Biography

Contact Information:
Mark Pucci Media
5000 Oak Bluff Ct.
Atlanta, GA 30350-1069
(770) 804-9555
www.markpuccimedia.com

Release Date of Christmas Single: Nov 15, 2022
Release Date of Album: Feb 4, 2022


The Twangtown Paramours is an award-winning husband and wife duo and band from Nashville. They are three time Kerrville finalists and winners of Texas’s Wildflower Contest. The team of Mike T. Lewis and MaryBeth Zamer are excited to release their new retro Blues and Americana album, Double Down on a Bad Thing. The project represents a new and energetic musical direction for them. This full band album is largely early1960’s sounding and upbeat. Influences of the Beatles and Memphis blues are prominent, but those sounds are re-interpreted and combined to form something new. The Twangers have plans to follow up the album with live band touring.

In Double Down on a Bad Thing, the Twangtown Paramours seem to ask their audience to remember when catchy pop melody and great blues influenced groove served as the soundtrack of a dynamic America and Europe and of a forward thinking society. If positive and energetic music can lead to positive attitude and action in trying times, this is the album to do it. If not, it will at least cheer people up.
The bonus Christmas track on the album was released as a special single in December. It was played over 214,000 times in more than 16,000 stores and malls across the country.

Double Down on a Bad Thing is the third album by the Twangtown Paramours. Their first two acoustic albums went to #11 and #2 on the folk charts and received accolades for singing, songwriting, and performance. In contrast, Double Down on a Bad Thing is electric, hard-hitting, and bandcentric.

The Twangtown Paramours overheard the phrase that would become the title of their new project when they were in Las Vegas a few years ago. They were in a casino walking behind a guy who was a dead ringer for Joe Pesci. On each of his arms was a tall, gorgeous woman with red hair. The Twangers weren’t sure if this Pesci doppelganger was referring to gambling or to the two women when he said, “Tonight, I’m gonna double down on a bad thing.”

The core group on Double Down on a Bad Thing consists of MaryBeth on vocals, Mike on guitars and bass, and Shawn Pelton of SNL band, Shawn Colvin, and Roseanne Cash fame on drums and percussion.

Some of the other featured musicians on the album include Dave Keyes, who is a two time Blues Society Pinetop Perkins pianist nominee, Rave Tesar, music director of the band Renaissance, Steve Conn, pianist for Sonny Landreth, New York session piano player and organist, Ed Alstrom, and horn players Dan Nigro and Vinnie Cutro from Smokey Joe’s Café.

Lead singer, MaryBeth Zamer was a fixture in the Washington, D.C. club circuit for many years. She performed with the band Ignition and sang background vocals for Eva Cassidy. She is also the main author of the some of the most meaningful songs in the Twangtown Paramours catalog.

Mike is a session musician, producer, and hit songwriter. He is the author of a #1 platinum pop tune in Korea, which is ranked as the second biggest selling female ballad of all time in that country. He also sometimes plays upright bass for Jimmie Dale Gilmore and does a little TV acting. He has appeared on the Investigative Discovery Channel and as a background actor on CMT’s “Nashville”.

1. DOUBLE DOWN ON A BAD THING is the title track and goes right to the heart of what the album is about – a retro early 1960’s sound, a great catchy melody, a hard hitting groove, and a lot of fun. The tune features Dan Nigro and Vinnie Cutro in a Memphis sounding horn section.

2. THAT’S WHAT THE BLUES ARE FOR is a heavily blues influenced song with a Nashville lyric twist. It is a request for truth in a relationship, but with attitude. The song features co-writer Dave Keyes on B-3 and Wurlitzer.

3. TALK ABOUT PEACE is a song with a clear message. We live in a society that is set against itself. We all know how to fix it, but we haven’t so far. Every major religion tells us what to do: think of others before you act, love thy neighbor as thyself, don’t let ego and greed get in the way, be kind, forgive. This song is an anthemic plea for action instead of lip service.

4. ANYONE BUT YOU contains the most poetic lyric of the album. It is about taking a step back and finding perspective at a moment of anger and hurt in a relationship. Truthful, personal, and poignant, it is one of two more modern sounding ballads on the album.

5. COMIN’ BACK is an uptempo female empowerment song with an in your face lyric. This hard hitting blues groove features co-writer Dave Keyes on B-3 and Vandellas- style female background singers. Check out Shawn Pelton’s drum fill at the end.

6. WHOA NELLIE is simply whimsical uptempo fun and is one of two songs on the album that features Mike on lead vocals. This guitar-centered blues based tune came out of just messing around while testing the newly acquired vintage 1957 Gibson GA-25 amp, which appears on this and many other songs on the album. The title is a riff on the name of one of Mike’s ex-girlfriends.

7. LOVE IS A STRANGER is a melodic 1950’s style mid-tempo, but underneath this very musical tune hides a truthful and personal lyric and a psychological observation: it’s hard to give love if you’ve never gotten any or have gotten very little. The song features Steve Conn from Sonny Landreth’s band on piano.

8. SOME OTHER DAY is perhaps the most Beatlesque song in the collection – guitaristic, catchy, and uptempo. It contains some good advice about repairing relationships and not wasting time on petty squabbles. And it happens to be MaryBeth’s favorite song to go around the house singing.

9. I MISS WHO I THOUGHT YOU WERE is the most specifically autobiographical song Mike ever wrote. Sung by Mike, this second modern sounding ballad is emotional and exact. The woman who it is about will recognize herself immediately when she hears it.

10. SINCERELY YOURS NO MORE is a steady hypnotic mid-tempo groove tune that draws on a 1960’s Spaghetti Western vibe. It actually began as a Bluegrass number, and the lyric still has the feel of that genre. The song features some great slinky playing by Mark Deffanbaugh on lap steel.

11. ALRIGHT AGAIN is a prayer with a message of hope and encouragement for those who have lost faith in the human condition. This stripped down ballad starts quietly and then soars. It draws on Gospel and R&B influences and consists simply of one voice, piano, and B-3.

12. MY GINGERBREAD MAN is the bonus Christmas track on the album. 40% nice, 60% naughty, this song, like much of the mostly upbeat and retro project, is a harkening back to boom times in America. This classic sounding song seems like it could be found on AM radio in 1963 or in a playlist of Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ ‘Round the Christmas Tree”, Bobby Helms’ “Jingle Bell Rock”, and the Chipmunks’ “Christmas Don’t Be Late.”Besides MaryBeth on vocals, Mike on guitars and bass, and Shawn Pelton on drums, it features New York session pianist and Yankees Stadium organist, Ed Alstrom, and Dan Nigro of Smokey Joe’s fame on saxophones.