Preach, brother
If you see Brother Dege perform, he might end the show with fireworks shooting out of his dobro. Literally.
“I think of it as incinerating the traditional concept of how roots music should be performed,” he says. “Growing up on punk and rock ‘n’ roll tends to make one less inclined to be like those genteel indie folk performers.”
True, there is nothing traditional about the sound of Dege, a Lafayette musician who can be seen at this year’s Baton Rouge Blues Festival. Even he struggles to describe his music.
“It’s like a mildly experimental, psychedelic take on Delta blues music,” he says. “Then, that’s mixed with punk rock ethos and a love for great songs and rad riffs. I love Dylan, Sabbath and Sonic Youth, and I love the slide.”
Dege’s recent success is even less conventional than his heady musical mix.
In 2012, he finished his second album How to Kill a Horse—a process that was fraught with challenges. The 10-track LP was recorded in an empty warehouse during the summer heat and winter freeze. In the middle of the sessions, he went through a “soul-crushing breakup.”
“It was like climbing a mountain at night in a storm wearing nothing but dirty underwear,” he says.
Dege was set to release the album and move on with his life, one that saw local acclaim thanks to his 2010 release Folk Songs of the American Longhair but was filled with odd jobs like cab driving and helping at a men’s homeless shelter.
“There’s no trust fund or family fortune to fall back on,” he says. “It’s like working without a net. I work and do my creative things. I’m just into making art, even if it’s sitting on the side of the road and playing with rocks.”
But Dege got a break in 2012 when an agent with movie director Quentin Tarantino called.
Tarantino wanted to use Dege’s “Too Old to Die Young” in his film Django Unchained. The musician couldn’t say no, and his song was heard on a national scale. After being featured in the Oscar-winning film, he toured the United States and Europe. He finally got to release How to Kill a Horse last year, too.
Surprisingly, though, Dege says his music is still an “underground operation.”
“There’s no caviar or Jacuzzi limousines,” he says. “I’m still in a van. There’s no tour bus. There are no five-star hotels. It’s mostly sleeping in vans, motels, strangers’ apartments At least the scenery has gotten more interesting. Sleeping on the floor is way more tolerable when you wake up and see Brussels or Paris out the window.”
