299 episodes

The KUTX music team looks high and low for songs and artists that should be on your radar. It's a no-frills showcase for some of the great music that comes through the "live music capital of the world." Join us to discover new music and revisit some old favorites -- one song at a time.

Song of the Day KUT & KUTX Studios

    • Music

The KUTX music team looks high and low for songs and artists that should be on your radar. It's a no-frills showcase for some of the great music that comes through the "live music capital of the world." Join us to discover new music and revisit some old favorites -- one song at a time.

    Riders Against the Storm: “Black Girl Payday”

    Riders Against the Storm: “Black Girl Payday”

    As Women’s History Month comes to a close this Sunday, we assure y’all that we’ll keep featuring the countless talented women of our fair city all year ’round. But March 2024 does end with a unique spectacle this weekend, thanks to a fierce feminine force who’s already left her historic mark on Austin’s steadily diversifying music scene.







    And that’s Qi Dada, one half of the husband-and-wife hip-hop duo, Riders Against the Storm, one of KUTX’s very first Studio 1A guests and some of Austin’s most influential socially conscious creators. Following a track record of promoting Black and Brown women’s voices through RAS Day Fest (currently on hiatus) and Body Rock ATX (which has found new legs at Sahara Lounge), Qi Dada’s put something together just for the ladies…well…at least lineup-wise.







    That’s right, audiences of all kinds are welcome to join Qi Dada and her handpicked crew for a live concert taping and post-show ceremony – Black Divas – 6:30-8:30PM this Saturday at Austin PBS. It’s all in the name of uplifting motherhood and maternal health, aiming to raise awareness around the rise of maternal death rates in Texas and beyond, so you know your cover fee is going towards a great cause and great music. And although we wish we could spin stuff from the whole roster of performers, we also don’t want to spoil the Black girl magic ahead of the actual event. So instead we’re bending the knee to Austin’s certified queen of the hustle with an oldie-but-goodie Qi Dada solo cut from RAS’ 2021 LP Flowers For the Living. Because with empowering triplet-ripplin’ lyrics and a sassy bass-heavy beat to match, “Black Girl Payday” is the alarm you need to keep from sleeping on Black Divas this Saturday.

    • 3 min
    James Mastro: “The Face of the Sun”

    James Mastro: “The Face of the Sun”

    It’s well-known that we here at KUTX have a soft spot for Alejandro Escovedo – a love affair that’s lasted far longer than we’ve even been a station. So it’s our due diligence to let you know that Señor Escovedo does have a new record entitled Echo Dancing dropping this weekend. That said, we’re not just talkin’ up Al today.







    No, we gotta jump in and tip our hat to Escovedo’s returning tour mate, Mr. James Mastro. A fellow pioneer in the early days of punk rock, this singer-songwriter/multi-instrumentalist/producer’s already had the privilege and pleasure to perform across the globe more times than we can count, including in the company of Patti Smith, Ian Hunter, Judy Collins, and Robert Plant. This year, Mastro’s been riding high off his latest LP Dawn of a New Error, which dropped the final week of February.







    Over the next month-plus of national touring, Escovedo and Mastro will likely be playing some of these new tunes in front of a live audience for the very first time. So as the pair escape the clouds and thunderstorms dominating Austin’s forecast for the next fortnight, familiarize yourself with “The Face of the Sun” and all the other cuts off Dawn of a New Error and Echo Dancing with the shared tour kickoff 8PM this Friday at Antone’s.

    • 3 min
    Nakia: “Thrill-O-Matic”

    Nakia: “Thrill-O-Matic”

    If you’re already planning out your weekend and want to offset the Sunday scaries with some fresh visuals, consider checking out a three-act bill that coincides with a music video premiere.







    The ringleader behind the affair is Nakia, the mononymous grifter of Austin’s vibrant blues scene. With only two records to his name at the time, Nakia started off the 2010s strong as a semi-finalist on The Voice‘s inaugural season. That’s absolutely an accolade worth bragging about, but nothing compares with new content, right? Well, keeping pace with his already-robust post-pandemic output, Nakia’s got some new optics he’s about to drop under the spotlight.







    This Sunday Nakia commemorates the music video release for last October’s “Thrill-O-Matic”, a tune that was actually penned right after The Voice‘s finale, demo files long lost to the aether before a recent recovery made it a reality. Doors are at 7PM, Junerise kicks it off at 7:15, Nakia does his thing at 8:15 (your only opportunity to see “Thrill-O-Matic” before it hits the internet on Monday morning) and our June 2023 Artist of the Month Pelvis Wrestley wraps it up a quarter past 9. Until then, vanquish any Tuesday blues with the soul-rockin’, Abbey Road-mastered, Dolby Atmos-mixed mechanics of this Nathaniel Rateliff-esque original.

