Lisa De Novo
Lisa De Novo, award-winning singer/songwriter, is based in Charlotte, NC. She calls her music Bubblegum Blues – an eclectic blend of catchy pop music and soulful blues music influenced by artists like Amy Winehouse, Sia, the Cranberries, and Ed Sheran. In October 2016, she released her EP the Stars Align. In May 2018, she released her first full-length album – The Big Bang. The album is a unique blend of pop, soul, and alternative rock. Lisa De Novo just finished her cross-country tour from Charleston, SC to Hollywood, CA. She has featured on “Your Carolina” in Greenville, SC and PCTV in Park City, Utah. Fans all over the country are raving about her new album! She has done several electronic dance music collaborations with DJ’s all over the world. One of her songs called The Weekend produced by SMK has over 300,000 plays on Youtube. She stays busy playing shows all over the United States, hosting open mic nights, and writing new songs whenever the inspiration hits! Her positive energy and contagious smile will leave you feeling the good vibes all night!
Greazy Keyz – In the studio today, we have some awesome guests. We have Miss Lisa DeNovo and Jimmy Ski here in the studio with us to talk about their music and some great things coming up. Welcome to the studio, guys.
Lisa – Hey, thanks for having us.
Greazy Keyz- Very cool. So you guys have been involved in the music scene in Charlotte for quite a while, right?
Lisa – Yeah.
Greazy Keyz – I know personally I had the opportunity to meet you. I remember a recording session with Pam Taylor. Back in 2017, it seems like I was working at the old house studio with Chris Garges.
Lisa – Yeah, that was really cool.
Greazy Keyz – I remember very distinctly you were, you had the boots with the fur. (laughing) So that’s really cool. So as you were, you know, doing some background, but you were already established as a songwriter yourself, right, Lisa?
Lisa – Yes. Yeah, I started, it was around summer of 2015, just doing music full -time.
Greazy Keyz – Right on. So, are you originally from Charlotte?
Lisa – No, I was actually born in Utica, New York, and then I grew up a lot of my life in Florida and Southwest Florida, and then ended up moving here to Charlotte when I was about 23.
Right on. Very cool, so how many years ago was that?
A long time, yeah, a little over 10 years.
Oh, right on, okay, very cool.
And then I found out, like, I mean, I decided to move to Charlotte just because it was a bigger city from where I was ’cause there weren’t a lot of places to play and I just knew I wanted to do music. I knew it even before I decided to take the jump to do it full time, but then there’s just way more opportunities and even now, it’s like tripled since then with places to play and people to jam with, it’s really cool.
Wonderful. Well, I definitely got the sense, even from meeting you then, you are a lifer when it comes to being a live performer. And I’m just blown away by your persistence and your innovation, like I said, as either a solo artist or playing as a duo with you and Jimmy or even with a full band. So tell us your approach about, you know, when you’re booking yourself, like how do you plan certain gigs for certain times of the year? What’s your approach to booking?
So usually you just have to think ahead, like even a little farther than you want to sometimes and just kind of anywhere from like three to six months and figure out like the monthly shows you want to do solo, and then throw a couple duo ones in the mix. And then for the bigger shows, sometimes you have to apply way far in advance and then other times you just have to kind of ask the band like, “What are you guys down to do this year?” And then kind of put a good show together. Jimmy’s pretty good at helping me with that. We did a big show at the Visulite last year and if you want to talk about that.
Greazy Keyz – Yeah, Jimmy. How did you get plugged in here with Lisa?
Jimmy Ski – We met at Tommy’s Pub. Nice. The old Tommy’s Pub.
Greazy Keyz – Yeah, the original Tommy’s pub on Central Avenue.
Yeah, good times. I liked sitting outside there, more than inside. I don’t drink much though. There’s a good vibe there though. Yeah, we met there. And then, yeah, I don’t know, we did open mics. Once we started playing together, we hosted a few open mics, and then that Visulite show that we just booked, we booked a comedian, Chris Corrado, a magician, Colin the Laser, and then the River Keepers opened. Yeah, so it was like music, comedy, and magic all in one.
Yeah, that was a lot of fun to do that one.
That’s very innovative.
In between all the acts, we played music videos that we made.
Yeah, and we have a new music video that just came out for my Not Giving Up, and Jimmy starred in the video and filmed the video, and his friends do some skateboarding in the video, so it’s kind of, just kind of about, an inspirational song. About not giving up even when life gets hard, so.
Henry & Derrin from the band Dumpster Service
And so, Jimmy, you’re the percussionist last drummer in the band, right, and it sounds sort of like the videographer for the band as well, right?
Yeah, yeah. There was a couple scenes that I thought was recording that weren’t because I had to run back and hit it and run in and I heard the beep and I thought it was recording.
The pitfalls of self -production.
It’s a dance.
Oh, yeah It really is a dance because you know you’re using you know your your right brain I guess for the creative side, you know the music side, but then your left brain’s got to be ready for the technical side
Yeah, you get back and see my hats all crooked and she’s like “wait, your glasses!”. I’m like oh.
