{"id":3085,"date":"2022-07-04T15:33:17","date_gmt":"2022-07-04T15:33:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/?p=3085"},"modified":"2022-07-06T03:54:41","modified_gmt":"2022-07-06T03:54:41","slug":"jonathan-jamison-on-bourbon-scents-brass-bands-and-the-great-new-orleans-fire-of-1788","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/?p=3085","title":{"rendered":"Jonathan Jamison on Bourbon scents, brass bands, and the Great New Orleans Fire of 1788"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

June 2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

JJ: <\/strong>My love of Frenchmen is really the evolution of New Orleans as a whole. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So what I mean is: They just did the construction on Bourbon Street, right? Bourbon Street used to stink. You\u2019d walk down Bourbon Street and smell that stench. But it doesn\u2019t stink anymore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LJD:<\/strong> It doesn\u2019t?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

JJ:<\/strong> It doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LJD:<\/strong> Okay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

JJ:<\/strong> Now though, you\u2019ve actually got Frenchmen, and it<\/em> stinks. And that\u2019s partially based on the fact that they fixed the stench on Bourbon Street. It used temper you for Frenchmen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LJD: <\/strong>Huh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

JJ: <\/strong>My first memories of Frenchmen Street, in 2004, when I was first here, are the vacant lot where Dat Dog used to be and Mardi Gras Day and the fire-spinners. It was a place where\u2014as a waiter\u2014I sent tourists to increase my tip percentage. Now the tourists and the cover bands have gone to Frenchmen and the jazz has moved back to Bourbon. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The vacant lot. Photo by K. Hanrahan<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

But Frenchmen has that magic of breaking the stubbornness of New Orleans. Like, \u201cWe\u2019re going to change, you fuckers, and it\u2019ll live through it. We\u2019ll be here for Mardi Gras Day, we\u2019ll be here for New Year\u2019s Eve, we\u2019ll be here for Halloween.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yeah, there are daiquiris and chicken tenders on Frenchmen Street now, but on the other hand, if it\u2019s 3 o\u2019clock in the morning and I\u2019m stumbling out of a great music show and I\u2019m really drunk and I need a chicken tender\u2026 And there\u2019s an art market that wasn\u2019t there back in 2004.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s still my favorite place to dance to a brass band. Right there on the corner of Frenchmen and Chartres. The Young Bloods usually is the brass band that plays there, and now that Caf\u00e9 Brasil has reopened\u2014I mean, where Caf\u00e9 Brasil used to be, whatever they\u2019re calling it now\u2014they\u2019re playing across the street there by the bookstore. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The bookstore\u2019s just reopened too. We haven\u2019t lost the bookstore. The books are important. He closes at 11 and lets the brass band play there. And yes, you do have Willie\u2019s Chicken Shack right there, but that corner of Frenchmen and Chartres, we evolved that one. It\u2019s a place where bands can come and play, where a guy can walk by with a cooler of beer; it\u2019s a celebration. We\u2019ll always hoist, hoist, hoist this part of humanity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a celebration and, hopefully, the bands keep playing at Frenchmen and corner of Chartres.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, that\u2019s the same corner where Coco Robicheaux <\/strong>lived and set that apartment on fire. That was across the street, above Cafe Brasil, and it started because he had candles lit<\/a>, prayer candles, just like the first fire of New Orleans in 1788. That was also started by prayer candles, a dude praying at his altar on Good Friday. He had some candles lit, and he walked out to go to the bathroom or something, and the candles caught the drapery on fire. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He ran out to the church, to the people in the church, and said to the priest, \u201cRing the bell! My house is on fire! Let everyone know to put out this fire!\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The priest was like, \u201cDude, it\u2019s Good Friday. We don\u2019t ring bells on Good Friday. Sorry, I can\u2019t help you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LJD:<\/strong> Is that a thing?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

JJ:<\/strong> You\u2019re not allowed to ring Angelus Bell, the largest bell of the church,  on Good Friday. And that\u2019s why New Orleans burned down in 1788 \u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But anyways, that\u2019s my story of Frenchmen Street. It\u2019s the evolution of New Orleans. It\u2019s going to keep changing and shifting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

June 2019 JJ: My love of Frenchmen is really the evolution of New Orleans as a whole.  So what I mean is: They just did the construction on Bourbon Street, right? Bourbon Street used to stink. You\u2019d walk down Bourbon Street and smell that stench. But it doesn\u2019t stink anymore. LJD: It doesn\u2019t? JJ: It doesn\u2019t. LJD: Okay. JJ: Now […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interviews","category-quick-reads"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3085"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3087,"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3085\/revisions\/3087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/frenchmennotes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}