Watch Olivia Ellen Lloyd’s Paste Session from the Jalopy Theatre in Brooklyn
Paste Studio “On The Road” made a stop at Jalopy Theatre and School of Music in Red Hook, Brooklyn, for a mini-set by New York City-based, West Virginia-raised songwriter Olivia Ellen Lloyd, featuring four songs from her forthcoming sophomore album Do It Myself, due out Fri, Mar 21. We recorded on a cold and blustery afternoon in January, but Lloyd and her band brought enough warmth to spare.
Full Session
From the first phrase of the title track, “Do It Myself,” we know we’re receiving a message born from the artist’s singular, self-reliant vision: “I’m gonna get up and go swimming at the Red Hook Community Pool, up and at ‘em every morning with no time to think of you.” Self-reliance doesn’t mean solitude, creating an album like Do It Myself takes a village. It sounds more like Lloyd is talking about deciding to live life the way she sees fit, and not placing much value in other people’s opinion on the subject: “And I will go see live loud music like i did when i was young / Close my eyes and I’ll start moving right in front of everyone.”
“Do It Myself”
Lloyd brought her dog Hilly to the party as well, and dogs make everything better. Hilly did take a dump on the floor the moment she walked in, but I’ll take an adorable dog with a minor dogshit incident over a no-dog and no-dogshit scenario all day. The second song “Billy Pilgrim,” references Kurt Vonnegut’s anti-war novel Slaughterhouse-Five, and is dedicated to Hilly’s adoptive father.
“Billy Pilgrim”
Lloyd put down the guitar during the semi-autobiographical third song “Live With It,” for a more vulnerable vocal performance, sung about perseverance, despite a lack of knowledge about how to keep going, and sometimes a lack of desire to keep going at all. Guitarist and producer Mike Robinson set the tone with a beautifully understated opening riff, while bassist Dave Speranza and drummer Connor Parks kept driving us reliably towards the promised land.
“Live With It”
The last song in this session is dedicated to “the greatest country band of all time,” Fountains of Wayne.
“Bound To Lose”
Big thanks to Olivia and her band, to audio engineer Irving Gadoury and his assistant Sophie Kyle Collins, to all-around MVP Emmarose Turoff for lighting and more, and to Eli Smith and his team at Jalopy for bringing this session to life.