“You never know where someone is going to hear you; ya’ know? Bluesville is a blessing, I’m so happy to be on there,” says Detroit born and current Jersey City, NJ resident Eliza Neals as she covered all of the bases from her past to the present as well as the upcoming release of her new album “Badder to the Bone,” due out April 23 via E-H Records and on all the major platforms.
Growing up in and around Detroit and learning a love of music from a young age, Eliza seemingly knew she was destined for the stage but once she enrolled in a music school at Wayne State, she discovered that life’s journey can take you down some unintended roads; hers led to being “Discovered” and eventually to the blues.
“I studied with Barrett Strong, Barrett Strong of “Heard It Through The Grapevine,” “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone,” “I Wish It Would Rain;” learning the Motown and soul thing and R & B but I really grew up with my family and sisters doing the blues, southern rock, classic rock and then I studied opera too, if you can believe it,” she said with a slight laugh. ”I went to music school and studied opera and piano and I’d been singing in all of the clubs in Detroit five nights a week while I was going to music school. I was sitting in at Bert’s; have you ever heard of Bert’s? It’s like the longest running jazz club in Detroit where you go there and you sit in and if they like you they let you stay and if not they boo you off of the stage; kind of like The Apollo. I’d go there and sit in at places like that and people would tell me, wow, you have a voice for the blues; people would tell me that all of the time. No matter where I’d sing I’d hear, you should sing some Etta James, you should sing some Bessie Smith, Koko Taylor; they thought my voice went with that. So, I started doing a lot of the ballads; Etta James “At Last” and stuff like that and then I started writing more songs in that vein but they always had a blues rock tinge to them. It has been a long road doing it, I sang in cigar clubs and I don’t even know how I did it; five sets from seven o’clock until two o’clock in the morning in these huge smoke-filled rooms; I would be dead now if I had to do that (laughs).”
Lead by Motown, Detroit has always been known for its strong music scene and it is one in which Neals was and still is firmly entrenched. So, how does she find life in Jersey and wait; did she say opera?
“I’m in Jersey City, I moved here about 12 years ago but I’m from the Detroit area and I go back and forth a lot because my family is there and everything I did, do and learned was from there,” she explained. “Like I said, I went to music school because my dad said, “You have to get a degree if you live here,” so, I said, OK, I’ll get a music degree that should be easy but oh boy! I had to pick either jazz or opera and I picked opera because I thought it would help me with my training to save my voice if I ever had to sing a lot and it did; it really did help and it helped me a lot. I like it here, it’s so close to New York but I like going back home because it’s home; I like going all over actually. A lot of my tours were cancelled, I was supposed to go to Spain and back to the UK and that’s all pushed back now until the Fall so, I’m regrouping.”
“Regrouping” isn’t the only thing she’s managed to have done. Since the start of the pandemic and ensuing lockdowns, “Badder to the Bone” will be her second release and for this one she brought in some well-known support and even if her quickly rising star and immense talent haven’t quite yet become a household name; they will be soon.
“I have Lance Lopez, I had him guest; I have so many different people that I sit in with and I thought, I’ve got to get him on something. So, I called him up and he said, “Oh yeah! I’ll do it” so, believe it or not, the already released single “Queen Of The Nile” was done in one take; it was just magic, it was crazy. I have Lance and I have Peter Keys from Lynyrd Skynyrd on that song. The Album comes out on April 23 and it is the second one that I’ve done during this lockdown pandemic thing and I just figured that I would write some new tunes. So, we went to Florida and I sat there with my keyboard just staring out the window at some palm trees and started writing these songs on the piano and coming up with the arrangements; starting over again and making sure they were right. I guess it has taken me about two years for this album to write and hash out correctly. I’d sit there and just kept coming up with more and more lyrics that didn’t necessarily go with the music but I came up with enough stuff where I thought, that could be an album; you know? So, that’s what happened. I had the lyrics for “United We Stand” in my music book; I have this book I carry around and I just write lyrics in it all day whenever something hits me and then I also write songs with my friend from Detroit, his name is Mike Puwal and he’s in Nashville. I go there and he helps me produce it and he’s an engineer and we’ve been working together since 1997. He used to run Barrett’s studio in Detroit and Barrett was my mentor and pretty much one of my best friends. So, he ran Barrett’s studio we started working together in 1997 so, this has been blues rock in the making (laughs). People will say, oh, I just heard of you recently but I’ve been around singing a lot especially in Detroit and all over the world now since 2015.”
