Bon Dimanche! It’s written in graffiti on several buildings all over Rennes. Happy Sunday! Sunday is the day of rest for the French people and even our crew got to take a small break on the final day of filming during the Trans Musicales festival. Normally, we’re up by 6am, breakfast at 7, out the …
Stephin Merritt likes to keep it clever with his long-running project The Magnetic Fields. From 1999's 3-CD set 69 Love Songs, to his recent A-Z tour (performing a song starting with each letter of the alphabet), and now a five CD set titled 50 Song Memoir scheduled for a March 3rd release on None…
The last time they were at the Paramount Theatre, Sigur Rós were touring behind their just-released sixth album Valtari, their final LP with founding member Kjartan Sveinsson, who declined to tour with them that year and would fully quit the band not long after. That album remains the most mellow i…
Over decades of milquetoast radio throwaways and sales taking precedent over content, it's undeniable: pop music has lost its sensibility of the extreme. But all is not lost in the brave new world of the digital age. Need evidence? Look no further than Prince Rama's press release for their new albu…
At every great concert, there's a moment where everything, for lack of a better word, clicks. When the audience moves from excited to engaged, when "wow" turns "holy shit". On the closing night of Sleater-Kinney's three-night stand at the Showbox at the Market, that moment was two-and-a-half minute…
The EMP Pop Conference covers a lot of ground in its panels, discussions, and presentations – where else could you find programming covering both a Missy Elliott retrospective and a roundtable seeking to find out what the worst song ever is? – so it only makes sense that for its Seattle artist show…
It's an eclectic mix of new releases this week, including some moody music out of the UK, led by trip-hop pioneer Tricky, whose latest album is, according to our Music Director, Don Yates, "his most focused effort in years" featuring the sounds he's most known for, i.e. "gloomy, mostly downtempo be…
In early June, Australian singer/songwriter Courtney Barnett and American singer/songwriter Kurt Vile announced that they would be teaming up for a collaborative tour featuring an "all-star band" called The Sea Lice which is a revolving cast of musicians that includes Janet Weiss (Sleater-Kinney, W…
Now in its sixth year, KEXPort celebrates KEXP’s ongoing relationship with Kex Hostel in Reykjavik, where we broadcast every year during Iceland Airwaves. Typically, it's a music marathon consisting of 12 bands in 12 hours, but this year they've expanded the program to feature 15 bands over two da…
At the Paramount Theatre last week, Phantogram opened their set without even being on stage. After they performed two songs obscured from the audience, a screen fell shortly thereafter, revealing the New York duo behind the fourth wall to fervently shake the physical walls of the venue. Going from …
The second day of Macefield Music Festival invoked thunderstorms and musical fanfare as dozens of bands faced ecstatic crowds of music lovers at the KEXP Mainstage, Tractor Tavern, Conor Byrne Pub, and The Sunset. Seattle rapper Grynch threw down his approachable, lyrical west coast rhymes for an e…
Joining us in the studio for a KEXP Secret Stage performance at Bumbershoot is Austin post-rock powerhouse Explosions in the Sky. Playing together for over 15 years, their sound is hugely emotive, accented with glistening guitar. It’s a unique listening experience, both cathartic and calming, comfo…
Los Angeles artist Ramona Gonzalez launched her Nite Jewel project back in 2008, unveiling a magnetic fusion of dreamy synth-pop, ethereal R&B, woozy funk, and hazy disco on early hotly-tipped releases for Italians Do It Better as well we her own label, Gloriette Records. A prolific artist and…
Music and beer are a perfect pair. Add Seattle as a backdrop, and it gets even better. At Elysian’s 20th Anniversary event this past Saturday, fans of all three came together for a celebratory day at Seattle Center’s Fisher Pavilion. Festival attendees sipped Elysian brews to sets by Ming City Rock…
With the sun about to set both literally and metaphorically at Sasquatch! Music Festival on Sunday, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard brought their electric sound to the Yeti stage, immediately riling the crowd into a massive mosh pit that wouldn’t subside until the band left the stage. The grou…
Brooklyn pop singer Tei Shi is on the come up like nobody else in her league. Earlier this year, Valerie Teicher dropped her second EP, Verde, doubling her sonic dynamic, upping her lyrical prowess, and giving us three addictive singles with "Bassically", "Go Slow", and "See Me". Between this and h…
Thomas Arsenault is not afraid of feeling. He did it in droves on his debut EP Worth, and he does it again on this week's full length effort Seraph. On song after song, Mas Ysa brings joy, pain, abandon, doubt, and suffering in quantities that most bands hope to capture once in their career. Meanwh…
"Good evening" or "we're Iceage from Copenhagan, Denmark" wasn't the first thing that Iceage frontman Elias Bender Rønnenfelt said when the Danish four-piece arrived onstage. It wasn't even a simple "hello". It was a startling, guttural grunt that soared over the opening chords of "On My Fingers". …
