Strap on your snazziest goggles and buckle yourself in for a zany ride into fashion’s future with UI’s wacky space/time/fashion continuum, Flashion Forward. Let us frolic playfully about the closets of our fanciest, freshest interviewees and see what silken treasures hide underneath all of their growly, grating, gaspy gush of sound.

Hurricane Bells (Steve Schiltz) has been resounding quite loudly of late, due to the overnight sensation-style wave of teeny-bopper fans created when the track “Monsters” reared its deceptively lovely head on New Moon’s deceptively lovely soundtrack.

Schiltz–of (relative) Longwave fame–seemed to figure Hurricane Bells was just a side project. But like many seemingly innocuous hobbies and side interests–Grandpa’s penchant for golf, Aunt Marge’s devotion to kitty cats–it’s taken over his life. And he couldn’t be happier. In fact, when describing his newfound popularity with the young, pale ‘n’ posh set, he sounds like a slightly slow fourth-grader who has received a gold star every day this week.

But instead of being tiresome, it’s totally cute. It also helps that Hurricane Bells genuinely began as a quiet, creative outlet–not some MTV-grasping bid for fame. You can now find the band’s debut album, Tonight is the Ghost, at several fine digital retailers.

Schiltz and his cohorts are those rare rock gems who seem (and look and sound) like the type of fun, smart, slightly insecure but totally kickass guys you’re actually friends with, except with better hair and lighting.

Who’s ready to Flashion Forward? Let’s grab our gear and dive into fashion’s future with UI’s wacky space/time/fashion continuum through which we frolic about the closets of our fanciest, freshest interviewees.

Today, we’re headed into Basement Jaxx’s pimped out den of iniquity to see what they’ve got. The UK house music duo got their start at a night club in Brixton in the mid’-90s, but by the turn of the millennium, their shizzle was landing in commercials and on the soundtracks of cinematic tour de force’s like Bend it Like Beckham.

So does that make them, like, totally lame? Mmm, not so much. Especially if you take their various forays into po-mo land with collaborative installations at London’s Tate Modern museum and their work with the likes of Yoko Ono and Lightspeed Champion.

Their maximalist musical style, boldness and simultaneous ability to evoke “potent sadness…open-hearted plea[s] for affection and understanding” amid a potpourri of “fun, uptempo party tunes” summarizes their raison d’etre.

At first glance, they look like suits who are ready to sell out to the highest bidder–but after about, oh, one second of careful concentration, you realize they’re flipping the bird at that concept (literally in some cases).

So who, and what, are they–really? Just two regular hipster dudes who liked Metallica when Metallica was still cool. Oh, and they may have a slight addiction to video games. So, yeah; two regular hipster dudes.

Flashioning Backward through UI’s archives is like paging through your old middle school yearbook. You can’t help but hold your breath and hope your BFF Tracie wasn’t busted in perpetuity sporting those damn pink leg-warmers she insisted on wearing everywhere. Today, we’ve stumbled upon fragments of Crooked Fingers’ past.

CF lucked out–no fashion faux pas to be found. The Denver, CO, indie rockers are clearly more interested in keeping it real and sticking to what they get paid for (i.e., making music) than making waves on the catwalk.

Aggressively outré without being flashy about it, Crooked Fingers are the Prada of the music world. While a lot of outsiders don’t really get what it is they’re selling–more than just a pretty package; it’s like a philosophy on life wrapped in a pretty, tuneful package–music insiders totally get Eric Bachmann’s schtick. And whether they like the schtick or not, they can’t help but respect it.

It seems Bachmann’s yin and yang approach to album-crafting bleeds into his strange blend of hippie/professor, Hemingway/Lethem, dapper/slob style. Oh, and his love life too.

Below, check out why he aims to take a lover who’s the enemy of his music.

Hey there, kids. It’s time to strut our sartorial stuff and dive into fashion’s future with UI! Pull up a chair,  gaze into my custom-made Flashion Forward crystal ball and prepare to coquettishly zig and zag about the closets of UI’s fanciest, freshest new interviewees. Let’s examine the stylish physical and psychological baggage they pack their shizzle in.

The “indefinable” WHY? poses the question right up front so we don’t have to. Don’t you love folks who are clear about their inability to be clear right up front? I find it as bracingly refreshing as their recently released Eskimo Snow; a change of pace for the art-rappers, who, while never delivering bubble-gum poptastic status quo, could generally be counted on for a neatly packaged sweet n’ sour combo of banter and desolation.

It seems the boys of WHY? have become men: their fascinating but relentlessly inward-gazing musings on life and love (and how it affects them them them! Marcia Marcia Marcia!) have blossomed into full-blown explorations of the human psyche. And if you’re into that sort of thing, you’d be hard pressed to find an album that does it more succinctly and intelligently than Eskimo Snow.

Now, if we could only do something about that hair. I don’t know where I’d start, with their heads or their faces. Look! They’re as scared as we are. It’s possibly a reaction to how their dietary requirements were received while on tour in former Eastern Bloc states.  Don’t worry WHY? We still think you’re manly studs–even if you do eat salad.

