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Short Cuts

Post author By
Post date March 22, 2002

Don’t Worry About Me

Joey Ramone

(Sanctuary)

Released a few months after he died of cancer (at age 49) and just a few weeks before his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, this solo debut and final farewell from punk’s most beloved icon can’t help but bring to mind some of rock-and-roll’s other great posthumous statements — John Lennon’s Double Fantasy, Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged, Notorious B.I.G.’s Life After Death, Otis Redding’s “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay.” But the key difference with Don’t Worry About Me is that it was crafted, without getting too morbid about it, with full knowledge that death was imminent.

And so this is Ramone’s self-written epitaph, so carefully constructed — a 10-song center with bookend covers followed by a farewell coda — that the effect must be intentional. A simple if more fleshed-out and slightly slowed Ramones-style riffage reigns throughout, including the aforementioned covers of the Louis Armstrong-indentified “What a Wonderful World” and the Stooges’ “1969.” Ramone makes both sound like standards and complementary pieces to the same life puzzle — the lovestruck/awestruck “yes” and shiftless, insouciant “no” that equally animated the Ramones’ best music.

Much of the record comments –directly or indirectly — on Ramone’s medical condition. On “Stop Thinking About It,” he advises a visitor, “Ahh, nothing lasts forever/And nothing stays the same/Feeling numb all over and totally deranged/When you finally make your mind up/I’ll be buried in my grave.” “Spirit In My House” (“I got a spirit in my house and I know it ain’t no mouse”) and “Like a Drug I Never Did Before” are more oblique. And then there’s “I Got Knocked Down (But I’ll Get Up),” which is fiercely, and movingly, confrontational, with Ramone spitting out a punk-rock analysis of terminal illness — “I, I want life/I want my life/It really sucks” — before launching into the chorus. But despite all this, Don’t Worry About Me is far from morbid, and, in fact, the high point –the most touching and anthemic and just plain weird moment on the record –comes with “Maria Bartiromo,” where Ramone takes a break from IV drips and nurse visits to pen a musical mash note to cable television’s most fetching financial reporter, crooning, “I watch you on the TV every single day/Those eyes make everything okay.” And so when the title song closes things out, it doesn’t sound like a weepy goodbye but a triumphant send-off from a guy who deserved nothing less. — Chris Herrington

Grade: A-

Walking With Thee

Clinic

(Domino)

It seems like everything about music you read these days is someone whining about the downfall of the music industry or about why there’s no good stuff anymore. Well, I might as well add another complaint to the stack: Why is it that Radiohead can debut number one with art-rock that’s arid and distancing, but these Radiohead cohorts and endorsees can’t even crack the Hot 200 with art-rock that’s as warm and pleasurable as Bo Diddley? Because this bunch of Liverpool pranksters called Clinic are what Radiohead would sound like if they were a rock-and-roll band rather than just a rock one.

After a decade of lounge-rock schmoes and post-rock sourpusses, we finally get a band who rifles through rock’s cluttered closet to play dress-up but does so without laughing at their own jokes. “Harmony” opens the record with keyboards that split the difference between slasher movie and Ennio Morricone. “The Bridge” opens with a cowbell, like a futuristic “Honky Tonk Women.” “The Equalizer” contains percussion that sounds like clanking bottles but gives way at the two-minute mark to a “funky drummer” break that Public Enemy would be proud of. And the whole thing is suffused with the hearth-like organ drone that’s comforted bohemians from ? and the Mysterians to Yo La Tengo. But for all of the pop bricolage going on here, half the time Clinic reminds me of music they sound nothing like: The way songs build to peaks of tension then abruptly and dramatically end evokes the perversely brilliant instrumental coda of Prince’s “I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man.”

Walking With Thee can’t match the sonic sugar rush of last year’s debut Internal Wrangler, partly because the shock of the new has worn off but mostly because it’s just a little bit more tame. Only on “Pet Eunuch” do they really let the dogs out, unleashing the kind of effed-up surf-guitar assault that made Internal Wrangler such an ecstatic listen. Other than that, Walking With Thee is more mid-tempo. Actual songs replace Internal Wrangler‘s sharp pop shards and ruins. But just because they have more lyrics now doesn’t mean that words are any more central to the music. This is still a band with much more going on sonically than verbally. On Internal Wrangler, my fave lyric was cribbed from the Velvet Underground; on Walking With Thee it’s a bit of unintelligible-at-any-speed that I’d translate like this: “Oh beak it back oh beak it boo oh beak it oh oh oh/Meet the past meet the bastard oh oh OH-OH-OH-OH!” — CH

Grade: A-

I Break Chairs

Damien Jurado And Gathered In Song

(Sub Pop)

