Yellowbirds

Following the 2009 dissolution of his longtime band Apollo Sunshine, guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Sam Cohen began recording on his own in a bedroom studio, expanding on the same indie psych sound with understated country touches that he'd worked with in his previous band. Cohen chose the moniker Yellowbirds for the project, enlisting some friends to help him flesh out the songs, and eventually released a few singles and in early 2011 a debut album, The Color. To tour in support of the album, Cohen assembled a full-time band to back him up consisting of drummer Brian Kantor, multi-instrumentalist Josh Kaufman, and bassist Annie Nero. When working on songs for the follow-up album, Cohen chose to write solely on an acoustic guitar, hoping to create songs in an unpolished form before ornamenting them in the studio. This writing process resulted in 2013's sophomore album Songs from the Vanished Frontier.