Kevin Cole

This track was selected as a Song of the Day earlier this week by Kevin Cole, host of Drive Time on KEXP; download your own free copy from the link below! Based out of Pamplona, Spain, Melnas are evoking a refreshed, revamped, and revelatory take on dream pop. Suppose they start out work on their new album Ahora with the basic premise, "Can you make jangle pop and garage rock with synthesizers?" The answer is a resounding yes. The song "Bang" is effervescent, yet propulsive. A delicate balance of restraint with booming synthesizer whirls propelling their soft, entrancing melodies forward. Evoking Stereolab and Kraftwerk, the band find themselves in good company with this exciting direction. shorturl.at

Though both are now based in New York, Pakistani singer, songwriter and author Ali Sethi had been entranced by Chilean-American Nicolas Jaar’s music long before they began collaborating. "It felt familiar to me, that sense of adventure you have when you hear his music, like a tale that teases you and plays with your expectations as it unfolds," says Sethi. "In that sense it resembled the leisurely improvised ghazals and qawwalis I grew up hearing in Pakistan." When the two were finally introduced by Indian visual artist Somnath Bhatt, a regular Jaar collaborator who also handled the album’s artwork, Sethi was well prepared. He began to sketch out voice notes using loops snipped from Jaar’s acclaimed 2020 album, Telas, improvising vocalizations and seductive Urdu poems over Jaar’s weightless, time-bending productions. Jaar was astonished by the result; "It was what Telas had been missing," he explains. tinyurl.com

This year's SMASH Benefit will pay tribute the local iconic record label Sub Pop this Sunday, November 19, 2023, at The Moore Theatre. The 2023 line up includes, Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie, Love Battery, Brittany Davis, Jessica Dobson of Deep Sea Diver, Naked Giants, Eva Walker of The Black Tones, Small Paul, Molly Sides of Thunderpussy, Shaina Shepherd, Heavy Metal Marching Band, and more! More info here: shorturl.at

"Ticking boxes / charging laptops / separating causes from ourselves," they sing on this archived Song of the Day, which you can download from the link below. The Singaporean dream-pop band first formed in 2015, when lead vocalist Nur Wahidah and guitarist Daniel Castro Borces met at school. The pair bonded over their shared love of music, and while they initially started writing songs for fun, the pastime quickly turned into a full on passion. They would eventually go on to add Jared Lim (guitar), Lucas Tee (drums), and Sam Venditti (bass), but the DIY spirit of that initial encounter between Wahidah and Borces remains a driving force behind their music. "We also love that it really just feels like five friends hanging out and jamming some tunes. We have a very loose approach to things and no one is really the main ‘leader’ so everyone’s opinion equally matters. It’s a very collaborative effort." That egalitarian approach is a driving force behind All Around You. tinyurl.com "Nature is everywhere around you, even in the city," vocalist Nur Wahidah told Whiteboard Journal last year. "It adds something special like cycling to school. It’s not just going to school — enjoying your time outside. I feel like a lot of people would think of it as like, 'oh, I live in the city, that means I can’t go into nature and stuff.' But, I think we all realized that nature is everywhere around us." tinyurl.com

On the new single, lead vocalist Karla Chubb, says, "'Up And Comer' is a pretty dry take on a fear and self consciousness that has been ruminating in me since I picked up an instrument. This innate fear that maybe I would always be 'good for a girl', but would I ever actually be great? It's an invisible narrative that has been constructed by the doubts and negativity I've been fed by others, as well my own imposter syndrome. "It's a song that takes aim at the idea that some of these traits and behaviours may almost be hereditary, and instead of letting that continue to hold me back, finally break free of the expected, embrace the anger and let it rip. The only way is forward," she continues. Born in Dublin, Chubb spent a portion of her early childhood in Germany, initially turning to music as a consequence of feeling out-of-step with the world. "I lived in a constant state of existential crisis. Music became an outlet for emotion, and a way for me to understand myself and society." shorturl.at