The rock bug has been biting folkies ever since a well-timed “Judas!” was leveled at Dylan and the Byrds decided to jumpstart American psychedelia with a self-parody. But now, regardless of age, the suitcases have either formed under our collective eyes or the cynicism has hardened our ears, and Damien Jurado’s current choice of Uncle Tupelo via HÅsker DÅ worship will, at best, momentarily raise an eyebrow rather than inciting genre formation. Not that he cares, really. We’re looking at a guy who followed three albums of Nick Drake-isms with an album that consisted entirely of edited tapes pulled from thrift-shop answering machines (2000’s Postcards and Audio Letters). That’s what I call eyebrow-raising, but you probably missed that one unless you are um like me and derive entertainment from listening to complete strangers leaving creepy phone messages. And despite my initial despondency, I can’t help but pull some easy pleasure from I Break Chairs.

A scattered half of this album could easily be an early Sunny Day Real Estate record — not out of place considering that SDRE frontman/pastor/nutjob Jeremy Enigk brought Jurado to Sub Pop in the mid-’90s — and the other half could be a loud, riff-oriented, insurgent country release or “college rock,” as your older brother used to call it. Eccentric, lyrically droll, and very open about being stuffed to the gills with antidepressants, Jurado offers a needed additive to indie-rock (or whatever it is we’re calling it now): a personality. Doesn’t hurt matters that he can write a good guitar rave-up either (see “Dancing” for proof) or that he can craft an entire album that I would rather hear on the radio than any faux-intense baggy-pants metal. No pretense for miles and proud of it. — Andrew Earles

Grade: B-

Music Music Features

Sound Advice

Post author By
Post date March 22, 2002

Filmed last fall at Newby’s as an extension of the Memphis Troubadours Acoustic Showcase and as a pilot for a proposed syndicated television show, The Acoustic Highway will have its local premiere at the Lounge on Wednesday, March 27th. The event will kick off with a live remote broadcast by 107.5 FM the Pig from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., followed by an airing of the one-hour pilot. The program features performances by Cory Branan, Garrison Starr, Paul Thorn, Robert Belfour, and Native Son interspersed with interview segments filmed at various local landmarks.

After the screening, a Troubadours-style song-swap will commence, featuring Cory Branan, Kim Richardson, and Patrick Dodd. After this premiere, according to Troubadours organizer Wayne LeeLoy, aka Native Son, the Troubadours Showcase will change from weekly to monthly and will feature big-name national acts joining local Troubadours regulars. — Chris Herrington

They Might Be Giants are the unquestioned kings of the novelty song. Unlike other silly songsmiths, their material doesn’t lose its goofy luster after the third spin — because there is more to it than just goofiness. Once you’ve heard one of their earliest anthems, it’s hard not to “keep a little birdhouse in your soul,” and it’s impossible to hear their revved-up, classic-in-its-own-right cover of “Istanbul (Not Constantinople),” without grinning ’til your face cracks. Of course, now that they have a Grammy and have produced a CD for Dave Eggers’ highfalutin, cleverer-than-thou quarterly McSweeney’s, They Might Be Giants are defiantly too good for you. Perhaps they always were. They’ll be at the New Daisy Theatre on Thursday, March 21st.

For some down-home rock-and-roll, Earnestine & Hazel’s is the place to be this week. The Grownup Wrongs, featuring the Reigning Sound’s Greg Cartwright on guitar and the Porch Ghouls’ suitcase-pounder Bruce Saltmarsh on real drums, will play on Friday, March 22nd. The last time I saw these guys play was a year ago in somebody’s basement, and as near as I can tell that was the first and last time they played, so this is truly a rare engagement. They will be opening for Oakland rockers The Cuts.

— Chris Davis

Opinion Viewpoint

Blowing It

Post author By
Post date March 22, 2002

Two years ago, the NAACP galvanized a horde of politicians, college and professional athletes, and hip-hop, rock, and movie stars to rally and boycott South Carolina for flying the Confederate battle flag over the state capitol dome. State officials capitulated and agreed to move the flag to a Confederate monument on statehouse grounds. This should have ended the issue. But it hasn’t. The NAACP now says it will rev up the boycott again until state officials toss the flag into a museum backroom.

At first glance, the NAACP’s Confederate flag obsession seems tiresome and worthy of quick dismissal. But there’s a method to its flag antics. The Confederate flag fight is a textbook example of the NAACP’s strategy of elevating peripheral issues to a life-and-death struggle for African Americans in order to grab maximum media and public visibility.

The strategy is simple: Pick the softest target possible, make a lot of fuss about it, and take minimal action on the real crisis issues that devastate poor and working-class black communities. While the NAACP saber-rattles over a worthless flag, it’s deafeningly silent on South Carolina’s black poverty, school dropout, infant mortality, and victim-of-violence rates which are among the worst in the nation. It also barely utters a peep on the dreary plight of hundreds of black South Carolina farmers whose farms have been foreclosed by bankers and government agencies in the past decade.

Then there’s the organization’s annual over-hyped Image Awards bash, which supposedly honors the best and brightest of those who uphold positive black images. Instead, it is a cheap imitation Academy Award drool over foul-mouthed rappers, comics, celebrity gadabouts, and black Hollywood box-office showpieces. This year was no exception. Denzel Washington and Halle Berry copped best actor and actress awards, and rapper Ja Rule’s “Livin’ It Up” grabbed top hip hop honors.

But did Washington’s portrayal of a corrupt, foul-mouthed, rogue cop in Training Day really advance the black image? And did Berry baring her torso in Swordfish provide the wholesome image of black womanhood that the NAACP says it wants to promote?

Then there’s Ja Rule. Last year he drew howls of protests from many blacks for using the word “nigger” in singer Jennifer Lopez’s controversial hit, “I’m Real.” His NAACP award-winning song trashes women and butchers the English language.

The NAACP’s appalling inattention to the big-ticket issues that sledgehammer the black poor is no surprise. It spent the better part of the 1990s in a monumental retreat from visible cutting-edge social activism. That retreat can be directly traced to the collapse of legal segregation in the 1960s, the class divisions that imploded within black America, and the greening of the black middle-class. This is a process that has sped full-throttle forward since the 1960s. The NAACP’s success has not had the remotest bearing on the lives of the black poor, who have become even poorer and more desperate.

But a tilt by NAACP leaders toward an aggressive activist agenda carries the deep risk of alienating the corporate donors that they have carefully cultivated the past few years. They depend on these firms to gain more jobs, promotions, and contracts for black professionals and businesspersons and to secure contributions for their fund-raising campaigns, dinners, banquets, scholarship funds, and programs. The NAACP’s Confederate flag fight poses no threat to these corporations and, more importantly, no threat to their cozy relationship with the NAACP.

With yet another boycott call of South Carolina, NAACP leaders can claim that they are striking a mortal blow against racist oppression. And since much of the public and media thinks that only rabid, unreconstructed race-baiters defend flying the Confederate battle flag, they’ll be applauded. But the flag fight won’t save black farms, improve abominable schools, stop racial profiling, fight the crime and drug plague, or help poor, malnourished mothers. The NAACP has no obsession with these fights.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and columnist. This column first appeared on AlterNet.

News The Fly-By

PURITAN VALUES II

Post author By
Post date March 18, 2002

Look! Up in the sky! It s a stick er, it s a poster, it s a bill board, it s all of the above, it s … it s … it s the $25,000* anti-prostitution media cam paign. That s right. Memphis is working hard to eliminate prostitution by inform ing hook ers and would-be hookers that they could be locked in jail for up to seven days. Listen close and you can almost hear the sound of fleshy palms smacking foreheads and that chorus of angelic voic es saying, Jeepers, if only I d known … .

* This money, and the money spent annually prosecut ing and jailing prostitutes, could not be more effectively spent supporting halfway houses, women s shelters, or educational programs. Why, that s just crazy talk.

Music Record Reviews

Short Cuts

Post author By
Post date March 15, 2002

Caught In the Webb: A Tribute to the

Legendary Webb Pierce

Various Artists

(Audium Records)

Webb Pierce dominated country music in the ’50s, all but inventing the lonesome twang and weepy pedal-steel-laden sound of modern honky-tonk music. But Pierce’s voice could be grating taken in large doses. The Louisiana Hayride‘s commanding cowboy Horace Logan, who regularly took chances on artists the Opry wouldn’t touch (Hank Williams and Elvis Presley being prime examples), only allowed the pitch-impaired Pierce on his show because of his persistent badgering. Logan’s risk paid off. Complex material and a gift for subtle yet dramatic phrasing made up for Pierce’s vocal deficiencies. Fifty years after Pierce’s pinched nasal whine topped the charts, Caught In the Webb, a rare gem of a tribute album, proves that the Wondering Boy’s music is still as vital, rebellious, and endearing as ever.

Nouveau Texas troubadour Dale Watson opens with a driving rendition of the Jimmy Rogers-penned “In the Jailhouse Now,” a tune recently brought back into the pop consciousness by the ubiquitous O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack. Watson’s Haggard-esque baritone, propelled by the Jordanaires’ tight harmonies, is nearly as whimsical as Pierce’s own cover and is far superior to the Soggy Bottom Boys’ campy (sorry, folks, but it is) send-up.

There are disappointments on the disc, notably Charley Pride’s throaty “I’m Tired” and the great George Jones’ croaking on “Yes I Know Why.” BR5-49’s mechanically precise version of the drunkard’s national anthem, “There Stands the Glass,” is fun but sadly lacking in the pathos department — the very quality that took the song to number one in 1953 even though it was almost universally banned from the radio.

