Vocalist Margie Perez radiates positive energy and danceable grooves. She’s been performing on Frenchmen Street since 2005, with material and influences ranging from Cuban rhythms to funk; pop, jazz, blues, and more. Mainly you’ll see her with her own band—catch them at 30/90 every other Monday—but her versatility has made her a popular front-woman and guest performer for all sorts of other projects as well. We hung out on her front stoop in March of 2021 and picked her brain about her favorite Frenchmen experiences over the years, plus some of the nuts and bolts of making a living as a musician in New Orleans.
A FEW QUICK QUESTIONS TO START-
You started playing on Frenchmen in 2005 – was that before or after Katrina?
MP: Before, singing with other bands at the Blue Nile and Cafe Brasil. After, under my own name. At the Apple Barrel. But for 10 years before I moved here, I was coming here for Jazz Fest, and I would go to all the night shows. So I knew what Frenchmen was like before Katrina—although that was just Frenchmen at Jazz Fest—and it was fabulous. It was the first time that I experienced walking out of a club and it was daylight. I never did that in DC. It was quite an experience.
Do you have one main band these days?
MP: Yes. My four-piece (Will Repholz, Billy Franklin, Kyle Sharamitaro and me) which has become my five-piece since we added Jake Gold (keys). …We do a regular gig every other Monday at 30/90, and we play irregularly all around.
What year do you think Frenchmen was the best?
MP: I’ve only just heard anecdotally about how Frenchmen used to be, and it’s gone through a bunch of phases. I’d guess that the ‘80s and ‘90s would probably have been the best time to be on Frenchmen, but I’ve had some magical moments in the years since 2005.
FRENCHMEN CULTURE
“Where the locals go’
MP: Frenchmen has always been known as “Where the locals go.” Cab drivers would be the first point of entry for tourists. They would always ask, “Where should we go see music?” and cab drivers would either say, “Go to Bourbon” or [whispers] “Go to Frenchmen!” It was always known as a best-kept secret that just kept getting louder and louder.
But it just changes, and like everything, we don’t accept change but we learn to live with it. And that’s kind of how Frenchmen has become. Everyone says “Frenchmen is the new Bourbon”… but every now and then there’s a show that you just gotta go down and see! I’ve learned to park so I don’t have to experience much of the Bourbonization of Frenchmen—I’ve learned to strategically park.
“Like a mini Jazz Fest”
MP: Frenchmen has made me what I am today, and I will say that proudly. It’s like a mini Jazz Fest, you know? You just walk down the street, and you’ll hear great music, and you can just go from one place to another. There are a lot of clubs, for better and for worse, that don’t charge a cover, and that gives you the luxury to weave in and out between bands. People pay a cover to get into DBA, but you’ll also see them at Cafe Negril or at the Apple Barrel when the band takes break. People walk outside and they go to the next place. I’ll do that sometimes when I take a break.
With most other venues around town, there’s only one or two bars right nearby. Like the Maple Leaf, or Tipitina’s, or the Bon Temps, so they’ve got their own feel and their own charm, but when you’re playing on Frenchmen… I think probably because there is that revolving door of people, that every gig feels different even though it’s the same.
Because it’s Frenchmen, it’s just real special. A lot of the stages are right by the window, so you can look out—like if I’m looking at my drummer, suddenly I see a face pressed up against the window that I know. Like, “Hey I haven’t seen you in forever!” People with strollers, the babies just looking up… It’s just so different.
And every club is different. Snug Harbor feels totally different from the Spotted Cat, and the Spotted Cat feels totally different from Cafe Negril. Like I said, it’s like Jazz Fest, where each stage is different. Even though you’re at the same venue, every stage is different.
There’s this variety that you can’t find anywhere else. Even on Bourbon, it’s not the same. I’m not one of those people who disparages Bourbon Street. Even though I’ve played there and…. yeah. [laughter] I am not a Bourbon Street musician, for sure. But yeah, every club you walk into on Bourbon feels the same. But on Frenchmen, it’s very different.
MEMORIES
“The first thing that came to mind was when you asked about a stand-out memory was the day Coco Robicheaux died at the Apple Barrel…”
…I was playing. Was I at 30/90 or was I at Three Muses? One of those places. We come out on our break, and we see that the ambulance there, and some people walk by and say it was Coco Robicheaux. And then word spread so quickly.
