Peter Case

(Translated from my original Italian text by ChatGPT and Piero Scaruffi)

A fundamental group for the development of Los Angeles power-pop was the trio of Paul Collins (drums), Peter Case (bass), and Jack Lee (guitar): the Nerves. Their first, self-titled, self-produced EP from 1976 contains three classics of the "Sixties revival" popular at the time: Hanging On The Telephone by Lee (later made famous by Blondie), When You Find Out by Case, a perfect restoration of the garage sound, and Working Too Hard by Collins, a refined ballad.

The Nerves lasted only one season. Then Collins formed the Beat and Case the Plimsouls (traces of Lee were lost). From the EP Zero Hour (Beat, 1980), Case immediately proved to be the most capable heir of the Nerves: the title track is an effervescent soul song sung with Costello-like acerbity and accompanied by a gospel organ; How Long Will It Take is a concentrated blend of melodicism and folk-rock arrangement.

Plimsouls (Planet, 1981) is one of the masterpieces of the genre, alongside the best of Tom Petty and a few others. Case’s vocal register is a mix of youthful Paul McCartney and passionate rhythm’n’blues. The extremely restrained guitar solos and tiptoe riffs of Eddie Munoz, along with the prominent rhythm section of Dave Pahoa (bass) and Lou Ramirez (drums), create a mixture that is elegantly classic and charmingly fresh.
The expressive range is not very wide, confined between mid-tempo Petty-style rock’n’roll like Lost Time and a gritty Who-style ballad like In This Town, between the Beatles-like Now and the garage-rock of Hush Hush. But while the references to ’60s bands and styles are endless, the way their power-pop fuses catchy melodies and driving riffs in songs like Everyday Things is truly unique. All tracks are infused with Merseybeat vocal harmonies, yet simultaneously reinforced with vibrant boogie guitar figures. The album also teems with Stones-like inflections, particularly in the trio of I Want What You Got (soul), Nickels And Dimes (boogie), and I Want You Back (blues). The arrangement masterpiece is perhaps the cover of Women, a rock and roll track with a fast tempo, dizzying bass pulse, a Merseybeat-style chorus sung in a lustful, gritty register halfway between Jagger and Daltrey, and a furious Alvin Lee-style guitar solo.
A master at reworking blues-rock and folk-rock, rock and roll, and beat music, Case was one of the first to perform the reinterpretation process that the Fleshtones would later bring to full glory.

The 45 rpm single A Million Miles Away (self-produced and released in 1982) in particular revived the glory of the Byrds with a slightly harder rock edge.

The Plimsouls’ second album, Everywhere At Once (Geffen, 1983), abandoned the "beat" posturing and displayed more mature arrangements, characterized by a driving, tribal rhythm and blues, as well as a vocal register closer to punk rock than to Merseybeat. Opened by Shaky City, a swingy Stray Cats-style rockabilly, it showcased above all the furious, "anthemic" ditties Magic Touch and Play The Breaks, which used melodic guitar counterpoints and a verve reminiscent of the Monkees.

The Plimsouls, misunderstood despite never releasing a bad record, disbanded in 1984. (Munoz would return to performing only in 1988, with the Walking Wounded, alongside another veteran of that scene, the other guitarist Roger Prescott of the Pop).

Case spent two years wandering, playing in cafés until he arrived in San Francisco. With his first solo album, Peter Case (Geffen, 1986), the leader produced a work very different from his previous band efforts, marked by humility and introspection. His vocal register changed again, becoming a much more personal "roadhouse" tenor. But above all, the purpose of the music had shifted: the martial and mournful Echo Wars, the solemn boogie of Old Blue Car, paint a portrait of America through the eyes of his generation; and not coincidentally, Steel Strings (despite its world-music percussion) and I Shook His Hand (despite its 1950s-style feel) echo the rousing, populist drive of Bruce Springsteen. In his songs there is always a shadow, a trace, a gene, however imperceptible, of the archaic, as demonstrated by the blues of Icewater and the folk of Walk In The Woods. Unknowingly, Case, inspired by T-Bone Burnett, was launching the acoustic folk revival among the ranks of the new wave and punk-rock troops.

Despite the excellent reception from critics and the public, the next album, The Man With The Blue Postmodern Fragmented Neo-Traditionalist Guitar (Geffen, 1989), was released only three years later. Drawing inspiration from Petty (This Town's A Riot) and Springsteen (Hidden Love), the two quintessential singers of the decade, Case continued an artistic trajectory that increasingly moved away from form and leaned ever more toward content. The colorful characters of his small-town theater (Poor Old Tom), and the lively vignettes they inhabit, still place him in a niche of his own within the neo-folksinger scene.

Six Pack Of Love (Geffen, 1992), featuring one of his melodic masterpieces, Dream About You, abandons folk rock in favor of a more passionate and arranged roots-rock. The heart of the album lies in the somber autobiographical confessions of Vanishing Act, Never Comin' Home, and It Don't Matter What People Say.

Sings Like Hell (Vanguard, 1994) confirmed this embrace of the masters’ sound with a collection of archaic traditional songs. The album serves as a metaphor for the transition taking place in his personal life: divorced from Victoria Williams, he remarried and started a new family.

Torn Again (Vanguard, 1995) reconnects to the tradition linking Woody Guthrie to John Hiatt, that of proletarian folk played in a stripped-down, even brutal style (Workin' For The Enemy, Turnin' Blue). Blind Luck, by contrast, is vigorous rock and roll, almost a furious outburst after all the melancholy swallowed during his journey through America of the defeated.

Simplicity reigns supreme on Full Service No Waiting (Vanguard, 1997), his sixth solo album, a work tinged with a slightly senile mood. On Honey Child, Beautiful Grind, and On The Way Downtown, he presents a domestic, bourgeois perspective that, with age, aspires to wisdom. The album closes with the autobiographical Still Playin', which seems to take stock of his life.

Plimsoul reformed for Kool Trash (1998).

A tremendously talented social songwriter, Peter Case has the ability to evoke images as if he were making films rather than music.