Category NEWS

In an effort to be nominated for a nomination in the 57th GRAMMY Awards, NOLA based indie band The Shiz found itself with so many entries in its selected categories that it is the only band on the ballot who’s songs are so relevant that it will essentially end up defeating itself.

It also doesn’t help that they waited until one day before voters were asked to mail in their ballots to release their nomination nominations.

Here’s the official list:

GENERNAL FIELD
Record of the Year
The Shiz, Tumble

Best New Artist
The Shiz

FIELD 4 – ROCK
Best Rock Performance
The Rapture

Best Rock Song
Juggernaut, Elizabeth Hogan, songwriter (The Shiz)

Best Rock Album
Meet You in the Morning – The Shiz

AMERICAN ROOTS MUSIC
Best American Roots Performance
Driftin’ – The Shiz
New Jim Crow – The Shiz
Sleep B...

iO Tillett Wright’s Self Evident Truths project is a photographic document of 10,000 people in the USA that identify as ANYTHING OTHER than 100% straight. The project exists to spread awareness and understanding about a broader spectrum of human sexuality. We want to bring human stories from within the LGBTQ community to the world, so that we can begin to erase the boundaries between “Gay”, “Trans”, “Straight”, and “Other”.

Holding the belief that individual stories are our greatest tool in the struggle against discrimination, they’ve launched the “We Are You” campaign to collect LGBTQ spectrum stories from across the globe. The story of  The Shiz is featured on the official site at www.selfevidentproject.com, where incidentally, Lilli’s head shows up on the homepage….

Fo...

Album Description:
“Meet You in the Morning” co-produced by The Shiz and TJ Barends (Bare Sounds Productions at Sir-Reel Studios, Hammond, LA) is an ambitious 70 minute 14 song opus with a wide ebb and flow reminiscent of Tom Petty (one of the band’s most obvious heroes) from his “Wildflower” days. Singles include “Juggernaut,” “Driftin’, ” and “For the People” from Hogan, and “New Jim Crow” and “Sleep Baby, Slumber” from Lewis. But as with any album conceived project, the songs, diverse as they are, belong to each other, and are held together by the quartet’s “electric chamber music” approach and Barends’ roots based sensibilities, yielding a youthful, transparent authenticity to the relatively mature and nuanced collection...

New Orleans is the home of the Cutting Edge C.E. In New Orleans, music is more than business; it’s also cultural expression. Every artist that performs during the Cutting Edge C.E. becomes a part of New Orleans cultural history. The Shiz will be performing at the historic Little Gem Saloon (445 S Rampart) at 11pm. Beautiful listening room and a FREE show with some of NOLA’s finest in original music.

This month, The Shiz “I AM” EP is featured on the inaugural re-launch of indie-music.com music reviews, and they had a few nice words to say about us. Check it out!

AfterEllen.com’s “Next Big Thing” is a blog curated by Dana Piccoli that features unsigned LGBTQ talent. The Shiz is honored to be a selected feature, but we couldn’t have done it without the help of the Shiz fans that brought the blog to our attention. It really does take a village people! Thanks!

Liz and I are looking forward to playing Promised Land songs for the New Orleans Mission on Dec. 1st, but in the meantime, we’ve been getting a little internet press as it were. This week, John Vorhees featured “War No More” as song of the week on the Hootenanny Hootcast, and interviewed us at The Julep Room in Jackson, MS.

Check it!

FYI – Hootenanny is the musical arm of Owldolatrous Press, home of the brilliant chronicles of fearless Huff Post writer, Wayne Self.

We celebrated the successful Kickstarter campaign with a full house of family and friends at St. John’s Coffeehouse in Covington, LA on 5/19 and literally went in to record at Studio In the Country on 5/20. The 6 hour session yielded four tracks of which we are mighty proud, so we’ve made the EP available for FREE at noisetrade.com. If you’re unfamiliar with SITC, I assure you, you are not unfamiliar with the musicians who’ve recorded there. (ever heard of Stevie Wonder? or a little known soundtrack called “Dirty Dancing?”) We’d like to give a special thanks to our engineer Ben Mumphrey, who may very well be our new favorite person.

The Shiz just returned from an awesome tour with Backbone of Oberlin, OH. We celebrated their CD Release “Who We Want to Be” with four dates, including Toledo’s 2nd Annual Pride festival, and culminating in an awesome opening set for none other than BITCH at Outskirts Toledo. Many thanks to Bitch & Alligator, Lexi Staples, Gina Veronica, Hal Walker and Off the Wall Productions for making the tour a grand ole time.

Lilli and Liz will represent The Shiz in Atlanta for this year’s International Day Against Homophobia (IDAHO) celebration on Tuesday May 17th. Lilli will also give a full concert on Sunday May 15th at an event sponsored by ZAMI NOBLA. Check our calendar or www.lillilewis.com for more details.