Jazzfest

New Orleans

After an epic drive across Texas, with a stop in Austin to take a quick nap at Jess’ house, we pulled into NOLA in the wee hours, early Sat. morning. D and L-dog were still out on the town but we were pretty done from the long drive so we crashed out ‘early.’ Durl had managed to secure a massive 2 bed 2 bath suite with a full kitchen and living room at the Residence Inn, a block from the Howlin Wolf. Spent the first two nights there before we got our own place on Sunday night. Saturday night we caught Eric Krasno, Russell Batiste, and Joe Krown at a little bar down the street from the hotel. Ivan Neville even stopped by to sit in. Sunday night was the first of our 2 shows at the ‘Wolf. Like last year the lineup was pretty stellar. PBS opened followed by the ‘Fest Allstars’ which included George Porter, Russell, Ivan and Ian Neville, Kraz and Skerik. Then late night was the Duo with Skerik and Kraz. Guests included the drummer from Sly and the Family Stone. We had our own place from Suday through Wednesday night and managed to avoid most of the insanity that has characterized Jazzfests of yore. While I had plenty of ‘work’ to do, setting up gear, coordinating w/musicians etc. it was a much mellower Jazzfest overall. Also, since this was my third ‘fest I felt much less pressure to be everywhere and see everything. Our next show was Thursday. That lineup included some DJ sets from Logic, then Russ’ band with a whole slew of guests. At one point I counted 17 musicians on stage. Sit ins included Bernie Worrell, Page n Mike from Phish, Kraz (again), Oteil (yep Vida Blue reunion), and many others. Then came Global Noize, a project featuring Jason Miles (Miles Davis), DJ Logic, Bernie, Oteil, Karl D, Billy Martin and others. Pretty sweet night overall. Thursday also, marked the arrival of Brad, Beth and Ben. We moved into a hotel with them for the rest of the weekend. Friday we hit up the fairgrounds for some food, music, shopping and daylight. Stevie Wonder was the headliner that evening but we found ourselves pretty much crowded out from the stage he was playing. After only a couple songs we gave up and went over to watch Franti and Spearhead instead. Other shows we hit up second weekend included New Mastersounds (sounds like greyboy without karl D) at House of Blues Parish and Greyboy (w/Karl D) and Dumpstaphunk at Tip’s. Kelly pretty much fell in love with NOLA and would definitely move there if she wasn’t certain she’d gain 50 pounds.

Comments