Online Press Kit |
EMAIL: info (at) pamelameans (dot) com
QUICK LINKS: Download Pamela Means and The Reparations Album Press Release pdf [66kb] Download Pamela Means and The Reparations Band Bios pdf [57kb] Instagram: @PamelaMeansMusic Patreon: PamelaMeans |
Pamela Means and The Reparations
New Release!
Pamela Means and The Reparations "Live at Northfire"
"Favorite Albums of New England in 2020"
- Worcester Magazine
Pamela Means and The Reparations "Live at Northfire" (2020) |
New album reviews and articles: "...impeccable new album..." - Green Left, Australia "Pamela Means' 'Northfire' is, sadly, always timely" - Worcester Magazine "Live at Northfire" showcases six Pamela Means original songs. Primarily, politically-charged indictments of our sociopolitical landscape plus a dose of romantic reprieve from two mesmerizing ballads." - Curve Magazine |
Recent interviews and articles: ‘Walking through the fire’: Easthampton singer Pamela Means releases album focused on systemic racism - Daily Hampshire Gazette, Northampton MA "Pamela Means calls out the Strange Fruit in her savvy songwriting" - Bill Copeland Music News, Western Massachusetts "Pamela Means is All That Jazz" - Valley Advocate, Northampton MA |
Say whaaat?
Pamela Means press quotes:
Pamela Means press quotes:
“Stark, defiant songs.”
— New York Times
"Within the music industry, I've been compared to both Tracy Chapman and Ani DiFranco. I've also been described as a cross between Suzanne Vega and Jimi Hendrix. And, heir to the legacy of Nina Simone. But, really, I'm just me."
— Pamela Means
“You groove so deep, so deep, I can’t get out. And I wouldn’t want to.”
— Ani DiFranco
‘Walking through the fire,’ Easthampton MA singer Pamela Means releases album focused on systemic racism. [Pamela Means and The Reparations “Live at Northfire”]
— Daily Hampshire Gazette, Northampton MA
“When Pamela Means picks up her guitar and begins to sing, a listener doesn’t forget her. She possesses musical attitude and purpose.”
— WSHU Connecticut Public Radio
“…dizzying guitar riffs…”
— Boston Globe
“Singer-songwriter and demigod, Pamela Means, is one of the fiercest guitar players and politically rooted singer-songwriters in the music industry today... With [Pamela Means Jazz Project Vol. 1] Means takes her rightful place among contemporary superstar jazz vocalists such as Cassandra Wilson and Norah Jones.”
—Curve Magazine
“Good stuff.”
— Neil Young
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Abbey Road, Pamela Means recently performed that whole Beatles album, in order, solo, on acoustic guitar. Means has the skills and the artistic vision to pull off this kind of feat with aplomb. Best known for her folk music career she is also a fine jazz singer and social activist. Her recent recording, the driving, Impeachment Now! pulls no punches. “The president, is incompetent, an embarrassment, im-peach-ment now.”
— Green River Fest
“Pamela Means's Plainfield turns pain into perfect art.”
— No Depression
“Wow. [Plainfield] is the deeply personal album you wanted Tracy Chapman to make. Alone in the studio with just her guitar and one take tape rolling...this is the anti-pop antidote that will reach you no matter where your sympathies lie ...”
— Midwest Record, Chicago IL
“Means is, quite simply, superb.”
— HiFi Magazine, London, England
“...insanely brilliant...”
— Press Herald, Portland ME
“She's got more chops than the gentle pickers of her ilk will ever have.”
— Oregon Live, Portland OR
“If Black warrior poet / feminist political activist Audre Lorde had taken up folk singing, she might have attacked her guitar and wrapped her lyrics around it the way Pamela Means does.”
— Valley Advocate, Northampton MA
“…powerful songs…”
— Time Out New York
GO Magazine Top 100
— GO Magazine NYC
“…redefin[ing acoustic] music…”
—Washington Blade, Washington DC
"Pamela's vocals are hard-wired to her heart: emotional, raw, angry when it needs to be, yet supple and warm as an embrace. The truth may not always be pretty, but Means is a stunningly effective messenger."
--Oregon Live
Pamela Means • Bio
Pamela Means is a Easthampton MA-based Out(spoken), Biracial, independent artist whose “kamikaze guitar style” and punchy provocative songs have worn a hole in two of her acoustic guitars. Armed with the razor wit of a stand-up comic, engaging presence, elegant poetry, and irresistible charm, Pamela Means’s “stark, defiant songs” (New York Times) set the status quo and the stage afire.
Pamela’s commitment to interrogating social ills was fostered by her unique childhood. “As the adopted daughter of a white mother and black father, I learned about dismantling systems of oppression from the inside out.” Pamela received her first guitar at the age of fourteen, just after her mother died of cancer, and it soon became Pamela’s primary vehicle for expression. It would also serve as a passport out of a life that consisted of poverty, foster homes, and the inner city life of hyper-segregated Milwaukee WI.
Pamela Means relocated to Boston, busked in the city subway and famed Harvard Square, founded her own record label and began touring. Pamela has since performed on three continents and across the country, gaining fans and rave reviews from Anchorage to Amsterdam, Sydney to Stockholm, San Francisco to Honolulu to New York, breaking album sales records at national festivals and sharing stages with Pete Seeger, Neil Young, Shawn Colvin, Joan Baez, Richie Havens, Gil Scott-Heron, Adrian Belew, Violent Femmes, Holly Near and more. Means has also been the recipient of several nominations and music awards in multiple categories.
