by: Scott Iwasaki
Mary Ramsey, the new lead singer/violist for 10,000 Maniacs, thanks her parents and older sister for introducing her to music.
"I was five when I first started playing and singing," Ramsey remembered during a late night phone call from her home in Buffalo, N.Y. "My older sister played violin and I wanted to do what she did. And my parents were really supportive."
10,000 Maniacs - Ramsey, drummer Jerome Augustyniak, bassist Steven Gustafson, keyboardist Dennis Drew and guitarists Robert Buck and John Lombardo - will play Club DV8, 115 S. West Temple, Friday, Dec. 19. Doors open at 7 p.m.
"I also listened to the Beatles and used my baby-sitting money to buy their albums," Ramsey said. "But I heard a lot of Bessie Smith, Simon & Grafunkel, the Weavers as well as Debussey and Tchaikovsky."
Ramsey met 10,000 Maniacs while she was singing with Lombardo. Lombardo, incidentally, used to be in 10,000 Maniacs. And when he and Ramsey opened for the band back in 1994, former singer Natalie Merchant took an immediate liking to Ramsey. [webmaster's note: this is wrong, obviously, since Natalie left the band in 1993; John & Mary first opened for the Maniacs in 1990]
"It was the fact we were both women among many men," Ramsey said. "So when Natalie left, the band immediately looked at John and I. John wanted to join again, and they wanted me to sing and write."
One thing lead to another and the band recorded a new album, Love Among the Ruins.
"We're in it for the music," Ramsey said. "It would be great to make a lot of money, but it's the music that comes first."