Of all the musicians I could’ve sworn were gonna be huge and ended up being a cult band, the great singer songwriter Freedy Johnston is high on my list of complete and total bewilderment. I just plain don’t get why he didn’t break big. From 1990 to 1999, the man released one brilliant album after another, culminating in one of my favorite albums of all time Blue days, Black Nights, which includes “The Palest Light” a song Conor Oberst –indeed any singer-songwriter, Ron Sexsmith, would cut his right arm off to have written.
His breakthrough as it was came in 1994 with “Bad Reputation”, maybe the best song of that year –asong so new York City it name checks Herald Square IN THE CHORUS. It is off This Perfect World –a perfect album of stories seeped in tragedy, especially the title track where a terminally ill man claims he has the right to say goodbye to a daughter he has neglected.
On the 1992 “Trying To Tell You I Don’t Know”, the Kansas born Freedy documented how he got where he was “I sold the dirt to pay the band” and that feeling of a man willing to compromise everything for music has remained over the twenty years since he wrote those words. And his last album, Rain On The City was excellent with the prime Freedy track “Don’t Fall In Love With A Lonely Girl” leading the way.
Freedy will be at Joe’s Pub, a 730p show on Wednesday August 14th. I’ve seen him on stage several times and he is completely excellent, and the price, $15 plus $12 minimum for waiter service, will be worth it. He sold his farm to get here, the least you can do is attend!