Our Stories

Posts by and about the RFB community

Local music takes center stage at Pet Sounds Music Festival

Pet Sounds Music Festival co-creator Jake Murray speaks with RFB's Orie G. about the festival and the challenges in the local music scene they're trying to overcome. Radio Free Brooklyn is a local media partner of Pet Sounds Music Festival, happening Sept. 18 and Sept. 19, at Rubulad in Brooklyn.
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Radio Free Brooklyn and Pet Sounds Music Festival announce local media partnership for Vol. III event in Bushwick

Radio Free Brooklyn is proud to partner with Pet Sounds Music Festival for Vol. 3 of its event on Friday, Sept. 18, and Saturday, Sept. 19, at Rubulad, 389 Melrose Ave., in Brooklyn.
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Brooklyn Pride celebrates three decades with more Pride Month events in 2026

Brooklyn Pride events kick off this week, with two weeks of festivities through June 20. 
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Barber Pole with the word "Records" written underneath

Every Record Store In New York City

I often find myself sharing spaces with collector scum: record stores, flea markets, record fairs, thrift stores, etc. My disgust likely speaks to a Jungian shadow self that shares many traits of collector scum. I, too, am driven by a desire to acquire.
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Liz Cooper - Photo by Michael Heinz

Liz Cooper Plays to the Beat of Her Own Piano

Liz Cooper's new album "New Day" reflects the highs and lows of living in NYC and reveals a new sound.
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Mercury Lounge

The Incident Report: Zwei Null Zwei and Shudder To Think at Mercury Lounge

Shudder To Think and Zwei Null Zwei have not aged a day and still sound as fresh as ever,
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Beche

The Incident: Gigs You’ve Never Heard Of

Beche, Sweetbreads, and Zoe Firn go for a swim at Union Pool.
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Man Playing Trombone with a band

Summer Sounds Celebrates Community and Soul

With their new outdoor series, Summer Sounds, midtown's Manhattan West aims to make music a part of everyday life.
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Justin Bieber

Why Go Low When You Can Go High?

Why has pop music moved away from lower male voices? They can be heard as more mature, seductive, and thus potentially dangerous.
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Billy Joel

When the Piano Man Picks Up a Guitar

Billy Joel is a pop stylist before anything else, but his jazzy sensibilities make his songs sound slightly different than the rest.
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Billy Corgan with Smashing Pumpkins

Billy Corgan’s Wall of Sound

On "Siamese Dream," Billy Corgan creates a fullness of sound and texture that wallops the listener with a tidal wave of fuzzed-out arena rock
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Pat Boone "In a Metal Mood: No More Mr. Nice Guy"

Stupid Pop Star Tricks: Pat Boone’s “In a Metal Mood…”

Pat Boone's metal album was head-scratching but harmless fun. That doesn’t make it any less strange.
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Robbie Robertson

Albums You Might Not Know: Robbie Robertson’s “Contact From the Underworld of Redboy”

In 1998, Robbie Robertson explored his Indigenous roots with an ambitious and rewarding album.
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Bob Dylan holding "look out" card

A Year After Going Electric, Bob Dylan’s Transformation Was Still Making Waves

The Timothée Chalamet Bob Dylan biopic doesn't tell the whole story. The "Judas" jeers happened in Manchester in 1966.
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Bad Religion

The Only Christmas Album You Need

Bad Religion's "Christmas Songs" celebrates a time when Christianity wasn’t merely performative.
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Mariah Carey Pop Christmas Music

The Case Against Pop Christmas Music

Adam Carlson shares his thoughts on how pop Christmas music is ruining the holidays.
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Janet Jackson New Jack Swing

New Jack Swing: The Subgenre That Revlolutionized R&B and Hip-Hop

New jack swing took over pop R&B for nearly a decade and pop music would never be the same.
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Car Crash

Who Writes a Song About a Car Crash?

The phenomenon remains a strange footnote in the history of American pop music.
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The Brooklyn Artists Exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum

A Walk Through the Brooklyn Artists Exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum

RFB spoke with Brooklyn Museum's Jennie Tang about the Brooklyn Artists Exhibition for the museum’s 200th anniversary.
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United Sounds NYC Festival

United Sounds NYC Festival Kicks Off October 25th

The United Sounds NYC Festival kicks off its inaugural event Friday, October 25, and Saturday, October 26, in Red Hook at Pioneer Works
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Warm Weather

Warm Weather Music 2024 – A Retrospective

Let’s take a moment to reflect on the music that made us hip this past spring and summer. 
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Junior Brown plays his guit-steel

Just a Man and His Two Guitars

His singular guitar and his unique approach to his chosen genres mean that he sounds like no one else.
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Singer/Songwriter Jillian Dawn

Jillian Dawn: 25-year-old singer/songwriter on a journey to the dream. 

