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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Commercial Appeal Mistakes Memphis Band Lucero for Mexican Entertainer — DAMMIT

Whoa! It’s totally like we’re seeing double.

Everybody makes mistakes, even your pesky Fly on the Wall. But the particular mistake I’m highlighting here makes me think it’s time to abandon any faint shreds of almost certainly false hope we may have harbored that whatever’s wrong at the Gannett-owned Commercial Appeal will work itself out.

When the bot and/or out-of-towner editing Memphis’ daily paper can’t distinguish between Lucero the Mexican entertainer and Lucero the enormously popular Memphis band, there’s a problem. When said bot and/or out-of-towner turns to a general image search instead of scanning the local paper’s own archives, it’s really bad.

The error was made announcing the lineup for the Mempho Music Festival

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Tom Lee Park Redesign ‘Totally Unrelated To Atlantis’ New Riverfront Chief Says

Definitely not an irradiated Gill Man.

At a press conference in their Front Street headquarters on Tuesday, Carol Coletta, head of the Memphis River Parks Partnership (MRPP), previously called the Riverfront Development Corporation (RDC), told reporters that her organization’s plans to dramatically alter the landscape of Tom Lee Park have nothing to do with her predecessor’s ambitious project to raise the lost, subaquatic city-state of Atlantis from the depths of the Mississippi River.

“Our plan will activate the park space for all Memphians, and make it more attractive to Memphis In May festival goers,” said Coletta. “It’s totally unrelated to the RDC’s plans to raise Atlantis.”

Coletta joined the RDC in March, replacing Benny Lendermon, who had announced the public-private partnership’s multimillion dollar plan to spend millions of dollars on targeted nuclear explosives that would trigger powerful earthquakes bringing the long hidden city/state of Atlantis back to the Above World, presumably to rule over a golden age of peace and prosperity for Memphis and the Mid-South region.

“Now some people will say that the new undulating hills we’re building in the flood zone of one of the most powerful rivers in the solar system would be an ideal spot for burying the thousands of horribly burned gill-men cadavers that have been washing up on the banks of the Big Muddy, but you would be wrong,” said Coletta.
[pullquote-1] “We acknowledge mutation is an ongoing problem in this area of the river,” she added. “But we prefer to focus on making the riverfront great for everybody.”

Similarly, a rebranding effort that changed the name of a corporation devoted to riverfront development (RDC) to Memphis River Parks Partnership (MRPP), was in no way caused by news reports associating the RDC with the effort to raise Atlantis.

“Having a new name that doesn’t come up in Google searches next to the words ‘raise Atlantis’ and ‘nuclear weapons’ was in no way a factor in our decision to rebrand,” said Coletta. “Look, the truth is, there wasn’t much to the Atlantis thing. It was really overblown by the media, right from the beginning.

“When Benny’s crew of nuclear demolition engineers got to where they thought Atlantis was going to be, there wasn’t anything there. So, they left. That’s what happened.

“Those earthquakes you want to ask me about, we had nothing to do with those. Completely natural phenomenon.

“We’re just laser-focused on making the riverfront better by cleaning up all the radioactive material from the shoreline and disposing of it somewhere that’s not Tom Lee Park.”

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Commercial Appeal Names Harding Academy Volleyball “Volleyball of the Year”

In the photograph to the right you can see an unnamed woman* holding onto a very special volleyball named Lauren Deaton. For those who don’t already know her, Lauren is a Harding Academy volleyball. Go Lions! She was very recently named “Volleyball of the Year”  by The Commercial Appeal, Memphis’ once proud, now Gannett-owned daily newspaper.

Lauren’s father Wilson, the sports equipment whose life was famously celebrated in the Tom Hanks movie Cast Away, had nothing to say about his daughter’s achievement. He just sat there in silence, his crimson smudge of a face an infuriating enigma.  It was almost like he was saying, “Why wouldn’t she be Volleyball of the Year?” So I got defensive and said, “What’s your point?” But he just kept his silence while somehow also asking, clear as day, “Are you saying my daughter Lauren’s not good enough to be Volleyball of the 

Wilson Deaton

Year?” And I said “no” and we went on like that for some time before Wilson finally thanked me and bounced down the sidewalk. I watched him roll to his Mini Cooper where Lauren had been patiently waiting, also not saying a thing.

As the pair drove off I couldn’t help but think I’d get better interviews if the CA would give awards to people instead of stupid balls. Maybe that’s racist of me. I just don’t know anymore.
———————————————————————————————
*Congratulations to the actual Lauren. Awesome job! We’re sorry the CA makes it sound like you’re gear. 

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Goodbye Colonel Tommy

Self portrait.

Tommy Foster was the epitome of Memphis cool. Every day of his     too-short life, this artist and enabler of alternative culture in Memphis made the city where he grew up a more colorful place to live in and explore. In addition to building his own outsider-styled constructions, contraptions, and curios, the self-taught sculptor and painter founded spaces for other artists to display and sell their work. He operated a storied venue that hosted some of the best bands of the day while doubling as an incubator for a host of local players. He made safe, visually inspired and inspiring spaces where writers, poets, and would-be filmmakers felt comfortable working and sharing their words in a noncompetitive  environment.

