Lindsay Ell first ventured to the UK on tour in 2013 as she opened up for The Band Perry. I was studying in London at the time and went along to the show as I was a massive fan of the sibling trio but I didn’t know anything about their support act at the time. For half an hour, she blew me away, I’d never seen anyone play guitar quite like Lindsay Ell and it was mesmerising to watch. Since then I have followed her career as she returned to the UK time and time again, working her way up to being a MainStage act at this years C2C.
“I’m so grateful for the opportunity to have really grown up with the festival. I’ve been coming to the UK now for 10 years. We’ve been over for a bunch of different kinds of tours, but to be able to work my way up the ranks of the C2C festival, it feels really neat. Feeling the brilliance of the side stages, and then I can feel the magic on the spotlight stage and now, tonight, I get to step onto main stage and feel that wonder,” she gushed to me after returning from sound check. Her performance was breathtaking as she showed her vulnerable side in her lyricism but entertained with her rock leaning guitar solos, “It’s so exciting to feel country music as a genre where it’s going and how much it’s growing and that fans in the UK are getting to learn that country music is such a wide definition of what falls into country music. It’s not just the traditional things that we would consider Country and Western music, but also things that lean more pop, more hip hop, more rock, all of it can be a part of the definition of country music. I’m so honoured to be here.”
It’s a big year for Ell professionally as she navigates releasing her latest music alone after recently departing her record label. “It’s been pretty crazy the past few months. I have recently left my record label a few months ago so I’m working on my next record but just figuring out the best ways on how to release that and when to release that. I’m also going on tour with Shania Twain in a couple months, which is insane. If you were to tell 10 year old little Lindsay that she was gonna go on tour with Shania Twain I would have been like, you are crazy! So I’m busy getting ready for that.”
Ell and Twain are both Canadian country Queens, proud graduates of a system that looks to support homegrown talent through every stage of their career. Canada does more for it’s artists than any other country, “Canada does a wonderful job at supporting their artists with things like grants. When you’re just starting out, and you don’t have the money to maybe fund a record or a tour, you can submit applications for these amazing grants that can really help catapult your dream and your vision,” Ell reflects. “33% of music on the radio has to be from Canadians, it’s a wonderful way to make sure that Canada is supporting their very own. I still feel the support from my home country of Canada. I think it is a wonderful opportunity for other countries to even maybe look at the system and be like, okay, what are ways that we can help support our local art scene and being like the incubator for young artists so that they can really get things going.”
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