Really!

Just because the fashion publishing world is imploding in Madison Avenue’s botoxed, chemically peeled and pinched little face, it doesn’t mean the rest of us need to abandon our sartorial explorations, right?

So toss aside the tree-killing Vogues and W’s and join us at UI as we us gaze into our custom-made Flashion Forward crystal ball and prepare to coquettishly zig and zag about the closets of our fave new interviewees and examine the physical and psychological baggage they pack their shizzle in.

Today we’re invading ElodieO’s elegantly appointed boudoir to check out her style file. This rigorously no-nonsense yet strangely whimsical (apparently these qualities aren’t mutually exclusive after all) French singer embodies all the much-ballyhooed qualities of a true Parisian artiste. She’s got an unabashed sophistication in manners of dress and comportment, an ability to look completely chic sans makeup, shampoo and a hairbrush and a fairy-like quality with sexual and even vaguely menacing undertones all without the bullshit, snobbery and a penchant for Gaulouise ciggies.

Hailed as a “sensually gifted songbird,” ElodieO churns out electro-pop that actually lives up to its name–there is some living, crackling quality to her music that her breathy intonations belie. And yes, tunes like “Stubborn” do in fact make you want to abandon your espresso and croissant for a moment to do a little spontaneous–and hopefully elegantly executed–French jig.

The truly grand thing about ElodieO is her grasp on reality, an atypical situation in the indie music world. Her clear-eyed ability to navigate the choppy waters between form and function as a musician is unparalleled. Go, Captain ElodieO, go.

Below, check out her almost disturbingly lucid grasp of what it takes to be a successful artist in the new millennium (she should really pen a “How to Not Sell Your Soul While Still Managing to Sell Records for Dummies” book, no?)

Here we are again with our special helmets strapped under our chins and our fancy silver space suits. Ready to zing back through time into UI’s archives to see what ancient creaking box of treats lies in wait for our delectation? Today we’re sampling the Lelia Broussard, Southern Belle by way of Philly, who regularly graces NYC with her presence and lilting, soulful voice.

And quite the spicy concoction of flavor-flave our friend Lelia turns out to be.

She belts out soul and jazz but isn’t afraid to throw in a little pop and–gasp–hip hop.  Somehow this potentially hot and juicy mess ends up being a melancholic meditation; a mature assimilation of styles that’s both soothing and jarring at the same time. Lelia doesn’t exactly look the part of a postmod-lounge lizard, though. She is the picture of corn-fed innocence: one cute blond pile of puppy-dog eyes, perfectly frayed jeans and sweet girly tanktops she acquired at Gap sales circa 1998 and farm-girl “aw, shucks” charm framed in her mom’s Talbots castoffs.

But take another look at Strawberry Shortcake: Methinks she’s harboring an inner black-clad, whisky-swilling, heart-breaking, moody, slip-dress wearin’ vixen with whom you’d cross swords only at great personal peril. (It’s always the innocent looking ones you have to watch out for–in a good way).

Like many of the complicated “creative geniuses” influenced by everyone from Al Green to Harry Conick Junior, (think Aretha Franklin, Babs, Liza), she’s a lady, she’s a dame, she’s a walking contradiction–just check out her bitchfest about Uncle Junior and Co., below. (One would think miss thing would be rather laid-back on the guido/B&T tip, but bitch isn’t holding punches, no matter what NYCers think of the residents of Philly–our, ahem, sixth borough.

Let us gaze now into our custom Flashion Forward crystal ball and coquettishly zig and zag about the closets of UI’s fave new interviewees to examine the physical and psychological baggage they pack their shizzle in. Join me, won’t you? Today we’re invading Aimee Allen’s boudoir.

First things first: kick ass music aside, I absolutely love it when a lady–who could have become yet another corny helmet-hair talking head (oky, babbling incoherently talking head) on a horrifyingly craptastic TVGuide Channel show–decides to take the rougher, more shoddily paved (and paid) road to notoriety. Aka, indie rock.

When Aimee isn’t blowing up former beaus, disappointing friends or dispersing tragic life lessons with carefully aimed B52 bomb-worthy lyrics, she finds the time to churn out collections of “mostly acoustic tracks that sound tailor made for contemplation in the sunshine or sitting by a campfire.” But she hasn’t gone totally soft on us. In her latest effort, A Little Happiness, she still manages to issue forth some welcome sturm und drang, this time with a more “reflective” take on “less happy themes come up like heartbreak and organized religion.”

With all of Angelina Jolie’s seductive, tattooed, introspective charm, but sans the over-puffed peckers and almost tangibly sky-high and stomach-churning degree of self-regard, Aimee embodies the girl-crush inducing style of your coolest gal pals: whimsical, self confident, slightly zany, always fun.

And like the best of the BFFs, she’s not afraid to pass on a few life lessons without sounding like your mom with a roiling case of PMS. See her sage advice below regarding the sometimes surprising factoid that alcohol + talent + a microphone + an audience does not in fact = brilliant insights that your fanbase will want to go home and worshipfully contemplate.