Thao and the Get Down Stay Down
Live at the College of Santa Fe, 7 April 08
(hear it not - I really need to start recording shows again)

Thao Nguyen is a great writer of songs and a singer who grew up in the same area of Virginia as my wife Lea.

I was really excited and blown away by the performance of this band. We had never heard her before, on record or in person, and really didn't know what to expect. In fact, we went to the show to see another unknown-to-us band, called Xiu Xiu - Lea read about it in the paper, it said "experimental pop", we went. That band was like a very angry baby being whose stroller, left at the top of the steps in front of a big library, is bumped by a passerby - you watch it with concern and a little bit of interest in how the baby can stay in the stroller.

Thao writes songs in a similar vein to the Moldy Peaches' Kimya Dawson, in that an picture of an innocent world is painted by someone who has developed a much larger worldview. The band was really awesome - the drummer in particular. He played kind of like Jim White (who I know as the drummer for some great Smog shows) - they both have a real concept of the structure of the song, and while being fairly busy, keep the essential rythm front and center.

bb, 8 Apr 08