Lonnie Walker, a band who has been named by Earfarm as the top band to hear in North Carolina, caught the eye of quite a few people at Hopscotch Music Festival in Raleigh. They were named one of Paste Magazine's Top 5 moments at Hopscotch, thrown in with names like Broken Social Scene, Lost in the Trees, and Midtown Dickens. If you've ever been to a Lonnie Walker show then you know why. The band exudes energy whether they're playing in a packed house, like they did at Deep South for Hopscotch, or out behind a diner in a fenced in lot full of gravel, like they did for their Day Party performance outside of Remedy Diner. I sat down with Lonnie Walker on Saturday at Ruby Red and talked a bit with the band about things such as the origins of Lonnie Walker, Brian's side project, NAPS, and much more.
The band also sat down for two acoustic performances of their songs, "Wider Than White" and "Teenage Poem". Brian and Eric stripped it down for "Wider Than White" and the whole band got in on an acoustic rendition of "Teenage Poem" including drumming on the chairs and stomping on the porch. Lonnie Walker's performance for The Bottom String Sessions was definitely a highlight of my Hopscotch experience.
TBS:
So Lonnie Walker originated as a solo project that you had. What made you make the decision to flesh it out to a full band?
Brian:
It started out as a solo project in Greenville, just to get a kickstart for writing songs. I kind of always knew the songs would develop into something, I mean they were just stripped down folk songs.
TBS:
So you wrote them with the intention of turning it into a full band?
Brian:
Yeah, we come up with ideas and I arrange it and stuff, but it just thickens out the sound after all of the other members input is in it.
Justin:
We just met up and played one day and it worked really easily and we all learned his songs.
Brian:
Yeah, it wasn't like an epiphany or something where it's like "Oh, I need a full band." I just started playing with Eric first, then Justin started playing keyboard, I'd recorded a song with Raymond before when I was still writing songs solo and that was when Raymond first joined.
Justin:
And then there was Josh and I. I'd played with Raymond a bit before too, but we all just sort of started playing together.
Brian:
Yeah we were all friends anyways, we just decided to jam out.
TBS:
I saw that you guys just got off of a string of dates with Dinosaur Feathers. How did you guys go about hooking up with those guys and how did that your go?
Brian:
Matt from Earfarm, he did that bands to hear in North Carolina piece, he liked their album a lot. That blog also paid a lot of attention to Dinosaur Feathers. The two guys that run Earfarm kind of put it together. or sort of suggested it. They were coming down here anyways, so why not get a show together? Then Justin started communicating with Greg from Dinosaur Feathers, so we decided we should do a string of dates.
Justin:
Yeah, we started booking a tour for it instead of doing just one show.
Brian:
We went up to New York and met them, then came back down here.
Justin:
The idea was sort of like a trade. They had a pull in New York and we had more of a pull around here, so we just decided to trade off.
Brian:
And then we became the bestest of friends. The end. But not the end...to be continued.
TBS:
Lonnie Walker has built up quite the reputation in the North Carolina music scene. What have been your favorite bands to play with?
Brian:
Future Islands. Definitely Future Islands. Megafaun, I love those guys. They carry a torch around here in Raleigh.
Eric:
Buckwheat Zydeco
Brian:
The Rosebuds, The Love Language. Americans In France was my favorite album of last year, so I really love playing shows with them. I guess just all of the local dudes around here, everyones really nice and easy to get along with.
Justin:
I like playing with Veelee a lot
Brian:
Yeah, we played with Veelee and Gross Ghost in Baltimore and it was awesome. They got a pretty good response, I felt, and I think they enjoyed it. I think it was either their first or second time in Baltimore.
Justin:
That was their first tour, I think.
TBS:
So who do you feel is a band to watch out for in the Carolina music scene?
Brian:
Bands to watch out for? Lonnie Walker, haha.
Justin:
I'd say watch out for Veelee
Eric:
NAPS.
Brian:
Yeah, NAPS! Look out for NAPS. Genius songwriter from North Carolina and all he needed was a little push. Yeah, me and my are currently working on a cassette tape label called Dig-Up Tapes and we released some of his material. Daniel Michael was his name and he's the songwriter of NAPS. I play in the band as well as Nathan, the guy I started the tape label with. We released the cassette tape for NAPS also as a digital download and it kind of kickstarted our idea to start doing more. We're going to do a singles box set of local bands and the release date of that is to be determined but we are getting songs in every day. We've got all of the bands that said yes and want to work with us and it's an awesome lineup, it's fucking really awesome. We're going to have some sweet shows for that in celebration of it at Kings.
TBS
What's been your favorite venue to play at?
Brian:
Kings, and it's back! Well it was [our favorite], we've yet to play there again since it's so new now but it was my favorite. I was in high school then and my band was called Felix The Drum Machine. I was in a band with William Cashion from Future Islands, those guys were like best friends with us so thats why we like playing with them so much. But anyways, we've played that place a few times before it got destroyed back when I was in high school and it was always awesome. Also it's like some of the first really awesome shows that I saw when I was a kid were there. Man or Astroman, they let me in when I was under 18 and that was cool, I'm not sure if they were supposed to do that though.
Eric:
I've always liked playing Tir Na Nog
Raymond:
Theres lot's of good places to play in Raleigh.
Brian:
Yeah, and we played this Barnstorm in Iowa. This barn called Codfish Hollow, Sean from Daytrotter sets it up with these barns around the area. I don't know if he guts them out, but he gets it ready for a show and gets a p.a in there. So it's right out in the middle of nowhere and you think you're lost until you see a sign that says, "Take a left for Barnstormer" and it was awesome. That was like the highlight of our tour I feel like. It was definitely one of the coolest venues I've played at though for sure. An emptied out barn.
TBS:
Have you guys started work on a new full length yet? If so how much progress has come along with it?
Brian:
Yeah, we started writing songs that will go on a future full length. We have an EP that is around 80% finished that just has a few mixing touches and it needs to be mastered so that'll probably happen next year, early next year. I think we might do one last push for "These Times" even though it's kind of old locally. But we've got some tricks under our sleeves.
TBS:
What are you looking forward to most about Hopscotch weekend?
Brian:
Uhm, just the community of bands that are around. Like meeting new bands and I've seen a lot of acts that I've never seen before. That's how it always goes at these type of events It's just great to see the city of Raleigh being so excited about it. I mean it's not just me, it's everybody. I'm really stoked.
Justin:
Raleigh finally stepped up. Theres a lot of other cities that have festivals like this, so thank you Grayson. I mean this one's been even better than a lot of the ones that have been around for a while. But I get the feeling that if this keeps happening then it's gonna put Raleigh on the map even more than it already is.
Brian:
Yeah, I think it's done really great for its first year. I mean nobody really knew what to expect. I mean they knew that the wristbands sold out, but theres still the capacity of club issues and how thats gonna work.
TBS:
What is the proudest moment of your career thus far?
Raymond:
Probably doing a Daytrotter. I think that's the biggest.
Brian:
I like that this high school band from Connecticut covered "Back Home Inside With You" and it's on Youtube and I didn't really know them but I just got this link that's like a high school band that's playing what looks like their talent show at their high school. They do an awesome job, it's so good. That's like my proudest moment. I mean, I don't know these guys and they're all the way further up north than we are.
Raymond:
We've never even been to Connecticut
Brian:
Haha, yeah. I just think that thats really cool.
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