We've got new releases from a few music veterans this week. British rock legends The Rolling Stones return with their first album in 11 years. KEXP Music Director Don Yates calls it, "a shockingly potent set of Chicago blues. The band sounds raw and vital, and Mick Jagger tears into the set list of…
It's a great week for local music. The latest from Olympia-via-Seattle artist Briana Marela is what KEXP Music Director Don Yates calls, "her strongest set to date of adventurous electro-pop. Co-produced by Juan Pieczanski and Ryan Heyner of Small Black, the album features a brighter, more dynamic …
"This is the most beautiful festival we've ever played," beamed Bully's Alicia Bognanno. "I mean, I've still got sand in my pedalboard from Hangout, which was cool, but nothing like this." Bognanno's sentiment about playing while facing the Columbia River Gorge is one that's often repeated througho…
Luminescent electronic lady Julianna Barwick shares her new album, Will, next Friday, May 6th via Dead Oceans, but you can stream it now in its entirety via NPR Music. The latest from this Brooklyn-based songstress features guest appearances from Thomas Arsenault (Mas Ysa), Dutch cellist Maarten V…
Hot on the heels of the Capitol Hill Block Party announce, the Timber! Outdoor Music Festival share their initial lineup for their 2015 event, and it sounds like it's gonna be fun times in the forest this summer! This July 16th through 18th, head out to the rural splendor of Carnation, Washington f…
As major labels continue to exist behind the times, artists and labels with little capital and lesser reputations are producing some of the most innovative, interesting, and inspiring music. Whether it’s creating a new niche in digital technology or looking to once obsolete formats, Agitated Atmosp…
Christopher Owens makes for one of the most interesting characters on the indie scene. His band former band, Girls, garnered mass critical acclaim in the late aughts, with a bright, unique rock sound and Owens' brilliant albeit dark assessment of the modern context of youth and progression in the c…
To call Mammút's live act "emotive" is a huge understatement. Frontwoman Kata Mogensen seems to enter a completely different state onstage, even covering herself in fake blood or painting her face ominously, while the rest of the band unleashes a colossal sound. We've been fortunate to watch the yo…
American influences from John Coltrane to Bob Dylan are clear in U.K. singer-songwriter Pete Molinari's acoustic bluesy-folk. Scratch the surface of his four albums and you'll find a broad range of sounds in the low-key Brit's music. Molinari grew up in an Egyptian, Maltese and Italian family, whic…
It took losing her voice for Wye Oak to rediscover theirs. On the heels of their successful previous album, Civilian, the Baltimore duo were playing arenas, opening for acts like The National and The Decemberists. And then, sadly, frontwoman Jenn Wasner developed vocal-cord nodules, and under docto…
tUnE-yArDs — even the typography of the name seems to pop off the page like the ecstatic rhythms of the band's new album. For Nikki Nack, Merrill Garbus has traveled far, sonically and literally, expanding upon the conceit of her self-recorded debut and turning tUnE-yArDs into a communal arts tribe…
British band Cheatahs sped over to the Cutting Room Studios in NYC, all the way from London, to play a raw live set just for KEXP. Well, not exactly. Last month, the UK group, consisting of Dean Reid, James Wignall, Marc Raue, and Nathan Hewitt, made a quick 7-city jaunt in the U.S. to introduce th…
THUMPERS — not only is the name itself indicative of their sound, but the preferred spelling is all in caps. "Every time people actually do it, I feel a bit bad", confessed John Hamson Jr., one of the band's two founders, in a recent interview with KEXP. But Hamson and his cohort Marcus Pepperell m…
"We're not one-dimensional human beings, so why should our music be?" asked Honus Honus, the mastermind behind Philadelphia band Man Man. Their names may be repetitive (true to theme, the drummer goes by "Pow Pow"), but this experimental group is anything but, always striving to evolve their quirky…
Easily one of the most popular bands to perform during our broadcast from the Bumbershoot Music Lounge, The Joy Formidable have blown up since the first time they played for KEXP back in 2010. Their second and most recent album, Wolf's Law, amps up their shoegazery rock sound to epic proportions, y…
This month, UK electronic act Factory Floor finally release a proper full-length record. This is the London band that started almost eight years ago, bouncing around styles to dial into the pure genius that they’ve come up with now. They released mini album Talking On Cliffs in 2009 and dropped the…
There's no denying Surfer Blood's love for 90's indie rock. Fragments of Pavement, Pixies and Weezer are undeniable elements in their sound, but the band made a space for themselves on their 2010 debut, Astro Coast, by adding breezy surf melodies blown off the beaches of their Florida home. Since t…
Thursday's weather forecast put Austin, TX, at a high of 80 degrees Fahrenheit, but you wouldn't know it listening to the Copenhagen-via-Los Angeles trio Gliss' shimmering cool. Supplanted by multi-instrumentalist Martin Klingman and guitarist David Reiss' brooding soundscapes, vocalist Victoria Ce…
