Tag: Southern Avenue

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Blake Rhea’s Final Encore at Railgarten

Blake Rhea (Photo: Bob Bayne)

A week later, and the Memphis music community is still reeling from the cold-blooded murder of bassist Blake Rhea. As Bob Mehr reported in the Commercial Appeal last Thursday, the musician was at Louis Connelly’s Bar for Fun Times & Friendship on South Cleveland Street in the early morning hours of Wednesday, November 6th, when he was involved in an argument with another man. That led to the two stepping outside, where security cameras recorded the other man first possibly stabbing, then shooting Rhea point blank in his car before running off. Rhea was pronounced dead on the scene. Later that day, police “arrested and charged 51-year-old Edward Wurl with first degree murder in the shooting.” Wurl was also charged with being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm.

Fox 13 News later reported that two witnesses in the bar claimed that “Wurl and Rhea had both been recently involved in a romantic relationship with the same woman. The witnesses then positively identified Wurl from a six person photo lineup.” WREG News Channel 3 reported that “court records show that Wurl was convicted of burglary and unlawful wounding in 1994.” WREG then quoted bar owner Louis Connolly as saying, “Stories like this are so common that we have become almost numb to them. We are thankful that the violence did not come into the bar. But that doesn’t make this any less heartbreaking, and our thoughts go out to the victim and the victim’s family.”

Since that fateful night, those who knew Blake best having been struggling to pick up the pieces, recalling his easygoing humor, his skill and sensitivity as a musician, and his role as a much-loved teacher at School of Rock Germantown. Having played in such pivotal bands as CYC, American Fiction, John Németh, Lord T & Eloise, The Gamble Brothers Band, Marcella Simien, and, most recently, Southern Avenue, his brilliance had been celebrated for years by fans and fellow musos alike.

Just how many lives Rhea touched will be apparent on Saturday, November 16th, from 4-8 p.m., when Railgarten will host “Blake Rhea’s Encore,” a celebration of his life, featuring performances by bands who were especially close to him, including Jombi, American Fiction, Salo Pallini, and (possibly) “Tierinii, Tikyra, and Ori from Southern Avenue.”

Speaking to the Flyer this Thursday, Southern Avenue’s drummer, Tikyra Jackson, was still trying to get past a feeling of unreality, having toured extensively with Rhea over the past year. “I’m still just taking it in,” she confided. “We spent all year together. It’s so weird, knowing that we’re gonna get back into the vehicle and it won’t be the same vibe.

“He had already toured a lot [in the past], and so he kind of was, like, staying home. He was a teacher. But he came back out on the road for us, because he liked us and he enjoyed what we were doing. So over this past year we were able to create something together. I was able to be a part of his life.”

Asked if there was a special bond, as there so often is, between the drummer and the bassist, Jackson replies, “Yeah. And it’s all on camera too. I have my camera set up by my drum. So when I’m watching this footage, it’s like, you can see that connection between us. And for this latest record that we’ve made, he recorded on half the record. Luther [Dickinson] was on bass on the other half. So yeah, Blake was a great part of what we played. We played the new record before we even went into the studio. We had some shows before the studio session, just to go into the studio more comfortable. So he was a part of the early process of getting from the stage of the writing to actually making it happen, making it happen live.”

In the studio, Jackson notes, Rhea’s contributions were memorable. “He was open to trying different things,” she said, noting that “his touch, his flavors in the music” were memorable. “One of the songs, ‘So Much Love,’ is very iconic to me because of the bassline that he came up with.”

Recalling all this, it was hard for Jackson to go on. “I don’t know, man, even talking to you now, I’m like, I feel like I’m experiencing new emotions and new realizations. But what a beautiful thing to capture his soul on the record, you know. And it’s not like it was 30 years ago. This was him living and breathing just yesterday, you know?”

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We Recommend We Saw You

WE SAW YOU: RiverBeat Music Festival

Jackson Hendrix, Gabrielle Duffie, Nakita Spencer, Lawrence Matthews

You could call them “RiverBeatniks.” They were the more than 30,000 people who attended the inaugural RiverBeat Music Festival May 3rd, 4th, and 5th in Tom Lee Park.

Matthew Burdine and Daniel Bonds 
Russ Thompson and Katherine Terry
Emily and Will Carter

They braved periodic raindrops and often warm temps to see and hear performers, including Stax great Carla Thomas, Al Kapone, the Wilkins Sisters, Southern Avenue, Killer Mike, and Lawrence Matthews. All some music lovers needed was a blanket and a comfortable spot to kick off their shoes and experience 50 performers on five stages.

“We scanned in over 30,000 over three days,” says RiverBeat producer Jeff Bransford. “Ten-thousand a night.”

Kristin Leach and Haggard Collins
Ariyanna Beecher and Miles Robinson

How did he think RiverBeat went? “Spectacular. We couldn’t be happier. The feedback we got from both patrons and artists has been overwhelming.”

And will RiverBeat return next year? “One-hundred percent,” Bransford says. No doubt about it. “We’re already planning.”

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Music Music Blog

Memphis Music on Main: A Mini-Festival Blossoms Downtown

The North Mississippi Allstars (Credit: Federico Sponza)

Music fans are still raving about Get Loud!, the weekly live music events that took many by surprise, yet proved to be one of this summer’s most memorable concert series. As it turns out, it was but one feather in the cap of Downtown Memphis this year, and there’s still more coming. This Friday sees a full blown mini-festival going down, thanks to Memphis Tourism and the Downtown Memphis Commission.

Memphis Music On Main, a free live music event scheduled for Friday, October 29th, will bring some serious musical firepower, including the North Mississippi Allstars, Al Kapone, Southern Avenue, The PRVLG, and Dottie. Performances will take place on two outdoor stages at Main and G.E. Patterson near Central Station, and a second stage at Main and Beale Street near The Orpheum.  

If many of the city’s historic Downtown buildings once seemed destined for demolition, including the glorious Orpheum itself, the popular movement to preserve the area has now firmly taken root nearly half a century later. Indeed, the area is seen as key to the city’s identity.

