Nick Waterhouse is a Santa Ana, CA-born, San Francisco, CA-based singer/songwriter and guitarist, who first took up gutiar when turned 12. And as teenager, he found himself increasingly interested in more obscure and ecletic Americana and blues outside of the pop and contemporary rock his peers were listening to; in fact, he’s cited Bert Berns, Mose Allison, John Lee Hooker and Van Morrison among his earliest musical influences. However, Waterhouse’s musical career started in earnest when he was a member of an Orange County-based band Intelligista, an act that was compared to The Animals and High Numbers-era The Who. After the band split up, Waterhouse went on to attend San Francisco State University — and while studying, he continued pursuing music with very little luck.
As he was purising a music career, Waterhouse was simultaneously getting more involved in San Francisco’s DJ scene; in fact, he had quickly become a fixture at tthe all-vinyl Rooky Ricardo’s Record Shop eventually taking up a job with the store. Publicly, the San Francsico-based singer/songwriter and guitairst has cited that his time working under the store’s owner, Richard Vivian was deeply influential, as it put the then-aspriing musician i touch with the city’s soul club scene — while developing a friendship with The Allah-Las’ Matthew Corriea.
His debut 7 inch “Some Place”/”That Place” was recorded at the Distillery Studio in Southern California with backing band billed as the Turn-Keys, featuring The Fabulous Souls’ Ira Raibon on saxophone. The single was hand-pressed with letterpress printed labels, and because of the single’s overall response and its rairty, collectors have snapped it up. And on the strength of that single, Waterhouse was able to assemble his own backing band The Tarots and a trio of backing vocalists The Naturelles, with whom he played shows with Ty Segall, The Strange Boys, White Fence and The Allah-las. And in between touring across North America and Europe, the California-based singer/songwriter produced The Allah-Las 2012 debut effort. He then followed taht up with the release of his first two singles as a frontman and bandleader.
Waterhouse’s third full-length effort, Never Twice was released earlier this year thorugh Innovative Leisure Records and the album finds him collaborating once again with producer Michael McHugh, who has worked with Black Lips, Ty Segall, and The Allah-Las. As the story goes, McHugh was Nick’s first producer — and as Waterhouse was about to record the material that would comprise Never Twice, Waterhouse enlisted McHugh to recrate and capture the sound of Nick’s youth while in bands in Huntington Beach.
After McHugh was on board, Waterhouse being calling his favorite musicians to join him — Bob Kenmotsu, who contributed his flute; Ralph Carney, who has played with Tom Waits and Elvis Costello contributed sax; Will Blades, a protege of Dr. Lonnie Smith, contributed organs; a highly-accomplished batch of horn planers, bassists and guitarists join in; and Leon Bridges contributed vocals on the album’s lead single “Katchi.” The album’s latest single “It’s Time” will further cement Waterhouse’s burgeoning reptuation for crafting old school, jazzy soul with an incredibly uncanny period specificity — in this case, sounding as though it were released in the mid 1950s/early 1960s, thanks to a careful attnetion to craft while adding his name to a growing list of contemporary artists, who specailzie in the classic soul sound.
Directed and edited by Laura-Lynn Petrick, the video shot on what apears to be old Super 8 Film, and follows Waterhouse as she wanders around New York and features live footage of the Californian and his backing band playing live sets — and with the grainy, old-timey footage, it adds to the song’s old school aesthetic.