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After some major transformative work on herself, indie americana singer/songwriter Lara Taubman has produced a new album in her usual style but with a whole new twist. The Gospel of Getting Free, released June 21st, tells her story from a renewed, refreshed and positive perspective.
My new album, 'The Gospel of Getting Free,' has been like a ship on which I can finally sail home. I see only now that my three albums are primers that guide me out of my own complex trauma to become my true self.
As a New York city die hard, Taubman started her work in the arts as a visual artist and critic. After a period in the wilds of Montana, she was inspired to start creating music, drawing on her passion for artists like Leonard Cohen, Patti Smith, David Byrne and dozens of others as well as her bluegrass-fed childhood in coal country in Virginia. She soon created a style of americana and gospel-inspired folk that brought all her inspirations together.
Taubman began writing music in 2015 and after honing her craft and arriving on her sound, released her first album, Revelation in 2020. With a distinctive voice that's equal parts Patti Smith and Joni Mitchell and a storytelling ability that rivals both, Taubman also found her audience with this goosebump-inducing release. Her star continued rising with the help of producer Steven Williams, and she released two more albums and a handful of single in rapid succession between 2022 and late 2023.
From the americana, soul, bluegrass and junkyard country of Revelation to the bluesy soul and classic folk of Blind Spot to the Indie gospel of Ol' Kentucky Road, it's clear that the central theme of Taubman's work has been of a yearning to grow and be free from trauma and pain. Especially, in Ol' Kentucky Road, that theme is clearly spoken and Taubman sings it with so much wanting in songs like "Come to Me," that listeners will find themselves urging her on, rooting for her.
That need for emotional freedom and true joy is, by Taubman's own admission, where fans will find her in The Gospel of Getting Free.
The same ideas that drove me to write the songs for 'The Gospel of Getting Free' also helped me come up with the songs for the first two albums. What distinguishes this album from the last two are two things. First, I feel more mentally healthy than I ever have. Last summer I began working with somatic therapy for trauma and it changed my life quickly. I immediately wanted more hope in the music as expressed in the songs “The Reason I Was Born” and “Sing Your Song.” Even the songs that are about dark matters like addiction (“Sugar”) and heartbreak (“The Odyssey,”) carry a sense of humor and an inner hope instead of despair.
That's only one bit of the stories Lara Taubman tells in The Gospel of Getting Free, but it's all there, in vivid emotional detail, for the listener to discover. Promising to be her most transformative work both musically and emotionally, this album is everything it says on the tin and more.
Stream the full album "The Gospel of Getting Free" on Spotify.
Watch the new video for the surreal, immersive video and album highlight "The Siren" on Youtube.
Stream "The Siren" on Spotify.
Lara Taubman is a performing singer songwriter currently living in New York City. She is about to release her third album The Gospel of Getting Free. Lara calls herself a troubadour of the new world because she believes in the power of song and story as a critical aid for people who need respite and refuge in a world that is rapidly transforming.
Before she began writing songs in 2015, she was a visual art critic, curator and painter. She has been passionately creating since she can remember, but it was when she committed to singing and songwriting that her personal world changed radically. She was living in Montana and it blew up her marriage. She moved back in 2016 to the creative home of her heart, New York City, to pursue music as a career.
Soon after she put music at the center of her world, life became very simple. She had found her reason for being. Music had always been a powerful healing force since she was a girl. Born and raised in the coal country of southwestern Virginia, the ubiquitous Old Time and bluegrass music got into her blood and is a significant inspiration in the long, rambling ballads of her own songwriting today as can be seen in her songs, “Snakes in the Snow,” “The Water” and in the title track of her new album,” The Gospel of Getting Free” and others.
The ancient ballads of Britain and Appalachia bring her back to memories of the beautiful Blue Ridge mountains of her childhood home. She still drowns in the long narratives of the music, luxuriating in the memory and feelings of them. The music of her childhood made her know that she wasn’t alone. Lara’s hope is to make music that helps others to also feel less lonely. The more music she makes, the more it is clear to her that this was why she was put on earth.
She released her first album “Revelation” in 2020 on Wolfe Island Records. She was so moved by the year long journey of her first album, that she often returns to Wolfe Island. Fortuitously in 2021 she met producer/drummer Steven Williams on a gig and soon after they started working together on her second album Ol’ Kentucky Light. Through Steven, she met and began co-writing and working with musicians Walter Parks, Askold Buk, Teddy Kumpel, Etienne Lytle, Paul Frazier and others. She feels fortunate to have found this group of exceptional, award-winning talents in New York City.
In the summer of 2023, she began writing on “The Gospel of Getting Free.” Around the same time, she began her work in somatic trauma therapy which created a rapid shift in her emotional life. While this next album continues the melancholy, heartbroken themes of the first two albums, she suddenly felt compelled to write songs about joy and hope. Contacting a more ecstatic approach to her music led her to go deeper into gospel music, which was a key inspiration for her second album “Ol’ Kentucky Light.” In The Gospel of Getting Free,” she went further, choosing simpler lyrics and trusting the music to lead her into the journey of a song. She wanted to make music that could move the spirit.
The human impulse to take devastation and transform it into a melody, a story, a rhythm, is what drives Lara to create music. All the darkness she has lived through has been the fuel for her to turn her tragedies into music. She believes despair and hopelessness are energies to be endured in order to get to the light and to personal emotional freedom. The alchemy of music and design, the creative process, is there to remind humans that all is not lost.
Lara makes music for human beings because she believes in their highest ability to do good, to feel better and to know that they are not alone in this world.
Lara has not entirely left the world of design. In 2023 she started a vintage garment rental company called Lara Sings Vintage. It is a collection of her own clothes that she has spent a lifetime amassing over a 40-year period. Wearing beautiful design is one of her favorite pastimes after making music. She loves intermingling music with styling her outfits for her shows. Not ironically, most of her clients are musicians. She lives peacefully in Manhattan with her dog and cat and a beautiful collection of hats that hang on her living room wall.
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