The first performance of our Hood to Hood 2013 broadcast is a special collaborative performance by Jon Russell, Damien Jurado, and Tomo Nakayama, all Seattle based singer-songrwriters. So far Jon Russell has played just one show as a solo musician, an acoustic show at Neumos, though he has been pla…
Jimmy Cliff might be the most prolific artist I've covered in this blog (OK, probably not more prolific than Jandek, but he's superhuman). Last year, forty-five years after his debut, he released the Tim Armstrong-produced Rebirth, which shocked the world by being both a brilliant artistic achievem…
Nu-disco god Andy Butler and his Hercules and Love Affair project have been blowing our minds for years now. With the self-titled, Butler cultivated a disco masterpiece, full of slow burn and tainted love that needed to be danced to. Then, with last year's excellent Blue Songs, he moved in a slight…
Amongst the fervent Seattle soul scene, The Dip stands out as one of the most exciting and joyous acts to emerge in recent years. The seven-piece act fronted by Beat Connection's Tom Eddy emerged in 2015 with their decadent self-titled debut LP and have kept the momentum going with last year's Won'…
KEXP's Expansions host, Masa, has done a radio special on Detroit's Electronic Music Festival for many years and now brings you his very first podcast focused on the festival. It's a 12 track celebration and spotlight on Detroit based and inspired electronic artists performing at the festival this…
Details and a FAQ to the KEXP.ORG redesign.
Dusty Henry takes us back to 1977 when a young DJ from the Bronx, Theodore Livingston, debuted a technique so powerful, so innovative, that it’s become an essential part of hip-hop: scratching.
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KEXP was lucky to host an in-studio session with Okkervil River over the weekend. If you missed it, here's a consolation prize: a new video for the track "Judey on a Street" off their recently released eighth full-length, Away. Director Gabrielle Demeestere captures actor Steven Ogg, meandering th…
See that sweater Robin Pecknold is wearing? Apparently, the Fleet Foxes frontman took to wearing it so often that a fan created the Tumblr, "Fuck Yeah Robin Pecknold’s Sweater." This past Spring, during a Reddit AMA, he mentioned he'd been trying to get in touch with the site's "editor in chief"..…
I love it when I stumble across an album that got regular play in my house growing up in the KEXP stacks - especially when the super-cool college DJs of yore actually thought it was pretty good! I'm certain that by the time my parents were buying records by The Human League they were getting plent…
It's the most wonderful time of the year... for a music lover. This Saturday, April 16th is the ninth annual Record Store Day, a celebration of independent music stores around the globe. It also happens to be the day of KEXP's New Home Grand Opening celebration! Our event doesn't start until noon, …
There have been so many excellent summer festivals, it's been hard to keep up, but one line-up you shouldn't miss is the one at the 33rd Annual West Seattle Summer Fest! From Friday, July 10th to Sunday, July 12th, the West Seattle Junction will be bustling with entertainment, shopping, and fun for…
One of my favorite days of the year is fast approaching — Record Store Day, an international holiday for record collectors and music lovers! A day to celebrate the role of the independent record store in the community, as a gathering space to discover, share, and experience the joy of music and com…
Not only has he taken his haircut, Jack White will now be re-releasing the first vinyl record ever cut by Elvis Presley himself. A press release from Third Man Records explains: "Utilizing the actual unrestored audio as it currently exists on the sole original copy of 'My Happiness' b/w. 'That's W…
A "rain plan" is practically unknown in the Northwest. It rains here too frequently, but rarely fervently, for anyone to need that kind of contingency. Instead, for us rain plans are active ones, scenarios for doing and being. Maybe that's why Israel Nash's 2014 album, Rain Plans, gripped us so fir…
It's hard to believe, but we've literally watched Jessica Lea Mayfield grow up before our very eyes. She's been on our airwaves since she was a teenager, starting with her 2008 debut, With Blasphemy So Heartfelt, produced by Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys. Over the years, we've been lucky to have h…
This past weekend, the Fremont Fair launched their inaugural Solstice Concert Series to great success! The sound was great, and the Redhook Main Stage was perfectly positioned in a parking lot with a slope, so everyone could see the excellent line-up. Friday night was a celebration of Northwest roc…
Between his bluegrass voice, genuine love for performance, and one-man-band resilience, there's just something so authentic about Scott H. Biram. If that weren't enough, in 2004, Biram was involved in a near-fatal car crash, requiring him to have his bones re-connected with metal rods and even nec…
It's fitting that the Arts in Nature Festival is where Cloud Cult planted the seed. Their concert last summer inside the Lodge at Seattle's Camp Long marked the first time the the Minnesota band went fully acoustic. They had recently rearranged songs spanning their entire catalog for what would bec…
KEXP staffers aren't the only Americans to fall under the ethereal spell of Iceland: when musician John Grant played the Iceland Airwaves Music Festival in 2011, he liked it so much, he decided to stay! Performing songs from the album he recorded there, his sophomore release Pale Green Ghosts, Gran…
