Song of the Day

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October 15, 2024

Chance Peña: “Blackbird” (KUTX Pop-Up at ACL Fest)

By: Jack Anderson

For a lot of major artists, ACL Fest is just another tour stop. For up-and-comers, it’s the opportunity of a lifetime. But for those who overlap the brackets, the experience falls somewhere in between: somewhat routine, somewhat sentimental.

And we’re guessing Chance Peña lands in that final category. Depending on your age demographic, chances are you’ve already heard of Peña through one avenue or another. Nearly a decade back, Chance Peña caught widespread attention at the tender age of fifteen as a contestant on The Voice. These days, Peña pulls an impressive social media presence and colossal streaming numbers for someone in their mid-twenties.

Yeah, in between the release of his debut full-length Ever-Shifting, Continual Blossoming last month and his current headliner tour that’ll take him across Western Europe and Scandinavia, Chance Peña is pretty much on top of the world. However, we do feel like playing Austin City Limits the first Friday must have been a pretty big deal for a Tyler native, so kudos to the ACL coordinators for showing strong home state support for a young Texan on the up and up. And shoutout to Peña as well for paying that Lone Star love forward with a passionate pop-up performance of his ES,CB standout, “Blackbird”, recorded that same day.


Episodes

October 29, 2025

Michael Arizmendi: “Dependence”

Born and raised in Brownsville, TX, new Austinite Michael Arizmendi recently graduated from the esteemed Berklee College of Music in Boston. Principally a trumpeter, Arizmendi studied music production and songwriting, and he blends those skills with a passion for exploring and synthesizing different genres. His debut single “Dependence” blends sultry jazz and hip-hop showcasing both […]

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October 24, 2025

The John-Pauls: “Eep Eep”

Yesterday, I watched a video of a guy unsuccessfully attempting to get a beached dolphin back into the ocean, and as luck would have it, today I get to write about a song from a dolphin’s POV. And a louche little devil they are. “Eep Eep” is the appropriately named title and single from the […]

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October 22, 2025

Moonkill: “Full Stop”

I’m not sure there’s a better way to say you’re basically a space punk band than to name yourselves MoonKill, and, hey, that’s exactly what this Austin quartet has done. But it’s not like floating-in-space post punk; it’s more like if the Thunderdome had a Tatooine location. They’ve been busy back in the studio working […]

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October 20, 2025

Spill Tab: “Hold Me” [Backstage at ACL Fest]

ACL Fest may be but a flicker in your rearview mirror at this point, but our ACL Fest content is still poppin’ fresh. LA’s Claire Chicha is Spill Tab, a lo-fi alt pop project focused on incorporating rhythms from across time and the globe and nestling them warmly in her dulcet, mezzo soprano jazz vocals. […]

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October 17, 2025

Go Fever: “Amagosa” [Live in Studio 1A]

They’re back, baby! After a several-year hiatus, the Aussie-meets-Austin rock group Go Fever returns to retake Austin by storm. Known for putting out banger after absolute banger, their “vibrant jungle print, but in rock music” brand with earwormy hooks and lyrics that warrant an English-class close read have been profoundly missed across Austin’s stages. With […]

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October 16, 2025

Girl Tones: “Blame” [Backstage At ACL Fest]

From cellos and pianos to guitars and drums. So goes the story for classically trained musicians (and sisters) Kenzie and Laila Crowe, and together the duo are Girl Tones, a project set on unlocking the secrets of the universe to discover what it is to become more than mere sentient beings. The nascent indie rock […]

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October 15, 2025

Briscoe: “Saving Grace” [Backstage at ACL Fest]

Austin duo Briscoe made their musical imprint back in 2023 with their coming-of-age in the Texas Hill Country debut West of It All. Now having toured extensively (“from Canada to Cancun”), their latest album Heat of July is a different type of coming-of-age output for the folk-rock duo, literally written on the road largely without […]

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October 14, 2025

Aaron Page: “Lord Knows” [Backstage at ACL Fest]

Houston’s Aaron Page is a rising star. The R&B artist recently released his debut EP Before I Go, a meditation on vulnerability and conversations that lead to life’s great romantic pivots, for better, worse, or just more confusing. He stopped by our tent backstage at ACL Fest to perform his viral hit “Lord Knows,” a […]

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