ALLIÉ: From Utah to Nashville, you were just getting started. LA was next. Tell us about your songwriting wins there. Please also share the story of the second battle for your life you had to fight.
ELLE: After the Nashville depression, I actually ran away to Italy for over a year. I went to clear my head and take a break from music, but ended up singing all around there as well. After Italy, I moved to LA. I lived in my car for 6 months, I’d sleep in Walmart parking lots, or on the lifeguard towers in Huntington Beach. I got a job singing and playing piano at Ocean Prime in Beverly Hills during this time, so I saved up that money and was able to get a tiny room in a loft in DTLA. From there, I worked 17 different part time jobs over the span of 2 years, until one day I was able to find my place in the music industry and do it full time. I realized that I was really good at writing several different genres, so I was able to get cuts with R&B Artist IV Jay, Rock icon Tommy Lee, Hip Hop legend Wale, plus my stint in country music. Being so diverse really skyrocketed things for me, and it also helped me find my sound as an artist. I think I’m kind of a melting pot of all of those genres. Besides rock, maybe. Not yet, anyway. But one day, my life changed forever. It was my 24th birthday when I passed out in the middle of downtown LA, got taken to the hospital, and woke up with a tube in my chest to start dialysis the very next day. I was going to get myself an acai bowl for my birthday breakfast. I had no warning, no time to process, just BOOM, nothing was the same. I had felt really sick for a very long time, but I figured it was just because I was in remission from my previous kidney cancer. I always ignored it though, I pushed through. I never thought that I would ever have to go through something so difficult. After working my entire life toward something and finally catching a glimpse of success, my entire world fell apart. Even now I still don’t think I’ve had time to process it, so writing it out is making me tear up a little. It’s not something I think about often, I don’t have time to. It’s wake up, dialysis, eat, make music if I have the energy, sleep, wake up, dialysis, etc.. It’s a daily adjustment, but like I said, I push through. But the plus side is that this all created King Elle Noir.
After working my entire life toward something and finally catching a glimpse of success, my entire world fell apart. KING ELLE NOIR
RECORDING ARTIST, CANCER SURVIVOR & DIALYSIS PATIENT Photo Credit: Joe Lyman 56 AWARENOW / THE MENTAL EDITION
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