LaMP is a new project/super group from Jersey-born guitarist Scott Metzger (Joe Russo’s Almost Dead), drummer Russ Lawton (Soul Monde, Trey Anastasio Band), and keyboardist Ray Paczkowski (Dave Matthews & Friends, Trey Anastasio Band). You can find their debut album here.
Scott took some time to answer a few questions about the group’s formation, their long-delayed upcoming shows, and more as they get ready to hit The Wonder Bar in Asbury Park, NJ on Friday March 24.
Andrew Howie: So tell me a little bit about how LaMP came together.
Scott Metzger: So, it got started as this trio of me, Russ and Ray (Lawton and Paczkowski, drums and organ in the Trey Anastasio Band, respectively). We played in 2018 in Burlington, Vermont, just the one show that year, and it went great, the whole town came out to see us. A sold-out gig, rave reviews, everyone was into it, we had a good time! At that point, we were playing each other’s songs, but after that, we decided we should write some material, so we came up with an album’s worth of songs, and in 2019 I went up into Burlington and we recorded. We have tried to do some dates here and there, but with the shutdowns and outbreaks and whatnot, everything was postponed, so it’s nice to see the finish line.
AH: I can only imagine the feeling of finally getting to take these songs on the road! Speaking of the songs, what can you tell me about your approach to this record vs. your other projects? Any striking similarities or differences you noticed?
SM: As far as the songwriting goes, this was the first album I’ve ever written virtually. Russ would send a drumbeat around, just a sort of voice memo recording, very rough, and either Ray or myself would come up with other ideas. I can record here in my Brooklyn apartment. So we would massage things and flesh the ideas out. I would have a verse and hook, Ray might have a chorus idea. That was how we wrote the material, that was how it presented itself. In addition, I recorded in a new studio, I believe Sugarhouse Soundworks, in Vermont. I get the impression Russ and Ray have worked there a lot, but we basically just spent three days there, it was a very quick recording, basically just those few days with almost no overdubs at all. The idea was to get a couple good performances down of these songs. The melodies are strong enough that we felt we didn’t have to lean too much into the production or piling on overdubs. They’re just good songs and we just wanted to capture some good performances.
AH: Let’s talk about that for a second, capturing good performances with no overdubs, etc. Do you find it more beneficial to work songs out with your bandmates in a structured rehearsal or to just let them fly live and see how they work out?
SM: I enjoy both tactics equally. I like to try and approach each project that I’m involved with as a blank slate. I feel that I can pull from a couple different methods and ways of looking at things, and I find both equally satisfying. The tricky part tends to be cracking the code on which way to approach something; which projects need more of a studio way of thinking as opposed to which need to be thought of as a more live and improvisational approach. But once that question is put to bed, for lack of a better term, I know which skill set to pull from that I’ve acquired over the years with my exhaustive research (laughs).
AH: How do you see yourself within the context of this new project?
SM: To be honest, I’ll have a much better answer after we play a few gigs. The way I see it, and I’m anticipating going into these gigs, is that these two guys have played thousands of hours together. That is something that a) can’t be replicated, can’t be faked, and b) needs to be respected tremendously as a musician, because it’s kind of a sacred thing when musicians develop that kind of telepathy or connection that only playing thousands of hours together can bring. To me, Russ and Ray, their connection, whatever that means, and what they bring to the table, is the focus of this project. That is what I’m interested in highlighting, and trying to contribute something to that. That’s an already-existing thing, and what can I bring to the table to hopefully elevate that into a different thing.
AH: Where can fans find you out on the road?
SM: We have five gigs at the end of the month (March), so it’s coming right up. Which means I definitely need to start practicing! We start down in Asbury Park, my home state of New Jersey. Then we go up to Albany, and the following week we’re at Brooklyn Bowl, and then we go up to Russ and Ray’s home turf in Burlington, VT at Nectar’s, which everybody knows, for two nights. That’s our tour schedule as of now, but I’m assuming everything is going to go well. Apparently the people are coming, the tickets are selling. Hopefully this is the beginning of many shows; I’m picturing this as a long-term project.
AH: Without spoiling anything, should fans expect to feel familiar with LaMP material?
SM: I think they’ll be familiar with it for sure, enough to feel comfortable, but a lot of the melodies will bend people’s ears and are unexpected enough that it will feel familiar and safe but with an element of ‘where are they going with this’ or ‘how is this going to turn out.’ There was a lot of talk while we were recording, if we were talking influences or whatever, where we mentioned Ornette Coleman, Mark Turner, some forward-thinking jazz stuff, so that was on table for sure.
AH: Now for something a little different: you’re a seasoned touring musician at this point. However, we all have off days. What do you find helpful when you’ve woken up on the wrong side of the bed and you have to get in gear for a show?
SM: I think at this point I’ve been doing it long enough to just trust the process that once I get going it will be fine; getting started is the hardest part. Once I get out there, no matter how I’m feeling, usually I just can’t help but find something that turns the corner for me and gets the gears turning. I don’t have a specific process or ritual or anything, but I always think of it like this: I’m a big baseball fan, a big Phillies fan, and I always think of it as if you have an off night, if the star is in a slump, it doesn’t mean that they’re not a great player. They just have to get through the rough patches. I look at music like that in the short and long-term. If I play a solo and there’s a false flat, I don’t just chalk the night up as ruined. You get back up at bat on the next one. You got no choice.
AH: Anything you’d like to say to the fans who are attending these upcoming LaMP gigs?
SM: All three of us were pretty frustrated because of things being postponed. We had two windows of gigs on the books that got shut down. Even though it hurt, we felt it was the right thing to do. So to see the gigs on the horizon and finally get out to play these gigs in a live setting, it really stands out and makes these gigs a little more special for us than a regular gig.
