Lana Lane Releases First Album in 10 Years with Neptune Blue
A decade since her last solo album release, the queen of melodic prog rock is back and just wants to have fun.
Thanks for spending part of your day with Michael’s Record Collection. This newsletter has had a very good open rate the last two issues, and I want to thank you for that. With that said, no one has yet responded to my question from those issues about whether or not you also listen to the MRC podcast or watch the videos. This will be my last time asking because I don’t want to beat a dead horse, but if you don’t mind taking a few seconds to drop me a line via reply to this email or by emailing me separately at michaelsrecordcollection@gmail.com and letting me know, I would be very grateful. Data collection is not my specialty, but having some data would be better than having none.
For this week’s issue, I spoke with Lana Lane, who has released her first album in a long time, and it’s a good one. Let’s get to it.
California singer/songwriter Lana Lane has one of the great voices…well, that’s it. There is no qualifier. Lane’s voice is strong and distinctive, but is elastic enough to be dreamy or even delicate when that’s called for. Her voice has made her an in-demand talent for other artists who want to add excellent female vocals to their projects, and she’s worked with the likes of Ayreon, Gary Hughes, Roswell Six, and of course Rocket Scientists — the primary band of her husband, Erik Norlander.
Lane is back after a long hiatus, with Neptune Blue, a collection of 11 songs that are distinctively Lana Lane. The album dropped on Jan. 28 on Frontiers Music.
Neptune Blue was released almost 10 years to the day after Lane’s last solo album, El Dorado Hotel came out. That decade is double the longest previous gap between Lana Lane solo albums.
“Well, life happens, and it goes by fast,” Lane said of the time off in between releases. “In the beginning of our career, Erik and I were putting out two, three, four albums a year between Lana Lane, Rocket Scientists, and Erik's solo albums, and it was it was very stressful to produce that much music in a finite amount of time. And it always felt like we were just running and running and running, and it got tiring because it continued that way for a few years.”
Lane said that even her previous album, El Dorado Hotel, which came out in 2012, was difficult from a timing perspective.
“It was like it had to be finished by this time,” she said of the album’s deadline. “And it takes away from creativity and it takes away from just the joy of making a record.”
In the decade since El Dorado Hotel, Norlander continued to release solo and Rocket Scientists albums and Lane helped with those. But, aside from that, her solo career took a pause.
“My mom is getting older and I was spending time with her. I started my little gourmet foods business, and just kind of enjoyed life,” she said. “You know, and I'm getting older too. I've been recording 26-plus years. And I just didn't feel like I had anything new to say either. So, Frontiers had been asking me for a few years, ‘Can you please do another record?’ and the timing just wasn’t right for me. I didn't feel it. And then this time they asked it was like, ‘You know, I think so.’ So, well, that's why the gap (between albums).”
The bulk of the album was written by Lane and Norlander — a keyboard and production wizard — with additional writing contributions from Norlander’s Rocket Scientists band mate, Mark McCrite. Neptune Blue is performed by Lane (lead vocals), Norlander (keyboards, vocals), Jeff Kollman (guitar), McCrite (guitar, bass, vocals), and Greg Ellis (drums and percussion), with third Rocket Scientists member Don Schiff playing NS Stick. Former Asia singer John Payne pitched in with some backing vocals as well, and despite having a distinctive and recognizable voice, he doesn’t overpower any of his parts when backing up Lane on the album.
Neptune Blue explores themes of separation from people (“Remember Me”, “Neptune Blue”), and places (“Bring It on Home,” “Miss California,” “Far from Home,” and possibly “Come Lift Me Up”). Whether intentional or not, that’s quite understandable given the way we’ve all been living the last couple of years.
Album opener “Remember Me” kicks off the album with Norlander playing a church organ-type intro that is reminiscent of something Geoff Downes might have done in early Asia or a piece Rick Wakeman might have recorded. That might indicate a heavily progressive album is to come, but Neptune Blue is rooted primarily in melodic, AOR-style rock. That’s not a coincidence.
“I just wanted to do songs that made me feel good,” Lane said. “Yeah, it’s AOR. I don't know if we set out to do that, but it just naturally evolved into that because I just wanted to do songs that I enjoyed singing and were symphonic.”
After the church organ intro, “Remember Me” becomes an up-tempo rock song. It would be oversimplifying to call it a mere AOR track though. There are some tasty double organ/synth lines and a folky-sounding ending, just to remind you that this is an artist and a backing group of musicians with deep ties to symphonic progressive rock. The lyrical message isn’t coincidental. When she sings “Remember Me” in the chorus, it’s not a request so much as a demand.
Lane said the church organ opening was Norlander’s idea.
“The sounds are just fun and reminiscent of the 70s,” she said. “It's a nice component.”
Norlander’s identifiable, and tasty, mini moog opens “Under the Big Sky” with a nice riff. With the state of the world today, it’s not surprising to hear an upbeat song about being outside from sunrise to twilight. It’s uniquely relatable in an age of lockdowns and closures and where many of us longed to be for quite some time.
“Really Actually” features some interesting lyrical word play and an unusual chorus from a musical standpoint. It sounds like Schiff and Ellis are having some fun at the bottom end. Lane opted not to reveal who she was singing about but admitted it was aimed at a particular person.