This is today's Featured Song of the Day, as selected by Kevin Cole! You can read more about, and download for free, the track here: shorturl.at The band’s latest offering takes "corporeal form" as a loving middle finger directed at their record label. The single was spawned by asking the band to "write another track like the song that did well," with the resulting tongue-in-cheek, punk-rock melee proving to be decidedly catchy. Recorded and produced by the infamous Ross Orton (Arctic Monkeys, Amyl and the Sniffers, Drenge, Gang of Four), the track is packed with off-kilter guitars, fuzzed-out driving basslines and hip-shaking, blown out drums that paint pictures of a violent disco. Speaking on their new single, vocalist Genevieve Glynn-Reeves reveals, "If you want the highbrow answer, then 'BIG HIT SINGLE' is about the experience of creating art under late capitalism. If you want the lowbrow–and slightly more honest– answer, then 'BIG HIT SINGLE' is me trying to wind up our label." tinyurl.com

Rigmor is a Danish indie rock band that formed in 2018, and features Sarah Wichmann (vocal, guitar), Oliver Stewart (guitar), Victor Sousa (bass), and Lasse Lykke (drums). In 2022, the band released their critically-acclaimed debut album "Glade blinde bør." That autumn, Rigmor performed frequently, including at SPOT Festival, Roskilde Festival, and DR Koncertsalen. During the SPOT Festival, Rigmor performed a live session for KEXP, which has garnered more than 100.000 views on YouTube thus far. Rigmor is currently at work on an upcoming album, set to be released in the spring of 2024, and have already released a first single from that album, "Alt det du gør" ("Everything You Do"). The single was born in a summer house in Ebeltoft, where the band hunkered down to write and work intensively on the songs for the upcoming album. "'Everything You Do' is about a heart in pain, but it can be in many different forms. The song can be about a failed relationship as well as losing a part of yourself – depending on the listener's situation. We think that's an essential part of our songwriting on this album," Rigmor shares.

The Shins were not truly a band when James Mercer composed the song, and the idea of making music his career seemed uncertain. The song's creation was partially a reaction to the music scene in Albuquerque, New Mexico, the band's hometown, which Mercer described as "macho, really heavy, and aggressive." Mercer sent a demo to Sub Pop Records and label co-founder Jonathan Poneman caught a concert in San Francisco while the band was on tour with Modest Mouse. He offered the band a one-off single deal, and the label included it in their Single-of-the-Month series, issuing a 7" single to fan club members in February 2001. bit.ly

Church Chords is a collaborative music project helmed by producer, multi-instrumentalist, artist Stephen Buono and his daring cohorts. Buono shares in the album liner notes, "The sample I provided co-producer Elliot Bergman, was the harsh noise of an ARP synthesizer. We layered a bunch of percussion, and then I asked Ricardo Dias Gomes if he would write lyrics in both Portuguese and English. As someone who has exhaustively listened to both versions of Caetano Veloso’s 'Baby,' I was thrilled he was open to doing so. "Genevieve Artadi was learning Portuguese at this time, and I am appreciative that she was willing to give it a try. I believe this is the first appearance on record of her singing in Portuguese. John Herndon (Tortoise) co-produced this track, which he made so dag sexy."

Blonde Redhead return with Sit Down for Dinner, their first album in nine years. Its title a nod to the often-sacred communal ritual of sharing a meal with those you love, this immersive, meticulously crafted album appropriately serves an expression of persistent togetherness, a testament to the unique internal logic Blonde Redhead have refined over their three-decade existence. tinyurl.com

Happy Birthday to Sampha Lahai Sisay, who turns 35 today! Speaking about the track, Sampha shares, "It's about the importance of connection to both myself and others, and the beauty and harsh realities of just existing. "It's about acknowledging those moments when you need help - that requires real strength. I hope people can enjoy that feeling of someone being there for you, even if that person doesn't have the answers. "Just calling someone up without overthinking... letting go and just dancing.. wanting to see past the mundanity of things and appreciating the magic of it all, from birds nests to spaceships." tinyurl.com

Out on this day in 2018! This track, performed by American rapper and singer Anderson .Paak, was issued as the lead single from his third studio album Oxnard. The song is a duet rap with fellow American hip hop recording artist Kendrick Lamar; and it peaked at #9 on the Billboard Adult R&B chart in 2018. On December 1, 2018, Anderson .Paak and Kendrick Lamar performed the song on Saturday Night Live. tinyurl.com

