Mixtape: Grace
Mixtape No. 107 features Witch’s Mirror, Tashi Dorji, Damien Jurado, The Rheingans Sisters, Sun Ra, Extol, Anno and Souled American. Bruised and exhausted,...
Mixtape: Wrecked
Mixtape No. 106 features Romperayo, Gong Gong Gong & Mong Tong, Moin, Haley Heynderickx, Darius Jones, Abriction, His Name is Alive, Mount Eerie, Sun Araw....
Give the Punk Drummer Some
When drumming, always wear protection. Where were you when you heard about emo revival? In 2009, I was asked to appear on a panel about the "future of radio"...
Mixtape: Monarch
Mixtape No. 15 features Starflyer 59, Yasmin Williams, Janel & Anthony, Dawn Richard & Spencer Zahn, Alan Sparhawk, Karate Fort RenoWashington, D.C.Aug. 1,...
Mixtape: Chrysanthemum
Mixtape No. 104 includes Meridian Brothers, Chuck Johnson, Dark Thoughts, MF DOOM, Judy And The Jerks, Jessica Ackerley, Feeling Figures As soon as the...
Mixtape: The Seer
Mixtape No. 103 includes Nubya Garcia, The Jesus Lizard, Pigeon Pit, Respire, Fulu Miziki, Loren Connors & David Grubbs A few months ago, I got a text from a...
Mixtape: Oração
Mixtape No. 102 includes Luiza Brina, Alsarah, Senyawa, Hermeto Pascoal, Fire-Toolz, Black Eyes, Krallice, Aaron Dilloway Recent concerts, movies, TV shows...
Limbo District Q&A with Henry Owings
Come see the art film ‘Carnival’ featuring the weirdo post-punk band Limbo District. My Q&A with Henry Owings to follow the screening. Imagine the iceberg...
Mixtape: Silver Blue
Mixtape No. 101 includes Lilly Miller, SUMAC, Bacchae, Psychic Temple, Tashi Wada, Thou, Anna Tivel, Kass Richards I like getting emails from y'all; it means...
Mixtape: Zipper
Mixtape No. 100 features Sonhos Tomam Conta, Broadcast, Dirty Three, New Jazz Underground, Jeremiah Cymerman, Olivia Block, Tujiko Noriko Welcome to mixtape...
Mixtape: That Thang
Mixtape No. 99 features The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis, Rra, Elf Power, Marisa Anderson, Kamasi Washington and Myriam Gendron. What's your post-show...
Mixtape: Colossus
Mixtape No. 98 features Mdou Moctar, Kelly Moran, Gileah Taylor, Morgul Blade, Combo Chimbita, Buck Curran Dream journal: There's mail from Alynda Seggara on...
Mixtape: No Sleep
Mixtape no. 97 features Unwed Sailor, Still House Plants, Nox, Restorations, Claire Rousay, Meshell Ndegeocello, Jessica Pratt. In the [gulp] 26 years since...
Mixtape: Forest
Mixtape no. 96 features Daisy Rickman, Castle Rat, Locrian, Sensor Ghost, Six Organs of Admittance, Lord Spikeheart I am known to love lavish tea ceremonies...
Mixtape: Ramble
Mixtape No. 95 features Kim Gordon, R.A.P. Ferreira, Frances Chang, Mali Obomsawin, Linda Smith, TAMTAM, Magic Tuber Stringband, Thou. Toots Barger: world-...
Mixtape: Wilderness
Mixtape No. 94 features Accidente, Julia Holter, Nathalie Joachim, Anika Pyle, Peter Brötzmann I generally like to have a song to set the tempo for the New...
Mixtape: Snow
Mixtape no. 93 features Woo, Laura Cannell, Ronnie Martin, Nonconnah, The Innocence Mission, Terje Isungset Maybe, like me, you're having a tough time...
Mixtape: Jellyfish
Mixtape No. 92 features Björk, Krallice, Reyna Tropical, Chuquimamani-Condori, Kali Malone, Vestígio and Nabihah Iqbal. I thought I'd never make another, but...
Mixtape: Change
Mixtape No. 91 features Outer World, Sheer Mag, Ndox Electrique, 카코포니(cacophony), Kelly Moran, Keith Fullerton Whitman. Some podcast recommendations:...
Mixtape: Twisted
Mixtape No. 90 features Dawn Richard, Limbo District, Nabalayo, Wendy Eisenberg, Sunn O))) and Mary Halvorson. Do these weekly-ish mixtapes satisfy y'all's...
Mixtape: Each Day
Mixtape No. 89 features Angelica Garcia, Canary Room, The Veldt, Zalaam and Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe. I haven't been sleeping. The world is so much. But now...
Mixtape: Bending
A new look for the mixtapes! I've made waaay more than 88, but that's how many I count since I moved to BNDCMPR. Some favorite moments from Furnace Fest, in...
Mixtape: Unpopular
Doom riff opens lowly. I've missed Harvey Milk. The Athens, Ga., band has been out of action for more than a decade now, but its sludgy, deconstructed WTF ZZ...
