Pandemic Music | Part 1

See original article here on Iowa Informer. http://iowainformer.com/society-culture/2021/02/pandemic-music-part-1/

If there is a silver lining to the pandemic (and I’m not saying there is, because things remain terrifying), it would have to be seeing Iowa musicians and artists getting busy with their art. The first few months of this global catastrophe were like a gut punch, but after getting used to what has become known as “the new normal,” I saw SO MANY Iowa artists sharing their work, whether it be paintings, drawings, comic books, songs they’d written, albums they’d recorded, or something else. It’s been truly inspirational.

I thought it would be fun to share some of this work in one spot, so that anyone could enjoy it and see that there are glimmers of hope and creativity going on all around you (plus it may help while away the time as you work or dance at home!).

I’m going to focus on the music side of things, because I know more about music than I do art, basically. There’s been so much great work released, and this will just be part one — if you’ve released some music, please send me links at bryon.dudley@gmail.com, and you can be part of a future Informer article!

Des Moines artist Lizzy Poppyseed has remained active during the pandemic as well, releasing a full-length album in December that she wrote and recorded herself. Her previous work has fallen more in line with singer/songwriter or straight-up rock genres, but “Canary Yellow Lemon Popp” is, as the title suggests, pure pop enjoyment. Also of note are her YouTube and Bandcamp channels-. Starting in January of this year, Lizzy has been choosing a song from the Billboard top 100 at random (both the year and the chart number are randomized) and covering it, seemingly on the fly! So far, she’s covered everything from The Backstreet Boys to Benny Goodman, so it’s been fun just to see where this exercise takes her and her talent.