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Monday, Nov 16 2020, 7AM
I dug the Zero 7 track, it was just what I needed this morning. Started the work week by breaking my glass coffee pot. I am making due with tea for today until I can get a replacement glass pot.
Keep up the great selection of music.
-Michael
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On October 23rd, Zero 7 areleased their first record in five years. The EP, named Shadows, features a new lead singer for the band, British singer Lou Stone, joining the band’s core duo of Henry Binns and Sam Hardaker. It is the band’s first record since they released EP3 in 2015 – they haven’t released a full-length album since 2009’s Yeah Ghost. Find it here: t.co
Speaking on the tracks, Biig Piig - aka Jess Smyth - wrote ‘Oh No’ about finding moments of calm amongst the chaos, noting “that the safest place to be was my room – when I get paranoid or anxious or upset, hiding away felt like the easiest thing to do. Which is mad, because then quarantine happened and that literally was the safest place to be. ‘Oh No’ is about being sad but also lockdown, unintentionally.”
“‘Liahr’ is about not trusting myself in recent relationships,” she adds. “I feel I’ve been running into things headfirst and believing myself when I say I’m all in, but then falling out of it as quickly as I fall into it. ‘Liahr’ is basically a one-to-one with myself about how I need to chill and stop hurting myself and others ‘cause of goddamn trauma.” -bit.ly
“‘Hurt’ surrounds the possibility of healing from pain and the temporary nature of suffering,” London artist Arlo Parks said via a press statement. “It is supposed to uplift and comfort those going through hard times.”
This track is featured on The Weekly Mix, Vol. 745 - Cheryl Waters helps us get unstuck with this week’s mix, moving through ebbs and flows with lyrical wisdom and globe-spanning beats to inspire some much needed re-centering. Subscribe and download the 18 track mix here: www.kexp.org
The eerie percussion and guitar were sampled from Lalo Schifrin's "Danube Incident," music composed by the Argentine composer for an episode of Mission Impossible.
Check out our exclusive interview with Portishead's Geoff Barrow and Adrian Utley about the 25th anniversary of this iconic album here: www.kexp.org
Kruder & Dorfmeister, the Viennese duo whose classic 1998 double CD The K&D Sessions was inescapable wherever cool chillout music could be heard in the late '90s (hotel lobbies, salons, fusion restaurants), are back with their first new album since The K&D Sessions. It's titled 1995 and out October 30. Technically, it's a "lost" album, which they made in 1995, made a few test pressings of and then forgot about. They recently discovered in a box of DATs, did a little polishing, and here we are. Find the tracklist for 1995 and video for 'Johnson' here: bit.ly
KEXP Wo Pop DJ Darek Mazzone recently interviewed Kruder and Dorfmeister. You can watch it on Darek's YouTube channel at www.youtube.com
Thievery Corporation performed live at KEXP on Oct. 5, 2016. Listen to the set here: www.kexp.org
Song Machine: Season One – Strange Timez, collects together Gorillaz' recent collaborative singles plus a whole lot more. Releasing in both a standard version and an expanded deluxe edition, the latter version will feature a collaboration with none other than Aotearoa's Unknown Mortal Orchestra and Goldlink, alongside songs with such mega-stars as Elton John, Robert Smith, 6LACK, Beck, St. Vincent, Kano, Roxani Arias, Leee John, EARTHGANG, Joan As Police Woman, Moonchild Sanelly, JPEGMAFIA and CHAI.
"What Else Is There?" features vocals from Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife.
“The video for ‘Crash’ takes place on a flight,” Yanya said in a statement. “Last year, doing a lot of touring I found myself becoming more and more anxious each time I boarded a plane, something that was new for me as I’ve never had a fear of flying. With each flight we took it felt like the turbulence was getting worse and I was convinced my luck was due to run out. I didn’t write ‘Crash’ about being on an airplane, but I really like it visually as an embodiment of the song.”
In addition to “Crash,” the EP will include two other tracks. “One of the songs had the theme of luck in it as a concept but then I realized they all do,” she said. “That got me thinking about luck in general: good and bad. Things out of our control and things in control of us, how often we put acts and happenings down to the fortune of good luck or bad luck when things exceed our expectations or don’t go according to plan.”
