Melissa Giannini

An early, longer version of the Saturday Looks Good to Me story posted here a few months ago (much longer, like almost 3,000 words longer) included an anecdote about walking by the office of one of my editors and hearing Fill Up the Room. I poked my head in to ask what he thought of it. “It’s good,” he said, or something to that effect. And then he mentioned how he had heard of SLGTM before but always assumed they were a “Warped Tour” band because of the name.

A week or so ago, I was doing some research for a record review that’ll eventually find its way here, and I came across these amazing Scout Niblett videos. I had heard her mentioned in passing over the years and always played along because I had such a clear image of what someone with that name must sound like.

And even though I was practically a fan of her music, which was then completely the product of my own imagination, assumptions, history, etc., the reality turned out to be way way better. I love when that happens. Here are those videos:

In this one, she’s playing “Dinosaur Egg” while waiting in line to get into a show.

Here she’s playing a song in the back of a black cab.

Side note: I’ve been thinking a lot these days about loops, heartbeats, and being “unstuck in time” Slaughterhouse-Five-style. In honor of that, here is my “best of 2006” list (yes, 2006) in the form of two YouTube videos:

Steve Reich’s “Piano Phase” accompanied by choreography Pt. 1/2 from a performance at BAM in October 2006.

“Come Out” from the same performance.