“As the city’s definitive entertainment district, music fuels the vibe in Downtown Memphis. And live music often serves as an invitation to locals and visitors to come join us in downtown,” says Paul Young, president of the Downtown Memphis Commission (DMC). “Creating activity that contributes to a vibrant and active downtown is a core part of our mission at the DMC. Combining a Memphis Music Month event with Trolley Night is a great way to celebrate what makes Memphis and our downtown neighborhoods so special.”

This Trolley Night, a regular event sponsored by the South Main Neighborhood Association, and already a bit over the top with Halloween activities this month, will be one to remember with a stellar lineup of some of the city’s best musical artists. It’s a perfect note on which to end an October bursting with local music events.

“Memphis is music. The Memphis sound is what motivates people from across our country and around the world to visit our amazing city,” says Kevin Kane, president & CEO of Memphis Tourism. “On the heels of our Get Loud! live music series on Beale Street, our goal remains the same, celebrating Memphis music by highlighting our music attractions, vibrant live music scene, and artists that define the Memphis sound of today.”

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Music Music Features

Mempho Mingles Memphis Music with Megastars

Panic at the Garden — Widespread Panic headline Mempho Music Fest (Photo: Josh Timmermans | Noble Visions)

With Memphis in May having canceled the 2021 Beale Street Music Festival entirely, back in those uncertain days of spring, concertgoers are thanking their stars that the city has a fall alternative. This Friday, the Mempho Music Festival launches its fourth iteration with a lineup that, true to form, mixes local luminaries with national acts. This year, it will be more convenient than ever, setting up shop in the Memphis Botanic Garden rather than Shelby Farms.

Everyone is pinning their hopes on their favorites. One friend is focused on Austin’s Black Pumas, described by some as “Wu-Tang Clan meets James Brown”; another lights up at the thought of seeing Memphis native Julien Baker; still others are dead set on hearing the gritty, soulful stomp of Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats. Mempho is sure to have all tastes covered, though there are markedly fewer hip-hop acts than ever relative to previous years, when such artists as Anderson .Paak, Nas, or Wu-Tang Clan were featured.

Black Pumas (Photo: Courtesy Chris Duncan)

Still, the diversity is impressive, and audience members can seamlessly see every artist on the bill. In addition to the Garden’s permanent Radians Amphitheater, a second stage will be set up. As one act performs, the next can set up in the other space, ready to hit it soon after the previous act’s finale. And then there’s the Incendia Dome, sponsored by Whatever, complete with pyrotechnics and DJs playing to wireless headsets issued to everyone who steps inside. Onlookers peeking in will see only a throng of dancers gyrating in complete silence.

One thing is clear: With all due respect to co-headliners The Avett Brothers, the kings of this event are Widespread Panic, who cap off both the sold-out Friday and Saturday slates. Mike Smith, the festival’s head of production, who’s also worked for years as Widespread Panic’s production manager, says that’s not unusual, especially with everyone’s favorite jam band.

“They almost never do just one night in a location,” he says. “They always play at least two nights everywhere they go. Usually three. Widespread Panic realizes that they’re creating music destinations for people, making it easier for ticket buyers who might say, ‘Hey, let’s go to Chicago for the weekend, or Memphis.’”

Indeed, for Panic fans, the uniqueness of each performance makes multiple shows a real draw. “One of the things with Widespread Panic is, they never repeat a song night to night,” says Smith. “Their repertoire is so large that it may be three or four or five shows before you hear the same song repeated in a set list. And there are literally songs that they may not play for two or three years at a time. There are fans out there ‘chasing that song.’ They come to every show, just hoping that that’s the night their song is going to get played.”

The band’s devoted following also brings a different demographic to bear on this year’s Mempho Festival. As Smith points out, “The Widespread Panic crowd is a very mobile crowd. If you look at our ticket sales, we’ve got a lot of people coming in from Georgia and the Carolinas. And a lot from Colorado. I think Denver’s one of our top three markets that tickets are sold in right now. Typically for any festival, you get some travelers, but this year, because of this lineup, we’re getting a lot more people from out of town.”

That also helps bring a fresh audience to Memphis-based groups, always an important ingredient in the festival bearing the city’s name. “We always try to incorporate what we consider to be some of the local stars that we have to offer,” Smith notes. “Memphis has some of the best talent in the world playing in our backyard. That’s definitely one of the missions of Mempho, to introduce those talents to new people.”

Mempho Music Festival takes place October 1st-3rd at the Memphis Botanic Garden. Gates open at 3 p.m. Proof of vaccination or a negative Covid-19 test is required. Covid testing available on site. Visit memphofest.com for details.

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Music Music Features

Southern Avenue’s Be the Love You Want

Southern Avenue (Photo: Courtesy Big Hassle Media)

The title of Southern Avenue’s latest album, Be the Love You Want, debuting Friday, August 27th, on Renew Records/BMG, could hardly be more apt. Lately, the band embodies love on multiple levels, what with Tierinii and Ori Naftaly, the band’s singer and guitarist, respectively, celebrating their second year of marriage in October and a baby girl due in November.

But before any of that, there were other bonds between them. As Ori says, “I always loved Tierinii like a sister. It was so platonic from 2015 to 2018. Almost four years. But then we traveled the world together and experienced our lowest and highest moments together. I’ve never before had a girlfriend who was my best friend at first. So that’s a different experience. We got married in October of 2019 in Israel, with my family. So we’re a true family band. Her sister, my sister-in-law, is on the drums. And I have another sister-in-law, Ava, she’s 22, and she just joined us full-time as a background singer and percussionist.”

Putting a finer point on it, Ori emphasizes that Southern Avenue is a collective working unit. “It’s not a couple band, it’s a family band, so we’re not that mushy-mushy together when we’re working. It’s not about me and her; it’s about all of us.”

