Soundcheck

1

With his heavy horn section, electric backing vocals and a crack band, California soulful rocker Nick Waterhouse serves up a neo-noir concoction of modern rhythm and blues with surf-rock. Inspired by crate-digging in record stores for 45’s, Waterhouse has embraced the mid-century sound and is looking to make folks boogie. He and his retro-modern band play songs in-studio from his latest record, his fourth, a self-titled affair, Nick Waterhouse.   - Caryn Havlik

Watch the session here: 

Multi-instrumentalist, singer and songwriter Heather Woods Broderick’s talents have been put to use by Sharon Van Etten and Laura Gibson; and she’s been a member of Efterklang and Horse Feathers. Her latest record, Invitation, is a grand and mysterious adventure into quiet and dark introspection. Piano riffs anchor this baroque-folk pop, and string arrangements might reflect the swells and whispers of her new digs around the impressive coastal landscape of Oregon. Or, as Western Vinyl puts it: "It's about how the stillness of such settings can unearth the disquiet often buried by the infinite distractions of a life without pause." Heather Woods Broderick joins us to play some of these songs in-studio.  - Caryn Havlik

Watch the session here: 

Multi-instrumentalist, composer and songwriter, host of the podcast Aria Code, and MacArthur Fellow Rhiannon Giddens’ latest collaboration is with the Italian pianist and percussionist Francesco Turrisi. Entitled there is no Other, the twelve songs explore the connections between European, Arabic, African-American and Mediterranean sounds and at once offer opposition to "othering" and “a celebration of the spread of ideas, connectivity, and shared experience” (Nonesuch Records).

The duo’s artistic cross-pollinations and discoveries draw from Italy, Ireland, Iran, Africa, and Brazil, among other places, and reflect the history of the movement of both people and instruments (with particular attention paid to both the trans-Saharan and the trans-Atlantic slave trade). Giddens and Turrisi have said in interviews that audiences probably won’t be thinking on how cultures meet and collide and create new forms, but perhaps as the players weave their magic, the result might also be that the music will start deep and productive conversations about migrations. Rhiannon Giddens and Francesco Turrisi, along with bassist Jason Sypher, join us in-studio to perform these songs. – Caryn Havlik

Here's the performance from May 1 in The Jerome L. Greene Space:

Through his band the Eels, singer/songwriter Mark Oliver Everett has drawn on the tragedy and turmoil in his life and counters it with humor and hope. He is the son of a quantum physicist who developed the Many Worlds Theory, who now has a son himself. Eels’ latest, The Deconstruction, brings the feelings with a bit of wry optimism, and plenty of reflecting. It brings Mark Oliver Everett, aka E, to the studio to play some stripped-down versions of his songs and perhaps tell tales of the world around him and how he balances all that with tour and family and being kind. -Caryn Havlik

"There are times you have to tear something apart to find something beautiful inside." -E, EELS guy

Watch the session here: 

German-Canadian-English singer and songwriter Alice Merton crafts upbeat dance-pop tunes anchored by punchy-funk basslines, complete with swirling synths and chiming guitars. Growing up in Canada, she was classically trained in piano and voice. Later, her family moved to Germany, where she studied at Popakademie (the University of Popular Music and Music Business), before the family moved to England. With her best friend and manager, she created her own international label, and earlier this year, released her debut album, MINT. Alice Merton and her band join us to play some of those crafty-funk-pop songs. - Caryn Havlik

Set List: 

Watch the session Here:

Formed in 2005, New York-based indie pop trio AJR mixes close sibling harmonies, electronic music, strings, and jangly riffs into their sunny sound. The Met brothers family band, made up of multi-instrumentalists Adam (vocals/bass), Jack (vocals/guitar) and Ryan (guitar/piano/vocals), got their start busking around the city, playing covers of Vampire Weekend, the Beach Boys, and Fun. They’ve worked with Weezer’s Rivers Cuomo and are about to release their latest, Neotheater. The band joins us in-studio to play some of those tunes.

Watch the session here: 

Hear tropical psych-rock from Combo Chimbita, a quartet based in New York City by way of Colombia. Their tropical psych-rock is an alchemical experiment of drawing on ancestral mythologies, metal strangeness, and deep groove. Their latest record, Ahomale, is a blend of futuristic flange-y electric rock and funk, with vintage synths and tropical rhythms, all supporting Carolina Oliveros’s powerful vocals in a quest to connect with the spiritual realm. Combo Chimbita joins us in-studio to play some of these new songs. - Caryn Havlik

Set list: 

Watch the session here: 

On his latest record, cheekily titled My Finest Work Yet, Andrew Bird manages to embrace self-doubt, engages with both beauty and terror, and goes into the depths of the intimacy between adversaries, all the while leaving room to make things personal or escalate them to the international. It is with immense fan reverence and celebration that we welcome Andrew Bird to the studio to perform some new material from My Finest Work Yet. -Caryn Havlik

Avi Avital is an astonishing mandolin player, whether he’s playing classical music or Eastern European folk songs. Omer Avital, though born in Israel, has been an essential part of the New York jazz scene for over 20 years as both a bass player and a composer. Their collaboration, Avital Meets Avital, draws on Moroccan and North African sounds, folkloric and classical traditions, Israeli harmonies and Mediterranean rhythms and jazz improvisation. In fact, Gramophone calls out their "sense of delight in making music together" and their music "Utterly brilliant." Avi and Omer Avital, along with Yonathan Avishai on piano and Itamar Doari on percussion, play some of their works, in-studio.