“The new album is 10-tracks but it is actually nine-tracks because I’ve got two different mixes of “Queen of The Nile,” she continued, “One is almost seven minutes and that is the one they are playing on Bluesville; the long one. I did a shorter one thinking they were going to play that one but I’m glad they are playing the longer one because Lance Lopez is killing it on like a two-minute solo; damn near but the second mix is just a little shorter. Lance is really great, he just came in and knocked it out in one take and I was kind of in awe because it was great. I didn’t even say, let’s do another take just in case; you’re supposed to have another take just in case the tape gets burned up or something (laughs). Thank God it all worked, he did that one take and I said, OK, it’s all good and he looked at me and said; “That’s all?” I said, well, just do one more on “Can’t Find My Way Home” where he’s harmonizing with himself and that was it but next time I’ll get three or four more (laughs). Over the last two years with the lockdown stuff, a lot of my lyrics like “Lockdown Love” are what happened; a lot of the words came from that. “United We Stand,” if we’d all just get together, it’s all a lot of stuff that has been going on; past love affairs even. I mean, it’s a dark comedy if you ask me; ya’ know?”
Sharing stages with countless blues and rock luminaries has become second nature to Neals. Andy Watts, Joe Louis Walker, Walter Trout, Tommy Castro and more have benefitted from her presence and in many cases she theirs but if asked, she’ll tell you her greatest joy comes from her audiences and the things they are capable of giving her in return.
“I love connecting with people,” she said with total sincerity, “When I look out at the audience and I see the people and I know they just want to have fun and let loose and forget about all of the crap that they are going through; my whole thing is, if they’re not having fun then I’m not having fun. So, it’s about making the audience have a blast and if they’re having a blast, then I am; I’m almost directing as I go. I never play a song really the same twice and if you ask my band they’re like; it’s fun! I mean, it’s kind of like a work in progress. They know the song, I get up there and we’re dangerous; we may have a B3 solo for four minutes; it’s action packed, it’s a blast and just so much fun. I guess it’s what I’m meant to do; just play music and hopefully everybody is having a blast with us and it makes me feel happy that they are smiling and dancing. They’ll come up to me after and say; you know what? I had the best time, you made me forget about my divorce or about this or that or I got out of my wheelchair and actually danced for the first time in five years and I was like; whoa. That actually happened to me once and it’s just magic when that happens and it’s actually cathartic for me because I feel so much better because they feel better and it’s like a healing session. I do things with my voice that I’ve never done before, I’m finding new things and I’m like, wow, I’ve never done that before. I’ve used like almost four octaves because I’ve done opera and learned how to go really high or really low; I could do that anyway but do it without hurting myself and if you throw all of that in on a blues tune like “Queen Of The Nile” or another of the ballads that I do; it’s fun, it’s like your pushing yourself to the outer limits. It really is great and then between the musicians, when we are jelling everybody is having a blast. Honestly, if I’m bored for even one second, I’ll throw a stunt like I’ll walk over to the guitar player, stop all of the music and make him do a solo and then he gets better; it’s amazing. We’re pushing each other and when I sat in at a lot of the clubs in Detroit the musicians would do that to me and that’s how I got better because they are always pushing you; OK, you’re gonna do this now and I’d be like; I am? The great Joe Louis Walker taught me a bunch of stuff. I was singing on stage with him at The Mustique Blues Festival and of course Mick Jagger walked in while I was singing and I almost died (laughs). He came in every night at this festival on the private islands of Mustique and I was like wow, look where the blues brought me and I couldn’t believe; you’d never think. He walked in while I was on stage and thank God I didn’t know but my friend took a picture of him doing that Mick Jagger dance (laughs) and Joe was on stage with me and he said, “Eliza!” I said; what? He said, “You’re running around and doing great but take a break and let them do some work; you’re working so hard” and I was like, oh, OK, you’re right. So, he taught me little things like let them do the work, chill out a little bit and then come back; he’s amazing. Then he picked a song for me to sing that I didn’t even know and I just made up the words but it worked and he loved what I did, he said it was within the realm of the blues and it made sense and it was on the spot in front of 500 people but that’s what happens, you just do it; right?”
Yes, yes you do and what she’s doing is rapidly garnering a ferocious reputation as a live entity; even being called an “East Coast Beth Hart,” a compliment of the highest order given Hart’s well-documented high-energy, let it all hang out, leave it all on stage performances. Once “Badder to the Bone” which she says is, “Kind of an homage to George Thorogood” is released; will we see her and the band coming to a venue near us soon?
“I was in Florida and I did a bunch of gigs there, I was there for four months and then I came back to the East Coast and did some stuff and then I came back here to Jersey, then I went to Detroit and did The Token Lounge and recorded and now I’m back here for a minute and the next things that I’m doing are The Cape Cod Music (Fest); then to Iowa for a big festival and then another show in Cleveland and then a couple of more festivals that I’m working on but I can’t say yet. I should have a couple of more things for the summer but like I said, a lot of stuff got rescheduled for the Fall due to the pandemic.”
To discover more about the intense artistry of Eliza Neals, please visit http://elizaneals.com/.
That's it for this week! Please continue to support live and original music and until next week....ROCK ON!
