Tsunami opening for Beat Happening in an attic in Milwaukee 1991. Photo by Pat Graham @instapatgraham
Recent Press
PRESS and REVIEWS
Tsunami empowered a scene. Did its music get lost in the noise?
Chris Richards, Washington Post | November 8, 2024
“[Tsunami] create[d] an indie rock blueprint.”
"There was something singular about their sound, their intuition, their inventiveness, their work ethic, the way they replied to the ugly twin auras of capitalism and misogyny in gauzy bursts of melodic noise that felt mysterious and personal at once. Their music often felt big, and when Toomey describes it three decades later, that capaciousness seems to have been created with inclusion in mind: 'Everyone could be in the riff together.’” - Washington Post
Washingtonian Write-up & Tour Preview
"Keeping in the DIY spirit, the band created a sound that was unique in the landscape of DC indie-rock music: slower yet still upbeat with intricate melodies that borrowed from the developing genre of math rock, Riot Grrrl, and a touch of twee.” - Washingtonian
The Big Takeover review
Ryan Gabos, November 8, 2024
"Loud Is As is a marvel of physical preservation, as Numero Group is wont to do, as much as it is an imperative reminder of the band’s large-looming legacy.”
"1993’s Deep End introduces the band’s sound with the dual forces of Toomey and Thomson’s razor guitars and lyricism… Their strum is a unique one, all their own. Brazen, even.”
"Extremely worth digging into.” - The Big Takeover
PODCASTS
November 7, 2024: Kristin Thomson and Jenny Toomey from Tsunami are here to discuss their band’s new 5LP box set, Loud Is As, living in upstate New York with the AC on in October and also living in Philadelphia but being from Canada, loving hockey but not liking sports, how they first met via punk and Positive Force, the band Geek, touring with Superchunk, and starting Simple Machines Records, Dischord and the D.C. music community, nostalgia vs. longing, the contents of their Numero Group box set, touring again, other future plans, and much more.
November 5, 2024: Jenny Toomey & Kristin Thomson—arguably the two women most responsible for the ceaseless onslaught of incredible indie music in the 1990s due to the Simple Machines Records label and their explosively powerful band Tsunami—go head-to-head-to-head with Discograffiti during an unprecedented 3-hour interview during which they discuss the entirety of their catalog, which thankfully is being reissued today by Numero Group in a lovingly compiled box set entitled Loud Is As. Do yourself a big favor and get yourself one.
Beginnings Podcast
November 1, 2024: On today’s episode, I talk to musicians Jenny Toomey and Kristin Thomson of the band Tsunami. Tsunami formed in Arlington, VA in late 1990, when Jenny and Kristin were housemates at Arlington, Virginia’s legendary punk-activist Positive Force house. Over the next seven years, Tsunami wrote and recorded prolifically, releasing three full-length albums (Deep End, The Heart’s Tremolo and A Brilliant Mistake) and over a dozen seven-inch singles and EPs, most on their own Simple Machines label. And next week Numero Group will release Loud As Is, a 5-LP box set reissue of their entire catalog, and buddy, you better believe it’s great!