Jan V. Ramsey
Follow Your NOLA,
New Orleans Visitors Targeted
The New Orleans Tourism Marketing Corporation (NOTMC) presented the plan for its annual campaign yesterday to members of the hospitality industry. Its theme is “Follow Your NOLA” and it targets the “experiential discoverers,” which according to NOTMC’s agency, Dentsu America, is a demographic that’s not so much dependent on age, but on its curiosity about [...]
Read moreJazz Fest Is Over? Jimmy’s Keeps Trying.
Had a glorious second weekend at Jazz Fest—if you count Friday and Saturday. Thursday was too rainy and Friday too cold for my tastes, but I did go on Friday for a couple of hours, until I literally started shivering and had to leave. First Jazz Fest I can remember when it was just too [...]
Read moreJazz Fest For The Gimped and Otherwise Infirm
I am handicapped, and I have limited use of my legs due to an automobile accident some 30 years ago. The older I get, the worse the pain. About 16 years ago, I started walking with a cane because of the injuries, and about 14 years ago, after trying to enjoy Jazz Fest in the [...]
Read moreTreme Blog
Treme Episode 9: Musicians Seal the Deals
Most of the musicians on Treme play themselves. Others are given small acting roles, and a very few are actually both musicians and actors playing out storylines that overlap with real history. We saw how slippery that ground can be right at the beginning of Season 3 when Glen David Andrews reenacted his arrest for [...]
Read moreTreme Recap: Get No Kick Out Of That Modern Jazz
Treme does such a wonderful job representing New Orleans music I find it odd when the music story line hits a clam, but there were bum notes all through last night’s episode (titled “Don’t Leave Me Here”). Going back to season one, I thought the storyline pitting New Orleans jazz against New York jazz was [...]
Read moreVoodoo and Treme: We Do What We Need To
Black night is falling. The stars are incredibly close. Jack White is mining the past to an adoring crowd in City Park. The Saints are being crushed in Denver. I’m heading to Buffa’s to watch Treme. I’m really torn by what I witnessed at the Voodoo Experience. I want to thank Neil Young and Crazy [...]
Read moreElsa Hahne
The Gravy: In the Kitchen with Dr. John
“We [musicians] all kind of got stuck in this thing, in cooking, because we like certain things. I used to sit on the back of the band bus and we’d be talking about how we liked this and that cooked this and that way. We used to sit on the back of the bus and [...]
Read moreThe Gravy: In the Kitchen with Drummer and Green Goddess Chef Paul Artigues
“I grew up in New Orleans. In school, I was always playing, and when I got home from school; music was always something I wanted to do. With cooking, I sort of cook all the time, I play music all the time; it’s a passion. It’s my whole life. I play drums with Die Rotzz, [...]
Read moreFest Feast: French Quarter Fest 2013 Food Guide
Every French Quarter Fest I walk around the Square in front of St. Louis Cathedral, sun-dazed and confused about what to eat, and somehow locate Vaucresson’s stand. Arms automatically go out, sleepwalker style, and that first bite into Creole hot sausage is enough of a jolt to wake me up to realize that it’s French [...]
Read moreJohn Swenson
Revivalists Score at SxSW
The Revivalists played one of the shows of this young band’s life Friday night at SXSW. The crowd at the Holy Mountain backyard was packed with hardcore fans but also a large media contingent and talent scouts checking for the next big thing. The showcase nature of the gig forced the band into a tighter [...]
Read moreLIVE FROM SXSW 2013: Hurray for the Riff Raff Plays Startling Song
Tell me what a man with a rifle in his hand is gonna do for his daughter when it’s her turn to go… —Alynda Lee Segarra Hurray for the Riff Raff is making a big splash this week at SXSW. Alynda Lee Segarra seems to be gaining confidence every time she plays and shows an [...]
Read moreHi Ho Lounge Sold to Maison Owners
The Hi Ho Lounge, one of the anchor clubs of the St. Claude entertainment district, has been sold to the owners of the Frenchmen Street restaurant Maison. Brian Greiner and Jeff Bromberger’s partnership officially took over the operation of the Hi Ho in early February from John Hartsock and his wife Lori Bernard, who still [...]
Read moreAlex Rawls
Times-Picayune Plans to Cut Staff and Publication Days
I had thoughts on the twilight of American Idol based on Ann Powers’ excellent analysis, but the news about changes at The Times-Picayune jumps in front. According to Gambit, The New York Times broke the story that the T-P is going to shift its thrust to Nola.com, cut the print edition to three days a [...]
Read moreGathering of the Tribe
Jan Ramsey kicked a hornets’ nest when she raised the issue of accessibility at Jazz Fest for those with disabilities. The conversation that followed in the comments on her post is lengthy, rambling and contentious, but there’s a near-universal sense that the festival ought to do better by festgoers who need help getting around. They’re [...]
Read moreHow Disneylanding Happens
Today’s Times-Picayune has a story by Jaquetta White on the revisions for the planned downtown taxing zone—an area from the river to Claiborne Avenue, and from the Pontchartrain Expressway to Elysian Fields. White writes: As is, the proposal, written and supported by Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s administration and local tourism leaders and sponsored by state Sen. [...]
Read moreBen Berman
Happy Thanksgiving: A Big Freedia Animated GIF
Nothing says Thanksgiving like an animated GIF of Big Freedia and her dancers poppin in downtown New Orleans, taken from Freedia’s “Y’all Get Back Now” music video. Source: eatcasey.tumblr.com.
Read moreExperience the Voodoo Experience on Spotify
Listen to our “Experience the Voodoo Experience” playlist on Spotify Even if you’re living under a rock, you know the Voodoo Experience takes place this weekend in City Park. But even the most tuned-in of your friends are unlikely to know all of the artists performing at Voodoo. To make it easy to figure out [...]
Read moreWhy Does Sly Stone’s Appreciation End In 1973?
Sylvester Stewart, leader of seminal funk band Sly & the Family Stone, is one of the least well understood of a cluster of funk artists who produced memorable hits in the late 1960s through early 1980s. Sly Stone vanished in the ’80s, making brief appearances in public when Sly & the Family Stone were inducted [...]
Read moreBrett Milano
BLUES FOUNDATION SALUTES
BENOIT AND THOMAS
You don’t need to tell anyone in New Orleans that Irma Thomas and Tab Benoit are two of the best, but that’s been officially confirmed by the Blues Foundation this week. Both were among the winners in the Blues Music Award ceremony, which happened Thursday night at the Cook Convention Center in Memphis. Guitar-slinger Benoit [...]
Read moreJAZZ FEST DRAWS OVER 425,000
The Jazz & Heritage Foundation has confirmed that more than 425,000 people attended the 44th annual Jazz & Heritage Festival this year, over seven days at the Fair Grounds Race Course on April 26-28 and May 2-5. This is an impressive total by any standard, despite the rains and mud that reduced the turnout on [...]
Read moreFirst Listen: Kelcy Mae, “Oh How the Whiskey”
It’s our pleasure this week to give you the first listen to “Oh How the Whiskey,” a standout track from the new five-song EP, The Fire by local singer/songwriter Kelcy Mae. Informed by folk, country and bluegrass, the Shreveport-born singer made some waves with her 2011 album Pennies in Hand, which OffBeat singled out for the [...]
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