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Saturday, October 27, 2001

By Ed Masley, Post-Gazette Pop Music Critic

Twenty-some years into living the rock 'n' roll lifestyle, Hard Rain's Bill Toms has emerged from all those early morning drives with a healthier perspective on his dream, a perspective that fuels a number of the hardest-hitting tracks on Hard Rain's latest effort, "This Old World."

In "Moonlight Mystery," Toms, who rose to local fame as Joe Grushecky's lead guitarist, sings, "Man said 'Hey boy, you're gonna be a star someday/The way you play guitar takes my breath away/And I'm telling you, son, it won't take long, you'll see'/That was 18 years and a million miles away."

Throw in a line about "an empty road, an empty set of dreams" and a person could get the idea that Toms is feeling disillusioned.

"I'm not sure it's disillusionment," he says. "I think the gist between, like, 'Moonlight Mystery,' 'I'm Getting Off This Train' and 'Dying to Live Again' ... those three songs really deal with not worrying about the brass ring or chasing the light at the end of the tunnel, but enjoying the ride."

He's learned to step away from music -- "to put the guitar down," as he calls it.

"And by learning how to do that, I've actually found that music and being creative is a lot more enjoyable. The music and the work itself mean more to me than getting a record deal and trying to be on top of the trends and what not. You know, I turned 40 this past year and I feel a lot more relaxed as a musician, more secure in my own skin, I guess."

And "This Old World" reflects that feeling.

"It's more of a personal record," he says. "It's coming from a sort of hitting middle age playing music for 20-some years kind of spot."

As personal as "This Old World" is, a number of songs -- including the strongest, a devastating eulogy to an absentee father called "Born on the Streets of Heartache" -- are actually character sketches.

"I do a lot of reading," Toms explains. "And I take characters I read about and put them into places and people I know."

The title cut finds Toms remembering some personal heroes the world has forgotten, from Blind Jack Dupree to his own Uncle John.

"It really had a lot of power over me," he says of the song. "It came real quick. And the first thing I thought about was how we treat heroes in our culture. I wanted to bring out people that I knew and people that I'd read about that were not famous, were not rich, but were, in my book, heroes."

Toms and Hard Rain celebrate the new release tonight at Moondog's in Blawnox and again next Saturday at Nick's Fat City. The following Friday, Toms will showcase material from the album acoustically at Borders in the North Hills.

The album is a co-release between the local label Moondog Records and the Jersey label Schoolhouse Records, which also recently released a live set by his other band, Grushecky and the Houserockers.

"I think we made more money on that than we ever have on any other label," he says. "It's amazing. Just monetarily speaking, it's a lot better for us. And as you get older, you just try to take more control of things. It's a lot more enjoyable that way."

The Houserockers recently walked away from a deal with a bigger label, one that Toms says "wanted us to go out and be on the road for maybe 150 shows a year without tour support before they would sign us."

For all his older, wiser views on rock 'n' roll, Toms says he doesn't want to "come off sounding like I hate the music business."

It's just that, after all these years, he's found he likes the music much more than the business.

"When you're younger, the ultimate goal is to sell a lot of records," he says. "And it would be nice. I'm not saying that I would turn that down. But I enjoy the ride a lot more than what might be at the end of the highway. And this has been going on for quite a number of years, where you say, 'You know what? This may be the most popular I ever get, or whatever. And that's fine. I could live with this for the rest of my life.' And that's a nice feeling."