Cut Off Your Hands Essentials

New Zealand has a proud tradition of tunefully ramshackle indie rock, but Auckland's Cut Off Your Hands deliver their whimsical melodic musings with power and precision. An Antipodean answer to mid-'00s UK phenoms like Franz Ferdinand and The Futureheads, the quartet hitch fidgety, post-punky guitar lines to soaring, open-hearted hooks on “Let's Get Out of Here” and “Oh Girl”, with singer Nick Johnston flaunting a pop sensibility that falls somewhere between Robert Smith and The Smiths. But with 2011's “Hollowed Out”, their sound expanded to absorb the crystalline guitar jangle and sky-high ambition of prime Echo & The Bunnymen.