1997-Lzzy HaleVocals, guitar, keyboard1997-
Arejay HaleDrums1997-
Joe HottingerGuitar2003-
Josh SmithBass2004-
Roger HaleBass1998-2004
Leo NessingerGuitar1999-2000
Halestorm (as in "hail storm") are a hard rock band formed by Elizabeth "Lzzy" Hale and her younger brother Arejay. Lzzy is the frontwoman, esteemed as a force of nature in the male-dominated world of metal. She and Arejay both started learning piano at age 5; Arejay progressed to the drums and Lzzy became adept at keyboards, guitar and bass.
Halestorm was born in the summer of 1997 when Lzzy and Arejay Hale entered a talent show at the Schuylkill County Fair in Pennsylvania - she was 13 and he was 11. Arejay suggested the name Halestorm, a play on their surname, and Lzzy agreed. "We played our show, had one song written called 'Love Is Power,' ended up losing to a tap-dancing cowgirl," Lzzy told Beacon Audio.
Lzzy and Arejay Hale's dad Roger was their first bass player - he played on their debut EP, Don't Mess With the Time Man, in 1999. A second disc, Breaking the Silence, was issued in 2001, and by the end of that year Halestorm's music was being played on Under the Radar, a show on the York, Pennsylvania radio station WQXA.
In their early days Halestorm played bars and had a tip jar that would help pay for gas. Lzzy told
Kerrang! that their ballad "
Rose In December" was especially profitable. "Whenever we played the song, people would come up and put money in the tip jar," she said, "we had a good $250 in there!"
In early articles about Halestorm, they were referred to as a family-based Christian rock band. Lzzy Hale told 1/2 Creeper magazine in an early interview: "We have a Christian background, and we are Christians. But I also write about other stuff going on with teenagers and just what's in my heart at the time."
By 2001 their local newspaper, The Patriot News was no longer referring to Halestorm as a Christian group.
In 2003, guitarist Joe Hottinger joined the band and bassist Josh Smith was recruited the following year. Hottinger and Lzzy Hale started dating soon after he joined the band and have managed to remain both bandmates and romantic partners.
The ring Lzzy wears dates back to the early years when she and Arejay bought four matching rings with plans to give the other two to their future bandmates. When Joe Hottinger and Josh Smith joined, they were thrilled to see the rings fit them.
Asked by Noisecreep what some of her non-musical hobbies are, Lzzy Hale replied: "I like to sew and I am into bending metal and making industrial jewelry. I sew a lot of my own clothes and customize stuff. It's not entirely rock 'n' roll but it keeps my hands busy in another creative outlet."
Lzzy likes to observe and soak up what's around her to get inspiration for her songwriting. She said: "I have a whole box full of napkins and receipts with lyrics and one liners written on them. Also, if I'm in the moment when something happens to me, like my heart is breaking, or an argument, or a tough situation that I have to step up and prove myself, I make sure I write down everything I'm feeling, EVERYTHING while I'm still in that moment, because that is when the truth comes pouring out... And you have no control over what your writing. Which is good."
Arejay Hale married Jessie Covets, the singer and guitarist of the all-female Los Angeles-based quintet True Violent in late 2014. A last-minute nuptials in Last Vegas, Slipknot frontman Corey Taylor's wife, Stephanie, acted as one of the witnesses.
Baking soda is one of Halestorm's go-to items when on the road. Lzzy Hale explained to
Billboard:
"It's great for when we're hanging out on a long bus ride and all you can smell is feet. And you can also use it as deodorant or toothpaste. But every now and then when we fly, TSA is like, 'What the hell is this?'"
Lzzy Hale and Joe Hottinger both love to go fishing. The Halestorm singer told Kerrang: "I do it a lot with Joe - his grandparents had a lake in the house, so we'll spend a lot of time there when we were young. Now we carry fishing rods in a bottom of the tour bus! I especially like fishing for bass and trout."
Speaking to Australia's Keen Eye 4 Concerts in February 2019, Lzzy Hale revealed that she's never taken a driver's test. "I've gotten my permit a couple of times that I've gone out driving, but legally, I'm just never behind the wheel," she said.
Lzzy Hale once broke up with a guy who fell asleep during a Tool concert (we didn't think that was possible, but
Hale says it happened). That was a deal-breaker for Lzzy, who's a huge Tool fan. She loves their 2001 album
Lateralus.
Lzzy Hale spells her name that way in honor of Ozzy Osbourne. "Every time I ever saw a live performance of Ozzy, it looked like he was having the absolute best time in his life," she explained to People.
It was a thrill for Lzzy and her bandmates when they got to play the Back To The Beginning concert in 2025, which reunited Black Sabbath and served as Ozzy's last goodbye - he died three weeks later. Halestorm were the only female-fronted act on the bill, which also included Metallica, Pantera and Slayer.
Lzzy Hale jokes that she's "married to three boys, and one of them is my brother," referring to her tight-knit relationship with her bandmates. "A band is like a marriage," she
told American Songwriter. "We have a lot of trust and there's a lot of brutal honesty."
Halestorm don't use backing tracks in concert for one simple reason. "We're so technologically illiterate that everything would go wrong every night,"
Arejay Hale told Chile's PowerOfMetal. "So the best approach for us is just to keep it as raw as possible, which is really good. It's the most effective, I think, for us, personally. But it does make it challenging, but also a fun challenge."
On their days off, Halestorm love hitting up karaoke bars, often bringing their crew along for the ride. While Lzzy Hale usually flies under the radar at first, it's only a matter of time before the crowd clocks her identity. Once recognized, fans inevitably start pressuring her to perform her own hits, a situation she described to Audacy as feeling "self-serving and really weird," though it's always a good time.
Lzzy tailors her song choices to the crowd. In a mellower, more country-leaning bar, she'll open with Bonnie Raitt, then escalate to Pat Benatar and finish with AC/DC.
The band are serious vinyl collectors: Lzzy and Joe said they have around 1,500 records at home. On US tours, they bring a record player that opens up to reveal a whiskey bar, and they habitually visit record shops on the road, leaving with 20–30 new records each tour.
