Elizabeth Elkins is a singer-songwriter you call when you need to rock-and note, if you will, that there are two parts of this sentence that seem to contradict one another-”singer/songwriter” and “rock”.
That’s merely one of many fascinating facets of the Atlanta-based Elkins, who, in addition to being front-woman for Resonator favorites ;The Swear (whose criminally underrated album Hotel Rooms And Heart Attacks is a mastery of pop-melody and hard-rock muscle), is launching a new solo project,Ghost of Summer Suns
Whereas the music of The Swear tends to traverse graveyards at midnight and blacktop at dusk, the sound of Ghost of Summer Suns is confessional, winter-kissed soundscapes that still, well, still rock.
In typical RES fashion, the following Q&A with Elizabeth encompasses everything in our long, strange and ultimately awesome history with her and her various musical projects, culminating this coming Saturday when Ghost of Summer Suns plays our RESrawk party in NYC. Take a read and get familiar now, so that you’re not left behind Saturday night (or…ever). Cheer as she takes no prisoners, calls out rock crictics and indie kids alike, and cue this up for an audio taster:
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RES: I know that in your holy chapel of musicians, Moz is number one and…I think…Tori Amos is number two. If you were to pick five records that have had a massive impact on you, musically, song-writing wise, and otherwise, that WERE NOT by either of them, what would they be?
Elizabeth Elkins: Five most influencial records (minus Moz/Smiths and Tori):
PS - this is tough because when I think of most influential, I generally think of literature (T.S. Eliot, Joseph Conrad, Gustav Flaubert, Edward Albee, Eugene O’Neill, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Erich Marie Remarque…) influencing me as a writer just as much as music….but here goes:
