It’s no easy feat to get an L.A. crowd to sing along and dance with an indie, folksy singer-songwriter. Unless you’re Thomas Dybdahl. The Norwegian singer performed at The Satellite in Los Angeles on Saturday night, for the last stop on his North American tour. more ›

Norway's dance club mastermind Annie emerged on the music scene in 1999, with a Madonna-sampling bit of pop brilliance called "Greatest Hit" that created considerable underground buzz, which she capitalized on by spending... the next 5 years... recording her debut album. Despite the ominous overtones that usually accompany such obsessive tinkering, that record, , was brilliant from start to finish, chock full of songs spanning various dance styles that felt shockingly new and warmly nostalgic at the same time. It earned her the slavish devotion of fans of perfectly crafted pop dance music, widespread critical acclaim, and several minor hits including the bittersweet "Heartbeat", and her amazing ass-shaking ode to the playgirl lifestyle, "Chewing Gum". more ›

On Monday night, while Norwegian rocker Ida Maria (MySpace) wowed the Spaceland (MySpace) crowd, Santa Barbara's Katy Perry (MySpace) returned to her singer-songwriter roots by headlining a sold out show at the Hotel Cafe (MySpace) in Hollywood, with support from last-minute openers Holly Conlan (MySpace) and Meiko (MySpace). LA-Underground observed that, "If [Perry] returned to the 50-capacity Genghis Cohen Cantina or Highland Grounds where she really started now that would be something (especially since Highland Grounds/The Dive closed last year)." But to say that this intimate show wasn't highly anticipated would be wildly inaccurate, as fans flew in from as far away as Vancouver, offering as much as $200 for a pair of tickets, and upwards of 15 paparazzi camped outside at the front and rear entrances for the duration of the evening. more ›