Meter Made
Widespread Panic keyboard player Jojo Hermann says the Meters taught him the importance of the groove.
by Brett MilanoHermann may be the biggest New Orleans music enthusiast in Widespread Panic, but the city's influence on the whole of the Athens, Ga., jam band is hard to miss. Panic has toured and recorded with the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and its rotating list of cover tunes includes Dr. John's "Walk on Gilded Splinters" as well as the Meters' barnstormer, "It Ain't No Use." Adds Hermann: "I'm sure I've jammed on 'Cissy Strut' too many times to count. Along with another instrumental of theirs, '6V6 LA.' That's a great little tune that I've played a lot over the years. There's a lot of influences in Widespread Panic, but the Meters would be on everybody's list. I think they're the only band that all of us can agree on."
As a college dropout in the late '70s, Hermann lived in New York City and got to see the original Meters at the tail end of their run. "All the musicians in New York were turning me onto them. At the time, I was just starting to play. For me, it started with the Doors, then I moved on to Professor Longhair. But the Meters -- they had a sound and they had a groove. And if you listen to our jams, you can hear how many of Art's licks that I've been sneaking in." In fact, Hermann is such a fan that he briefly considered blowing off a gig in Raleigh, N.C., when he heard of the original Meters' scheduled Fest reunion. Widespread Panic members are now writing songs for their first studio album in two years, which will be recorded this coming winter. "There are nine or 10 songs written so far," Hermann says. "We're just getting started, so we're going to let the music take us where it goes. But it's sounding like it's gonna be pretty funky."
