The Meters are often credited with helping to originate funk music, while remaining intimately tied to the Mardi Gras sounds of their native New Orleans. Though the group’s classic lineup parted ways in the late ‘70s, band co-founders Art Neville and George Porter Jr. have toured since the late ‘80s at the funky Meters —first with original Meters guitarist Leo Nocentelli and drummer Russell Batiste, Jr and later with Batiste and guitarist Brian Stoltz. Then in March 2007, around the time the original Meters members reunited for a series of festival and club gigs, Stoltz left the funky Meters and was replaced by Art Neville’s son Ian. This past January, Stoltz reunited with the funky Meters for a show at New Orleans’ Tipitina’s and quickly rejoined the group as a permanent member. Oddly enough, around the same time Bonnaroo’s promoters reunited the Original Meters for an appearance at Bonnaroo, opening the door two distinctly different bands tied to the same legacy. Porter and Stoltz explain all this and more to Jambands.com as they prepare for a very busy 2011.
PART I: GEORGE PORTER JR.
You recently released a Christmas EP for your mother. What inspired you to record a set of holiday music at this point in your career?
The idea kind of came about when I was on tour with 7 Walkers last year, and my mom got sick again. It kind of shook my earth—it triggered the thought that this could easily be the last year that I have with my mom. And she had been asking me for years to make a Christmas record but never directly. She would say, “Everybody else is recording Christmas records why don’t you do one?” So I just thought that was something I needed to get done. I came home from tour December 5th and I woke up on the morning of the 6th and started recording. On the 15th—before I went out to do the tour with 7 Walkers—I recorded my final vocal tracks. All week between the day I started recording and that morning I had a really bad voice and couldn’t sing. I woke up that morning and it was a magical thing. It just happened.
It’s the power of modern technology, you can record an album in 10 days and get up on the Internet and out to the people before the holidays.
It was. I had other people working in the camp that were very instrumental in doing the artwork and mastering. And my daughter, she was very instrumental in making sure everything looked the way she perceived the Porter clan would like it.
You spent a good portion of 2010 touring with 7 Walkers. Do you remember the first time you met Bill Kreutzmann?
I met Bill one time a long, long, long time ago. He came in and sat in on a John Mooney gig, which none of us remember much. That was my first experience with Bill and it was very short. One song and he was gone.
But then Malcolm, or Papa Mali as most people know him, was doing a Mardi Gras gig in New Orleans last year and doing a guitar tuning or something like that. He looked at me real kind of strange so I just kind of eased over to see what was going on and when I eased over he asked me, “Are you available to play some gigs in June?” I think it was five shows or something on the West Coast. I said, “Ask me tomorrow when I’m in front of my calendar.” So the next day he called me and I was in front of the calendar and the dates were available and I said, “I’ll make the dates.” I wasn’t quite sure what exactly was going to be expected of me, but I knew who Bill was.
How familiar were you with the Grateful Dead’s music at that point in your career? Obviously the Meters and the Dead crossed paths but they also seemed to exist in parallel worlds.
I don’t have a very large history of Grateful Dead music in my repertoire. Russell Batiste played a few songs. But for the most part, if you’re listening and I have a great set of ears, so there’s not too much that gets played that gets passed me. We had sound check rehearsals at the five gigs and at the end of the first night Bill told Malcolm, “Man, I want this guy in the band.”
They wanted me to become a partner in the band but at this point in time I’m not able to take on any partners because of an ongoing lawsuit that I’m involved with. So I couldn’t become partners with the band so I’m an employee of the band at this point. But I’ve been very active as you know, in performing, as well as singing. I’ve taken on two songs that I really like, “Sugaree” and “Eyes of the World.” I really like those two songs, so I’ve been doing those.
Was it challenging tackling such a vast catalogue of music?
