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The San Antonio band Girl in a Coma formed over a junior high obsession over the tortured music of Morrissey. “I loved him so much it hurt,” says singer Nina Diaz, who was only 13 when she joined the band. “I turned vegetarian after that, started reading Oscar Wilde, eating yogurt ...

If your New Year’s resolution died a quiet death months ago, but you still want to make your mark in 2012 – make a musical summer resolution with Soundcheck! 

The London-based band Micachu and the Shapes - led by multi-instrumentalist, singer and composer Mica Levi - made an indie rock splash in 2009 with their debut album, "Jewellery." The group's follow-up, called "Never," comes out in July - and today, we get a preview.

Indie-pop quintet Freelance Whales plays the Bowery Ballroom on Friday night. Download the group's charming tune "Generator (First Floor)." 

Long before rap, there was “the dozens” – the African-American street rhyming tradition that author Elijah Wald defines as “halfway between ‘yo mama’ jokes and rap freestyle battling.” He joins us to share the surprising musical history of the R-rated comedic insults.

With her new solo album “Instersteller,” indie veteran Frankie Rose (of Vivian Girls and Crystal Stilts fame) breaks out of her lo-fi cocoon and takes flight as a shimmering synth-pop butterfly. Frankie joins us to play songs off the record and tell us about life in the trenches of the Brooklyn music scene.

Make a musical summer resolution with Soundcheck! Yesterday we announced that there are some big plans ahead for the show. Starting next Monday, we're spending the summer off the air - building a better Soundcheck. And as we embark on our big self-improvement project … we want YOU to start a project of your own. Find out how you can get involved, here.

A Latin-ska-reggae fusion band, a female mariachi group and a wind quintet were among the 25 new musical acts selected to be part of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's Music Under New York program.

One of New York's most loved cabaret spaces will not return after renovations. Singer Andrea Marcovicci was kind of a lifer at the Oak Room. For 25 years she performed there, surrounded by its burnished wood panels and ornate wall sconces.

Native American DJ-producer trio A Tribe Called Red makes its New York debut at S.O.B.'s on Thursday night. Download the Ottawa crew's tune "General Generations."

On this edition of New Sounds, hear some chamber music by composer Marc Mellits with a populist bent.  We’ll sample his work, “Tight Sweater," which contains traces of funk, echoes of rock, and minimalism's rapidly shifting patterns of notes and interlocking rhythms.  With the provocative and whimsical titles, ("Exposed Zipper," “Pickle Trousers” and “Mechanically Separated Chicken Parts”) the movements are compact and alarmingly catchy.

Hoboken, NJ is less than 5 miles from Manhattan -- but its main street couldn’t be more different from Wall Street. This quiet town with a population of 50,000 or so has served as the birthplace of baseball, the small-but-hardy rock venue Maxwell’s, and a long-running indie band called Yo La Tengo. We hear more when music writer Jesse Jarnow joins us with his new book, "Big Day Coming: Yo La Tengo and the Rise of Indie Rock."

The New York band called Outernational puts politics back in rock with their album "Todos Somos Ilegales: We Are All Illegals."  It’s a bouncy, bi-lingual, almost cinematic look at America’s southern border, and Outernational will play songs from it live in our studio.

Join the Archives department in celebrating the life of Doc Watson with this rare interview and performance at the Philadelphia Folk Festival. 

Just like a band on tour pulls off the road and heads into the recording studio, Soundcheck will spend the summer off the air creating something new. Online, the show will be more active than ever. Find out more.

Jazz trombonist John Yao and his trio perform at the Brooklyn Lyceum on Wednesday night. Download the title song from his new album, "In The Now."

Doc Watson, the Grammy-award winning folk musician whose lightning-fast style of flatpicking influenced guitarists around the world for more than a half-century, died Tuesday at a hospital in Winston-Salem, according to a hospital spokeswoman and his manager. He was 89.

With a new album out today called “What We Saw From the Cheap Seats,” singer and pianist Regina Spektor returns to our studio to play some new songs. The best seats in the house will be right in front of your speakers.