Dawn talks to RFB about her latest track, performances, and plans for the future.
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Dick Dale & Lana Dale

What Shaped Dick Dale?

Dick Dale's Lebanese roots and connection to the Arab world layed the foundation of his innovative surf-rock sound.
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Bono from U2 with an American flag inside a speech bubble

Un-Accenting the Accent

Why has the American accent become de rigueur for artists around the world?
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Saidah Blount

Saidah Blount: The Face Behind the Music

BRIC! Celebrate Brooklyn Executive Director talks about the challenges and successes of her first season.
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Canibus

Canibus’ Rip The Jacker: A Most Unusual Production

Stoupe The Enemy of Mankind and Canibus caught lightning in a bottle in a strange but successful way.
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LA LOM and Thee Sacred Souls perform at Celebrate Brooklyn!

A Night at the Bandshell with LA LOM & Thee Sacred Souls at BRIC! Celebrate Brooklyn

California's LA LOM and Thee Sacred Souls bring the romantic allure and charm of classic Mexican Boleros and Cumbina Sonidera inspired music
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Double album CD

The Mysterious Allure of the Double Album

The double album is a dying breed, but the vanity and ambition needed to make them will never go out of style
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Run DMC Performing in Long Beach 1984

Why Are There No Rap Covers?

Rap covers succeed when they take a song with universal lyrics and give it a complimentary coat of new paint.
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The Jam / Curtis Mayfield Mashup

Did The Jam Have a Perfect Cover?

Where Curtis Mayfield lays back, The Jam lean forward.
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The Greatest American Rock Band

The Greatest American Rock ‘N’ Roll Band Is…

When considering the Greatest American Rock band, apply the three C’s: Critical acclaim, Commercial success, and Cultural relevance.
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Yo-Yo Ma

Yo-Yo Ma and the Impetuousness of Youth

Like wine, some musicians get better with age.
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Bette Smith

Local Artist Spotlight: Bette Smith

Bette Smith's new music sounds like a party
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Train - Worst pop song ever?

The Worst Pop Song of All Time?

"Hey Soul Sister" is a memorable, significant song, but for all the wrong reasons.
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Comfort Club Fear of Moving on album cover

Comfort Club Explores Distance, Defeat, and How to Disconnect Yourself from Your Ex

Colin Tracey discusses the feelings of those of us who love too hard, struggle to let go, and are afraid to be alone. 
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Keith Moon standing on drum kit

The Madness of Keith Moon

His timekeeping was sloppy, but his feel was amazing.
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Caroline Shaw with Attaca Quartet

Ringdown is a Let-Down, But Caroline Shaw Remains Refreshing

The music of Ringdown sounds more like the music Danni Lee, not Caroline Shaw, wants to make.
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Jeff Beck and Stevie Wonder

An Unintentional Cover: Jeff Beck’s Superstition

It’s still Stevie Wonder’s song, but Jeff Beck finally made it his for one night.
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Charles Mingus holding his cat

The Hidden Genius of Charles Mingus

Perhaps the inspiration to toilet train a cat is indicative of an expansive mind that was willing to experiment and take risks
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Shuggie Otis

Random Artist Memories: Shuggie Otis

Otis continues to perform sporadically but remains a talented, insular mystery.
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Klaus Nomi

The Rarest Singing Voice

It’s a voice that can seem impossible but is often unforgettable. If you encounter one, cherish the experience. You don’t experience them often.
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Randy Savage 'Be a Man' album cover

Albums You’ve (almost certainly) Never Heard Of: Randy Savage’s ‘Be a Man’

The album is no more than a footnote in a life lived largely. But it is not a failure.
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Christina Aguilera singing live

When Pop Music Gets Weird: Christina Aguilera’s “What A Girl Wants”

It’s strange to hear a standard 4/4 pop melody get spun around like this. Music is more interesting when it makes your brain say, “Waitaminute - what just happened?”
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Brooklyn Royalty: The Dap-Kings

Their musical lane may have been narrow, but they drove it in a monster truck powered by James Brown’s hairspray.
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Elvis Costello's Spanish Model album cover

Albums You Might Not Know: Elvis Costello’s Spanish Model

Spanish Model may be another footnote in Elvis Costello’s career, but it’s a career more memorable for the chances it has taken.
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Skorts Brooklyn Band

Local Music Spotlight: Skorts

A new band making waves in the North Brooklyn/Lower Manhattan circuit have a heady sound that's both retro and refreshing.
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Booker T. and the M.G.'s McLemore Avenue album cover

