LIGHTS
Video
Biography
LIGHTS is a one woman, 22 year old, intergalactic electro pop, phenomenon, who already has a massive following in North America and Canada, having attracted over eight million visits to her Myspace alone, not counting the loyal community of fans grown out of her own website iamlights.com
Self initiated, self marketed, and self styled, LIGHTS may represent a new kind of "pop star" circumventing the usual conventions associated with pop music in the Lady Gaga age, certainly for performers reaching such a larger audience.
With her personal appearance based on video game characters and superheroes, you might think LIGHTS had been marketed, by some big label, towards nerdy teenage boys, but LIGHTS is eager to point out, "It's easy to misconstrue a young girl singer as a total puppet. I am the opposite of that. This is what I do. I am LIGHTS".
This is not to say that LIGHTS is all about an image or concept. On the strength of her eponymous EP, LIGHTS won the 2009 Juno (the Canadian equivalent of a Grammy Award) for New Artist of the Year, joining the ranks of Feist and Nelly Furtado. The quality of her wistful romantic song writing and skillful electronic composition, show LIGHTS to be quite the artist.
With her UK dates at Dot to Dot Festival Subculture took the opportunity to catch her set, and find out a bit more about the Canadian electro-pop superhero.
Reviews
...While some electro-pop singers stumble with pretentious arrangements and hazy self-indulgence, Lights is simple, cute and intelligent. She is the epitome of the D.I.Y. musician, piecing songs together in the backs of vans or playing with a keytar during live shows to add some adorable mobility.
Lights is the type of performer that could easily be dismissed as a magnet for the headband-wearing teen girl set, but that would be a mistake. While there's a certain pillowy-softness to every word that she sings, Lights is the consummate performer and is sharp as a tack.
The Listening showcases this through its 13 tracks, illustrating how simple, sweet-sounding tunes can go a long way in producing genuine emotions. Even with a healthy dose of vocal effects, Lights proves herself to be a surprisingly good singer, too, and this helps out a great deal in making the record something well worth noticing...
