PAUL BURCH, a writer of unmistakably modern but instantly classic songs, released his new album Still Your Man via Ramseur Records in 2009 with his longtime band the WPA Ballclub. Burch produced the album with WPA bassist Dennis Crouch (Robert Plant & Alison Krauss) and former Jayhawk Jen Gunderman. The album features guests Kelly Hogan (Neko Case) and Tim O’Brien. The album won a spot on the Grammy ballot for 2009 Best Americana Album of the Year.
Born in Washington D.C. Burch's family had close ties to the art and music scenes. “My grandmother was program director for WWDC in the 50's. She knew Chuck Berry and Link Wray so I always had great music in my life." Inspired by a Jason & the Scorchers concert at age 15, PB took up drums and guitar.
Arriving in Nashville in the early 90's, Burch formed the WPA Ballclub and began a residency at Tootsie¹s Orchid Lounge. His marathon shows helped spark the ‘Lower Broadway Revival' bringing international attention to the live music scene in Nashville. The collective scene blended honky tonk, folk, blues, and pop into a style that would eventually be dubbed Americana. Burch's debut album Pan American Flash was hailed by Billboard editor Chet Flippo as "extraordinary, establishing Burch as a leader in marrying country's roots tradition with a modern sensibility” and was Amazon.com’s Top 5 Country cd’s of the 90s’
Burch has collaborated with stylists in every genre of popular music including Ralph Stanley, Lambchop, Beverly Knight, Mark Knopfler, Bobby Bare, the Mekons, Vic Chesnutt, and the Grammy nominated comeback by Charlie Louvin. Burch also served as music consultant to the PBS film “The Appalachians" and composed the soundtrack album Last of My Kind for Tony Earley's NY Times bestseller Jim the Boy.
Critics have praised Burch’s 7 albums as “music that sounds thoroughly modern but completely unlike contemporary country” (USA Today) and Entertainment Weekly has called him "a modern day Jimmie Rodgers".
Peter Guralnick, author of biographies on Elvis Presley (Last Train to Memphis) and Sam Cooke (Dream Boogie) says: "I'm a Paul Burch fan. How could I not be? How many other contemporary artists have forged a body of work of such cleverness and coherence, careful craftsmanship and white-hot heat, with all the zeal of the most dedicated student and all the passion of a true original? His music never fails to achieve its purpose, what Sun Records founder Sam Phillips has deemed the unequivocal purpose of every kind of music: to lift up, to deepen, to intensify the spirit of audience and musicians alike."
