Month: June 2019

Categories
Politics Politics Feature

County Commission Continues Budget Battle

There came a moment in Monday’s regular public session of the Shelby County Commission when chairman Van Turner attempted to assure his colleagues that all the forthcoming year’s budget numbers were in order, including maintenance of a fund balance amounting to no less than 20 percent of the total budget — the amount regarded as sufficient to ensure solvency.

After all, Turner remarked, there was the matter of $2.5 million that was “going back in” to the 2020 budget at some point. That would offset the impact of several new expenditures approved by the commission on Monday, including $2.5 million (or $2.4 million; the exact amount remained somewhat hazy) required for the county’s obligations under a joint pre-K program undertaken with Memphis city government.

The commissioners present seemed to know what Turner meant, though there was considerable confusion in the audience at large. In the course of an extended recess, during which much head-scratching occurred among media members and other spectators, things became a little clearer: As members of the commission and Mayor Lee Harris had been informed by county attorneys during executive session, a piece of litigation — its exact nature unspecified publicly — was about to be resolved in favor of the county.

Further prodding revealed that representatives of the city had evidently assured county officials that a settlement, in which the aforementioned $2.5 million would be made over from city to county, was imminent, though the deal was not yet done.

If this informaton seems uncertain to the point of being opaque, that circumstance is due to what amounts to a vow of omerta imposed upon county officials regarding the nature of the aforesaid litigation.

In any case, this “trust-us” premise is at the heart of what would appear to be a somewhat conditional resolution of both the county property-tax rate (at the current figure of $4.05 per $100 of assessed value) and the planned operating and capital budgets for fiscal 2020.

There’s an interesting ambiguity involved in the tax-rate figure, as well. As Shelby County Trustee Regina Morrison Newman revealed at Monday’s meeting, the $4.05 rate was arrived at last year by error, as the result of some faulty arithmetic (including double-counting of expected revenue amounts). Responsibility for the error was not assigned, though it occurred on the watch of former County Mayor Mark Luttrell and former Trustee David Lenoir.

Erroneous or not, the same tax rate is being continued, though, as Commissioner Reginald Milton keeps insisting (and did so again Monday), an “adjustment” is clearly in order. One impediment has been the adamant opposition to a perceived tax increase on the part of the commisson’s five Republicans and Democrat Edmund Ford Jr. — enough opposition to forestall the charter-ordained eight votes needed, especially since Mayor Harris is also reluctant on the score.

The like-mindedness of Ford and Harris on this point was in contrast to some ill feeling that has flared between them of late — and did so again on Monday when Ford publicly castigated the mayor for remarks made on a weekend television show blaming previous disagreements between the two on the fact that Harris had achieved his electoral victories by defeating members of the extended Ford family.

“Don’t use any member of my family as backup when you don’t have answers,” Ford said. “I can’t respect you.” Harris did not respond right away, but at the end of Monday’s meeting, which ended around 10 p.m., he made a point of praising the political Ford family and denying any animosity toward its members.

All of that, however, was but a sideshow to the budget turmoil, which, almost certainly, will require a revisit and perhaps a revision.

• Kudos: To 9th District Congressman Steve Cohen for presiding over an eye-opening panel of the House Judiciary Committee last week on a question that won’t go away — that of potential reparations to African-American citizens for the effects of slavery and Jim Crow laws. Cohen, chairman of the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, was the sponsor, years ago, of a House resolution expressing an overdue apology for slavery.

To Sidney Chism, for another installment last week of his annual summer political picnic, this one attracting numerous political candidates, including mayoral foes Jim Strickland and Willie Herenton.

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

Think Big

CREDIT: Justin Fox Burks

Ben Earhart is the self-proclaimed best bartender in Memphis, the “crazy Tennessean” who mans the bar at Kooky Canuck and serves as the gatekeeper of the best happy hour Downtown. We headed to Kooky Canuck to watch the draft and talk Canada with Earhart and owner Shawn Danko. It seemed only fitting that we talk basketball with Danko — who relocated to Memphis from Toronto — and get the opinions of Memphis’ second-most famous Canadian now that our most famous Canadian is NBA champ Marc Gasol.

Kooky Canuck is known for its big menu items, most notably their various “Challenges,” including the Kookamonga, King Kookamonga, and Humonga Kookamonga, a $99.99, 25-pound meal to be consumed between no more than four people in under 60 minutes. Those who claim victory over the burger earn a spot on the wall of fame and a free meal. The burger challenges might’ve made them famous, but there’s more to this place than the food. When it comes to all things bar-related, Kooky Canuck does it big and cheap.

Justin Fox Burks

Ben Earhart

Happy hour is from 3 to 7 p.m., Monday through Friday, and features a house wine, well mixed drink, or domestic beer for $2.50. A 34-ounce Molson Canadian sets you back a mere $5 at any time. Ten dollars will get you a craft beer of the same size. Interested in a 34-ounce cocktail? It’s $9.99 all day every day, pal. And a 12-ounce pour of a house wine, literally a pour to the brim of the standard wine glass, is $6.99. With these deals, you, too, can be drunk enough to nearly fall off a bus during a parade in your honor.

Speaking of Gasol’s now-legendary drinking antics after earning a ring with the Toronto Raptors, what would owner Danko’s poison of choice be if he needed to tie one on while bussing through the streets of Toronto? “Canadian whiskey, absolutely,” he says. He prefers Forty Creek, but clutched in his hands is a bottle of Wayne Gretzky’s proprietary booze that he’s giving a shot. Canadian whiskeys are normally blends and, in Canada, they’re often referred to as ryes, despite the absence of rye in almost all of them, Danko says. Earhart reappears with Forty Creek Copper Pot, a Canadian whiskey with a maple finish that he asks us to try. Maybe it’s the effect of the 34-ounce beer I’m enjoying, but the maple-y Copper Pot is almost as delightful as my beloved Jameson.

Danko is quick to point out Memphis-Canada connections, including Canadian politeness’ similarity to Southern hospitality. The Memphis Grizzlies now have two Canadians with the addition of Brandon Clarke (the other being Dillon Brooks). Danko also shares that Kyle Lowry’s first meal, upon moving to Memphis, was at Kooky Canuck. His favorite memory of Gasol came a few years ago at the Grizz Gala in Tunica. As he posed for a picture with Gasol, Danko accidentally grabbed his ass (we’ve all wanted to do it, so shout-out to Danko for getting the job done) and then, as is custom for our polite Northern neighbors, apologized profusely.

Kooky Canuck’s drink specials are the shining star of this place, but its most prominent feature is the décor. The inside is full of deer, moose, and caribou heads. Where does one acquire this substantial collection? “Bachelors getting married,” Danko deadpans. While I might be here for the booze and taxidermy, it’s worth noting that Kooky Canuck also has a substantial menu and a kitchen that stays open late. On weeknights, the kitchen is open until 1 a.m. and the bar until 3 a.m. On weekend nights, the kitchen is open until 2 a.m. At the Cordova location, it’s open until 2 a.m. every night of the week to accommodate those unfortunate suburbanites who don’t have a plethora of late-night dining options.

Interested in finding out how many $9.99 34-ounce cocktails you can consume under the watchful eyes of a dead moose? Head to Kooky Canuck and vie for a coveted seat at Earhart’s bar. You might end up in the warm embrace of your new favorite Canadian whiskey and with that much more in common with your recently departed Memphian-turned-Canadian.

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

Escape to the Natural State

CREDIT: Bruce VanWyngarden

It’s late afternoon when we pull into Ponca, Arkansas (Pop. 9). We’ve been winding north along Highway 21 through the Ozark National Forest for an hour or so, trusting Siri, even when Siri seems untrustworthy. Finally, here it is, our destination, a wide spot on a narrow road along the Buffalo River, home to a canoe-and-cabin-rental operation and little else, it appears.

“Not much of a town,” says my wife.

“But they’re famous for their music here,” I respond.

“Really?”

“What, you never heard of Ponca-rock?”

“Shut up,” she explains.

It had been a long drive.

Bruce VanWyngarden

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art

Last week we did an Arkansas getaway: two days canoeing the Buffalo, followed by a trip to Bentonville to see the Crystal Bridges Museum, then wrapping it up with a day and night in Eureka Springs. Since I still had to turn in a column this week when I got back, you’re going to get a play-by-play of the trip. Fair warning.

After a night in a rustic cabin, we left Ponca and drove to the designated put-in spot, where we loaded our 17-foot rental canoe with a cooler and dry bags holding our tent, sleeping bags, air mattresses, and food, and headed downstream. If a canoe had gills, we’d have been loaded to them.

The water was a bit low, making for a few tricky riffles and the occasional skinny water bump-and-grind, but it was mostly smooth paddling — like gliding across the surface of an aquarium, with smallmouth, gar, suckers, sculpins, sunfish, and various turtles easily visible below. The bluffs were high, the sky was blue, birds were everywhere — and the day got warm, meaning lots of dips into the water to cool off. As evening fell, we pitched our tent on a gravel bar, built a little fire, and went to bed before the sun went down on the shortest night of the year.

Late in the night, we scared off a few curious deer who were huffing and puffing and inspecting the tent, but they weren’t bears, which we counted as a victory. By noon the next day, we were back in the car and on our way to Bentonville, tired and happy and ready for a soft bed.

If you haven’t been to the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, I enthusiastically recommend it, as much for the grounds and museum buildings — which are remarkable — as for the formidable collection. And it’s free, unless you opt to tour certain temporary exhibits. It’s funded with Walmart money, of course, which made our consciences twitch a bit, but like I said, it’s free and a phenomenal resource and tourist draw for the area. Bentonville itself is a bit like Seaside, Florida, with lots of precious faux-traditional houses, tons of running and bike trails, plus a lovely, thriving town square straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting. Anyway, go. You won’t be sorry.

The final leg of our Natural State Triathlon was Eureka Springs, home to the “Gumby Jesus” statue (google it) and a dinosaur museum that claims “immature dinosaurs” were on Noah’s Ark. Of course. There are also lots of bars, hippie paraphernalia shops, souvenir joints, and New Age boutiques crammed onto vertical streets that resemble paved goat paths. Think Myrtle Beach with hills. We stayed at the “haunted” 1905 Basin Park Hotel, but opted not to buy one of the “ghost detectors” for sale in the lobby, because we don’t scare easy.

I wandered off in the late afternoon to find a watering hole, finally settling on a balcony bar overlooking the main drag. I ordered a margarita and listened for 15 minutes, fascinated, as a couple from Kansas and a couple from Ontario at adjoining tables chatted about their dogs, which were waiting back in their RVs. It was the nicest, least ironic, least cynical conversation I’ve ever heard. Sadly, I had to push them off the balcony to their deaths.

The street below was filled with an endless stream of loud, rumbling Harleys, each occupied by an older couple with gray ponytails flying. Whether this was a standard weekend activity or there was a convention of the AARP chapter of Hell’s Angels in town, I can’t say. I also witnessed perhaps the bravest two men in Arkansas — one black, one white, each wearing gaudy gym shorts, walking down the street holding hands. Or maybe that’s just how Eureka Springs swings. Who knows? I’m just a simple tourist.

Categories
We Recommend We Recommend

Mid-South International Festival Comes to Railgarten

CREDIT: Mark Brown

Sarah Bishop spearheads perhaps one of the most captivating international festivals in Memphis.

Last year’s inaugural event, then called DeSoto County International Festival, took place at DeSoto Civic Center, with an attendance of 50-70. “I looked at the data from the involvement of ticketing on Eventbrite and a lot of general comments from people who attended last year, and the big consensus was that a lot of people were actually coming in from Memphis,” says Bishop. “I thought, why don’t I just bring the festival to Memphis, since that’s where most of them are coming from? To me, it’s a no-brainer.”

Mark Brown

The Mid-South International Festival brings diverse cultures to Railgarten.

Bishop, who works as the events and catering director for Railgarten and its sister companies like Carolina Watershed and Rec Room, thought Railgarten would make the perfect setting for this year’s event with its expansive indoor and outdoor areas, nice ambiance, and never-ending activities.

So, naturally, the festival was moved to Railgarten, and the name of the festival was changed to Mid-South International Festival. As the name suggests, the two-day festival celebrates diversity and culture with a spread of international vendors, performances, and activities. Several countries will be represented, including Argentina, Ireland, West Africa, and more.

Throughout those two days, Railgarten’s two stages will house 28 performances, including musical performances, ethnic dances, yoga demonstrations, drum circles led by Memphis Drum Shop, fire performances, and more.

Food, offered by Railgarten, will include international options like Korean barbecue and skewers, as well as tofu items. Corona beer, one of the festival’s sponsors, will be available.

The other sponsor, Mempho Music Festival, will be present offering discounted presale tickets for the festival.

Fourteen vendors, each representing different countries around the world, will be selling clothing, crafts, jewelry, and more.

If all of that weren’t enough, Railgarten will also be introducing its new life-sized cornhole game played with bean bag chairs.

Categories
Cover Feature News

Memphis: City of Song … and Songwriters

CREDIT: Chris Paul Thompson

Jocelyn “Jozzy” Donald is recalling her mother’s glory days in the recording industry. “She was a singer with Hi Records, with Willie Mitchell producing. She had a group called Janet and the Jays, back in the day. Boo Mitchell knows my whole family.”

It’s the kind of memory a family can treasure, a brush with greatness, a bit of immortality on vinyl. The group not only worked with a producer who became legendary, they recorded songs by writers like Don Bryant and William Bell, masters of their craft. They too have become legendary, though Janet and the Jays fans would only have seen their names in the very small print below the songs’ titles. That’s just how songwriters were credited. In the age of streaming, the people who composed the music are often completely unacknowledged (though the Sound Credit platform designed by Memphis’ own Soundways is trying to change that).

Chris Paul Thompson

Jocelyn “Jozzy” Donald

The lack of public credit given songwriters is all too apparent when I ask Boo Mitchell if he remembers Jozzy and her family. “Sure!” he says. “She writes music herself. I recorded some of her first stuff in the four-track room at Royal Studios.” It’s yet another moment in the big small town of Memphis, where everyone seems to know everyone else. But he’s not ready when I toss out another factoid: that a song she co-wrote is currently the No. 1 song in the nation — a little number called “Old Town Road.”

Matt White

Don Bryant

“Really?” he exclaims. “Good for her!”

It’s a Memphis thing. Great songwriters are crawling out of the woodwork, and most of us don’t even realize it.

Jamie Harmon

William Bell

In the case of Jozzy, it’s a tale many years in the making. “My brother became a recording artist but got locked up. So I pretty much took his whole love of music and just ran with it. That’s what happened with me falling in love with music. I started working at this studio called Traphouse, with DJ Larry Live. He’s actually Yo Gotti’s right-hand man now. He had a studio on Highland, right near the University of Memphis, and I used to go over there and write. That was where I got my start. I was still at Germantown High School then. All the rappers in the city knew me as the girl who wrote hooks. I was just the hook girl.”

Word of her prolific creativity got around, and before long she was working with famed producer Timbaland in Miami. Then came a move to Los Angeles and being signed to Columbia Records as an artist in her own right. It was then that her label mate, Lil Nas X, found he needed a hand supplementing a song he’d already written and released.

“Old Town Road,” his song of determination in the face of alienation, made use of the old pop trope of the African-American cowboy, which dates at least as far back as the Coasters or Jamaican dub legends the Upsetters. But having a banjo-driven track with Western themes wasn’t enough for the Nashville establishment to recognize the song as a legitimate entry on the country charts. So Lil Nas X upped the ante and actually featured a country star in a remix of the song. That’s where Jozzy came in to write an extra verse for the cameo.

“I just love that Billy Ray Cyrus really stood behind us,” says Jozzy of the star she ended up writing a passage for in the remix. “Because Billy Ray went through the same thing with ‘Achy Breaky Heart,’ which they also took off the country charts. So he could relate to it. And really, the controversy added to the greatness of the song, but I hate that the country music industry had to act like that. Still, new country artists like Keith Urban are supporting this song.”

Indeed, country fans even love it. When Cyrus brought Lil Nas X out for the song at the recent Country Music Association Music Festival, the crowd went crazy.

Now dropping her debut single as an artist, “Sucka Free,” featuring Lil Wayne, Jozzy is poised for something most songwriters never receive: public acclaim. It’s almost a tradition in Memphis, which does not always get the same credit as Nashville as a font of song creation. The absurdity of that is apparent if one simply reflects on the songwriting legacy of the Bluff City. Of course, Memphis looms large in the Songwriters Hall of Fame, where notable inductees include Al Green, Isaac Hayes, David Porter, Otis Redding, Maurice White, and W.C. Handy. Keith Sykes, now managing Ardent Recording Studios after a lifetime of songwriting for himself and other artists like Jimmy Buffett, recently attended this year’s induction ceremony for the New York-based institution and saw fellow Memphian Justin Timberlake receive the Contemporary Icon Award. “He also closed the show. Fantastic, man! And he gave a huge shout-out to Memphis, several times,” Sykes says. His friend and erstwhile collaborator John Prine, who is rightfully honored as the gold standard of songwriters, also was inducted, causing Sykes to ponder Prine’s longtime connection with Memphis.

Keith Sykes

“He did his first album here, with Don Nix at American,” recalls Sykes. “He did Common Sense here and Pink Cadillac here. He’s done a bunch of stuff in Memphis. And he loves it down here.” Beyond working in the city so often, Prine has influenced a whole crop of songwriters based here, who took his template of finely honed, detail-rich narratives to heart. The great John Kilzer, whose recent death is still being mourned, was one such practitioner of the narrative songwriter’s craft. “John Kilzer, I signed in 1986,” says Sykes. “His songs, you could just tell there was something there.”

Beyond his natural talents of observation, Kilzer studied creative writing at then-Memphis State University. It’s a path that other songwriting greats have taken as well, including local writer and performer Cory Branan, whose tightly woven tales are gems of song construction. (I should know; I sometimes play bass for the guy.) English hitmaker Frank Turner recently quipped, “The thing about Cory for me is, almost every songwriter I know is slightly embarrassed by his existence, in the sense that he’s just better than all of us. And should be more successful than any of us.”

Cory Branan

Branan says studying creative writing and literature can indeed enhance this approach to songwriting. “I didn’t write songs until I was 24 or so, but I wouldn’t be doing this if I hadn’t tested into the right classes when I was in school in Mississippi. My teacher, Ms. Evelyn Simms, went off the curriculum, let’s just say that. She would see what we were interested in and then steer us toward things that technically she couldn’t assign.”

