Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Sazerwrap Part 2: The Music

The Sazerwrap has been the @RockBodyElec way of rounding up all the amazing things that happen down at our annual trip to Jazzfest in New Orleans.  We will breaking the review up into two parts, Food and Music, today is the Music.  Only 11 Months until next years festival!
While the food rightfully deserves its own post, the music is the real star at the end of April/beginning of May in the Crescent City. We will look into some of the real highlights so click that read more and join us for a recap...
Starting off we have stated before but by picking the second weekend, because we always do, originally looked like a mistake, but in retrospect is always the right move. One of the reasons is simply the extra day that you are afford for music in town. We get started for the last few years at the Louisiana Music Factory which moved this year to a pretty pimp location on Decatur and Frenchman.
This year we caught Kermit Ruffins set and a few songs off of Rebirth Brass Bands newest release as the band seemed in fine form. We can't wait to grab that disk and review it. Here is some of Kermit's set from last year (we were there for that too)

This lack of video from the set brings up an issue for us and one we basically solved this trip; shows/sets/songs are so good we want to record everything, but by doing that we would miss out on the moment. We decided this trip that we wouldn't video anything, but it makes these reviews a bit tougher...either way, you want to see Kermit play The Music Factory? Come on down next year...

Back to the good stuff Thursday Night was highlighted by the amazing Trombone Shorty Fest which is not only a great cause, but a killer night of tunes. A more thorough review of this one is coming on the site (very soon) so stay tuned. For now peep some of this:

Friday night had the get down vibes of the 8th Annual James Brown tribute at Maple Leaf which was funkier then all hell, led by Tony Hall the band played hits and deep cuts with passion and pride.
The real surprise came late night with a stumble into One Eyed Jacks only to find an amazing ensemble called Wild Fiya getting down. Heroes from our youth Bernie Worrell, Norwood Fisher and Steven Perkins were some how playing keys bass and drums respectively on the same stage. It was really late, with very few people in attendance at that point (even front-man Corey Glover had left apparently) and all the songs we saw were instrumental jams but god damn that was a pleasant surprise, only at 5 in the AM in NOLA!!! Here is some video of the band from earlier in the night:

Saturday saw us hit the festival, and it was a doozy. We started off with some hip-hop on the Congo Stage, that was highlighted by T-Ray The Violinist. Yup, a hip-hop violin player.  Pretty cool here is his cover of Kendrick Lamar:

After that interesting experiment we went old school to catch a bit of Allen Toussaint who had new school Big Sam out with him on trombone when we cruised by. Here's a vid clip of earlier in the set:

While the sun shone down hot and the crowds filled in we took a break in the gospel tent and were simply blown away by Jonte Landrum Thomas. She absolutely dominated the stage and an act like this makes Jazzfest such a special experience:


Alexis & The Samurai were a cool folk rock breather before heading to the Young Tuxedo Brass Band who were joined by the Lady Jetsetters Marching Club, like the gospel tent only here could you find history dating back 60+ years and mixing it with the theme from Ghostbusters in 2nd Line Style. What a treat.  
https://www.flickr.com/photos/derek_b
Bruce Springsteen then dominated the rest of the afternoon.

Mixing in hits, new tunes and tracks from The Seeger Sessions (which ring especially powerfully at Jazzfest) Bruce and company put on a hell of a show for the MASSES of people there to see him.
Actual picture of Springsteen crowd, only about 10,000 behind us too...
We have been attending JF for years now and never are the crowds bigger then the two times we caught Springsteen. So big in fact I doubt there will not be a third time we are there when he plays...just overwhelming and we would choose to go another day. That aside his set was great and in retrospect I wish we stuck around until the end when John Fogerty came out...

oh well we caught easily our musical highlight after our day after the fest is done...but you have hopefully already read the full review of the Rough Seven show. Well add this, I think we have our pick for best live show of the year pretty much locked up.

Until next year...Jazzfest, we love you.    

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