Larkin Poe Are In Full ‘Bloom’

The success of Larkin Poe’s 2024 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Blues Album could have been a double-edged sword, painting the rootsy duo of sisters Megan and Rebecca Lovell into a creative corner. But they’re not about to let that happen. “We’ve been very welcomed by the blues community, and we’re super thankful for that,” says songwriter, lap steel and dobro player Megan. “But we do have a lot of other interests and inspirations. Those interests—and Larkin Poe’s mastery of many American musical forms—are on display on the duo’s seventh and latest studio release, Bloom, released January 24.

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Ever since the Georgia-born Lovell sisters debuted on record, they’ve resolutely done things their own way. Their earliest releases came in the form of four EPs—each titled after a season—and were released by a tiny Norwegian indie seemingly created just for them. Fifteen years and numerous releases later, Larkin Poe remains independent. 

“When Meg and I were 15, 16, 17 years old, we did receive a lot of interest from major labels,” says guitarist Rebecca, admitting that at the time, they wanted to sign. “But they wanted us more in the country space; they were sort of chasing down another chick-style sister group. And that never sat well with us.”

So Larkin Poe forged their own path. By 2017, that approach led to the group launching its own label, Tricki-Woo. That move leveraged Larkin Poe’s creative freedom. “We could release records whenever we decided we wanted to,” explains Rebecca. And with that independence came the opportunity to self-produce their albums, something they had long wanted to do. 

Rebecca admits that she and Meg are musical chameleons. “We can fit ourselves into an acoustic setup, hard rock, or a blues setup,” she says. That comes in handy when Larkin Poe works—as they’re often called upon to do—as hired guns. Megan and Rebecca have played on recordings by Elvis Costello, Steven Tyler, ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons, and many others, most recently Ringo Starr.

The duo’s versatility is a kind of superpower, Rebecca says with a chuckle. But in the past it was also a kind of Kryptonite. “When we would get in the studio with a producer, we could effectively shape-shift into whatever it was that the producer would suggest.” At some point, the sisters began to feel inauthentic: “That’s not exactly what we’re hearing in our own heads,” Rebecca recalls thinking. 

Bloom gets to the heart of what Larkin Poe wants to sound like; it’s a varied set of songs that touches on Americana, country blues, arena-sized rock, and more. “If God is a Woman” imbues hill country blues textures with modern production values. The swaggering “Bluephoria” is a distaff distillation of Led Zeppelin and the Allman Brothers Band. 

“What we desire to do in the studio is present an authentic, real-world representation of who we are as a band,” Rebecca says. “We’re first and foremost a touring band.” Working with co-producer Tyler Bryant (“Who also happens to be my husband,” Rebecca adds), Larkin Poe cut much of the music for Bloom live in the studio. “You’re not hearing a whole ton of extraneous overdubs,” she says. 

From its beginnings, the making of Bloom was a very intentional endeavor. “We enjoy writing with focus,” says Megan, “so we set aside time just to write for the record.” With what she characterizes as a workmanlike approach, Meg and Rebecca made a point of getting together every day to write. “If it’s bad, that’s fine,” she says with a smile. “If it’s great, even better.” 

That approach yielded a set of songs that are more collaborative in character than past works from Larkin Poe. “In previous writing experiences, we found collaboration difficult,” Megan admits. “I think songwriting requires a very particular kind of vulnerability that we struggled to find between the two of us.” But they committed to making it work for Bloom, and that commitment paid off. “It was like a veil had been lifted,” Megan says. “We were able to come together. We learned a lot about each other, and we found a new confidence in our writing abilities.”

Some songwriters road-test their new material, effectively auditioning it in front of an audience and then tinkering with the songs before taking them into the studio. Larkin Poe doesn’t work that way. “I like a surprise,” Rebecca explains. “It’s always been important to Megan and me to be a little bit protective of these songs, to make sure we know how we feel about them before sharing them.” 

One way that Megan and Rebecca figure out how they feel about songs is to break them down. “Something we’ve taken in during these last few record cycles is that a good song stands on its own,” Rebecca says. Once written, the songs on Bloom developed by “sitting in a room, playing them in a very stripped-down manner,” she says. They would ask themselves demanding questions: “Is this landing without any production at all? Can it land with just an acoustic guitar, without a drum beat?” 

If the answers were all yes, that song made the album; otherwise not. “It’s a way for us to set a bar for the songs,” Rebecca says. “Because while we’ll play them with a full band on stage, we’re also playing them in sessions with stripped-down arrangements.” 

There’s a vulnerability that shines through the lyrics of Bloom’s songs. And that quality was hard-won for the Lovell sisters. “It takes a lot of strength to be able to present your inner dialogues and put them out into the public for comment,” Megan says. “And it can be a little bit scary.” But she says that connecting with other people who have been willing to share their own stories has inspired her and Rebecca to share more themselves, strengthening those connections.

Larkin Poe is also riding high on the thrill of having played with a former Beatle. Megan and Rebecca backed Ringo on two cuts—“Rosetta” and “String Theory”—for his new country-flavored album Look Up. They both gush at the recent memory of a dress rehearsal with him at Nashville’s famed Ryman Auditorium. “We were four girls along the front,” Rebecca explains. “Me, Megan, Molly Tuttle, and Sheryl Crow, singing ‘Boys’ with Ringo on drums!” Megan nods and smiles. “That takes your breath away,” she says. 

But there’s little time for Larkin Poe to bask in that glow. Right on the heels of an album release show at the Grand Ole Opry—their first-ever headlining spot there—the band heads out on tour in support of Bloom. Upcoming dates in the U.K. and France sold out long ago, and demand is expected to be strong for tickets on the group’s run of U.S. dates, taking them from late March into June. From there it’s festival gigs and another Atlantic crossing, with overseas concerts keeping Larkin Poe busy up to Thanksgiving. 

As much effort and care as Larkin Poe puts into their albums, the ultimate destination for their songs is in front of an audience. “When we’re thinking about our next record,” Megan says, “We always ask ourselves, ‘What are these songs going to feel like on the live stage?’” Rebecca reiterates the point her sister made earlier: “We are a touring band, first and foremost.” 

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