"I've never written a song that was hypothetical. They're all real and about my life," says Paolo Nutini. It's an approach that has served most of the great singer-songwriters down the years, whether they've escaped from a dull mining town in Minnesota or been brought up - as in Paolo's case - in a chip shop in Paisley, near Glasgow.
At 19, his songs suggest he knows an awful lot about the vicissitudes of life and love. Let's not heap patronising platitudes upon him by calling him 'an old head on young shoulders' or 'mature beyond his years'.
Paolo Nutini isn't really any of those things. Nor is he the latest Bob Dylan or the new Damien Rice. He's simply a sharp, open-hearted, hugely talented young man with a unique gift for expressing in song the typical attitudes and experiences of someone his age. He describes his debut album as nothing more or less than a record of the last two or three years of his life. Songs about leaving home, about missing friends and family, about the highs of being in love and the lows of falling out of love.
Tuesday, July 21st
Terminal 5
610 W 56th St
New York, NY10019
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