It’s good to have someone to pay attention to the details too. And then we had Jason from Sector on Tap. He helped us get a nice warehouse in Camp North End. So that was my favorite scene in the video, to just be able to actually do a real video on an independent artist budget. Like it’s like, it’s hard to find a good place to do that, but he helped us and it sounded and, it looked really good with all the lights and everything.
He was super patient with us too, getting all our gear in and out, and yeah, it was really unexpected, honestly. I didn’t think we were going to get it like that. He offered it to us at a show one time, and we took him up on it.
Greazy Keyz – Right on. Well, let’s check it out. So again, this is a music video for a song called “Not Giving Up” by Lisa DeNovo and her band. Roll that beautiful footage.
Greazy Keyz – Fantastic, that was a video “Not Giving Up” by Lisa De Novo and her man Jimmy Ski and featuring Zach Willard and Michael Lanigan of the band as well. Such a fantastic job. I mean as an independent video, that is just top notch all the way around.
Thank you.
Greazy Keyz – And I think that it really is a testament to your artistry. You know, it’s not only as a singer-songwriter, but as a video producer and making sure that your stuff is top quality. So what about, who are some of your influences? Like to me personally, like I got a little Nelly Furtado kind of vibe from that one, but who are some maybe your influences as far as your singer -songwriter background?
Lisa – Well, I grew up listening to a lot of different types of music. It was everything from Christian music to rock music to even Lauren Hill, Christina Aguilera. I really liked Avril Lavigne as a kid and Amy Lee from Evanescence, so there’s just so many. But anything that was on the radio, I’d find myself singing along to and I could learn lyrics really easily. So just after hearing so many different types of music and then flash back to now, I can do song requests, I can play hundreds of different songs, and if I hear a melody that’s a little bit poppy or a little bit rock, I can usually sing it back really quickly.
I know, are you mostly self -taught musically that way?
So I taught myself how to play guitar. My older brother, Micah, taught me how to play bass, and we used to sing together in the church band, and he was the lead worship leader and I did bass guitar and I sang when I was 17 so that was my first instrument, performance, experience and it was a lot of fun.
Great musical family. How about you, Jimmy? What are some of your musical backgrounds? Who are some of your influences?
It went like Def Leppard to Guns N’ Roses and then to Pearl Jam and when I got that, I got 10 on tape when it first came out and it was just a random, like my mom was just like pick something we’re going on a road trip to Chicago, and I just was like, “Pearl Jam sounds cool,” and I loved it. I didn’t stop listening to that, and then got into like Korn, Deftones, and then kind of got into some rap, got into like Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, the Resurrection album on it. I don’t know if you know about it. It’s got a lot of like strings and a lot of like real instrument sounding beats on it. And then, yeah, it then got into rave music and then just turned right back around and went right back and got into rock and roll again.
Right on. And primarily as a drummer or do you play other instruments as well?
I play a little of everything. Right. I just, you know, I could, I can get something out of everything I feel like except a, I’ve always had a hard time with like trumpets. I can’t.
Me too.
The three things.
How do you get so many notes out of just three, three valves? It’s a mystery.
It perplexed my brain.
I could do almost anything with strings and like keys I can play, I can play a tiny bit of drums, but then it comes to like the wind and the horns and all that.
The rock and roll instruments are sort of your thing. I’m the same way, I love that. So not only as a singer-songwriter, but you mentioned earlier, hosting open mics and sort of promoting live music as a community. This community seems to be a big part of your love as well. Let’s talk about that. Is that, do you like to be a part of the community and what are your approaches to building that?
I think community is key for building a strong scene like in Charlotte and then just kind of like building your own career as well because it’s like your network is important. And then the opportunities kind of come from one person “Oh I can’t do this show will you cover for me?” or maybe like “Hey I have this opportunity you should get on this roster” So it’s really nice to help each other out. So we started hosting open mic nights in 2016 and that slowly evolved into what we now do the Rock Stars in the Round and that’s a monthly song writer round inspired from the Nashville ones. I actually went and did a couple of those where you just, it’s kind of like popcorn style, like one person will play a song, and then the next person will play one, and then the next person will play one, but you’re all on stage the whole time, and then you can sing on each other’s songs and play on each other’s songs. It’s a little bit more collaborative, like a step up from an open mic night. And we do that the first Wednesday of the month at Goldies, and that’s been going really well. So it’s fun to book my friends, and then book people sometimes that I haven’t met yet that I really wanted to hear and then some people that I want to co- write with. So it’s really fun for everyone to play live and the crowd really seems to enjoy it as well.
I know we have a picture of one of your flyers. You can show that on the video board.
And they also are doing half off hamburgers, they have wonderful hamburgers there
So Goldies how about a shout out to Goldies. Kind of a newer spot I guess they’ve been around about a year now. They sort of have a different approach live music there almost every night of the week and you can find everything from incredible songwriters in the round, you know, focusing on original music, I would imagine, to like an open mic to you know, maybe a party band or cover band.
Yeah, lots of cover bands on the weekends, they are all really good.
