Teragram Ballroom Los Angeles, CA
Contact: hannah@dollhousemusic.com
Web: instagram.com/ellise
Players: Ellise, vocals; Aaron Stechauner, drums; Evan Yoshino, guitar, bass, keys
Dark pop artist Ellise was opening for English singer-songwriter Bishop Briggs on a Thursday evening at the Teragram, and as it turns out, that was the perfect show for Ellise to showcase her substantial talents. Briggs’ vibe, delivery, and lyrical output is dependent on honesty and authenticity, strength in vulnerability, and a poetic eye on the dark side of life. That suits Ellise down to the ground.
Shortly after the conclusion of this Tell My Therapist I’m Fine tour, Ellise dropped her sophomore album Pretty Evil. As was the case with her 2021 debut Chaotic, Pretty Evil is a perfect jumble of feelings. An exercise in gothic poetry set to pop. A glorious dichotomy of romance and misery.
The setlist at the Teragram leaned heavily on the new album, with only the closing “911” pulled from the debut. A cover of Paramore’s “Decode” proved to be an inspired choice; a line like “the truth is hiding in your eyes, and it's hanging on your tongue, just boiling in my blood” is the sort of thing that makes complete sense when transported into Ellise’s creepy fairytale world.
It's worth remembering that, with “911,” the Iraqi-American artist amassed over 440 million global streams. Yep, you read that number correctly. With Pretty Evil, her people say that: “The record chronicles the trials and terrors she braved on a steadfast journey to reclaim her voice from industry titans while navigating deep personal conflicts. After the success of ‘911’, the Iraqi-American artist found herself losing creative control, caught in an industry machine that sought to dictate her sound, image, and narrative. The pressure to conform left her disillusioned, forcing her to take a step back and rediscover her artistic identity on her own terms.”
The results are spectacular, from “PRETTY” which opened both the show and the album, to the appropriate bite of “bite,” and the morbid beauty of “Dead Girl Dreaming.” At the Teragram, Ellise performed all of these with boundless enthusiasm, skipping onto the stage and strutting off like the “pop star waiting to happen” that she is.
There’s a magical, other worldliness about Ellise that recalls Melanie Martinez, an aura that transports the listener into her world while she regales them with tales of love, death, and everything in between. That she makes that same trick work in the live environment is massively impressive.
