When's the last time you listened to a record and thought to yourself, "Wow, that's a sound you don't hear every day". Calgary based post-punk quartet Viet Cong (featuring members of now-defunct Calgary act Women) drop their self-titled first LP this week on Jagjaguwar, and it's one of those record…
In 1998, Old Crow Medicine Show were busking in front of Pike Place Market. In 2014, they're headlining the 2,800-capacity Paramount Theatre. Along the way, the Nashville, Tennessee-based group became one of the primary figures in the 2000s roots music revival, bringing the same energy from their b…
Having just played an exquisite showcase for the Ballard Day Hood-to-Hood Celebration, Nila Leigh and Sam Ford of Goodbye Heart are ready to take over Seattle and its surrounding areas, provided you let them. Well-versed musicians, the outfit has been making music since 2007, back when they lived i…
Well, can't say we saw that one coming! In the next phase of the ever-evolving state that has come to define them, experimental indie rock chameleons Liars come to us now as... a synth pop band?! Well, perhaps that's a bit of an exaggeration. But still, on new record Mess, we find Liars a far cry a…
Drangar: their name translates roughly in English to “pillars of rock”, and it's about as apt a description you'll find for this Icelandic group, whose members — Mugison, Jónas Sigurðsson and Ómar Guðjónsson — are each highly respected musicians with their own projects. Thanks to the chance occurre…
If volume is your only musical qualifier, then there is probably only one band on your best of 2013 list. San Francisco metal duo Deafheaven dropped Sunbather last month, a seven track sonic masterpiece that relentlessly pulls at your heartstrings and threatens hearing damage for 60 minutes. The al…
Categorization systems are important for us as humans. It's how we make sense of this sometimes nonsensical world we live in. Which is why as soon as radio delivered us a bevy of different styles of music, we immediately had to put everyone into categories, starting with the basics: jazz, rock, cla…
"It's on, baby!" Those three words signaled the end of the day's nine-hour freeze on main stage acts due to heavy winds, but as the sun set, Alabama Shakes brought back music to the Gorge Amphitheatre for Sasquatch! Music Festival, and to say there was palpable relief both on stage and in the audie…
If everything else in the world seems to be going crazy at the moment, take solace knowing that The Joy Formidable still shamelessly tour with a gong. The Welsh trio's stage presence has always been one that's far larger than whatever venue they're playing in – inside or outside – and the gong that…
For Plants and Animals, growth can take time. The adventurous Montreal trio took four years to release their fourth album, double the time between each of their previous ones. After years of prolonged touring and rapid recording, the childhood friends Nic Basque, Matthew Woodley, and Warren Spicer …
As Cheryl Waters jokes, it's taken over ten years to get Trevor Powers' band Youth Lagoon in the KEXP studio. Really, the band has only been around since 2010 - it just feels like we've all been waiting that long. We were all happy finally to have wrangled Youth Lagoon come grace us, and the timing…
Sun Liquor and Silversun Pickups - the pairing pretty much writes itself - yet there's so much more to the LA band's relationship to KEXP and history behind their generosity in performing an exclusive show for our donors. Our love for Silversun Pickups goes back to their debut EP, Pikul. KEXP was n…
Considering their output (3 albums in 13 months), you won't be surprised to learn that Wand are pals with Ty Segall. The LA trio released their debut, Ganglion Reef, in August last year on Segall’s Drag City imprint, GOD?, which they followed up in March this year with Golem, on Ty's sometime label…
Church took place on Sunday at Sasquatch, and Paul Janeway was the officiant, worship leader, and pastor. St. Paul, as he's otherwise known, was a man possessed led by the Spirit from the second he set on stage with his equally as fiery bandmates in St. Paul & The Broken Bones. From The City, t…
A hot sun is shining down through mostly blue skies, revealing sweeping views of the spectacular Columbia River Gorge from which this venue takes its name. Sasquatch 2015 is officially getting underway, and tens of thousands of music fans are streaming in from far and wide today to catch bands like…
London, Morrocco, West Africa, Hell, Plastic Beach, Congo, London (again), and now Hong Kong. Damon Albarn's globe-trotting take on pop music has brought him far beyond Britpop, to say the least. But as he travels across the globe and in and out of projects, the line between his personal and preten…
Although they're mostly critical darlings in the United States, Elbow have been headlining stadiums and festivals in their native UK for a few years now, so it's no surprise that their Sunday evening set on the main stage at Sasquatch was a brilliant display of showmanship. Their latest album, Marc…
