Alt-Rockers The Flaming Lips to Perform Acclaimed ‘Yoshimi’ Album at The Florida Theatre in April

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Oklahoma City space cadets the Flaming Lips return to Northeast Florida for a live performance of Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots at the Florida Theatre on Saturday, April 20, 2024. Released in July of 2002 and taking its name as a tribute to Yoshimi P-We (Boredoms, OOIOO), the 22 tracks of the original release built off the success the band …

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Live Sessions | Susto Performs “Good Right Now” and “The Get Down” at Intuition Ale Works

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Led by singer-songwriter Justin Osborne, the Charleston-bred indie-Americana band Susto visited Jacksonville in early 2023, performing at the Bier Hall inside Intuition Ale Works. The band broke out with the 2021’s Time in the Sun, which combined Osborne’s introspective songwriting with an energetic live-band feel. And with 2023’s My Entire Life — another suite of songs grounded in American roots, …

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Live Session | Watch Frankie and the Witch Fingers Melt Faces on the JME Soundstage

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Nearly a decade of constant touring is paying dividends for the L.A.-based psychedelic-rock outfit Frankie and the Witch Fingers. The group cranks out energetic, riff-heavy earworms befitting of a band that has shown incredible stamina. And their seventh-studio record, Data Doom (out now via Greenway Records) is poised to make the band’s extraneous nom de plume (there are no Frankies …

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Head East with Forthcoming Bob Dylan Box Set That Reframes the Rock Bard’s Live Seventies Release

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In 1978, Bob Dylan was in an untenable position. Rock fans still looked to the de facto troubadour to guide youth culture toward the next step to the ‘60s promised land. After all, Elvis Presley had recently died in August 1977. And John Lennon was content to stay at home, apparently baking bread. Disco was still spinning the vapid hits …

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Chlöe | Tiny Desk Concert

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Chlöe Bailey and her band were scheduled to fly in the day before this show. But with thousands of flights delayed or canceled at the start of the Fourth of July holiday weekend, one member couldn’t make it into town. Because the arrangements were designed for two background vocalists, it didn’t make sense to have just one and the team …

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Christian McBride’s New Jawn | Tiny Desk Concert

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The start is chaotic for sure, but that’s the intent. Two minutes of craziness is an accurate description of the intro and outro of “Head Bedlam.” “A sonic description of us looking at Twitter particularly during the pandemic,” leader Christian McBride explains after the first tune of his Tiny Desk set, “when you put your phone down, that’s when the …

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Speedy Ortiz | Tiny Desk Concert

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Ten years ago, sometime after Speedy Ortiz transformed itself from a Sadie Dupuis solo project into a functioning rock band, its jagged and clever early singles caught the attention of NPR Music’s Lars Gotrich. So we reached out to inquire about a Tiny Desk concert, only to learn that the timing wasn’t quite right: The group didn’t have any days …

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Live Session | Jacksonville Indie-Folk Band Bobby Kid Plays Songs from their Beloved New Record, ‘Babyface’

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A few weeks back, the Jacksonville Music Experience conducted an in-no-way-scientific poll of our Instagram followers (a small-but-mighty bunch nearing 2K; follow here) based on the following prompt: Fave Local Release of 2023. Of the four-dozen or so respondents, nearly half said they either liked Bobby Kid‘s Babyface or a song from the band’s new full-length album. In some ways …

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Live Session | Watch pioneering Zamrock band WITCH perform “Waile” on the JME Soundstage

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The months since WITCH visited Jacksonville to perform on the JME Soundstage inside WJCT Studios have been inarguably momentous. The pioneering Zamrock band released a new album Zango on Desert Daze Recordings via Partisan Records, a label whose increasingly eclectic roster now includes post-punk act Fontaines D.C., UK jazz-fusion outfit Ezra Collective and the catalog of Afrobeat maestro Fela Kuti. …

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Little Dragon | Tiny Desk Concert

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The last time Swedish band Little Dragon performed for Tiny Desk, the group wasn’t actually at the Desk. Like a number of Tiny Desk alum who played between 2020 and 2022, Little Dragon delivered its debut Tiny Desk as a (home) concert in the band’s Gothenburg studio. That performance provided a comforting balm to many during the early and confusing …

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Action Bronson | Tiny Desk Concert

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There are times during Action Bronson‘s Tiny Desk when his vocals momentarily drift. We instruct our guests to face the directional microphones so that our recorders clearly pick up the voices. Action warned us of the improbability of that happening before we started filming and sure enough, the Flushing, Queens emcee strolled off mic a couple of times, did an …

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Meridian Brothers | Tiny Desk Concert

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You gotta love a band that names itself after siblings that don’t exist, and under a name that doesn’t match anyone in the band. At least I do. I’ve been a fan of the edgy sonic traditions of the Meridian Brothers for a while now, and jumped at the chance to bring the duo’s space age cumbia direct from Bogotá, …

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Juvenile | Tiny Desk Concert

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NPR Music is celebrating Black Music Month with an array of brand new Tiny Desk concerts. Together, these artists represent the past, present and future of Black music. This month of carefully curated shows is a celebration of Black artists expressing themselves in ways we’ve never seen before, and of the Tiny Desk’s unique way of showcasing that talent. “WTF …

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Live Release from Brötzmann, Bekkas and Drake Trio Blasts World Music Into Free Jazz Multiverse

