Best-known as a multi-instrumentalist and co-lead singer in Durand Jones & The Indications, Aaron Frazer broke out on his own earlier this year with his debut solo album, Introducing…
On this episode, find out more about No-No Boy's journey from professor to rock star before diving into a stirring set of songs off his sophomore album, 1975.
Today's Song of the Day, as chosen by Cheryl Waters, host of The Midday Show on KEXP, is "Living Proof" by The War On Drugs, from the 2021 album I Don’t Live Here Anymore on Atlantic.
José González speaks with Larry Mizell Jr. about how his two children influenced him to inject more playfulness and creativity into his tunes, as well as write songs in his mother tongue of Spanish for the first time.
Seattle’s Da Qween is probably best described by KEXP’s own Martin Douglas as “simply is what they are. A very good rapper, a queer-identifying person, too talented and too stubborn to allow straight people to view them as a gimmick, and as the title of their 2019 album suggests, a renaissance bitc…
The Halluci Nation's Tim "2oolman" Hill and Ehren "Bear Witness" Thomas make what is often labelled as “powwow-step,” blending hip hop, reggae, moombahton, and dubstep with elements of First Nations music.
"Seriously? Another song?" Kristin Hersh, frontwoman for Throwing Muses, teased KEXP's DJ El Toro (a.k.a. Kurt Reighley) in mock-exasperation during their in-studio session, "We are so old, Kurt -- why are you doing this?" The veteran alt-rock legends are doing it for their latest release, Purgator…
Besides deliberate misspellings and prodigious capitalization in band names, we hope that one of the trends people will note about the music of 2013 is the ascendency of female voiced indie pop. CHVRCHES, HAERTS, HAIM (okay, a few bands fall into both categories!) as well as London Grammar, Lorde, …
You'd be mistaken to think that the artists at Pickathon are all a bunch of wizened fingerpickers. One of the highlights of the Portland-area festival's carefully curated lineup is the pairing of musicians new and old. On stage, you'll hear veteran songwriters with more stories to tell than songs t…
The career of Midnight Faces frontman Matthew Doty feels like scrolling through the KEXP Blog. He began making music as a teenager with childhood friend Jonny Pierce of The Drums (who was recently in town and who we interviewed). And as a young adult, he co-founded the band Saxon Shore with Josh Ti…
A review of Fauna Shade's single "Marzipan" described their sound as "Floydian... zapping electronic wiggles." This simultaneously whimsical yet vague description fits the band perfectly: their sound bounces through all the psychedelic subgenres, with droning stoner fuzz meeting some of Tame Impala…
Next on the KEXP broadcast live from Kex Hostel at Iceland Airwaves was Icelandic art-rock band Agent Fresco. Formed in 2008, mere weeks before playing in the Icelandic battle of the bands (Músíktilraunir), at which they won best guitar, best drumming, and best bass playing. The four-piece band inc…
A massive lighting rig. Pulsating four-on-the-floor beats. A constant, insistent bass presence in every song. Choruses that, in the moment, seem like they can actually propel the audience to the heights the singer is claming she'll go to. This is not Chvrches, the Glasgow basement project that emer…
At the end of Alabama Shakes' set at Marymoor Park, there was a conspicuous absence: their biggest hit. "Hold On" just isn't the song that introduced the band to a wider audience, it's still one of their greatest moments. On paper, its omission is bewilidering to say the least. (Hell, even the noto…
Hey, it's another Shimmy-Disc release! Apparently I have this unconscious attraction to their catalog. When People Were Shorter and Lived Near the Water is one of those bands whose name I've noticed (how could you not?) and admired for decades, but I don't believe I've ever heard them until just no…
History was made (and relived) this weekend in Portland with the first ever Project Pabst. The festival, a testament to the PDX+PBR love affair, tossed Portland into a beer-fueled time warp. Along with newer acts, Zidell Yards hosted some 80s and 90s greats like Tears for Fears, Violent Femmes, GZA…
For Seattle electronic music fans, Decibel Festival has spent the last 11 years working its way from mythical creature to household name. The festival has hosted some of the best electronic music in the Emerald city since 2003, and in the last couple years, has expanded into an year-round sponsor t…
At 60 years old, Robyn Hitchcock has experienced a longevity that would be the cause for many musicians' envy. He began his career as a member of several small, local London bands until 1976 when he founded the psychedelic folk rock group The Soft Boys. In 1981 (about a year after The Soft Boys bro…
What's old is new in Seattle. It has been that way for a while, since before even the grizzled-beyond-their-youth folkies made country rock a "thing" in Ballard during the last half-decade. But now, in hepper neighborhoods like Capitol Hill, organ is the new banjo as Western psychedelia of the late…
