LSQ

After years of admiring Jason Isbell's gifts as a songwriter and storyteller, I finally got to ask the alt-country artist about his earliest sparks of creativity, and it was fascinating to hear his memories of sitting on the front porch, singing with members of his extended family during weekly Sunday evening gatherings, and of listening to his Pentecostal preacher grandfather playing guitar,...

Alvvays have made some of my favorite indie music of the past decade, and although I’ve interviewed them briefly in the past, I loved going long with Molly Rankin from the band for episode 96. We talked about Alvvays’s awesome latest album, Blue Rev , the origins of “Archie, Marry Me,” which had it's 10th anniversary this year, about how Molly started writing songs as a teenager, inspired by l...

On the eve of Blonde Redhead ’s first new album in nine years, their excellent Sit Down For Dinner , the band’s Kazu Makino joins the LSQ podcast for episode 95. She talks about how the experience of making her own solo album a few years ago inspired a new confidence going into this Blonde Redhead album; the influence she took from growing up in a household where classical music was playing at a s...

Episode 94 features an interview with singer, songwriter and producer Andrew Wyatt , whose voice and tunes you probably know from a few different contexts: In addition to being the frontman and lead songwriter for alt-pop band Miike Snow, Wyatt keeps incredibly busy collaborating as a writer and producer with artists like Dua Lipa, Charlie XCX, Caroline Polachek, Lorde, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and many ot...

Fresh off releasing "Two Songs I Wrote in 1993 & Recorded Last Week," legendary Australian singer-songwriter Ben Lee joins me for episode 93 (pure numerological coincidence!) to reflect on key moments of musical discovery -- seeing Nirvana play at Big Day Out, starring in a school musical called Uncle Moishe and his Mitzvah Men , recording fucked-up sounding songs on his Tascam 244,...

"I always said, I felt like, when the five of us are together, the universe does something different," says Albert Hammond Jr , guitarist for The Strokes , of his band's cosmic connection. "From the moment I met them, even before we did anything, all of a sudden the world felt different. I can only explain it like in the Matrix when he sees the numbers, so then it didn't fee...

The incomparable Jenny Lewis joins me for LSQ #91 and, let me tell you, THIS is one of my all-time favorite episodes. Not only is Lewis an artist whose music I've admired since her days in Rilo Kiley, but over the course of our ~15 years of friendship, I've learned what a hilarious, generous, soulful and inspiring person she is, as well. The release of her excellent new album Joy'All g...

On the occasion of their new 26th studio album, The Girl is Crying In Her Latté , the legendary Los Angeles art-pop duo Sparks (brothers Ron and Russell Mael) join the LSQ podcast to talk about the evolution of their sound; their work with producers such as Giorgio Moroder and Todd Rundgren, and why they value being able to produce their own music nowadays; growing up in LA seeing concerts by Brit...

When she started playing guitar at age seven, Sunny War saw herself as the next Slash or Angus Young, a future shredder, certain to be a rock star, and definitely NOT a folk singer. And yet, here we are, it's 2023 and thanks to her excellent latest album, Anarchist Gospel , and a Triple A-radio hit single, "No Reason," she is finally getting well-deserved recognition as one of the mo...

To celebrate the release of the paperback edition of her beautiful, best-selling memoir, Crying In H Mart , and its accompanying book tour, the author -- celebrated indie singer-songwriter Michelle Zauner of Japanese Breakfast -- joins the LSQ podcast for a conversation that explores her early experiences in both writing and music. She also shares that her next book is already in development, as s...

KP, the singer-songwriter at the helm of Black Belt Eagle Scout , joins the LSQ pod to talk about their beautiful new album, The Land, The Water, The Sky, recorded as KP was transitioning back to living in their homelands in the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community , in LaConner, Washington. We talk about how KP first got into playing and writing music, learning to play Für Elise by ear on the piano...

Ryan Lott and Ian Chang from the experimental trio Son Lux talk about their Academy Award-nominated work on the score and soundtrack for the beautiful, epic film Everything Everywhere All At Once , which is as brilliantly unclassifiable as the movie itself. Their score is nominated for Best Original Score and the end credits tune (a duet between Mitski and David Byrn e, who cowrote the tune with S...

Post-punk pioneer Gina Birch (bassist and founding member of UK band The Raincoats) joins the LSQ podcast on the eve of releasing her first ever solo album, the refreshing and irreverent collection I Play My Bass Loud , produced by Youth and out this week via Third Man . In episode 85, Birch talks about important music memories from her childhood (hearing her brother's Bob Marley records through t...

