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From Mike Hasen of Pentimento:

Have Mercy - The Earth Pushed Back This is one of those records that's just plain SOLID. It's got a great vibe and it's something I find myself drawn back to time and time again. Very excited to see where these dudes go from here. Also, we share a booking agent so it's like. C'mon. How have we not toured with this band yet? Someone's getting fired immediately. Football Etc - Audible After falling in love with this band thanks to a Count Your Lucky Stars sampler, I listened to their 2011 release The Draft almost nonstop. When Audible was announced, I immediately turned all my attention toward what they were up to. This is a release that fans throughout the genre, but also beyond the normal mode of operation within emo, can truly appreciate. The vocals on this record, and on all their releases really, shine for me because they've got this clean edge to them without losing out on the *feel* during the delivery.  I Can See Mountains - Life On A Houseboat I love this band. I love this record. I could talk forever about why this is easily my favorite release of 2013. There's nothing like absorbing this record and getting so stoked on it that you want to punch your entire family, and then also being able to see these dudes around the city, or being able to call them up and hang out while we're home. I'll never get over this record or this band, not only because they're great friends, but just because this release and all of their work feels like immediate classics that I'll be sure to show my children if/when I have them if/when I let them out of the basement.  Dick Tucker - Stay Tucked This is something I made up just now but god damn i wish it was real So Many Ways - Seer The first time we'd ever played Chicago, we had the chance to share the stage with So Many Ways. It was one of those sets you watch and keep looking over at your friends going "DUDE WHAT!? DID YOU JUST-HOW THE FUCK DID HE-WAS THAT A FUCKIN-DUDE WHAAAAAAAAAAT". Save for the fact that their music is just a lot of fun, it's also fucking awesome and extremely well crafted when you consider the amount of musicianship and talent in this band. Take your favorite snotty punk band, quadruple the speed, throw in some guitar licks that would just plain piss off Steve Vai and make Yngwie Malmsteen lose his accent and you're almost at the point where you can say "I still have no idea how to describe So Many Ways". Please don't ignore this band. They've taken the idea of genre blending to a whole new level and do it so seamlessly and so effortlessly that you literally can't NOT like this band. Army Wives - Demo Remember when Underoath was that band? Remember how a few years after you got over the hip print shirts with giant hot pink designs on them you got into As Cities Burn and you were like "This is like Underoath but way better" and then pretended you liked them more than Underoath the whole time? If you or someone you love has exhibited any of these symptoms, please seek out and listen to Army Wives. If this is a statement that directly applies to me and I'm just typing this as though I'm not the most clear example of the aforementioned criteria, then please still listen to Army Wives. Then call me so I have an escape from watching episodes of Wife Swap and talk about how fucking awesome this band is. 

From Alec of Aspiga:

Alkaline Trio - My Shame Is True Saves The Day - Saves The Day Broadcaster - A Million Hours A Wilhelm Scream - Partycrasher Off With Their Heads - Home Great Apes - Thread Restorations - Lp2 The Exquisites - S/T Iron Chic - The Constant One Paint It Black - Invisible ep

From Kevin of Aspiga:

Lemuria - This Distance Is So Big Plow United - Marching Band Great Apes - Thread Broadcaster - A Million Hours Alkaline Trio - My Shame Is True The Exquisites - S/T The Young Leaves - Alive and Well Sundowner - Neon Fiction  Placeholder - I Don't Need Forgiveness Banquets - S/T

From Zack Sekuler of The Braces:

1. Bad Religion - True North  Bad Religion put this out in January and it sounds like it could have come after “Suffer” in 1989.  2. Modern Life Is War - Fever Hunting This is a record I never thought would exist, kind of like Episode VII is the movie I never thought would exist. If Episode VII is as good as this record, everyone wins.  3. The Swellers - The Light Under Closed Doors I was lucky enough to hear this go from rough demos to a full album. It was good then and it’s amazing now.  4. Surfer Blood - Pythons  This band is always effortlessly cool, this isn’t their best and I heard they’re dicks but I still like it.  5. Samiam - Whatever’s Got You Down (Reissue) Technically this came out in 2006 but it sounded like shit then and the great songs were hard to listen to. Now that it sounds better this earns a spot in the top 10.  6. The Wonder Years - The Greatest Generation This band is the best “pop-punk” band around and they proved it with this record.  7. The Songs Of Tony Sly - Tribute  A lot of these covers aren’t as good as the original, but the FAT roster brought it.  8. The Sheds - I’ll Be Fine  These guys grew up with us and their new record is the best skate punk album to come out all year. 

