Look up Lowe or lowe in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Lowe is a common surname in English. See List of people with surname Lowe.

Lowe may also refer to:

Places[link]

• Lowe, Delaware
• Lowe Township, Moultrie County, Illinois

Other uses[link]

• Lowe Alpine, an American outdoor equipment manufacturer and supplier
• Löwe Automobil, a German car-part manufacturer
• Division of Lowe, an Australian Federal government electoral division
• Lowe (band), a Swedish synthpop band
• Lowe Worldwide, a global advertising agency network headquartered in London
• The Lowe, traditional name of the assistant to the Scharfrichter (executioner)

See also[link]

• Lowe's, a home improvement store chain in North America
• Lowes Foods, a grocery store chain in the USA
• Lowe's Oculocerebrorenal Syndrome
• Löw, Löwe
• Low (disambiguation)
• Lowes (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Jonathan Sean Lowe (born March 29, 1971 in Dallas, Texas) is a retired Major League Baseball pitcher. He played during seven seasons at the major league level for the St. Louis Cardinals, Chicago White Sox, Pittsburgh Pirates, Colorado Rockies, and Kansas City Royals. He was drafted by the Cardinals in the 1st round (15th pick) of the 1992 amateur draft. Lowe played his first professional season with their Class A (Short Season) Hamilton Redbirds in 1992, and his last with Kansas City and their Triple-A Omaha Royals in 2003. Lowe's unique spot in baseball immortality occurred 16 June 2001, against the St. Louis Cardinals, when Albert Pujols recorded his first, and what may yet be his only, sacrifice bunt against Lowe.

External links[link]

• Career statistics and player information from MLB, or ESPN, or Baseball-Reference, or Fangraphs, or The Baseball Cube

This biographical article relating to an American baseball pitcher born in the 1970s is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Nick Lowe
Lowe performing at the Kursaal in November 2008
Background information
Birth name	Nicholas Drain Lowe
Born	(1949-03-24) 24 March 1949 (age 63) Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, England
Genres	Rock, pub rock, New Wave,[1] Power Pop[1]
Occupations	Musician, singer-songwriter
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, piano/keyboards, bass
Years active	1966–present
Labels	Columbia Records, Demon Records, F-Beat Records, Radar Records, Reprise Records, Upstart Records, Yep Roc Records, Stiff Records, Proper Records (current).
Associated acts	Brinsley Schwarz, Rockpile, Elvis Costello, The Attractions, The Imposters, Huey Lewis and the News, Noise To Go, The Cowboy Outfit, Johnny Cash, Little Village, Bill Kirchen
Website	nicklowe.net

Nicholas Drain "Nick" Lowe (born 24 March 1949), is an English singer-songwriter, musician and producer.

A pivotal figure in UK pub rock, punk rock and new wave,^[1][2] Lowe has recorded a string of well-reviewed solo albums. Along with vocals, Lowe plays guitar, bass guitar, piano and harmonica. He is best known for his songs "Cruel to Be Kind" (a US Top 40 single), and "I Love the Sound of Breaking Glass" (a top 10 UK hit), as well as his production work with Elvis Costello, Graham Parker, and others. Lowe also wrote "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding", a hit for Costello.^[3] He currently lives in Brentford, London, England.

Career history[link]

Songwriter[link]

Nick's best-known songs (mostly known for cover versions) include:

• "(What’s So Funny ’Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding"
• "The Beast in Me"
• "I Love The Sound of Breaking Glass"
• "All Men Are Liars"
• "Cruel to Be Kind"
• "So It Goes"
• "I Knew the Bride (When She Used to Rock 'n' Roll)"

Producer[link]

Lowe produced Elvis Costello's first five albums, including My Aim Is True, This Year's Model, and Armed Forces. He also produced The Damned's first single, "New Rose", considered the first English punk single, as well as the group's debut album, Damned Damned Damned.

His early 'rough and ready' production style earned him the nickname Basher (as in 'bash it out now, tart it up later'). Upon moving from Stiff to Jake Riviera's Radar and F-Beat labels, Lowe became selective in his choice of production tasks.

Bands[link]

Influence[link]

A 2011 article in The New York Times starts "The 40-year career of the English singer-songwriter Nick Lowe constitutes a paradox: the songs he has written are better known than he is."^[3]

Some musicians claim to have been influenced by Lowe. Alex Turner, of the Arctic Monkeys, said that he is 'blown away' and 'back to square one' by Lowe's songwriting^[4]

Biography[link]

Lowe attended the independent Woodbridge School in Suffolk^[5] and he began his musical career in 1967, when he joined the band Kippington Lodge, with his school friend Brinsley Schwarz. They released a few singles on the Parlophone record label as Kippington Lodge before they renamed the band Brinsley Schwarz in late 1969, and began performing country and blues-rock. Lowe wrote some of his best-known compositions while a member of Brinsley Schwarz, including "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding", a hit for Elvis Costello in 1979, and "Cruel to Be Kind", a solo hit for Lowe in 1979.^[6]