    • 2 min
    Giulia Millanta: “I Dance My Way”

    Giulia Millanta: “I Dance My Way”

    Few people are as effervescent about their passions than those from Florence. But we’re not talking about the tiny Texas town about half an hour north of here. No, we mean the Tuscan capital that gave us cultural heavyweights like Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo, Gucci, Cavalli, and more.Well, in a testament to “you can take the woman out of Italy but you can’t take Italy out of the woman”, Austin multi-hyphenate Giulia Millanta‘s pace of polymath output raises her profile towards that of her legendary Florentine predecessors. She’s a professional chef and a published author. Yet Millanta still finds the time and energy to write and record original music – which doesn’t sound quite as impressive as it truly is until you factor in what all she’s working with: guitar, upright bass, ukulele, plus vocals with lyrics in English, Italian, Spanish, and French. Yeah…Giulia’s the real deal.And this year is set to be another fruitful one for Giulia Millanta’s big batch of crafts; she’s soon set to share a new Italian cookbook – Dinner with Giulia – Flavors, Songs and Stories of a Florentine Troubadour, not to mention her ninth solo full-length, Only Luna Knows on April 19th. And while yes, you can hire Millanta to cook, spin yarns, and sing songs right in your own home, you can also familiarize yourself with this indie folk innovator in some more open settings – 8:30PM this Saturday at The Purple Barn in Wimberley, 7PM next Thursday at Pecha Kucha, 6PM at Guero’s on Wednesday the 17th, and the Only Luna Knows LP release party 6PM on Saturday April 20th at Saxon Pub.So there you have it – a full course of Giulia Millanta concerts to choose from. Now treat yourself to one of Giulia’s three pieces of antipasta from the album. We recommend last Friday’s “I Dance My Way”, since it’s got that ristorante-ready arrangement of piano, electric guitar, double bass, percussion, and vocals – all for that extra zest of Texan + Tuscan twang. Mangia bene.

    • 3 min
    SPRINTS: “Literary Mind” (KUTX Live at Scholz Garten)

    SPRINTS: “Literary Mind” (KUTX Live at Scholz Garten)

    The taste-ranging genre gastronomy of our latest Scholz Garten lineup alone made it one for the books. And that A.M. affair simply couldn’t have been complete without SPRINTS. Because…yeah, the pairing of a Dublin four-piece – garage grit, post-punk precociousness, and all – against a full KUTX crowd at one of Texas’ oldest venues was exactly what you’d expect: a pre-St. Paddy’s blast.







    SPRINTS just made Letter to Self public this January, and the eclectic, confessional record has already reached millions of streams worldwide – no small feat for any up-and-comers’ big debut. But sudden success clearly hasn’t killed frontwoman Karla Chubb’s of-kilter candor, since she expertly steered her quartet through a mad dash of lyrical honesty and aural adrenaline. SPRINTS heads back to the UK next week, so fingers crossed when they’re planning their next tour, our KUTX-clusive live recording of their show closer, “Literary Mind” preserves the memory and inspires another Austin appearance some time in the future.

    • 5 min
    Sinkane: “How Sweet Is Your Love” (KUTX Live at Scholz Garten)

    Sinkane: “How Sweet Is Your Love” (KUTX Live at Scholz Garten)

    We’re still recovering from the flood of foreign artists that turned our fair city (and Scholz Garten) into an international exhibition last week. And if that worldwide melting pot of genres is best embodied by any SXSW 2024 performer, multi-instrumentalist Ahmed Gallab definitely makes the short list.







    Born in London, Gallab spent a chunk of his childhood in Sudan and the remaining rearing in Ohio. The Buckeye State’s rich punk culture rubbed off on Gallab, whose multi-faceted talents and one-of-a-kind musical perspective led to session work with the likes of Caribou, of Montreal, and Yeasayer. Through his solo focus Sinkane, Gallab was able to refine his kitchen sink of sounds, but a dozen years down the line from their debut record MARS, we haven’t heard a lot of new studio stuff from them on this side of the pandemic.







    Well, with the release of Sinkane’s eighth LP We Belong on April 5th, we know exactly what we’ll be sinkin’ our teeth into next month. And that cross-genre sense of acceptance was strong when Sinkane wrapped up our the morning’s live lineup last Friday at Scholz Garten. A shining specimen of modern gospel soul spiced up with that idiosyncratic Sinkane twist, the new album’s second installment, “How Sweet Is Your Love” was a solid standout of their live set. Oh, how sweet it was…

    • 6 min

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