NOTE: All photos are copyright of Howard Shiau Photography 2025
Gayle (aka Taylor Gayle Rutherfurd) is having quite a year. The Nashville based nineteen year old pop rocker released her fourth EP, toured with Taylor Swift and Pink, and had a Grammy nomination for her viral TikTok hit “ABCEDFU”. So why not wrap up this amazing year with a solo tour! Added to the tour was UK singer/songwriter Dylan (aka Natasha Woods). Together, they made quite an incredible one-two punch. On Saturday, November 4th, they performed at the Velvet Underground in Toronto.
Opener Dylan has been on my short list for the last year but the scheduling has never worked out. She kicked off her set with “Someone Else” from her 2022 EP “No Romeo” and the energy in the venue went immediately up to 100%. The pop sensibilities of her music are perfect for today’s teenage fan but, with guitar in hand and long tresses of blonde hair, Dylan and her band rock hard with high energy and positions her well to be a rock star for this decade. Check her out while she’s on tour with Gayle. If not, she’ll be embarking on a solo tour across Europe, the UK, and Australia become returning to North America. In fact, she indicated she will be back in Toronto in April 2024 (not yet announced)
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Gayle first caught my attention as she did with millions of others with “ABCDEFU” and her music had a very pop sound. However, listening to her recordings vs watching her live are two very different animals. On stage, Gayle’s performance, both musically and physically (high kicks and punches) is much more rock than pop. As with Dylan, this puts Gayle in the perfect place of attracting a young pop audience as well as fans that prefer an indie rock performance. She’s also not an artist that quickly transitions from one song to another. There was constant engagement with the fans, even during songs where she’ll take someone’s phone and take video as she’s performing. Her incredible personality made the show so much more fun and stretched out the twenty-one song set to an even longer but fun night for the audience. One fun point was before she played “Alex” and she looked for fans that had dated Alex’s. Everyone was instructed to hate Alex’s for at least four minutes! She closed out her set with, of course, “ABCDEFU” with the whole venue singing along! Gayle will be wrapping up her tour this month with the final show on November 15th in Nashville. Catch her while you can!
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