Rock and Roll Voodoo

by Mark Paul Smith

  Victory was short lived. Eleven minutes to be exact.

  As the band was bringing their extended version of “Liza Jane” to a frenzied conclusion, the lights went out like a knockout punch. The music stopped like Death itself changed the channel. A shocked silence pierced the room for a brief moment until it was replaced by a collective howl of disapproval from the disoriented crowd. Shouts of confusion from the crowd turned into screams of panic. The total lack of light disoriented those who were already hallucinating. The sudden darkness left the crowd with nowhere to turn. Desperate souls pushed and punched and shoved and clawed for whatever exit they could find. All Jesse could see in the sudden blackness was the cow skull from the bayou, flashing on and off in the darkest corner of his brain like a subconscious neon sign. He thought he heard it say something, but when he listened again, there was nothing.

  The band put down their instruments as best they could in the darkness and groped their way back to the patio garden. Butch lit his lighter. Even in his frightened state, he had to chuckle at the jack-o-lantern faces gathered around. “Looks like we really fucked up this time. Nice work, Jesse. Way to be diplomatic with the cops. Who’s ready to go to jail?”

  Jesse hung his head. “I’ll go. I’m the one who got crazy on the microphone.”

  “I say we climb the wall and get out of here,” Dale said.

  Tim sat down cautiously. “Let’s just stay back here and hope they don’t arrest us.”

  Dutch walked in, carrying a lantern that was bright enough to light up the entire patio. “Time to pack up your gear and get out of here. I can’t have horseshit like this going on in my club. I don’t know what you did to make the crowd so crazy but that thing with the police was more than wrong. I might get shut down for good. So guess what. You’re fired.”

  Dutch turned around and walked out, leaving the band in the dark. Nobody lit a lighter. Darkness was appropriate for the moment. It took a few minutes before their eyes gradually adjusted to the starlight of the patio and the lights from adjoining buildings. Fritzel’s was the only club to have its plug pulled.

  Butch fumbled for a chair and sat down. “Feels like it’s time for a band meeting, but I think I’m too high to concentrate.”

  “Let’s not do anything until the lights come back on,” Tim said. “Maybe the police won’t come looking for us.”

  The police never did enter the club to arrest anyone. They had an extremely tolerant attitude toward musicians. In three months at Fritzel’s, the band had been busted four times outside the club for smoking marijuana. Each time, the officers simply confiscated the weed and let them go. Musicians were expected to be eccentric and creative. The cops gave them room to move and license to explore. After all, it was the musicians of New Orleans who gave Jazz to the world. They called it Jazz because the girls in the brothels where the bands played wore jasmine perfume.

  Knowing the laissez-faire attitude of the police, Jesse had been emboldened on the microphone. What he hadn’t counted on was the political clout of the nearby club owners who were losing customers to the psychedelic party next door.

  When the lights came back on at Fritzel’s, about an hour later, The Divebomberz piled most of their gear into the van parked outside on the street. It took longer than usual since they were too disoriented to organize much of anything. They couldn’t get everything into the vehicle, and ended up dragging their instruments and microphone stands out to Bourbon Street like a squad of wounded soldiers after a brutal firefight.

  Dutch was nowhere to be found. The club looked like a tornado had touched down. Tables and chairs were broken and turned over, shattered glass and spilled booze covered the floor. The window over the front door was smashed. Garments had been left behind. A blond wig was pinned to the ground by a chair with only three legs. Two Mardi Gras posters had been ripped off the wall and stomped to death at the entrance.

  Dutch wasn’t about to deal with what had happened to his beloved speakeasy. He left the mess for Dolly and the backup bartender to clean.

  The Divebomberz retired to the private patio of a friend to drink the night away and lick their wounds. Nobody took any more mushrooms. By sunrise, it was beginning to dawn on Jesse that his band had lost their only source of income.

  CHAPTER THREE

  SAUCE PIQUANTE

  It was hard for Jesse to admit to himself that his showboating had caused so much trouble for the band. He tried to blame the police, the neighboring club owners and even Dutch.

  Dale finally had to sit him down for a little talk. “You have nobody to blame but yourself. You know you can be your own worst enemy. You want so much to be the center of attention that you’ll do almost anything to get there.”

  Jesse had to smile at the irony of the situation. “Odd that you, the lead singer, would be talking to me about needing to be the center of attention.”

  “I might be the lead singer but you’re the one who leads us into all kinds of illegal activity.”

  “It wasn’t me who called the cops.” Jesse tried to defend himself.

  “No, but it was you who got half of Bourbon Street tripping their brains out and then told the cops to fuck off.”

  Jesse finally had to hang his head in shame. He’d been getting into trouble to get attention since his class clown days in school. He knew Dale was right. “What do you think I should do?”

  Dale was ready for that question. “You should come with me and we’ll go apologize to Dutch.”

  Jesse looked up hopefully. “Do you think he’ll hire us back?”

  “That’s not the point,” Dale said. “The point is we owe him an apology.”

  Dutch was waiting behind the bar when Jesse and Dale walked in and took a seat on two stools. He continued washing shot glasses and glared at Jesse as if daring him to speak.