This beat-heavy opener to the In Rainbows album, which was featured prominently during Radiohead's 2006 tour, features a group of children from the Matrix Music School and Arts Centre in Oxford hand clapping and shouting "Yeah!" "15 Step" was written in the rarely used 5/4 time signature. The most well-known example of a song written in a 5/4 meter is "Take Five" by The Dave Brubeck Quartet. Another example of a Radiohead song written in an unusual time signature is "Morning Bell" from Amnesiac, which was written in 7/8. When performing, the band sometimes puts these songs together. In an interview with New York magazine, Ed O'Brien explained why they did so at a June 2006 concert at Madison Square Garden: "Putting '15 Step' and 'Morning Bell' together was deliberate. '15 Step' is in 5/4 and 'Morning Bell' is in 7/8. It's nice to have a bit of clapping, a bit of audience participation, if they can get the beat. In Spain, they love 'Morning Bell' - all the fast clapping is like flamenco music. But in the West, we're not very rhythm-savvy. Anything not in 4/4 is hard for a lot of people." tinyurl.com

gglum, the moniker of London-born songwriter Ella Smoker, releases "SPLAT!," her first single for Secretly Canadian. The charming and immediately memorable song arrives with a video directed by Finnegan Travers. "'SPLAT!' was just me splurging a bunch of feelings I had around a complicated relationship, where it feels like nothing really happens and no one makes a move but you’re constantly thinking about it," Smoker explains. "I wanted to capture the emotional chaos of teenage desire and the intensity of your feelings when you’re still learning how relationships work. The song really expresses all the ways I felt but in a very disordered way bouncing between raw feelings, rationalisation and angry outbursts." tinyurl.com

"'Vaporized' was the first song I wrote that I knew specifically would be for the new EP," reveals Sea Lemon's Natalie Lew. "The song is all about my personal health anxieties and fear of death, which is something I’ve dealt with since I was little. The chorus' 'I thought he was buried alive/out of my mind/I thought she was vaporized/out of my mind' is playing on the most unlikely, almost impossible ways to die because I think making light of my personal anxieties can help me from spiralling. "I have insomnia a lot and wake up in the middle of the night, and used to have this tendency to read headlines while I was awake (a terrible idea), wondering if some horrible accident might happen to me too. The song instrumentally gets a little heavier and more intense each chorus, which implies this impending doom feeling that gets worse and worse as I worry." tinyurl.com Sea Lemon will be playing this year's SMASH Benefit at The Moore Theatre on Sunday, November 9th! tinyurl.com Earlier this summer, John Richards selected Sea Lemon's "Cellar" as a KEXP Song of the Day. You can get a free download of the track, and subscribe to get all of our DJs' great picks, here: tinyurl.com

Telehealth will be playing The Sunset Tavern on Saturday, December 2nd, 2023 with Spirit Award. tinyurl.com The new-wavey Seattle band Telehealth cheekily bill themselves as "an ideas-driven music corporation,"and recently released this nugget with Devo, the B-52’s, and Kraftwerk in its DNA. Check out this full performance from Telehealth, playing live in the KEXP studio, recorded in August of this year: tinyurl.com According to their press, "Telehealth wears the color green to remind us all that the American pedagogy, which has become so focused on selling green as a product to alleviate the symptoms of a self-inflicted hellscape. Instead of being upset, Telehealth embraces uncertainty and absurdity." tinyurl.com

"Second Guessing" from Eddy Current Suppression Ring is a rollicking punk infused romp in the tradition of X, The Cramps and The Troggs. On the track the Melbourne-based four-piece spark a high energy, slow burn rocker that is highlighted by lead singer Brendan Suppression’s rambling, nasally but ultimately cool vocals. tinyurl.com From Pitchfork: "It took Eddy Current Suppression Ring just six studio hours to craft a follow up to their sophomore LP, Primary Colours. That's less time than most Americans will spend at work in a day. While that pace created a final product much less polished than the band's previous work, Rush to Relax is also a more accurate, interesting sonic articulation of the band's frenetic frontman, Brendan Suppression."

