PETE BERWICK (NEW ALBUM 2010)

Bio:

"Pete Berwick is one of the last of the Hardcore Troubadors."--- Nashville Songwriter's Association

"This is one of the last remaining rebels of the genre. We feel he's ready for Grammy's, but in a way, that wouldn't suit Pete at all. His new cd 'Just Another Day In Hell' is a CowPunk classic, and if you're into countryfied rebellion, then this is a must."--Rock Solid Pressure Radio

"Pete Berwick is worthy to stand shoulder to shoulder with the likes of Dylan, Springsteen and Mellencamp. A tall statement but the music tells a story of a man who has poured his guts, his soul and his passion into his songs."--- Lucas Campbell, Rock Of Ages Radio Show, Uk

With a defining sound like no other, Pete Berwick's new album release "Just Another Day In Hell" is a shining example of what the Roots Rock world expects from its performers. Well written songs, great vocal performances and a hard driving in your face sound flavored with a tad of country salt from all the musicians in the studio. This album is first rate and provides music proof that Roots/Americana rock is alive and well in the great state of Illinois. Radio should pay attention to this new CD and increase their listening audience by spinning "Just Another Day In Hell" for hard and fast music fans around the globe.--- Robert Bartosh, Roots Music Report (www.rootsmusicreport.com)

"Berwick rocks to hard for Nashville, but isn't that why God and Gram Parsons created alt-country music?" --- Rev. Keith A Gordon, All Music Blues Guide, Creem Magazine

"Methinks Hank woulda done it this way." --- Fred Mills, Blurt Magazine

"Snarly, battered and bruised rock that bleeds out of the speakers. Berwick is a true denim ‘n' leather rebel son and outlaw rambler. With rockabilly power, leathery baritone vocals, and defiant lyrics, Berwick is equal parts Dylan, Elvis, and Johnny Cash, with just a pinch of Steve Earle for acerbic flavoring."-- Tom Lounges, Northwest Indiana Times

If you think that rock and roll is dead, think again. Pete Berwick brings it crashing home time and time again. I have been a fan or Pete's since I heard his first screaming release and I have to say that whenever I grow cynical of the industry, I put a Berwick CD on and dance myself into a born again rock frenzy. What I most love about Pete's work is his sense of sick humor. He can sell road kill as easily as he sells heartache. His vox sounds like he was born gargling with whisky and rock pebbles. He plays his well worn ax like a well played woman. Pete Berwick is and never has been a flash-in-the pan musician. Those of us that have discovered him wish lovers of real rock could all discover him. Nobody would ever say again that rock is dead. "Ain't no Train Outta Nashville" is still my favorite but all of his CDs are terrific. As a musician and critic myself, I give Pete the highest rating I can. Maybe it's because I been there, done that and wear the T but he's the real deal.--- Fly Williams

BUY THE NEW ALBUM "JUST ANOTHER DAY IN HELL"

"Imagine a run-down bar somewhere along the road packed with truckers shooting pool, smoking and drinking beer. Someone is passed out in the men's room, a couple of guys are fighting out front while others are playing stud or dancing with the local girls. The sound from the jukebox is more than likely to sound something like Pete Berwick." So wrote Christopher Davidson of Mutinyzine Magazine.

"Hard edged and whiskey infused" is how one radio DJ described Pete Berwick's music, and music critic Rev. Keith Gordon, former contributor to Creem Magazine wrote, "Berwick pens his own reality and, much like Hank, Waylon, Townes Van Zandt and Steve Earle, his songs are inhabited by heartbreak, humor, insight and emotion."

The UK's Maverick Magazine mirrored that sentiment, writing, "Berwick's songs are dark, sad, funny, spooky, hell raising, facinating and always interesting, and Chuck Eddy, senior editor for Billboard magazine and former writer for Rolling Stone wrote, "Pete Berwick, an Illinois roughneck who has somehow fallen through the cracks, writes songs that rock right through their platitudes.

Berwick's journey began in Illinois in the mid seventies, hammering out irreverant country, roots rock and reckless honky tonk rave ups night after night to anyone in the midwest who cared to listen. Then after after almost fifteen years of non stop performing he headed to Nashville with a fistful of songs and the clothes on his back. By the time Berwick arrived in the music city, Steve Earle was on his way to jail and Jason & the Scorchers had broken up. Signed by an up and coming independent record label in the heart of music row, Berwick was heralded by many in town as the one to run with the cowpunk gauntlet left at the roadside. After years of belting it out in biker bars and nowhere dives, Pete now found himself opening shows for Charlie Daniels, Doug Kershaw, and other musical legends. He was invited to make cameo appearances in music videos by The Kentucky Headhunters and Travis Tritt, and also appeared on a commercial for Monday night Football. But as fast as luck goes up in Nashville, it comes down even faster. The promising record deal went bust, but not before the recording of the critically acclaimed "Ain't No Train Outta Nashville." Recorded in Waylon Jennings old studio, The album was shelved in 1991 due to contractual disputes and economic hardships. Disgusted with the politics of the music industry, Pete bought several acres of land fourty miles east of Nashville and resigned to shooting his guns, writing some of the songs that would become his third album "Just Another Day In Hell" and working at the local factory.