In later years, Foster took pictures at parties. It was a gig, but also an extension of his art. As usual, this fanboy and trendsetter was showing Memphis its best, fanciest, and funnest self.

Foster, who sometimes signed his artwork “Colonel Tommy,” lost a long, hard-fought battle with cancer this week. Even if you never met the man, if you’ve lived in Memphis in the past 40 years,  you’ve encountered some aspect of his marvelous, multivarious legacy.

The first mention of Foster I could locate in The Memphis Flyer‘s digital archives is dated April 2, 1998 (and now reprinted here on the right, where you can click to expand it). It certainly wasn’t his first appearance in our pages, nor would it be his last. But it’s an appropriately colorful yarn and, in describing this life well-lived, it seems as good a place to start as any. On that date, the original Fly on the Wall column reported that the Java Cabana founder, who sometimes moonlighted as non-denominational minister, had sold his funky Cooper-Young coffee shop and would no longer perform Elvis-themed weddings in its Viva Memphis Wedding Chapel. He was packing up his decorated box of sideburns, wigs, and chunky gold sunglasses and taking his kingly matrimony business to the Center for Southern Folklore, which was then located on Beale Street.

Wedding packages were affordably priced starting at only $185.

Memphis is a  city of marvels and curiosities and Tommy Foster did his part to keep it weird and real. In the 1980s, he founded the Pyramid Club, an upstairs rock-and-roll bar on a stretch of Madison Ave. where all the buildings were leveled to make room for AutoZone Park and surrounding apartment buildings. Musicians who played there may remember the seemingly endless, narrow stairway as the “worst load-in in history” but it attracted players like Alex Chilton and personalities like musician/journalist Bob Palmer and it hosted performances by bands like Flat Duo Jets, Human Radio, The Grifters, and The Scam.

Foster almost singlehandedly launched coffee culture in Memphis  and laid a cornerstone for Memphis’ funky coffeehouse scene. He opened Java Cabana in the Cooper-Young neighborhood in 1992, at the dawn of the C/Y comeback.

Foster turned Java’s back room into his Viva Wedding Chapel, so Elvis-loving couples wouldn’t have to go to Vegas to get married by the King. It could happen in the birthplace of rock-and-roll in a funky little room where the walls were hung with folk art depictions of rock-and-soul saints. Foster’s wonderful coin operated Elvis impersonator shrine— originally a window display for Java  Cabana— was replicated and placed in House of Blues venues across the country.

Foster ran the quirky Viva Memphis photo booth, oversaw the creation of A. Schwab’s fantastic soda fountain, and did so many other things I’m sure I’m leaving out. He’ll be missed, but his spirit will be with us for some time to come.

A memorial service is planned for later this summer. Details to come.

Goodbye Colonel Tommy

 

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

The CA Takes a P — Dammit Gannett!

Look, Gannett, it’s not that I’ve got so much going on in my life that I don’t have time for your nonsense. It’s just that there’s so much more interesting nonsense to think about. Like, “Can anybody else see that face in the leaves outside my writing window or have I finally gone starkers?”

I’ve started calling him Leaf Garrett

But I can’t think about that now. Now I have to think about this. 

Is it a “P” that’s missing or an apostrophe? Maybe the reader worries for “parents in decline.” Maybe she worries for “aren’ts” in decline. That doesn’t make any sense unless kids today are moving away from contractions. I suppose I could scan the syndicated advice column to discover the truth of the matter but if I’m honest with myself I probably wasn’t gonna read this filler content anyway. 

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Zombies!

The 2018 Memphis Zombie Walk happened last Friday, when the undead hit Beale Street.

This annual walk benefits the Mid-South Food Bank.

[slideshow-1]

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Quest for Grocery Store Porn — Testing Diane Black’s Theories About School Shootings

Bottom right. Easy access at Walgreens.

Diane Black, a U.S. Representative from Tennessee, has been getting a lot of media attention for her belief that grocery store porn is a “big part” of the “root cause” of why school shootings happen.

Or something like that. 

“It’s available on the shelf when you walk in the grocery store.” she said. “Yeah, you have to reach up to get it, but there’s pornography there.

“All of this is available without parental guidance,” the 67-year-old Republican candidate for governor added. 

Puzzle porn at Kroger.

I decided to see if there was anything to Black’s claim. Saucy glossies are still in demand, if greatly diminished in number since the Internet made just about anything you can imagine in this arena free and available on our phones. But can you really get it in every grocery store easily and without adult supervision?

Not at my Kroger (Pop/Cleve 4-evvs). Unless you’re talking about Cosmo.

And whatever you think about the Cosmo is Porn campaign, we’re pretty sure any smutty advice they may or may not have printed about “polishing your partner’s assault rifle” was pure metaphor.

Newsweek had a really super-naked picture.

There were Sudoku puzzles, sports rags, teen-crush mags, Little Golden Books and a Wonder Woman coloring book on the bottom shelf. I asked an employee where all the porn magazines were. She looked at me suspiciously (cant say that I blame her) and said these were the only magazines she knew about.

