The Funky Meters, one of the most heavily sampled acts of all time, bring their pioneering New Orleans sound to New Zealand next week, writes Scott Kara.
George Porter jnr speaks in a laid-back dialect dominated by grooves, rhythms, and pockets. For around 45 years the bass player in legendary New Orleans funk band the Meters - now known as the Funky Meters - has come up with the tightest grooves and slotted into the meanest pockets on the planet.
And though he wasn't the band's most focused songwriter, preferring to "get high all the time" in the band's 70s heyday, his basslines had an unflinching and heavy funkiness.
"I knew how to hold a pocket," he says laughing, ahead of the band's show at the Powerstation tomorrow night.
The Meters - along with fellow musician, composer and producer Allen Toussaint - ushered in a powerful era of New Orleans music in the 70s. The music coming out of the city at that time put it back on the musical map and made it one of the funkiest towns around, with the Meters' music influencing everything from hip-hop to drum 'n' bass in the future. In hip-hop especially the Meters have been sampled - some might even say pillaged - with abandon.
"It's hard to put my finger on exactly what we did," says Porter, who founded the Meters in 1965 with keyboardist and vocalist Art Neville, guitarist Leo Nocentelli and drummer Zigaboo Modeliste (with percussionist Cyril Neville joining later). "But I think that we probably did start something again [in New Orleans] because there was some stuff that we were doing that hadn't been done before."
He's being vague, but when Porter starts talking in that unique muso lingo of his, you start getting a picture of what impact the Meters had back in the day.
"When we came along as a rhythm section we were doing something else no one else was doing with the New Orleans kind of thing, with the pockets and the grooves that were being done. We changed the playing field a little bit."
He and Nocentelli played jazz, Modeliste was "more of a street player", and Neville was "old school" having started out in the New Orleans music scene in the 50s. Porter reckons the combination of all four lent their music an edge over anything else that was around at the time.
And when they went into the studio in 1969 to record their self-titled debut album with producer Toussaint, he honed their sound even more, stripping it back and giving it space.
"I was a very busy player, I played a lot of notes, and I believe I walked away from the Allen Toussaint sessions learning about space. His favourite line was it's not what you play, it's what you don't play that makes the groove. And I still live by that now."
The Meters and much of the band's earlier material was minimal yet funky, characterised by songs like Cissy Strut ("I've learned to hate that song because I've been playing it for 45 years, but it's still on the [set] list," he chuckles) and the syncopated double-dutch funk of The Handclapping Song. Into the mid-70s tracks like Liar and Fire on the Bayou were a little tougher and staunch, and then there was the loved-up lope of Just Kissed My Baby.
"And as well, the band grew from simplicity to becoming great songwriters because originally we were groove makers and then as we grew older we developed our songwriting talents."
But it came to an end in 1977 when the band played their last show as the Meters. Porter believes the band fell apart because "the individuals got more popular than the band".
Porter and Nocentelli were in demand as session musicians for big name artists (in fact the last time Porter was in New Zealand was in the early 90s with solo Talking Head David Byrne), and Art Neville formed a band with his brothers (you might have heard of the Neville Brothers).
But then there was the bad management (or "lack of management" as Porter puts it) that hindered the band. It also didn't help that they never had a breakthrough hit, and after they split up lawsuits over publishing rights and royalties were launched.
"We were getting hit [but] most of it is in the past," he says, with himself, Neville and Nocentelli resolving their dispute many years ago, while Modeliste is still in litigation.
You get the feeling it's all about the music these days with the set list predominantly from the late-60s and early-70s Meters era - as well as some random songs that they love playing.
"We are definitely indeed a jam band with songs. Anything can happen - and most of the time it does."
LOWDOWN
Who: The Funky Meters (aka The Meters)
Where and when: The Powerstation, tomorrow
Essential albums: The Meters (1969); Look-Ka Py Py (1970); Rejuvenation (1974); Fire on the Bayou (1975)
-TimeOut
