This is New Wisco Weekend. I'm Lisa Hale your host. Every week we like to close the show
with music. The gentlemen, Grifters are a Wisconsin-based fan that twists bluegrass,
western folk, ragtime, and hard rock into unique and fun music. Take a listen.
The mermaid approached in the haze and offered me her hand. She said she'd give me a
sick passage back on to try land. Look, I was a bitch, she played a trick upon my
weary eye. At the time I thought I had a hand of mine in pride.
Well, I've been known to see on many other nights, but the waves had never been
but as bad as tonight. I held onto the rudder as I lay upon the floor. The
ship should have set a foot upon that hiker's shore.
We went back into her dance, so we could rest a bit. Now we're in for my safety as the
captain. The gentlemen, Grifters were guests on civic media's Mino and the mayor show recently.
Here's a little bit of their interview. All right, Mino is my good one. Not really a leader here.
We can all do our parts. We all do singing. We all do instruments. So yeah, we've been doing this
for a few years. We started around the pandemic kind of doing things over the internet, passing
back and forth before we could really get together in person and not infect everybody.
Well, I like the fact, like we said, this is the most unique, different, not unique, but tell us
about the different instruments you have in your trio. Yeah, well, I've got, we call this a guitar.
You don't see these two off. All right, wow, here we go.
Over here, we got Amanda Lynn and then we have a violin, a fiddle. I have no idea. Some
four-stringed instrument. Oh, Vanda fiddle. Yeah. And violin for, that's a cool instrument.
David, you in the high school choir course. What'd you do? Yeah.
No, I played in heavy metal bands when I was a kid. Look at this guy.
Yeah, he could be in the movies. Yeah, that's serious. I have a clean cut here.
Look at these guys. No, he said this dude. Yeah, he was like, damn, punch or something.
All of them. He was the choir kid, actually. Wow. Okay, you guys, hide it well. All right.
How'd you get into this? And I think that's cool that you play a violin.
I tried a lot of different instruments and they kept shrinking. I started with drums and then it
went to piano and guitar and I'm finally down to a fiddle. Maybe I'll get down to a harmonica or
something that's even smaller at some point, but I think I'll stick with fiddle. You can just do what
I do is just do vocals. Well, you get to my point that you're not even a musician anymore.
So careful. But you're a big advocate for people trying different things. Oh, absolutely.
It's great for, you know, from a learning standpoint. And at least guys are so talented.
They can pick up an instrument in two weeks. They're like, well, wait till you hear us.
How about you choir boy? So my name is Chris Lalonde. I Chris. Yeah, I picked up Mandolin
about a decade ago, about 10 years. I actually worked with the guitars for toast and jam.
Oh, yes, we had him in here. Haven't we? Not yet.
Yeah, I worked with him back in the day out of fiberglass shop and I didn't even know what
a mandolin was until I worked at that fiberglass shop. But I started on bass. I taught myself
bass when I was 12 and then guitar when I was 14. How does it translate to the mandolin?
So this is actually tuned just like a fiddle or an upside down bass. And actually one of my
buddies was like, oh, yeah, soon just like an upside down bass and they just stared at it for like
a good solid hour flipping all those scales around in my head.
Yeah, that's scrambled eggs to me. Can you imagine that?
Wow, learning it backwards. Pretty cool. That's amazing.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I thought about it like an upside down bass for about a month.
Then what happened? Then it turned into a mandolin.
Okay. That's the spirit. Yeah. And shout out to Andrew Madson. He's a luthier down in Nina.
He made this beautiful instrument. Oh, Andrew is awesome. We got to get him into.
Oh, he made that? Yeah. All right, you guys. What kind of music do you play?
Like, what would be your genre?
Oh, bluegrass primarily, but we kind of beautiful. That one a lot of different things.
All right. Don't you have a big festival in Marquette? Like by ordockers?
A big bluegrass thing in the summers? They're too big for that.
Oh, yeah. Oh, okay. I don't think so. Don't you use guys that?
What bluegrass? Bluegrass.
Bluegrass. Big as you, PS3. They're, they got a blues festival.
Bluegrass. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's huge. Yes.
It's very big. Yeah. Yeah. So let's hear a little something.
All right. All right. Tell us about what it is that you're going to play.
The gentleman grifters. All right. Here's a song that's, I guess this is bluegrass,
but it's it's very, uh, regtime inspired. I love it.
Okay. That's the best.
Shout it out from the tops of the trees.
Good times I hear again.
I think it's time to shake these blues, put down your phone, and turn off the news.
Get yourself a pair of dancing shoes. Let this little sound be your excuse.
So tell the bartender, tell the queen, tell everybody in between.
Shout it out from the tops of the trees.
And good times I hear again. Come on, Chris.
Thank you so much for being a part of New Wisco Weekend.
Your look at the stories and issues facing Northeast Wisconsin.
This issue of New Wisco Weekend is written, produced, and directed by Lisa Hale.
Our executive producer is Todd Michaels with features from Conrad Krieger,
Brittany Merlot, Melissa Kay, Joanne Croulette, and Peach Schwabba.
Our commentator is Amanda Nimmer and we had special appearances this week by John
Mino, Jim Schmidt, and Dennis Peters. If you have a story you'd like to hear us cover,
please feel free to email us anytime, lisa.hale at civicmedia.us.
I'm Civic Media, Northeast Wisconsin Bureau Chief Lisa Hale for WISS and WGBW News. Be unstoppable.