  “I’m sorry,” Jesse said.

  Dutch kept washing. “Sorry for what?”

  “Sorry for being such an idiot.”

  Dutch pressed him. “Being such an idiot about what?”

  Jesse lowered his forehead almost to the bar and then looked up. “First of all, for bringing drugs into your club. I can promise you that will never happen again.”

  “What makes you think you’ll have the chance?”

  “And second, for being disrespectful to the police.”

  “That’s it?”

  “And for disrespecting you and your club. You deserve better. You’ve always treated us right.”

  Dutch looked at Dale. “And what have you got to say for yourself?”

  Dale wasn’t about to join Jesse in the groveling. “I’d like to order two Heinekens, unless they’re still on the house.”

  Dutch turned to fill two frosty mugs and banged them down on the bar. “They’re still on the house.”

  Dale took a big swig of beer and set the mug down on the bar. “Actually, Dutch, I need to join Jesse in apologizing to you. We let things get way out of hand and we’re all sorry. We never meant to disrespect you or get you in trouble with the law. You’ve always been good to us.”

  Dutch filled up a third mug of beer for himself and drank half of it before setting it down next to Jesse and Dale’s mugs. “All I really want to know is what the Hell happened? I’ve never seen my bar so crowded and out of control.”

  Jesse decided it was time to come clean. “What happened was we got a bunch of psychedelic mushrooms and passed them out to the crowd. I was tripping my brains out when I got stupid on the microphone with the cops.”

  Dutch took another long drink of beer. “Well, that does explain it. I know drugs can turn people into wild animals. So, I tell you this. I will accept your apology if you promise nothing like this will ever happen again.”

  “Deal,” Jesse said as the three men raised their mugs to clink them together.

  The band was back onstage at Fritzel’s four days after the police pulled the plug. No city action was ever taken against Dutch or his club. He didn’t even get a noise ordinance
ticket.

  The band played on at Fritzel’s for the next four months, six nights a week. The schedule was grueling but they continued to pack the club every night. They were making good money, including tips and free drinks. Bourbon Street became a blur, but Jesse got to know the French Quarter and all its characters quite well.

  One night, he thought he saw the mystery man from the bayou in front of Fritzel’s. He went out to check, but whoever it was had left.

  Jesse searched the street for a few minutes. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. He could smell the mystery man getting out of the rain and into his car. He remembered how disoriented he felt when Gabriel disappeared from the side of the road. Jesse knew something big was about to happen.

  Back inside the club, he found Dale and Tim talking to a stocky, longhaired man with a thick, Cajun accent. The man looked Caucasian but he sounded like a Jamaican from Brooklyn.

  “I hear you’re looking for a drummer,” the man said, reaching out to Jesse for a handshake. “I’m Rene.”

  Jesse shook his hand and smiled.

  “He’s got a big P.A.,” Dale said.

  Jesse opened his arms wide. “A drummer with a sound system? Are you kidding me? You are the answer to our prayers. I’ve been looking for you for months. You’re hired. When can you start?”

  “Right now. You got any drums?”

  Dale jumped up from his chair. “We sure do. We’ve got bongos and an extra microphone. We’ll mike you up.”

  “Great,” Rene said. “I’ve been listening for a set and a half now. I love what you guys are doing. It’s like Zydeco only more rock.”

  Butch came in from the back patio to join them at the table. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing much,” Dale said. “We just hired the best drummer in the bayou. People call him Bam Bam.”

  Rene held his hands in the air, palms up. “Please, call me Rene.”

  Butch looked at Jesse and Dale in disbelief and then introduced himself to Rene. “So, you’re the best drummer in the bayou?”

  “No, I never said that. But I have been listening to you guys. You got something special going on. I’d love to be a part of it.”

  “We’re thinking of miking him up on my bongos for the next set,” Dale said.

  Butch took a long swig on his Heineken, and set it back down on the table. “Why not? Let’s give it a shot. We can’t get out of this place without a drummer. Let’s see how it feels.”

  It took only two verses and one chorus of the first song for Jesse to realize the band had found their drummer. Rene didn’t follow the beat; he pushed it. His timing was great. He wasn’t busy. He didn’t play too many notes. Even on bongos, he kept it simple and gave the band the extra drive it needed.

  By the time the first set with Rene was done, The Divebomberz had become a five-piece band.

  Jesse felt his prayers had been answered. The band needed a drummer. He knew they couldn’t progress without the rocking beat of a kick drum with a snare and a high hat and toms and cymbals.

  They needed to evolve musically. The four-man singing group was in constant danger of slipping into a barbershop quartet rut. A drummer would spread things out and give the instrumentation more room to develop. They could become more electric and less acoustic.

  A drummer brings the beat, and the beat is the heart of a lot more than rock and roll. It makes hips move and moneymakers shake and shoulders shimmy. It’s the Bristol Stomp and the Boogaloo and the Twist and the Locomotion all rolled into one.

  Rene brought the jungle beat. He could be primitive and even brutal, or he could sound distant messages from hollow logs filled with jazz and classical roots.

  Jesse knew the band needed to get out of Fritzel’s. The club was too small and they’d been there every night for way too long.