That “us,” according to Ori, is expressing itself more fully on the new album than ever before, thanks to the freedom afforded them by their label. “BMG heard the demos, and they were like, ‘Cool, make an album, here’s the money.’ ‘Who do you want to produce? Okay, cool. We love Steve Berlin.’ And I wanted to co-produce it, and they were like, ‘Cool.’ They didn’t hear anything up until the mastered tracks. We could have made a polka album!”

In having free rein and a sympatico producer with decades of know-how behind him, the band has crafted a statement of their diverse talents more compelling than any previous work, including their Grammy-nominated Keep On. “This is as us as we’ve ever been. We explored a lot of ideas that are in us musically, but we’d never had the opportunity to either write or record,” says Ori. “Some songs, like ‘Push Now’ and ‘Heathen Hearts,’ we wrote with Cody Dickinson less than a month after Keep On was released. There’s a special freedom right after releasing an album, knowing nobody’s going to ask you for another one for a while. A lot of the songs have these twists and chord progressions that are a bit more sophisticated, maybe jazzy, or maybe more of a fusion of blues/soul/gospel/R&B.”

For his part, Berlin simultaneously encouraged the band and pushed them out of their comfort zone. “I’m such a perfectionist, and he was more like, ‘Let’s make it dirty,’” Ori says. “I recorded a solo on ‘Push Now,’ and it was good. But Steve said, ‘No no, make it sound like crap. Make your guitar sound crazy. Turn all your pedals on!’ We were all respectful of the studio and always trying to be clean and tight, and he kind of broke that for us. He was like, ‘Make it sound like shit and record it!’ I learned a lot from him, like how to let go.”

Perhaps surprisingly, Berlin, a saxophonist, was not the main motivator for the dazzling horn parts all over the album. “Our first album was very primal,” Ori notes. “But with Keep On and this one, the horns were our decision. We’ve only ever used Marc Franklin and Art Edmaiston. Art arranges half, Marc arranges half, and they decide which ones. It helps freshen things up.

“Sometimes Steve didn’t think a song needed horns, but I insisted. We will always have horns on our albums, and hopefully always Marc and Art. They’re part of the band, even though they’re not touring with us. It’s not just having horns; it’s having them specifically because of the style and the feel they bring. It elevates the songs to a different place and grounds it in the Memphis mud. The melting pot. It’s like I turn up the heat of the melting pot by 200 degrees once I have these guys on it.”

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Music Music Blog

Blues Going Global: The International Blues Challenge Brings It All Home

CREDIT: Tom Davis

Tom Davis

Hector Anchondo, double-winner at this year’s International Blues Challenge

It’s been a heady time for Memphis and the blues lately. The city and the music are nearly synonymous, not only due to our storied past but for the ongoing love we collectively show the art form. Naturally, Memphis is home to The Blues Foundation, and aside from every spring’s Blues Music Awards (scheduled for May 7th), the nonprofit’s shining (and most music-filled) moment is the International Blues Challenge (IBC).

The importance — and global reach — of the IBC couldn’t have been underscored more with the Memphis-based Southern Avenue still riding high from their Grammy nomination. Although Gary Clark, Jr., ultimately won the title of Best Contemporary Blues Album, the nomination alone was yet another notch in the belt of a band whose story has gone hand in hand with the IBC.

Guitarist Ori Naftaly first came here from his native Israel for the IBC in 2013, and getting to the semi-finals that year was enough to convince him to stay. Two years later, he founded Southern Avenue, and by 2016 they’d made it to the IBC finals. It wasn’t long before they were signed to the newly revived Stax Records and were the toast of the town. The Grammy nomination for their second album, Keep On, only furthers that trajectory.

This past Saturday’s final competition and award cermony served as a capstone to IBC events sprinkled through the preceding week. At the Keeping the Blues Alive Awards ceremony, Peter Astrup, Rob Bowman, Janice Johnston, and Kathleen Lawton were recognized, as were the Cali Blues and Folk Festival in Colombia, the Jimiway Blues Festival in Poland, Hal & Mal’s Restaurant, the Jus’ Blues Music Foundation and the Kentuckiana Blues Society.

Other events included a screening of the classic documentary, Deep Blues: A Musical Pilgrimage to the Crossroads, a keynote panel on “Blues Women: Creators, Conductors, and Catalysts,” and the workshop, “Leading Your Own Career with Bobby Rush.” Additionally, the Blues Hall of Fame opened its new Women of the Blues exhibit along with hosting a Janiva Magness book signing and a panel discussion addressing “Music Across Borders.”
Tom Davis

HOROJO Trio

The cumulative event, of course, was the International Blues Challenge finals, which took place at the Orpheum Theatre. The HOROJO Trio, representing the Ottawa Blues Society, left Memphis with a first-place finish in the Band Division. JW Jones (the “Jo” in HOROJO) took home the Gibson Guitar Award for Best Band Guitarist. Hector Anchondo, from the Blues Society of Omaha, triumphed in the Solo/Duo Division as well as earning the Memphis Cigar Box Award as the Best Solo/Duo Guitarist.

Felix Slim picked up the Lee Oskar Harmonica Award for the Best Harmonica Player, while finishing second to Anchondo in the Solo/Duo category. Anchondo and Slim are both former finalists who now have won an IBC award.  Rick Nation

Felix Slim

This year’s winners also underscore the international aspect of the IBC. Slim, after becoming one of Spain’s leading blues men, spent several years living in Greece being influenced by its music before moving to New York City. And placing second to the Canada-based HOROJO Trio was the Jose Ramirez Band, which is led by Ramirez who was a major blues star in his native Costa Rica before relocating to America.

Meanwhile, Anchondo’s Latino background makes for a cross-cultural blues sound. While Latino contributions to the blues reach back to what Jelly Roll Morton called the “Spanish tinge” in pre-war New Orleans jazz, or old records like 1949’s “Muy Sabroso Blues” by Lalo Guerrero, Anchondo’s double-win was a strong affirmation of a cultural side of the blues that many sleep on. And, of course, it was a strong showing from Nebraska’s thriving blues scene. 

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The Music Issue

CREDIT: Frank Maddocks

Gary Clark Jr.: The Triumph of the Riff

“No other people in the land have as yet evolved a characteristic idiom that relects a more open, robust, and affirmative dispostion toward diversity and change. Nor is any other idiom more smoothly geared to open-minded improvisation. The blues tradition, a tradition of confrontation and improvisation … is indigenous to the United States along with the Yankee tradition and that of the backwoodsman.”

— Albert Murray, The Omni-Americans

We don’t want, we don’t want your kind

We think you’s a dog born

Fuck you, I’m America’s son

This is where I come from

This land is mine

This land is mine

— Gary Clark Jr., “This Land”

Blues may come and blues may go, but they color every facet of American culture in ways we hardly recognize. Ironically, it’s easy to lose sight of that in Memphis, where the blues in their most traditional forms rule the night, often viewed by experimentalists and punks as part and parcel of a mainstream culture they’re trying to escape. Here, and in other hubs like Chicago and Kansas City, where the blues is “a thing,” the celebration of the blues in their most distilled expression can obscure the fact that they color all of America’s identity, even the avant garde. For Albert Murray, the music is the ultimate expression of African Americans’ contribution to the national character. Black Americans, in his eyes, are the Omni-Americans, the template for all of us, due in part the blues’ celebration of diversity in the face of dislocation and disenfranchisement.

While hipper musicians are often disdainful of Murray’s traditionalist musical tastes, one can readily see his larger point. For the blues, built on the marriage of riff, rhythm, and rhyme, have informed every aspect of our popular culture. And as American pop culture has overtaken the world, so too have the principles of the blues. Which is only a more long-winded way of saying what the ever-insightful Jim Dickinson distilled into a catchphrase, glib but true: “World boogie is coming”™.

Frank Maddocks

Gary Clark Jr.

Perhaps no contemporary artist captures the ongoing power and relevance of the blues as well as Gary Clark Jr. Rising from the multicultural hotbed of Austin, he’s taken a deep understanding of actual blues riffs into new territory, freely cross-referencing hip-hop, funk, soul, and rock in his all-consuming appetite for innovation. Clark’s genius is to weave the diversity of our sound-bite universe seamlessly into a coherent vision, using the versatility of the blues.

He’ll be one of the headliners helping to close out the embarassment of riches that is the annual Beale Street Music Festival. With so much star power of such diversity converging here over three days, the real challenge will be choosing who to see at any given time. To keep the inspiration flowing, you might challenge yourself to find common threads between such eclectic talents as Cardi B, the Killers, BlocBoy JB, the Claypool Lennon Delirium, and others.

One such thread, I would argue, is the blues. It will be most obvious at the Coca-Cola Blues Tent, which will feature such masters as Bettye LaVette and William Bell, not to mention Memphis’ own Barbara Blue backed by the legendary Bernard Purdy on drums. Beyond that, you’ll find endless variations on riff, rhythm, and rhyme. And Clark’s Sunday appearance on the Bud Light Stage might just provide the perfect capstone to the weekend, tying it all together.

Clark isn’t working in a vacuum, of course. As trends have come and gone in American music, the blues, and its more cosmopolitan cousin, soul music, have been a constant and steadily growing presence. If the blues meta-template has subliminally steered nearly all American music (even in hip-hop, where the riffs are often samples of others’ riffs, radically recontextualized), music wearing the blues influence on its sleeve never went away. Our city’s International Blues Challenge and Blues Music Awards are only samples of a globally expanding interest in the genre. The North Mississippi Allstars have, for example, worked stages around the world for more than 20 years, pairing traditional blues with a thirst for other forms such as jam rock, folk, hip-hop and even EDM. They’re often to be seen at the Beale Street Music Festival, although this year we’ll have to wait until they open up the summer’s Orion Free Music Concert Series at Levitt Shell on May 31st.

They’re kindred spirits to Clark, both in the diversity of their influences and the way their fan-base cuts across traditional boundaries. If Luther and Cody Dickinson have always brought a little of their father’s punk energy to everything they do, so, too, does Gary Clark Jr. Though Jim Dickinson railed against modern day Beale Street as a “four-block theme park devoid of soul,” he never lost sight of the power of the blues to channel one’s rage against the status quo, most recently summed up by Clark: “Fuck you, I’m America’s son.”

It’s a sentiment for our times, a strident affirmation of belonging in the face of bigotry. In the song “This Land,” inspired by a real-life encounter with a white man who refused to believe Clark owned his own land, his literal ownership of property becomes the claim he stakes on this nation as a whole. And in Clark’s case, the statement is made in the context of the olive branch he holds out to stereotypically white forms. His heavier-than-molten-steel take on Lennon and McCartney’s “Come Together” is sure to please any Guns ‘n Roses fan, and elsewhere he carries the torch of Jimi Hendrix into this century with panache.

Turning on a dime, he can also evoke earthy pre-war blues with tunes like “The Governor.” Or deftly channel the sweet sounds of soul, evoking Curtis Mayfield or Prince with his expressive falsetto. It’s all part of this virtuoso’s take on nothing less than the whole of American music. As synthesizers mesh freely with bottleneck guitar, he’s refreshing our view of the past and charting a course for our future.

— Alex Greene

St. Paul & the Broken Bones: Working on a Process

When you talk about Southern values, family certainly ranks as a significant cornerstone. For Paul Janeway, lead singer of St. Paul & the Broken Bones, it was inspiration for the collection of songs that make up Young Sick Camellia, the third studio offering from the Alabama octet.

Not unlike the two albums that preceded it, 2014’s Half the City and the 2016 follow-up Sea of Noise, Camellia is a gritty batch of gut-bucket soul framed by on-point horn arrangements and driven by Janeway’s vocal phrasing that bounces between a biting falsetto and yearning croon. Janeway, who hails from the rural Alabama burg of Chelsea, started the project by decided he wanted to record a trio of EPs inspired by the relationship between his grandfather, dad, and himself.

McNair Evans

St. Paul & the Broken Bones

“I think when we got done with record two, I kind of knew where I wanted to go almost immediately. Once I’m done with a record, I want to know where I’m going next and it’s kind of what I did with this,” Janeway explained in a recent phone interview. “For me, initially, it was to make three EPs. It was going to be through my eyes, my father’s eyes, and my grandfather’s eyes. I had a desire to do it because they are complicated relationships, which I kind of think a lot of people can relate to. It doesn’t have to be a father, but family in general. For me, I wanted to kind of work through that. This is kind of part one and I just had this desire to do it through my kind of lens. It became a bigger project than I thought.”

When it came time to tackle this considerable undertaking, Janeway and his bass-playing collaborator, Jesse Phillips, were in the middle of trying to find a producer who would help facilitate their creative vision. Columbia Records CEO/chairman Ron Perry suggested the duo meet with Jack Splash, best known for working with hip-hop/R&B artists like Kendrick Lamar, Goodie Mob, and Alicia Keys. It didn’t take long to find plenty of common creative ground.

“On the musical end, it was one of those things where we worked with Jack Splash, a producer that was ‘out of our realm.’ That was musically important because it changed things for us. For him, he was just enthusiastic about the project. For us, it felt right and we just kind of led with our guts. If it feels right, then it probably is right on the creative and artistic side,” Janeway explained. “It was kind of like a blind date in a lot of ways, when you do these kinds of things. We had our publishing company and the record company tell us to talk to this guy to see if we liked him, and we really liked him and kind of hit it off almost initially. We said it was an open canvas, that we needed to figure out what to do. Working with him, he’s an overly positive guy. He extracts the best effort out of everybody, which is really what a producer should do.”

Having grown up as a preacher’s kid, Janeway brings the kind of performative fervor as equally to the studio as he does to the stage, not unlike musical forbearers/influences like Sam Cooke and Al Green did a generation before. Highlights include “Apollo,” a delectable mash-up of Hammond organ, funky synth squiggles and a dash of ambient psychedelia punctuated by lyrics like “Lookin’ down from my orbit/Captain, can you get her to call me?” Elsewhere, cuts like the stop-and-stutter “Convex” and the string-kissed “GotItBad” pump up the grooves in a way that anyone who’s ever been sucked in by the late Sharon Jones or Charles Bradley will immediately gravitate to and embrace. Equally entrancing is the dreamy soul of “Concave.”

Adding to the esoteric vibe infusing this collection of songs are snippets of dialogue from conversations Janeway recorded with his late grandfather that are interspersed throughout the album. Camellia closes with “Bruised Fruit,” a ballad that finds Janeway dialing down and delivering a performance that builds off the slightest bit of orchestration, mournful horn charts and sparse piano accompaniment that frames couplets like “You did nothing right/you did nothing wrong/But no one seems to recall the love that you gave/The love that you forsake.” It all comes off as equal parts substantial, dark, and life-affirming.

While Janeway and Phillips had been the main ones to steer St. Paul and the Broken Bones, the decision to rope the remaining members into the creative process for the current record proved to be a successful and rewarding one.

“I think our approach this time around was just kind of open and we went many different ways. There are songs on this record that the trombone player wrote. And some of the songs were written with me, Jack, and Jesse,” he said. “We had a drop box, and anyone who had any sort of musical idea could put it in and I could choose what I was feeling. ‘Apollo’ was written in the studio, with all eight of us in the room. Honestly, it was the best because we learned over time that there are many ways up a mountain. Obviously, if you’re afforded the time, that was what was really great about it. Honestly, this is the most prepared we’ve ever been for a record, and that’s a good feeling.”

Having spent a significant time performing live, including a memorable stint opening for the Rolling Stones, St. Paul & the Broken Bones are a road-tested bunch eager to expose fans to their latest evolutionary direction.

“[We’re going to do] mostly new stuff,” Janeway said. “We’re getting to the point where we’re singing some of these songs for six years and it starts wearing thin. You don’t want to mess up what got you to the dance obviously, but you want to change a little bit. I think every record, you should have a different show. Even what I wear is different. We recently did a test run and went to Texas and we were doing the new show. I think the energy of the crowd and audience has never been better, and that’s a good sign because you don’t know [how it’s going to be] until you do it.” — Dave Gil de Rubio

Southern Avenue: Threads of Blues and Soul

Of all the threads of blues and soul woven through this year’s Beale Street Music Festival, few have been more inspiring than Memphis’ own Southern Avenue. From the beginning, they’ve struck many as marking a watershed moment, not only for their youthful enthusiasm for older forms, but as a flagship act for the briefly revitalized Stax label. Since their first gig in September of 2015, they’ve gone from success to success, to the point where an appearance at Memphis in May’s musical extravaganza is the norm, not the exception.

While their early days were marked by a search for their true identity, the past year has seen the solidification of both the band’s sonic stamp and its personnel, now consisting of Tierinii Jackson (lead vocals) Ori Naftaly (guitar), Jeremy Powell (keyboards), Tikyra Jackson (drums, vocals), and Gage Markey (bass). I recently spoke with Naftaly, who also writes much of the band’s material, about the changes they’ve seen in the past two years and where he thinks it’s all headed.

David McClister

Southern Avenue

Memphis Flyer: It seems like Southern Avenue is touring a lot these days. What have been some of the highlights?

Ori Naftaly: In the past year or two, we’ve had so many amazing moments. With the North Mississippi Allstars, with JJ Grey, and the Revivalists. Galactic. Marcus King. For me, the Lockn’ Festival was definitely a huge moment, being able to play next to all of these people. There was a huge crowd, and then the other bands: Tedeschi Trucks Band, George Clinton and P-Funk, George Porter Jr. and Zigaboo Modeliste with the Foundation of Funk. So, playing the show itself, and then the green room experience. Shaking Bob Weir’s hand, talking to Tedeschi and Trucks. And Tierinii and me meeting John Mayer. That whole day was unique. And then we couldn’t stay. I hear four songs by the Dead and we had to leave for the next show. So we never felt like we really concluded the night, the day, the experience. We left with our jaws open. Lockn’ was huge, for sure, for all of us.