I didn’t find it challenging at all because I am a drummer. I’m not Zigaboo or Bill, but I can play. So I know what they’re doing and when they’re doing it. There’s things that drummers do—statements—that allow you to know what’s coming next. So I can read the signs because I play the kit. I’m very able to adjust. The thing that I do more than anything—outside of learning the songs and learning the changes—is I play with the drummer. I become a unit with the drummer. I think that’s what my job is. My job is to become part of the drums and make that whole—make the drums and bass become a single unit where everyone else on stage has somewhere to go and somewhere to come back to. I always say the drummer’s the guardian of the groove, and I’m the glue that hold all that together.
Photo by Vernon Webb
The funky Meters asked Brian Stoltz to rejoin for Tipitina’s 33rd birthday party in January. What led to the decision to bring him back into the band?
Ian Neville has some conflicts with his dates, and I told management that they had to settle whatever led Brian to leave in the first place. I wanted to keep the band intact as a Louisiana, New Orleans-based band with all members being from Louisiana or New Orleans. So I told them, “You have to make this happen.”
The Meters pretty much opened Tipitina’s. I believe that Professor Longhair played the first Friday night, we played the Saturday and the Radiators played the Sunday night. That was the first weekend of Tipitina’s being the Tipitina’s. Originally it was 501. We played all of us together [as The Meters] at the club when it was the 501. But it was only about a month later the 501 acquired the name the Tipitina’s. Then we had a big throw-down that weekend. The original Meters. I mean, the original Meters before Cyril Neville came in the band. Cyril came in the band about mid-70s.
Besides Brian, Russell has been your most regular collaborator over the past decade. You played with his father David, who was a member of the Meters for a few years. When did you first approach Russell about playing with you?
Well, I heard Russell at JazzFest close to 20 years ago, playing with his dad’s band. At the time I was playing a gig with Charmaine Neville, a Monday night hit with her little gig. And she was suffering with drummers, and I told her, “You know, you need to call this kid Russell Batiste up ‘cause I think he could play your gig really well.” So she called him. So me and Russell played with her for a while. That was only when I was available that I played a gig with her—it wasn’t all the time. And Russell got to play the gig with her for quite a while. When I came home off of the road and started reorganizing my Runnin’ Pardners band, I called Russell to come in to play that so Russell started playing with Running Partners and then the idea of putting the Meters back together. At the time Leo Nocentelli was still in New Orleans, and it would have been Leo, Art, myself and we asked Zig, but Zig declined. And they said, “Who we gonna get for a drummer and I said, ‘let’s get Russell Batistse’ and we brought Russell in and everybody loved him.
Being in so many bands, what are your top priorities for 2011?
Pretty much Runnin’ Pardners, 7 Walkers and—if funky Meters and 7 Walkers front offices can pull it together—I think that it would be a great idea to combine those two bands and move us out of smaller rooms and into larger capacity rooms. I think both bands will cross a platform of people who like both bands. I think that we can help each other a lot by doing it. It would mean me playing two gigs every night but I don’t have problem with that. I’m still feeling healthy enough.
Speaking of long shows, you recently celebrated your birthday with a New Orleans jam session that nodded to all your different projects.
The birthday party was killing. It was killing. The second set—the first set Runnin’ Pardners set of the night—was close to a 90 minute set. And then the second set was all of my friends that came out to play and we just kind of jammed. Three and half hours later we realized I had been on stage almost four hours.
When we spoke last year you mentioned your lifelong desire to make a jazz album. Have you gotten any closer to achieving that goal?
No, I haven’t. It’s still something that I really am wanting. I mean, I talked about it earlier today. It’s on my bucket list. It’s actually close to the very top. I think my dream band would Branford Marsalis, David Torkanowsky, Herlin Riley and John Scofield.
You and John recently toured together…
John has so many different music ventures that he does, it’s hard to kind of narrow him down to any one thing because he records different projects, and he puts bands together to fit that project. He goes out and he works that for as long as he can. I believe that the Piety Street band as we know it, unless we go and do another record, we probably have seen the last of it.
