[ATTENDED: October 15, 2026] Lauren Ash
I have enjoyed Lauren Ash as an actress for a pretty long time–since I first saw her on Super Fun Night, and then of course on Superstore. I had no idea she had put music out. Indeed, I found out that Lauren Ash put out a record when I saw this show listed at Kung Fu Necktie. So I had to look her up. And she has an album out. And I really liked it–90’s era pop punk, funny lyrics and catchy as anything.
I thought it would be interesting to see her, but I had a ticket to see The Dillinger Escape Plan that evening–quite a different sound.
The more I looked into the DEP show, the less I was interested in seeing the first two bands (no offense to them, I just didn’t think I could handle a full on heavy night), so I decided to do something wacky. The Lauren Ash show started at 7. What if I went to the Lauren Ash show at Kung Fu Necktie, and when she was done, I could drive to Underground Arts and see just DEP. I had tried a similar plan a few times before with varying results. But I assumed that Lauren’s show would be fairly short and that all would work out.
Here’s some deets on Lauren’s music career
She exploded onto the music scene in 2023 with her pop punk single “Now I Know” (which debuted at #1 on the Canadian iTunes rock chart and #5 on Billboard’s Alternative Download Chart). Her debut album “Call Me When You Get This” released in September 2025 featuring her single “Whiplash” which was nominated for a “Hollywood Independent Music Award” for best rock/pop song. She performed her single “Sad This Christmas” on “The Kelly Clarkson Show” and spoke about her music on “Jimmy Kimmel Live”.
I read some reviews of her UK shows and they were all positive, so I was in.
After The Droogettes set, her stage was set up wit a TV and a telephone. When 9PM came around, the phone rang. After several rings, Lauren’s voice said, can someone answer that please? A woman answered it and Lauren thanked her and then asked if that person would start the TV. Which she did. And what played was a series of well wishes and teases from just about everyone from The Superstore cast as well as other folks (Cobie Smulders). It was really funny and set a great tone for how the show might go.
Lauren’s band (a guitarist and drummer) came out on stage and then Lauren ran out to the stage. She was psyched to be there and psyched to be playing music. She brought an incredible energy.
The biggest surprise for me both on record and live is how high her voice is. She has a pretty deep authoritative voice on her shows, but she was up an octave for these songs. Of course I had to wonder if her higher voice had anything to do with her weight loss–I wouldn’t think so, but what do I know.
She started with Dumpster Fire and was clearly having a blast–jumping around stage and emoting the lyrics. I enjoyed it a lot that she was snarky in her delivery when necessary–it added a lot to the presentation. I know the album pretty well, so I was surprised when she played some songs I didn’t know. Like The One Who Got Away (a 2024 single) and Now I Know (a 2023 single).
Lauren played guitar for a couple of songs and talked about how excited she was to be in a band. (more…)
