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Katrina is the ultimate matriarch.
Ceaselessly, to the point of cliché, the phoenix-like births from the hurricane’s destruction along the Gulf Coast are recited. Pairing the hurricane with excellence has become narrative du jour, especially with the New Orleans art scene. As tired – and insulting to those who felt Katrina’s wrath – as it may be, there’s undoubtedly truth in many instances.
The Honey Island Swamp Band’s formation is one. Four New Orleans evacuees took to San Francisco. It was there where Aaron Wilkinson and Chris Mule’ met with Sam Price and Garland Paul. All components of the pre-Katrina music scene in New Orleans, they were familiar with one another, and with NOLA’s future uncertain, they banded together and landed a weekly barroom set.
They developed a following and were sought out to record an album. Honey Island Swamp Band acquiesced, and released a seven-track, eponymously titled record in 2006. Satisfied by the album and propelled by success abroad, Honey Island stayed together upon its return to New Orleans one year later.
Accolades have followed, including the band’s honoring as 2011’s Best Roots Rock Artist at the Big Easy Awards.
Trevor Brooks joined the band three years ago, adding an organ to the stable and further diversifying Wilkinson (acoustic guitar and mandolin), Mule (electric guitar) Price (bass) and Paul (drums). Four of the five are outfitted with microphones, allowing the band to distinguish its vocal sound and permitting a range in their harmonies.
Shifting from slide-laden, southern blues rock to country, reggae and brass- and key-blasting funk, Honey Island aims to infuse the sounds of Louisiana and Mississippi, adhering to their namesake swamp on the states’ border. The band gives more than cursory attention to each genre, and it often incorporates its range into single songs, making the music “so familiar yet so unique at the same time,” according to its biography.
This array is evident in “Cane Sugar,” the band’s fourth album, produced by Grammy winner John Porter and released in July. The 12-track recording is Honey Island’s first to be distributed nationally.
In contrast to tightly crafted album tracks, Honey Island possess enough confidence in their music to stretch tunes during live performances, allowing fans to join them on a ride through sound. The Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia is a claimed influence, after all, and similarities with renowned southern-rock jammers Widespread Panic are frequently apparent.
Honey Island, the penultimate set at Best of the Bayou’s Gulf Groove stage, come to Houma amid a tour taking them to North Carolina, Virginia, New York, Florida and Sao Paulo, Brazil.
