This Week in the Shack

It's carnival time, and that means that the Shotgun Shack moves back to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. So dip yourself a nice big bowl of red beans & rice, mix up that hurricane, and kick back for three and a half hours of those unmistakeable NOLA sounds. Whether it's that line of piano professors from Jelly Roll to Fess to James Booker to Dr. John; the percussion-heavy chants of the Mardi Gras Indian tribes; that sweet Crescent City R&B of the fifties; or hot horn playing from Pops to Kermit Ruffins and Trombone Shorty, there's no city that has consistently produced finer music and finer musicians consistently over the last hundred years.

This set will stay up through Fat Tuesday. In the meantime, I'll decide if I'm going to do a gospel set for the beginning of Lent or go back to the blues.

Lastly, this set is dedicated to Dan Baum, whose Nine Lives: Death and Life in New Orleans was one of the two or three best books I read last year, and gave me a so much greater appreciation and understanding of New Orleans culture.


1. The Golden Eagles - Two-Way-Pak-E-Way (5:40)
2. Kermit Ruffins/ReBirth Brass Band - Mardi Gras Day (4:45)
3. Dr. John - My Indian Red (4:47)
4. Kid Ory - Do What Ory Say (4:27)
5. Clarence "Frogman" Henry - Ain't Got No Home (2:21)
6. Paul Sanchez - Foot Of Canal Street (3:48)
7. Olu Dara; The Dirty Dozen Brass Band - Junko Partner (3:52)
8. Allen Toussaint - St. James Infirmary (3:51)
9. Wynton Marsalis - New Orleans Bump (4:32)
10. Sidney Bechet - Shake It and Break It (2:55)
11. Lil' Queenie & The Percolators - My Darlin' New Orleans (4:01)
12. Marcia Ball - That's Enough of That Stuff (6:29)
13. Jon Cleary - Fool's Game (4:42)
14. The Meters - Look-Ka Py Py (3:19)
15. Galactic - Hamp's Hump (3:47)
16. ReBirth Brass Band - We Come to Party (7:53)
17. The Neville Brothers - Hey Pocky Way (4:13)
18. Anders Osborne With Monk Boudreaux - Meet The Boyz On The Battlefront (4:36)
19. Bo Dollis & The Wild Magnolias - Iko, Iko (3:40)
20. Buckwheat Zydeco - Hard to Stop (4:43)
21. Zachary Richard - Who Stole My Monkey? (3:38)
22. Preservation Hall Jazz Band - Eh, La Bas (3:52)
23. Professor Longhair - Tipitina [*] (2:24)
24. James Booker - Lawdy Miss Clawdy (3:31)
25. Chris Kenner - I Like It Like That, Pt. 1 (1:57)
26. Eddie Bo - Now Let's Popeye (2:39)
27. Shirley & Lee - Let the Good Times Roll (2:23)
28. Fats Domino - Ain't That A Shame (2:30)
29. Dr. John - Milneburg Joys (2:39)
30. Huey 'Piano' Smith - Rockin' Pneumonia And The Boogie Woogie Flu (2:18)
31. Professor Longhair - Mardi Gras in New Orleans (2:53)
32. Preservation Hall Jazz Band - Little Liza Jane (5:55)
33. Coolbone - Phat City (3:33)
34. Jon Cleary - More Hipper (5:27)
35. The Neville Brothers - Yellow Moon (4:04)
36. Dr. John - John Gris (5:20)
37. Bo Dollis & The Wild Magnolias - Golden Crown (3:53)
38. Professor Longhair - Bald Head (3:01)
39. Tab Benoit - Hustlin' Down In New Orleans (5:27)
40. Zachary Richard - Bon Temps Rouler (4:01)
41. Irma Thomas - Back Water Blues (3:31)
42. Ellis Marsalis - The Mooche (5:19)
43. Jelly Roll Morton & His New Orleans Jazzmen - I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say (3:13)
44. Louis Armstrong - Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans? (3:03)
45. Kermit Ruffins - What Is New Orleans? (8:26)
46. Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews/The New Orleans Social Club - Hey Troy, Your Mama's Calling You (3:57)
47. Jon Cleary - When U Get Back (Live) (7:32)
48. Allen Toussaint - Yes We Can Can (4:15)
49. Lee Dorsey - Working in the Coal Mine (2:51)
50. Harry Connick, Jr. - Do Dat Thing (5:32)

(NOLA 4)