NOLA Jazz and Heritage Festival

You like Los Lobos and Chicano bands?  Kool.  I consistently heard that music growing up whenever I would be at my cousins houses.  My kids think I'm weird, but they unwillingly know all the words to, "Suavecito".

Orale Vato.

OMG!!!!!!!    Yes!  I know all the words to Suavecito!  I sing along with it in the car!  Méxicano Americano, too, and a bunch of others!  I grew up listening to West Texas groups - Roberto y Bobby Pulido, Flaco Jimenez, Freddie Fender, Tish Hinojosa and others.  Tough music to find in Massachusetts before the Internet!!  NOw, I can get the Chicano bands on Amazon Music.

True Story:  I was out in Anaheim, CA, for a convention in 1994 or so and visited Rancho Transaxles to drop off a core and pick up a new transaxle a couple of days later.  Getting back to the hotel in Anaheim after the drop-off in Fullerton, I got hopelessly lost in East LA.  Couldn't get enough of the wall murals over there and kept seeing signs for really cool looking restaurants and Bodegas.  Ended up stopping and having dinner at some place in East LA and chatted up the people at the counter.  They gave me the hairy eyeball at first - Honestly, while my Spanish is good I have this distinct Honduran accent (long story) and really look like a honky so it took a while, but eventually we had a good time and they told me about a group I should go listen to that night, nearby - "Los Super Seven" - A typical (I guess) East LA chicano band with a dynamite brass section and a lead singer (Raul Malo) that would blow you away.  I got them to go with me (I felt it was probably safer to have an "escort" and support) and the concert that I thought might last a couple of hours, finally broke up around 3am.  Best....Night......Ever!!!!!!!!   I have the "el Burro Song" on my short list of favs on my music server, along with a whole bunch of Spanish stuff.  Here it is for you non-Spanish folks - It's still wicked cool:

IS THAT AWESOME OR WHAT?!?!?!?!?!!??

I get to the booth at the tradeshow next day and tell the local field service people where I was last night.  Their eyebrows shot for the ceiling and they said "You were where???" They honestly thought my life was in danger.  I had a great night with some of the best band-fans ever.  Boy.....did my co-workers miss out!

@Gordon Nichols - Check these guys out.  They are my 2nd cousins.

http://jimenezbrosairrideandrodshop.com

Very Cool Todd.................Bruce

Gordon, with all due respect, how did you end up in East LA when you were going from Fullerton to Anaheim? They are contiguous.

East LA is miles from Fullerton in a totally different direction.

If you ever get to hear Raul Malo's version of almost anything, "Bad Company" for instance you will enjpy it.

Are you kidding me?  A kid from little old Massachusetts (an entire STATE which is maybe 1/4'th the size of greater LA) turned loose in LA with all those freeways and boulevards and Spanish-sounding names and stuff?  Here in "East Massachusetts" we have precisely three  major highways:  I-90 East/West, and I-95 or I-495 North/South.  That's it.  REALLY hard to get lost around here.   Besides, the ocean is always right where it's supposed to be, to the EAST, not the West!  Put the ocean on the wrong side and it messes us up all the time!

So I left Rancho (which, BTW, took me two HOURS to find in the first place) just before 6pm and headed what I thought was kinda South, but you have to remember that everything is flipped when you've only known that the coast is always to the east.  Everyone has this innate, internal compass that always tells us which way is North, right??  

So I finally find my way to the 5 and get on - going the wrong way, of course (I had thought that Anaheim was north of LA because we turned left out of LAX), but I don't know ANY of the names on the signs....I'm just hoping that, eventually, I'll see that magic place:  "Anaheim".  By the time I figured out that I was lost again (and sat in traffic for a while, too) I was down (up?) around Pico something and got on the 710(?) but probably was supposed to get on the second exit - Oh, well....  Besides.....the 5, the 710, didn't much matter -  everything was just creeping along, but by now (and in the pre-historic age of paper maps, of which I had none at the time) I figured I was pretty lost.

Picture this:  Middle-aged guy in sports clothes with my company's logo on them in a White Dodge Caravan (I needed the rental van to haul around those two transaxles) that screams "I don't belong here!", trying to find his way the heck Outa here....  Just imagine the looks one gets from the people on sidewalks or crosswalks when nobody looks like you.......

By now, it's pushing 8pm and that's when I figured I would just get something to eat (see story above).  The folks I met in the restaurant got me a map and detailed instructions to get back to Anaheim and the hotel from where Los Super Seven were playing.  I was actually surprised at the heavy amount of traffic on the 5 at 3 - 4 am.....   Don't you guys sleep out there?  WhatsamottaU?

So I get to the hotel (we stayed across the street from Disneyland) around 4 am and it seemed like as soon as my head hit the pillow the friggin' alarm went off to get up and head to breakfast.  I was supposed to give a presentation that afternoon so I disappeared from the booth mid-morning to go take a nap.  

The day after that, I went back to Fullerton for my new transaxle, but THIS time I had my trusty map and found Rancho in, like, 45 minutes, tops, but I cheated and brought one of the local field service guys with me.  Who knew it was, like, the next town over??  I thought it was halfway to San Francisco!!  Even made it back to the Trade show where I just happened to have a spot in one of the equipment transport crates that perfectly fit a VW transaxle if you stood it on the bell housing (It fits perfectly in the spot for a DEC Alpha pedestal server - Who knew???)   

How to pimp out your van in under a minute.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtSr-GLFz8s

@Gordon Nichols - Great story, but a white van with car parts in the back fits right into East LA.

A few years ago, my wife and I had the occasion to drive from Mass. to Maine, and having the ocean on the wrong side truly bothered me.  I felt like I was driving south.

I KNOW, right?   It messes wit'cha head!

If you're driving along and the water's on the right, you just KNOW you're heading north, right?  

Except for you "Left-Coasters".  

It's like living upside down in Australia.  You don't know you're upside down, it just feels right!

Another short anecdote:  The trade show rented all of Disneyland that evening just for convention goers.  Pretty cool going on ride after ride with no lines, ever.  I have no photo, but wish I did, of  me and two co-workers, walking down "Main Street, USA" in Disneyland at 10pm.   The place is entirely lit up like it's daylight outside and we were the only three people on the entire street.  The other two guys were Jim Veres and Jim Allchin, both of whom eventually went to Microsoft and made Bazillions.  I stayed at a couple of East Coast start-ups and made, maybe, 50¢.   

Only the 1 day is sold out, Thursday May 2, Rolling Stones etal....The other 7 days are available as either day passes or weekend passes. Having attended Jazz Fest for 25 years it is a bucket trip event and this being the 50th year the line up is insane. One of my vendors has offered us passes for both weekends, work precludes me from going this year. If someone wants to go let me know I may still be able to get the passes. 

OMG!  I wish I could make it.  You're right - that line up IS insane.

If anyone can make this festival AND get Rich's free passes, as Rich said, THIS IS A BUCKET LIST CALIBRE EVENT!  You'll kick yourself if you don't take him up on this event.  Contact him now!