Nashville DA Glenn Funk (Photo: Courtesy Nashville Post)
Since the bombshell announcement last Friday of the Supreme Court decision invalidating the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling on abortion, numerous political figures — governors, senators, an abundance of political candidates, and smaller fry galore — have gotten themselves on the record either for or against the court’s dramatic reversal.
Few and far between are those politicians who have spoken in more qualified, measured terms, but among the most cautious have been the two candidates for Shelby County District Attorney — incumbent Republican DA Amy Weirich and her Democratic challenger Steve Mulroy.
Both had addressed the pending decision weeks ago, after a draft of the ruling-to-be, authored by Justice Samuel Alito, had been leaked to the media.
Weirich’s first utterance on the subject came early in June on the occasion of a ceremony in which she received the endorsements of the Memphis Police Association and the Shelby County Deputy Sheriff’s Association.
The full SCOTUS decision had not yet been formally announced, a fact which underscored Weirich’s reluctance when she was asked point-blank what would be her attitude toward enforcing Tennessee’s new anti-abortion act, a “trigger” law that would come into effect once Roe was dissolved.
“To answer that question, we have to assume a lot of hypotheticals,” Weirich said. “And I think any conversation about a law that hasn’t gone into place about a Supreme Court decision that may or may not be overturned … is hypothetical and, quite frankly, political grandstanding. To even discuss what our office would do, you would first have to assume that doctors in this community would break the law. And then you would have to assume that that criminal conduct was reported to law enforcement. There’s a lot of criminal conduct that doesn’t get reported about.
“And then you have to assume that an investigation is conducted and that there is enough information to make a charge against someone. Too many hypotheticals, too many hoops to jump through. And that’s not, that’s not the universe I live in. I don’t make conjecture statements about what I will remand or could or should do. We deal in facts, we deal in truth, and we deal in the evidence that’s before us.”
On Friday, Weirich updated those sentiments: “It is a dangerous path for a DA to make broad and hypothetical statements without an actual charge or case before them. To do so violates Tennessee Code Annotated 8-7-106, which requires a DA to consider the unique facts and circumstances of a particular case.”
The law referred to by Weirich is sometimes called “the Glenn Funk law,” after a Davidson County (Nashville) DA of progressive bent who has long made public his refusal to prosecute any and all cases dealing with anti-abortion statutes. Funk repeated his adamance in the wake of the Roe reversal.
Candidate Mulroy, asked weeks ago about his attitude toward enforcing the state trigger law, declined to make a Funk-like disavowal, noting that 8-7-106 allows the state Attorney General to appoint a special prosecutor for cases disdained by local district attorneys. Mulroy did say abortion-law violations would be a very low priority in his tenure.
On Friday, Mulroy said, “This is a sad day. The politicized right-wing Court goes out of its way to overturn half a century of precedent, with women as the victims. As District Attorney, I’ll be very different from Amy Weirich.
“Weirich’s party and Donald Trump want her to turn her attention away from prosecuting violent crime and prosecute women and their doctors. We need to be focusing on carjackings, murders, domestic violence — not jailing doctors helping women make reproductive choices.”
Mulroy also said Weirich, who “won’t say what she thinks about prosecuting reproductive choice,” was “one of the few Tennessee DAs who, under a now sunsetted law, prosecuted pregnant women for ‘fetal assault’ for showing up to hospitals to get substance abuse treatment.”
Beer and summertime compete in the same class as peanut butter and jelly; they just go together.
The summer sun warms you up and makes some a little grumpy. That’s where beer steps in. It cools you down and mellows you out. It’s simply irreplaceable in so many summer mainstays. Do you cheer on the Redbirds with a cappuccino? Do you stock your fishing boat with Earl Grey? Do you lounge around Loflin Yard with mugs of steaming hot cocoa? Didn’t think so.
Beer’s importance to what is an already hot Memphis summer led the Flyer staff to action. We could not sit idly by without letting our readers know their options. So, we geared up for our Summer Beer Guide.
<i>Flyer</i> writer, Toby Sells, and Memphis Made Brewing president and head brewer, Drew Barton, stand for a photo during last week’s beer tasting.
Flyer reporter Toby Sells headed straight to Downtown’s South Point Grocery to stock up for an ultimate taste test of some of the best summer beers from Memphis breweries. Luckily, Garrett Metts, the director of alcohol sales with Castle Retail Group, was in the house that day last week. He guided our beer run, pointing out the city’s best, newest, and most summer-ific suds on offer (of which there are many).
Sells also perused the aisles of Joe’s Wines & Liquors to ensure no Memphis brewery was left behind. There, he wondered about summer beer trends. Like that summer jam you can’t escape (Remember the “Old Town Road” summer?), summer beer trends had the masses drinking juicy India pale ales one year. Another was the summer of the sour, and hard seltzers have reigned now for years. Chris Schirmer, beer buyer for Joe’s, predicts this year may be the summer of “beer-flavored beers” like basic pilsners, lagers, and kölsches.
“I think people are just resetting their palates or chasing the flavors has gotten old,” Schirmer says. “I think people just want a classic standby thing. You could eat steak all the time, right? But a good-old burger every once in a while is pretty satisfying.”
