Rhythm ‘N’ Bayous: A Road Map To Louisiana Music

“In his new film, RHYTHM ‘N’ BAYOUS, Mr. Mugge returns to the South (this time to Louisiana) to compile a singing dictionary of the state’s roots music styles and assorted hybrids, from the blues to ‘swamp pop’ to the fusion of Cajun, Creole and rock ‘n’ roll known as zydeco.

Part musical travelogue, part anthology, part archival document, RHYTHM ‘N’ BAYOUS is a rambling journey loosely divided into four sections. Begun as the official chronicle of a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame bus tour…it turns into a more informal, out-of-the-way journey to blues and zydeco clubs, gospel churches and radio stations, and musical family gatherings in backwater bayous.

A number of the performances are as rough-hewn as the tiny clubs in which they are filmed. But RHYTHM ‘N’ BAYOUS is finally not about being polished. It’s about the organic process by which a culture expresses itself though music and the hybrids that evolve naturally when these cultures begin to mingle. That, after all, is how rock ‘n’ roll was born.”

– Stephen Holden, The New York Times