This track features James Murphy and Nancy Whang of LCD Soundsystem. Joe from IDLES shares, "TANGK. I needed love. So I made it. I gave love out to the world and it feels like magic. This is our album of gratitude and power. All love songs. All is love." "'Dancer' is the violence that comes from the pounding heart of the dancefloor and rushes through your body and gives you life from music, from love and from you." tinyurl.com

Today is National Button Day! Buttons, as a fastener, date back to 13th-century Germany. Throughout history, people went so crazy for buttons they became a status symbol for a time. ​In the 1300s, the Church denounced buttons. ​Europe was so button crazy, the church started calling them the "devil's snare." This was probably because most women's clothing of the time buttoned up the front. Furthermore, ​women's clothing traditionally buttons on the right (reportedly because it was easier for maids to dress the ladies they served that way) and men's on the left (they dressed themselves). On the White Stripes FAQ, Jack White is quoted as saying about this song, "There's a button at the top of my navy peacoat, and it's the hardest button to button. I thought that was a great metaphor for the off man out in the family. It also comes from sayings of my father, like 'My uncle Harold had a 10 button vest but he could only fasten 8.'" In the Michel Gondry-directed video, Jack White's amp and Meg White's drum kit trail behind on every beat as they travel through a town. They had 32 amps and 32 drum kits for the shoot. The video was parodied on an episode of The Simpsons where Jack and Meg guest starred. tinyurl.com

Written and composed by bandleader Ahmed Gallab, and featuring Harlem-based multi-disciplinary artist Tru Osborne, "Everything is Everything" is an acute reflection of life as a Black person in America. "The complexity of living in a Black body has long been documented, yet tapping into our pain to testify, curb further abuses for the next generation, or simply explain ourselves is exhausting," says Gallab about the meaning behind the track. "We get through it by wearing masks the entertainer, pacifier, comforter. Being adept at reading rooms and choosing which one to wear is one of our many superpowers; one we’ve elevated to an art. But, behind all of the eloquence and the adaptation, we’re bursting at the seams, holding tightly onto our humanity in a world that challenges it on a daily basis. Ain’t that some shit?" tinyurl.com

On making this album, Eric Burton confesses, "We were under pressure this time. Being that it’s the dreaded sophomore album it was really heavy, I’m not gonna lie. It was also a fun process and very cathartic as well. We were very fortunate for the fact that when Black Pumas first started, Adrian had made a lot of the music beforehand. I also had the opportunity to share some of my own music with Adrian for the first project. This round, I had a lot more to do with the creation of the music outside of lyrics and melody." Burton noted how Chronicles Of A Diamond "feels more like a second debut" where "the handshake is almost reversed" between himself and Quesada, finding a new chemistry where his bandmate is now adding the finishing touches to his own creations. "We got really lucky, because the music that was sent on Adrian’s behalf for me to finish for the first album was really beautiful," said Burton. "Now, Adrian has kind of been tasked to embrace some of my really weird and interesting ideas as well as bringing back some of my older material." tinyurl.com

Playing the Sunset Tavern on Friday and Saturday night! Fronted by married songwriting duo Kim West and Ryan Devlin, the bands melodies and harmonies exude intimacy. The swirling synths of keyboardist/vocalist West cut through the heaviness of Devlin’s fuzzed out guitars like a neon sign in the night. Bassist Luke Ragnar fills in the bottom end with stylishly inventive bass lines that perfectly compliment Nick Krivchenia’s grounded and authoritative drums. With Ragnar’s voice in the mix, the band’s hallmark three part harmonies radiate. Lyrically, Devlin and West trade off telling personal stories of doubt and existential anxiety, while always keeping a hopeful eye to the future. Devlin’s gravel filled voice alongside West’s honey dipped melodies is a shot of raw whiskey spiking a cherry soda. The resulting alchemy is performed with a professional aplomb that not only highlights Smokey Brights stellar musicianship, but the genuine passion and love the group has for their music, each other, and their audience. tinyurl.com