From wider reading, Branan learned to take in the wider world. “Keats called it ‘negative capability.’ The idea of not having a persona or a personality, to be able to pursue another one. Basically, not getting your fingerprints all over shit.” (Playing with him and seeing rooms full of fans singing along to “The Prettiest Waitress in Memphis” and others attests to the power of evoking characters that may or may not reflect the songwriter himself.)

It’s an approach that befits almost any style of songwriting, revealing a basic attitude toward the craft that transcends any genre or timely trends. Producer IMAKEMADBEATS, reflecting on songs he’s cowritten with singer Cameron Bethany, puts it this way: “The thing about stepping out of the world of hip-hop, whether it’s for a Cameron Bethany record or an Aaron James record, is that you get to just shamelessly become somebody else. You get to really take on the perspectives of another person. And try to tell that story. With that, songwriting is fun to me because it becomes infinite. I’ve heard songs by people from the perspective of being a gun. I’ve heard songs from the perspecitve of what they thought it was like to be their parents. You can take on any and all perspectives.” Memphis native William Bell, one of the first hitmakers for Stax Records and a 2017 Grammy winner, would agree. “I started singing with the Phineas Newborn Orchestra when I was 14, and I was always a people watcher. At that age, I couldn’t go out in the club, so I had to sit backstage and peek out at the audience. And I would just watch people as they’d come into the club, and after a couple drinks, how they were acting. All of that stuff just kinda hit home, and I wrote about a lot of that just from observation.”

Catherine Elizabeth

Cameron Bethony

Don Bryant, who started in the same era and for a time put off his own performing career to become a staff writer for Hi Records (penning “I Can’t Stand the Rain” for wife Ann Peebles), is similarly inspired by the everyday tales he hears around him to this day. “I had six brothers,” Bryant recalls, “and they always came home with something, or I’d be out in the neighborhood and you hear little things. After a period of time, you visit back on those days and you see a whole lot of things. I pull stories from anywhere I can.”

While much younger than pioneers like Bell or Bryant, Greg Cartwright is universally admired in Memphis as a writer whose songs might have been written in their heyday. As such, his recorded work (on which I’ve played in the past) stands as a kind of bridge between the classic songwriting that emerged from studios like Stax, Royal, or American and the edgier, punk-infused style of bands like the Oblivians or the Reigning Sound.

Kyel Dean Reinford

Greg Cartwright

“I write about things that I’m familiar with,” he says, “so I can speak with authenticity when I say it. But that doesn’t mean necessarily that it happened to me. It just means that I can empathize with the idea. Even though it may not be purely autobiographical, it’s certainly something that I can understand and empathize with. I’m not saying it’s about me so much as to say, ‘I empathize with you if you feel this.'”

But if not autobiographical, Cartwright feels it’s imperative to find one’s authentic voice, something he did through a longtime bandmate. “When I met Jack [Oblivian], he was the first person I met who didn’t sound like anybody I’d ever heard. He wasn’t trying to sound like anybody I could put my finger on. Sure, he had lots of influences, and he would tell you right away what they were, but in my early 20s, most people were very taken with whatever the music of the time was or whatever their social scene was into. And he just seemed like he was just flying his own flag.” In the end, this willingness to buck prevailing trends and pursue a personal vision may be the hallmark of all the city’s great songwriters. “What I look for is something fresh and original,” says Sykes. “And I can never put my finger on what that is.” Some toil at length to build that quality into their songs. “I work hard at making things sound off the cuff,” Branan told one interviewer. Others, like Jo’zzy, take another route. “Your first mind is everything,” she says. “Your first melody that comes into your head, normally that’s the right melody. I tell my manager all the time, ‘Never play me a beat before I go in the studio.’ I’d much rather go freestyle.”

Yet another approach to forging individuality is to be overwhelmingly prolific. Kirby Dockery, a graduate of the Stax Music Academy, left Berklee College of Music to pursue her music career, but was having trouble getting recognition. Her resolve led her to post a song a day on YouTube — eventually culminating in 200 compositions and being signed to Jay-Z’s Roc Nation Publishing. There, she ascended to what is surely the songwriter’s mountaintop, co-writing “Only One” with Kanye West and Paul McCartney, and “FourFiveSeconds” with West, McCartney, and Rihanna.

Josiah Roberto

Kirby

Working under the name Kirby, she reflects on the role of the Stax legacy in her achievements. “The Stax Music Academy [SMA] was one of the first catalysts that helped me believe that songwriting wasn’t just a dream. It was there where I first heard my lyrics and melodies put to music. If it wasn’t for SMA I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of meeting my future publisher years before I even knew how to be signed as a songwriter. SMA planted seeds that are still blooming in my life today. I am forever grateful.”

