In 2018, on the heels of her full length album You’re a Shooting Star, I’m a Sinking Ship<\/a><\/em>, singer songwriter Whitney Ballen<\/a> and her band were gaining momentum in Seattle. Thanks the ongoing pandemic, Ballen’s name has been noticeably absent from venue calendars, but she’s been writing new material\u2014and on Saturday, January 14th, Ballen plays her first show back with her full band at Sunset Tavern where she will showcase new songs, and old favorites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ballen, who was raised in Redmond, found her footing as a singer songwriter by becoming a regular at the Old Fire House Teen Center, an all-ages arts hub known as “The Firehouse” that has played a key role in exposing teens to music on Seattle’s Eastside for more than 25 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Modest Mouse. Death Cab for Cutie. Gossip. Botch. Death Cab for Cutie and all of their side projects. Rocky Votalato.\u00a0All of these groups played The Firehouse early on,” Ballen rattles off, adding that her first-ever live show was seeing a local band called Arabian Nightmare at The Firehouse when she was around 13.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Around the same time, Ballen developed an interest in guitar and writing songs on her own, and by the 9th grade, staff at The Firehoue invited her to play her first ever show there. From there, Ballen’s interest in songwriting and performing snowballed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once in college at University of Washington, Ballen put together her first band. That band has evolved and grew in popularity over the years, as fans leaned into Ballen’s honest songwriting and unique, childlike voice, which has been compared to Joanna Newsom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I would just say that most of the songs that I’m writing…there’s not really any filter to them. It’s not any kind of act or anything. It’s real,” Ballen says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In March 2020, Ballen and her band were just returning from a big tour in support of You’re a Shooting Star, I’m a Sinking Ship.<\/em> “We played our last show in Dallas and flew home and the next day it feels like things started shutting down. So, we were on this high of playing the biggest shows we had ever played. We were so excited for what was next and it was like, ‘oh, nevermind.’ It was kind of a bummer,” Ballen recalls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n