Orleans. // photo by Ash Newell Photography
Formed in Woodstock, NY in 1972 by John Hall and the late Larry Hoppen, rock band Orleans released their first album, the self-titled Orleans, in 1973, and has been bringing their music to the masses ever since. While best known for their smash 1976 hit, “Still the One,” off 1976’s Waking and Dreaming, as well as “Dance With Me” and “Love Takes Time,” the band continues to release new music, with their most recent LP being 2021’s Christmas album, New Star Shining.
Orleans is currently working on a record in belated celebration of their 50th anniversary, and ahead of their show at the Uptown Theater on Friday, September 5, with fellow classic rock lifers Pure Prairie League, Atlanta Rhythm Section, and Firefall, we hopped on the phone with bassist Lance Hoppen to discuss Orleans’ longevity, the forthcoming album, and why “Still the One” is …well, still the one.
The Pitch: This tour that you all are on is just so fascinating because it’s a very diverse array of groups that all seem to go together really nicely. How’d this tour come together?
Lance Hoppen: Well, this is packaged by the booking agency, obviously, and three of the four acts have the same manager, and it’s all of a kind. Orleans, Firefall, Atlanta Rhythm Section, Pure Prairie League–all ’70s pop rock. Of course, PPL is more country but had pop hits, so that’s why this works. It’s strength in numbers.
We do these shows periodically. It’s not like we’re only touring this way. We do one-off individual shows and or two of us, or that kind of thing, but this is a four-act show.
What’s the appeal of a package tour like this? Do you find that the audience that the other bands pull in compliments and contrasts with yours versus a solo show where it’s just Orleans?
Yeah. I mean, like I said, strength in numbers. We do larger houses. I mean, Orleans will do performing art centers with 300 people, that kind of thing, or big clubs, but if we’re four of us, we’re talking a thousand, 2000 seats perhaps. It’s more appealing.
Depending on the region, it depends on who’s the headliner. I think Pure Prairie League is, in this case, Midwest makes sense. But if it’s in the Northeast, we’d be headlining. If it were in Colorado, it would be Firefall, and so on and so forth.
You’ve been in this band since you were 18. I have to imagine you feel pretty fortunate to have been able to be with this band for 50-plus years?
Yes, absolutely grateful for it. My older brother, Larry, was in this. Formed as a trio, right? John Hall, Wells Kelly, Larry Hoppen. My dream as a teenager, starting out gigging since I was 14, was to be, not rich and famous, but to be a working musician as a career, and hopefully do that with my older brother and lo and behold, when I was 18 and the trio wanted to expand, I got the gig that has shaped my life in a certain way.
It hasn’t always been easy. Orleans has risen and fallen plenty of times. Half a dozen anyway. And I’m the last guy still out there, carrying the legacy forward. We’ve had, on top of the four of us, probably another ten singers and players come through the band at different versions. Each one would bring in their own contributions and move on.
This quintet that I’m at the helm of, I have my younger brother Lane, who’s been with us since 2000. At one point, it was all three brothers in the band ’til Larry passed in 2012, but this quintet is every bit as strong as any other in its own way. I’m pleased and proud to still be able to work as Orleans here in year 53, which is nothing short of amazing to me.
Orleans is best known for “Still the One,” and I am sure you have talked this to death over the years, but it continues to find its way into film and television to this day. Is there any particular attribute that you find contributes to its longevity?
Well, it happens to be a great marketing slogan for most anything, right? Anything with longevity, anything with staying power, and it is among the most licensed songs ever for commercial uses of all kinds, from regional banks to–at one point it was Burger King and Toyota doing national campaigns, and everything in between. Then, some movies. Some TV, of course. ABC movie theme song for two years in the late ’70s. Political campaigns, and then people use it for their anniversaries.
It has become ingrained in Americana due to its ubiquity. So on top of being a top five hit, it achieved that, somehow. “Dance with Me”–also a top five hit, but not of the same order in its being everywhere.
Is there a song that’s part of your set that warms your heart when people respond to it? It seems that every musician has their big hits that they have to pull out, but there are always the ones that give them the warm fuzzies when they get to play them.
We do “Dance with Me” early on, like second or third, and the crowd always responds really warmly there. That’s a good footing to be on. And of course, at the end, “Still the One,” and people are up if they’ve been sitting. There are a lot of dancers at that point. Everybody responds to that.
But, to answer your question, there’s a song called “No More Than You Can Handle.” It’s the last one I wrote with my brother Larry before he passed and ironically, it’s a song about persevering in the face of adversity, which was definitely the case in 2012 when he passed away.
It was like, “What do I do?” and what I didn’t wanna do was disappear. We had about eight shows to do the finish the year, and I figured with the alumni–guys who had been in the band, including John Hall, coming back from his stint in Congress–we could somehow finish the year and that would be year 40, and that’s enough, and we could put it away.
Well, that was the plan, and we did that. But as usual, somebody came up with an idea for a tour, and then we picked it back up and never stopped ever since. When I tell this story to preamble the song, people get it, because everybody knows hardship, tragedy, triumph over adversity in their own lives, or going through it at that very moment, so people are very touched by it and tell me so at the merch table after the show.
How odd was it for you to have your former bandmate be in Congress?
Well, John was always been political and an activist back in the day in the ’70s. He initiated the No Nukes concerts and gathered around him Bonnie Raitt, the Doobies, Graham Nash, and all those people. He was the driving force on that. He has always been an activist. He was on the school board, he was on the county legislature.
Actually, what happened was when the Bush campaign was using “Still the One” without consultation and he didn’t appreciate that, someone said, “Hey, stop belly-aching and run,” so he did, and he won. He got two terms and he did a good job. He went in on a blue wave, and he got ousted on a red wave, and that was enough for him. He’ll tell you that. John has a lot of accolades, a lot of credits to his name. Too many to mention. He’s got quite the storied career, but he retired from the road in ’22 ’cause he’s just turned 78 in July. I am still only 71. Or maybe he turns 77? In any case, age gets to every one of us and at a certain point you just say, “Okay, enough,” except for Willie Nelson.
Are you working towards new music, or do you find that you’re kept so busy on the road that it’s a little more difficult these days?
We did New Star Shining, that Christmas holiday album, under the lockdowns, during Covid. We had time on our hands, and we did it all remotely, everybody in their own home doing their part and sending it to the center. That was quite an experience in and of itself.
The idea though, prior to that, in 2020, we had done a couple of YouTube productions–audio, video of some songs, some remakes, some new things, and having done that, the idea was, “Well, we got four of these and got other stuff. Let’s make our 50th anniversary album,” but we never got to do that because we elected to do the Christmas thing. ’cause it had a more finite deadline, then we never got back to that 50th anniversary [project], although most of it was already in the can.
However, just recently in the last month or two, we broke the inertia and we now have two or three things finished that were partially finished, and we only have one or two left to finish and then we will put out–a little bit late, what would’ve been the 50th anniversary, but yeah, you can expect at least one more collection from Orleans, whenever we get it done. It might come out for the holidays. It might be spring of next year.
Orleans plays the Uptown Theater on Friday, September 5, with Pure Prairie League, Atlanta Rhythm Section, and Firefall. Details on that show here.