I’m trying to imagine being 18 and listening to Ten for the first time like I did when I was 18 in 1991. I can’t. You May Also Like: Pearl Jam, “Soon Forget” from ‘Binaural’ (2000): One Track Mind Pearl Harbor and the Explosions – ‘Pearl Harbor and the Explosions’Read More

by Tom Johnson A sadly overlooked band, the Trees got lumped in with the grunge movement in the early 1990s. What’s unfortunate is that, like fellow Seattlites Mudhoney, these guys were way better than what got popular. It’s a typical complaint, I know, but I dare you to listen toRead More

Tangerine Dream — or as they were known, back when I was in school: The guys who did the weird music for the “Risky Business” soundtrack — had gotten significantly less weird by this point. Founding member Edgar Froese is the lone hold over from Tangerine Dream’s 1971-77 whoa-man synthesizer-soundscapeRead More

Cuong Vu is a Vietnamese-born, Seattle-raised trumpet player who can be considered a pretty damned impressive and forward thinking just by looking at the list of bandleaders who he impressed enough to have in their bands: You May Also Like: Cuong Vu 4-Tet, featuring Bill Frisell – ‘Change In theRead More

Photo from Todd Christoffel’s ReverbNation.com page by Nick DeRiso Seattle-based folk-rockers Don’t Ask have a fondness for the comfy sounds of 1970s pop, though they are careful not to get too caught up in nostalgia. They simply use that era’s singer-songwriter-inspired prose, its soaring symphonic pop structure and its feel-goodRead More

by Nick DeRiso Voyage d’armour, French-born Danick Isabelle Jawer’s thrillingly intricate new collaboration with Amitie, captures the affection, the sorrow and the music of a relationship – whether the listener speaks her native tongue or not. That’s thanks in no small way to Amitie (“friendship” in French), a trio fromRead More

“The Guitar Hero” moves away from the tabloid side of the Jimi Hendrix myth, instead delving into the American guitarist’s sweeping impact on rock music and the instrument. That makes director Jon Brewer’s film not so much a biography, per se, as it is tone-poem love letter to Hendrix’s muse,Read More

Brazilian-born, Seattle-based multi-instrumentalist Jovino Santos Neto is an artist I’m just getting familiar with, but his brand new CD Alma do Nordeste (http://www.adventure-music.com/) has sure gotten my curiosity. The title means “soul of the Northeast” in Portugese, and the “northeast” being referred to here is the northeast region of Brazil.Read More

by S. Victor Aaron Bill Frisell is a guy I’ve been a huge fan of for about six or seven years, but the sheer volume, originality and wide range of his music has made it impossible for me to know where to begin when writing about him. There is notRead More