<\/a><\/p>\nA Swiftie with her birthday present.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Arceneaux is blasting music onto Ryan Street. Today, it\u2019s JD McPherson, who he will be seeing in concert later, in Lafayette. \u201cHe\u2019s a guitarist with a voice and style that\u2019s reminiscent of Little Richard. People passing by are drawn into the shop by the music coming out of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arceneaux realizes that if the powers-that-be can\u2019t see what the past provides, we run the risk of losing the history and the romance of what music can still provide.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cDowntown Lake Charles was a ghost town when I came in the mid-90s,\u201d he says. \u201cFor over 40 years, you could walk into my grandfather\u2019s shop though, purchase an LP or 45, and leave with it in a paper bag. You\u2019d get home, unwrap it from its plastic cover, pull that record out of its sleeve, and play it over and over until you wore out the grooves. That\u2019s what we all did.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arceneaux says the revitalization of downtown Lake Charles has been an ongoing quest ever since he returned. Despite hurricanes and other setbacks, he still believes it can continue to grow into a place where residents and tourists can shop, dine and remember what made it unique and lively.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cIt\u2019s cultural and romantic pulse, alive and well once again,\u201d Arceneaux says.\u00a0\u201cJust today, I had some Australian tourists come in. I would\u2019ve loved to recommend that they visit an old local recording studio, with its building still intact, housing a retail shop and diner inside, with that smell. We lost that, but folks still want it. None of the places that were part of the SWLA musical roots still exist today. We\u2019ve torn them down, demolished them. I\u2019m just a middle-aged kid, a musician that still plays gigs, but one who wants that history to not be forgotten.\u201d<\/p>\n
What is it about the music from our past that fills us with a desire to hear, touch and, yes, even smell it? Was it the simplicity of the melodies, the truth hidden within its lyrics, or the stories behind the performers and their performances? For a visionary like Arceneaux, it\u2019s all of the above, and then some.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s seeing a kid, a teenager, who\u2019s getting a record, or finding a record for the first time,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s that look of wonder on their face. You fold the cover out on your bed. You stare at the pictures as you play the music. You read about the artist. All that went away with the digital age. It became too easy \u2014 there\u2019s no contact, no physicality to that whole experience anymore.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s really what this is all about though, isn\u2019t it? When you find music, it gives you an identity. It may even become your identity. It\u2019s your first love when you think about it. I remember that first time for me; I still have my first record player. Double Fantasy <\/i>by John and Yoko came out about a month before Lennon was killed. I was nine. When my grandfather gave it to me, he explained how much John had meant to everyone who loved his music. I played it non-stop for months.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cFifty-two years after the Beatles played their last live performance together in England, my Beatles band, Lucy In Disquise, played that same set on a rooftop, on the corner of Broad and Bilbo, right here in Lake Charles. So, when I say it\u2019s going to change a kid\u2019s life, it\u2019s because it probably changed mine.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
What makes vinyl a $1.2 billion industry today? For most who buy vinyl records, it\u2019s that whole sensory rush. There\u2019s the sound, of course, but it\u2019s also the romance \u2014 the feel and smell of an LP \u2014 that music from a digital source just cannot provide.\u00a0 That is what motivates Bam Arceneaux, musician and [&hellip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12177,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[4],"yoast_head":"\n
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