  The drunks on Bourbon Street had become more than tedious. Every night, somebody knew somebody who was going to make the band rock stars. Tales get taller with each drink. Lies get larger. People make promises they can’t keep just so they can talk to the band. The Divebomberz had gotten quite good and tight as a musical unit, playing more than six hours a night. It was one long rehearsal. The vocals got better, the starts and stops more crisp and the fiddle and guitar leads more intricately interwoven. The set list of songs got longer and more diversified.

  More importantly, they were still getting along as friends and having fun working together. They were united by their common determination to succeed in the music industry. But after nearly a year, Bourbon Street had lost its luster. The glamour was gone. The famous street began to feel like the gutter. By 3 a.m., it smelled more like the sewer. Amateur drunks piss on the sidewalk and puke a lot.

  Jesse knew he needed to get the band playing at Tipitina’s or Judah P’s or The Fais Do-Do. The larger, uptown clubs required a drummer.

  Rene came along at the perfect time.

  The band was ready to graduate from the Bourbon Street School of Entertainment and find a way to get their songs on the radio.

  Rene took the band to new heights right away.

  The first time he played a full drum kit with The Divebomberz was a party at his parents’ three-bedroom, ranch-style home in Raceland, on Bayou Lafourche.

  The large living room was packed with a Cajun crowd as the band did its first sound check on Rene’s monster P.A. He had towers of main speakers, five monitor speakers and six microphones for his drums, all running through a 16-channel Peavey board with Crown power amps.

  After a few horrifying rounds of feedback screech, the band kicked off with their standard opener, “Jambalaya.”

  The sound was so strong it nearly knocked people off the couches. Little children covered their ears. Adults spilled their drinks on the carpeted floor. Jesse signaled the band to stop.

  “Too much?” he whispered into the mike.

  “Too much,” everybody yelled back, waiving hands at the band like that would somehow turn the volume down.

  Rene spoke into his microphone. “Okay, sorry everybody. Let’s turn everything way down and only use the vocal mikes.”

  “Do you have any brushes?” Tim asked Rene.

  “Don’t get carried away. I’m not some kind of jazz drummer here.”

  The band was still loud after the major turndown on volume but they sounded powerful and complete and wonderful. Dale nodded his head to Jesse in wide-eyed approval as the band rocked on. Butch and Tim were obviously enjoying the ride as well.

  “This is the biggest thrill I’ve had with my pants on,” Butch said after the first song.

  “Sounds like we’ve been playing together for years,” Tim said.

  Jesse recalled one night of humiliation at a big club on Magazine Street. A few hecklers had booed them for not having a drummer or a big enough sound. Let them boo us now, he thought. We won’t even hear them.

  The Divebomberz played twenty songs in a row that first night with Rene. There were some rough edges but they sounded pretty darn good. By the time they finished, a crowd had gathered on the front lawn, cheering the band on and listening through the open windows.

  “Looks like we’re going to be bigger and better than ever,” Dale said as three people tried to hand him a drink after the impromptu show.

  Rene’s father was beaming with pride. “You boys are going to be huge, Look at all the people outside. You attracted quite a crowd. The house isn’t big enough to hold them all. They’re still out there, hollering for more.”

  Butch took off his guitar and settled down in a cushioned chair with a beer. “Amazing. It finally feels right.”

  Tim came over to give Butch a triumphant hug. “All we needed was an ass-kicking, Cajun drummer named Bam Bam.”

  Jesse was unstrapping his bass guitar when he thought he heard a voice. At first, he couldn’t understand it. The sound was far away, but it kept getting closer. He looked around the room to see where it might be coming from. He listened more closely. It was the deep voice of an African man, so
unding ominous. The more it resonated, the more Jesse realized the voice was coming from inside his own head.

  “Welcome to my world,” the voice said.

  “What was that?” Jesse asked out loud.

  “What was what?” Butch responded.

  Jesse sat down next to Butch so no one else could hear. “I wasn’t talking to you. It’s something I heard.”

  Butch looked at him like he was joking.

  “No, really, I just heard a voice say ‘welcome to my world.’”

  “Are you eating shrooms again?”

  Jesse shook his head “no” as he put his hands over his ears. He looked up at the ceiling and then back at Butch. “This voice came from someplace outside my head, but it’s not something I’m hearing with my ears. And I think I know who it is. Or what it is.”

  “What is it?” Butch played along.

  “It’s the Voodoo cow skull. The one you met the night the lights went out at Fritzel’s.”

  “I wouldn’t say I met anybody,” Butch said. “I saw a cow skull. A dead cow’s skull. And may I emphasize the word ‘dead’?”

  “I’m telling you it said to me quite clearly, in this deep, rumbling voice, ‘welcome to my world.’”

  “I never heard the skull talk. What makes you think it was the skull?”

  Jesse took his hands off his ears. “I get the same feeling from the voice I do from the skull.”

  Dale came over to join them. “What are you two rock stars talking about?”

  “Jesse says the cow skull is talking to him.”

  Dale clapped his hands together. “I knew it. That skull is nothing but Voodoo from the bayou. What did it say?”