At the very start of KindieFest (nee StinkFest) 2009, Audra Tsanos introduced herself by saying "Welcome to my hood." And Tsanos, the force behind AudraRox, wasn't kidding. She lives just a few blocks from Jalopy, she was one of the most gregarious folks in the place, and, heck, her husband's art was hanging on the walls. Not only that, but she not only knew the showcase before it was KindieFest, she knew it before it was StinkFest. (Hootenanny, anyone?)

One of my favorite parts of the non-showcase portion of KindieFest was talking with Audra about the compromises associated with dealing with the corporate world. For all of the talk about trying to find additional opportunities for kids music to break through into a higher national consciousness, Audra's experiences with Jack's Big Music Show and Sesame Street show that working with entities designed to create more mass-market entertainment can force compromises you may not be entirely comfortable with. Be careful what you wish for...

But those thoughts were pushed aside when AudraRox took the stage, seven strong, led Audra's and Jen's powerful vocals. They played a bunch of cuts from their upcoming album. At the start of the song embedded below, "You Can't Crawl in a Dress," my first reaction was "Flute? Really?," but by the end of the song, with multi-hair-colored and tattooed Tsanos bending backwards to belt out the notes, I figured that Tsanos knew exactly where she was going with her music. (Yeah, the flute rocked, too.)

AudraRox - "You Can't Crawl in a Dress" (Live at KindieFest 2009)