For the first episode of Season 6 of the LSQ podcast, I was honored to welcome an artist whose words and music I have admired for nearly thirty years now: the Mountain Goats ' John Darnielle. In episode 84, John shares fascinating insight into his early creative inklings, the music he loved as a kid, and how he went from clinging to his Aristocats soundtrack to embracing Elton John and the Bay Cit...

U.K. artist Kae Tempest , on the first time they ever spit rhymes in public, at age 15: “I remember pushing through the crowd. I remember the tunnel vision. I remember reaching for the mic. I remember, like, the heat, the fever — your whole body beginning to like go into almost like unbearable minute precision-detail slow motion, and then the words. That was 20 years ago. More! And it's the same f...

Bartees Strange reflects on important moments during his musical development, including: Learning to sing alongside his opera and gospel singer mother, who brought him to most of her performances as a child, until eventually he was singing alongside her. “There's something magical being a child in an opera Hall, hearing sound without microphones, bouncing off of the wood, bouncing off of the space...

On the heels of their excellent latest LP, LA indie-pop trio MUNA (Katie Gavin, Josette Maskin and Naomi McPherson) call into the LSQ podcast from the road, to talk about their individual experiences falling in love with music as kids, how they came together to form MUNA, and how their approach has evolved over the years. The original ethos remains: “We decided to make music that made us feel good...

This is a special bonus episode for LSQ listeners of a podcast I had an excellent time collaborating on, as producer, with alt-J . Things Will Get Better is a five-episode podcast miniseries that explores the U.K. band's early days, and the making of their incredible, groundbreaking debut album, An Awesome Wave, in honor of its tenth anniversary. Within the series, the band revisit Ash Grove, the...

"As young, upcoming artists, we aim to be the examples we saw, but as you grow in your artistry, you realize that example was only there to show you you could do it. Now it's time for you to take that example and interpret it into who you are. So, the less I tried to be like Lauryn [Hill], the more I could be Sampa. And the more I could see what I love, the stories I love to tell, the music I grew...

One of the most influential guitarists and songwriters of all time, Johnny Marr ( The Smiths , Electronic , The The , Modest Mouse , The Cribs ) delves into major moments in his creative evolution, from discovering his love of guitar at age five to finding favorite artists like Marc Bolan and Patti Smith and The Only Ones as a teenager to joining his first band (Sister Ray; he was fourteen, playin...

The young San Diego singer-songwriter Jelani Aryeh caught my attention with his awesome tune "Stella Brown" a couple years back, and I really enjoyed his debut full-length, I've Got Some Living To Do , from 2021. But I especially loved the brief interview I got to do with Jelani last year for XMU, and was left with so many more questions for him about these early days in his career as an artist. S...

One of my favorite insights from Belle & Sebastian ’s Stuart Murdoch in episode #75: “Maybe 1994 or 1995, a switch came on, and I started writing better songs. There's no doubt about that. I remember writing a song called ‘Dog on Wheels’ at the start of 1995, and then quickly after that, I wrote a song called ‘The State I Am In,’ a song called ‘Lord Anthony,’ ‘Sleep The Clock Around,' and it s...

“I remember meeting [guitarist] Nick [Kivlen] outside a bar that we couldn't get into because we were probably 17,” says Sunflower Bean’s Julia Cumming, reflecting on the New York City indie rock trio’s early days. “He said, ‘I’m starting a band called Sunflower Bean, and I had this gut feeling, like, ‘Oh sh*t, I’m gonna join that band, aren’t I? And it became my life.” In a conversation recorded...

“Fill in the blanks” - that’s how Grammy-nominated hip-hop, jazz and R&B artist, musician and producer Terrace Martin describes the special sauce he brings to any collaboration. What he means is that he is ready, willing and able to offer whatever tools from his well-equipped creative shed the situation calls for. Whether that’s playing saxophone (which he does at a master level) or putting to...

It did honestly feel like one of those Wayne’s World "I’m-not-worthy" moments when I first got on the Zoom with the legendary Steven Van Zandt for the interview in episode 73 of the LSQ podcast. Was truly was an honor and pleasure to get to ask him about his creative ideas and process. Last fall, the musician, songwriter, producer, activist, DJ/radio maven, actor, and more, added "author" to his b...