The Official “Stevie Wonder Sucks” Post

I was fortunate enough to have attended New Orleans’ Jazzfest over the weekend, and my brain cells have finally regenerated to the point where I’m able to write about it. Three nights at the Old Absinthe House and two mornings of bloody marys at the Chartre House will have that effect on a person.

BTW, the Olde Absinthe House is the greatest bar in the world. I’m convinced of this and am not accepting arguments about it. Great drinks, great people, friendly if harried service, a kick-ass jukebox, a bunch of ’70s vintage NFL and collegiate football helmets hanging from the ceiling, what more can you ask for? You sit on one of the streetside stools for an hour and not only will 300 beautiful women pass through the place, and another 2,000 will pass by on the street in front of you. You stay in there until 3:00 a.m. drinking vodka sodas, and your wife, girlfriend or other partner of choice (that’s for you gay folks) will have to spend an hour telling you all the stupid shit you did after midnight, including apparently nearly getting into a fist fight with the cabbie who brought you back to the hotel. But that’s another story, and I frankly can’t remember any of it, so we’ll move on.

It’s the greatest bar in the world. Oh, yes, it is.

The Chartre House is also outstanding, in that they make the best bloody marys I’ve ever had. I don’t even like freaking bloody marys, but if I lived in New Orleans, I’d have two or three of theirs every damn day of the week. Of course, I’d also soon be unemployed and in rehab, but it’d be worth it.

The bad part was the wifey and I waited too late to make airline reservations, so we had to drive from Houston to New Orleans and back. That was ok driving over last Thursday afternoon, but really not fun at all coming back on Sunday. The good part was that we were staying at the W on Poydras and had passes to the Shell hospitality pavillion as well as the Big Chief stands at the main stage. So life was good.

That is, until Stevie Wonder took the stage on Friday evening.

Mind you, I like Stevie Wonder’s music, and was looking forward to seeing him more than any other act over the weekend. Plus, I’m cheap as hell, and hate having to admit I disliked any movie, concert, play or other sort of show I paid good money to attend. So I was inclined to like the guy, come hell or high water.

Well, come high water, anyway. Kurt Russell, playing Wyatt Earp in “Tombstone” yelled the famous line “You tell ‘em I’m comin’! You tell ‘em I’m comin’, and HELL’s comin’ with me!”

Like Wyatt Earp, Stevie came to the Acura Stage at the 2008 New Orleans Jazz Festival, and he brought hell with him. He started by lecturing the audience on a subject which we can’t discuss at the Barking Carnival. Which wouldn’t have been so bad if he hadn’t taken ten goddam minutes to do it. Then again, it did give me time to go take a leak and get another can of champagne (yes, they do serve canned champagne at Jazz Fest), so I guess that was ok after all. Come to think of it, it was actually a highlight as things turned out.

This is a photo of Little Stevie Wonder, sucking.

He then began the actual music part of the show with three interminably long, boring songs that nobody in the audience appeared to recognize. At a couple of points in the third song, he simply stopped and refused to continue until the audience applauded. What we were applauding was completely lost on me and everyone around me.

30 minutes into the ‘performance’, he finally played one of his hit songs. I forget now which one it was. He then took a break and let his mediocre-voiced daughter entertain the crowd with a couple more unrecognizable numbers. At this point, the crowd began to thin out.

So anxious were were to actually be entertained for at least a moment or two by this legendary singer/songwriter that the group we were with stuck around until Stevie came back onstage. When he launched into yet another song no one recognized, we decided enough was enough and it was time to get something to eat. Screw this.

So, it’s official: Stevie Wonder sucks. If you ever have an opportunity to spend money on tickets to see this guy in concert, don’t walk away, run like a freaking banshee, like Forrest Gump returning a kickoff, like Big Brown in the Kentucky Derby, like…well, you get the picture.

How to react when offered tickets to a Stevie Wonder concert.

The good news is, Jimmy Buffett kicked ass and took names on the same stage on Saturday night, so we had that going for us.