Thanks to you, KEXP has hit another milestone! This past weekend, we added one more thing to be thankful for as we surpassed half a billion views on our YouTube channel! Back when we first brought video cameras into our live room, nearly ten years ago, we couldn't have imagined the impact KEXP vide…
If the Internet age is defined by one thing, it's probably disposability: the temporal state of everything we define ourselves by. We live in a world that is exponentially unsatisfied with singularity and smallness. Our good intentions for globalization and interconnectedness have gone by the waysi…
Opening this year’s live broadcast from Kex Hostel at Iceland Airwaves Music Festival is Icelandic experimental electro-pop band East of My Youth. Formed just last year, East of My Youth created a lot of buzz with their first single “Lemonstars” at the end of last summer, and have since been on a s…
For longtime followers of the band, it's a little strange that Modest Mouse has now spent more time as a big-name ticket than a scrappy indie rock band from Issaquah, but in retrospect, the band's current status goes along with Modest Mouse's singular trajectory. Although many would label them with…
Truly, we can't do without you, Dan Snaith. With a discography 15 years deep and only getting sweeter with time, any chance to see Snaith in any venue under any of his monikers is an incredible blessing. In fact, I bet he could have sold just as many tickets throwing a DJ set as Daphni or even just…
Warhol would've been proud. Although the wigged genius fostered relative grumps like the Velvet Underground as his house band, his own art was often considered just this side, if not over the line, of parody. Warhol was both revered and despised for presenting such common items as soup cans or doll…
Just as their name is a consonant away from that of an iconic British candy, Palma Violets's sound is just shades removed from the late 70's UK punk bands like The Clash and those who followed years later like The Libertines and Arctic Monkeys. The young rock quartet has already caused a scene in t…
"You got your peanut butter on my chocolate?" No, we got your chocolate on Thurston Moore! Or maybe it was the other way around! Either way, a simple chocolate bar wrapper was the inspiration for a brand new song, written on the spot, by Thurston and his new project Chelsea Light Moving. No doubt …
Since its formation in 2008, Bleeding Rainbow has evolved into the kick-ass psychedelic rock band that you will have the pleasure to jamming to today. Although every young band goes through some growing pains, most don't have to deal with cease-and-desist letters over their chosen name. Philadelphi…
As the sun began to set on The Gorge Amphitheater, The Head and the Heart played a memorable set at Day 1 of Sasquatch Music Festival, representing Seattle in the Eastern Washington Sasquatch setting. Despite Josiah Johnson still being absent from the band, the band still demonstrated their ability…
Holy Fuck! Noise upon noise, wires upon wires, dance beats upon dance beats - and a dinner knife traversing a slide guitar? Yep, that's how the unconventional Canadian electronica gang Holy Fuck rolls when performing songs off their new album, Congrats, which magnifies their noise-enthusiast, gear-…
Seattle's Joe Martinez brings old-school skills into a contemporary world every time he gets behind his beloved turntables as Scratchmaster Joe to unleash his wildly unpredictable sets. The renowned turntablist has competed in DJ battles all over the world, and his workmanlike philosophy towards DJ…
This past week, L.A. rapper Kendrick Lamar unleashed his latest, untitled unmastered, seemingly out of nowhere. The album consists of eight previously unreleased outtakes from his To Pimp A Butterfly recording sessions, which KEXP Music Director Don Yates notes "holds together remarkably well, comb…
It's hard to lament The Strokes hiatus when their guitarist Albert Hammond, Jr. keeps putting out such great solo releases. On his third full-length, Momentary Masters, he delves into an unintentional new wave inspiration ("I don't really know how to put it into categories," he tells DJ Troy Nelson…
Danish psych-rock band Mew returned to the KEXP studios in support of their first album in six years, + - (pronounced "plus minus"). It ended up being quite an appropriate title. Plus: the return of founding bassist Johan Wohlert, who left the band in 2006 before the birth of his first child. Minus…
Next on the live video broadcast from Kex Hostel at Iceland Airwaves Music Festival was popular Icelandic rap group Úlfur Úlfur. Comprised of rappers Arnar Freyr and Helgi Sæmundur with a rotating group of musicians, they combine hard rock, post rock, melodic choruses and hard rap. They debuted wit…
