Emerging as the voice of post-Katrina New Orleans, John Boutte's sense of mission to share the soul of his beleaguered and beloved hometown has expanded in the wake of the devastating failure of levees and bureaucrats in the 2005 storm. His vocal style and rapport with audiences have been compared to the greats: Nat King Cole, Sam Cooke, Marvin Gaye, and Jackie Wilson. As part of the New Orleans Social Club collaboration with Ivan Neville, Henry Butler, and members of the Meters, he has performed on both the Austin City Limits Festival and PBS television program, and recorded his version of Annie Lennox's "Why" for the group's Sing Me Back Home compilation. Boutte was also featured vocalist with the award-winning latin jazz band Cubanismo.

"The greatest song ever written about an American flood is Randy Newman's "Louisiana 1927", and it has been sung constantly since Katrina washed ashore. But no one has ever sung it quite like Boutte did that afternoon."
--offBeat, New Orleans