"Roddie Romero feat. Lee Allen Zeno and Jermaine Prejean“
When three times Grammy nominee Roddie Romero performed with Yvette Landry and Beau Thomas in 2017 at the 'American Cajun, Blues & Zydeco Festival it felt like a showcase. He will return with Lee Allen Zeno, famed bassplayer for Buckwheat Zydeco and Roddie's drummer in 'Hub City All Stars', Jermaine Prejean. They will blow the roof off with this band.
Roddie Romero Website
Buckwheat, Sonny, Clifton, Fats. Many of three-time Grammy nominee Roddie Romero’s heroes are long-gone icons who need no introduction. Others are legendary local heroes he’s collaborated with for years. Two of them will join him on tour in Germany this fall.
As the leader of The Hub City All-Stars for more than two decades, accordionist, guitarist, vocalist and songwriter Romero has long mined the many influences of the bayou country. Zydeco, blues, soul, Cajun and swamp pop music are his bedrock inspiration.
“I keep searching for a sound as good as that,” Romero says, referencing
the classic recordings he learned to play along with. Romero first led a band at age 12 and recorded soon thereafter, and over the years he’s collaborated with Los Lobos, The Mavericks and many other artists.
For his American Cajun, Blues & Zydeco festival performances, he’ll be joined on bass guitar by Lee Allen Zeno, the musical backbone of Buckwheat Zydeco’s Ils Sont Partis Band for decades. Zeno has also recorded with Lil’ Buck Sinegal and Robert Ward. Romero was a teenager when he first heard the bassman lead the world’s top zydeco band through an opening set of blues and soul classics at El Sido’s Zydeco & Blues Club in Lafayette. “He’s one of the greatest musicians to come out of south Louisiana,” Romero is quick to note.
Drummer Jermaine Prejean is the engine room of the three-piece ensemble. “As I’m coming up with things in a live setting, there are things that Jermaine seems to hear before anyone else does,” Romero says. When he was a kid, Prejean would play his drum kit along with vintage recordings until he could no longer hear the drummer on the track.
Romero is interested in a similar musical disappearing act. “I feel like I’m searching for something more creative, more original, but still wrapped in all of this that’s around us,” he says.
“The La Louisianne Sessions’ richly deserved its Grammy nomination. … (It’s) a vital, southwest Louisiana jukebox of a record that covers much stylistic ground while still sounding like the same band. ‘It’s all what we grew up on,’ Romero said. ‘It’s all these great musics together. It’s Lafayette.”
