Moon Taxi gives back with charity food and toy drive

Alumni band Moon Taxi is celebrating the season by giving back to Nashville’s community.

The indie-rock group partnered with Lightning 100 and Frothy Monkey to promote the Metro Police Christmas Charities program, which gave baskets of food and toys to deserving families in Davidson County.

“We love Lightning 100 and what they do for Nashville’s community, so we jumped at the opportunity,” said frontman Trevor Terndrup.

The band joined Lightning 100 on Dec. 10 for a special broadcast from the Frothy Monkey in The Nations. DJ Dan Buckley interviewed the band at the coffee shop while they met fans donating toys. Over the hour and a half span, they filled the entire donation bin.

“It was a live broadcast, and in between songs we would just chat,” said Terndrup. “It was a really good time.”

Thousands of toys were donated over the span of the campaign, which officially ended on Dec. 16 but happily accepted donations up until Christmas. When the time came to make deliveries, 997 people received baskets of food, toys or both.

The band promoted the program through social media, events and a ticket giveaway for its New Year’s Eve show.

“We try to make each New Year’s show unique – sometimes we do a tribute to a famous musician or a medley of biggest songs of the year,” Terndrup said about preparing for the show. “We have some ideas, but it’s getting down to crunch time.”

Keeping the show fresh is important to the band, as Monday night’s performance will be Moon Taxi’s 10th New Year’s Eve show in Nashville.

“Last year we were in Atlanta, but it’s so much more fun in your hometown,” Terndrup said.

Moon Taxi has seen plenty of success in 2018, with appearances on “The Today Show” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live” promoting the single “Two High,” which has been streamed over 110 million times on Spotify.

“We’re so happy and grateful for the opportunities we’ve been given,” Terndrup said. “I want to continue to be the lucky person on stage performing with my friends.”

The band shows no signs of slowing down into the next year, as they are already in the studio working on a new album.

“We want to continue to challenge ourselves,” Terndrup said. “We don’t want to be complacent, so we’ll keep challenging ourselves with our individual instruments and as a band.”