Under The Radar

Amy Rigby never stops rocking and rolling and, as the title of her most recent album says, Hang In There With Me. Or, rather, try and keep up. From childhood in less-than-lively Pittsburgh, she moved to art college in the Big Apple and music took over. The New York punk scene alongside the likes of Richard Hell (although playing in a curious folk group) fast-forwarded into life that (including live releases) has meant a dozen albums plus musical connections without end. These have included LPs with the drummer with power pop greats dB’s, Will Rigby (first husband and father of daughter Hazel), and with Patti Smith guitarist, Lenny Kaye (producer of 1991 album Quilt by Rigby’s all-girl trio The Shams).
                Rigby is a singer, a songwriter, a guitarist and an author. As for her career, she says: “A lot of it was kinda random… I don’t want it to sound like I was directionless, but I was always open to a new idea.”
                Of the acoustic, drummerless New York country sounds she makes she says: “Partly it was practical reasons – we were in a tenement apartment, neighbours above and below and either side, and it meant we could rehearse – we called it urban hillbilly.”
                The band was Last Roundup. “There was an album recorded in a Nashville studio,” she explains. “I won’t say it was rustic, but it wasn’t fancy.” It was in the home studio of hit songwriter/producer, Cowboy Jack Clement, and even though the record wasn’t released it did give Amy a taste of the music world.
                As for The Shams’ big-name producer, she says: “Amanda, one of The Shams, was going out with Richard Hell. He just happened to tell Lenny about us, and he became one of our biggest fans.”
                But The Shams folded as Rigby, an increasingly confident songwriter, felt that she had to go her own way. She is a prolific writer, with a style all her own, sometimes country rocking, sometimes quieter and emotionally charged.
                Although Last Roundup released the album, Twister!, in 1987, her first solo album, Diary Of A Mod Housewife, didn’t arrive until 1996. The record set out Rigby’s stall as someone walking a tightrope between music and motherhood, the witty, wise country-edged songs given a modern touch by producer Elliot Easton, The Cars’ guitarist who played much of the music, along with the likes of drummer Don Heffington (later of Lone Justice) and The Paley Brothers’ Andy Paley, who died in 2024.
                Deciding that songwriting was the way forward, Rigby was enticed to Nashville, finding herself mixing with alt-country stars such as Greg Trooper, rockers including Warren Zevon, and more.
                “The other day I was on Instagram and saw Rosie Flores had posted she was in Nashville,” she says, “There was a photo for her with Lucinda Williams and it was like, oh, my old neighbours!
                “What attracted me to country was the humour,” she adds. “I didn’t realise I was funny but you can’t try to write a funny song, it has to come out that way. Loudon Wainwright songs have great humour but one minute you’re laughing then there’s a little twist and you end up crying, too.” Hence, songs such as Are We Ever Gonna Have Sex Again? and Cynically Yours.
                Then, on 2005 album, Little Fugitive, a song that everyone loves the moment they hear it, Dancing With Joey Ramone, Rigby’s chugging guitar makes it a pop-punk masterpiece.
                Her writing doesn’t stop at songs. Her memoir, Girl To City (2019), traced the path from childhood to the musical mayhem of New York. The next instalment, Girl To Country, is newly published; it’s a rocking, rolling journey from new wave New York, through Nashville, on to England then a curious new life in France. It’s moving and
very funny.
                Aside from musical meetings, a mix taking in The Raincoats and Sid Griffin, one of the major events, during a UK tour, is ending up with Wreckless Eric joining her onstage in his old art school town of Hull to sing Whole Wide World. There ensued instant attraction, marriage, and even a double act across three albums, two uniting their own work, the other, Two-Way Family Favourites, wildly disparate covers: ABBA’s Fernando alongside Ballad Of Easy Rider, with Smokey’s Living Next Door To Alice not far behind.
                “We’ve done loads of other covers; we definitely have enough for Two-Way II!” laughs Rigby. The pair opened Eric’s November 2025 show at London’s Lexington by dusting off a few duets.
                The couple’s initial transatlantic relationship quickly moved on, helped by Eric’s earlier retreat to rural France. “We went to Paris for the only gig I’ve ever had there, and Eric said, ‘I’d kind of like to move back, would you consider moving there?’ ‘Sure!’ There was as little thought put into it as that.
                “I love being in bands, that feeling of support, and I was tired of being alone musically, and was such an admirer of Eric,” she justifies her decision. “We’d spend our time sitting with our guitars saying, ‘Hey, do you know this one… Sugar, Sugar!”
                After nearly a decade in a French village the couple moved to the mountains of upstate New York for 12 years (“It didn’t seem so much of a backwater… we had 24-hour Walmarts!”). Then, in 2024, they moved to England. Eric had previously lived near Norwich, and they had a short spell in the north Norfolk seaside town of Cromer, before setting up home just inland.
                As for 2026… Rigby played a string of US dates at the start of the year with some arranged for Britain – some book events with live performance. Eric plays bass in her band, and she plays guitar in his, with Wreckless dates also coming. Says Rigby: “I have a lot of new songs so I’m hoping to make another record this summer, and I’m hoping to do some Mod Housewife shows in the fall [for its 30^th anniversary].”
                Meanwhile, she keeps on writing. “When we were in France, I started a blog and have written consistently so have thousands and thousands of words about France and upstate New York and all the rest,” she says. “There’s at least one more book!”
               
Interview: Nick Dalton
Girl To Country is published by Southern Domestic. Hang In There… is on Tapete