Don’t feel too out of touch if you browsed the Gretna Heritage Fest lineup and said “Hey, I thought those guys were all dead.” The festival this year is full of bands that you loved in the ‘70s—before you were born, of course. But are these really the same people who made the classic records? Here’s our wrapup of who is and who ain’t:
EWF at Jazz Fest 2013 (Photo: Elsa Hahne)
Earth, Wind & Fire: Only two members, bassist Verdine White and lead singer Philip Bailey, remain from the classic lineup (Longtime leader Maurice White has been battling Parkinson’s disease and no longer works with them). But constant touring has kept them tight, and EWF still sounded great at Jazz Fest (where they’ve been a fixture in recent years). As Verdine White told OffBeat last month, the new album Now, Then & Forever was a conscious return to their ‘70s sound. And when Bailey unleashes that high tenor, you always know what band you’re hearing. (Main Stage, Friday at 9:30pm).
Blood, Sweat & Tears at Gretna Fest on Saturday, 10/5.
Blood, Sweat & Tears: Zero original members, and nobody who played on any of the hits. The famous lead singer David Clayton-Thomas split in 2004, and the current band is mostly just the latter-day outfit that Clayton-Thomas assembled to back him up. The one connection with the classic era is that original drummer Bobby Colomby owns the name and licenses it to these guys. (Main Stage, Saturday at 7:45pm).
Chicago plays Gretna Fest on Saturday, 10/5.
Chicago: Doing pretty well for a band of this vintage, with four of seven founding members still aboard: Singer/keyboardist Robert Lamm and the horn section of Jimmy Pankow, Walt Parazaider and Lee Loughnane (though one or more horn guys use understudies at some of the shows). But the most famous singer Peter Cetera is long gone, and later lead voice Bill Champlin jumped ship more recently. Chicago’s live shows still tend to emphasize their earlier, better material over the ‘80s power ballads. (Main Stage, Saturday at 10pm).
ZZ Top play Gretna Fest on Sunday, 10/6.
ZZ Top: You weren’t expecting these guys to change, were you? Last we checked, ZZ Top—together since 1970 with the lineup of Billy Gibbons, Dusty Hill and Frank Beard—was the longest-running, all-original, never-broken up band in popular music, anywhere. The group had a mini-comeback this year with the Rick Rubin produced La Futura, its best album in eons. Gibbons has even been playing some recent one-off shows with the full lineup of Moving Sidewalks, the psychedelic blues band he fronted before ZZ. (Main Stage, Sunday at 7pm).
One more biggie for ‘70s junkies: Friday in Gretna will see the return of Jim Dandy Mangrum, the lead singer of Black Oak Arkansas, who were by far the punkiest and most gonzoid of all the Southern rock bands from the ‘70s (and though they formed in their namesake town, BOA were based for most of their heyday in New Orleans). He’ll be backed up by the one local band that could really pull it off: Dash Rip Rock, who we’re told are learning “Happy Hooker,” “Uncle Lijah” and more for the occasion. Jim Dandy to the rescue! (Market Stage, Friday at 7pm).
