First, let me share this Soul Shower music blog I found that is highlighting New Orleans music. Right now the host has some great Barons, Huey Piano Smith and George Porter up. I got to see George Porter twice in Louisiana over Christmas. The better show was with Vidacovich right after the Peach Bowl - those guys can really get a crowd dancing.

New Year's Eve, Anna, Kyle and Jenny formed a band in 3 days and played in K&J's 9th ward residence/ art studio.
They were great, switching instruments throughout the songs. Their candlelight party featured fireworks, bike punks, bands, dance music, and MRE's at midnight. The neighborhood felt pretty calm, with no street lights, they're of the few home owner/residents in the area, so fireworks were the only noises. FEMA seemed more on the ball reimbursing homeowners for generators and tool expenditures, and paying contractors a motivating amount to put blue tarps on roofs. The Red Cross drives around all day in a hot dog truck and there are neigborhood volunteer centers giving out supplies.

The aspect of the destruction that's hard to convey is the scale. This is a ten thousandth of the damage east of Bucktown:



Tree upon house after tree upon house with ten foot water lines for miles and miles and miles. It seemed that the majority of the homeowners were residents. I was about to take a photo of a car in a tree, when I saw a sign asking that I didn't.

In New York on Sunday at the Knitting Factory there's a 30 band benefit show . It looks like the money goes to the Southern Arts Federation.