To that end, she’s now giving back to the institution. As SMA executive director Pat Mitchell-Worley notes, “Kirby offered four scholarships to students in the program, based on the students creating original material. And she listened to every song that was offered. And not only did she pick the best ones, she gave them feedback on their songs. So her scholarship reinforced our songwriting focus.” In fact, the SMA is now promoting the importance of songwriting more than ever.

“For the upcoming regular school year,” says Mitchell-Worley, “we have a full songwriting track. Songwriting and music business. And the two go hand in hand. If you’re gonna pursue a career as an artist, you need to have every form of revenue that you can grasp, and songwriting is a very important part of how you get paid. Students have come to understand more that owning the material that they record and perform affects their revenue streams.” Beyond that, they’re thriving on the creativity that such an emphasis fosters.

Perhaps an old tune by Youmans, Rose, and Eliscu from 1929 puts it best, reeling off the reasons we should be grateful for the craft that has shaped the city’s history for so long:

Without a song, the day would never end

Without a song, the road would never bend

When things go wrong, a man ain’t got a friend …Without a song.

Categories
We Recommend We Recommend

Celebrate Independence Day with the Redbirds

CREDIT: Memphis Redbirds

Every year since the Redbirds were introduced to our city in 2000, the Memphis Redbirds Independence Day games have served as a staple for Memphians looking to celebrate the holiday. After all, how much more of an All-American experience can you get beyond combining baseball, hot dogs, and fireworks? The Redbirds have you covered.

This year, our beloved baseball team will play against the New Orleans Baby Cakes in front of a packed house of 10,000 attendees.

The first 1,000 fans to show up will receive free sunscreen samples from the American Cancer Society as part of Minor League Baseball’s aptly named “Cover Your Bases” initiative.

Memphis Redbirds

Take me out to the ball game.

“We also have a specialty ticket that includes a ticket to the game and an all-you-can-eat hamburger/hot dog buffet, which is always very popular,” says Michael Schroeder, director of media and public relations for the Redbirds and 901FC.

Other food items included in the unlimited buffet: potato chips, cookies, bottled water, and two Coca-Cola beverages per person.

“It’s a good way to let us do the grilling so you can just sit back with family and friends and watch some baseball while eating great food and enjoying post-game fireworks,” says Schroeder.

After the game, Schroeder promises the Minor League Baseball team will deliver AutoZone Park’s biggest fireworks extravaganza in history.

And because the Redbirds’ Independence Day celebrations occur on July 3rd, attendees can get a head start on Fourth of July festivities a day early and/or celebrate two days in a row. “No matter when it is, we create a memorable night at the ballpark,” Schroeder says.

Categories
Opinion Viewpoint

Internet Married

It’s kind of like that old saying: When Tennessee lawmakers close a door, the internet opens a window.

This year, lawmakers here valiantly slew the wicked wishes of those evil, eager couples hoping to get married by someone not of the cloth or of the government. Since 1997, even two Tennessee Attorneys General have opined against this dark, all-encompassing oppression choking the necks of every soul across the Volunteer State. But this year — redemption! Thanks to 26 separate, holy actions by the House and 10 by the Senate, Public Chapter 415 becomes the law of the land on July 1st. The hills shall rejoice and give praise!

Getting “internet married” is a digital, DIY culture hack that allows couples to get hitched by anyone they choose. Friends, relatives, bosses, book club leaders, crosswalk guards, rodeo clowns — anyone — can marry any two people in Tennessee — for the rest of this month at least.

All they need is an internet connection and an email address. Point a browser over to the digital temple of the Universal Life Church. Enter your name (it has to be a real one). Enter your email address, and Bang! There’s your official ordination on an official-looking certificate you could print off and hang on the wall.

Couples get “mail-order ministers,” who are usually friends or family, to give their personal, private ceremony a personal, private touch. Such a solemn pact could be sealed by a friendly face, not some stranger who’d say Satan-knows-what during your special day. But Tennessee Republicans — who think the government should stay out of our personal business — think the government they lead should get all up in this personal business in a great, big way.

So, two white, cis-gender, Christian, white-haired, East-Tennessee Republicans sponsored a bill that wades right out into the middle of the private lives of every Tennessean. It passed with easy majorities of both legislative bodies, which are dominated by those small-government Republicans.

Here’s your new law, Tennesseans:

“Under present law, in order to solemnize the rite of matrimony, a minister, preacher, pastor, priest, rabbi, or other spiritual leader must be ordained or otherwise designated in conformity with the customs of a church, temple, or other religious group or organization; and such customs must provide for such ordination or designation by a considered, deliberate, and responsible act,” reads the bill summary.

So, you can’t be ordained by the click of a mouse anymore. You must go through an established religious organization. This, in a country that stands upon a document that proudly proclaims a separation of church and state and freedom from religion. It’s all right there alongside the right to bear arms. Isn’t it, Republicans?

