OffBeat Magazine December 2010 Issue by OffBeat Magazine

CEDRIC WATSON RADIATORS BLACK SANTA KID ORY UNO JAZZ THERESA ANDERSSON LOUISIANA MUSIC, FOOD & CULTURE—DECEMBER 2010

Ivan Neville Dumpstaphunk

Free In Metro New Orleans US $5.99 CAN $6.99 £UK 3.50

Pha-la-la-la-lah. LOUISIANA CHRISTMAS MUSIC New and Vieux

Letters

Mojo Mouth

10 Photo Op: Monk Boudreaux by Erika Goldring School’s Out

Aaron LaFont tells what UNO-educated jazz musicians do in the real world.

THE CHRISTMAS DUMPSTA ISSUE

Dumpstaphunk is All Ears

Ivan Neville and crew tell John Swenson how the pieces fit together.

In the Kitchen with Theresa

Theresa Andersson tells Elsa Hahne how the lemon doesn’t fall far from the tree.

22 26

30 38

40 42 44

Listings

What are they laughing at?

As art director and photographer for OffBeat, I occasionally have to work to make cover subjects smile. Not this time. The most Christmasylooking “song book” in my bookcase is my green family album, so I brought it to the shoot for the guys to hold. CENSORED Should I have warned Dumpstaphunk that it’s full of naked, Swedish women? Such as my aunt and I in the Bothnian Bay, circa 1982. —Elsa Hahne

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Reviews + Plan A with Dâm-Funk

Fresh

The Permission Not Given Hank Cherry examines the legacy of Kid Ory.

Dixieland Santa

Alex Rawls highlights Louisiana’s rich history of Christmas songs.

Doctor’s Orders

Rene Louapre finds out why doctors make wine. Hint: because they like it.

OffBeat Eats

James Singleton is in The Spot at Crescent Pie and Sausage Co., and Rene Louapre and Peter Thriffiley review the Rib Room. BLAST FROM THE PAST

with 61 Backtalk the Radiators

John Swenson talks to Ed Volker, Dave Malone and Reggie Scanlan about the band’s decision to call it quits—or something like that. “The only definite thing is that Ed has given us his letter of resignation,” Scanlan says. “The band now has to decide whether to look for a replacement or fold the tent.”

“The Radiators—Rock Solid for 20 Years” by Scott Jordan, August 1997

The announcement in November that this issue’s Backtalk subjects, The Radiators, will be disbanding next summer was met with dismay by the legions of fans the band has acquired in its 33-year history. In 1997, the band’s 20 years together was already an eighth Wonder of the World, an impressive feat celebrated by their first appearance on OffBeat’s cover. A round of applause for having made it another 13. To read this article and more from this issue online, go to offbeat.com/1997/08. D ECEMBER 2010

Letters

“Voodoo has the perfect balance for young and old fans alike… the younger folks tend to stay on the right side and soak up the big headliners, while the more seasoned folks [are] at the Preservation Hall and SoCo/WWOZ tents.”—Mark D’Agostino, Chelmsford, MA

TALES OF THE OFFBEAT As a fan of old pulps and EC Comics, I am quite captivated by the cover of your Halloween issue. Great job. —Randy Haecker, New York, NY Congrats on the November cover “Tales of the OffBeat.” It looks great. Every time I pass one, it catches my eye. You guys did an awesome job. —Scott Williams, New Orleans, LA

TREME? Have you heard any news about Treme? Will there be a second season? No word from the HBO website. Any feedback is appreciated. I’ve been subscribing to OffBeat for several years and enjoy the Weekly Beat as well. Keep up the good work! —Tracy Ahr, Evanston, IL Yes, there will be a second season of Treme. This year will focus on Fall 2006 through Spring 2007, and the show’s shooting schedule mirrors the time covered. Since hurricane season is ending, shooting has started again. Recently I ran into Matt Perrine, who had just finished shooting a scene.—ED.

VOODOO FEST We had a blast at our fourth consecutive Voodoo Fest this year. We find this festival much more inviting than Jazz Fest for the simple fact that we can stay on the left side of Voodoo and catch all the N’Awlins acts without the crush of the crowds. Voodoo has the perfect balance for young and old fans alike. Not to infer there wasn’t crossover, but I think the younger folks tended to stay on the right side and soak up the big headliners, while the more seasoned folks made up the crowds at the Preservation Hall and SoCo/WWOZ tents. The Bingo! Parlour was a mix. There is nothing like being five feet in front of Paul Sanchez’s Rolling Road Show, Galactic, Voice of the Wetlands Allstars, etc. This year we mostly liked the improvements with the set-up. The left side stages were nicely stacked, but the music was bleeding from one stage to other. It got

a little annoying if you weren’t right down in front of the stages. The techno stage was way too loud and could be heard from all three left side stages. The Dickies set-up was ill-advised. We really did not care for hearing a Dickies MC amplified so close to the Preservation Hall Tent. Musical highlights for us were Stanton Moore with Anders Osborne, Soul Rebels, Paul Sanchez, Galactic, Voice of the Wetlands Allstars, Basin Street Record Revue, and the Bingo! Show. The only scheduling conflict for us was Trombone Shorty up against the Bingo! Show. Since Shorty comes up north every so often, and the Bingo! Show does not, we decided on the Bingo! Show. Every year it seems Voodoo gets better and better and they learn and tweak as they go. You couldn’t ask for much more than that—well maybe they could soften the five percent ATM fee a little. We’ll be taking up Rehage on their half-price offer for next year and we’re ready to book our return trip. The countdown begins... —Mark D’Agostino, Chelmsford, MA In our November 2010 issue the following letter was wrongly attributed to David Kunian. The letter was actually written by J. Scott Fugate. We regret the error.—ED. The thing about those of us that “love, love, love” the music is that we are often more tied to the city and the culture than many that live here! When I meet someone from New Orleans I always assume we’ll have an immediate connection, since that is the place my heart resides, but unless they embrace the music and culture they may as well be from Iowa. I think this is a question for all Americans, wherever they are from—“What is it that makes you feel a pride in a place of residence if you don’t take time to learn about the culture which surrounds it?” —J. Scott Fugate, Gainesville, GA In November’s “Kick(Start) Me” article, quotes and experiences attributed to Yancey Strickland should have been attributed to Perry Chen, and Strickland’s name is Strickler. We regret the errors.—ED.

OffBeat welcomes letters from its readers—both comments and criticisms. To be considered for publication, all letters must be signed and contain the current address and phone number of the writer. Letters to the editor are subject to editing for length or content deemed objectionable to OffBeat readers. Please send letters to Editor, OffBeat Publications, 421 Frenchmen St., Suite 200, New Orleans, LA 70116.

DECEMBER 2010

Louisiana Music & Culture

December 2010 Volume 23, Number 12 Publisher and Editor-in-Chief Jan V. Ramsey, janramsey@offbeat.com Managing Editor Joseph L. Irrera, josephirrera@offbeat.com Associate Editor Alex Rawls, alexrawls@offbeat.com Consulting Editor John Swenson Listings Editor Craig Guillot, craigguillot@offbeat.com Online Editor Ben Berman, benberman@offbeat.com Contributors Ben Berman, Hank Cherry, Chloe Curran, Barbie Cure, Erika Goldring, Elsa Hahne, Jeff Hannusch, David Kunian, Aaron Lafont, Chris Lee, Jacob Leland, Sam LeVine, Rene Louapre, Caitlyn Ridenour, John Swenson, Peter Thriffiley, Dan Willging, Zachary Young Cover Elsa Hahne Design/Art Direction Elsa Hahne, elsahahne@offbeat.com Advertising Sales Casey Boudreaux, caseyboudreaux@offbeat.com Melinda Johnson, melindajohnson@offbeat.com Aaron Lafont, aaronlafont@offbeat.com Advertising Design PressWorks, 504-944-4300 Business Manager Joseph L. Irrera Interns Rosalie Cohn, Barbie Cure, Chloe Curran, Cooper O’Bryan, Julia Ramsey, Zachary Young Distribution Patti Carrigan, Doug Jackson, Shea MacKinnon OffBeat (ISSN# 1090-0810) is published monthly in New Orleans by OffBeat, Inc., 421 Frenchmen St., Suite 200, New Orleans, LA 70116 (504) 944-4300 • fax (504) 944-4306 e-mail: offbeat@offbeat.com, web site: www.offbeat.com Copyright © 2010, OffBeat, Inc. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the consent of the publisher. OffBeat is a registered trademark of OffBeat, Inc. First class subscriptions to OffBeat in the U.S. are available at $39 per year ($45 Canada, $90 foreign airmail). Back issues available for $6, except the May issue for $10 (for foreign delivery add $2). Submission of photos and articles on Louisiana artists are welcome, but unfortunately material cannot be returned.

MOJO MOUTH

Preserve the Moment

thoroughly enjoyed going to Cleveland to visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last week. But I’ve always been a museum buff. It’s interesting to see what’s come before and see it happen again and again. You just have to be cognizant of the patterns that emerge as time goes by. Music is no different. As a New Orleans R&B listener, I love seeing the form re-emerging in younger performers and audiences who appreciate them. Of course, it’s not the same as it was, but then, nothing is. Change is constant, and I’m content with that. The “Rock Hall” was fascinating because it was the story of my generation and subsequent generations’ lives. This museum showed the rhythm of my life because it honored the music and musicians that made me who I am today, and there’s nothing wrong with looking at the past—as long as you don’t live in it!

DECEMBER 2010

One of the things I think about as I get older is what will become of our music, as the generations age, tastes change, and musical choices become so accessible and vast. When I was growing up, classic New Orleans R&B is what I listened to, and it had a major influence on what I listen to and appreciate musically. Needless to say (but I will anyway), I hold New Orleans musicians of that era close to my heart because they made the music that influenced the way I relate to all music. I never get tired of listening to it. I suppose this is the main reason I do what I do today. When you’re younger, you always feel as though everything—your life and everything you love and enjoy, like music—will never end. But the people who make it do end. They get old, and they pass away, leaving us with an aural legacy. So many great musicians have passed on; as I write this, I just heard that “Gentleman” June Gardner died, one

of New Orleans’ most revered bandleaders (more about June and his musical legacy next month, and online at OffBeat.com). They’re leaving us, slowly, steadily. So all you guys who hit the Maple Leaf to go see Rebirth Brass Band, understand that one day the guys in Rebirth won’t be with us anymore. Ditto Kermit Ruffins, Stanton Moore, Lil Wayne, Nathan and the Zydeco Chas Chas, Galactic, ad infinitum. Ray Bong at some time in the future will no longer be able to revel in debauchery or give his Voodoo Fest picks. Bands break up, bands move on. Characters fade away. Times marches on. The point is that the moments you live, the music you hear, your family and the people and friends you acquire are precious. Cherish the moment. Do what you can for people who mean a lot to you. That’s my wish for you this holiday season. —Jan Ramsey

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FRESH

rombone Shorty’s Red Hot

Photo: INGRID C. HERTFELDER

Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews will curate an all-star New Orleans revue scheduled for December 3 and 4 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York City. The show’s producers asked Shorty to assemble a representative contingent of New Orleans musicians for the AIDS-benefit concert series, and he came up with a list of performers that includes Dr. John, Ledisi, Marc Broussard, Partners-N-Crime, Kermit Ruffins, Irma Thomas, Mannie Fresh, Ivan Neville, James Andrews and members of the Rebirth and Dirty Dozen brass bands. “The Red Hot people contacted me and explained what they wanted to do,” says Shorty. “They did one about Brazil where they brought some Brazilian musicians in. They pick a country or culture and feature that. I threw some names out there that I thought would be something to play with, and just do what we do in New Orleans.”

DECEMBER 2010

Shorty admitted that one of his biggest problems was figuring out which New Orleans musicians to leave out. “I selected a few people and then saw who was available to do it at that time. I’m happy that most of them were available so it could flow well. I wanted to get some of the Neville Brothers and we got Ivan Neville, which I’m happy about. The people are all musicians who I’m a big fan of, so we should be able to enjoy ourselves playing on that stage all at once.” Partners-N-Crime may be a surprise inclusion to the Brooklyn audience. “I grew up on their music,” says Shorty. “I had all their records when I was a kid. I saw them one day and I said, ‘Hey man, come do some music with me.’ I invited them on my show at Voodoo Fest. They were into it, and we kept in contact. Since then, we’ve done a string of shows together. They’ve invited my band to back them up, and I invite them whenever they’re around.” Though the final details haven’t been worked out, Shorty has a general idea of how the show will be structured. “It don’t take too much thinking,” he explains. “When you get a group of New Orleans people together it just happens naturally.” Shorty hopes he can assemble a similar show in his home town. “I wish we could bring this same show back home,” he says. “They’ll film it but I want to play for the people of the city with all these great musicians and give something back. Maybe we can do it for Jazz Fest or something.” The Red Hot organization has been raising money through album projects and concerts to benefit AIDS sufferers and other charities including Haiti relief since the 1990s. Red Hot + New Orleans is produced by BAM in association with The Red Hot Organization in recognition of World AIDS Day (Dec 1). Part of the proceeds will benefit New Orleans’ NO/AIDS Task Force.—John Swenson www.OFFBEAT.com

FRESH

hick Lit

What? Sean Yseult of Rock City Morgue has released her memoir from her White Zombie days, I’m in the Band: Backstage Notes from the Chick in White Zombie. “The chick in White Zombie”? During the ’80s and ’90s, heavy metal was a man’s world. Yseult says that aside

Supersuckers, eyehategod, and Pantera, and includes personal details from her journey, such as her relationship with Rob Zombie. Why such a big book? Lots of art. Posters, backstage passes, art and photos. Photos of her as a young ballerina, and photos of her swinging her hair. Lots of photos of her swinging her hair. Sean Yseult will be signing her book I’m in the Band at Garden District Book Shop on Friday, December 3 from 6 to 8 p.m. —Barbie Cure NEW ORLEANS SAINTS AT CINCINNATI BENGALS, DEC. 5 It’s snowing in Cincinnati; seems like it should be an advantage for the Bengals. But the Saints get up on them early 17-0 thanks to a heavy dose of Pierre Thomas (crossing my fingers he’s back by now) and Marcus Colston. The Who Deys make a game of it with two Brees INTs, including one for a TD, but the Who Dats hang on for a 24-21 road win.

MADDEN ON THE SAINTS

Sean Yseult

ST. LOUIS RAMS AT THE SAINTS, DEC. 12 Rams win the toss and march to a FG. They’re going to pay for that. Long drive, Henderson TD. Rams punt, Bush scores on the return. Rookie Patrick Robinson gets his first interception and picks off Bradford. Colston scores on the short field. It’s 21-3 before the St. Louis fans find their seats. The Rams have no answer for the Saints offense and the D takes the ball away from them three times en route to an easy 3810 pounding.

from girlfriends and groupies, she was the only woman at the shows. Even though she liked being called “the chick in White Zombie,” she struggled to get people to see her as “a musician and songwriter first and foremost.” Highlights? Yseult recounts everything from their early days when the band slept on floors or in the van between shows, to their explosion of fame. She describes hanging out with bands like the Cramps, the Ramones,

DECEMBER 2010

THE SAINTS AT BALTIMORE RAVENS, DEC. 19 It’s snowing again in the AFC North and the Ravens drive to the Saints 3 before Vilma forces and Sharper recovers a Ray Rice fumble. Eight plays and 97 yards later, Colston caps the defining drive of the game. The Saints out-physical one of the most physical teams in the league, and go into halftime up 21-3 on three Brees TDs. It’s the defense’s turn in the second half as Robinson, Vilma and Shanle all sack Flacco, and Porter and Sharper each get a pick for a 31-10 statement win heard round the NFL. www.OFFBEAT.com

FRESH

rima 100 Years Later

Louis Prima would have been 100 this year. Jazz Fest honored him this year with a series of Prima-themed shows, and on Saturday, December 11, the Louis Prima Centennial Colloquium will be held in Tulane’s Freeman Auditorium. The colloquium has been organized by Bruce Raeburn of Tulane’s THE SAINTS AT ATLANTA FALCONS, DEC. 27 Hogan Jazz Archive, and he contends that Prima has been unfairly overlooked. It’s a back and forth game as you would “Ever since jazz became recognized as an art form in the 1930s, there has been expect with the Saints taking a 21-17 lead a tendency to subscribe to a jazz canon constructed by music critics that privileges into half. But the game’s in prime time, and ‘seminal’ artists at the expense of musician-entertainers,” he writes. Reggie Bush loves prime time. “The Louis Prima Centennial Colloquium will take a different approach, He scores his second TD of MADDEN celebrating a musician that unfailingly combined art and entertainment to the game on the second ON THE SAINTS deliver memorable performances that changed people’s lives. Within the half’s first possession. On New Orleans jazz community there have always been legions of incipient the next Atlanta possession, jazz stars whose primary objective as professional musicians was to satisfy Sharper picks Ryan to steal the their audiences. Most of these performers never became nationally recognized momentum for good. A long, ass-pounding celebrities, although Louis Prima certainly did, making Gunther Schuller’s failure to drive later, Shockey scores to make it 35-17 include him as a person of interest in his monumental study of the 1930s, The Swing going into the fourth. Brees finishes 20Era (1986), very hard to understand. If for no other reason, Prima’s composition, 27, 278 yards, 4 TDs and 0 INTs. Meachem “Sing, Sing, Sing,” which became an anthem for the Swing Era in Benny Goodman’s and T. Porter add TDs late to make the final hands, would seem to be enough to qualify him for inclusion, as would his broad score a head turning 45-17 victory over the popularity in the period. Yet Schuller mentions Prima just once in his book, in a Dirty Birds. footnote stating that the clarinetist Sidney Arodin had worked for him. “Fortunately, we don’t need the approbation of jazz critics to celebrate the music of THE REGGIE FACTOR Louis Prima, and I’d like to think that given enough time and opportunity, even the critics I try to play with a balance of the run and will eventually come around. He gave himself completely to performance, as an artist and the pass, but when Brees gets hot, why not as an entertainer, and created music that will never go with it? And Reggie cease to inspire, simply because it was fun. Louis Bush makes Brees really Prima today remains an American original, a hot (wait, that sounds timeless musical personality whose creativity, weird). With Bush vitality and humor are abundantly evident in an back, the red zone international musical legacy that is susceptible offense gets a lot to endless rediscovery by generations to come.” more potent. Pitches Participants in the colloquium include Dan outside, draw plays, Morgenstern, who has been the Director screens and plays of the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers to the TEs all work University since 1976; Marcello Piras, Italy’s way better with foremost authority on jazz and music of the him either as the African diaspora; Elijah Wald, a musician and back or as a decoy. writer whose books include How the Beatles On the rest of the Destroyed Rock ‘n’ Roll: An Alternative History of field, Henderson American Popular Music and Escaping the Delta: and Meachem start Robert Johnson and the Invention of the Blues; and getting those long Jack Stewart, a historian, musician, city planner and TDs we’ve been restoration contractor who is currently working on missing, but Marcus several books on New Orleans’ musical history. Colston benefits This event is from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and most from Reggie is free and open to the public. Because of being back. He’s not limited seating, those interested need to going to be double reserve seats by calling (504) 865-5688. teamed nearly as much, The colloquium is made possible so watch for him to start with the support of the Jay Pritzker scoring often. Foundation, the New Orleans/Gulf South See Chris Lee when Center at Tulane University, OffBeat and Supagroup, the Happy Talk Band and Brah French Quarter Festivals, Inc. play a free show at Tipitina’s Friday, Dec. 3. —Alex Rawls —Chris Lee

