Tonight at the Independent on Divisadero, local guitar pop rising stars Social Studies will debut their new album Developer for an adoring local crowd in advance of the record's anticipated release next week. The Sam Chase and Jon Gunton open.

For the locals who clung to their digital copies of the band's 2010 debut Wind Up Wooden Heart, Social Studies is now a guitars-and-keys five-piece, with frontlady Natalia Rogovin's warm and sharp vocals float over dark and dreamy pop songs like November fog over Cole Valley. (Full disclosure: Rogovin once served me coffee at a Divisadero coffeeshop.) Appropriately enough, the new record Developer is tied to San Francisco with moments like "Western Addition" and the title track's disembodied apology to "pioneers with Spanish names."

With accolades coming from Vice Magazine, who called the band "like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs only sober," it won't be long before Social Studies isn't our little neighborhood secret anymore.

The Sam Chase and Jon Gunton provide support tonight, and if you're in the neighborhood early, we heard a rumor there would be free drinks across the street.

Social Studies, The Sam Chase, Jon Gunton
The Independent [Tickets]
628 Divisadero at Hayes
Doors: 8:30pm
$13-15