April 2005
Alt NO
- Passing Grades
A while ago I wrote a book about my bad experience teaching in a New Orleans public school. I taught for…
BackTalk
- Joe Krown
Raised in Westbury, Long Island, New York, keyboardist Joe Krown commenced playing piano as a child. In college at the State…
Bayou Boogie
- The Donkey Show
In classic literature, a lovesick Romeo once told his beloved Juliet “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”…
Cover Story
- Tim Laughlin: Clarinet Crusader
According to his friend and frequent collaborator, pianist Tom McDermott, “Tim’s sound makes a lot of other clarinetists sound like they’re…
Dis 'n' Dat
- You Make It Sound So Bad
“A drunk woman was giving [drummer Andy Harris] a bath when I first met him,” says Joshua Glass, guitarist and vocalist…
Features
Feed Me Something, Mister
- Crawfish Tales
Longer days, warmer nights and blossom-spiked breezes are sure signs of spring’s approach, but for me a more distinctive harbinger of…
Hidden Charms
Jazzin'
- Catching Craig Klein
“I used to go crazy at the French Quarter Festival,” exclaims Craig Klein remembering past events when he’d play six different…
Letters
- Letters April 2005
“Living in Houston, we’re halfway in between the best hotbeds for music and we will be coming in for French Quarter…
Live Wire
- Bob Schneider, Drew Landry, the Gourds, Tipitina's
- Kings of Leon, House of Blues
- Davell Crawford and the Davell Crawford Orchestra, Tipitina's
- Deck The Halls with Flogging Molly
Flogging Molly's sold-out show was one of the best live gigs I've ever been to, The seven-piece melting pot of traditional… - South By Sore Feet
- Elvis Not Ready For Old Folks' Home
Mojo Mouth
- Make It Festive
As you can see from our cover, we have officially entered festival season with our French Quarter Festival issue. What we…
St. Rock
Reviews
- The Elements, The Brightness (FireAirWaterEarth Productions)
In this day and age of global snipe hunts for weapons of mass destruction, you can never have too many soul-connecting… - Omara Portuondo, Flor de Amor (World Circuit/Nonesuch)
Cuban vocalist Omara Portuondo made her mark in the 1960s when she embraced the bossa nova music of Brazil then kept… - Carlos Del Junco, Blues Mongrel (Northern Blues)
Harmonica hellions traversing beyond traditional folk and blues realms these days are hardly earth-shattering given the growing ranks of stylists exploring… - Todd Adams, Can't Stop the Rain (Independent)
Houma native Todd Adams demonstrates his skills on piano with a five-piece band and three backing vocalists. The tracks are a… - O.V. Wright, Live In Japan (EMI Special Products)
The final recordings of one of soul music's true giants, this ten song set (the liner notes confusingly claim there are… - Yellow Jackets, Altered State (Heads Up)
With their eighteenth album, the "rhythm and jazz" outfit the Yellowjackets (Robben Ford's old band, for you blues fans and jazz… - Chris Cortez, Mum Is The Word (Blue Bamboo Music)
You might not expect someone who teaches jazz guitar studies at the University of Southern Mississippi to have crafted one of… - Imagination Movers, Stir It Up (Rec Room Records)
For any parent sick of the frumpy purple dinosaur, or those well-rounded beings with various head protrusions, the blue coverall-clad Movers… - Rory Block, From The Dust (Telarc Blues)
Block offers up a great collection of acoustically rendered original songs on her new disc. Block's voice and guitar stylings are… - Monty Alexander, Live at the Iridium (Telarc)
Here's one for the audiophiles. This Kingston-born jazz pianist has already released a half-dozen live CDs done with every permutation of… - Pott Folse, Everything's Going to Pott (Jin Records)
One of swamp pop's brightest stars in recent years isn't some conquering upstart holding the genre's precious future in his hands… - John Ellis, One Foot in the Swamp (Hyena Records)
During several extended periods John Ellis called New Orleans home. Now living in New York and increasing his reputation as a… - Dave Holland Big Band, Overtime (Dare2 Records)
From the opening notes, the brilliance of tone of the Dave Holland Big Band lifts the spirits and expectations. It is… - Tom Coerver, Waterfront View (Independent)
Surely you remember that classic hit from the Charlie Daniels Band, "Uneasy Rider"? Well, he may not be on his way… - Shad Weathersby, Light Outside That Door (Rolling Road)
Twenty years ago, Shad Weathersby gathered up an all-star lineup of some of New Orleans's finest musicians, trekked over to Bogalusa's… - Morris Ardoin with Dennis Stroghmatt, Le Tracas De Morris (Maison De Soul)
If you're confused by the seemingly countless Ardoins playing zydeco/Creole music these days, you're in good company. That's the reason Morris… - The Robotic Subwaymen, 2083 (Independent)
Remember in the '70s and '80s when prog rock and new wave bands would throw in a line or two sung… - Various Artists, Best of the Brass Bands (Sound of New Orleans)
This compilation represents brass band material originally released on the Sound of New Orleans label in the early 1990s. Since that… - Shades of Praise, God Is Still Doing Great Things (Independent)
Shades of Praise is a 70-voice interracial choir founded about five years ago by Philip Manuel and Michael Cowan and is… - Chatham County Line, Route 23 (Yep Roc Records)
Alt.country, or whatever you might like to call it, is a muddy row to hoe, with all manner of hard-to-document hybridization… - Joe Krown Organ Combo, Livin' Large (Independent)
Joe Krown, New Orleans' premier authority on the Hammond B-3 organ, has worn any number of musical hats in his career:… - The Palmetto Bug Stompers, The Palmetto Bug Stompers (Independent)
If you look at George Buck's Jazzology CD catalog, you'll find an item listed as Tony Parenti's New Orleans Shufflers, with… - The Tomatoes, The Rise and Fall of the Tomatoes (Revolution Blues)
This is the great grunge album that just never was, released a good ten years too late. But better late than… - Rock City Morgue, Dead Man's Song (Nocturnal)
Rock City Morgue introduced their new direction, driven by bassist Sean Yseult's piano skills and singer Rik Slave's haunted crooning, on… - James Evans, First Encounter (GHB)
New Orleans has served as a Mecca for European jazz musicians for close to 60 years now, just as Paris once… - Fred Dupin's New Bumpers Jazz Band, Trip to New Orleans (Jazzology)
New Orleans has served as a Mecca for European jazz musicians for close to 60 years now, just as Paris once… - Tab Benoit, Fever For the Bayou (Telarc)
- Lightnin' Hopkins, Blowin' the Fuses: The Greatest Hits 1959-65 (Empire Musicwerks)
- Irvin Mayfield with the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra and Dillard University Choir, Strange Fruit (Basin Street Records)
- Hot Club of New Orleans, More! (Independent)
So these guys, the Hot Club of New Orleans, have challenged themselves with an awesome task: take the swing era music… - Andy J. Forest Band, Live (Independent)
- The Bally Who, You Is President (Independent)
- Marcia Ball, Live! Down the Road (Alligator Records)
Artists love to cap off their recent studio successes with live albums; think of it as a public victory lap. For…
