Tonight, everybody's favorite local chanteuse Jesse Sykes plays a free KEXP show at Seattle Center's Mural Ampitheater, featuring music from her new EP Gentleness of Nothing. (Tomorrow night, Rocky Votolato plays the Mural.) Tomorrow, the Mountain's Music Festival at Marymoor with Brandi Carlile, Jackie Greene, and Train's Pat Monahan. The less said about the latter, the better. Here's our gal Brandi performing "The Story," her Grey's Anatomy Soundtrack hit: And Seattlest's old friend Steve Winwood......

Road trip! The seventh annual What the Heck Fest is taking place all weekend at venues in Anacortes. Mt. Eerie is but one of the many bands set to perform. If you're staying here in town, tonight loud-ass two-piece Middle Class Rut plays King Cobra, along with Burning Brides.......

We've already mentioned the lovely and talented Jesse Sykes appearing tonight at the Tractor with bandmate Phil Wandscher. Also tonight (and also in Ballard) is San Francisco's Citay at the Sunset. Think Sabbath and Zep meets the light pop touches of Big Star. Here's some footage of them from a previous visit to Seattle: Saturday night, besides Kultur Shock at Chop Suey, there's LA's Spindrift at the Comet, who play peyote-twinged cosmic cowboy jams. As......

Jesse Sykes is playing at the Tractor Tavern this Friday and we couldn't be happier about it. Along with Neko Case, we can't think of a local-grown voice that we like better than Jesse's. What makes it even better is that she's billing it as "a special last-minute acoustic show" according to her MySpace page. If you know Jesse Sykes and her music, you already know why this is so exciting. Her melodic, sometimes ephemeral,......

Audrey pretty much summed it up yesterday, but to paraphrase: Rocky Votolato and Jesse Sykes are a miraculous match made in Americana heaven. It was over two months ago that we spotted this double-feature and -- no exaggeration -- we actually gasped. Having seen Sykes and Votolato on separate occasions and having been blown away by both, the prospect of seeing them perform on the same night (and hopefully together -- fingers crossed), well, we're......

Some things go together so naturally that you wonder how they ever existed apart from each other. Peanut butter and jelly, Spencer and Heidi, the gays and Halloween. And now a musical double-header that seems to be a match made in heaven: Rocky Votolato and Jesse Sykes (and the Sweet Hereafter). Thanks to Barsuk (their shared record label), the two singer-songwriters are on the road together, and their joint appearances promise to be something......

Saturday we were at Smith with friend Wade just before heading down to the Triple Door to hear Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter [MySpace], and we were saying that while we liked the band we didn't get the goosebumps some people do and were curious to hear her live to see if maybe that would give us religion. It was warm and humid and the rain was coming down harder, and we finished up......

As usual, this weekend offers approximately nine million live music options. Kicking things off tonight is Soular at the High Dive. The Albuquerque-based quartet likes dirty bass lines, soaring choruses, Moog synths, and the occasional theramin. Tomorrow night there's Slint at the Showbox performing Spiderland for all the post-rock lovin' dudes: While at the Triple Door chanteuse Jesse Sykes plays her spooky and soulful Americana for the ladies:......

Last night at the Crocodile was one of those evenings you stumble on where things just keep getting better and better. We went down to see headliners Sea Wolf [MySpace] after hearing them do an in-studio bit at KEXP (not posted yet). About two songs in, the indie-folk melodies and lead singer's baritone duets with cello swept us and Shelves of Vinyl off our feet. They're a six-piece -- Alex Brown Church on vocals and......

While Neumo's hosts SIFF's second Face the Music Rock Party, featuring the dreamy pop of Viva Voce, the fragile and spooky soul of Jesse Sykes, and the swoon-worthy indie rock of Siberian, local cutie pie sister act Smoosh opens for sassy Brit girl-group throwback The Pipettes tonight. Here's a video of Smoosh's cover of Bloc Party's "This Modern Love" from a show earlier this week: And the Pipettes--who also have a free instore tonight (7pm)......

Sniff sniff, single tear. It's the last full week of SIFF, so you're well approaching your last chance till next year to take in some of that sweet filmy goodness. SIFF's not just movies; this week offers both the Opticlash 2 VJ battle at the CHAC and the Face the Music party at Neumo's, the latter of which includes performances by Viva Voce, Jesse Sykes, and Siberian. Tickets for both are going fast! Seattlest......

We’ve all heard it. Many of us have even said it. A “religious experience.” As in, “Seeing Tool at the Paramount was just amazing – like a religious experience.” It’s different for everyone. For some, it’s all about the environment of the show – the venue, the crowd, maybe the mushrooms you ate about an hour before the lights went down. For others, it’s all about the band. Maybe it’s Tool at the Paramount.......

When Seattlest first got word that we could interview Jesse Sykes we got really excited. Then we got nervous. You see, she kind of intimidates us. She's deep. She's beautiful. And that voice. Oh, that voice. But you know what? We really had nothing to worry about. What began as an interview became more of a conversation. One of the best conversations about music we've had in awhile. This is about half of that conversation.......

There' a constant ebb and flow when it comes to the music we love. Sometimes it seems like there's just nothing interesting out there. Nothing to light us up when we listen at home, in our car or on the bus, eyes closed. And then sometimes we find ourselves hauling fist-fulls of new music to the counter of our favorite record store. This week we've been all about Aqueduct's Or Give Me Death, Jesse Sykes......

Last year's Sasquatch line up was good, but not good enough to get us to spend three days at the Gorge. We still prefer the festival in its one-day, all-in-one-fell-swoop form, but with the lineup that's been announced for this year's two-day fest, we may just have to make the trip. Out of the two days, it was Saturday that really made us coo. Bjork *and* Arcade Fire? Consider us sold. There are still......

MUSIC: Dancing on the Valentine features wall-to-wall Duran Duran songs covered by local bands, including Say Hi to Your Mom, Valu-Pak, Speaker Speaker, and Peter Parker, all to benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. 8pm // The Crocodile, 2200 2nd Ave // $10 -- to fight disease! MOVIE: Age of Consent, a rare Michael Powell film featuring James Mason (Eddie Izzard's voice of God) slurring his lines and Helen Mirren as an incredible young hottie,......

Wednesday, February 14 >>> Sparklehorse at Showbox. Sparklehorse is touring in support of their first effort in five years, with more of the same delicate, pretty songs that made them indie darlings. Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter open. * sample: Song Streams available on MySpace 8:00 pm // $17 // 21+. >>> Miss Mamie Lavona the Exotic Mulatta at Conor Byrne. The last time we saw Miss Mamie she charmed us in entirely......

It looks like a couple of the kids will be getting together this weekend at Linda's to raise money for Teen Dance Ordinance foe and friend of the music scene, City Council member Richard Conlin. Check it out; it's a Rock Star Bake Sale. Local music types from your favorite bands such as U.S.E., IQU, The Catch, Mountain Con, Jesse Sykes & the Sweet Hereafter, Brad, and others (notably, John Wesley Harding) will be contributing......

Tomorrow is the Neumos edition of the Bonni Suval benefit concert series. Suval of the NYC band Fear of Dolls was hit by an alleged drunken motorist outside of Chop Suey in early February and has been in a Seattle hospital since with extensive injuries including a fractured skull, shoulder blade, kneecap, and leg. The bane of musicians and artists around the country--the lack of adequate health insurance-- has compounded Suval's bad situation, and......