Soundcheck

When we last heard from Rachika Nayar, she was creating warped textures from her guitar and the software program called Ableton. Our introduction to Nina Keith came from her 2019 album Maranasati 19111, an eerie album of electroacoustic chamber music. After fan-girling each other’s music online, the two composer/musicians have now joined forces for a new project called Disiniblud. Their fantastical wordless conversations graze freely from post-rock, glitchy indie electronica, neo-classical, and pop – “all resulting in a work that suggests sweeping transformation can come from embracing old wounds with childlike wonder”, (album liner notes on Bandcamp.) Disiniblud plays new music from their 2025 self-titled debut album, in-studio.

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The Philadelphia-via-Vegas artist, singer, and songwriter Shamir has had a decade long career as a musical shapeshifter. Shamir has marked his ten year career with his tenth album, and perhaps not surprisingly, it’s called Ten. What is surprising is that it features songs that Shamir didn’t write, but that were written by his friends and colleagues - in essence, a love letter to the community of people who shaped Shamir’s life. And the most surprising thing about Ten is that Shamir says it's his final album as a solo artist. He plays intimate arrangements of these songs, in-studio.

Set list: 1.I love my friends 2. Neverwannago 3. 29

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Listen to a Juneteenth edition of the Soundcheck Podcast, with music celebrating African-American culture and history. Juneteenth marks the day that the enslaved people of Galveston, Texas learned that they were legally free -  June 19, 1865. Hear music from Igmar Thomas' Revive Big Band – a blend of jazz, neo-soul, funk, blues, and hip hop – which showcases the deep roots of Black American Music; composer and electronic artist Jlin; the slide blues guitar of Jontavious Willis; American roots artist Valerie June; hip-hop production meets contemporary classical in music by W4RP Trio; and the country-soul of The War and Treaty.

1. The War and Treaty – “Mr. Fun”
2. Jontavious Willis – “Ghost Woman”
3. Valerie June – “Endless Tree”
4. Igmar Thomas' Revive Big Band - To Kinda Lounge Around ft. Raydar Ellis
5. Jlin – “Precision of Infinity”
6. W4RP Trio & LiKWUiD – "Here’s One"

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Guitarist Marc Ribot has established himself as one of the most versatile , distinctive, in-demand guitarists anywhere. He’s played with Tom Waits, Marianne Faithfull, Elvis Costello, and dozens, maybe hundreds of others, and led his own bands that have touched on jazz, Cuban music, no wave, and more. But now, with his new album, "Map of a Blue City", we get another side of Marc Ribot: he sings. 

The album incorporates recordings made over nearly half of Ribot’s life. Some of the songs were decades in the making, going from demos and home recordings in the 1990s to at one point in 2014 recording with his friend, the legendary producer Hal Willner, who died in 2020. Ribot had shelved the project several times, but the songs just wouldn’t leave him alone. Finally working with producer and guitarist Ben Greenberg, they found was a way to reconcile the intimate recordings and previous choices – adding overdubs and taking things away. Ultimately, Ribot says “There are some hard truths and cold observations in these songs. I wanted the room to be small enough so that we couldn’t turn away: but warm enough to feel like you’re hearing it from a friend.” Ribot plays some of these tunes in-studio.  

Set list: 1. Elizabeth 2. Death of a Narcissist 3. Bella Ciao

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The melodic power pop band OK Go, as much a visual art ensemble as they are a rock band, has just released its first new album in over a decade. It’s called And The Adjacent Possible, and it’s full of relatively small songs with some really big ideas.  It also means there are some new entries into the catalog of how-did-they-do-that videos that OK Go has become famous for. The band plays new songs and an oldie in-studio for the Soundcheck Podcast - sans treadmills. 