DECEMBER 2010

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FRESH

anta’s Got a Brand New Book

Last year, Jamie Bernstein included the song “Black Santa” on his Songs from the Tree of Life album, which he recorded under the name J. the Savage. That Christmas, he posted an animated video for “Black Santa” on YouTube, and just in time for this Christmas, UNO Press has published Black Santa, the book. It looks like a children’s book—it’s illustrated, with the images taken from his animation efforts—and reads like a children’s book—the text is the lyric to the song—but according to Bernstein, it’s not a children’s book. “This is a book for human beings,” he says. “All human beings could profit from gaining more understanding of other human beings and stop hating them. I really feel like this book is a vehicle for that.” The song and video were the result of Bernstein’s surprise at moving here from West Virginia and seeing for the first time an image of a Black Santa on a neighbor’s yard in the Irish Channel. “There are not a lot of Black people in West Virginia period,” he says. “I had never seen Black Santa or even intellectually conceptualized the idea of Black Santa. When I saw this Black Santa on my neighbor’s yard and it was made out of plywood, it had the spirit of Christmas for me, a do-it-yourself spirit, and it had the trappings of real love and care.” His Santa is truly black, though, with black hair and a black beard. He’s Black Santa and not African-American Santa because he lives in Mexico, the song says. “I think the world is ready for this,” Bernstein says. “I think if you read this book and understand this book, then you understand Black people and all people better.” Black Santa is on sale now in selected bookstores and online from BlackSantaBook.com. —Alex Rawls

DECEMBER 2010

rchitecture in My Art

What? DesCours, a free, annual, public event that presents 14 large-scale architecture installations by international architects. These experimental installations use new materials, methods, technology and interactivity, and many involve local musicians to underscore the history and tradition the architects are engaging. Say what? DesCours merges art and architecture to enliven public and private spaces, including private courtyards, rooftops, abandoned buildings and walkways in the French Quarter and CBD. When? December 4-11, with installations open from 6-10 p.m. nightly. There will also be a VIP preview party, a fashion show and a second line, but their dates haven’t been announced at press time. What’s new? This is the fourth go-around for DesCours, which is presented by the American Institute of Architects New Orleans. This time, guests can take podcast- or docent-led tours of DesCours’ venues. Both will start nightly at the new Center for Design on Lee Circle. Why New Orleans? DesCours aims to highlight New Orleans’ culture and history as a framework for a consideration of possible futures. Follow DesCours online at DesCours.us or on Facebook by following AIA DesCours. —Chloe Curran

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PHOTO OP

Photographer: Erika Goldring Date: April 5, 2009

onk Boudreaux is Big Chief of the Golden Eagles Mardi Gras Indians. I’ve walked from his house to Second and Dryades on Mardi Gras with him and his family the last five years. This day in 2009 was the first time for me to approach Sportman’s Corner with Monk in a different suit. His daughters,

DECEMBER 2010

Nokie and Natché, started the Ladies of Unity Social Aid and Pleasure Club in 2008, and 2009 was the first year for the Men’s Division, the Men of Unity. It was the first time for him to come out with a social aid and pleasure club in nearly 30 years. —Erika Goldring

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KID ORY

The Permission Not Given

dward “Kid” Ory may not be as well known as the superstars of early jazz, players such as Louis Armstrong and Buddy Bolden, but Ory played with them all, and he left an indelible imprint on each of them, all the while, helping to create the most dominant trombone sound of all. Ory left New Orleans for Los Angeles in 1919. In the mid-1920s, he landed in Chicago with other venerable New Orleanian jazzbos including Armstrong, Joe “King” Oliver and Jelly Roll Morton. Unlike the others, Ory called it quits when the Great Depression hit, retiring from music altogether. Only the New Orleans jazz revival of the ’40s brought the trombonist-turned-chicken-farmer back into the jazz fold. Ory got his start as a kid in LaPlace, Louisiana, playing a cigar box banjo he made himself. “When I was 13, I formed a band,” Ory told historian Samuel Charters. “We had a homemade violin, bass viol, guitar, my banjo, played on a chair for drums.” After the teenaged band made the rounds, they had saved up some money for real instruments. Ory switched over to trombone. The jazz man of myths himself, Buddy Bolden, chanced upon the kid practicing his new instrument outside of his sister’s place in New Orleans. Bolden liked what Ory did with the instrument, even asking the kid to join up with him. Ory told Bolden he would need his sister’s permission, permission that was not granted. Ory scurried back to LaPlace to hone his chops. His band’s

DECEMBER 2010

Christmas card with a photo by Daguerre of Louis Armstrong’s band, including Baby Dodds, Louis Armstrong, Kid Ory, Johnny Dodds and Lil Hardin Armstrong. To the right, Kid Ory with his daughter in 1958.

raw talent combined with Ory’s leadership and predatory sense about money meant that by the time he hit 21, Ory had enough cash to move to New Orleans. The kid had a spectacular ear. He could hear a song once, and know it absolutely. He instinctively knew the role the trombone should play, developing a blowsy tone that both established rhythm and gave tunes that “Ory” spark, an immediately identifiable brassy glissando that managed to leave room for melodic harmonies of the trumpeters and clarinetists. Kid Ory’s growling style was often copied; most every bandleader in early jazz and ragtime utilized his brash syncopations and copped his arrangements. Luckily for him, Ory had a studious mind. He learned to read music early after arriving in New Orleans. This ability came in handy when he was presented with the opportunity to record while in Los Angeles. He snatched the chance,

By Hank Cherry

making the first jazz recordings by an African-American jazz band under the name Spike’s Seven Pods of Pepper Orchestra. It was the heart of the Jazz Age, and his sound spread like wildfire. The trombone sound he perfected came to be known as tailgate trombone. He dressed sharp and expected bandmates to do the same. He was quick-witted in business, painting his name on the side of a furniture cart. Ory hung a sign on his house, too: “Orchestra and band for hire.” Word got out, and his skills kept the audience paying. Most of the jazz musicians of this era ended up playing the Storyville District, the legal Red Light district off Basin Street. A series of highly publicized murders starting in 1913 led to intensified federal scrutiny, which led to the closing of Storyville, which put the jazzers out of work. When the Great Depression hit, it was the next cultural hurricane to lay waste to a New Orleans musical

community and all but ended the Jazz Age. Many musicians’ spirits were broken, including King Oliver, who lost his band and life savings in one fell swoop and never fully recovered, dying in 1938. Others persevered and flourished. Armstrong and Jelly Roll Morton became household names. Edward “Kid” Ory went back west to help his brother run his chicken farm. He played no music publicly from 1933 until a decade later, when the jazz revival came calling. But he hit his stride right off, creating the Kid Ory Creole Jazz Band. Besides the recordings he did as a member of Armstrong’s Hot Five and Hot Seven groups, it is the Creole Jazz Band’s output for which Ory is best known today. He was a nuanced arranger, and strong composer to boot, penning classics “Muskrat Ramble” and “Savoy Blues.” Yet, Ory’s influence remains eclipsed by those with whom he worked: Sidney Bechet, the Dodds brothers, Armstrong, Oliver, Mutt Carey and Red Allen. Ory’s gift of rambunctious slide trombone, however, is as unique and lasting a contribution to jazz as that of any of those listed. He continued to record and lead bands well into his 70s, but by the early 1960s his health was failing. Ory stopped performing and retired to Hawaii, where he died at the age of 87. His swooping trombone sound won’t soon be forgotten, even if you don’t remember his name. O www.OFFBEAT.com

PhotOS COURTESY OF THE HISTORIC NEW ORLEANS COLLECTION

Kid Ory’s career started when his sister said no.

School’s Out What comes next for the UNO-educated jazz musician?

“I

’m just trying to connect with people my age because it’s dying. Jazz is dying. We have to find a way to connect with a younger audience,” says saxophonist Khris Royal (24) as he gulps down an iced coffee at the Fair Grinds coffee house one Saturday morning. The previous night, Royal’s funk-fusion outfit Dark Matter’s boundless improvisations and explosive grooves rocked a small but enthusiastic crowd at The Maison on Frenchmen Street. Throughout the night, Royal danced amongst the spectators, jamming on his EWI (basically an electronic sax), periodically passing around a tip jar. Even

in New Orleans, the birthplace of jazz, bastion of tradition, and home to a burgeoning new generation of jazz musicians led by the likes of Royal and his cohorts, the future of jazz lies in some measure of doubt. Musicologists offer several explanations as to why and how jazz has evolved over the years. Explanations, hypotheses and theories aside, as jazz’s popularity waned, rock’s surged. As one ascended to a status of high art, the other spoke to the masses. Ultimately, as jazz became increasingly urbane and scholastic, rock became increasingly urbanized, suburbanized and commercialized with genres as diverse as punk and hip-hop resonating across the mainstream. Blame it on society, blame it on the record industry, stretch and blame it on the musicians, but

Will Thompson, Khris Royal (in back), Cliff Hines, James Westfall, Sasha Masakowski

DECEMBER 2010

By Aaron LaFont

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PHOTO: AARON LAFONT

UNO JAZZ

jazz has fallen so far out of the public eye that it isn’t hard to fathom that most people born in the ’80s will never encounter what Rahsaan Roland Kirk dubbed America’s classical music. “So many people don’t experience jazz at a young age,” vibraphonist James Westfall (29) says. “For someone who doesn’t come to their first jazz concert until they’re in their 30s, it’s difficult for them to understand what’s going on. On the other hand, a lot of jazz musicians play for themselves, and others unknowingly close the audience off because they’re not used to playing in front of a crowd.” This wasn’t the case at One Eyed Jacks recently when jazz guitarist Cliff Hines (21) hosted a David Bowie tribute show. Hardly a jazz concert, this gathering brought members of the local indie rock and jazz communities together. To the elation of an even more outrageously costumed crowd, the revolving cast of

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Bowie-clad performers played two sets spanning the Thin White Duke’s catalogue. Hines, whose genre-morphing quintet (which often includes Royal) released his debut album Like Mystics of Old in late 2009, describes his approach: “Because of the uniqueness of our sound, we felt that we might better appeal to the indie rock audience more so than to the quote-unquote jazz audience in the city,” he says. “Our plan is to try to blend in with the more progressive rock groups in New Orleans. It may mean less playing, but the audience tends to get into it more.” Adding vocals to several songs at Hines’ Bowie tribute in a sparkled, spandex get-up and spiky pink wig was Sasha Masakowski (24). Her band, Musical Playground, includes Westfall on keyboards and blends an eclectic mix of sounds ranging from Latin and world music to contemporary pop into

a mélange of modern jazz. It’s a far cry from the trad standards heard in Preservation Hall. A charismatic performer and one of the brightest young talents in the Big Easy, she is no stranger to her peers’ frustration as she vies to convert audiences often seeking the more established sounds of the city. “I don’t know if New Orleans really embraces modern jazz,” she says. “It’s good to preserve things, but that’s not the nature of jazz. The nature of jazz is to constantly push and grow and stretch and create new things.” She admits to grappling with the issue on a personal level, “On certain gigs I wonder if I should play what the audience wants me to play, or if I should I play what feels good?” All up-and-coming bands struggle to establish a following and define a sound regardless of genre, but New Orleans’ young jazz musicians face imposing odds. “People generally come

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down here to see what made New Orleans famous,” says Hines. “Progressive jazz is not something that New Orleans is instinctively known for. We have to work twice as hard to prove to club owners that our music is half as profitable.” Despite a limited audience, little promotion and few open doors, these artists are presented with a unique opportunity, one that could only exist in a city where jazz still shapes culture and influences daily life. “I think for people like us in many ways it’s harder to get recognized, but it’s also easier because we can pave the way in a scene that’s saturated

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Ultimately, whether you like it or not, the tradition is here.

with so many different sounds,” Masakowski says. This is something that both Royal and Westfall, two of the scene’s most accomplished musicians, realized only after attaining recognition and experiencing the shortcomings of success in larger markets. Royal grew up learning from local luminaries such as Clyde Kerr and Kidd Jordan, but he abandoned his studies at Boston’s esteemed Berklee College of Music to become a session man in Los Angeles. As a member of the Regiment horn section, he went on to record with R&B and hiphop superstars Erykah Badu, Mary J. Blige, Nelly and The Game. Of his time there, Royal says, “I missed playing for real. If I got a solo, it was a cheesy, Hollywood sax solo. Despite the commercial opportunities, there was little else compared to New Orleans. Just think about how many styles of music we have that come out of jazz. Here, we play small clubs, often without a guarantee, and to get people in the door we play things that in a lot of other cities you would never hear.” Westfall came to the Big Easy from his native Houston in 2000 to study at the University of New Orleans. Mentored by Terrence Blanchard, he became the first vibraphonist to be accepted into the prestigious Thelonious Monk Institute, then located in Los Angeles. While enrolled, he was afforded the opportunity to perform with legends such as Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter and Kenny Garrett. His career then took him to New York, where, despite receiving accolades, he found the atmosphere creatively stifling. “I think every young jazz musician has the desire to go to New York

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because of its aura and the music it’s produced. It’s like one of those things that you have to go out and experience for yourself before you see what it lacks. It took me a few years to realize that everything I wanted to do musically was in New Orleans.” Perhaps no other musician’s journey has taken as many detours en route to the Crescent City as pianist Will Thompson’s. Thompson (30) grew up between north Mississippi and southeast Louisiana and chose to attend UNO so that he could entrench himself in the city that produced Professor Longhair and James Booker. Thompson, a member of the Louisiana National Guard, soon found himself entrenched in an entirely different set of circumstances when he was called into service in Iraq in 2004. There, using an iPod, a handheld recorder and a laptop computer, he compiled sequences of found sounds, ambient noises and electronic textures into a compelling musique concrète experiment titled Baghdad Music Journal, the first album ever recorded and released from a combat theater. “I knew there would be no pianos there, and I didn’t know what I was going to do,” Thompson says. “There were times I thought I was going to lose my mind. I thought that I would never play music again. So I bought a computer, an iPod and some software and began recording conversations, prayer calls, air conditioner sounds, power generators—whatever I was around. It saved my life.” Thompson’s current band, WATIV, is a heady, avant-garde quartet that blurs the lines between free jazz and freeform experimentation. “Jazz,” however, is a word Thompson

hesitates to use, and “tradition” is a subject he approaches with caution. “I don’t like to think about categories. Mostly, what I do gets called jazz because I come from a jazz background. I think if I choose to call it that, then I can; although a lot of people in this city would say that my band is definitely not jazz. Ultimately, whether you like it or not, the tradition is here. It’s not something that you have to make a conscious decision to uphold. Some people would say that it’s something you need to foster, but I think that if you’re really playing, then it is upheld. Tradition is our greatest blessing, but it can also be a curse when misused.” Within jazz circles, tradition is a fiercely debated topic; within most others, not so much. But in the city where tradition runs the deepest and looms the largest, this emerging group of jazz artists have been able to draw from it a new, liberating source of creativity, one which allows them to roam freely between the past and the present as they forge their own identity. Westfall explains, “We’ve assembled a group of like-minded musicians who are drawn to each other. Everyone shares the same vision. Our goal isn’t to play jazz the way it was recorded. We want to play things differently. I feel that the spirit of the city, the vibrancy of the city, and the emotions of the city are all interconnected. I believe when I play a keytar solo, it holds the same spirit as what’s played in Preservation Hall.” Connecting the dots may seem like a stretch, but beneath the surface the connections are clear. Royal, Masakowski and Hines all passed through the curriculum at the New Orleans Center for

the Creative Arts (NOCCA), the same curriculum that bred modern masters Wynton Marsalis and Harry Connick, Jr. as well as contemporary climbers Christian Scott and Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews. All but Royal continued their education in UNO’s Jazz Studies program, taking their cues from professors including Irvin Mayfield and Roland Guerin. “At UNO, they really push you to be an individual and to find power in creativity and to break boundaries, musically and personally,” says Masakowski. Hines has taken his commitment and craft one step further. While enrolled at UNO, Hines went on to assume the position of guitar instructor at NOCCA. “As a teacher now, I’d like to think that I’m a link in the chain,” he says. “I try to reflect the education I was given and the values my teachers instilled in me, the ways they taught and the ways they helped me find myself. That’s what jazz is. That’s what New Orleans is.” Regardless of who they are—or aren’t—the way to define the next generation of New Orleans jazz musicians isn’t in terms of their merits as players or against the merits of the past. It is to look at them in terms of their connection to their city, their music and each other. “New Orleans is a city with a foundation unlike any other,” Westfall says. “People come here for the experience.” “Once you embrace the diversity of music in New Orleans, it becomes easier to create your own path,” continues Masakowski. “If you as a musician are moved by what you do, you can move an audience,” Thompson says. O www.OFFBEAT.com

CHRISTMAS MUSIC

A Dixieland Santa Claus Christmas has never been about the unvarnished truth—certainly not in

hristmas music fans keep to themselves. They’re out there, wondering if they’re weird for listening to it all year around, while those who don’t like it grouse openly and loudly, particularly when radio stations start playing it before Thanksgiving (as if it’ll make the turkey feel unloved). But Christmas is a subject for songs, just like love and money, and it’s inspired some brilliant and laughable recordings. Here are some of the finest to come out of Louisiana: Louis Armstrong, “Christmas Time in New Orleans”: Written by Richard Sherman and Joseph Van Winkle, “Christmas in New Orleans” is hopelessly inauthentic. “Fields of cotton look wintery white” is pure Tin Pan Alley since cotton is harvested in the fall, and a Dixieland Santa Claus is just words, just like “a barefoot choir” in 1952. But as Ricky Riccardi writes in his Armstrong blog, “Pops sounds like the happiest guy in the world. And how could he not?

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Theresa Andersson, John Fohl and David Doucet, “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”: Peace Songs from 2001 emerged from an acoustic performance in St. Louis Cathedral as part of the series of free Christmas concerts. Here, Doucet and Fohl play the spiritual as a prancing He loved folk blues, and Andersson’s violin Christmas and he loved New Orleans so any song that underscores the gravity they never combined the two, even with dopey compromise despite the bounce. lyrics, was bound to inspire him.” Johnny Adams, “Silver Bells”: Adams’ weepy “The Little Boy Harry Connick, Jr., “It’s the Most That Santa Claus Forgot” has Wonderful Time of the Year”: been collected on a number of Connick’s What a Night! anthologies, but this Christmas classic is further evidence of his is a far better use of his remarkable inventiveness as an arranger, and that’s evident from the start when voice as he loans soul to a song that he sings this lightweight Christmas has always seemed quintessentially tune over congas that suggest the urban (in the downtown, not the bustle of the season while leaving euphemistic sense). space in the sound. He maintains Aaron Neville, “Please Come that mood by letting horns scurry in and out while his voice remains Home for Christmas”: The spirituals on 1993’s Soulful the calm center, hanging on to a Christmas sound oddly pro forma, central joyous thought.

By Alex Rawls

Louisiana.

but Neville is at his most relaxed and authoritative on his take on the Charles Brown classic. Even though most of the musicians on Soulful Christmas are L.A. studio pros, the sax line and insistent piano evoke the heyday of J&M Studio. Wayne Foret, “All I Want for Christmas is You”: Christmas is almost inherently nostalgic, so swamp pop’s determined look back at the Golden Age of New Orleans R&B is perfectly suited to the season. Foret’s one of the great voices in swamp pop, supported by a piano playing triplets and a sweet sax section as he explains all the things he can live without if a certain someone isn’t under his tree. Wynton Marsalis, “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing”: On Crescent City Christmas Card, Marsalis crams a lot of ideas in every song. This carol becomes a “tastes great/less filling” battle as his trumpet contends the melody should be played straight in march time, only to be answered by a swinging band that suggests something with a groove is more appropriate. Guess who wins. www.OFFBEAT.com

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“Twas the night before Christmas and all through the lab / not a body was stirring on any a slab.”

