Live on KEXP

From his beginning with a pen and paper in 2009 to the release of his 2017 full-length debut Watercolor, Porter Ray has been one of the increasingly prominent, hardest-working talents in Seattle for some time. His art has never been more fully realized than it is on Watercolor, which finds him meditating on his life in Seattle and the death of his brother with poignance and incision laid across sm...

There's a low-key nuance to Haley Heynderickx's silvery guitar-based songs, but their brilliance radiates through stronger at a quieter level. That's to say nothing of the Portland-based artist's positivity-seeking outlook (“We saw a bald eagle and five rainbows on the way up here!”) and the colorful additions of the brass and horn arrangements she brings to this session on Aud...

Tommy Stinson put Bash & Pop on hold for just over two decades before reviving it last year, but the Minneapolis group's raucous, delightfully unhinged energy remains intact because, as the onetime Replacement says, “I'm not pretending to be anything other than what I am.” Stinson and the band run through five cuts from their 2017 LP Anything Could Happen and tell the story of why the band cam...

After taking time to do projects that allowed him to, in his own words, “take some time off from being Jens Lekman,” the Swedish musician has returned to his day job of being himself with his latest LP, the cleverly-titled Life Will See You Now.  Returning to the KEXP Live Room with DJ Stevie Zoom, Lekman and his band play a quartet of dance-friendly tunes from Life and discuss how interviewing ot...

With their latest album HeartTones, Julia Massey and the Five Finger Discount have sharpened their kinetic pop-rock more than ever before, building their latest batch of songs with an agile energy that belies their emotional resonance. The Seattle trio return to KEXP on a cold February day for a session on Audioasis featuring four songs from HeartTones.  Recorded 2/4/2017 - 4 songs: A Bit Of Hard...

Ranging from searing heat to sludgy gravel, Meatbodies' powerful, muscular, and meaty (of course) garage rock is an immediate rush of blood to the head, more than ever on their latest album, Alice.  Joining DJ Morgan in studio, the band runs through six Alice tracks, discusses their guilty pleasures, and helps Morgan name her potential Meatbodies cover band. Recorded 2/23/2017 - 6 songs: King...

Paris Combo's most recent album, this year's Tako Tsubo, is named for the Japanese-named condition of what's commonly known as “broken heart syndrome”, but it's hardly morose. If anything, the colorful, flowing sounds of this session imply that there's anything but sadness in the multinational group's spirit. The vibrant, jazz-influenced outfit join Darek Mazzone on W...

While everyone else in Seattle was decked out in rain boots and all-weather jackets, the dapper Los Angeles quartet Chicano Batman returned to the KEXP studio dressed to the nines, bringing a bit of psychedelic sunshine to one of the wettest Seattle winters in recent memory. The band's ebullient tropicalia- and psychedelia-tinged rock has only grown sharper on their latest album, Freedom is F...

“Well, we couldn't get faster.” That's how Cloud Nothings frontman Dylan Baldi explains the (relatively) slower tunes on their latest album Life Without Sound, but the Ohio crew has hardly slowed down. The quartet join Cheryl Waters in the KEXP Live Room to play four searing songs and talk about the process of making Life Without Sound, as well as why bands should stop in for the green r...

Cherry Glazerr's rip-roaring rock and roll documents, to paraphrase band leader Clementine Creevy, “the struggles of a 17 year-old”, at the only volume that makes sense for that age - loud. Cherry Glazerr's latest album, 2017's perfectly-named Apocalipstick, is loaded with guitar-heavy jams that channel that youthful energy with a barely-contained chaos that shines through in this frenetic session...

The last time Ty Segall was in KEXP's studio, he ripped off a baby mask and squealed into the mic before he'd even played a single song. About a year later, he's definitely more coherent in his interview - he doesn't ask Cheryl Waters to be his mommy this time around - but he's still anything but boring in this explosive session. Joining his “surrogate mommy” Cheryl Waters...

There's a wave of fantastic music coming out of Sydney at the moment, but Australia's Middle Kids never get overshadowed by their scene siblings. The silvery rock trio's knack for steely hooks and gleaming tones made them a breakout artist in summer 2016, and nine months later, they're continuing to realize their potential. Joining DJ Troy Nelson in the KEXP Live Room, the yout...

