“I have the musical taste of a 50-year-old man.” This is what Laura Azzarello, the 24-year-old singer and songwriter for the folk-rock/soul/indie duo Laura A and the Bad Grades, says about her musical influences. Perhaps her passion for bands like the Zombies and the Beatles, and songwriters like Tom Waits and Smokey Robinson is what sets her aside from most writers her age. The often shy singer from North Carolina does not hold back onstage. Laura’s bluesy and boisterous voice developed after years of singing and writing alongside her father, who was a touring drummer in the ‘60s and ‘70s. In 2002, Laura took her voice to Boston when she became a recipient of The World Scholarship at Berklee College of Music. There, Laura was introduced to jazz harmonies and learned how to apply them to her music, and this is what makes her songs sound unique.

Laura moved to Nashville immediately after graduating from Berklee and soon hooked up with guitarist Andy Ellis, a longtime editor for Guitar Player and Frets magazines, and another Berklee alum. “My infatuation with the baritone guitar lets me fill a twangy role that’s somewhere between bass, piano, and lead guitar,” he says.

Working in a small studio, the Bad Grades are exploring Laura’s voice and writing with the goal of developing a sound that’s fresh and unexpected, yet strangely familiar, like a half-remembered dream. Sometimes accompanied by other musicians, the duo is now actively performing in the Nashville area.