After leaving Brinsley Schwarz in 1975, Lowe began playing in Rockpile with Dave Edmunds. In August 1976, Lowe released "So It Goes" b/w "Heart of the City", the first single on the Stiff Records label where he was an in-house producer.^[6] The single and thus the label was funded by a loan of £400 from Dr. Feelgood's Lee Brilleaux. The label's first EP was Lowe's 1977 four-track release Bowi, apparently named in response to David Bowie's contemporaneous LP Low. (The joke was repeated when Lowe produced The Rumour's album Max as an 'answer' to Fleetwood Mac's Rumours). Lowe continued producing albums on Stiff and other labels. In 1977 he produced Dr. Feelgood's album, Be Seeing You, which included his own song, "That's It, I Quit". The following year's Dr. Feelgood album, Private Practice, contained a song Lowe jointly penned with Gypie Mayo – "Milk and Alcohol". Along with "I Love The Sound of Breaking Glass", "Milk and Alcohol" is one of only two Lowe compositions to ever reach the Top 10 of the UK Singles Chart.^[7]

Because the two main singers in Rockpile had recording contracts with different record labels and managers, albums were always credited to either Lowe or Edmunds, so there is only one official Rockpile album, which was not released until the waning days of the collaboration: 1980's Seconds of Pleasure, featuring the Lowe songs "When I Write The Book" and "Heart". However, two of the pair's most significant solo albums from the period; Lowe's Labour of Lust and Edmunds' Repeat When Necessary, were effectively Rockpile albums (as was Carlene Carter's Lowe-produced Musical Shapes album).

Lowe was quoted as saying that he had "escaped from the tyranny of the snare drum" in No Depression, (September–October 2001) when explaining his move away from regular pop music that would get played on mainstream radio.^{[citation needed]}

Other well-known Lowe songs include "I Love The Sound of Breaking Glass", "All Men Are Liars", and Cruel to Be Kind, co-written with Ian Gomm and originally recorded with Brinsley Schwarz, a re-recording of which was his only US Top 40 hit, reaching #12 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1979.^[6]

In 1979, Lowe married country singer Carlene Carter, daughter of fellow country singers Carl Smith and June Carter Cash and stepdaughter of Johnny Cash.^[8] He adopted her daughter, Tiffany Anastasia Lowe. The marriage ended in 1990, but they remained friends, and Lowe remained close to the Carter/Cash family. He played and recorded with Johnny Cash, and Cash recorded several of Lowe's songs.

After the demise of Rockpile, Lowe toured for a period with his band Noise To Go and later with The Cowboy Outfit, which also included the noted keyboard player Paul Carrack. Lowe was also a member of the short-lived mainly studio project Little Village with John Hiatt, Ry Cooder and Jim Keltner, who originally got together to record Hiatt's 1987 album Bring the Family.^[6]

In 1992, "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding" was covered by Curtis Stigers on the soundtrack album to The Bodyguard, an album that sold about 44 million copies world-wide.^[3]

A New York Daily News article^[9] quoted Lowe as saying his greatest fear in recent years was "sticking with what you did when you were famous". "I didn't want to become one of those thinning-haired, jowly old geezers who still does the same shtick they did when they were young, slim and beautiful," he said. "That's revolting and rather tragic." Rock critic Jim Farber observed: "Lowe's recent albums, epitomised by the new At My Age, moved him out of the realms of ironic pop and animated rock and into the role of a worldly balladeer, specialising in grave vocals and graceful tunes. Lowe's four most recent solo albums mine the wealth of American roots music, drawing on vintage country, soul and R&B to create an elegant mix of his own."

In 2008, Yep Roc and Proper Records released a thirtieth anniversary edition of Lowe's first solo album Jesus of Cool (entitled Pure Pop for Now People in the US with a slightly different track listing). The re-issue includes tracks from the British and American releases in addition to several bonus tracks. In March 2009, he released a 49 track CD/DVD compilation of songs which spanned his entire career. Proper Records released it in the UK and Europe, entitled Quiet Please... The New Best of Nick Lowe.

In September 2010 Yep Roc issued The Impossible Bird, Dig My Mood and The Convincer on vinyl for the first time, and after a one-night reunion concert with Elvis Costello in October in San Francisco,^[10] Lowe embarked on his first non-solo United States tour "this millennium." His backing band comprised Geraint Watkins (keyboards), Robert Treherne (drums), Johnny Scott (guitar) and Matt Radford (bass). In March 2011, Yep Roc reissued Lowe's 1979 solo album Labour of Lust.^[11]

Lowe played Glastonbury 2011, performing a short solo set of Brinsley Schwarz tracks on The Spirit Of 71 stage, where they played back in 1971, before heading to the Acoustic Stage for a full band show.