As we’ve said with each of our beer guides, we’re not beer experts. Flyer staffers are curious craft beer consumers, walking into their local grocery store or gas station to see what’s new. We’re not cicerones nor can we predict a beer’s IBU with a swig or two. We are average beer consumers with opinions to share.
But we always know we need help tasting these beers. Another beer-guide tradition has been the presence of a Memphis brewer at our tastings. They help us understand the styles we’re tasting and help us with questions like, “Is this beer supposed to taste weird?” This year, we tapped Memphis Made Brewing’s president and head brewer Drew Barton for help. He lit our path through the many styles icing in our cooler, all with his feet in the pool. Not a bad gig.
“We have some definite seasons here in Memphis needing some different flavors along the way,” Barton says. “A stout’s great when it’s 32 degrees outside … but you don’t want that stout when it’s 70 degrees hotter, like it is today at 102 [degrees].”
All the beers we tasted this year are from Memphis and all of them are widely available in stores. So you won’t have to go out of your way to find them. Memphis breweries have really churned out beers for just about anybody this year. So, use our beer guide to make a beer run of your own this summer. Get yourself cool. You won’t be disappointed. — Toby Sells
Photos: Chris McCoy
Ghost River Brewing Co. Grindhouse Cream Ale This brew brings to mind the workingman’s beers of my wastrel youth — Schlitz, Hamm’s, Falstaff — but with a creamier texture. This beer is old-school, and not bad. — Bruce VanWyngarden
The “cream” in this beer’s name is a little misleading (though I think maybe it’s a beer term?). Easy drinking on this one, mild flavor. Not at all what you’d consider creamy. — Shara Clark
It’s very smooth and inoffensive. I can easily sip this outside on a hot summer day, and it’s usually what I default to at Ghost River’s Wednesday night trivia, where I am almost every week. It’s fine! Grab a few and kick back. — Samuel X. Cicci
Memphis Made Brewing Co. Dockside Wheat Ale Dockside is a beer that smells like beer and tastes like beer, and nothing’s wrong with that. — Abigail Morici
For me, Dockside is an ideal summer beer. It’s not too heavy or filling, but it still has a lot of flavor. You could call this crisp, balanced, slightly hoppy brew “Fireside Light.” — Chris McCoy
This is the beeriest beer I drank during our tasting. It doesn’t show off. It just delivers the goods. A lighter version of Fireside that works well in the summer heat. — BV
Crisp, refreshing, perfect light beer to sip pool, er, dockside. It’s the one I came back for after our beer-tasting rounds. — SC
It’s another light, wheat smooth ale, but with just a little bit of heft to it that makes it stand out more than your typical summer beer. It’s described as a lighter type of Fireside, which everyone likes. So if you like Fireside, you’ll like Dockside. Enough said. Go get some. — SXC
This was the most enjoyable of the bunch, a welcoming beginning that isn’t sweet but pleasantly tart, and then settling into an agreeable aftertaste. — Jon W. Sparks
High Cotton Brewing Co. Razz Wheat If you had blindfolded me and told me to smell this beverage, I would’ve said you had a cup of crushed Smarties that had been sitting in the bottom of your backpack long enough for the plastic wrapper to have tainted the candy ever so slightly.
So imagine my surprise when I found this drink not to be sweet and plastic-y but to taste like the ghost of fancy bread, the kind that is exclusively showcased in the bakery section of a grocery, not shelved in the bread aisle where the lighting is dimmer and the dust bunnies crawl on the tiled floor, where a curled hair has been fossilized in the latest waxing of the tiles. No, this bread was above average, and its ghost is enjoyably average. — AM
The most remarkable thing about this beer is the smell. The fruity nose holds the promise of a bright flavor, but the taste is not as intense. The effervescent mouthfeel is refreshing. — CM
Did someone drop a SweeTart in this? The initial hit was sweet, but that didn’t linger. Still an easy drinker. — SC
An ale! With raspberries! The opening taste is an odd sensation. It hits me with a fruity texture that almost makes me feel like I’m sipping juice, but that drifts away quickly. After that, it’s a pretty solid wheat beer. I do like raspberries, but when I see razz, I need more razzle dazzle in my can. — SXC
It’s light. It’s drinkable. But it has a soapy taste to it (on that first drink, anyway) that tastes artificial somehow. — TS
Grind City Brewing Co. Tiger Tail (malt liquor) Tastes like penny-flavored cotton candy spun in an ashtray. — AM
Okay, I was expecting something like Colt .45 — brutal and efficient and quick to the rim, like Penny Hardaway in his prime. But this is more like a Larry Porter third-down call. — BV
Knowing before trying this that it was a malt liquor, I assumed I’d be comparing it to a Colt .45, however, as the can describes, this beer has a “thin body” and might be too easy to drink for its 7.5 percent alcohol by volume. There’s a slight banana aftertaste, which the expert here says could be a result of fermentation. — SC
The taste is bold. The body is thin just like the can will tell you. There’s a corny flavor to it that — whatever it is — is not my thing. If you’re crushing these 7.5-percent beers at a game, this Tiger may have you by the Tail by the fourth quarter. — TS
Hook Point Brewing Co. Afterburner Red (Irish ale) Drinking this ale is like accidentally getting warm bath water in your mouth after the local government has issued a warning of brain-eating amoeba in the water supply. You’ll swallow it absent-mindedly, only to regret it when the aftertaste hits. — AM
I love a good Irish red beer, and this one delivers the malty goodness I’m looking for. Dryer than most reds, this has almost no aftertaste. This is the Collierville brewery’s best product yet. — CM
This one is darker than the others we’ve been drinking. It’s got a roasty after-burn and a hearty feel. Not the beer I’d pick for July in Memphis, but it would go great around a fire pit in November. — BV