Wild Nothing, aka Jack Tatum, shares, "This track was incredibly cathartic for me. It’s a song about your relationship reaching its most brittle moment and still trying to find even the smallest open window that can lead you back to that person. "Musically I was drawn towards something that felt very body centric and could help get me out of my own repetitive thought patterns. It’s a propulsive and hopeful track that’s meant to act as a release valve, but the somberness that inspired the song remains intact." As for the album, he writes, "I've sat with this record for a very long time now, so naturally I’m both excited and apprehensive to let it see the light. It’s my first record as a father. My first self-produced record since my debut. It’s a record that deals in existential themes but doesn’t always take itself too seriously. It’s not afraid of pop but it’s hopefully not afraid to be strange either. It has fun, gets sad, dwells in the quiet moments and embraces the loud ones. It’s me doing what I love and feeling grateful for it." tinyurl.com

This acclaimed album will be reissued as a 2-LP set on Crystal-Clear vinyl exclusively for Record Store Day Black Friday on November 24. The album is limited to 8,000 copies worldwide at participating indie retailers while supplies last. In addition, the band’s catalog is now available digitally through Rhino, including I Just Can’t Stop It and Special Beat Service. tinyurl.com This was written by The English Beat singer and guitarist Dave Wakeling, who revealed, "I was working in construction at the time, and it was the winter. I had forgotten to hang my jeans up to dry overnight, so when I got into the bathroom to shower up, I noticed my jeans were still on the floor, soaking wet, covered in sand. So I hung them up thinking well, it's probably best to have them steaming hot and wet. I went to shave, and it was snowing, and I really, really didn't want to go. "So I started talking to myself in the mirror as I was shaving up. And it was weird, because I looked deeper in the mirror, and I could see the little caption on the door behind, and I said to myself, Look, David, there's just me and you in here. The door's locked. We don't have to go to work. Of course we did. Got on the motorbike, and I just started pondering as I skated my way to the construction site on this motorbike. And that's how it started. It was thinking about how self-involvement turns into narcissism and how narcissism turns into isolation, and then how isolation turns into self-involvement again, and how what a vicious cycle that can become. "So then I just started thinking about different situations where people would ostensibly look like they were doing something, but in fact they were checking their own reflection out. And you'd see it perhaps on Saturday afternoon with people window shopping, half the time they're actually just looking at their own reflection. Then this restaurant opened, and it was a big deal at the time because it had glass tables, and I was like, oh, you can watch yourself." tinyurl.com

Hurray for the Riff Raff will be at Neumos on Saturday, March 30th, 2024. Alynda Segarra (Hurray for the Riff Raff) says the album was recorded the month after the death of her father, and described "Alibi" as "a plea, a last ditch effort to get through to someone you already know you’re gonna lose." They continued, "It’s a song to myself, to my Father, almost fooling myself because I know what’s done is done. But it feels good to beg. A reckoning with time and memory. The song is exhausted with loving someone so much it hurts." tinyurl.com

"I feel like we have developed our own unique sound to the point where we can ask ourselves 'what would Slothrust do?'" says drummer/percussionist Will Gorin. "The paradox being that if we knew, Slothrust would do the opposite." "Will and I have been playing different genres of music in different configurations together for almost 15 years now and that is a big part of our lock," says Slothrust guitarist, singer and songwriter Leah Wellbaum. "We know how to work with each other in a variety of different settings and how to communicate outside of what we do specifically. That offers us tremendous freedom." tinyurl.com

The band formed at Leeds Conservatoire in 2020, blending multiple trendy sounds that don’t normally go together. There’s some talky, angular post-punk in there, but also dream-pop and straight-ahead pop-rock. Lily Fontaine shares, "I wrote and recorded the demo in my bedroom in one day, during my final year of university in 2018. Moving to a city for university forced me to reflect on how my experience of growing up in and around Pendle, how witnessing the social, economic and political issues that exist around there in juxtaposition with the beauty of the landscape and the characters that live within in it, has shaped me into the artist and person that I am. These semi-rural stories leak into most of my writing; in particular, this song tackles delusions of grandeur and inferiority from the perspective of a small town’s local celebrities. It’s split into two halves." tinyurl.com

