Hey hey, the gangs all here...

How do you know when Carnival is really about to take off? When the group of people renting your neighbor's house for the week come in from the bars at 6:30 am, start to work on another case of beer, turn up the volume to max on some kind of hideous nu-metal band, and don't pass out by 10:30. Instead they headed out again sometime around noon, undoubtedly in search of more beer and another eight-ball of coke. I suspect we'll hear more from them over the next 5 days.

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For the first time in years I've very little to do with Carnival celebrations. We went to a couple of fancy dress parties in January, which I felt very lucky to attend, but that by itself isn't anywhere near my usual involvement. Most of all, I'm gonna hate not rolling with the Muses this evening. It would be really nice to go down and cheer the girls on.

My mom's offered to babysit, in fact would love to babysit, but ya know, I'm not ready to cross that river quite yet. I can't imagine being away from Baby Girl for 2 minutes, much less an hour or more. Actually, I'm not sure there's any real reason why we should be separated for some time to come. I'll wait for her. Still, it's too bad she isn't several months older, I'd def take her out in a pink wig and a pair of fairy wings. Next year for sure.

There are a number of common misconceptions about Mardi Gras, specifically it's history, but I'll skip over that today and address something I'm not sure everyone fully appreciates. It's that the people of New Orleans are the ones who make Mardi Gras happen year after year. It's the central social event of a very socially oriented city. Literally thousands of individuals involved in only God knows how many groups/organizations/krewes/social aid societies contribute their time, effort, and money to make it happen.

That's the lovely thing about it. The effort is very grassroots. If you want to participate in the making there's a group/a club/a krewe for everyone. If you're not happy with any of the existing groups, you're perfectly welcome to form your own. Come together with an existing krewe's parade...or have one of your own if you want. People do it all the time.

And as I hinted above, the parades aren't the whole story. There are lots of related parties/masquerade balls/dinner dances/debutant presentations, and the like throughout the season and beyond. But even that's just the tip of the iceberg. The core experience lies in all the time spent hanging out with your pals throughout the year while working to make these elaborate events, parades, and costumes all come together. It's very much a social thing.

Certainly more "social" than flying into town once a year to get blind-drunk and show your tits on Bourbon St., which is exactly how many think of Mardi Gras. Behavior of that sort only qualifies you for that most distinctive of all local souvenirs, an empty wallet. Don't worry, we'll let you keep the beads and plastic go-cups from Pat O'Brien's as well.

And that's all fine [as long as you don't stop to piss on my front stoop, in which case you're likely to get hit with a broom]. Ya see, one thing we really excel at in New Orleans is walking the line between minimal order and utter chaos. Believe me, there's a highly skewed balance to be maintained. Since we never have near enough home-grown chaos available come Mardi Gras, we are forced to import it. Fortunately, most of this imported chaos carries cash and thus offers a virtually endless supply of the aforementioned "empty wallets".

In short, individual Mardi Gras experiences may vary, but just know that the people of New Orleans would be celebrating during the pre-lenten season even if nobody else came. Carnival is of such local importance that I tend to measure my years by it much more than say, New Years Eve.

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This could well be the last Oliver Morgan 45 I'll post. I don't own the other two singles and they are very hard to find. In fact one of them is so rare that I only know one person who's ever even heard it. For my part, I've never heard either of the missing two.

This 45 is of course easier to find, but it too is getting scarce on the market as more copies have settled into collections. I was lucky in that a friend passed it on to me for a very nice price when he came up with a better copy for himself.

It's one of four records Morgan made with Eddie Bo. It was released in 1966.

Hope ya'll enjoy....

I know it was a 44....[re-post/re-up]

[As requested, by Kerry]

It seems stupid to introduce Oliver Morgan with any other single than this one, even though most folks have probably already heard it.

'La La' was Prince La La [Lawerence Nelson], a friend of Morgan's who died too young....very likely of a drug overdose.

What's fascinating about the song is that Morgan took what was really just a very sad story and elevated it to a mythic level. La La suddenly becomes a legend along the same lines as Stagger Lee. In short, Morgan hits on something very old with this song.

Now, I know several folks are listed as co-writers of the song, including Eddie Bo, but Morgan always insisted that he wrote it....and I, for one, believe him. Perhaps Bo added a little something, but as far as I recall the other two 'co-writers' were DJ's. A common enough situation in the days of payola.

Enjoy.

I've been searchin' the whole wide world...

In my opinion, one of the ten best records to ever come out of New Orleans. Oliver Morgan and Eddie Bo tear-it-up!

I'm not certain, but I think that's Deacon John Moore on guitar.

Hope ya'll enjoy...it's ripped from a very nice copy.

They all say I'm the biggest fool in town...

I'm not exactly sure how many singles Oliver Morgan cut. I can count six, but I wouldn't be surprised if there's another couple of rare ones floating around. Anyway, the number is pretty small, which is surprising given that he had one of New Orleans' hottest bands during much of the sixties.

After scoring a fair sized national hit with, Who Shot The La La, the rest of his recordings seem to have been a purely local phenomenon, as most of his output falls into the category of 'Mardi Gras song', usually by design.

A born showman, Morgan's live show was all about having a good time, invariably ending with him leading the audience in a second line parade while twirling the traditional tasseled umbrella of Baron Samedi [yep, the jazz funeral is essentially voudoun in nature].

Funny, but this is starting to sound like a memorial...and I guess that's apropos, as Morgan is missed. He died in Atlanta, where he landed after Katrina, in 2007. Most include his death in the huge statistical spike in 'natural' deaths which occurred after the storm. A spike so large that the leading health authority in New Orleans testified before Congress that as far he was concerned the number of people who died as a result of Katrina should be raised by a factor of four.

Morgan's heart truly was in the 9th Ward....bless him for that.

Normally I'd post both sides of a record like this, but not only is Part 2 very similar to Part 1, it's also true that the very cute horn part in the song will literally drive you up the wall after more than three minutes.

From 1969...