This week KEXP unveils its new “Music Matters” T-shirt, designed by New York native Jeff Glendenning, Assistant Professor of Communications Design at Syracuse University and former Art Director for The New York Times Magazine (fancy!). “I was inspired to create something listeners would want to wea…
“One of my dreams is about to come true,” DJ Derek Mazzone said, introducing the psychedelic Brazilian rock band Os Mutantes before their performance live on KEXP's Wo'Pop. The band, part of the Tropicália artistic movement that bridged popular culture with the avant-garde in the 1960s in Brazil, c…
Essaie Pas is Marie Davidson and Pierre Guerineau, a married singer and engineer from Montreal, who have worked as individual artists as well as making three prior Essaie Pas records before this one. Demain marks a special milestone for them as their first for DFA, a label which continues to give h…
If volume is your only musical qualifier, then there is probably only one band on your best of 2013 list. San Francisco metal duo Deafheaven dropped Sunbather last month, a seven track sonic masterpiece that relentlessly pulls at your heartstrings and threatens hearing damage for 60 minutes. The al…
Named after a race of diminutive creatures in Magic: The Gathering, Kithkin's energetic, uplifting indie rock is the type of music that gets the cops called over to house shows (in the best way possible). Although the band's aesthetic is clearly a fantastical one - the self-described "Cascadian you…
We opened this year’s broadcast live from Kex Hostel at Iceland Airwaves Music Festival with a newer Icelandic band, Between Mountains. Hailing from the Westfjords, the promising new duo were this year’s winner of Músíktilraunir, a youth-focused battle of the bands (similar to Seattle’s Sound Off!)…
For his latest film, A Bigger Splash, director Luca Guadagnino (I Am Love) reached out to guitar-dynamo St. Vincent (a.k.a. Annie Clark) to cover The Rolling Stones 1980 single "Emotional Rescue." Listen below. Clark said in an e-newsletter, "I saw an 11 AM showing of I Am Love at the sunshine cin…
A rubber band is the perfect picture to fit Swedish electronic outfit Little Dragon. Up to this point, the band has been carving a unique sound that occupies a haunting modern space somewhere between historical influences like Massive Attack and Bjork. After singer Yukumi Nagano made an appearance …
For the past 12 year, EMP's Sound Off! battle of the bands competition has helped many young artists in the Northwest realize their dreams. Quite a few -- like The Lonely Forest, Kithkin, Dyme Def, Brite Futures, Sol, Tomten, and many others -- have gone on to reach wider acclaim and even regular r…
Last month, Charles Bradley and the Menahan Street Band stopped by our studio to deliver a special joint session for KEXP listeners. The Menahan Street Band -- featuring members from the NYC Daptone Records soul and funk world including the Budos Band, Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, and Antibalas…
Chalk it up to: You'll never see that again. Last week, Mercury Prize winners and KEXP fan-favorites Alt-J performed their headlining Seattle debut at the Crocodile, a venue whose size they've long outgrown. While previously they opened for Grouplove at the Moore (and I'd say at least half the full…
Irish songwriter Dolores O'Riordan, most famously of The Cranberries, has passed away at the age of 46. A statement from her publicist says that O'Riordan was in London for a recording session, but not further details are available at this time. O'Riordan was born and raised in Limerick, Ireland, a…
Rounding out a stunning second day of the KEXP Broadcast live from KEX Hostel at Iceland Airwaves Music festival are the incomparable Kronos Quartet. The San Francisco-based string quartet has been around for over 40 years, with a roster of rotating musicians, currently comprised of David Harringto…
