It's scary how many great albums are coming out on this Halloween week! Highlights include the fourth album from Scottish band The Twilight Sad. KEXP Music Director Don Yates says the band, "brings back the loud, shoegazerish guitars that were mostly absent from their last release (2012’s No One Can Ever Know), while still carrying forward with that album’s icy synths and often-mechanical rhythms on sharply crafted songs blending elements of brooding post-punk and anthemic, shoegazer-tinged rock with mournful vocals, bleak lyrics and haunting folk-tinged melodies."
Other highlights include the debut from Los Angeles band Francisco The Man (no relation to Portugal) whose album is "a promising blend of shoegazer psych-rock, wistful dream-pop, motorik prog and anthemic indie-rock, with atmospheric guitars, propulsive rhythms and catchy pop hooks." Philly band Restorations returns with "a strong set of brooding, anthemic indie-rock a la The National and Constantines, with a dynamic sound featuring loud, buzzing guitars and swelling keyboards accompanying Jon Loudon’s hoarse vocals and anxiety-fueled lyrics." And Portland band The Shivas share "another fun, ‘60s-inspired blend of surf, garage-punk, girl-group pop, psych-rock and other styles, featuring a lo-fi sound with jangly guitars, energetic rhythms and bubbly pop hooks."
Everyone's favorite weirdos, The Flaming Lips, "deconstruct the Beatles’ landmark 1967 album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band with help from a wide variety of guests ranging from My Morning Jacket and Phantogram to Miley Cyrus and Tool’s Maynard Keenan. Musically, the album isn’t far-removed from latter-day Lips, with a dense, maximalist sound of fuzzy psychedelic textures, abundant electronics, whimsical sounds and blasts of noise." Brooklyn band Haerts release their long-awaited debut, " a slick set of moody, ‘80s-steeped electro-pop, featuring ultra-polished production, shimmering synths, sleek guitars, propulsive rhythms, aching vocals, lovelorn lyrics and melancholy melodies."
Also, in anticipation for Iceland Airwaves, two Icelandic bands have released new albums today: Rökkurró, who we recorded last year at Kex Hostel, and Kiasmos, a new project featuring composer Ólafur Arnalds and Janus Rasmussen of Bloodgroup, and who will be live on KEXP on Wednesday, November 5th, at 6AM PST. Find out more about our Iceland Airwaves broadcast here.
November spawned a lot of good releases this week, including the debut release from Les Sins, a side project of Toro Y Moi’s Chaz Bundick. KEXP's Music Director Don Yates notes the album "is a smartly constructed blend of house, techno and hip hop beats with warm synths and repeated vocal hooks."
This week's highlights include Master Mix: Red Hot + Arthur Russell, the latest volume in the Red Hot series to benefit AIDS awareness. KEXP's Music Director Don Yates describes the 2-CD collection release as "an impressive 2-CD tribute to influential composer/musician Arthur Russell, whose eclecti…
