Bentley's Bandstand
There are some bands--and stories--that deserve to be heard. The Iguanas are a New Orleans bunch that carries the torch for real rock, played for people who love to sing, scream, dance and drink whenever they want to. The group has built a devoted following from scratch the right way: playing endless club gigs and treating their fans with respect. Like the Radiators before them, they’re a people’s band, and proud of it. The quartet gathers together a boatload of incendiary influences, from down home rhythm & blues to spicy Latin grooves, also weaving in plenty of hot jazz and rollicking rock through the songs, but never makes a look-at-us big deal out of it. It’s all done on the natch, and like a lot of things in the Crescent City, it’s hard to define exactly what makes them so strong. In the end, it’s probably everything thrown into their musical gumbo that makes it so cool. After Hurricane Katrina, the Iguanas had to run for the border, ending up in Austin, Texas and biding their time before returning home to start the long rebuilding process. If You Should Ever Fall On Hard Times is their first album since the storm, and is surely a huge source of pride for these men. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that this is the best album they’ve ever made, but even more amazing is how you can feel the enduring soul of the city on every note played and sung here. The Iguanas got back home. Let’s repeat that: The Iguanas got back home. For those in New Orleans who went through the rising water and the devastation of their city afterward, this band is offering hope on each of these moving and momentous songs that the healing has begun.
