items tagged with Paul Thorn

The cliché says that good writers mostly write what they know, so it’s little wonder that Paul Thorn has crafted an under-the-radar career as a respected songwriter and performer.

The title of his 2010 album is Pimps & Preachers, and he speaks of both from experience: His father was a minister, and his uncle was a pimp. “When I was a kid, them was the two guys that I hung around a lot,” Thorn said in a phone interview this week. “I got to witness what went on on both sides of the tracks of life – the dark and the light side of life.”

That uncle also taught the future songwriter to box and served as his trainer, and in 1988 Thorn fought (and lost to) Roberto Durán, considered one of the sport’s greats. Thorn also used to skydive.

In the mid-1990s, Thorn was plucked from a day job in a furniture factory and a regular gig singing in a pizza joint, signed to a major-label contract. And the first concert he ever attended was a Sting show – at which he was the opening act.