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National Features

A city's music scene is about more than which artists get radio play. We're fortunate to have a wealth of talented artists representing the region across the entire spectrum of genres. We've got money players at every position and a deep bench to boot.

But the scene is also lucky to have you, the fans, who scan these pages and support the bands when they play out.

This issue gives you a handy guide to the artists that are the best of their respective genres. The top vote-getters from June's online and paper balloting will be announced at Scene's Cleveland Music Awards on Friday, July 14, at the House of Blues.

In the meantime, here are the nominees. -- Chris Parker

Cleveland Icon
Respect from the music industry may have been a long time coming for Mushroomhead, but there's never been a shortage of love here at home. While lesser lights streaked across metal radio, the bandmates have remained true to their blueprint of intricate, melodically rich, goth-inflected metal, refusing to dumb it down for Limp Bizkit fans. Why should they? With their dramatic sense of songcraft and arresting stage show, it was only a matter of time before a major scooped them up.

That happened in 2001, after the release of their third album, XX, on Eclipse Records. Universal snatched it up and rereleased it, and two years later the eight-piece band emerged with its major-label debut, XIII. After a decade of building an audience from scratch, Mushroomhead wasn't about to change its approach, and XIII is everything we've come to expect -- a tour de force of industrial, punk, goth, rap, and metal, puréed into a distinctive, surprisingly atmospheric, raging sound.

With a new album ready for release in a few months, Mushroomhead has graduated from fixture to legend. In honor of its dozen-plus years as lord of the local metal and hard-rock heap, it's been named winner of Scene's 2006 Cleveland Icon Award for lifetime achievement. The band's steadfast adherence to its own style continues to serve it well and makes Mushroomhead one of the most idiosyncratic acts in metal. -- Parker

Best Rock/Pop
Like a hot-wired F-150, the Whiskey Daredevils mix country twang with spirited rock rebellion that's fast, wild, and illicit. Singer Greg Miller channels the King's brogue, while guitarist Bobby Lanphier's razor-wire leads cut a wide swath. Their country-rock rave-ups really thrive, thanks to healthy doses of humor and irreverence.

If you rose with a Good Morning Valentine, you'd immediately feel refreshed by the warmth of the melody. The Akron quartet ranges from jangly pop to gentle, near-twee Belle & Sebastian sway, drifting across a watercolor landscape of melancholia and longing. It's a sad trip, but the scenery's fantastic.

And to your left you'll notice a View From Everest, the crisp wash of radio-friendly midtempo pop-rock melodies enveloping singer-guitarist Chad Armstrong's impassioned croon. The breezy guitar sustains bouncy choruses through the eight tracks on the band's Contagious EP, which combines the pop classicism of Foreigner with the modern-rock style of Matchbox Twenty. Disregarding the trucker-capped hipsters, the local trio pursues the broad populist appeal of lovelorn ballads.

Formed in the first spastic moments of emo, Brandtson has delivered driving power pop with a dense, textural churn and catchy rhythmic snap for almost a decade, so the dramatic shift represented by the group's sixth full-length, Hello, Control, may well have been due. Bassist John Sayre's departure proved fortuitous in that his replacement, Adam Boose (Furnace St.), has imbued the band with a dance bounce. Joined to the already tight musicianship and the nervy vocals of singer-guitarist Myk Porter, Brandtson's sound dovetails nicely with the indie new-wave revival.

Akron's answer to those color-coded candy stripers from the Motor City, the Black Keys twist the blues -- not so much with garage-rock ferocity as primal power and sloppy elbow grease. The duo of singer-guitarist Dan Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney deserve credit not only for the continued excellence demonstrated on their latest -- the slightly more lysergic Chulahoma EP -- but also for their support of the thriving Akron scene through their Audio Eagle record label. -- Parker

Best Solo Artist
Chris Allen's solo debut, Goodbye Girl and the Big Apple Circus, continues in the roots-rock vein he mined for a decade in Rosavelt, though it also employs a lazy, nightclub vibe, heard in the Velvets' "Pale Blue Eyes," which he renders as a foot-tapping alt-country tune.

To say Patrick Sweany is just a blues musician is like saying Coke is just a soft drink. A Sweany set can veer from soulful, slow burn, John Lee Hooker-style blues to swampy, delta-country pickin' to white-hot rockabilly. A solo fixture in Akron from the Lime Spider to the Zephyr Pub, Sweany also fronts a combo, the Patrick Sweany Band, which just released its second full-length, C'mon C'mere.

With more talent and assurance than her tender age might suggest, lithe Mentor teen Jami Ross has the potential to be on TRL a year from now. Performing at the House of Blues during the Cleveland Music Fest, she sounded even better than she does on her debut, Figure Me Out. She's backed by a crackerjack band that offers swooning pop-rock, over which Ross struts with more attitude than the typical pop artist and less "Oops, I did it again."

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