Second Wednesday of the month is an open mic.
And then and like you said, serve food.
You know their food is great. I will vouch for that.
Yeah I’ve heard a lot of good things about hot dogs there, but they have a little hot dog kiosk in the middle of the venue that’s pretty amazing.
They serve those on the weekends, on Friday and Saturday, I believe.
So people that maybe want to get involved with the song right around, what’s the best way to reach out and connect with you about maybe getting involved with that?
Yeah, they can either send me a message on Instagram or shoot me an email at Lisadenovo@gmail.com if they want to get involved with Rock Stars in the Round event and it’s just a lot of fun and it’s just good to go or even if you want to go and be involved and perform on it, you can usually even squeeze up people for a feature at the end for a song or two, too. So it’s a lot of fun.
Oh,nice. Now, do you guys ever take the opportunity to jam on each other’s songs or anything like that?
Yeah. Definitely.
See, to me that is sort of the spirit of open mic or spirit of open jam is really to kind of connect with people musically and communicate that way. ‘Cause music is a language and you know, people can kind of work on each other’s songs and I’m sure that can even be more inspiring in a lot of ways too, right?
We’ve had a few nights where everybody that was involved would play a song at the end of the night altogether.
Oh, nice,
That was a lot of fun.
And we can even take requests too, that’s another thing. We will like, while we do the round, people can text in their requests, and if we know it, we’ll play it in the last hour. So the last hour is covers based on audience requests and things you want to try to collaborate on together that we might all know. But before that, that early time from like six to eight is all like original music.
Very cool. So that’s cool, you see kind of dedicating an hour just for, you know, people have songs that maybe you’re familiar with.
Yeah.
And kind of dig in too. That’s awesome. So again, that’s the songwriters in the round, Rock Stars in the Round, really is what it’s called, Goldie’s first Wednesday every month. Goldie’s on South Boulevard in Charlotte. Fantastic. Well, we’re gonna get ready to take a short break, but let’s talk a little bit before we go about your new song that’s coming out.
Yes. So I have a song called Carolina, and I wrote it this summer of 2023, just kind of in the car, came up with an idea when it was just, I was just driving out of a storm and then it was about a year later I finally recorded it and it was my first experience for like kind of being a sound engineer and producer like all in one.
What?!
And also like laying down the tracks. I did most of the instruments myself but then I had my friend Alana Flowers, Gibson Dubangio, Glenn Gibson did bass, Akima River did violin, Jimmy did snare drum and some of the percussion there.
Wow
And then I kind of just did everything else and then we sent it over to Mix with Mike Parker and then it got mastered by Old Colony with Scott. And it just turned out really well. It’s very warm and heartfelt. And I think it’s the perfect time right now to release a song about how Carolina feels like home. There’s just something about it.
I love that. And I love the promo photo you have of that. That’s a great shot of you with Carolina in the heart-shaped clouds there.
Thank you.
Very bright, again, just artistry throughout everything you do.
Jimmy Ski – That’s right on the Virginia line looking into North Carolina.
Nice, beautiful, beautiful shot. Well, I think we’re gonna have to take a short break here in just a minute and get ready. We’re gonna have a live performance of a couple of songs. I’ll have the honor to play with you on one. But again, we have Lisa DeNovo and Jimmy Ski here in the rBeatz Studio. I’ll take a short break with rBeatz Radio.
Greazy Keyz – Welcome back to rBeatz for another episode of Local Music Somewhere. I’m your host Greazy Keyz in the studio. We have Lisa DeNovo and Jimmy Ski here with us, they’re gonna play some live music. Lisa tell us about your first song you’re gonna play.
This one’s called “Lost In You” and it’s about falling in love on the beach.
Fantastic, fantastic song.
Thank you.
You got one more for us in there.
Let’s go. This next one is called “Sunshine” and I wrote it back in 2020 when the world was kind of shut down and there wasn’t much to do besides, like, sitting outside sometimes, so this is my tribute to the sun called “Sunshine.”
Greazy – Oh man those are amazing songs Lisa. Such positivity. Such good vibes from those. So, as a singer -songwriter, do you have any advice for anybody who may be an aspiring local singer -songwriter, or just anyone who may be tuning in today?
So, if you want to be an indie artist, I would suggest doing these four things
- Having a good performance
- Practicing as much as you can
- Get really good at scheduling and thinking ahead and booking far in advance
- Having really good photo and video and social media presence.
Content creation, right? That’s a big thing, part of being an artist today. Awesome. Lisa, thank you so much for coming into the studio today.
Thank you for having us.
Greazy Keyz – Thank you, Lisa Jimmy, for coming in and bringing just, again, just great vibes, great conversation, great songs. I wish you guys all the best. If you’re tuning in, please check out Lisa DeNovo. She’s got a new single coming out. You can find her on YouTube with some awesome music videos, very well produced, very entertaining. Thank you guys again for coming in. Again, this is Greazy Keyz signing off with rBeatz.com. Tune in next time.
More Artists and Show Episodes
