LAUREL

An English singer, songwriter, and producer of sparkling, soulful alt-pop, Laurel Arnell-Cullen is better known as simply LAUREL. After beginning to upload demos in 2012, her first official single was 2014′s “Fire Breather.” Doubling down on her cinematic production style, LAUREL’s full-length debut, Dogviolet, arrived in 2018. She teamed up with Chrome Sparks to produce synthy songs including 2020′s “Best I Ever Had” and the next year’s “You’re the One.”
Raised near Southampton and based in London, Arnell-Cullen let it be known she wanted to be a singer at the age of five. Inspired by hearing Laura Marling at 13, she got a Spanish guitar and started learning how to play folk. She had already been writing songs, and booked local gigs with her own material as soon as a year later. Following high school, she studied business and music performance in Portsmouth for two years, during which time she started posting her songs online. In early 2013, she uploaded the home-recorded electro-pop demo “Blue Blood,” which was discovered and shared by various music blogs. She then relocated to London, signed with a management company, and released her official debut single, “Fire Breather,” on her own label, Next Time Records, in early 2014. The three-track EP To the Hills followed a few months later, and another EP, Holy Water, was issued in December 2014. The mixtape Allelopathy appeared in 2015, and LAUREL signed with Counter Records for the EP Park, released in late 2016.
Having developed a more sophisticated sound by then, one that incorporated electric guitar, live drums, keyboards, and production touches tending toward the cinematic, her debut LP, Dogviolet, arrived on Counter Records in August 2018. Following another label move, this time to Communion Group, she delivered the glossier PETROL BLOOM EP in late 2020. It included a song co-written and produced by Chrome Sparks (Jeremy Malvin). The following April, LAUREL self-released another Chrome Sparks-produced track, “You’re the One.” ~ Marcy Donelson