Atkins: a different type of Jersey girl

Singer reflects on her home, her ‘City’ and the Boss

Nicole Atkins’ debut full-length, “Neptune City,” canonizes her New Jersey hometown. But it couldn’t be further from the rock bravado precedent set by Jersey boy/god Bruce Springsteen.

She never cared for him much, not until a few years back, anyway. And when she had a Wednesday night gig at an Irish pub just out of college, she eschewed bar-rock bangers and played Pavement, Wilco and Sebadoh songs for the half-empty room instead.

Her songwriting started out in the indie and alt-country contexts, but after harmonizing guitar parts as placeholders on her demos, she happened upon her gossamer girl-group sound.
Fully realized by producer Tore Johansson, who has worked with the Cardigans and Franz Ferdinand, “Neptune City” conjures the torchsong netherworlds of Nick Cave and Rufus Wainwright.

By phone from the Newark airport, Atkins says she likes minor chords and
ghost-story atmospherics.

The winters in Sweden, where she recorded with Johansson, also helped forge the sonic backdrop. The sun would rise at 7 a.m. and set at two in the afternoon.

“We created a little dream world to make our day-to-day more interesting,” she says. “Because there was no day-to-day. It made New Jersey look like the Bahamas.”

She lives two miles away from Neptune City now, in Asbury Park.

“It’s all these beautiful 1920s seaside facades, all broken down ghost town,” she says. “It’s gorgeous. But it used to be Dogtown — lots of gang activity and surfers. The gay community moved in and now it’s all artists and upstarts. It’s gone through a nice revitalization.”

Atkins has also come around — on a guy who, rock-wise, put Asbury Park on the map. 

“I grew up in a town where every band in town wanted to be Bruce Springsteen and everybody had a story and was like, ‘I know Bruce Springsteen, man,’” she scoffs. “I didn’t like the whole ‘Rosalita’-era. But I never heard him do it — I just heard bad imitations.”

Then she read an article on the making of “Born to Run” while recording her album. She turned the corner.

“Now I love him,” she says. “I see him in town from time to time, and we’ll sit and have a drink and talk. ... He’s seriously the coolest guy ever made.”

It’s hard to resist giving Atkins a hard time, now she’s “that guy” who brags about knowing Bruce Springsteen.

“Oh, yeah,” she coos. “He’ll come into my friend’s bar and ask about me, and I won’t even be like [casual]. I’ll be like, ‘Me? Really? Tell me! Tell me! What’d he say? What’d he say?’

Nicole Atkins and the Sea
Tonight, 9
TT the Bear’s
10 Brookline St., Cambridge
MBTA: Red Line to Central
$12, 617-492-BEAR
www.ttthebears.com