Berwick later moved back to his hometown in northern Illinois, and free from the publishing and other legal disputes tying up the album, he released "Ain't No Train Outta Nashville" on his own label in 2007. From there it shot to 5 on Cross Country Satellite Radio and 20 on The Roots Music Report Charts, and the title song appeared in Paramount Pictures "The Thing Called Love" starring River Phoenix and Dermot Mulroney. Prior to releasing "Ain't No Train Outta Nashville" Berwick recorded and released also on his own label "Only Bleeding" with Brian Wilson bassist Bob Lizic, and as the critical acclaim started pouring in, he hit the road once more in support of both albums.

It's been over thirty years since Pete Berwick stepped on a stage for the first time, and thousands of shows and two albums later he has delivered his third recording, "Just another Day In Hell". An eighteen song epic of non fictional tales which colorfully and often brutally describes the trials and hardships left behind on the long hard trail, "Just Another Day In Hell" is Pete Berwick's biography and heart and soul worn on his tattered sleeve. From shattered relationships, broken dreams and drug abuse, to prison walls and battles with angels and demons, this is as real as it gets. Pete's rough and ready vocals spit out stark tales of heartache, pain and redemption, and just like life, the endings aren't always pretty.

Unlike the country music hacks of Nashville today who are judged more on their poster appeal than the merits of their music, Berwick is not afraid to take the listener to that dark side, that desolate and heartbreaking place where dreams die hard. Performing on the album are Berwick's former band mates, guitarist Rick Devries, bassist Nick Verbic, and drummer Rob Sury. "The last thing I wanted was the slick Nashville sound'' said Berwick."I wanted to capture what it really sounded and smelled like on the road and in the trenches of life, and I knew no better way then with my old band. "These guys stood behind me for years as we played dump after dump for half a dozen drunks and an occasional dog, and this album tells some of those stories in all their beer drenched glory."

Though well below the radar throughout most of his career, Berwick's die-hard spirit and gritty songs have earned him due respect from critcs and fans weary of the cookie cutter fluff churned out by the country music industry, and his albums have earned several top ten album of the year awards, and americana artist of the year awards.

Like the country outlaws before him, Berwick lives the songs and then writes about them, and from the titles on his new album it's obvious the living hasn't always been easy. The only things that ever did come easy for this fifty one year old veteran are the hard breaks, yet Pete Berwick carries on down the road less travelled regardless of the potholes and roadblocks. Call it roots rock, call it americana, call it alternative country or call it cowpunk. In the end, it's "Just Another Day In Hell."

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Pete Berwick & The Nashville Underground 1992 Performing "Ain't No Train Outta Nashville"

"Standing At The Gates" Live From The Motel

"Hello Hand" Live @ Zanies Comedy Club Live Taping Psycho Babble Show

Member Since:

December 12, 2006

Influences:

BUY ALBUMS BY PETE BERWICK HERE:

JUST ANOTHER DAY IN HELL

I don't rightly remember where I first met Pete Berwick…might have been at the car wash, in the rows of one of Nashville's many pawn shops, or maybe during a barfight in some back-alley Music City dive. You know what they say about the '80s…if you can remember the decade, well…. What I do remember is that Berwick was the real deal, singing the truth to a mud-crusted, foggy-thinking Music Row establishment too deaf to hear the honesty in the guy's rough-hewn vocals, too rabbit-scared to face the reality portrayed by Pete's lyrics. Hell, they all but crucified Steve Earle back in the day – there's no way that they'd embrace Berwick's heresies. The country music biz might have preached "traditionalism" back in the day, but when faced with an artist too proud and talented to genuflect at the altar of Garth, they ran like Little Bo Peep and her sheep in the opposite direction. Fast-forward to 2009 and Just Another Day In Hell. Nashville's star-making machinery routinely crushes the souls and dashes the hopes of country music hopefuls, but in Pete Berwick's case, they couldn't stomp out the man's dreams. Here he is with a new album, his best yet, bringing blood, sweat, and balls back to a country music genre sorely lacking in all three. In Nashville, conventional wisdom says, it "all begins with a song." Problem is, too many Music Row tunesmiths are pets kept on a short leash by the artists they hope will record their songs. Berwick pens his own reality and, much like Hank, Waylon, Townes or Steve, his songs are inhabited by heartbreak, humor, insight, and emotion. For instance, consider the Dylanesque remembrance that is "I Fought With Angels." Fraught with regret, the song's bone-chilling weariness is reinforced by searing guitarplay and a high lonesome harp. "Cold Wind (Baby Come Home)," like John Prine's best material, provides a perfect balance between the simplicity of song and the complexity of emotion. The ribald "Hello Hand" is scatologically funny in its embrace of Onanism, while the title cut, "Just Another Day In Hell," is a wry jail song in the mold of Johnny Cash or Merle Haggard. Berwick deftly illustrates that there's more than one kind of prison cell, and that the bars that keep us in are sometimes of our own making. That's just a few songs from Just Another Day In Hell – the rest are every bit as good, each and every one delivered with a reckless country spirit that is equal parts juke-joint soul and honky-tonk energy. Berwick still rocks too hard for Nashville, but isn't that why God and Gram Parsons created alt-country music? No, I don't remember where I met Pete Berwick, but I'm glad that I did. Pete and his music keep getting better with age, and Just Another Day In Hell sounds like a cold beer at the end of 500 miles of broken road…it's just that damn good! Rev. Keith A. Gordon, ramblin' man & Pete Berwick fan…. Rev. Gordon authors the About.com Blues Guide, and is a regular contributor to Blurt Magazine. In the past, his wriitngs have appeared in Creem, High Times and Harp Magazine, among many others.

AIN'T NO TRAIN OUTTA NASHVILLE

Pete Berwick has been around the block a time or two and is very much a throwback to the 1970s outlaw movement rather than today's country mainstream. Though recorded in Nashville, on this album, he's the embodiment of everything that all those chin-out, tough-guy country young 'uns on CMT would try to become if they borrowed a clue from Hank Jr. or any of the other real dudes. His songs are dark, sad, funny, spooky, hell-raising, fascinating and always interesting. The titles give it away: Rebels And Cadillacs, Only Bleeding, Devil Knows His Name and Rusted Ball And Chain. He opens up with "Rebels And Cadillacs" a real kicker and a great upbeat tune. An out-and-out rural rocker with a chuck Berry inspired lead guitar and in-your-face vocal onslaught. "When I'm Gone", "The Years We Left Behind", and "This Used To Be A Town" might seem either abrasive or unconvincing if voiced by someone with a less muscular and rich delivery. "Can't Hide The Tears" recalls the hey-day of Jason & The Scorchers--- cowpunk with attitude and soul. Cutting edge electric lead guitars, sawing fiddles, haunting harmonicas, a solid bass-and-drum rhythm section and rough' n' ready vocals that spit out real life experiences. There's nothing pretty or ordinary about this. Pity there ain't no train outta Nashville, it could have taken all those country wimps to Vegas or Branson and left Music Row to the likes of Pete Berwick and instilled some much needed guts, soul and reality into today's country.----

AC (MAVERICK MAGAZINE. The new voice of country music)

ONLY BLEEDING

Here's a guy who's been writing, performing, and recording for over thirty years, and you can hear the battle scars. This is authentic Americana rock with occasional forays into punk. Imagine Bruce Springsteen performing songs by the Ramones." -- Jennifer Layton, Indie-Music.com

Berwick's Jack Daniels soaked vocals are raw and rough-edged, as he sings songs from a discerning and familiar point of view. Berwick weaves his early cowpunk influences with contemporary and traditional styles to create a musical mosaic, which is diverse, yet comprehensive and extremely individual, and deeply rooted in American music.--Tony Engelhart, Crud Magazine

A veteran of both the Nashville and Chicago music scenes, Pete Berwick's 2002 album Only Bleeding showcases all of his various influences and incarnations, the songs mixing rock, country and blues in the creation of a heady musical elixir.-- The Rev. Keith A, Gordon, Creem Magazine

I think this was the soundtrack to a barfight the other night. Cool roadhouse rock. You can feel the bottles breaking and cigarettes burning behind these songs. Cool acoustic storytelling, but rebuilt for the bar with some electrified twang and gravel-throated delivery. Rating: 10 -- Black Bart, cdstreet.com

Sounds Like:

Johnny Cash, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Steve Earle, Drive By Truckers, Jason And The Scorchers, Georgia Satellites, Tom Petty, Charlie Daniels, Hank Williams jr, Rolling Stones, Waylon Jennings, Jerry Lee Lewis

Record Label:

Shotgun Records