1 SMITH WESTERNS Soft Will Mom And Pop 2 DAFT PUNK Random Access Memories Columbia 3 MIKAL CRONIN MCII Merge 4 DEERHUNTER Monomania 4AD 5 KURT VILE Wakin On A Pretty Daze Matador 6 SURFER BLOOD Pythons Warner Brothers 7 PORTUGAL. THE MAN Evil Friends Atlantic 8 ROSE WINDOWS The Sun Dogs SUB POP 9 PART TIME PDA Mexican Summer 10 YOU ME AND US Stay Inside [EP] Self-Released 11 BASS DRUM OF DEATH Bass Drum Of Death Innovative Leisure 12 PHOENIX Bankrupt! Glassnote 13 HUNX AND HIS PUNX Street Punk Hardly Art 14 SONNY AND THE SUNSETS Antenna To The Afterworld Polyvinyl 15 WILD NOTHING Empty Estate Captured Tracks 16 BOARDS OF CANADA Tomorrow's Harvest Warp 17 SPLASHH Comfort Kanine 18 VAMPIRE WEEKEND Modern Vampires Of The City XL 19 BAPTIST GENERALS Jackleg Devotional To The Heart SUB POP 20 NATIONAL Trouble Will Find Me 4AD 21 SPEEDY ORTIZ Major Arcana Carpark 22 PASTELS Slow Summits Domino 23 ANNA VON HAUSSWOLFF Ceremony Other Music 24 MANTLES Long Enough To Leave Slumberland 25 SALVIA… Read More

KWVA Eugene 88.1FM turns 20 this year and is celebrating by throwing a week long music and media festival called BETTERFEST!  KWVA wants to party with you May 13th - 18th! The festival culminates in three main stage concerts at the legendary WOW Hall featuring performances from your favorite college radio artists. During the week leading up to the concerts enjoy a kick off party, record swap, hip-hop freestyle tournament, Small Howl local band showcase, unique radio programming, campus events, and participation of local businesses. The three WOW Hall concerts will be completely free to all UO students. Thursday and Friday night shows will be $5 for non-students, and Saturday’s show will be $8. Events earlier in the week leading up to the concerts will have cover charges. For $20, anyone can purchase a VIP pass that will guarantee them entrance into ANY Betterfest event or concert.… Read More

1 STROKES Comedown Machine RCA 2 WAVVES Afraid Of Heights Warner Brothers 3 SALLIE FORD AND THE SOUND OUTSIDE Untamed Beast Partisan 4 KURT VILE Wakin On A Pretty Daze Matador 5 UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA II Jagjaguwar 6 YOUTH LAGOON Wondrous Bughouse Fat Possum 7 PHOSPHORESCENT Muchacho Dead Oceans 8 WAX IDOLS Discipline And Desire Slumberland 9 DAVID BOWIE The Next Day Columbia 10 COLLEEN GREEN Sock It To Me Hardly Art 11 PURLING HISS Water On Mars Drag City 12 CAYUCAS Bigfoot Secretly Canadian 13 IO ECHO Ministry Of Love Iamsound 14 FOALS Holy Fire Warner Brothers 15 LAPALUX Nostalchic Brainfeeder 16 LOW The Invisible Way SUB POP 17 VIRGINS Strike Gently Cult 18 CAVEMAN Caveman Fat Possum 19 BLACK ANGELS Indigo Meadow Blue Horizon 20 TELEKINESIS Dormarion Merge 21 WHITE FENCE Cyclops Reap Castle Face 22 SMITH WESTERNS "Varsity" [Single] Mom And Pop 23 TROPICAL POPSICLE Dawn Of Delight Volar 24 TWIN TIGERS Death Wish Old Flame 25 YEAH YEAH YEAHS "Sacrilege" [Single] Interscope 26… Read More

KWVA has been selected to participate in the "Soundtap Madness" college radio listening tournament for a 2nd year. We did pretty well last year and made it to the semi-finals. This year, Soundtap has made some improvements, including shorter rounds (just two days instead of three), making mobile devices compatible, and changing their selection criteria. KWVA is seeded #3 in our region, super exciting! The tournament starts today, so be sure to go set-up your account and get ready to listen to KWVA via Soundtap... only listeners who are logged in to the Soundtap interface will count for the listening tournament. There are no commercials and this is not a profit driven venture, just a fun way to engage people in college radio listening. More info at http://soundtap.com/madness

By KWVA Music Director: Thor Slaughter As any person that has experienced SXSW will say, it's a crazy experience. The overused phrase, no matter how vague and non-descriptive it may be, still is the only one I can use to describe the festival. Being born and raised in Eugene, Oregon, I couldn't have been more culture shocked by the state of Texas in general and the week long music festival has taken a toll on my ears that I will never be able to get back. I promise to keep it short in this re-cap, more is on the way though! Lots of pictures and stories but here is a list of three performances I was lucky enough to see! -Icky Blossoms at the Parish. This Omaha goth dance collective crammed the tiny stage at the Parish with their own state of the art light and projection system that was in sync with their blistering electronic dance rhythms. Dark and moody vocals covering the thumping dance rhythms made for a combination of head banging and butt shaking in the crammed venue. Their set… Read More

KWVA was selected, along with a handful of other college stations, to be on the mtvU College Radio Countdown. Take a look at the video student staff made and the 10 music videos selected:

Get More: www.mtvu.com

The band MUFASSA was in the KWVA studios for a live on-air performance and we partnered with the Oregon Voice to produce this video: