Chubby Carrier & The Bayou Swamp Band - It's Party Time! (1999)

►The album

Chubby's swamp funk

If your feet stay still while "Bernadette" is playing, you're irremediably beyond musical redemption ! This album is a highly enjoyable and dancing one, even if Chubby and his boys have evidently cast off the moorings with roots rural Zydeco to expand to a new swamp funk more urban sound, incorporating deadly bass lines and drum beat, and a very active trumpet-sax section which gives the music its clear rhythm'n'blues color, sometimes even a bit jazzy. Chubby has made his, the "adapt or disappear" biological evolution principle.

Yet he was born in July 1967, in a Creole family from Pointe-à-l'Église (Church Point, about 30 km north-west of Lafayette) deeply linked to Zydeco : his grandfather Warren Carrier, his father Roy Carrier, and his cousins Bebe and Calvin Carrier, were all renowned Zydeco musicians. So Joseph R. Carrier Jr., soon nicknamed Chubby by his grandma for his fat round cheeks, fell into Zydeco from the cradle and even before in his mother's womb. He often confessed that in his early teens he wanted to be a drummer.

So at 12 he started to play drums in his father's band, then after he learned to play it with his dad, accordion at 14, replacing him when his oil rig work prevented him to lead the band. In 1986, at just 19, he joined the Terrance Simien band, the Mallet Playboys, again as drummer and toured all over the world with them for two years and a half. In 1989, he decided to start his own band with his brothers Troy "Dikki Du" Carrier and Kevin Carrier, definitely adopting the accordion : Chubby Carrier & The Bayou Swamp Band entered the Zydeco scene and soon put out their first album, "Go Zydeco Go". Twenty odd years later, their 2010 album "Zydeco Junkie" was awarded a Grammy.

Chubby Carrier is also devoted to social causes : children and education, and the fight for a smoke-free environment, which specially touches him because in May 2010, his father Roy Carrier died from lung cancer. On the educational side, he and his wife set up the "Zydeco A-Z" project, in cooperation with the Acadiana Symphony & Conservatory of Music, aimed at allowing children to learn about Zydeco origins and culture, and if possible encourage them to play an instrument (1). A similar project was launched by his former band leader Terrance Simien (2).

Zydeco is a dance music, no doubt about it, we've said it many times here. The title of the album is clear : it's party time ! A very funky party in fact. The hot feet stomping two-step "Bernadette" sets the funky rhythm'n'blues tone of the album, confirmed by the following  tracks. The horns riffs are systematic, almost taking over Chubby's accordion, the bass is throbbing hard, the drums and washboard are hammering down a tempered steel beat. If it wouldn't be for the accordion… the album could almost be filed next to James Brown in record shops !

Amede Ardoin (center)

Songs like "Funky BSB", "Zydeco All Night" or "Where Is My Woman" would well fit in this category. "I Don't Want To Leave You", sung by drummer Charles "Red" LeMark, is a pure piece of soul, and the last track, also sung by LeMark, "Keeping Me Out Of The Storm", by some musical and vocal aspects reminded me of another band, Jamaican this one : Third World, which always put a lot of R'n'B in its reggae.

Yes of course we're far from old traditional Zydeco, far from Amede Ardoin or Clifton Chenier, but wasn't Buckwheat Zydeco almost as far ? ■

(1) Zydeco A-Z : recognizing that kids today don’t have the same musical opportunities that he had, Chubby set out to find a way to educate children on Zydeco music. After a few brainstorming sessions with his wife, he started the Zydeco A-Z educational project. “I want to teach them everything about Zydeco music from A to Z. The instruments involved in Zydeco music, where Zydeco music came from, how Zydeco music got started, and give them a chance to interact with me. And then I’ll invite them to play the accordion, the washboard, the drums..." : https://youtu.be/0bLI-pJwqSg
→ A "Zydeco A-Z" workshop in 2018 : https://youtu.be/g7nfO4PnN7Q

(2) https://onurblues.blogspot.com/2022/04/terrance-simien-tribute-sessions-2001.html

Interviews & Documents

● A series of 12 very short videos of Chubby on different subjects (youth, nickname, family, music, band, food…) : https://www.lafayettetravel.com/explore/music/chubby-carrier/
● About his love of Zydeco music and how he was inspired to make it his musical career, 2019 : https://youtu.be/7iXOxuLegBU
● Backstage at the Baton Rouge Blues Fest. in 2015 : https://youtu.be/cNU0zOVFWkQ
● With host Linda Boudreaux on the "Extra Mile Show" :
→ around 2014 : https://youtu.be/QDicfJEWgLs
→ around 2012 : https://youtu.be/o29TkIfIjWg
● On McTVLive in 2022 : https://youtu.be/OTMDhDjhqTI
● During the Blast Furnace Blues Fest., Bethlehem (Pennsylvania), in 2011 : https://youtu.be/vbebIIY1Kec

Zydeco versus Cajun

● Chubby about the difference between Cajun and Zydeco music (audio) : https://soundcloud.com/wxpnfm/chubby-carrier
● "Zydeco Is Not Cajun Music !" : https://youtu.be/QnyZMirkZ2c
● See also our recent post about Nathan Williams : https://onurblues.blogspot.com/2022/04/nathan-zydeco-cha-chas-feat-michael.html

