RICK BERLIN's “ME & VAN GOGH”
NEW HI-N-DRY RECORDS RELEASE FEBRUARY 7, 2006
“For the uninitiated, be prepared; the songs are startlingly confessional, filled with the kind of soul-bearing + rapid-fire beauty that has always been Berlin’s trademark.” (Kevin O’Hare/Newhouse News)

Hi-N-Dry Records is proud to announce the release of Boston-based songwriter/singer/piano player RICK BERLIN's “ME & VAN GOGH” on FEBRUARY 7, 2006. Berlin’s first release on the label, "ME & VAN GOGH" was recorded at the Hi-N-Dry loft in Cambridge, MA, on the late Mark Sandman’s (phat, low-end) acoustic piano. Billy Conway (Morphine, Twinemen) produced. Tom Dube (Richard Thompson) engineered. Featuring 12 original tunes, “ME & VAN GOGH” is a return to an earlier, more innocent format (Rick Berlin - piano/voice). Simple, skeletal portraiture. The Song Itself - unadorned.

As true as a torn pocket (“Buddha”). As confused as a kid stuck in jail (“A Letter”). As sad as a beautiful girl alone on a street corner, her heart + loss a thousand miles away (“Don’t Talk About Joan”). Absurd as a leering drunk with a beer gut (“Beer Belly”), or a drive past midnight to nowhere (“The Ride”), Berlin creates a world, a town, a topography that seems as familiar as it is unusual. If Van Gogh was alive + wrote songs, they might sound like this album (the title track: “Me & Van Gogh”).

“Berlin’s songs evoke characters as colorful as the crowds that gather to hear them, and he willingly
shares the highs and lows of his life with a level of depth rarely captured through song.”
(Christopher Muther/Bay Windows)

Rick Berlin is a giant on the Boston music scene. His colorful songwriting and strong stage presence
have influenced countless other artists since the early 1970s, when his innovative band Orchestra Luna was on Epic Records and harnessed a potent blend of theater and music years before the Tubes. “Berlin is a throwback - to the androgynous glam of Bowie and the New York Dolls, the glammy punk of Talking Heads and Blondie, and the proto-new wave of Roxy Music. Berlin is the traveling troubadour of the Boston scene, bringing the stories of one neighborhood to another in his songs. Berlin is Boston.” (Jon Garelick/The Boston Phoenix)

Throughout the decades and the shifting fortunes of the business, Rick has continued to make music
with intelligence and integrity, building an international reputation around his knotty, singular piano
playing, straight-from-the-heart singing and a style of character-based songwriting that's drawn favorable comparisons to the likes of Tom Waits and Leonard Cohen - although Rick rocks more than both. “Er heißt nicht nur Berlin, er ist wie Berlin: Wild, ungezügelt, hart, ein Chansonnier, der rauhe Wärme ausstrahlt, immer unfertig, immer auf der Suche, voller Gegensätze. Es ist unmöglich, ihn zu hören, ohne wirklich zuzuhören.” “His name is not only Berlin, he is like Berlin: Wild, harsh, unleashed, a singer-songwriter of raw energy, always searching, never finished, full of contradictions. It is impossible to hear him without truly listening.”
(Robert von Rimscha - Washington Bureau Chief “DER TAGESSPIEGEL” - Berlin/Germany).

“...plucked-from-life stories, tough piano playing. Berlin approaches the piano like a good punk-rock guitarist, driving the grooves in a spare forceful way, yet darting into angular blocks of sound and laying snatches of melody over his rhythm lines. Next to his voice — which rises and sinks like an emotional barometer of his lyrics, his homespun piano style is a most distinctive instrument. He holds nothing back.There’s something genuine and special in the chemistry of his voice, playing, and songs.” (Ted Drozdowski Cellars By Starlight/The Boston Phoenix)

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, REVIEW COPIES OR TO ARRANGE AN INTERVIEW PLEASE
CONTACT: Karen Leipziger/KL Productions (615) 297-4452, klpzgr@earthlink.net