But these Sky-Daddy-Fearing lawmakers gave some reprieve to all of those helpless, sinful internet-marrieds. If you got internet married (before July 1st) by your sweet old grandma (because she was going to die soon and she always wanted to see her sweet little one get married one day), you can stay married. Oh, such benevolence.

In 1997, then-state-Attorney General John Walkup said internet ministers couldn’t seal the deal in Tennessee. But are internet-marrieds still married? Eh, depends on who’s asking but the “presumption in favor of marriage is very strong.”

In 2015, Attorney General Herbert Slattery put a finer point on online ordination. He said, officiants (outside of government leaders) must belong to religious groups and be “ordained by a considered, deliberate, and responsible act.” So, not only did you have to be in the God Club, Jesus also had to pull your name out of the Goblet of Fire, or whatever.

So, our faithful defenders of Democracy For Some created a new, unbreakable law on internet hitching this year. But this week, a window on all of this was slated to open here in Memphis.

The American Marriage Ministries was to set up shop at Shelby Farms on Monday to ordain — in person — anyone who wanted to marry anyone. It’s enough, the group says, to stand against Tennessee’s new law.

The AMM church’s doctrine is broad enough to cover Christians, Muslims, Atheists, Agnostics, or even Pagans, it says. Weird. Isn’t that what the American Constitution was created to cover?

Toby Sells is a Flyer associate editor.

Categories
Music Music Features

Review: Fresh Releases from Memphis Artists

Model Zero

Model Zero (Slovenly Recordings)

There’s something different going on in Model Zero, the self-titled debut album from members of the Sheiks, Yesse Yavis, and several other Bluff City bands. Model Zero is Keith Cooper (bass, synth, drum machines), Frank McLallen (vocals, guitar), Linton Holliday (guitar, vocals), Jesse James Davis (drums, synthesizer, background vocals) — a supergroup, of sorts, made up of members of bands who usually specialize in punk, garage rock, and roots rock. So where do the pulsing drum machines and swirling, psychedelic synthesizers fit in?

“We were in the lab for a long time,” Cooper says of working out the dynamics of playing the songs live. Part of the danger was the exploration of new musical motifs and temperamental equipment.

“Anything could go wrong because we’re using a lot of old equipment and analogue equipment,” Davis says. “I think it adds to the energy.” And there is an undeniable energy to the album. The band’s cover of Buffalo Springfield’s “Mr. Soul” pulses insistently; “This Modern Life” is frantic with guitars, percussion, and the refrain repeated like a chant.

“Our first major performance was playing at Quintron and Miss Pussycat’s Lundi Gras at Sailor Jack’s in New Orleans,” McLallen says. “It was the first time the drum machines went through a huge P.A., and there were guys and girls in costumes coming out on the floor and dancing with this sexy verve.” Holliday chimes in: “That’s the secret. We’re a dance band.”

Model Zero’s album release concert at DKDC Friday, June 28th, at 10:30 p.m.

Alyssa Moore

The Farmer’s Revenge (Self-released)

This is what it sounds like when a talented multi-instrumentalist and audio engineer exorcises her demons — and has fun doing it. With her third solo effort, The Farmer’s Revenge, Alyssa Moore confronts new horizons, the joys of independence, and life after trauma.

“It’s a sequel to The Girl Became a Farmer,” says Moore, solo artist, bassist for math-rock outfit Strengths, and owner and operator of indie recording studio Move the Air. “The lyrics and songs were more about getting up and going forward [this time],” she says, explaining a shift on the new record. “The last [album] was put out as a way to release some emotions about the event that happened,” Moore says, referring to a violent public assault by her ex-boyfriend in 2017. With The Farmer’s Revenge, however, Moore explores new territory; most of the work, she says, fit the motifs of freedom and independence.

Alyssa Moore

“I just locked myself up here and recorded it all,” Moore says. “Everything on the album was written, recorded, and played by me. When I hear the term ‘solo artist’ or ‘solo album,’ I think of a single person doing the work.”

Moore makes no bones about sticking to any one style with her new release. On “Here Comes the Thunder” she alternates whispers and screams during the refrain. With “Cat’s Cradle,” cut-time drums and a bed of acoustic guitar share sonic space with swaggering squalls of electric guitar. The result is as dynamic as the person who crafted it, at times joyous, sometimes dark, and overflowing with personality.

Alyssa Moore performs at Midtown Crossing, Thursday, June 27th, 10:30 p.m.

