RUL got the chance to meet the lovely Lzzy Hale, a few hours before their show with Alter Bridge, at le Zénith, in Paris. A nice encounter, for sure!
Hello Lzzy, how are you?
Lzzy Hale (vocal/guitar) : I’m doing well, I’m in Paris so. (laughs)
How goes the tour so far?
L : The tour is amazing, we’ve known the guys for years and we’ve all seen each other on the road or what, but we never actually been on tour together. It’s very cool, there’s a lot of mutual respect and lot of love going on.
Did you see the venue tonight? Way bigger than the last time you played in Paris right.
L : Hell yeah. (laughs) I’m so excited; yes it’s the biggest place we’ll play in France so far.
First of all, do some people still think that you’re the pirate metal band?
L : They do sometimes. You know, I think that we’ve created enough of a name for ourselves that people still don’t get that but yeah; last time there were some people who thought that we’re Alestorm. And we still haven’t met those guys! Which, I think that we should, just go on tour with them. They’ll be the one with the H and the one without the H. (laughs)
Your second album “The Strange Case Of…” was released last year, how long will you tour in support of it? Because they’ll be a Euro tour next year too.
L : Yeah, we just released a cover EP; we’re coming back in April, to do a headline tour. I’m so excited about because we really want to do, before we go ahead and record the next record, we want to be sure to come here again. We’ll probably have a few surprises on that tour but I’m going to try and convince them to play maybe one or two new songs, so that’ll be fun.
Do you already think and write for the third one?
L : We began writing, I’ve been writing anyway just because that’s what I do (laughs) and I don’t know, it’s exciting, there’s a couple of songs that we’re really proud of. Some of them we’ve shown to our label, some we haven’t but the ones that we’ve shown, they were excited about so, you know, we’ll see. Sometimes those are just kind of gateway songs, maybe there are better ones, and they won’t go on the record but so far so good.
“ReAniMate: The CoVeRs eP“ is your last release. Why did you choose these songs, these bands? What do they represent for you?
L : This is a very eclectic mixture of a lot of different things. There’re certain songs such as the Fleetwood Mac cover that we used to cover like eight years ago and we always wanted to put it down on tape, we never got the chance, so that was a conscience decision and then there’re songs like “Get Lucky” or the Marilyn Manson song that we just basically said “let’s try it and see what happens” so it was more of a risk for us and maybe a challenge. And obviously there’s the Judas Priest cover that we started to cover the last time we came overseas, mainly because we just like the song, so we did it more and more live and when this opportunity came in “yeah, let’s just put it on, that’ll be easy”.
What about the Daft Punk cover? Was it a kind of challenge to cover this kind of music?
L : Definitely a challenge because… I don’t know it’s always strange thing to do something that’s currently on the radio, it’s just kind of popular right now and it’s a disco song (laughs) “wow we never tempted anything like that”. So we went to the studio not knowing how we’re gonna do it, how we’ll figure that; within a couple of hours, playing and testing certain things, Joe got that riff similar to the song so we used it and it ended up sounding really dark for the fact that’s a party song. (laughs) Hopefully we did it right but it was fun to do.
You like to play covers on stage. Isn’t it sad to sacrifice one of your songs for a cover?
L : It is, it is. We try to use them; you know what I mean, use them as a tool. Especially back in the days when nobody had any idea of who we are, with any records out. It was fun to throw in some covers here and there, just to kind of bring people like “oh, I know that one”. But yeah, we’ll probably end up putting one into it today and, it’s always funny, not boring at all, it’s nice to see what happens with the crowd every time that you throw in a cover.
Will you keep on playing covers when you’ll have 6 albums out?
L : (Laughs) I don’t know. Probably, mainly because it’s fun for us, I think that we do that selfishly you know like “I want to cover that song!”; but it’s going to be a lot harder to cuts something out. (laughs)
You also guested on plenty of tracks or on stage with other bands. With whom you’d like to work with? That you never worked with of course
L : Wow, there’s always somebody. Let’s see; there’s definitely a band with whom we’ve never toured with, is Foo Fighters. It’ll be fun just to do something with Dave Grohl. Tom Petty is amazing, I just want to be in a room with that guy, I don’t even care you know, he’s indisputably cool. There’re a couple of people that I’ve met that I haven’t work with yet, one of them in particular, I’d love to do something with one of the great women in rock n’roll, Pat Benatar, Heart or Lita Ford; I’ve met a lot of the older gentlemen in the genre and I’ve got in to meet the Heart sisters and have actually talked with Pat Benatar over the phone, we haven’t met in person but I’m just like “come on guys, let’s do something together”. (laughs) And also, there hadn’t been a girl/girl duet for a long time and that would be fun to do, we’ll see. (laughs)
And being on stage wearing heels on a rock n’roll stage? Really isn’t it hard? How comfortable it is?
