Tag: Memphis

Categories
Sports Tiger Blue

Memphis Routs South Alabama, 42-6

CREDIT: Matthew Smith

The University of Memphis stepped on the gas early against South Alabama and never let up in a 42-6 victory in Mobile. The victory moved the Tigers to 3-0 on the season and marked the team’s first road win of the year.

Matthew Smith

Kenneth Gainwell

The Tigers led 23-0 at halftime, mostly on the strength of a running game for which the Jaguars seemingly had no answer. Kenneth Gainwell, standing in for the second consecutive week for injured starter Patrick Taylor, had 141 yards — by halftime. Kylan Watkins added 87 yards to pad the halftime ground totals.

In their first possession of the second half, the Tigers drove 65 yards to a score in 70 seconds, using a tipped-pass reception to Joey Magnifico for most of that yardage.

The breaks were going the Tigers’ way, to be sure, but the Tigers were clearly the superior team on both sides of the ball. Judging from the vast vacant spaces shown on television in Ladd-Peebles Stadium, the locals weren’t exactly pumped about this matchup. Announced attendance was 12,373, but several thousand of those fans were obviously disguised as empty bleacher seats.

After a Riley Patterson field goal made it 33-0 early in the fourth quarter, the Tiger defense got on the scoreboard when Austin Hall scooped up a fumble and returned it 47 yards for a touchdown, making it a 40-0 game. It was Hall’s second fumble recovery of the contest.

South Alabama finally found the end zone on its next possession, but promptly muffed the extra point and Memphis’ Jacobi Francis picked it up and returned it to the opposite end zone for a two-point score. With the game at 42-6, Memphis starting quarterback Brady White left the contest, as Coach Mike Norvell called off the dogs, er, Tigers. White completed 12 of 20 passes for 209 yards, including three touchdowns and one interception.

Memphis finished with 302 yards rushing, for a total of 511 offensive yards, while holding the Jaguars to fewer than 230 yards total offense.

Memphis has a bye next weekend before taking on Navy on Thursday, September 26th.

Categories
Film/TV Film/TV/Etc. Blog

Music Video Monday: Sweet Knives

Music Video Monday is coming in hot!

Today, we’ve got a world premiere from Sweet Knives. The group grew out of the wreckage of Lost Sounds, the legendary Memphis band that counted the late Jay Reatard as a founding member. Alicja Trout, Rich Crook, and John Garland got back together and added Eli Steele and Lori McStay to write and record new music. “Sweet Knives’ new batch of songs sounds different from the Lost Sounds dark-wave synth punk sound,” says Trout. “With this song in particular Rich [drums] wrote the core of the song and the guitar solo, then I built the melodies and lyrics from there. It’s a new approach for us. We don’t want to sound like Lost Sounds. We are a new band, though our set still includes a few old Lost Sounds songs.”

“I Don’t Wanna Die” has a personal meaning for Trout and the band. “Jay, as we know, died of substance complications. All of us are concerned for our health, and I think I speak for the band that we want long, healthy lives; we don’t want to live recklessly and have our lives end early as Jay’s did,” she says.

The video was directed by Laura Jean Hocking, shot by Sarah Fleming, and stars Shannon Walton as a pilot facing a bad situation. “This was a really enjoyable collaboration,” says Hocking. “The concept was Alicja’s idea, but I was given free rein. I’m very attracted to the image of a woman set adrift alone in the world.”

Music Video Monday: Sweet Knives

Sweet Knives sets out on a two-week tour of the Southwest and West Coast this week. Here’s where you can catch this don’t-miss live show.

-Friday, June 14, Little Rock, AR – White Water with Stifft Beat

-Saturday, June 15, Oklahoma City – Blue Note with Psychotic Reaction

-Sunday, June 16, Albuquerque, NM – Launchpad with The Ordinary Things and nowhiteflag

-Tuesday, June 18, San Diego, CA – Whistle Stop

-Wednesday, June 19, Long Beach, CA – 4th Street Vine with Assquatch

-Thursday, June 20, Los Angeles, CA – Cafe Nela with Guilty Hearts and Tenement Rats

-Friday, June 21, San Pedro, CA – Recess Ops with Lenguas Largas

-Saturday, June 22, San Francisco, CA – Parkside with Control Freaks and Dots

-Monday, June 24, El Centro, CA – Strangers

-Tuesday, June 25, Tempe, AZ – Yucca Tap Room with Lenguas Largas

-Wednesday, June 26, Tuscon, AZ – Club Congress with Lenguas Largas

-Thursday, June 27, El Paso, TX – Monarch Theater with Lenguas Largas

-Friday, June 28, Austin, TX – Barracuda outside with Lenguas Largas, Wiccans, more tba

