Anna Hillburg

Anna Hillburg is a Bay Area singer, songwriter, trumpet, guitar, drum, and bass player.  She has contributed to acts such as Shannon and The Clams, The Dodos, The Moore Brothers, Will Sprott, Dream Date, Greg Ashley, Shannon Shaw and her All Star Buddy Band, and more. She spent her teenage years playing with the All American Band at Knott’s Berry Farm in Buena Park, California. Hillburg graduated from the highly selective Los Angeles County High School for the Arts where she was awarded the Lew and Edie Wasserman Award as the school’s top instrumentalist. After graduating she came to the Bay Area to study music at UC Berkeley, where she was a member of the University’s symphony. She spent her 20’s and early 30’s touring with several different bands in the US and Europe before becoming a music teacher to students of all ages. After her 2013 self titled album, Hillburg went on to release “Really Real” in 2018, gaining even more accreditation and praise a songwriter on her own. She has once again joined Bay Area members of Extra Classic, The Dodos, Yea-Ming and the Rumours, and Chime School to release her third solo album, ironically entitled “Tired Girls.”

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“Tired Girls” was recorded with Jason Quever, long time producer and musician with his group The Papercuts. The pairing comes across perfectly creating dreamy soundscapes throughout each track. Their individual musical accolades make what can only be described as a beautifully enchanting record.  Quever has previously recorded albums for Sugar Candy Mountain, Cass McCombs, Skygreen Leopards, Vetiver, Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, and more. Speakeasy Studios, a female owned and operated label and studio based in the basement of a Mission house, run by Alicia Vanden Heuvel (Aisler’s Set), will release the album this fall. 

Hillburg’s title track “Tired Girls” explores “the way young girls are raised to consider falling in love as a main life priority and what a woman’s life is like if she doesn’t fit into that mold.” The album’s first single “Girl Girl Girl” delicately points out generational differences between women and their female family members, and “living the lives they did not have the opportunity to live.” The entire record has a real “Ladies, trust your gut” feeling, unsurprisingly, as Hillburg tends to write songs about “the reality of womanhood and feminism but ya know, why not make that ‘dancey’?” 

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She incorporates elements of classical music while creating a thoughtful masterpiece of a pop record. It has an extremely rich feel, featuring intricate piano solos and soaring trumpet sections. Her rich musical background shines brightly throughout the album and tells the story of aspects of her life (musically and otherwise) up to now. There also garage rock elements and nods to great singer songwriters of the past, poppy hooks, and trumpet solos that can only be described as classy and elegant. Yet again she still manages to write catchy hits that keep coming. Try to find a dud on the album because frankly there really isn’t one. Hillburg’s third record marks her arrival. Each track shows not only her talent but her progression as a songwriter, performer, and composer and absolutely should not be missed.

Listen to "Tired Girls" on your favorite streaming service

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