You want plenty of thrust when you hit the afterburners, although this concoction isn’t too distinctive but gives a nice enough ride. — JWS
Hampline Brewing Co. Cherry Bomb Cherry Amaretto Sour Gose If you had to engineer red snowball syrup to be strong enough to pave the streets of Memphis, I’d start with the Cherry Bomb as a template because, my oh my, the cherry flavor is way too strong and so sweet that it feels like my teeth have been tarred over in sugar. — AM
With too much carbonation and a sickly red color, it looks like a cherry-flavored Emergen-C. This is a beer that wishes it was a seltzer. — CM
I’ll preface this by saying that I’m not a fan of sours, and it’s certainly a personal taste issue, but this one’s a little too funky, absolutely sour, and has a not-so-faint hint of cherry lozenges. — SC
My grandkids would love this sour candy mouthfeel. For grown-ups, not a nice thing to have as an aftertaste. — JWS
Meddlesome Brewing Co. Mango Funk Yoself (Berliner Weisse sour ale) Mango Funk Yoself is essentially the lackluster juice presented to you at the healthy family’s house as the well-intentioned mom tries so hard to convince you that it’s a substitute for dessert, but you and she both know it’s not. It’s really not. This drink makes you wish you stayed home. — AM
For me, the problem with fruit-flavored beers is that the first sip tastes good, but by the time you finish, you’re sick of it. If you like a sweet beer, this one will satisfy. What does passion fruit taste like, anyway? — CM
It’s a sour. But, I’m not sure it tastes like a sour? My co-worker said it would be great as a mimosa mixer, so I’m going to shamelessly steal her line and use it here, and collect my paycheck without a care in the world. This is a nice fruity light beer. It’s like taking a juicy IPA, minus the hops. If you’re just looking at it in a cup, it looks like juice. But what a name! — SXC
What the hell is with all this gawdamn fruit beer? (Old Man yells at cloud.) This one is pretty tolerable, as these things go. (And I wish they would … go.) Kinda mimosa-ish, so it could pair well with brunch. — BV
I can hear my colleagues harrumphing over these fruity beers. They can go funk themselves. This is delicious. Also, is this the best beer name of the summer? Or the best beer name of all time? — TS
Crosstown Brewing Co. Dog Days Pink Lemonade Shandy The shandy is a European cocktail that mixes beer with a citrus juice or ginger ale. Expertly balancing the elements, this version is eminently drinkable. It’s a refreshing, low-alcohol alternative for a hot afternoon. — CM
It’s a tart little petal plucked from a sunflower. — SC
It tastes exactly as advertised! A pink lemonade shandy that’s a smooth and sweet summer drink. Not quite my cup of tea, but probably a good entry point to the habit for those who aren’t huge beer drinkers to begin with. Oh wait, the “dog days of summer,” I get it now! — SXC
Pink lemonade shandy: Fruity beers make me grumpy, but this one is acceptable for its kind. Certainly not as bad as it sounds. I did not gag. — JWS
Soul and Spirits Brewing Co. Proud Meri Hazy Pale Ale If, out of a hungry desperation, you’ve sucked on a lemon cough drop that you’ve found in your pants pocket after it’s made its rounds in the washing machine, then you’ve basically had this session hazy pale ale — though, you’re more likely to get a rush from the cough drop that’s likely contaminated by laundry detergent than this drink with a 2.9 percent alcohol by volume. — AM
Hoppy, but not to excess; a fortified taste, but with one of the lowest alcohol contents of any beer we tried. This beer felt like a compromise, not sure of exactly what it wanted to be. — CM
At 2.9 ABV, this session beer offers the hoppy flavor of an IPA without any fear of getting an actual buzz. — BV
It’s not a super hoppy beer, which I’m fine with. And being a session variety, it’s only 2.9 percent ABV, making it better suited to these long summer days and nights. I’m not an IPA guy, but I wouldn’t mind finishing off one of these tall boys. — SXC
I am an IPA guy and there’s a lot going on right here. The session IPAs are fine, I guess, but I never really got into them like I did with, say, Coke Zero. Something was missing: flavor. Proud Meri’s got it, though. — TS
Beale Street Brewing Co. Dark NinJA Rises (IPA) Absolutely not. — AM
The can looks super cool, and the name means business. But the beer itself is nothing special. — CM
The can design is as mesmerizing as a Ja Morant triple double. The beer inside is more workmanlike. Think Kyle Anderson Euro-step with a slo-mo finish. — BV
I’m never quite sure what kind of flavor blast I’m going to find inside a Beale Street Brewing can. It’s pretty crisp, and there are a ton of fruity flavors battling it out when I sip it. Again, not sure I’m the audience, but heck, I’m here to support Ja, so I’ll finish it. — SXC
So they’re going for the Ja thing, and, like Mr. Morant, it’s nice enough. But not as distinctive as you’d expect of an All-Star — certainly not a slam dunk. — JWS
Wiseacre Brewing Co. Puffel Hazy Double Juicy IPA This hazy IPA comes on strong in the flavor department. The 9 percent alcohol content is readily apparent in the mouthfeel. It comes in a 19.2 fl. oz. can, so this is the beer to have if you’re having only one. — CM
This thing is the hammer of Thor, with classic IPA flavor cues. It packs a punch at 9 percent alcohol by volume, so you best be careful when indulging in a can of this stuff. Or, you could just drink 6 Proud Meris. — BV
Gives you that IPA mouth-pucker. If you’re an IPA fan and want to get totally blitzed, this 9 percent [alcohol by volume] tall boy is for you. Don’t forget to drink some H2O. — SC
This one has a distinct personality, is thoroughly agreeable, and provides a pleasant aftertaste. — JWS
I will admit I had a hazy boi summer (or two). Even though I ain’t ’bout that life no more, Puffel reminds me of why I loved these juicy, fruity beers to begin with. They’re fun to drink. Period. And with Wiseacre’s big-ass can of Puffel, the fun will last in this never-ending summer. — TS
Chip Dunham may be the only chef inspired by SpongeBob SquarePants.
