{"id":38772,"date":"2019-12-04T09:55:16","date_gmt":"2019-12-03T22:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/maytherockbewithyou.com\/mtrbwy\/?p=38772"},"modified":"2019-12-05T07:24:36","modified_gmt":"2019-12-04T20:24:36","slug":"lzzy-hale-of-halestorm-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maytherockbewithyou.com\/mtrbwy\/2019\/12\/lzzy-hale-of-halestorm-interview\/","title":{"rendered":"Lzzy Hale of Halestorm"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\u201c\u2026it\u2019s been a beautiful thing, just this feeling of family and unity and not that we didn\u2019t feel that before but it\u2019s just been elevated this time around.\u201d<\/p>\n

From Release: Halestorm have toured extensively with a diverse variety of artists, including Eric Church, Avenged Sevenfold, Alice Cooper, Rob Zombie, ZZ Top and Evanescence – and were here last earlier in 2019 for Download Festival Australia – where they blew everyone off the stage. They’ve played around 2,500 dates around the world to date, and performed at festivals like Taste of Chaos and Rockstar Energy Drink Uproar Festival. The band scored a Grammy for Best Hard Rock\/Metal Performance in 2013, and Lzzy was named the “Dimebag Darrell Shredder of the Year” at the Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards in 2016. Both\u00a0Halestorm<\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0The Strange Case of…<\/i> were certified Gold, further evidencing Halestorm’s massively supportive fanbase.<\/p>\n

While still at home before leaving for tour Lzzy Hale gave us a call to talk about the upcoming Australian tour, their recent album cycle, new music, achievements, and much more\u2026<\/p>\n

Always great to talk to you, Lzzy, now it\u2019s been almost four years since we last chatted, so let\u2019s catch up, how have the last four years been for you?<\/strong>
\nOh it feels like I\u2019ve lived about fifteen different lifetimes, but all in a very good way. I think we had a lot of these moments in the past four years that have kind of been, you know those moments when you say if my thirteen year old self could see me now *laughs* like their mind would be blown. We\u2019re happy, and we\u2019re I don\u2019t know, we\u2019re discovering new things about each other and our band and we\u2019re getting better live, the shows have been amazing, it\u2019s crazy, it\u2019s awesome.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re headed back to Australia, thankfully you keep coming back, what can we expect on this upcoming run of shows?<\/strong>
\nOh my goodness, well we\u2019ve upped everything, we\u2019ve upped our production and our shows, our shows have become just monumentally better and I\u2019m not saying that in any egotistical way it\u2019s just that we\u2019ve been learning a lot of new things and just growing as musicians and actively trying to grow as a band and I\u2019m excited for everybody to see this show and to see it\u2019s going to be different from last time and I\u2019m happy about that.<\/p>\n

Seeing you guys live is a treat, how important is the live aspect of Halestorm?<\/strong>
\nVery important, I would say it\u2019s probably our first love as a band and makes up about 90% of what we do. Even when we go into the studio it\u2019s usually us trying to create that magic that we feel when we play live in front of people which is quite difficult and I feel like every time we go into the studio that\u2019s always the goal, and so yeah it\u2019s pretty much the pinnacle of what we do, we\u2019re primarily a live band. You know how it is so with rock shows and especially with us we don\u2019t use any click tracks, we don\u2019t use any tracks of any kind it\u2019s all us, it\u2019s just the four of us playing and listening to each other and also especially in this past four years we\u2019ve started to switch up the set every night and there\u2019s also these elements of improv that we\u2019ll do, so we\u2019ll decide kind of before a show which song it\u2019s going to be, but we\u2019ll play a song and then we won\u2019t end it perse *laughs* where it\u2019s supposed to end and we don\u2019t really know how we\u2019re going to get out of it so we have to listen to each other and get on the same page and ride that same wave with each other, and when you make these moments that you\u2019re creating on stage live and when all of a sudden when the audience catches that same wave with you it\u2019s just magical. So there\u2019s that risk factor every single night that it could go amazing or it could go horribly wrong but that\u2019s up to you *laughs* so I like that rush that you feel that it\u2019s almost a beautiful panic, it\u2019s not a horrible anxiety you have to sharpen yourself up to be prepared for that. It\u2019s exciting I can\u2019t wait for you guys to see it.<\/p>\n

