Alison Sudol

Sudol was born in Seattle, Washington, to dramatic arts teacher Sondra (Fraser) West-Moore and acting coach John Sudol. She and both parents moved to Los Angeles after their divorce, when she was five. She grew up listening to a wide range of music, including Aretha Franklin, and Ella Fitzgerald and other swing artists. She cites Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash and Simon and Garfunkel as some of her biggest musical influences.

She graduated from high school at 16. She considered herself "nerdy and quiet", and did not "drink or smoke or do anything like that". She told an interviewer, "I was so nervous about going into college like that and super young. I figured I would take two years and try to find out what I was doing with music. And when I was 18, I was just so deep into it that I didn't want to stop."

Sudol had a passion for literature, immersing herself in the works of C. S. Lewis, E. B. White, Lewis Carroll, Anthony Trollope and Charles Dickens. Her stage name, A Fine Frenzy, is taken from a verse in William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream: "The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven" (Act 5, Scene 1). After teaching herself to play the piano, she began writing songs.

A short demo she sent out received attention from EMI's Jason Flom, who signed her after visiting her house and "listening to her play".