It is a beautiful day in J. Monque’D's neighborhood.

You can't quite see the Mississippi River from the door of his rented shotgun apartment, but you can feel the cool breeze that hurdles the levee and washes over Tchoupitoulas Street.

Neither J. Monque'D nor his interviewer bothered to shave today. Wearing bright orange shorts and a "black Bart" T-Shirt, the bluesman settles into the passenger seat with a bottle of Heineken.

Like the French Quarter buggy driver he once was, Monque'D...