Dirty Streets are here to kick your butt into this week on today’s Music Video Monday. 
Memphis gunslingers Thomas Storz, Justin Toland, and Andrew Denham have a new album, Distractions. The first video, directed by Waheed Alqawasmi, documents the band working at Sam Phillips Recording.
Here’s a little shot of adrenaline called “The Sound.”
Music Video Monday: Dirty Streets
If you’d like to see your music video on Music Video Monday, email cmccoy@memphisflyer.com.
Neighborhood Preservation Inc./University of Memphis
Herewith, six numeric takes on an already memorable Tiger basketball season.
• 90 — From his opening press conference as Tiger coach, Penny Hardaway has stressed a desire to run opponents out of FedExForum, to leave players in dark jerseys gasping for breath at the first media timeout. There are various ways to measure the pace of a basketball team: number of possessions, number of shots, frequency of turnovers (for either team). But the best measure of a fast team is in the scoring column. The Tigers recently sprinted through five consecutive games in which they scored at least 90 points, a streak unmatched in these parts since the 1975-76 season (when Bill Cook and Marion Hilliard were leading the Tigers to the NCAA tournament). Memphis has struggled at times (including shooting accuracy from the field), but it hasn’t been muddy basketball at FedExForum. As the current team continues to grow — yes, college teams can grow after New Year’s Day — Penny’s pace may indeed end a game or two before halftime.
Larry Kuzniewski
Kyvon Davenport
• 0 — Kyvon Davenport’s uniform number has become a paradoxical reflection of his value to this team. After a rocky first five minutes in last week’s AAC opener against Wichita State, Hardaway was pleading (loudly) for his team to get Davenport the basketball. They did. And the senior, freshly shorn of his signature dreadlocks, scored a game-high 25 points in a relatively comfortable win over the Shockers. Don’t confuse Davenport coming off Hardaway’s bench with his place in this roster’s pecking order. He’s pulled down 30 more rebounds than any teammate. Jeremiah Martin may be the anointed leader of the 2018-19 Tigers, but you get the impression that, come March, this team will go as far as Davenport takes it.
• 77.9 — The Tigers rank 12th — dead last — in the American Athletic Conference in points allowed per game. Hardaway has insisted his team will play fast with the ball and apply the clamps defensively. Memphis has done one of these well to date.
• 9 — Hardaway has gone nine-deep with his rotation, and it might be ten had freshman sharpshooter David Wingett not been sidelined by injury. Five seniors, a junior, and three freshmen have played at least 13 minutes per game, with only three — Martin, Tyler Harris, and Alex Lomax — averaging 25 per game. There is no true “A unit” (the team’s best player currently comes off the bench). Hardaway can go small and, as he says, “speed [an opponent] up.” He can lean on veterans like Martin, Davenport, and Brewton, or go with the hot freshman hands of Harris, Lomax, or Antwann Jones (a trio that disappeared in last Sunday’s loss at Houston). These Tigers aren’t just deep, they’re versatile.
• 1 — There appears to be but one killer team in the American Athletic Conference, and the Tigers 13-point loss to Houston last Sunday will be the only time Memphis faces that team until (possibly) the league tournament in March. According to the NCAA’s new NET rankings, only the Cougars (4) belong among the country’s top 30 teams (through last Saturday’s games). Perusing the list, you find UCF (32), Cincinnati (33), and Temple (61) before locating Memphis (75). Houston may dominate this league, but there’s room for another team (or two) to accumulate wins and enter the conversation for an at-large NCAA tournament berth.
• 119,828 — The Tigers sold more tickets for their first eight home games (all nonconference) than they did for the entire 19-game home schedule in 2017-18 (118,277). Hardaway has a delightfully ironic nickname. A math wizard needs to calculate the pennies generated not just for the U of M, but for sponsors, bars, hotels, and vendors that support Tiger basketball since Hardaway took over coaching duties. And you get the sense this is much more than a honeymoon. A crowd of 13,000 for South Dakota State on a Tuesday in December? That’s money, Penny.
I actually left an unfinished draft of this article on my personal blog-site before the season started. It was going to be a an article that explained why, in a transitional season like this one was scheduled to be for the Memphis Grizzlies, having players like Mike Conley and Marc Gasol was so vital. It was meant to outline, while the best years for both Gasol and Conley were behind them, how it would be the best idea to still base the team’s immediate future around them.
