A reader in Chicago asked if I had any Nick Lowe stories but I was scratching my head. I’ve known and loved Nick since about 1972 but no anecdote stood out particularly at that moment, so I found this and emailed it to Chicago.
Thinking later about more recent times, I took Alex Fynn to the Festival Hall one night to see Iris DeMent and John Prine and we bumped into Nick.
Alex and Nick had a chat & Alex was thrilled with that. We also talked to Iris after the gig.
Rootsy pop with a smile
Nick Lowe
Her Majesty’s Theatre. Sunday 29th November
The audience is a forty/fiftysomething GLR audience.
That’s Greater London Radio, where Charlie Gillett plays CDs like Nick’s superb latest, Dig My Mood.
Support act? American songwriters Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham, who wrote The Dark End of the Street.
Onstage Dan looks like Robert Mitchum. He plays acoustic rhythm guitar and sings Do Right Woman very slowly. It’s strangely compelling. Nobody’s Fool has a Bill Withers groove but Dan phrases exactly as Elvis Presley would have done.
Spooner plays funky keyboards and sings Lonely Women Make Good Lovers. This reminds me that a country lyric is usually better than a soul lyric because a soul lyric gets half its meaning from the great voice that sings it.
During the interval the bloke in front reads Time Out. I wonder if he is a football fan and will turn to my interview with Darren Anderton. He doesn’t.
Nick Lowe comes on with a big silver quiff and a small guitar and does six songs alone.
Then he brings on a threepiece band, just after Cruel To Be Kind, one of the songs that needs a band.
They hit a sublime groove on Rose of England, with Geraint Watkins playing exquisitely soulful piano, like Mark Jordan on Tupelo Honey.
Faithless Lover is a doomy ballad with liquid guitar by Ed Dean, Lonesome Reverie gets its great backbeat from drummer Robert Treherne. Four instruments is all you need for this music.
What’s Shaking On The Hill is another of my favourites.
Man That I’ve Become has a grumpy lyric but is very warm with a swirly organ.He does one of Dan’s demos called Dan’s Holiday. Superlative after-midnight pub-rock, lovely stuff.
Cracking Up hits a marvellous Memphis soul groove and High On A Hilltop is superb.
But a blues number with Geraint’s cajun accordian is a bit crass.
Nick encores with Shelley My Love, followed by a real oldie. What’s So Funny About Peace, Love and Understanding? has a ghostly organ, a tinkle of guitar, a whisper of brushes on the snare.
A gospel lullaby, not a punk snarl like the Elvis Costello version.
A 12-bar boogie number is too loud. I Knew the Bride When She Used To Rock n’ Roll works well as a country tune rocked up like Chuck Berry.
Finally, a heartfelt version of You Better Move On, with Dan and Spooner, is really mellow R&B.
Nick Lowe is a master of understatement.
He gives us a hip Englishman’s take on rootsy American pop.
He does that better than anybody, so he should stick to it.
He was a groovemeister in the Seventies, but should not play the blooze now. A zillion bands can do that.
His former girlfriend Tracy Macleod of BBC2 is backstage with Alan Yentob.
I swallow some white wine, congratulate Nick, promise to call him, and go home.