Robin Hilton

I love the crazy surprises you get when two or more artists get together and turn their creative ideas over to one another. When the band Junip wrote the song "Your Life, Your Call," frontman José González says, it was meant to be an unambiguous meditation on growing ...

We got a lot of great suggestions when we asked readers to tell us their picks for the perfect pair of headphones last week. We also learned a lot. For example, you all know way more about this than I do.

Another thing I learned is that the kind ...

It was a cool, clear night in Austin, Texas, as the 2013 South by Southwest music festival was nearing its end. Bassist Chris Slorach, guitarist Alex Edkins and drummer Hayden Menzies — three affable guys from Canada who make up the band Metz — strode onto the stage at Bar ...

The Keaton Henson who appears on the new album Birthdays is an avowed hermit with a profoundly broken heart. He also has one of the most beautiful voices I've heard. The 24 year-old singer from London, who says he rarely leaves his bedroom, bares his wrecked emotional remains in an ...

Shortly before the fabulously chaotic rock group Gashcat took the tiny stage at the Javelina coffee house in Austin, Texas, frontman Kyle Craft confided that his voice was totally shot. It was the final day of the 2013 South by Southwest music festival and Craft wasn't sure ...

Surfer Blood's live sets are more about charm than spectacle: While the band's music is a punchy mix of infectious pop and rock, you're not likely to see pyrotechnics or stage diving. Its members instead seem to connect with their fans on a personal level, even when a large mob ...

I've been buying headphones for 30 years now, have owned more they I can possibly remember and still haven't found the perfect pair. I must chew through one or two sets a year in a never-ending, desperate (and futile) search to find the right acoustics, feel and functionality. I've tried ...

Ask die-hard John Denver fans why they love the late singer's music so much and they'll likely tell you the same thing: "He makes me cry." Denver, who wrote unabashedly sentimental songs about love, nature and an ever-homesick life on the road, had a rare gift for stirring something ...

Arian Asllani, who records and performs as Action Bronson, is a hulking figure on stage with a flow and fearless showmanship to match his size. The former gourmet chef from Queens often raps about food and fine dining, with equal parts humor and conceit.

For this all-too-short set, presented by ...

It's hard to kill it when your show is at 3:30 on a Thursday afternoon, especially in a small club with a stage the size of a college dorm room. But when Chance the Rapper's turn came in a swiftly moving showcase of hip-hop artists at Austin's Karma Lounge, he ...

Get some earplugs and a case of your favorite caffeinated beverage ready: The annual sensory-overload-joy-fest known as South by Southwest is almost here. Bob Boilen, Ann Powers, Stephen Thompson and I, along with a small army of other NPR Music peeps, will be there next week for the whole ...

The psych-rock trio Unknown Mortal Orchestra doused a sold-out Washington, D.C., crowd in an epic wash of guitar noise during an hour-long performance at the Rock and Roll Hotel, recorded and webcast live on Feb. 27.

Unknown Mortal Orchestra, from Portland, Ore., just released its latest shape-shifting album, titled ...

The trippy pop group Foxygen gave a thrilling, sometimes chaotic live performance at the Rock and Roll Hotel in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday night, channeling everyone from The Velvet Underground to The Rolling Stones and Ramones.

Foxygen (A-plus for the name alone) is the music of Jonathan Rado and ...

I knew I had a rare gem of a song when even Bob Boilen couldn't place it, especially since it was by The Kinks, one of his favorite bands. The cut was "Nothing In This World Can Stop Me Worryin' 'Bout That Girl" and I'd discovered it in the ...