Dunham, 31, who owns Magnolia & May along with his wife Amanda, was 14 when he began working at a restaurant. “My parents told me I needed to get a job if I wanted to go to the movies or any sort of extracurricular activity with my friends,” he says. “I needed a job to pay for that.”
His mother wanted him to bus tables at The Grove Grill, which was owned by his dad, chef Jeffrey Dunham. “My dad said cool people cook in the kitchen.”
Thanks to an animated TV series, Chip became a pantry cook, making cold salads and appetizers. “At the time I was really into SpongeBob SquarePants. He was a fry cook.”
Working at the restaurant was “a really positive experience. We had a good bunch of people back there. When I first started, Ryan Trimm was the chef de cuisine.
“I wouldn’t be doing it to this day if I didn’t love it. It was a lot of fun. It gave you a creative outlet.”
Chip, who could “work every station in the kitchen,” enrolled in The Culinary Institute of America at Hyde Park, New York. “There’s a distillery on campus, a brewery, a culinary science program. If anyone is going into the culinary arts field, that is the place to go.”
Chip, who met Amanda at school, worked at Slightly North of Broad Restaurant, Butcher & Bee, and The Glass Onion in Charleston, South Carolina, before moving back to Memphis.
In 2017, his parents were thinking about adding a second location of The Grove Grill but couldn’t find the right location. They decided to convert Chip’s grandfather’s insurance company into a restaurant.
The Grove Grill closed in March 2020 during the pandemic. “We ended up just putting all our efforts into Magnolia & May,” Chip says.
They opened the restaurant in May 2020, with Chip as executive chef and Amanda as general manager. “We were ready to go and our employees were ready to go. There was no sense in waiting anymore.
“We had online orders, did curbside, and you could dine in. It was all about doing what we could to stay afloat. We did those chef boxes and instructions on how to make a dinner for two.”
As for the concept, Chip says, “We call ourselves a country brasserie. We present ourselves in a rustic way, but while we’re a restaurant based in the American South, we don’t want to pigeonhole ourselves as that.”
Influences include Asian and Middle Eastern, but everything is “rooted in that classic French technique,” Chip says. And they change the menu daily. “That could be as simple as one change or we could basically overhaul the whole menu.”
Core items include sautéed trout with fried green tomatoes and jumbo lump crab meat and hollandaise. “We’re doing it with sockeye salmon right now. The only reason we switched out trout is salmon is in season.”
Sandwiches include a fried chicken and collard greens melt and a double cheeseburger with melted cheddar.
They still serve the pimento cheese from The Grove Grill. “We don’t have the ability to do the flatbread like we did at The Grove. We just serve it with crackers, pickles, and bacon marmalade.”
They include some “exclusive items” for the recently reinstated lunch. One is pastrami made with Home Place Pastures beef brisket served on marble rye bread. “And then I put some house-made barbecue chips on it and jalapeño cheddar cheese sauce.”
As for desserts, Chip says. “My kids really like ice cream cones, so one of our desserts is chocolate-dipped cones with sprinkles.”
Dunham family children are responsible for the restaurant’s name. “Our family has a silly tradition where before you know the gender of the baby, you give it a little nickname. At the time, Amanda was pregnant with our daughter, who we called Baby Magnolia. And my sister was pregnant, and we called my niece Baby May.”
Magnolia & May is at 718 Mt. Moriah Road; (901) 676-8100.
Emma Lockridge led an eight-year fight for justice for her heavily polluted Detroit hometown. (Photo: Courtesy Emma Lockridge)
Imagine waking up in the middle of the night to put on a face mask to block the horrific smell of chemical odors that seeped into your bedroom from nearby factories. That used to be my nightly routine. Wearing a facial mask is nothing new to me. I’ve been using them since 2007, the year my courageous nephew donated a kidney to me to extend my life. After surgery, my transplant team gave me a packet of masks to protect myself from germs because organ transplant anti-rejection medications also would suppress my immune system throughout my life. Since then, Covid has escalated my need to wear masks.
