Caroline Elizabeth Polachek (born June 20, 1985 Manhattan, New York) is an American musician, singer-songwriter and record producer. Raised in Connecticut, Her family relocated to Tokyo, Japan when she was six years old, and later settled in Greenwich, Connecticut, where Polachek started singing choir in the third grade. She was a synth player from a young age as her father gifted her a Yamaha keyboard to dissuade her from being disruptive on the piano. Polachek co-founded the indie pop band Chairlift while studying at the University of Colorado, The duo emerged from the late-2000s Brooklyn music scene with the sleeper hit "Bruises". During her time in the band, she worked on the solo projects Ramona Lisa and CEP, before embarking on a career under her own name after Chairlift's disbandment in 2017. Her debut studio album, Pang (2019), blended art pop styles with electronic production and was released to critical acclaim. Polachek has worked extensively with other artists, collaborating with Blood Orange, SBTRKT and Charli XCX, and penning material for Beyonce ("No Angel"). Travis Scott, and Superfruit.
Polachek recounts her early exposure to traditional Japanese songs and anime themes s being influential on her musical education: "[Japanese singing] [is] a lot of minor and pentatonic [tonality], with really angular melodies that I think really stuck in my subconscious." She rode horses growing up: "I learned a lot about rhythm and about voice from that. Like, you don’t always have full control of your instrument. You have to trust it, you have to give it space, you have to know when to push, give it air." As a "hyperactive kid", her divorced parents would play Enya at each other's houses in order to calm her senses.