-Saturday, June 29, New Orleans – Circle Bar with Manatees and Dummy Dumpster, Ponk Dance party DJs

If you’d like to see your music video on Music Video Monday, email cmccoy@memphisflyer.com

Categories
Intermission Impossible Theater

POTS 2019-’20 Season Revives Memphis, Showcases Kinky Boots, Go-Gos

Playhouse on the Square‘s 2019-2020 Season Revives the musical Memphis, while showcasing popular Broadway fare with 1980’s music tie-ins. Kinky Boots, with a book by Harvey Fierstein and songs by “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” singer Cyndi Lauper, opens the season, a season that also features The Go-Gos unusual jukebox  show Head Over Heels.

The ’19-’20 season folds in classics like Little Shop of Horrors and Ain’t Misbehavin’, with world and regional premieres.

Via Playhouse on the Square:

KINKY BOOTS
By: Harvey Fierstein Lyrics by Cyndi Lauper

August 9 – September 1, 2019 @ Playhouse on the Square

Based on the 2005 British film of the same name and scored by Cyndi Lauper, Charlie has inherited a shoe factory from his father. It sounds like a great deal, except the factory is failing and on the way to being shut down. Enter Lola, a cabaret performer and drag queen, who sees what Charlie can’t – and it’s all in the heel.

THE HUMANS
By: Stephen Karam

August 23 – September 8, 2019 @ The Circuit Playhouse

Thanksgiving in a run-down, Chinatown apartment isn’t the usual setting for the Blake family. But Brigid and new boyfriend Richard insist. A family get together is a great time to reconnect with those you love – or complain about religion, career choices, and why you spend money on organic vegetable smoothies. For this family, it is somewhere in between.

ON GOLDEN POND
By: Ernest Thompson

September 20 – October 6, 2019 @ Playhouse on the Square

Norman and Ethel Thayer are living out their golden years, enjoying summers at the family lake house. As with most homes, you find there are always things in need of repair. As you get older, you may find the same can be said for relationships as well.

HEAD OVER HEELS
By: James Magruder / Lyrics By: The Go-Go’s

October 4 – October 27, 2019 @ The Circuit Playhouse

Charged with the unmistakable, iconic music of The Go-Go’s, the kingdom of Arcadia goes on a daring quest to do whatever it takes to protect their famous “Beat.” On their journey they will find love, deceit, and misinterpreted prophesy. Will the kingdom of Arcadia be saved? “Our Lips Are Sealed.”

PETER PAN
Based on the Book By: J. M. Barrie
Lyrics By: Carolyn Leigh Betty Comden and Adolph Green / Music By: Mark Charlap and Julie Styne

November 15 – December 29, 2019 @ Playhouse on the Square

Life will never be the same for Michael, John, and Wendy Darling after Peter Pan visits their nursery window offering to take them to the magical world of Neverland. They meet the Lost Boys, spritely fairy Tinkerbell, the beautiful princess Tiger Lily, and the evil Captain Hook. The conflict between Peter and Hook takes center stage as the magical adventure turns dangerous and teaches everyone the true power of friendship.


JUNIE B. JONES THE MUSICAL
Book & Music By: Marcy Heisler / Lyrics By: Zina Goldrich

November 22 – December 22, 2019 @ The Circuit Playhouse

It’s Junie B.’s first day of first grade, and a lot of things have changed for her: Junie’s friend, Lucille, doesn’t want to be her best pal anymore and, on the bus, Junie B. makes friends with Herb, the new kid at school. Also, Junie has trouble reading the blackboard, and her teacher, Mr. Scary, thinks she may need glasses. Throw in a friendly cafeteria lady, a kickball tournament and a “Top-Secret Personal Beeswax Journal,” and first grade has never been more exciting.

THE TWELVE DATES OF CHRISTMAS
By: Ginna Hoben

November 29 – December 22, 2019 @ The Memphian Room

One moment you’re headed into the holidays with your cute dress, new bling, and an adorable fiancé. But when you catch him kissing another girl at the televised Thanksgiving Parade, things change. Watch Mary navigate life in the dating world where romance ranges from weird and creepy to absurd and comical. Will she be able to answer the question: What do the lonely do at Christmas? Or will she have us all thinking love stinks?

WHEN WE GET GOOD AGAIN
By: James McLindon

January 10 – January 26, 2020 @ TheatreWorks

When brilliant, idealistic, but poor college student Tracy is tempted by a lucrative job selling term papers to her classmates to pay her tuition, she begins to wonder: Is it ever okay to put being good on hold?

