Page 34 - BiTS_04_APRIL_2025

BiTS: What about doing support acts? There's a mass of blues singers and people
who play blues in Finland. Erja Lyytinen springs to mind. How about doing support

acts for them?

LP: It's the usual thing if they
Erja Lyytinen
haven't heard of you, it's always

trying to get to that point where
somebody knows about you.
Even in Finland, having played
lots of festivals in Finland, which

I haven’t done for a while, but if
they know you, it's okay, but

sometimes, even if they do know
you, it's such a clique that people
have. A lot of the times it depends

on the actual promoter or
whoever's doing the gig, whether
they like you or not. Not

necessarily what might the
audience like, but what they
think? So typically it could be a

bit stressful trying to do that. You
send out 100 emails and you
might get one reply, and that one reply says, oh, thank you, but we’re fully booked this

year, or we're not interested. Yeah. Okay, fine.

BiTS: Very depressing, I imagine.

LP: Yes, but like I've been lucky enough, I got in contact last year with Barry Hopwood,

and I sent him my CD because I’m playing at Upton on the Friday and then on the
Saturday, I'm going to go to Barry's place. He's got Barry’s Blues Barn. I don't know if
you know him or anything, but he's got a little barn in his back garden. So it's like a

little Juke Joint.

BiTS: Yeah, I know about it. I've never met him. I've never been there. But I know all
about it.

LP: Yes, yes, so I'm quite excited about going there because it’s the kind of place that
I really like – small, intimate, probably as close as you're going to get to how it used
to be in a Juke Joint, but hopefully without all the gambling and the shooting and killing

and other things that used to go on at that time, but who knows? I've never been there,
so it should be fun anyway.

BiTS: Absolutely. Listen, I'll do what I can to promote you.

LP: Well, thank you very much. Yes, I don't know what to say to that. Thank you.