Legendary New Orleans musician and session-musician-to-the-stars Dr. John (Mac Rebennack) has died at 77. I don't know if he's well-known to you, but you've probably heard his work in some form or another - he performed on albums by everyone from Sonny and Cher to Frank Zappa and from Canned Heat to the Rolling Stones.
I'm certainly going to miss him, but I'm thankful for the vast discography with many, many gems he leaves behind.
I saw Dr. John years ago at NYC's Blue Note Jazz Club. If you don't know about it, the place is super tight. So tight, if you hang your coat on the back of your chair, there's not enough space for servers to pass between the tables. All that to say, I could practically reach out and touch him as he sat there on the stage singing and playing piano. It was a magnificent performance. A fun take away: after the first encore, my date asked him to play Candy. Dr. John just kind of grunted/snorted and said. "Naw. No candy tonight." Having him answer us directly made up for him not playing it. Almost. :-)
So sad. Another one gone way too soon.
Man, what a great track that is. It's just so... authentic.
The amount of the world music influence on that album is pretty unparalleled for the era. This is pre-Santana. The Beatles opened up that door, but Dr John was one of the first to walk in.