Jazzfest: In The Dark of Night

Words By: Scott T

 

The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival celebrated its 45th year in 2014. While the food and sonics of the fairgrounds are unparalleled, some argue that the truest light of JazzFest shines in the darkness of night. The following is a personal musical highlight reel of one man’s late night adventures over the course of 11 nights of JazzFest. 

The first Thursday, before the festival even began, played host to Stanton Moore Trio at The Blue Nile. Drummer Stanton Moore, flanked by Robert Walter and Will Bernard, thanked the crowd for finally making this annual jazzfest gig a soldout event. After DJ Kevvy Kev spun a perfect selection of tracks during setbreak, The trio reemerged and were joined for a few songs by Nigel Hall and Eric Krasno.

 

After opening day at the fairgrounds, Preservation Hall Jazz Band also held its first of seven ‘Midnight Preserves’ concerts, which raise money for The Preservation Hall Foundation. Not much has changed in the historic room that is Preservation Hall, the aesthetic combined with music in the midnight hour is a recipe for timelessness. The band performed songs from their recent release “That’s It!” as well as standards like “Go To The Mardi Gras” – even infusing it with call and response “We’re gonna jump / And shout / We’re gonna tear this mother out!”

 

Before taking a setbreak, the Infamous Stringdusters were announced as the evening’s special guests and would perform a few songs by themselves, including “Sitting on Top of The World” – Hearing only stringed instruments and harmonies, un-amplified, inside the hall, was an acoustic treat. The two bands later performed together; the small room of about 100 people all hollered when Jeremy Garret’s fiddle went toe-to-toe squeal-for-squeal with 81 year old Charlie Gabriel’s clarinet. Afterward, the bands marched into the courtyard behind the hall and played for the moon and stars.

 

Later, uptown, Galactic was just getting started at Tipitina’s, where they would play until sunrise. Check out this video of the band playing “Black Dog” at 2 AM, with guest vocalist Maggie Koerner. 

 

 

After a big day at the fairgrounds, complete with Phish’s first JazzFest appearance in nearly 20 years, Saturday night saw new New Orleans resident, Eric Benny Bloom, along with Wil Blades, Adam Deitch, and Eric Krasno throw down an impressive set of Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder tunes. A swinging “Way You Make Me Feel” and a hard hitting “Billie Jean” were the highlights. Enough can’t be said for Eric Benny Bloom’s ability to front most of the vocal melodies  through his trumpet making the room pop with the peaks of his solos.  

The high water mark of the first weekend took place at the Joy Theater, a great room for live music with a general admission floor and a seated balcony. The Word performed a two-set scorcher. The first set contained only instrumentals, including a great outing of “Ride Me High” by JJ Cale. Luther Dickinson would grab the room by the balls with a guitar solo before letting go and letting the room be washed away into the bliss of John Medeski’s organ or Robert Randolph’s pedal steel. Randolph pulled out all of his tricks, playing with the entire pedal steel rig resting behind his neck. The second set featured possibly the greatest washboard solo of all time from Cody Dickinson. It started with him sending the washboard through some cool effects before the star studded sit-in affair began. Randolph moved to the drums, Eric Krasno walked on stage guitar in hand, Luther Dickinson moved to the bass, Roosevelt Collier sat down at the pedal steel, and Nikki Glaspie sat down on keys next to Medeski. Eventually, Robert Randolph picked up a slide guitar behind Roosevelt and Cody moved back to the drums. On the final note of this super super jam, Cody Dickinson’s cymbal went flying off of his stand. 

 

 

The days between Jazzfest weekends are also known as the “Daze Between” and rightfully so. A weekend at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival can take a lot out of you, so a breather between weekends is welcome, but that doesn’t mean the great music stops! Monday Night saw the Blue Nile host its annual Frequinox gig. The crowd of mostly locals and those in it for the ‘long haul’ made for a fun environment; the room really began to boil during “Express Yourself” as dancing and smiles spread throughout the Blue Nile like wildfire.

 

A few doors down at The Maison, DarkWave was performing. A sinister trio consisting of Skerik, John Medeski, and Adam Deitch, DarkWave was quite possibly the prize of the Daze-Between. Roosevelt Collier made an appearance on stage and around time for a typical setbreak, the band showed no signs of slowing down. Medeski faced some adversity in his organ’s sound completely failing at times, at its worst it prompted a great Skerik & Adam Deitch duel before Medeski’s organ came back online and skerik blew down the melody to “Acknowledgement” from John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme”. Some people in attendance were visibly moved and disturbed by the wild and psychotic grooves and melodies DarkWave emitted; overhearing people headed for the door, eyes wide, declaring “this is too fucking weird,” for this writer, is the ultimate sign that one is in the right place. It felt as though they would play all night but the show eventually had to end so Medeski could make a 4:30am flight. But not before Skerik gave all the props in the world to Medeski for persevering through playing a wounded organ and letting everyone know “There is no melodica in the darkness.” 