Matt Preston
It seemed like a solid way of thinking at the time but, just like the real life product on the court, I never got around to actually finishing what I started. It was good in theory but the actual follow-through was left incomplete.
Larry Kuzniewski
Conley and Gasol pick-and-rolls have been as much as a staple of the franchise for Grizz fans as growl towels, close wins, bad draft picks, and blowing big leads. The two veterans have had a chemistry that has made them one of the winningest active tandems in recent history. Whether it’s been under the leadership of Lionel Hollins, Dave Joerger, David Fizdale, or JB Bickerstaff, when all else fails, some good ol’ Mike-and-Marc magic has seemed to always save the day — or at the very least, make the Grizzlies a team that can compete and play above the talent level of the sum of its collective parts.
The duo is 361-288 (55.6 percent) playing together over their careers, which is impressive. But they are only 57-56 as a duo since the 2016-2017 season, which also lines up with the departure of fellow “Core Four” members Zach Randolph and Tony Allen.
The Grizzlies are currently 18-21, and have gone 6-16 after starting the season with a 12-5 record. Conley leads the team in scoring but the offense has been abysmal lately, especially with Gasol being inconsistent and limited, either physically or emotionally. It’s also fair to say to say that Conley and Gasol have done a poor job in trying to look for rookie Jaren Jackson Jr. more in the offense.
Trading the last two members of the core four that captured the city’s heart is always a possibility, and honestly, as a media member who is also a fan and a Memphian, I can see both sides. It’s an interesting dilemma, because you know that trading one or both will ultimately send the team into rebuilding mode, immediately.
I took a hard stance against tanking this season, due to the fact that the Grizzlies still owe their 2019 draft pick to Boston if it lands outside of the top eight picks, but as the season and reality progress, I have found myself not as “10 toes down” as before.
Larry Kuzniewski
The two core vets were supposed to be the guys who would help hand the franchise over to the new era, led by Jackson Jr. This looked to be the case early in the season, but lately, it seems like they are simply denying the inevitable change that has to come. You can’t help but wonder if it would be better for Jackson — and the team — if Gasol and Conley would defer to him more, to allow him to be the focal point of the offense while they still do “Marc and Mike stuff.” It would be something similar to the way that they still deferred to Zach Randolph, even while at the height of their careers. It’s frustrating and confusing. It seems like it should be much simpler than what we’re seeing on the court. The two established leaders should be benefitting to the young players and helping them grow, which should ultimately lead to wins.
But it simply isn’t happening.
The madness may be two months away, but the Houston Cougars are becoming part of college basketball’s national storyline this season. In easily handling the Tigers Sunday at their shiny new arena, the Cougars extended their home winning streak to 28 games to remain one of only three undefeated teams in the country (along with Michigan and Virginia). Houston (15-0) led from start to finish to end the Tigers’ four-game winning streak and drop Memphis to 9-6 for the season and 1-1 in the American Athletic Conference.
Armoni Brooks led the way for Houston with 22 points, draining three-pointers (a total of six) whenever the Tigers seemed to be closing in. Nate Hinton added 19 off the Cougar bench.
Senior forward Kyvon Davenport spurred a Tiger comeback early in the second half with eight straight points. But Memphis never reduced the lead below four points (50-46) and finished with its lowest point total since Thanksgiving weekend. Davenport finished the contest with 17 points and Kareem Brewton added a career-high 25, also off the Memphis bench. Jeremiah Martin scored 16 points for the Tigers, but the freshman trio of Tyler Harris, Alex Lomax, and Antwann Jones combined for just seven.
Memphis shot 48 percent from the field but committed 17 turnovers, a factor in Houston taking 21 more shots in the game. The Cougars shot 45 percent and hit 12 treys (to the Tigers’ eight).
Houston does not play in Memphis in the regular season, so the teams will not meet again unless they’re matched against one another in the AAC tournament (at FedExForum) in March.
The Tigers return home Thursday night to host East Carolina (8-6, 1-1). Tip-off is scheduled for 8 p.m.