That’s how word spread among the musicians. And that was one of those moments where all the musicians that were there, we just kind of… it’s hard to describe. I can honestly say that was one of the most memorable moments, one of the saddest; a timeline moment on Frenchmen. And it just–well, in a way there was no better place for him to go than at the bar at the Apple Barrel, you know? The only better place would have been on the bench outside the Apple Barrel.
“Another hard one was Ready Teddy…”
…He was the one who would get a chair and stand on his head, and that was his schtick. And unfortunately, he got into an accident and broke his neck, and he was paralyzed for a couple years before he passed. Everybody thought that he did it in performance, but no, he was just hanging out a bar, and somebody said something and he laughed, and because he had a cold or something, he was really congested, and he started coughing and fell off the bench and hit a pillar. That’s what caused his paralysis.
That was one of those urban legends: if you ask most people who knew about Ready Teddy and ask them how he got paralyzed…”
[Int: “He was standing on his head.”]
MP: Right, nope–everybody thought he was going to go out that way.
Dave Gregg’s foot-notes
MP: We’ve lost the opportunity to talk to many people, so it’s great that you’re doing this. The other day I was thinking about, what’s his name, Dave Gregg? He played the Apple Barrel a lot, and he would play the bass with his feet. He’d play the guitar with his hands, and he’d play the bass with his feet. Ask anybody who was around in those days.
He probably was around—well, definitely longer than I was. He came down to Frenchmen a lot earlier. I don’t even know if he’s in town…I should Google him. I wonder if he’s taken his feet somewhere else.
Magical moments: Stevie Wonder
There was another moment, where I wasn’t playing, and this was in 2006. It was the first anniversary of Katrina and Stevie Wonder played a concert I think at the Super Dome, or the Arena
And then he came down to Frenchmen. This was 2006, everybody had flip-phones. I was hanging out at Cafe Negril, and it was a Wednesday night. Walter Wolfman was playing every Wednesday at DBA, and I would make my rounds. I was hanging out outside—and it looked like the zombie apocalypse: everybody was sloooowly heading down the street. And then somebody said, “Stevie Wonder’s at DBA.”
I went in. There wasn’t a cover at the time, and there was barely anybody on the street because it was a Wednesday. Well, everybody was in DBA, and that’s when they had the seats on the side, so he was sitting… I would say “watching,” but you know…he was absorbing it all, and like I said, everybody who was on Frenchmen Street—I think every musician that was playing in every other club—stopped what they were doing and went to DBA.
And then Walter invited him to play. He sang, because they didn’t have a piano, and every single flip phone was up in the air taking pictures, and my phone died! It wouldn’t have taken a good picture anyways.
All my friends were like, “You should have texted me!” and I was like, “My phone died! And besides by the time you got down here… he only sang a couple songs.” He sang for a lot of songs actually!
I remember Kevin O’Day was playing drums for Walter, and a few days later I went to a gig he was playing and I said, “Sooooo, what was it like to back up Stevie Wonder?”
And he was like, “Oh-my-God-I-can’t-believe…. I just jumped up and down on the bed, told my wife, ‘Oh my God I played with Stevie Wonder…”
It was the anniversary of Katrina. They had this commemorative concert, so he came down. It was really slow. Late August. But what a memorable moment that was.
Magical moments: Allen Toussaint
One time Allen Toussaint walked in when I was playing at Cafe Negril. I was singing with Smokey Greenwell. A friend of mine was good friends with Allen Toussaint, she came to town and said “I’m gonna bring him to your gig.”
And he just walks in… I didn’t tell anyone else in the band because he might not have come and I didn’t want to get everybody’s hopes up. So that was cool! When he walked in, everybody who knew who he was…. It’s a tiny place, you know? When somebody walks in, you know that they’re walking in. Did they have seating back then? I think so, because there’s no way he would have hung out that long standing up.
Magical moments: Warren Haynes
Another time playing with Smokey, he invited Warren Haynes to play. It was a special thing–Cafe Negril wasn’t open on Mondays at the time, but they opened it for him. Smokey is friends with Warren Haynes, so he said, “If we opened the club, you wanna play?”