Ken “Afro” Williams, “Lil’ New Orleans Drummer Boy”: “Little Drummer Boy” is a clam as a Christmas song—rhythmically leadfooted as it celebrates a gift so simple that it can be summed up by “ba-rump-pum-pum-pum.” Not surprisingly, Williams’ New Orleans take on it gives it a groove so strong that to sing it properly would require an impressive onomatopoeic imagination and the vocal dexterity to phrase it. Huey “Piano” Smith and the Clowns, “Doing the Santa Claus”: Wipe the lyrics from these songs and you have some prime, uproarious New Orleans R&B. The semi-attention to the season makes everything on Smith’s Christmas album, Twas the night Before Christmas, a little nonsensical, starting with this brand new dance (when it was released in 1962). Louis Prima, “What Will Santa Say (when He Finds Everybody Swinging’)”: Louis Prima fooled me once with “Shake Hands with Santa Claus,” which isn’t a Christmas song but a sugar daddy song. This is the real deal from his pre-Keely years, but the vision is typically Prima: a Christmas party so wild and rockin’ that it even startles Santa. Fats Domino, “I’ll Be Home for Christmas”: Much of 1993’s Christmas is a Special Day is marred by the FisherPrice electric piano Domino plays, but this song written in 1943 to capitalize on the wartime popularity of “White Christmas” sounds better than the rest of the album. He sings with genial commitment, and the sax line riffs as it did 30 years earlier. Topsy Chapman with Lars Edegran, “Have Yourself a

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Merry Little Christmas”: Chapman sings the Christmas classic on Edegran’s Crescent City Christmas from 1999 with a hint of theatricality that the song calls for, but with enough personality in her voice to make the sentiment sound felt. Evan Christopher’s smoky sax solo is all mood and suggests that Chapman’s singing to one special someone. Marva Wright, “Marva’s Holiday Shuffle”: Christmas is often a time to remember those who aren’t celebrating Christmas with us this year, and we miss Marva Wright. Here’s a charmingly domestic blues that evokes the head-spinning nature of a family-and-friends celebration as she documents who’s doing what to make the Christmas dinner happen. Don Rich, All I Want for Christmas Dear is You”: Longing is a common theme in Christmas music. Swamp pop singer Rich hopes to find the one he loves under his tree in this midtempo ballad, but he sings the song as a hypothetical and not true heartbreak, so you get the narrative without the sadness and the happy ending doesn’t matter. John Boutte, “Holding You this Christmas”: Most of the classic Christmas songs come from a less ironic, coolconscious era, which explains why so

but there’s no winking in his vocal performance. He takes the words as seriously as those vocalists who slow the song down until the melody can’t take the strain.

few modern songs have entered the Christmas canon. John Boutte’s song from last year’s A Very Threadhead Holiday might not become a standard, but not because it couldn’t. This lovely ballad written by Paul Sanchez and Boutte is delicate and scopes the holiday spirit down to two people. Michael Doucet, “Trinquez, Trinquez”: I’m not sure why my favorite songs from BeauSoleil’s Michael Doucet’s Christmas Bayou album don’t feature his fiddle, but I return to the kids-and-t-fer “Vive Le Vent” (“Jingle Bells”) and this a cappella Cajun Christmas song toasting the season. Dr. John, “Silent Night”: I don’t remember this song being on Dr. John Plays Mac Rebennack when I first bought this album, but perhaps I was too caught up with the solo piano wizardry to notice this funky, organ-driven take on the classic hymn. Whatever, it has my attention now. He stretches things out with organ and piano solos,

Kermit Ruffins, “O Christmas Tree”: There’s a long tradition of swinging jazz takes on Christmas songs, largely because the melodies are so durable. “A Saints Christmas” got the attention when Have a Crazy Cool Christmas came out last year, but this swinging second-line take features a percussive solo by Matt Lemmler, who’s a star throughout. Hadley Castille, “O Come All Ye Faithful”: This spry version comes from 1997’s Cajun Christmas with Castille’s fiddle carrying the melody. While he and an accordion groove away, a prancing piano reminds everybody where the beat they’re whirling around is. Morgus the Magnificent, “Chopsley’s Night Before Christmas”: “Twas the night before Christmas and all through the lab / not a body was stirring on any a slab.” Christmas isn’t Christmas without a version of the Clement Moore classic, and Morgus the Magnificent here proves that he’s not just a Halloween kind of guy. FOR THE MORE ADVENTUROUS: Turk Dietrich of Belong, “Blue Christmas”: Not the most seasonal Christmas song, or perhaps the soundtrack for sitting up alone at 3 a.m. on Christmas morning wondering what went wrong. www.OFFBEAT.com

CHRISTMAS MUSIC Electronica band Belong has made sonic manipulation its calling card, and here Turk Dietrich gives us an idea what Elvis’ classic would sound like from the bottom of the pool. Frankie Ford, “Christmas on Bourbon Street”: The keyboard-synthesized strings undercut the grandness Ford goes for on this big, florid ballad, but he commits to the stagey performance as if he was singing “You’ll Never Walk Alone” in Madison Square Garden. I’m also caught by the notion that sooner or later, “it’s time to go home. / It’s Christmas on Bourbon Street.” Rockin’ Sidney, “It’s Christmas (Let the Good Times Roll)”: No one could accuse Rockin’ Sidney of overworking anything on A Holiday Celebration with Rockin’ Sidney. Sidney aficionado Jeff Hannusch says Rockin’ Sidney recorded it in his home studio and it sounds it. A pogo stick rhythm machine does what it can to energize this collection of effortless (as in “no effort was put in on them”) rhymes. Here he takes half-assed to the next level by borrowing a chunk of Shirley & Lee’s “Let the Good Times Roll” and jerryrigging it to an inconsequential start to each verse. And yet, I can’t turn away. Ann-Margret & Al Hirt, “Baby It’s Cold Outside”: This song is in this section because it’s only half Louisiana content, and because I’m not sure that the song’s a Christmas song at all. Still, it’s one of the most memorable versions because Ann-Margret sings it as kittenishly as possible, which makes Hirt sound equally wolfish as he tries to convince her to stay. AND FINALLY… Judith Owen performs her annual Christmas sing-a-long with husband Harry Shearer at the CAC December 17 and 18. She deserves inclusion for her treatment of “The Christmas Song.” Similarly, R&B singer Ledisi was born here, so that gets her cover of the Jackson 5’s “Give Love on Christmas Day” seasonal love. The groove is irresistible and she sells the thought as if it’s the most joyous thing she could think of. And she’s right. O www.OFFBEAT.com

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Dumpst

COVER STORY

taphunk is All Ears

van Neville wanted to meet at Mahony’s on Magazine Street. The night before, Dumpstaphunk had slayed an audience at Lafayette Square, playing most of the outstanding new album Everybody Want Sum, and he was in an expansive mood as he devoured a hot sausage po-boy. “This,” he said as he tore the meal out of its white paper wrapping, “is the best hot sausage sandwich in the city of New Orleans.” Neville was just as eager to praise his bandmates. “It’s a group effort,” he insisted, “and I want to get that out there. I’m just part of a great band. Dumpstaphunk is about the band. It’s a real band. Even though my name is used—Ivan Neville’s Dumpstaphunk—you see on this record it just says Dumpstaphunk. The name recognition is something that we use, but it is an actual band. It’s not like I call the shots. We make decisions and everybody has a say. We don’t try to put a lot of thought into it because if you overthink music it’s no good, but we do try to make sure that everybody gets featured and there’s a good balance. “It’s fun to be a part of something, and I think that’s the main reason I wanted to be in a band. I was in the Neville Brothers for years, but you always knew that this was the brothers and that was the band. The closest I’ve ever been to being in a band other than the Uptown Allstars was when I was with Keith Richards in the X-Pensive Winos. That was a band, even though Keith called the shots. This is a band, and I wanted to be in a band. We get to bounce ideas off of each other and one person doesn’t have all the pressure on him. It’s on all of us.” That unity is immediately apparent in the group’s live performances, as well as on the new record, which is a dense, smoldering pyre of funk grooves with very few individual solos. The band’s collective improvisation works at an extremely high level, even extending to the vocal arrangements, which balance Ivan’s singing with that of bassists Nick Daniels and Tony Hall and drummer Raymond Weber. Only guitarist Ian Neville, the youngest member of the group, stays out of the vocal mix. But Ian is essential to the centrifugal groove of Dumpstaphunk, chopping deep rhythm patterns against the undulating funk of the twin basses, Weber’s artillery and the stabbing colorations of Ivan’s B-3. “Just because it’s rhythm-based doesn’t mean there’s not improv going on,” Ian explains. “I haven’t been in a position where I’ve been www.OFFBEAT.com

called on to shred or go all Derek Trucks on everybody. I appreciate good rhythm guitar more than most people probably. “We’ve always been basically just about listening carefully to each other when we play,” Ian adds. “I don’t think we necessarily improved by playing together in that sense, but we may be better at guessing where each of us is going to go. The vocals are more of a conscious effort, where everyone gets their specific part to play. It’s nice to hear a variety of voices rather than one guy’s voice through the whole show. There are not a lot of bands that have as many singers that can sing as well as those guys can. If I had a gun to my head I guess I could sing, but we’re pretty well off as it is. Four parts are tough to pull off; you’ve got to be really good with those harmonies.” Ivan notes that assigning parts to each singer is an easy task. “It’s about range,” he says. “Nobody sings like Nick. You know what he’s gonna sing. Raymond has a higher voice, so he sings the high harmonies. Tony’s voice is similar to mine, so if there’s ever any question of who sings what part, it’s usually between me and Tony. We do have to rehearse it, but it comes naturally.” Daniels says that the vocal arrangements seem to work themselves out. “For the most part it falls into place,” he says. “We all know harmony. Everybody in the band can lead their own band. It’s like a band of bandleaders.”

ne of the keys to Dumpstaphunk’s sound is having two bassists, an idea that seems simple at first glance but is extremely tricky to pull off. “What we do is contingent on what the other guys are doing,” says Ivan, “and that’s how the two basses work. When Tony’s playing the bottom, Nick’s doing some high ends that are not going to get in the way. And when they both go down there, they know how to keep it from getting muddy. “It’s harder than it seems,” agrees Ian. “You could put two bass players onstage and a lot of times they’re going for the same areas, but they hear stuff so differently that they don’t go for the same areas. I’ve got to listen to what they’re doing all the time.” The theme of listening to each other returns when any of the band members try to explain Dumpstaphunk’s sound. “The two basses work because we’re good musicians and we listen to each other,” says Daniels. “The very first rehearsal we started playing and we were working on parts, and when we got to the fourth or fifth song we realized we had something going. It started working right off the bat. The key is we listen to each other and then play off each other. Tony might play a bass line, and I’ll slide further down the neck of the bass. I just add to what I hear.” DECEMBER 2 010

Photo: ELSA HAHNE

The key to good funk and two bass players is a lot of listening. By John Swenson

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Katrina changed me. I changed, I know I did. I think I became a better man, a better father, a better grandfather.”

umpstaphunk began as a one-off for the 2003 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Ivan had been living in Los Angeles for most of the previous 20 years. “Back then it was just a side project,” says Ivan. “I rejoined the Brothers because Art was in the hospital; that was when I started hanging around New Orleans again for a couple of reasons. My mom had gotten sick and I was subbing for Art. That’s when the idea came about to do Dumpstaphunk. I got an offer to play a solo gig, but instead of doing that, I thought maybe do a band. It was the same people, but there were more of us on that first gig. My little brother Aaron, Jr. was there. June Yamagishi was on the gig as well and the Dirty Dozen horns. We played a few shows like that over the next couple of years, at Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest. I was with the Brothers, Tony Hall and Raymond were out with Trey Anastasio, Nick was with the Brothers as well, so was Ian. We gradually started playing a little bit more.” It wasn’t until after Katrina that Dumpstaphunk became a full-time pursuit. “When Katrina happened, it almost forced us into playing more because there was nothing else to do,” Ivan says. “We couldn’t come back to New Orleans right away, except to play. We played that first Mardi Gras. Some of us were in Austin and some of us were in other places. People were showing a new appreciation for New Orleans around that time, so we were able to find a lot of work all over the country.” During that time, Neville was recruited to be part of the band for Sing Me Back Home, producer Leo Sacks’ all-star project featuring a who’s who of New Orleans music singing or playing as the New Orleans Social

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Photo: JEFFREY DUPUIS

Weber, who is as astute a musical theoretician as he is a timekeeper, explains the two bass system best. “Not only am I playing with two bass players, I’m playing with two funky bass players,” he says, laughing. “Two of the funkiest out of New Orleans. I have to exercise and eat my Wheaties just to keep up with them. They come from different schools of playing. Nick is mostly like a high register player and he likes to pop a lot. Tony is a real bottom player. He comes from the blues world; he likes to play whole notes and deep notes. That’s why they never get in each other’s way.”

Ivan and Ian Neville

Club. “Me and Raymond Weber were also in New Orleans Social Club,” Ivan says. “We had George Porter on bass. It was kind of like the Meters meet Dumpstaphunk with Henry Butler in the band. It was a pretty cool band. That was a post-Katrina project that could have still been doing stuff on a part-time basis, but it didn’t work out.” Before Katrina, the five members of Dumpstaphunk were hired guns, session players making a good living plying their trade. But the flood changed things. “I put more of my personal heart into it,” says Daniels. “Friends have passed away, everything’s changed, really. Katrina changed me. I changed, I know I did. I think I became a better man, a better father, a better grandfather.” Daniels, Ivan and Ian Neville all decided that their own band should take precedence over the Neville Brothers, and Dumpstaphunk went into high gear. “Nick was the first one to make the move,” says Tony Hall. “He gave his notice to the Neville Brothers. I was making a nice living as a session musician, but the difference between that and Dumpstaphunk is that the people who were hiring me as a session player were rich and I’m not. This is our band. Raymond and I have been playing together for 15 years, so we were down with it. We all like the same type of music, so it just made sense.” www.OFFBEAT.com

Photo: CLAYTON CALL

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Nick Daniels and Tony Hall

he band put out a five song EP Listen Hear in 2007 and has taken its time putting together a full-length album, but Everybody Want Sum was worth the wait. “It wasn’t like we went into the studio and said, ‘Let’s make a record’,” Ivan says. “We kind of did it piecemeal, a little bit here a little bit there over a period of a couple of years. It might have taken us three weeks altogether, two days here, maybe three, four days there. We were on the road making a living, which took away from time we could have been in the studio.” Part of the album was recorded at the now-defunct Neville Brothers’ studio on Canal Street. “It was a cool place,” says Ivan. “We recorded a bunch of this record there. We also recorded some stuff at another studio across the lake, Balance Studio, with Drew Vonderhaar engineering. Then we did a track at the Music Shed. We had Chris Finney mix the whole record. “Most of the stuff on this record is first or second take,” says Ivan. “We’d have an idea, we’d make it up on the spot and we’d play it. Some of that great, live-sounding stuff like ‘Paper Chasing Britney’ or ‘Gasman Chronicles,’ that was born in the studio and those were the first or at the most second takes. “Initially when I was putting the band together for that first gig, I was trying to decide who to get on bass, Tony or Nick. I thought of

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one song that I knew the two bass players would work well on. The song was ‘Standin in Your Stuff,’ it’s a Zigaboo Modeliste song. That song has been in the Dumpstaphunk repertoire since we started. That’s why we put it on the record. “One thing I love about this band is that when we start playing, it sounds like we’ve been playing for quite a while. Last night we started with ‘Deeper,’ which is a great song to start with when you’re playing a festival kind of show and you don’t get a chance to really do a sound check. The way we play it, it starts with the drums so it gives the sound guy a minute to dial it in. By the time we’re one third of the way into the song, I feel like we’ve been playing for a half hour because of the intensity of what we’re giving to each other.” “Deeper” was written by Gerald Tillman and Gerald Trinity, two nowdeceased musicians who were influential on Dumpstaphunk’s sound. “Gerald Trinity was an amazing singer and Nick kind of came up under Gerald Trinity. He used to have a band called Black Male,” says Ivan. “Gerald Tillman started that. Tillman was a big influence on me playing keyboards. He helped me appreciate the Brothers when I was young because I was leaning toward other stuff. I didn’t appreciate what my dad was doing and what Art was doing, and Tillman really hipped me to that, made me take a second and third listen, digging the simplicity of what Art did with the Meters. It’s so simple that it’s www.OFFBEAT.com

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Photo: MARC PAGANI

‘How dare you not play?’ That’s a shout out to the original Meters.

complicated. I would love to hear Meters tracks with just Art and Zig and hear the rhythmic interplay between those two, what Art is doing with his left hand. All of us have played with some form of the Meters. When Nick was starting out, Zigaboo used to always call him to play on stuff. Ian started sitting in with the funky Meters as a kid when he first started playing. He was 12, 13 when he first sat in. Tony Hall played in a version of the Meters after George left the band.” Ivan lamented the fact that the Meters no longer play together. “Someone said something to me a long time ago when I was on drugs real bad and I was spending more time doing drugs than I was doing music,” Ivan says. “The guy was a sound engineer for the Stones and he said, ‘Ivan, how dare you not play?’ I’ll never forget that. I was wasting my life away on drugs, but that’s my story, right? I’m just saying to other people that should be playing, people in my family, ‘How dare you not play?’ That’s a shout out to the original Meters. The Brothers still have an opportunity to do stuff. How dare you not do it while you’re all still here?”