Speaking of risk factors, how do you play in those shoes?<\/strong>
\n*laughs* Thank you, very carefully. I\u2019m not as silly as I was when I was younger, when I was in my early twenties I would get up on the half stack in my heels and jump off of them and I don\u2019t do that anymore but I\u2019ve become so comfortable in the heels and this is a riot because I play the wah peddle and obviously I have the peddle board and all of that and I noticed that when we\u2019re in rehearsal and I\u2019m in my boots, just my flat boots I can\u2019t work the wah in the same way that if I have my heels *laughs* I\u2019m a better player in the heels *laughs* than I am without them now. So I know that there\u2019s going to be a point in time where I have to retire them, but I keep saying to myself well Tina Turner wore heels well into her seventies right? Maybe I can hold on a little longer, but right now it\u2019s such a fun element because I started doing that when I was a teenager because it was one more thing that the guys in other bands couldn\u2019t do, it was one more thing, and its just become this fun element because I\u2019m pretty good at balancing on one foot and that usually makes the people in the front that are taking pictures freak out a little bit and so it\u2019s just a fun element to play with.<\/p>\n

Now, with \u2018Vicious\u2019 being out now for almost eighteen months, how has the cycle been since its release?<\/strong>
\nOh it\u2019s been beautiful, better than anything we could\u2019ve expected because what as happened monumentally is I think that we have elevated our core, for some reason on this album cycle people are paying a lot of attention to what I\u2019m saying in the songs and the meanings behind them and I don\u2019t think we\u2019ve ever had an album cycle where there has been more people with tattoos of my lyrics on them, like people will show up with full verses, not just the chorus or the main tagline *laughs* it\u2019s full verses like on their thigh and arms and stuff and it\u2019s amazing, a little nerve wracking because people are listening to what I\u2019m saying for better or worse, but it\u2019s been a beautiful thing, just this feeling of family and unity and not that we didn\u2019t feel that before but it\u2019s just been elevated this time around. It\u2019s a beautiful launching pad for them for whatever we\u2019re going to do next *laughs* so I\u2019m excited about that as well.<\/p>\n

From the new to the old, you\u2019re just about to release a 10th<\/sup> anniversary edition of your debut album, two part question, where the hell did 10 years go and what are some of your fondest memories of releasing your first album?<\/strong>
\nOh my goodness, to the first part of your question I can\u2019t even tell you how many time I\u2019ve said that, like it\u2019s already been ten years, what happened? Time is elastic, apparently it\u2019s not even a real thing, time goes by and kids get older and all of a sudden all the little kids that were coming to our shows with their parents are graduating high school and doing the whole thing in college now, it\u2019s crazy. Oh man, making the first album was a whirlwind, trying to make a very long story short we were signed to Atlantic in \u201905 and then we went right out on the road with a five song live EP hence when the live thing became hugely important *laughs* it always has been in Halestorm, and we went right on the road and so around \u201907 we settled down, we went to LA we were going to find a producer we were going to do some writing with people and just collect songs and make our first record. Now during that time our A&R guy got fired, there was a fire, a mudslide, two earthquakes, and we the one producer that was going to do our record couldn\u2019t do it, then we ended up having this guy who then became our A&R guy Pete Ganbarg got hired as a freelance, he was just a freelance A&R guy and he was put on our project to help us organise it and so we organised everything and then he got hired by Atlantic and then we were his first project. The whole process we were in LA, in the Oakwoods in this crappy apartment complex in Burbank, California for nineteen months from the time that we got there through to the mixing process of our entire first record. It was total craziness but I\u2019ve got to tell you it was such an exercise in togetherness for the four of us but through all the chaos and we would have all these moments where we thought well that was a good run we\u2019re going home I guess, we\u2019re seeing all these bands that were our peers that were getting dropped from their labels and every time something happened we though we\u2019re next, we\u2019re next on the chopping block and for some reason we survived through the entire making of that first record and the whole time we\u2019re fighting to do something special and to have an opportunity to be known as a band and put our first record on a major label, and so it was such a beautiful fight and we came out of it so much stronger as friends and as a band, so we\u2019re really proud to say now a decade later we ended up including in this bundle all these old demos that we literally recorded most of them in my parents basement before we went to California and then there\u2019s some that we did in California and so we included all of this in the special release to kind of show a different side of us, some of the demos we loved and some of the demos we hated but we included all of them in there anyway *laughs* so I\u2019m so happy to have kind of made it to the other side to this point to now where we\u2019re on our fourth major release on Atlantic now and about to do our fifth, like it\u2019s crazy, like I said if my thirteen year old self could see me now, it\u2019s really nuts *laughs*.<\/p>\n

