Thao & the Get Down Stay Down – "Phenom" (2020)

I am erupting

Don't interrupt it!

Last month, Thao Nyugen was preparing to shoot a music video for “Phenom,” a soon-to-be-released new song by her San Francisco-based indie group, Thao & the Get Down Stay Down.

Thao Nyugen

But sh*t happens . . . as does coronavirus.  So Nyugen found herself in self-quarantine rather than getting together with a bunch of dancers to shoot the video.

Nguyen said she “entered a light despondency” after California’s stay-at-home order went into effect.  

(Speaking of California, have you noticed how well they handled the coronavirus compared to New York?  Cuomo, de Blasio, et al. really screwed the pooch compared to the folks in California, which has twice the population but only 7.3% as many deaths as New York.)

From the “Phenom” video

But what good is sitting alone in your room when you can fire up the ol’ computer, open up your Zoom teleconferencing app, and create “a fluidly evolving dance video of astonishing visual power and imagination” (to quote dance critic Sarah Kaufman in a review that appeared in the Washington Post yesterday). 

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Boswell once told Dr. Johnson that he had recently attended a meeting of Quakers where a woman had preached.

Dr. Johnson famously responded that “a woman’s preaching is like a dog’s walking on its hind legs.  It is not well done, but you are surprised to find it done at all.”  (Who knew Dr. Johnson was such an effing sexist?)

(Happens to me ALL the time)

That’s kind of how I felt about the “Phenom” video.  It’s clever and fun to watch once or twice – but I’m not as wild about it as the Washington Post critic was.

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Thao Nyugen has been compared to Regina Spektor as a singer.  I think Spektor’s voice is a little more forceful, and Spektor has a lot less trouble staying on pitch than Nyugen.  (Maybe she sings slightly off-key for effect.  Whatever the reason, I’d rather she didn’t.)

“Phenom” reminds me a little of Spektor’s “You’ve Got Time,” which is the song that’s played over the opening credits of Orange Is the New Black episodes.

That may because both songs have lines that repeat the word “trap” three times.

From “You’ve Got Time”:

The animals, the animals

Trap, trap, trap ’til the cage is full

From “Phenom”:

Careful I’m an animal

Trap, trap, trap

I think Nyugen’s singing on “Phenom” also sounds a little like Eminem at times.

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Click here to watch the “Phenom” video.

Click below to buy the song from Amazon: