Month: April 2001

Categories
Editorial Opinion

An NBA Rationale Now

If NBA boosters in Memphis want the city and state to spend some serious money, they should make a serious argument.

So far they haven’t done that. The detailed financial package given to the Memphis City Council and Shelby County Commission last week relies too heavily on “found” money — new money spent at the new arena or within the special taxing zone around it. That presumption is overly optimistic if not deceptive. At least some of the money spent on the NBA is “transfer” money that would have been spent somewhere else in Memphis and Shelby County.

Other parts of the presentation lacked substance. A higher tax on rental cars? Then tell us how many cars are rented, and what the current taxes are. A refitted Pyramid would cost $192 million? Then show us the documents and the architectural studies — if they in fact exist. And why are we being asked to pay $250 million for a new arena when other cities have built them for considerably less?

There’s a better source of money for a new arena. Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley, we read, is a billionaire. The annual interest on $100 million at 5 percent is $5 million. That would service a substantial amount of debt. Heisley keeps his billion. All he gives up is the interest on one-tenth of his wealth. It’s not too much to ask. Repeat the process until private investors foot the bill for half the cost of the new arena. Then ask the public sector to match it.

It’s hard to see how a new arena will win approval otherwise. NBA owners are losing $40 million a year in Vancouver and Charlotte. It appears to be a business where expenses and revenues are simply out of balance, and it would be foolish indeed for Memphis and the state of Tennessee to invest $250 million in such a venture without laying off some of the risk.

The “NBA Now” team is not helping its cause by being impenetrably close-to-the-vest on the location of the proposed arena. The south side of Union Avenue between Danny Thomas Boulevard and the bus station seems like the best one. Paint this picture: An arena will do for the south side of Union what AutoZone Park did for the north side.

Finally, in this necessary matter of making sense of the proposal’s nuts and bolts, where are the salesmen? Where are investors Staley Cates and his partner Mason Hawkins of Southeastern Asset Management? Why are we hearing from Gayle Rose and Marlin Mosby? Pitt Hyde and Rose are giving it a good shot, but they’re not the most dynamic speakers around. And it’s disconcerting that they’re not really hardcore basketball fans. They don’t seem to recognize how troubled the NBA is right now. One of the things that made AutoZone Park successful was Dean Jernigan’s lifelong love and knowledge of baseball. That’s missing in the NBA Now team.

Where is the demand for the NBA? There has been no appreciable demonstration of public support. This deal looks strangely artificial, as though all the “support” has been drummed up from public relations firms and people with a vested interest.

Even in state government, where first reports indicated a clear disposition to support an NBA franchise for Memphis, serious doubts have set in. They, too, are of the “Show-Me” variety.

NBA Now needs to put the first team on the floor and give the public the information it needs to make a decision. Now. Or no NBA.

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

Wealthy Tastes

Open since last August, Tycoon Asian Restaurant and Noodle Shop offers a sampler of the diverse tastes of East Asian cuisine — from the curry, dried fruits, and nuts of Indonesian and the ginger, soy sauces, and garlic of Malaysian to the more familiar rices and noodles of Chinese and Vietnamese. Patrons can try a noodle soup from Vietnam, tofu seaweed soups from Japan, a wok stir-fried noodle entrée from Singapore, breaded pork chops with marinated lemon vegetables from Malaysia, and wok-tossed rice selections from China.

Tycoon, located in the Kirby Parkway shopping center, is an intimate restaurant, with seating for 60 to 70 people. Its interior is simple and tastefully decorated with plants, artwork, white tablecloths, and black chairs. The atmosphere is made complete with background classical music. (My Asian dinner companion informed me that it is typical in Hong Kong, her home, for restaurants to faintly play classical, not Oriental, music.)

The appetizer section of Tycoon’s menu offers items such as chicken and beef satay, spring rolls, crab Rangoon, pot stickers, and coconut prawns. We chose the Malaysian chicken satay and the Chinese coconut prawns. Both appetizers were displayed on square Japanese-style trays. The satay featured strips of chicken breast skewered and lightly grilled and served with a light peanut sauce that had been simmered with garlic and curry. The coconut prawns were large butterflied shrimp, not the tiger prawns I expected. The shrimp were dipped in a sweet coconut batter and fried. A traditional Oriental sweet-and-sour sauce and a red chile sauce accompanied the shrimp. Be warned, though, the chile pepper sauce is very hot; use in moderation to avoid overpowering the shrimp.

While the appetizers are plentiful, don’t make the mistake of passing on the soups. Tycoon’s selections include a Vietnamese beef noodle (Pho), Chinese shrimp wonton noodle soup, and Thai Tome Kha Kai (coconut milk soup). Our table chose to share the Malaysian beef satay rice noodles. Presented in a delicately painted porcelain bowl, the soup was glistening with chunks of onion and strips of beef tenderloin. The vermicelli rice noodles were abundant, and the base had a spicy flavor with hints of red chile, garlic, and curry. Chinese mushrooms (dried mushrooms that have been rehydrated) without their stems completed the soup.

Our guest from Hong Kong guided our entrée selections. The goal of our party was not to sample any “Americanized” Oriental dishes. We wanted to experience authentic Asian cuisine and eat in traditional style. Therefore, the main courses were served family-style in the middle of the table and the steamed white rice was served separately. Wooden chopsticks, forks, and small plates were placed in front of each of us. We chose not to utilize the small porcelain bowls for the rice. Our Asian guest quickly picked up a fork. I asked her if we were being offensive by not using the bowls and chopsticks. She explained that she only uses chopsticks when she is eating rice from a bowl or selecting pieces of the entrées to sample. Appropriate protocol for eating off a plate is to use a fork or spoon. In addition, she commented that plastic or ivory chopsticks are used in her home and that wooden chopsticks are used in America for the convenience. Once the etiquette was established, the entrée ordering ensued.

Three very eclectic entrées leapt off the pages of the menu, and the “Hong Kong Cho Ho Fun” was the first we devoured. Ho Fun is a wide rice noodle. Steam swirled above the platter as it was placed on the table. The portion was more than ample. Slices of beef tenderloin smothered in dark soy sauce mingled with bean sprouts, green onions, and carrots. The slightest essence of garlic and the dark soy sauce gave the dish an appealing sweetness.

The Chinese “Perfect Match” was our second selection, and it was just that. Two cast-iron kayak-shaped platters cradled the most vibrant and colorful dish of the evening. Sizzling, curried green-lip mussels garnished with chunks of green pepper and carrot filled one of the kayaks. The adjacent kayak overflowed with green-lip mussels swimming in a black bean sauce with pieces of onion, carrot, and green peas. The menu claims that this dish is delectable. It was.

The incomparable coconut curry chicken is classic Indonesian. The blend of flavors from the coconut and curry tantalized the senses. The coconut milk engulfed pieces of potato, onion, green pepper, raisins, and cashew nuts. Red chile pepper was subtly added, offsetting the coconut milk mixture perfectly. Traditionally, this dish would be served with steamed rice atop the chicken, onion, potato, and carrots, and then covered with the coconut, raisins, and cashews.

For our final selection of the evening, our Asian guest consulted with the owner, who was more than willing to accommodate an off-the-menu request. A few minutes passed and a large white plate appeared. A succulent orange roughie fillet that had been lightly steamed embraced a delicate ginger, lemon, and garlic butter sauce. Atop the flaky fish were steamed snow peas, broccoli, carrots, Chinese corn, and scallions. The longer the fish sat, the more the sauce absorbed the ginger. Delicious.

There is no separate dessert menu at Tycoon. After our entrées, a pinwheel slice of plain yellow cake or coffeecake rolled with cream were brought to the table. Both were moist and flavorful, an encore to a delightful culinary experience.

Tycoon is located at 3307 Kirby Parkway. Hours: Monday through Thursday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Friday and Saturday 11 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Take-out available by calling 362-8788.

Categories
Hot Properties Real Estate

In Tune With the Times

During the first quarter of the 20th century, America was swept up in a veritable bungalow craze. Advertised as “simple but artistic homes” for people of modest means, bungalows could be built for $500 to $5,000, affordable for a broad segment of the population. This type of single-family house with its own lawn offered style, convenience, and respectability — the fulfillment of the American dream. Bungalows and the bungalow lifestyle were zealously promoted in The Ladies Home Journal, Gustav Stickley’s Craftsman, and Bungalow Magazine. These publications included plans, elevations, details, and advice on appropriate gardens and interior decoration. They also featured poems and songs, including (really, I’m not making this up) “In the Land of the Bungalow” and a waltz, “Bungalow Love-Nest,” extolling the pleasures and benefits of life in a bungalow.

Memphis, like many other American towns that boomed in the early 20th century, has acres of bungalows, most of them built to accommodate the burgeoning middle-class population. This stone and stucco house on Linden, in the area once known as the Town of Idlewild, is a bungalow to sing about. At some time it was divided into three apartments, but it has now been sensitively restored as a single-family house. A deep porch with stone piers and a closed stone balustrade provides an outdoor living room that is somewhat screened from view. Unlike many bungalows, this one has a symmetrical facade with the front door in the center and banks of triple windows to either side. The front door has a grid of beveled-glass lights in its upper portion and is original to the house. A broad shed dormer is centered above the door.

The living and dining rooms occupy the entire front of the house. A sense of foyer is created by a columnar screen with box piers that separates the entry area from the dining room. Both rooms have robust box beams on the ceiling. The breakfast room between the dining room and kitchen has a bay window with leaded diamond panes and still has its original built-in cupboard. The original hardware found throughout the first floor, such as sash-lifters, door escutcheons, and bin pulls on the breakfast-room cabinet, is copper — a quintessential Craftsman material that seldom survives.

The kitchen has been completely remodeled and has all new cabinets and appliances. A laundry room was added off the kitchen. A former bedroom had a wall removed, opening it to the kitchen and creating a den with a new corner fireplace. A broad deck connects an addition similar to the laundry room on the other side of the house, reflecting the symmetry of the front facade and providing space for a full bath with a whirlpool tub, a separate shower, and a linen closet. This new bath adjoins the downstairs master bedroom.

The stair to the second floor is under a broad arch opposite the front door in a cross hall in the middle of the house. The original bathroom, with claw-foot tub and pedestal lavatory, is at the end of the hall.

The second floor has a long hallway with numerous closets and enough room for a study or seating area at one end. The three bedrooms and a full bath are all large and pleasantly bright, but the prime space is definitely the center room with its five dormer windows. Each bedroom has plenty of closet space, not the usual walk-in closets but something more like “wander-around-in” closets with cavernous, irregular spaces formed by the odd nooks and crannies of the attic.

This restored bungalow is a great example of the houses that inspired such a devoted following in the early 20th century and are now enjoying a strong revival.

1959 Linden Avenue

2,700 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3 baths; $234,900

Agent: Susan Overton, Realtor: The Neilson Group, 818-3230

Categories
Letters To The Editor Opinion

Postscript

Errors of Fact

To the Editor:

Last week’s cover story (“Prescription for Disaster”), which stated that Shelby County taxpayers have “paid out $40 million to settle lawsuits filed by jail inmates” over the past five years, is irresponsible. As the chairman of the county commission’s Law Enforcement Committee for three of those five years, I can assure you that the amount paid by the county for such claims is nowhere remotely close to that figure.

Any payment by the county must be made in a manner that is disclosed as a matter of public record. Any settlement of over $50,000 must be approved by the County Commission. There have been less than 10 such payments, to my recollection, over the past five years, and probably closer to five. According to the county attorney’s records, since 1996 the county has paid less than $7 million for all claims against all departments of county government, whether by settlement or judgments.

In addition, and importantly, the county’s contract with CMS, its third-party health services provider for the downtown jail, contains an indemnity provision requiring CMS to carry at least $3 million in coverage per year for any such claims. It lists the county as an “additional insured” under the policy. Any payment made by the county for CMS’s negligence is going to be made by CMS’s insurance company, not the county. I don’t believe we have exhausted the $3 million limit at any time under the agreement.

I contacted the reporter for this piece, who has apparently left for a job with another publication, in order to see where she got the information for her inflammatory assertions about the CMS contract being “an especially costly pill for Shelby County taxpayers to swallow,” since all of the things referenced above are easily accessible through public records. She at first agreed to show me her documentation but then declined on the grounds that sharing her notes would not be “ethical.” I can only assume that she confused the amounts inmates seek in legal filings, which is an arbitrary number that means nothing in and of itself, with payments made by the county. This, frankly, is incredible and if true, absolutely indefensible. I suppose the “taxpayers” should consider ourselves fortunate that some prisoner hasn’t made a claim for $100 trillion, because, under your reporter’s reasoning, we would all be in big trouble.

There are plenty of problems with the downtown jail that can and should be the subject of media scrutiny. Making up numbers about taxpayer payments in order to draw attention to one aspect of the jail’s operations, however, is quite another thing, and that’s essentially what the reporter of this piece appears to have done.

I am a regular Flyer reader. I find its political reporting generally first-rate, and sometimes the Flyer finds an angle on a newsworthy issue that other local media outlets miss. You seem to be relying, however, more and more on young journalists with limited experience on important investigative pieces, and you are going to have to do a better job of double-checking some of their assertions. This particular reporter had an obvious talent for observational reporting. She is a good writer. That does not make her a good reporter, at least not yet, as this piece demonstrates.

The article warrants a retraction of the “$40 million in taxpayer money” message. I hope the retraction will be as prominent as the cover of your last issue.

Buck Wellford, Shelby County Commissioner

Editor’s note: Shelby County, as Commissioner Wellford asserts, has not paid out $40 million in lawsuit settlements for inmates, as last week’s cover story reported. Please see this week’s “Viewpoint” (p. 13) for more information.

Environmental Feedback

To the Editor:

The United States is now the last major nation of the world refusing to sign the Kyoto agreements (“Deja Vu All Over Again,” April 5th issue), agreements that do very little very late. This is outrageously arrogant for a nation that produces many times its share of greenhouse gases and pollution. By refusing to sign on with the overwhelming majority of nations around the world, President Bush is not only the quintessential tool of the fossil fuel industry, he is a traitor to our country and economy and he is a traitor to the planet.

The truth is that the recycling of our obsolete fossil- and nuclear- fueled technology and the building of new, appropriate, cleaner, safer technologies, fueled with renewables, could be a boom to our economy like no other in our history. If we allow this oilman and dimwit to get his way, we truly are “the great Satan” of the earth.

Don Johnson, Minneapolis, MN

To the Editor:

In Bruce VanWyngarden’s “Deja Vu All Over Again” he recognizes that the pursuit of truth is what our democracy embraces, not an “us” against “them” mentality when it comes to environmental issues. In Andrew Wilkins’ “Poisoned” (April 5th issue) it’s obvious that the bottom line of industry should not be more important than the health of the common man. Can’t we as citizens bond together to produce a common working relationship where both parties gain? We can if people take an active role in our democracy and prevent the far right from instigating yet another war that doesn’t realize the gray areas! Common sense is not universal unless parties agree on respect for debate to achieve truth.

Ran W. Foster, Memphis

The Memphis Flyer encourages reader response. Send mail to: Letters to the Editor, POB 1738, Memphis, TN 38101. Or call Back Talk at 575-9405. Or send us e-mail at letters@memphisflyer.com. All responses must include name, address, and daytime phone number. Letters should be no longer than 250 words.

Categories
Music Music Features

Choose Ani

So, who’s your pick? That dude from Cypress Hill or Chuck D.? The Ruler of the Funky Buddha or The Mouth That Roared? I’m talking about who the new lead singer for Rage Against the Machine should be, of course. The highest-profile radical rock band in the land needs a new mouthpiece, and those seem to be the prime names being bandied about. I wish I could say I’m surprised that no woman’s name has come up, though it’d be a much more radical move to let a femme voice (and perspective) harness the phallic power of Tom Morello’s axe than another Boy Acting Serious and Important. Like Public Enemy before them and like many other great agit-rock acts, Rage’s rage seemed as much about macho posturing as inspiring a livable revolution, and incorporating a little girlie action into their Godzilla-like roar might be a refreshing new direction. All of which is a roundabout way of offering my own suggestion for a new lead singer: Ani Difranco!

Why not? Difranco could use the commercial boost after watching her cult diminish over the last few years, and Rage could use someone with the ability to connect their political sloganeering (and the power of their Molotov-cocktail music) to the physical and emotional realities of everyday life. Sounds like a match to me.

For those outside her core demographic — (very) young, smart, left-leaning (white) women — Difranco can be an acquired taste. After dismissing her for years, like so many others have, as a strident feminist folkie (and “folkie” is the bad word here, not “feminist”), Difranco finally won me over in 1998, when I stumbled onto “Fuel,” a cut from her Little Plastic Castles album. Righteous and caustic, funny and quirky, down-to-earth but with an unexpectedly visionary twist, “Fuel” still sounds like the “protest” song of the decade to me. The song begins with Difranco walking by a Manhattan construction site where a slave cemetery has just been found (“May their souls rest easy now that lynching is illegal/and we’ve moved on to the electric chair”), a sight that triggers a personalized, stream-of-consciousness State of the Union address that encompasses everything from bankrupt politics to crass corporate culture to our isolated citizenry — all conveyed in a thrillingly conversational, everygirl voice. Then Difranco snaps back to real time, still standing over the unearthed cemetery, with a desire to dig even deeper: “down beneath the impossible pain of our history/beneath the unknown bones/and the bedrock of the mystery” to a place where “there’s a fire just waiting for fuel.” Morello’s quicksilver guitar could be the sonic match needed to ignite the blaze.

Okay — time to cut the crap. Won’t happen, right? Rage’s sound is too monolithic to make room for someone whose rhythms and desires seem so deeply personal. Besides, married and past 30, Difranco’s radicalism knows too many shades of grey to embrace the reckless abandon of Rage’s revolution.

The political genius of Difranco’s art is her ability to demonstrate, without ever seeming too willful, how an ethical outlook and subsequent emotional responses can inform how you relate to a lover and a friend as much as it informs how you relate to your country. With the new, two-disc, two-hour torrent of images and ideas, Revelling/Reckoning — essentially her marriage album — Difranco makes this connection plainer than ever. What Difranco has done in the process — perhaps unintentionally — is leave her kids’ cult behind and craft a great adult pop album — a hard thing to do in a genre clogged with the dispiriting self-regard of people like Sting and Don Henley.

The two records have distinct personalities: Revelling boasts fuller arrangements, making the most of Difranco’s unique jazz/funk-folk. Reckoning is more intimate and introspective, boasting a more captivating group of songs. Each record lives up to its title. Revelling starts off, on “Ain’t That The Way,” with Maceo Parker background vocals and Difranco scrunching up her voice like the “Left Eye” Lopes of funk-folk. The message: “Love makes me feel so dumb.” Difranco restates this theme of romantic happiness a bit more slyly on “Marrow”: “I’m a good kisser/and you’re a fast learner/and that kind of thing could float us/for a pretty long time.”

But Reckoning is the real keeper, with “Your Next Bold Move” starting with this: “Coming of age during the plague/of Reagan and Bush/watching capitalism gun down democracy/it had this funny effect on me.” It’s a defeat song, chastising the ineffectualness of a “left wing that was broken long ago,” but what makes it remarkable is how effortlessly the song’s emotion segues into the more personal skepticism of the following marriage songs, “Reckoning” and “So What.” And so it is with the whole of the record, as the political defiance of a song like “Subdivision” (“White people are so scared of black people/they bulldoze out to the country/and put up houses on little loop-dee-loop streets/while America gets its heart cut right out of its chest”) mingles easily with the romantic travails of a song like “Sick of Me” (“The first person in your life/to ever really matter/is saying the last thing/that you want to hear”), making it all sound like part of the same struggle.

So while the job might sound tempting, Difranco probably won’t be too concerned if Rage’s invite never arrives. Judging from Revelling/Reckoning, she’s got more serious battles to wage.

You can e-mail Chris Herrington at herrington@memphisflyer.com.

Music Notes

by CHRIS HERRINGTON

The Premier Player Awards, held at The Pyramid Thursday, April 5th, may have been the site of a New Orleans invasion, but Memphis artists still stole the show. This annual awards ceremony, sponsored by the local chapter of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, is essentially the local Grammys, and this year famed New Orleans funk band the Meters took home the Governors Award, the Premier Player’s highest honor. Three-fourths of the original Meters lineup (drummer Joseph Modeliste was a no-show) closed the show with a half-hour greatest-hits set.

The Meters minus one were fine. I may have gotten more of a charge from staying home with my Wild Tchoupitoulas record, but The Meters were still much better than younger New Orleans groove bands Galactic and Astral Project on a night when five of 14 performers fell loosely into the “jam-rock” category, encompassing the good (Meters, North Mississippi Allstars), the so-so (FreeWorld, Galactic), and the so, so bad (the tepid noodle-jazz of Astral Project).

The Meters may have walked away with the show’s biggest honor, but the night really belonged to locals the North Mississippi Allstars and fast-rising Cory Branan. The Allstars took home their second straight award for Best Band and also picked up the Outstanding Achievement Award, besting competition like platinum-selling Three 6 Mafia and hot producer Paul Ebersold for the award that band patriarch Jim Dickinson won last year.

Singer-songwriter Branan won the Phillips Newcomer Award and seemed genuinely surprised, explaining, “I don’t even have a record out,” but thanking voters for keeping their ears to the ground. Branan, who received fervent applause whenever his name came up, also gave arguably the night’s best performance with a typically edgy and heartfelt reading of his song “Tame” during a songwriter’s showcase with Nancy Apple and Keith Sykes.

In all, 21 awards were given, with Steve Potts (drums/percussion), Jim Spake (woodwinds), and Jackie Johnson (female vocalist) joining the Allstars as repeat winners.

The show opened with a “Mardi Gras parade” led by eclectic Best Band nominee FreeWorld and spiked by cameos from Jackie Johnson and last year’s rap winner Lois Lane. Performances from Best Female Vocalist nominees were among the show’s strongest segments. Ruby Wilson delivered a blistering rendition of the Etta James standard “At Last,” with sax man Jim Spake, fresh from winning his eighth woodwinds award in the program’s 16 years, getting a nice showcase. And female vocalist winner Johnson joined nominee Susan Marshall-Powell for a powerful run-through of William Bell’s “You Don’t Miss Your Water” and a gospel number.

Spake’s brief acceptance speech, in which he issued a casual plea for voters to check out a wider range of local music, was one of the few interesting thank-yous of the night. Gaffe of the night award has to go to host Larry Raspberry, who revealed himself to be probably the only person left in Memphis who hasn’t seen The Poor & Hungry when he mistakenly said the film was a documentary while introducing director and Best Band Award presenter Craig Brewer.

The most decorum-free performances of the night came from a couple of Best Band nominees and likely sources: Big Ass Truck, a club band that’s been around so long now they’re probably underrated, were a highlight, dedicating a performance spiked by Steve Selvidge’s animated guitar to late local musician Craig Shindler. And Lucero gave the most out-of-place and, consequently, the most interesting performance of the night with a willfully perverse reading of their slow, loud, and mean live staple “No Roses, No More.” Technical problems dulled the performance’s force, though, and it was hard to tell if the deliberate change of pace won them new fans or drove potential converts away.

This year’s winners were: Harmonica: Blind Mississippi Morris; Woodwinds: Jim Spake; Brass: Scott Thompson; Guitar: Preston Shannon; Strings: Susanna Perry Gilmore; Live DJ/Turntable Artist: Michael “Boogaloo” Boyer; Rappers: Three 6 Mafia; Drums/Percussion: Steve Potts; Bass: Dave Smith; Keyboards: Tony Thomas and Charlie Wood; Female Vocalist: Jackie Johnson; Male Vocalist: Jimmy Davis; Choir: O’Landa Draper’s Associates; Teacher: Jackie Thomas; Engineer: William Brown; Producer: Paul Ebersold; Newcomer/Phillips Award: Cory Branan; Community Service/John Tigrett Award: WEVL FM-90; Outstanding Achievement: North Mississippi Allstars; Songwriter: Kevin Paige; Band: North Mississippi Allstars.

Categories
Music Record Reviews

Short Cuts

Do you remember last August when Eddie Vedder sang that double-time version of Elvis’ “Can’t Help Falling In Love”? Wasn’t that unexpected? Or remember when the band vamped out on an extended version of “Better Man”? Wasn’t that awesome er transcendent? Remember? If you were at the show, good for you. If you bought a commemorative concert T-shirt, you might be interested in this double-live gonzo souvenir as well, so you can relive Pearl Jam’s lithe, grand, familiar if not-yet-classic hard rock in your own home. But what if you weren’t at the Memphis show? What interest does this release hold for you?

This question looms large as the band continues their bizarre live music “project.” As you may know, Pearl Jam has already released every single show from their European tour in cheaply priced, cheaply packaged, and virtually indistinguishable double-CDs. The Memphis show is part of the first 23 shows on the band’s United States tour, all of which have been similarly issued. The grand total for officially released, live double-albums is nearly 50 (or about 100 CDs), with more promised as the second half of the tour kicks off.

In the face of such a glut of product — one of the most horrifying acts of consumer fraud I’ve ever encountered — my question remains unanswered: What makes this concert more special than the preceding concert in New Orleans on August 14th or the following show in Nashville on August 17th? Well, there’s the Elvis cover, but it’s the only rarity on the entire album; 15 of the 29 songs were played at the concerts that bookend the Memphis show, and the other 28 songs are played on the U.S. tour at least 10 times across 24 shows. So much for the uniqueness of live performance.

Most importantly, what music fan in his or her right mind would demand or welcome 100 live Pearl Jam albums? This isn’t Miles Davis or James Brown or Bruce Springsteen or even the Grateful Dead, all artists whose concert indulgences and musical firepower might make such an endeavor fascinating and worthwhile. This is Pearl Jam, whose idea of improvisation is to end a set with “Baba O’ Reilly” instead of “Rockin’ in the Free World.” This affront to discretionary income is no service to fans; that’s what file-sharing is for, isn’t it? It’s just another baffling statement of principle from America’s most baffling and principled major band. Nice to know that their integrity has finally paid off. — Addison Engelking

Grade: D-

The Red Thread, Arab Strap (Matador)

Pare Arab Strap down to their lyrics and you get sexually charged, intelligent verses written by and about (but not necessarily for) commitment-phobic males with alcohol issues and the myriad problems that surround that existence. Arab Strap are two Scots who have purged from themselves a body of work that most contemporary underground pop artists will never be able to touch. They can take the feeling of waking up on the bathroom floor and set it to music, inspiring resplendent emotion in the process.

Aidan Moffat is the wordsmith in question, and like the Wedding Present’s David Gedge, he has no problem with positioning himself as a clown prince of the metaphorically challenged — Moffat’s songs leave nothing to the imagination. His dialectical and largely spoken (mumbled) delivery incites cries of “acquired taste” among many, and admittedly, it can be like trying to understand Trainspotting over a baby monitor, but this obstacle easily becomes trivial when the whole package is examined. Moffat writes lyrics that forgo musical influences and instead recall the direction of literary figures like Russell Banks, Raymond Carver, and the easy one that I’m not entirely convinced of: Charles Bukowski. Understanding the gauze-gargling slur is the first step in discovering normal, everyday stuff (as retold by a 30-year-old drunk experiencing open-wound emotional discourse) addressed with all the subtlety of acute hives.

Meanwhile, musical mastermind Malcolm Middleton stays true to the Scottish tradition of crafting sublime and brilliant song structures. Maybe because Moffat’s vocals serve as such a trademark, Middleton feels that he has to counteract with the laughably rare feat of an eclectic approach done correctly. With Factory Records-like dynamics, percussion evenly split between kit and tasteful drum machine, and lots of piano, every note hit will raise your neck hair: The Red Thread — a return to original label Chemikal Underground (licensed by Matador in the States) after a two-album stint on Jetset — is number four in a run of albums that are all essential listening.

So, similar to the posthumous fashion in which My Bloody Valentine, the Pixies, Slint, and Galaxie 500 serve us now, I predict that Arab Strap will be on tongues and (maybe) reissue itineraries a decade from now. — Andrew Earles

Grade: A

No More Shall We Part, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds (Reprise/Mute)

There are three sides to Nick Cave. First, there’s the faux Southern Gothic troubadour appearing on albums like Tender Prey, a man obsessed with the secret underbelly of the Reconstruction South — its inbred cultures and spooky stories. Then there’s the bawdy Elizabethan of Murder Ballads, whose ribald humor is matched only by his insistent vulgarity. And third, there’s the emotionally sincere balladeer of The Boatman’s Call, who examines questions of love, guilt, sorrow, and death with a sensitive manner and a troubled soul.

All three Nick Caves are on full display on his 11th album, No More Shall We Part. The intense “Oh My Lord” burns with a narrative momentum that suggests a coked-up Faulkner, while on the crazy “God Is in the House,” this profane soul alternates between a nasal whine and a hysteric stage whisper that satirizes modern conservative religious mores. And the title track moves slowly and beautifully, a hymn to love and the immense pain it brings.

Cave sounds a little hoarse on some songs, especially the opening “As I Sat Sadly by Her Side.” His deep baritone sounds damaged and done for, but he still invests each song with as much soul as he can muster. He manages to create an intimate theatricality, and the strain in his voice makes it all the more affecting.

The Bad Seeds sound as brooding and threatening as ever, anchored by longtime Cave cohorts Blixa Bargeld and Mick Harvey. More recent additions to the lineup infuse the music with sinister rumblings of atmosphere and sonic melancholy. On “Hallelujah,” for instance, the Dirty Three’s Warren Ellis rips his soul apart on violin.

As with his past efforts, No More Shall We Part proves that only Nick Cave can create this twisted brand of rock music, and his cocksure bravado and tender heart not only make it succeed but allow absolutely no room for failure. — Stephen Deusner

Grade: B+

Categories
Politics Politics Beat Blog

A Pax Herentonia

The cadres of the Ford political organization, once upon a time the diehard Democratic adversaries of the now-dominant Herenton-Chism camp, remain in the conciliatory mode with which they had awaited Saturday’s inevitable coronation at East High School of the mayor’s press secretary, Gale Jones Carson, as new chair of the Shelby County Democratic Party.

Ever since the mayor’s race of 1999 in which Herenton won a third term resoundingly against city council member Joe Ford and several other opponents, these Democrats — most of them loyal to the Ford family political organization or at least close to it — have backed away from the sort of direct contest with the Herenton camp that they were long-used to winning.

After all, the 2000 political season, a presidential one, demanded Democratic unity — meaning that the Fordites and the Herentonites were constrained to work in harmony, as for the most part they did. Sidney Chism, the former Teamster leader and onetime Democratic chairman who had been a chief aide to Willie Herenton since the then-challenger’s first run for the mayoralty, cooperated with the get-out-the-vote efforts of former congressman Harold Ford Sr., with the result that the Gore-Lieberman national ticket carried Shelby County with a handy 40,000-vote majority.

If Democrats in the rest of the state had done as well, Al Gore would have won Tennessee and the nation’s pundits would probably be pondering the prospects of some Gore-backed environmental-protection measure just now instead of wondering how much of George W. Bush‘s tax-cut legislation will make it through Congress.

Except for the bizarre scare whipped up by some of the mayor’s cadres concerning an alleged plot by outgoing chairman David Cocke, a Ford ally, to stack the party caucuses and convention with a horde of teenage voters, there was little friction between the two camps in advance of this year’s selection of a new executive committee and new chairman.

“We’re tired of trying to keep Gale Jones Carson from being chairman,” said one Ford cadre, a veteran of at least three prior (successful) efforts to do just that. “We don’t have a candidate of our own,” said another Fordite (a fact which, when communicated to City Court Clerk Thomas Long, who had hoped for the Ford camp’s endorsement, meant the end of Long’s candidacy).

The current star of the Ford dynasty — U.S. Rep. Harold Ford Jr., who has national ambitions and considerable clout with the Democratic Party brass and the media within the Washington beltway — had long been distancing himself from the trench warfare of local politics and let it be known that he had no interest in the outcome of Saturday’s convention.

As if to provide a symmetry of sorts, Mayor Herenton said at a Democratic meeting or two that he, too, would stay out of the convention picture.

Right, and Don Corleone was an above-the-battle olive-oil importer with no connection whatsoever to the nitty-gritty operations carried out by his soldiers.

The Herenton-Chism Game Plan

The fact is that there was no contest last Saturday because the outcome was certain. Last month’s caucuses had elected a majority of convention delegates in some measure hand-picked by Chism and certainly responsive to his wishes.

The Fords and their supporters, rather than risking their still-formidable political clout in pointless resistance, will live to fight another day. For the time being, they have had to yield the field to the mayor’s men (and women), and they’re making the best of that bargain.

But make no mistake about it. Willie Herenton, about to embark on a fourth-term re-election effort which looks like the proverbial lead-pipe cinch, is not only the chief political figure of Memphis politics, he and his cadres dominate the Democratic Party as well. Consider:

(a) The delegation sent to last year’s National Democratic Convention was almost exclusively composed of Herenton allies. Selected in a steamroller convention overseen by the indefatigable Chism, it included, besides the ex-party chief himself, mayoral spokesperson Carson, mayoral bodyguard Mike Graves, and a plethora of others whose only — or primary — political loyalty was to the mayor.

(b) In the aftermath of that process, Herenton made it clear what his next move would be — the domination of this year’s caucuses and convention and the installation of spokesperson Carson as party chair. None of this was a matter of conjecture; it was attested to by the mayor himself, in a taped interview.

(c) Then there was the fourth-term announcement, made at least a year early so as to be “pre-emptive,” as Herenton put it. The mayor cited “unfinished” business — as if anything in government or politics is ever “finished” — and, at Herenton’s formal announcement ceremony at the Adam’s Mark last week, there was no shortage of talk amongst the Who’s-Who types on hand about the possibility of the city’s having a mayor-for-life.

(d) There remained only one area of political possibility which Herenton had not yet proved his prowess at — the ability to elect other public officials who were bona fide members of a slate backed by — and loyal to — him. Citing failed former campaigns by such Herentonians as Harold Collins and Rickey Wilkins, and the third-place finish of the Herenton-backed Rufus Jones in the 1996 9th District congressional race, members of the Ford faction would often say, “Herenton has no coattails.”

A Test of “Coattails” in 2002

That thesis is about to be tested, big-time, in the forthcoming 2002 election cycle.

The mayor himself will profess once again to be neutral in Democratic primary situations, as will (for the most obvious of reasons) new party chairperson Carson. Chism, who is Herenton’s chief strategist and who makes, you may be sure, no political move that has not been squared with the mayor, is crystal-clear about his two major choices for 2002.

PHOTO BY JOHN LANDRIGAN
Harold Byrd

They are:

* FOR COUNTY MAYOR: Harold Byrd, the Bartlett banker and two-time Democratic congressional candidate in the Republican-dominated 7th District. Byrd and members of his extended family and work force were prominent in the now-concluded Democratic caucuses and convention, as they had been in the Gore-Lieberman campaign of 2000.

Opposing Byrd in next year’s Democratic primary will be state Representative Carol Chumney, who is affiliated with neither of the party’s major factions but has her own constituency of Midtown residents and Democratic women; state Senator Jim Kyle, who owns a blue-collar constituency in the Frayser-Raleigh area and has proposed a controversial referendum on public financing of a proposed new arena for a transplanted National Basketball Association team; and possibly also state Senator Steve Cohen, who made an appearance on stage at Saturday’s convention, during which he indirectly tweaked longtime rival Kyle, citing his own quite different positions on such issues as the referendum and a Kyle-sponsored bill that would penalize vendors of discount gasoline.

* FOR SHERIFF: Randy Wade, currently a deputy administrator in the Sheriff’s Department and an outspoken antagonist of Chief Deputy Don Wright (who will seek the Republican nomination for sheriff along with several others, including deputy administrator Bobby Simmons and possibly including current Circuit Court Clerk Jimmy Moore). Wade has no declared Democratic opposition at present, although there continues to be talk about (and from) former Memphis police director Melvin Burgess, currently chief of security at Horseshoe Casino in Tunica.

Beyond Burgess, Wade may have another major problem in former Secret Service agent Henry Hooper, who is talking up an independent candidacy. As an African American with some name recognition, Hooper could drain votes from Wade in a general election race.

Other races there will be, for this or that clerk’s position, and do not be surprised if the Herenton-Chism forces field a full slate. If they do, and they are successful in a goodly portion of them, Willie Herenton will be master of the Memphis political battlefield in ways that only people with names like Crump and Ford have been before.

No matter how many times he solemnly swears he’s above the battle.

* Outgoing state Republican chairman John “Chip” Saltsman, who last weekend yielded the party reins to State Rep. Beth Halteman Harwell of Nashville and is expected to take a job with the Bush administration soon, marked his leavetaking with a missive sent this week to Tennessee political reporters, which said in part:

“You are the champions of the people, waging battle against wrong. Your sword of truth conquers injustice from Mountain City to Memphis. Your pens bring peace. Your cameras bring prosperity. Your words inspire hope and admiration. I write you, Tennessean sentinels of free press and commercial appeal, to bid farewell … I am sure you will grieve my absence… .”

* The Memphis “NBA Now” team’s financial proposal, announced with much fanfare at a press conference/luncheon last week, is in trouble on almost all political fronts.

City councilman Myron Lowery insisted that the bonding obligations of city and county governments, ostensibly equal, be adjusted to ease the burden on doubly taxed Memphis residents; Pat VanderSchaaf and Brent Taylor argued, respectively, for more private money and more funding alternatives as part of the arena-construction package. Tom Marshall pointedly (and skeptically) requested of “NBA Now” spokesperson Gayle Rose a cost-accounting for retrofitting The Pyramid.

County commission members, especially those representing suburban districts, have been, by and large, non-committal.

And in Nashville, where fully half of the bonding liability for the proposed $250 million NBA-worthy arena lies, members of the Shelby County delegation have been put on notice by both the administration of Governor Don Sundquist and House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh that they have little to no chance for approval of the proposed state funding package (which is considerably in excess of that granted Nashville to construct Adelphia Coliseum for the NFL Titans) unless they toe the line for significant broad-based tax reform.

That could mean, of course, a state income tax, anathema to suburban Republican legislators. It is in the suburbs, too, that enthusiasm for the NBA and an expensive new arena is most lacking. Not a good recipe for unanimity.

You can e-mail Jackson Baker at baker@memphisflyer.com.

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We Recommend We Recommend

Big Stars

Don’t believe the hype. All Access, the Pink Palace’s most recent IMAX offering, is not a rare opportunity for the public to go behind the scenes of an arena-sized rock concert. Not in any realistic sense anyway. It does take us behind the scenes at a number of shows, but everything is sterile and manipulated. We’ve seen this format before, usually on VH1. And though we have never seen it bigger, we have certainly seen it better. The format, that is, not the content. There is no way to get a real sense of the performers’ true personalities, and while we are privy to rehearsals and sound checks, we are never allowed to see their private pre-show rituals. The grueling work of unloading and preparing all the lights and sound equipment is glossed over entirely, as is the drama that goes into putting together and tearing down one of these traveling monsters.

What All Access is is a filmed version of an extremely tired musical genre — the duet album with stock and standard rockumentary-style interviews linking the performances. It allows popular performers from different generations to perform together for the viewing pleasure of young and old alike. While pitching itself as a bit of cinema verité may diminish the film’s integrity, its pairing of the Dave Matthews Band and Al Green, and Mary J. Blige and Parliament-Funkadelic, B.B. King and the Roots, etc., is no doubt a wise business decision. And there can be no denying that all but the smallest handful of the performances are mighty impressive.

All Access begins with what is more like a collage than a montage. A single, smallish square about the size of an art-house movie screen shows electronica hero Moby waking up and jumping on his bed. Other squares begin to appear in rapid succession. A security guard wanders down a long, dimly lit hallway. A techie adjusts a light. The musicians appear one after the other discussing their musical influences, sometimes seriously and sometimes comically. Sting relates an encounter with jazz legend Miles Davis. Apparently Davis said, “I saw you in that movie. Man, you’ve got a big head.” It’s all fun, fast-paced, and absolutely geared for a Saturday afternoon family outing. The Pink Palace’s wonderful, recently revamped digital sound system makes the auditory experience about as close to a live concert as you are likely to experience inside a movie theater.

Sting is the first major star to be showcased, and his performance of “Desert Rose,” with backing vocals by Middle Eastern singer Cheb Mami, may very well be his finest recorded performance since the Police called it quits. Though the song blends a number of international styles, it’s 100 percent rock-and-roll. Mami’s eerie stratospheric backing vocals blend seamlessly throughout, making the song sound like some kind of lost George Harrison masterpiece.

Mary J. Blige, who is pretty darn funkadelic in her own right, joins Parliament for a good-time medley of “Flashlight,” “One Nation Under a Groove,” and “Atomic Dog,” while frenzied fans wave posters reading, “Paper Acid.” The pairing of Blige and Parliament is rivaled only by Al Green’s soaring rendition of “Take Me to the River” backed up by the Dave Matthews Band. Green is so energetic as he takes command of the stage in a gold lamé jacket and dark sunglasses that the DMB (mercifully) fade into the background where they have always belonged. Though Matchbox 20 vocalist Rob Thomas has been performing with Carlos Santana for some time now, their rendition of “Smooth” seemed forced and uncomfortable. Thomas, who should have been selling the song, essentially hid behind the celebrated guitarist, and his attempts to generate onstage chemistry looked like so much leg humping. Pairing B.B. King with Phish’s monstrously overrated guitarist Trey Anastasio was just a bad idea. Letting the Roots’ own answer to the human beat box wheeze rhythmically over King’s atypically choppy guitar work was an even worse idea.

The film’s best numbers are not the duets. Moby, Kid Rock, Macy Gray, and Sheryl Crow are all allowed to do their own thing, and this quartet of performances really stands out. The K-I-D’s stunning and unbelievably energetic rendition of his signature “Bawitdaba” gets so much rock it’s almost overwhelming. Crow’s intimate “If It Makes You Happy,” performed backstage with nothing but an acoustic guitar, is so perfect that even her detractors will have no choice but to sit up and take notice. It is the raspy-voiced Gray’s “Can’t Wait to Meetchu,” however, that steals the show, establishing her as soul sister number one, godmother of funk, and the heir apparent to one Mr. James Brown. Her band, for being so idiosyncratic, is amazingly tight, and it is safe to say that if this performance doesn’t get your butt a’shaking crazy then you must not have one.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

Spring Game Is Offensive

Was new University of Memphis coach Tommy West just trying to sell season tickets? How else to explain the performance in the annual Blue-Gray scrimmage by a new Tiger offense which threw on first down, operated without the benefit of a huddle, scored the first time it had the ball, and generally ran circles around the usually ferocious Tiger defense.

Behind quarterbacks Travis Anglin and Danny Wimprine, the offense scored five touchdowns during the two-hour scrimmage. When Anglin or Wimprine were not passing the ball effectively, they were handing it off to running backs Sugar Sanders, Aaron Meadows, and Jeremiah Bonds. Anglin had two touchdown passes and ran for another, while Wimprine threw for one and ran for a second.

Afterward, coaches and players alike expressed enthusiasm. “How did you like that?” one assistant coach asked after the scrimmage.

“This is the most excited I’ve ever seen our team,” said junior receiver Tripp Higgins. “Our defense even gets pumped up because of the tempo of our offense. They like seeing us do good.”

“We’re pleased with what we’ve accomplished in 13 practices,” West said after the scrimmage. “I think they’ve really come a long, long way. Our offensive players have an attitude right now that you want. They realize that they haven’t been very good; they haven’t been very productive. They’re listening to the fundamental coaching.”

West admitted that there were some areas that still need work, and he had some blunt words for his quarterbacks.

“We had some miscues at quarterback where we got people open. That’s not good enough to play quarterback here,” he said. “When we’ve got people wide open, we have to hit them or you can’t play Division I college football. That’s the way it is.”

The Tigers will go into August without a number-one quarterback. “I really don’t think we have a quarterback who deserves to be number one. I don’t think anybody is playing to a level that we’ll have to play to win games,” West said. “I think we’ve got some good competition and I don’t want to cut it off. I’m going to carry it into August.

“I think Travis has done some good things. He needs to improve in the passing game, but he certainly is a threat running the ball,” West continued. “I think he has improved throwing the ball. He has improved his accuracy. He is certainly in the mix.”

Wimprine said he welcomes the battle. “Competition only makes you better,” he said. “Hopefully, all the quarterbacks will get better from this situation.”

Excitement was the word of the day.

“We’re all excited about the new offense, it’s explosive,” said Trey Erye, who is competing for the starting right guard position. “The best thing is that it makes everybody accountable for themselves. Today we had a lot of good things happen.”

“Coach West and his staff have done a great job of installing a new offense. It makes it fun,” added Higgins. “The defense does not have as much depth as we do now. We just got a lot better. Not to take anything away from them, but we did a lot of things good today.”

TIGER NOTES

· Defensive back Bo Arnold is improving after being in a serious one-car collision near his home in Georgia. Arnold received facial injuries in the crash and has had to have his jaw wired, according to school officials.

· A third quarterback, senior Neil Suber, played in the game but was ineffective. Scott Scherer, who was the starter at the end of last season, sat out the scrimmage. Scherer took a vicious hit at practice a few days before and was held out of the game. Scherer’s mother, Michelle, attended the game, but his father, former head coach Rip Scherer, was out of town.

· Senior defensive end Tony Brown, who had to sit out his freshman season because he didn’t qualify academically, says he is hopeful of getting another year of eligibility by graduating in 2002. “It is looking like I will be, with all the classes I’m taking,” Brown said. He and Andre Arnold, the other starting defensive end, make up the most experienced part of a line that suffered heavy losses to graduation.

· West doesn’t know what the NCAA will do with the university’s appeal to have defensive tackle Albert Means, a transfer from Alabama, declared eligible immediately. “He can help our team,” West said. “I just have to keep my fingers crossed and hope people do the right thing and restore his eligibility. I don’t think we will know anything till mid-summer. There really has never been a case like this. I don’t know what is going to happen.” Means found himself at the center of a recruiting scandal after a Memphis high school coach claimed that an Alabama supporter gave Means’ high school coach $200,000 to have him sign with the Crimson Tide.

· Wimprine made the most incredible play of the game when he ran down speedy defensive back Quincy Stephenson who had just intercepted a pass and returned it 49 yards. Wimprine, who missed some practice time because of academic problems, says not to worry about him. “I will be fine,” he said. Both of his parents attended the game, traveling from their home near New Orleans. His mother is a frequent poster to the message board at the Web site Tiger Illustrated. She uses the screen name “Dan’s Fan.”

· Offensive line coach Rick Mallory says former tight end Wade Smith‘s move to right tackle has worked out well despite the ego adjustment involved. “I went through it and a lot of guys I know in the NFL went through it. It’s always a shock to your system, to your ego,” Mallory said of the transition. “But Wade sees the wisdom behind it. He is a real athletic guy and he’s going to help us a lot.”

· Deep snapper Jarred Pigue has quit the team. He told coaches he wants to transfer to Tennessee. ·

You can e-mail Dennis Freeland at freeland@memphisflyer.com.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

The First Time

In its first season of fireworks, cheerleaders, and the occasional highlight reel, the Memphis Maniax have — at the very least — entertained the 100,000-plus fans who came to the Liberty Bowl. Ironically, the league that was supposed to challenge the networks because of its production savvy instead impressed with its ticket sales, averaging over 24,000 viewers per game per city, drawing more than 1 million people.

But putting butts in the seats, entertaining the home crowd, and playing (mostly) quality football really isn’t the point. The XFL, in its television incarnation, underperformed. While network execs promised advertisers a Nielsen 4.5 share, the XFL has struggled to produce a two-point rating, sometimes falling below that.

The result is a threat from co-owner NBC to pull the plug on the Saturday prime-time broadcasts. Another result is the XFL is expanding to new markets sooner than planned in order to build its TV base.

NBC’s involvement provided the league and its founder — the always-ambitious Vince McMahon — too much hype before anything happened on the field. The first week’s rating of 10.3 on Saturday night only accelerated that process. Look for the league’s other TV partners (UPN and TNN) to provide the focal point for the second XFL season.

That the XFL will most likely leave primetime is in some sense appropriate in light of its anti-network persona. The XFL has been up-front about its mistakes. The public has never before been exposed to the inner workings of big-league sports productions. Coaches talk about league meetings and rules they don’t like. Players talk about officials and don’t get fined. Game announcers denounce the media openly and grit their teeth menacingly at the assured backlash. This is revolutionary. No one will ever look at the game of football the same way again.

That’s not to the say the league’s legacy is secure. For one thing, it’s impossible to say what this league is about. Early in the season we got vignettes with cheerleaders and players, then some football, then a rivalry between — of all things — an announcer and a coach, then we got cheerleaders in locker rooms, then we got some football, then what? If you asked a car salesman to describe his brand of car and he said, “Well, it’s like a Porsche, but more like a station wagon, with some SUV features” you would probably walk off the lot.

Another issue is a fundamental confusion about who the real players in this game are. Attention is divided between owners, announcers, cheerleaders, coaches, and (oh yeah) the guys with the uniforms. It’s difficult to know where to focus. While multiple storylines and characters may serve a wrestling show, in the sports world some depth is needed.

One notable exception from this is the league’s best facet — the coaches.When goaded by the governor of Minnesota, New York/New Jersey head coach Rusty Tillman sent a clear message: He is a football coach and his game speaks for him. Even with a 0-4 start, his team was in the playoff hunt until the last weekend.

Maniax head coach Kippy Brown disappointed but still represented himself, his team, and the league well. Though he was not able to coach his talented but underachieving team past a 5-5 record, he at least admitted what he did wrong. At press conferences, he would address the mistakes he seemingly couldn’t coach out of his team and what he was doing to improve.

Do not doubt Brown’s honesty with himself or others. When the Maniax were still in contention for the playoffs, Brown said of their chances, “If I were a betting man, would I bet on us? No. Because our M.O. has been not to be able to finish [ball games].” How’s that for coaches more worried about pissing off star players than saying what’s on their minds?

Look at Brown if you want to see this league’s potential. He’s an inexperienced head coach learning as he goes, trying to tune his athletes who have everything to prove and literally nothing to lose. If the XFL becomes the premier minor league of football, it will be because of coaches like Brown who have shaped their clubs from the ground up, creating teams that wouldn’t be possible in the NFL because of player salaries, egos, and intruding owners.

As for salaries, everyone gets paid on a scale, though that model might bend next year for certain players on a case-by-case basis. Also, each player is on a yearly contract, necessary for a league filled with players who would run to the NFL on a moment’s notice. The coaches, on the other hand, have extended contracts and are presumably paid more than even quarterbacks, though no salaries have been divulged publicly. That means that the stabilizing factors in this league are the coaches.

And this might come as a shock, but apparently McMahon listens to the coaches and has accepted many of their suggestions. One example is the bump-and-run rule dropped at mid-season. Expect further rule modifications, like the point-after conversion and the rule allowing forward motion — all because the coaches asked for it. How refreshing is it to see changes happening in the game made by those who know the game rather than those who own it?

Coaches are also going to factor heavily in the off-season as the league drafts rules on player recruitment, player swaps, and the XFL draft, which will next year include college players. Since this is the league’s first off-season, it is unlikely that the coaches will be told what is happening rather than giving significant input.

In many ways, the XFL’s first season was the anti-cheesy summer movie it prophesied itself to be. There is no glory and only the minimum of satisfaction. There is also the attitude that a serious amount of work needs to be done. Luckily for the league, that work is in the hands most capable: the coaches. ·

You can e-mail Chris Przybyszewski at chris@memphisflyer.com.