Winnipeg blues/folk guitarist and singer Romi Mayes has been staying close to home for the past few month, but she will be coming back to Lethbridge on July 28 to play the Slice. But she and guitarist Jay Nowicki have been far from idle.
“Manitoba has been really good to us. Last year was crazy, so in addition to having family here that we wanted to spend time with, we have a video we made in the spring but we had to be home for,” said Mayes.
“Luckily we ended up getting a lot of gigs close to home.”
The concept for the new video for “Lucky Tonight,” the title track of their most recent album has been on Mayes’ mind for a long time — about a year, but because they are constantly on the road, they never had time to actually do it.
“We]re only doing four tour this year instead of a thousand,” Mayes chuckled.
“ I was afraid it might turn out to be one of these dead ideas,” she said.
The concept was both Jay and Romi pick up somebody after a gig, but it turns out the two people they picked up were actually a couple. They wanted to include a lot of their friends in the music community in the shoot.
“Originally Corb Lund was supposed to do it and a lot of other friends like Hayes Carll. We thought it would be cool to fly them in for the shoot, but we just couldn’t make it work for scheduling,” she continued.
“ So we polled Winnipeg about who we should have in it.”
She was surprised by how many people volunteered.
“ I actually didn’t know a lot of the guys, but they knew me. I knew their bands, but I didn’t know them. So I ended up calling my buddy Jamie (Buckboro) from the band the Honeysliders. They’re relatively new, but they have been in a lot of cover bands, ” she said.
She enjoyed the experience.
“ I was actually sad when it ended. We had a lot of the Winnipeg music scene in group shots, which were cut, which was disappointing, but we trusted the director,” she said.
She has been starting to do more writing and for now is considering a recording an all ballad album for 2013 and another rock record.
“I just want to rock right now. I felt people were starting to get bored with the ballads. So they have been pushed aside. But people really like the ballads, so I always put on one or two tear-jerkers. This way they won’t have to click to track four. I’ll re-record some of them and others will be brand new.,” she said adding she may call it ‘The Ballads I Left Behind,” though she is far from having begun work on it.
She always enjoys playing Lethbridge. The current, quick tour concentrates in Alberta and Montana with the Calgary blues festival being the anchor. Their next tour will be an October tour of Eastern Canada.
“ It will be the same old story. We’re going to give’er. We’re going to get on stage and rock hard and i think we have a couple new tunes. I think the last time I played Lethbridge I had laryngitis and had to go to Emergency. this time it will be better because I won’t have laryngitis,” she said.
— By Richard Amery, L.A. Beat Editor