Albums You’ve Forgotten: Booker T. and the M.G.’s McLemore Avenue

The album didn’t break new ground, but it's fascinating to experience four geniuses re-imagining the work of four other geniuses.
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Elevator Rap - Image by SomatArt

Elevator Rap: Hip-Hop’s Newest Subgenre

You can’t dance to it, and it’s so inoffensive that your grandma can vibe to it.
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P.H.0 Silkpunk band from Brooklyn, NY

Local Music Spotlight: P.H.0

Brooklyn's silkpunks subvert, reshape, and redefine what it means to be East Asian in a Western setting
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Peter Svensson of The Cardigans

One-Hit Wonders: The Cardigans

The Cardigans were fringe artists with a rich library who had one song cross over out of nowhere. It never happened again.
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What if Wu-Tang Clan were a basketball team?

Wu-Tang Basketball

If New York's Wu-Tang Clan were a basketball team, what would that look like?
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Mingjia, Yaz Lancaster, and Andrew Yee perform at C'Mon Everybody in January 2024 (author photo)

The Top 9 Places to Hear (and See) Experimental Music in Brooklyn, According to Musicians

The Brooklyn avant-garde music scene is no longer burgeoning; it is flourishing. 
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Handwritten Kurt Cobain lyrics

Lyrical Economy and the Art of Subtle Songwriting

Many songwriters are lauded for their descriptive lyrics. It’s rarer for a lyricist to do the same thing within a much tighter word budget.
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Laura Branigan Self Control

Self Control

Let’s take a trip back to 1984. Hair was big, pants were tight, Dallas was on TV every Friday, and two recording artists on either side of the Atlantic deployed a most unusual strategy.
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Graffiti of "No North Brooklyn Fracked Gas Pipeline" in Greenpoint

North Brooklyn Organizing for Climate Justice is Community and Environmental Resilience (Part 1)

For the past two years, a coalition of Brooklyn-based climate activists has been demonstrating in opposition to a fracked gas transmission pipeline project running from Brownsville to Greenpoint.
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Gianluca Tramontana with Cuban musicians

Radio Free Brooklyn presents: “Changüí, Music of Cuba”

Come join RFB on a musical journey into the heart of Cuba’s Changüí country with RFB host Gianluca Tramontana.
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George Faulkner at the microphone

#RFB Host Profile: George Faulkner and “Metrowave”

George Faulkner spills about his favorite childhood band, the unexpected delight of creating music remotely—and internationally—during the pandemic, and why Sunday nights are Funday nights!
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Kaitlyn DeTrinnis

#RFB Host Profile: Kaitlyn DeTrinis & “Mixed Signals”

The Power of One: Kaitlyn DeTrinis of "Mixed Signals" wants to make us think more ethically about the way we all consume music.
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Jim Melloan in a 70's photo

#RFBMilestones: Jim Melloan and “50 Years Ago This Week”

Jim Melloan of “50 Years Ago This Week” has been bringing popular music from the 20th century to new audiences since RFB began. Read on for the method (and memories) behind his music madness! (That's Jim on the left with his sisters 50 years ago, in 1971.)
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happy anniversary monkeys

#RFBMilestones: Happy RFBversary!

There hasn't been all that much to celebrate lately...but check out these Radio Free Brooklyn shows that reached milestones this summer! Shout-outs and congrats to all!
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improbable confetti playing music

“Improbable Confetti” hits Episode 100!

”Oh wait, I thought we were doing costumes for the 100th?! So I just bought this Jorge Luis Borges full-body suit and mask for nothing? Seriously, we talked about it and everything!”
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Millie Small

#RFBinTribute: Millie Small

In the mid-1960s, teenage Millie Small's hit song, “My Boy Lollipop,” helped pave the way for Jamaican music and musicians (especially ska), to become internationally popular.
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Noah Dreiblatt

RFB Artist Interview: Noah Dreiblatt

“I’ve always thought if you can’t laugh into the abyss, it’ll laugh into you.” Experimental pop artist Noah Dreiblatt talks to RFB's Girl Wunder about his debut solo album, Doomscrolling, on the eve of his appearance on this week’s (05/07) Virtual Voyager!
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LoveHoney band photo

RFB Artist Profile: LoveHoney’s New Album Release

Lovehoney frontwoman Aly Quiñones on what it was like for the band to create their new album (releasing 02/14/21) while the Covid-19 pandemic is still, sadly, a thing, being a little brown grrrl in a band making noise — and the William Burroughs quote she lives by.
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Francesca D'Alessio in a radio studio

RFB Host Profile: Francesca D’Alessio and “Love Me or Leave Me”

