DBA

This guide to d.b.a. on Frenchmen Street in New Orleans opens in 2020, when the pandemic shut down the club Tom Thayer had spent two decades building, right after he had just finished buying out his partners. It follows how Thayer turned the empty dance floor into a broadcast studio, launching d.b.a. Live and streaming eight to twelve concerts a week to an audience of laptops and chat windows, with acts like Little Freddie King and the Soul Brass Band playing for tips typed in from thousands of miles away. Look up at the stage in front of you, for months it faced nobody but a camera.