With lyrics like “I don’t care if I’m not the first love you’ve known/Just so I’ll be the last,” Pierce’s “I Don’t Care” ranks among the sweetest love songs ever recorded, and Billy Walker’s lurching rendition can’t begin to measure up.

A trio of plaintive ballads, “Wondering” by Emmylou Harris (the disc’s one genuine treasure), Allison Moorer’s divinely morose “Back Street Affair,” and Crystal Gayle’s “More and More” stand head and shoulders over everything else collected on Caught In the Webb. Willie Nelson’s beautiful “That’s Me Without You,” Mandy Barnett’s faithful “Slowly,” Dwight Yoakam’s “If You Were Me,” and Guy Clark’s hot lickin’ “Honky Tonk Song” are all classic recordings in their own right.

Webb Pierce charted 96 songs in his career, but the 21 selected for Caught In the Webb make for a pretty definitive track listing, with the wonderfully goofy “Teenage Boogie” and the self-explanatory “The New Raunchy” being the only glaring omissions. — Chris Davis

Grade: A-

Zero Church

Suzzy and Maggie Roche

(Red House Records)

Ironically enough, Zero Church, the latest collaboration from Suzzy and Maggie Roche, was originally set to be released on September 11th. In fact, Suzzy Roche, a native New Yorker, was out walking her dog and witnessed the disaster firsthand. How timely, then, is this collection of prayers that the Roches set to music, the result of a seminar held at the Harvard Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue which the sisters were invited to join. As part of that project, the Roches were given the task of writing music to accompany contemporary prayers, many written in a nonreligious context, offered by the participants. The prayers themselves spring from a great diversity of both famous and everyday folk suffering and rejoicing: one a near haiku from a wheelchair-bound Buddhist troubadour, another attributed to Mother Teresa on her deathbed, and a prayer for Matthew Shepard, the young gay man murdered in Wyoming, among others.

The exquisite harmonies, humanity, and humor we’ve come to associate with these renegade folkies are here in abundance (check out Suzzy’s Dylan impression on one track). And, as always, the Roches exhibit a thoughtfulness, joie de vivre, and intimacy.

An impressive lineup sings with the group and/or contributes lyrics. These include siblings Terre and David Roche, Dr. Ysaye Barnwell from Sweet Honey in the Rock, Broadway star Lynette Dupree, and journalist and author Ruben Martinez. Martinez does a particularly fine job, his gravelly vocals evoking the hardships that Latinos face in the land of the free. But the real stars of the album are the ordinary yet extraordinary people who offer prayers of thanksgiving and hope despite unbelievable suffering — the AIDS patient who refers to her virus as her “spiritual growth”; the Vietnam vet turned firefighter who tries to atone for his previous bloodshed by saving lives; and most touching of all, a young Sudanese man, sold into slavery for 10 years as a child, who gives thanks in broken English for his escape and asks for help for those still enslaved. Destined to be a classic. — Lisa Lumb

Grade: A-

New Ground

Robert Bradley’s Blackwater Surprise

(Vanguard)

God dawg, what a waste of a great voice. The voice being wasted here belongs to 52-year-old Robert Bradley, who often sounds like the late Arthur Alexander, another Alabama native with a stunningly expressive vocal approach. Both share the same melisma-drenched and countryish (as in Southern rural) voice. And, like Alexander, Bradley writes his own material. Unfortunately, his playing partners — I hesitate to call them a band because they simply don’t function like one; they sound like a pack of bar-band palookas with a great singer straining for some measure of soulfulness — come across as an unholy grafting of Hootie & the Blowfish and Creed (lemme hear you say, Ugh). Mediocre white rock bands have been hiring powerful black vocalists to cover up their inadequacies for decades, and Blackwater Surprise seems to be desperately hanging onto Robert Bradley’s coattails, hoping he won’t notice how dull they sound.

What offends most about this recording (besides the lackluster band performance) is the production. It’s your typical “modern rock” formula with tons of anthemic choruses, layered keyboards, pedestrian guitar breaks, and horribly processed vocals that bury the best features of Bradley’s voice. And the songs are obscured as compositions by the aforementioned baroque, track-laden production. Bradley may have written some decent tunes here, but it’s hard to tell due to the production tricks piled on like so many layers of cheap makeup. This wedding of a middle-aged soul singer and a noisy rock band sounds more like a shotgun affair than an act of volition by all parties involved. Perhaps it’s time for Bradley to opt for the proverbial solo career. That voice of his sure deserves better. — Ross Johnson

