On January 17th, Nneka previewed a few of her new songs in New York’s tiny club, Cielo. The line was long to get in when the doors opened for the free show since the bouncers were strict about checking coats. It even creating some difficulty for Nneka and her friends but it wasn’t long after that she began her short, intimate performance.

Shortly after, she announced a proper US tour to support the US release of her latest album, Soul is Heavy out at the end of February.

January in Colorado, to anyone who doesn’t live on the front range of the Rocky Mountains, seems like the coldest and stupidest time to be outside listening to music. But if you spend some time in or around Denver, you’ll know that’s not true. It might snow a foot on Monday, and hover between eight and ten degrees on Tuesday, but Wednesday, Thursday and Friday still have a chance of hitting 60. In fact, the entire winter is like one long game of frostbite roulette. On January 27, the first ever winter concert at the open air, naturally formed Red Rocks Amphitheater will take place, inviting 9,000 people to play this only-sane-if-you’re-in-Colorado game with some of hip hop’s finest – Atmosphere, Common, and Rocky Mountain State native Grieves. 

It’s the brainchild of Ben Anderson, founder of Icelantic Skis, who couldn’t wait to pair his love of winter with his love of summer. While Red Rocks is flocked to by thousands of concertgoers every summer, it is practically uninhabited during the colder months – except by the most extreme athletes found running the stairs in the thin air every morning. It’s a little crazy to think that the amphitheater will be full of people in snow gear rocking their arms back and forth as Atmosphere rhymes about Lucy Ford, or as Common waxes and wanes over water and chocolate, but it’s also completely believable. To everyone there, it’ll just be a matter of chance if they go home with blue fingers or if they have to shed a couple of layers. As always in Colorado, it’s a time for the risk takers, and there’s no telling what can happen.

The Boss has an announcement. Bruce Springsteen is releasing a new album (his 17th), Wrecking Ball on Columbia Records in March (5th March UK, 6th March US). The album will was produced by Ron Aniello with Springsteen and includes appearances from Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello and former Pearl Jam member, Matt Chamberlain as well as members of the E Street Band.

To coincide with the album, Springsteen has also announced a European Tour with plans for a US tour to come. He’ll be stopping by SXSW as a keynote speaker before then. And out now, is the lyric video for the first single, “We Take Care of Our Own”.

With his first truly exciting album in a number of years, and a tour on the way, Ryan Adams is making the most of his time right now. His 2011 album Ashes and Fire was highly regarded as one of the best records of the year, and his sold out, intimate shows late last year made him seem like less of a commodity than a rare stone. He just released his second video for the new single “Chains of Love” off Ashes, in advance of his tour, which begins on January 24. Check out the video and tour dates, below. 

With a new tour about to begin David Bazan fans can get a little taste of the man in action with bassist Andy Fitts and drummer Alex Westcoat via a new Daytrotter session (Bazan’s third) and an appearance on the venerable Austin City Limits. The Daytrotter session finds the band running through three tracks—“Eating Paper”, “Level With Yourself” and “Virginia” with an intensity that bodes well for the group’s upcoming performances.

With this year’s Strange Negotiations continuing to garner the onetime Pedro The Lion man critical acclaim, the road seems the perfect place for Bazan to connect with fans, which he will be doing straight through the middle of December, starting in Spokane, Washington and ending in Eugene, Oregon. Although those bookends might make it seem as though Bazan isn’t really traveling all that far, the tour winds through the middle of the country, to the south and southwest before he brings it all back home.