Hash Redactor

Drecksound (Goner)

After a heavy touring schedule in 2018, Hash Redactor released their debut album, Drecksound, in April via Goner Records. The pairing is hardly surprising, as the band is pure Goner. Fronted by guitarist Alec McIntyre of Ex-Cult and with Meredith Lones (bass) and Charlotte Watson (drums) of Nots laying down rhythm, the band is a Goner supergroup. George Williford on guitar rounds out the lineup.

It’s not just Hash Redactor’s c.v. that screams “Goner.” The songs come in fast and hard, propelled by booming bass and tight drums. Watson and Lones share an easy comfort playing together; their confidence oozes from every song. McIntyre sneers the vocals, an antihero decrying humanity’s self-destructive tendencies and looking cool while doing so. The guitars alone are worth the price of admission.

Hash Redactor performs at Bar DKDC, Saturday, July 13th, 10 p.m.

Categories
News News Feature

Driving High

CREDIT: Arkansas Cannabis Industry Association

Drivers drive high and don’t think they’ll get caught, according to the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.

Nearly 14.8 million drivers said they drove within an hour of using cannabis, according to a report released last week. And nearly 70 percent of Americans thought it unlikely they’d get busted for it.

“Law enforcement officials are getting more sophisticated in their methods for identifying marijuana-impaired drivers, and the consequences are not worth the risk,” said Stephanie Milani, Tennessee public affairs director for AAA.

Arkansas Cannabis Industry Association

CBD flower from The Bold Team, Arkansas’ supplier.

There are now about 185 Drug Recognition Experts (DREs) working in the Tennessee Highway Safety Office, up 30 percent since 2013.

Fed Protections

Congress debated bills last week that sought protections for federal employees using cannabis in conjunction with their state laws and protections for banks doing business with the cannabis industry.

New Arkansas Dispensary

Arkansas Natural Products opened last week in Clinton, Arkansas. It’s the third dispensary to open there. ReLeaf Center Dispensary and Farm is expected to open in Bentonville next month.

Categories
News The Fly-By

Wedding Workaround

CREDIT: American Marriage Ministries/Facebook

On July 1st, “internet married” is over in Tennessee.

State lawmakers this year passed a bill that prevents online-ordained ministers from marrying couples. The new rule (Public Chapter No. 415) gives that power to a broader array of government officials but demands more from “ministers” of any stripe.

“Under present law, in order to solemnize the rite of matrimony, a minister, preacher, pastor, priest, rabbi, or other spiritual leader must be ordained or otherwise designated in conformity with the customs of a church, temple, or other religious group or organization, and such customs must provide for such ordination or designation by a considered, deliberate, and responsible act,” reads the bill summary.

American Marriage Ministries/Facebook

A couple married thanks to American Marriage Ministries.

But American Marriage Ministries (AMM) was in Memphis Monday for a free and easy (and legal, they say) workaround. The group, an official, nonprofit church, performed in-person ordinations for anyone hoping to “internet marry” couples.

“With thousands of ministers stranded by the discriminatory Public Chapter No. 415, our ministers and the communities they serve are entitled to wedding ceremonies that reflect their values and beliefs, despite what the Tennessee legislature says!” reads a statement from AMM executive director Lewis King.

— Toby Sells

Memphis Flyer: Why are you doing this?

Lewis King: We’re here because Public Chapter No. 415 discriminates against non-traditional Tennessee ministers, preventing thousands of our ministers from exercising their freedom of religion by officiating wedding ceremonies. While we are doing everything we can to get this discriminatory law repealed, it is important that we do right by our ministers. By providing in-person ordination and training, AMM is giving our ministers a way to remain in compliance with Tennessee’s marriage law and meet their obligations to couples across the state.

Solemnizing marriage is an important spiritual service of love that requires getting ordained, spending hours working on a ceremony, practicing it, and then delivering it on the wedding day. The disregard that Public Chapter No. 415 displays is not only offensive, it’s also an indication of how out of touch Tennessee’s legislature is with the way that Tennesseans practice their faith.

MF: How does it work?

LK: As a nationally recognized church, we are able to ordain ministers, which gives them the legal standing to conduct certain ceremonies such as the solemnization of weddings. It’s the same process, more or less, that all other churches use. Ours just happens to be much more user-friendly and less caught up in dogmatism.

MF: Does it satisfy Tennessee law?

LK: We’ve carefully reviewed the latest version of Tennessee’s marriage law, including consulting internal and external legal counsel to make sure that our ordinations meet the letter and spirit of the law — and they do.

AMM is registered in Tennessee as a foreign nonprofit corporation, and we are providing in-person ordinations and training to our ministers like every other state-sanctioned institution does.

MF: Has this worked in other cities and states?

LK: Almost 50 percent of weddings in the U.S. last year were officiated by friends, family, and neighbors — ie. non-traditional ministers. Society has embraced this expression of spirituality. It’s time for Tennessee’s lawmakers to catch up.