Grade: C

Music Music Features

Sound Advice

Post author By
Post date March 15, 2002

Fresh off a Premier Player Award nomination for “Best Band” (along with three nominations in individual instrumental categories), The Gamble Brothers Band will celebrate the release of their debut album, 10 Lbs. of Hum, on Friday, March 15th, at Newby’s. Recorded at local songwriting fixture Keith Sykes’ Woodshed studio, with Sykes co-producing, this impressive debut presents a style of smart, jazzy rock that may be what Steely Dan would have sounded like if they were more relaxed and as influenced by Jimmy Smith, Booker T., and the Allmans as they were by Horace Silver and Charlie Parker. As the aforementioned Premier Player nods attest, all four members of the band (bassist Will Lowrimore, saxophonist Art Edmaiston, drummer Chad Gamble, and his brother, singer and keyboardist Al Gamble) are accomplished and (especially given their ages) experienced musicians, with the jam tendencies that grow from such virtuosity nicely balanced by a strong commitment to songwriting. This band has been building momentum through constant local gigging lately, and with the Premier Player nomination and this record that momentum doesn’t appear to be letting up.

But if you happen to miss them Friday, the Gamble Brothers Band will also be appearing at an all-day jazz show on St. Patrick’s Day at the Young Avenue Deli, with San Diego’s jazz-funk keyboardist Robert Walter and his group 20th Congress headlining a show that will also include the Deli’s Sunday jazz band. — Chris Herrington

Something happens when a pair of piercing tenors harmonize over the sound of ringing mandolins. Perhaps you are a metalhead or a blues hound. Maybe your taste runs toward dub, trip hop, or hardcore. It doesn’t matter much. When the bluegrass begins to play, chances are you will stop to listen. It calls out like Gabriel’s trumpet, and when the pickin’ parties begin audiophiles of every stripe come marching home. When it comes to high lonesome, nobody in Memphis does it better than Mudflap Eric Lewis and his multitalented friends. Okay, maybe Andy Ratcliff does it better, but superlatives hardly seem to matter when these two great voices join to sing about liquor, lost love, and the life to come. The fact that the Pawtuckets’ powerhouse Mark McKinney is joining Lewis and Ratcliff at the P&H Café on Friday, March 15th, only makes things that much more exciting. The first time I saw Lewis and Ratcliff raise their voices together it was with Professor Elixir’s Southern Troubadours, and for the first time in that divine trainwreck-of-a-band’s history it seemed like the engines were running on time. Since then, both performers have seasoned their voices and perfected their licks. Lewis’ regular shows at the Poplar Lounge have had a decidedly country flavor of late, adding covers by Merle Haggard, George Jones, and Johnny Russell to the mix. Lovers of American roots music won’t be disappointed.

Planning to get plastered and celebrate St. Paddy? I’d have to suggest closing one eye and stumbling into Murphy’s on Sunday, March 17th. Big Betsy, a once-a-year musical event in and of itself, will be on hand to forget the words to all your favorite Pogues songs. But you won’t care. You’ll be plastered. You’ll try to kiss the bewigged boys’ feet. And later in the evening The Joint Chiefs, Memphis’ most brilliant arbiters of the world’s dumbest rock, will be on hand to R-O-C-K all the snakes out of the greater Mid-South. When the Chiefs are playing you can guarantee that Erin, and all the other tattooed ladies, will Go Braghless. It’s a known fact. — Chris Davis

Sports Sports Feature

City Sports

Post author By
Post date March 15, 2002

Taps For the Tigers

A disappointing U of M season nears an anticlimactic close.

By Frank Murtaugh

It’s not such a great time to be John Calipari. You might say the honeymoon has faded from memory — along with all the preseason hype that had Tigers fans and media planning itineraries around the Final Four in Atlanta. Having spent a good portion of the season arguing his team’s case, first for a Top 25 ranking then for a position in the NCAA tournament, Calipari was every bit as wrong about his team as the pundits (Sports Illustrated had the Tigers ranked seventh in its season preview). To begin with, the U of M was not nearly as deep as originally thought. Seven Tigers averaged more than 20 minutes per game; the other four players on the roster averaged fewer than 10. Conventional wisdom says a team needs to go eight deep to even begin harboring championship thoughts.

The Tigers weren’t nearly as tough as forecast either. Despite the imposing front-court troika of Kelly Wise, Earl Barron, and Chris Massie, Memphis never muscled up the way a team must in battling the likes of Alabama, Ole Miss, and, as it turns out, Houston. (Ironically, the closest we came to seeing a truly tough Tigers squad was in the March 3rd overtime loss at Cincinnati.) The nadir had to be at UAB February 8th when the Tigers (minus an injured Wise) were out-rebounded 43-33 by a Blazer team that had no starter over 6’8″. Even when Memphis beat UAB in The Pyramid two weeks earlier (with Wise), UAB won the rebounding battle.

