The Louisiana music community on Saturday was mourning the death of Lafayette’s Dege Legg, aka Brother Dege, a Grammy-nominated musician and writer born and raised in South Louisiana. Legg, 56, has been described as a Southern-swamp-psych-rock musician turned neo-blues man.
He caught the break of a lifetime in 2011 when Quentin Tarantino heard his song, “Too Old to Die Young,” and used it on the soundtrack of his film “Django Unchained.”
Being included on the soundtrack helped Legg move from conventional jobs he’d done for years to making much of his living through music. Legg, who has a BA in philosophy, worked as a cab driver, dishwasher, journalist, manual laborer, warehouseman, mechanic, driver, line cook, and a caseworker in a homeless shelter in order to support his artistic compulsions. In 2020, Legg published his fourth book, “Cablog: Diary of a Cabdriver,” which chronicled his five years of driving a cab in Lafayette.
The memoir recounts his memorable cab encounters, including the grieving parents of a serial-killer victim, a gang of ex-Holiness Apostolic Pentecostals, James Taylor’s band, and a parade of characters. Before “Django Unchained,” Legg led rock band Santeria for 10 years. He moved to Los Angeles in 2004 to pursue a prospective recording deal. After going home to Lafayette, Legg played guitar in C.C. Adcock’s band, the Lafayette Marquis, for a year. He also formed another band, Black Bayou Construkt, and worked as a journalist covering music.
In 2009, Legg began recording the album “Folk Songs of the American Longhair,” which included “Too Old to Die Young.” “Frankly,” Tarantino has said of the album, “every track on the CD could have been in the movie. … Almost every song could be a theme song. It’s like a greatest hits album.” “What I admired most about you was your humble kindness,” fellow Lafayette musician Eric Adcock shared Saturday on Facebook. “And… zero ego — which was so refreshing in the music scene. And always an intelligent, insightful conversation and a genuine interest in others.
You worked incredibly hard with strategic focus to reach great heights in a very difficult career path, and that was admired by all. Your music sounded like you, which made it true. Your legacy will live on through your music, your incredible literature, and how wonderful you made others feel.”
