If you switched on Top 40
radio in 1995 you stood a good chance of hearing Joan Osborne’s “One of Us”—after
all, the song, from Relish, her debut album of that year, was a worldwide
smash that went to number four in the US. And it seems reasonable to assume
that the Grammy-nominated folk-rock troubadour will bust out the tune when she plays
a rare intimate local concert at the Colony on August 31.
Born and raised in a
suburb of Louisville, Kentucky, Osbourne came to New York to study film in the late
1980s and started singing casually at open mics in the city. Before long she’d
assembled her own band and was performing as part of the same adult-alternative
scene that would birth contemporary hitmakers like Blues Traveler, the Spin
Doctors, Jeff Buckley, Chris Whitley, and others.
Since striking platinum with
Relish, the singer and activist has collaborated with the Dead, Phil
Lesh and Friends, Mavis Staples, Spearhead, Cheap Trick, and others; produced
two albums by the Holmes Brothers; and served alongside ex-Black Crowes Jackie
Greene and Steve Gorman in the band Trigger Hippy. She released Nobody Owns
You, her 11th studio album, last year.
Joan Osbourne will
perform on the Garden Main Stage at the Colony in Woodstock on August 31 at 6pm
(doors at 5pm). Tickets are $50.38-$81.28.
This article appears in August 2024.
