The Bingo! Show

by Brian Serpas

    A stolen bus and a deck of cards mixed with a little New Orleans charm helped some multimedia artists begin one of the most popular acts in town.
    Vaudeville meets the carnival where all of the performers provide the soundtrack, may be one way of summing up The Bingo! Show. The project began seven years ago in the back of Fiorella’s, a fried chicken restaurant in the French Quarter. Initially the idea of the show was a party that their friends could attend on Thursday nights. It was a modified setting of the usual scene, where barflies could continue to exist and get a chance to feel lucky. That simple idea evolved into a musical carnival that couldn’t be stopped, and has become a name most New Orleanians are familiar with. But the act has taken breaks here and there, in the form of a small hiatus at one point for personal growth, or a breath of air to break the complacency. All in all, the performance continues and show-goers will see delightful tricks and hear New Orleans sounds.
    Clint Maegden (the song writer and lead vocalist), Ron Rona (master of ceremonies), and Matt Vaughan (Mr. The Turk), have been the mainstays of the group. Over the years they’ve had various musicians and performers be a part of the project, such as members of Morning 40 Federation here in New Orleans and Bones from Baton Rouge. Current members also include Earl Scioneaux III as The Madd Wikkid, Marty LaStrapes as Caramel, Chris Davis as Cakewalk, and Veronica Russell as the sultry Veve LaRoux. Every member has an important hand in the performance and musical aspect, each adding their own take on circus-style entertainment and New Orleans music. I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Ron Rona, a.k.a. Ronnie Numbers, Master of Ceremonies for The Bingo! Show. The Royal Blend on Royal St. in the heart of the French Quarter was the perfect setting for our conversation. Cigarettes and coffee were the perfect stimulants for some insight on the group and their plans for the Voodoo Fest.
     
Would it be right to assume that you and Clint Maegden are the founding members of the group?
Definitely. Clint and I worked at Angeli then Fiorella’s together, started talking about presenting something in the back of the place and that’s how it began.

So, Bingo! Where did that idea come from? Clint was out on a delivery one day and saw all these vintage bingo cards in the window of this little boutique on Esplanade and Dauphine. At first, the owner wanted like $300 for them. Clint waited a couple of months and went back again and she let go of them for $25. He shows them to me and suggests we start having a little party every Thursday night.

You guys were actually playing bingo?
It started as a party for our friends. Every week we would have a guest caller, Luke Allen from Happy Talk Band for example, and very quickly it evolved into this happening.

What about the musical aspect of it all?
Clint was doing Liquidrone at the time and he found a pump organ and started writing all these songs, ballads and such that didn’t really fit into that project. So we just started using those songs for The Bingo! Show.

How did the affiliation with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band begin?
Ben Jaffe, whose family founded Preservation Hall Jazz, came in and saw the show. He really took a liking to it and got Clint involved. After Katrina, they did a big tour for the Hall’s 45th Anniversary and invited Clint, Matt Vaughn (Matt the Turk), and me as Ronnie Numbers to go with them. Eventually The Bingo! Show did some touring with them. We were the opening act.

In the beginning, I remember seeing you all cruising around town and performing in a bus.
We bought a beautiful fucking 1970s school bus for a little guerilla theatre. Just so happened, right before we bought it two escaped convicts stole it from a church. They were driving around the country and robbing parts from auto stores, then selling the parts to different garages. When we bought the bus, the rig they built for gas siphoning was still in it.

Wow. All right, well, visually, the band fits perfectly in New Orleans. Conceptually, where does The Bingo! Show stand?
We didn’t plan on that. There was no plan in the beginning as to how the project would be presented. It just happened naturally.

Would you go as far as to say the character of New Orleans helped you?
Watching. I don’t think any of us would take credit for creating something original. It’s more like seeing some crazy shit some day, having an idea and amplifying it. So yes.

How is it that you have a brilliant circus tent covering the stage for the Voodoo Fest?
Last year we had it and I used Google, what an amazing thing, to help me find it. Meeting this family was awesome. The Anastasini family, a circus family that goes back five generations and is based in Florida, rented it to us. The family shows up, literally a caravan of RVs. Out comes Renato Anastasini, the Grandfather Guru of the troupe, poodle in arms, and introduces himself. Built like a truck and the sweetest old dude you’d ever meet. He introduces me to one of the aerialists. Drop dead gorgeous. Kind of reminds me of Adrianna from the Sopranos. So we hung out with them and they’re running the show. It’s not like they brought in local labor or anything. They built the tent, and they will be helping us again this year.


So what can we expect from The Bingo! Parlour this Year?
Inside we create a whole cabaret feel. We will be performing on Friday and Saturday. There will also be acts from genres we haven’t had before to draw different people to the tent. The Meat Puppets will be playing, and also Down. The Squirrel Nut Zippers are playing and Luke Winslow King. There will also be Quintron and Ms. Pussycat, Preservation Hall Jazz Band, and Brother Taisuke Mass Choir from Niigaata Japan, which has 50 people. Many more over the weekend will also be performing.

    As you see, there are many reasons to visit The Bingo! Parlour this year. The scene in the tent will be like a mellow circus with a friendly vibe and a variety of cool music from all walks of life. The group of characters that has created this parlour invites you to share their idiosyncratic joy. They ask you to be drunk and merry, goofy and spooky, and bob and sway to anything from Japanese gospel music to heavy metal. Voodoo Fest always has great bands and fun things going on during its three day weekend. There will be plenty of music to tune in to as you walk around City Park. But be advised, The Bingo! Show is not to be missed.