Thao We Brave Bee Stings and All WB rating out of 100

Thao Nguyen’s sophomore album We Brave Bee Stings and All, her first for seminal American indie label Kill Rock Stars, is a bundle of scuffed joy. Nguyen’s youthful insouciance at once makes a plea for the Virginian, her songs wafting a relaxed feel and small-town pace that suggests that this singer-songwriter refuses to take life as seriously as we are told we should. While, the quality of We Brave Bee Stings and All suggests that Nguyen could be a ‘next big thing’, the sentimentality of the record indicates otherwise – her website revelation (it’s worth a look just for her human beat-boxing to Gary Glitter) that she’s only just discovered what iTunes is providing confirmation of this – its Cat Power-esque vocals and soul-infused pop more the product of small pleasures than a Feist-like explosion.

For this record Nguyen has enlisted the help of her musical friends, The Get Down Stay Down, to add extra punch. And punch they certainly do. Like the drums on the album’s opener ‘Beat (Health, Life and Fire)’, the sweeping rhythm drives the song forward as Nguyen sings out: “beat my bra/beat my chest/beat the ones who love me best”, the rollicking feel empowering her emotive delivery. These arrangements add an extra depth that wasn’t present on her first release Like the Linen and combined with the production talents of Tucker Martine (The Decemberists, Sufjan Stevens), whom she met through friend and contemporary Laura Viers, Bee Stings is the beneficiary of a more accomplished, warm pop feel.

Both this beefed out instrumentation and polished production all hang upon Nguyen’s sweet and loose singing style, swinging around like a leaf on a breeze her voice is reminiscent of an upbeat and altogether happier Scout Niblett or Cat Power. However, while the songs have the uplifting nature which identifies all great indie pop, it’s the hints of the bittersweet which add depth to the album. This juxtaposition of happy/sad themes is present on the opening track (ending with the reflective “I’m never gonna leave/but you’re never gonna love me like I need”) and weaving its way throughout Bee Stings, Nguyen’s musical contradiction stays with the listener till the final track, ‘Fear and Convenience’, where Nguyen’s take on new-folk is laced with a bleak morbidity that off settles the lilting guitar melodies: “I have seen fear and convenience/I have never felt a romance”.

Without close inspection the darker side of Nguyen’s lyricism can easily be lost, the singer’s quirky delivery making the words somehow lighter and easier to take – particularly compared to the aforementioned contemporaries. As such, Nguyen has crafted an album of semisweet indie pop; musically optimistic and cute, but lyrically a product of isolation and dissatisfaction. The redeeming grace of these trials being that Nguyen’s characters and her performance compels us to fight on, braving the bee stings and all.