MEMPHIS: THE MUSICAL
By: David Bryan and Joe DiPietro

January 17 – February 8, 2020 @ Playhouse on the Square

In the 1950s, on the downtown streets of Memphis, TN, Rock and Roll was born. The marriage of downtrodden blues, uplifting gospel and forlorn country made way to a genre of music that would, one day, speak to the soul of the entire world. But for now, in a seedy bar on Beale, this music has spoken to the soul of a local country-boy. The girl that the sound has come from has stolen his heart. Will the objections from their families or the challenges of society be too much for the couple to withstand? Or will Huey and Felecia let nothing steal their rock and roll?

INDECENT
By: Paula Vogel

January 24 – February 16, 2020 @ The Circuit Playhouse

In 1923, a Jewish theatre troupe produced a controversial play on Broadway that led to the entire company being arrested on the grounds of obscenity. Playwright, Paula Vogel, recounts the controversy surrounding this play and the lives of the actors who created it. Indecent questions the fear of love, the joy of making art, and the courage to do so during the rise of Nazism.


THE BOOK OF WILL
By: Lauren Gunderson

March 6 – March 22, 2020 @ Playhouse on the Square

When a poor rendition of Hamlet is performed three years after the death of William Shakespeare, it is obvious to his friends – someone should put his work to pen – and save the words of the world’s greatest playwright. But to make one, they’ll have to battle an unscrupulous publisher, a boozy poet laureate, and their own mortality, to create Shakespeare’s First Folio.


SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK, LIVE!
Book by: George Keating, Kyle Hall, and Scott Ferguson
Lyrics by: Bob Dorough, Dave Frishberg, George Newall, Kathy Mandry, Lynn Ahrens, and Tom Yohe

March 14 – April 4, 2020 @ The Circuit Playhouse

“Get your thing in action” and relive the glory days of Saturday Morning’s iconic cartoon series. Tom is ready to start his first day as a schoolteacher. The only problem is he is scared to death! Watch as characters from the classic series come to life, reminding Tom the best way to learn has always been with music and an imagination. With memorable songs “I’m Just a Bill,” “Inter-Planet Janet,” and “Conjunction Junction” you will want to scoot down front and grab a big bowl of cereal.

AIN’T MISBEHAVIN’
By: Murray Horwitz and Richard Maltby Jr.

March 13 – April 5, 2020 @ The Circuit Playhouse

A revival of this tribute to the Harlem Renaissance and the black musicians that defined a significant era in American music comes home to The Circuit Playhouse. Through the 1920s and 1930s hits like “T Ain’t Nobody’s Bizness,” “Your Feet’s Too Big,” and “Fat and Greasy” filled Manhattan nightclubs and caused a spark across the nation! Join us as we get the joint jumpin for one of America’s favorite musicals.

LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS
By: Howard Ashman

May 1 – May 24, 2020 @ Playhouse on the Square

When a “Mean Green Mutha From Outaspace” lands in your flower shop, what do you do? Feed it people of course! Hapless flower shop worker, Seymour, only wants the love of his life to notice him. When his little blood sucking plant grows to become the talk of the town, Seymour will get more than he bargained for.

DAYS OF RAGE
By: Steven Levenson

April 17 – May 10, 2020 @ The Circuit Playhouse

It’s October 1969 and five 20-something idealists find themselves in the middle of a country divided. Living together in a house in Upstate New York and confident in the knowledge that they are the only generation to ever take up the resistance, they retaliate against society by denouncing monogamy and other capitalist notions. But when they admit a mysterious newcomer to their collective, the delicate balance they’ve achieved begins to topple. It’ll be six and a half years until the Vietnam War ends but their fight is just beginning.

SOMETHING ROTTEN
By: John O’Farrell and Karey Kirkpatrick

June 19 – July 12, 2020 @ Playhouse on the Square

When Nick and Nigel Bottom decide their theatre troupe rivals that of William Shakespeare the best way to beat him is to hire a soothsayer and write a musical about Eggs… right? This Tony Award-winning romp is a love story to all things theatre!

MISSISSIPPI GODDAMN
By: Jonathan Norton

June 5 – June 28, 2020 @ The Circuit Playhouse

In 1963 Jackson, Mississippi, the stirring of Civil Rights is beginning to rally a nation of long oppressed people. But on a particular street, which is home to a civil rights pioneer, not everyone is pleased to see it begin.

ST. PAULIES DELIGHT
By: J. Joseph Cox

July 10 – July 26, 2020 @ TheatreWorks at the Square

When Paul learns his estranged aunt has passed away, he holds a wake for her that doubles as a testing ground for his exquisite, big gay wedding. A day-of shift in plans leaves Paul’s life in shambles, forcing him to confront burying his definition of family along with his mysterious aunt.

