“New Orleans is a musician’s beacon,” said Dana Abbott, who just released her new soul-rock album, Moonlight.

It’s been 10 years since the California-born singer, songwriter, and guitarist moved here from Chicago, and this album marks new heights of musicianship and self-expression that she doesn’t necessarily think she could have found elsewhere.

She’d visited and recorded in the city many times before permanently relocating, making her decision after one of those quintessential, transcendent musical moments that tend to seal the deal for so many would-be adopted New Orleanians.

“I saw Papa Grows Funk on a Monday night, and I’m like, ‘This is a Monday night show?’” she said. “I’m movin’! That’s it. Put the flag in, I’m done.”

She wasn’t kidding about her mind being made up. When Katrina hit just two months later and she lost her home, she moved into a FEMA trailer and got to work.

Photo by K&D Photo+Video

“That… was an interesting way to have your first hurricane,” she remembered.

Although she’d enlist in the city’s particular brand of Career Musician Boot Camp a few years later with repeated ten-set days playing on Bourbon (“I was just, just constantly playing. It was like the Rocky Movie, you know? Where he’s trying to become the best, doing all the old-school Russian sit-ups?”), she wasn’t ingrained enough in the musical social network at the time of Katrina to sustain herself as a full-time musician.

Instead, she became a crisis counselor, working with charities and helping others get back on their feet.

“I care a lot about people,” she said earnestly. “And I think, musically, that’s kind of my quest, to figure out…how to make people feel cared for? And loved. With strangers, somehow.”

She remembers being shown that kind of consideration when she first moved here, citing Jack Miele, Terry McDermott, and countless other mentors from the city’s big musical family.

“Everybody helps each other out here. Thank God people took me under their wing and showed me the ropes,” she laughed. “How to get better, and how to not be a typical, you know, singer-songwriter type that just gets by. To really push yourself and continue to grow. It’s a beautiful thing. It’s not so competitive here, like people are trying to get you down.”

“That’s the good thing about this town,” she continued. “Everybody has their own freak flag that they’re not afraid to fly. And that’s what makes us feel at home.”

New Orleans, she explained, upholds weirdness and edginess (in life as well as music) in a way most places don’t. She was able to carve out an immense freedom of expression from its weird, edgy, aggressive take on rock and roll, a genre she describes as “old R&B off the meds”.

“Before moving here, my style of playing was so different!” she remembered. “It was much softer. I mean, you can tell on the first album I put out… it’s super mellow, it’s really Lilith Fair kind of stuff.”

Moonlight, however, “is us,” she said. “It’s really and truly what’s in our hearts and souls. Warts and all.”

After a decade of hard work here–performing, writing, studying up on other musicians, and soaking in the city’s rhythms–she’s ecstatic to be at a point where she feels her band can confidently communicate what they want to through their music.

Her music, of course, isn’t the only thing that’s changed in that time. The city has seen some wild shifts itself, especially Frenchmen Street.

“It used to be… dirtier, in a pure kind of way,” she mused. “But, it’s good to see the traffic coming down here.”

“Everybody gets a little uptight thinking it’s gonna be the new Bourbon Street,” she went on, “which I definitely don’t wanna see happen, and I don’t think it will, but it might turn into something different.”

Even if Frenchmen changes, though, Abbott retains an unshakable faith in the city’s eternal soul.

“No matter what, the attitude is here. If it’s not Frenchmen, it’s gonna be somewhere else,” she said. “Like look at, I dunno, St. Roch, or something like that. I’m just not worried about it. The grit’s here, the culture’s here. That’s kinda the charm of the city. It’s never really gonna change. Flaws and all.”

Obviously, then, she’s just as sure that New Orleans is home as she was when she moved here ten years ago and immediately got flooded.

“I want to tour a lot, but I want this to be my anchor,” she said. “Yeah… this is definitely my forever home. There’s no two ways about it. I’m stuck, that’s for sure. But man. There’s no other place with so much culture and so much attitude.”

Read more about Abbott and Moonlight here.