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ut even if we don’t have the Meters, we have Dumpstaphunk, and the band members are well aware they are carrying that torch. “I will always be representing New Orleans,” says Daniels. “I was born and raised in New Orleans. Whatever I’m playing, it will always be New Orleans-oriented. I can’t get more New Orleans than I am.” “We are New Orleans,” Hall adds, but maybe Weber says it best. “Ever since I was a kid, I wanted to be a part of New Orleans music,” says the drummer, who lost everything in the flood but has rebuilt his home in New Orleans East and returned to live there. “My father and uncles were in a family band, and it was my dad who told me you’ve got to look to the Meters if you want to play this music. Since then, I’ve played with great jazz artists like Joe Sample and Harry Connick, Jr., and in every band I ever played with, I represented New Orleans music. It took me a little while to get back, but I’m home now. I’ve been all around the world but when I get back to New Orleans I know there’s no place like home. I feel strange anywhere else.” O

EATS

Doctor’s Orders I

t is a well-told tale that Americans cared little for wine until the mid-’80s when a 60 Minutes report revealed the French Paradox. The French Paradox, in short, goes like this: eat whatever you want, but especially foods high in fat from dairy or animal products, and supplement your diet with three glasses of wine per day. If one did this, heart disease and other ailments would seemingly vanish. Enter wine drinking as hysteria and big business. Shortly after the French Paradox came out, Dr. Nicolas Bazan found himself giving a talk at Jordan Winery on wine’s other healthy side effects. Dr. Bazan has discovered that more than just a talisman against heart disease, wine can help stave off Alzheimer’s. Working for Bazan in his research lab was a young med student named James Moises. Fast forward 20 years and both doctors are producing wines of stunning clarity from the Willamette Valley in Oregon. Bazan grew up in Argentina and through a series of events found himself in New Orleans in charge of neurology research at LSU Medical Center. He remembered that when he first moved to America, no one drank wine. “You would go to a dinner party—this was in the’60s— and there would be cocktails in huge glasses before dinner, but no wine with dinner. This was strange to me and my wife.” While Dr. Bazan found himself drawn to wine based on his heritage and research, Dr. Moises discovered wine through his friend and native Oregonian, Mark Wahle. “Mark and I were both residents at LSU together,” Moises says. “Like any plan, the one we had to start making wines was hashed out over many, many beers.” Wahle had gotten his undergraduate degree from UC-

DECEMBER 2010

James Moises and Nicolas Bazan Davis, a school well-known as the Harvard of the Vines. After finishing their residencies in New Orleans, Wahle moved back to Oregon and Moises stayed in New Orleans. The friends stayed in touch and in 2002, Moises and Wahle partnered to develop the winery that would become Moises Wines, with 2006 being their first vintage. In 2004, Bazan decided he also would like to make wines. The 2006 vintage was also the first release of Bazan Wines. To further complicate things, some of the Bazan grapes come from the Wahle Vineyard owned by, you guessed it, Mark Wahle. Got all that? Both doctors entered the practice of wine making in part because drinking wine is good for your health. But it goes beyond polyphenols and anti-oxidants for Bazan. “Drinking wine is also

By Rene Louapre

beneficial to how we eat,” he says. “In America, breakfast, lunch and dinner tend to be serious, businessoriented approaches to dining. Wine at the table is the driver of enjoyment and digestion.” Certainly, there are enough wines to make all of us happy and healthy, so why did these two doctors decide to make their own? For Moises, it was the opportunity to combine his joint passions of teaching and taking care of patients. “In many ways it is the same. I see patients in the hospital; I tend to the vines in the vineyard,” he says. “I tell patients which medicines to take; I tell consumers which wines to drink with what foods.” For Bazan, making wine represents a convergence of his lifelong pursuits. There is science in winemaking, in measuring the sugars of the grapes and in

controlling the temperature of fermentation. As an ardent fan of jazz music, Bazan notes the artistry in knowing how long to age a wine or in blending wines from different plots of lands. “A jazz musician must know the rules to break the rules,” Bazan points out. And finally, there is the opportunity to make a wine that can be enjoyed at the table. “I have always loved the simple pleasures of the dinner table,” Bazan says. Both doctors make wines that are to be enjoyed at the table, but specifically at the New Orleans table. The tannic Cabernets and flabby Chardonnays made by the giants of California do not mesh with the cuisine of the Crescent City. Both produce Pinot Noirs with higher levels of acidity than the cherry coke-flavored pinots that too often come from California. Bazan says his wines shine with a plethora of foods common to the New Orleans table. “Meat, pinot is much better with meat than Cabernet. Seafood; especially the type prepared by places like Rio Mar (where Bazan’s son is a partner) and Emeril’s. This wine shines with the traditional food at a place like Antoine’s or Galatoire’s; and it helps coat the esophagus, which means better digestion of spicy foods,” he explains. For Moises, his Pinot Noir sings best when served alongside a simple filet of redfish with a light meuniere sauce that has a little kick of cayenne. The grocery stores, wine shops, restaurants and wine bars of New Orleans are filled with wines designed to appeal to Joe Q. Public. But hidden in those lists and aisles are a few wines built by New Orleanians for the New Orleans palate. Seek them out and drink them up. Doctor’s orders. O www.OFFBEAT.com

Photo: ELSA HAHNE

Why do doctors make wine? They like it, for one reason.

E TH

Y AV GR

In the Kitchen with Theresa I

didn’t cook much when I lived in Sweden. I was 18 when I moved here, and that was basically when I started my own home. We planted our lemon tree five years ago. I grew up on a farm so I love plants. I didn’t know this before I moved here; I love being in the garden. Right now it’s in pretty good shape, but when we travel it grows wild. This summer, we were gone for three months, so now we mainly have a lot of mint and basil out there. I make a lot of pesto. I always wanted to pick an orange off a tree; I’d never done that. But they didn’t have any orange trees the day we went to the store, and we saw lemon trees, so now I pick lemons instead of oranges. It’s a Meyer lemon and it started carrying fruit after just one year. Only a couple of lemons, but then it exploded. The bees and the monarch butterflies love it, which is good. They’re friendly. You just have to watch where you put your hands and not inhale a bee accidentally. There must be 200 or 300 lemons on here. It’s intense. In the past I’ve used lemons for juicing. I make fresh juices with kale, carrots, apples, lemons, and you can put the whole thing in the juicer, with the rind and everything. I also make lemonade. In our English lessons in Sweden, they were talking about lemonade a lot. I was maybe nine. I’d never had it, but I pictured it as being sparkly and tangy. It took 10 years before I tasted some, but it was a dream come true. No one knew how to make lemonade back home. My mom tried to squeeze some oranges one time and put sugar in it. This year, I’m trying something new—preserved lemons with salt and olive oil. You can use them for grilled fish, stews, or in couscous. They’re salty and tangy, like some weird olive. I was blown away when I first tasted it last year. There’s a little cafe here in the Point called Tout De Suite, and that’s where I tried it. First I was like ‘Erh, I don’t know about that.’ And then I was like, ‘Give me

DECEMBER 2010

the meat and the fish and the chicken—all that. I tried chicken for a while and quickly stopped. But fish I’ve been eating since I came here. I have a couple of quick soup recipes. Carrot soup I learned from my mom. We used to grow carrots on the farm. It’s quick to make and absolutely delicious. You take five carrots and peel them and coarsely grate them. Sauté them with a couple of cloves of crushed garlic in twothree tablespoons of olive oil. Then you pour ten cups of water on them, so they’re swimming, and add three tablespoons of Better Than Bouillon and a shake of ground white pepper. Bring it to a boil and simmer for ten minutes—done! [Grating carrots] This will make good worm food. The worms don’t like citrus and they don’t like onion, but they’re crazy about this. I can’t stand this house in December, honestly. There is no insulation. We’ve been working on all the little leaky spots, but there are so many more and the floors are cold. Last year we had to check into a hotel for a couple of those cold days because it was just unbearable.

Preserved Meyer Lemon

more! I want more!’ Maybe I’ll get adventurous with some ice cream and put little pieces in there. Salty and sweet is a good combination. When I get off the road, I don’t like driving around too much. I like staying at home because I do enough car time. After Hummingbird, Go! I was on the road pretty much straight. When I’m home, I cook everyday. We cook a lot, and we compost everything from the kitchen. We have worm bins with African red wigglers. They’re moody. If it’s too cold, you have to bring them inside. You have to be able to take care of them. We’ve had times when they’ve died,

By Elsa Hahne

which is very sad, but we have friends who come over and feed them when we’re out of town. If you buy plants from Lowe’s or Home Depot and something dies and you have your receipt and the container it came in, you can bring it back. I bought my lemon tree at Home Depot. Didn’t have to bring it back, though. I try to have stuff in the garden that takes care of itself, things that bloom when I’m usually home. The mums are wonderful because they come back and bloom three times. I’ve been a vegetarian since I was five years old. I just started refusing

12 large Meyer lemons 1 cup coarse kosher salt 4 pint-size canning jars 1/4 cup (or more) olive oil Wash whole lemons. Boil 6 lemons in plenty of water for 5 minutes, remove from water and let cool. Boil glass jars for 15 minutes; soak lids in hot water for 10 minutes; remove jars and lids from water and let dry. Cut lemons into eigths, removing seeds and center white membrane. Coat each piece with salt. Pack tightly into jars. Juice remaining 6 lemons and pour juice over salted lemon pieces in jars to cover, or close. Screw on lids. Let sit in room temperature for 5 days, shaking jars once a day. Pour oil on top. Refrigerate. Use within 1 year. www.OFFBEAT.com

Photo: ELSA HAHNE

Theresa Andersson fell far from the tree.

EATS

AMERICAN Green Goddess: 307 Exchange Pl., 301-3347 Feast: 200 Julia St., 304-6318 O’Henry’s Food & Spirits: 634 S. Carrollton Ave., 866-9741; 8859 Veterans Blvd., 461-9840; 710 Terry Pkwy., 433-4111. Port of Call: 838 Esplanade Ave., 523-0120. BARBECUE The Joint: 801 Poland Ave., 949-3232. Squeal Bar-B-Q: 8400 Oak St., 302-7370. Walker’s BBQ: 10828 Hayne Blvd., 2418227. BREAKFAST Daisy Dukes: 121 Chartres St., 561-5171. Lil’ Dizzy’s Café: 1500 Esplanade Ave., 569-8997. New Orleans Cake Cafe & Bakery: 2440 Chartres St., 943-0010. COFFEE HOUSE Café du Monde: 800 Decatur St., 525-4544. Café Rose Nicaud: 634 Frenchmen St., 949-2292. CREOLE/CAJUN Atchafalaya Restaurant: 901 Louisiana Ave., 891-9626. Clancy’s: 6100 Annunciation, 895-1111. Cochon: 930 Tchoupitoulas St., 588-2123. Dick & Jenny’s: 4501 Tchoupitoulas, 894-9880. Galatoire’s: 209 Bourbon St., 525-2021. Gumbo Shop: 630 St. Peter St., 525-1486. K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen: 416 Chartres St., 524-7394. Mulate’s: 201 Julia St., 522-1492. Olivier’s Creole Restaurant: 204 Decatur St., 525-7734. DELI Mardi Gras Zone: 2706 Royal St., 947-8787. Stein’s Market and Deli: 2207 Magazine St., 527-0771. FINE DINING Antoine’s: 701 St. Louis St., 581-4422. Arnaud’s Remoulade: 309 Bourbon St., 523-0377. Bistreaux at Maison Dupuy: 1001 Toulouse St., 586-8000. Café Adelaide: 300 Poydras St., 595-3305. Commander’s Palace: 1403 Washington Ave., 899-8221. Emeril’s: 800 Tchoupitoulas, 528-9393. Iris Restaurant: 321 N Peters St., 299-3944. Lüke: 333 St. Charles Ave., 378-2840. Mat and Naddie’s: 937 Leonidas St., 861-9600.

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Le Meritage at Maison Dupuy: 1001 Toulouse St., 586-8000. Mr. B’s Bistro: 201 Royal St. 523-2078. Restaurant Cuvée: 322 Magazine St., 587-9001. 7 on Fulton: 701 Convention Center Blvd., 525-7555. Stella!: 1032 Chartres St., 587-0091. FRENCH Café Degas: 3127 Esplanade Ave., 945-5635. Delachaise: 3442 St. Charles Ave., 895-0858. La Crepe Nanou: 1410 Robert St., 899-2670. Crepes à la Cart: 1039 Broadway St., 866-2362. Restaurant August: 301 Tchoupitoulas St., 299-9777 GERMAN Jäger Haus: 833 Conti St., 525-9200. ICE CREAM/GELATO Creole Creamery: 4924 Prytania St., 8948680. La Divina Gelateria: 3005 Magazine St., 342-2634; 621 St. Peter St., 302-2692. Sucré: 3025 Magazine St., 520-8311. INDIAN Nirvana: 4308 Magazine St., 894-9797. ITALIAN Domenica: 123 Baronne St., 648-1200. Eleven 79: 1179 Annunciation St., 299-1179. Irene’s Cuisine: 539 St. Philip St., 529-8811. Maximo’s: 1117 Decatur St., 586-8883. Tommy’s: 746 Tchoupitoulas St., 581-1103. JAPANESE/KOREAN/SUSHI Kyoto: 4920 Prytania St., 891-3644. Mikimoto: 3301 S. Carrollton Ave., 488-1881. Miyako Japanese Seafood & Steak House: 1403 St. Charles Ave., 410-9997. Wasabi: 900 Frenchmen St., 943-9433. MEDITERRANEAN Byblos: 3218 Magazine St., 894-1233. Jamila’s Café: 7808 Maple St., 866-4366. Mona’s Café: 504 Frenchmen St., 949-4115. MEXICAN/CARIBBEAN/SPANISH Juan’s Flying Burrito: 2018 Magazine St., 569-0000. El Gato Negro: 81 French Market Place, 525-9846. Nacho Mama’s: 3240 Magazine St., 899-0031. RioMar: 800 S. Peters St., 525-3474. Taqueros Coyoacan: 1432 Saint Charles Ave., 267-3028 Tomatillo’s: 437 Esplanade Ave., 945-9997. Vaso: 500 Frenchman St., 272-0929. MUSIC ON THE MENU Carrollton Station Bar and Grill: 140 Willow St., 865-9190.

NEIGHBORHOOD JOINTS Café Reconcile: 1631 Oretha Castle Haley Blvd., 568-1157. Captain Charles’ Café on the Ave: 4600 Washington Ave., 258-1719. Lakeview Harbor: 911 Harrison Ave., 486-4887. Parkway Bakery and Tavern: 538 Hagan Ave., 482-3047. Sammy’s Food Services: 3000 Elysian Fields Ave., 948-7361. Sports Vue: 1400 Esplanade Ave., 940-1111. Ye Olde College Inn: 3000 S. Carrollton Ave., 866-3683. Wit’s Inn: 141 N Carrollton Ave., 486-1600. PIZZA Fresco Café & Pizzeria: 7625 Maple St., 862-6363.

SEAFOOD Acme Oyster & Seafood House: 724 Iberville, 522-5973. Casamento’s Restaurant: 4330 Magazine St. 895-9761. Crazy Lobster Bar & Grill: 1 Poydras St. 569-3380. Drago’s Restaurant: 2 Poydras St. (Hilton Hotel), 584-3911; 3232 N. Arnoult St., Metairie, 888-9254. Felix’s Restaurant & Oyster Bar: 739 Iberville St. 522-4440. Huck Finn’s Café: 135 Decatur St., 529-8600. SOUL Dunbar’s: 501 Pine St., 861-5451. Praline Connection: 542 Frenchmen St., 943-3934. Willie Mae’s Scotch House: 2401 St. Ann St., 822-9503. WEE HOURS Clover Grill: 900 Bourbon St., 523-0904. Mimi’s in the Marigny: 2601 Royal St., 872-9868. WINE BAR & BISTRO Orleans Grapevine: 720 Orleans Ave., 523-1930.

James Singleton hits the How often do you come here? We’ve calmed down and come about every other week. They actually catered my 55th surprise birthday party.

Photo: CAITLYN RIDENOUR

AFRICAN Bennachin: 1212 Royal St., 522-1230.

Slice Pizzeria: 1513 St. Charles Ave., 525-7437. Theo’s Neighborhood Pizza: 4218 Magazine St., 894-8554. Turtle Bay: 1119 Decatur St., 586-0563.

Why do you come so often? Because I’ve been thrown out of every other place in the city because of Ruby [James’ daughter] and we love all the artwork on the walls by Rick Olivier. How did you hear about this place? Rachel and Tatjana—our neighbors.

Crescent Pie & Sausage Co. 4400 Banks Street (504) 482-2426

OffBeat

Chickie Wah Wah: 2828 Canal St., 304-4714. House of Blues: 225 Decatur St., 412-8068. Le Bon Temps Roule: 4801 Magazine St., 895-8117. Maison: 508 Frenchmen St., 289-5648. Mid City Lanes Rock ‘N’ Bowl: 4133 S. Carrollton Ave., 482-3133. Palm Court Jazz Café: 1204 Decatur St., 525-0200. Rivershack Tavern: 3449 River Rd., 834-4938. Southport Hall: 200 Monticello Ave., 835-2903. Snug Harbor: 626 Frenchmen St., 949-0696. Three Muses: 536 Frenchmen St., 298-8746.

What are you ordering today? The flame thrower pizza, one of the specials, made with Crystal and sriracha sauce with jalapeno. I’m always ordering the specials because I always want to eat what the chef felt like making that day. —Caitlyn Ridenour [James Singleton plays Snug Harbor on December 12 with Skerik and Mike Dillon as Illuminasti Trio, joined by Larry Sieberth.] www.OFFBEAT.com

DINING OUT The Rib Room Entering the stately dining room of the Rib Room on a Friday at half past noon, you may well have full intentions of returning to the office. But as soon the martini hostess rolls by with her cart loaded with vodka, gin and vermouth, the prospect of a working afternoon fades away with every self-service pour from your washbucket martini. If Galatoire’s, Antoine’s, and Arnaud’s are the grand dames of the French Quarter, then the Rib Room is the loud, boisterous uncle. For the last 50 years, the Rib Room has made a name for itself by turning out rosy red cuts of prime rib marbled with glistening, melting fat, along with potatoes, blue cheese salad and turtle soup. Diners may come to the Rib Room for the standard fare, but Chef Anthony Spizale delights in recreating classic dishes with a modern touch. Take, for example, a barbecue shrimp served over a doughnut made with rice flour which was spicy, slightly sweet, kitschy, and executed well enough that it did not seem gimmicky.

www.OFFBEAT.com

The turtle soup here has more bisque qualities than you are used to seeing, with a greater hit of butter and tomato. With all entrees comes the Rib Room salad, a bowl filled with chopped lettuces and a tangy blue cheese spiked dressing. Even though it is only a salad, it is worth a visit on its own. The namesake prime rib is the main attraction, and diners can choose between the 11 oz. standard cut or 18 oz. bone-in. Presentation is minimalist perfection—a large slab of beef, a few sprigs of arugula and Yorkshire pudding resembling a chef’s toque. A maitre d’ will pass by with a bowl of horseradish and sour cream; sauce at your leisure. Non-traditionalists can opt instead for catfish from local Haring’s Pride Farm, cooked four different ways and with equally as many sauces. After that feasting, go with the dense

Photo: CAITLYN RIDENOUR

EATS

chocolate explosion that is the Rib Room chocolate mousse. The Rib Room calls to mind feasts of yesteryear. Be it feudal suppers read about in a history book or the three martini lunches of the good ole days. But with Spizale at the helm, the menu keeps evolving to bring in a crowd of young, adventuresome diners. His flair may bring them in, but the atmosphere, stiff drinks and solid meals keep them coming back. 621 St. Louis St. (504) 529-7046. Open daily 6:30 a.m.-10 p.m. —Peter Thriffiley and Rene Louapre.

DECEMBER 2 010

REVIEWS

Reviews

When submitting CDs for consideration, please send two copies of the CD to OffBeat Reviews, 421 Frenchmen Street, Suite 200, New Orleans, LA 70116

CDs reviewed are available now at In the French Quarter 210 Decatur Street 504-586-1094 or online at LouisianaMusicFactory.com

Creole and Its Roots

Cedric Watson et Bijou Créole Créole Moon: Live From the Blue Moon (Valcour) Creole Moon, a live recording from Lafayette’s Blue Moon Saloon, is Cedric Watson’s second release in less than a year following his late 2009 studio release L’Éspirit Créole. Unlike so many live recordings that follow in close succession to their studio counterparts and have repeat tunes, here there’s no overlap whatsoever. Watson proves that he’s a master mixologist, juxtaposing old style, accordion-played zydeco with rollicking Cajun/Creole fiddle tunes

and a haunting rendition of Dennis McGee’s “Pa Janvier.” The sound quality is crystal clear, capturing the group’s polyrhythmic assault and the audience’s approving response that’s essential to a live recording. What makes the proceedings truly amazing are the three tracks featuring Senegalese kora virtuoso Morikeba Kouyate, who performed at Festival International that weekend. On the opening track, the aptly named “Afro Zydeco,” a strange rhythmic juking sound emerges that’s foreign to zydeco. Soon, it becomes clear that it’s Kouyate’s 21-stringed kora in perfect sync with the band and nailing dancing runs whenever there’s enough space. “We’re taking Creole music and mixing it back with the roots!” Watson zealously proclaims afterwards. “Juré” is undoubtedly the most unusual juré ever heard. Drummer Jermaine Prejean kicks off a secondline rhythm and Kouyate adds a sweet melodic flavoring. Soon, Watson and Kouyate venture beyond juré with some exploratory fiddle-kora

call-and-response interaction, with dazzling solos by both. Hopefully, this is the start of many genre crosspollinating, cultural exchanges to come. —Dan Willging

Bipolaroid Illusion Fields (Bipolaroid) Bipolaroid has always been a lot less psychedelic than advertised. Until now. Previously a mishmash of psychedelic surface signifiers borrowed from Syd Barrett, the band now sounds seriously disorienting on Illusion Fields. Multiple simultaneous blues guitars make a big interesting mess around lead singer Ben Glover’s hard to discern, droning nasal slur—a very wasted sounding voice. Drums, provided by local garage rock purveyor King Louie Bankston, bash away without ever really kicking in, adding another layer of unique tension. The album is wonderfully recorded, belying that every strange move has been made on purpose.

