Lia Ices On World Cafe

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Lia Ices. Jersey Walz/Courtesy of the artist hide caption

itoggle caption Jersey Walz/Courtesy of the artist

Lia Ices.

Jersey Walz/Courtesy of the artist

A lot of the music Lia Kessel records as Lia Ices centers on her powerful voice — and with good reason. It's equal parts declamatory and fragile, with echoes of Tori Amos and Cat Power. That being said, on her new album Ices, Kessel demonstrates her talents as an inventive and playful songwriter in arrangements that look around the globe for melodic and rhythmic ideas.

World Cafe's Michaela Majoun speaks with Kessel — and her brother Elliott — about the origins of her stage name in a Bob Dylan song, her theatrical training, and how Joseph Campbell and Pakistani pop from the '60s both influenced the new record.