Herlin Riley

[Bob]

This cat is from New Orleans and has such a unique style I couldn't find a category in the Listening Post to put him in.  Maybe we make a New Orleans category?  I am going to go deep on Herlin.

 

[David]

3 hours ago, Bob said:

This cat is from New Orleans and has such a unique style I couldn't find a category in the Listening Post to put him in.  Maybe we make a New Orleans category?  I am going to go deep on Herlin.

 

Yep, Stephen has a section under world drumming called New Orleans drumming I think, this is great to see 🙂

[Stephen]

Where y'at?!?!

You all are speakin' my LANGUAGE now!!!

The drummers from there have that lagniappe...a little something extra.

Herlin is an incredible player...he sounds FANTASTIC on Harry Connick Jr's second christmas album. I believe most of that is Herlin. A more sophisticated New Orleans sound to my ear.

Here are some of the drummers from that area that you need to know:

Shannon Powell - He taught me how to set up a big band with his simplistic and powerful style on Harry Connick Jrs first Christmas album
James Black - A jazz cat that became popular in the R&B/funk scene that was coming around in NOLA about the same time as Motown. I believe he played on a bunch of Fats tracks as well as one of my favorites, Hook & Sling by Eddie Bo. Man...forget about it...that song is so funky.
Johnny Vidakovich - You will hear cats like Brain Blade talking about Johnny. He is ALL vibe. Just incredible feel. And he's a character to boot
Raymond Weber - Currently playing with Dumpstaphunk. Some great funk drumming on She and Star Turtle by Connick. I crashed a band in front of him when I was 19...still trying to recover my dignity lol
Russell Batiste - Same vein as Raymond...incredible feel.
Stanton Moore - Probably the one that is holding the torch around the world for NOLA drumming. Galactic is his group
Brain Blade - Nuff said
Zigaboo - Long time drummer for The Meters and a legend worldwide

Brass bands are also important to listen to for their drumming. My favorite recently is The Hot 8 Brass Band...younger vibe and more aggressive sound. More traditional sound would be Olympia Brass Band and Treme Brass Band. A bridge between those two would be the dirty dozen brass band or Rebirth (I believe Russell Batiste was with them for a while...may be wrong there)

Ok...I'm gonna stop now lol. But seriously, there's some CATS down south that NOBODY really knows about. Geoff Clapp, a recent guest artist we had, was a heavy cat in the NOLA area for a long time.

If you're ever in the area, The Maple Leaf is a killer local venue and the Snug Harbor area will be where you go to hear jazz and big band on a nightly basis.

Laissez les bon temps rouler!!!