Asuna is a Japanese sound artist and musician who has been performing and releasing albums since the turn of the century. I first became aware of Asuna’s music when his album “Organ Leaf” was released as part of the Sparkling Composers series in the early aughties via Lucky Kitchen Records, whose founders Alejandra and Aeron featured back on Low Profile episode 48. In 2014, when I was on tour with LAKE, I asked our tour manager Koji about a handful of my favorite Japanese artists, and when I...

This week, Low Profile presents music and conversation with Kim Salmon of the Scientists.  This program was originally broadcast on the KAOS program Jack Habegger’s Celebrity Telethon.  Jack has co-hosted and guest hosted previous episodes of Low Profile, interviewing Lavender Country, Jeffrey Lewis, Michael Hurley and James Maeda.  Here’s what Jack had to say about this episode:     “A little over a year ago, I connected with Kim Salmon over Zoom to discuss his long, storied career for my...

 Today I’m talking with the band Califone’s founding member Tim Rutili.  Califone began 25 years ago as a solo project after the dissolution of his previous group Red Red Meat in Chicago.  You may have heard his collaboration with Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock, Ugly Casanova, or his ambient rock group Loftus.  Tim has continued to do sporadic collaborative efforts over the years, but Califone has been a constant having released 15 albums as well as a bunch of singles and EPs.  Their experimental...

Today, my co-host Madison Nadine and I sit down with Mike Stax joining us remotely from his home in San Diego.  For kicks, Mike records and tours with his band, the Loons,  but he’s better known as a writer, having published the magazine UGLY THINGS for 40 years and running.  In 2022,  he  started an excellent new podcast bearing the same name. Ugly Things is an established authority on the golden era of obscure underground rock music, and today we’ll be talking to Mike about a guy named...

Phil Elverum (The Microphones, Mount Eerie) returns to Low Profile with his audio engineer friend Matt Fenton to discuss the time they gave the Kamloops, British Columbia band Peace a chance. They discuss their behind-the-scenes experience facilitating the 2006 debut by the band Peace, “On Earth.” It was the first project Elverum signed to his own label PW Elverum and Sun, up to which point had only released his own music.  One might argue that the album has not particularly aged well, but...

Singer, Author and Nashville Songwriter Hall of Famer Layng Martine Jr’s compositions have been performed by the likes of soul legends The Pointer Sisters, Featherbed frontman Barry Mannilow, Bo Diddley, Reba McEntire, Las Vegas regional sensation Elvis Presley, and Philly correspondant Karl Blau.  Now an octogenarian- with over six active decades in the background and just a handful of singles under his own name- 2023 marks Layng’s debut album, “Music Man.” The album was produced by his son...

Karl Blau takes over the show again, this time to speak with members of our mutual friends Hermit Thrushes, recorded at various locations in Philly back in 2021.  Band members Yianni Kourmadas, Taryn Jones and Andrew Keller share why they use the cheapest gear possible, their experiences with bars vs D.I.Y. and all ages spaces, musical influences, and tour stories including how they rebounded from a robbery.  The group often learns new material by way of MIDI demos, and we’ll be hearing a...

Austin Leonard Jones is a singing storyteller, spinning narratives based in fact and fiction with a penchant for writing country-flavored tunes that feel familiar from the get-go.  Born and raised in Texas, he currently calls Ojai, CA his home.  In the past year he’s released four albums on cassette tape: a live record, a collection of new songs called “Dead Calm,” and a ten-year retrospective in two volumes, called “The Wonder Years of Austin Leonard Jones” on Perpetual Doom records.  He’s...

Chronophage is a band that started in Austin, TX and has since scattered into various locations.  While on tour in winter 2021, band members Adam, Casey, Sarah and Parker dropped by for an in-studio taping at the Happy Birthday House for Channel 22 on Thurston Community Media.  Madison Nadine conducts this interview along with first time co-host Markly Morrison. The group talks about their new self-titled album recorded by studio masters Craig Ross (Lenny Kravitz, Sheryl Crow, Daryl Hall,...

Born 100 years ago in Scotland, the late musician/poet/author/humorist Ivor Cutler was a self-described Oblique Music Philospher.  He released tons of art by way of radio, television, books and records.  His work, no matter the medium, is thoughtful as it is absurd, as irreverent as it is romantic.  Author Bruce Lindsay took it upon himself to write the greatest-and-only biography on the O.M.P. called Ivor Cutler: A Life Outside the Sitting Room.  Markly Morrison and Andrew “Hollywood”...

Jim O’Rourke is a composer and producer living in Japan after spending most of his life in Chicago. His solo and collaborative works range from pop songwriting to electronic and avant-garde, being one of the first musicians to use a computer for live improvisations. His albums have been released on Table of the Elements, Drag City, Mego, and his own label Moikai. As a producer he has worked with Joanna Newsom, Wilco, US Maple, Stereolab and countless others. He has been a member of Sonic...

On today’s episode, instead of our usual format, I’ve got a folkorist.  Derek Piotr lives in Connecticut, and was introduced to me by Dollar Country host Franklin Fantini, who you might remember from a bonus episode from October 2021.  Derek’s released several albums of experimental and electronic music this century (see listening links below), but in recent years has shifted his focus to collecting folks songs as remembered by folks.  He has traveled here and abroad collecting field...