Lowe performed as an opening act for Wilco in their North American tour, September 2011. He performed solo with acoustic guitar.

Lowe is married to Peta Waddington, a designer and DJ. The couple have a son, Roy Lowe, who was born in 2005.

Discography[link]

Lowe performing with Rockpile in 1980

Studio albums[link]

• Jesus of Cool (1978, UK) (released in the US as Pure Pop for Now People)
• Labour of Lust (1979)
• Nick the Knife (1982)
• The Abominable Showman (1983)
• Nick Lowe & His Cowboy Outfit (1984)
• The Rose of England (1985)
• Pinker and Prouder than Previous (1988)
• Party of One (1990)
• The Impossible Bird (1994)
• Dig My Mood (1998)
• The Convincer (2001)
• At My Age (2007)^[6]
• The Old Magic (2011) - UK: #66

Live albums[link]

• Untouched Takeaway (2004)

Singles[link]

^[6]

EPs[link]

• Bowi, 7" 45 rpm (Stiff 1977)
• Nick Lowe & Dave Edmunds Sing the Everly Brothers, 7" 33⅓ rpm (F-Beat/Columbia 1980)^[6]

Compilation albums[link]

• A Bunch of Stiff Records (One track, "I Love My Label")
• Live Stiffs Live (1978) (Nick Lowe's Last Chicken In The Shop got two tracks, "I Knew the Bride (When She Used to Rock 'n' Roll)" and "Let's Eat", on this live compilation of the first Stiff Records' tour.)
• 16 All Time Lowes (1984)
• Nick's Knack (1986)
• Basher: The Best of Nick Lowe (1989)
• The Wilderness Years (1991)
• The Doings (1999)
• Quiet Please... The New Best of Nick Lowe (2009)^[6]

Other appearances[link]

• "Baby It’s You," duet with Elvis Costello, on single "The Only Flame In Town" by Elvis Costello and the Attractions (1984)
• "In The Middle Of It All" on Adios Amigo: A Tribute to Arthur Alexander (1994)
• "I’m Coming Home" on Rig Rock Deluxe: A Musical Tribute to the American Truck Driver (1996)
• "From Now On" on Original Soundtrack: Mumford (1999)
• "Shake That Rat," bass on album Sing Along With Los Straitjackets by Los Straitjackets (2001)
• "Arrête Pas La Musique" on Evangeline Made: A Tribute to Cajun Music (2002)
• "Don’t Let The Cold," backing vocals on album Sentimental by Tanita Tikaram (2004)
• "It’s All In The Game" on Sweetheart: Love Songs (2004)
• "Only A Rose," duet with Geraint Watkins on album In A Bad Mood by Geraint Watkins (2008)
• "A Man In Love," guest vocals on album The Guest List by Martin Belmont (2009)
• "Shelly’s Winter Love," guest vocals, duet with Paul Carrack, on album Word To The Wise by Bill Kirchen (2010)
• "Changing All Those Changes" on Rave On Buddy Holly (2011)

Tributes[link]

• Labour of Love: The Music of Nick Lowe (Telarc, 2001) (features Dar Williams, Tom Petty, and Elvis Costello, among others).
• Lowe Profile: A Tribute To Nick Lowe (Brewery, 2005) (two-disc, 30 song collection featuring Dave Alvin, Foster & Lloyd, Ian Gomm, among others).
• 5 songs on "The Stiff Generation: If it Ain't Stiff it Ain't Worth a Tribute" (Groove Disques, 2002).
• 5 songs on "Happy Doing What We're Doing" (Freedom [City Hall], 2005) by Elizabeth McQueen and the Firebrands.

Uses in media[link]

• "Without Love" from the album "Labour of Lust" appeared on the soundtrack of the film "Americathon".
• "(I Love the Sound of) Breaking Glass" was used on the soundtrack album of the film "That Summer".
• His recording of "So It Goes" appeared on the soundtrack of the Roger Corman movie "Rock 'N' Roll High School", which featured the Ramones.
• "We Want Action" from the album "The Abominable Showman" appeared on the soundtrack of the film "Easy Money".
• An original song "Little Cat (You've Never had it So Good)" was written for the British rock opera film "Absolute Beginners", which starred David Bowie and Sade.
• The music video for "All Men Are Liars" was featured in The Brothers Grunt episode "The Ugly Gruntling".
• His recording of "The Beast in Me" was used in the pilot episode of The Sopranos.
• The song "All Men Are Liars" was featured in the Australian film All Men Are Liars written and directed by Gerard Lee and starring Toni Pearen, David Price and John Jarratt.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Nick Lowe (musician)

• Official website
• The Old Magic UK page
• Batty for Music podcast
• Allmusic
• Nick Lowe at the Internet Movie Database
• Electronic press kit for "Quiet Please..."
• Return of the Man Who Used to Rock - NY Times 9-13-11