You might know her as the bottom end and pulse of the Lehighton-based band Another Day Dawns, but Livi Dillon is also a singer/songwriter in her own right.

The Technicolor-tressed teen recently challenged herself to step beyond the hard-driving, edgy music she performs regularly as an up-and-coming rocker to create “Growing Pains,” an EP featuring five original tunes she wrote, recorded and produced on her own.

“This EP is on the pop end,” said the 19-year-old Allentown musician. “It’s still alternative, but more mainstream and pop. I challenged myself to do something different. I really wanted to push myself.”

Music is Dillon’s life, and pushing herself beyond the norm means growth.

Dillon began studying piano when she was just 8 years old. By the time she started high school, she was learning to play the guitar.

Next, it was the bass guitar, which she declares is her main instrument and one of the reasons she moved halfway across the country to attend boarding school for her last two years of high school.

Dillon attended the Lehigh Valley Charter High School for the Arts for her freshman and sophomore years. Wanting a heavier concentration in songwriting and to improve her bass-playing skills, she transferred to Interlochen Center for the Arts in northern Michigan where she would get that opportunity.

“I was studying classical vocals, and I wanted to learn more about songwriting,” said Dillon. “Lehigh Valley didn’t have that but Interlochen did.”

She learned a lot more than songwriting.

“I had to learn to be independent really quickly. It was my responsibility to do well, to get to class. It was really good for me. I learned a lot about life and myself, and I grew up a lot there.”

In addition to a focus on songwriting, Dillon learned to take playing the bass more seriously, dedicating herself to practicing and learning all she could.

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Inspirational influences

Dillon said the first singer/songwriter/performer she looked up to was Taylor Swift, who was born and raised in Wyomissing and moved to Nashville at the age of 14 to pursue a career in country music.

“She was my first inspiration for songwriting, and she was my first-ever concert.”

Swift’s influence is present on “Growing Pains,” but Dillon said she also listened to pop artists Dua Lipa and Bea Miller to help her determine what she wanted to do and to get a feel for what artists in the pop world are doing right now.

Like Swift, Lipa and Miller were launched into the spotlight in their teens.

From classical to rock to pop

Dillon is a fan of all types of music, from classical to rock.

“I like taking bits and pieces from all sorts of genres.”

For her new EP, she sifted through songs she’s written over the years and some she’d penned specifically for the project, culling them down to five that fit what she was trying to achieve.

All of the songs on “Growing Pains” are personal, Dillon said.

“In general, I wanted them all to be about me growing up and going through life and that experience,” she said. “Hence the title ‘Growing Pains.’”

Each of the songs on the EP has meaning, but the tune “Before” is the one most special for Dillon.

“It’s about a relationship I had a while ago that was not very healthy and the repercussions and how that changed me,” she said. “It’s one of my favorites.”

While Dillon’s bass skills are celebrated in Another Day Dawns (Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale let Dillon know he was a fan of hers after judging the band’s performance in L.A. late last year), but we don’t typically get to hear her sing — until now.

Her voice is warm, honeyed, but with just enough of an edge to make it distinctive. Her words are sharp, lyrical. The notes melodic and captivating.

All hers, from start to finish

Dillon handled all aspects of the EP on her own. The music is electronic and, surprisingly, all of it is created on a computer.

“I don’t have a good enough setup to record live instruments,” she said, “but my next project is going to have live instrumentation — a lot more.”

She already owns six bass guitars; the most recent was purchased when Another Day Dawns was in Nashville earlier this year working with songwriting icon Desmond Child.

She also owns an acoustic, which she uses when she writes and plays for herself.

“I just bought an electric guitar for my next EP and will do more with my acoustic as well.”

If you’re worried Dillon has any plans to go solo, don’t be. She’s all in with Another Day Dawns.

The band has been busy, and this week released a new single, “Talking to Myself,” and also traveled to Manhattan to meet up with Child again for another collaboration.

Dillon insisted that “Growing Pains,” and any future solo projects, are just a way for her to continue to grow and stretch her musical chops.

“It was something I worked hard on, and I really pushed myself. I wanted it to be a challenge and a learning experience as I went along, which is what it turned out to be.”

“Growing Pains” is available on all major streaming services, such as Spotify, Sound Cloud and YouTube, where you can listen to it for free.

It’s also available for purchase from iTunes and Amazon music.

Dillon said she has no plans to distribute physical copies of the EP.