Music

LZZY HALE’S EVEREST HAS NO PEAK

American rock band

Halestorm sells out arenas

and has a Grammy, but their

vocalist says they still feel

they have something to prove.

 

Words by Emma Wilkes

 “There’s no point where we’ll ever say, ‘We’ve done it,” Lzzy Hale affirms. “The goal is always just to see what comes next.”

It’s partly why Halestorm christened their most recent album after the world’s tallest mountain. In reflecting on their near-three decades together, Lzzy and her bandmates – Josh Smith, her brother Arejay and her partner Joe Hottinger –  found themselves connecting the dots between succeeding as a band and climbing Everest. After all, both are odds-defying feats of endurance that not everyone survives. 

“It’s crazy to do this, truly,” she continues, speaking from her home in Tennessee that overlooks a lake. “There’s a lot of easier ways to form a career. This life is messy. There’s no guarantee of success. But the reason that we climb is just to see if we can do it.”

After all, Lzzy and her bandmates know that growth comes from venturing towards what is uncomfortable. Case in point: when they arrived at producer Dave Cobb’s studio, he threw down an immediate challenge – ditch every idea they’d brought and start again from zero.

At first, it was a nail-biting prospect, but the advantages soon showed themselves. “It didn’t allow us to overthink anything, and we really had to trust each other. There was so many first takes and second takes and things that I don’t think that we would have pulled off if we weren’t just kind of letting it come through us. There was no time to question it. We just had to chase whatever got us excited.” 

That daringness harks back to Halestorm’s beginnings when Lzzy and Arejay were just teenagers growing up on a Pennsylvania farm. It’s where their underdog mentality was born, coming from a blue-collar family – their dad working as a mechanic while their mom stayed at home – with no music industry connections and a million question marks raised around their ambitions. “I didn’t really fit in anywhere when I was a kid, being a young girl who loves rock and roll. The other girls in my school and my neighbors just weren’t having any of that. They’re like, ‘Why do you like this?’ When my brother and I started the band in ‘97 everybody thought we were nuts.” 

Nowadays, they’re arena conquerors, Grammy winners and modern icons, with Lzzy herself being widely looked upon as a beacon of positivity, empowerment and as a queer role model. Despite all of this, the urge to have something to prove has never evaporated. When they step on stage, that feeling is amplified. 

“We don’t use any tracks. There’s no miming. There’s no trickery. We plug in, we play, we hold each other’s hands, and we jump off the cliff together every night, and we hope we packed our parachutes,” she says. “That’s exciting, to try to make a moment with a live audience that may never happen again, be the host to the party and the sanctuary for anyone who has ever felt misunderstood or mistreated.”

When Lzzy looks out at the thousands of faces before her, she sees those who might have finally found a sense of belonging. They’ve taken Everest into their hearts despite the risks the band took, getting the lyrics tattooed, finding ownership in them. It reaffirmed to Lzzy that the love of their fans has always been unconditional.

“I get to look at all of these women and say, ‘Oh my gosh, they’re just like me. I wish I had known you in high school, you know?’ she says. “The inspiration comes full circle, and it’s such a beautiful thing.”