NEW ORLEANS FESTIVALS - Jazz Fest Features

ROCK & BLUES - George Porter

The inauspicious founding of the Meters in the mid-'60s started the career of one of funk's most influential bands. The project ended before most people realized.

"I don't think by the time the band broke up we realized how strong our reputation was," bassist George Porter says. "We were really striving for something."

The band was playing on Bourbon Street as Art Neville and Neville Sound when Allen Toussaint and Marshall Sehorn hired them for studio work. They also recorded four songs of their own, the seminal Sophisticated Cissy, Cordova, Cissy Strut and Ride Your Pony.

"We went back to Bourbon Street," Porter says. "A few months later Marshall called us back to sign papers and handed us a check."

The Meters were off and by the early '70s were on tour with the Rolling Stones. They would become one of hip hop's most sampled bands. But internal differences arose and the band split. The possibility of a reunion is floated almost annually, though some contractual differences make it doubtful.

"Porter has assembled several bands including versions of his Pardners, and the new project PBS, which preach the New Orleans syncopated beats and thick funk. He's also become an avidly sought-after hired gun for recording and touring.

Gov't Mule approached Porter in the wake of bassist Allen Woody's death to play on a tribute album collaboration. Porter became one of the jam band's fan favorites.