What’s on the horizon for you, as far as touring?

ON: Just a week ago, Tedeschi Trucks announced that we would support them on their tour in November. They were checking out a lot of bands, and we were really biting our nails until we found out that we were the ones. They take it very very seriously. I think what made it all happen was that Lockn’ show, where I got to talk to Derek for 20 minutes. A Tedeschi Trucks support tour is huge for us. I’ve been a fan since I was a kid. I’ve seen them all my life, and I’ve been playing since I was 5. Like us, Susan Tedeschi did the International Blues Challenge, years and years ago.

You’re about to release a new album, Keep On, on Concord. How has your sound evolved since the first record?

Fans have known many of the new songs for a while. Especially “Whiskey Love” and “Lucky.” Those two songs have been with us for a year now. We wrote on tour, we wrote in the van. We recorded songs on our days off. And we ended up not seeing our family like Tierinii’s kids and Jeremy’s daughter for two extra weeks. It was a lot of stress. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears went into this record.

With the first one, we were stirring the pot of what Southern Avenue is, and with this one we’re more grounded. It’s an evolution. I remember the first record: Half of it was recorded by me and Kevin [Houston] in a studio in East Memphis, with zero budget. It was done very independently — we’re talking about a very primal version of Southern Avenue. I couldn’t afford overdubs for solos. With the new record, we had time on a lot of them to plan and have a vision. “Keep On” is a song where we wanted to have this Isaac Hayes vibe. A retro soul sound. And then “Whiskey Love” is a perfect Southern Avenue kind of jam. Throughout the album, I wanted to bring in new elements, but I wanted them to be vintage, not new. So I brought a Mellotron [a tape-based proto-sampler from the 1960s] and used it on specific songs. And it’s not a plug in, it’s a real Mellotron being played. I think the Mellotron, mixed with the already heavy vocals and background vocals and horns, having all that together, it really gives this album a lot of air, a lot of breathing. You can hear a lot of space.

How was it working with William Bell on “We’ve Got the Music”?

That was so much fun. That dude is very in the know and very sharp. He still knows every corner in town. He’s very very hip. We had a great time writing together. I had a vision for the song, and he was really into it and kept taking the concept further and further, deeper and deeper into the essence of “we’re all the same, and what connects us is music.” And when everything brings you down and life is hard, it’s okay, you got the music. He loved it, and he was like, ‘Okay, let’s do this.’ I brought the bass line, and then Tikyra Jackson contributed a lot. It make us feel like we’re doing something right.

Working with him must have felt like a culmination of your being on Stax for the first album.

Being on Stax, we felt like we found a hole in the matrix, and we managed to squeeze in just in time. Because they’re not doing new releases any more that I know of. I don’t know why. Even more, we feel like we were really able to stretch the matrix and find a spot in their catalog. I think the first one is so Staxxy. That album was as Memphis as anything gets.

The new one will be on Concord. And that’s good. I’m happy about that. The Stax thing was amazing, but it was also limiting in the way it affected people’s perceptions and expectations. And we just wanna be a band. We will always be Stax, but even at Stax, the sound was always changing, you know? Now we can just be who we are. — Alex Greene

Southern Avenue is hosting a signing and album listening party at the Stax Museum of American Soul Music on Sunday, May 5, at 2:00 PM.

Categories
Cover Feature News

Memphis 2017: The Year to Come

Business and Development …

Memphis ought to be used to crazy, impossible blockbusters by now.

For example, it may be tough to remember that the Pyramid was once a dim, vacant, hopeless reminder of good times gone by instead of a game-changing outdoor retailer, hotel, restaurant, bowling alley, shooting range, and gator pit with the best view in town. Weird, right? Who saw that coming?

The coming year promises a ton of similar projects, the kind of projects that make you marvel that someone could imagine the thing in the first place — and that teams of people had the guts and determination (and money) to pull it off.

But taking something old and making it new again is just how we do. You can call it “adaptive re-use” if you want. We’re just going to call it the Memphis Way, something that sets us apart from, ahem, other cities of music.

Crosstown Concourse

This is without a doubt the blockbuster-est of 2017 blockbusters. Crosstown is a $200 million renovation project for 1.1 million square feet, about 17 football fields spread across 10 floors. The mammoth structure closed in 1993 and sat dormant, vacant, and hopeless for years, until energy formed around the project, beginning with the formation of the nonprofit Crosstown Arts in 2010. More money was raised, tenants were signed, and work crews have mobbed the place since 2014.

Crosstown will officially open on May 13th, with a day-long celebration of music, food, speeches, and all the rest. But residents of Parcels at Crosstown, the apartments inside the building, will begin moving in on January 2nd, according to Todd Richardson, project leader for the Crosstown Development project.

Crosstown Concourse

Business tenants, including Tech901, Memphis Teacher Residency, the Poplar Foundation, Pyramid Peak Foundation, and Church Health Center will start moving in next month, as well. Richardson expects all of the 31 business tenants, except Crosstown High and the American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities (ALSAC), to be moved in by May.

“We have a healthy panic about us, in terms of shifting from construction to operations,” Richardson said. “I always say once we finish construction we’re about 50 percent done.” The other 50 percent, Richardson said, is the “magic” of Crosstown, the people, the programming, and the activity of the place.

Expect construction inside the building to last at Crosstown for a full year and a half after the celebration — on tenant projects and the high school. Construction of the new, 425-seat performing arts theater will begin next month and continue through June of 2018.

Here’s a list of all the other tenants expected to move into Crosstown: A Step Ahead Foundation; Daniel Bird, DDS; the YMCA; Christian Brothers University; City Leadership; The Curb Market; Crosstown Arts; Crosstown Back and Pain Institute; FedEx Office; French Truck Coffee; G4S; Hope Credit Union; Juice Bar; Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare; Mama Gaia; Madison Pharmacy; nexAir; the Kitchen Next Door; So Nuts and Confections; St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital; Tanenbaum Dermatology Center; Teach for America; and Teacher Town.