Categories
Editorial Opinion

Electrolux Deal: Time to Rethink the Industrial-Development Process

The catastrophic news late last week of the imminent closing of the Electrolux plant at Pidgeon Industrial Park underscored the importance of long-overdue efforts currently underway to examine the incentives policies employed locally to recruit industry and, more generally, to reform the industrial development process.

It was not even a decade ago that the announcement was made, in mid-December 2010 at a gala year-end Chamber of Commerce banquet at the Peabody, that the giant Swedish appliance manufacturer would be building a 700,000-square-foot installation on Presidents Island. Numerous luminaries were present, including Electrolux executives, Mayors A C Wharton and Mark Luttrell of Memphis and Shelby County, respectively, and then-Governor Phil Bredesen.

Bredesen said the enterprise would represent a $190-million investment and would bring some 1,200 jobs, in addition to supplier jobs and other ancillary benefits. The facts, as things turned out, were a little different: The supplier jobs never really developed; the ancillary benefits remained theoretical; the job numbers totaled out at 1,100 and had subsided to roughly half that number at the time of last week’s announcement; and only the $190-million investment turned out to be entirely real.

Except that $190 million was the amount paid out by local and state taxpayers, not a measure of bounty to be received by the local economy. And, most worrisome of all, there was no “clawback” provision in the contract with Electrolux mandating that the company would be liable to refund any of this investment in the case of any default in its commitment to Memphis, Shelby County, and Tennessee, all of whom played the role of marks in this one-sided transaction. All that Electrolux had consented to do by way of recompense is to pay the standard tax rate, deferred to this point, for the remaining year or so the plant will be doing business in Shelby County.

How could such a deal have been made? To be sure, all the governmental principals had reasons. A basic fact of life for an elected official is the need to demonstrate results. The two mayors were facing elections, the exiting Bredesen was understandably eager to crown his gubernatorial legacy, and for the then-incoming Governor-elect Bill Haslam, who gave the project his approval, it no doubt had the looks of a godsend on a platter.

For current Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland, who was a member of the city council that gave the deal its blessing, it must look now like a joke at his expense. The Electrolux deal was not of his making, but it is a setback that may count against him in his reelection campaign. It is not to his advantage that his own explanations for the debacle dovetail with the company’s: a troubled economy, blowback from Trump tariffs, the going belly-up of Electrolux super-customer Sears.

All of that may be so, but none of it explains the embarrassing and costly predicament facing Memphis and Shelby County now. The fact is, our civic guardians undertook an enormous gamble without elementary protection. They bet on the come — and it came and went.

Any valid reform of our industrial recruitment process must include safeguards against any possible recurrence of this disastrous deal.

Categories
Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Memphis TV News Has a Dateline Issue

TV 5

I almost didn’t post this because I worry about sounding like a broken record on this topic. But a recent WMC Facebook post stands out as a special example of how our broadcast media has abandoned any responsibility to the idea of “first do no harm.”

For years Fly on the Wall has observed local news teams over-reporting crime and padding their broadcasts and social media feeds with crime reporting from other markets. Most out of town stories aren’t introduced with a dateline, giving the initial impression that these scandals and abominations might be local. This dislocation is amplified by headline driven “scroll and share” consumer habits. I’m hardly the first critic of this cheap, media economy approach to news delivery, nor am I the only journalist to suggest that an over-saturation of fear-based reporting coupled to endless stream of brown faces builds stereotypes and cements misleading cultural narratives while triggering racist anxiety and public policy crafted in response to racist anxiety.

The post in question:

On one hand, the link attached to WMC’s post does eventually identify Houston a the location of the event. Many, similar posts don’t even do that and one has to be clicked in order to see a dateline pegging the story to Florida, California, or somewhere else in the heartland. Only, people don’t read news in blocks, taking in all the content at once. We read top to bottom, left to right. So the first information consumers get from WMC’s post is the station’s logo followed by news that five officers have been shot and are being transported to the hospital. At this point in reading, anybody with a husband, wife, son, daughter, or friend on the local force experiences a little heart failure. It may be allayed if they read on, but the messenger has already failed by not providing key information up front while appealing to raw emotion and cravenly picking at the scabs of discontent.

As if on cue one of the first commenters emerges from the disinformed fever swamp to pin this mass shooting of police officers on an imagined “race war” ginned up by President Barack Obama.

So why would the commenter think this drug raid-related shooting was somehow related to younger generations and Obama’s secret race war? Although the linked story doesn’t include the usual mug shot and one has to Google a bit to get the details, these perps were 50-ish and white. 

