Events in New Orleans on the weekend of May 17th:

SATURDAY 5/17

Chef Menteur, Metronome the City, Circle Bar, 10pm

Damn Hippies, Checkpoint Charlie’s, 6pm

Free Jazz, Brah!, Dragon’s Den (Upstairs), 10pm

Friend Fest f/ Fatter Than Albert, Black Belt, Meadow Flow, Emergence, A Living Soundtrack, White Colla Crimes, Smiley With a Knife, Handsome Willy’s

Good Enough For Good Times, d.b.a., 11pm, $5

Rosie Ledet, One Eyed Jacks, 9pm

Statuary Triangle, MC Shellshock, Arajay, DJ Dentistry, Hi-Ho Lounge, 10pm

Tribute to the Godfather of Soul f/ Bootsy Collins and more, House Of Blues

SUNDAY 5/18

Good Luck, Attack the Gas Station, Shark Whale, Dragon’s Den, 7pm, $5

Linnzi Zaorski, d.b.a., 6pm

The Nerostotles, Circle Bar

Schatzy, d.b.a., 10pm

She Wants Revenge, Be Your Own Pet, The Virgins, Switches, House Of Blues

Test Patterns (ala Gito Gito Hustler), Hi-Ho Lounge, 10pm

This interview originally appeared in the March 2007 issue of ANTIGRAVITY.

To celebrate After The Deluge getting picked up by Pantheon, I thought I’d post our original talk with artist Josh Neufeld, which coincided with A.D.’s debut over at SMITH. Interested parties may want to know that the current issue of DC/Vertigo’s American Splendor mini-series features some of Josh’s work.

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Josh Neufeld has become adept at telling graphic stories of a personal nature — his comic series The Vagabonds chronicles his and wife Sari’s travels around the world, his artwork frequently tells Harvey Pekar’s unique slice-of-life stories in American Splendor, and his 2004 graphic novel A Few Perfect Hours (and Other Stories From Southeast Asia & Central Europe) won him a prestigious grant from the Xeric Foundation. Neufeld’s latest projects feature both personal and, for the first time, communal stories. In early ’06 Neufeld released Katrina Came Calling, a chapbook-style collection of prose journal entries written in late ’05 during a three-week tour of duty with the Red Cross in Biloxi and Gulfport, Mississippi. In January ’07 the prologue of Neufeld’s new sequential art project, New Orleans: After The Deluge, premiered on SMITH, an upstart website that celebrates personal storytelling and, in 2006, published Shooting War, a highly acclaimed webcomic about the war in Iraq. After The Deluge features several real-life people affected by Katrina (including AG editor Leo McGovern), and Neufeld intends to weave those people’s stories together in an attempt to show readers that New Orleans isn’t a city full of statistics; that the populace of the Gulf Coast isn’t simply full of people either with or without the means and/or desire to leave, return and rebuild; that our region, even a year and a half after Katrina, is brimming with grey area.

ANTIGRAVITY spoke with Neufeld about the reasons he created A.D., what he hopes readers take away from these stories, and how this project is different from anything he’s done before. (more…)

We just received word that New Orleans: After The Deluge, the webcomic that features the real-life Katrina stories of six New Orleanians, including mine, has secured a publishing deal with the graphic novel division of Pantheon, which itself is a division of Random House.

A.D. author Josh Neufeld joins a very distinguished catalog of authors that includes some of my personal favorites: Jessica Abel’s La Perdida, Charles Burns’ Black Hole, Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, Craig Thompson’s Goodbye Chunky Rice and Art Spiegelman’s Maus.

Neufeld has planned for the web version of A.D. to run 12 chapters, and the GN version will be expanded to further delve into all the characters’ stories. A.D.’s set for a Summer 2009 release and will appear in both hard and softcover editions.

It’s kind of mind-blowing to be a character in a webcomic, much less a graphic novel published by a company like Pantheon. How awesome is this?

After a year and a few months at it, nine-piece local band Antenna Inn’s sleek, smart and superbly constructed suites of jazzy prog rock are starting to draw a large crowd. They’ve been headlining shows more frequently and are about to release their solid new album, Do/Work, with a party at Tipitina’s. Their’s is the sound of a band working through ideas together for the first time, as they realize their talent and range. As good as Do/Work is, you get the feeling that their next album is going be the one—it’s going to be crazy. For now, though, Do/Work and its highlights: the angelic and Beach Boys-ish back-up vocals and the jazz dirge breakdown at the end of “Ernest Borgnine,” the high frequency bass and bright keyboard on “Ink,” the disorienting horns on “Stockholm Syndrome,” and the swingin’ verses in “Nobody Expects The Spanish Inquisition.” Though the choruses are pretty catchy, there’s something sublime about each song’s instrumental stretches. The lyrics are dark, anxious, and purging, sometimes malevolent and sometimes self-help-like: “If you’re looking for love, stop, because you will never be happy, even when you are. You will always be lonely…c’mon, people, fall back out of love. Call your mother. Mothers, call your sons.” There’s also a rolling confidence throughout the band—one that could easily be perceived as arrogant, except that confidence is tempered with a clear love of not only New Orleans and its rock scene but the city’s traditional music, as well as a want, almost a need, to create a unifying force that makes it all more successful.

