This fine Carpenter’s cover was discovered by my lovely wife who tells me that when she grabs the mic to sing, her favorite karaoke jam is this song. As for this version, it’s marvelous. Ms. Ericks channels Karen Carpenter excellently. Enjoy: https://www.youtube.com/user/ShaneEricks https://www.facebook.com/shaneericksmusic
On the eve of the Pitchfork Music Festival last month, I read the Chicago Tribune’s preview of the three day event. The article coded the entertainers by genre such as EDM, hip hop, indie, rock, etc. On day one, the first act was a rock band called Beach House. On day two, Brian Wilson was …
I have been on a Modest Mouse kick of late. Love the records Good News for People who Love Bad News and We Were Already Dead before the Ship Sank. I really love those records, pretty much in their entirety, but especially, “Ocean Breathes Salty.” My right now favorite lyric of all time is: “That …
Last Saturday night was a long anticipated event, the return of NJ ska band Streetlight Manifesto. SLM are a very tight band. They exude an energy on stage that is reflected in their music, but not in their physical actions. This is not a band that interacts much with their audience. They get up on …
I am extremely grateful that Ian Hunter is still with us. So underrated… He has a new record coming out called Cross My Fingers. Since I saw Ian and the Rant Band on their 2001 tour I honestly don’t think anyone has put out better music since. We’ve had Rant, Shrunken Heads“, Man Overboard, and …
A side project from her work as front woman of Philadelphia indie punk band Little Big League, Michelle Zauner released a tape in June 2013 under the solo moniker Japanese Breakfast. The tape was titled June and boasted thirty tracks written and recorded every day of the month. A stark deviation from Little Big League’s …
In light of the recent stories about Roger Ailes and what appears to be the locker-room culture at Fox News, this would be an appropriate musical theme for their broadcasts: Fountains of Wayne’s, “Traffic and Weather”. “We belong together, like traffic and weather . . . “
I saw the Furs the first time at the Riviera Theatre in Chicago on August 21, 1981, 34 years and 11 months to the day before last night’s show at the Santa Monica Pier. That show was opened by the Chicago power pop band, The Kind, and was followed by a night of dark droning …
This tune is truly special. It starts out pained, focused and inward but opens to illuminate an emotional story and sonic landscape as big as all of our sadnesses put together. The voice of Darling Cora (Darlene Cuevas) has a delicious range, vivid color and a soothing, comforting feel. She sounds like the Mona Lisa, …
Fitz and The Tantrums’ self-titled album came out June 10. The first single, “HandClap,” was #1 most added at Alternative radio for 3 weeks in a row, was in the Top 5 of Spotify’s US viral chart and is already in a FIAT ad. It’s big and danceable and may be the summer song for …
I shouldn’t like Skating Polly, two Oklahoma kids playing thrashy post punk, but it turns out I love them utterly to bits. I got the album on a whim, and to check them out further, seeing as it turns out I’d seen them live supporting Babes In Toyland. I’d kinda filed that away in the …
Friday night July 8 Seattle’s foremost punk club, El Corazon, hosted one of punk’s foremost bands, the Dickies. Hailing from So Cal, the Dickies have been around since 1977 and are essentially the clowns, the satire of punk rock while still being punk. The band integrates numerous props in their performance including an anatomically correct …
Maccie is from a different Portland, “I grew up in Portland, Ontario in foster care, and from a young age I used music as an escape. I always had a passion for singing but when I discovered the piano at age 8 I was hooked. I taught myself by ear, I learned piano, then moved …
From the album Impossible Dream out August 5, 2016:
Samm Henshaw will release his second EP, The Sound Experiment 2, via Columbia Records this summer. He describes this song as “a mission-statement to honing your craft, and being able to do anything when you put the work in.”
On Saturday June 25 the long awaited return of So Cal’s Tiger Army came to El Corazon. The last time Tiger Army played in Seattle I think it was 2008 or 2009. The band took some time off, but Seattle hadn’t forgotten them. The club was packed and there was already a good crowd when …
Today’s NPR Fresh Air show features a review of a debut album by Margaret Glaspy, who grew up in Red Bluff, CA. I once was treated to a private concert with some friends at her mother’s house, where she sang country tunes and Great American Songbook standards, with a banjo accompanist who did a respectable …
She’s all the rage in NYC. After you hear this song and see this video you will understand why she’s our unanimous 2016 Artist of the Year. Mitski insists she didn’t write this song to stick it to the smelly white boy indie rock establishment, but it works on that level anyway. Mitski will be …
As is my wont, I recently got hooked on a song released many years ago, a totally new discovery to the clueless me. The Cure’s “Exploding Boy” popped up on KEXP and I thought, “Holy shit, Robert Smith’s still got it.” Of course, the song was released probably circa 1980 as a B side. Anyway, …
Last Saturday I headed back to the Highline for a sweaty, rowdy night of pure punk rock. Headlining the event was Moral Crux, a band I’d seen once before and was totally blown away by. They blew me away again. Front man James Farris is the quintessential punk. Sporting short platinum spikes, tight leopard print …
Wednesday night April 27, Seattle’s Tractor Tavern hosted England’s Subways. Bursting with power and dripping with charisma, the band is led by they very boyish looking Billy Lunn. Add his brother Josh Morgan who thrashes the drum kit like a wild animal and Charlotte Cooper on bass. Charlotte was no slouch in the charm department. …
“Empty is just exactly what it says it is. A song about emptiness,”said the band’s Shirley Manson. Strange Little Birds, Garbage’s sixth studio album, due out on June 10, was recorded and produced by the band in Los Angeles and is the follow up to 2012’s heralded Not Your Kind of People. https://youtu.be/W5ZgmPpDtXs
Friday night April 22 I headed to Seattle’s Highline Bar for the first night of the 2016 Seattle Ska Fest. I’d been looking forward to this show for a long time that even the head cold I’d come down with earlier that day wouldn’t keep me away. Due to having to rescue my son whose …
Attention all you fans of punk pop, have you heard of the Subways? They’re an English punk pop trio and they’re coming to the Northwest this next week. Think New Found Glory meets the Runaways. They have a brand video out called Dirty Muddy Paws. Check it out here. They’re playing Seattle on April 27th …
Believe it or not, I’ve been to two Prince concerts. Not out of a “hometown boy made good” support kind of thing but mostly because Mrs. Rimkus was always smitten by him. And liked his music I suppose. They were electrifying shows. Those who never had the pleasure… Back in Prince’s early days, we boring …
Muddy Waters was interviewed countless times in his long career, often by people who had little knowledge of his life or his music. Pete Welding was a different case. He owned Testament Records, a Chicago Blues label that recorded many of Muddy’s contemporaries and friends. In this brief but illuminating interview, Welding knows the likely …
At once lush, scatalogical, heartfelt, cosmological, lyrically-piercing and honest, Melody Pool’s new single “Love, She Loves Me” is not easily forgotten. This tune forms part of her eagerly anticipated second album, Deep Dark Savage Heart which will be out 29 April 2016.
Melbourne MC REMI and musical collaborator Sensible J share their first single “For Good” featuring Sampa The Great, from their upcoming album Divas and Demons, due for release later this year. After the success of 2014’s Raw x Infinity, REMI returns with a Dilla inspired, soulful track that features Sampa’s raw and powerful poetry while …
Lake Jons is one of Finland’s most hyped bands, rolling in like a thick mist on a sweet northern wind. Although Lake Jons comes from a garage on the outskirts of Helsinki, their sound is birthed in the woods and melodies of the Nordic landscape. They combine the harshness of a folk-ish disposition with the …