November 1, 2023: Today, Lizzie No (she/they) released “The Heartbreak Store,” the second single to be pulled from their forthcoming album Halfsies that will be released on January 19 via Thirty Tigers / Miss Freedomland. The song is accompanied by an official video directed by Annalise Lockhart and shot at The Jalopy Theatre in Brooklyn, NY, where Lizzie No invites you into their inclusive honky tonk where friends and strangers can shed the pain of heartbreak and dance and cry together.
Today, Lizzie No also announced a national tour in support of Halfsies that kicks off on album release day, January 19, at Brooklyn’s Union Pool and will make stops in Boston, Chicago, Seattle, Los Angeles, Philadelphia and many more. Find a full list of tour dates below or visit their website.
Watch the official video “The Heartbreak Store” via YouTube.
About the new single, Lizzie No explains: “If you walk around New York City with a broken heart and your eyes open, you might be lucky enough to see a storefront window opening with a cashier peeking out. You may offer this person the relic of your lost love (a t-shirt that still smells like him, the keys to an apartment where you once lived, a guitar they gave you which you never learned to play, a book with a particular postcard tucked in between the pages), and they may invite you to step behind the door and down the long staircase to the basement. In this velvet-walled speakeasy are a dozen other rejects who have set their burdens down. This is country music, so dancing and crying are both encouraged. Heaven is a honky tonk full of queer people who have stopped being ashamed.”
About the video, Lizzie adds: “When I wrote ‘The Heartbreak Store,’ I envisioned a mystical place where I could bring all the detritus of lost loves. It was a place that lived in my imagination only. Then, in 2022, I went on the round-up tour with lavender country and a crew of queer country artists (including Paisley Fields, who dazzles in the music video). every night of that tour was my vision in real life. The way Patrick Haggerty fostered queer community was remarkable. At the end of the show, when we played the ahead-of-its-time coming out hymn, ‘Lavender Country,’ Patrick would go out into the crowd and get the shy folks to dance. There are tears in my eyes thinking about it now. He taught me that making music isn’t about promoting yourself. It’s about bringing people together and saying ‘you belong here. I see you here. I embrace you here.’ When he said ‘y’all come out, my dears,’ he meant it. Whatever I do as an artist and activist, I am steering towards that same north star of transparency, courage, and compassion. We absolutely had to shoot this video at the Jalopy Theatre in Brooklyn. It is a haven for all kinds of old-time musicians and alt-country freaks and two-steppers and folkies.”
“The Heartbreak Store” follows Lizzie No’s recent track release “Lagunita” feat. Brian Dunne, which was highlighted on Rolling Stone’s Songs You Need To Know. Reflecting the frantic energy of a character and a country gone off the rails, the debut single sets the scene for an album that finds “Miss Freedomland” (a character representing both No and the audience) on an apocalyptic journey from exile to liberation in an increasingly violent and nightmarish American landscape. No’s beautifully intricate songwriting shines across these twelve songs, with the personal and political folding into each other as naturally as their patchwork of influences.
Lizzie No is at the forefront of a new vanguard of genre-defying artists able to move frequently and seamlessly between overlapping musical circles – she has toured with Iron & Wine, Son Little and Adia Victoria, and collaborated with Pom Pom Squad and Domino Kirke. Halfsies follows a dizzying five year span that saw the release of two celebrated, eclectic albums, Hard Won and Vanity, in addition to No’s work as co-host of the Basic Folk podcast, where she has interviewed artists from Ben Harper to Valerie June to Kishi Bashi.
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