QUINN CHRISTOPHERSON
“Welcome to the Fillmore,” the top-hatted greeter with gentle eyes said as their generous gloved hand-stretched an apple towards me. “Thank You.”
I pocketed it, entered the regal lavender ballroom, and slid into the sparse audience.
Slight and polite on-timers stood around waiting.
A small boyish figure and an obvious bestie shirked out of the side stage shyly.
The odd couple. Alaska-origined Quinn Christopherson and Nick Carpenter took their places. A short outcry of songs silenced most of the empty venue. A couple of times I thought “what is contemporary Christian music sounding like these days?” The backbeats were dazed and wobbled steady faint synth and Casio pulses. Undercooked Prince animus but can be served raw. Michael Bolton approach to some of the production on the recorded music seconded my internal joke. This music is talent show uneasy to watch. It’s a spectacle of soulfulness disguised in sloppy clothes and relaxed but anxious stature. Quinn’s maternal figures appear a regular feature lyrically and themes of queerness and struggle. Most of the humor in the lyrical mockery was self-focused. The power of being yourself turned both inside and out. My advice? Read about Ahtna Athabascan culture while listening. Go deep the catalog is short.
Black Belt Eagle Scout
Katherine Paul is her own guitar tech. Veiled in long dark hair, a round sweet face slivered out while tuning and prepping instruments . She disappears and reappears. Black Belt Eagle Scout is notoriously Northwestern. Katherine has a tiny voice at times. Tanya Donnelly finishes on the high intimate detail of her confessive sound. Jason Lytle better be listening. Torchy. Alt Surf rocky mountain highs. Katherine has a native history that is so rich, a Swinomish/Iñupiaq singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist based in Portland, Oregon.
I caught these swaying bodily moments of ascendence. When I observed her history on the internet, I was able to go back to the movie of her in my mind. She was a shell dancer at pow-wow’s for many years. I could feel the time spent among her ancestors and community radiate silently from her grounded pendulous body. No doubt there is a heaviness to the sound and lyrics. A weight to carry. Her band helped. They lifted her up and over quiet vocal stanzas into a centrifuge of dale style surf rock and their own version of Pavement song end jam-outs. One snarling note overlaying sweet soulful feedback. It’s been noted that Nirvana and Hole helped usher in her influence and confidence with playing. I noticed that on “Indian’s Never die”. A mainline track on Mother of My Children, a 2018 gem. There is native percussive instrumentation and a simple Seattle-sounding bass line leading us in. I heard the Foo Fighters.
She has a reverent calm about her. Until you hear the guitar. She has control. A lot of it.
They left a neat and tidy set with some screaming alt surf guitar and hallowed vocals. The openness of her voice and the continued vulnerability of triggering themes she shares leaves her vessel askew. I made sure to listen harder then. I would hone the moments with my ear and breathe awe in when entire collective histories were present in the vocal. She is so powerful. Lucky us.
Thao
Brave, graceful, soft, and fierce. Thao Nguyen is a force. In public appearances, she articulates her point of view openly. The essence of it all is activism-driven music and video. Award-winning videos, and quite the resume of collaborations. Joanna Newsom, tUnE-yArDs, Rogue Wave, Andrew Bird, and more. Early Aught art warehouse sounds. Writing since the age of 12 Thao has an impenetrable history. Daughter of Vietnamese refugees with a killer education. From Virginia but Bay-based since 2009, I would have pegged her a bay area native.
The crowd murmured all night about Thao being “from here”. She rolled out on stage in oversized opalescent Sequins. Matching Mermaids theme. Shimmying and crouching. Thao approaches a mic with brutal tension. The music live is falling away rather than apart but as a listener, you wonder once or twice if they meant to do that. It jangled along with country style and transformed along the way. I dissapoint myself regularly with comparisons in music reviewing only in hopes of the reader discovering something new I mention. This one could have half-hearted “they sounded likes” but the only tease I heard was Dengue Fever. And then, only In the slightest.
Uncommon writing style, plot twist collusions with the other players. Small whispering choruses of voices on recordings are replaced with Thao forward shouts. Discordant and jazzy hooks and almost 20 years of experienced live performances maintain a natural and unusual approach to song building. Stage presence conveys the dread of Patti Smith.
The guitar work was flawless and practiced humming along as the second voice in the live renditions. The one bust of the experience was the lack of crowd. Everchanging protocols and statuses have show occupancy developing til the moment an artist hits the stage. And if you weren’t there “because she broke up the band” that was not a wise choice. I’m in for next time.
