Even if you're not familiar with the name Lili K, there's a good chance you've heard her voice.
The soulful singer/songwriter, who drops her full-length debut "Ruby" in late April, first broke into the public conscious delivering the hooks on a handful of tracks by Chicago's Chance the Rapper - a collaboration that culminated in an onstage appearance during the MC's headlining turn at last summer's Lollapalooza.
For her solo debut, however, Lili opted to reconnect with her deep jazz and soul roots, turning out lush, orchestrated tracks born of busted hearts and the early flickers of romance.
"I got introduced to jazz in middle school, and it resonated with me," said the 23-year-old Edgewater resident. "I didn't realize it had been missing, but once it was there it was like, 'Where has this been my whole existence?'"
Obviously a lot of people in Chicago know your name from your work with Chance. Do you think those people will be surprised by this record?
I think some will, but I've always gotten comments from people that they hear the jazz and they hear the soul in my voice. Even when I was doing the hip-hop features, I was still trying to put as much of myself into them as possible.
A number of the songs are rooted in relationships.
Whether they're romantic or just friendships or family, people are constantly weaving in and out of your life. It's just a process that is so relatable because we all go through it. We've all had our hearts broken. We've all fallen stupidly in love. It's a universal feeling, and it comes to me easier than anything else because I feel it so strongly.
There are numerous references to holding on and to letting go. Which is more difficult for you?
Definitely letting go. I try to do everything in my power to make something work before giving up on a relationship or a person. I know those situations can become unhealthy, and I should have let them go long before I did. I'm learning about things like that, but it's hard. In my mind I think, "I can make this work. I can forgive enough [and] I can forget enough." And that's not always the case, unfortunately.
Do you have anything from childhood you haven't been able to let go of? Like a favorite stuffed animal?
There are definitely things I hold on to for too long, like a sweatshirt I never wear and still keep because it reminds me of something. I also have boxes of childhood stuff I never look through, but I'd never consider throwing them away.
Can you describe the scene at Minbal Studios where you did the recording?
It's got a really cool, retro atmosphere. You walk in and you feel like you're in the 1960s. It has a really warm sound, and it fit the project really well. I wanted this to be a very raw album. I didn't want it to be over-edited or over-processed. I wanted to leave in a lot of the mistakes and miscues that happen in recording, like people talking or a creaky piano bench or a guitar amp picks up a radio station. A lot of that stuff is so cool to me. That's what I love about older recordings: You can hear those mistakes and they're not polished away.
You address your mom in a couple songs, and I've gotten the sense she's still an important person in your life.
Yeah, my mom is my best friend. She raised me as a single parent, so our thing has always been, "It's me and you against the world." She was always open, and she let me make my own mistakes. She had an unconventional parenting style, but it worked because it made it easy for me to approach her with a problem rather than hiding it. Honesty makes every relationship - boyfriend/girlfriend, parent/child, or even friendship - so much easier.
So did you find you'd rebel by spending extra time in the library?
[Laughs] I didn't rebel that much. I was an art-school nerd, and all of our free time was spent in rehearsals and making fake movies. We had a horror movie series. The first was "Oops, I Peed My Pants," then there was "Oops, I Did It Again," and then there was "Oops, I Peed the Pool." This was all in middle school, and I was this murdering grandma. That was the type of stuff we did.
Andy Downing is a RedEye special contributor. @andydowning33
Lili K, 8 p.m. Sat. at Metro. $12-$15