Michael Donahue
Three Kings cake for Epiphany
I like to be the one to find the king in the “King Cake” during Lent. This is the green, yellow, and purple-frosted coffee-cake-like concoction, which sometimes is filled with cream cheese. It usually is decorated with Mardi Gras beads and other knick knacks. A little plastic baby, which symbolizes Jesus, is hidden in the cake.
Whoever is first to find the baby is supposed to buy the cake the next year. I just like the thrill of the hunt.
If you just can’t wait for the King Cakes to arrive, you can buy a “Rosca de Reyes,” also known as the “Three Kings” cake. It’s an Hispanic tradition for the feast of Epiphany. And it’s another chance to find a plastic baby in a baker’s confectionery.
Kay Bakery, which also makes King Cakes, makes “Three Kings” cakes. This year, they’ll make about 400 cakes, says owner Queo Bautista.
The cake symbolizes the Three Wise Men. “When they brought gifts to Baby Jesus,” Bautista says.
A plastic baby is hidden in the cake, which symbolizes hiding Baby Jesus from King Herod. According to the Bible, Herod, who didn’t know where Jesus was, wanted to kill all baby boys who were born about the time Jesus was born to make sure he’d get rid of him. He was afraid Jesus was going to one day become the new ruler.
Unlike the fancy “King Cake,” the “Three Kings Cake” basically is “bread with some fruit on top,” Bautista says.
The sweet fruits on top of the cake are candied figs, cherries, and strips of green, yellow and red candied papaya, which symbolize the gifts the Kings brought Jesus. They were gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Dollops of yellow sugar icing also adorn the top of the cake, which is made from a slightly sweet dough.
The cake is round to symbolize that “Jesus has no beginning and no end,” Bautista says.
In Mexico, the cake traditionally is served on Epiphany Sunday, which, this year, is January 6th. Children receive small gifts — “Not as big as Christmas” — to symbolize the gifts, which the kings brought Jesus. “Gifts to the new king.”
I love the subtle, sweet taste of the Epiphany Cake. And, to make things even sweeter, I instantly found the plastic baby. Unlike the little pink ones usually in a seated position in the King Cake, these babies are white and in a standing position. My editor said the baby looked like an “android.”
You can order Epiphany Cakes through January 5th at Kay Bakery. Small, which serves 12, is $18; medium, which serves 20, is $25; and large, which serves 30, is $30.
Kay Bakery is at 667 Avon Road. Call: (901)-767-0780.
TIRRC
After a law that prohibits state and local governments from interfering with the enforcement of federal immigration laws went into effect on January 1st, the Shelby County attorney said that the law doesn’t apply to Shelby County or the county’s sheriff’s department.
In a Wednesday tweet the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office (SCSO) said that Marlinee Clark Iverson, the county attorney, advised that HB2315, the “new Tennessee laws governing sanctuary cities don’t apply to Shelby County or SCSO.”
“Therefore, the SCSO will not detain anyone being released from the jail unless there is a warrant or probable cause to do so,” the agency said.
SCSO will, however, continue to honor requests for notifications from the U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE).
The Shelby County Attorney has advised the SCSO that the new TN laws governing sanctuary cities/policies don't apply to Shelby County or the SCSO. Therefore, the SCSO will not detain anyone being released from the Jail unless there is a warrant or probable cause to do so.
— ShelbyTNSheriff (@ShelbyTNSheriff) January 2, 2019
State GOP Challenge Shelby County’s Response to New Immigration Law
Now, the notion that Shelby County is exempt from the law and that detaining individuals without probable cause or a warrant would be in violation for the Fourth Amendment is being challenged by Tennessee Lieutenant Governor and Speaker Randy McNally and Speaker Glen Casada, the Associated Press reported Friday.
Associated Press
Lisa Sherman-Nikolaus, policy director at the Tennessee Immigration and Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC), who has called the law “one of the most extreme, anti-immigration laws in the country” said Friday that the group warned legislators that the measure puts local governments in “impossible positions.”
“Tennessee’s new ‘anti-sanctuary city’ law forces local governments to choose: violate the U.S. Constitution or violate the new state law,” Sherman-Nikolaus said. “If the Lieutenant Governor and the Speaker of the House are going to threaten Shelby County, the state should have to foot the bill when counties are inevitably sued for violating their residents’ fourth amendment rights.”
