Nicole Atkins

The shores of New Jersey are littered, quite literally, with small towns whose better days are far in the past. They're towns that have been written about, and sung over; towns that have been mythologized and idealized; and they are the towns that 28-year-old musician Nicole Atkins--a native of Neptune City, located a stones throw from fabled Asbury Park--was born and raised in.

They can be places steeped in their own history, buried under the sense of their own pasts. Places of hey-days and what-once-was. And it's that sense of something lost, and of what perhaps should have been, and what might be, that permeates Atkins's debut, Neptune City.

"Neptune City is just this old place," Nicole says. "There was this glory time, way back when, that I never experienced, but that you cannot escape if you live there. Everyone talks about. They almost yearn for it, but I never experienced it. So maybe this album is my attempt to build something new on top of all that."

It's these environs that brought her to where she is today. Nicole was that kid slightly out of touch. When her friends were collecting the latest New Kids on the Block album, she was raving about Traffic or Cream. At the age of 13 she found an old beat up guitar in the attic of her house. It had belonged to an uncle who died when he was young, and she taught herself to play a Grateful Dead song. Her father turned her on to blues artists like Jimmy Reed, and allowed Nicole to sit in on sessions with local musician friends. And then she left that town, that place, behind, attending art school in North Carolina, where she played for three years with the North Carolina alt-country band Los Parasols before making a name for herself as a solo performer on New York City's anti-folk scene. She slept in an old Dodge Ram Charger on Avenue A, finally, with a little help from her friends, among them David Muller (occasionally a member of Yoko Ono's band, Fiery Furnaces and Fischer Spooner) finally discovered her own sound.

And it's that sound that washes over Neptune City, produced by Tore Johansson (Cardigans, Franz Ferdinand, OK Go, Saint Etienne, New Order), an album that sounds like it came from anywhere but the New Jersey Americana rock tradition made famous by Bruce Springsteen. Her music ranges far afield: at some times vaudevillian, at others psychedelic, a little bit country, a dash from early musicals, all under a cloud of pop-noir, often all coming in the very same song. Atkins writes songs that could have come from an episode of Six Feet Under, or an updating of Grease, as directed by David Lynch.

The characters in her tunes seem to live in an idealized past. "This record is the history of my town; it's the history of my family and friend in this town," she explains. "From the time I was a kid I started collecting these sad little tragically beautiful personal stories from the people in my life, and my own as well. That sense of history really appeals to me as an artist." These tales became her blue prints, her inspiration, that would become songs like "Maybe Tonight," a Ronnettes sounding traipse about a possible chance meeting, or "The Way It Is," a dark and haunting defense, an insistence by someone hell bent on finding out for herself that something might be wrong. But it might be right, too.

The record calls to mind Roy Orbison if he were a woman; the bleak visions of Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen; the darkly mysterious girl group-on-acid musings of Julee Cruise and Lynch composer Angelo Badalamenti; the sorrow of Patsy Cline, the ‘60s experimentation of Love and Nuggets; all with a redeeming sense of hope amidst the emotional wreckage that is all Nicole. A sense that's perfectly captured on "Cool Enough," on which she sings, "I don't care where you're going/You're taking me with you/This place got nothing that I could want/But I think that someday, I might feel different/But still, that's someday/Still that's someday/So take me with you."

"War Torn" is about the frustration of a long-distance relationship that inevitably must end for your own good, while "Neptune City," with its double-tracked harmonies providing its ghostly atmosphere, is an elegy, an homage, to her home.

Over everything, Atkins brings a painterly quality to her music, fitting for a woman who studied illustration while at UNC Charlotte, and still has her own mural business. Her songs are aural paintings, mixing and matching colors and sounds.

"That's why I have such a hard time playing solo these days," says Nicole, who plied her trade in hundreds of bars North Carolina, New York, and New Jersey before attracting the attention of a major entertainment attorney, who helped her get signed. "When I write a song, I think about all the different layers that will go on top of it."

In the end, Neptune City comes across as a restoration project in a way, an attempt to build something new on something old. There's an acute subtlety to the art of restoration. Do it wrong and you're simply cribbing the past. Do it right and you're actually, in a profound way, carrying it forward into today. And that's what Neptune City accomplishes. It brings its past with it, carries its heart on its sleeve, and strides hopefully into a better day it can hardly imagine, but hopes will be there nonetheless.

