Don’t let the name, tongue-in-cheek song titles and subjects or their nonchalant, goofy online presence fool you. Salmon Thrasher mean serious business. While the band has clearly embraced the ridiculousness of their name, calling their latest release Thrashin in the USA (recalling some long lost Beach Boys cover band or a Beach Blanket Bingo gag) the bands songs and their ear for no-bullshit, hook-laden garage pop prove they are anything but a joke.

If they were a joke, they wouldn’t have worked nearly so hard. In the short 8 months since their first show Salmon Thrasher has played just about every venue in the city, most of them a few times. And in that same time, they (along with lead singer Justin Ripley) have release six solid EPs of original material.

Thrashin’ in the USA, their latest and last before Ripley moves to New York City, finds the band’s sound and DIY recording at its most fully realized, and dare I say, refined. Sure, this is still straight up sloppy lo-fi tunes, but the sound quality is better than many debut records that bands shell out thousands for in studio time and mastering. And these, like all of Salmon Thrasher and Ripley’s local releases, were recorded in basements and bedrooms. Ripley’s licks are as sharp as razor blades and drummer Tara Sloan drives the record forward with crisp stick work that never allows the momentum of the album to lag. Anchoring the album is Evan LeSure’s limber bass lines, in moving at a slower, but no less sure pace than the rest of the band he is the sunny spine to the songs; recalling the bass work on some of the surfy retro sounds sweeping the internet from Beach Fossils, Best Coast and Dum Dum Girls.

These might be DIY recordings and they might have a joke name, but there’s nothing amateur going on here and there’s no reason that Salmon Thrasher shouldn’t be able to find a larger audience outside of Seattle if they continue to write songs. There’s only two things about Thrashin in the USA that I don’t like. One: its just 15 minutes long and I want more. Two: its the bands last foreseeable Seattle release and I want more.

Download Salmon Thrasher’s Thrashin In the USA for free.

Drew Grow and the Pastors’ Wives ::: Photo by Josh Lovseth

Music at its best is more than catchy. At its best, music moves and transforms you. Drew Grow and the Pastors’ Wives perform songs that cut to the core, spirituals with soul, but no dogma. The songs are an amalgam of folk, gospel, wailing blues, dirty rock and exploratory noise. Drew will play modest and say what he does is nothing new, but no one I can think of today sounds like Drew Grow and the Pastors’ Wives.

And no artist I’ve seen, ever, has moved or captivated an audience the way Drew and the Pastors’ wives do. I’ve yet to leave a Pastors’ Wives performance where someone wasn’t left weeping by his soul-stirring songs. During his mid-afternoon set at the Doe Bay mainstage, Drew and the Pastors’ Wives had a thick crowd of people pressed against the stage, arms wrapped tightly around each other and singing along with the conviction of the saved. After the set, one of the most powerful men in Seattle music, came up to me with tears streaming down his cheeks. “It was just SO beautiful,” was all he could manage to say.*

I admit, I was thankful for my sunglasses during the set more for their tear-hiding than sun-blocking. Inevitably, after Drew sings I am left thinking, “that must be what people who believe in God feel like when they sing and hear hymns.” It is a performance enjoyed with eyes closed tightly, arms raised aloft to the stage, heads thrown back in ecstasy and exultation and a sense you are witnessing something as a collective, not an individual. I don’t attend church anymore and I moved on from believing in God to believing in music and the people who create it, and seeing Drew Grow live is as close to a religious experience as I will ever have. You’re either a believer or not, and I am a believer. And I’m not alone. After The Pastors’ Wives Doe Bay set I overheard the following: “You know, if Drew and the Pastors’ Wives start a cult, even if we have to drink the kool-aid at the end, I’m joining.”

On September 14th, Drew Grow and the Pastors’ Wives are releasing their debut full-length. Until then, you can stream the album in its entirety on their Bandcamp. The band will be celebrating the release at Columbia City Theater on September 11th, with Pablo Trucker and Yuni in Taxco. I know that everyone and their brother are playing that night, but I wouldn’t miss this show for the world … much less The National or The Gories.

The Crowd Responds to Drew Grow and the Pastors’ Wives ::: Photo by Abbey Simmons

* (I won’t say his name because I don’t want to ruin his whiskey drinking, outlaw reputation.)

Photo by Josh Lovseth

Not the new Eminem.

Beating out The Black Keys, Band of Horses, The Roots and The National … is The Head and The Heart’s self-titled debut. (And that’s only on one day of sales after their Saturday in-store performance.)

