With its half-English, half-French music and guitarless seven-person formation, New Orleans’ own “Sweet Crude” is anything but ordinary. In anticipation of the group’s upcoming New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival performance on April 30, The Daily Reveille sat down with co-lead vocalist Sam Craft about what’s in store.
The Daily Reveille: What does Sweet Crude anticipate with your upcoming festival performances?
Sam Craft: Well, we’re hoping to gather new audiences and hopefully win over some new fans- which is important to us right now, as we are in the process of finishing and promoting our new LP, which we’ve been working diligently on and we’re hoping to build momentum and get some new ears on our music. Festivals are our bread and butter, in terms of they’re the vibe for our music. Festivals go well with the kind of music we play, which is happy and jovial and sunshiney for the most part. We think with that, the weather and the good feeling that festival season brings, it fits right in with our music, so we’re hoping that we’ll win over some new fans and give our existing audience something new and exciting to watch. We love to dress it up and add little touches of flare, so we’re going to pull out all the stops this festival season.
TDR: Speaking of your happy and jovial style- I’ve noticed that you’re one of the happiest bands I’ve ever seen perform. Where do you guys get the energy to perform like that every time?
SC: Before every show, we do a little ritual where we do like a weird chant before we get on the stage. It’s never the same thing twice. We do something that’s a mix between a theater warmup and a football chant. It gets us psyched to get out there and have a great time. That, and we feed off the audience — we put a lot of energy into it because the music has that, for the most part it’s pretty phonetic and kinetic. It makes us move as we play it, and that gets us going first and foremost. When we’re doing it right, the audience picks up on that and it becomes a rather contagious sort of feedback loop. It’s part warm-up, part experiencing the music as we’re playing it.
TDR: What can listeners expect with your new full length LP?
SC: It’s exciting for us, because we got to work with a producer. We got to bring in an outside ear who has worked with a lot of our favorite artists, and he was able to add another flavor that none of us would have thought of. The result of that was a really dynamic, huge sound. We wanted to go for a really huge sound, intense drums and really big expansive soundscapes, so that’s what our producer was able to bring to the table. He got our vibe really quickly, which you want in an artistic collaboration, and he was able to help dial in these huge soundscapes. On the new LP it’s going to be really dynamic and this big sound that envelops you, and that’s what we want to create, so you feel like you’re in the middle of it.
TDR: Is the album going to be an extension of your first EP, or is it going to be a really different sound?
SC: It’s totally different, but it looks like we are bringing in one song from the previous record — we’ve updated it, and we’re going to bring that into the fold because we feel like it translates well to the new songs. We’ve woven that in, but the rest of it is a totally different adventure.
TDR: With seven members, how are you guys able to keep things democratic with making music and songwriting?
SC: It’s patience, and it’s deliberative and slow. But the result is something we’re fond of, so we don’t want to give up anything. It takes time to make sure no stone is left unturned. At the same rate, with the songwriting process, someone will come into the rehearsal studio with something more or less fully fleshed out or at least something that’s got a really good framework. Sometimes somebody will be the overseer of an idea or a song, and everyone else will chip in or add their part to it. Other times it’s more collaborative, where everything is very much seven ways. It’s not as slow and deliberate as it could be, but we have various pioneers in the group that will bring in a fully arranged idea. We’ve done it enough times to where we understand what everyone’s strength is. We know what each instrument has the capacity to add, so we make sure we’re writing something to leave room for everyone’s thing, and if everyone else has their own puzzle piece shape that they can fit into, then it becomes streamlines, and we’re able to play with each other’s strengths.
TDR: Is there anything in particular that inspires you when it comes to the lyricism, especially with the different languages?
SC: French rhyme is interesting-there’s a lot of puns available to you because there’s so much homophony. I love to read French poetry, especially Acadian French poetry and Louisiana French poetry, just to get inspired by rhyme and rhythm. You can create plays on words with the French language which doesn’t really happen in English as much — it does obviously happen, but it’s not as explicit as it is in French. Musically, the things that we like to do involve a faster beat, use of quick percussive vocals, we have very maliferous melodies as well. We’re often looking to all of our inspirations that use the quick percussive use of languages, and that comes from Talking Heads, Animal Collective, that sort of thing, bands like that who have fun with the percussive aspect on words. By blending languages together, we get to pick our favorite aspects of both.
TDR: Is there anything in particular with Jazz Fest that you guys are really excited about?
SC: Yeah, we get to play on the Gentilly stage, which is amazing. We’ve seen lots of great, amazing artists on that stage, through our years of being festival attendees and playing with various projects. It’s a really great stage and a great vibe, that’s something really big. We’re playing the same day as Stevie Wonder, so we have that look to forward to.
TDR: What do you see with the future of the band, as you’re getting bigger and more well known?
SC: As this album is coming out and we’re starting to really spread our wings, we’re going to be touring more, which is great because we’re going to be tapping into some brand new markets. We hope to be playing more festivals around the country, and we hope to be expanding our brand all over the place and seeing how it works. There’s a lot of places we haven’t built up yet, and we look forward to seeing how this works everywhere. It’s a little bit unusual; the music is unusual, what we’re doing with the language is unusual. But it’ll be fun to see what happens.
TDR: Can you tell me about being able to spread the Louisiana Cajun culture to different places as you tour?
SC: We love to wave the Louisiana flag so to speak, in terms of what we do and what we offer culturally, and people seem to get that, which is very refreshing. People seem to understand what it is we’re doing and how we’re using this language, and what that means to Louisiana. It’s been a pleasant surprise to see how people react to that, and how audience members seem to get it with very little explanation. Our little pocket of the world in Louisiana casts a huge shadow. Because of that, it’s been really exciting and refreshing to see people get it, I guess. I think you have to hear it first, it’s hard to put it in words to describe. We’re happy to do our small part contributing to that, even though it doesn’t necessarily contribute to the use of jazz or funk or cajun music. We’re really enjoying offering a fresh take on Louisiana culture.