ANTIGRAVITY recently sat down with drummer Eric Rogers and talked about Do/Work, the band’s fan base, and his good, old-fashioned sibling interaction with brother Ryan. (more…)

Today is Free Comic Book Day! Local stores have FCBD activities going on all day, including sales and signings, and you can grab a pretty good assortment of special free comics.

If you’re in Metairie, head over to Media Underground Comics (524 Shores Dr., Suite 13, basically W. Esplanade and Clearview) from 11am-7pm.

If you’re in New Orleans, head over to More Fun Comics (8200 Oak St., next to Z’otz) from 11-6, where you’ll have the added bonus of seeing Gabe Soria sign copies of Life Sucks beginning at 2pm. You can can read AG’s interview with Gabe and find out more about Life Sucks here.

You can see the selection of Free Comic Book Day books here.

You can download the May issue now, or pick up the print issue later today! We’ll hit the printer this afternoon and start at the Fair Grounds and work our way out from there.

We’ve got Antenna Inn, Flight, Mondo Bizarro, JazzFest Week 1 photos by Zack Smith, a review of the new Breeders album, tons of reviews and all our regular columns, including a Saints Draft ‘08 wrap-up.

Next month: AG’s 4-year anniversary!

ANTIGRAVITY has learned the three headlining rock acts for the ‘08 Voodoo Music Experience: Nine Inch Nails, R.E.M. and Stone Temple Pilots.

Set for October 24th, 25th and 26th at City Park, the tenth Voodoo also features traditional New Orleans artists the Neville Brothers, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and Irving Mayfield’s New Orleans Jazz Orchestra, as well as the Bingo! Show.

Tickets go on sale ($100 for a 3-day pass) this Friday, May 2nd at TheTenthRitual.com.

Saints subplots were flying just before NFL Draft 2008, where the team was scheduled to pick no.10 overall. We knew the Saints’ two biggest needs (Defensive Tackle and Cornerback), and pretty much the 1st-round caliber talents the team was interested in, both of whom the Saints would have to trade up for: USC DT Sedrick Ellis and a player New Orleans coveted most of all, LSU DT Glenn Dorsey. If a trade couldn’t be made, the speculation was that the Bengals, picking immediately before the Saints, would take Ellis and the Saints would be left to take an excellent LB, USC’s Keith Rivers. Other rumors swirled: would the Saints trade their second round pick (no.40 overall) to the Giants for TE Jeremy Shockey? Would they trade with the Eagles for starting CB Lito Sheppard, made available after Philly signed Asante Samuel but who wants a new, big contract? (more…)

Hey everyone, thanks for checking out the new AG blog. We have a classic good news/bad news situation for you. We just talked to our web designer and he’s going to have a brand new, all original AG site for us sometime next week. The good news is that it’ll feature all the same permalink and blog capabilities that WordPress is giving us now—the bad news is that, if you’ve linked to a story here or bookmarked this page, that link is likely not going to go to the new site and may not work once we’ve launched.

We’ll do our best to make the transition as seamless as possible (like providing new links on the stories already posted here), but with that in mind we’re going to refrain from posting any more new or classic stories until the new site’s up. Still look for news, calendar info and random rants in the meantime, though!

We apologize for the confusion—we weren’t expecting a new website any time soon but we feel this will work out well for everyone. Stick with us, please!

In this week’s edition of Pro Football Weekly’s “The Way We Hear It” column, it’s rumored that the Saints are interested in moving up from their no.10 position in this year’s draft. PFW claims the Saints are going after USC defensive tackle Sedrick Ellis (who new Saints D-line coach Ed Orgeron recruited) and think they have to move up to at least no.8 (Baltimore currently holds that spot) to snipe the Cincinnati Bengals, also rumored to be strongly interested in Ellis.

New Orleans radio station 870AM reportedly claimed on yesterday’s SportsTalk that the Saints were interested in moving all the way up to no.2 (St. Louis’ pick). If that’s true, it could mean the Saints are intersted in one player: former LSU Tiger Glenn Dorsey.

Mock drafts almost universally have the Saints (if they stay at no.10) picking either USC’s versatile LB Keith Rivers or one of the top cornerbacks available. The way I see it, if you believe that second year pro Usama Young will step up and newly-signed Randall Gay will shore up our cornerback spots (along with Jason David playing better and Mike McKenzie being able to return from his knee injury), defensive tackle is the glaring hole in our defense. If you can grab one of these two DTs, it immediately gives you a playoff-caliber defense, on paper at least.

Keep in mind that it’s also rumored the Saints are interested in trading for two Pro Bowl-type players: Eagles CB Lito Sheppard (whose want for a new contract might impede things) and Giants TE Jeremy Shockey (the Saints have reportedly already offered NY a second round pick and safety Roman Harper).

Is it possible that the Saints forgo a complete rookie class and exit NFL Draft ‘08 with Dorsey/Ellis, Sheppard and Shockey? It would certainly mean the team feels the Super Bowl window with this squad has a one or two year opening. It’s possible, but it’s definitely going to be an exciting draft.