Funny that I’d just been reminiscing about Liz Phair’s best album and then put on Talk a Blue Streak by little bit. I’d be shocked if Hannah Liuzzo isn’t a huge fan of Phair’s first two albums. This EP sounds a little like what could have been for Phair. But for Liuzzo’s gentler voice, “On the Mend” could almost be a b-side for one of the singles from Whip-Smart:
It’s perfect mid-90s indie-rock, right down to the amazing flute solo. This would have fit right in the Matador Records lineup of 1994. Liuzzo apparently moved from Boston to Los Angeles in a quest for personal reinvention, and that comes through in the music. “Long Drive” has a fantastic sunny sound to it, with clear guitar and lush harmonies:
Hannah was a member of a band called Lilith that had a fair amount of success, but little bit is pretty much a solo project — on the Bandcamp notes for this EP, it credits Liuzzo as playing everything but the drums (that includes the flute in “On the Mend”).
Another thing that Liz Phair did so well on those first two albums is take the familiar and bend it into something that’s kind of a mirror image of itself. Exile in Guyville is famously an inversion of a Rolling Stones record, and Whip-Smart starts with “Chopsticks“. little bit does it here too, using a song from Beauty and the Beast as a starting point for a breakup song:
I’m not sure how much of this similarity is real, or some kind of Baader-Meinhof illusion, but this EP showed up on my playlist at exactly the right time to scratch a nostalgic itch. Whatever the case, if little bit has more of this vintage indie-rock sound to come, I’m here for it.
Have something to share?
Something you wrote or made? Something you just think more people should see?