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10/06/07 SUBZERO STEAK, SLASH AND SALVIA
I'm writing this from the mountains of Wyoming. We're out on tour again right now. I figured I'd fill you all in on the last week, which has by far been the most far out week of my life. Last Tuesday my record finally came out! my friend J from the Cloud Room sent me a text that he ran out to the Virgin Megastore in NYC the night before at midnight. I sat in my apartment in no man's land Asbury Park cursing the fact that there are no record stores on the shore anymore because i wanted to experience that. ah well. not a big deal. The next morning me and Paul and my friend Colin and hairdresser lady Marina were picked up to go to the city...to play on the David Letterman show. I dont think I slept the entire night. We got to the Ed Sullivan Theatre (whooaaa!!!) and I sat in the freezing studio getting my hair done and having a mild panic attack while Colin and Paul went out to buy my cd and a fifth of Jack Daniels for them and a little bottle of wine for me. I think they were more nervous than I was. We found out that Slash was going to be on the show with us. His dressing room was right next to mine so I called all my bandmates and their girlfriends into my dressing room so we could all meet him. There were almost 14 of us in this tiny ass dressing room. I saw Slash walk to the bathroom so I waited for him to come out and was like "Yo Slash, sup?" and he was nice and came into our room and said hey to everyone and asked why we had so many people in there. I wanted to be like "because we're all stalking you!" but I didnt. It was so surreal because I was thinking "damn, when i was in 7th grade, my first band, Whiplash, all we did was cover the GnR Lies record." and now here I was chatting up fucking Slash before we were about to be on the same talk show. And 18 years later he is still rocking leather pants and a top hat. timeless. So they called our name down to play. "5 minutes for Nicole Atkins." holy fuck. i went down to the side of the stage and did some jumping jacks in my heels. it really is like 40 degrees down there. all i could think about was "what if i fall in these heels," "what if we fuck up the chorus" "what if i make fraggle faces on tv" but then i went on stage and boom! nothing. total ease. Before we even started playing Letterman said thanks for us being on the show. It caught me off guard but was so awesome. We played better than i ever imagined we would. To say it was fun would be an understatement. After we finished Dave came out and shook my hand but wouldnt let go. It was funny, a bit creepy and totally awesome. He said we were fantastic, Paul Shaffer agreed and said he liked my shoes, then Dave leaned in and said "You wanna go get a steak?" YEAH! I guess that was a figure of speech for "good job" because we didnt get that steak after but whatevs. We all piled in a van buzzing and went to set up for our release Monster Ball at Union Pool in Brooklyn. The Sea and I dressed up as the Lost Boys. MIntzer was the one with the long hair that gets electrocuted at the end. I had this curly long haired wig to lend him. it was amazing. He looked like the bastard son of the Parlor Mob and the Wildbirds. His girlfriend was so grossed out it was perfect! Everyone came out to the party decked to the nines. I swear everyone from Jersey was completely shitfaced, in true garden state form. My parents were buddying up with the bartender, people were dancing and singing along. Then after we played, Dave Hollinghurst's other band, Hand of Doom, came out in wizard costumes and played Black Sabbath covers. They had a huge skull as a backdrop that vomited smoke out it's mouth. After that we wheeled some tvs on stage and all watched the Letterman show. Everyone was whooping it up. It looked so amazing. Derek and I caught eachother weeping backstage after and started laughing upon being discovered. It really was the most perfect day. Everyone had to be carried home drunk, blissful and triumphant. The next day we all groggily packed to leave for tour the next evening. I got picked up at 5am to catch the train to Seattle to meet the band. In order to get our van out to Seattle, i enlisted the help of VW Dan and his mystic friend Jimmer to drive our van out there to meet us. While i was checking my boarding pass, the lady informed me that i couldnt bring my flight case and amp on the plane bc even though i paid for an overwieght bag, it was way past regulations. I begged her. No dice. I begged three other people there. No dice. I was about to miss my flight, couldnt leave the amp, couldnt go to Seattle without it. I was fucked. I hate to admit this but I got a bit teary eyed and this kind woman with cornrows came out of nowhere and was like, "Quit your crying, we got it on for you." Amen! I thanked her profusely and got on my plane with 5 minutes to spare. Once in Seattle I met up with VW Dan and Jimmer. They looked completely blissed out. They told me how they took all of these dirt roads and backways across the country and had this CB radio installed in the van so we could talk to all the