To compare the band’s new style to another semi-famous local: Illusion Fields is to rock ’n’ roll what MC Tracheotomy is to rap. None of this is meant to say Illusion Fields (a name seemingly copped from the post-Katrina spoken-word band led by N.O. poet Moose Jackson) isn’t good. Rather than trudge the good-time, party-hardy path followed by almost every other band in the city, Bipolaroid have chosen to make an artistic statement. And true art is not always necessarily pleasing. In the case of Illusions Fields, it’s often unsettling and interesting rather than groovy. Despite an upbeat appearance by the Egg Yolk Jubilee horn section, and the fact that the almost exclusively vinyl album was paid for by donations on the populist fundraising website Kickstarter.com, it’s hard to tell who in New Orleans would actually “like” this warped music. Still there’s no denying that Glover and company have created good art that is uniquely strange and, in its own way, beautiful. —Sam LeVine

Hitmakers and the Hits that Should Have Been Various Artists Sehorn’s Soul Farm (Charly) Here’s a welcome return of an old friend (two actually), and a reminder that for every Irma Thomas, Lee Dorsey, the Meters, King Floyd and Jean Knight who made hits in New Orleans in the 1960s and ’70s, there were a score of neighborhood hit makers including Eldridge Holmes, Warren Lee, Zilla Mayes and Willie West. The bulk of the material on this double CD was originally released on locally distributed labels like DeeSu, Sansu, White Cliffs and

DECEMBER 2010

Tou-Sea, all of which were owned at least in part by the late Marshall Sehorn. Some only sold a few hundred singles, but these Allen Toussaint-produced tracks are as good, if not better, than anything else he produced before or after. There’s a few familiar names here—Dorsey, Aaron Neville, Earl King, the Meters and Ernie K-Doe—but the lesser-known artists steal the show throughout. Case in point is the energetic Warren Lee, whose opener “Star Revue,” and infectious “Climb the Ladder” are both worth the price of two copies of this CD alone. Another highlight

is the oft-recorded foot soldier Eldridge Holmes. Possessing a bluesier style than the other artists here, his “Cheatin’ Woman” and the jaw-dropping “Love Affair” are particularly appealing. The Aaron Neville hard-to-ignore pairing, “Hercules” and “Strutting On Sunday” are worth noting as the arrangements on these songs owe nothing to New Orleans, but in fact are contemporary (circa early 1970s) urban soul. There’s a couple of former Clowns here—(as in Huey Smith and the Clowns) “Scarface” John Williams and Curley Moore (of “Soul Train” fame)—who both

prove to be outstanding solo artists in their own right. Too much great material here to mention. Dare we hope for a volume two? —Jeff Hannusch www.OFFBEAT.com

REVIEWS

The Local Skank Collect All Five! (Independent) We might as well quit counting what “wave” we’re on, because it seems like ska—the music the most white people feel confident dancing to—will be popular forever, at least with the kids. In the tradition of bands like Skankin’ Pickle and Operation Ivy, the mostly girl band the Local Skank play silly,

good-time, horn-infused ska music with a slight punk edge. The band’s gender matters little, although you can’t help noticing that the Local Skank’s singing is far better (really great at points) and the band doesn’t sound like aggressive, rushed teenagers, like so many of their male ska-punk peers. The song topics on the Local Skank’s newest album Collect All Five! are all very literal, told in story or joke form, addressing childish concerns

Bands on Film Mutemath Armistice Live (CD/DVD) (Warner Bros.)

Down Diary of a Mad Band (CD/DVD) (Down) My first instinct when watching Mutemath’s Armistice Live DVD was that it made the show look more exciting than it really was. Quick cuts, dramatic camera angles and a host of lighting effects really energize the show, which was energetic and inventive to start with. But that’s only relevant if you think of the DVD as a document of a show. If the DVD is thought of as its own entity, then the camerawork and editing is just as naturally a part of its creation as production and editing are when making an album. In fact, Armistice Live is exactly the DVD you’d expect from the production and technologyconscious Mutemath. As the title suggests, the set leans very heavily on material from last year’s Armistice album, and the stage set includes an arch that imitates the entrance to Armstrong Park, which was featured on the album’s cover. Musically, there are some changes to songs, but not enough to make it musically necessary. Visually, it’s dynamic, but its visual vocabulary comes entirely from music videos, and that glossy, dramatic style would be convincing if human moments weren’t already the best parts of the DVD. No camera angles tart up singer Paul Meany offering a guitar-shaped

DECEMBER 2010

synthesizer to those in the front row to tap and work, then handing it to them when he had to do something else. When he returned for the toy moments later, they handed it back, and that trusting relationship with an audience—in Atlanta, in this case—is more interesting than all the beautiful, quizzical, athletic, dramatic shots. Visually and conceptually, Down’s Diary of a Mad Band is the diametric opposite of Armistice Live. There’s no tricky lighting or innovative camera work. The DVD is intentionally a throwback to rock films that take the fans on tour. As such, it documents the show and the backstage horseplay, and as you’d expect, it ranges from fascinating to mundane, and from the juvenile to the inspired. Phil Anselmo’s meditations on the bandas-brotherhood walk the fine line between insightful and Spinal Tap. Fans debate Anselmo’s status on the tour—is he a mess or not? I don’t hear the disaster that some of the reviewers at Amazon.com hear, but I’ve found him more involving and compelling live than I do in these performances. At the same time, the band is a sledgehammer with songs, as the set list from this 2006 European tour illustrates. —Alex Rawls www.OFFBEAT.com

REVIEWS

bookmark

such as peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (“Fatty Snax”) and who is a slut (“That Girl”), with a childish sense of glee. “Stalker Ex-Girlfriend” and the silly hardcore joint “Bummer Pie,” telegraph their intentions via their titles. Album opener “Confused” is the most sincere and best track, with great singing and clever, insightful lyrics about a confused young couple. Other than the unfortunate fact that, during the “punk” sections (such as on the record’s thinnest number, “My Friend Pants”), the guitar distortion is somewhat quieter than the clean guitar, the record boasts impeccable production. But like most genre-specific music, the Local Skank to some degree just fill

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By & By String Band Little Darling Pal of Mine: Songs of the Carter Family (Independent) The first song on Little Darling Pal of Mine is “Are You Lonesome Tonight,” and with it the band announces its intention to turn the listener’s clock back past 1960, when Elvis Presley released the

Peas and Love Sandy Warren Art Blakey Cookin’ and Jammin’—Recipes and Remembrances from a Jazz Life (Margaret Media)

Growing up where fresh fruit meant the occasional brown banana or “sour green apple he found on the ground,” Art Blakey craved freshness in the kitchen as well as on stage when his need for heroin didn’t override everything else. Sandy Warren, or “Egghead,” Blakey’s partner in love, has traced an honest portrait of a man and a cook and one of the greatest jazz drummers in America. The recipes are reasonable, and there are almost 100 of them. Some are quite simple, such as “Sautéed Flounder in a Flash,” which consists of seasoning the fillets with salt and pepper, dredging in flour, and frying in butter—not a recipe you’d need to read twice. “Peas” are just peas— fresh peas, boiled in water, served with a dab of butter and a dash of kosher salt. But the recipe belongs, because buttered peas were Blakey’s favorite vegetable. “Outrageous Oatmeal Nutmeg Cookies” are not outrageous, but rather mellow. The only surprising thing about this recipe is the addition of one quarter cup of water to the dough, which becomes quite sticky (I was glad I

in the blanks on a previously created template. The guitarist doesn’t usually have to think of what to play; it’s been mostly pre-decided. Still, in terms of doing something that’s been done a lot, the Local Skank’s version is especially well done. —Sam LeVine

had my mechanical cookie/meatball scoop to portion it out with). Warren describes a household that valued fresh produce and seafood above all else, but also secured boxes of instant vanilla pudding mix. Art Blakey Cookin’ and Jammin’ is first and foremost a love story about two people trying to figure out how to balance a life together with a pinch of salt, a lot of love, and just the right amount of self-destruction. Warren ends her chapter on cookies thus: “I would soon experience first-hand that sometimes the only way for love to survive is to let go of one another.” Art Blakey died of cancer in 1990, seven years after his and Warren’s separation. —Elsa Hahne www.OFFBEAT.com

REVIEWS

version most of us know best, to the late 1930s, when the Carter Family recorded it. In its arrangement and performance, the band is successful. This collection of Carter Family songs does nothing to date itself to the present. This is not to say that Little Darling Pal of Mine plays the studio tricks that other retro recordings do to synthesize a dusty, archival sound. Rather, the By & By String Band’s approach to the songs themselves demonstrates its thorough understanding of the idiom that inspired the album. For many listeners, the album will function as a showcase for lead vocalist Kiyoko McCrae. That’s probably good enough. She sings beautifully throughout, and the band’s harmonies and occasional call-and-response vocals emphasize and echo her easy, warm tone. If those listeners overlook, though, the precision and quality of the instrumental performances that provide the album’s foundation, it’s their loss. Rhythmically and melodically, the band leads us through the compositions in a way that opens up new ideas in some of the oldest songs we know. Little Darling Pal of Mine eschews the loose, good-time feeling common to so much contemporary bluegrass in favor of casual understatement. In their approach, they manage both reserve and emotion. “This album,” the liner notes read, “is a nod to the Carter Family.” One imagines Maybelle, Sara, and AP would nod back. —Jacob Leland

Tarik Hassan Tarik Hassan (Independent) For his debut album, bassist Tarik Hassan assembled an outstanding www.OFFBEAT.com

quartet that features Rex Gregory (saxophones), Austin Johnson (piano, Rhodes) and Simon Lott (drums). Vocalist Johnaye Kendrick also joins the ensemble, lending her impassioned stylings to three of the nine originals on Hassan’s self-titled endeavor. The album, while cool on the surface, uncovers a warm, emotionally charged core driven by Hassan’s profound compositions and the group’s expressive, improvisational interplay. Akin to a contemporary version of the legendary Modern Jazz Quartet, this band plays with an understated intensity, a deep connection to one another, and a subtle mastery of the jazz lexicon that speaks not of their virtuosity as individual players, but to their strength as a collective. Together, the tandem of Gregory and Lott shapes the album’s contours and impels its melodies while the rhythmic playing of Hassan and Johnson colors its contrasts and enlivens its phrases. The tune “Colorblind,” with its chilled theme and funky, creeping groove, sizes up both hard-bop and hip-hop as it shifts into an air of modern-day cool. Gregory’s brisk flights and Johnson’s radiant soaring on the mysterious “Slinga” provide some of the album’s best moments, but it’s the vibrant pulse, energetic rush and organic interaction found on “Mid-Citizen” that truly showcases the unique synthesis of sounds coming out of the Crescent City today. Hassan’s two ballads, the poignantly melancholy “Malene” and the soulfully somber “That Long Brown Hair” highlight his depth as a composer as well as the band’s as an ensemble. As the album settles onto the serene, uplifting “St. John’s River,” Hassan’s subtle touch and the group’s elegant rejoicing leave a lasting imprint. —Aaron LaFont DECEMBER 2 010

REVIEWS

The Professors of Pleasure Volume Two (Independent) The Professors of Pleasure, John Doheny’s Tulane University faculty jazz band, use their second CD, Volume Two, to put on a clinic in modern jazz performance and composition. In less capable hands, we’d need to worry

that the recording would sound clinical, but that isn’t a concern here. Instead, the interactions between the band on a collection of original compositions, Harold Battiste pieces, standards by Miles Davis (“Half Nelson”), Hank Mobley (“This I Dig Of You”), and James Van Heusen (“Nancy with the Laughing Face”), and a rousing version of the Tulane University fight song set to a secondline beat make for a fun, expressive and often whimsical exploration of what Doheny calls modern New Orleans jazz. Responsible for the sessions’ feel, as is usually the case with jazz combos, is the solid work of the rhythm section: Geoff Clapp on drums and Jim Markway on bass absolutely lock in. Given such a strong foundation, the rest

Are They/Aren’t They Los Po-Boy-Citos Brand New Dance (Independent) In a city that has synthesized musical styles throughout its history, a boogaloo band makes perfect sense. Los Po-Boy-Citos embraced that mingling ethic from the start, merging New Orleans R&B hits with boogaloo tunes on 2008’s New Orleans Latin Soul. On Brand New Dance, the band resists the temptation to become a gimmick and only returns once to the mash-up concept. The title track welds Eddie Bo’s “Check Your Bucket” to Archie Bell and the Drells’ “Tighten Up” and regrooves the results in a way that sounds not only natural but obvious, as if someone should have done this years ago. As a band, Los Po-Boy-Citos have themselves tightened up since their last album and grown as players, so the pleasures go beyond a good concept and a good groove. The horn players put solo time to good use, but not to such a degree that anyone loses sight of this as dance music played by an ensemble.

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They have become sufficiently fluent in the boogaloo musical vocabulary to write in the style, adding four originals to a set of well-chosen covers, and it’s not immediately obvious which is which. The spoken word intro to a reworked “Jive Samba” is a red herring that makes the rearranged Cannonball Adderley composition sound like an original, while the snappy “Long Way Home” sounds like it has been around forever. Like the cratedigger soul bands, Los Po-Boy-Citos are hopelessly inauthentic in one sense—most of them are young white guys—but their passion for the classic boogaloo records has led them to preserve the form in sound, song and feel. Brand New Dance is a solid step forward for the band. —Alex Rawls www.OFFBEAT.com

REVIEWS of the musicians get to stretch and showcase their impressive chops without the performances feeling perfunctory. “Elysian Fields,” an original composition of Markway’s, is a personal favorite for the emphasis its stop-time feel places on the bass and drums. There isn’t much about Volume Two (beyond the Tulane Fight Song second-line) that will put listeners in mind of traditional New Orleans jazz. It’s inflected enough by modern jazz and fusion-funk idioms, and bebop vocabulary in particular, to avoid that easy categorization. Its obvious intent, both in conception and in execution, is to widen the category of New Orleans jazz to include what Tulane jazz performance students learn and modern jazz aficionados everywhere listen to. —Jacob Leland

Leroy Thomas Jewel of the Bayou (Maison de Soul) Though Leroy Thomas’ CDs have been consistently good over the years, they’ve also had a run-and-gun sound that left them rough around the edges. His Maison de Soul debut stands out from previous offerings in that 1) more time was spent in the studio and 2) it’s his first disc recorded in Louisiana (the rest were waxed in Houston) where studio engineers know what authentic zydeco sounds like. The result is something that sounds more natural, with proper levels set for vocals and instrumentation. Thomas’ latest batch of songs has an unrushed, slow-cooked feeling, having been road-tested considerably. While it scores well in the groove, boogie and shuffle categories, it also reveals what a comic Thomas can be. There’s the dreaded morning after woman who’s a cross between a bear and a gorilla (“Bearilla Woman”) and the self-explanatory “(Everybody Wanna Go to Heaven) Nobody Wants to Go Down” that’s a joke in itself. Thomas’ greatest punch line comes on “I Think I Need a Boosta” where he sings, “The girl gave me viagra / abracadabra!” Though humor is one of the many cards Thomas plays here, his rendition www.OFFBEAT.com

of the south Louisiana jukebox fave “I Don’t Want to Be Wanted” trumps all. With an unusual blending of zydeco and country, Thomas emotes his heart out, begging a potential paramour not to get involved with such a feckless spirit. It’s an uncharacteristic selection but given his stirring performance, there’s obviously a deeper side to the party time Creole cowboy than previously thought. —Dan Willging

Flow Tribe Now Ya Know: Live at Tipitina’s (Independent) Perhaps the dominant trend in recent New Orleans party-rock music has been to lean heavily on wahwah guitars and drum kits. Flow Tribe is an interesting case in point, as their groove pushes funk hard towards its rock ’n’ roll edge. The cover of Flow Tribe’s Now Ya Know updates the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ 1991 Blood Sugar Sex Magik. The image also invokes some 1970s funk iconography, and the band’s addition of saxophone and brass gives them a distinct New Orleans flair, but Flow Tribe’s fusion of rock, funk and hiphop recalls the Chili Peppers before they started singing ballads more than it does Galactic, Greyboy, or, reaching further back, the Meters. Recorded live at Tipitina’s uptown on April 4, 2010, Now Ya Know showcases Flow Tribe’s ability to move a crowd—the shouts and responses come from an audience squarely in the palm of the band’s collective hand. Flow Tribe hits the stage with frenetic energy and contagious enthusiasm. Attending their live performance, though, is different from listening to it recorded, where the steady pace of their jams can get monotonous. Although the band sequenced its set that night— which featured a three-song guest appearance from a Real World cast member—for variety and arranged its individual songs tightly, that gets lost between the dance floor and the stereo speakers. Pushing the guitar up front in the mix enhances the groove for the crowd, but it buries the horns and takes some of the color out of the band’s sound. The DECEMBER 2 010

REVIEWS live recording captures the crowd and the atmosphere, but it does so at the expense of some of the band’s musicality. Flow Tribe has an innovative take on funk music, and the creative energy that goes into its songwriting and performance pays off when they get on stage. Now Ya Know proves the band has the chops for a full-length release, but it also keeps us waiting for them to go in the studio and make it. —Jacob Leland

pLink Floyd Nickels & Diamonds (Independent) In a 1991 interview with OffBeat, Béla Fleck expressed frustration at being constantly credited with “bringing the banjo to jazz.” While much of the world may be ignorant of the instrument’s long history in the genre, it’s not a problem we have here in New Orleans. Stroll down Frenchmen on a random night and you’re likely to hear that distinctive plunking rhythm behind any number

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of jazz combos. And one of them might be Orville Lee Floyd III and the Jumbo Shrimp Jazz band. Floyd is one of New Orleans’ most versatile banjo players, and under the alias pLink Floyd he stretches his stylistic legs. A perusal of the packaging reveals some unusual details. The words “modern fusion banjo” are emblazoned across the cover, while the instrumental credits include such entries as synthesizer and Japanese shamisen. But despite the curious ingredients, the final product is wellrooted in traditional styles. “Fusion” here seems to refer to the ensemble’s no-boundaries approach to American folk and roots music (notwithstanding

the syncopated reggae guitar part that underpins “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”). Nickels & Diamonds is all over the place in an endearing way. Allen Poche’s searing electric guitar solo on “House of the Rising Sun”, coming as it does on the heels of a plunking interlude by Floyd, is sure to make you sit up in your seat, as will Doug Belote’s forceful drum solo on “Caravan”. Tom McDermott contributes Fender Rhodes to the Beatles’ “Here, There and Everywhere”. And that’s just the beginning of the record’s long cast list. Floyd has a knack for bringing out the essence of a tune through his brisklyplucked chords, and transitions from rapid arpeggiated rolls to plaintive melodic lines with seeming ease. —Zachary Young