A McCrite penned song, “Come Lift Me Up” is a gorgeous acoustic-guitar-driven ballad that shows off Lane’s outstanding Ann Wilson-esque vocals. The song’s chorus provides one of the most melodic and beautiful moments on the album. The song has back-to-back guitar solos, starting with an acoustic part and followed by a lengthier electric one by Kollman.
“That was actually a Mark McCrite song,” Lane said. “The way Mark and I work together is he will record acoustic guitar and sing — it’s usually la-la’s — and I’ll write lyrics. Erik will arrange the song. On that song, Erik actually wrote the chorus. I felt the verse and the chorus that Mark brought, that the chorus sounded more like a B verse. So, we just kind of reworked it, the three of us, and it just turned out to be a really beautiful song.”
“Bring It on Home” isn’t a cover of the Led Zeppelin song, which is what I expected when I saw the track listing (Lane has been known to cover some great songs throughout her career). It’s a rocking-yet-funky Lenny Kravitz-like track that shows off Kollman’s guitar prowess.
The strangest track on the album has to be the shortest one — “Don’t Disturb the Occupants.” This three-minute song was inspired by an episode of Doctor Who that Norlander saw. I’m not sure it works overall but I like the eerie feel of it and it’s an interesting song with a haunting chorus that might grow after more listens.
“Lady Mondegreen” opens with a boogie groove that lays a foundation for some vintage Norlander keyboard theatrics. If it sounds familiar, it’s because the song shares some musical DNA with the Rocket Scientists’ title track to the Revolution Road album, whether intentionally or not.
It’s always fun to learn from music and I had no idea what a mondegreen was until I researched whether the titular Lady Mondegreen was an actual historical figure. In fact, a mondegreen is a misunderstood or misinterpreted word or phrase resulting from a mishearing of the lyrics of a song. That knowledge makes the lyrics to the song a lot more fun. Lane herself learned the word from Norlander.
“Most people, it just completely goes over their head, and same with me,” she said. “I was like ‘Mondegreen? Lady Mondegreen?’ and Erik’s like, ‘Funny you should ask.’ He told me what a mondegreen was and I'm like, ‘Oh, that's awesome.’”
Speaking of wordplay, there’s an obvious double meaning to “Miss California.” Although the roots of this song likely came from world tours that took place well before the pandemic, the theme of separation of place returns. It speaks to the feeling of homesickness one gets regardless of how wonderful a vacation trip (or concert tour) may be going.
“When you’re on the road and you’re traveling, you kind of forget how great home is because you’re all wrapped up (in the moment),” Lane said.
“Someone Like You” sounds like something that could have come from Sheryl Crow’s self-titled 1996 album. It’s a mid-tempo blues rocker and again Kollman shows what he can do with a guitar in his hands.
Another song adhering to the separation theme is the up-tempo “Far from Home,” a song about a concert trip that Lane and Norlander took to Saint Petersburg, where they got to experience some of the Russian countryside.
“Neptune Blue” is an epic album closer in two acts. A sci-fi love song that again visits the themes of separation and longing. The second act is a slow-building departure for “all aboard the Starlight train.”
“It’s one of my favorite songs because it’s kind of like my musical journey with Erik from the time we met until now,” she said of the title track. “It’s just our little love story, and I love the science fiction part of it.”
The title track was inspired by a song by Electric Light Orchestra on the Time album.
“I love ‘Ticket to the Moon’ by ELO. I kind of wanted to write a song like that,” she said. “I had been doing research on the astrology signs for that song and Neptune blue is an actual element. I was like, ‘You know what, that’s really cool. I like that.’ So, I went with Neptune Blue.”
Polish surrealist Jacek Yerka once again did the cover painting. Lane, Norlander, and Rocket Scientists have used Yerka’s work on their albums for years and it perfectly creates a mood that complements the music. The Neptune Blue cover art incorporates elements from the cover paintings from some of Lana’s previous solo albums.
For the first time ever, a Lane solo album will be offered on vinyl. Frontiers’ webshop is selling an exclusive yellow double-LP version of the album in a gatefold sleeve, meaning Yerka’s work will be available in a larger format. Lane and Norlander wrote the liner notes themselves.
Fans of Lane’s work will find a lot to like when they dive into Neptune Blue. You don’t have to be a progressive rock fan to get into this accessible album, but if you are, there are subtle instrumental surprises throughout. Kollman and Ellis show off their considerable strengths, adding to kinds of well-known sounds that Norlander, McCrite, and Schiff have cleverly and inventively produced for many years.
You can learn more about Lana Lane at her website.
To purchase the yellow double-disc vinyl version of Neptune Blue, visit the Frontiers webshop (the CD is available at Amazon and other major retailers and the album is available digitally as well) and you can pick up several titles from Lane’s back catalog at the Think Tank Media webshop.
For my full conversation with Lana, check out the video below. There’s a bit of talk toward the end about her catalog not being on Spotify, which has since been rectified. Whether that happened after our conversation or the service was merely acting up that day and not showing what I was searching for, I couldn’t say, but there’s plenty of Lana Lane music to stream. We also spoke about her first favorite record, how she pivoted to progressive rock, and the musical family she has created with McCrite and Schiff.
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