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WITCH - Waile Nov 09, 2022

Show notes

WITCH - "Waile" a 2022 single on Desert Daze/Partisan.

It's been almost 40 years since WITCH (which stands for "We Intend To Cause Havoc") caused some havoc.

The Zambia-based band were early adopters of the "Zamrock" sound, a combination of traditional African music with psychedelic rock, releasing seven albums back in the '70s and '80s. After Zambia-born hip-hop artist Sampa The Great featured them on her latest LP As Above, So Below, WITCH decided to reconvene, releasing the single "Waile."

"'Waile' was one of the songs that I brought to the WITCH when I joined in 1978," explained keyboardist Patrick Mwondela via a press release. "While it was played live often back in the day, it was never recorded until the new formation of the band picked it up 43 years later during a rehearsal on an island in Kenya, where the band embraced it and made it their own. A few months after that, they gave it a new lease of life by recording it in Lusaka’s legendary DB Studios. Sang in my native language Luvale, the subject matter is a nostalgic wailing for home of ancient African tribes that would eventually settle in Zambia."

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Cuffed Up - 10 for 10 Nov 08, 2022

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Cuffed Up - "10 for 10," a 2022 single on Corduroy Recordings.

Los Angeles-based trio Cuffed Up return with a punk-pop pep-rally anthem for anyone struggling with imposter syndrome.

"It's deeply rooted in confidence," vocalist and guitarist Ralph Torrefranca told Atwood Magazine. "The dialogue in the song follows a creative, trying to understand the negative thoughts that plagues their mind every time they feel the imposter syndrome. The chorus is the heavy-handed conclusion that they arrive to every time but the bridge is the 'big aha! moment' where the character finally realizes that they are amazing at what they do and are in fact, 10/10."

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Winter - sunday Nov 07, 2022

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Winter - "sunday" from the 2022 album What Kind of Blue Are You? on Bar/None.

Songwriter Samira Winter (who records as Winter) returns with her sophomore full-length, What Kind of Blue Are You?, described as an "emotional excavation of [her] purest self." The new album features guest appearances from artists like Hatchie and Sasami. "“I feel like I’ve come full circle, making an album that my 22-year-old self who just started Winter would love," she says in a press release. "It’s my inner shadow girl, revealing herself in all her brokenness, despair, and beauty.”

Winter describes today's Song of the Day as "a fever dream meditation on social media toxicity," a topic she says is "always on my mind and generates a lot of fear and anxiety for me. It’s a critique on social media’s effect on mental health and contorted beauty standards for women."

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Lydia Ramsey - I Will Wait For You Nov 04, 2022

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Lydia Ramsey - “I Will Wait For You” from the 2022 self-released album Like A Dream.

Lydia Ramsey is an Indianola, WA-born, Seattle-based Americana artist that’s been channeling the vintage folk sounds of Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt since 2016. Her wistful melodies and enchanting vocals and often simple in presentation: just a guitar or banjo, perhaps some twinkling piano, and showstealingly lovely coos.

Her latest record Like A Dream was released in September and hones in on the collective thoughts, anxieties, and loneliness felt during the pandemic. Our Song of the Day “I Will Wait For You” is especially relatable looking back on those lockdown days but also for many still, as she speaks to a friend - or perhaps to herself - in the depths of despair, encouraging them to keep moving forward.

“Running through your head /What if this lasts forever,” Ramsey quavers. “It’s bitter end in these days without being close together.” Resiliently, she presses on, hoping, waiting, and praying for the day in which things “will be better than ever.”

Ramsey collaborated with a number of longtime musician-friends, engineer Johnny Bregar, and New York-based engineer/producer, D. James Goodwin (The National, Kevin Morby, Blitzen Trapper) on Like A Dream. Watch the intimate Jacob Rosen-directed video for “I Will Wait For You" and read the full post at KEXP.org.

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Rival Consoles - World Turns Nov 03, 2022

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Rival Consoles - “World Turns” from the 2022 album Now Is on Erased Tapes.

Ryan Lee West has been making electronic music under the name Rival Consoles since 2007, experimenting with a diverse range of styles and influences primarily with analog equipment. His latest release Now Is was made during the pandemic and sees the English producer in a contemplative mood, painting an atmospheric kaleidoscope of occasionally glitchy sounds. He had this to say about the record:

“There are some pieces that are influenced quite strongly by the isolation and anxiety of these times. There are also pieces which are more optimistic and vibrant, which I think is a consistent attitude of my records, as I want art to express many aspects of life.”

Our Song of the Day, “World Turns,” thrums with spacey energy, slowly unfolding and retracting. Not quite a dancefloor jam, the song mimics the spinning orb we live on and the twinkling stars that sit amongst it, making the song a perfect late-night headphones listen.

Check out Rival Consoles' Boiler Room set from 2016 and read the full post at KEXP.org.

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Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs - When the Lights Go Nov 02, 2022

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Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs - “When the Lights Go” from the 2022 album When the Lights Go on Nice Age.

Over the past decade, Orlando Higginbottom has been thriving under the name Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs. The British producer scored a Grammy nomination for his collaboration with Bonobo, and has released several singles and EPs since his 2012 debut LP Trouble.