Feeling Lucky? is out December 11th
From mystery collective SAULT's second great album of 2020 - "a sublime, soul-affirming masterpiece of transcendent musical power" - there are "moments... when you realize, in the middle of the fast and hard-driving “I Just Want to Dance,” that the lyrics have moved abruptly from dancefloor-loving lines like the title to “We lost another life” to “Why do my people always die?”
variety.com
Following the success of Graceland, which was influenced by the sounds of South Africa, Paul Simon did some traveling through South America and found the bombastic, repetitive drumming of Olodum, an Afro-Brazilian cultural group. For his 1990 album The Rhythm Of The Saints, Simon recorded Olodum performing live and later structured some of his tracks around the group’s rhythms. Album opener “The Obvious Child” is the perfect confluence of the wild, frenetic drumming and Simon’s folksy melodies.
'Freedom' samples:
The organ from Kaleidoscope's late 1960s cut "Let Me Try." It is a track from the little-known Puerto Rican band's only eponymous release.
Folk preservationist Alan Lomax's 1959 field recording of Reverend R. C. Crenshaw's "Collection Speech / Unidentified Lining Hymn." Reverend R.C. Crenshaw's sermon enhances the song's gospel feel.
The African American spiritual "Stewball" (credited here to Prisoner "22" at Mississippi State Penitentiary).
Lindsey Buckingham was keen on experimentation at the time, so he recorded some of his vocals for this song in his bathroom using a microphone he placed on the floor that was connected to his home studio. He also did some percussion for the track on empty Kleenex boxes in his bathroom.
Daniel turns 11 today and would love to hear MGMT’s Little Dark Age. Hope you can fit it on.
Thank you!
- Edward in San Diego
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Happy birthday Daniel!
After Dark 3 features myriad Johnny Jewel projects, including Chromatics and Desire, as well as a solo track from Jewel himself. There are tracks included by Club Intl, Farah, Glüme, Orion and Joon, among others. For all the artists, check out the full tracklist below:
01. Desire — “Boy”
02. Orion — “Higher”
03. Johnny Jewel feat. Glüme — “Surgery”
04. Double Mixte feat. Desire — “Chambre 48”
05. Farah — “Boyz R Bad”
06. Chromatics, ATRIP — “TOY (ATRIP Remix)”
07. Love Object — “Holodnoe Solnce”
08. JOON – “Cruel Summer”
09. Glüme — “Don’t @ Me”
10. MOTHERMARY — “Resurrection”
11. Orion — “Space Girl”
12. Guy Gerber — “Cameo”
13. Causeway — “We Were Never Lost”
14. Club Intl — “Crush”
15. Double Mixte — “Tirage En Croix”
16. JOON — “Worse Things Than Feeling Lonely”
17. Pink Gloves — “Fading Stars (Johnny Jewel Remix)”
18. Chromatics — “Endless Sleep”
Here’s what frontman Ian Devaney had to say about 'A Different Kind of Life':
"This song first started to come together in the early days of the Trump administration, but was never quite finished and got a bit lost as time went by. When the demo resurfaced during the pandemic, the song struck a chord not just in its intended political context but in the context of so many people losing family members, jobs, or any semblance of normality — whatever might be left of it after the past few years. I had seriously hoped that by the time the song came out it would be slightly less relevant than when I first wrote it, but defeating Trump was always going to be just one step in the fight to make the country a more just and decent place. So, no matter what, the core message still resonates with me deeply."
Good morning! Proud amplifier and donor of almost two decades. Today is my quarantine birthday - hoping you could play some Radiohead!
Big love. 💚
-Becca
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Happy birthday Becca!
Peckham post-punks Goat Girl will release their second album, On All Fours, via Rough Trade in January. And the South London quartet are offering an early preview of the album with the release of new single Sad Cowboy.
"Sad Cowboy centres around the idea of losing a grip on reality and how often this can happen," says Goat Girl’s Lottie Cream. "When you’re within a world that constantly makes you feel as though you’re living out a really bad dream, disillusionment is inevitable."
You can watch the band's darkly surreal video for the song here: bit.ly
Influences of Richard Wagner's Prelude to Das Rheingold can be heard throughout the track "All Day Long." New Order have subsequently used the piece as a concert opener.
The Avalanches' greatly anticipated new album, "We Will Always Love You", comes out on December 11.