Movies
● Chubby Carrier and the Bayou Swamp Band also participated in two documentary movies :
→ “Zydeco Breakfast", the story of zydeco music and the culture of French Louisiana : https://www.zydecobreakfastfilm.com

→ “Hurricane on the Bayou", a 2006 42-mn detailed account of the damage hurricane Katrina caused to coastal Louisiana wetlands and New Orleans in 2005 : https://youtu.be/61ugfR-5W9M
- Infos about the film : http://hurricaneonthebayou.com/html/index.htm
- Interview with Chubby : http://hurricaneonthebayou.com/html/music.htm#chubby

The Grammy album
● "Zydeco Junkie" (2010) : https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_mV1eF0BLMI6s7UU_0Dog7cnwtsCM6knnw

Live videos

● At the Zydeco and Crawfish Fest. at Waterway Village, Gulf Shores (Alabama), 2022 : https://youtu.be/fUH4uexJRgg
● At the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Center, July 2021 : https://youtu.be/ha86vC1MLP4
● At The New Orleans Jazz Museum, 2021 : https://youtu.be/pCXdyheFdyI
● Live at the Focal Point in Maplewood (Missouri), for the KDHX TV program "River City Acoustic", 2020 : https://youtu.be/DIdLcPGhigc

Lenny "Fuzzy" Rankins (left)

● At the Riverhawk Music Fest. in Brooksville (Florida), 2020 : https://youtu.be/RYtXAu5gwu0 & https://youtu.be/pUKE5iuf24o
● With special guest Lenny "Fuzzy" Rankins at the San Diego Annual "Gator By The Bay" Fest., 2019 : https://youtu.be/8ccSBPzgUmg - https://youtu.be/aToivV1aBtk - https://youtu.be/wQQcCfGvGUQ
● On Lafayette (Louisiana) KADN TV, 2019 :  https://youtu.be/1vgIUZvuyVE & https://youtu.be/1JxF4jK-mHM
● At the Knuckleheads Saloon in Kansas City (Missouri) :
→ March 2019 : https://youtu.be/fs63PhpnIt8  | → July 2018 : https://youtu.be/8gABLHEU1As
→ July 2017 : - Set 1 : https://youtu.be/8HALDQvivaM  | - Set 2 : https://youtu.be/9KVrbM2fIBA
→ June 2017 : https://youtu.be/jb55BriaF_E

Tab Benoit (left) & Chubby

● With Tab Benoit at the Rhythms on the River Fest., Lafayette, 2018 : https://youtu.be/uCmMXsBvEy0
● With Leroy Thomas at the Feed and Seed Fest., Davenport (Iowa), 2017 : https://youtu.be/8WX7D6jaX0U
● At the Waterfront Blues Fest., Portland (Oregon), 2017 : https://youtu.be/aWj5DHzA_KY
● On "Le Rendez-vous des Cajuns" TV program, Eunice (Louisiana), 2016 : https://youtu.be/pmg2Zm6vYh8

● At the Simi Valley Cajun & Blues Music Festival, Simi Valley (California), 2016 : https://youtu.be/oW6VslwL2-M
● At the "Acadiens Et Creole" Fest., Lafayette, 2015 : https://youtu.be/0ks_1bbSSXA
● With "Shane the Washboard Man", Washboard Neil and the Washboard Brigade, 2015 : https://youtu.be/6u4NBsnJwRw
At the Paola Roots Fest., Paola (Kansas), 2015 :
→ Pt 1 : https://youtu.be/-OYwxF9sRwc
→ Pt 2 : https://youtu.be/zrPzAUyeIX0

● At the Louisiana Music Factory Fest., 2013 : https://youtu.be/iXbQW4jf93Y
● At the Gumbo CookOff Fest., New Iberia (Louisiana), 2012 : https://youtu.be/Iuzf3Qeywno
● At the Breaux Bridge (Louisiana) Crawfish Fest., 2016 : https://youtu.be/1eJMElazaIc & https://youtu.be/9OWbxd2plss

● On the Opelousas (Louisiana) based Acadian KDCG TV "Swamp'n'Roll" program, 2013 : https://youtu.be/pOXg6Sa6qtE
● At the Grammy Afterparty in downtown Lafayette, 2011 : https://youtu.be/cfYvqwCfqKM
● At the Creole Heritage Zydeco & Crawfish Festival, Baytown (Texas), 2012 : https://youtu.be/ucTbmjTT-go & https://youtu.be/T38jyUY626o
● At the "Festival International de Louisiane", 2011 : https://youtu.be/M5hR3bEXRR0

Tab Benoit (left) & Chubby

● With Cajun bluesman and wetlands environmental preservation activist Tab Benoit (both appear in the "Hurricane on the Bayou" film), in Houma (Louisiana), 2009 : https://youtu.be/jxiZyClk3fI
● In March 2009 : https://youtu.be/PCHvak-lqGA
● On the Legendary Rhythm and Blues Cruise, 2005 :
→ Part 1/4 : https://youtu.be/jR9MWf3utGc
→ Part 2/4 : https://youtu.be/z6rWnBj7vsk
→ Part 3/4 : https://youtu.be/bBMQKmY91tg
→ Part 4/4 : https://youtu.be/DTWOOwiZXec
● At the Girard (Illinois) Sesquicentennial celebration, 2005 : https://youtu.be/sMHF8BmKIWA

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