About to do your fifth? Some new music coming?<\/strong>
\nYeah well I write all the time anyway but we\u2019ve begun collecting some of our demos together and gearing up, now we\u2019re going on this tour starting tomorrow we leave and we\u2019ll be out for about six weeks, so that\u2019s basically going to be this last run on this album cycle and we\u2019ll settle in to do another one and I\u2019m excited for that too it\u2019s only moving forward and that\u2019s a beautiful thing.<\/p>\n

When we first spoke back in 2012 you were just about to release The Strange Case of\u2026 hadn\u2019t been to Australia yet, now you\u2019ve been here 3 times with a 4th<\/sup> time coming, released another 2 albums, won a Grammy, played all over the world, and come so far. Do you ever get a chance to stop, step back and look at how far you\u2019ve come?<\/strong>
\nOh absolutely, we have a lot of these moments now as a band and friends we call them mile markers, the way we\u2019ve always rolled with Halestorm is that there is no real end to the highway that we\u2019re on, the glory is in the work and in doing it and all of these things that you listed on these beautiful mile markers we literally all stop and go hey guys isn\u2019t this so cool? *laughs* Like we just had one the other day, my little brother said \u201cHey do you remember the first time we were ever in somebody\u2019s tour bus?\u201d and like yeah it was like Sevendust invited us up for something and we\u2019re sitting there and we\u2019re all awkward and we don\u2019t know what to do in tour busses it\u2019s weird, it\u2019s somebody else\u2019s home\u00a0 it\u2019s all fancy, and he\u2019s like \u201cremember I asked hey do you think we\u2019ll ever have our own tour bus?\u201d and I\u2019m like \u201cI don\u2019t know man\u201d this is before we were ever signed, and now little bro says \u201cand now, a tour bus is just part of our normal life\u201d that\u2019s what we do when we\u2019re on tour we\u2019re on a tour bus and he\u2019s like isn\u2019t that cool, it\u2019s so cool. All these little moments, we collectively look at each other and yes this proves we were indeed crazy for doing this but we weren\u2019t stupid. For some reason we did the right thing by following our dreams and our hearts and as cheesy as that sounds we talk about it a lot, even in front of audiences, they\u2019re singing back at you, they\u2019re singing these silly songs that you can remember sitting on the floor in your living room trying to make a demo of this silly song you\u2019re trying to write and now people are singing it back to you and they have it tattooed on their arm, those little moments are just so mind blowing to me and still it makes me emotional about it because this is so much more than a career choice for me this is an extension of me and what I do, so you take those things personally in the best way. It\u2019s such an amazing thing.<\/p>\n

Lastly let\u2019s look ahead to the future, finish this sentence for me, in 2020 Halestorm wants to\u2026<\/strong>
\n*laughs* Halestorm wants to\u2026 turs out you never run out of dreams\u2026 I think Halestorm wants to own and airplane *laughs* that\u2019s what I want, I want Haleforce One, that may not happen in 2020 realistically but I\u2019m gonna throw it out there in the universe *laughs*. We\u2019ve done so much flying and oh man if we just had our own plane *laughs*. We just won\u2019t let the drummer fly it though *laughs*.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Catch Halestorm in Australia with special guests Villainy<\/strong><\/p>\n

Friday 6 December – Sydney<\/strong>
\nEnmore Theatre<\/p>\n

Saturday 7 December – Brisbane<\/strong>
\nThe Tivoli<\/p>\n

Monday 9 December – Adelaide<\/strong>
\nThe Gov<\/p>\n

Tuesday 10 December – Melbourne<\/strong>
\nThe Forum<\/p>\n

Tickets from www.mjrpresents.com<\/a> or www.halestormrocks.com<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Essential Information<\/u><\/strong><\/h2>\n

From:<\/strong>\u00a0Pennsylvania, USA<\/p>\n

Band members:\u00a0<\/strong>Lzzy Hale \u2013 Vocals, Guitar, Arejay Hale \u2013 Drums, Josh Smith \u2013 Bass, Vocals, Joe Hottinger \u2013 Guitar, Vocals<\/p>\n

Website:<\/strong>\u00a0http:\/\/www.halestormrocks.com<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Latest release:\u00a0<\/strong>Vicious (Out now \u2013 Warner Music Australia)<\/p>\n

Check out our review of the \u2018Vicious\u2019 HERE<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n