“The conceptual heart of things is really important to me,’ the Avalanches’ Robbie Chater said in a press release. “I can’t just be blindly creative, I need to find a feeling and a deeply personal place that gives me the energy to start making a record and a story to share. Wildflower changed so much over 16 years, whereas with this album, we knew what it was about right at the beginning, and then we did it, and it’s done.”
Pitchfork calls this "the most joyous album Aesop Rock has ever made. " - pitchfork.com
"'This Island' is about incoherence and inarticulate responses, both personal and political, in a time and place you don’t fully understand anymore," says vocalist Charlie Drinkwater. "It’s an unrequited love letter, and a howl of frustration; a mea culpa and a call to arms. We wrote this to an increasingly nationalistic and isolationist drum beat playing out at home and abroad, and frankly, we are scared and appalled. As artists, we aren’t offering up solutions for living, but maybe we can extend a hand and let someone know that you aren’t alone in feeling under-prepared in your responses yet powerful in your convictions. That small boats can still make big wave. That we have a world to win."
KEXP Just recently premiered this new single from Spirit Award's upcoming album "Lunatic House" - Learn more about the track here: www.kexp.org
The title of the album comes from a German word with several meanings, such as "to lift up", "to abolish" or "to preserve". In philosophy, it is used by Hegel to explain what happens when a thesis and antithesis interact.
This album was included in the Pitchfork list: 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. Pitchfork also included it in their The Best Britpop Albums… That Aren’t British list.
Future Islands were the musical guests on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert in early October. They performed “For Sure” from 'As Long As You Are.' Watch it here: youtu.be
Stay tuned for their Live KEXP at Home session too!
Robert Alfons AKA TR/ST stopped by KEXP after the release of The Destroyer - Part 1 early in 2019 and spoke with KEXP DJ Abbie. Watch this dark, intimate session here: www.youtube.com
Good Morning John. 26 years ago today my daughter lucy was born. Will you please play Today by the Smashing Pumpkins as that's was the song playing on KEXP in the room when she came into our lives. Happy Birthday Lucy.
-Grimes in Ballard
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Happy birthday Lucy from the Morning Show Crew!
The Flaming Lips shared their quirky vision of the COVID-19 concert experience on The Late Show with a truly quarantined performance of “Race for the Prize” that featured both the band and the audience in their own personal bubbles. See it here: youtu.be
Seattle’s Deep Sea Diver is out with their third album, "Impossible Weight." The album was written after frontwoman Jessica Dobson's experience with depression. Listen to a KEXP Sound & Vision interview with Dobson: www.kexp.org
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On September 25th, Deep Sea Diver played a Lawn in the Morning session for KEXP. The introduction to this song was the best! Watch it to hear her story about asking Sharon Van Etten to sing this track with her: www.instagram.com
Phair's upcoming record, called Soberish, was originally slated to be released this summer, but it's been pushed back a bit, and is now scheduled to come out in 2021.
Find 'Feel the Void' on Floored Faces' bandcamp: flooredfaces.bandcamp.com
"Do you hear that thunder?...That's the sound of strength in numbers..."
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Frontman Joe Talbot has described it as “a song that embodied self-belief, and gave us self-belief – a counter-punch to all the doubt we build up from all the noise we so easily let in”
“We wanted to make the sound of our own hearts’ marching band, armed with a jackhammer and a smile,” he explained. “We wanted to make the sound of our engine starting. So we did. Thank you.”
"Grounds" was KEXP Song of the Day. Download it for yourself here: www.kexp.org
The digital version is out January 1 but you can also preorder the vinyl: gibraltarsongs.bandcamp.com
K.G. was conceived by King Gizzard ringleader Stu Mackenzie during lockdown this year. It’s billed as “both a stand-alone work and also part of a bigger musical picture,” but the band is being vague about what exactly that means.
Misty Coast are a duo out of Ballard's sister city, Bergen, Norway. Linn Frøkedal and Richard Myklebust mistycoast.bandcamp.com
Although it was the Sundays' biggest hit internationally, topping the U.S. Modern Rock Tracks chart for one week, the track was never released as a single in the group's native United Kingdom due to the collapse of the Rough Trade Records label. Nonetheless it achieved no. 36 placing in John Peel's Festive Fifty for 1990.
Watch the Australian band performing this one live on The Morning Show in 2019 here: www.youtube.com