"OK, let's see, I grew up on Long Island, New York and then moved upstate to Ulster County to go to college at SUNY New Paltz where I studied Public Relations and started my first band. I kind of fell in love with the area and I've lived in Ulster County ever since where I've played a lot of music in a lot of bands throughout the years and about 10 years ago I started playing with this band; not all the same members but The Ark-Tones formed around 2011/2012 I believe and since then we have released three albums of original material, have toured extensively around the country, a little bit in Europe and just put out our third studio album. My husband and I also play as a duo called The Gold Hope Duo and we released a live album a couple of years back."
Lara Hope is the undisputed front of the band which bears her name; with her retro look, sex appeal and stage presence, she is the bow that sits atop of the fun, rockabilly, rock 'n' roll package know as Lara Hope & The Ark-Tones.
Lara and crew's recent release, "Here To Tell The Tale" is a full length album which according to Lara was a work in progress which happened to finish up at the opportune time.
"Here To Tell The Tale" is 11 tracks; all original," she began with sounds of relief and enthusiasm in her voice. "I personally like an album but what I keep hearing is that singles are the future now; everybody likes singles. I don't know, I don't get it, I wanted an album but to each their own I suppose. There is kind of a running theme on the album that wasn't even necessarily something that happened intentionally; it just kind of unfolded that way. The album was written over the course of two or three years and I realized when more and more songs were written; the title track kind of encompasses the theme. It is ironic that we recorded this before the pandemic because I feel that the message is even more true in a post-pandemic world. Before the pandemic, I feel like so many people were living this virtual life and staying in more because there was so much access to Hulu, Netflix and computers and people weren't necessarily going out as much as they used to and appreciating in-person events. So, "Here To Tell The Tale" is about putting that aside, actually going out, having real-life experiences; they're not all going to be good but whether they are good or bad; just making your own memories and basically having your own tale to tell. Now, post-pandemic I feel like people may have a new appreciation of the arts that they may have not even realized after not having access to them for 16 months. I'm hoping that people are excited to get out and make their own tales and make up for lost time now."
In all bands, there is usually a leader; someone who casts the tie-breaking vote or deals with the business end of things but when it comes to songwriting or material choices those lines can become blurred. So, with Lara being the face of the band; who is the principal when it comes to writing or choosing material?
"My husband is the upright bass player, I play rhythm guitar and write songs, I really like to not tell anybody what to do; we are a team," she stated emphatically. "I won't lie, I do have the final say on our songs for the most part but I am really happy that I get everybody in on it; it's really important to me that everybody is happy. There have been cases where things vary from song to song but there are certainly some songs that I am confident in the arrangement and have already had it in my head the way I want it to be recorded and in that case I'll come in and say to Eddie, or sing a lead line for him but as many times as that happens, I'll come in and say, please; what do ya' got? What are your ideas? What do you think of the arrangement? Where do you think the solo should go? Let's work on the arrangement; so, yeah that varies from song to song."
Given the current climate of home studios and recording software being all the rage; where did they choose to record the record and why the wait on the release date?
"We went into a professional studio; we live in the city of Kingston which is right near Woodstock and we recorded in Catskill. We recorded with an engineer named Scott Petito and it was our first time working with him; he's pretty well known in the jazz world and he's a jazz bass player and he records a lot of bigger name jazz players like Jack DeJohnette but he's very eclectic and does all sorts of stuff. He's got a great studio called NRS and we spent 10 days in the studio with him at the beginning of 2020 and we thought that we were going to release the album later in 2020 in the summer but then because of everything that happened we decided to just hold off until the time felt right and that time is now."
"Now," is always a good time, no time like the present; right? Considering the unit has been sitting on this record for quite a while and the pandemic being the reason; the fact that it, "Felt right" can only come from the gut. So, what did they do while the record was percolating? Ah but being the fun-loving group they are; they found ways to keep busy.
"It came out on June 25 and our website is the easiest place to find it," Lara continued. "During the pandemic I did mostly three things; I mentioned already that my husband is my bass player and we closed on our first home on March 11, 2020. So, basically the day the world shutdown; we were planning on leaving that same evening for a six-week national tour. So, needless to say, we closed on our house and as we were packing the tour got cancelled. So, we had this new home and now basically a lot of time to unpack, settle in, paint, make it ours and just enjoy being home. We've been on the road so much this past decade that it was like, alright, we've got all of this time and we've got this space where we're happy to be so, let's enjoy it. We also spent those first few months writing and home-recording a duo EP called, "Songs In The Key Of Quarantine" which we released in July of 2020. We toured often before the pandemic, now we've also started doing a Monday night livestream since the pandemic hit and we've continued to do it every single Monday night since March of 2020 and it can be found on our Facebook page and YouTube pages Lara Hope & The Ark-Tones from 7-8 p.m. Eastern Time. Our connection with our fans is important to me and I really feel that the connection is stronger than it's ever been as a result of the livestream. I would have the livestream up and I'd have the computer open and read the chat and what people were saying and in between songs we would talk; we'd talk back and forth and the fans would talk amongst themselves. We actually formed this really tight-knit community of people that have tuned in every single Monday for the last 16 months; we even started calling them "The Monday Knights" and we made their own Facebook page called "The Monday Knights." We've made our own line of merchandise; one is Joan of Ark wearing the red-framed glasses called "The Tone of Ark" tee-shirt (laughs) and we've had this great community. There are people who pop in from all over the world and I'm sure there are others who only watch once or twice but there are a lot of people who are really diehards and these people have become friends with each other just because it's like this one thing that when everything in the world was so unknown; everybody would know, every Monday night at 7 p.m. grab your drink, sit down and let's all hang out together and that's how it felt. We had one of our Monday nights recently and because of them we made a strong connection in Michigan and during the livestream I said almost in jest, if anybody who is watching wants to come for our album release party; you can stay with us. I was kind of kidding but one of our Monday Knights who I only remember from once or twice while touring in Michigan reached out and said, "If I fly in from Michigan; can I stay with you?" "So, this woman that I don't really know just spent two nights at our house for our album release party on June 26; I joked that I finally gave birth to this album because it was finally out there."
Fun, danceable, maybe even slightly quirky but always extremely enjoyable, Lara Hope & The Ark-Tones are a great add to anyone's collection and to discover more about them; please visit www.larahopeandtheark-tones.com.
That's it for this week! Please continue to support live and original music and until next week....ROCK ON!
