Peter Case has enjoyed a storied career that, over the span of five decades, has included playing punk, rock ‘n’ roll, blues and pop and points in between, though, since his first solo album in 1986, he’s mainly been pegged as a singer-songwriter. Over his long haul, he’s busked on corners, experienced (briefly) being the next great thing, operated in relative obscurity and prevailed as a touring solo artist with a loyal cult audience.
Case used to find himself stuck in the loop of the highs and lows and might-have-beens of a life in music, but now, as he approaches his 70s, he’s gratified to still record and tour and have loyal followers turn up to listen to his latest.
On March 23, Case will play at Eddie’s Attic in Decatur, where he’ll feature songs from his 16th solo album, “Doctor Moan.” His first piano-driven album is billed as channeling “spirits of jazz, blues, and boogie-woogie into exquisitely nuanced expressions.”
Case surfaced in 1976 playing bass in the punk trio the Nerves — a band best known for the single ”Hanging on the Telephone,” famously covered by Blondie.
In 1979, Case formed the raucous rock band the Plimsouls, recording albums for Planet/Elektra and Geffen, and releasing the 1982 single “A Million Miles Away,” featured in the movie “Valley Girl.”
His self-titled solo debut was released in 1986, only to be declared album of the year by the New York Times.
“I was kind of basing myself out of Atlanta for a little while then,” Case recalled during a recent phone call from his home in San Francisco.
“I went on the Jackson Browne tour, and then I had some time off and came down to Atlanta. I was hanging out with Kevn Kinney a lot, right before Drivin N Cryin started. He was really into songwriting the way I was.”
Credit: Ekevara Kitpowsong/ The Aperturi
Credit: Ekevara Kitpowsong/ The Aperturi
Now, Case returns to the city on a solo tour. “I’m glad to be going back on the road,” he said. “For me the break during the pandemic was kind of interesting in a way. I made two albums over that period. ‘The Midnight Broadcast’ sort of simulates a late night broadcast on the radio. The next one, ‘Doctor Moan,’ was the result of the pandemic, and not being able to go anywhere. But I’ve got this upright piano here in my front room, and I was depressed, and just decided to play piano every day. I’d been playing with the Saint John Coltrane Church out here, and then these songs just started to pop out.”
In addition to two new albums, the documentary “Peter Case: A Million Miles Away” from filmmaker Fred Parnes was released in 2023.
“The film kind of came up out of the blue,” Case said. “It’s not exactly the movie I would have made, but the guy is a good storyteller, and people seem to relate to it. It tells a lot of my story. But my songs are my films, you know.”
Parnes’ film begins with the infamous story of David Geffen, who had seen Case in a club with the Plimsouls and was convinced he could be the next John Lennon. But Case has a different take on that time.
“He said, ‘I’m going to put out a record, and I’m going to be right behind you, and we’re putting all the promotion people on it. Take yes for an answer. You came to David Geffen. You got exactly what you wanted.’ And then they cut me loose. They kept me on the label. They wouldn’t let me go, but they didn’t support me at all.”
Other sections of the film cover Case’s early life growing up in Hamburg, New York, where he first felt the power of live music.
“I saw the Butterfield Blues Band in 1967,” he said. “I was just a little kid and I saw them in a bar with my parents. They just blew my mind so completely. Paul Butterfield was such a great performer. He gave me a sense of what it means to really bring it to a room. The other show I saw that year was the Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia. Like Butterfield they just really brought it. So I had that as an example.”
Later, Case would use that model to move on from homeless hard times busking around San Francisco to joining a band.
“I was living on the streets when I got in the Nerves,” he said. “That was a whole step up in my life. To play rock ‘n’ roll in a band was, ‘Wow, we’re going somewhere now.’ I learned so much from them. We ended up out on tour with the Ramones in 1977. We played with Mink DeVille. We played Cleveland and the opening act the first night was Devo, and the opening act the second night was Pere Ubu. That was super exciting.”
Summing up a life in music, Case allowed that “it all worked out for the best.”
He added, “I’ve had a great life just being able to go out and play music on the road. My heroes when I was a kid were poets and blues singers. I don’t sit there and worry about the past anymore. I’m not living in the past.”
CONCERT PREVIEW
Peter Case
With Ben de la Cour. 7 p.m. Saturday, March 23. Eddie’s Attic. $22. 515-B North McDonough St., Decatur. eddiesattic.com.
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