[The Valparaiso Men’s Chorus at Chaz Fest, photo by Adam McCullough]
AM on Café Brasil and John Boutté:
I played on Wednesday nights with Ben Hunter at Café Brasil. We were doing reggae, and it was my first steady gig there. That was in the ‘90s. The band never got started until after 11, and the whole New Orleans Rasta scene would set up shop outside—incense salesman, food vendors, everything.
Before that, in ‘89, was the first time I ever played there. I was still in college at Tulane playing with my college band, the Vince Behrman Trio. There’s no evidence of that band anywhere. It’s great. Nothing online, no music, nothing incriminating.
A friend who was acting as our manager had told us, “There’s this place downtown called Café Brasil, and they just got their liquor license.” We hadn’t wanted to play there at first because we thought it’d be no fun to play for people drinking tea. It really was a cafe. But Adé got the license, so we booked a gig.
It was almost empty that night, of course, but there was this one little guy wearing white hanging around the back listening. After the show, this guy comes up to me, and he says, “Say man, I really like the way you sang that. I think you’re a real good singer.” Nobody had ever complimented me on my singing before. I had just started singing, really. I was just like, “Wow, thanks.”
Anyways, I found out, years later, that he was John Boutté. That’s how it goes around here. He was just this guy that used to hang around Café Brasil.
On sitting in at Checkpoint’s:
On those Wednesday nights, I used to get done around two in the morning, and I had a Marshall amplifier that I would pick up and carry down to Checkpoint Charlie’s to play with Irene and the Mikes. I would sit in with them on their third set until the sun was high in the sky. High in the sky. There was nothing to get home for, you know? And the crazy shit that we used to do.
The real hang was down there. Checkpoint’s and the Dragon’s Den. In the ‘90s, the mid-90s. Over this way [Frenchmen closer to Royal Street] was kind of sleepy.
On the Frenchmen Latin scene:
When I first started coming down this way, they used to have Latin bands. Pedro Cruz would play at what was called the Istanbul; now it’s Blue Nile. It was totally different then. The stage was against the wall that faces Checkpoint’s. It was a big-ass room, bigger than it is now, and it would be all Latinos dancing. Serious Latin dancing. Like, you could go in there and hang out, but don’t try to fuckin’ dance.
I was there like, ”Oh man, this is so awesome, but they don’t have a guitar.” I met one of the horn players, and he tells me, “Ain’t no guitar player in this band. There’s no way. Forget about it.”
Later there was the white boy Latin scene that happened too.
It was crazy down here on Frenchmen back then, but a different kind of crazy than it is now. Obviously. There was no money back then, but you didn’t need any. Our rent was $150 a month.