We hate to be a blog that says “we were right,” but … remember when we said the band had momentum unlike anything we’d ever seen (from a new local band)? Or a few months back when we introduced you to them by saying you were about to discover your new favorite band? A huge congrats to The Head and the Heart, we think you deserve all this success and more!

In fact, with things moving so swiftly, my best guess is that “self-released” by the band’s name won’t last for long. The only question is: what local label is going to be lucky enough to scoop up The Head and The Heart?

And if you haven’t picked up their new record yet or you are a reader who lives outside of Seattle, you can order it HERE from Sonic Boom.

Photo Gleefully Swiped from Chris Zasche

The Moondoggies “It’s a Shame, It’s a Pity” from Yours Truly on Vimeo.

It’s a big week for The Moondoggies. Not only is the band preparing to embark on a national tour backing Blitzen Trapper, complete with a stop off at Bonnaroo, but the buzz around Tidelands, their follow-up to Don’t Be a Stranger, has begun four full months before its release. Clearly, it’s not just me who is anticipating the Moondoggies follow-up with more eagerness than any other 2010 release.

Lucky for us all, we got a sonic peek at Tidelands courtesy of Yours Truly who filmed The Moondoggies performing “It’s a Shame, It’s a Pity” in the ladies’ restroom of The Independent.  For the clear acoustics and sweet harmonies you would think The Moondoggies were in a church rather than some cramped bathroom, a testament not only to the band, but the skillful filming of Yours Truly. When two of your favorite things come together and collaborate, it is a beautiful thing, and this video is proof.

But the video wasn’t all us Moondoggies fans were rewarded with this week, Hardly Art also announced that there would be a special limited edition EP of left-over tracks from Tidelands, scheduled to be released on June 8th. And these aren’t throw-away tunes, if you’ve seen the Moondoggies in the past year, some of the tracks from You’ll Find No Answers Here will be fond favorites.  Courtesy of Hardly Art we have one such track for you to download: “Fly Mamma Fly”.

And if a brand new video and song weren’t enough for you, The Moondoggies will also be playing all over Seattle in the coming days. Tonight the band is headlining Neumos, as well as opening the show as Grant Olsen’s backing band for their new side project “Magic Mountains.”  As if two gigs in a single day wasn’t enough, the band will be playing the next night as part of the “Bare” all a capella evening at the Fremont Abbey. It should come as no surprise, I’ll be at all three sets and I recommend you do the same.

Check back on Sound on the Sound for more from the Moondoggies soon, the band will be sending us postcards from their national tour in another installment of “Postcards from the Road.”

Follow the jump for the complete tracklists for Tidelands and You’ll Find No Answers Here.

Read the rest of this entry »

Damien Jurado ::: photo by Abbey Simmons

In a year of highly anticipated local releases, there are few we’re looking forward to more than Damien Jurado’s Saint Bartlett. Not only is it the follow-up to Caught In The Trees (a quintessential Northwest album), Saint Bartlett finds Damien exploring new, happier territory without losing any of the intensity  that made his earlier songs so compelling.

One only need listen to the swooning and swelling strings that introduce “Cloudy Shoes” (the first song on Saint Bartlett) to realize there’s something different about Damien and this album. And it’s not just the warm embrace of the orchestration, which stands in contrast to Damien’s previously sparse arrangements, it’s the content. I mean, “Cloudy Shoes” finds Damien singing the word ‘magic’ in a way that seems full of joy and wonder, not snarling irony. Sure, “Cloudy Shoes” isn’t the sunshiniest song I’ve ever heard, this is Damien Jurado after all. And while there’s plenty of Damien’s signature longing (in both his voice and subject matter), the longing of “Cloudy Shoes” is directed at the attainable, healthy and (mostly) happy.

Download: “Cloudy Shoes” (courtesy of Secretly Canadian)

What we long for is May 25th when Saint Bartlett will be released, so you can listen to what is sure to be one of Sound on the Sound’s most cherished albums of 2010. And don’t forget, you can catch Damien with the Saint Bartlett Band (Kay Kay and His Weathered Underground) on a nation wide tour starting May 29th at the Triple Door in Seattle.

Here’s the first official video from The Avett Brother’s new record, I And Love And You, which is certain to be featured on Sound on the Sound’s favorite records of 2009.

