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| Brianne Sargent, Nigel Newton. (by Jenna B) |
The Skinny Cooks, a Dallas band, has been playing around
town trying to define and find its sound. The Skinny Cooks might have just
found its sound with the release of an EP – Soul Token.
The band is led by two young guys – Nigel Newton and Brianne
Sargent – who many assume are brother and sister; may be because of their many
similarities like being thin-built (skinny?), ‘baby dreads’ hair, a love for
eclectic music, and quiet, shy personalities.
The group has been working diligently with strong support
and encouragement from Dallas industry insiders like guitar star Eric McFadden,
sound engineer Geoff Lloyd, Reinventing Jude bandleader Jude Gonzalez, and
promoter Jah Work.
Nigel Newton on vibraphone and Brianne Sargent on cello have
brought together a few friends to put out a respectable five-song debut. With
songs like Glitzkrieg, The Skinny Cooks introduce their funky, head-bobbing,
wonderfully-produced sound. Nigel Newton sings and excels on this one.
Superglue puts Brianne Sargent up front as a lead singer, a
position she takes reluctantly because she considers herself solely as a cello
player. With Brianne Sargent’s on-point enunciation, and the wind-blown sounds,
the song has an epic build-up and turn and becomes a serious, thoughtful,
elegiac composition.
With Man of Wonder, there are a lot of surprising and
unexpected sounds and syncopation because of the use of instruments not common
in pop music such as Nigel Newton’s four-stick technique on vibraphone, Brianne
Sargent’s alternating finger and wand technique on cello and Evan Veenstra’s
lead bass.
The Skinny Cooks with a great background in music (Brianne
Sargent at Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts,
and Nigel Newton at Berklee College of Music) has shown that hard work and a little
help goes a long way.
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