In a new interview with Playboy, Halestorm singer Lzzy Hale explained how she got over her shyness on stage. When asked what changed about her shyness, the singer admitted that she plays a little game with fans in secret to get over the fear — and she usually wins too.
“I forget who suggested this to me but they had suggested that because I was terrified, I couldn’t look anybody in the eye,” she started explaining. “I’d play guitar and I’d be afraid to play with my left hand, I might mess up, so I would grip the mic and then say [to myself] ‘don’t look at anybody’ and just sing the songs. I don’t know why that particular advice really clicked, but it was almost a little win every single time. You could stare someone down … they would look away and I’d say ‘okay I win, next one.’”
The singer also recalled the conversation with her bass player when he first joined the band. “Apparently I did that to our bass player Josh. Before he joined the band, he would come to see shows and he said, ‘this the first thing you did to me when I came to see you for the first time.’”
“I think it’s still inherently part of who I am, but now instead of it being an intimidation thing, it’s more of a connection,” Hale added. “Once you lock eyes with someone and you start kind of doing what they’re doing, it’s wild — they know you’re looking at them and then it makes their world, which then makes me happy so I do it selfishly because I want to have a good day.”
Hale grew up with anxiety and impostor syndrome. She talked about how it affected both her music career and her personal life in many different interviews. Apparently, there are a few ways the rocker maintains her mental health.
“Anxiety, it’s very swift with me. When I have an anxiety attack, it usually starts with some type of spiraling out,” Hale said in an interview before explaining how she keeps herself out of it. “I have a couple of tools in my tool belt that I use to kind of get myself out of that spiral. A lot of times I will look for a voice of reason, and they will tell me, ‘This fear that you have right here doesn’t exist.’”
She added: “I’ll grab any number of notepads that I have and I’ll literally just vent it out to paper. And to be able to see it in a physical form really helps put those irrational fears into perspective. And then a lot of those irrational fears end up in a song somewhere.”
Halestorm and Evanescence are hitting the road together for a Canadian tour this Fall 2024. The tour kicks off on October 15th in Vancouver and wraps up on October 29th in London, Ontario. They will stop in Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Ottawa, and other cities along the way. The Warning will be joining the two bands as a support act.