Preview // New Orleans Oyster Festival: 06.04.2011 – 06.05.2011
The Deepwater Horizon Offshore Drilling platform exploded and sank into the Gulf of Mexico just a month and a half before the gates opened for last year’s inaugural New Orleans Oyster Festival. Although the proceeds from the event benefited those coastal communities affected, the Oyster Festival was not, as many believe, launched in direct response [...]
Preview // 2011 Community Records Block Party
After much anticipation, the de facto centerpiece of festival season is finally upon the city of New Orleans. After a massive first act that included Foburg Fest, French Quarter Fest, and Austin’s South by Southwest Festival, the third annual Community Records Block Party is, seemingly by design, the punk rock primer for the laid back, [...]
Preview // Record Store Day 2011 in New Orleans
Record Store Day started as a humble attempt to preserve the stability of local music vendors in the face of the digital age, but it has grown exponentially in both popularity and output during its short life thus far. Conceived three years ago to celebrate the role independent record stores all over the world play [...]
Preview // 2011 French Quarter Fest: 04.07.2011 – 04.10.2011
04.09: Billy Iuso & Restless Natives – 4:35PM – House of Blues Stage
After cutting his teeth playing Grateful Dead covers as a teenager, Billy Iuso formed the critically acclaimed Brides of Jesus in 1989. The band’s unique mix of funk, jazz, soul and rock influences helped usher in the third-wave jam-band movement of the early 1990s and earned the Brides opening spots with such heavy hitters as Widespread Panic, Dave Matthew’s Band and George Clinton.
Preview // Foburg, Day 3: 03.13.2011
Toro Y Moi + Small Black + Cults + Sun Airway + Cloud Nothings – Saturn Bar
Two independent, non-Foburg-affiliated concerts featuring some of the most up-and-coming names in indie were scheduled for March 13. Everybody, including the guys at Deft Jams, said, “Why not just combine the shows.” The result is an impressive showcase that not just trumps most of the weekend’s Foburg competition but stands to be one of the best indie and/or electronica concerts [...]
Preview // Foburg, Day 2: 03.12.2011
The Hood Internet + Christoph Andersson + Big History – Maison Upstairs
The Hood Internet’s approach of simply matching a rapper with an indie song is seemingly straightforward; but the genius is found not just in Brink and Reidell’s intuitive mashups but their seemingly encyclopedic knowledge of the unabashedly hip culture of indie and electronic music, and the end result is often something surprisingly greater than the sum of its parts.
Preview // Foburg, Day 1: 03.11.2011
Debauche + The Lisps + Hurray For The Riff Raff + Luke Winslow-King – Blue Nile Upstairs
Debauche’s Yegor Romantsov spent his Friday evenings sipping homemade vodka and playing Soviet Union-era prison dirges about criminals, orphans, and other assorted ne’er-do-wells. Within months, his weekly solo gig turned into a series of increasing wild jam sessions as members of cajun-klezmer band the Zydepunks became regular guests.
