Laura Cole discovers ‘Hawaiian soul’ on new LP Piece of Paradise
Laura Cole and her guitar-playing partner Chris Chiarcos stumbled across a crate of old Hawaiian albums three years ago at a flea market in Haliburton.
They bought the whole box for $12, brought them home to Ancaster and gave them a listen.
They weren’t impressed with Don Ho’s over-the-top crooning on “Pearly Shells,” but they loved the sound of the Hawaiian slide guitar.
Cole, 28, is best known as a bluesy-rock oriented soul singer with a throaty voice that exudes sensuality. You can hear it on her debut album “Dirty Cheat,” which won Cole female artist of the year honours at the 2015 Hamilton Music Awards.
But those Hawaiian albums have had an effect on Coles’s new album “Piece of Paradise.” Cole calls the new sound “Hawaiian soul.”
Parts of it sound like they were recorded on an island resort, but, no, they were recorded in a shed in the backyard of Cole’s parents house in Ancaster.
Cole and Chiarcos converted the building into a combined recording studio and living space they call “The Pool House.”
It’s where they wrote the 11 tracks for “Piece of Paradise” with lots of help from friends who would drop by, including Cole’s father Ron, who plays keyboards on most of the tracks.
The final inspiration for the album’s sound came about when an old family friend — super producer Daniel Lanois — stopped by the Ancaster house with a vintage beat box/drum machine called a Rhythm King. Lanois, who went to high school with Cole’s dad, thought it might help them put the songs together.
The Rhythm King did the trick, allowing them to experiment with other sounds while the metronomic beat held things together.
“It became this island vibey thing with a couple of electronic tracks and a couple of funk tracks,” Cole says. “There’s all these different genres with the only cohesive elements my voice, the Rhythm King and the slide guitar.”
The little drum machine isn’t the only beat keeper on the album, however. Adding to the funk are drummers Brian Chiarcos and Mark McLean, as well as percussionist Joe Gravina. Chris Chiarcos plays all the bass parts as well as most of the guitar, with help from Mike Tokarchuk. Melissa Marchese backs up Cole on vocals.
Cole and her band are holding a special “prerelease” party for “Piece of Paradise” on Saturday, June 2, at the The Music Hall (New Vision United Church) in downtown Hamilton with vinyl copies of the album and digital download cards available at the show.
Cole is calling it a “prerelease” party because she’s putting together a management team for a more nationally oriented release later in the year.
“We’re really anxious to celebrate with Hamilton,” Cole says. “It got to a point with us where we wanted to express how much Hamilton means to us. It is a really incredible scene that I have not found duplicated anywhere in my travels. Nobody has as tight-knit support community as we do here.”