PAUL BURCH

For over two decades, Paul Burch's unique interpretation of American rhythms and roots music has attracted fans and collaborators from punk to honky tonk. “At the risk of being impeached by the bluegrass purists,” wrote legendary music critic Chet Flippo, “I think Burch is the best duet partner Ralph Stanley has found since his brother, Carter Stanley, died in 1966.”

Burch's new album Light Sensitive (April 2020) on Plowboy Records features a dozen parables about living in the modern south. Longtime co-producer and WPA Ballclub bassist Dennis Crouch is featured along with instrumental ace Fats Kaplin and guests Luther Dickinson, Aaron Lee Tasjan, Robyn Hitchcock, and Amy Rigby. 

In a Billboard cover story on the emergence of Americana, Burch's debut  Pan American Flash, was called “extraordinary … establishing Burch as a leader in marrying country’s roots tradition with a modern sensibility.” The album went on to be ranked No. 5 on Amazon.com’s Best Country Albums of the Decade and all of Burch’s subsequent LPs have landed on pop, rock and country “best of” lists in the U.S. and U.K.

In 2015, Burch & the WPA Ballclub were honored with an invitation to perform at the White House with Hip Hop for Public Health as part of Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move campaign with Chuck D and Doug E. Fresh and contributed to the album Hip Hop for Public Health. And his salute to Buddy Holly, Words of Love, found a fan in Holly’s widow, Maria Elena: “Paul has everything Buddy wanted to hear in an artist — his own style and his own sound.”

Peter Guralnick, author of biographies of Sam Phillips, Elvis Presley, and Sam Cooke, wrote about PB & WPA Ballclub for the album Still Your Man:

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?

It’s different every night, but it 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.  Listen to the music. Every time it offers the possibility that this may be the best one yet.

Visit the Discography page to read more about PBs albums featuring the WPA Ballclub, the Waco Brothers, Mark Knopfler, Ralph Stanley, and many more.