“Love Me or Leave Me” host Francesca D’Alessio on her lifetime love of radio, why Nina Simone is her muse and how RFB’s “Wall of Lies” led to doing her show.
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Adam Schlesinger

#RFBinTribute: Adam Schlesinger

RFB editorial star Emily Scott penned this poignant tribute to the Fountains of Wayne frontman, who died from complications of COVID-19 in April 2020 at age 52.
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Dan Fireberg in front of chain link fence

RFB Artist Profile: Dan Berg interview with Girl Wunder

Jessica Wu (a.k.a Girl Wunder of RFB’s Virtual Voyager), chats with electro-soul-jazz-house music producer Dan Berg (a.k.a. Fireberg) on the debut of his latest mix, “Supernova,” making music during a global pandemic — and the sounds you might find in outer space.
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Alex Jones

RFB Host Profile: Alex Jones of “Alex Jones’ Planet of Sound”

Broadcasting from Manchester, England, Alex Jones shares his love for psychedelic music and breathes new life into a genre associated with the turbulence and social changes of the 1960s.
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Stranger Than Christian on Radio Free Brooklyn

RFB Host Profile: Christian Carrion of “Stranger Than Christian”

He’s been a game show contestant, podcast host and co-founder of a game show marathon charity. Now, Christian Carrion adds “unscripted radio show,” to his considerable credits.
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Jesse Roth

RFB Host Profile: Jesse Roth of “The Mess”

Jesse Roth brings her comedic chops to a new medium with her new show lauding (and loving) all things Pop.
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Giants Among Men logo

RFB New Host Profile: Brian and Scott of “Giants Among Men”

Brian DiMenna and Scott Ishii have been shouting their hot takes on New York sports at each other since childhood. Now, you’ll get to hear them, too.
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Kevin Rooney and his cat Eric

RFB New Host Profile: Kevin and Eric of “The Daily Echo”

Multispecies host duo Kevin and Eric of “The Daily Echo” give their unique perspectives about... what it’s like to be a multispecies host duo.
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Dead Air Logo

RFB New Host Profile: Cookie Puss of “Dead Air”

Universal Pictures had E.T.; NBC had ALF. Radio Free Brooklyn has Cookie Puss — its new resident alien host who promises to be very tasty (if not exactly tasteful).
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Private Party logo

RFB New Host Profile: Mr. Funkopops of “Private Party”

SoCal DJ Mr. Funkopops hosts a smooth and sensual “Private Party” where everyone (or at least RFB listeners) is/are always on ”The List.”
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Give to Grace

Securing Their Future: Grace Exhibition Space Celebrates Its Evolution with #Give2Grace

From September 22–28, Grace Exhibition Space presents a week-long virtual art event and fundraiser to celebrate its evolution — and survival as a dedicated home for performance artists.
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Manu Dibango

#RFBinTribute: Music in Memoriam “Big Blow — The Loss of Manu Dibango”

Kent Koren, RFB’s host of “The Mothers of Connection,” penned this tribute to the great and prolific Cameroonian musician Manu Dibango, who died this spring from COVID-19 at the age of 86.
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4 hurdy gurdy players

Hurdy Gurdy Songs Celebrates 100 Episodes of Music, Truth Telling and Memories

Jorge Arevalo Mateus and RFB’s Hurdy Gurdy Songs celebrates its 100th episode on Tuesday, September 15 with a calvacade of truth-telling musical talent from around the world.
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Hallie Spoor

RFB Artist Profile: Brooklyn singer-songwriter Hallie Spoor’s new video: “City Angels”

Vivian Bossieux-Skinner of RFB's Art Corner revisits with Brooklyn singer-songwriter Hallie Spoor as she releases a new video of her song, “City Angels.”
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The Oral History of New York logo

RFB New Host Profile: Brad Bailey of “The Oral History of New York”

Not many people would choose to debut a new radio show in the midst of an ongoing global pandemic, but Radio Free Brooklyn — and all of New York City — should be real glad Brad Bailey did.
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girl wunder jessica wu

#RFBhostprofile: Jessica Wu is the “Girl Wunder” behind “Virtual Voyager”

RFB’s “Girl Wunder” debuts her new show “Virtual Voyager” in the midst of a global pandemic... and the worst civil unrest the U.S. has experienced in our lifetimes.
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Time to be Useless show logo

#RFBhost profile: Eric Speck and the fresh sounds, hidden treasures and lost gems of “Time to Be Useless.”

Many people love music, but to Eric Speck, letting it render you “useless” is an even higher calling.
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Fraser Tye

Fraser Tye of Radio Free Brooklyn’s “Brooklyn Vignettes” podcast

Australian expat Fraser Tye on why “Brooklyn Vignettes” is Brooklyn’s ultimate “bedtime story.”
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