The earthy folk/rock effort is one of my favorites from '22. It is frequently reminiscent of solo efforts by Bruce Springsteen, Jon Bon Jovi and Willie Nile, not to mention younger artists such as Jesse Malin and The War on Drugs. I would highly recommend fans of those acts purchase a copy.
Check out the video to "Our Little Secret": https://youtu.be/YB3yytKz3rY
Read more info about the recent music by the Chicago-based singer/songwriter, who started his career in the early 1990s...
St. Paul’s Boulevard is a concept album of sorts, introducing characters lost and found, rich and poor, young and old, and many who are struggling to survive on a fictional street that could exist anywhere.
It was co-produced by McDermott and Steven Gillis, who also plays drums. Matt Thompson handled acoustic and electric bass; Grant Tye, guitars; Heather Lynne Horton, violin/vocals; and Vijay Tellis-Nayak, piano and organ.
Additional musicians on St. Paul’s Boulevard include Will Kimbrough (a producer of Rodney Crowell, Todd Snider) on guitars, banjo, and mandolin; John Deaderick on piano, organ, and keyboards; Danny Mitchell on piano and keyboards; and David Grissom (John Mellencamp) on guitars. McDermott also played guitars and piano. On the track “Marlowe,” he pays tribute to Raymond Chandler's Phillip Marlowe character.
“Everyone has their own St. Paul's Boulevard, the place where we left pieces of our
hearts, our innocence, where we suffered heartbreak, came to learn about shame,
where we struggled to find our place in this world,” says McDermott. “It’s a place where we struggled to nurture love and light in a darkened world. It’s where some of us were permanently arrested in our development and our social and emotional intelligence.”
After more than a dozen studio albums, the heartland rocker continues to make music on his own terms. St. Paul’s Boulevard is both personal and universal. McDermott has lived these songs, that place, and those shattered hopes.
where we struggled to find our place in this world,” says McDermott. “It’s a place where we struggled to nurture love and light in a darkened world. It’s where some of us were permanently arrested in our development and our social and emotional intelligence.”
After more than a dozen studio albums, the heartland rocker continues to make music on his own terms. St. Paul’s Boulevard is both personal and universal. McDermott has lived these songs, that place, and those shattered hopes.
“Those days are now just a wash of dreams of characters, of drunken and drug-fueled nights wandering all over town looking for an angry fix driven by love, lust, longing, or connection,” he says. “I lost a lot of people on St. Paul's Boulevard. Many never made it out, but I'm lucky to have. It's a place that brings out our best and our worst in equal measure. It's the landscape where the doggedness of the spirit rises above the grim realities that surround us.”
In other McDermott news...
Last fall, the musician won the prestigious Tenco Award for career songwriting, an honor that recognizes artists who have made a significant contribution to songwriting in Italy and abroad. The award, established in 1974, pays homage to the late singer-songwriter Luigi Tenco and celebrates exceptional and impactful songwriting on an international level.
Previously, the Tenco Award has gone to Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Tom Waits, Sting, Jackson Browne, Elvis Costello, Randy Newman, David Crosby and others.
“There are a few times when my life felt like a waking dream,” says an elated McDermott, “when I saw my wife Heather as I stepped out of an elevator in Chicago, when I held my daughter Rain in my arms for the first time, when I read what Stephen King had written about me for the liner notes of my album, and now when I heard that I won the Tenco Award. To have my name placed alongside the hallowed company of Tenco, Waits, Mitchell, and Cohen is just so humbling. To me, this is the honor of an eternity.”
McDermott also released a 2022 memoir, Scars from Another Life, available through his website, michael-mcdermott.com. Find dates for his current book tour there.
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