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entertaining u newspaper: your weekly guide to entertainment
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by rick grant
rickgrant01@comcast.net
Ten years ago, I had a lively discussion with Tab Benoit at Freebird before he went on stage to perform. We talked about the frustrations of golf, how the blues has changed, and his Cajun roots. Even back then, Tab was committed to restoring the wetlands around New Orleans.
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Cut to today. When I chatted with Tab last Thursday, I mentioned that I’d viewed his documentary Hurricane on The Bayou, which was shot before, during, and after hurricane Katrina. Meryl Streep narrated the first part of the film, then Tab narrated and starred in the second half, after the storm devastated the wetlands. Tab can be seen tooling around in his air boat and piloting a twin engine airplane over the area, making commentary on the need for money and engineering expertise to address the many problems of the region.
Just my mention of the film ignited Tab into an adrenaline-pumping dissertation on the problems facing the South Louisiana coast, how the area has been woefully neglected by the Bush administration, and how the Iraq war has taken priority over the dire needs of the people of New Orleans and the surrounding Louisiana coast.
Now, Tab, the singer/songwriter blues star, and Tab, the socio-political activist are one in the same. In other words, Tab is committed to using his music career as platform for helping affect change in South Louisiana. He feels strongly about this cause. In fact, he not only has an encyclopedic knowledge of the complex politics of the area, but he is trying to make things happen.
Of course, for Tab and the people of South Louisiana, the post-Katrina era has been disheartening because the Bush administration is driving a war that is costing 20 billion a week, draining the treasury and preventing funds from reaching the region. Clearly, politics is snarling any hope of saving New Orleans and the wetlands until a new administration takes charge.
For me, Tab was the best case scenario as an interviewee because he talked without prompting and he’s passionate about his cause. It helped that I vehemently agree with him. Moreover, I was impressed with his amazing knowledge of his subject. We could have talked all afternoon.
“You know that the entire moon mission, Project Apollo, cost $20 billion (adjusted for inflation it would be much more, of course) but we are spending $20 billion a week in Iraq on this ill-conceived war. More importantly, New Orleans is America’s biggest port and the wetlands are an environmental resource for the region. Never in the history of America has an administration neglected to make the funds available to restore a major port city.”
“Of course, there are other factors in play. For instance, there are 4,100 oil platforms in the Gulf near New Orleans, and Louisiana is the only state that doesn’t receive oil royalties from oil exploration. That’s a sizeable amount of money that the state desperately needs for restoration projects and shoring up the levees. The Bush administration has left the entire coast of Louisiana and Mississippi vulnerable to another storm like Katrina. We can’t get all the people to come back when they know that the levees are not adequate for over a class 3 hurricane.”
“My family was in oil and I piloted planes for the oil companies. Today, we have the technology to switch from an oil to a hydrogen economy. But the government does not have the will or the extra money (it’s all going down the drain funding the Iraq war) to devote to it. The Bushes are in the oil business and it’s not in their best interest to seek alternatives to big oil.”
“You talked about that movie Who Killed the Electric Car, that chronicled how, in the early 1980s, GM produced a popular electric car. That happened because a law mandated it. You couldn’t buy them but the people who leased them loved them. But as soon as the law was repealed, GM picked up all the electric cars and crushed them. I could go on about this. But you agree with me and I’m doing what I can with my music to make a difference. I’ve spoken to our congressmen and I’ve done countless benefit concerts to raise money and awareness. But until we have a new administration, change will happen slowly or not at all,” Tab said.
By then, I was riled up. I could feel the adrenaline coursing through my veins. Hell, my next blog was writing itself. Tab, the in-demand blues star, is working on a new album and has been approached by the production team that made Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth to be the host and be directly involved in a documentary on the post-Katrina scandal. Tab Benoit will headline the George’s Music Springing the Blues Festival Saturday night schedule. He goes on at 8:45 pm
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