This picture is how it all started. This is my friend Donovan Guidry. We met in an acting class at the University of New Orleans. In New Orleans after college, I fell into modeling and signed with an agent and the next thing you know they are preparing me to speak to a camera in commercials. I landed the very first job I auditioned for and made a quick few thousand dollars. This indeed got my attention, though the idea of speaking for a living with my cajun accent intimidated me. Fast forward to when I moved to New York to study at The Stella Adler Conservatory of Acting. There was a voice class and every day we laid on our backs and moved the tongue around over annunciating. My big Cajun tongue was lazy and always kicking and screaming among the British actors with their perfect diction. I hung in there enough to be pulled aside a few times by the teachers and they would tell me that I was an artist. It didn't matter how it sounded coming out of my mouth.
At the same time, Donovan was finishing his studies in New Orleans. I'd leave him song ideas on his answering machine. He was a Hip Hop head and loved beats, and didn't care about music theory or any of that. The combination of the acting teachers confidence and Donovan would be the kindling to get me going.
I convinced him to move to New York and we lived for a short time in my 200 sq. ft. apartment in the East Village. When my parents visited they laughed and said, "I can't believe my son is living like this"? It was great simplicity. No microwave, a fridge and basic stove and a futon on the 5th floor and my fire escape went right to the roof for afternoon hangs at sunset.
The picture above is at the airport. I don't know why we are both in suits but it was a big day for both of us. We didn't know we were about to make a record, just two Cajun voyagers on a quest to find their art and purpose. We dropped off his bags and went off into the Friday night sights, alive with the sounds of the city. At the time, I was listening to a lot of 50's and 60's jazz music. Artists like Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Chet Baker, and some Charles Mingus. Mingus would become my working nickname during the recording of "So Long". Quite funny, cause I was such a beginner.
There was a glow at "Jules" on this first night. A friend of mine joined us, who was from France and was a film maker. There was always a jazz trio playing live and the space was perfect French simplicity. No silly American frills, just a great space and vibe. It was a thrill to live inside this excitement for Donovan moving to the big city. I had just done it a year prior. It was a jittery feeling, but exciting. He was there to maybe pursue film making and took classes at the New School.
It is very important to note the significance of living in such tight quarters at these times. We weren't in New York to impress anyone with our living quarters, the rent was now cut in half to $400 a month. Breathing room was always so important to me. It allowed me the space and time to dream. Don quickly found interesting waiting jobs at really cool restaurants and that's how we met Mac Premo, but that is a whole other chapter and it needs to stand alone. Though it is very hard not to get into it now. Ha. I remember going to a vintage home goods store across the street on 5th avenue with Mac and discovering Serge Gainsbourg. I love these sign post in life. Large shifts can happen in a moment. Every night we'd be exhausted. We'd eat rice and beans and watch the Yankees in the World Series. We slept on a futon, with our heads on opposing sides and we brainstormed until we fell asleep. I can't express how important it was that we were forced to live this way that summer. So many ideas were pouring out, and then out of the blue we start dreaming of actually making a record.
As we made plans to move over the East River to Williamsburg, Brooklyn we found ourselves on 48th St. buying a bunch of gear to build a small home studio so we can carefully craft our music without the pressures of the studio. We despised the idea of working with the older pro's who had their tried and true ways of working. We listened to a lot of Digable Planets and A Tribe Called Quest and I had just discovered Trip Hop through the timeless classic "Dummy" by Portishead. There was a Reggae shop on 3rd avenue at the time and my new friend, Ras Kush was teaching me about Dub music and so many Jamaican singers. This was important for us too. There were tons of records on the wall, all from Jamaica and they had crafted their own sound, out of the sounds of the compressed airwaves from New Orleans. This was a huge connection for us. We would go on to weave this through the songs and the mixing style and singing styles would hugely influence "So Long".
We had braved it and found a place on the Southside of Williamsburg for $1200 a month. Before we moved we discovered Joni Mitchell's "Blue" album and we were floored by it and listened to it over and over. The longing, with a hint of sadness really spoke to us. I didn't understand the feeling at the time, but now 30 years later I see it as a tinge of sadness of letting our old selves go and braving the new.
We were reinventing. On Friday nights, I'd hit the streets and would think to myself that there were high school football games happening back home and no one seemed to care. On Saturday night, I hopped in the subway car after LSU beat the great Florida and no one seemed to care. It was like I ripped off my old suit and became anew. Shaving my head helped me in a way to become something else and let my old self go.
" The mind, once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions" - Ralf Waldo Emerson
