Sean Nelson on indie rock and sexuality in the 1990s:

Songs About Fucking is an amazing album that I heard in an extraordinarily high percentage of the houses and apartments I visited between 1990 and 1996. But who could concentrate on losing themselves in a passionate embrace while Big Black was shearing skulls? Do you really want "Bad Penny" to come on during an intimate moment? Or how about Sebadoh, a band I worshipped, whose unstintingly detailed relationship dissections (the same relationship, dissected from every conceivable angle) and masturbation confessions trade off with spastic-screaming noise songs? It would be like using tears for lubricant. Who then? Slint? Smog? Tortoise? Palace? Silver Jews? Beat Happening? Daniel Johnston? I would be lying if I said I didn't take them on test drives.

Larry Mizell Jr interviews Thee Satisfaction:

Thee Satisfaction will only see their profile rise with the release of Snow Motion, an EP inspired by the Great Seattle Blizzard of 2008. Recorded while the duo were living in a broke-down palace dubbed "the Madhouse" on 23rd Avenue and Madison Street (where the rats in the walls and ceiling kept them awake), the EP reflects a time when they lost friends to gun violence, suffered death in the family, struggled with money issues, and drove each other crazy with cabin fever. In a significant step up from the rough sketches of Weird, Motion carves crop circles—the duo's natural chemistry is through the roof and beyond. Irons packs more than her share of thoughtfully ill rhymes, and her bouncing, loping, space-boogie productions redshift the duo's black-upliftment sci-fi visions into heretofore unknown territories.

Eric Grandy demystifies Major Lazer:

Diplo and Switch are clearly no strangers to this music or its makers—they're professionals who make their living in record shops and recording studios—but it's safe to say they're counting on an audience whose knowledge of dub and dancehall might not necessarily extend any further than what they've sampled in their previous productions or occasionally mixed into their DJ sets. So Guns is more of a casual survey, a vacation to Jamaica, than it is an academic guided tour. This isn't a Soul Jazz anthology we're talking about here; it's a Saturday-morning cartoon. It's dancehall for dummies, but it's not (all) dumb.

Kelly O talks with Seth Bogart of Hunx and His Punx:

Some might recognize Seth Bogart as the keyboard player and singer from the hamburger-loving electro-pop band Gravy Train!!!!. Now he's also the mustachioed, leather-jacket-wearing lead singer of bubblegummy, homorrific garage band Hunx and His Punx. I don't think I've ever heard a band quite like them. The best way I can think to describe them is if someone put equal parts Ramones, John Waters, and the Ronettes in a blender with some ice and made hot-pink frozen daiquiris to serve at one of those big gay pool parties where everyone looks like early-'80s-era Freddie Mercury in a bathing suit. Hunx and His Punx have released singles on San Francisco label True Panther (think Ty Segall), Atlanta's Rob's House (think Demon's Claws, Black Lips, Golden Triangle), and Jay Reatard's Shattered Records. I predict their weird trashy combo of '60s girl-group styling and catchy lo-fi punk is going to seriously take them places, especially if Bogart keeps taking his clothes off every chance he gets.

Dave Segal chats about middle eastern music with Sir Richard Bishop:

A tribute of sorts to Egyptian guitarist Omar Khorshid, Araby finds Bishop at his most structured; it also includes some of the most sensuously propulsive rhythms to appear on one of his records. His famous fiery fluidity is put into the service of traditionals, covers, and originals that tap into Arab music's predilection for florid melodies that exude a profound yearning. Traces of these elements, of course, surfaced in some of SCG's finest work, but Araby is Bishop's most explicit nod to his Arab heritage (he's half Lebanese).

Another notable Bishop aesthetic departure, Elektronika Demonika, was created on synths and shortwave radios. It conjures a much darker, even horrific, mood than his other works, which usually radiate a kind of clarity and enlightenment. That being said, some of Bishop's songs attain such a frenzied tempo—especially those on Improvika—that they inspire thoughts and imagery of a demonic nature. It brings to mind the question of whether Bishop tries to generate more light than darkness through his art.

Up & Coming details extraordinary shows and concerts for this week, like Saturday's show with Bachelorette:

(Triple Door) Bachelorette is the stage name of New Zealand musician Annabel Alpers. At the core of Bachelorette's songs on the new album, My Electric Family, is Alpers's alternately glassy and evaporating singing voice. Surrounding her singing are lush layers of traditional live instrumentation, expansive audio effects (delay and reverb up to the heavens), and tasteful electronic flourishes. The lyrics can get wincingly wonky, as on utopian electro-pop number "Technology Boy," but the arrangements—such as that song's stuttering vocals reminiscent of Morr Music softies Lali Puna—are consistently captivating. Bill Callahan is the dour tenor behind the much-loved, long-running solo project Smog. Recording under his own name for his past two albums, Woke on a Whaleheart and Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle, Callahan continues to churn out the terse and brutal and just sometimes bright-around-the-corners folk songs, always sung in that coldly commanding voice of his. ERIC GRANDY