Trader Joe’s

“Coming 2017” is all the Trader Joe’s website offers Memphians about its plans for a store here. However, a building permit was pulled this month for a $2.5 million renovation of the former Kroger store on Exeter in Germantown. The project has been on again and off again since officials announced the move here in 2015. So, Two-Buck-Chuck fans, keep your fingers crossed for news in 2017.

Poplar Commons

That old Sears building close to Laurelwood has been razed to make way for a new $15.5 million, 135,000 square-foot shopping center called Poplar Commons, to be anchored by Nordstrom Rack. Store officials said to expect Nordstorm Rack to be open by “fall of 2017.”
Ulta, the beauty products retailer, has also signed on as a tenant at Poplar Commons. Nordstrom officials said the center will include “national retailers, specialty retail, and several well-known restaurants.”

Wiseacre Brewing

Will they or won’t they? Wiseacre Brewing officials have until early 2017 to tell Memphis City Council members if they will convert the long-vacant Mid-South Coliseum into a brewery, tasting room, event space, and retail location.

The idea was floated to the council this summer by brewery co-founder Frank Smith. The council approved the lease terms for the Coliseum, and Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland lauded the deal.

But Wiseacre would have to bring the 104,000 square-foot building up to code. They’d also have to retrofit it for their uses. It all comes with a price tag of about $12 million, brewery officials said earlier this year.

ServiceMaster

Crews have been hard at work converting the former Peabody Place mall into a new headquarters for Memphis-based ServiceMaster, parent company of Terminix, American Home Shield, Merry Maids, and more. The company says about 1,200 employees will be moved to the new location by the end of 2017.

The transformation will bring light and life to a long-darkened corner of Peabody Place in downtown Memphis. The company, which reported $160 million in profits for 2015, received about $24 million in taxpayer-supported incentives.

South City

Demolition will begin on the Foote Homes housing complex sometime early next year, said Marcia Lewis, executive director of the Memphis Housing Authority. When it’s gone, the massive, $210-million South City project will revitalize the area, which is a stone’s throw from Beale Street and South Main.

Only 40 Foote Homes residents were still living in the complex in mid-December, Lewis said. Those residents all have housing vouchers, are looking for new housing, and will all have moved out by early 2017. Once it’s gone, there will be no more “projects” in Memphis.

Foote Homes will be replaced with an apartment complex, to be filled with tenants of mixed incomes. The apartment campus will have green space, retail, and on-site education centers. Developers and government officials hope the new apartment will spur further economic growth in the area.

Lewis said no solid timeline for construction exists, since some federal government approvals are still being sought.

Tennessee Brewery

Work continues at the former Tennessee Brewery site, and the project’s developers say the brewery — slated to become an “urban apartment home community” — will be “re-established in 2017.”

Tennessee Brewery

Construction crews have spruced up the old brewery, completed the parking garage across the street, and have raised the bones for the two other new apartment buildings that will complete the project.

The brewery building was saved from the wrecking ball in 2014, when developers bought it for $825,000. The planned mixed-use development will cost about $28 million.

Central Station

The 100-year-old train station at Main and G.E. Patterson is getting a major, $55-million makeover, and parts of that project will become visible in the new year. Construction of the new Malco movie theater on G.E. Patterson will begin in January as will the major improvements at the Memphis Farmers Market, including the construction of a more-permanent market plaza area that will front Front.

Work is in full swing on the new South Line apartment buildings on Front, which are expected to be completed in February. Design work has begun on the concourse area around Central Station, which will connect trolleys, buses, bike riders, and pedestrians with Central Station from Main Street, the South End, and Big River Crossing. Dirt should move on these projects in the next few months.

ALSAC/St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital & the Pinch District

No formal plans have been revealed for the St. Jude/ALSAC hospital campus or the long-dormant Pinch District. But one thing is clear, the plans are really big.

ALSAC/St. Jude officials say they are investing between $7 billion and $9 billion to expand the organizations’ facilities and operations. Leaders there say the newly expanded ALSAC/St. Jude will bring an annual $3.5 billion economic impact to the city.

The expansion is expected to bring about 1,000 new jobs, more beds for more patients, and officials hope to double the amount of patients in the hospital’s clinical trials.

The Pinch got $12 million in state funds this year. City leaders have promised to invest $25 million in the area with funds from the already-approved Tourist Development Zone. Again, no final plans for these infrastructure investments have been made public. City leaders wrapped up a series of public meetings on Pinch development last month.

Also Upcoming for 2017

The Hampline should break ground on a project to connect Broad and Tillman.

New plans for the skyline-changing One Beale project are expected to be revealed to city leaders.

Plans for upgrades at the Cook Convention Center should come into focus.

Work on a new luxury boutique hotel called Teller (with a rooftop bar called Errors and Omissions) on Madison should be finished.

Construction should begin on a new Hilton Garden Inn Downtown at the former Greyhound bus station site on Union.

The fully-restored Memphis Grand Carousel is expected to open at the Children’s Museum of Memphis.

The Memphis Bike Share program will launch with a networked system of 60 stations throughout Memphis — and about 600 bikes. — Toby Sells

Theater and Dance …

Prediction #1: You will see a lot more dance in 2017, even if you never go to the theater. All you have to do is go to the Overton Square area.

For years, Ballet Memphis has been hidden away on Trinity Road in Cordova where “street life” is limited to cars zipping by. “Transparency” was the word most frequently used by architect Todd Walker on a late November media tour of the construction site for Ballet Memphis’ new Midtown home on Overton Square, one of the city’s most heavily pedestrian areas. The 38,000 square-foot building will literally bring dance to the corner of Madison and Cooper.

Ballet Memphis

The Ballet’s new, glass-walled home has five studios, all linked together by a series of courtyards. It will house business offices, conference rooms, a physical therapy room, and an egg-shaped cafe. Dancers rehearsing in Studio A will be visible from the street.

There’s also limited retractable seating in Studio A, and an observation area. This brings the number of available stages in Memphis’ growing theater district to six. Eight if you include the Overton Square amphitheater and Circuit Playhouse’s cabaret space. Ballet Memphis has a long history of scheduling public rehearsals in places where they are accessible to pedestrians. This takes that idea a little further.

