Ida Maria to release Stella

• 15th Feb 2008

Ida Maria is a 23 year old Norwegian singer-songwriter-guitarist who combines the songwriting suss of early Strokes and the fearlessness of Iggy Pop with a voice that has been compared to Janis Joplin yet also echoes the other-worldly strangeness of Björk.

Following on from two limited edition singles on her own label, Nesna Records – ‘Oh My God’ and ‘Drive Away My Heart’, both favourites of Radio1/6Music DJ Steve Lamacq – ‘Stella’ is the first Waterfall/RCA single from Ida Maria and tells the story of God giving the world away to a 43-year-old prostitute from Manhattan in return for a night with her. The new single will be released on March 10th 2008. Ida Maria recently performed ‘Stella’ and other tracks on Later With Jools Holland, you can see them here:

Oh My God: link
Queen Of The World: link

Now living in Stockholm, Sweden, Ida (pronounced Eee-da) Maria grew up in Nesna, a tiny university town in the north of Norway with a population of 1,776, one gas station, one pub, one closed-down shoe factory and lots of mountains. It's near the Arctic Circle, which means that it's in perpetual darkness for half of the year.

An utterly absorbing, totally unselfconscious front woman (“A fizzing yelping ball of Nordic excitement”, Dazed & Confused) Ida Maria gives everything when she plays live, where she is joined by her band – Stefan Törnby on lead guitar, Johannes Lindberg on bass, and Olle Lundin on drums. Already filling out dirty dives from Camden to Shoreditch, make sure you catch her at one of her live shows in February:

Fri 15th – Club 229, 229 Great Portland St W1 (supporting The Raveonettes)
Tues 26th – Astoria W1 (NME Awards Shows, supporting Young Knives)

The debut album from Ida Maria will be released in the summer. For more info see her MySpace here: link