You mentioned the Runnin’ Pardners is one of your priorities this year. Do you plan to record an album with them?
I’m mixing a Runnin’ Partners record as I’m out here on the road. I have a rig set up in my room and I am mixing an album I made of 16 Meters songs that were never played played by the Meters.
Will listeners be familiar with any of these songs?
No. A couple of them might have been picked up by other artists. Since I had put the word out that I had done this a couple of groups like Dumpstaphunk have jumped on the song “What’cha Say.” That’s probably the only one out of the 16 that is out there—and the Runnin’ Pardners have performed “I Need More Time.”
Were most these songs written in the ‘60s or ‘70s?
All these songs were written in the ‘60s. Pretty much out of the first three records. As a player, I wanted the original band to address some of this music. Bands can get in a rut where they just keep playing the same songs over and over again. I’m at that point where I think that if you want to keep the shit interesting, you got to keep changing. Even though we may play those same 20 songs differently every night, it’s still the same songs you know. So I think that it’s always in our best interest to keep adding some songs. I mean it’s not like we didn’t have the music to add. We recorded 128 songs as The Meters and we only played maybe 25.
Right and you’re still playing those 25.
Yeah.
And the, I guess the players on the album is the current Runnin’ Pardners lineup?
Yeah. The five piece band. It’ll be the five piece—bass, drums, saxophone, guitar and keys. Two of the guys are the old guys from the original Runnin’ Pardners band: Mike Lemmler on keyboards and Brent Anderson—Mike’s been in the band almost 19 years. Brent’s been in the band almost 21 years. And two younger players, Terrance Houston, the drummer, 22 years old. I think he, I think he just maybe be turning 23 this year. And Khris Royal, who’s 23 turning 24 this year.
Photo by Vernon Webb
PART II: BRIAN STOLTZ
I know you’re always working on a lot of different projects. At this point, do you have plans to return to the studio?
Well, I’ve got enough stuff in the can—finished—for at least two records, maybe three. Unfortunately, I can’t put anything out right now because PBS is involved in this lawsuit with Highsteppin’ Productions, and I’ve got two major distributors that want to put a record out and distribute it. But when this lawsuit went down then they backed off. Now nobody will touch me until this thing is over with. So it’s kind of a major ordeal in my life because I was trying to get this record out—I’ve been trying to get it out for almost two years and then right when I was really getting it to come together a little over a year or so ago we got served with this suit. That put the brakes on everything. So, I mean, yeah, I could go ahead and press it up and put it out myself and just take my chances. But, you know, I had a couple of distributors ready to roll with it and then it came to a halt. So I’m just kind of biding my time right now waiting to see what happens.
Can you describe some of the music that was on these albums? Was it more funk-centric or rock-oriented or a mixture?
Well, it’s kind of a mix. I wouldn’t call anything I’ve ever done funk—some of it might have been real groove oriented and some of this material is like that but then some of its more laid back, more singer/songwriter. I guess I would say there’s a couple songs on there that really touch on old country and gospel and I’ve got a couple of good people on it with me. I’m calling it modern day gospel. Then I’ve got another track that’s kind of old country oriented and Shannon McNally’s singing on that one with me. So, this is the stuff I’m trying to get out. It’s quite different from anything I’ve done and it came out so good. But we’ll have to wait and see what happens.
You mentioned the lawsuit, which put a halt on PBS as an entity. Do you plan to perform as a trio with George and Russell under a different name?
I think you’ve seen the last of PBS. I guess you never say never, but we weren’t really able to make a go of it and towards the end it just wasn’t working out. A lot of that has to do with the business moves we made. But now we’re playing together again with our funky Meters. It looks like the funky Meters are going to make a go of it again. So I’m happy with that.
I left [funky Meters] in 2007 so it’s been about three years or something like that. The other night [at Tipitina’s] was really off the hook, man. From the first note to the last it just locked in and it was cookin’ all night. It was really good.
