Summer is nearly over but, on the upside, that means Seattle's biggest music and arts festival is back. Running Friday through Sunday, rather than Saturday through Labor Day Monday, for the first time in its history, Bumbershoot otherwise hasn't changed much else in their formula: a mixture of musi…
When a supergroup becomes a band, magic happens. For German electronic figureheads Modeselektor and Apparat, their work together as Moderat qualifies as a full time gig. Now that they're three albums deep, it's no secret that these three gentlemen enjoy working together and challenging each other c…
The unstoppable Kristin Hersh is at it again. Earlier this Spring, the Throwing Muses frontwoman released a new EP with her noise project 50 Foot Wave, and now she has a solo full-length out this Fall, a double CD/hardcover book combo titled Wyatt at the Coyote Palace. Stream the first single "Som…
Ty Segall is like the American Horror Story of rock 'n' roll. The now-LA based maniacal, musical polymath constantly reinvents while rotating a cast of characters around a shifting approach to one theme: to rock the living shit out of you. Though his latest album - and what we can assume to be just…
Y'all. It finally happened. Last night, Frank Ocean dropped Endless, a new visual album exclusively on Apple Music. And that's not even the best part. According to Rolling Stone, a SECOND "official" album will be released some time this weekend. We don't know the name of this upcoming LP, because …
Today, over five and a half years after my post about Lida Husik's 2nd album and its reception at KCMU, I decided to share her very first album. Way back in 2010, I was lamenting whatever oversight had led to Ms. Husik's not being on Wikipedia, and expressing excitement that she was working on her …
There's a bittersweetness to the latest from long-running power pop veterans The Posies. The Bellingham-bred band endured two tragedies prior to the new album's release: bassist Joe Skyward passed away from cancer earlier this year, and drummer Darius Minwalla passed from unknown causes last year. …
Following his stunning participation in A Tribute to Woody Guthrie and His Month of Song at Benaroya Hall last month, L.A. punk legend John Doe shares a video for the track "A Little Help," which, incidentally, gets a little help from Chan Marshall aka Cat Power. Doe explains, "There is beauty &am…
There's a new pop-savvy sheriff in Sub Pop town, and he goes by the name of Cullen Omori, and instead of having to wield a Smith Western to corral a crowd's attention, all he has to do is coo his name. Omori quickly became a wunderkind as one of the instrumental brains of the Chicagoan outfit Smith…
Last week, Seattle sons Harrison Mills and Clayton Knight took their hometown for three straight sold-out nights at the Paramount Theater. It is truly mind-boggling how quickly and how flawlessly ODESZA has skyrocketed over the last three years. The band's debut album Summer's Gone came out only th…
John Grant shares a video from his third full-length, Grey Tickles, Black Pressure, out now via Partisan. Watch the clip for "Down Here" below, directed by Lisa Gunning. In a press release, Gunning says, "I'd been wanting to make a video for John for a long time so when he sent me 'Down Here' it s…
These days, we all want love letters from Father John Misty. While the stage persona of former Seattle based songwriter Josh Tillman rose to indie stardom following his somewhat calculated invention and an inventive debut filled with 70's inspired soft rock, expansive folk melodies and nearly exces…
Following their soulful set at last weekend's Capitol Hill Block Party, the Northwest's own Unknown Mortal Orchestra share a very theatrical video for "Ur Life One Night," off their latest release, Multi-Love. The clip was directed by Manoj Leonel Jahson, who told Rolling Stone, "I am deeply inspi…
As soon as word came out earlier this year that George Lewis Jr. had signed with Warner Brothers, there was one thing that was clear: Twin Shadow was getting bigger. Not just in the commercial sense - rather, all of the massive 80s indulgences explored on past records were now going to have the cei…
The more or less random selection of Tucson band Naked Prey's third album from the shelves at KEXP was something of a blessing for me - and hopefully for you - as it led me to the web site and Bandcamp page of Frontier Records, a label whose tastes seem to have been wide open and ranging as their n…
There’s an art to first impressions. As an artist, you really only get to make one first step onto the scene, and whether everyone cares or no one cares, that’s the point from which you take every single step after. For Thomas Arsenault, that first step has been a long time in the making. He’s been…
Not surprisingly, Valerie June's childhood was steeped in spiritual music at church and R&B and soul music at home. Between her time spent singing with choruses consisting of sometimes hundreds of parishioners and the influence of her father, who booked and promoted concerts near her hometown o…
A while back, a producer, a DJ and an MC, each with solid careers of their own, formed a sort of hip hop supergroup to face against rising corporate interests in their fields. Like Gorillaz, Deltron 3030 was high-concept, semi-fictional, character driven project that blew the minds of music fans of…
