We the Common
The freewheeling, oddly upbeat music of Thao & The Get Down Stay Down gains further definition on the combo’s sophomore album. Leader Thao Nguyen evolved her persona (part freak-folk diva, part earthy soul goddess) as a solo singer/songwriter before assembling TGDSD. *We the Common* feels less like the work of a jam band than a collection of smart, playful material brought to vigorous life by a supple rhythm section and dressed up in nicely contrasting instrumental colors. Nguyen rides the swells of her combo’s sound, delivering tunes like the title track, “We Don’t Call,” and “Human Heart” with a palpable joy. The churning beat of “City,” the tingling trudge of “Every Body,” and the Asian-inflected cadence of “Holy Roller” testify to the band’s creative breadth. Lyrically, Nguyen fuses the personal and the political, celebrating brotherhood and self-empowerment amid the complications of modern times. Joanna Newsom lends her quirky trill to the wistful country strains of “Kindness Be Conceived.” Nguyen and her bandmates ramble through these tracks with a mix of inspired skill and spontaneous fun.
Conscious of having spent her 20s on tour, Thao Nguyen settled in San Francisco and got involved in the community in pursuit of so-called real life experience. Accordingly, We the Common teases out the tension between life and art, the individual and the community, security and restlessness.
Thao Nguyen's fourth full length with her band further hones the San Francisco act's folk-rockin' chops, on a fine record all about trying to making a change.
The other day my dad asked me what Thao Nguyen was like. Despite the cynically accepted perjorative definition, I felt the most fitting word was "cute."
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On her third album as Thao & The Get Down Stay Down, Thao Nguyen’s nimble genre borrowings pay great dividends. There are touches of porch-front folk on banjo-based sing-along We The Common (for Valerie Bolden); country trail songs on Kindness Be Conceived (a duet with Joanna Newsom); then there's the afrobeat infusions of occasional collaborator Tune-Yards in City’s playful percussion and rolling guitar riff.
Thao Nguyen's solo work was put on hold for much of 2011 when she teamed up with indie songstress Mirah to write and record Thao & Mirah, a collaborative, fun effort that married their styles of music-making.
Thao Nguyen and her backing band return with something bigger and better here, after Nguyen spent a year settling down and building a non-transient life in San Francisco. The album title speaks directly to her experience of becoming part of a community an
ClashMusic: Read an album review of the new album from Thao And The Get Down Stay Down, 'We The Common', released on Ribbon Music on 4th February 2013.
For Thao Nguyen’s latest album with her band the Get Down Stay Down, she worked on it while enjoying a rare escape from that vagabond life, largely composing the songs during the roughly yearlong stretch when she finally got off the road.
Versatile songwriter's third album drops introspection for activism. CD review by Lisa-Marie Ferla