Paula Cole Releases Deeply Personal New Album ‘Lo’

LISTEN TO 'LO'

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(March 1, 2024) Today Grammy-winning singer-songwriter and producer Paula Cole releases Lo, her first collection of entirely new, original songs in nearly a decade. A truth-teller, provocateur, feminist, and brilliant autobiographical writer who has pushed for personal honesty and social change, Cole wrote all the songs on Lo, as a way to navigate her opening to trust again after life’s indelible blows. Weaving the personal with the universal, she wrestles with questions of identity and intimacy, history and our collective failure to learn from it, ultimately showing the album to be a window into her own psyche. 

On February 27th the Grammy Museum hosted an event at New York’s National Sawdust where Paula played selections from the new album and spoke to Grammy-winning artist Joe Henry about the making of Lo. The conversation between Cole and Henry was profoundly intimate, offering long-time fans at the packed National Sawdust venue a deep insight into Paula's career journey and the personal significance of her music.

Initial offerings from the album include “Green Eyes Crying”, “Invisible Armor” and the first single "The Replacements & Dinosaur Jr.”. The songs, like the album, beautifully blend vulnerability with joy, staying true to Paula's signature authentic and soul-stirring style. “The Replacements & Dinosaur Jr.” is a heartfelt tribute to Paula’s friend and artistic mentor, Mark Hutchins, who left us too soon, aged 51.

The album features longtime Cole collaborator Jay Bellerose (Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Bonnie Raitt, Elton John) on drums, plus Ross Gallagher (Joe Henry, Marc Ribot) on upright bass, Chris Bruce (Meshell Ndegeocello, Bettye LaVette, Tom Waits) on guitar, and Rich Hinman (Maren Morris, Sara Bareilles) on pedal steel and guitar. The album was produced by Cole and recorded at The Village recording studio in Los Angeles by nine time Grammy-winning engineer, Mike Piersante.

Paula has also announced an extensive US tour which will kick off April 11 in Chicago, and feature many of the musicians who perform on Lo in her backing band. See below for a full list of dates.

Paula Cole is a Best New Artist Grammy-winner and was the first woman nominated in her own right for a Grammy for "Producer of the Year." She has in recent years honored her love for jazz and folk standards, and songs for social justice with her releases ‘Ballads’, ‘American Quilt’ and ‘Revolution’ for which NPR called her a “boundary-pushing feminist trailblazer,” for having “long incorporated powerful social statements into her emotional hit songs.” Her beloved anthems "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?" and "I Don't Want to Wait" are still playlist and radio perennials. 

PHOTO CREDIT: Ebru Yildiz