I initially wore masks to shield myself from human germs, but in 2017 I was regularly wearing facial masks for another reason. I had to shield myself from the chemical odors that overwhelmed my bedroom on most nights at around 2:30 a.m. when there was a massive release of factory toxins into our community.
(Photo: Courtesy Emma Lockridge)
My subdivision, Detroit 48217, was and still is the most polluted area in the entire state of Michigan. It is surrounded by more than 30 major polluters that self-report emissions to the Environmental Protection Agency and a Michigan state environmental department. The area is subjected to chemical releases from a tar sands oil refinery, steel mills, a municipal water treatment plant, asphalt production facilities, a multi-lane freeway, and a facility that bakes human waste into fertilizer. I nicknamed the biosolids fertilizer facility “the queasy-bake oven” after inhaling its putrid-smelling emissions.
In addition to polluted air, I discovered our former elementary school grounds were contaminated with enough lead in the soil to deem it an EPA brownfield. The school grounds were fenced off so no one could walk on the poisoned land, but the swings and climbing apparatus from my youth are still in place as a reminder that as children we played endlessly on that land.
I was diagnosed with kidney failure in 2005 after my sister died of the disease. My next-door neighbor’s kidneys also failed and my neighbor across the street died after years of dialysis treatments. It is important to note that when I was diagnosed with end-stage renal failure, I was not diabetic, my blood pressure was controlled, and I was a healthy weight. Many studies, including data from the CDC, have made a connection between kidney failure and lead contamination.
The largest polluter based in our ZIP code is an oil refinery that underwent a $2.2 billion expansion around 2010. The refinery conducted a home buyout plan near its facility but did not include our sector. The purchased area had a large white population. It felt unjust to me living in the predominantly Black area not to have our homes included in the buyout plan.
Trapped! That’s how we felt in our homes. Our home values had plummeted to $15,000 because no one wanted to move into toxic air. Many of us did not want to stay, but we also could not afford to leave
My calling to become an environmental justice organizer was launched. I strategically organized my neighbors, and after nearly eight arduous years of protest rallies, testimony before local government and congressional panels, trips to refinery shareholder meetings, and garnering support from outside our community, the refinery extended the buyout offer to our community in 2020.
I have transitioned to Memphis only to find a community that reminds me of home. The Boxtown neighborhood in Southwest Memphis is based near a refinery and they are dealing with the possibility of an oil pipeline being routed through their area. Many Memphians are also concerned about protecting the aquifer. I feel compelled to help inform people about what is happening there. I will continue to advocate for a healthy environment so that others do not end up tethered to a mask for life.
Emma Lockridge is a veteran news reporter who focuses on the environment and social justice initiatives. Formerly based in Detroit, she also is a photojournalist who has had exhibits of her impactful images.
A cartoon music video for a song called “Memphis Style” draws the city in blunt terms.
Posted to Facebook last month by cartoonist (and Nashvillian by way of Memphis) Skylar Wilson, who said he was “proud to make a cartoon set in my hometown.” The song is by record producers and songwriters Kenny Greenberg and Wally Wilson.
“Nobody lives here anymore. That’s what the ones who moved away are saying,” says the song. “Midtown’s tired. The streets are on fire. It’s 100 degrees in the shade. … Don’t touch that dial. We’re rolling, Momma, Memphis style.”
In a scathing assessment of the city’s virtues, the song says names like Otis Redding and B.B. King don’t matter anymore, replaced with greed. Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland (who is labeled “Mayor Dickland” by his desk nameplate) has “all the power” but “he don’t have a soul.”
Memphis Mass Band
Posted to YouTube by Killa Kev Productions
School’s out but that won’t stop the Memphis Mass Band from taking the field. It’s a mash-up of the Memphis All-Stars Band and the Memphis Universal Alumni Band. Check them on YouTube doing their version of “4’s Up.”
Memphis music fans looking for the short, sharp, shocking angles of ’80s post-punk have long known of Model Zero, who began circulating cassettes as early as January 2018. Since then, they’ve been regular players around town — but that’s all in a day’s work for these yeoman troubadours, who’ve played musical chairs through various overlapping bands together for years. Many know Frank McLallen, Keith Cooper, and Jesse James Davis as the Tennessee Screamers, and McLallen and Cooper are with the Sheiks, but their roles are scrambled here, with Cooper playing only bass, McLallen on guitar, and Davis on drums, not to mention Linton Holliday’s guitar thrown in for good measure.
Today, it’s clear that all those nights in hot, sweaty nightclubs tweaked these players’ brains: Their latest slice of wax clearly comes from a land where dancing rules. “Little Crystal” b/w “Leather Trap” arrives this week, courtesy Nashville’s Sweet Time Records (complete with a vivid music video directed by Laura Jean Hocking), and everyone is bound to find their ideal groove on one side or the other. True, “Little Crystal” is the A-side, but the drums and groove on the flip are just as infectious.