Rhogena Nicholas and Dennis Tuttle

But an endless news stream showing crime after crime — brown face after brown face — creates a misleading narrative that lends itself to irrational conclusion. Per the old programmer’s maxim: Garbage in, garbage out.

None of this is accidental. It almost feels trite to remind consumers that content is a market run by enormous financial interests who use trusted, appropriately coiffed personalities to anchor their brands and make you think they care about anything besides where the next dollar’s coming from. That’s glib, but it’s neither incorrect or an understatement to say that news content is determined by market, not the public good. 

For newsrooms, police blotter crime reporting with no context and no followup stories requires very little investment and no investment at all if you’re sharing from an affiliate market. This stuff is as close to free as news content gets. Meanwhile, to borrow from media critic James T. Hamilton, useful and informative but more costly and potentially less clickable stories are left undone due to the “difficulties of translating the public benefits from excellent news coverage into private incentives for [media] owners.”

If TV news is our window on the world, the view is constantly grim and brown is the color of mayhem. The market has spoken and the second comment to the post is the kind of dividend it pays. 

All WMC’s social media person had to do to make this post not abhorrent was include the word “Texas” somewhere in the first sentence. That’s it. So, at this point it may be fair to assume that showing a jot of responsibility really would kill our TV news folks, and someone would no doubt interpret their tragic death as yet another victim of Obama’s fantasy race war.

In other words, we’re doomed: Scene at 11. Thanks WMC. 

Categories
Music Music Features

Monterosso Meets Memphis: Italian Guitarist Finds a Home

CREDIT: Photographs by Billy Morris

With foreigners and asylum-seekers now becoming the objects of some folks’ daily two-minute hate, it’s worth noting the value of immigrants in the Memphis music scene. Guitarist Mario Monterosso has been in Memphis more than two years, but he’s not the first Italian to seek a fortune in the Bluff City. W.C. Handy wrote of another, “a ragged immigrant boy, a dark-browed Italian youngster called Pee Wee, [who] crept out from under one of the box cars. He had come all the way from New York on the rods.” Later, the youngster came into his own on Beale Street. As Handy recalled, “When I first visited the city as a boy, Pee Wee was running a saloon … and his place became almost a landmark and a legend. Moreover, it was a headquarters for musicians.”

Unlike Pee Wee, Monterosso came to Memphis wielding a guitar, but like Pee Wee, he found a home on Beale. Many have marveled at this newcomer’s playing with the likes of Dale Watson or John Paul Keith and wondered what his story could be. It’s a tale of the fascination a boy had with the music of the American South.

Hailing from the ancient port of Catania, on Sicily’s eastern shore, Monterosso recalls that “music was part of my family. My great aunt was a very important opera singer in Italy. And my sister was a classical pianist. My father used to write about the opera.”

Photographs by Billy Morris

Mario Monterosso, an Italian guitarist in Memphis

But for the young Monterosso, the muses of the Old World were no match for those of the New. “When I was 10, my sister had a rockabilly boyfriend. My father died in the same period, so this guy became a kind of role model. And the first time I went with them to a concert, I saw this guy named Vince Mannino. With this big quiff and sideburns, and a rockabilly drape. A real Teddy Boy. He was singing ‘Boogie Woogie Country Girl,’ and I said ‘Wow, what is this? I wanna learn to play!’ And little by little, I started.”

He found more enlightenment via cassettes. “My first tape ever was of a British radio show named Radio Memphis — a compilation of Sun records and rock-and-roll. So rockabilly was my first imprint. And that’s when I discovered Tav Falco. A friend gave me this tape, and I was like ‘Wow, what is this?’ The first time I saw Tav was in Catania, in 1989.” Throwing himself into guitar, he played in bands and expanded his musical horizons into jazz, blues, funk, and country. Yet by the time he was 30, Monterosso had never left Catania.

“I was a clerk at the court,” he recalls. “So I asked for a transfer to Rome, just to have a formal excuse for my family: ‘I’m moving to Rome because of my job.’ But the truth was that I wanted to do more in the music scene.” He made a name for himself as one of Rome’s go-to roots-rock guitarists, when the fates struck once more. “A friend sent me a message, ‘Would you like to work with an American guy? His name is Tav Falco.’ I said, ‘What? You mean Tav Falco and the Panther Burns?’ She said, ‘Yes. He wants to record an album in Rome and then tour around Europe.’ I said yes immediately.”

Falco sent him a message: “Hey, I’m not a rockabilly or rock-and-roll or blues cover band. I’m something else.” Finding that “something else” to his liking, Monterosso embarked on the European tour, and then a U.S. jaunt. It was a game-changer.

