Never Too Late to Call Paul Thorn

• 1Two Tears of Joy03:00
• 2It's Never Too Late to Call03:01
• 3Sapalo03:09
• 4Breaking up for Good Again03:35
• 5What I Could Do03:53
• 6Here We Go02:48
• 7Apple Pie Moonshine03:24
• 8Sapphire Dream03:59
• 9You Mess Around & Get a Buzz03:09
• 10Goodbye is the Last Word03:41
• 11Holy Hottie Toddy03:35
• Total Runtime37:14

Info for Never Too Late to Call

Seven years in the making, Never Too Late To Call features all original material, some songs written by Thorn, others co-written with his friend and longtime manager Billy Maddox. The album was recorded at Sam Phillips Studio in Memphis and produced and engineered by Grammy winning wunderkind Matt Ross-Spang.

Some years ago I happened to see Paul Thorn performing on an outdoor stage at a street festival in the heart of a small Mississippi town. Suddenly, in mid song, Thorn stopped playing and looked down at the upturned, sugar-splattered face of a fan on the front row. “I sure would like me a funnel cake,” Thorn announced. The crowd exploded with laughter. By the end of the next song, someone in the audience had responded, and soon Thorn was happily munching on the doughy confection.

And that, dear people, is one more shining example of how Paul Thorn is able to breathe in the air around him, everyday and commonplace, and exhale something original and often side-splitting funny. It’s a kind of genius, and it’s there plain to see, in his music, his art and through his performances, which not only showcase his chops as a singer-songwriter, but as a pitch-perfect improv comic.

His audiences love it. And they come back for more because no two Paul Thorn performances are alike. For further confirmation of this, check out Thorn’s YouTube videos, though I warn you. You will find yourself a long time in this rabbit hole.

We live in a world where the terms “artist” and “genius” have been rendered meaningless through overuse. To use either in describing Thorn, though, is not overreach. Pick up any of his dozen or so CDs. The evidence is plain to see. Just listen.

The scenery of Thorn’s rural South is changing. The trailer parks, gravel roads around Tupelo and high school beauty queens flicker in the rear-view mirror. Two years ago, Thorn returned to his early gospel roots with the release of “Don’t Let the Devil Ride.” In contrast with earlier work that riffed on short-term love affairs, as well as “kissing the right one good-bye,” the writing on Thorn’s latest release, “Never Too Late To Call” features music from a man who is with the “right one” and is happy to be there.

This offering, seven years in the making, features all original material, some songs written by Thorn, others co-written with his friend and longtime manager Billy Maddox. The CD was recorded at Sam Phillips Studio in Memphis and produced and engineered by Grammy winning wunderkind Matt Ross-Spang.

In the case of what is arguably the CD’s most tender composition, “Sapphire Dream,” Thorn teamed up with his daughter Kitty Jones, who co-wrote the song and accompanies her dad on vocals.

Jeweled birds fly under crushed velvet skies
And the blue rain don’t fall on me
The sun is on our face; it’s a perfect place
And the one I love is here with me, in my sapphire dream

Particularly poignant is “Breaking Up For Good Again.” On this track, Thorn is accompanied by his wife Heather. Their harmonizing is not only lovely, but resonates with a ring of truth known to two who have driven together that rutted, bumpy road every married couple must travel.

Counselors of would-be newly-weds would do well to require their young charges to read and discuss the lyrics of this song:

Anger, tears and pride, are hard to hide, I lost my cool
I said some hurtful things, I did not mean, we both were fools
I know we need some space, I’ll call you in a couple days
We’ve come this far by now we know
We’ll never let each other go

Much has been written about Thorn’s early years performing in his father’s Pentecostal church and later coming under the tutelage of his Uncle Merle, a pimp and small-time hustler. While those early relationships were formative and offered their attractions, the admonition of Jesus to love one another seems to hold powerful sway with Thorn.

I asked him about it.

“I’ll tell you where I got that from. My father was a minister, and one of his strongest qualities was he had time for the big people and little people too. … In fact, I went and visited him yesterday, and when I got there, there was a guy standing on the porch, dirty clothes, hadn’t had a bath.

“My mom walked on the porch and she gave him a two-liter 7-Up bottle filled with water because he didn’t have water in his house. She gave him a plate of fried chicken for his supper and told him he could come back tomorrow if he didn’t have any food.

“They’re not talking about it. They’re just doing it. If I got it from somewhere, that’s where it came from.”

While that sentiment has been there all along in Thorn’s earlier CDs, it’s more prevalent in “Never Too Late to Call.”

“There’s a theme running throughout the record about people needing each other and reaching out to each other,” Thorn said.

Take for example “Holy Hottie Totty,” the CD’s raucous feel-good closer he co-wrote with Maddox:

Life goes by so fast you better not blink
You might not have as much time as you think
Let go of any grudges while you’re still around
You can’t say you’re sorry when you’re laying six feet in the ground
The best time is right now.

Holy hottie toddy Good God Almighty Love everybody

As is the case with all of Thorn’s songs, the CD’s title track, “It’s Never Too Late to Call,” comes with a story.

He wrote the song for his sister Deborah who died in 2018. When Thorn was on the road, he’d long to talk to someone after his shows, hours after the members of his immediate family were asleep. But his sister, a night owl, would often stay up all night.

“I could call her and she’d always be awake,” Thorn said. “I wrote that song about her.”

