, Foul Swoops have been an up-and-coming band for a couple of years but since having anchored their lineup with Laurie Spector on drums, Sean and Devin Connell have been able to focus more on writing songs than between bouncing back and forth between guitar and percussion. And boy, have they written some songs. Usually “Colossal Sized Picassos” from their early EP is the only familiar song in their live set, but whether they’ve played a full thirty minutes or curtailed their set after ten, the trio always leaves the audience wanting more. They’re one of the more talented and dynamic groups that have taken the garage rock aesthetic and run with it. I’ve been fond of saying that they play out like they’re the best band in D.C. but the truth is that I’ve also seen them make touring bands look the fool with more raw energy and better hooks. —Valerie Paschall

Foul Swoops play February 22 at the Black Cat with Parquet Courts and Roomrunner.

Photo by Shawn Brackbill via Facebook

PROTECT-U: Mike Petillo and Aaron Leitko’s electronic project Protect-U has been stewing for a couple years, but I’ll be damned if they aren’t one of the best this city has to offer. The duo use analog equipment to make hypnotic dance tracks, like the three on last year’s near perfect EP Motorbike. Protect-U is also one of the few bands on this list to break out of the D.C. hole and get major national attention. The band aisre currently recovering from the theft of their gear at a Paris gig last year, but there will surely be more music to come. —Rohan Mahadevan

Listen to Protect-U’s new “Crashers in Paradise” mix:

Priests at The Pinch in January. (Photo by Nathan Jurgenson)

During their final D.C. show, Nolen Strals of the high-strung Baltimore band Double Dagger asked for the audience not to be sad on account of their break-up, but to form their own band instead and become even better. That’s a stiff challenge coming from a band that had developed a fervent cult following, but the members of Priests (who I didn’t actually see at that show) seem to be taking them up on it. Katie Alice Greer is one of the most arresting singers we’ve seen since Strals, pouring her 110% into songs like “Personal Planes” and “Lillian Hellman,” which could end up being one of the best songs of 2013. Her vocals which vary between loud hard rock barking and hardcore screaming are all the more potent due to the furious drumming of Daniele Yandell and the guitar riffs of Gideon Jaguar, which sounds less like a hardcore crunch and more like a dissonant take on surf rock. Judging by the impressed tweets of blown away fans in other cities, it seems Priests is already developing their own cult following. —Valerie Paschall

Priests play February 13 at the Black Cat with Hilly Eye.

Bella Russia at DC9. (Photo by Yassine El Mansouri via Facebook)

BELLA RUSSIA: Of all the bands on this list, Bella Russia is probably the one you’re least likely to have heard of. Hopefully that will change soon. Their impressive instrumental soundscapes remind us of bands we already love. We see a lot of the repeating patterned guitar of Buildings and some of the grit of Imperial China, but Bella Russia veers less dissonant than the latter and more unpredictable than the former. As soon as Bella Russia have you caught in a familiar groove, they’ll change to staccato rhythms or add some guitar shredding, as if taking you down a highway and then careening off an exit ramp. They also contributed a track to the latest Bluebrain project, Rainbow Arcade in which each band involved only had three hours in which to record their song. We think they did well. —Valerie Paschall

Bella Russia plays February 11 at Comet Ping Pong with Holopaw and the Sea Life.

America Hearts in Los Angeles in August 2012. (Photo courtesy of Jess Matthews.)

AMERICA HEARTS: Yeah, we’ve written about them and they have written for us, but there is a reason why this website keeps crushing on Jess Matthews’ indie-folk quartet. America Hearts continues to make some of the most catchy and tuneful music in D.C. While they only have a handful of EPs in their catalog including three “singles” from last year, 2013 will hopefully see a full-length debut. —Rohan Mahadevan

America Hearts plays March 25 at Galaxy Hut.

Photo by Erin Smith

COUP SAUVAGE AND THE SNIPS: “Don’t worry Fort Reno,” singer Kristina Sauvage said during a particularly hot installment of the summer concert series, “We’re here!” This sort of well-placed sass is part of what makes the six-piece Coup Sauvage and the Snips such an intriguing draw and part of what actually got the humidity sapped crowd (and every crowd) to get up to the front and start dancing. To be fair, the music made by the three singers, bassist and neon-outfitted keyboardist and beat maker is also ripe for grooving like a contemporary turn on En Vogue tossed with a splash of 1970s European showmanship. Yet, for all of their flashy influences, the subject matter of Coup Sauvage’s songs is always easily relatable. This landed them an opening slot during the Make-Up’s reunion show at the Black Cat last fall. Who knows what they’ll be up to next? —Valerie Paschall

Find Coup Sauvage and the Snips online.

Photo by Phillip Jamieson

BLACK CLOUDS: No matter how impressive (or, OK, just plain loud) a post-rock band can be, there’s usually some moment during their live set where the yawning kicks in along with a desire to sit down. Not so with Black Clouds, although it helps that they aren’t strictly a post-rock band. The instrumental trio of Jimmy Rhodes, Ross Hurt, and Justin Horenstein borrows as much from hardcore and metal as it does from motion picture soundtracks and thus, the sounds that they come up with are alternately beautiful and disturbing. When Hurt takes a bow to his electric bass it sounds almost as much like doom as the vocals that Clutch singer Neil Fallon adds to their album closer, “Santorum Sunday School.” But during a Black Clouds set, the reflex you can’t stop won’t be a yawn, but a decided head bang. —Valerie Paschall

Find Black Clouds online and check their Facebook page for upcoming shows.

The Dismemberment Plan at Eyeclops in Fredericksburg, Va. (Photo by Steve Rogovin)

THE DISMBEMBERMENT PLAN: Save the occasional reunion tour, D.C.’s best band of the late 1990s and early 2000s lived mostly in our nostalgia. But at a pair of benefit shows in Baltimore and Fredericksburg, Va. last summer, the D-Plan debuted their first new tracks in more a decade. And in October, lead singer and guitarist Travis Morrison confirmed that for the first time since 2001’s Change, the Dismemberment Plan will be headed back into a recording studio. The new album doesn’t have a release date yet, much less a title, but the mere anticipation has Plan fans as giddy as the first time they clamored up on stage for “The Ice of Boston.” —Benjamin R. Freed

Find the Dismemberment Plan online and hound the band about that new album on Twitter.