Voodoo Fest in New Orleans! Day One!
All Photography courtesy of the amazingly talented Rory O’Neill.
Day one of the 2008 Voodoo Music Experience, in New Orleans, Louisiana started out with my friend and photographer, Rory O’Neill, myself and Papa O’Neill, Rory’s Dad, chowing down eggs and biscuits at Slim Goodie’s Diner on Magazine Street. Once we were fueled with enough butter to give a child a coronary, Rory and I headed out to City Park to start our day.
After driving in circles trying to find the press parking lot, we checked in and hurried off to meet up with my new favorite person in music, Grace Potter, and her rad tour assistant, Nicole. Grace Potter has a band called The Nocturnals; three deliciously crunchy dudes, jaunty in their dress, who play their instruments as though life may possibly depend on it. Over the last while, she’s toured with Gov’t Mule, The Black Crowes, Dave Matthews Band, to name a few. If anyone is curious as to hear the 21st century version of a young Bonnie Raitt, it’s Grace.
After an unsuccessful attempt to conduct an interview on her bus (which is sponsored by Cabot; Vermont’s finest cheese…..clearly, a girl after my own heart!) we found the next best thing; the back of a vintage black pick-up truck. (We later discovered the owner of the truck is none other than Frenchy; well-respected local artist. When Frenchy came to the truck to retrieve something from the passenger side, we quickly apologized for trespassing in the back of his vehicle. His response? “Keep creating, keep creating.” God I love this town.) Grace and I spilled into the back of the truck to chat, and I found that she is a Jane Austen nerd who loves cheese and sleeping naked. I know that tantalized you all, but a full interview will follow a bit later!
VoodooFest tends to fall on Halloween weekend, which gives festival-goers an excuse to dress up. Actually, some New Orleanians dress up on a weekly basis. Sadly, this time it’s a bit early for the droves of Halloween costumes Rory was hoping to photograph…..but these guys were ready:
Local Flavor
Miller is a sponsor of VoodooFest, and set up their yearly cushy area with plenty of complimentary Miller Lite, Miller High Life and jambalaya for friends and family of the Miller company, of which we are. And couches. And a treehouse. And a hot-tub? For a second, I thought I was going to see Bret Michaels stroll in with a gaggle of big-haired bikini-clad skanks, but it just sat idle. Sad.
Local R&B singer Marva Wright played at the Preservation Hall Stage. She was sure to let everyone knew that she is not Etta James, nor is she Irma Thomas. She is “a brown-skinned woman from New Orleans, Louisiana.” And boy can she sing. And with a sparkly hat and outfit to boot, matching the power in her pipes. No wonder Grace Potter sites her as an influence.
Joss Stone was next at the Playstation/Billboard.com stage. The only recognizable qualities of the performance I could decipher from the first time I’d seen her perform, at a small club in New York in 2004, was her hippie-flower-love-child dress and bare feet. Then, she was akin to a skittish colt who couldn’t figure out how to speak to an audience, how to move her body and how to gallop around a stage. Now, goodbye colt, hello sexual little filly! This girl was winking a la Sarah Palin at the male photographers flanking both sides of me in the photo pit. She was interpreting emotion with her hands. She was moving around the stage with the confidence of a seasoned professional. What a difference four years makes.
Joss Stone likes to sing. She likes to SING.
Find Of The Day: The Fuse TV Tent!
Way to go, Fuse! We stumbled into the Fuse tent, who are a sponsor of the festival, for a little shade. Instead, I made a music video for M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes.” I picked my backdrop, lip-synched into a microphone, and had a blast.
There were computer stations lining the tent for the kids to check their treasured Myspace and Facebook accounts. Good times. In the center of the tent, opportunity for ridiculous competition, with a gong for good measure. Clearly, I’m in. And I drag Rory to join me as my partner. We completed a round of music trivia against another twosome, hosted by a cute Fuse VJ from Brooklyn. And WON! Who, seriously, doesn’t love winning something? We won t-shirts, and put ourselves in a “winner’s raffle” for an iPod. Woot. (Fast forward to later on today after dinner at Camellia Grill when Rory receives a text message from Fuse saying that we have WON the iPod. Best day ever? Possibly….)
After more gratis Miller beer, we head to the backstage area at the WWOZ/Southern Comfort stage for Grace Potter and the Nocturnals’ set. Grace rolls up in fierce fringed pseudo-Pocahontas boots. Dammit, I love her. High-fived Grace Potter. Rory found a spot onstage for some killer photography. I chillaxed.
The show starts, and a few songs in I smell smoke and, oddly enough, it’s not marijuana or cigarette. Song ends, and Grace announces that her organ has caught fire. She’s such a little organ-playing bad-ass, that it catches fire. Somehow, makes sense. She plugs in her guitar and the amp is also not working. What do you do when you are a multi-instrumentalist and you can’t play any of your instruments because of crazy outside elements? You sing. You, your band, a mic, and a Nina Simone cover.
She could have said screw it, and recited bad poetry or Prague’s phone book; the audience would have totally been down. But instead, she sang. And we were thrilled. In introducing her spiritual, “Nothing But The Water (1)” she acknowledged Hurricane Katrina. In acknowledging what happened, like each of the other artists we saw today, it gave power to the words that would not necessarily be felt otherwise. The song brought chills to my arms and tears to my eyes.
Tomorrow is going to be a long day, so we retired early.
Continue on for Noel and Rory’s reports from Day 2 and Day 3 of Voodoo Fest!
