If you haven’t heard the raw sounds of Sleigh Bells as of yet, you must’ve been living under some kind of well-isolated rock since November. After their CMJ performance last year, that duo with the cute vocalist in disco pants was all anyone could talk about. I’ll be honest with you, I didn’t really know what to expect at first — there are so many boy/girl duos in electronica with a supposedly fresh sound that Pitchfork tries to shove down my throat every year that I’ve lost count by now. However, upon hearing their 2HellWU EP, I couldn’t help but get caught up in their crazily catchy distorted beats. Their sound is probably hard to simply describe or even give a proper comparison, but in a way it’s a weird hybrid between good punk and a heavy hip-hop beat.

Sleigh Bells is the unpredictably delicious offspring of two artists with a polar opposite music background. Alexis Krauss previously used to write songs with titles such as Fallen for You and Stronger Than That when she was playing bass and providing vocals for a sugary sweet band named Ruby Blue. Derek Miller used to play guitar in an experimental post-hardcore band named Poison The Well. Needless to say, the collaboration between these two is clearly a successful prototype case of opposites attract. You can’t help but be intrigued by this Brooklyn duo because their whole act is made up of so many different types of elements that shouldn’t match on paper, but still do in practice. Alexis used to be a school teacher, which seems to be a good previous occupation for musicians we bloggers love. She looks cute as a button and gets memorable YouTube comments such as “She’s so cute, she’d make a great inside spoon!”). Her vocals go from raw screams to sensual moaning to convincingly sweet in split seconds while Derek manages to give us everything from powerful breakdowns to slow nostalgic guitar chords. Best advice is probably to listen for yourself and get carried away.

The band was unsigned for a while there, but my fellow capslock abuser Maya Arulpragasam got on that in time and Sleigh Bells will be releasing their much-awaited debut “Treats” on N.E.E.T. Recordings in collaboration with Mom+Pop Records this year. They cleaned up their sound for a crisp performance at SXSW this week and will be supporting various Yeasayer and Major Lazer dates for the first half of their year, so we’d strongly advice you to check them out live for sure. And while we’re on the subject, M.I.A. will be announcing two more freshly signed artist to her label for every week of March, so keep an eye on N.E.E.T.!