Paul Thorn Happenings

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Paul Thorn will celebrate his new album What the Hell Is Goin' On? (Perpetual Obscurity/Thirty Tigers, May 8) with a live webcast on StageIt.com http://www.stageit.com (performance portal at http://bit.ly/IGYBI8) on Tuesday, May 8 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT. During the event, the critically acclaimed singer-songwriter will discuss and play tracks off his new album from Watson's Icehouse in Tupelo, Miss. All proceeds from the webcast, which allows fans to donate whatever they feel is a fair amount, will be given by Thorn to St. Jude's Children's Hospital in Memphis.

Music industry pundit Bob Lefsetz recently raved about the Elvin Bishop-penned title track: "You've got to check this out . . . It's about the groove, the feel. And this track is so in the pocket it's like you've just swallowed a jumping bean, you can't help but get up from your seat and start flailing your limbs like Gumby. To paraphrase our forebear Ahmet Ertegun, this is the kind of cut that you hear on the radio that makes you jump out of bed and go to the all-night record store in your pajamas to buy. You won't hear this on Top Forty radio. Paul Thorn is never going to be on American Idol, never mind Elvin Bishop, but this is the essence, this is what this wonderful business was built upon. SOUND!!!"

Paul Thorn took an unexpected detour on the road to recording a follow-up to his most successful release, 2010's Pimps and Preachers. After writing many discs of semi-autobiographical tunes that have drawn comparisons to John Hiatt and John Prine, Thorn — once hailed as the "Mark Twain of Americana" — decided to record an album of covers. "I wanted to take a break from myself, " he reveals, "do something different, and just have fun."

No slouch as a songwriter himself, Paul chose songs from some of America's greatest: Buddy Miller, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Elvin Bishop, Lindsey Buckingham, Rick Danko & Bobby Charles, Big Al Anderson, Foy Vance, Donnie Fritts and Eli "Paperboy" Reed among them. Delbert McClinton (singing on Wild Bill & Martha Emerson's "Bull Mountain Bridge") and Elvin Bishop (singing and playing guitar on his own "What the Hell Is Goin' On?") appear as guest performers on the album as well.

The idea for a covers album grew as Thorn encountered tunes that meant something important to him. "I would hear them in the tour van or I'd be at a festival and see someone perform them live, " Thorn says, "and I'd say, 'That's a great song, I wish I had written it!'" One thing all the writers have in common, according to Thorn, is that they are true artists. "They don't just write songs in an effort to become popular or follow trends, " he explains. "At the risk of sounding corny, they write with their hearts. None of these songs are cookie-cutter tunes like you hear on the radio today. They all have real depth, which is very appealing to me."

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