Thanks all the same, England, but we’ve got our own Amy
Winehouse. And our version has twice her soul, with none of the
crazy.
While the Winehouse comparison makes an easy shorthand for what
Boston’s Eli “Paperboy” Reed does, there are
big differences between the Brookline boy and his British, beehived
female foil.
“There’s less irony, less cynicism to what we do
and people can latch on to that,” said Reed, whose debut, “Roll
With You,” is out today. “What I want to do at my
core is make American music in the grand tradition. Plus, I’m
American and I’m a guy. I’m not Amy.”
The baby-faced Reed - who opens for Nick Lowe at the Calvin
Theater in Northampton on Thursday - has spent his 24 years obsessed
with classic Black American music. It began with his father’s
wax stacks of gospel, blues and r & b and continued when
Reed moved to blues mecca Clarksdale, Miss., after high school.
“At that time I was all about blues,” he said from
a Los Angeles tour stop. “What I got was education in r & b
and chitlin’ circuit music. Clarksdale is a really tightknit
community, people would roll down their windows and say, ‘Who
are you?’ So it didn’t take long before I was playing
with people in a practice space in the back of the Delta Blues
Museum and around town.”
After nine months in Clarksdale, Reed followed his muse north
to the University of Chicago, where he landed a gig playing piano
for ex-Chess Records’ artist and current minister Mitty
Collier’s South Side congregation.
“I’m Jewish, so the whole thing wasn’t a religious
experience,” he said. “It was more of a cultural,
musical endeavor.”
Everything Reed learned from Pop’s record collection and
his travels informs “Roll With You.”
The album is full of originals with the simmering lust and desperate
ache of a ’60s Stax act that are dressed by his seven-piece
band, the True Loves, in Memphis horns, heavy Hammond organ and
church harmonies. It’s like dropping the needle down on
a scratchy, undiscovered Otis Redding side.
Boston’s Q Division, which put out the record, is betting
Reed’s on the verge of breaking big. The label shelled
out thousands to hire Shore Fire - of Bruce Springsteen and Robert
Plant fame - to do Reed’s PR.
“We’re on tour with a van with seven people and
all of our equipment in eight seats,” he said. “So
I’m taking all these really good opportunities with a grain
of salt.”
Reed plans to pull an Otis Redding-at-Monterey-Pop this summer
and flip rock fans to soul at a few major festivals. He starts
his campaign at the WFNX Best Music Poll at the Bank of America
Pavilion on May 10.
Eli “Paperboy” Reed and the True Loves, opening
for Nick Lowe, at the Calvin Theater, Northampton, Thursday.
Tickets: $25-$35; 413-594-1444. And at the WFNX Best Music Poll,
at Bank of America Pavilion, May 10. Tickets: $38.50; 617-728-1600.
