Emily Easterly

Blending an autonomous approach with skilled guitar work and compositional techniques inspired by Cat Power as well as Liz Phair’s Exile in Guyville phase, Emily Easterly launched her recording career in 2001 through the independently issued Assembling Emily. Several hometown figures from Richmond, VA lent their efforts, among them Sparklehorse’s Alan Weatherhead and Cracker guitarist Johnny Hickman, and the album appeared while the songwriter completed her final high-school weeks. Shortly afterward she shifted several hours southward to enroll in music studies at the University of Miami, issuing Cole there in 2002 and receiving airplay on campus stations. Seasons Never Change appeared in 2005, its close, minimal arrangements shaped by the singer’s four-year residence in sunny Miami, after which Easterly relocated to Brooklyn to focus on her work without interruption. Drawing from Neil Young, the Beatles, and Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, Heart Comma Heart surfaced in late 2007. The next year she joined fellow songwriter JSeger for the split single Please, Please Say Goodnight/City Love Is Strange, pressed on 45-rpm vinyl that autumn.