Since being freed from major label shackles a few years ago, Tinashe has been on a tear and returns to Seattle, where she riled up a 2018 Bumbershoot crowd with killer choreography — towing one of the year’s most immersive pop/R&B albums of the year, “333.”
This week’s concert offerings around metro Phoenix are nothing if not varied. In addition to a handful of high-profile reggae-rock bands (including 311 and The Expendables), there will be performances by alt-R&B act Chase Atlantic, indie-pop project Bleachers, punk icons Rancid and Dropkick Murphys, hip-hop legends Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, and industrial rock group Combichrist happening from Monday, October 11, to Thursday, October 14, at local music venues.
R&B/soul star Tinashe will visit The Van Buren in downtown Phoenix while this year’s Country Thunder Arizona music festival makes its long-awaited return on Thursday down at Florence’s Canyon Moon Ranch.
Tinashe, who has finally been able to unleash that second side of herself during her journey around the US on the “333 Tour,” is completely in her element throughout the show, to the point where she doesn’t even notice a fight break out between two women in the middle of “Link Up.” The way she dances through it proves that it’ll take a lot more than an offstage tussle to stand in the way of one of today’s most charismatic performers putting on a show. And as Tinashe will tell you herself, when you watch her concert, you’re watching a pop star at work. “It’s great to be back,” she says, grateful for a return to the stage after a string of pandemic-driven virtual gigs throughout 2020. “It’s great to feel the crowd. It’s just way better than those virtual performances.”
In an interview before her gig, she was asked about the most important takeaway from ‘333’ and this tour so far, and she replied, “I’m just trying to really live in the moment and be in the moment now, and appreciate every step of the way. Because I do think that there was some time in the early days of my career—I’ve always been very appreciative—but there were moments where so much was happening. I’m so busy traveling. Just taking a second to really try to take it all in every day, is probably the biggest takeaway. Just being really viscerally in every moment.”
Tinashe is scheduled to perform on Thursday, October 14, at The Van Buren.
