Alexander Ebert, lead singer of the Los Angeles entourage Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros, released his debut solo album Alexander this week via Community Music (Rough Trade will release the album in Europe).Alexander includes ten brand new songs that Ebert wrote and performed entirely himself.

During breaks from touring with the Zeros, Ebert began building and recording the pieces alone in his bedroom. Prior to beginning work on this album, all of the music that he worked on had been collaboratively written, especially with the 10-person Magnetic Zeros. There isn’t a single sound on the Alexander album that Ebert didn’t perform himself.  Read more...

Story by Myles Crawley.  Photos by Danica Waters.  Read more...

by: Ryan Mulligan

826LA (http://www.826la.org), a non-profit, tutoring organization dedicated to nurturing creative and expository writing skills in children and young adults, has succeeded in giving voice to their students’ creativity with an inspiring project that merges lyrics derived from the imagination of students from the ages of seven to thirteen with the musical vision of LA indie pop band The Submarines. “Songwriting with the Submarines,” a music composition workshop in which the pop duo helped students craft original songs, saw the children develop their own bands, with such tremendous names as Pig Power, The Weirdoz and Jennifer Lopez. The resulting songwriting efforts have since been covered by such diverse artists as Fiona Apple (who is also a member of 826LA’s advisory board), She & Him, Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros, Cold War Kids and many more.  Read more...

By: Myles Crawley (with excerpts from The Voice Project‘s website)

For over two decades war has ravaged Northern Uganda, Southern Sudan and Eastern Congo. Joseph Kony’s LRA has made abducting children and forcing them to fight his chief weapon of war, even making them kill their friends and even their own families. As Kony’s power is starting to ebb, many former soldiers are escaping but hide in the bush, afraid to return home because of reprisals for the atrocities they were forced to commit.  Read more...