Nice guys do win
Despite selling four million albums and being drooled over by a goodly part of the world’s female population, Paolo Nutini remains one of the most affable, down-to-earth stars around. Ahead of his headline show at this year’s Oxegen Festival, Celina Murphy catches up with the Scottish heartthrob to talk awards, heroes, illegal downloading, Red Bull Jagerbombs – and his new musical direction.
Celina Murphy, 14 Jun 2011
If there are two sides to every performer, there’s no better example than the King Of Soul, Otis Redding. In the six years before his death, the inimitable singer-songwriter flipped happily between the roles of tender balladeer and untamed soul rocker. Sadly, there’s a great portion of the music-loving public who will never know his fiery sweat-soaked, chest-baring side, and for whom his name will conjure the image of a cool-headed Sunday morning crooner.
It’s a story Paolo Giovanni Nutini knows all too well. His lilting, chart-topping drawl conjures up images of a certified prettyboy, grinning out at you from the window of HMV, making you feel 30% paler and 50% less attractive. Nutini the live performer is something entirely different. Crouched over a microphone with his eyes closed, shuffling his feet and digging his fists through the air, he forms the silhouette of an ageless soul skanker wrapped entirely up in the music.
“That’s what I love about it,” he tells me. “It’s not as if there’s a particular stamp or seal of approval. Music is available to every different kind of person and gets heard by every different kind of person and gets judged – and then gets recycled and passed down… or else headed away, never to be heard again.”
The one degree of separation between Nutini and his idol Redding is Ahmet Ertegun, founder of Atlantic Records, who released Redding’s very first single in 1960. Shortly before his death in 2006, Ertegun personally welcomed Nutini to Atlantic, proclaiming: “I’m as sure about Paolo as I’ve ever been about any artist I’ve had.”
He wasn’t wrong.
With a face that could tempt Smash Hits! back into production and an almighty soul rasp, it’s only logical that Paolo Nutini would make his way into the hearts of the public, but who’d have predicted that the Scottish Italian kid would do so by channeling Sam Cooke, Wilson Pickett, and of course, Redding.
To date, the Paisley native has sold four million albums, played two shows in the Royal Albert Hall, performed with Mick Jagger – another Redding connection: the Georgia man covered the Stones’ ‘(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction’ in 1965 – and just 12 months ago, he received an Ivor Novello for the songwriting on second album Sunny Side Up. Today, he’s equally welcome on the celeb-packed couch at The Graham Norton Show and the stage at Later… With Jools Holland. Critics, musicians and teenage girls all seem to find something different to love. It’s a great place to be in.
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