Arson Anthem Insecurity Notoriety (Housecore) Arson Anthem, according to the band’s website, has a mission:

to bring “the roots of painful amplification, raw production, and a true ‘Fuck All’ attitude” to a new generation of thrashers. For Insecurity Notoriety, the band went back to the early 1980s for inspiration from such bands as Negative Approach, Poison Idea and Discharge. Singer Mike IX Williams of Eyehategod can bring out the angry teenager in anyone with lyrics such as, “Inconsiderate and bored shitless / Complaining about doing nothing, then actually doing nothing,” from the song, “Has Been/Had Been.” The screaming continues through the guitar of Pantera and Down’s Philip H. Anselmo, whose label—Housecore—

www.OFFBEAT.com

REVIEWS released the album. The speedy riffs prove that Anselmo’s fingers probably defy the laws of physics, and the shrill shredding is almost hard on the ears. While Anselmo’s guitar screams, Collin Yeo’s bass growls, especially in the song “Teach the Gun (To Love the Bullet).” Finally, drums from Hank Williams III never give a listener’s heart time to slow down and catch up. Insecurity Notoriety hurts. It is harsh, it is aggressive, and it is pissed off. But for any hardcore punk tough enough to sustain the inner-ear damage, it is a step in fulfilling Arson Anthem’s anarchic mission. —Barbie Cure

Ray Charles The Undiscovered Masters (Concord) In discussing Ray Charles, local trumpeter Frank Mitchell once stated, “I don’t know who first called him ‘The Genius,’ but they sure hit the nail on the head.” That quality of ‘genius’ is fully evident on these previously unreleased sides just as it was on most of his music released during his lifetime. Charles is simply Ray here. He’s equally sad, happy, sassy, humble and always, a playful perfectionist. He touches several style bases along the way, including blues, country, pop, jazz, funk and swing. Oddly though, many of the songs have a common theme: squandered love and the squandering of love. Although there’s no information on the advance copy, my guess is these sides were cherry-picked from various sessions recorded in the 1990s. The attractive opener, “Love’s Gonna Bite You Back,” swings along nicely, pushed by punchy brass section and Charles’ magnetic vocals. He also personalizes the Annie Laurie R&B warhorse “It Hurts to be in Love” by slowing down the tempo and letting the orchestra add some jazzy flourishes. The lush “Wheel of Fortune,” with its prominent strings, will remind listeners of Charles’ early 1960s work at ABC. “I’m Gonna Keep Singin’” also turns back the clock, but to the early 1970s when bass started poppin’ and synthesizers snuck into the funk. “There’ll Be Some Changes” reminds us that no one wants you when you’re old www.OFFBEAT.com

and grey, while on the other hand, “Isn’t It Wonderful” confirms that just because there’s snow on the mountaintop, that doesn’t mean there can’t be fire down in the valley. Really a fine CD from beginning to end. Recommended to Ray Charles fans and fans of really good music. —Jeff Hannusch

The Jazz Passengers Reunited (Justin Time) Given that jazz can easily slip into the realm of the too serious, the return of the Jazz Passengers with their gonzo attitude and slightly off-kilter tunes is to be celebrated. This is not to say that they are not serious musicians nor that they don’t take the music seriously, but they don’t take it too seriously. For example, the title track is a cover of the Peaches and Herb hit that starts with saxophonist Roy Nathanson speaking the lyrics before the other members switch off lines over an arrangement that would fit in on a recent Tom Waits record. In the same vein, “Button Up” has a strong backbeat and R&B-esque vocals complete with a Coasterslike bass vocal. Right when one thinks that this is a Was (Not Was) comeback record, the vibraphone sweeps in for a solo followed by alto saxophone/violin riffing. Guests include Deborah Harry, Elvis Costello and guitarist Marc Ribot who freaks out on their driving version of Radiohead’s “National Anthem.” Even with a layoff of over a decade, this record shows that the Jazz Passengers haven’t lost their sense of humor, group interplay, nor unique take on jazz music. —David Kunian DECEMBER 2 010

When you’re out, text the word ‘offbeat’ to 33669 for daily listings. For complete listings, go to www.offbeat.com

Listings

EXPRESS

Here are OffBeat’s highlights of music and entertainment in New Orleans and the surrounding area for the current month. Each day’s events are listed in alphabetical order by club or venue. Listings are compiled based on information provided by clubs, bands and promoters up to our deadlines. Unfortunately, some information was not available at press time and listings are subject to change. Special events, concerts, festivals and theater listings follow the daily listings. For up-to-theminute, complete music listings, check OffBeat’s web page at www.offbeat.com. For more details on a show, call the club directly. Phone numbers of clubs are shown in this section and/or at www.offbeat.com. To include your date or event, please email information to our listings editor, Craig Guillot at craigguillot@offbeat.com or call 504-944-4300. Mr. Guillot can also provide listing deadlines for upcoming issues.

AC AU BL BU BB SH KJ KS CL CO CW DN FE FK GS IR IN MJ TJ JV LT ME PK PP RG RH RB RR SI SW TC VO ZY

A Cappella Acoustic Blues Bluegrass Brass Band Cabaret/Show Cajun Christian Classical Comedy Country Dance Folk Funk Gospel Indie Rock International/World Jazz, Contemporary Jazz, Trad Jazz, Variety Latin Metal Piano/Keyboards Pop/Top 40/Covers Reggae Rap/Hip Hop Rhythm & Blues Rock Swing/Gypsy Spoken Word Techno/Dance/Electronica Vocals Zydeco

WEDNESDAY DEC 1

12 Bar: Ruby Moon 7p, Brass-A-Holics, 9p Apple Barrel: Wendy Darling (BL) 8p, Mike Sklar & the Hip Shakers (BL) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: United Postal Project (FK) 8p, Khris Royal and Dark Matter (FK) 10p Candle Light Bar: Treme Brass Band (BB) 9p Chickie Wah Wah: Bruce “Sunpie” Barnes (ZY) 8:30p d.b.a.: Tin Men (MJ) 7p, Walter “Wolfman” Washington & the Roadmasters (BL) 10p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p

DECEMBER 2010

Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Sasha Masakowski (MJ) 5p, Irvin Mayfield’s NOJO Jam presents the music of Dizzy Gillespie (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Chip Wilson (BL) 9p Maison: Jerry Jumonville & the Jump City Band (BL) 7p, the Cats Pajamas (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Jenn Howard (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Ched Reeves (RR) 2p, Joe Bennett (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Lars Edegran and Topsy Chapman (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Glen David Andrews (JV) 8p Republic: Insane Clown Posse, Anybody Killa, Axe Murder Boyz (RH) 7p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Joe Krown (SI) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Delfeayo Marsalis (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, the Orleans (JV) 6p, St. Louis Slim & the Frenchmen St. Jug Band (JV) 10p

THURSDAY DEC 2

12 Bar: Misled 9p Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 8p, Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: DJ T-Roy (RG) 10p, Gravity A (upstairs) (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Cindy Scott (JV) 10p d.b.a.: Eric Lindell (RB) 7p, Andrew Duhon (OR) 10p Fritzel’s: Tom Fischer & Friends (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Harrah’s: Michael Ward (JV) 6p Hi Ho Lounge: Stooges Brass Band (BB) 9p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Comedy Gumbeaux (CO) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Roman Skakun (MJ) 5p, Shamarr Allen (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Dave James & Tim Robertson (BL) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Soul Rebels Brass Band (BB) 11p Maple Leaf: the Trio feat. Johnny Vidacovich, George Porter, Jr. and guests (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Frank Fairbanks (RR) 2p, Captain Leo (RR) 7p Ogden Museum: Ogden After Hours feat. Bill Baird (OR) 6p Palm Court: Crescent City Joymakers feat. Leroy Jones and Katja Toivola (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Brass Band Thursday feat. Treme Brass Band (BB) 8p Rivershack: Reed Alleman (RR BL) 7p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Chris Ardoin (ZY) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Baptiste Trotignon (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Miss Sophie Lee (JV) 6p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p

FRIDAY DEC 3

12 Bar: Marc Belloni 7p, John Lisi (BL) 11p Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Holladay (BL) 8p, Mike Hood (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Mykia Jovan and Jason Butler (MJ) 8p, Bionica, the Mumbles (MJ) 10p, Black Pearl, DJ Real (upstairs) (RR) 12a Bombay Club: Amanda Walker (PK) 6p, Johnny Angel & the Swingin’ Demons (SI) 9:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Happy Hour feat.The Pfister Sisters (JV) 5:30p, Paul Sanchez (LT) 8p, Rebecca Loebe (RR) 10p d.b.a.: Hot Club of New Orleans (JV) 6p, the Iguanas (LT) 10p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues: Attack Attack!, Emmure, Pierce the Veil, Of Mice and Men (RR) 5:30p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): White Bitch, Metronome the City (RR) 9p Howlin’ Wolf Northshore: Idil, DJ Scrim,Al Capella (VR) 9p

Howlin’ Wolf: Don’t Spike the Eggnog 2 Benefit for Bridge House feat. Bicipital Groove, Dirty Netter, Spermatic Chords and more (RR) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Professor Piano Series feat. Josh Paxton (MJ) 5p, Leon “Kid Chocolate” Brown (MJ) 8p, Midnight Burlesque Ballroom feat.Trixie Minx and Linnzi Zaorski (SH) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: Damien Louviere (BL) 5p, Ghost Town (CW) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Joe Krown (PK) 7p, J. Monque’D Blues Band (BL) 11p Maison: Some Like it Hot (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: Good Enough for Good Times (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Colin Lake (BL) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Clive Wilson (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Jazz Masters feat. Leroy Jones (JV) 8p Republic: Jean-Eric (VR) 11p Rivershack: Coldshot (RR BL) 9:30p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Flow Tribe (RR) 9:30p Snug Harbor: Ellis Marsalis Quartet (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 6:30p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: Supagroup, Happy Talk Band, Brah (RR) 10p

SATURDAY DEC 4

12 Bar: Earphonk (FK) 12a Apple Barrel: Maxwell (BL) 4p, Sneaky Pete (BL) 8p, the Hip Shakers (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (MJ) 7p, the Revivalists, Sol Driven Train (OR) 10, the Fessters (upstairs) (RR) 10p, Black Pearl, DJ Real (upstairs) (RR) 1a Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p, Leroy Jones Jazz Band (JV) 9:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Grayson Capps and the Lost Cause Minstrels (RR) 10p d.b.a.: John Boutte (JV) 8p, Debauche & Los Skarnales (JV) 11p Fulton Street: BRW (PP) 8p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues (the Parish): Fuego + Fuego feat. DJ Juanes and DJ Q (LT) 12a Howlin’ Wolf Northshore: Slave to the Metal Festival feat. Mistress Juliya (ME) 6p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): My Life is a Party feat. Aquaforce, Lyriqs, Jim-E-Stack and more (RH) 9p Howlin’ Wolf: PANTyRAid, FLT Risk and Formless (RR) 10p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Glen David Andrews (MJ) 8p, Round Midnight Brass Band Jam feat. Kinfolks Brass Band (BB) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: Hurricane Refugees (BL) 5p, Beatles Tribute feat. Rites of Passage (BL) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Dave Jordan & the Neighborhood Improvement Association CDrelease party (FK) 11p Maple Leaf: Los Po-boy-citos CD-release party (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Joe Bennett (RR) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 5p Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p Old Point Bar: Clarence “Tadpole” Henry (BL) 9:30p One Eyed Jacks: Suplecs (ME) 9p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Lionel Ferbos (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: 726 Jazz Band feat.William Smith (JV) 8p Rivershack: Blackened Blues (RR BL) 10p

Rock ’n’ Bowl: Sgt. Pepper’s Beatles Tribute Band (RR) 9:30p Snug Harbor: Deacon John’s Tribute to Louie Prima (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Luke Winslow-King (JV) 3p, Panorama Jazz Band (JV) 6p, Davis Rogan Band (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: WWOZ 30th Birthday Bash feat. Theresa Andersson, Kirk Joseph, John Groz, Willie Green, Shamarr Allen and more (VR) 10p

SUNDAY DEC 5

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Claiborne (BL) 8p, Johnny J. and Benny Maygarden (BL) 10:30p Blue Nile: Mainline (BB) 10p Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p Columns: Chip Wilson (BL) 11a, musical showcase feat. Andy Rogers (VR) 8p d.b.a.: Palmetto Bug Stompers (JV) 6p, Mamones (JV) 10p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p House of Blues: Sunday Gospel Brunch (GS) 10a Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Brass Band Sunday feat. Hot 8 Brass Band (BB) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Tyler’s Revisited feat. Germaine Bazzle and Paul Longstreth (MJ) 7p Kerry Irish Pub: Schatzy & Associates (RR) 8p Maison: the Rhythm Jesters (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: Joe Krown Trio feat. Russell Batiste and Walter “Wolfman” Washington (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 2p, Cindy Chen (RR RB) 7p Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p Palm Court: Sunday Night Swingsters feat. Lucien Barbarin and Duke Heitger (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Treme Brass Band (BB) 8p Snug Harbor: Gentilly Groovemasters (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Rights of Swing (JV) 3p,Kristina Morales (JV) 6p, Pat Casey (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: Cajun Fais Do Do feat. Bruce Daigrepont (KJ) 5:30p

MONDAY DEC 6

Apple Barrel: Sam Cammarata (BL) 8p, Shotgun House (BL) 10:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Spencer Bohren (RR) 7p Columns: David Doucet (JV) 8p d.b.a.: Glen David Andrews (JV) 9p Fritzel’s: Tim Laughlin Quartet (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Bob French & the Original Tuxedo Jazz Band (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Kim Carson (BL) 9p Maison: Jayna Morgan (JV) 7p, Super Jam Musicians Open Mic feat. Rue Fiya (OR) 10p Maple Leaf: Papa Grows Funk (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Butch Fields (RR) 2p, Brint Anderson (BL) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Band feat. Maynard Chatters (JV) 8p Snug Harbor: Charmaine Neville Band (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Dominick Grillo & the Frenchmen St.All-stars (JV) 6p, Jazz Vipers (JV) 10p

TUESDAY DEC 7

12 Bar: Comedy Night 8:30p Apple Barrel: Kenny Claiborne (BL) 8p, Kenny Swartz & the Palace of Sin (BL) 10:30p Blue Nile: Rex Gregory (upstairs) (OR) 10p

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LIVE LOCAL MUSIC Chickie Wah Wah: New Orleans Nightcrawlers (BB FK) 8p d.b.a.: New Orleans Cotton Mouth Kings (JV) 9p Fritzel’s: Tom Fischer & Friends (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues: Sick Puppies and guests (RR) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): the Big Busk, a night of burlesque and live music (SH VR) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Jason Marsalis (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Honky Tonk Open Mic feat. Jason Bishop (CW) 9p Maison: Caroline Fourmy (JV) 7p, the No Name Group (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Rebirth Brass Band (BB) 10p Margaritaville: Jimmy James (RR) 2p, Brint Anderson (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: the Joint Chiefs of Jazz feat. Frank Oxley (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Little Freddie King (BL) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Gordon au Quintet (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Smokin’ Time Jazz Club (JV) 6p, Davis Rogan Band (JV) 10p

WEDNESDAY DEC 8

12 Bar: Lynn Drury 7p, Brass-A-Holics 9p Apple Barrel: Wendy Darling (BL) 8p, Bottoms Up Blues Gang (BL) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: United Postal Project (RR) 8p, Khris Royal and Dark Matter (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Candle Light Bar: Treme Brass Band (BB) 9p Chickie Wah Wah: the Iguanas (LT RR) 8p d.b.a.: the Tin Men (JV) 7p, Walter “Wolfman” Washington & the Roadmasters (JV) 10p Fritzel’s: Chuck Brackman and Barry Foulon (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Sasha Masakowski (MJ) 5p, Irvin Mayfield’s NOJO Jam presents the music of Kenny Garrett (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Chip Wilson (BL) 9p Maison: Jerry Jumonville & the Jump City Band (BL) 7p, the Cats Pajamas (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Jenn Howard (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Ched Reeves (RR) 2p, Joe Bennett (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Lars Edegran, Tom Sancton and Ronelle Johnson (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Joe Lastie & Friends (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Jerry Embree (SI) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Delfeayo Marsalis (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, the Orleans (JV) 6p, St. Louis Slim & the Frenchmen St. Jug Band (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: Dave Barnes and Drew Holcomb Christmas Show (RR) 9p

THURSDAY DEC 9

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 8p, Andy J. Forest (BL) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Bottoms Up Blues Gang (BL) 7p, Gravity A (upstairs) (RR) 10p, DJ T-Roy (RG) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Butch Hancock (RR CW) 8p d.b.a.: Eric Lindell (JV) 7p, Los Po-boy-citos (LT) 10p Fritzel’s: Tom Fischer & Friends (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Harrah’s: Naydja Cojoe (JV) 6p Hi Ho Lounge: Stooges Brass Band (BB) 9p House of Blues: Shinedown, Will Hoge (RR) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Comedy Gumbeaux (CO) 8p, Future Leaders of the World, Touching the Absolute, Luke Starkiller (VR) 10p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Roman Skakun (MJ) 5p, Shamarr Allen (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Bloomin’ Onions (BL) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Soul Rebels Brass Band (BB) 11p Maple Leaf: the Trio feat. Johnny Vidacovich, George Porter, Jr. and guests (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Frank Fairbanks (RR) 2p, Billy Outlaw & the Wild Bunch (CW) 7p Ogden Museum: Ogden After Hours feat. Roland Guerin (OR) 6p Palm Court: Crescent City Joymakers feat. Ed Polcer (JV) 7p

DECEMBER 2010

Preservation Hall: Brass Band Thursday feat. Survivors Brass Band (BB) 8p Rivershack: Truman Holland (RR BL) 7p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Leon Chavis & Zydeco Flames (ZY) 8:30p Snug Harbor: John Mahoney Big Band (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Miss Sophie Lee (JV) 6p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p

FRIDAY DEC 10

12 Bar: Erin Demastes 7p, Cha Wa Mardi Gras Indians 9p Allways Lounge: Intimate Stranger, Lovey Dovies (RR) 10p Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Holladay (BL) 8p, Mike Hood & the Hip Shakers (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Bottoms Up Blues Gang (upstairs) (BL) 7p, Mykia Jovan and Jason Butler (MJ) 8p, Soul Rebels Brass Band (BB) 11p Blue Nile: Black Pearl, DJ Real (upstairs) (RR) 12a Bombay Club: Amanda Walker (PK) 6p, Banu Gibson & Trio (JV) 9:30p Chickie Wah Wah: happy hour feat. By & By String Band (OR) 5:30p d.b.a.: Meschiya Lake & the Little Big Horns (JV) 6p, the Dead Kenny Gs (JV) 10p

PLAN A: Dâm-Funk In the world of local funk, there are few praises higher than “DJ Soul Sister’s Favorite DJ,” but that’s who will be playing his first show in New Orleans December 17. A 20-plus-year veteran, DâmFunk’s star began to rise a few years ago when word of his DJ night, “Funkmosphere,” spread throughout Los Angeles and beyond. The weekly party had originally been titled “1983,” a salute to the synth and bass-heavy sound that had long been neglected in favor of Meters/James Brown-styled funk

Blue Nile: Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 7p, Los Po-boy-citos CD-release party (LT) 10p, Happy Jack Frequency (upstairs) (RR) 10p, Black Pearl, DJ Real (upstairs) (RR) 1a Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p, Judy Spellman & Trio (JV) 9:30p Carrollton Station: Henehan Twins (RR) 10p Chickie Wah Wah: call club d.b.a.: John Boutte (JV) 8p, Little Freddie King (JV) 11p Fulton Street: Vince Vance & the Valiants (PP) 8p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Harrah’s: the Electrocity (VR) 10p House of Blues (the Parish): Fuego + Fuego feat. DJ Juanes and DJ Q (LT) 12a House of Blues: Robert Earl Keen (OR) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Grenade Man, Stathakula (RR) 9p Howlin’ Wolf Northshore: Drunken Santa Party (VR) 9p Howlin’ Wolf: Burlesque on the Bayou II (SH) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Bill Summers and friends (MJ) 8p, Midnight Brass Band Jam feat. Kinfolk Brass Band (MJ) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: Lynn Drury Band (BL) 5p, Buddy Francioni & Home Grown (BL) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Brass-a-Holics Brass Band (BB) 11p Maple Leaf: the Radiators (RR) 10p Margaritaville: Joe Bennett (RR) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 5p Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p One Eyed Jacks: Hamp Fest 2010 feat. Quintron and Miss Pussycat, Fleur de Tease, Katey Red, Truth Universal and more (VR) 9p Preservation Hall: 726 Jazz Band feat. William Smith (JV) 8p Rivershack: Mustard Brothers (RR BL) 10p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Kermit Ruffins (MJ) 9:30p Snug Harbor: Astral Project (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Luke Winslow-King (JV) 3p, Panorama Jazz Band (JV) 6p, Jazz Vipers (JV) 10p

