Valley Queen

Valley Queen, fronted by Arkansas native Natalie Carol, incorporates sounds drawn from Southern rock, Laurel Canyon, and Woodstock. After Carol settled in Los Angeles in the early 2010s, she encountered guitarist David Donaldson at a neighborhood jam session. Detecting echoes of the blues and Southern rock familiar from her youth, she initiated contact, and the pair began trading song ideas. Their first output, the double-sided single “Carnaval/Make You Feel,” surfaced in mid-2014. When Canvasback Music/Atlantic Records issued “In My Place” and “High Expectations” in 2016, the group comprised Carol, guitarist Shawn Morones, bassist Neil Wogensen, and drummer Gerry Doot. Both tracks were documented in an Audiotree Live session that appeared that September. Festival bookings had already included a headline slot at Echo Park Rising Festival along with support dates for Reggie Watts, Thao & the Get Down Stay Down, and Laura Marling. The band self-released its debut EP, Destroyer, in March 2017. Lewis Pesacov, whose credits include Nikki Lane and Best Coast, produced the set, and Donaldson added supplementary guitar; its six songs featured a cover of “Painter in Your Pocket” by Dan Bejar’s Destroyer.