On his 15th album, Damien Jurado is coming back down to earth and leaving the cosmic vibes of Maraqopa for more familiar territory. The self-produced The Horizon Just Laughed finds the singer/songwriter coupling the more straightforward folk influences that could be found in his prior work with a 60's/70's pop sensibility to produce one of the most engaging and heartfelt albums of his career.  

PLUS! Nashville's Erin Rae has a killer new album (Putting On Airs) coming in June, and we're spinning it's latest, heart-wrenching single "Bad Mind."

Even in the darkest of timelines, Janelle Monáe has always been the most triumphant of superstars, and five long years, Janelle Monáe is finally returning to music to claim her throne.. Featuring the likes of Grimes, Brian Wilson, and everyone in between, Dirty Computer lets its freak flag fly higher than fuck, and the results represent a landmark achievement in pop, hip-hop, funk, and whatever the hell else Monáe feels like proving she's better than the rest of us at. 

PLUS! The Australian psych scene is on the rise again and Turtle Skull may be leading the charge. Check out a dank new track "Eden" from their upcoming self-titled EP. 

Over the past few decades Country has dominated the music industry by embracing pop and hip-hop sensibilities, which makes Joshua Hedley's debut album Mr. Jukebox all that more refreshing. Forget "saving" country music, Hedley is merely laying down some great storytelling with a little twang, a time-tested recipe for feeling good, even if you're feeling bad. Kevin, Marcus, and Eduardo are taking a spin with this surprise hit of 2018, so come along for the ride and feel the love!

PLUS! Philadelphia, PA's Hop Along is back with a new record - Bark Your Head Off, Dog - and it's giving Eduardo ALL of the feels so we're spinning a track to get your heart swelling along with him. 

Known to most of the world as a political playground, Washington, D.C. is a city where decisions that shape the course of, not just American, but HUMAN history, are made every day. More than that though, D.C. is a city where cultures collide resulting in a creative class that produces some of the most compelling and diverse art in the world. Built on the legacy of jazz and go-go, D.C. is on the cusp of a creative explosion and bringing everything from hip-hop to indie rock into the fold.

In part four of our Sounds of Washington, DC series, we're dipping our toes into the DIY space, traveling back in time for some homegrown jazz/funk, and getting serious about what needs to be done to protect and revive this city's native culture for not just a day, but all year long. 

Stoner metal legends Sleep are back with a surprise new album - their first in almost twenty years - that dropped on that highest of holidaze, 4/20. Are the heady trio's new jams worth the wait, or are they skunked like so many lost bags of dirtweed? Kevin and Paul have got the hookup and aim to find out.

PLUS! Joachim Cooder's new album Fuchsia Machu Picchu confirms that genius runs in the family and we're spinning it's tasty new single for you to get lost in!

On their sophomore LP Port Saint Joe, Brothers Osborne has pulled off the rare feat of being EXACTLY as good as the hype makes them out to be. Good times, sick jams, with copious amounts of whiskey, weed, and Willie all make this "country" album one of the years best releases whether you believe in Nashville or not. 

PLUS! We've got some thoughts on the current state of Country Music journalism, Kendrick's Pulitzer, and Washington state's The Moondoggies are back from the cosmos with a new album and a new single to go along with it!

The best art happens when like-minded creatives get together with the simple goal of sharing and exploring a moment or feeling. For their debut album, Loma - the band made up of Shearwater's Jonathan Meiburg and Cross Record's Emily Cross and Dan Duszynski - headed to the Texas countryside to craft their shared vision and returned with one of the best albums of 2018 to date. Intimate, but sonically sprawling, Loma depends as much on the sounds of the locale where it was created as it does the grandiose soundscapes of Peter Gabriel and exacting folk of Fairport Convention.

We're here for it, and you should be too, so let's hang out for a few and talk about this remarkable first step for a band we hope will be around for years to come. 

PLUS! Motorcade loves that 80's sound ERGO we love Motorcade and have got a track to turn you on to them too!

Living Colour is one of the most important bands in music history. On their third release Stain, the black rock innovators dug deep into the history of their culture, the dysfunction of America, and the sounds of underground rock and roll and came back with violent, high-volume exploration of love, hate, identity, and deep humanity that resonates maybe even stronger in 2018 then it did twenty-five years ago.

Join Kevin and Marcus along with special guest Timothy Anne Burnside as they work through this intense, complicated masterpiece, it's legacy, the questions AND answers it poses,  much, much more. 

Over twelve years and six albums, Wye Oak's Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack have proven time and again that their talents know no boundaries. Their new LP The Louder I Call, The Faster It Runs, finds the experimentation that the duo has been pursuing over the past few years - both within the constraints of Wye Oak and through various solo projects (Flock of Dimes, El Vey, Dungeonesse)  - coalescing into a real evolution of the band that isn't just their strongest release to date, but one of the best albums of 2018. Join us as we try to suppress our fanaticism and explore what makes this record so singular, and such a milestone for one of indie rocks greatest bands.

PLUS! Phil Cook is BACK and here to help you through this life with the first track off of his upcoming LP,  People Are My Drug.