If you don’t know already, La Luz is killing it these days.  They got the thick harmonies, they got the deep twang in the guitar department, and everybody in the band brings a hell of a lot to the table.  Outside the band, they all have other music projects that are keeping it fresh.   The solo projects of guitarist Shana Cleveland and keyboardist Alice Sandahl are glorious in their own right, as well as bassist Lena Simon’s new studio project Kairos Creature Club and drummer Audrey Johnson’s...

 Hey, Markly here, this is the sixty-third episode of Low Profile. A couple years ago, my friend and former bandmate Nehemiah St-Danger told me about this band he started playing bass for, and thought would be a good match for this show. I loved what I heard- in fact, I started listening to it all the time, but I was hesitant because A: there were only two albums out, and I usually like to do a lot of research in a deep discography before having them on as a guest, and B: I already had a...

Oakland-based singer-songwriter Stephen Steinbrink, one of my favorite artists and a friend to boot, is my guest today.  Multi-instrumentalist and frequent co-host Andrew Dorsett is also in on the conversation, accompanying Stephen on piano and steel guitar in the Lounge of the ABC House.  He has released 14 albums and EPs under his own name and his earlier moniker French Quarter on the labels Holy Page, Western Vinyl, No More Second Chances, Lost Sound Tapes, and Melodic Records.  Steinbrink...

Come for a ride down Interstate 5 with Suzzy Roche and Lucy-Wainwright Roche as I talk to them on their way to the next gig on their west coast tour.  Suzzy is one-third of The Roches, a group of sisters whose records since the 1970s have been creating fanatic enthusiasts around the world, myself included. Her daughter Lucy has released several killer solo records in the last couple of decades, and the new album “I Can Still Hear You” is the third that the two of them made together.  This...

I'm very excited to kick things off today, I’ve been working on this season for a little over a year and as usual, I’ll be presenting a ton of terrific musical guests.  Also, my wife Lani Is supplying hand drawn portraits of all the artists for each episode, starting with today’s guest, Peter David Connelly of the Mona Reels, whose latest self-released album “Without Love” is available on bandcamp.  In addition to the band’s output over the past twenty years or so, Peter and I talk about how...

 Dev Ray, Dylan Shearer and Ali Baker (with Summer Schief) make an appearance at the final Sherler Sundays concert of 2022. Ali and Summer reveal their new band name, discuss singing harmony with the Mona Reels, and share about their recent opportunity to share the stage with hip-hop royalty. Dylan performs in Olympia for the first time in 20 years and talks about his formative years in the Mojave desert, and the chapter of his life in the Bay Area leading to working with members of the Osees...

The penultimate live episode for this series of highlights from the Scherler Sundays concert series features three Olympia acts and one out-of-towner, Austin Leonard Jones.  The Mona Reels has been the ongoing  project of singer-songwriter Peter David Connelly for over 20 years, today we hear his current and self-proclaimed favorite line-up of the band, a six-piece ensemble.  Included is a suite of songs from their latest record, "Without Love."  The Mona Reels will also be kicking off the...

This is the sixth installment of highlights from the Scherler Sunday’s concert series earlier this summer. We’ll be hearing interviews and three songs each from Hot Pursuit of Happiness, my old friends LAKE, and Kelsey Magnuson.  The first two sets were recorded on July 24th, and Kelsey’s set is from July 31st of this year, all recorded in front of an audience behind the Historic Carnegie Library in Olympia.  If you want to hear the complete sets and unedited versions of the interviews, it...

Patrick Haggerty brings his six-piece Lavender Country band to the grassy knoll.  After a candid interview in front of the Scherler Sundays audience, the band's lively honky-tonk set serves as a framework for Haggerty to tell his life story using his songs as the soundtrack, making for a very special show celebrating almost 50 years since their release of the first openly queer-themed country album.  Engineered by Robin Carmosino, behind the historic Carnegie Library in Olympia, WA.Scherler...

Today’s live highlights reel features interviews and performances from July 10th and 17th, 2022.  First up it's NYC-based Zachary Cale, who shares about his musical journey and finding his rock chops in Olympia at the turn of the century.  Next, Portland’s Jack Habegger returns after guest-hosting last week for his first time as the interviewee before performing with his band Celebrity Telethon.  Then, we jump ahead a week to meet Olympia neo-bluegrass artists the Pine Hearts, and Oly’s indie...

Musical storyteller Michael Hurley made his debut on Folkways records way back in 1964 and shows no signs of slowing down because there’s always another story to tell. His songs have been covered by The Violent Femmes, Cat Power, Yo La Tengo and previous Low Profile guests Eugene Chadbourne and the Holy Modal Rounders. Michael’s performances are few and far between these days, and interviews with him are even more rare. Without him American music would not be the same, and it was an honor to...

For the second collection of highlights from the Scherler Sundays 2022 concert and interview series, we have a document from an indie rock lover’s dream: Doug Martsch of Built to Spill and John Atkins of 764-HERO, and more recently, his new band Sun Breaks. Doug and John each play intimate acoustic sets behind the old Carnegie Library in Olympia. For this show, I interviewed the two of them together since they have a bit of mutual history in their formative years in their respective music...

Live performances and interviews from Olympia artists Null State, Waves Crashing, Annie Schultz, The Cold Sweats and Fastener. Recorded July 12 and July 19 2022 at Scherler Sundays in Olympia, WA presented by Three Magnets Brewing Company. These are highlights from those days; if you would like to hear the unedited recordings they are being made available via patreon.com/LowProfile at any support level. These are my first interviews in front of an audience, and all of the guests are...