Tracy Bonham is a bada$$
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Artist:
So I went to see my friend Brian Scott and a brand-new band of some other firends of mine play last night in Brooklyn. Brian's old band, Donkeys, haunted my shuffle for a while a couple years back, and I miss his weirdness. Check out their EP, "Toilets of Brooklyn" if you can find it. Their set was great, the songs were well-arranged and executed, and the band was far-out, elec gtr, upright bass + Moog Taurus (yeah!!), drums, keys, theremin, and violin.
The violin was provided by none other than Tracy Bonham, who I have had the good fortune and distinct pleasure to work with before. She closed the night with her own band, and absolutely floored me. I very much appreciate her singing and writing, and she did do several songs on acoutstic guitar, keyboard, and pizzicato violin, which spanned folk, to soul, to country-old timey-songstress, but what really knocked me out was the super-out contemporary string trio material, performed with an outstanding viola-ist and cellist, and EXCELLENT drumming by someone else whose name I didn't catch. Dense but accessible, atonal but rootsy, arranged but loose and improv-y, plus she had a looper pedal, YEAH!! I totally ate it up. You rock Tracy.
Locating MOG account...
Comments (6)
Cool review...
she's awfully talented. did she do anything after her Mother, Mother hit?
Great review! Wish I'd been there. I love her song "Navy Bean". She has done so much!
does she have a record out with this ensemble?
She had a few records, but I think none of them did as well as "The Burdens of Being Upright." She did a bunch of work with Blue Man Group, which is how I know her, but I also know that she just played some fiddle on Juliana Hatfield's last album.
I have no idea if she plans to record the out string-trio stuff, but it's AWESOME.
Tracy Bonham was one of the last flailing attempts made by a record company (I can't for the life of me remember which) to wrap up the nearest 20-something who could sing as the new voice of angst and rebellion. I remember having lunch with a rock band manager when her name came up somehow, back in... 96? Holy cow... Anyway, the woman looked at me, and said (I paraphrase) "Nothing's ever what it looks like in this business. Right now, I'd say that judging from looks, Tracy Bonham will be a laughingstock in two months. So she's gonna be around a while."
I do, however, suspect that someone swiped an idea of mine for her video...