Dear Music Insiders,
Anne here, turning over this week’s Insider to two of KCRW Music’s extraordinary Senior Music Producers, MD-W and NN, with a great take on this year’s SXSW — KCRW’s showcases and beyond. Enjoy! xo
Airline strikes, world-class BBQ, musical transcendence, and the largest single-day temperature drop in Austin history: where else could this be but SXSW 2026? With performances by over 1,100 official artists crammed into a shorter time frame, this year’s SX was bound to be different. KCRW was nonetheless on the scene, represented by Music Senior Producers Nassir Nassirzadeh and Myke Dodge Weiskopf (your writers of this week’s Music Insider).
By day, we curated the Radio Day Stage at the Downright Austin, with a lineup that included runo plum, Radium Dolls, and The Tullamarines. And by night, we co-presented the (incredible) Jazz re:freshed showcase at Flamingo Cantina, which packed the cream of London’s contemporary jazz scene into one of Austin’s most eclectic downtown venues.
We lost a few showcasing artists due to unforeseen delays and cancellations, including Adult DVD, Steven Bamidele, and Spike F*ck. (Our apologies to those who came out to see them.) Fortunately, we course-corrected with a pair of amazing pinch-hitter performances from 18-year-old Australian pop wunderkind Mariae Cassandra and the atmospheric Belgian neo-goth quintet, The Haunted Youth (who gave Clan of Xymox-meets-M83 vibes).
Australia’s Radium Dolls kicked things off with a set of classic-model garage-pop including fan favorite “Tractor Parts” and “Scorching Heat,” which mercifully had no bearing on the day’s weather. Nass says they remind him of early Courtney Barnett. This was their second-ever show in the U.S., following a sold-out appearance in NYC, and they’re headed to Zebulon in LA this Saturday night.
runo plum cast a gauzy spell of Mazzy Star-esque pop over the early afternoon, with a confident, full-band performance of songs from last year’s debut, patching, in addition to previewing an imminent new EP, bloom again. And Australia’s Tullarmarines brought the voltage back with a set of spunky, youthful power-pop that might have you digging out your Buzzcocks or Undertones vinyl (with the essential added ingredient of Lucinda Machin’s superlative lead and harmony vocals). The weather was picture-perfect, the artists were in high spirits, and the crowd showed up and threw down on the back lawn of SXSW’s official Music HQ at the Downright. (Special thanks, as always, to our production team on the ground, the SXSW volunteers, and especially the ASL interpreters, who are the unsung heroes of every show.)
For our second event on Sunday, March 15th, KCRW teamed up with London’s Jazz re:freshed collective for a kaleidoscopic and ever-changing evening of jazz-derived artists — none of whom fit neatly into the category, however you think of it. The energy never flagged from the moment Zimbabwe-born singer/producer Zola Marcelle hit the stage until the electrifying concluding set of producer/multi-instrumentalist Werkha. Each act seemed to build upon the last, every musician gathering stageside to root on the next act until the entire venue felt like a spontaneous living-room throwdown, punctuated by cheers and chants and call-outs. Anyone who happened into the Cantina that night surely had their spiritual energy rearranged. The party rolled on until nearly 3 AM, and it was the best of what SXSW represents.
Elsewhere at SXSW, Nassir repped for LA’s own DJ_Dave, whose rigorously technical approach to production via livecoding resulted in some surprisingly emotional music. Nass says: “I caught a show that she curated and presented at one of Austin’s best-sounding nightclubs, Kingdom. Her set started with her interacting with the audience via coding to let them know what sounds were on deck — vocals, drone bass, etc. — and then she started using the code to manipulate sound visually and sonically. It was quite an interactive experience, and one of the most unique approaches to DJing I’ve seen. I think the sky’s the limit.”
Myke returned to the Flamingo Cantina on Monday for the Classical Unlocked showcase, which promised to “[bridge] the gap between traditional orchestration and modern soundscapes.” As with the jazz showcase the night before, the lineup showed how malleable the term “classical” can be, with artists ranging from young Irish composer Jamie Duffy to the stunning, Balkan-influenced vocal interplay of French trio Les Itinérantes. Although worlds away from the Cantina’s jazz or Afrobeat showcases, the evening’s acts repeatedly transfixed the lively crowd into total rapt silence — and in the heart of East 6th Street, that’s a nearly impossible feat.
Until the next SXSW…
Myke & Nass
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