When his team struggled early — the Tigers were 6-3 after losing to Ole Miss December 7th — Calipari told anyone who would listen not to worry about his young team, that they’d turn things around. “Games outside your league are not significant,” he said. “Games within your league — games for first place — those are significant.” He changed his tune after a 17-point loss in The Pyramid to Arkansas January 2nd, saying he wished the defeat had been by 25. All part of a season’s plan, one was left to assume.

When Memphis did indeed pull a 180-degree turn and reel off 10 straight wins to open Conference USA play, Calipari seemed vindicated. He knew it all along, right? Then came five losses in seven games, including a dispirited spanking at the hands of Houston in the C-USA tournament. What a few weeks earlier had appeared to be a coach’s unique handle on the personality of his squad now looked like a man merely trying to figure out the components of his team, its strengths and weaknesses — just like the fans and media were. End result? The NIT lands in The Pyramid Thursday night. Whether it was Kelly Wise’s knee injury, a lack of heart and motivation, or simply being overrated, the 2001-02 Tigers weren’t nearly the team we expected last fall.

It goes without saying a coach deserves more than two years to build a program. And say this for Calipari: He has the national spotlight back in the Bluff City after the dreadful Tic Price scandal cast such a cloud over the program. But he’s shown some chinks in the armor, not so much with his work on the sidelines as with his stewardship of the basketball program.

Most troubling is the public stance Calipari has taken with the possible jump to the NBA by Dajuan Wagner. In late February, the star freshman spoke openly of returning to the U of M campus, at least for his sophomore season. As a national TV audience watching the Tigers play Cincinnati March 3rd can attest, Wagner’s coach felt like the comments were premature. In an interview with ABC, Calipari said Wagner should wait to see if 1) the Tigers make a run in the NCAA tournament and 2) if Wagner’s role in such a run would vault him into the upper echelon of potenial NBA draftees.

This is nothing short of academic heresy and a black eye for the University of Memphis being taken seriously as an institution of higher learning. I have no problem with Calipari being honest with Wagner regarding the player’s potential standing in the NBA draft. If Coach Cal genuinely feels he should advise Wagner to leave school early, fine. But — and this is important — do it privately, behind closed doors. When a basketball coach making $1 million a year publicly supports the idea of one of his student-athletes leaving school early, he is making a mockery of the university for which he toils. Calipari has a track record for this kind of thing: He attended the press conference at UMass, where star forward Marcus Camby announced he was leaving a year early for the NBA, and said it was a decision he encouraged.

At the very least, Calipari owes it to the thousands of University of Memphis students who are on campus for learning purposes to carry the banner for completing an education. The reality of big-time college sports is what it is. Tigers boosters and fans are savvy enough to understand a player of Wagner’s talent seriously considering the millions that await in the NBA. But Calipari gains nothing by publicly endorsing a player’s leaving school early — unless it’s in the eyes of the player involved. Wagner must feel Calipari is putting aside his own best interests to objectively assist in what amounts to an educational and career choice. But again, why not keep it private?

Whether or not Wagner returns for another season, there is reason for optimism for next year’s team — and for the future of Tigers basketball. The hope here is that Calipari remains firmly in place to continue a process far too many of us — including Calipari himself — were ready to fast-forward. The best thing about a young team, after all, is that it grows up.

Star Power

The Grizzlies demonstrate that there’s hope for the future.

By Chris Przybyszewski

In his pre-game interview before Monday’s game with the Utah Jazz, Grizzlies head coach Sidney Lowe looked a happy man. No, he had no premonitions of the “divine powers” (his words) that helped his team to a 79-78 win and a 3-1 season edge over a playoff-bound team. He was just happy that he had some players healthy enough to play.

The Grizzlies found themselves in the middle of an eight-game losing streak a while back, mostly because the team could not field enough talent to win. In some games the team was forced to start rookie Will Solomon and a couple of 10-day contract players (Elliot Perry, Eddie Gill) at guard. Williams and Brevin Knight nursed injuries and center Lorenzen Wright had not regained his form from his extended injury absence.

But then both players found their health and their game. The result? Three competitive matches against three playoff contenders: the Indiana Pacers, the Miami Heat, and the Utah Jazz. The game against the Pacers — a win — saw a franchise record 122 points scored by the Grizzlies. In the game against the Heat — a loss — the Griz offered a gritty performance against one of the NBA’s hottest teams and best defenses. And against the Jazz — another win — there was a combination of solid offense and good defense.

Williams gives the Griz the ability to attack. His speed and skill in transition pressures defenses and allows the team to run — the original plan for the season. Williams’ propensity to make perimeter shots helps the outside game. It also gives forwards Grant Long and Shane Battier breathing room from defenses concentrating on shutting them down behind the arc.

“I’m just getting tougher than I was earlier in the season, and so I don’t get the free looks I did get,” Battier says. “Having everyone back allows me to roam. I don’t feel the burden to score like I did when everyone was hurt.”