“After the tour, when I came back to Rome, I said, ‘I can’t do this anymore.’ That’s when I dedicated my life to music.” And to Memphis.

“During the tour, when I arrived in Memphis, I said, ‘I would love to live here.’ I saw New York … I saw Chicago. Very important cities, very cool. But people are always running. Here, there’s still something between people. And when I find myself at Sun Records or Sam Phillips, recording albums, it’s something special. It’s like if you love art and you find yourself in Florence or Rome, working at the Colosseum or the Cappella Sistina. Wow.”

He pauses a moment, then adds, “And it’s pretty cheap, too.”

Categories
Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Memphis is Funny, 2018: The Year in Parody

It’s been a great year for Fly on the Wall’s fake news team Davis Christopher and Peripheral Gibson. Together our parodists covered everything from Senator-elect Marsha Blackburn’s hair being identified as a brain-eating alien parasite, to riverfront development. Here are the top 5 Fly on the Wall parodies of 2018, in no particular order.

1.Tom Lee Park Redesign ‘Totally Unrelated To Atlantis’ New Riverfront Chief Says
POSTED BY PERIPHERAL GIBSON
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. *CLICK TO CONTINUE READING*


2. Men at War
Old Friends Won’t Let Women Bring Them Down
POSTED BY DAVIS CHRISTOPHER

Gunner Armstrong shakes his head, and digs into his backpack to retrieve a freshly purchased bottle of pepper spray. “I don’t know how effective this stuff is,” he mumbles, pulling on his reading glasses and skimming the directions. “I had a friend in college who would get a couple of beers in him and squirt it in his mouth like it was breath freshener.”

Like many manly men today, Armstrong lives in abject terror. “You never can be too careful with women being what they are,” he says, expressing an increasingly common, and deeply masculine sentiment. At least twice a week Armstrong says he finds himself walking a block or more past his house, keys clenched firmly in his fist like claws, because he’s convinced a woman is following him home, possibly to accuse him of harassment. “At some point I’ll find a nice bright street light and stop there to pretend like I’m taking a phone call or something. I’ll just let them walk on past, you know?” Armstrong says. “It’s probably all in my imagination. But like dad always said: better safe than hungover and accused of some bullshit you totally don’t remember doing.” CLICK TO CONTINUE READING.

3. Great Works of Literature as Written by the Shelby Co. Election Commission
With Help from The Memphis City Council
POSTED BY DAVIS CHRISTOPHER

Emboldened by national attention resulting from the careful and creative wording of current ballot amendments, the Shelby County Election Commission has committed considerable time and evident talent to improving the greatest works of world literature. While Fly on the Wall has yet to see a completed text, 5 first line samples were leaked this morning, revealing the epic scope of the Commission’s City Council-aided writing project.

Moby- Dick
Herman Melville with the Shelby Co. Election Commission

“Shall Ishmael serve as a common spoken or chirographic signifier not expressly for greeting, but sometimes for gaining the narrator’s attention?” CLICK TO CONTINUE READING


4. Consultants Plan Monument To Consultants On Memphis Riverfront
POSTED BY PERIPHERAL GIBSON

Claiming they have “bridged the gap between perception and reality,” a group of consultants has proposed Consultants’ Park, which will be dedicated to the many consultants hired to determine what Memphis should do with its riverfront.

“Since 1924, the city of Memphis has been trying to figure out what to do with this unique space, which overlooks one of the largest, brownest bodies of water in the world, and also Arkansas,” says the Preamble to the Executive Summary of the 2,667-page report issued by the Memphis Riverfront Consultants’ Coalition (MRCC). “Like the hundreds of consultants who came before us, we puzzled about how to polish Mud Island into a Mud Diamond. Then, three days into our recent ayahuasca trance charette, it suddenly hit us. What is more dependable and integral to the Memphis Riverfront experience than the Big Muddy? For the last century, the answer has been, consultants. That’s why we are executing Consultants’ Park, a reminder to all Memphis and the world that consultants matter, and that they must be paid.” CLICK TO CONTINUE READING

5. Citizens Organize to Protect Neighborhood Bar With Wall, Moat
POSTED BY DAVIS CHRISTOPHER
Community organizer Bing Hampton knows his audience. “Big Development’s not gonna get their grubby paws on Alex’s Tavern,” he shouts into his trusty bullhorn. There’s no reason to believe developers of any size are looking to acquire the Jackson Avenue institution, but that did not allay the concerns of roughly two-dozen Midtowners who waved signs with all-cap messages like “THE DIVE MUST SURVIVE,” and answered back, “Hell no.” CLICK TO CONTINUE READING

Categories
Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

MLK50 Tapped to Join ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network

Wendi Thomas

A rare bit of good news for Memphis-area media consumers, especially those with a taste for investigative work.

