Liz Green

With her odd, quavering, and expressive voice and acoustic hillbilly approach, Manchester's Liz Green sounds more like she belongs to the early part of the 20th century than the 21st, which gives her slight output a refreshing uniqueness. Green grew up listening to her father's mixtapes, which exposed her to the Rolling Stones, Elton John, Chuck Berry, the Jackson 5, and other pop acts, but she found herself gravitating to distinctive earlier artists like Son House, Bessie Smith, and Edith Piaf, and she eventually picked up the guitar and began to write songs, albeit songs that sounded like they originated in the previous century. She started playing acoustic nights around Manchester and soon signed with local label Humble Soul Records, which released a 7" single pairing two Green originals, "Bad Medicine" and "French Singer" (both of which sound like they come from some distant era in the past), in 2007. That same year, she won the Emerging Talent competition at the prestigious Glastonbury Festival. Another single followed before her debut LP, O, Devotion!, arrived in 2011. Her blend of folk, jazz, and blues continued with her 2014 follow-up Haul Away! which was again released by London-based label PIAS.