Inside, Wright forces defenses away from rookie forward Pau Gasol. Teams were double-teaming Gasol and forcing him away from the basket. With Wright back, there are more opportunities for Gasol near the basket.

“Lorenzen’s going to bang,” Lowe says. “You have someone in there to take the pressure off you. Pau needs a player in there like that. ‘Ren gives us an aggressiveness.”

Just as important, Wright’s rebounding fills a huge need for the Grizzlies. In the Utah game, Wright pulled down a game-high 13 rebounds, including three on the offensive end. When your team shoots only 41 percent against the tough rebounding Jazz, you need every second chance you can get. And since the Grizzlies won by a point, Wright was arguably the difference in the game.

Divine powers? Probably not. But Coach Lowe at least has some healthy NBA talent on the floor. That, for this team, can be considered holy.

The Score

Notable:

Pau Gasol has led the Grizzlies in scoring in 25 of the team’s 63 games and in rebounding for 32. Shane Battier has led the team in scoring 14 games, in rebounding five games, and in assists six times. Jason Williams has led the team in scoring nine times and in assists 27 times. Center Lorenzen Wright has led the team in scoring four times and in rebounding 17 times.

Gasol is the only member of the 2001-02 Grizzlies to play in all of the club’s 63 games this season.

Quotable:

“That was a foul.” — Grizzlies coach Sidney Lowe on the no-call collision that took place between Memphis’ Tony Massenburg and Andrei Kirilenko of Utah, whose coach, Jerry Sloan, became so incensed that he garnered two technical fouls and an ejection for arguing the call.

“If he was going to win it, he was going to have to go over me.” — Grizzlies center Lorenzen Wright on his block of Utah’s John Stockton’s last-second shot attempt. Memphis won the game, 79-78.

Music Music Features

Sound Advice

Post author By
Post date March 7, 2002

Emerging over the last year as perhaps the most promising new band in the city, Snowglobe takes the next step this week with the release of their debut album, Our Land Brains. Released by the Athens, Georgia, label Bardot Records, Our Land Brains actually improves on the band’s live show, capturing their gently psychedelic sound. Snowglobe’s music compares favorably with like-minded bands from the Elephant 6 collective — The Apples in Stereo, Neutral Milk Hotel, Olivia Tremor Control — but just as easily conveys a love for ’60s source material like the Beatles and the Kinks. On Our Land Brains, singer-songwriters Brad Postlethwaite (one of the guys behind the local Makeshift Records compilations) and Tim Regan come up with a collection of beautifully melodic songs, and the band puts them over with a varied, playfully experimental sound that makes great use of piano, horns, and strings with their guitar-bass-drums format.

Snowglobe will have a CD release party for Our Land Brains on Saturday, March 9th, at the Young Avenue Deli, with Geraldine. Earlier that day, from 3 to 5 p.m., the band will join locals Loggia for a set at Shangri-La Records to celebrate the release of the bands’ split 7-inch single. — Chris Herrington

The Bloodthirsty Lovers is a nearly unimaginable assemblage of virtuosity. Just consider the lineup of this genuine Memphis supergroup and let it sink in deep. First and foremost (in every way), there is Dave Shouse, the multifaceted musician and songwriter from indie stalwarts the Grifters and critical darlings Those Bastard Souls. Add to the mix Jason Paxton, the Satyrs’ sweetly maudlin frontman, whose sweeping classical aspirations were revealed on the final track of the Satyrs’ first (and possibly last) album. And let’s not forget DDT’s mad genius Paul “I swear you can turn a tree into a violin played by the wind” Taylor. Doesn’t it all sound too good to be true? If Shelby Bryant of the Clears and Cloud-Wow Music fame — and a charter member of the Bloodthirsty Lovers — wasn’t leaving town for parts unknown (a terrible blow to the Memphis scene), it would have been too good to be true.

But even without Bryant, this group of amorous vampires is composed of so many brilliant sonic chefs that any musical stew from their collective kitchen seems doomed to arrive DOA. Far from it, friends. Though each of these guys has his moment to shine, Shouse is clearly taking the lead here. He has blended the explosiveness of the Grifters with the pop-meets-prog sensibility of one of his earliest musical endeavors — the all-but-forgotten Moroccan Roll. Shouse abandoned “head” music for flat-out rocking in the ’80s when he had the great revelation that “working people don’t go out on the weekends to seek enlightenment, they want to shake their ass.” With the Bloodthirsty Lovers he may have proven, after two decades of experimentation, that these two musical byproducts are not mutually exclusive. The Bloodthirsty Lovers will be at the Map Room on Monday, March 11th. — Chris Davis

