Lizz King: New LP/CD on Ehse Records

Lizz King: New LP/CD on Ehse Records

www.ehserecords.com
www.diymummy.com


artist: Lizz King
album: All Songs Go To Heaven
release: 2010 Ehse Records
release date: February 16th, 2010 -- a belated Valentine

Ehse Records is proud to be releasing the new LP and CD by Baltimore's favorite West Virginia transplant: Lizz King.

A crucial part of the Wham City collective, for the last few years King has been performing critically acclaimed concerts with the likes of everyone from Dan Deacon to Daniel Johnston. Her style mixes weird weird pop with big big soul, and the new album features some of the catchiest, quirkiest, and yet most sultry songwriting Baltimore has ever heard.

Lizz King will be touring the USA throughout Winter 2009 - 2010.


"The quality of music on this bill was outstanding, far and away one of the strongest I’ve seen in years. As I walked towards the Ottobar, a few minutes after Lizz King’s set time, I was hopeful that she had not come on. The place was dead silent. But as I walked through the door, I could see the reason. King was on stage and delivering a captivating performance that had the room so silent you could hear the floorboards creak. Nobody even tossed away beer bottles. This was going to be something special… Lizz King is a pixie and an angel. It’s a shame that in this day, in order to get noticed, you have to have a strong gimmick in addition to a gorgeous, timeless voice. For all the Winestones that get attention, a deserving gem like King is swept under the rug. Let’s remedy that, shall we? King’s music is some of the most barebones, heart-wide-open stuff I’ve heard… in a good and completely disarming way; she goes from banjo to ukulele to what I think was an electric tenor banjo, alternating playing some groovy, delicious computerized beats track as the musical foundation of some of her songs. Her voice is warm, like Billie Holiday and the best voices of old found on gramophone records or streaming through the vacuum-tube radios, and haunting like Fiona Apple and the other female vocal prodigies of the present. The whole picture is distinct, something I imagine sounds not unlike an electrified, breaking music box mating with the aforementioned gramophone jazz records and a healthy dose of desolate country and blues twang and instrumentation likely inspired by her time in West Virginia. She is a unique sound that is nothing short of refreshing."

- Aural States


Best of Baltimore 2007: Best Songwriter
"Wham City might be best known for giddy, hyperactive noisemakers such as Dan Deacon and the Santa Dads. But the collective's best-kept secret, Lizz King, defies her crew's prevailing aesthetic with bluesy vamps wherein she wraps her throaty voice around a single instrument, usually guitar or keyboard, and the occasional minimal drum-machine pattern. Sure, a little bit of that old Wham City absurdity lurks in song titles like 'Booty Queen' and the maniacal cackling that abruptly concludes 'Bigger Better Faster Stronger'. But the Lizz King whom we fell for is the gal who sings torch songs like 'Kissin Part' with banjo accompaniment."

- City Paper


"When the folks at Wham City, named 'Best Creative Hive' by the City Paper in 2006, were forced to stop holding shows last September, the bands who lived there-- Dan Deacon, members of Videohippos, Lizz King, Santa Dads, to name a few-- diffused only to regroup at other burgeoning fire hazards with crappy ventilation to continue to inspire the blood out of everyone around them."

- Pitchfork


"Sounds like: A haunting blend of rustic country and synthetic punk. King’s satirical lyrics linger against minimal keyboard beats and basic guitar chords.
Influences: King borrows electro-bops from her Wham City constituents, but her sultry scowl is reminiscent of R&B powerhouse Big Mama Thornton."

- Venus Zine


"In a stuffy, odd house called Lemon Hill in a crappy area of Baltimore, a girl with just her banjo sat cross-legged on the floor and sang us all to sleep with absolutely beautiful lullabies. Her voice was smooth and soulful, and I snapped her photograph with a yellow glow from the only streetlight shining outside the windows. Her name is Lizz King."

- The Walrus