Imagination
Fred: A large part of this job is imagination.
When this band first started, I didn't have much. Back then I would spend a lot of time just walking in this neighborhood I lived in in uptown New Orleans. I would walk for miles and imagine myself playing a song or playing in shows.
I used that imaginative power to see what I wanted to do, how I wanted to approach things, and how it felt to perform those shows long before they ever happened. There was a lot of imagination at play. And there still is.
I still imagine the shows we are going to play long before we ever play them. That's one of the ways I rehearse off the road, practicing a show in my head. That way, when I do perform in front of an audience, I can allow myself to kind of let go and let the moment take over.