Set list: 1. A Stone Only Rolls Downhill 2.This Too Shall Pass 3.Love

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The string quartet known as Brooklyn Rider features the usual two violins, viola and cello.  And that’s about all that’s usual with this band. Over the past two decades they have played with Yo Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, Mexican singer Magos Herrera, Irish fiddler Martin Hayes, and banjo wiz Bela Fleck.  They’ve commissioned a bunch of new pieces, and now, to celebrate their 20th anniversary, they’ve released a new record called The Four Elements - a wide range of music from the past and the present which is representative of, or directly inspired by Earth, Air, Fire, Water. And in parallel, the record is also designed to raise the alarm and bring “attention to the powerful forces of climate change which represent the single greatest challenge of our time”, (Bandcamp). Brooklyn Rider plays new works and an older piece, in-studio.

Set list: 1. Colin Jacobsen - A Short While To Be Here... - I. Whoa, Mule!  2-3 Colin Jacobsen - A Short While To Be Here... - IV.- The Old Cow Died-V. Little Birdie," 4.Osvaldo Golijov: Tenebrae

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Kentucky-based singer and songwriter S. G. Goodman blends a deeply-rooted Americana sound with indie rock and sharply observed tales of life, love and loss. Her songs acknowledge the poverty, violence, and homophobia of the region while celebrating its beauty and the strength to be found in family, friends, and storytelling. Her new album, Planting By The Signs, (due out June 20), is named for an ancient farming tradition that still exists in parts of the South, where the position of the moon as it moves through the signs of the zodiac determines when it’s a good time to plant crops. Goodman previews some of these new songs, in-studio.

Set list: 1. I'm in Love 2. Fire Sign 3. Heat Lightning

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The brass and dhol-led party band Red Baraat began as a Punjabi wedding band here in New York, but for the past 15 years they’ve brought their raucous energetic dance sound to everyone through a series of well-received albums and their memorable live shows. Drummer and bandleader Sunny Jain, infused the band with the sounds of his upbringing: music of the South Asian diaspora (Bollywood soundtracks, Jain Bhajans (devotional songs), and Bhangra ) injected with go-go, jazz, and rock. Red Baraat plays in-studio to celebrate their 15 year anniversary and the release of their new album, Bhangra Rangeela. 

Set list: 1. Bhangra Rangeela 2. Thums Up 3. Zindabad

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Denver-born songwriter, guitarist, singer, activist, and performer Jill Sobule, is possibly best-known because of her breakthrough hit of “I Kissed a Girl” (pre-dating Katy Perry by more a decade), and “Supermodel,” the anthem from the film Clueless. In her over seven albums, the troubadour has "mused on topics such as the death penalty, anorexia, shoplifting, reproduction, the French resistance movement, adolescence and the Christian right." She has also written music for TV and theater, been active in numerous social and political causes, and been a pioneer in the art of crowdfunding.

On her 2018 album, Nostalgia Kills, released on her own Pinko Records, the songwriter/composer tackles adult topics, and looks back without sentimentality to “exorcise some junior high school demons.” The late Jill Sobule and her band joined us to perform some of these songs in-studio in 2018. (From the Archives.) - Caryn Havlik

Set list: 1. Where Do I Begin 2. Island of Lost Things 3. I Don’t Wanna Wake Up

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Since releasing his first solo album in 2010, William Tyler has become associated with the so-called cosmic country style – his music has tended to be expansive, atmospheric, clearly rooted in Americana but with an experimental edge. Now comes Tyler’s new record, Time Indefinite – an album that might, paradoxically, be his most modern or avant-garde sounding. “Crafted by razor blade and chainsaw, it’s destructive and hopeful, a mirror and a dream, internal and external, unsettled and peaceful, non linear and all at once, analogue and digital, broken and repaired then broken again, surprising and nostalgic, but it’s a product of its time, definitely”, (Jake Davis, via Instagram.) William Tyler, along with producer, engineer, and synthesist Jake Davis play some of the songs, in-studio. 

Set list: 1. Star of Hope 2. Anima Hotel 3. Concern

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