From 'Boston Town' to the Big Easy
Former new waver Digney Fignus is back with a new album.
By James Sullivan Globe Correspondent / (photo: David Kamerman/Globe Staff)
 September 5, 2008 LEXINGTON - The folks at FEMA might want to check with Digney Fignus the next time they're tracking another hurricane approaching New Orleans. Fignus, a onetime major-label new waver from Boston who has utterly reinvented himself as a roots-music storyteller, was rehearsing material for his first album of a projected three-record Big Easy song cycle when Katrina hit in 2005.
This week, just as Hurricane Gustav was making landfall, Fignus was gearing up for a record-release party to celebrate "Talk of the Town," his second album of songs about the fictitious bayou scoundrel Johnnie Boudreaux. Fignus plays Wednesday at Scullers.
For all the authenticity of the performer's steady-rolling, two-stepping songs about voodoo queens, riverboat grifters, and Basin Street prowlers, it's strange but true that Fignus has never been to New Orleans.
"Why screw things up by going?" he says with a smile, sitting in the front room of his girlfriend's sunny home here. It's the same town where the singer grew up in his parents' "little G.I. house" as Bobby Brown, progeny of a long line of working-class journeymen.
"My dad was a bus driver for the MTA," says Fignus. "His dad drove for the Boston Elevated, and his dad was a train worker in England."
That lineage might help explain the singer's far-flung imagination. After falling in with Boston's post-punk scene in the late 1970s, he chose himself an alter ego.
"I was hanging out with all these whacked-out artists, doing crazy stuff," he recalls. "Everyone was changing their names."
Looking up his name in Billboard's musicians' directory, he was dismayed to discover a whole page of Bobby Browns. So he put a twist on one of his own song lyrics - "dig the fig" - and created a fanciful moniker suitable for a Roman emperor. |
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Trouble on the Levee | Figtone
By: TED DROZDOWSKI
10/24/2006 1:02:51 PM Fignus emerged on the Boston scene in the ’90s as an accomplished pop-punk songwriter. In 1984, his “Girl with the Curious Hand” won MTV’s “Basement Tapes” competition and led to a major-label deal. Now, with this indie release, he’s rebuilt himself as a roots musician, riding roughshod on an easy-to-digest but sophisticated blend of blues, folk, Cajun, and old-time music with a rock-and-roll heart. The 12 songs, which tell the story of a protagonist whose life is tossed by a Louisiana flood, were in the works well before Katrina.
Fignus’s clear-toned, flexible voice puts his story of loss, faith, and hope across with ease, and his ensemble’s playing is always dead on — precise, spare, yet loose enough to serve the backcountry spirit that the lyrics evoke. The central cut is “Trouble on the Levee,” where the rising water becomes a metaphor for life’s pains. But by the end of the disc — after we’ve had doses of Cajun swing and some barrelhouse boogie — Fignus’s Johnnie Boudreaux is on the road to personal redemption through love, sweet, love.
Digney Fignus | “Steppin’ Out” benefit for Dimock Community Health Center at Boston Sheraton Hotel, 39 Dalton St, Boston | November 4 | 617.442.8800 x 1006 |
 Digney Fignus - Trouble on the Levee
Recorded and mixed by Andre Kolarevic at
Boston Audio Group and John Bono at Newbury Sound
Mastered by Toby Mountain at Northeastern Digital Recording, Inc. Like any good entertainer, Digney Fignus knows to lead with sex and murder and does so with first track "Boudreaux," a story-song that leaves the listener following along with the narrative of the lyrics just as closely as with the thunk-bump one-two swing and strum of the backing music.
Digney Fignus cavorts and romps his way through the 12 tracks on Trouble on the Levee. He's aided and abetted by 14 friends on mandolins, trombones, accordions, and all other manners of instruments that are plucked, squeezed, or tapped. His strong bayou accent comes off as a mix between a Cajun Johnny Cash and an adult Disney character that Brer Rabbit might have hung out with off the set.
