April Smith and The Great Picture Show

What do you call a female Brooklyn songwriter with a smarmy, witty lyrical edge, a band that plays as if they'd just stepped out of the Brill Building, and a voice that's got the squeaky charm of Gwen Stefani's? Howabout: the next Lily Allen. “I was the surprise,” says April Smith, the bonus baby her parents won late and whose moxie and dash astounded everyone she met. Today, she remains a welcome bolt: a loose-lipped, cocked-hip gal whose music and mien could buoy the Titanic.