Press & Reviews
The Hook – Culture, Art & Culture in the Lower Hudson Valley
Jan. 2010
Special feature issue – music
Jamie Block – A Universe Rekindled
In a decade preceding his 30th birthday, alt-folk/anti-folk/songwriter Jamie Block had something a lot of musicians wish they had too, but probably never will: an original record deemed "perfect as is" by Capital Records, and signed and released into the public domain exactly the way he wanted it. The music press was equally dazzled by that 1998 album, Timing is Everything. The same press that had also praised his fist album, Lead Me Not into Penn Station, two years before. For all intents and music-career purposes, this bright, sardonic and intently observant English-major transplant from Chapel Hill was well on his way to claiming a primo chink of the universe as his own. But by the time he was 30 touring, partying, exhaustion and doubt overtook him. He was, as he puts it, "done, forget it, good-bye."
In 2001 he wound up on Wall Street, having being hired by an investment firm that figured if Block could get himself signed to Capital, he could sing just as convincingly about the value and risk of investing. As it turned out, he sang quite well and in time, settled into the life of a financial advisor. Then early one morning a few years later, dressed in a suit and driving to Manhattan, he heard one of his songs on WFUV. As the song ended, Dj Claudia Marshall began talking about the talents of a vanished artist named Jamie Block, and a remarkable album he'd put out a few years earlier. "She literally said, 'Jamie. Phone home," he recall, before long, he was interviewed on WFUV and, thanks to Marshall, reacquainted with the beauty, faith and approval of a universe he'd convinced himself was lost forever. "Jamie, she say, "you put out a great album and you work on Wall Street. Get over it."
He did. And years later, while still working on Wall Street, Block released The Last Single Guy, and quickly found himself "welcomed home" by enthusiastic reviews and audiences alike. Today, he's not about to give up his day job, but his is back into music in a way that's less frenetic and more on his terms. The future, he says, is "best left undefined." but for the present, there's another album in the works. Which means for Jamie Block-and his fans-all is right in the universe. Again.
By Paul Clark