How many artists can convincingly cover semi-obscure bluesman Skip James and also duet with super-famous pop-country hunk Keith Urban?
Well, Larkin Poe can.
Nashville-via-Georgia sister duo Rebecca and Megan Lovell are gifted at braiding raw blues with pop sugar.
“That just is what feels like home to us,” says Rebecca, Larkin Poe’s lead singer and electric guitarist. “And it feels like the most genuine way that we can give people a taste of our musical perspective, so we have no problem genre-hopping or genre-blending, because that’s the way things go in the 21st century and I think it’s really beautiful.”
Larkin Poe's stripped-back sound centers on Rebecca's barbecued vocals and Megan's stinging lap-steel slide-guitar. The group's frequent use of field-holler rhythms gives their music infectious primal stomp. This can be heard on tracks such as "Sometimes," the horns-laced opener on Larkin Poe's latest album, 2018's "Venom & Faith," and sassy single "Bleach Blonde Bottle Blues," from that same LP.
"I think a lot of people have a stigma attached to what blues is," Megan says, "and I think blues is more of a feeling than anything else and an approach to writing music and melody and lyric. We approach the blues with great respect to the music that has come before, but at the same time we don't want to be a time capsule either."
The Lovell sisters were raised as self-described “free range children,” homeschooled and allowed full access of their family’s book shelves. Those books included the works of proto horror writer Edgar Allen Poe. As teens, the Lovells learned they were actually relatives of Poe’s and his gothic aesthetic and last name were cribbed for Larkin Poe. But even before the sisters were aware “The Raven” was perched in their family tree “we both gravitated to Poe and his writing,” Rebecca says.
The swaggering, Black Keys-ish tune "Trouble in Mind" from 2016 release "Reskinned" appears to be Larkin Poe's most-streamed song on Spotify, at around 3.5 million. But Megan and Rebecca aren't quite ready to say that's also their best. "It's one of our older songs, so I think sometimes the analytics with Spotify if you rack up more plays with an older song it makes it look like it's more popular," Rebecca says, "and that's what people end up listening to. But I don't mind that people are introduced to us from 'Trouble in Mind.' It sort of clicks all the boxes and it’s a song that we still perform live. So, I dig it."
Larkin Poe’s rootsy-yet-streamlined vibe has cultivated a swelling fanbase, including more than 500,000 on Facebook. (In addition to their own studio and live recordings, Megan and Rebecca’s homemade covers of artists ranging from Howlin’ Wolf to Black Sabbath are YouTube delights.) Celebs like actor Russell Crowe are among the band’s supporters.
Despite their growing fame, Megan and Rebecca can find themselves in situations where people still ask, “Which one’s Larkin and which one’s Poe?” Then there was that time they showed up to a casino gig to see in huge letters on the marquee their show promoted as “Larkin & Poe.” “We just had to laugh about it,” Rebecca says, “because it’s all over the contracts, it’s all over our social media. But hey, you show up and do your best to make them remember you, so that’s all we can do.”
In addition to their own career, Larkin Poe have been tapped to back classic artists, including Aerosmith singer Steven Tyler in the studio and singer/songwriter Elvis Costello onstage. Megan says one of the biggest lessons Larkin Poe learned from performing with Costello, “is to lay it all out. He puts a lot of sweat and soul and faith into his show every night, without fail.”
The most random object Megan, who moved to lap-steel from dobro, can recall using as a slide is a knife. She and Rebecca have been singing together since they were preschoolers duetting on lullaby “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” Over the years, the sisters worked their way through classical and bluegrass. Outside of music, Megan and Rebecca enjoy grilling-out vegetarian food together or cooking paella. And even though they’ve toured heavily for the past year, unlike famously beefing rock siblings from say Oasis or Black Crowes, the sisters swear they’re not sick of each other. “Even when we’re home we see each other every day,” Rebecca says.
Larkin Poe performs 7 p.m. May 30 at Decatur’s Princess Theatre, address 112 2nd Ave. N.E. Tickets are $25 (plus service fees) via princesstheatre.org.
