Comments on: Baghdad on the Bayou: Cyril Neville Talks About Threatened Projects and Losing the Home He Loves

By: New Orleans News Ladder

New Orleans News Ladder — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 15:32:40 +0000

Mellisa, let us not kick someone when they are still down, wherever they hang their hat~~but rather let us rip out their heart, stomp it into the broken pavement and drag it through the filthy streets to Crucifixion in the City That Care Forgot and the Presidente left for dead…Jeeez Louie!~viva de Maid du Orleans~écrasez l’infâme~chere’yat Bourgeois Nievete!

By: Georgianne Nienaber

Georgianne Nienaber — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 08:19:00 +0000

Frankly, I should not give a D#@^, but since Cyril was brave enough to step forward in solidarity with the dispossessed, I will break my own rules and respond to this post. Please find the archives of the Times-Picayune on November 16, 2007. There is an extensive discussion of the “hard feelings” towards the Neville Brothers. I did not interview the brothers, I interviewed Cyril.

BUT..you will note that Aaron and Cyril did lose their homes. Charles has lived in MA since the 1990’s.They did not perform in 2006 because of one of the brother’s asthma, but Art did perform with another group in 2006. 2007 was canceled because Aaron’s wife had a relapse of cancer. She died in January and Aaron returned to NOLA for the first time since Katrina to bury her. Art also had near fatal back sugery in 2007. There is more, but why go on? Is that enough heartache and heartbreak to satisfy the vile comments psoted here?

The writer of the previous post is so filled with hatred that one can only wonder at her motives, if he/she is areal person.

As far as the state of the projects, readers of this blog should go to http://www.peopleshurricane.org and check out the information including video testimony that many of the projects are totally livable. I have seen one that is, in person.

I was born and bred in Chicago and consider it home, even though I have not lived there for 40 years.

By: Melissa Gutierrez

Melissa Gutierrez — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 00:11:23 +0000

This story is all wrong.

For starters, everyone on this city remembers how the Nevilles turned their backs on the city for the first few years after the storm. You can’t change that now, Cyril.

Here’s what he said (which contradicts this article) after the storm:

—Neville said he has no desire to return to a New Orleans that will never be the same. —
—”My new home is here in Austin,” he said.

Why didn’t they play Jazz Fest? Why did he and the other Nevilles rag the city for a couple years? And, no, they weren’t only ragging the “authorities.” This city is going to have a long memory about where the Nevilles stood after the storm.

As for being “born and bred in the bricks,” he may have been born in the projects, but I don’t know how much time he actually spent there. It’s common knowledge that the Nevilles grew up on Valence St., miles from any projects. Don’t believe me? Go look at the Nevilles’ own website:

–[Art]He still lives in the same Thirteenth Ward block of Valence Street where he and his siblings were raised in New Orleans.– click here.

As for the projects, they were absolute hellholes that only a lunatic would want to bring back. Don’t take my word for it, YouTube the words “new orleans” and “projects” to see what they were really like.