Elle King Biography

news-detailsElle King was born Tanner Elle Schneider on July 3, 1989 in Los Angeles, California to comedian Rob Schneider and former model London King. Her parents divorced shortly after she was born and she took her mother's last name after turning 18.

Her mother remarried when she was a child. She grew up in southern Ohio, between Wellston and Columbus, with her mom and stepfather Justin Tesa, who gave her a record by pop/punk band The Donnas when she was 9. Thanks to the present, King decided to be a musician. She then started listening to The Runaways and Blondie among others. Around the same time, she also started her acting career by making her debut alongside her father in "Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo".

She began playing guitar at the age of 13 and listening to everyone from Otis Redding, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Etta James, Aretha Franklin, Al Green and Hank Williams to Johnny Cash and AC/DC. She also learned the banjo after getting inspired by Hank Williams and Earl Scruggs.

In her teenage years, she lived in New York City before moving to some cities like Los Angeles, Philadephia and Copenhagen, Denmark. After graduating from Elisabeth Irwin High School, she moved to Philadelphia and entered University of the Arts to study painting and film. During these college years, she saw a live show where the band onstage used a banjo purely for accompaniment purposes. She then began to use the banjo as a compositional tool.

King was eventually signed to RCA and released her debut single under the label, "Good to Be a Man", on March 13, 2012. In June that year, four-song EP called "The Elle King EP" was released on RCA and Fat Possum Records. The project was recorded in New York and was produced by Andy Baldwin and Chris DeStefano, with King herself producing a track. Its lead track, "Playing for Keeps", was chosen as the theme song for VH1's "Mob Wives Chicago" series that premiered on June 10, 2012.

Since 2013, King has played at several festivals including SXSW and opened for many artists including James Bay and Ed Sheeran. In September 2014, she released "Ex's & Oh's" which was inspired by her real-life relationship dramas.

The song serves as the lead single off her debut album, "Love Stuff", which was released on February 17, 2015. The song achieved success in the rock genre, peaking at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Rock Songs chart, and later crossed over to adult pop radio. It also reached the top spot of the Alternative Songs chart in September 2015, becoming only the second song by a solo female artist to hit No. 1 since 1996 after Lorde achieved the feat in 2013 with "Royals".