The PAUL THORN BAND

Paul Thorn has created an innovative and impressive career, pleasing crowds with his muscular brand of roots music – bluesy, rocking and thoroughly Southern American, yet also speaking universal truths. Among those who value originality, inspiration, eccentricity and character – as well as talent that hovers somewhere on the outskirts of genius, the story of Paul Thorn is already familiar.

Raised in Tupelo, Mississippi, among the same spirits (and some of the actual people) who nurtured the young Elvis generations before, Paul Thorn has rambled down back roads and jumped out of airplanes, worked for years in a furniture factory, battled four-time world champion boxer Roberto Duran on national television, signed with and been dropped by a major label, performed [on stages with Bonnie Raitt, Mark Knopfler, Sting, and John Prine among many others, and made some of the most emotionally restless yet fully accessible music of our time. He’s also appeared on major television shows such as Late Night with Conan O’Brien and Jimmy Kimmel Live, been the subject of numerous National Public Radio (NPR) features and charted multiple times on the Billboard Top 100 and Americana Radio Charts.

This year, Paul released an album titled Don’t Let the Devil Ride, which he describes as “the culmination of my whole life in music, coming back to my roots.” It marks his first time recording gospel music – featuring guests such as the Blind Boys of Alabama, the McCrary Sisters, and Preservation Hall Horns – and his creation of a body of strikingly original songs that address the foibles of human relationships without necessarily favoring the sacred over the profane. 

““My message on this record is ‘let’s get together’—I want to help lighten your load and make you smile.”

SHORT OPENING ACT:
ALICE DRINKS THE KOOL-AIDE
Alice Drinks The Kool Aid is a Blues Based Chicago Indie Rock band founded in a Park Ridge basement in 2014 as a creative outlet for three life long musician friends. The drummer Jim Widlowski is a top session player in the city who has anchored many of the Broadway productions that have come to the city in the past 20 years. The bassist Alan Berliant is a peerless performer who makes his living as a composer of commercial music of all styles. Tony Magee, the founder of Lagunitas Brewing Company manages the guitar and vocal responsibilities. The band’s original material is written and arranged by all three members in congress and draw from the deepest free Jazz and the most fundamental Rock and Blues.
        

TICKET INFORMATION:

ONLINE Tickets available HERE    Or walk up at the RIALTO BOX OFFICE at 318 E Congress,  Box Office open: Mon- Sat, 12-6,  741-1000 

♥ONLY UNTIL DEC. 31♥  Purchase at “no fee” retailers:
(We suggest: call first and please thank them!)
Dark Star Leather, 4980 N Swan. Plaza Palomino, 881-4700
Hours: Mon-Fri- 10-6, Sat 10-5
The Folk Shop, 2525 N Campbell, 881-7147
Hours: 11-6, Tues-Sat.
Antigone Books, 411 N 4^th, 792- 3715 (open Sundays)
Mon- Thurs: 10-7· Fri & Sat: 10-9· Sun- 11-5