Known as one-third of lo-fi noise-rock trio Palberta, Lily Konigsberg's solo releases have ranged from her early noise experiments of the mid-2010s to later, more-streamlined bittersweet indie pop. The latter was the focus of her 2020 EP It's Just Like All the Clouds, which doubled as her solo debut for Wharf Cat Records. She issued the song-focused compilation The Best of Lily Konigsberg Right Now before making her official full-length debut with Lily We Need to Talk Now in 2021.

A self-described lifelong musician and songwriter, Konigsberg was playing solo café shows in her native Park Slope, Brooklyn as a teen. As a student at Bard College in 2013, she teamed up with classmates Nina Ryser and Ani Ivry-Block to form Palberta. While her band were touring D.I.Y. venues behind the self-released My Pal Berta later that year, they attracted the attention of OSR Tapes, which issued My Pal Berta and Shitheads in the Ditch on cassette in 2014, as well as Feeding Tube Records, which released both on vinyl in addition to Special Worship, Palberta's split EP with (New England) Patriots.

Meanwhile, Konigsberg worked on solo material, releasing the improvisational seven-track I can't stop feeling so good in October 2014. A split album with Ulysses of Hellier Ulysses appeared on Datura Sound in late in 2015. That year, Datura also released Palberta's Live on the Spot tape (recorded at the Brooklyn venue Silent Barn), while the Palberta cassette Hot on the Beach appeared on JMC Aggregate (and subsequently vinyl by Feeding Tube). A split cassette with No One and the Somebodies titled Chips for Dinner was also released by Underdog Pop Records. Back on her own, Konigsberg put out a short set of keyboard pop experiments titled kawai that claps in mid-2016.

Palberta began to receive wider recognition when Wharf Cat Records released their ambitious full-length Bye Bye Berta in early 2017. They were featured as one of Rolling Stone's "10 New Artists You Need to Know" that month, and later in the year, Wharf Cat issued Chips for Dinner on vinyl. That August, Konigsberg delivered a split release with Andrea Schiavelli, Good Time Now, her first official EP. Another EP, 4 picture tear, followed in 2018, as did Palberta's Roach Goin' Down, another sprawling set of unpredictable art-punk. In the meantime, the band continued to play shows, opening for the reunited Bikini Kill in 2019.

In addition to her solo material and work with Palberta, Konigsberg played in the group Eyes of Love (with Schiavelli) and the duo Lily and Horn Horse (with Matt Norman) around this time. She returned with her first solo EP for Wharf Cat, the Paco Cathcart-produced It's Just Like All the Clouds, in 2020. It featured more-coherent pop structures and clean, full-band arrangements. Palberta re-emerged in January 2021 with their fifth full-length, Palberta5000. Four months later, Konigsberg offered up the Wharf Cat compilation The Best of Lily Konigsberg Right Now. Before the end of the year, the label followed up with her proper full-length solo debut, Lily We Need to Talk Now. A set of varied indie pop tunes all under three minutes each, it was produced by Nate Amos and featured contributions from Schiavelli, Ryser, Norman, and Cathcart. ~ Marcy Donelson & Paul Simpson, Rovi