Hope you’re feeling this week’s jam featuring San Francisco-based singer-songwriter Thao Nguyen and the Get Down Stay Down.
Bitter, Sweet: Thao Nguyen and her band Get Down Stay Down is out with their fourth full-length release, Know Better Learn Faster.
ISSUE: Spring 2010
DEPT: Personalities
STORY: Jimmy Lee
Here’s your chance to watch a young pop artist mature and take on new musical risks. And with her fourth full-length release, titled Know Better Learn Faster, Thao Nguyen is also taking out some resentment on an ex. Wallowing in anger and bitterness to produce a break-up record is a time-honored rock tradition, and Nguyen joins the fray with some pointed lines for an unfortunate fellow: “Now you are a dead man, and I just have to shoot the gun,” she sings on “Body.” To help get her message across, Nguyen and her band, Get Down Stay Down, use a wide assortment of sounds to produce more of the catchy and captivating songs she has been penning for the last few years. Not stuck in any one genre, Know Better Learn Faster incorporates a stomping piano blues, some banjo picking and brooding strings. And there might be foot stomps and handclaps backing her singing, as well as some of the child-like yelping found in her past records, but her voice also possesses a ferocity that seemingly comes when you’re determined to overcome heartbreak. And like her record, it’s a goal we all can believe in. — Jimmy Lee