Thao & the Get Down Stay Down have returned with A Man Alive, a brilliant and cohesive album that surpasses expectation. It's an elaborate showcase of musical talent and diversity; styles are blended between fractured beats and uninhibited vocals, while elements of tension and release are used strongly to toy with listeners' emotions.
Unorthodox song structures make every song on A Man Alive unpredictable: subterranean bass pulsates through "Astonished Man," while the album's highlight track, "Nobody Dies," features screaming, distorted vocals from Thao. The album's use of staccato funked-out guitar and twisted synths adds the variety of different genres and sounds employed here.
But while this album is masterful in a number of ways, it's Thao's confessional element that ties everything together. "Guts" makes for a perfect break in the album, slowing A Man Alive down with intimate lyrics like "I got the guts, I don't need my blood / If the breeze leaves, with the ones I love," that provide a sense of both pain and coming to terms with it. In "Fool Forever," Thao roars "To be scarce is to be king" and in "Meticulous Bird" she claims self-ownership with lines like "I take my body back" and "Now I perch above you, meticulous bird of prey." Listeners are invited to witness Thao at her most vulnerable, but also at her most fearless.
On A Man Alive, Thao wears her heart on her sleeve, and in doing so, she's created an album that has the ability to shake its listeners from within.
(Ribbon)Unorthodox song structures make every song on A Man Alive unpredictable: subterranean bass pulsates through "Astonished Man," while the album's highlight track, "Nobody Dies," features screaming, distorted vocals from Thao. The album's use of staccato funked-out guitar and twisted synths adds the variety of different genres and sounds employed here.
But while this album is masterful in a number of ways, it's Thao's confessional element that ties everything together. "Guts" makes for a perfect break in the album, slowing A Man Alive down with intimate lyrics like "I got the guts, I don't need my blood / If the breeze leaves, with the ones I love," that provide a sense of both pain and coming to terms with it. In "Fool Forever," Thao roars "To be scarce is to be king" and in "Meticulous Bird" she claims self-ownership with lines like "I take my body back" and "Now I perch above you, meticulous bird of prey." Listeners are invited to witness Thao at her most vulnerable, but also at her most fearless.
On A Man Alive, Thao wears her heart on her sleeve, and in doing so, she's created an album that has the ability to shake its listeners from within.