Crocodiles -- Listen Up!

We're constantly getting turned on to new music here at Spinner HQ. Between our Free MP3 of the Day and weekly Free CD Listening Party, we hope you are too. To help further the cause, we're gonna bring you our personal must-hear music picks with Listen Up! -- Spinner's weekly spotlight on staff-approved artists who rock our world.

Who: Crocodiles
Hail From: San Diego, Calif.
Why We Love Them: We first fell in love with the stylish scuzz rock duo on their raw 2009 debut, 'Summer of Hate.' But it's their latest effort, 'Sleep Forever' that has hooked us ... well, forever. Drawing comparisons to Jesus and Mary Chain, which guitarist Charles Rowell jokes (among other things) about in the interview below, they're certainly part of a select few bands who effectively -- with dizzying arrangements and a cool aptitude for the anthemic -- usher shoegaze back into this decade (see also: Film School, the Big Sleep, Deerhunter).
Essential Listening: 'Sleep Forever' (MP3 Download)
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Exclusive Q&A With Singer Brandon Welchez and Guitarist Charles Rowell:

What's your favorite album right now?
Brandon Welchez: I've been listening pretty obsessively to Opal, 'Early Recordings,' which is just a compilation of all the early work of this great paisley underground band. As far as newer records go, I've also been listening to 'Doomed Forever' by Procedure Club pretty often. Great songwriting on that record.

Charles Rowell: John Cale, 'Paris 1919.'

Tell us about the first concert you ever saw.
BW: I tried so hard to convince my parents to let me go to the Ramones show in San Diego on their farewell tour but they wouldn't let me. I figured the best way to get them to start letting me go to shows was to start a band and actually be part of the show. So that's what I did. I started my first s----y little punk band and booked a show, which was also the first show I attended. It was my band and two really corny -- in retrospect -- punk bands comprised of men in their Forties. I was so nervous that my knees were shaking; that's probably the stand-out moment.

CR: My first concert was on the Winter Dance Party tour at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa. It was a terribly cold evening. My mom drove me there. Embarrassing, I know. My favorite performer was Buddy Holly but Richie Valens singing 'We Belong Together' was the most memorable moment of the evening and probably my whole life.

What's your biggest vice?
BW: Alcohol I guess? I try to keep my vices in check.

CR: Coffee. It's literally my motivation for getting out of bed in the morning.

Why not alligators?
BW: Because that would be a bad name.

CR: Alligators as a word is kind of boring and silly-sounding. No offense to any alligators reading this.

When you stop making music, what's the one thing you want people to remember about your band?‬
BW: That we did whatever we wanted to regardless of what people thought.

CR: That Jesus and Mary Chain ripped off our sound.