FREETake one
Tidewater Beat
Tides · BaitBands · Boils

The Gulf Coast’s Weekly Entertainment PaperCorpus Christi to JacksonvillePrinted Tuesdays in Biloxi, Miss.

Vol. 11, No. 32Tuesday, November 7, 1989Free
← Back issuesRecovered by the Sideband Label archive September 19, 2026.

Show Report · Biloxi

The Kitchen Band Comes East One More Time

The restaurant in New Orleans has closed, and Spanking The Sauce are closing with it. They brought the farewell to Biloxi Friday. Nobody said farewell from the stage.

By Margie Desporte · Tidewater Beat

Six cooks in kitchen whites posed arm in arm on a sidewalk at night in front of closed steel shutters
In front of the shutters, the night they came down. Photo courtesy of Spanking The Sauce

BILOXI — The restaurant in New Orleans where all six members of Spanking The Sauce worked has closed this year. The band is closing with it. It is playing seven dates around the Gulf: New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Lafayette, Houma, Biloxi, Mobile, and New Orleans again. Friday was Biloxi.

They came in their whites. They have always come in their whites, but this time there was no dinner service to come from. Louis Duplessis, who sings, set his ladle on a stool by the stage door. We asked him about the ladle. He said, “Heard,” which in a kitchen means he got the order.

Dewey Mahoney played in the paper kitchen hat. Theo Arceneaux kept a side towel over his left shoulder all night. Hieu Tran took his saxophone solos the length of a ticket time, no longer than necessary. Rosalie Fontenot counted every song in from the bass. Marcus Labat played trumpet. He was seventeen and washing dishes when the band began. He is twenty-nine now.

Nobody said it from the stage. Nobody said farewell, either.

They played most of the new record, The Farewell Sauce, and a good deal of the old ones. The last song was “It Only Simmers.” The sleeve of the new record carries one line: “It never ends. It only simmers.” Nobody said it from the stage. Nobody said farewell, either.

About a hundred and fifty came, some of them from New Orleans. They said they could not stand to wait for the last night.

Afterward we asked Ms. Fontenot what she would do next. She said she would like her own kitchen. We asked Mr. Labat. He said he would like not to wash dishes for money again.

Mobile is next, Saturday. Then home.

Around the Coast

The Norther

A blue norther crossed the Coastal Bend Saturday at 8:40 p.m. during The Seagle’s show on the Corpus Christi bayfront. The temperature fell twenty-two degrees in forty minutes. The synthesizers, warmed up since the afternoon, held pitch. The twelve-string did not, and Eagle Montoya retuned between every song. A small craft advisory went up for the bay at 9:15. The band played “Small Craft Advisory” at 9:16. — Y. G.

Live This Weekend

Listings are taken by telephone until Friday noon. Call Tina. If it is not here, nobody called.

Mobile Bay

New Orleans

Biloxi–Gulfport

Corpus Christi

  • Sat.The SeagleIndoors this time, 8 p.m.After last week, indoors.

Jacksonville

  • Wed.Quittin' SnakesThe Copperhead Saloon, 9 p.m.That Don’t Make No Sense, out this year.

Tides This Weekend

Biloxi–GulfportBiloxi Bay entrance
Fri. 11/10H 4:48a 1.9L 3:60p 0.1
Sat. 11/11H 5:36a 1.9L 4:48p 0.1
Sun. 11/12H 6:24a 1.9L 5:30p 0.2
Mobile BayDauphin Island
Fri. 11/10H 4:06a 1.6L 3:24p 0.1
Sat. 11/11H 4:48a 1.6L 4:12p 0.1
Sun. 11/12H 5:42a 1.6L 5:00p 0.2
PensacolaBay entrance
Fri. 11/10H 3:24a 1.5L 2:30p 0.1
Sat. 11/11H 4:12a 1.5L 3:18p 0.1
Sun. 11/12H 5:00a 1.5L 4:06p 0.1
GalvestonBolivar Roads
Fri. 11/10H 7:12a 1.8L 3:60p 0.2
Sat. 11/11H 8:00a 1.8L 4:48p 0.2
Sun. 11/12H 8:48a 1.8L 5:36p 0.2
Corpus ChristiGulf side, Padre Island
Fri. 11/10H 7:36a 1.9L 4:60p 0.3
Sat. 11/11H 8:24a 1.9L 5:48p 0.3
Sun. 11/12H 9:18a 1.8L 6:30p 0.3

Heights in feet above mean lower low water. All times Central. One high and one low most days; Galveston and Corpus Christi sometimes get two. A hard north wind will hold the water out a half foot or more. A south wind will push it back in. These are predictions, not promises.

Bait & Boil Report

By Nolan Seymour · Water: 64° after the front. Clear and cold in the shallows.

At the dock & the shop

  • Live shrimp (scarce)$3 doz.
  • White shrimp, 16–20, heads off, at the dock$4.25 lb.
  • Oysters$14 sack
  • Blue crabs, No. 1$10 doz.

The cold front put the specks down in the deep holes in the bayous and the rivers. Fish slow and fish the bottom. Redfish are schooling on the flats on sunny afternoons when the water warms a degree or two. Sheepshead are on every piling with a barnacle on it; a fiddler crab and a light touch. Flounder gigging is about done for the year.

Boil of the Week

Oysters are the boil this week. Roasted, raw, fried, or in the dressing. Your choice. Your aunt’s choice, if she is cooking.

Letters to the Editor

Write to the Editor, P.O. Box 4120, Biloxi, Miss. 39533. Sign your name. We will withhold it if you ask.

Editor:

Will the kitchen band ever print the recipe for whatever is in that stockpot?

— Mrs. A. Ross, Bay St. Louis

We asked. Mr. Duplessis said “Heard.” We are still waiting on it. — Ed.

Editor:

Regarding the tuner readings in your report on Saturday’s show on the bayfront. I dispute them.

— R. Montoya, Corpus Christi

Noted. — Ed.

Classifieds

Boats & Motors

  • Skiff, 15 ft., with 20 hp and a new tiller extension. $1,100. Ocean Springs. 601-555-0171.

For Sale

  • Restaurant equipment, New Orleans. Six-burner range, two 40-qt. stockpots, hotel pans, three-compartment sink, stools. Must go by the 30th. Call after two. 504-555-0140.

Wanted

  • Oyster shucker, Fridays and Saturdays, Biloxi. Must be quick and careful, in that order. 601-555-0105.

Records & Mail Order