The song is one more example of a distinguishing characteristic of Thorn’s work — a quality his fans love — the intensely personal nature of his lyrics. Thorn’s music has always been a reflection of where he’s been or where he is in his life. On “Never Too Late to Call,” we find mellower Paul Thorn. The razor wit and the gently humorous commentary on life’s existential questions are in evidence, but here there is a peace about his life’s journey. Or, to put it in his words, “I’ve been such a lucky boy. I’m crying two tears of joy.” — Bernie Imes

Paul Thorn, guitar, vocals
Chris Simmons, guitar, acoustic guitar, slide guitar, vocals
Michael Graham "Dr. Love", piano, synthesizer, organ
Ralph Friedrichsen, bass, vocals
Jeffrey Perkins, drums, percussion

Paul Thorn
An interesting thing happened on Paul Thorn’s road to recording a follow-up to his most successful release, 2010’s Pimps and Preachers. After writing many discs of semi- autobiographical tunes that have drawn comparisons to John Hiatt and John Prine, the critically acclaimed singer-songwriter - hailed as the “Mark Twain of Americana” - decided to take a detour and do an album of covers. “I wanted to take a break from myself,” Thorn reveals, “do something different, and just have fun.”

The collection, entitled What The Hell Is Goin’ On? (due May 8, on Perpetual Obscurity/Thirty Tigers) finds Thorn putting his own gritty rock stamp on some of his favorite songs. There are some names familiar to Americana fans (Buddy Miller, Ray Wylie Hubbard), some lesser-known (Foy Vance, Wild Bill Emerson) and some surprises. The Buckingham/Nicks tune “Don’t Let Me Down Again” originated on that duo’s debut, not during the Fleetwood Mac era, while the Free song that Thorn chose to cover is an obscure one, “Walk In My Shadow.”

Thorn selected tunes that meant something important to him. “I would hear them in the tour van or I’d be at a festival and see someone perform them live,” Thorn says, “and I'd say ‘That’s a great song, I wish I had written it!’” One thing the songwriters have in common according to Thorn is that they are true artists. “They don’t just write songs in an effort to become popular or follow trends,” he explains. “At the risk of sounding corny, they write with their hearts. None of these songs are cookie-cutter tunes like you hear on the radio today. They all have real depth, which is very appealing to me.”

This set of songs covers subjects that are familiar territory to Thorn, from the spiritual pull of Miller’s “Shelter Me Lord” to the spirited fun in Big Al Anderson’s “Jukin’”. Thorn, so skilled with his own character studies, plays storyteller with such lurid tales as Hubbard’s “Snake Farm” and Emerson’s “Bull Mountain Bridge.” Emerson (who has written for George Jones and Tammy Wynette) is someone, according to Thorn, who “can tell a story in a song like nobody else.”

What The Hell Is Goin’ On? also delivers songs of love and salvation. Vance’s “Shed A Little Light” and Eli “Paperboy” Reed’s “Take My Love With You” are emotionally powerful tunes that really resonated in Thorn. The latter particularly expresses Thorn’s feelings about being on the road and missing his family back home: “Being a touring musician is a blessing and a curse...and Eli put into words what I feel like sometimes.”

What The Hell’s centerpiece is the powerful title track, a blistering look at life in modern times that was penned by blues-rock icon Elvin Bishop. Its message really hits home with Thorn. “We are living in a new world where people are very connected, but also at the same time are disconnected,” Thorn states. “I believe technology in moderation is good but too many folks are walking around wearing ear phones and some have forgotten the lost art of basic social skills.”

The song also is significant because he has developed a friendship with Bishop over the years. “I sometimes visit him at his house when I’m out in California and he always gives me a jar of his homemade jelly that he makes with fresh kiwis from his garden.” Thorn recalls. “He sang this song for me on his front porch one day and it blew me away.” It was also a treat for Thorn to have Bishop perform a guitar solo on the tune – which Thorn describes as “wonderfully raw and dirty.” Other special guests on the album are Delbert McClinton (another Thorn idol) and the marvelous singing McCrary Sisters. The heavy lifting on the album, however, was done by Thorn and, as usual, his touring band (guitarist Bill Hinds, keyboard player Michael Graham, bassist Ralph Friedrichsen and drummer Jeffrey Perkins). “The guys in this outfit are a tight unit and a well-oiled machine,” Thorn proclaims. “I’ve had the same guys in my band for goin' on 15 years and they are incredible musicians.” Another long-time collaborator is Billy Maddox, who Thorn describes as a “genius in the studio,” and who served as What The Hell’s producer. The sense of camaraderie between Thorn, his band and the producer contributes to the disc’s loose, live performances. The lived-in quality is undoubted aided by the fact that Thorn and the band had already played these songs live and honed them into what Thorn calls “crowd-pleasers.”

Thorn has been pleasing crowds for years with his muscular brand of roots music – bluesy, rocking and thoroughly Southern, yet also speaking universal truths. The Tupelo, MS native worked in a furniture factory, jumped out of airplanes, and was professional boxer before sharing his experiences to the world as a singer-songwriter. His last album, Pimps & Preachers, which topped the Americana charts for 3 weeks and broke into the Billboard Top 100, perfectly exemplified the vivid scope of his songwriting but also his family background. While his father is a Church of God Pentecostal minster, his uncle (his father’s brother) spent time as a pimp - and Thorn was influenced by both of these men. Mining these ‘saint and sinner’ scenarios, Thorn crafted a disc that All Music Guide lauded as “a great rock & roll album,” while the Nation labeled it “an incredible find.”

When Thorn and his band hit the road, he’ll be performing both his captivating originals and these favored covers, because, as he states, “there are so many great writers out there whose songs need to be heard.” Thorn also might slip in a new song or two as he already has started writing more songs of his own for the next album.

This album contains no booklet.