Inside the latest Good Lovelies album, Let the Rain Fall, group members Caroline Brooks, Sue Passmore and Kerri Ough are pictured in a rowboat, wearing yellow slickers and matching floppy hats, with huge smiles on their faces.

There's no collective thought bubble above them, but what's on their minds seems pretty clear: That's right, we’re all in the same boat — ha ha. And more than five years into the good-natured, tight-knit Canadian folk band's career, there’s no indication that these band mates/good friends have any plans to jump ship.

Inside the latest Good Lovelies album, Let the Rain Fall, group members Caroline Brooks, Sue Passmore and Kerri Ough are pictured in a rowboat, wearing yellow slickers and matching floppy hats, with huge smiles on their faces.

If you were born anywhere between 1955 and 1960, and consequently were just a tad too young to teethe your ears upon Pet Sounds or Revolver, like me you tuned into your local NBC-TV affiliate on the evening of Sept. 12, 1966, sat transfixed for the next 30 minutes, and then told yourself, "Hey! So THAT'S what a rock 'n' roll band really lives, looks, sounds and acts like!" Eating communal Rice Krispies at the break of noon, practicing in front of the patio window every day instead of going to school or work, yet always making sure to keep too busy singing to put anybody (under the age of 25) down.

But even more importantly — and, as it turns out, much more slyly and cleverly — what Peter Tork, Davy Jones, Micky Dolenz and Mike Nesmith of The Monkees really did during their 58 half-hours on NBC was, for the very first time, bring the counter-culture boldly into the North American entertainment mainstream.

Really.

Originally a solo project for singer/songwriter/guitarist Tony Dekker, Great Lake Swimmers eventually morphed into a full-fledged band. And while the Toronto group's lineup has changed over the course of its recording career, what has stayed the same is the commitment by Dekker and company to playing acoustic instruments.

The recently released "Easy Come Easy Go," which can be found on the fifth Great Lake Swimmers album, Near Wild Everywhere (due April 3), follows a similar path. That ought to please NBC news anchor, music blogger and GLS fan Brian Williams, but how much appeal is there for those unfamiliar with the folk-flavored band?

"Spontaneity and danger" — that's what attracts singer/songwriter Liam Finn to doing a club residency.

Finn should be able to satisfy that performance jones during Murmation, his Monday-night residency throughout January at the Rock Shop in Brooklyn, N.Y. His basic strategy will be to mix a casual attitude and anything-goes approach with craft and creativity. That said, it's quite possible he'll perform material from his acclaimed Yep Roc solo albums I'll Be Lightning and FOMO, a few songs by his former band Betchadupa, a choice cover or two and maybe something brand new — all in the same night.

Finn checked in a few days prior to his first scheduled Rock Shop show to talk about Murmation, as well as his plans for a follow-up to FOMO and more.

Is Brooklyn, N.Y., the unofficial indie-rock capital of America? It sure appears that way, with scores of musicians relocating there and/or bands coming together in the hipster borough on a regular basis.

One of the more recent groups to emerge from Brooklyn is the female/male foursome Starlight Girls (the name coming from the 1980s animated TV series Jem). Guitarist Shaw Walters and drummer/singer Karys Rhea attended the same grade school and high school in California's Marin County and became friends years later when they reconnected in New York. About a year ago, they teamed up with singer/songwriter/keyboardist Christina B., who had been working on a solo project, to form Starlight Girls, then added a bassist from Seattle known as Tyson a few months ago to round out the current lineup of the garage-rock band.

While there never seems to have been any let-up whatsoever over the past four decades bringing out "new" Jimi Hendrix product, two 2011 releases of vintage live material prove the exception to the rule:

Almost getting arrested for a raucous, early morning snowball fight in New York City. Fearing a premature death while staying at a New Jersey motel. Driving for miles in the midwest, delirious from a gig and oblivious to a dragging muffler. Allowing a rhythmically challenged drunk woman to guest on percussion.

It certainly wasn't a dull year for Echogram (above), The Michael J. Epstein Memorial Library, i am Love and Nathan Mathes, who are among the independent bands and musicians offering their memories (music-related and otherwise) of 2011, plus predictions for 2012.

1. Middle Brother — Middle Brother (Partisan).
The principals aren't famous enough for this project to be called a supergroup, but the frontmen from Dawes, Deer Tick and The Delta Spirit turn in an inspired effort for a side project, and for the genre of indie folk there's a suprisingly loose vibe (see their cover of The Replacements' rarity "Portland").

1. Nicole Atkins — Mondo Amore (Razor & Tie).
Atkins and her backing band, The Black Sea, turn in an album that has a little bit of everything. Strong songwriting, tight rhythm section and catchy choruses make this her most complete effort to date.

1. Paul Simon — So Beautiful or So What (Hear Music).
Simon’s first album in five years is lyrically impressive and a delicious concoction of blues, gospel and bluegrass.

Fifteen minutes — that's all the time it took for Johnny Winter to select the songs for his first studio album in seven years, according to producer/guitarist Paul Nelson.

"Once I told him the concept," Nelson explains, "that I wanted him to do a roots album, it was like, 'Johnny, name an artist.' 'Chuck Berry.' 'OK, what influenced you?' 'Maybellene.' It was like that."

The end result is the aptly named Roots (Megaforce Records). The 11-track album not only highlights Winter's personal influences, but it also provides a fresh take on early blues and rock 'n' roll.

"They were just some of my favorites," says the soft-spoken Winter from a tour stop in Germany. "There were a lot more, though. But these were all favorite songs of mine when I first started playing guitar."

Kurt Reil of The Grip Weeds knows this much: No matter how one chooses to classify his New Jersey band's sound — "power-pop, psychedelic rock, whatever you want to call it" — there isn't a lot of Christmas music that falls into the same category.

So with the goal of filling that void, Reil and company recorded the recently released Under the Influence of Christmas. And just like wrapping presents properly or decorating the tree, putting the album together was not done in a hurry.

As the opening credits of this grand new MVD Visual DVD state, "On September 3, 2010, Iggy and the Stooges performed Raw Power live in Monticello, New York. Six fans filmed the concert and interviewed Iggy and the Stooges after the show."

Really, then! A concept so crystalline in both its simplicity and beauty — much like Iggy Pop himself. But the result is mountains above and beyond the ultimate DIY epic for Generation YouTube: What we have here is a real-time and, of course, real LOUD (thanks in no small part to the work of audio recordist Max Bisgrove) down 'n' dirty antidote to all those precious Jonathan Demme-style concert films regularly being awarded art-house praises and prizes.

Raw Power Live: In the Hands of the Fans is, in fact, with all apologies to The TAMI Show, the best on-screen rendering of rock 'n' roll I have ever seen.

They've made the most of their second act together.

Now the members of the New Jersey-bred garage band The Doughboys have chronicled their entire history in Rock N’ Raw, a documentary/concert film that’s scheduled to be screened Dec. 3 in Manhattan.

Drummer Richard X. Heyman recently checked in to discuss the reasons for making Rock N' Raw and more.