SUNDAY DEC 12

Fulton Street: the Wiseguys (PP) 8p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues: Christmas with Aaron Neville and his Quintet (RB) 8p Howlin’ Wolf: Slow Burn Burlesque (SH) 11p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Professor Piano Series feat.Tom McDermott (MJ) 5p, Leon “Kid Chocolate” Brown (MJ) 8p, Midnight Burlesque Ballroom feat.Trixie Minx and Linnzi Zaorski (MJ) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: Steve Keith (FE) 5p, Foot & Friends (BL) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Ramblin’ Letters (VR) 11p Maison: Some Like it Hot (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: the Radiators (RR) 10p Margaritaville: Colin Lake (BL) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p One Eyed Jacks: Givers (RR) 9p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Clive Wilson (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Kathleen Lee’s Coming Up For Air CD-release party (JV) 8p Republic: Silent Cinema (RB) 11p Rivershack: Omega 3 (RR BL) 9:30p Rock ’n’ Bowl: the Help feat. Barbara Menendez (RR) 9:30p Snug Harbor: Ellis Marsalis Quartet (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 6:30p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p

SATURDAY DEC 11

12 Bar: A Christmas Gruve 12a Apple Barrel: Maxwell (BL) 4p, Sneaky Pete (BL) 8p, the Hip Shakers (BL) 11p Big Top: Eva Fishberg CD-release party (VF) 7p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p

and Parliament/Funkadelic-like R&B among retro-lovers. Dâm (government name: Damon Riddick) came up in the early ’90s under the wing of producer Leon Sylvers, and by mid-decade he was playing keyboards on R&B and hip-hop sessions in L.A. His current label, Stones Throw Records, recently released Adolescent Funk, homemade recordings from his formative years, and besides the Jacko, Prince and P-Funk influences, it’s clear that new wave, hip-hop and jazz inspired the young Riddick as well. His epic 5-disc album, Toeachizown, is a modern classic, and he tours with a full band and an arsenal of vintage keyboards. Riddick speaks frequently of cosmic vibrations, and when he touches down this month, you’ll find funk’s biggest fan in top form. Dâm-Funk plays at 10 p.m. Friday, December 17 at One Eyed Jacks. Tickets $10, $7 for ladies before 11 p.m.—Ben Berman

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Claiborne (BL) 8p, Blue Max (BL) 10:30p Blue Nile: singer and songwriter open mic (upstairs) (SS) 7p, Mainline (BB) 10p Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p Columns: Chip Wilson (BL) 11a, musical showcase feat. Andy Rogers (VR) 8p d.b.a.: Palmetto Bump Stompers (JV) 6p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p House of Blues: Ledisi (OR) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Brass Band Sunday feat. Hot 8 Brass Band (RR) 9p Howlin’ Wolf: Battle of the Bands (RR) 5p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Tyler’s Revisited feat. Germaine Bazzle and Paul Longstreth (MJ) 7p Kerry Irish Pub: Speed the Mule (FE) 8p Maison: the Rhythm Jesters (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: Joe Krown Trio feat. Russell Batiste and Walter “Wolfman” Washington (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 2p, Cindy Chen (RR RB) 7p Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Lucien Barbarin (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Tommy Sancton’s New Orleans Jazz Band (JV) 8p Snug Harbor: James Singleton and the Illuminasti Trio (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Rights of Swing (JV) 3p, Ben Polcer & Friends (JV) 6p, Pat Casey (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: Cajun Fais Do Do feat. Bruce Daigrepont (KJ) 5:30p

MONDAY DEC 13

Apple Barrel: Sam Cammarata (BL) 8p, I Tell You What (BL) 10:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Spencer Bohren (RR) 7p d.b.a.: Glen David Andrews (JV) 9p Fritzel’s: Tim Laughlin Quartet (JV) 9p Funky Pirate:Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p

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LIVE LOCAL MUSIC Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Bob French & the Original Tuxedo Jazz Band (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Lynn Drury Band (BL) 9p Maison: Jayna Morgan (JV) 7p, Super Jam Musicians Open Mic feat. Rue Fiya (OR) 10p Maple Leaf: Papa Grows Funk (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Butch Fields (RR) 2p, Brint Anderson (BL) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p Old Point Bar: Brent Walsh Jazz Trio (JV) 5p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Jazz Band feat. Mark Braud (JV) 8p Snug Harbor: Charmaine Neville Band (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Dominick Grillo & the Frenchmen St.All-stars (JV) 6p, Jazz Vipers (JV) 10p

TUESDAY DEC 14

12 Bar: Comedy Night 8:30p Apple Barrel: Luke Winslow-King (BL) 8p, Kenny Swartz & the Palace of Sin (BL) 10:30p Blue Nile: David Bode Octet (OR) 10p Chickie Wah Wah: New Orleans Nightcrawlers (BB FK) 8p Columns: John Rankin (JV) 8p d.b.a.: New Orleans Cotton Mouth Kings (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues: Apocalyptica, We Are the Fallen (RR) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): the Big Busk, a night of burlesque and live music feat. The Dirty Bourbon River Show (SH VR) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Derek Douget (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Honky Tonk Open Mic feat. Jason Bishop (CW) 9p Maison: Caroline Fourmy (JV) 7p, the No Name Group (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Rebirth Brass Band (BB) 10p Margaritaville: Jimmy James (RR) 2p, Brint Anderson (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Joint Chiefs of Jazz feat. Frank Oxley (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: James “the Sleeping Giant” Winfield (RB) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Thelonious Monk Institute Ensemble (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Smokin’ Time Jazz Club (JV) 6p, Meschiya Lake & the Little Big Horns (JV) 10p

WEDNESDAY DEC 15

12 Bar: Ruby Moon 7p, Brass-A-Holics 9p Apple Barrel: Wendy Darling (BL) 8p, Bottoms Up Blues Gang (BL) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: United Postal Project (RR) 8p, Khris Royal and Dark Matter (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Candle Light Bar: Treme Brass Band (BB) 9p Chickie Wah Wah: the Iguanas (LT RR) 8p d.b.a.: the Tin Men (JV) 7p, Walter “Wolfman” Washington & the Roadmasters (BL) 10p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Sasha Masakowski (MJ) 5p, Irvin Mayfield’s NOJO Jam presents the music of Nat King Cole (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Chip Wilson (BL) 9p Maison: Jerry Jumonville & the Jump City Band (BL) 7p, the Cats Pajamas (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Jenn Howard (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Ched Reeves (RR) 2p, Joe Bennett (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p One Eyed Jacks: Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band feat. Grant Watts (RR) 9p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Lars Edegran and Topsy Chapman (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Jazz Band feat. Mark Braud (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Swing-a-Roux (SI) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Delfeayo Marsalis (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, the Orleans (JV) 6p, St. Louis Slim & the Frenchmen St. Jug Band (JV) 10p

THURSDAY DEC 16

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 8p, Louisiana Hellbenders (RG) 10:30p

DECEMBER 2010

Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Bottoms Up Blues Gang (BL) 7p, DJ T-Roy (RG) 10p, Gravity A (upstairs) (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Richard Julian (OR) 8:30p d.b.a.: Eric Lindell (RB) 7p, Washboard Rodeo (JV) 10p Fritzel’s: Tom Fischer & Friends (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Harrah’s: Real Love (JV) 6p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Comedy Gumbeaux (CO) 8p Howlin’ Wolf: In the Dark, Crizmatic, Dragon, LOU and many more (RR) 9:30p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Roman Skakun (MJ) 5p, Shamarr Allen (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Steve Keith (BL) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Soul Rebels Brass Band (BB) 11p Maple Leaf: the Trio feat. Johnny Vidacovich, George Porter, Jr. and guests (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Frank Fairbanks (RR) 2p, Billy Outlaw & the Wild Bunch (CW) 7p Ogden Museum: OgdenAfter Hours feat. Ingrid Lucia (VF) 6p Palm Court: Crescent City Joymakers feat. Tim Laughlin (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Brass Band Thursday feat. Paulin Brothers Brass Band (BB) 8p Rivershack: Mocking Birds (RR BL) 7p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Nathan & the Zydeco Cha Chas (ZY) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Spencer Bohren Christmas Party (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Miss Sophie Lee (JV) 6p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p

FRIDAY DEC 17

12 Bar: Hypersoul presents 9p Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Holladay (BL) 8p, Mike Hood & the Hip Shakers (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Bottoms Up Blues Gang (BL) 9p, Johnny Sketch & the Dirty Notes (FK) 10p, Black Pearl, DJ Real (upstairs) (RR) 12a Bombay Club: Amanda Walker (PK) 6p, Tim Laughlin & Trio (JV) 9:30p d.b.a.: Hot Club of New Orleans (JV) 6p, Rotary Downs (RR) 10p Fulton Street: Benny Grunch & the Bunch (PP) 8p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Vedas (OR) 9p Howlin’ Wolf Northshore: Invoke the Nightmare (RR) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Professor Piano Series feat. Joe Krown (MJ) 5p, Leon “Kid Chocolate” Brown (MJ) 8p, Midnight Burlesque Ballroom feat.Trixie Minx and Linnzi Zaorski (SH) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: Damien Louviere (BL) 5p, Hurricane Refugees (BL) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Ernie Vincent & the Top Notes (OR) 11p Maison: Some Like it Hot (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: Booker-Worrell, Beausoleil (FK KJ) 10p Margaritaville: Colin Lake (BL) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p One Eyed Jacks: Soul Sister, DaM-Funk, DJ Soul Sister’s Right on ’80s Party (VR) 9p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Clive Wilson (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Jazz Masters feat. Leroy Jones (JV) 8p Rivershack: Eudora and Deep Soul (RR BL) 9:30p Rock ’n’ Bowl: the Topcats (PP) 9:30p Snug Harbor: Ellis Marsalis Quartet (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 6:30p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: Flow Tribe Christmas Crunktacular (RR) 10p University of New Orleans: An Animated Christmas (CL VR) 7:30p

SATURDAY DEC 18

12 Bar: Hypersoul presents 9p Apple Barrel: Maxwell (BL) 4p, Sneaky Pete (BL) 8p, the Hip Shakers (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Blue Christmas feat. Smokey Greenwell & the Blues Gnues, Johnny Neil, Washboard Chaz

Blues trio, Jesse Moore, Margie Perez and many more (VR) 7p, Los Po-boy-citos (RR) 10p, Black Pearl, DJ Real (upstairs) (RR) 1a Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p, Leslie Smith Jazz Quartet (JV) 9:30p Chickie Wah Wah: 101 Runners,Woody Wood (RR FK) 9p d.b.a.: John Boutte (JV) 8p, Good Enough for Good Times (JV) 11p Fritzel’s: Mike Fulton and Richard Scott (JV) 9p Fulton Street: Rockin’ Dopsie & the Zydeco Twisters (PP) 7p, Classic Addict (PP) 7p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues (the Parish): Fuego + Fuego feat. DJ Juanes and DJ Q (LT) 12a Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Mike’s Birthday Bash feat. Mississippi Rail Company and Carmine P. Filthy (VR) 9p Howlin’ Wolf Northshore: Benjy Davis Project feat. Generation Way (RR) 9p Howlin’ Wolf: Soul Rebels Brass Band (BB) 10p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Night Before Christmas jazz show for children (JV) 1p, Glen David Andrews (MJ) 8p, Midnight Brass Band Jam feat. Brass-a-Holics (MJ) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: Speed the Mule (BL) 5p, Rites of Passage (FE) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Soul Project (FK) 11p Maple Leaf: J. the Savage (RR) 10p, Gravy (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Joe Bennett (RR) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 5p Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p One Eyed Jacks: Tin Men (BL) 9p Palm Court: Palm Court Jazz Band feat. Lionel Ferbos (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: 726 Jazz Band feat.William Smith (JV) 8p Rivershack: Blue Meanies (RR BL) 10p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Eric Lindell (RB) 9:30p Snug Harbor: Stanton Moore Trio (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Luke Winslow-King (JV) 3p, Panorama Jazz Band (JV) 6p, Meschiya Lake & the Little Big Horns (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: the Chilluns (RR) 10p

SUNDAY DEC 19

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Claiborne (BL) 8p, Ready Teddy’s Birthday Party (BL) 10:30p Blue Nile: Mainline (BB) 10p Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p Columns: Chip Wilson (BL) 11a, musical showcase feat. Andy Rogers (VR) 8p d.b.a.: Palmetto Bump Stompers (JV) 6p, Louisiana Hellbenders (BL) 10p Fritzel’s: Jumbo Shrimp Jazz Band (JV) 9p Fulton Street: Sharon Martin (PP) 4p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p House of Blues: Sunday Gospel Brunch (GS) 10a Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Brass Band Sunday feat. Hot 8 Brass Band (BB) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Tyler’s Revisited feat. Germaine Bazzle and Paul Longstreth (MJ) 7p Kerry Irish Pub: Traditional Irish session (FE) 4p, Betsy McGovern Celtic Xmas Favorites (BL) 8:30p Maison: the Rhythm Jesters (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: Joe Krown Trio feat. Russell Batiste and Walter “Wolfman” Washington (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 2p, Cindy Chen (RR RB) 7p Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p One Eyed Jacks: Meschiya Lake & the Little Big Horns (RR) 9p Palm Court: Sunday Night Swingsters feat. Lucien Barbarin (JV) 7p Preservation Hall: A Creole Christmas feat. Lars Edegran, Big Al Carson, Topsy Chapman and the St. Peter All-stars (JV) 2 & 4p Snug Harbor: James Booker Tribute feat. Davell Crawford, Tom McDermott and Larry Sieberth (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Rights of Swing (JV) 3p, Kristina Morales (JV) 6p, Pat Casey (JV) 10p

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LIVE LOCAL MUSIC Tipitina’s: Fess Fest feat.Tipitina’s All-star Band with Dr. John, Kermit Ruffins, James Andrews and more (VR FK) 7p

MONDAY DEC 20

Apple Barrel: Sam Cammarata (BL) 8p, Mike Darby & the House of Cards (BL) 10:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Spencer Bohren (RR) 7p d.b.a.: Glen David Andrews (JV) 9p Fritzel’s: Tim Laughlin Quartet (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Bob French & the Original Tuxedo Jazz Band (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Steve Keith (BL) 9p Maison: Jayna Morgan (JV) 7p, Super Jam Musicians Open Mic feat. Rue Fiya (OR) 10p Maple Leaf: Papa Grows Funk (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Butch Fields (RR) 2p, Brint Anderson (BL) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p Old Point Bar: Brent Walsh Jazz Trio (JV) 5p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Band feat. Maynard Chatters (JV) 8p Snug Harbor: Charmaine Neville Band (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Dominick Grillo & the Frenchmen St.All-stars (JV) 6p, Jazz Vipers (JV) 10p

TUESDAY DEC 21

12 Bar: Comedy Night 8:30p Apple Barrel: Kenny Claiborne (BL) 8p, call for late show Blue Nile: Ed Barrett and Dennis Formento (OR) 10p Chickie Wah Wah: Anders Osborne, John Fohl and Johnny Sansone (RR) 8:30p d.b.a.: New Orleans Cotton Mouth Kings (JV) 9p Fritzel’s: Tom Fischer & Friends (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): the Big Busk, a night of burlesque and live music feat. The Dirty Bourbon River Show (SH) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Jason Marsalis (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Honky Tonk Open Mic feat. Jason Bishop (CW) 9p Maison: Caroline Fourmy (JV) 7p, the No Name Group (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Rebirth Brass Band (BB) 10p Margaritaville: Jimmy James (RR) 2p, BrintAnderson (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall-stars feat. Shannon Powell (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Johnny J. & the Hitmen, Benny Maygarden (RB) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Masakowski Family Quartet (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Smokin’ Time Jazz Club (JV) 6p, Meschiya Lake & the Little Big Horns (JV) 10p

WEDNESDAY DEC 22

Apple Barrel: Wendy Darling (BL) 8p, Shotgun House (BL) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: United Postal Project (RR) 8p, Khris Royal and Dark Matter (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Candle Light Bar: Treme Brass Band (BB) 9p Chickie Wah Wah: the Iguanas (LT RR) 8p d.b.a.: Tin Men (JV) 7p, Walter “Wolfman” Washington & the Roadmasters (BL) 10p Fritzel’s: Chuck Brackman and Barry Foulon (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Sasha Masakowski (MJ) 5p, Irvin Mayfield’s Birthday Celebration feat. poetry and music (SW) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Chip Wilson (BL) 9p Maison: Jerry Jumonville & the Jump City Band (BL) 7p, the Cats Pajamas (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Jenn Howard (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Ched Reeves (RR) 2p, Joe Bennett (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Jazz Band feat. Mark Braud (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Joe Krown (SI) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Delfeayo Marsalis (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, the Orleans (JV) 6p, St. Louis Slim & the Frenchmen St. Jug Band (JV) 10p

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THURSDAY DEC 23

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 8p, Blue Max (RG) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: DJ T-Roy (RG) 10p, Gravity A (upstairs) (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Chickie Wah Wah: the Call Girls (RR) 8:30p d.b.a.: Eric Lindell (RB) 7p, J. the Savage (RR) 10p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues: Home for the Holidays, a concert for the Danial Price Foundation feat. Kermit Ruffins,Amanda Shaw, Rebirth Brass Band and many more (VR) 7:30p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Comedy Gumbeaux (CO) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Roman Skakun (MJ) 5p, Shamarr Allen (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Speed the Mule (FE) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Soul Rebels Brass Band (BB) 11p Maple Leaf: the Trio feat. Johnny Vidacovich, George Porter, Jr. and guests (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Frank Fairbanks (RR) 2p, Billy Outlaw & the Wild Bunch (CW) 7p Ogden Museum: Ogden After Hours feat. Helen Gillet (VF) 6p Preservation Hall: Brass Band Thursday feat. Tornado Brass Band (BB) 8p Rivershack: Refugeze (RR BL) 9:30p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Geno Delafose (ZY) 8:30p Snug Harbor: Phillip Manuel Christmas Quartet (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Miss Sophie Lee (JV) 6p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p

FRIDAY DEC 24

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Holladay (BL) 8p, Mike Hood & the Hip Shakers (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: call club Bombay Club: Amanda Walker (PK) 6p d.b.a.: Meschiya Lake & the Little Big Horns (JV) 6p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Professor Piano Series feat.Tom Worrell (MJ) 5p, Leon “Kid Chocolate” Brown (MJ) 8p, Midnight Burlesque Ballroom feat.Trixie Minx and Linnzi Zaorski (SH) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: call club Le Bon Temps Roule: call club Maison: Some Like it Hot (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: closed Margaritaville: Colin Lake (BL) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Creole Christmas feat. Lars Edegran, Big Al Carson, Topsy Chapman and the St. Peter All-stars (JV) 2 & 4p Snug Harbor: closed Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 6:30p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p

