King of Stage

New Orleans in summer is hot, humid, noisy, sleepless all night, wanton carnival.

Starting from the early summer of June, the music festival with the strongest jazz atmosphere in North America slowly kicked off its grand prelude; to the peak of midsummer in July, the two-week food carnival is enough to make any old gourmet return home full of joy; finally To the end of summer in August, the stage of the theater festival provides a stage for every art-seeking soul to perform.

crazy. lively. carefree. publicity. Wanton.

This city, which has been revived after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, bears the vicissitudes and thickness of more than two hundred years, once again blooms with dazzling light, and reproduces the style nicknamed "Big Jolly". There is no doubt that this is The most distinctive and charming city on the North American continent has its own unique character and soul.

Taking an old streetcar along St. Charles Avenue from the French Quarter to Uptown/City is like stepping into a time tunnel, experiencing a short but bumpy history.

From the old and elegant French Quarter, to the fashionable and young American business district, to the Oak Avenue in Charleston, Carolina, and the Victorian style buildings that were popular at the beginning of the last century...these different languages, cultures, fashions It is closely intertwined with faith, and finally gave birth to carnival, jazz, decadence, and evolved such a unique New Orleans style.

Today, Bourbon Avenue in the center of the city is full of sensuality, regardless of race and youth, gender and class, and it is a starting point for singing and singing every night. If you go north and cross the purple dividing line of St. Ann Avenue, you can see all kinds of people. Singing and dancing centered on "The Exiled Lafayette Café", and the brilliant colors embellished the night thrillingly.

Going further north, crossing Esplanada Avenue, you can stay away from the hustle and bustle of carnival and the enthusiasm of music festivals, and enter the Marini District, a secret jazz center known only to locals, and pass through the bookstores that carry the weight of history , clothing store, tattoo shop, a turn, a row of colorful taverns of different shapes lined up.

The flamboyant and maverick young man stood on the side of the street puffing, leaning against the mottled brick wall and watching the passers-by in the melodious and chaotic jazz notes. The years seemed to melt away in the midsummer night of New Orleans. In the warm wind, the sound of the Pentium of the Mississippi River not far away tells the forgotten and submerged legends of this city and this land.

The "Noon" bar is located here.

On the jet-black exterior wall, there are strange and weird graffiti, large and small, black and white, color, painting signatures, etc., arranged in a chaotic manner, but they have built up a unique aesthetic feeling that cannot be planned or copied over time, recording the history of the bar. not so long history.

Throughout the entire North American continent, jazz has gradually declined. Even New York, where elegant jazz flowed in the streets and alleys, has not been able to avoid it. New Orleans has become the last paradise of jazz. , Jazz flowing in the hair.

However, jazz is not the only symbol of this city. The passionate and multicultural Creole welcomes all music lovers with open arms. The blood of this land flows with golden musical notes, day and night. The singing and dancing are enough to make every tourist linger.

The "Noon" bar is like this. In addition to the jazz band, there are a variety of performers on stage, from rock to pop, from country to soul, from folk to bluegrass, and a variety of music melodies are always floating, Monday to week Fifth, it is open throughout the year, and there are performances every night.

Tonight is Thursday, which is a working day just like yesterday, but the atmosphere has changed subtly. The joy and excitement around Friday have begun to surge ahead of time. The bloody sunset is still burning on the edge of the sky. The bar land One after another, you can already see the guests coming in and out.

People who have just finished a busy day at work can't wait to let their muscles relax by replacing dinner with alcohol and restaurants with bars.

Usually, on weekdays, it might take until after ten o'clock in the evening before the bar really gets lively; but today, the hotness in the air can already be felt before dinner time.

Duncan-Turner is one of them.

After a whole day of boring work, my whole head was almost a mess, and I left the office with a gesture of fleeing, but the dullness and irritability accumulated in my chest were still unable to vent, and I felt uncomfortable, so Just gave up the idea of ​​going home and turned into the bar, eager to cool the blood with a cold beer before going home to eat and end Thursday's trip—

After all, tomorrow is still a working day.

Sitting at the bar, turning around and looking back, there are thirty or forty guests bustling in the bar, although it is far from being full of seats and overcrowded, it only takes up one-third of the space at most; A tired face comes into view, but it is so familiar, even if they are all strangers, they can find the same frequency resonance in each other at this time.

Duncan let out a long breath, took another big sip of beer, and relaxed his limbs. He couldn't help but let out a happy voice, "Ah..."

My eyes shifted to the stage in front of me, looking forward to the upcoming performance, drinking beer and listening to music, my mind is completely empty, this is the correct way to start off work, but I don’t know what performance is going to be tonight?

At the same time, in the backstage corridor, Ollie was probing the situation in the bar, then turned around happily and entered the lounge, and couldn't wait to share the good news with his teammates, "There are more guests tonight than last night. Almost halfway through!"

For One Day Kings, this is indeed a good thing.

Although the owner of the bar, Sam, agreed to the band's encore performance tonight, the problem is that the bar's daily performance list is full, and there is no need for Sam to change the performance list for the One Day King Band - the band is not yet such a big name ability, so in the end the band was ranked in the first show, which is basically equivalent to the position of the opening band.

Generally speaking, the audience and quality of the opening performances are not satisfactory, and it is not uncommon for there to be only two or three kittens.

But tonight, the band was lucky, and the audience was even bigger than last night's eleven o'clock performance.

Apart from other off-site factors, the performance still needs the support of the audience, because the interaction between the performance and the audience is the essence of the stage performance, otherwise what is the meaning of the empty performance?

This was especially true for Ronan, whose heart was beating a bit violently.