You played with funky Meters from the early ‘90s until 2007. But your relationship with Art Neville goes back a decade before that, right?
My very first gig with the Neville Brothers was at Tipitina’s in September of ’81. So this will be my 30th anniversary with Art—I didn’t even realize that. I used to work in a club on Bourbon St. and Art and Aaron used to come in all the time. I’d see them in the club, though I didn’t really get to know them. They’d walk in and we’d kind of acknowledge each other—just a little “Hey, how yah doin’?”—and [I] never really got to hang with them much because I’d be up on stage and they’d be out in the crowd with friends and stuff.
I left that gig when the Neville Brothers were out on the Fire on the Bayou Tour which was I guess summer of ’81 or fall of ’81. When they came home Art wanted to put together a new band, and he remembered me from down at that club, and he went down there looking for me but I was gone. Well, it just so happened that that morning I had just gotten a new phone number, and I called a few friends to give them the number. Now, one guy I gave the number to was down there on Bourbon St. and when Art went looking for me and I wasn’t at the club, he walked two blocks down to the Absinthe Bar, and he saw this friend of mine. He said, “Hey man, you remember that little white dude that used to work down there at the 544 Club.” He couldn’t even remember my name. But he just said “that little white dude that used to work at 544 club,” and my friend Mark said, “Oh yeah, Brian. Matter of fact, here I got his new phone number,” and he pulled the number out [of] his pocket and gave it to him [Laughs]. Art called me that night so it’s kind of funny how things work.
It is funny how things have come full circle. Here you are working with him again, beginning with a show at Tips.
That’s right. You know, he called me up and I started working with Neville Brothers. My first gig was at Tipitina’s. We went to Texas and did one or two dates and then we started the Stones tour. So I went from Bourbon St. to being out of work due to carpal tunnel surgery for six months to the Stones tour.
Not a bad turn of events.
Yeah, it wasn’t bad at all. My life’s kind of like that. It’s like everything falls apart and then all of a sudden it just comes back together instantly. You know?
So now that the funky Meters are reactivated with you in it is that your primary focus this year?
As far as funky Meters goes, Art wants to work. I think the Neville Brothers are not doing a whole lot this year. I know they have some dates, but I don’t think they’re doing a whole lot. So I think Art wants to work funky Meters…so we’ll see. There’s no plans to record. funky Meters has never really had a history of recording. But, I know Art wants to work and whatever we can get out of George to agree to some dates as opposed to the 7 Walkers then we’ll be rolling.
Did you rehearse with the band before the Tips show?
Rehearsals? What is that? I played with funky Meters for 14 years before, and we hadn’t had a rehearsal yet. So there certainly ain’t gonna be any now. Guys in New Orleans really don’t like to rehearse—you either have to be able to get up there and do it or you don’t do it. There’s not much in between.
But I’ll tell yah, honestly just the other night coming back after three years, it was like riding a bicycle. You just jump on and start riding. It was perfectly seamless, actually. And it was better in some ways because, I did 13 or 14 years with funky Meters and after all those years of playing basically the same songs, things can get a little bit stale. And I guess that’s how it was getting towards the end. There wasn’t much room for growth; there wasn’t any new material coming out. Nothing was happening. That’s really what spawned PBS—George and Russell and I were writing stuff, and we were demoing songs but we couldn’t get Art on board at the time.
So PBS kind of just formed out of that—out of the frustration of wanting to be able to record and the frustration of wanting to be able to go out and work. Art was going around with Neville Brothers at the time and so that’s just how PBS happened. But then PBS was really a completely different band. I mean, it really didn’t sound anything like funky Meters. The whole approach was different. You know, back then in the funky Meters— even though Russell and I had free rein to pretty much play like we played—there was still a level of respect that you had to pay to the original music. So, even though I didn’t attempt to play the songs like Leo, there’s still a level of respect that you have to stick to in order to keep the integrity of the song intact. Same thing with Russell, he didn’t play like Zig, but still he altered his style to fit what that music was.