Pamela Means “exhibits a rare emotional fire in today’s folk world,” (Seven Days, Burlington VT) so much so that Ani DiFranco exclaimed, “you’ve got such a deep, deep groove, I can’t get out. And, I wouldn’t want to.” With Truth as ammunition, Pamela Means brings the fight for social justice and human dignity to the forefront of a new generation.
Awards • Nominations
Best Acoustic Act, Milwaukee WI (two years in a row!)
Wisconsin Folk Artist of the Year
Wisconsin Female Vocalist of the Year
Falcon Ridge Folk Festival Best New Artist
Boston Music Award Nomination Outstanding Folk Artist
Gods of Indie Guitar, Silver Award, Acoustic category
Outmusic Best Album of the Year (“Single Bullet Theory”)
Top Ten Album of the Year (“Pamela Means Jazz Project, Vol. I”), Muruch Entertainment Blog
Tour history and highlights
National touring (decade+ of playing 150+ shows and 50,000 miles per year)
International touring highlights include Canada, Australia, Europe (Sweden, The Netherlands)
Extensive touring within New England and The Northeast
Numerous prestigious venues and festivals including Newport Folk Festival, Falcon Ridge Folk Festival, Green River Festival, New Bedford Folk Festival, Bumbershoot Seattle, Calvin Theater, Somerville Theater, Academy of Music, and several support roles opening for Neil Young, Shawn Colvin, Ani DiFranco, Leo Kottke, Violent Femmes, Joan Baez, plus playing in Pete Seeger’s band for the Clearwater Folk Festival.
Wisconsin Folk Artist of the Year
Wisconsin Female Vocalist of the Year
Falcon Ridge Folk Festival Best New Artist
Boston Music Award Nomination Outstanding Folk Artist
Gods of Indie Guitar, Silver Award, Acoustic category
Outmusic Best Album of the Year (“Single Bullet Theory”)
Top Ten Album of the Year (“Pamela Means Jazz Project, Vol. I”), Muruch Entertainment Blog
Tour history and highlights
National touring (decade+ of playing 150+ shows and 50,000 miles per year)
International touring highlights include Canada, Australia, Europe (Sweden, The Netherlands)
Extensive touring within New England and The Northeast
Numerous prestigious venues and festivals including Newport Folk Festival, Falcon Ridge Folk Festival, Green River Festival, New Bedford Folk Festival, Bumbershoot Seattle, Calvin Theater, Somerville Theater, Academy of Music, and several support roles opening for Neil Young, Shawn Colvin, Ani DiFranco, Leo Kottke, Violent Femmes, Joan Baez, plus playing in Pete Seeger’s band for the Clearwater Folk Festival.
Current Album Release Bio
Pamela Means and The Reparations
“Live At Northfire”
℗ Wirl Records 2020
catalogue: 10108 (explicit), 10109 (radio edit)
Live-in-the-studio set of Pamela Means’s punchy political tunes and sultry queer love songs;
personal, primal, danceable and transcendent.
“Stark, defiant songs.” New York Times
‘Walking through the fire’: Easthampton MA singer Pamela Means releases album focused on systemic racism
— Daily Hampshire Gazette, Northampton MA
Easthampton, MA - PAMELA MEANS, acclaimed singer-songwriter, jazz musician, and activist, is releasing, Pamela Means and The Reparations “Live at Northfire,” her tenth album. For Means, a restless artist fronting many varied projects including a Billie Holiday-era jazz quartet (Pamela Means Jazz Project), solo acoustic performances of The Beatles Abbey Road album in its entirety, a nascent instrumental jazz guitar duo, and the staple of her career as a multi-award winning solo singer-songwriter having toured coast to coast and multiple continents, delighting critics and winning audiences from Boston to Brisbane, Anchorage to Amsterdam, Seattle to Stockholm and points in between. This is the first release with her new acoustic trio, The Reparations.
“The name Pamela Means and The Reparations came to me in a flash and it felt just right. I like the bold political stance of it but Reparations also means healing and repair through love and nurturing, which is also what I seek to provide with my music and shows.” -Pamela Means
An in-studio performance, recorded live, for a small group of fans, at Northfire Recording, in Amherst MA, “Live at Northfire” showcases six Pamela Means original songs. Primarily, politically-charged indictments of our socio-political landscape plus a dose of romantic reprieve from two mesmerizing ballads.
Pamela Means’s clever, concise lyrics, soothing to seething vocals, and fleet-fingered fretwork are elevated with the thick bass lines, infectious conga beats and lush, velvet harmonies of bassist, Cinamon Blair, and, percussionist, I-SHEA. Pamela Means puts her gentle wit, big loving spirit and powerful songwriting to work for peace in the world. She just keeps getting better and better. Her voice is strong, her musicality is entertaining and her commitment to peace is deep, genuine and consistent.
Produced by Pamela Means
All songs by Pamela Means © Phylorra Music, BMI
Recorded by Garrett Sawyer, Northfire Recording Studio, Amherst MA
Mixed by Garrett Sawyer, Northfire Recording Studio, Amherst MA
Mastered by Mark Alan Miller, Sonelab Mastering, Easthampton MA
Pamela Means and The Reparations personnel:
Pamela Means: guitar, vocals
Cinamon Blair: bass, vocals
I-SHEA: percussion, vocals
TRACK LIST:
Impeachment Now!
James Madison
Color of the Skin
Cinnamon and chocolate
My Love
Hands Up
Pamela Means and The Reparations
from the album "Live at Northfire" "Hands Up" https://youtu.be/mw9tHElnmJQ |
Pamela Means and The Reparations
from the album "Live at Northfire" "My Love" https://youtu.be/WwwQQmNVurw |
Pamela Means and The Reparations
from the album "Live at Northfire" "Color of the Skin" [Explicit] https://youtu.be/7uiSxcSielI |