ProPublica, the Pulitzer-winning digital newsroom focused on investigative journalism in the public interest, has selected Wendi Thomas and her MLK50 Justice Through Journalism project, to participate in year two of ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network. Thomas describes the announcement as a, “vote of confidence in the importance of this work.”

ProPublica’s Local News Network supports regional and local investigative journalism and MLK50 is one of 14 selected organizations.

From the ProPublica announcement:


“Through the program, participating reporters collaborate with ProPublica senior editors Charles Ornstein and Marilyn W. Thompson as they embark on investigative journalism within their communities. Two of the projects, based in Illinois, also will work with the staff of ProPublica Illinois. ProPublica reimburses one year’s salary and benefits for each of the participating reporters and also supports projects with its expertise in data, research and engagement elements of the work… Topics will include racial segregation, correctional facilities, emergency response, environmental regulation, profiteering and higher education.” 

MLK50 is taking part in the general, local reporting category.

“While the past year has seen yet more cutbacks at local news organizations, the ProPublica Local Reporting Network has been a bright spot nationally,”  Ornstein said, in a written statement. “We couldn’t be happier with the accountability journalism produced by our inaugural class and are excited to pursue another year of investigative projects with moral force.”

ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom and nearly 11 years old. It has been honored with four Pulitzer Prizes, three Peabody Awards, two Emmy Awards, and five George Polk Awards.

For more details about the partnership you can read MLK50’s announcement here. 

Categories
Fly On The Wall Blog Opinion

Consultants Plan Monument To Consultants On Memphis Riverfront

Sign greeting visitors to Consultants Park.

Claiming they have “bridged the gap between perception and reality,” a group of consultants has proposed Consultants’ Park, which will be dedicated to the many consultants hired to determine what Memphis should do with its riverfront.

“Since 1924, the city of Memphis has been trying to figure out what to do with this unique space, which overlooks one of the largest, brownest bodies of water in the world, and also Arkansas,” says the Preamble to the Executive Summary of the 2,667-page report issued by the Memphis Riverfront Consultants’ Coalition (MRCC). “Like the hundreds of consultants who came before us, we puzzled about how to polish Mud Island into a Mud Diamond. Then, three days into our recent ayahuasca trance charette, it suddenly hit us. What is more dependable and integral to the Memphis Riverfront experience than the Big Muddy? For the last century, the answer has been, consultants. That’s why we are executing Consultants’ Park, a reminder to all Memphis and the world that consultants matter, and that they must be paid.”
[pullquote-1] “That’s ‘Consultants’, plural,” says the first of the document’s 1,300 footnotes. “Because consultants love company.”

According to the design documents, Consultants’ Park will stretch the entire 2,348 mile length of the eastern bank of the Mississippi. It will include a specially designed “Consultants’ Safe Space Play Area”, where businesses can bring their consultants to frolic in the fresh, humid river air and socialize with other consultants. There will also be a Consultant’s Corner, where citizens can interact with and ask questions of a real live consultant, and then pay them directly in cash for their advice. “We see this as a way to get people off the streets and into cushy consulting gigs,” says the MRCC.

The centerpiece of the park will be a 1,923-foot tall statue of a consultant riding triumphant on a rearing steed. “It’s 1,923 feet tall, because 1923 was the year our consultant forefathers first discovered the Mississippi riverfront,” says the MRCC.
As for the rest of the 2,000+ mile park, the MRCC says “We’ll get food trucks or something.” 

Signage directing visitors to Consultants Park

The project is estimated to cost $1.2 billion. The MRCC points out that only $1 billion of the budget is allotted to consultant’s fees. “It’s a bargain for the taxpayers!”
As of press time, no city officials were available for comment.
————————————————————————————————————————————————
Yes, this is a PARODY. Didn’t you see the black and yellow tab at the top.

Categories
Beyond the Arc Sports

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117

CREDIT: Larry Kuzniewski

Larry Kuzniewski

Everybody poops. Just ask my 8-month-old daughter. Or the Grizzlies when they shat the bed in a 111-83 loss at the Pacers to start the season. It’s a part of life. Poop is smelly and gross, but it can also be funny and heartwarming. Need proof?

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117

As far as Grizzlies gamebreak entertainment goes, this one is immediately in my top ten. The premise is perfect for Conley and Gasol, both fathers with young children. The video says so much about them, even though the two men barely utter a word. You see them as humans and fathers. You see their personalities. You see how they’re able to have a conversation without words.