Sherman-Nikolaus adds that the TIRRC applauds SCSO and the county attorney for defending all residents’ constitutional rights.
“Local governments across the state should join together and urge the legislature to reconsider this blatantly unconstitutional law,” Sherman-Nikolaus said.
In county attorney Iverson’s legal opinion, she agreed that the law could violate constitutional rights: “The language in the statute is unclear to the extent that it can be interpreted as requiring absurd and/or potentially unconstitutional conduct by any law enforcement agency.”
Union Avenue could be vastly different in the years ahead, as the city is planning to revamp the street through the Union Avenue Complete Streets Project.
The street will undergo a multi-phase “major reconstruction,” according to the city’s Bikeway and Pedestrian program’s Facebook.
Beginning with the segment of Union from Marshall Avenue to Manassas Street in the Medical District, the street will get improvements like street beautification, enhanced transit stops, heightened safety for pedestrians and cyclists, modernized traffic signals, and eco-friendly solutions to stormwater runoff.
Google Maps
The first segment of the project is highlighted in yellow.
City officials spearheading the project, as well as a team of design consultants will present the plans for the first segment in detail and seek feedback at a public meeting on Tuesday, January 8th. The meeting is slated for 6 p.m. at High Cotton Brewing Co.
A social hour sponsored by the Memphis Medical District Collaborative will follow. Attendees of the meeting will receive a complimentary drink ticket.
Kiki Layne and Stephan James in If Beale Street Could Talk
Let’s get this out of the way: If Beale Street Could Talk is not set in Memphis. It’s not about Beale Street or the blues, or loquacious rights-of-way. In fact, in the opening epigraph, author James Baldwin says Beale Street is in New Orleans.
James Baldwin may have been geographically challenged, but he was a stone cold literary genius. When he invoked Beale Street in the opening of his 1974 novel, one of the country’s first black-owned business districts existed to him as a lost world of African-American freedom. The name represented the realization of the kind of personal autonomy American capitalism always promises, but which was ultimately denied to people like Tish Rivers (Kiki Layne) and Fonny Hunt (Stephan James), two young, working-class kids from Harlem, who happen to be black.
Tish and Fonny are in love like only 19-year-olds can be. As soon as Fonny gets a new place — he’s got a crappy cold-water flat, but the budding sculptor is looking at a fixer-upper artist’s loft — he’s going to pop the question. But then Fonny gets in the mildest of street hassles, just a little pushing and shoving over Tish’s honor, and all the sudden he’s in the crosshairs of the prison-industrial complex. The racist cop he pisses off that fateful night soon gets an opportunity to frame him for a brutal rape that happened on the other side the city. With Fonny on trial for his life, it is not a good time for Tish to announce she’s pregnant.
Director Barry Jenkins has broken the rule that mediocre books make the best movies. He takes Baldwin’s dauntingly nonlinear literary structure and makes it smooth and easily understandable. Each jump forward and backward in time reveals a little bit more of the story in a way designed to maximize the emotional impact. The ending, when it comes, reveals characters who are forever changed, but unbroken.
Jenkins color sense is second to no one working today. I think he invented some new, tastefully early-70s hues especially for this movie. The film’s recreation of 1970s Harlem is flawless, and, knowing Jenkins, done efficiently. Jenkins loves to work in close up, or with his camera fixed on an effortlessly flawless composition. When his camera does move, it flows through space.
Every performance on the screen, from Layne’s heartbreakingly naive Tish, interrupted on the edge of lasting happiness, to Colman Doming bringing laughing gravitas to the role of her father, feels fully human. As Tish’s mother, Regina King puts on a one-woman Strasberg-ian acting clinic.
Regina King as Sharon Rivers
It all comes together in an emotionally epic scene where Tish and Fonny’s families grapple with the reality of a new baby on the way. If my description makes this film sound like a downer, it’s not. Tish’s family’s first reaction is to rejoice at the prospect of a new member. They know Tish and Fonny’s love is real. It’s different with Fonny’s family. His religious mother (Aunjanue Ellis, tightly wound) lashes out at the Rivers family, while the two grandads-to-be hatch plots to pay for it all. It’s a deeply humane and instantly recognizable scene that, if removed from the larger context, would be the best short film of the year.