Unlike their previous release, the devastating Emotionalism, there’s an air of hoepfulness to The Avett Brothers new melancholy tunes. Though the record isn’t out until next week, you can stream the album in it’s entiritey now over at NPR. We recommend you do so right away. Since my first listen on Monday, I’ve probably listened to the record in full 10 times. Stand outs include the title track, which you can hear on the delightful video and well, basically the whole first half of the album. Though I’m particularly fond of “Kick Drum Heart.”

Monotonix ::: photo by Abbey

Monotonix took to their Myspace today to announce that they’ll be releasing a new record this year. Tentatively titled Where Were You When It Happened the album will be :

8 songs, some of them played at recent tours, and most of them will be played in upcoming summer tours and festivals.
30 minutes long. short and sweet. gets pretty fast and fun sometimes and pretty slow and heavy at other times. we like it. hope you will too.

Even more exciting than a new Monotonix record is the promise of a supporting tour. The Tel-Aviv trio of perfect insanity will be releasing their album come August in the UK and September in the US and the rest of Europe.

Hopefully that means we’ll all be seeing a sweaty Ami screaming in our face very soon.

The Whore Moans ::: photo by Abbey

Best news of the week just came in the form of a Whore Moans bulletin! Even though we still can’t get enough of their debut Watch Out For This Thing, we only have to wait one more month for the band’s second album — Hello From the Radio Wasteland! But you don’t have to take my word for it–here’s what the Whore Moans themselves have to tell you about it.

Hello everyone! This is Jonny of what is certainly your most favorite band ever, or you just haven’t heard us yet, The Whore Moans. I’m writing to let you know that our new CD is completely finished and is ever so close to being in your beautiful, soft, grubby little mits!
   We are so pleased to present to you “Hello From the Radio Wasteland!”
    The official release date in Seattle is the 25th of November. On that day it will grace record stores all the across this fare Emerald City.
However! That’s FOR SUCKERS!!! Why (oh why!) would you degrade yourselves in eyes of your friends, the general populace of Seattle and your god (whomever they might be) by purchasing a  fantastic record at a store on the 25th of November when you can get that same monumental album 3 days earlier at what is sure to go down in history as one of the greatest Rock n’ Roll galas ever concocted by man or beast! You guessed it The Whore Moans’ Record Release Extravaganza!
   Thrills, chills, and death defying pills await you all! That’s right ladies and gentlemen. Come one come all. We’ve toiled, sweat, and broke our backs to put as much of ourselves as possible on to this disc, and we are really fucking happy with the results. The Whore Moans’ Record Release Extravaganza! The evening of November 22nd at the ever prestigious King Cobra! Oh what fun will be had! Joining us to celebrate the evening will be the insane, the profane and the grossly over talented likes of Wild Orchid Children, and the smoothest pack of bastards you’ll ever have make love to your ear holes (with music), The Hands. Dress is formal to extremely formal, to extreme bondage wear, to extreme bear suits. (bear suits are strongly encuraged) Also don’t be late for we have plenty of fun and surprises in store for you all!!

We Wrote The Book On Connectors  is unleashing their first full length album, Ride It Like A Turbo Horse , which is sure to be fun and frisky, like all that is WE related. The above delight is the first glimpse of the album’s art-work.

We guarantee you won’t want to miss the band’s album release show–November 15th at the High Dive, where they will be joined by equally merry-making  A Gun That Shoots Knives and M. Bison.

This makes me very very very happy:

Recording, Day 4

Nothing like a cold and the promise of a cup of hot Tang to make a Saturday afternoon feel like the best day of yr life. Day 4 at Avast, the old Ironwood, basic tracks are done, drum and bass. 36 clocked hours of playing guitar. Blisters, callouses, the like. 2 bottles of Old Crow, 1 Jameson’s, 1 Hornito’s, 196 beers and counting. Breakfast burritos with mounds of avocado, cheese, mushrooms and Tabasco. The sound of a B-3 Hammond reaching from one room to the next. Song after song. To name a few. Goodbye. Time is Right Now. Cold November. Say Nothing. Do You Still. Tequila Sunday. Whidbey Island Blues. Tuireann. The New One. Blood Relations. Walk Away. And one more to to make it an even 12. Do you hear what I hear? I listen to the thunder. And it sounds like the Maldives. The new album is coming.

Love, The Maldives

First, it’s new stuff from my favorite Wrangler Headbangers. Secondly, the first three songs listed I am completely obsessed with and are just about my favorite songs out there right now. Thirdly, the proper amount of liquor and breakfast burritos seem to be involved in the endeavor. I can’t wait to hear the new recordings!!!

photo by Josh from Slackfest 2008