This Month we received new releases from 15 local artists, adding to the 500+ artists and 4k+ tracks in the Local Waves Library! 33 new tracks were added to on-air rotation, with a few notable releases from late 2025 including one of the biggest local releases of last year Hannah Cohen’s Earthstar Mountain (Woodstock) which ended up on many year end lists and has her opening for everyone from CAAMP to Alabama Shakes this summer. Similarly, someone who has been slowly honing their songwriting the last decade, Kingston’s Spero released her first full-length of original material Self-Titled in Nov, with touches of neo-soul and intricate finger-picking guitar. We also added tracks from 2025 releases by Albany based DJ Scotia (“Human Host” is a freaky treat, released on Berlin label Delft), Kingston based J. Ashdown’s sound exploding and mesmerizing "Shape Unto Itself " (on Crude Tapes), and Catskill’s Fascinating Chimera Project Little Wooden Boat which includes a Yo La Tengo-esque take on Madonna’s “Beautiful Stranger.”

But onto more fresh releases, this month saw tracks from Catskill’s Kendra McKinley keeping her run of funky, art-pop going with a guest vocal on Brooklyn producer Homer’s “New Wellness”. An exciting new local label called Sandy Rock Poetry has just launched out of Tivoli, and with a focus on spoken word and experimentation, they have released something truly special from local-legend Brian Dewan (Catskill) with his Curious Sealife album. Speaking of legends, Poughkeepsie Free Jazz pioneer Joe McPhee features on classical guitarist Ayman Fanous forthcoming record, hear one of two tracks “Duo with Joe McPhee” now. Another experimental release that really jumped out at me is this compilation-cum-album from Oneonta based artist Simple, with the sprawling but very engagingly sequenced album “L B”, collaging lo-fi punk rock textures with ambient passages and dark mantra-like lyrics. And finally we added some great singer-songwriter tracks from Allie Chip (Saugerties) with the goofy self-aware lilt of “Not That Cool”, and Mark Donato’s (West Shokan) nerdy and abstract take on folk-rock (think They Might Be Giants unplugged) with last year’s Community Theater release (no relation to the recently re-opened movie house on Main St. in Catskil lof the same name). Oh and I (under moniker LOVESICK) even got the pleasure of adding my own track to the Library for the first time, with a cover I just self-produced of Norma Tanega’s mystical call to action “Now Is The Time.”

-Mike Amari of Chosen Family Presents

Local Waves airs every Friday at 8PM. All local artists are encouraged to send your music into to be added to this ever growing library. Send to music@wgxc.org with ‘‘Local Waves’ in subject, mp3s (320kps) or Bandcamp download codes are preferred!