But the tender pas de deux between Tish and Fonny, told intermittently between scenes of fear and despair, is the beating heart of the picture. Is there anyone who does romance better than Jenkins? The couple’s wide-eyed innocence, an emotion never available to the brutally repressed Charon Harris in Moonlight, is pure joy to behold. If, as Roger Ebert said, movies are machines to create empathy, then Jenkins is our greatest empathetic engineer.
Together, Baldwin and Jenkins celebrate the love that flourishes in the midst of tragedy and injustice. Jenkins came up from the indie underground, emerging from Miami in 2008 with Medicine for Melancholy and going on to win Best Picture for 2016’s Moonlight. He found the perfect material to adapt in If Beale Street Could Talk. Its examination of the human cost of the carceral state and indictment of institutions of justice that wink at racism as long as the conviction numbers stay high is, sadly, as relevant as ever.
If Beale Street Could Talk
Memphis opened American Athletic Conference play Thursday night at FedExForum with variables both known and unknown. Having completed their nonconference slate of 13 games, the Tigers know they have a veteran playmaker and leader in senior Jeremiah Martin. In Tyler Harris, they know they have a freshman with a scorer’s frame of mind (whether or not he’s on target). But what’s to be made of players like Antwann Jones, Alex Lomax, or Mike Parks? Swing variables — like that trio — tend to steer a season one direction or another.
Larry Kuzniewski
Alex Lomax
Jones, Lomax, and Parks played significant roles in helping the Tigers beat Wichita State to complete a 6-1 homestand and extend their current winning streak to four games. A sloppy opening five minutes gave way to the accelerated pace Memphis has shown under rookie coach Penny Hardaway. Lomax converted a steal into a layup to cap a 9-0 Tiger run and give Memphis a 29-20 lead with 4:15 to play before halftime. The Shockers closed the margin to five points (46-41) early in the second half, but the Tigers never surrendered the lead in avenging a 20-point loss to Wichita State a year ago. (The Shockers return no starters from their 2018 NCAA tournament team.)
“I’m proud of the effort, overall,” said a hoarse Hardaway after the game. “We had some mental lapses, but we overcame that with hustle and came away with a great victory. This game meant more to Alex Lomax than anybody, because of his [previous] ties to Wichita State. And Antwann Jones . . . what can you say about him? He’s just a talent. We’ve been waiting for him to come around.”
Lomax stuffed the stat sheet off the Tiger bench with eight points, a team-leading eight rebounds, five assists, and three steals in 25 minutes. Fellow-freshman Jones scored a season-high 16 points in just 21 minutes, connecting on seven of nine shots from the field, including a few among larger defenders in the paint. “Back in my YMCA days,” said Jones, “I played the five [position], so I’m comfortable [down low].”
Parks converted a pair of reverse layups in the first half and hit all four of his field-goal attempts to go along with four rebounds and three steals. Hardaway emphasized that the inconsistent senior is physically healthy, noting only “a mental thing” hindering his becoming an integral part of the Tiger rotation.
Senior Kvon Davenport had his finest game since cutting his signature dreadlocks, scoring a game-high 25 points in 27 minutes off the Memphis bench. He hit nine of 11 free throws, boosting a huge advantage for the Tigers from the charity stripe. (The Tigers made 25 of 31 shots while the Shockers only took — and made — six.)
Larry Kuzniewski
Penny Hardaway
“We scored 85 points on an off night,” noted Hardaway, whose team had scored at least 90 points in its previous five games, a streak unmatched by a Memphis squad since the 1975-76 season. “Our offensive woes don’t worry me, because I feel like we’ll be able to turn it on at any time.”
The Tigers won the rebounding battle, 35-29, impressing Hardaway with the toughness necessary to win league clashes. “That’s a different Memphis than they’re used to seeing,” said Hardaway. “They’ve only been in the league one year, but last year they kind of had their way with the team physically. To be able to take that physicality, and put it back on them, I’m definitely proud of that. We want to grow in that category.”
Markis McDuffie led the Shockers with 19 points but needed 17 shots to match his season scoring average. The loss drops Wichita State to 7-6.
Now 9-5, the Tigers will play their first road game in over a month when they travel to 19th-ranked Houston Sunday. Memphis is 0-3 against ranked teams this season.