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Press Page Reviews from around the world Ordinary man, music geniusDennis Kane
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Music Preview: Five
questions for Bill Toms
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Bill Toms "Spirits" CD
was inspired by the state of the world and neglect
concerning the working class.
Bill Toms spent 19 years as the sidekick to Joe Grushecky in the Houserockers. During the end of that stay, he broke off to form Hard Rain and work as a solo artist. Toms is releasing his sixth record, "Spirits, Chaos and a Troubadour Soul," a collection of gritty rock songs in the working-class vein of the Houserockers and the E Street Band. What were your inspirations in making this record? I think the state of the world is inspiration enough. I was traveling quite a bit these last few years. So the record was written with a troubadour mentality. I was seeing the results of years of neglect concerning the working class. The division between the haves and the have-nots has become wider. I am reporting what I see. Painting the picture of events that have led us to where we are and trying to figure out a better path.
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Bill Toms - Spirits, Chaos, and a Troubadour
Soul
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Soul' showcases Toms' other musical side By Harry Funk hfunk@observer-reporter.com If you meet Bill Toms, you'll find him to be a very polite guy who speaks in a relatively unassuming, somewhat modest tone of voice. That's the off-stage Toms. Put him and his guitar in front of an audience, and he's a changed man, infused with the spirit handed down to him by the great rock 'n' rollers. Toms spent two decades playing with Joe Grushecky's Houserockers, and eventually he formed his own band. Attending a Bill Toms and Hard Rain show is like chugging a Red Bull, without the aftertaste: It's all about energy. But although he can rock with the best of them, the Scott Township resident has another musical side, exploring the folk tradition of Americana with an introspective pen. Click here for the entire article Bill Toms gets in touch with inner troubadour (Video Attached!)
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Feature: Bill Toms
April 2008
Discover this amazing local musician who is about to release his 5th solo CD and continues to push the boundaries of his music.
"Now
I'm stranded out on the highway 'tween Memphis and
Pittsburgh, PA I've been walking not knowing my way
That ways as good as this" - Bill Toms, 'Paying
These Dues'
Saturdays in Pittsburgh's Strip District can offer
many things to many people, and this weekly ritual
is the surest way to get a good, clear look at the
'real' Pittsburgh. Ethnic food vendors nestle up
against Steelers merchandise tables, butcher shops
and specialty food vendors are packed to capacity,
bars start filling before noon and excited children
anxiously view row upon row of chocolates and
candies. So perhaps it is fitting that just off the
main drag the lucky passerby is treated to the sound
of live music emanating from the Leaf and Bean Cafe,
and often times that music is being made by Bill
Toms. Standing in the corner with his acoustic
guitar, harmonica and microphone, Toms is inevitably
joined by a small army of loyal fans who sit in
quiet appreciation of the performance, knowing what
a treat it is to see a musician of this capacity in
such an intimate setting.
Bill Toms Releases
"Spirits,
Chaos, And A Troubadour Soul"
By Julie Toye
For The Herald Standard
March 2008
\
Ever since Pittsburgh musician/guitarist Bill Toms took to the road in 2006 to promote his music, he has not stood still very long in one spot except to perform on American and European stages and write and record his new CD, "Spirits, Chaos And A Troubadour Soul."
Music Preview: Bill Toms turns up electricity on new Hard Rain CD
Thursday, October 20, 2005
By Ed Masley , Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Bill Toms could have called Hard Rain's new album "Harder Rain," kicking it off as he does with a street-tough bar-rock anthem fueled by Joffo Simmons' pounding Motor City beat, a fierce garage-rock riff on distorted electric guitar and Toms' impassioned vocals growling out the story of a faded boxing champ getting drunk at the neighborhood bar.
Produced by Rick Witkowski, "One Lonesome Moment" is filled with sketches of characters real and imagined. "Gilbert Connolly" is drawn from Toms' memory of a homeless man he used to see while going to technical school in Pittsburgh 20 years ago. "At the Grave of Rosey O'Leary" is a fictional account of two unrequited lovers. "How Much More Can We Endure" was inspired by news footage Toms saw of black protestors being attacked by white supremacists.
Twenty-some years into living the rock 'n' roll lifestyle, Hard Rain's Bill Toms has emerged from all those early morning drives with a healthier perspective on his dream, a perspective that fuels a number of the hardest-hitting tracks on Hard Rain's latest effort, "This Old World."
The eyes have it. Bill Toms is best known as the guitarist for Joe Grushecky's Houserockers, but with the release of My Own Eyes (Moondog Records), Toms' days as playing second fiddle could soon be behind him. Toms mines the rich vein of Americana, writing songs about the average guy. His songs lack pretension; he paints the picture, makes his point, lets the band rock and gets out. Vocally, Toms sounds a lot like his boss as well as Grushecky collaborator Bruce Springsteen (whom the Houserockers have played and toured with), which fits perfectly within his style.
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review,
December 1999
"Musically, Toms and Hard Rain are solid throughout, never straying far from blues-based rock 'n' roll. Two songs stand out - the anthem-like title track (that Tom Petty would be glad to own), and "Smithfield Cafe", an intoxicating, dreamy mood piece that also benefits from Toms' best writing".
"When Toms sings Thirty years gone, thirty years down/Down another road that's going nowhere, desolation and solitude never sounded so good. "
"My Own Eyes" finds Toms and his meteorological crew seeing clearly, and comfortable in musical variety.
Title track, relaxed but musically tight, sets the stage, hinting that what's to follow will be a personal statement. Toms brings it home to "Smithfield Cafe", a mysterious place in which the storyteller recounts his tale from a back booth; you fill in narrative gaps yourself.
Favorite tracks are "Somebody Call the Doctor, I Think I'm Gonna Blow", with it's gimmicky vocal presentation, as if delivered via telephone; the yearning folky "Made in America" (he needs to click his boot heels together and chant "There's no place like South Side.."; and speaking of boots, Toms goes West-erns for "Losing You is Killing Me".
Any album by a group named after precipitation probably wouldn't sell in the Bahamas or Florida today, but wait till they dry out; As the intimate final cut suggests, "It's just the Rain, Suzanne".
The group's heritage is especially evident on the opening track of My Own Eyes, which is very reminscent of the Houserocker's signature sound. And then there is the vocal support of Grushecky himself on "Right on TIme".
But Toms demonstrates that this band is more than just a Houserockers rehash, finding a Tom Waits-ish motif on "Smithfield Cafe" and a nice pensive quailty in "It's Just the Rain, Suzanne".
