Highlights this week include the latest from Swedish singer/songwriter Jens Lekman. KEXP Music Director Don Yates calls Lekman's fourth LP, "a smartly crafted set of buoyant orchestral dance-pop inflected with disco, calypso, samba and other styles, combining bouncy dance beats and a variety of ins…
Metric frontwoman and Broken Social Scene collaborator Emily Haines is releasing the first Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton album in over a decade on September 15 via Last Gang/eOne. Entitled Choir of the Mind, it follows 2006's Knives Don't Have Your Back, which reached number 28 on the Canadi…
Singer-songwriter Jenny Mae Leffel passed away over the weekend at the age of 49, from "complications due to alcoholism." The Columbus, Ohio-based artist started out in the band Vibralux before branching out for a solo career as "Jenny Mae." She released two albums -- her now tragically-titled 19…
This week, French band Phoenix rises with their sixth album to date, KEXP Music Director Don Yates loves Ti Amo enough to call it "another sharply crafted set of buoyant pop-rock with a warm, streamlined sound featuring fizzy synths, glistening guitars, bouncy beats and sunny pop hooks". Brooklyn b…
You read that right. We're just as surprised to learn of his passing as you are. Chris Cornell, who was found dead in his Detroit hotel room late last night, has been a Seattle institution for decades, having formed Soundgarden in 1984 and predating in popularity nearly all of the so-called "grunge…
It's a good week for comebacks. UK band Slowdive return with their first new album in 22 years. KEXP Music Director Don Yates calls it "a strong return-to-form of shoegazerish dream-pop with swirling, reverbed guitars, ethereal vocals, hazy harmonies and blissed-out melodies." It's been 17 years si…
LA-via-San Francisco band Thee Oh Sees return with their 11th album, a release KEXP Music Director Don Yates calls, "a more jam-oriented take on the band's adventurous blend of raw garage-rock, trippy psych-rock and motorik prog." Veteran Minneapolis duo Atmosphere release "a potent set of emotive …
I feel like it's been a while since we featured some album-cover reviews with a solid dose of healthy disagreement and debate. And it may be a while yet, because honestly, while there was plenty of disagreement at KCMU circa 1990 around the Manchester band Inspiral Carpets' LP Life, it wasn't parti…
Daughter - the word alone inspires feelings of love, protection, fostering, sharing and hope. For KEXP listeners and viewers, there's even a stronger bond, as the band Daughter have become, since their first appearance on our airwaves in 2012, one of the most endearing bands to ever perform live in…
Collectors of kitsch and arcane Americana in their private lives, Cincinnati's Chuck Cleaver and Lisa Walker are also accumulators of high praise with their band, Wussy. Over the past 15 years, from when they first formed as a duo, the now five-piece has built a loyal fanbase and gathered a wealth …
Live in the KEXP studio, Lower Dens presents us with a sound that we didn't know we've been waiting for, half-nostalgic, half refreshing. Formed in Baltimore in 2010, Lower Dens is comprised of Jana Hunter, Geoff Graham, Nate Nelson, and Walker Trent. Their audacious third album, Escape From Evil, …
Filmed in the 1970s, premiered in select theaters in 1982, and now recut and travelling the festival circuit in 2015, Human Highway is widely regarded as one of the strangest, head-scratching films ever created. And now it's come to the Pacific Northwest - this weekend, September 4th through 6th, N…
A quick look at the Restorations tour schedule might have your eyes glazing over. After releasing their third studio album (LP3) in only four years at the end of 2014, the Philly indie-rockers have spent most of 2015 tirelessly touring across the U.S., the U.K., and even Jamaica. Or as singer/guita…
You know, it's bad enough when there's a band that I'm vaguely familiar with, that I know I should really check out, but have never quite gotten around to (we see a lot of those in this column). But when there's a band that I totally think "yeah, I know that band! I like them," only to realize that…
It's uncanny that yesterday just happened to be Australia Day, and the highlights of this week's new releases are dominated by the down under! Merge Records release the latest from Melbourne pop quartet Twerps, which KEXP Music Director Don Yates notes is, "a masterful album of jangly indie-pop rem…
It's another jam-packed week of new releases! Highlights include the latest from London-based artist Adam Bainbridge (aka Kindness). KEXP Music Director Don Yates notes the relase "finds him toning down the disco influences of his promising debut album in favor of an often-gorgeous set of ‘80s R&am…
KEXP knows all about the power of a Colin Meloy cameo in your video, and today, Bob Mould taps into the Decemberists' talent with his new video for the track "I Don’t Know You Anymore." Filmed in Portland by director Alicia J. Rose, the clip shows Mould moving into the modern age (#IDKYA). Mould's…
"This is a really beautiful city", Keith Morris remarked halfway his El Corazon set with super punk supergroup OFF!. He was talking to the punk kid who had fought his way to the very front of the crowd, sweating profusely through the leather jacket he dared not remove in the pit. "You don't know th…
2014 is off to a great start for new music! Highlights include the long-awaited sophomore release from LA band Warpaint. KEXP Music Director, Don Yates, declares it a "more subtle and minimalist take on the band’s brooding dream-pop, featuring a dark, atmospheric sound with swirling guitars and key…