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Taken from the recent Catching Ghosts album, recorded live at the November 2022 Jazzfest Berlin, the trio of German reedman Peter Brötzmann, Moroccan guembri player Majid Bekkas and Chicago-based drummer Hamid Drake tear lesser world music a new one with “Chalaba.” The merger of the Gnawa music that Bekkas brings to the forefront with his vocal and guembri (a type of bass …

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John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy’s Fearless Experiment Sets a New Album Ablaze

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A little over 60 years ago, the editor-in-chief of DownBeat magazine asked John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy a deceptively simple question: What are you trying to do? He rephrased slightly: What are you doing? The two saxophonists sat for a long 30 seconds before Dolphy broke the silence. “That’s a good question,” he said. The DownBeat editor, Don DeMicheal, printed …

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Wilco Return to the St. Augustine Amphitheatre for 2023 Spring Tour

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Wilco are readying to kick off their 2023 spring tour in support of their current, critically lauded 12th album, Cruel Country, and will return to the St. Augustine Amphitheatre for a performance on Wednesday, April 19.  Recorded at the Loft, the six-piece band’s Chicago studio space, Cruel Country is a double-album release that has been lauded as one of the best albums …

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Jax Indie-Rock Band flipturn on the JME Soundstage

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Indie-rock band flipturn is ascendant. The Fernandina-founded, now-Jax-based quintet is probably the biggest Jacksonville-music success story since Black Kids blew up in the early aughts.  Watch flipturn, as well as performance videos of other local and nationally touring artists on our NPR Live Sessions Page On the strength Shadowglow, their debut for unimpeachably cool boutique label Dualtone (Shovels & Rope, …

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Lee Fields | Tiny Desk Concert

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This year’s Black History Month celebration at the Tiny Desk features a carefully crafted lineup spanning many genres, generations and walks of life. Each artist represents the best in their class and will be performing at the Tiny Desk for the first time. You can’t see it on the screen, but there’s a piece of paper taped to the Desk …

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Soccer Mommy | Tiny Desk Concert

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When Sophie Allison says to our friends and coworkers assembled around the desk, “We’re finally doin’ it,” she really means it. A little less than exactly three years ago, Allison had just released the wonderful Color Theory as Soccer Mommy; it’s an album that marked significant strides in her songwriting and production. A big year was doubtless in store for …

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Watch Jax Multi-Instrumentalist & Songwriter Animal Clinic Perform at Blue Jay Listening Room

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While synthesizers have been commercially available for more than a half-century, a puritanical divide long existed between analog- and electronic-approaches to music. However, owing much to decades of experimentation by artists in a range of genres — from mainstream pop to hip-hop to rock and folk — as well as the genre-agnosticism of modern listeners, the bridge between man and …

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Jax Singer-Songwriter rickoLus live from JME Studios

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In a now famous — and, thanks to YouTube, now widely available — 1965 press conference, a young and insouciant Bob Dylan was asked if he considers himself more of a singer or a poet, among other earnest questions by a fawning San Francisco press corps. “Oh, I consider myself a song and dance man, y’know?” Dylan answers without skipping …

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Alex G | Tiny Desk Concert

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“I don’t have a lot to say,” Alex Giannascoli, who performs as Alex G, says with a laugh after his first song behind the Tiny Desk. Judging from his discography alone, that’s not something you might ordinarily accuse the Philly singer-songwriter of: nine full-length albums in the last dozen years, in addition to a couple EPs and a film soundtrack. …

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Watch | Acid Dad performs “Searchin'” live at the Jessie

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New York-based garage-psych band Acid Dad has built a substantial national following, blending ’70s guitar riffage with the primal energy of ’60s rock and roll across sprawling collections like 2021’s Take it From the Dead. The trio — Vaughn Hunt (vocals, guitar), Sean Fahey (vocals, guitar) and Trevor Mustoe (drums) — stopped through Jacksonville during a recent tour of the …

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Watch | Sailor Goon live at Blue Jay Listening Room

Jax singer-songwriter Sailor Goon spins and sings in Jax Beach

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With the release of several singles that blend jazz, neo-soul, psychedelia and pop under her alter ego Sailor Goon, Jacksonville vocalist Kayla Le has had our attention for some time now. Indeed, at the beginning of the year we named her one of the 10 Jacksonville artists to watch in 2022. Just a few months after the release of her …

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Watch | LPT Live on the JME Soundstage

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Our cavernous JME Soundstage felt a little less so a few months back when Jacksonville’s mighty LPT stopped by. The ten-piece salsa orchestra tends to fill up the room. As one of the most sought after live acts in the city, LPT not only commands the stage, they’re also prone to drawing the ire of those who would enforce fire-code-mandated …

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L.O.V.E. Culture | Live on the JME Soundstage

The popular Jacksonville group performs songs from their catalog of progressive hip-hop on the JME Soundstage

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On the heels of a promotional campaign with big-time beverage brand Sprite, Duval hip-hop collective L.O.V.E. Culture released perhaps the most talked about local record of 2021: 1827 N Pearl. Featuring five artists, each with his or her own distinctive skill sets — Che Forreign, Rob Mari, Spiritxiii, Flash the Samurai and Easyin2d — the group finds strength in numbers, …

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Fontaines D.C. | Tiny Desk (Home) Concert

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The Tiny Desk is working from home for the foreseeable future. Introducing NPR Music’s Tiny Desk (home) concerts, bringing you performances from across the country and the world. It’s the same spirit — stripped-down sets, an intimate setting — just a different space. Filmed in Chicago’s beautiful brick Irish American Heritage Center during a recent tour, this four-song set begins …

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