Tag: NPR

Robin Hilton | November 21, 2025 When Robert Plant first stepped behind the Tiny Desk on a blustery Halloween afternoon, he took stock of the relatively stripped-down setup. “This is just like Live Aid,” he said with a smile. “I couldn’t hear myself there either.” He was referring to the fact we don’t amplify voices or use monitors so artists can hear themselves. But if ever there was someone up to the challenge, it’s Robert Plant. With a voice that’s only gotten better with age, Plant has deftly moved from the full-throated rock and swagger of Led Zeppelin to the [See More…]

Lars Gotrich | November 19, 2025 Here’s the thing: Goo Goo Dolls songs endure. Formed almost four decades ago, the rock band’s artistic ambition has always been connection — pop anthems that can be blasted from car speakers and in karaoke bars, and sung en masse. These songs stick around, but never wear out their welcome. This set is bookended by songs from Dizzy Up the Girl, the 1998 album that found the sweet spot between catchy arena rockers and heartfelt power ballads. “Slide” is particularly suited to the space as John Rzeznik’s voice, which has aged gracefully into the [See More…]

Robin Hilton | November 13, 2025 I don’t think anyone expected to get a new album from Pulp in 2025, let alone a Tiny Desk. But the much-beloved group, fronted by the singular voice of Jarvis Cocker, returned this spring with More, its first full-length in nearly a quarter century. A couple of months later, the group celebrated with a visit to our D.C. offices for a career-spanning set. Just before making the short walk from our makeshift green room (a converted office) to the Tiny Desk down the hall, the band members held hands and sang, “This will be [See More…]

Bobby Carter | November 5, 2025 There’s often a moment during a Tiny Desk concert when an artist realizes that playing in an office was either the right or wrong thing to do. After starting the set with “Takin’ It to the Streets,” one of The Doobie Brothers’ many hits, Tom Johnston tells the audience, “It’s not like this at gigs. We just played up in New York at Jones Beach last night and y’all are outdoing them. It’s pretty cool.” For a band as accomplished as this to still encounter new experiences as performers says a lot about the [See More…]

Robin Hilton | October 29, 2025 Just a couple of days before arriving for her Tiny Desk, Oklou’s Marylou Mayniel flew with her five-month old baby from their Paris home to New York, where she met for the first time with an eight-piece choir to rehearse completely reimagined versions of four songs. The goal was to strip away the electronics and often heavy autotune heard across Oklou’s beguiling debut album, Choke Enough, while preserving the sense of sonic adventure. By the time everyone got to D.C., they’d puzzled it out. The songs here rely largely on piano, an acoustic guitar [See More…]

NPR Music’s Tiny Desk Concerts is a popular video series featuring live, intimate music performances by diverse artists, from major stars to up-and-coming musicians, recorded in the small workspace of Bob Boilen’s NPR office in Washington, D.C.brought to you by SloppBoxx.Com.

NPR Music’s Tiny Desk Concerts is a popular video series featuring live, intimate music performances by diverse artists, from major stars to up-and-coming musicians, recorded in the small workspace of Bob Boilen’s NPR office in Washington, D.C.brought to you by SloppBoxx.Com.

Stephen Thompson | October 27, 2025 Here’s a crucial reminder from The Beaches: It’s always summer somewhere. The Toronto band released one of 2025’s most effervescent albums, No Hard Feelings, in late August. Its new-wave-inflected pop-rock jams — about bad love, queer love, bad queer love and a life built around the steadfast refusal to let a good party end — would have made a perfect soundtrack for the defiant joy of Pride Month back in June. But, with darkness falling earlier and earlier, they seemed to know something we didn’t: that the world needs these songs now more than [See More…]

Alanté Serene | October 24, 2025 Asake arrived at the office with a warm smile and a quiet confidence that instantly bloomed as he stepped behind the Desk. The Nigerian artist is known for his high-energy stage presence, but this concert shows just how effortlessly he can blend the sounds of Afrobeats, amapiano and Fuji in an intimate setting. Grounded in his Yoruba roots, Asake’s music unites people across cultures worldwide. This set pulls hits from his last three projects, laced together in a seamless medley and backed by a stellar band. By the end, Asake joins in on the [See More…]

Isabella Gomez Sarmiento | October 22, 2025 Parcels does not shy away from abundance. The Australian quintet’s songs often feature a myriad of guitars, rivaling piano and synths, slinky basslines, pulsing drums and four (yes, four) vocalists. But the group opens its Tiny Desk concert with a secret weapon: hauntingly bare harmonies, backed only by gentle keys and guitar, that transform a snippet of the irresistibly catchy “Leaveyourlove” into a solemn oath of devotion. It’s a stunningly stripped-down choice for a band that can — and does — properly rock out, with explosive live performances that turn its glossy, electro-pop [See More…]