Jason McCue - When He Drinks

Sevdaliza - "Wallflower" from the 2020 album Shabrang on Twisted Elegance. Iranian-born, Dutch-based artist and producer Sevdaliza began her career as a professional basketball player before turning her discipline and talent to music, combining Persian mythology with trip-hop, crafting sensual soundscapes with hypnotic vocals. She describes her second full-length, Shabrang, as "kind of like a letter that I wrote to myself." She continues to French fashion magazine L'Officiel, "It is my own holy grail. I had to write and record this album in order to regain my trust and belief in life and in love. I always felt like an observer, and I think that with this album I'm materializing my observations of life and love in that particular period of my life — the past few years have been a roller coaster ride. But I think that with the album, I'm always trying to return to my life. With this record, I also hope that it will bring light and hope to the people that are listening to it. My first record was kind of like a very long therapy session and this is more of a jump towards conveying the light that I found in those first few years and always trying to go back to it." Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

9 Feb 20213min

Claud - "Soft Spot" from the 2021 album Super Monster on Saddest Factory. This Friday, February 12th, singer/songwriter Claud Mintz (who records as Claud) will release their debut album Super Monster via Phoebe Bridgers’ Saddest Factory Records, and what could be a better endorsement than being the first album released by Bridgers’ new imprint for Dead Oceans? Today's Song of the Day is a dreamy rumination on a relationship gone. Claud confirms in a press release, stating “‘… Sigh. I have a soft spot for lots of people, places, and things. This song is about knowing I can’t be with this one specific person, but my feelings won’t go away… I still hope I run into them, or they randomly text me about something. It’s just me romanticizing what I can’t have and being like ‘but what if…’” The accompanying video, directed by Brad Bischoff, captures that wistfulness. "Something I’ve come to realize in the last couple years is that moving away is VERY different than moving on (seems obvious but is really not … ). This video is about the stuff that you can’t seem to leave behind and that comes with you wherever you go, whether they’re good things or not so good things." Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

8 Feb 20213min

Gibraltar - "O, Devilish Sailor" from the 2021 self-released album Modern Mischief. It's been a few years since we last heard from Seattle post-rockers Gibraltar, but the trio return this March with the new full-length Modern Mischief. The album's first single features guest horn players Sari Breznau on trumpet, and Nate Henry on tenor sax, adding a soulful touch to the angular guitar and punchy percussion. In a statement to the Big Takeover, frontman and founding member Aaron Starkey shares the story behind the track: “Lyrically, [“O Devilish Sailor”] is about feeling powerless with the decisions that our bodies make for us. I tried to, lyrically, have a conversation about the frustrations I have with my own body. The generation of the song though, musically, came from a challenge that [drummer] Nick [Biscardi] put forth to me about writing song ideas at home versus jamming in the rehearsal room.” “My approach had always been to just get in a room and sweat it out, and he (strongly) suggested that I play around with ideas and structures on my own… and so the gauntlet was thrown and I dug in over a weekend and tried to compose more of the concept. What we ended up recording became far more than my modest home recording attempt, but I’m grateful for finally getting past the hurdle of how I’d been writing up to that point.” Modern Mischief will be out digitally on March 22nd, with a physical product shipping out on or around March 26th. Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

5 Feb 20213min

Mogwai - "Ritchie Sacramento" from the 2021 album As the Love Continues on Temporary Residence Ltd. Today's Song of the Day gets its title from someone's mispronunciation of the name Ryuchi Sakamoto, famed Japanese composer. Scottish post-rock band Mogwai transformed the flub into a tribute for David Berman, the musician behind the Silver Jews who passed away in 2019. “I was inspired by a story that Bob Nastanovich put online on the anniversary of the death of Dave Berman from Silver Jews,” frontman Stuart Braithwaite told NME. “When they were students, Dave threw a shovel at a sports car. That’s the first line of the song: ‘Rise crystal spear’. Obviously Dave was an amazing poet, songwriter and musician. I took the lead from there. I wouldn’t pretend to be able to write songs as good as him, but he’s definitely a huge inspiration.” Braithwaite continued: “It’s been a hard few years. There are a lot of people that we played with and were friends with that just aren’t around now. This songs is about those people, imagined conversations… and Dave Berman throwing a shovel at a sports car!” Mogwai’s tenth album, As the Love Continues, will be out February 19th via Temporary Residence Ltd./Rock Action. Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