truckers and find out where the cops were. They are too funny. Dan owns "the best damn carpet cleaner in town." so he put this sticker on the back of the van that says "i just got my rug scrubbed." Oh man! Apparently Jimmer is this crazy mellow hollistic dietitian that travels the world surfing. we all met up with the band and then my buddy Neil from the band the Virginia Reel in Charlotte, NC, who agreed to be our tour manager for this run, met us and we all walked around Seattle till it was time to get to the gig. VW and Jimmer had this legal hallucinogen called Salvia that apparently makes you trip for 5 minutes. Or according to them "makes you see and feel the entire fabric of the universe." They are like straight from a movie. They had us dying laughing the whole time. I said I wanted to try it but they insisted that I read the Celestine Prophecy first. haha! The show at the Crocodile Club in Seattle was fun. We were all exhausted from all the traveling but once on stage, I couldnt feel it. The whole staff was super nice and the crowd was all ages and very enthusiastic. The ages of the crowd actually ran the whole gamut and there were more than a handful of people there because they said they saw us on Letterman and digged us. It worked! After lots of hugs and some spiritual travel advice, VW Dan and Jimmer and us parted ways. They headed back to the Jersey Shore and us, to Olympia Washington for a much needed sleep at Derek's parents house. Derek's folks are A+ cats. They cooked us a huge meal of sourdough pancakes and loaded us up with sandwiches and blankets for the road. They are funny and easygoing. Just like Derek. True Westies. I actually dont remember much of the Eugene gig. Mostly because we drove for a while, played and left back to Derek's folks house again. It was good though. People danced. The next morning we headed to Vancouver, BC. Once at the border we were informed that Neil, our tour manager, wasnt allowed over the border because of some misdemeanor drinking incident that happened three fucking years ago. So lame. So we hugged Neil before he set out on his way to find a bar to sit at for 6 hours in Blaine, Washington. Poor guy. Once we were in Vancouver, we had pretty much no time to soundcheck. The show was another all ages show so there was a curfew. Derek and Dan got in a little scuffle with the soundguy, who besides being a giant dickhead, gave us pretty good sound. Me and the Dan's went out for sushi with Dan Chen's high school friends. and let me tell you, Vancouver has hands down the best sushi I've ever had. Kid Rock was playing across the street. I always wondered what type of people actually listen to Kid Rock. I found out. Bankers in their forties who take limos to concerts and wear snakeskin cowboy hats. Hahah, my mom told me the other day that she likes Kid Rock. Not his music but she thinks he seems like a nice guy. My mom. hahah! Anyways, we met alot of really sweet people from the crowd at the Vancouver show. Canadians are sweet. They have really great taste in music too. Then we headed back to the border only to discover that Dave left his guitar there and I left all the merch. We are forgetful idiots so i guess we really did need Neil there to cover our sorry asses. After much bullshit again at the border. Seriously, the border guards can eat a giant bowl of dicks. We finally picked up a very drunk Neil from a bar in Blaine called Pastimes Casino. The tale of his night was outrageous. After he left us and walked back to Blaine like the Border patrol told him to do, he was stopped by another border patrol guy. The man said "Hey, I'm stopping you because you look suspicious." (btw, neil looks like a very normal boy next door type) so Neil goes why is that? "Because you are walking with a suitcase" After a bit of expaining he went on his way and found a bar called the Wheel Shop. As soon as he entered and sat down to order a drink he was accosted by a man in his 60's who basically said "you! get your fucking suitcase and get the fuck out of here now!" huh? "we dont like your kind around here, get the fuck out!" whoaaa! so neil high tailed it outta there defeated yet a third time in an hour. Finally he settled at Pastimes, who too, gave him a hard time about his suitcase but let him stay after paying a five dollar cover. He drank chivas and got hit on by 50 year old women and listened to a band that played some pretty bad covers but did some good obscure byrds tunes he liked. After we picked him up he regaled us with this story in such humourus detail that you had to be there. Now we've been driving for about 20 hours with another 4 to go. The landscape is incredible. Mountains, planes, snowcaps, trees, valleys. I've never actually seen anything like this in person before. It seems like the perfect place to set off fireworks. The stars last night were like an irish girls face and shoulders. We've been sitting in the van > perfecting our Neil Young impersonations, singing Wings songs, watching Kill Bill over and over again. and reading the Celestine Prophecy, in hopes that when i get home in two weeks, I too, will see the fabric of the universe.