Grand Rapids’ Lipstick Jodi poised to take indie-pop to next level in 2022
The band led by Karli Morehouse aims to ‘hit the ground running’ with shows and new music this year. Plus, Local Spins on WYCE debuts fresh Michigan-made tracks, from Steven Malcolm to The Good Old Days.
Hitting the Ground Running in 2022: Karli Morehouse and Lipstick Jodi. (Photo/Anna Sink)
If there’s anything Karli Morehouse learned during this long, arduous pandemic with limited live shows, it’s that performing serves as “a big emotional outlet” for the multi-instrumentalist and her band, Lipstick Jodi.
And for the Grand Rapids indie-pop trio to take the next step, she also realized she’d have to step back from a full-time day job and devote more time to booking, writing and performing.
“I said, ‘If I’m going to actually take this and make this a career, I need to give myself the space to do it,’ ” Morehouse recalled.
“I’ve done lot of writing over the past couple of years. So I’ve got a folder of like 25 or 30 songs that aren’t done that we’re going to sift through and see what kind of release we’re going to make with it.”
Dozens of Songs in the Works: Lipstick Jodi plans upcoming single releases. (Photo/Anna Sink)
The band which released the full-length album, “More Like Me,” last summer also has ramped up show bookings for 2022, starting with a Friday (Feb. 18) gig at Benton Harbor’s The Livery to shows at venues across the state through early April and an inaugural appearance at the Beaver Island Music Festival in mid-July.
“We love to play live and reach out to people who might not have heard us before so I’ve really just been going hard on booking this year,” Morehouse said of the synth-driven band that also features bassist/synth player Andy Fettig and drummer Connor Middlebrook.
“I was in a pretty low place during the shutdown because I lost one of my biggest emotional outlets, and I decided to make it a goal for 2022 to focus more on my music career than I’ve gotten to in the past.”