Creation doesn't happen in a vacuum, and in Astral Weeks: A Secret History of 1968, author (and Hallelujah The Hills frontman) Ryan Walsh explores every weird, fantastical nook and cranny of Boston that surrounded and seeped into Van Morrison's soul-bending masterpiece. We're sitting down with Walsh to discuss how he brought this story to life, the eternal value of having your mind blown, and a history of his hometown that has remained largely untold…until now.

On Golden Hour, Kacey Musgraves is dialing back the humor and turning up the heart to deliver what many are saying is her best work to date. Is this latest collection of genre-defying, lane-shifting "country" songs the future of Musgraves, or just a stepping stone on the way to something better? We've assembled a panel of Musgraves superfans to find out.

PLUS! Jazz Bassist songwriter Nicole Saphos is classing up the #DCMusic joint and we've got a taste of her groovin' new EP Buzz and Bloom to get you hip.

Jean Grae and Qeulle Chris are both musical forces to be reckoned with in their own rights. Put em together, and you get what is sure to be one of the best albums of 2018. A heady shot of high-concept outrage, hip-hop, and heart, Everything's Fine is an unmitigated masterpiece that will serve as a lightning rod for anyone who rages against the insanity of modern existence for years to come.

Marcus J. Moore, Senior Editor at Bandcamp and author of the upcoming book The Butterfly Effect: How Kendrick Lamar Ignited the Soul of Black America, joins us as we dive into this pièce de résist to find out if everything is, in fact, fine, and if it isn't, how are we gonna make it better?

Known to most of the world as a political playground, Washington, D.C. is a city where decisions that shape the course of, not just American, but HUMAN history, are made every day. More than that though, D.C. is a city where cultures collide resulting in a creative class that produces some of the most compelling and diverse art in the world. Built on the legacy of jazz and go-go, D.C. is on the cusp of a creative explosion and bringing everything from hip-hop to indie rock into the fold.

In part three of our Sounds of Washington, DC series, we're joined by Blight Records label-head Benjamin Schurr and Mystery Friends guitarist Dave Mohl for a synth-heavy hang with some serious discussion about the DC scene thrown in for good measure.

After a recent diagnosis of Parkinson's Disease, legendary singer/songwriter Neil Diamond announced that after Fifty Years of sold-out crowds all over the world he was retiring from the road. But NEVER from creating music.

Andrew Wright (Blankus Larry) and Marcus K. Dowling (Iconoclasm) are joining Kevin in the basement to celebrate the career of this living legend, how his music shattered boundaries to become benevolently ubiquitous, and some awkward truths about Diamond's finest hour, the 1980 film The Jazz Singer.

On our latest podcast, we're turning over our mics to Marcus K. Dowling as he explores the intersection of hip-hop and country with R-Son and Rench of Gangstagrass. It's a (mostly) Kevin-free conversation that you're not gonna want to miss.

What happens when one of the most revered indie-rock bands of all time gets fed up with the state of the world around them? On What A Time To Be Alive, Superchunk answers that question the only way they know how: with shrieking guitars, wit, and fury. On our latest episode, musician/photog/cat dad PJ Sykes is joining Kevin via teh interwebs to dive into this minor masterpiece of righteous outrage that may just save us all.

PLUS! Richmond, VA's DOLL BABY has a throwback sound that sounds all their own, and we're spinning one of PJ's favorite tracks for your education and enjoyment.

On her latest LP, Brandi Carlile isn't so much returning to her roots as she is challenging the idea of what folk and Americana can be, and maybe should become. Sonically and stylistically diverse, the Dave Cobb produced By The Way, I Forgive You is a seemingly unconnected collection of songs that, taken together, packs an emotional wallop unlike anything in Carlile's career. 

PLUS! Eduardo goes crate digging and comes back with a killer track from Italian singer/songwriter Pino Daniele that Steely Dan fans are gonna love!

In 1993 Lenny Kravitz was a star to some, and a point of confusion to many more. But none of that kept him from creating his future-forward masterpiece that plays as hot today as it did twenty-five years ago.

Timothy Anne Burnside (NMAAHC) and Marcus K. Dowling (Medium) join Kevin in the basement to dig into this timeless LP, and get to the heart of why Kravitz was - and probably still is - misunderstood as an artist, the legacy of his music, and how making art that comes directly from the heart and soul is always gonna win. Always, every time. 

Lucy Dacus's debut album No Burden announced the Richmond, Virginia native to the world as a musical force to be reckoned with.

On her sophomore effort, Historian, Lucy and her band haven't just lived up to that expectation, they've created a modern classic. 

That's it. That's the pitch. Go listen to the album NOW, then come back to hear Kevin and Eduardo gush.

PS. We're bum ping a rad track from Washington, DC's Stronger Sex after all the gushing.

R. Kelly. Michael Jackson. Woody Allen. Kanye West. Roman Polanski. Chris Brown. Harvey Weinstein. These and many more artists and entertainment luminaries have all reached the peak of and continue to enjoy great success despite being, in some cases, general a-holes, and in many, guilty of acting on, the worst impulses humanity has to offer.

On a very special episode, we're talking about the separation between art and artist, how much responsibility do we as fans have, and when enough should be enough.