And that was really early on, before mass texting, but people knew. I mean, that place was packed. So that was neat. I didn’t get to perform with him at the same time; I was in the band, but my songs were later and he’d left by then, so I was kind of bummed that I didn’t get to share a stage with him. But I did meet him. I was like, “I’m the girl in the band!”
You know, little magical moments like that. Times that I get to sit in with bands. And other times when the band invites somebody cool to sit in.
Magical moments: Coco Robicheaux
There was a time when Coco Robicheaux sat in with us at the Apple Barrel and he did the Beatles “Tomorrow Never Knows,” which is a trippy song anyways, so imagine it being even trippier with Coco.
And it just–it went on forever, and I was just absorbing and loving every minute of it. When the song was over, he hands me back the microphone, and I was like “You wanna do another song?”
And he’s like [rasps], “It’s your show, baby.”
It was awesome. I didn’t get to know him as well as other people knew him, but he was a really special guy.
[Int: Speaking of urban legends and how they get passed, I heard two different versions about the day he died… In one, he walked into the Apple Barrel and ordered a shot of tequila, and then the bartender put it on the bar and he died before he could take it. In the other, he did the shot.]
MP: I think he did the shot.
[Int: Good.]
MP: Even if he didn’t…. he had to have gone out drinking that shot.
Magical places: The Vacant Lot
…The fire-dancers, and Conan would always have his art out there. You know, it was grungy people that just had a little charm to them.
MUSICIANS AT WORK
Honing skills & gaining exposure
MP: You can really hone your talent on Frenchmen. People who know me from DC before I moved here and people who knew of me when I first came here, they see a difference in my performance style, and–just everything. I’m more comfortable on stage, and it’s because I’ve been able to play more. Working those muscles, you see some definition.
It’s great for networking and meeting people from all over the world. People from all over the world love New Orleans. Like, I was able to hook up with the Threadheads. They’re from all over, and they just love music, and they love New Orleans musicians. So that was a really good, good thing that I’ve gotten support them. I have an audience as far as Australia.
People… go on to play at bigger venues because they get seen [at places like the Apple Barrel]. I’ve gotten gigs—wedding gigs and corporate gigs and stuff—from people who’ve seen me at these little clubs.
There’s this guy who comes to Jazz Fest every year. He lives in New York. One year, he came down for Jazz Fest with some friends of his who’d just started dating, and they came to the Apple Barrel, and that was the night that they solidified things. He flew us up to New York to play at their wedding reception.
He saw us at the Apple Barrel! And eventually, three years later, we were his wedding present to them.
So it’s been really great for me, and I’ve seen a lot of musicians grow and blossom because they’ve been able to play on Frenchmen Street so much. …[My keyboard player, Jake Gold] is a good example of someone who is one of the busiest players on the street. He told me once that because we were playing so much, musicians would see him play and want to hire him. Now he’s the main keyboard player in the house band in the Super Jam.
So, good things come from Frenchmen. It’s like Facebook: it may be awful, but a lot of beautiful things have come from Facebook.
Gigs & Money
For a while there, 100% of my gigs were on Frenchmen. Like around 2010. ‘Cause that’s when I kinda started to become–more people knew my name, because I was playing all the time. I can probably say that I’ve performed at every club on Frenchmen that exists now and even some that are no longer there. I’ve played all of them, in some way shape or form, in some band or combination.
I think the most that I ever walked away with was about $250 in one night. [Per man for a four-piece, for about five hours of playing.] And oddly enough, that was at the Apple Barrel. It was during Jazz Fest, and it was a Sunday; for a few years there, I was playing last Sunday. And even though you can’t fit many people in there, the tip jar was just going around non-stop, and there were people outside, and each bandmember would take a turn [with the tip jar], even our drummer.
And we played for a long time. And it might have been one of those nights when we walked out and it was daylight. We really worked it. We started at 11.
With the Apple Barrel, they only paid $100 [per band] guarantee at the time; I don’t know what they pay now. …But, they gave me my fist gig! I’ve always had that “better or worse” kind of feeling.
[Hannah points out that if the guarantee works out to $25 a man, than making $250 total means that 90% of the take-home pay was from tips. Obviously that was a good night, so the percentage would be smaller on other nights.]
