Dr. Klaw – New Orleans Jazz Fest Late Night at One Eyed Jacks

IS IT JAZZ FEST YET?

Before I hit the road to New Orleans again for Jazz Fest (and hopefully bring back lots of videos), I have to post my most vivid memory from last year at Jazz Fest.

Dr. Klaw is another super group, but one that actually works. One half is Adam Deitch (Lettuce, Break Science) on drums & Eric Krasno (Soulive, Lettuce, Chapter 2) on guitar. The other half is Nick Daniels III (Dumpstaphunk, Hoodoo Allstars) on bass & vocals and Ian Neville (Dumpstaphunk, Funky Meters) on guitar. The glue in the middle is Nigel Hall (Lettuce, Chapter 2) on keys and vocals. They only play one or two shows each year, and usually only in New Orleans during Jazz Fest time. (FYI, this Friday I’ll be catching them play on the Creole Queen Riverboat, out on the Mississippi River…)

This particular show started around 2am, so Red Bull was essential. Luckily I had borrowed a set of mics and a recorder from a friend because there were no other tapers there to capture this for posterity. Or so I thought. It turns out that Nicholas Burlison got a SBD patch that night, so I had two sources to use to make a SBD matrix mix. This video was shot by mrtour1981, who graciously allowed me to drop my audio on top of his video and reshare it. You can listen to the full show here: http://www.archive.org/details/INevilleDumpstaphunk2010-05-01.drklaw-matrix.

Why is this my most vivid memory from last year’s trip? Because, during this night-ending encore of a beloved Meters tune, I ran up front, put my hands around her hips, and just kissed my baby.

The Lee Boys & Oteil Burbridge @ Wanee Festival 2011

The Lee Boys & Oteil Burbridge – Going To Glory 4/15/11 Wanee Festival

I told you I was going to hip you to some funky music you wouldn’t otherwise run into! It’s Easter Sunday, so give this gospel music a chance. The Lee Boys are a Sacred Steel group in the style of Robert Randolph & The Family Band. Their chief asset is their pedal steel player, Roosevelt Collier. Just press play and enjoy, keeping in mind that the real heat begins around 7 minutes when Oteil brings a jaw-dropping scat bass solo.

And if you want to go deeper, follow this link to listen to Roosevelt sit in with Dumpstaphunk at Tipitina’s on a version of The Rolling Stones’ Sympathy For The Devil: http://www.archive.org/details/Dumpstaphunk2009-05-03_742.
The Lee Boys have many great live recordings on the Live Music Archive: http://www.archive.org/details/TheLeeBoys.

George Porter Jr’s 63rd Birthday Bash (VIDEO)

I had the pleasure of spending last Christmas in New Orleans. I was also fortunate enough to catch George Porter Jr‘s annual Birthday Bash at the Howlin’ Wolf on the last night of my stay (before driving 12 hours back to Kentucky the next morning).

With George’s permission, I mounted my new HD video camera to the side of Nick Burlison’s audio recording rig, and when the crowd poured out onto the chilly St. Peters Street at 3:15am I had nearly 4 hours of footage! I even shot a few songs from the front row with my iPhone4, which allowed me to make a 2-cam mix for several tunes. The audio on this one is simply top notch. It’s a matrix mix of Louie Liokis’ on-stage schoeps mics and a soundboard patch.

The entire performance, a 4 DVD set, is available to download here: http://www.thetradersden.org/forums/showthread.php?t=89960

The night began with a 90 minute set from George Porter’s Runnin’ Pardner‘s band. This set featured several classic Meters tunes like Borro, What’Cha Say, & The Dragon, as well as a reworking of Curtis Mayfield‘s “Check Out Your Mind” which exemplifies the way George holds down the groove. George’s wife brought out a cake and his granddaughter came out and sang a diva-like rendition of Happy Birthday. The set ended with a solo performance of a song from George’s new EP of Christmas songs, “Christmas In New Orleans.”

The second set was a free for all of guest players: Stanton Moore, Anders Osborne, Kirk Joseph, Brian Stoltz, June Yamagishi, Tony Hall, Russell Batiste, Eric Bolivar, Terence Higgins, etc. Seven different drummers and five different guitarists! At one point, you had a triple guitar threat of Tony Hall, June Yamagishi, & Brint Anderson ripping through Them Changes & Third Stone From The Sun.

To close out the night, George brought out Billy Iuso & CR Gruver for some Grateful Dead tunes, topping it off with a cover of Sugaree, a song that George has really made his own while touring with Bill Kreutzmann & Papa Mali in their new band, 7 Walkers.

UPDATE with 2 new videos added on 12/27/13:

Christmas In New Orleans:

Is Pray > Dance To The Music > I Want To Take You Higher > Them Changes (w/ Third Stone From The Sun tease):

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