And then when we did PBS, the chains were completely taken off—Russell played like Russell played and I played like I played and it was a totally different thing. So, that’s what made that band—even though we got tagged and trashed at the beginning for being the funky Meters without Art, it always had that stigma because of it and we could never get enough people—especially promoters and industry people—to really understand and listen to it see that is different, it’s not funky Meters. But I guess it never really caught on. It’s a combination of that stigma sticking with us and, like I said, we just made some bad business moves and things went sour.
Coming back to funky Meters, talk about coming full circle. The other night it was kind of like it’s back to the old thing but now—even though Russell and I have to hold on to the integrity of [the] original music—it felt like Russell and I are both bringing more of our own thing to the table. So, it’s grown into a third entity now. Now, it’s grown into this other thing which begins with The Meters, then the funky Meters, PBS and now this new thing that just opened wide up and played with free rein. It was a really relaxed gig, it was big and open, everybody played in a big way. There was no confusion, there was no train wrecks. It just grew all night long. It was really good.
I’ve felt that since the Original Meters reunited in 2005, the funky Meters has turned into its own band.
Right. Right. It’s really grown into a whole other thing now. And that’s been the whole thing anyway with these songs—it’s always been about exploring how far you can take these songs and where you can take these songs. That’s why it’s always in the moment. You know, you’re never going to hear the same version twice. You’re always going to hear something in there that’s not the same. And even though it might be the same song, it’s always going to be played as if it’s the first time, so there’s always going to be that element of excitement and surprise in it. I mean that’s what we live for. If you can’t walk up there on that stage and just forget everything else and just be able to be in that place right then and there, no matter what it is that you’re playing, well then there’s no point in it. That’s why there’s no rehearsals. That’s why there’s no strategy. There’s never any figuring anything out. Either you have to go make it happen or don’t make it happen. But luckily our odds are pretty good. It happens most nights.
You were one of a few New Orleans musicians who had their feet in both the New Orleans Meters/Nevilles world and the Grateful Dead world. In your mind, when did those two words first meet?
Well, I don’t think we ever did any shows with the Dead in New Orleans, [it was] always on the West Coast. I don’t remember what year we first did it. I guess it was around ‘84 or ’85—I’m really not sure. But we’d go out and do the New Year’s shows at Oakland Coliseum or at Henry J. Kaiser [Convention Center]. We did that every year for a few years. Honestly, I don’t remember the first time because we did it so many times, but I remember we’d always get up there and do that second set with them. That was fantastic. It was always really good.
The whole jamband thing—and George says this all the time—is like this: “We’ve always done that. You know, that’s always been our scene.” And in a real way, in the sense like we just talked, for us having bands, it’s not about rehearsing songs and arrangements, it’s just about this common thing in the song and then you’re able to just go onstage with the confidence that it’s all going to come together and go somewhere. There’s so many bands that ended up with that jamband title and in that jamband genre—and I guess these days anything can be considered a jamband because there’s almost every type of music involved. But I don’t really see anybody out there doing what we’re doing.
I’m not really sure it’s jambands. I think most of it’s rehearsed, but people call them jambands because they take solo sections and they might stretch out in spots but in the true sense—in the true improvisational sense—I don’t really hear a whole lot out there doing that same thing. So I’m not really sure. I was never really sure how something ended up in that genre or ended up with that title. And then at some point a lot of bands didn’t want that title anymore—they didn’t want to be called jambands. I remember doing an interview when Porter said something about jamband and the guy said “Wow, you admit to being that? Most bands don’t want to be called that,” and George said, “What are you talking about? We’re the original jamband. We’re not ashamed of it, we’ve always done that.”
It is the same thing. You find something new, it gets old after a while so you gotta find something newer and it becomes trite so you call it something else—then it becomes nostalgic so you go back to it. [Laughs]. It’s all the same. It’s all just music. All these genres and titles and things to label it, basically, are just music.
