There are three festivals on Saturday, but only one is free. Guess where TVD will be? Also, two big shows tonight—one featuring some beloved veterans of the scene and another featuring a band from Brooklyn that knows how to publicize a show.
The good folks at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation spend part of the profits from the annual shindig to bring you four neighborhood festivals each year. Saturday and Sunday is the fifth Congo Square New World Rhythms Festival and I am super excited for one reason and one reason only. DIBLO DIBALA is returning to New Orleans!
For those readers unfamiliar with this name, make sure you are downtown in Armstrong Park at 6 PM. Dibala is a legendary soukous guitarist from the Republic of Congo, formerly known as Zaire. He was a regular visitor to the Crescent City in the 1990s during what I call in my new book (shameless plug), “the heyday of African and Caribbean music in New Orleans.”
His style is highly danceable, guitar-driven African pop. Soukous was so popular at one time that it spawned a dance style as well as a unique fashion sense that was embodied in the flâneur—a well-dressed young man that loitered around the urban centers of Paris waiting for the band to start. You don’t have to dress for the show, but you had better dance. Check the video for how it’s done.
Also on the bill is a killer dance band from Cuba called Interactivo. They hit at 4 PM and it’s the first time in the U.S. for this 12-piece all star ensemble led by the pianist Roberto Carcassés. Click the link above for the full lineup.
Tonight, two of my favorite guitarists who also happened to be brothers debut their new band at Tipitina’s. The Malone Brothers feature Dave, formerly of the Radiators and Tommy, formerly of the subdudes. Actually the subdudes are on indefinite hiatus, which sounds like a break up, but then again, they broke up before.
I have a copy of a show the two played in New York a couple of months back and can say that they have a good thing going on. The between song banter, basically brothers ribbing each other, is priceless. Susan Cowsill opens.
I had never heard of the Shondes until their drummer, Temim Fruchter, started sending me e-mails. He was so nice and so persistent that I finally listened to the band. They are good! But decide for yourself by heading out to the AllWays Lounge tonight and checking out the show. See you out there!
