All Over The Place: Ike Reilly Is Working for a Living

[Here is the Ike Reilly Spotify playlist. I also included the video for "Good Work." It was shot at Ike's old high school in Libertyville, IL. You'll like Ike. - RFG]

Asbury Park may be Springsteen territory, but working class heroes of the music world can be found everywhere. Chicago’s Ike Reilly is one of them.

Reilly has been playing and writing music much of his life, but he’s worked regular jobs as well, including a 13-year stint as a hotel doorman in Chicago.

Taking a break from recording a new album with his band, The Ike Reilly Assassination (IRA), Reilly is playing a short string of solo dates on the East Coast, including one at The Saint in Asbury Park on Wednesday, May 15.

Reilly doesn’t play New Jersey often, but has played a number of times in New York, usually at the Mercury Lounge or the Bowery Ballroom.

Most of the IRA’s fan base is located in the Midwest: Chicago, Minneapolis and Milwaukee.

“We don’t have casual fans. We have a lot of fans who are very upset we’re not more successful. We make a living!” said Reilly.

“We’re an underexploited band for sure, but we’re in the process of changing that. We’re about finished with what I believe is our greatest record yet. I’m excited for people to hear it. Everything’s in the right place. The songs are the best songs I’ve written,” noted Reilly.

Much of the new album was recorded this past winter.

Reilly is as much a storyteller as a songwriter. “I write in the first person but it’s not me. I don’t think the guy who wrote ‘I Fought the Law’ ever got in any legal trouble. That’s what all writers do. They combine the external world with their own world and find a voice.”

Reilly continued, “There are moments in songs that are purely personal and there are songs that are inspired by things that have happened to me but generally isn’t confessional [stuff]."

Reilly’s first and only major label album, Salesmen and Racists, was released by Universal in 2001. About the major label life, Reilly had this to say: “It was no different than now except they gave me a bunch of money. I wasn’t prepared to perform at that point. I hadn’t played in years. Now I’ve played a lot. I had written a bunch of songs without an audience in mind. It was nice to get cash but I didn’t know anything about what needed to be done. We went out with some terrible bands that we shouldn’t have been associated with. I hadn’t found my voice and how I wanted to perform.”

After the major label experience, Reilly formed the Assassination and slowly figured out what he wanted over the next twelve years and five albums.

“Now I feel like we are what I’ve always wanted to be, a rock and roll band. The songs on this new record are like that. It’s everything I wanted my band to be. The songs are cathartic and defiant and inclusive. We’re achieving it,” said Reilly.

“The record we’re making isn’t a small record,” added Reilly. “It has a real working class vibe but not Bob Seger working class. It has a feeling of isolation and universality.”

Reilly’s solo shows take a different approach from the shows with the IRA. “It’s more communal. Somebody told me it was like Lenny Bruce or Will Rogers. Because I’m alone, I can be spontaneous. It seems to be that people laugh a lot. Not necessarily when I’m singing!” joked Reilly.

“I get to play songs I would never play with the band and I get to play songs I’ve never played for anybody. I usually have some interaction with the crowd,” continued Reilly.

Reilly also uses his music to advance causes he believes in. “Mostly my activism is with unions in the Midwest. I was a union member at the hotel for years. At my next Milwaukee show, I’m entertaining a bunch of organizers before our show for the head of the AFL-CIO. Anybody in need that needs me to play, I’ll go play, for people that need a voice. Any time I can build morale for anybody that’s struggling, I’ll do it,” he said.

Ike Reilly appears at The Saint on Wednesday, May 15. Tickets are $13 in advance, $15 day of show. Doors open at 7:30 pm. The opening acts are Jimmy Dunigan and Andrew Clayton. The Saint is located at 601 Main Street in Asbury Park.