Peter Case
“I’ve been told Peter Case (1986) had a big impact on musicians and listeners around the country – the opening salvo of a new singer-songwriter movement that would become known as Americana – and I was the first songwriter of my generation of musicians to turn from rock toward an acoustic sound.”
Three-time Grammy nominee, Peter Case’s work sets the bar for authenticity, passion and imagination and spans a number of genres, including folk, blues, and rock. Raised in Buffalo, NY, Case came to the Bay area in 1973 and worked as a street musician and played in the seminal power pop group The Nerves, before moving to Los Angeles to form the Plimsouls, landing a deal with Geffen Records.
The Plimsouls achieved success with the hit single “A Million Miles Away,” which landed them a role in the movie Valley Girl, as the band performing during the club scenes. Case’s 1986 solo Geffen Record debut revealed deep roots in folk and blues, and earned him his first Grammy nomination for the song “Old Blue Car” as well as the Number 1 spot on the NY Time’s 1986 Best CDs list. Six CDs later, Case earned another nomination for Let Us Now Praise Sleepy John, a remarkable collection of songs that features Case’s voice and a single guitar. It’s clear that Case is a major talent on the Americana troubadour landscape.
Case’s 2010 CD, Wig!, emphasized the rock and blues side of Case’s repertoire, while 2007’s Let Us Now Praise Sleepy John demonstrates what Case can do with just his voice and a guitar. With or without a backing band, Case delivers his songs with both intense passion and introspective nuance.
Find out more about Peter Case at petercase.com
What they are saying about Peter Case
“I really like Peter Case. He is a great songwriter and a magnetic performer.”
-John Prine
“….consistent excellence.” -Robert Palmer, The New York Times
“Peter Case is one of the best songwriters of his generation. As a melodist, he is simply unsurpassable; the apparent ease with which he constructs a song is still boggling. A lot of music has flowed into his style: vintage rock ’n’ roll and soul, the blues, traditional and modern folk. He’s probably the only non-Irish songwriter who can introduce Celtic elements into his music without making me gag. (I vividly remember his early cover of “A Pair of Brown Eyes,” which introduced me, and many others in town, to the Pogues.) The marvel is that all these elements nestle so comfortably against each other. The seams never show in a Peter Case song.“
– Chris Morris, LA City Paper