SATURDAY DEC 25

Apple Barrel: Maxwell (BL) 4p, Sneaky Pete (BL) 8p, Andre Bouvier (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 7p, Hot 8 Holiday Brass Celebration (BB) 10p, Black Pearl, DJ Real (upstairs) (RR) 1a Blue Nile: a Royal Christmas feat. Khris Royal and Dark Matter (upstairs) (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p Carrollton Station: Fred LeBlanc (OR) 9p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues: Trombone Shorty’s Funky X-mas Jam (MJ) 9p Howlin’ Wolf: Christmas Throwdown feat. Rebirth Brass Band (BB) 10p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): call club for early show, Midnight Brass Band Jam (BB) 12a Kerry Irish Pub: call club Le Bon Temps Roule: call club Maple Leaf: 101 Runners (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Joe Bennett (RR) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 5p

Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Benny Grunch & the Bunch (VR) 6p Snug Harbor: closed

SUNDAY DEC 26

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Claiborne (BL) 8p, Mike Darby & the House of Cards (BL) 10:30p Blue Nile: Mainline (BB) 10p Bombay Club: Jeff Greenberg (PK) 6p Columns: Chip Wilson (BL) 11a, musical showcase feat. Andy Rogers (VR) 8p d.b.a.: Palmetto Bug Stompers (JV) 6p, Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 10p Fritzel’s: Jumbo Shrimp Jazz Band (JV) 9p Fulton Street: Philip Manuel (PP) 4p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p House of Blues: Sunday Gospel Brunch (GS) 10a Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Brass Band Sunday feat. Hot 8 Brass Band (BB) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Tyler’s Revisited feat. Germaine Bazzle and Paul Longstreth (MJ) 7p Kerry Irish Pub: call club Maison: the Rhythm Jesters (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: Joe Krown Trio feat. Russell Batiste and Walter “Wolfman” Washington (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 2p, Cindy Chen (RR RB) 7p Mulate’s: Bayou Deville (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Tommy Sancton’s New Orleans Jazz Band (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: the Wiseguys (VR) 5p Snug Harbor: Victor Goines All-stars feat. Wycliffe Gordon (MJ) 8 & 10p Tipitina’s: Cajun Fais Do Do feat. Bruce Daigrepont (KJ) 5:30p

MONDAY DEC 27

Apple Barrel: Sam Cammarata (BL) 8p, Butch Trivette (BL) 10:30p Chickie Wah Wah: Spencer Bohren (RR) 7p d.b.a.: Glen David Andrews (JV) 9p Fritzel’s: Tim Laughlin Quartet (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Willie Locket & the All Purpose Blues Band (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Bob French & the Original Tuxedo Jazz Band (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Lynn Drury Band (BL) 10p Maison: Jayna Morgan (JV) 7p, Super Jam Musicians Open Mic feat. Rue Fiya (OR) 10p Maple Leaf: Papa Grows Funk (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Butch Fields (RR) 2p, Brint Anderson (BL) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p Old Point Bar: Brent Walsh Jazz Trio (JV) 5p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Jazz Band feat. Mark Braud (JV) 8p Snug Harbor: Charmaine Neville Band (MJ) 8 & 10p

TUESDAY DEC 28

12 Bar: Comedy Night 8:30p Apple Barrel: Luke Winslow-King (BL) 8p, I Tell You What (BL) 10:30p Blue Nile: Jeff Albert Quintet (upstairs) (MJ) 10p Chickie Wah Wah: John Mooney (BL RR) 8p d.b.a.: New Orleans Cotton Mouth Kings (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues (the Parish): 100 Monkeys (RR) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): the Big Busk, a night of burlesque and live music feat. The Dirty Bourbon River Show (SH) 9p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Jason Marsalis (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Honky Tonk Open Mic feat. Jason Bishop (CW) 9p Maison: Caroline Fourmy (JV) 7p, the No Name Group (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Rebirth Brass Band (BB) 10p Margaritaville: Jimmy James (RR) 2p, Brint Anderson (RR) 7p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall-stars feat. Shannon Powell (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Amanda Shaw (KJ) 8:30p DECEMBER 2 010

LIVE LOCAL MUSIC Snug Harbor: Donald Harrison Quintet (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Smokin’ Time Jazz Club (JV) 6p, Davis Rogan Band (JV) 10p

WEDNESDAY DEC 29

Apple Barrel: Wendy Darling (BL) 8p, Johnny J. and Benny Maygarden (BL) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: United Postal Project (RR) 8p, Khris Royal and Dark Matter (RR) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Candle Light Bar: Treme Brass Band (BB) 9p Chickie Wah Wah: Asylum Street Spankers Farewell Tour (OR FK) 8:30p d.b.a.: Tin Men (JV) 7p, Walter “Wolfman” Washington & the Roadmasters (BL) 10p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Sasha Masakowski (MJ) 5p, Irvin Mayfield’s NOJO Jam presents the music of Count Basie (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Chip Wilson (BL) 9p Maison: Jerry Jumonville & the Jump City Band (BL) 7p, the Cats Pajamas (JV) 10p Maple Leaf: Jenn Howard (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Ched Reeves (RR) 2p, Frank Fairbanks (OR) 1p Mulate’s: Lee Benoit (KJ) 7p Preservation Hall: Preservation Hall Jazz Band feat. Mark Braud (JV) 8p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Geno Delafose (ZY) 9p Snug Harbor: Delfeayo Marsalis (MJ) 8 & 10p

THURSDAY DEC 30

Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 8p, Louisiana Hellbenders (RG) 10:30p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Gravity A (upstairs) (RR) 10p, DJ T-Roy (RG) 10p Bombay Club: Marlon Jordan (JV) 7:30p Fritzel’s: Tom Fischer & Friends (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p Harrah’s: Tonia Powell & the Left Field Band (JV) 6p Hi Ho Lounge: Stooges Brass Band (BB) 9p House of Blues: Better than Ezra (RR) 8p Howlin’ Wolf (The Den): Comedy Gumbeaux (CO) 8p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Roman Skakun (MJ) 5p, Shamarr Allen (MJ) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Crescent Celtic Band (FE) 9p Le Bon Temps Roule: Soul Rebels Brass Band (BB) 11p Maple Leaf: the Trio feat. Johnny Vidacovich, George Porter, Jr. and guests (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Frank Fairbanks (RR) 2p, Billy Outlaw & the Wild Bunch (CW) 7p Ogden Museum: Ogden After Hours feat. Davis Rogan (VR) 6p Preservation Hall: Brass Band Thursday feat. New Birth Brass Band (BB) 8p Rivershack: Brent and George (RR BL) 7p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Bucktown All-stars (PP) 10p Snug Harbor: Herlin Riley (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Miss Sophie Lee (JV) 6p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p

FRIDAY DEC 31

12 Bar: Bonerama (FK) 10p Apple Barrel: John Williams and Billy Outlaw (BL) 4p, Kenny Holladay (BL) 8p, Mike Hood & the Hip Shakers (BL) 11p Bistreaux (Maison Dupuy): Paul Longstreth (PK) 7p Blue Nile: Mykia Jovan and Jason Butler (MJ) 8p, Black Pearl and DJ Real New Year’s Eve Party (upstairs) (RR) 10p, Kermit Ruffins New Year’s Eve Party (MJ) 10p Bombay Club: Amanda Walker (PK) 6p, Luther Kent (JV) 9:30p Chickie Wah Wah: subdudes (RR) 9p d.b.a.: Honey Island Swamp Band, John Mooney (BL) 10p Fritzel’s: Chuck Brackman and Barry Foulon (JV) 9p Funky Pirate: Mark & the Pentones (BL) 4p, Al Carson & the Blues Masters (BL) 8p House of Blues: Better than Ezra (RR) 9:30p Howlin’ Wolf: Ivan Neville’s Dumpstaphunk, Papa Grows Funk (FK) 10p Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse (Royal Sonesta): Professor Piano Series feat. Joe Krown (MJ) 5p, New Year’s Eve Special Concert (MJ VR) 8p Kerry Irish Pub: Damien Louviere (BL) 4p, Rites of Passage (FE) 8:30p

DECEMBER 2010

Le Bon Temps Roule: Soul Rebels New Year’s Eve House Party (BB) 11p Maison: Some Like it Hot (JV) 7p Maple Leaf: Big Sam (FK) 10p Margaritaville: Colin Lake (BL) 2p, Irving Bannister’s All-stars (RB) 7p Mulate’s: La Touche’ (KJ) 7p One Eyed Jacks: Morning 40 Federation (RR) 9p Palm Court: New Year’s Eve Gala Celebration feat. Palm Court Jazz Band with Loinel Ferbos and Topsy Chapman (JV) 9p Rivershack: Ten Buck Two (RR BL) 10p Rock ’n’ Bowl: Tab Benoit (BL) 9p Snug Harbor: Astral Project New Year’s Eve Party (MJ) 8 & 10p Spotted Cat: Brett Richardson (JV) 4p, Washboard Chaz Blues Trio (BL) 6:30p, New Orleans Moonshiners (JV) 10p Tipitina’s: Galactic, Tea Leaf Green (RR FK) 10p COMPLETE LISTINGS ON THE GO at offbeat.com/mobile. Check from any cellphone, or add to your iPhone, Android, Blackberry home screen.

LOUISIANA MUSIC ON TOUR Complete listings are available at OffBeat.com. Weekly listings are available with a free subscription to OffBeat’s Weekly Beat email newsletter.

FESTIVALS DECEMBER 8-12 DesCours Festival: Check out historical places in the French Quarter as they are transformed in the vision of designers and artists. (504) 415-8444, DesCours.us. DECEMBER 10-12 Festival of the Bonfires: Witness blazing bonfires and enjoy festival fun on the banks of the Mississippi River in Lutcher. (225) 869-1717, FestivaloftheBonfires.org. DECEMBER 11 Art Against AIDS 2010: Head to the Shops at Canal Place from 8:30p to midnight and enjoy a night of fun to help AIDS awareness. (504) 482-9000. DECEMBER 11-12 Treme Creole Gumbo Festival: Celebrate one of New Orleans’ most famous dishes in the heart of Treme with food, music and family fun. (504) 558-6100, JazzandHeritage.org. DECEMBER 31 New Year’s Eve in New Orleans: Ring in 2011 at Jackson Square and Decatur Street with live music, a gumbo pot drop and fireworks at midnight on the river.

SPECIAL EVENTS THROUGH JANUARY 3 Celebrate the holidays in City Park with lighted figurines and a Christmas village with live music, food, art and displays. (504) 483-9415, CelebrationintheOaks.com. THROUGH JANUARY 3 Miracle on Fulton Street: This event features a Winterland walkway with periodic “snowfalls,” dazzling lights and live music on Fridays and Saturdays. DECEMBER 2-30 Ogden After Hours: Visit the Ogden Museum every Thursday evening for live entertainment by a variety of local musicians. Check the OffBeat daily listings for a schedule of performances. 6p. OgdenMuseum.org. DECEMBER 5 Backstage 2010: Join New Orleans Artists Against Hunger and Homelessness for a concert with Jimmy Buffett, Dr. John,Allen Toussaint, Irma Thomas, John Cleary, Deacon John and more. Generations Hall. 7-10p. Hoaahh.org. DECEMBER 11 Bywater Art Market: Head to this art market for paintings, pottery, glass, furniture and more. 9a-4p. BywaterArtMarket.com.

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BACKTALK

The Radiators O

talk back

What happened? Ed Volker: My story is that after 9/11, the road started squeezing tighter and tighter. There was the enhanced security, and our fortunes started waning a little bit. We weren’t playing multiple nights when we traveled, so there was a lot more roadwork which meant a lot more riding from town to town. After Katrina, the finances stated getting even tighter. Over the last few years, I’ve been more and more compressed and I’m just exhausted from the squeezebox of the road. I’m looking forward to a quieter, less stressful life. It started about five years ago, slightly before Katrina. The band has made difficult economic decisions in order to keep on rolling. Compared to other friends I know, we’ve done remarkably well. But the road doesn’t soften up, and I’m certainly getting older and I’m not snapping back like I used to. I’ve been debating it seriously for about two years. It just got to feeling like it’s time. I love the guys and I love our music. I thought this was the most caring and fair way to make my departure, to give a lot

guy decided that not only could he not take the road anymore and believe me, I totally get that because the road always wins and eventually we all have a hard time recovering. I’m 58 and I’m the youngest guy in the band. In theory, we could have kept playing local stuff or hand-picked gigs, but he wants to just quit completely. He not only wrote most of the songs, he sings more of them than I do and plays all the keyboards. He’s also made every set list that we’ve played. When somebody that important decides he doesn’t want to do it anymore, what can you say? I was completely Dave Malone, Camile Baudoin, taken by surprise by Reggie Scanlan, Frank Bua and the announcement. At the band meeting, it Ed Volker. was a lot of confusion. People were trying to be understanding, trying to not be assholes. That would just ruin of lead time so if the rest of the guys want the last seven months. I don’t want him to be to continue on with the Radiators in some doing something he’s hating doing. fashion or another, it’s with my blessing. I can imagine continuing as the Radiators. I’ve gone through variations of three large It remains to be seen. It means trying out feelings. One is relief to finally get away from another keyboard player and it would have to it all. Another is complete heartbreak because be someone who can sing, but sure it could a large portion of my life has been dedicated conceivably happen. It’s way too soon for me to the Radiators and the music. And the other to say one way or the other about that, but is thing is I’m scared. I’ve had a posse to work it conceivable? Yes, it is conceivable. with for the last 33 years. Actually far before Ed had agreed to play through Jazz Fest that. I ran with the Rhapsodizers and before and after a day of sorting through the email, that the Dogs. I’ve been running with posses I called him up and reminded him that there since I was 15. This is a major life change. were other gigs we had booked beyond that that he wasn’t necessarily aware of because Dave Malone: I guess it should be made I handle that stuff along with Josh, our road clear that the band did not decide to stop. A manager. When he found that out, he agreed key—and most people would argue the key—

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By John Swenson

n November 4, Ed Volker, the principal songwriter and singer with the Radiators, sent a letter of resignation to his bandmates Dave Malone, Reggie Scanlan, Camile Baudoin and Frank Bua. Two days later, Volker reiterated his intentions to leave the group at a meeting in a Chicago hotel room. The news quickly spread across the group’s fan network. The band released a statement indicating it would honor its commitments through June of 2011. As of now, the remaining four members of the group have not decided whether they will attempt to find a replacement for Volker or simply disband. Their observations on the future took a philosophic turn as they reflected on the nature of impermanence and the difficulty of breaking lifelong ties. One thing is certain. Without Volker, this unique fixture of the New Orleans music scene over the last 33 years will no longer exist as we know it. Apologies to Camile and Frank. Their comments are valuable, but space limitations prevailed.

DECEMBER 2 010

BAC

KTA

My idea of social networking is Terranova’s and walking on the bayou and hanging out with friends on my porch. to go to the last booked gig. Then he called me back an hour later and said, ‘I think the last gig the Radiators play should be at home.’ I had been thinking the same thing. So Tips would be great, hopefully we could have farewell shows at Tips on the second weekend of June next year. That’s what’s going on. Reggie Scanlan: The only definite thing is that Ed has given us his letter of resignation. The band now has to decide whether to look for a replacement or fold the tent. Any decision we make now would be a knee jerk reaction. We have to get past the emotional stage. Some people had a big emotional reaction. We have to settle down and get realistic. Anybody who wasn’t prepared for this is totally naïve. I’ve been preparing myself for this for three years. I don’t have any bad feelings. After 30 years, I’ll support anybody’s decision to leave the band if it’s not doing it for them anymore for whatever reason. For some people, this might be an opportunity to say, ‘Ed’s right, I’m burnt out.’ You have to look way deep inside yourself to figure out what you’re going to do. It’s 30 years of your life. It’s a big decision. You have to make the right decision and once the decision is made, that’s going to be it. If you’re going to carry on, it’s got to be in the spirit of being the Radiators. We have to utilize whatever the new guy brings in. How much re-finessing can it take? I don’t think Radiators music is a set thing. If it was, we couldn’t have Bonerama or Warren Haynes play with us. I think people get trapped into wanting things to stay the same and that keeps you from moving forward. I think somebody could come in and do the job, make his own mark. It’s about throwing out any kind of idea you got. Somebody might suggest somebody you never thought of. If we decide we’re going to carry on, that’s probably what we’re going to do. I’m really excited about all this. Let’s see what’s going to happen. Just because Ed’s leaving the band doesn’t mean we have to quit. We’re musicians. We should be looking for new things, new ideas. If you don’t like change, this is the wrong business to be in. You should be an insurance agent. You should embrace this. This could be an exciting era for the band.

DECEMBER 2010

It strikes me that this is the end of an era of New Orleans music. The Radiators were the carriers of a particular type of New Orleans culture. Volker: We embodied the idea of the eclecticism that defined ’60s bands like Little Feat and the Dead and the early Stones, but we did it in our uniquely New Orleans fashion. There was nobody quite like us in the way we mixed things up. In that way, we were unique. While we were a part of New Orleans music, we were something apart from it as well. We didn’t have a set approach or style. We had Dave’s country rock thing, then riffing on the Meters with “Suck the Head” then a Merle Haggard song, a Blind Willie Johnson song. We covered a lot of different song spaces. You are also a direct link to an era of New Orleans music that no longer exists because you played with Professor Longhair and Earl King. Volker: That’s so much a part of us that I take it for granted. Malone: We played with both of those gentlemen, and they were super influential on our musical environment, but we also have ties to all of New Orleans rock ’n’ roll. We do versions of some pretty obscure New Orleans songs. Lots of people don’t even know that they’re not our songs. We were lucky to grow up in an age when we could hear Ernie K-Doe and Benny Spellman and Earl King and the Hawkettes on the radio, and we were thinking everybody in the country was hearing this stuff because at the same time we were also hearing national hits. We have that eclectic taste because back then the radio had free reign to play whatever the disc jockey wanted to play. You could hear Hank Williams Sr. and Otis Redding and (laughs) Gary Puckett and the Union Gap and the Amboy Dukes back to back. We have all these diverse musical influences that were all brought to the table when we created our own songs as well. The new wave of very interesting, eclectic New Orleans rock bands doesn’t have that connection. That’s been cut. You guys are the last link to that. These new rock bands could just as easily come from San Francisco or Portland, Oregon or Minneapolis or Brooklyn, New York.

Volker: All places with very good Chinese takeaway. Malone: There are some bands coming up that are connecting themselves to some old brass bands’ way of playing, even reinventing the songs. There needs to be another wave of kids appreciating the golden age of New Orleans rock ’n’ roll. What is the band’s legacy? Volker: That’s a tree that has lots of branches. What will it be remembered for? Part of it is the eclecticism of the music, part of it is the good-heartedness of the shows and part of it is an extension of that in that our fans became communities onto themselves, kind of floating communities. There was a lot of community spirit there, sort of like the fans created their own social aid and pleasure clubs wherever they went. The connections between those people don’t necessarily end even if the band isn’t there to conduct the service. What kind of feedback have you been getting? Volker: They’re kind of in a state of shock. My idea of social networking is Terranova’s and walking on the bayou and hanging out with friends on my porch. I don’t really go online to see what people are saying. I want to get away from ambition, the way the Radiators lifestyle for me was a drivenness. I’m not going to translate that headline deadline reality to any other entity. I like playing with Jolly House, but I have no plans or ambitions except to do the occasional gig. You must be happy about what you achieved. Volker: Oh yeah, I got to live my dream. When I was a kid first starting to get turned on to music when I was 10 years old, when I first started to write songs I would design my own LP covers and write the whole back cover and list all the songs. So back when I was 10 years old, I was dreaming of having this reality and I got to do it. Scanlan: I grew up in New Orleans and I know how to participate in the jazz funeral. The sad part’s over. Now it’s time to have some fun. www.OFFBEAT.com