Sam Doores of the Desolonds
Lake Pontchartrain, Louisiana
I know Sam through Gina and Phoebe. We met out by the old New Canal Lighthouse on Lake Pontchartrain. The New Basin Canal was built in the 1830s and filled in by 1950. It’s long gone except for the last few hundred yards where I picked up Sam. He stepped into the boat with brown cowboy boots. The sun was so bright that I lent him my glasses and he looked like he could have stepped off a 1970s album cover. The waves rocked us, but it was Sam that set the tempo.
Sam came out here via the Bay Area, busked the US, and then got his first break with a steady gig at an Irish Bar here in New Orleans. Incidentally, the New Canal where we started our row was built by primarily Irish labor. The canal was ruthless and A Celtic cross in the skinny park built over the canal marks the sacrifice.
Here in New Orleans Sam brought his multi-instrument talent to several bands, ‘Hurray for the Riffraff, and started a band called the Deslondes as well as continuing on solo projects. Now he’s producing for other musicians.
Sam played some songs and told me his parents had just moved to the other side of the lake. We gazed across to look for them but could not see the other side. Then Sam sang a song called ‘Cricket’s Creek’ and followed it with a song inspired by a book of epic poetry written by his great Grandfather, Henry Chapin called ‘To the End of the West.’ that followed the Vikings to the settlement of the west. Sam’s song inspired by it is called ‘The Wild Eden. It’s a song about the history of the Wild West. It’s a bittersweet love of a place and an unknown quantity that’s formed us, and one that we feel we have lost, and were perhaps culpable in the loss of. I liked his thoughtfulness and it reminded me of impermanence, much like the filled-in canal where he stepped into the boat. @samdoores