Conley and Gasol scored 11 and 13 points, respectively, with heavy minutes in the season-opening blowout loss against the Indianapolis Pacers. The Grizzlies’ overall team offense looked flat and dysfunctional. Nobody could break down the Pacers’ defense. Grizzlies fans were quick to hit the panic button on Twitter, with some calling Gasol washed up.

That foul mood changed Friday night, when Conley and Gasol revived their high-level two-man play, proving they can still be the engine of a successful team. Conley sped all over the court, breaking down defenders off the dribble, swishing two threes, and setting up his teammates with 11 assists. Gasol didn’t appear to be limited by the back spasms he experienced earlier that morning, running the floor normally and whipping crisp passes to his teammates to the tune of 5 assists.
Larry Kuzniewski

Although they didn’t lead the way in scoring, Conley and Gasol’s two-man game set the table for the rest of the team. The Grizzlies would hope to see this pattern repeated throughout the regular season, as Conley and Gasol are aging veterans with lots of mileage, and they should conserve their energy and health as much as they’re able before the Grizzlies are (hopefully) wrestling for playoff seeding.
Larry Kuzniewski


In his first regular season game with the Grizzlies at FedExForum, Garrett Temple quickly caught fire, and that blaze raged for the rest of the night. He lit up the Grindhouse with 30 points on 10-11 shooting, and was nearly flawless from deep, hitting 5-6. He also defended and handled the ball well.

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117 (2)

Was he 100 percent happy with his performance? In the locker room after the game, Temple said “I was actually real upset at myself for giving up that three to Taurean Prince — the first three he got.” When asked about Temple in his postgame presser, Coach J.B. Bickerstaff was quick to laud his defense, saying that there will be some nights where Temple won’t hit as many shots, but he’ll lock down the opponent’s best player.

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117 (3)


Larry Kuzniewski

How did the Grizzlies’ top draft pick do in his first home game of his first NBA season? Let’s just say he’s doing a pretty good job at endearing himself to the fanbase.

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117 (4)

Triple-J poured in 24 points off the bench, shooting 8-12 and going 2-4 from deep. His length and quickness transformed the defense. His shooting and defensive impact come as no surprise. What does surprise me, however, is how good he looks in the post and attacking the paint. Consistently, he was able to use his size, strength, and athleticism to work his way into the paint and finished over defenders like 7’1″ Alex Len. His touch around the rim has been impressive.

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117 (5)

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117 (7)

Chandler Parsons got the start over Kyle Anderson, but played fewer minutes than Anderson. Parsons shot 3-6 from deep and contributed 11 points in the game. One sequence stood out to me in particular: Conley beep-beeped through the defense and jumped beneath the rim, and slung a pass to Gasol at the top of the arc. Gasol immediately swung the ball to a wide-open Parsons for a made triple. It was a rare glimpse at the power of what the three highest-paid Grizzlies can do to a defense when they’re healthy and in sync.

I wrote about this in-depth for the Flyer‘s cover story this week, but the Grizzlies basically haven’t seen and don’t know the capabilities of a healthy version of this team. I’m betting that those unknowns play out as unexpected positives. Did you know that the Grizzlies set a franchise record last night by scoring 77 points in the first half?

Larry Kuzniewski

The one down note from the home-opening win was JaMychal Green’s injury. He broke his jaw colliding with a player’s elbow while contesting a fast break dunk attempt. He hit the ground, pounded the court with his hand, hopped up, and ran straight to the locker room. He underwent a “surgical stabilization procedure” this morning.

J.B. Bickerstaff said the injury shows how selfless Green is — that he was the only one contesting a difficult play. And how tough do you have to be to leap up off the floor and jog to the locker room with a broken jaw?

Dillon Brooks saw limited minutes, logging just two in the first half, but got more run in the second. Even though he was (conspicuously, for Grizzlies fans) on the bench for most of the first half, Brooks was highly engaged, celebrating when Shelvin Mack hit a buzzer-beating floater, and jumping up and cheering harder than anyone else when Jackson slammed home a lob.

Andrew Harrison didn’t play at all in the home opener. And unlike Brooks, he seems disengaged, seclusive, and dissatisfied sitting on the bench. I don’t know how much to read into that, though, since their personalities are so different and perhaps that’s just how Harrison is in general. In any case, people forget how good Andrew Harrison was at the end of last season, and he’s by far the best defender among Grizzlies point guards. I hope Memphis manages to work him into the rotation again, because he brings a lot to the table when he’s playing well.

The Grizzlies de-escalated an anxious fanbase on Friday. They’ll look to build some momentum when they take on one of the West’s scariest teams, the Utah Jazz, on Monday on the road.

Burn of the night:

Grizzlies Maul Hawks 131 – 117 (6)