This one caught my eye though. 

What kind of gun is that dude pig hunting with? It makes me feel all funny down there, if you know what I mean.

So maybe Black misspoke. Maybe she meant corner stores or pharmacies. Some of them sell groceries too. So I went to the Walgreen’s across the street.

You know, I do remember a time when porn seemed to be everywhere. I remember being eight or nine years old and looking at the dirty magazines on the bottom rack of a musty general store in Malakoff, Texas. I was a chubby kid and shirtless, wearing a big black cowboy hat with a big red and black feather band. It was the ’70s, man — even youngsters like me were letting it all hang out.

US Rep. Diane Black R-Tennessee

The pinch-faced prude behind the counter didn’t tell me to put down the porn or say “This ain’t a lending library,” or anything like that. “Developing young ladies should cover themselves,” is all she said to me. So, yeah, I was introduced to porn, and body/gender issues on the same sunny afternoon in Texas.

Porn magazines started losing “readers” in the ’80s — when video became cheap to manufacture.

At some point, magazine porn did get wrapped and placed on top shelves. And then it seemed to disappear from a lot of places where it used to be ubiquitous. I couldn’t even find porn at convenience stores where you can buy homeopathic sex pills and bongs.

“Try Walgreen’s at Poplar and Cleveland,” one convenience store employee suggested. Clearly I live in a porn desert.

Walgreens was also a bust, with content similar to what I’d seen at Kroger. Stuff on the top shelf included news magazine special editions and Popular Science. A few titles did catch my eye though down on the bottom shelf, in more or less the same part of the magazine rack where 8-year-old me first encountered porn way back in the disco era.

Check out Sniper. So. Hot.

And this Guns & Ammo AR-15 “pistol edition” with an assault pistol the cover. Or, whatever.

Precision Rifle Shooter has yet another sexy rifle on the cover.

And then there’s all the 2018 Handgun Buyer’s Guides right where little hands can reach them, free from parental guidance.

Long story short: Black’s weird claim just doesn’t seem to be true. Can we please get back to the time-honored business of blaming society’s ills on comic books, Atari, and satanic messages hidden on Black Oak Arkansas cassette tapes?

UPDATE: Similar porn deserts identified in Nashville.

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Dammit Gannett and other Media Follies — Long Weekend Roundup!!!

I planned to write a whole column goofing on WMC’s time machine. See, the well-intentioned tweet above notes that the City of Memphis was created 199 years ago (in 1819) and goes on to note that WMC has been “in love ever since” even though the 70-year-old media company was founded in 1948. Maybe you can be in love with Memphis retroactively, and find some kind of familial agape love to get you through the years of slave trading and civil strife. But who has time to dwell on that while Memphis still still has a dying daily newspaper to kick around? Especially when that newspaper has a time machine of its own. And instead of going back in time and not completely screwing itself up, the Gannett-owned sadness chose instead to bring back Houston High’s 2015 soccer team to win the state championship.

‘Stop, you’re BREAKING THE TIMELINE!!!’

This weird and probably misplaced act of heroism seems to have adversely affected the timeline, devolving Gannett’s copyediting staff to the point they can’t spell the name of their own damn newspaper. 

And, perhaps most alarmingly of all, the CA has begun to insert random photos of Burt Reynolds into its content. And not the good ones, either.

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Memphis comic book creators launch Rise of the Golden Dragon

I was biking around South Main a few Sundays back when I spied some nifty-looking Afrofuturist art at Art Village Gallery. So I popped in to discover that wasn’t the only thing going on. Artists/comic creators John Cooley and Erwin Prasetya were also giving away copies of a new, locally produced comic book titled Rise of the Golden Dragon.

Who says you can’t judge a book by its cover? This issue is cool.

The spreads are generous, thoughtfully broken down and nicely drawn. 

The action’s great. 

And the details are nice.

The story, which has a light tone and never takes itself too seriously, is focused around a pair of warrior “dragons” who are rooting out ancient supernatural evil wherever they find it. Think Deadly Hands of Kung Fu, and tracksuit Iron Fist meets John Constantine in an Enter the Dragon remake.

The lightly worn pop-culture references don’t stop there. Issue 1/12 was action-packed and full of gags, but still managed to lay the foundations of a sprawling story and establish a compelling set of personalities. And c’mon— Ninja exorcists? That’s got all kinds of potential.

The self-published Rise of the Golden Dragon is slated to come out once a month. Find out more about that and other titles at Fanboycomics.com

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Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Dammit Gannett: Fabulous Prizes Edition

Picking on the Commercial Appeal used to be its own reward, back in the day when they were the big corporate Goliath and we were the little dude with a slingshot. As the paper has continued to decline, it’s become a weekly, though not entirely joyless, chore. Still, it’s good to feel appreciated. So thanks, Jim Palmer, for this cartoon inspired by Fly on the Wall’s regular “Dammit Gannett” feature.

Jim’s a first generation Memphis Flyer vet who contributed illustrations for columns by Lydel Sims. He’s the creator of Memphis’ own Li’l E and your Pesky Fly’s very favorite cartoon about the journalist’s life.