Larry previews the upcoming concert with Neema in My Philosophy:

Yo, you remember MTV Unplugged? The Nirvana one I know back to front from severe '90s radio overexposure, and, sure, we all remember that Jay-Z one with the Most Incrediblest Roots Crew (as seen on television) as his band. But what about, like, Arrested Development? Or the Yo! Unplugged set with the LL Cool J performance where he rocks the crazy acoustic funk-rock "Mama Said Knock You Out" in the weird Paddington Bear hat with the fat urinal-cake chunk of Speed Stick under his pits? Then leads an inspiring "leave that crack alone" chant? Classic.

Okay, random. Not really, though—my man Neema is doing a special unplugged set at Nectar on Thursday, June 25, with supporting superstars Spaceman and Mad Rad. What's up, Neema: Why go acoustic? "I really wanted to do something different," he told me. "I feel like I've been doing the same kind of show for the last few years, and I wanted to switch it up. Truth be told, I want something a little more grown-up." .

Data Breaker reviews Joy Von Spain's sound:

No doubt Von Spain would make a riveting instructor, but in the meantime, she also occupies an integral position in the city's noise-music underground as half of 100Pieces with Murder, while also collaborating with various sonic brutes around town, most associated with Backwards Records. It's kind of like if Ruth White were moonlighting in Wolf Eyes.

While writing compositions of great subtlety and unconventional beauty, Von Spain also shapes extreme frequencies into experimental noise pieces that show formidable thought regarding dynamics. Her tracks' textures tend to shudder off the staves and agitate your senses with sadistic but not unpleasant astringency. Compared to most in the genre, there's much more richness of detail and expansiveness of tone palette. Von Spain succinctly describes her creative method as "Substance. Ritual. Catharsis. Repeat."

Fucking in the Streets praises the new record by Throw Me the Statue:

Creaturesque will be the band's second album—following their much-loved (at least by The Stranger) debut, Moonbeams, which was self-released on bandleader Scott Reitherman's Baskerville Hill label in 2007 and rereleased by Secretly Canadian in 2008—and it is not entirely without the problems that stereotypically plague sophomore releases. Where Moonbeams surprised at several corners, Creaturesque feels comfortably familiar; some of the old album's endearingly rough, homemade edges have been traded for objectively better production (courtesy of Phil Ek); and so on.

But! The best, most lovable things about the band remain: Reitherman's odd knack for cramming unwieldy words and phrases into totally charming pop songs where they should really have no business, the band's simply catchy melodies and flattering arrangements, that chorus-sweetening glockenspiel.

Michaelangelo Matos uncovers the latest and greatest in It's a Hit:

"The Girl and the Robot"
by Röyksopp ft. Robyn
(Astralwerks)

I've never been totally convinced about Robyn's merits, even when I liked her work ("With Every Heartbeat" especially), but boy does she sell this one. What an opening line: "I go mental every time you leave for work." I'll try not to take that literally. And when she gets to "I'm in love with a robot," she sounds like her wires are crossing. Röyksopp had been threatening to drown in irrelevance, so something this shameless is a marked improvement.

Casey Catherwood spotlights a new all-ages venue in Underage:

Steve Smith started the Seattle Drum School in a run-down building in North Seattle with a simple goal of providing a place for young people to learn to play the drums. As the demand for a more diverse curriculum increased, so did Smith's school. Now it's opening a supplementary all-ages venue, the Slab, in its Georgetown location (1010 S Bailey St, 763-9700), making SDS an even stronger asset for a community in need of resources for young musicians. Starting things off right, the sparkling new space will be hosting a grand-opening show this Saturday, June 27, featuring Shotty, New Faces, the Lonely Forest, and the Kleeners.

Christopher DeLaurenti wraps up the forthcoming premieres in The Score:

Cellist Joshua Roman boldly wraps up his TownMusic season with an "all premieres" concert (Thurs June 25, Town Hall, 7:30 pm, $15/$18). Roman's chamber group debut works by a slew of living composers, including Chuck Krenner, Alexandra Gardner, fellow cellist Stefan Freund, and Lisa Bielawa. Most of the names are unfamiliar to me, which I take as a good sign. I'm hoping Gardner's "There is a reason why" for clarinet, violin, cello, and drum set skirts the rote, often clumsy writing composers bring to drum kits. I also look forward to Bielawa's The Project of Collecting Clouds, which has Roman recite a poem by Christian Hawkey as part of the performance. A longtime member of the Philip Glass Ensemble, Bielawa has a gift for shaping austere, vocal incantations into arresting melodies.

Also check out Party Crasher and Poster of the Week! Remember to check our online music calendar for a complete listing of bands, DJs and live music.