Joe Pug: Press

"In Pug's hard plucking, exaggerated choruses, and lyrical vignettes you can draw a pretty straight line from Woody Guthrie to Bob Dylan to Johnny Cash to Bruce Springsteen to Steve Earle to Josh Ritter. Like all of them, Pug is a populist at heart, a singer who can't help but talk about all of us when he sings about himself and can't help but sing about himself when he's talking about all of us......"Hymn 101" is full of lines that will fill you with both heartbreak and euphoria. It's good to be reminded that that's why we listen to music in the first place."

"Fans of quality songwriting need to hunt down a copy of Nation of Heat."

"...Joe eschews verse/chorus/verse and instead lets loose a barrage of stream of consciousness that somehow is devoid of pretension and cliche."

"Pug is the real deal. The kid’s got that weariness in his delivery that you can’t smoke or drink your way to because it comes from somewhere deeper than the vocal chords. It’s the same gritty, spirited voice that made Hank I, Kurt Cobain, and Bob Dylan iconic, and we as Chicagoans will be privileged enough to watch the kid develop from precocious youngster to out and out star."

"Much in the way of Josh Ritter’s recent breakthrough, Joe Pug is able to sound like a wise old sage with a million stories and a memory that captures each detail and refuses to let them dim."

"I found it hard to make it past the first track, “Hymn 101,” just because it is so damn good. After taking that song off repeat and listening to the rest of Nation of Heat, I knew I’d be addicted. Here I am, almost a week later, and the album has still not left my player. It will be one of the best EP’s of 2008."

"You know how sometimes a song resonates with you? If Joe Pug’s songs don’t, I think you might be a zombie."

"Some pretty decent singer/songwriters have called Chicago home over the years. There's that Tweedy guy and Andrew Bird. Sam Cooke and Bo Diddley too. Well, get ready to add another name to that list: Joe Pug. This kid (still in his early 20's) is going to make a serious mark on this city's music scene, guaranteed."

Earnest, touching, and world-weary far beyond his mere 22 years, Joe Pug often recalls early Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan on his self-released, simply titled Five Music Songs. From heartbreaking ballads like “In The Meantime” to the fable-like “Motel 6 Blues” to the obligatory protest number, “I Do My Father’s Drugs,” Pug exhibits a thoughtfulness and social consciousness that’s rare in singer-songwriters more than twice his age, and a talent that’s even rarer. – Dean Ramos

The singer songwriter genre is riddled with talented people who write B-minus/C-plus songs, which only adds to the surprise when you stumble upon someone who writes truly great ones With "Hymn 101" Chicago's Joe Pug literally stunned me. The song is a gorgeous display of lyricism and melody, and it makes a strong case that Pug could hold his own with heavyweights of the genre like Richard Buckner and M. Ward. The singer is putting finishing touches on his first EP which will be released this fall.

I'd be hard put to come up with a better suggestion for the next four minutes of your life than to listen to this song.

Joe Pug is a local Chicago kid who’s been writing songs for all of 6 months, which is why you haven’t heard of him. But that’s why you’re here, I hope, so I’m not going to insult your intelligence by telling you who Pug will remind you of. Just listen to “Hymn 101” and think about what kind of lyrics you would’ve written at 22, and then go back to reading blogs and feeling untalented like I did.