Woody Radio DJ Mike Show #107, 4/25/2020: Jonny Campos and Lisa Said interviews!

This past Saturday’s show featured another pair of interviews! And why not–baseball season has been postponed, or cancelled, or something–so let’s just do our own doubleheader!

We started off by meeting Jonny Campos, steel guitarist of the highly-acclaimed Cajun band Lost Bayou Ramblers. I feel like I’m starting to collect the whole seat of Ramblers–I’ve had Louis Michot and Andre Michot on the show before. What’s really fascinating is that Jonny’s new side project, Weeks Island, is a complete 180-degree turn from what he’s known for. In fact, the style of music is not even anything that is particularly Louisianan. His new EP, Droste–contains five tracks of ambient music–yes, the kind you’d put on, and chill to, or hike to, or meditate to. It’s rather good–and it’s steel guitar-based. The songs were inspired by islands in South Louisiana that are no longer there, due to higher sea levels or erosion. Soundwise–imagine if Brian Eno landed in New Orleans, and started playing steel guitar with a cello bow. Remarkable. In the interview, I learned that Jonny is a big fan of, and interested in, playing all different styles of music–so this may not be as much of a departure as it seems. Pick up your copy at http://nouveauelectricrecords.limitedrun.com/products/665411-weeks-island-droste.

A bit later on, Lisa Said returned to my show. She is another really musically-diverse artist. Her first album was sort of in the Americana vein. But even back then, it came out in conversation that she was a rocker at heart. And boy–has she ever proved it. First came an EP–Estranged–which sounded transitional. It contained a lot of Americana sounds, but led with a rocker called Some Dudes–which named checked more classic rock taglines that you can count on both hands and feet–and was a bit of a response to the Rolling Stones “Some Girls”. (Editor’s note: well-deserved!)

Lisa’s next move: to form a Washington, D.C.-based band called Piramid Scheme. The goal: to rock. I absolutely loved that move, and now, they’ve got two EPs in their catalog. Good timing on the most recent one, “Seen This Before”–right after it was completed, she moved to beautiful Lisbon, Portugal. We chatted about that a bit, but also went into depth with the new EP. It is seriously the most rocking recording of Lisa’s to date. It comes out of the gate, punching its way through some fiery songs, and smoldering its way through some cooler ones as well. It includes a very inspired Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers cover (which I didn’t know–thankfully, an astute listener hipped me to that before I embarrassed myself). Anyhow, it’s always fun chatting with Lisa, and you should get this one: https://piramidscheme.bandcamp.com/album/seen-this-before?fbclid=IwAR35bj2s_ygmDoxWQDMhETqrSPfg1bUVGfzIt9FQpq7esBOD_Yh_1TMr98U

Before, between, and after the interviews, we managed to play a whole lot of other great indie and not-so-indie tracks. I hope you’ll listen and find your new favorites here.

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