The first thing that jumps out listening to Seattle's Maiah Manser is her loping, almost acrobatic vocals. But as the session goes on, it's just as impressive to see how her electronic compositions work themselves around her evocative voice to create swirling, hypnotic sounds. Joining DJ Sharlese on Audioasis, Manser displays the enrapturing characteristics that have made her debut EP su...

Howe Gelb's multiple-decade catalog is hard to pin down, but the one current that runs through it all is the Tucson, Arizona musician's warm-burning songwriting. The sometime Giant Sand leader pares down to a piano for his latest record, Future Standards, and accompanied only by a bassist, Gelb doubles down on the songwriting skills he's honed over his decades in this incandescent session with DJ...

There's a reason Seattle's Nail Polish called their most recent release Authentic Living. The trio's rapid-fire punk pulls no punches when it comes to documenting the struggle for finding authenticity in an ever-evolving Emerald City. Joining DJ Sharlese on Audioasis, the band cuts straight to the point with their ferocious six-song set and an interview where they expand on their observations of t...

Greta Morgan went into an “intense headspace” for her latest album as Springtime Carnivore, and the result was Midnight Room, her most finessed and melodic set of songs to date. Morgan returns to the KEXP studios for a semi-acoustic session featuring four Midnight Room tracks and a conversation with Cheryl Waters about the process of working with producer Chris Coady to make a song “sound like cob...

Including her rich new album Impossible Dream, Haley Bonar has released seven albums of resonant, roots-refined rock and in her debut session in the KEXP studios with fellow Minnesotan DJ Kevin Cole, her experience as a songwriter and performer shines through. Playing four Impossible Dream tunes, Haley and her band tell the story of her songwriting evolution from a high schooler putting out an alb...

For their fourth album, Amen and Goodbye, Yeasayer spent the longest time they've spent to date working on writing songs, and the end result contains some of their richest, most nuanced music yet. The Brooklyn outfit brings four Amen and Goodbye tracks into this session with Troy Nelson and discuss what goes into a Yeasayer record, working with Joey Waronker, and making an effort to play the Dakot...

Hamilton Leithauser is a veteran of the KEXP studios by this point in his career, but his rough and tumble brand of doo wop-damaged rock has never sounded as rich as it has on his 2016 collaborative album with Rostam, I Had a Dream That You Were Mine. The New York City songwriter is in fine form as he and a three-piece band run through four tracks from the album in this session with DJ Morgan. Rec...

"This is the music of the spirit," proclaims host John Gilbreath ahead of Jaimeo Brown's Transcendence's majestic set. It's high praise, certainly, but the trio of percussionist Jaimeo Brown, guitarist Chris Sholar, and saxophonist Jaleel Shaw create music that is truly impossible to box into any one category. Dive into this three-song performance transcendent performance on Jazz Theatre...

With three songwriters and a wave of melodic guitars behind them, LVL UP have more depth and nuance than most of their peers, but their music is never ostentatious about its DIY majesty. The Brooklyn quartet join Cheryl Waters in the KEXP studio to tell the story of how they went from being three musicians' side project to a unified band and to play a vibrant, expressive set of indie rock on the M...

They're wearing clothes and are normally sized (at least in this session), but make no mistake - Naked Giants rip and roar as powerfully as they would even if they were the unclothed titans their name implies. The Seattle trio enter the KEXP studio, plug in, and charge ahead so hard that two out of the three members don't finish the session with their headphones on (only because the thir...

The Moscow-via-New York songwriter Regina Spektor has been writing songs to capture a wide spectrum of vivid anecdotes, observations, and narratives for more than 15 years now, but for her latest record, 2016's Remember Us to Life, she atypically anchored herself to one inspiration: her pregnancy and the subsequent birth of her son. Performing solo on a grand piano, Spektor joins Larry Rose i...

It's always a special night (or day) when the soul journeymen Lee Fields enters KEXP's studios. Fields' energy is as infectious as that of any frontman half his age, to say nothing of the explosive, colorful sounds of his backing band the Expressions. Joining Larry Rose in the KEXP studio, Fields walks in and conquers the room moments after starting his first song with a confidence that only a man...

Their name implies that they have bad posture, but Sloucher are definitely not slackers leaning back in their desks at the back of the classroom. The Seattle outfit's locktight songwriting shows they've been paying attention to their Pacific Northwest indie rock predecessors in this brilliant session on Audioasis with Sean Nelson. Recorded 10/2/2016 - 6 songs: Flower Girl, Constant Questions, Drea...