Happy National Clarinet Day! National Clarinet Day is celebrated on November 16 every year, and if you’re an aficionado of music, this day is for you. Do you know that it has been 3,000 years since the first hornpipes were created in Ancient Greece? This track features a clarinet. In his 2003 interview with Performing Songwriter magazine, Bowie explains that the song "Inchworm," which was sung by Danny Kaye in the 1952 movie Hans Christian Andersen, was a big influence on "Ashes To Ashes." Said Bowie, "I loved it as a kid and it's stayed with me forever. I keep going back to it. You wouldn't believe the amount of my songs that have sort of spun off that one song. Not that you'd really recognize it. Something like 'Ashes to Ashes' wouldn't have happened if it hadn't have been for 'Inchworm.' There's a child's nursery rhyme element in it, and there's something so sad and mournful and poignant about it. It kept bringing me back to the feelings of those pure thoughts of sadness that you have as a child, and how they're so identifiable even when you're an adult. There's a connection that can be made between being a somewhat lost five-year old and feeling a little abandoned and having the same feeling when you're in your twenties. And it was that song that did that for me." tinyurl.com

Celebrating National Clarinet Day! A clarinet is similar to a single-reed instrument and is a blowing-type musical instrument with a cylindrical body and a flared bell at the bottom. It is a musical instrument widely used in bands and orchestras, especially in the military. It comes from the family of woodwind instruments. Clarinet Day was created to give credit to this amazing instrument that is a favorite among most musicians around the world. There are many theories as to how the clarinet came into existence. It is said that the clarinet evolved from the ancient woodwind instrument named 'chalumeau.' The chalumeau is also said to be the ancestor of the instrument 'oboe.' Even today, a clarinet’s lower register is referred to as chalumeau. The first clarinet is said to have been developed in the 1700s by German musician Johann Christoph Denner. It was made in the key of C. Clarinets today are usually made in the key of B flat. Other modifications in the clarinet followed in the 1800s. For example, the mouthpiece was made to face backward, instead of the front, which gave clarinetists the ability to play the instrument more smoothly. This prototype was brought forward by German musician Heinrich Baermann. Later on, thirteen keys were added to the clarinet, giving the clarinetists the ability to play the chromatic scale. Thereafter, many new versions and types of clarinets emerged depending on the key used, the size, or the range of registers. The clarinet was used as the voice for the wolf in the famous composition "Peter and the Wolf."

"With A Hammer" was composed across a two-year period in New York, Seoul, and London, begun shortly after the release of "What We Drew" and during the lockdowns of the Coronavirus pandemic. It is a diaristic ode to self-exploration; the feeling of confronting one’s own emotions, and the transformation that is possible when we’re brave enough to do so. In this case, Yaeji examines her relationship to anger. It is a departure from her previous work, blending elements of trip-hop and rock with her familiar house-influenced style, and dealing with darker, more self-reflective lyrical themes, both in English and Korean. Yaeji also utilizes live instrumentation for the first time on this album—weaving in a patchwork ensemble of live musicians, and incorporating her own guitar playing. "With A Hammer" features electronic producers and close collaborators K Wata and Enayet, and guest vocals from London’s Loraine James and Baltimore’s Nourished by Time. bit.ly

Explaining what inspired the track, Nia shares, "I was on ma way to the studio with Clipz listening to Ranking Ann, who is one of my fave MCs—period. And then I was just thinking about the fact that like whenever I go to one of my shows, it’s like 85% women, aged 18-25, which is amazing! And they are all baddies, absolute junglists. So I wanted to make a song that represents that and the women that come to my raves. And that’s how 'Bad Gyalz' was born." tinyurl.com

Released on this day in 1999! In an interview with The New York Times, Dr. Dre spoke about his motivation to record the album and how he felt that he had to prove himself to fans and media again after doubts arose over his production and rapping ability. These doubts came from the fact that he had not released a solo studio album since 1992's The Chronic. Dre stated, "For the last couple of years, there's been a lot of talk out on the streets about whether or not I can still hold my own, whether or not I'm still good at producing. That was the ultimate motivation for me. Magazines, word of mouth and rap tabloids were saying I didn't have it any more. What more do I need to do? How many platinum records have I made? O.K., here's the album – now what do you have to say?" tinyurl.com