The Little Gem Saloon played host to The Fantastic Four featuring Eric Krasno, Adam Deitch, Robert Walter & The Shady Horns. After opening with Funk Inc’s “Kool Is Back” the band tore through rare grooves and dance numbers backed by the genius of Adam Deitch’s drumming, which fueled every project he played with all week to new heights.

 

Later, at dba, Roosevelt Collier held court for an all-night Jimi Hendrix tribute while The Whip cracked backbones at Blue Nile. At around 6am on the Blue Nile Stage, the band left and DJ Kevvy Kev started spinning while Adam Deitch hopped on Stanton Moore’s drum set and, like a junkie for the groove, put an extra punch in every track Kevvy kev put through the speakers. 

Uptown Wednesday night at Tipitina’s, Brownout paid tribute to Black Sabbath. Lead singer Alex Marrero channeled his inner Ozzy and Ronnie James Dio throughout the set. After a few songs he would change his guayabera shirts and pants color schemes before culminating with a jacket that had tassles hanging down from both arms.

 

The Bear Creek All-Stars late night show at One Eyed Jacks on Wednesday night has become a can’t miss annual event. The lineup was bigger and better than ever this year, featuring Cyril Neville, Karl Denson, Ivan Neville, Eric Krasno, Adam Deitch, Nick Daniels, Ian Neville, Nigel Hall, Alecia Chakour & The Shady Horns. Though the lineup was epic, the sonic soundscape was a bit too muddy when backing guest vocalists, but the groove was never lost; so goes the territory of superjams. Ivan Neville and Cyril Neville trading vocal duties was a lot of fun. 

 

Thursday Night at the Maple Leaf was the trio of Johnny Vidacovich, Marco Benevento, and George Porter Jr. The three are all fully capable of backing up and taking the lead and the way they passed the spotlight around was a musical treat. They stormed through instrumental versions of sngs like “Heard it Through the Grapevine” and “Fever”.

 

Meanwhile, at the Royal Family Ball, Soulive played a set with Maceo Parker before new age funk stalwarts, Lettuce, took the stage dressed like they were auditioning for Sun Ra’s Arkestra. Though the crowd was too big for most clubs in New Orleans, it wasn’t quite big enough to fill up Mardi Gras World, so the sonics suffered a bit, but a crowd wanting to dance doesn’t have their good time dampened by things that are out of their control. The set swelled into an amazing hyper active “Chocolate City” which segued into “Busting Loose”, which Lettuce crushes. 

 

Fiyafest happens on the 2nd Friday of JazzFest and raises funds for The Roots of Music and this year featured two stages and a special indoor VIP stage. After Fiyafest most attendees boarded the Creole Riverqueen for a thrilling sonic excursion down the MIssissippi River. 

Later, at the Publiq House, Robert Walter’s 20th Congress performed with Carly Myers and Karl Denson. Meanwhile, at Cafe Istanbul, Rising Appalachia performed an unannounced 2nd set due to the energy the crowd brought to the room. These enchantresses sing from  the heart and can handle stringed instruments with finesse and grace. It’s always nice to hear a banjo if you can during JazzFest. Taking the stage at just before 4am was The Nth Power at The Maple Leaf. Playing until the venue made them stop, this is probably the newest and freshest band on the block; emitting songs that are expressions of who they are as people – it is a breath of fresh air from the bands that aim for a particular sound and don’t use the music as a vehicle for expression. 

“The Musical Mojo of Dr. John: A Celebration of Mac and His Music” at the Saenger Theatre was a star studded affair. The room has a ceiling that imitates the night sky, and the soldout crowd underneath it was filled with locals and cagey jazzfest veterans. It was a textbook PARTY throughout the entire event. The show began with NBC’s Brian Williams introducing announced special guest Bruce Springsteen who traded verses with Dr John during opener “Right Place, Wrong Time”. From there, Dr John left the stage and it was revolving door of guests paying tribute. Nearly every performance invoked full body goosebumps including Cyril Neville’s spirit stirring rendition of “Indian Red”, Allen Toussaint on “Life”, and John Fogerty pulling out the Gary U.S. Bonds song “New Orleans.”. Widespread Panic busted out of of Dr John’s funkiest songs, “Familiar Reality”, off of his album ‘Sun, Moon, & Herbs’ (an album that features Eric Clapton on slide guitar and Mick Jagger as a backup vocalist). The show closed with a special-guest packed rendition of the classic “Iko Iko,” popularized by Dr. John himself. Check it out:

 

 

From raucous rockers to soft heartfelt displays of emotion (see: Aaron Neville singing “Please Send Me Someone To Love”) this is one of the greatest concerts this writer has ever attended. When the DVD of this show comes out, buy it.

 

As the show ended, Karl Denson’s Tiny Universe stormed the stage at Tipitina’s where an all night dance affair transpired; culminating with a beautifully nasty tribute to the music of Rick James. A funky send-off to a great 11 days of New Orleans music.