We like to believe Sam Beam is one of our own. Though he hails about as far away as you can get, from South Carolina and later Florida, the first three Iron & Wine albums were released on Seattle's celebrated label Sub Pop. And of course, KEXP was one of the first radio stations to get behind his incredible debut, whose hushed rustic quality helped spark our own local alt-folk movement through friendship with bands like Band of Horses and Carissa's Weird (and having been first published by Yeti magazine). More than 10 years later, Iron & Wine has evolved through experimentation and collaboration, and even though his 70's pop influenced 2011 LP was something of a game-changer, Samuel Beam hasn't forgotten his roots, which he displayed openly to a massive and adoring crowd during our SXSW broadcast last month. Though not quite naked as he came, Beam stood alone onstage at Mellow Johnny's Bike Shop with merely an acoustic guitar and ran through a handful of songs from throughout his career, taken mostly from audience requests, along with three songs from his forthcoming album. A far cry from his orchestrated full band festival shows of 2011, this was a rare moment to see and hear how it all started: just a glad man singing.
Full Performance:
It's been hard for us to forget the beautiful and intimate session we had with Ólafur Arnalds during our Iceland Airwaves broadcast last year at KEX Hostel. This year, when we saw that the young Icelandic composer and songwriter would be performing at SXSW, we wanted to get him live on air again, n…
There are few moments in rock 'n' roll as iconic as the opening drum-and-breath line in "Time of the Season." Yet unlike many of their British Invasion co-horts (like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Who and The Moody Blues), The Zombies never reached the same level of success. Maybe it was tha…
