A Seat at the Kids Table with D.C.’s Rising Indie Pop Stars
Photo via Kids Table.
Living in Washington, D.C. in 2026 can feel weird. On a ten minute walk you may pass a hoard of National Guard troops deployed from every corner of the country, stumble upon giant banners of the president’s face, or get Reflecting Pool paint peelings stuck to the bottom of your shoe. And then when you get home, scrolling through social media feeds curated by location-based algorithms feels like watching homegrown Hunger Games clips (see: Patriot Games, UFC fights on the White House lawn). But beyond the National Mall lives a vibrant local music scene, and six-piece indie pop band Kids Table are proof.
Comprised of vocalist Amy Smith, bassist Max Wooten, guitarist Mike Weaver, drummer Andy King, keyboardist Bryan Truong (BT), and trumpeter Ryan Thomas, Kids Table builds upon the strong melodies of their indie pop foundation with soul flourishes à la bands like Couch and Melt. What started as a platonic meet cute between Max and Mike in the form of a Recessions karaoke duet in 2023 turned into the ultimate convergence of mutuals when the UNC Chapel Hill grads tapped fellow Tar Heels Amy and Andy to fill out bar gigs later that year.
“Mike got us our first gig before Andy even moved into town and basically blackmailed him, saying, ‘Hey, we told them that we had drums. You’re playing Saturday,’” Max said.
As the group continued to book gigs as a cover band, they decided four Tar Heels wasn’t enough and BT and Ryan were officially added to the mix in early 2024. Two years, seven original singles, and a handful of headlining shows later, the six members of Kids Table are inviting everyone to pull up a chair and bask in the true community culture the capital has to offer.
Ahead of their show opening for Morrissey Blvd. and Tobacco Road at Union Stage, Off the Record talked with the band about all things new music, recent gigs, and the Washington music scene. The band members’ frequent laughs as we sat in stools around a circular hightop table truly made the seating arrangement feel like gathering around, well, the kids table.
We met on the heels of their latest single, “Us and the Moon.” The light, swung feel of the track contrasts the straight-ahead indie rock groove of other 2026 releases “Killing Time” and “Done,” a phenomenon Max said offers insight into their songwriting process.
“Some of what I think makes our sound relatively unique is that it’s coming from six different directions,” Max shared.
The band usually owes their more soul-inspired tunes to BT, who said his college jazz lessons and affinity for “super thick chords” are at the foundation of tracks like “Us and the Moon” and 2025’s “Between the Lines.”
“The other day I was showing them an idea and Max was like, ‘Oh, I just assumed it was going to be swung,’” BT said through a chuckle.
Once the “bones” of a song are settled, Amy said, the collaborative process flows and ends in adding the “sparkle” of Ryan’s trumpet ad libs. Any stellar songwriting is the result of teamwork, but Kids Table’s deep-rooted admiration of each others’ talents was palpable as they commanded the stage that night, nodding each other on through solos with smiles that never left their faces.
The evening’s joy was clearly not a one-off, evidenced by the viral TikTok and Instagram videos of their May 2026 Adams Morgan PorchFest set. As the group performed the jaunty breakdown of Dexys Midnight Runners’ “Come On Eileen” while huddled on the stairs of an Ontario Road townhouse, an endless sea of bobbing heads consumed the street in a moment of rare connection in the digital age.
Having played the biannual neighborhood celebration four times, Amy said PorchFest has always been one of the band’s favorite gigs, but they were truly shocked by the crowd’s size and energy this year.
“The fact that it was captured in a way where it could be felt even if you were just looking at it through a screen was pretty cool,” she said.
And with sentiments like, “More of this. Less of whatever the hell has been happening,” and “Maybe the world is healing,” filling the videos’ comment sections, Kids Table certainly helped show the Internet that Washington is more than a city of political doom and gloom; it’s one where residents show up and show out for local artists — and each other.
“You couldn’t have 200 artists playing within four hours if there weren’t 200 artists in the city doing that stuff all the time,” Max said, shouting out bands like Staring in Spaces, Spoonfed, and Griefcat that make up Washington’s “eclectic” scene. “D.C. just isn’t a place that a lot of people assume has good music, and that’s a shame because they’re wrong.”
A hallmark of the city’s music landscape is the iconic 9:30 Club, a storied stage that Kids Table graced before even releasing an album, having opened for Strutman Lane in May. From entering the green room to devouring the complimentary, hand-iced 9:30 cupcakes (I asked. Amy said they’re chocolate and they’re delicious), Mike said their 9:30 Club debut was “the best hour of [his] life” — not to mention the performance was Mike and Ryan’s first time even stepping foot in the venue. What a legendary way to lose your 9:30 Club virginity.
May also took Kids Table to New York City, where a sold-out room of fans singing along to “Killing Time” greeted them for their first show in the Big Apple, headlining East Village’s Berlin in the wake of their PorchFest virality. By the band’s second New York City show — opening for The Asymptomatics at Arlene’s Grocery in July — the energy “went wild,” Amy said.
“I was at the bar before the show and someone approached me and was like, ‘Hey, I was nervous to say hi, but huge fan,’ and I was like, ‘What are you talking about? I’m nervous!’” Amy recalled.
Throughout Kids Table’s summer gigs, the band also attempted to implement pre-show rituals, but from spill-prone six-way Brüderschaft shots to logistically-annoying sound baths, nothing stuck. Back in Washington at Union Stage, however, the band shared they had plans to give a new potential new top secret tradition a go that night. Though the act remains a mystery (the only hint I was given was that it entailed a song), Mike checked back in after their set to tell me this might be the one that sticks.
If so, it marks a symbolic new beginning for a band that’s been at it for almost three years. As Kids Table ramps up their single rollouts —including the upcoming release of live staple “The Glow” — and prepares for a soon-to-be-announced September tour through the Southeast, the six-piece is carving its place deeper into the indie pop scene everyday. Yet it’s the mirth and amity they do it with that makes Kids Table worth listening to.