That’s no coincidence, as Cooper confesses that the entire band is committed to a life of servitude, not just to the rhythm, but to the Rhythm Master. “It’s funny,” he reflects, “this whole band is obeying the drum machine. It’s a brown box. A Rhythm Master, model RM-10, made in Whippany, New Jersey, in the late ’60s or early ’70s. It’s the most valuable member of the band, for sure.”
Devoted to their vintage overlord, the band works tirelessly to ensure its comfort and safety. “When we play outside in the sun, it heats up,” Cooper says. “If it even thinks about the sun, the tempo starts to really slow down. So with outdoor shows, I have to bump it up a little bit. But come nighttime in the cool, dark club, it’s fine.”
Ah yes, nighttime in the cool, dark club. That environment may be Model Zero’s other overlord, or guiding star. As Cooper says, “The whole concept of Model Zero was this forging of two worlds. We wanted a club dance sound, but also to rock. That’s where the drum machine pulse idea came in.”
McLallen concurs: “Everything’s written with the drum machine in mind. It’s groove-based. That’s been our philosophy from the beginning. It’s our synth groove band — a departure from what we’re doing with the Sheiks, which is more just guitar-driven garage rock.”
To be sure, there’s still plenty of garage in this machine. That dirty, distorted edge, combined with pounding beats reminiscent of Gang of Four and a very Memphis punk energy, heavily colored the band’s eponymously titled 2019 album. But then, Cooper says, as the band opened their minds and hearts more and more to the Rhythm Master, they began to mutate and change. “The old stuff was much edgier and a little bit darker,” he says. “We got that out of our system, and then it was time to party!”
As his zeal becomes more fervent, Cooper edges closer to the Rhythm Master, a gleam in his eye. “We’ve been discovering more beats on the drum machine, you know. Like ‘Little Crystal’ is mambo and Rock 2 combined. You can’t not dance to it.” Then he nudges the pulsing brown box closer to the air conditioning.
Yet it must be stressed that the Rhythm Master’s power is amplified by the considerable talents of minion Jesse James Davis, whose feel for New Wave tribal grooves organically augments his analog overlord to perfection. And he in turn serves other task masters, such as an Arturia MicroBrute synthesizer. “Jesse is able to sync up with the drum machine on his synth,” says Cooper. “You hear it in the background on ‘Leather Trap.’ He’s tapping the tempo and it’s this constant flourish of ethereal ambient noise. Nightclub-type stuff.”
For Cooper, the synth flourishes, the drum machine, and the grooves are all means to reach the end of a nightclub state of mind. “I’m just trying to summon this Happy Mondays vibe in this band,” he says. “That’s always been my mental approach to bass in Model Zero. It’s more like a mindset than an actual, direct reference. It’s just trying to tap into that world of the late nightclub.”
Model Zero performs this Friday, July 1st, at the Nashville East Room, and Sunday, July 3rd, at B-Side Memphis.
With the recent market downturn, I’ve seen countless questions like this:
I put $1,500 each month into my 401(k) and it has done well. Lately, however, the balance has been dropping very quickly. My friends are all stopping their contributions because they’re tired of adding money and watching it go away. What do you think I should do?
I remember being on the playground as a young child discussing ways to avoid catastrophes like an airplane crash or a falling elevator. The general consensus was to wait until the very last moment and then jump — rendering you immune from any sort of injury due to falling. That logic is similar to the logic above — stopping investment or pulling out of markets now is not going to prevent further losses. In fact, it will probably cause you to miss out on a rare opportunity to buy stocks at a discount.
One of the reasons investing is confusing is that market returns and bank account interest rates seem to be similar. In reality, they are completely different things. A high-yield savings account earning 1 percent a year means that you’ll earn 1 percent going forward, at least until the rate changes again. Returns of an investment account with stock and bond funds up 1 percent or up 20 percent or down 20 percent over the last year provide no reliable indication of what performance will look like tomorrow.
Saying “stocks always go up” sounds flippant and even reckless, but there is some truth to that notion. The price of stocks over time is tied to real businesses. In the long run, as long as GDP grows, productivity gains continue, and companies continue to earn and grow their income, it is very likely that stock market indices will continue to rise over time as well. Positive earnings growth is like a rubber band that pulls up on stock prices over time.
When market valuations get high, the rubber band gets slack and doesn’t pull up as hard, making market downturns more likely. When valuations are low, the rubber band gets taut and the stock market is more likely to rise, sometimes quickly. Earnings don’t tend to change as quickly as stock market prices, so the most common way to see the rubber band get stretched is during a stock market decline. It’s counterintuitive, but the best time to buy into the market is almost always after steep declines in share prices, when instincts tell us to run far away from risky investments.
Looking at recent performance is one of the worst ways to pick investments in a 401(k), second only to basing decisions off the names of the funds! To pick the right investments for the long run, you need a deep understanding of the choices and a plan to invest for the long haul using funds with reasonable fees, a sensible investing approach and as broadly a diversified footprint as possible. It’s very important, as many people have most of their investment assets in company 401(k) plans and the like. Financial advisors like Telarray who can help guide these investment selections can be invaluable in this effort.