Ten years later, he shares his sophomore full-length, When The Lights Go, which he says is "about love and the end of the world."

“I think that the record starts and all the ideas are quite direct, and then it gets murkier and murkier as it goes on,” he told Rolling Stone UK. But as we move further away from the lockdown, the apocalypse isn't quite as front of mind. “It’s kind of nice to get this material off my chest. The next record I’m working on is much more hopeful. I’ve come out and I’m very far over the other side now.”

Read the full story at KEXP.org

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United Freedom Collective - MERCY (feat. FACESOUL) Nov 01, 2022

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United Freedom Collective - “MERCY (feat. FACESOUL)” from the 2022 Am Ta EP on Dama Dama.

At the core of the United Freedom Collective are three musicians: Mathieu Seynaeve, WaiFung Tsang, and Robbie Redway. The trio convened in a remote barn in Cornwall, in South West England, to create music inspired by Zen Taoism, Buddhism, Jungian analysis, meditation, yoga, and more. “It’s supposed to be something more than us” they explain in a press statement, “it’s music with intention, music for healing”.

This open and experimental approach can be heard on their debut EP Am Ta. The intentional band name of "United Freedom Collective" leaves the door open for frequent collaborators, and on today's Song of the Day, we hear from Somali-born, U.K.-based singer/songwriter FACESOUL, who the band describe as "a dear brother who spent some time with us in Cornwall earlier this year to cook up some magic with his unbelievable voice."

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Bill Callahan - Coyotes Oct 31, 2022

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Bill Callahan - “Coyotes” from the 2022 album YTI⅃AƎЯ on Drag City.

Singer/songwriter Bill Callahan is shaking up reality — literally, with the backwards title of his latest LP, YTILAER, out now via his long-time label Drag City.

“It felt like it was necessary to rouse people — rouse their love, their kindness, their anger, rouse anything in them. Get their senses working again,” he shared in a press release.

On today's Song of the Day, that reality takes us to his backyard, where the titular animal made its presence known. “We lived for awhile in a house in the hills,” he explained. “Coyote hills. The coyotes would start their song at dawn. Dawn and dusk were their main appearance times. Our dog would sleep outside sometimes in the morning and our boy was still bite-size. The coyotes would come take notes, edging closer each day. Mornings on the kingsize outdoor daybed. Like a righteous floating tide the coyotes would drift into our world. Predator and prey, blurred. Past and present, blurred. The young, the aged are to be snatched and devoured. Past lives edge in closer to try to speak to us. Current lives eye the past ones like sleeping dogs. And love spans all, that is why the feeling is so deep — deeper than one lifetime.”

Read the full story at KEXP.org

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Grynch - Paper Route (feat. Sir Mix‐A‐Lot) Oct 28, 2022

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GrynchPaper Route (feat. Sir Mix‐A‐Lot)from the 2022 self-released album Born in '86.

Nearly fifteen years after dropping his debut full-length, My Second Wind, Grynch is back with his first solo record since 2014 titled Born in ‘86. While it may be a solo record, that doesn’t mean the Seattle-born-and-bred rapper isn’t still open to sharing the mic. The deeply collaborative artist invited artists like Boom Bap Project, Blake Lewis, Prometheus Brown, and Daz Dillinger to help add color to the nostalgia-hued record.

But there’s no collaboration more deeply Seattle than our Song of the Day. “Paper Route” sees none other than the big-booty-loving Sir Mix a Lot join Grynch for a song that recognizes the resilience it takes to continue on the winding and fickle journey of being a longstanding musician. “I could never do a thing that I aint about,” Grynch spits on the chorus, “Suckers out here running miles /Chasing clout /But when it’s all said and done and they faded out /I’m gonna still be getting mine on my paper route.”

Watch Grynch's KEXP in-studio performance of fan-favorite “My Volvo” from all the way back in 2010 and read the full post at KEXP.org.

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Bosq - Song for Ehi (feat. The Ibibio Horns and Kaleta) Oct 27, 2022

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4348Kevin ColeThursday10/27/22BosqSong for Ehi (feat. The Ibibio Horns and Kaleta)a 2022 single on Canopy Limited.

Bosq is the musical pseudonym for Benjamin Woods, who has been utilizing Afro-Latin music in fusion with Funk, Disco, Reggae, House and Hip Hop to dazzling effect for a decade now. The Boston-bred, Colombia-based musician has released 4 full albums, heaps of EP's of original music, and countless collaborative singles and remixes with artists like Fania Records, Orchestre Poly Rhythmo de Cotonou, Poolside, Nickodemus, and many more.

He recently teamed up with the horn section of Ibibio Sound Machine as well as vocalist Kaleta for a fiery new single released via Portugal-based label Canopy Records, whose specialty is “Sub-Saharan synth swagger, re-calibrated and re- celebrated.” Titled “Song for Ehi,” the track is a combination of classic Edo-funk, Afro-disco and reggae disco with a groovy meandering bassline, soaring horns arrangements, and timbale breakdowns. While it may be cold outside, the group is bringing the heat!

Watch Ibibio Sound Machine’s recently-released KEXP in-studio session from September and read the full post at KEXP.org.

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