4 Feb 20214min

Barbarossa - "Iris2Iris" from the 2021 album Love Here Listen on Memphis Industries. Barbarossa – aka UK-based musician/producer James Mathé – returns this March with his sixth album, Love Here Listen. Today's Song of the Day gives a first listen to the forthcoming full-length. In a statement, Mathé explains the track: "I was thinking about how I have moments of clarity more and more as I get older of what is really meaningful in my life and how I can best use my time in this life. The moments are often short-lived though, so I look at ways of accessing this mental state more. My kids bring me into this state and nature too. I jump in icy water now I live by the sea and it brings me into fight or flight, it brings what’s important to the forefront of my mind. The song is about spending more of your life with your eyes open, confronting everything that you are dealt with." As he did with his 2018 album Lier, Mathé again teamed up with fellow producer Ghost Culture (Daniel Avery, Kelly Lee Owens), using vintage synths to craft their dreamy electronica sound. "It was probably the most stress-free record to date and so much fun just messing around with synth arps," Ghost Culture told The Line of Best Fit. "It’s easy with James as we really understand each other and I trust him totally. He lives five minutes’ walk along the seafront from me. We even jumped in the sea a couple of times after lunch." Love Here Listen will be out March 5th via Memphis Industries. Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

3 Feb 20213min

El Michels Affair - "Murkit Gem" from the 2021 album Yeti Season on Big Crown Records. Multi-instrumentalist, writer, and producer Leon Michels has a long history in the Brooklyn music scene, with too many credits to list, but a few include being a touring member of Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings and The Black Keys, a co-founder of the The Menahan Street Band, a co-producer on Aloe Blacc’s album Good Things, and he was even a credited writer on Adele’s blockbuster album, 19. With his current project El Michels Affair, he brings his decades of experience together for a unique instrumental soul sound. His upcoming album, Yeti Season, combines R&B and jazz with Turkish and Persian psych-funk. Today's featured track features guest vocals from artist Piya Malik. "When Piya started singing in Hindi, she had a different voice, a different tone," Michels said in a press release. "I knew we had to do something together." Yeti Season is out on Big Crown Records on March 18th. Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

2 Feb 20213min

Nation of Language - "Deliver Me From Wondering Why," a 2021 self-released single. Brooklyn synth-pop duo Nation Of Language sent us swooning with last year's debut full-length, titled Introduction, Presence. Earlier this month, they returned with the new single "Deliver Me From Wondering Why," another new wave-inspired track that sounds straight from a '80s film soundtrack. The band layer video game-esque sounds against the programmed beats, adding soaring out-of-this-world effects. In a press statement, frontman/songwriter Ian Devaney shared more about the song: “Deliver Me From Wondering Why” is a bit of an exploration, rooted in a desire for something repetitious and a bit spacey — something that would make you really want to zone out or go for a long drive on the highway. (Ideally not at the same time.) We worked on it with Nick Millhiser (Holy Ghost!) and it was just a really fun exercise in letting the track carry us wherever it was going to go. The backbone of the steady synth arpeggios and rhythms just leads endlessly forward and lets the mind wander around it. Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

1 Feb 20214min

Toni Banx - "Chanel No. 5" from the 2020 album I Like It Here on Fifth House Media. And you know I get down on myself / I ain’t better that nobody else / But I’m better than what I done been through / Too late to say that I miss you Seattle's Fifth House is both a media outlet, and a duo (as featured in KEXP's October 2020 edition of In Our Headphones). Half of that duo — the richly-voiced Toni Banx — has emerged with the solo EP I Like It Here. Today's Song of the Day is a soulful ode to the loss of a relationship, and the stories, and scents, left behind. Read the full post on KEXP.orgSupport the show: https://www.kexp.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

29 Jan 20213min