On 24 February 2019, acclaimed singer songwriter A.J. Croce will perform a rare UK show at the 100 Club. Tickets are available from: https://www.the100club.co.uk/events/a-j-croce/
A.J. Croce’s nine albums encompass Soul, Blues, Folk, Pop, and Jazz, have been released via both major and independent labels, and have charted 17 Top 20 singles and all nine albums on the radio including on Top 40, Americana, Independent, Blues, Jazz, and Radio 1. Over his 20 year career he has shared the stage with an innumerable list of eclectic artists from Lyle Lovett to Ray Charles, Béla Fleck to James Brown, Lenny Kravitz to Morphine, and Rod Stewart to Dave Matthews.
A.J. Croce has also sat in with many notable artists including Willie Nelson, Ben Harper, Ry Cooder, The Neville Brothers, and Waylon Jennings. A.J. has done co-writes with acclaimed songwriters including Leon Russell, Gary Nicholson, and Robert Earl Keen and worked with legendary producers such as T-Bone Burnett, Jim Keltner, and Allen Toussaint. He has been seen and heard on shows including David Letterman, Jay Leno, Good Morning America, ACL, MTV, CNN, and E! His music has been featured on television, in films, and commercials including for Coca Cola, Heineken, Levi’s, and most recently in the national U.S. campaign by Goodyear with Dale Earnhardt Jr. A.J. is the son of legendary singer/songwriter Jim Croce.
Jim Croce was as a golden-voiced everyman, a singer-songwriter-guitarist who died too soon, leaving one of pop music’s most beautiful and memorable ballads (written about a young A.J.) in his wake. Croce the younger, on the other hand, is a piano man, first and foremost, and a vocal stylist second. His muted growl pulls from a host of American traditions and anti-heroes — it’s part New Orleans, part juke joint, part soul, but somehow evokes New York, a continuum where John Lurie meets Lou Reed. He is further a songwriter, driven by a personal muse, informed by a life on a boomerang of tragedy.
In 2017, Croce’s ninth studio album was released via Compass Records and is his most soulful album to date, produced by soul songsmith and producer Dan Penn (“Do Right Woman, Do Right Man”). Mostly written by Croce, one song was a co-write with the late great Leon Russell and one is an original Jim Croce composition, never before recorded. The album features many music luminaries including Steve Cropper, Vince Gill, and Jeff Taylor (The Time Jumpers) and an all-star band with David Hood, Colin Linden, Bryan Owings, The Muscle Shoals Horns, and The McCrary Sisters.
2015 marked the 20th Anniversary of his highly acclaimed BMG Records/Private Music release That’s Me In The Bar produced by Jim Keltner, featuring Ry Cooder, Jim Keltner, David Hidalgo, Robben Ford, Sweet Pea Atkinson, and Bill Payne. A re-issue was released via Compass Records on CD and LP in the Fall of last year, which included a bonus song featuring Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers.
A.J. Croce’s eighth studio album Twelve Tales was recorded with six legendary producers across the U.S. over one year including with the late “Cowboy” Jack Clement (Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley), Allen Toussaint (Dr. John, Eric Clapton), Mitchell Froom (Los Lobos, Crowded House), Tony Berg (Fiona Apple, Bob Dylan), Greg Cohen (Tom Waits, John Zorn), and Kevin Killen (Elvis Costello, Peter Gabriel), as well as co-wrote “Rollin’ On” with Leon Russell.
The UK show on 24 February 2019 at the 100 Club is a rare chance for fans of this mercurial talent to witness an intimate show in a legendary venue. Don’t miss out!
“London, like so many great cities, always reminds me more of a hundred different little communities with their own personalities. In my teens I used to save money from gigs in California to fly here and play any pub that had a piano. In those days I’d play Ray Charles, Memphis Slim, Chuck Berry, The Velvet Underground, the Kinks and all kinds of R&B, Jazz or Rock & Roll.
I came in the 1980’s looking for the ghost of 1960’s London and found a town that had put most of its skeletons away.
When I was 16 or 17 there was a vibrant scene here of great songwriters like Elvis Costello, Squeeze, Nick Lowe, XTC, Paul Weller. .. All the 2 Tone groups were huge with my friends and I. It was as if all these artists had taken stock of different genres of 60’s music, from America, England or Jamaica and repackaged them in a shiny new package.
Coming back to play a legendary little club after so many years away seems a bit like visiting a friend you haven’t seen in ages. You pick right back up from where you left off and in the process meet all of their new girlfriends, boyfriends, wives, husbands. It’s good to be back.”
A.J.
