Keyboard wunderkind LIGHTS takes her synth-laced
symphonies on a cosmic voyage to the top of the pops

“I see people from the LIGHTS Army here.”

“You have an army?”

“We have a LIGHTS Army, yes.”

“How many countries have you invaded?”

“So far, just a couple, but we’re working on world domination.”

You’d be forgiven for assuming such mystifying banter was lifted verbatim from some ’70s sci-fi B-movie, but the two mystery speakers are actually electropop musician LIGHTS (born Valerie Poxleitner) and CBC Radio One host Brent Bambury. They are recording a late March episode of Bambury’s program GO! in a Toronto studio filled to capacity with die-hard LIGHTS fans. Captain LIGHTS would be more than amused by the sci-fi movie conjecture, though, given her penchant for all things involving space travel, superheroes and epic battles of good vs. evil.

You might understandably still be scratching your noggin. “But who is LIGHTS?” Well, ask any loyal viewer of MuchMusic’s afternoon gabfest MOD, any Twitter-literate teenage pop fan, any Virgin Radio listener from coast to coast, or any Torontonian for that matter, and they’ll tell you that LIGHTS is about to be a very big deal. A Juno Award-winning singer-songwriter managed by none other than CBC heavyweight and all around cool cat Jian Ghomeshi, the cute-as-a-button musician released her debut album The Listening last fall and is in the midst of a mostly sold-out tour through the US, UK and Canada with fellow synthpop artist Owl City. Her songs could best be described as radio-friendly electropop with heaping helpings of happy and spiritual undertones to boot. Needless to say, the heartbreak ballads and wide-eyed wonder jams have struck a chord with her target market of teenage gals and, unsurprisingly, more than a few smitten lads.

As I tag along with LIGHTS and her posse on a busy promo day – radio spots, TV interviews, photo shoots and her first in-studio CBC performance are all on the menu – it dawns on me that the 23-year-old from Timmins, Ontario (look out, Shania Twain), has all the makings of a pop star. Set to hit the road again just a few days later to wrap her North American tour, the vivacious young musician tells me that while success is golden, she’s never aimed for the bull’s-eye of fame.

“One of the most important things that Jian has taught me is this constant reminder that every decision you make should be based on the integrity of the music,” she explains at an east end studio as a make-up artist readies her trademark side-parted hair for the glare of a renowned fashion photog’s spotlight. “If there’s any other reason why you’re doing it, then you’re doing it for the wrong reasons. We’ve had to make some really difficult decisions together, things that would maybe have launched me into stardom, who knows? But that’s not what it’s about. It’s about the music, and if you work on that slowly then everything will come when you’re ready, naturally.”

That refreshing maturity and composure in the face of impending fame prevented the premature release of a teenybopper record and being forever bound to a sound that she would’ve soon grown out of. Being afforded the time to come into her own musically also gave LIGHTS the opportunity to build a massive online following, a key component to her success thus far.

“The beauty of social media and online networks is that [they’re] with you no matter where you go. Whether you’re at home on your desktop or at a hotel on your laptop or on the road with your phone, you can access these communities at all hours of the day. I will never deny that it’s a big reason why I’m here today, so I always stay in touch, especially with my core group of fans, the LIGHTS Army.”

Here we are, back to this LIGHTS Army business. It might sound like an intergalactic squadron of electropop freedom fighters, but after spending a day in their vicinity, I can safely say that inoffensive, enamoured and positivity-preaching kids prone to occasional emotional outbursts (most notably at the sight of their captain) would be a more appropriate description. Case in point: when I join LIGHTS for her afternoon interview at CHUM-FM, host Richie Favalaro shares with us his stupefaction at the sight of a cluster of girls carrying LIGHTS swag, lining up outside of MuchMusic for her late-afternoon appearance. At the crack of dawn, no less. No wonder she steers clear of the Starbucks across the street in the hours leading up to the taping.

“If I go to places like the Eaton Centre,” LIGHTS confides in the van driving us from one media call to the next, “I can’t really go there anymore unless I want to get swarmed by teenage girls.” And sure enough, after a very brief live chat at Much during which she discusses her Young Artists for Haiti affiliation – which includes a recorded rendition of K’naan’s “Wavin’ Flag” in collaboration with artists like Emily Haines, Kardinal Offishall and Nelly Furtado – the in-studio crowd gathers around her like honeybees on the prowl for nectar (or in this case, her John Hancock on a variety of LIGHTS merchandise). Slightly overwhelming, this LIGHTS Army?

“I love it,” she says enthusiastically. “I love it! Not in the sense that I think I’m being idolized, nor that if I’d need anything done, I could call them up at my beck and call. It’s rather the fact that I’ve influenced people enough to the point where they’re making friends as a result of it. There are people who have met over my music, met at my shows, and they’re now really good friends. And if anything, that’s what the point of all this should be.”