Dr John Locked Down

Dr. John's collaboration with The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach, Locked Down, released last week on Nonesuch Records, landed at #33 on the Billboard 200, making it, remarkably, the highest chart debut in the New Orleans legend and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer’s 50-plus-year career. It also debuted at #1 on Billboard's Blues Albums chart and #8 on the Rock Albums chart, and had an excellent first week outside the US as well, entering the charts in the top 100 in many countries, including #16 in Holland, #27 in Norway, #40 in New Zealand, #51 in the UK, and #51 in Ireland. Locked Down has received rave reviews everywhere from SPIN and Pitchfork to The Guardian and NPR, with many echoing David Fricke’s assessment in Rolling Stone that “Dr. John has made his best album in four decades.” Dr. John (a.k.a. Mac Rebennack) premiered Locked Down live onstage with Auerbach (the album's producer) and the band from the album over three nights at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM)'s Howard Gilman Opera House last weekend, as part of his three-week residency at the venue, Dr. John: Insides Out. As noted earlier this week in the Nonesuch Journal, the New York Times's Jon Pareles wrote of the performance: "Physical and spiritual, earthly and supernatural, a memento mori and a promise of transcendence—all were aspects of Dr. John’s music for the night."