Rounding out an unbelievable first day of KEXP’s Iceland Airwaves broadcast live at Kex Hostel are garage rock legends The Sonics. Formed in Tacoma in 1960, The Sonics are widely regarded as the first garage and first punk band, and have had a wide-reaching influence on the course of garage, punk, …
Our girl Grimes always does the unexpected, and that's just part of the reason why we love her. Today, she has released not one, not two, but SEVEN new videos for tracks from her latest LP, Art Angels. The clips were created by Grimes, her brother, Mac Boucher, and her best friend, HANA, during a …
The recently-renamed psych garage band Oh Sees (fka Thee Oh Sees) are gearing up to release their 19th album Orc. Today they've shared their second single "Animated Violence" which is a killer track and makes the anticipation for Orc that much greater. Oh Sees are also auctioning off 14 test pressi…
Broken Social Scene are releasing their highly anticipated new album Hug of Thunder this Friday, July 7th but, luckily for us, NPR is streaming it ahead of time. Seven years after last release, Forgiveness Rock Record, the album sees all 15 original members featured on the album, including Feist, M…
Father John Misty stopped by Jimmy Fallon this weekend to promote his latest release Pure Comedy, which has been in near-constant rotation at KEXP since it was released. He played the track "Total Entertainment Forever" which also happened to be one of our Songs of the Day last week. Donning a pair…
Tuxedo is the collaborative project between Michigan-raised, Los Angeles-based singer/songwriter/producer Mayer Hawthorne and veteran Seattle-based producer Jake One. Bonding over a shared love of early 1980s boogie, disco, funk, and R&B, the pair soon connected to create modern-day jams steepe…
Influential icon Thurston Moore shares a new track today: stream the stand-alone single "Cease Fire" below. The former Sonic Youth frontman explains the inspiration for the track, "Guns are designed to kill and we, as non-violent human beings, are against the killing of any person or animal. The s…
The Suffers have earned their name: it took them about five years of running the Houston circuit before jumping overnight to national attention. Houston is one of the cities that often gets overlooked in the discussion of the American music scene, partially because neighboring New Orleans dwarfs it…
The Vera Stage's sound has been notably quiet (especially compared to the sometimes deafening main stage) all weekend, but that didn't bother Girlpool, the drumless duo of Cleo Tucker and Harmony Tividad. In fact, if anything, it probably galvanized the Los Angeles duo. Their music is emotionally a…
I was so excited about going to see Television next week at the Moore that I had this whole plan to do a post around their two first albums and had it all ready to go before I realized that I'd covered the KCMU DJs' gushing response to their classic debut, Marquee Moon a few years ago. But that's a…
Of all of the late night sets at Sasquatch 2015, none was more subtle than James Blake's. Unlike most of the nighttime sets in the Gorge, Blake's performance revealed itself gradually rather than blasting the audience over the head with lights and sound, and it was all the more effective because of…
"Let's get heavy," Other Lives frontman Jesse Tabish jokes before launching into the principle dichotomies behind the creation of their latest release, Rituals. But whether they're conflating old and new styles or humanity's primal nature and our technologically isolating modern world, the surprisi…
Elliott Smith fans, rejoice! KEXP presents the Seattle premiere of Nickolas Rossi's Elliott Smith documentary, Heaven Adores You at Northwest Film Forum, Friday, May 15, with an extended run by popular demand through May 26. Heaven Adores You follows the beloved musician's musical evolution, from p…
Tycho has seen a marvelous ascent to brilliance in the last couple years. With each album, Scott Hansen seems to find himself in a brighter sense of awareness and emersion in the beautiful, captivating world that the music of Tycho embodies. The band is now two albums deep with a fleshed out live s…
Supergroup The New Pornographers share a video for the track "Dancehall Domine," a track from their new release Brill Bruisers, out now on Matador Records. Director Scott Cudmore explains, "Sometimes I like watching the b-roll or behind the scenes or outtakes on DVDs and blu-rays...'Dancehall Domi…
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…
The lyrics "My fingers have shriveled and dropped to the dirt / and two giant talons have grown where they were" sound like a recurring nightmare, but in Chad VanGaalen's song "Monster," that's exactly what he's looking for. Ramshackler extraordinaire, DIY genius, and honestly weird CVG showcased h…
Seattle continues to prove how rich a music scene it really has. Sam Anderson, who plays in the popular Hey Marseilles, is continuing the trend of band members in well-established groups putting out solo projects that blow people’s minds. Before him just a few months ago, Benjamin Verdoes of Iska D…
It’s great to see that excellent, keenly questioning, perennially rebellious, truly inspiring, and high quality reading/viewing/listening materials keep being published and produced in this extremely DIY economy. Forged in the fires of pre-economic collapse in 2007, Oakland, CA-based PM Press is a …
This weekend, the streets will be alive with the sound of music – the Seattle way! There are a ton of terrific bands to see and hear this year at the Capitol Hill Block Party, from The Flaming Lips and Dirty Projectors to La Luz to Pickwick. Whole areas of Capitol Hill will be blocked off from traf…
