Tacoma synth-pop singer Shannon Curtis to bring ‘80s hits to the Chameleon

The journey of Shannon Curtis’ music career has been a windy road with many stops along the way to her current destination of synth-pop and the Chameleon on Friday.

Curtis, whether with a band or solo, spent years playing piano and piano-based music.

Throughout the 2010s, Curtis spent the decade recording an album to tour on every year. On those tours, she only played “house shows,” which are exactly what they sound like they would be: concerts hosted in a household or backyard.

“We were cranking out the albums,” Curtis said. “When I was writing them in the studio, I had to think about how I was going to perform these songs as a solo artist at a keyboard.”

Then, the pandemic hit in 2020, putting a halt on Curtis’ lifestyle and way of performing.

Stuck at home in Tacoma, Curtis and her husband Jamie Hill (a producer and musician in his own right) used this pause as time to explore.

The two were drawn to the sounds of their youth in the ‘80s, those of synths and drum machines – both of which Curtis taught herself over the course of the pandemic.

“When I was in elementary school and first discovering the radio, there was just a ton of synth-pop happening in popular music at that time,” Curtis said. “So that’s the stuff that has always been in my blood … The music that you listen to in your formative years, I feel like, is with you in your soul.”

With the many global rigors and social tensions present through COVID-19 and into the new decade, Curtis had felt “very bogged down” by it all. She decided to use songwriting as her method of coping.

Curtis journaled her thoughts and emotions, turning those entries into song form. This, along with her newfound love for creating ‘80s-esque synth-pop, created her latest record “Good to Me.”

The 10-track record was released in late 2022, and although it features some darker themes, Curtis was focused on keeping the record high-energy and joyous – especially within the production.

“You might be listening to the record and there might be a really sparkly, ’80s-inspired pop song that you can just bop along to,” Curtis said, adding, “But after listening to it two, three, four times you might pick up on some of the lyrics and they might not be so poppy and sweet.”

This project was nowhere near the first time Curtis and Hill had worked together on music. In fact, it only took about three months for the two to start collaborating after they first met 18 years ago. But, the shows the two started putting on afterwards were a new experience for both.

With Curtis on vocals, Hill performing the synths and a video art presentation, the two look to take those in the audience on an immersive journey that is also highly inclusive and welcoming to all.

“It’s almost more of a theater experience than a concert,” Curtis said. “It’s an unusual marriage of various disciplines.”

When the duo performs at the Chameleon on Friday, they will also be playing a few of their favorite ’80s hits as part of the upcoming project that they look to release next year, “80s kids.”

Already releasing covers of classics like Bruce Springsteen’s “Dancing in the Dark” and “Take on Me” by A-ha, the two are revisiting the songs that meant the most to them during childhood.

In similar parallels to recent years, Curtis and Hill remember the ‘80s as a “weird time to be a kid.” With circumstances like the Cold War creating ominous tensions, they remember being children and, while not precisely understanding the scope of it all, fearing such a massive scale entity.

But, they also remember music being a key light in their lives and this era of brand-new synthesizers acting as an escape from those fears.

“If there’s anything to celebrate from the ‘80s, it’s that music was amazing and it saved us,” Hill said. “And I think it still has the capacity to do that; it feels like now is a really salient time to dig back into that.”