MP: The worst gig was a gig that wound up not happening… We were supposed to play on Lundi Gras, and we were playing every Monday, and the owner decided that he was gonna book another band because it was Lundi Gras? And he neglected to tell me. And so I show up there, and this other band is setting up… So that was the worst gig.
[Int: What’s, you know, like a normal or decent night of pay? Nothing too remarkable but worth putting on pants for?]
MP: Usually like $100.
[Int: Is that true across venues?]
MP: Yeah. But my 30/90 gigs, I play the early slot. 5:30 to 8:30 on Monday. That’s a good night to play because it’s before the Super Jam.
Passing the tip jar
Tipping is a “for better or worse” kind of thing. We can’t survive without tips on Frenchmen. But at the same time, I hate it. I hate it. Because I have this weird social anxiety thing anyway, where I can sing with no problem but talking like between songs and that kind of banter, I just—ugh. It feels like I have to have a different skin on. I’m just not comfortable. So passing a tip jar is something that I know I have to do, but I just hate doing it.
Other people look at it in a different way. Like, “Well, you get to socialize with your audience!” And it’s true. Gene Harding is really good at this. He brings his horn around—he plays drums usually, but he has this French horn that he calls Daisy. He brings Daisy around with the tip jar, and he’s got the best tip jar, because it’s one of those big water cooler jugs and it’s got this basketball hoop on it. So people can just throw money. That tip jar gets tips.
Luckily, he would leave it at 30/90, so I get to use it on my Mondays. People have so much fun with it, they’d roll it up and they’d throw it in. So that eases the anxiety. But he’ll say things like, “Where are you from?” and I’m just like, [squeaks] “Excuse me!” I’m just so uncomfortable with it!
[Get Gene’s take on tipping and hosting the 30/90 Super Jam here.]
But at the end of the night, counting up those tips is just like, okay, it’s worth it. Sometimes you get more tips than you get from the bar.
[Int: Sometimes you get 90%…]
MP: Yes! And sometimes you get other things. I keep a little collection of things that I would get, Like, change: quarters and that kind of stuff. I would always keep that aside and say, “That’s laundry money.” But also, the occasional joint, the occasional business card, which is great because sometimes you get gigs out of that. Other times it’s foreign money. I’ve had euros, and money that I couldn’t identify—had to google it. And it’s like, from some Pacific Island nation somewhere where it converts to like three cents.
And occasionally you’ll find a hundred dollar bill in there.
New Orleans’ tip-based economy: complications in an imperfect system
MP: I have this memory: I’m watching Little Freddie King, and it was late in the night. He announced [rasps] “This is our last song.”
The tip jar is sitting in front of the band, so I walked around with it. Because over at the bar side, you know, people are there and they’re hearing it, but they’re usually on that side because they don’t want to be in the crowd. But, you can see, you know that the band is there, and sometimes you want to tip them! And people were tipping.
[Then one of the employees] says, “You know, people pay a cover to get in here. You shouldn’t be walking around with a tip jar.” He made me feel so bad! I went up to the manager and said, “Is this something that I’m doing wrong?”
He said, “Don’t worry about it,” and I think he had a word with the employee, but I’ve run across some people that have expressed the same thing, where it’s like, “I already paid a cover to get in here!” But sometimes when it’s late, the club will just let somebody in without paying a cover.
[Laura asks about where the cover charge goes]
MP: It depends. There’s sometimes where if the club has a guarantee, if you don’t meet the guarantee, the bar keeps whatever and the band gets the guarantee. Sometimes it’s a percentage.
[Hannah explains: “Sometimes it’s like, for example, the first $250 off the cover goes to pay the sound guy… there are variations.”]
MP: Each band has an arrangement.
[For more on the complications of tipping in New Orleans, read Hannah’s Antigravity article here.]
A community of working musicians
MP: All of my players, I met on Frenchmen. I was introducing myself to everybody, saying “Hey, if you’re doing a project and need a singer, let me know.” I can honestly say most of the musicians I’ve met, I met them on Frenchmen.
There’s never really been competition between musicians. We all kind of know what Frenchmen is. It’s like, “You’re not gonna get rich on Frenchmen, but it’s the best place to play.”
And you see the best local music. I always have a good time there whether I’m playing or not.
Margie must have been at Three Muses the night Coco died. 30/90 was not open yet.
Really enjoying reading through some of these!