Ripe

Half jam band, half R&B groove machine, Ripe play energetic and engaging music that's suitable for both dancefloors and living rooms. Releasing their debut single, "Eyes Like a Hawk," in 2013, the group have never sacrificed melody in favor of funk (or vice versa), penning tunes that are full of hooks and thoughtful lyrics along with potent organics beats, an approach they refined on 2018's Joy in the Wild Unknown. The band issued a steady stream of singles and toured frequently, and on 2023's Bright Blues, showed they could smoothly incorporate polished pop production with their trademark sound.

Ripe was founded in Boston by students of the prestigious Berklee College of Music. Lead singer Robbie Wulfsohn, guitarists Jon Becker and Tory Geismar, bassist Nadav Shapira, drummer Sampson Hellerman, trombonist Calvin Barthel, and trumpeter Josh Shpak all met at student parties, and informal jams sessions led the musicians to put together a band in 2011. Initially named Produce the Juice, the group streamlined their name to Ripe in time to release their debut single, "Eyes Like a Hawk," in April 2013, though they recycled Produce the Juice as the title for a five-song EP they issued a month later. Frequent gigging in New England and the East Coast spread word about Ripe, and by 2018 they had attracted enough attention and amassed enough material to release their first full-length album, Joy in the Wild Unknown. They were tapped to open a tour for G. Love & Special Sauce, and appeared at several leading music festivals, including the Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival, the Firefly Music Festival, and the Sweetwater 420 Fest.

As Ripe maintained their busy schedule, their permanent membership was pared down to a core quartet of Wulfsohn, Becker, Hellerman, and Barthel, with a variety of horn players and percussionists being added for individual projects. After previously self-releasing their recordings, the band struck a deal with Glassnote Music to issue their second full-length LP, 2023's Bright Blues. With an eye toward expanding their sound in a more pop-facing direction, Ripe worked with producer Paul Butler (St. Paul & the Broken Bones, Nick Waterhouse, and the Seratones), as well as producers and songwriters Noah Conrad and Ryan Linvill, who were former Berklee College of Music classmates of theirs and had gone on to work with BTS, Niall Horan, and Olivia Rodrigo. ~ Mark Deming