Joe_Romersa

Joe Romersa

Joe Romersa

American musician

Joe Romersa is an American musician, composer, voice actor, and music producer.

Quick Facts Genres, Occupation(s) ...

Romersa started his career as a drummer, but early on he branched out into sound engineering. As Romersa tells it, "After a tragic early tour I did at age 19 which left me homeless sleeping on a park bench in New Jersey, I had to find a way to make money and still be close to what I love; music."[1] Romersa later studied sound engineering. Combining his fledgling career as a professional musician with the more stable income of sound engineering allowed Romersa to hone his craft as both a drummer/percussionist and as a sound engineer.

Career

Early career

Romersa started touring as the drummer for the Marc Tanner Band. On April 19, 1979, they would open for Firefall, at the Palace Theater in Cleveland Ohio.[2] The Marc Tanner Band also opened for Jefferson Starship. Romersa was a drummer, percussionist, and composer on Tanner's second album, Temptation, along with guitarist Ritchie Zito and bassist Ron Edwards.

Soy Cowboy

While working in the studio, a chance meeting with keyboardist and songwriter Vincent Nicoletti would result in the band Soy Cowboy with its "Thai Western" sound. Romersa was brought in as a drummer and sound engineer, and eventually became lead vocalist. After their first recordings received airplay by Los Angeles radio personality Tom Schnabel of KCRW-FM (89.9), the band caught the attention of then-art student Tarsem Singh. In 1990, Singh would produce Soy Cowboy's only music video for their song "Lily Pads and Rock Cod".[3] Soy Cowboy's first album, First Time Again, was produced in 1991 but it was not released to the public. The album would later be released in 2009, by Shadow Box Studio. Their second album, 2012, was produced and released in 2012. As noted by Schnabel, "The band got moderate airplay on U.S. radio, but in England briefly jumped to the top of the charts."[4]

Sound engineering

Romersa was both a drummer and engineer on John Prine's 1991 album The Missing Years. He would go on to work with Carlene Carter on her 1993 country music album Little Love Letters as the drummer, percussionist, engineer and backup vocalist, along with bassist Howie Epstein and keyboardist Benmont Tench. Little Love Letters would rise to No. 35 on the Top Country Albums chart and included the No. 3 hit "Every Little Thing" and two top 100 songs; "I Love You 'Cause I Want To" (#50) and "Unbreakable Heart" (#51). Romersa's daughter, Reyna, would make her video debut in "I Love You 'Cause I Want To".

In the late 1980s, Romersa began working with eden ahbez.[5] Romersa and ahbez worked together until the latter's death in 1995.[6]

Voice acting

In 1994, Romersa started engineering, voice acting and ADR directing on anime and video game projects, which led to his work on Silent Hill.[1] Romersa would go on to work as music supervisor on Silent Hill 3, 4: The Room and Homecoming. He also wrote the lyrics and contributed vocals to "Hometown" and "Cradle of Forest".[7]

Return to music

One of Romersa's projects as a producer was singer Alana Sweetwater's 2004 self-titled debut album. Her single from that album, "Song of Love", was featured on the original Showtime series The Real L Word. Romersa was also a musician on the album and sound engineer.

Romersa released his first album as a solo artist in 2017, Enough. Written and composed by Romersa, Enough includes tracks by fellow musicians including Laurence Juber ("Love, and You"), Prescott Niles ("Enough", "Humans Doing Angels' Work", "Soldier of Love") and Jeff Jourard ("Give Our Money Back").

Romersa's musical inspirations include The Beatles, Ludwig van Beethoven, John Cage, Jimi Hendrix, Louis Prima, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, The Move and David Bowie.[1]

Discography

Mainstream albums

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Indie albums

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Acting

Anime voice-over

Video game roles

Non-anime voice-over

  • Big Rig Buddies as Smokey the Fire Truck (formerly)

Staff work

References

  1. [1]
    "Interview with Joe Romersa, the man behind the voice | 世楽 SEGAKU". segaku.com. Retrieved November 10, 2016.
  2. [2]
    "FIREFALL | TOUR ARCHIVE". Firefall. Retrieved November 16, 2016.
  3. [3]
    Jones, Janice L. (June 5, 1993). "Soy Cowboy: Thais to the West : Pop music: What started as a one-time project led this country rock band—with bilingual backup singers—to a niche in world beat". The Los Angeles Times. ISSN 0458-3035. Retrieved November 10, 2016.
  4. [4]
    "Soy Cowboy: Back Again". Rhythm Planet. Retrieved November 10, 2016.
  5. [5]
    "Eden Ahbez, the First Hippie". www.thenativeangeleno.com. Archived from the original on November 11, 2016. Retrieved November 11, 2016.
  6. [6]
    Chidester, Brian (February 1, 2014). "Eden Ahbez: The Hippie Forefather's Final Statement to the World". L.A. Weekly. Retrieved November 11, 2016.
  7. [7]
    "Joe Romersa Interview: Writing Songs for Silent Hill (March 2008)". www.game-ost.com. Retrieved November 10, 2016.
  8. [8]
    "Behind the Voice Actors – Joe Romersa". Behind The Voice Actors. Retrieved September 11, 2019.
  9. [9]
    Dimps; Polygon Magic. Seven Samurai 20XX. Sammy Studios. Scene: Ending credits, 5:09:47 in, CAST.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
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