From Joel Tannenbaum of Plow United/ Ex Friends:

2013 is the year I owned a record player for the first time since 2008, so there's that. I heard lots of good punk and not-punk and punk-ish songs in 2013, and these are those: 1. Big Awesome - "Living With Love" from Birdfeeder EP (self-released) This record is emo in the mid-1990s sense of the word, and features sterling but unobtrusive musicianship. The breakdown on "Living With Love" is a little bit of a downer, but it's a small and perhaps inevitable price to pay for the level of sincerity that pervades the song as a whole. "Living With Love" takes me somewhere. I haven't figured out where, but it's summer and it's snowing at the same time, and I'm 19 again, but not as dumb and self-destructive. Figure that one out.  http://bigawesome.bandcamp.com/track/living-with-love 2. Screaming Females - "Ancient Civilization" from Tenement and Screaming Females split EP (Recess Records) Okay, so, I bought this record because I love Tenement. I listened to the Tenement side once and was like "that was cool. I should do some due diligence and listen to the other side too." I listened to the other side seven times in a row.That should give you some sense of what we are dealing with here. The reason stoner rock sucks is because the bands never bother to write songs. This is what stoner rock would sound like if the bands wrote actual songs.  http://store.recessrecords.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=9&products_id=1271 3. Goddamnit - "With Whiskey" - from How To Take The Burn LP (Creep Records) It's not easy to pick a favorite song from Goddamnit's debut album, and it may seem a little counter-intuitive to hand the title to the strange, clanky acoustic ballad with the bro-y singalong that acts as the album's termination point, but honestly, I think this is one of the saddest and most haunting songs I've ever heard. The sense of loss and resignation that permeates it is as real and unaffected as it gets, and I think I could listen to it a thousand times and never quite get to the bottom of it.  Also, whiskey.  http://goddamnit.bandcamp.com/track/14-with-whiskey 4. Martin - "Sandy" - from The Worst Part EP (Square of Opposition)  The first thing that strikes you about this record is how much singer/guitarist Pat Graham's songwriting has matured since his days at the helm of Spraynard. Nowhere is this maturity more in evidence than on "Sandy," a driving, deceptively simple anthem that recounts a night spent huddling in the dark while Hurricane Sandy rages outside. Almost surreal in its eye for mundane detail, with an impossibly catchy chorus, "Sandy" is as sticky as a melted Goldenberg's Peanut Chew stuck to the floor of the van that Martin will no doubt drive around the country in the near future.  http://martinband.bandcamp.com/track/sandy 5. Pity Party - "Two Hobos Sharin' a Bean" from Fine Young Animals LP (Psychic Volt) Rather than waste two or three sentences explaining this band's complicated pedigree, I'm just going to say that Pity Party is a punk band from New York City that absolutely does not fuck around. Fast, inventive, catchy and almost unnervingly concise, Pity Party rules, and all of their ruling qualities are in evidence on "Two Hobos Sharin' a Bean," one of the standout tracks from their first full-length (which they insist on calling an EP for some reason) Fine Young Animals.  http://pityletsparty.bandcamp.com/track/two-hobos-sharin-a-bean

From Jason S. Thompson of The Sky We Scrape:

1. Frightened Rabbit - Pedestrian Verse 2. Arliss Nancy - Wild American Runners 3. Red City Radio - Titles 4. Banquets - Banquets  5. Hidden Hospitals - EP001+002 6. Norma Jean - Wrongdoers 7. Justin Timberlake - The 20/20 Experience 8. Frameworks - Small Victories 9. AFI - Burials  10. letlive. - The Blackest Beautiful Honorable Mentions: Reverse The Curse - Existent Queens of the Stone Age - Like Clockwork

From Ryan Steele of The Sky We Scrape:

Hi. Happy Fest 12. Take a free download.

Pentimento came out with their self-titled LP a while back, and most recently released their 'Inside The Sea' EP – that can now be purchased digitally and on 10" vinyl. The free download included in this Fest 12 celebration is an exclusive acoustic recording of "Unless."

Red City Radio just came out with their sophomore LP. It's called 'Titles' and the records are beautiful. Here, you get an exclusive acoustic recording of "I'll Take A Mile."