Julie Hamill - Boogaloo Radio, London: « wooo hold on there a minute Berry - are you the love child of Johnny Cash and Neil Diamond? I think so. Great voice! «
Bubblegum Slut/ UK: « A paradoxical mix of a Yorkshire man’s Northern bluntness that tells it like it is and a “continental poetic tongue which educates and stirs…! «
Stylus mag/ Canada: « Berry has a keen intellect, a disdain for those buffered from reality, and an internalised anger that fuels the vitriol in every adjective. It is real life undecorated, and smoulders like the everyday pressures. This is fucking brilliant. Clean glass please, and leave the bottle! »
With the aid of a guitar or piano he takes centre-stage and, with his powerful seducing voice, he recounts the tales of his life on the back streets of Leeds/England, his touring years through to his crippling road accident in Brighton/ England, which still leaves him limping around with foot splint…
In the 80s he was guitarist & a founding member of Rock/Goth band, The Rose of Avalanche. Eventually, enough was enough and after breaking up the band in the 90s, he embarked on a solo career under his own name, Paul James Berry. He played in every possible venue in the UK and Europe and even made a few trips across the pond to North America.
Late 2019 (yeah COVID), he reformed the band as a side project and played several shows, as well as supporting The Mission around the UK. However, again it was time to move on and broke with The Rose in 2022.
4 solo albums, (PJB, Ginnel ,Nations and Spitfire Jukebox 1) saw him support giants of the songwriting genre such as Frank Black, Vic Chestnutt, The Cranberries, Kevin Coyne, David Bowie, Howe Gelb, Townes Van Zandt, etc.
After a long rehabilitation from his accident, he released his most recent album, ‘Spitfire Jukebox 1’ on his own independent label, EggTéte Records. Primarily just one instrument and a voice, the album gives a beautiful raw insight to the human soul. It reveals a personal account of the last years and touches on the cathartic necessity to get through the nightmare of his road accident, to the celebration of life itself.
This deeply personal album was recorded in Berlin in the vast hall of the famous UFO-Studios, an old brewery which doubled-up as a bunker in the second world war.
«when I arrived at the studio in Berlin, there was this colossal old hall that just had ‘something’ that moved me. So, I said to the man, "get me a chair, put it in the middle of the hall and record me bleeding"…. The whole point of this album was to be in control and do everything myself - for good or bad - just me and my demons».
2022 Paul moved back to the UK having spent many years away. Last seen on the Leeds & Liverpool Canal, he can be found traveling around on the narrowboat he calls home.....