Monotown: it's a name you'll be hearing a lot on KEXP, and hopefully everywhere else, in 2013. Over the past several years, our trips to Iceland have allowed us to discover bands sometimes even before they've released any albums (as was the case with Of Monsters and Men in 2010), or at least before they've reached the wider audiences they deserve, like Sóley and Sin Fang. One of the most promising groups we saw in 2012 hadn't yet even mastered their debut, but they blew us away with their impassioned, full-fledged sound. Mash boisterous Britpop with Morricone-esqe spaghetti westerns soundtracks, add a healthy dose of late 60's Beatles, and you'll get a hint of what Monotown promises with their upcoming release, In The Eye Of The Storm. During Iceland Airwaves '12, we met up with Monotown to record three songs with them at Studio-Syrland in downtown Reykjavik. Trust us, you're going to want to hear this now:
Another Icelandic band whose debut we are eagerly looking forward to is Mr. Silla, a "supergroup" of sorts, led by Sigurlaug Gísladóttir (a.k.a. Silla) of of múm, and members of Sin Fang, amiina, Seabear, Tilbury and other great bands. We caught them in their studio a year ago, when they had just a…
It's not every day a musical legend walks through your door. At age 70, with some 50 years in the music industry as a performer, composer, and producer, John Cale has made an indelible stamp on the history of music alone and alongside fellow legends like Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, The Sto…
Over the last eight years, alt-country band The Maldives have become one of the Northwest's most celebrated and liked bands. Their live shows are joyful occasions that bring the crowd together, as all good concerts do, with swagger, soul, and hearts-on-sleeves abandon. The Ballard-based band stop…
For the rest of the year, we'll be spotlighting our KEXP DJs Top Albums of 2012, leading up to our 2012 Top Album Countdown, as voted on by our listeners! Voting ends today, Friday, December 21st, so let us know your favorites right now, and tune in on Friday, December 28th to hear if your picks ma…