The songs and sounds on Trouble are so infectious that the band quickly grows to include the listener. The strong folk grooves on this record make it easy to be swept up in the sepia-toned river along with the other travelers on board for this trip. Fignus himself sits up front at the helm, holding the wheel and tipping his hat to the trawlers dangling rods off the starboard bow.
Digney Fignus is perhaps not suitable music for your high-pressure evening commute, but it does serve as a window into a hazy, warm-colored world of swamps, storytellers, and shufflin' swang, as Farmer Fran might say. (Figtone Music) C. D. DiGuardia |
ROOTS MUSIC REPORT| CD: Trouble on the Levee | | Label: Figtone Music | | Rating: | | Reviewed by Brenda Barbee - RMR staff reviewer |
 Digney Fignus fans are in for a treat with his new CD “Trouble on the Levee”. If you are not presently a Fignus fan, you most likely will be after listening to his newest release. The Boston based singer/songwriter has teamed up with some great musicians and has produced a truly great CD.
And what a novel idea. You actually get a novel – a story book about the life and times of Johnnie Boudreaux. Each track conveys a scintillating episode, a testament to Digney’s imaginative songwriting talent. The really cool part is that these entertaining stories are set to such great up tempo music. The lively music is perfect to get you in an upbeat mood.
To hear this CD, you would never guess Digney is based in the Northeast. He sounds like he was born, bred and entrenched in bayou country, adding the authenticity of his excellent work. He has a “cajunesque” sound but it is uniquely Digney Fignus and it is uniquely top quality. Couple all this with strong vocals and some awesome musicianship and you have got a real winner of a CD.
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88.1FM WYCE
Grand Rapids, MichiganDIGNEY FIGNUS
Album: Trouble on the Levee
Label: Figtone
Genre: Folk
Date Entered: February 15, 2006
This is a Concept CD that takes place back in 1927 {the first time the Levee's broke} and flooded the Crescent City. It tells the story of Johnnie Boudreaux and how a man "too good lookin' for his own good" could live himself to death and still manage to laugh at his own funeral.
This CD is pure acoustic magic from a man who in the 1980's led the Punk band the Spikes. His vocals & story telling abilities fall somewhere between Marc Cohn and John Fogerty, but with a name like Digney he remains an original.
Since Digney Fignus has reinvented himself in 2006 I think he could be considered one of the best new artists to watch for this year.
Reviewed By: Gregg Saur
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Doug’s Top 5 for April 2006
~ DIGNEY FIGNUS
TROUBLE ON THE LEVEE
12-SONG CD
Well known for his MTV video hit “Girl With The Curious Hand” and song of the same name, Digney Fignus returns with yet another refreshingly different chapter to his musical career with his latest album Trouble on The Levee.
Fignus states that this “Cajun Opera” composed about a man named Johnnie Boudreaux, was borne in the summer of 2004 after meeting drummer Dave Mattacks. By the following May the recording was complete. The story is about a fellow “too good looking for his own good” and the adventures he encounters on the road of life.
Of course the music is sterling as Fignus’ studio band featuring Chris Leadbetter on mandolin, slide guitar, rhythm guitar and vocals, Dave Mattacks on drums, Wolf Ginandes on bass, Tom West on piano, Ian Kennedy on violin and Russell Jewell on trombone along with Katrin Roush & Gayla Morgan on backing vocals, Doug Dube on accordion & B3, Greg Tower on lead guitar, Jeff Casper on drums, Russell Keys & Brandon Pritchard on bass, and Bruce Katz on piano, develop an authentic Louisiana-bayou feel and groove for Fignus’ stellar vocal offerings.
With a well written and recorded offering like Trouble On The Levee, Digney Fignus will have no problem eclipsing the accolades he gained with "The Girl With The Curious Hand," and should be a prime candidate for a Boston Music Award nomination. Outstanding.
- Douglas Sloan |
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