Music Record Reviews

Short Cuts

Post author By
Post date March 1, 2002

Point, Cornelius (Matador)

By giving his fourth album the name of the smallest, least-reducible element of geometry, Cornelius (Keigo Oyamada) seems to be telegraphing a radical, stylistic shift to minimalism. The Tokyo-based auteur even toys with the listener before he begins his elaborate sonic safari by bookending Point with singular, resonating piano notes. This move references minimalist forefather Gyorgy Ligeti and, in turn, conjures up the stark, filmic mechanics of fellow obsessive-compulsive Stanley Kubrick (who utilized Ligeti extensively on the soundtracks of 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Shining, and Eyes Wide Shut). Cornelius’ songs are essentially aural dioramas — overwhelmed by artificiality and composed of notes as deliberately placed as props on Kubrick’s Pinewood soundstage.

His previous album, the breakout success Fantasma, was a Rube Goldberg gumball dispenser, an elaborate confectionary overdose. And while it could at times seem cloying and insincere, it was ultimately made irresistible by Cornelius’ omnivorous love of the undifferentiated sphere of international pop culture. Point may be Fantasma slimmed down to fighting weight, but in no way could it be classified as anything approaching true minimalism.

This purposeful genre-shifting is a perfect embodiment of the skittering hypertextuality of the digital age. Cornelius makes transitions from the penthouse nocturne of “Point of View Point” to the futuristic luau of “Tone Twilight Zone.” And right when he slips from the smooth, vocoder cover of “Brazil” to the metal-damaged imposition of “I Hate Hate” (which, by the way, beats the hell out of “Mean People Suck” for bumper-sticker pacifism), the musical influences and reference points begin to pile up. Your brain is unconsciously triggered into a proper-noun logorrhea — Brian Wilson, Xavier Cugat, Phil Spector, Carl Stalling, Santo and Johnny, Yngwie Malmsteen and suddenly you’re singing the lost verse of R.E.M.’s “It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)”!

Despite Cornelius’ reliance on studio wizardry and academic concepts, his wit and contagious glee always result in very organic, accessible records. After achieving moderate success four years ago with a national tour (where he and his band blew fellow tourmates Sebadoh, Flaming Lips, and Robyn Hitchcock off the stage and into the cutout bin) and a riveting appearance on HBO’s Reverb, we can only hope that Point helps him achieve the Ichiro-like status here that he has back home. At that point, his complete and total immersion into the glittery realm of pop music would be achieved and he would be forced to release the inevitable Double Live at Budokan record. And we already know that’s an arena he can fill.

— David Dunlap

Grade: B+

Is a Woman, Lambchop (Merge Records)

Is a Woman is a volte-face. Lambchop’s previous album, 2000’s career-making Nixon, was luxurious in sound; it took advantage of the Nashville-based orchestra’s size — more than triple the number of members in your typical indie outfit — to create lush, multilayered sonics that fit well with singer Kurt Wagner’s idiosyncratic songwriting.

As a follow-up, Is a Woman takes the opposite tack, using the many musicians to create a moody record with barebones arrangements. The idea here seems to be that much less is much more. Built on Tony Crow’s simple, elegant piano, these 11 songs feature only one or two instruments at a time. There are occasional musical flourishes, such as Deanna Veragona’s funky baritone sax on “The New Cobweb Summer” and Paul Burch’s eerie vibes on “Caterpillar,” but usually all the instruments coalesce into an understated, atmospheric sound.

For the most part, Lambchop fare well within the confines of this stripped-down approach. “Caterpillar,” for example, is musically as fragile as its lyrics are violent: “I know you heard me calling out a name that I never used for you, till then,” Wagner sings in the chorus, and the contrast between this scene of domestic upheaval and hushed music is quietly devastating.

Other songs, like “My Blue Wave” and “I Can Hardly Spell My Name,” strike a fine balance as precarious as the relationships they portray. It feels like these gentle songs would collapse under the weight of even one more instrument. Only one or two tracks here feel unduly bare. The few instruments on “D. Scott Parsley” can’t maintain the groove riff it’s based on, so the song feels underorchestrated and sluggish.

If the sound is stripped down, Wagner’s songwriting is just as sharp and original as it always has been. Conveying complex ideas in as few words as possible, he creates startling imagery and makes effortlessly keen observations about the rifts between the sexes. The effect is almost literary. “I guess it’s right,” he sings on “The Daily Growl,” “to love the girls who fight off our manly acts of desperation.” Is a Woman is rich with lines like this, which seem more akin to short stories than indie-rock songs.

Ambiguously titled and effortlessly intimate, Is a Woman is a beautifully restrained album — spare, relaxed, and spontaneous but always purposeful and deliberate. It may not be Lambchop’s most accessible album, but it’s as compelling as anything the collective has recorded. —Stephen Deusner

Grade: A-