L : I’m kind of used to it right now; it’s been a couple of years. I started wearing heels on stage, while I was 16 or so. It’s started like “yeah” stick it to the guys, one more thing that they won’t do and I could do. And I got used to it, but I am picky and choosy with the heels that I wear because they have to be comfortable, to have a nice balance make sure that I won’t totally break something on stage. It is funny tough, because the last time I actually fell on stage, I was wearing sneakers. (laughs) You know so… (laughs)
Can you run with these?
L : Yeah, yeah, I can get some good speed (laughs) especially these. We were in an interview with my bass player and he had shorts on I went like this and scraped his knee and he went like “oh no”. (laughs)
And what about leggings? Do you know Black Milk Clothing?
L : I do know that but I don’t own anything from them yet. Actually, one of the girls that works for us, she’s got lots of their leggings. I like leggings. I’m holding on every shred of feminity that I can. (laughs)
Most of the female metal/rock scene is into symphonic stuff. Apart from Doro, Cristina Scabbia and Angela Gossow. Why isn’t there more girls playing rock n’roll like you? Is it hard to make a name in this business, as a woman?
L : I always had the mentality that no matters what, it’s always hard to do what you like for your living. It’s a challenge to really go for something and I think as girls aren’t totally encouraged to be in this genre, it’s a dangerous business, it’s also unpredictable there’s no guaranty. But for those that are lucky enough to say “we’re having a career”, yeah you have to make a name for yourself, also have to practice and be good (laughs), which is a rule with me. I don’t mind wearing high heels and the small skirts but I work very hard to make sure I can back it up with something on stage. With girls, I know that lot of girls I was growing up with wanted, for example one of my friend at school wanted to be an artist, being a painter. It’s probably harder to say “I’m gonna paint for living” than “I’m going to sing for living” but her parents weren’t encouraging her at all. You always have to have a backup plan; you go to college, you marry your high school sweet heart and then see if you can make a living doing painting. For me, I was lucky enough to have incredible parents that basically said “you know what? You always have time to go out there and have a real job, but if you don’t try now, you’ll always going to mourn you; what if? …”.
You began music since you’re kid. What did make your success? Work work and work?
L : Yeah a lot of work and a lot of playing, anywhere and everywhere. We played restaurants, a funeral once… I don’t think we’ll ever do that again. It’s a onetime thing (laughs) and very depressing. You have to… I think you almost have to not have a backup plan and go for it, like there’ no other choice; because that’s what we did and you make friends, beginning something. You play in a bar, in front of a bunch of people, and then you move to clubs, do a mini tour in the region or go out with a band taking you on a national tour or something. It’s just a matter of spilling out without stopping. I’ve been doing a good 250 dates a year and it’s great, it’s still going and wonderful to be with those guys for so long. We haven’t killed each other yet. (laughs)
What are the last bands that you listened to?
L : Let’s see; the last band that I saw was Queens Of The Stone Age, a couple of weeks ago, we had time off and you would think that I won’t go to a rock show on a day off but they were playing so “I had to go!”. My guitarist and I are very into that strange record by Ginger Wildheart with Victoria Liedtke, the project is called Hey! Hello! And it’s very weird, it’s like hard rock meets Broadway, really weird. If my former self of two years ago, said “you’re going to listen to this throw your ears” “oh noo”, (laughs) but it’s actually very good, great songs and I’m keeping back to this saying myself “why am I still listen to this?”. (laughs) And of course there’s Judas Priest, I work out with Judas Priest every day, there’s that too. (laughs)
What are your next projects for 2014?
L : Well, we began writing for the next record, making demos and probably when we come back here in April, you’ll probably see one or two new songs, just saying. (laughs)
Will we see you at Hellfest next summer?
L : You know what; I was wondering that for myself, maybe. We’ve been definitely taking about it and if we can kind of squeeze that in, I’m not quite sure what is going on, because I know that Australia, has been calling as well and we might go to South Africa. If all kind of works out, it’ll lovely because that’s something we talked about last time; it’s definitely on my ToDo list. (laughs)
Any message to your French fans?
L : A huge thank you! We always wanted to come to France, and we had way too much fun yesterday (Lzzy talked about their day off in Paris) but I don’t know, every time we come here you guys always welcomed us with open arms, you’re not push over fans, it’s a tremendous honor to get the play here in France, for you guys. I know that you’re crazy rock fans and you don’t have to like us, no one is forcing you (laughs), it’s a wonderful feeling to be here, a dream of ours since we’re kid. Thank you for having us!
Finally, we are “RockUrLife”, so as a conclusion, what rocks your life?
L : Besides, going on stage and doing what I love every single day. What rocks my world is that I’m able to do it with people that I love. I mean, just from our experience, we literally got lost in Paris yesterday together and had the absolute best time. You kind of have to stop and appreciate that because I could do this with people I hate, I might not being doing this. I’m very lucky to be here and do what I love.
Photo credit : Fanny Schneider
Website : halestormrocks.com