Mixtape: Muzzle
View from a flotation device KT and I just celebrated 10 years of marriage. I'm amazed at how this decade has deepened our love in beautiful, weird and...
Mixtape: Stay
Dream journal: I'm on a street as it starts to crack open. Volcanic lava glows hazmat orange as it oozes through the asphalt. Everything and everyone is...
Mixtape: Sunset
Simply a photo of a church near our family's house at sunset. My neighborhood is quiet and unassuming, yet really knows when to turn on the charm. I hope...
Mixtape: Afloat
I can't fall asleep to music; my brain is too busy dissecting its melodies, textures and rhythms to fully rest, even if I find the music restful. As I've...
Mixtape: Awake
Where are the weirdos in normal spaces? The death of Paul Ruebens, best known for his character Pee-wee Herman, took me back to my childhood in the early...
Mixtape: Aurora
I proclaimed my love of sorghum syrup for Marissa's "ringing endorsements," so in the spirit of sharing, here are some more: I really like movies that won't...
Mixtape: Viking's Flames
Bands either got paid in cash or spaghetti — that was basically the deal when it came to church shows. When I first met Luxury, it was in a cafeteria...
Mixtape: Viking's Mysterium
If you're a good friend I haven't seen in a while who invites me to a thing, I will probably make it my business to go. So when Kim texted me on Saturday to...
Mixtape: Viking's Majesty
For all of its technique, theory and philosophy (or intentional lack thereof), improvisation is an extremely human conversation between people or the self,...
Mixtape: Viking's Syzygy
I really need to stop reading f***** up comics before bed — they give me surreal and stressful dreams. Zak Sally's Sammy the Mouse is set in a Dr. Suess-ian...
Mixtape: Viking's Bubblegum
Caption: Spectators is a NSFW webcomic by Brian K. Vaughan (Saga, Paper Girls) and Niko Henrichon (Pride of Baghdad). On the surface, it's a pre-post-...
Mixtape: Viking's Pearl
The photo above was taken by me, not a professional photographer, with a slightly busted camera phone at Rhizome, a beloved community space in Washington,...
Mixtape: Viking's Serenade
In an effort to reorganize Viking's Choice, I'm gonna try to parse out the regular features — the mixtape, the (hopeful return of the) Viking's Choice...
Unwound is for the Children
In 2003, I heard a WUOG DJ spin "Terminus," a sidewinding cyclone of music that finds the nexus of knotty post-hardcore and string-swept post-rock over a...
By the Fruits: Jack Rose, 'Now That I'm a Man Full Grown'
I turned 40 years old today, so lately I've been thinking about experiences that set roots. Here's the start of an occasional series called By the Fruits:...
Increased Ribbit Amplification
What I'm podcasting, comic-book reading or tweeting lately: Podcasts: WHYY's The Statue, a short-run podcast about the statue from Rocky III, its uneasy...
We Always Return to Destroy
It's the year 2008. Pop singers didn't release albums on cassette. Vinyl was a cult artifact. CD-Rs were still an acceptable format for scuzzy punk bands and...
Mailorder My Heart: 10 Choice Record Stores Online
What was the first music you ordered from a catalog? If memory serves, I sent away an envelope of well-concealed cash (LOL) for three CDs: Succulent Space...
Your Voice Never Really Leaves You
Christopher Guest should make a mockumentary about DIY punk shows. Broken and borrowed PAs, a Punk in a Kilt, a sound guy about to burst a blood vessel from...
94 Good Things from 365 Days of 2022
When I started putting together a personal year-end list back in November, I kept finding myself drawn back to moments not just in albums, but across comics,...
Viking's Choice 2022: Reissues & Renewals of Spirit
All music from the past speaks with the present to inform the future — these reissues and archival projects just so happen to have been released in the...
Guacamole Christmas!
Before his provider basically forced him to switch a few months ago, my Bolivian father-in-law had a dumb phone, which meant he was the target of incessant...
Over-Sensory Osmosis
Y'all ever listen to a piece of music and think: I don't know WTF this is, but it's unscrewing my brain in the best possible way. Scott Walker's The Drift,...
Just Leave Me to the River (I Miss You, Mimi)
I first heard Mimi Parker's voice in 1999. It began with an oh — clear, warm and sustained like a fuzzy pedal organ at an old church. Then a la la la —...
I Just Want You to Know Who I Am
For the life of me, I cannot remember lyrics to songs, even those I've heard hundreds of times. Ask my high school musical theater teacher, church choir...
It's A Little Like Science
I play records around the 3 year old and she has questions/opinions. From my notes app, A-L on Vashti Bunyan's dreamy and delicate 1970 debut Just Another...
Algerian Rave, Nu-Jock Jams, Blackened Thrash
Tracy Chapman's self-titled debut was in the tape deck, Sadie Dupuis' new poetry collection (Cry Perfume) was read in starts and stops and glasses of a...