Every year, the holiday season seems to inspire some of our favorite bands to write new music. KEXP has rounded up some of our favorites below. Need even more songs for rockin' around your Christmas tree? Be sure to check out previous round-ups for 2015 and 2014. Happy holidays from everyone at KEX…
As you'd expect after 20 years of performing together, Atmosphere bring a boatload of topics to their new LP, Fishing Blues. The personal and political wind throughout the hip hop duo's emotive songs, which flow between Slug's sharp rapping and Ant's soulful production. Recently, the Minneapolis v…
A band is like a marriage; the divorce rate for groups started two decades ago is high. Add in more members, each with significant side projects, and the odds of a split only climb higher. By all estimates then, The New Pornographers, formed twenty years ago in Vancouver, B.C., by players from a ha…
Ms. Sharon Jones! is a new documentary that follows Sharon Jones (and her Dap-Kings) through 2013, the year she and the band released their amazing Give the People What They Want and when she was diagnosed with cancer. The film was directed by two-time Oscar winner Barbara Kopple and will premiere…
The Decemberists waste no time. Earlier this year they released the LP What a Terrible World, What a Beautiful World and now they're back at it. Today they've announced plans to release a 5-track EP of songs that didn't make the album, called Florasongs, on October 9. Listen to the album's opening…
Earlier this year, Swedish sister duo First Aid Kit released their third album, Stay Gold, and the siblings do just that in the video for the title track, streaming below. In the clip, Klara and Johanna Söderberg wander dreamily around the island of Gotland. Check it out, and tune in on Saturday, …
Sadly, we lost Chicago footwork pioneer DJ Rashad earlier this year, but before he passed, he and his Teklife crew did this remix of the Sleigh Bells track "Young Legends," off their most recent release, Bitter Rivals. Check it out below. [Stereogum]
Dance label LuckyMe is releasing a new, free song a every day until Christmas as a part of their own amazing advent calendar. Today's offering (Day 17) is "Terra Star" from Scottish producer Rustie. It's a more intense version of his song "City Star" that he released last year. Download it here, a…
A few days after releasing their excellent debut album Amok, Atoms For Peace have revealed the first live dates behind their new LP. In addition to the DJ sets Thom York and Nigel Godrich announced for last week, the whole band has been confirmed for three European festivals in mid-July. According …
I honestly don't know how I do it. A few times a year, I collect a whole bunch of these album covers - enough to last me for months - and then at some point I grab one and write about it. And yet I often end up with some extraordinary timely coincidences. For instance, did you know that KEXP/KCMU f…
It's hard to believe it's been four years since Adam Yauch, aka MCA of the Beastie Boys, passed away from cancer. SoCal punks FIDLAR posted a tribute today online, a loving rendition of the single "Sabotage" from the 1994 Beasties album Ill Communication. Listen below. FIDLAR have long cited the g…
After 14 years together, San Fransisco band Thee Oh Sees have announced an "indefinite hiatus." They've been consistently turning out loads of fresh material over the last five years, but things recently got hectic when frontman John Dwyer decided to move from San Fan to Los Angeles. Their manager…
Because being the frontman for Radiohead and Atoms for Peace still leaves a little bit of free time in his schedule, Thom Yorke has been working on some soundtracks across the past year. However, unlike his film-scoring bandmate Jonny Greenwood, Thom has been making soundtracks for fashion montages…
Earlier this week, UK trio alt-J released the single "3WW" as a video game; today, we get an actual video. Directed by Young Replicant (aka L.A.-based artist Alex Takacs), the band describe it as "a beautifully shot story of love and loss in Mexico." The new album Relaxer is out June 2nd via Canva…
Get ready, Seattle. Radiohead play a sold out show next door to the station at Key Arena this Saturday. And last night, at Kansas City, MO’s Sprint Center, they dug out the track "Where I End and You Begin" for the first time in nine years. Watch fan shot footage of them performing the Hail to the…
"Bigger, better, faster, stronger" – that's what we said of Voices, this year's release by Phantogram. The Saratoga Springs, NY duo certainly upped the ante with their anticipated second album, making the nearly five years between well worth the wait. As always, Josh Carter's dark dance hooks and S…
Australian psych band King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard set a lofty goal at the beginning of the year to release five albums this year and by George, they just may do it. So far they've released three: Flying Microtonal Banana, Murder of the Universe, and Sketches of Brunswick East. Today they'…
At long last, this week, LA noise rock act HEALTH drop their third proper LP. It's a record I've been wanting to hear for almost six years i.e. as soon as their second, Get Color, left heavy rotation in the fall of 2009 after weeks and weeks of repeat listens. But HEALTH haven't left us completely …
Seven years after their last record, Canadian band Wolf Parade are back with a new full-length record. Called Cry Cry Cry, the album follows 2010's Expo 86 and last year's EP entitled EP 4. They've shared with us the first single off the album, "Valley Boy." The band is made up of Spencer Krug (Moo…
