Night Tripping in Broad Daylight

Like any good New Orleans cook will tell you, to start a meal you need to prepare a good roux. The 2009 Stockholm Jazz Festival prepared their staring roux to perfection.

Mac" Rebennack, Jr., Dr. John, started this year's event by walking slowly to his piano and proceeded to lead the audience through a lesson in down home New Orleans soul cooking.

Dressed in a grey suit with black pin striping, snakeskin loafers and a fedora trimmed in a blue scarf, Dr. John was back home on the bayou. To see the Night Tripper in broad daylight sans any back up was disconcerting but apropos to be playing on a stage by the river side. As a solo is probably the best way to experience the man.

In this manufactured Idol star machine of today's music, one can only wonder if there are any artists willing to put in the long hours in cat houses, bars and gambling joints where Max learned his chops. Tipping his musical hat to people like James Booker and Allen Toussaint (who would be following Dr. John), Max grew stronger as the performance went on. Completely turning around his signature "Wrong Place" as well as the classic "Walk On Gilded Splinters," Dr. John gave us all a lesson in what it means to be from New Orleans. Rather than giving us fans the expected gloss of the Night Tripper, Dr. John delivered the gospel of the gris-gris man.

Max told the crowd that his last record was a pissed off record, because of the travesty of the treatment of his city, New Orleans. "What my friends need is a second line," referring to the city's celebration of life during funeral processions. Finishing his musical sermon with "Merci boucous, and all of that shit", Dr John left the stage like he entered, with minimum fuss.

No, Dr John, thank you for laying the message down.