Is the market going to go back up from here? The answer is almost certainly yes — eventually — but nobody knows for sure when. One thing that seems certain is that if you like the markets at the beginning of this year, you should like them a lot more now that they’re down 10-30 percent from those levels. There’s no way of knowing if by the end of 2022 markets will be down more from here or mounting a recovery. In our view, continuing to invest at discount prices is the best decision today just as it has been in each market downturn we have studied. Nobody knows the future, but a true long-term approach means you should be excited to put money to work at a discount!
Gene Gard is Chief Investment Officer at Telarray, a Memphis-based wealth management firm that helps families navigate investment, tax, estate, and retirement decisions. Ask him your questions or schedule an objective, no pressure portfolio review at letstalk@telarrayadvisors.com. Sign up for the next free online seminar on the Events tab at telarrayadvisors.com.
Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Robert Traxler)
“I program my home computer, beam myself into the future.” So sang the group Kraftwerk in 1981, then already over a decade into their mission of putting the world on notice: the human race is morphing into a cybernetic hybrid of the organic and the synthetic. And at the Crosstown Theater last Saturday, the prescience of their vision over the past half century was brought home over and over again.
It seems implausible that a group so identified with “robotic pop,” so important to the history of hip hop and electronica, and so expressive of our collective technological fetishes, was conceived by two music students at Düsseldorf’s Robert Schumann Hochschule, a proper conservatory. Florian Schneider was a flutist and Ralf Hütter played organ, but they were early adopters of that now omnipresent musical machine, the synthesizer.
The rest is history, of course. Now the group, still led by Hütter (Schneider left the band in 2008 and died in 2020), rides the wave of their cybernetic vision well into the twenty-first century, having been honored with both a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and a place in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. And by all accounts after last week’s show, the accolades are well deserved.
The awestruck faces and comments after the performance stood in contrast with the spare stage that audience members saw upon arrival. Four stark podiums stood in a line, center stage, backed by a giant screen. Then the lights lowered and the band strolled onstage in Tron-like jumpsuits imprinted with grid lines.
That was when most of us donned our 3-D glasses. As the band began “Numbers,” columns and rows of digits tracked across the screen. The 3-D effects were subtle at first; later, the numeric grid began to undulate, and we were plunged into another dimension.
And yet the effects always complemented the stunning music. True, I did physically duck the first time the pointy antenna of a spacecraft leapt off the screen and seemed to pierce my brain, and there were other such moments, but for the most part the 3-D animations were resolutely minimalist, and all the more effective for it.
Though there were a plethora of dancing numbers, notes, shapes, and even cars on the Autobahn, not all of the projections were animated, as archival footage of models, cyclists, and other subjects from the songs danced around the players. Memphis even made a cameo, as orbital images of earth zoomed into the Mid-South, then the city’s skyline, and finally on the street in front of the Crosstown Concourse itself. Meanwhile, the onscreen action contrasted sharply with the musicians, who manned their podiums stoically. That made their every foot tap, hip shake, and trace of a smile all the more telling: they were getting into it, but subtly.
And they were really playing. While some of their movements obviously included triggering certain sound patterns, they did have keyboards. Moreover, Hütter explained to Rolling Stone why the familiar old songs sounded so fresh: “Our music is changing in time, so we always play different versions; sometimes we change the tempos and sound,” he said. “Sometimes there’s different traffic on the autobahn. It’s all real. That’s what makes it interesting. Our compositions are like minimalistic film scripts or theater scripts. We can work with this; it’s never going to be the same. It changes over the years.”
This sheds light on why even the retro-futurism of Kraftwerk’s sound and visuals felt decidedly au courant. Even as images of late-’70s-era computer consoles floated before us, the musical weave of rhythm, melody, harmony, and noise was full of funk, beauty, and the sonic detours of strange breakdowns. At the same time, the group did not dip their toes much into the territory of sampling and infinite layering so common in modern electronic music. Their minimalist approach, often boiling down to the interplay of four contrasting parts, kept their aesthetic tightly focused.
And what a powerful aesthetic they’ve created. In a sense, the band was the ultimate expression of the pop art first envisioned in the ’60s: catchy, reproducible melodies, elemental rhythms, and lyrics built on simple phrases or even single words. Yet behind the simplicity, the classical inclinations of the group’s founders shone through, as in the intriguing modulations of the basic building-block chords of “The Man-Machine,” or the elegiac fanfare of “Tour de France.”
Combining all these elements, Kraftwerk reminded us of the power of world-building, paring down the real world to its most basic elements, only to reassemble them anew. That they did so with a real historical insight and an inimitable style was clearly inspiring to both fans and musical innovators that happened to see them in action.
To mark this moment, and savor the possibilities that these masters of funk, melody and noise revealed to us, we present images captured by two of the community’s most fervent music lovers, Ron Buck and Robert Traxler.
Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater, Ralf Hütter, left, with Henning Schmitz. (Photo by Robert Traxler)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Robert Traxler)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Robert Traxler)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Robert Traxler)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Robert Traxler)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Robert Traxler)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Ron Buck)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Ron Buck)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Ron Buck)Kraftwerk on the Autobahn at Crosstown Theater (Photo by Ron Buck)Kraftwerk at Crosstown Theater
Setlist:
Numbers / Computer World / Computer World 2
It's More Fun to Compute / Home Computer
Spacelab
Airwaves / Tango
The Man-Machine
Electric Café
Autobahn
Computer Love
The Model
Neon Lights
Geiger Counter / Radioactivity
Metropolis
Tour de France / Étape 1 / Chrono / Prologue / Étape 2
Trans Europe Express / Abzug / Metal on Metal
Encore:
The Robots / Robotronik
Planet of Visions
Pocket Calculator
Non Stop / Boing Boom Tschak / Music Non Stop
Parties and events are now banned at all Airbnb-listed properties, the company announced Tuesday.
The move is a continued crackdown on what the company calls “party houses,” or ”listings that create persistent neighborhood nuisance.” The ban was first implemented in August 2020 and was in effect at the time until further notice. The company made the move permanent Tuesday.
Since the ban, Airbnb said it has seen a 44 percent year-over-year decrease in party reports at listings around the globe. Party nuisance reports in Tennessee dropped 68 percent in that same time period.
Tighter restrictions on parties began in 2019, when Airbnb banned open-invite parties, those advertised on social media, and “chronic house parties,” those that had developed into neighborhood nuisances. The platform also opened a new hotline for neighbors who could report these parties directly to Airbnb.
“When the pandemic hit, as many bars and clubs closed or restricted their occupancy, we began to see some people taking partying behavior to rented homes, including through Airbnb,” reads a statement from Airbnb. “This was concerning to us due to both the disruptive nature of unauthorized parties and the risk of such gatherings spreading the virus. As such, we announced the party ban to our community as being ‘in the best interest of public health.’”
“Over time, the party ban became much more than a public health measure. It developed into a bedrock community policy to support our hosts and their neighbors.”
The 2020 temporary ban included a cap on occupancy at 16 people. This policy has been lifted for large properties that can comfortably house 16 people, such as “castles in Europe to vineyards in the U.S. to large beachfront villas in the Caribbean.” But the occupancy cap remains for smaller properties listed on the platform.
“We also understand that 16 is not a magic number, and issues can occur with groups of any size,” Airbnb said in 2020. “To be clear, we are not sanctioning smaller gatherings with this policy and all community members are expected to comply with local health restrictions on gatherings.”
The 2020 rules also included a manual review of “high-risk reservations,” and restrictions on allowing guests under the age of 25 without a history of positive reviews to book entire home listings locally. These rules still apply, especially on holidays.
This comes as we’ve introduced strict anti-party measures for the upcoming 4th of July weekend, where guests without a history of positive reviews on Airbnb will be prohibited from making one-night reservations in entire home listings,” reads a statement from Airbnb. “We saw success with this initiative during both the 4th of July 2021 and the past Memorial Day 2022.”
Hosts and other guests who attempt to skirt Airbnb’s new party rules face bans from using Airbnb in the future, as well as legal action.
An abandoned Cooper-Young church could get a new life as a house if it meets the approval of city officials next month.
The old stone church sits at 775 Tanglewood, tucked away in an off-the-beaten-path part of the Midtown neighborhood between York and Elzey.
(Credit: Google Maps)
Memphis-based developer Griffin Elkington Investments LLC hopes to renovate the abandoned structure. The company plans for the building to be a house with four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a living room, dining room, and a kitchen.
(Credit: Memphis and Shelby County Office of Planning and Development)
The company is seeking approval for the project from the Memphis Landmarks Commission in an application filed this month. Leaders of that board are slated to hear the case and make a decision on it at its next regular meeting on July 28th. Comments from the public to be included in the hearing are accepted until July 22nd. Send comments to margot.payne@memphistn.gov.
Few details can be gleaned from the project’s application. The outside would apparently be fixed up and the inside gutted to make way for the new rooms.
(Credit: Memphis and Shelby County Office of Planning and Development)
According to information from the Shelby County Register of Deeds, the old church was sold in 2020 by Ceylon Mooney to M-Town Properties for $85,000. M-Town sold the church and another lot close to it to Elkington in March 2022 for $165,000.
Memphis magazine, our sister publication, ran down the church’s history in a story from April 2021. In it, Memphis columnist and historian Vance Lauderdale said, “constructed almost exactly a century ago, this little church has served as home to almost a dozen congregations and more pastors than I could name (though I’ll mention some of them).”
“Cedar Grove Baptist Church opened its doors on Tanglewood in 1920. The early years are a bit confusing. The city directories don’t list a minister. Sometimes they spell the name as two words and other times as “Cedargrove.” And they can’t even agree on the precise location of the property, many years listing the street address as 783 Tanglewood, which would have placed it smack in the middle of the old Beltway Railway, which at one time ran alongside the south wall of the church.
(Credit: Lily Bear Traverse)
“Even more confusing? Those same directories sometimes claim the church was located on the north side of that rail line, and at other times, they say it was on the south side. I seriously doubt the church, or the railroad, moved back and forth over the years, but I can’t make sense of the inconsistencies with the address.
”Although the tracks were pulled up decades ago, that same railway crosses over South Cooper, just a block to the east. In fact, it carried trains along the well-known trestle that’s decorated with silhouettes of Cooper-Young landmarks.”
Read more about the history of the church at 775 Tanglewood here at the Memphis magazine site.