Prediction #2: You’ll see a lot more of everything else. Memphis’ performing arts community has been experiencing a growth spurt, and that trend promises to continue. The Hattiloo Theatre, which moved to its Overton Square facility in 2014, will complete its first expansion in 2017, creating additional rehearsal and office space. A little further to the west, Crosstown Arts will begin construction on a new, versatile 450-seat theater in the Crosstown Concourse community.

Byhalia, Mississippi, which co-premiered in Memphis last year, went on to become one of the best reviewed and most talked about new American plays of 2016. Memphis continues to cultivate its reputation as a fertile environment for new work with Playhouse on the Square’s January 6th world premiere of Other People’s Happiness, a family drama by Adam Seidel. Haint, a spooky rural noir by Memphis playwright Justin Asher gets its second production at Germantown Community Theatre starting January 27th.

Although she will continue to direct, Memphis’ Irene Crist will retire from the stage in June, following her performance in David Lindsay-Abaire’s comedy, Ripcord. — Chris Davis

Politics …

The year 2017 will be an off year as far as elections go, and the politics that really counts may happen in our state capital. The venerable (if indelicate) political adage that “money talks and bullshit walks” may come in for an overhaul in Nashville in 2017. The second term in that expression may, in fact, be on as firm a footing as the first.

For the second year in a row, the State Funding Board in Nashville is projecting a sizable budget windfall — stemming from an increase of almost $900 million in revenue growth for 2017-18. And for the second year in a row, the forecast of extra money is actually complicating, rather than facilitating, some overdue state projects — the most vulnerable of these being overdue infrastructure work on increasingly inadequate and dilapidated state roadways. 

Governor Bill Haslam, who, with state transportation director John Schroer, went on a fruitless statewide tour in 2015 trying to drum up support for a state gasoline-tax increase, is almost certain to raise the idea of upping the gas tax when the General Assembly reconvenes in January. 

But the projected revenue windfall may actually undercut his hopes. Not only does all the windfall talk create a difficult atmosphere to talk about new taxes. There are also indications that the governor’s Republican party-mates in the GOP legislative super-majority see the dawning surplus as an excuse to dream up new tax cuts and eliminate existing ones — a double whammy that would sop up such financial gain as actually materializes.  

Democratic legislators (five in the 33-member state Senate and 25 in the 99-strong state House of Representatives) are too few in number to do much about the matter, and even some members of the Republican majority are troubled. State Representative Ron Lollar (R-Bartlett) touched on the problem at a recent forum of the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB) in Memphis, when he lamented that the ongoing elimination of the state’s Hall tax on interest and dividends — slated for staged reductions and final abolition over a five-year period — will mean the ultimate loss to financially struggling local governments of the fairly significant portion of the Hall tax proceeds that they are accustomed to getting annually.

At that same NFIB meeting, state Senator Lee Harris of Memphis, leader of the Democratic minority in his chamber, pointed out another fiscally related conundrum that he thinks has escaped the consciousness of the GOP super-majority. 

In their categorical rejection of Haslam’s “Insure Tennessee” proposal to permit state acceptance of federal funding of as much as $1.5 billion annually for Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), Republican leaders like retiring state Lieutenant Governor Ron Ramsey always said their attitudes would likely be different under a Republican president, who would surely reapportion such funds as block grants for the states to dispose as they saw fit. 

Harris maintains that the new block grants would be converted from the previous A.C.A. outlays and could be extended only to those states that had already opted for the federal funding. The truth could be even harsher; with congressional Republicans and President-elect Donald Trump both having sworn to “repeal and replace Obamacare” as a first order of business in 2017, it is uncertain just how much federal bounty — if any at all — would actually be available for the states, in whatever form.

Money is at the root of another pressing issue sure to be vented in the General Assembly. At the very moment that the state’s short-changed urban school districts, including the Shelby County Schools system, are entertaining a variety of legal actions to force the state to honor full-funding commitments to them under the Basic Education Program (BEP), word is that enough steam may have finally gathered among legislators to allow passage of long-deferred school voucher legislation that would re-route a significant proportion of the state education budget toward private institutions and out of public schools altogether. 

Under the circumstances, even a rumored bipartisan willingness among legislators to at least begin the consideration of medical-marijuana legislation may not be enough to ease such doldrums as continue to afflict the state’s population. — Jackson Baker

Food and Dining …

Old Dominick

For those keeping your eye on the Old Dominick Distillery, Alex Canale tells us, “We’re 100 percent, well, 99 percent, sure we’ll be open by late spring. We’ll definitely be open in 2017.”

Old Dominick

Old Dominick will sell bourbon, a nod to forebear Dominico Canale. There will be a tasting room, and the distillery will be open for tours. Construction is currently wrapping up, and all licenses have been secured. Shipments of grain and malt are currently on the way. Bourbon takes a few years to age, so Old Dominick will be selling vodka at first. They hope to have stock ready to sell by the spring.

Sunrise

The breakfast concept by Sweet Grass’ Ryan Trimm and Central BBQ’s Craig Blondis and Roger Sapp now has a name: Sunrise. They hope to have both places — one on Central, one on Jefferson — up and running by January or February. The Central location will serve breakfast from 5 to 11 a.m. and then switch to a Central BBQ to-go. The Jefferson location will open at 5 a.m. as well and will serve lunch.

Trimm says the coffee program they’ve come up with is particularly impressive. Cold-pressed and nitro will be on the menu, as well as “normal hot coffee.”

“The biscuit sandwiches will be more interesting than your typical sausage and egg biscuit,” says Trimm. Think bologna and house-cured meats and house-made sausage.

The lunch at Jefferson will offer hometown cooking and large sandwiches piled high with house-cured meats. The meats will also be available for purchase.

Crosstown Concourse

The Crosstown Concourse will be one of the biggest food stories of the upcoming year. The revitalized Sears building already has a stellar list of food and drink venues: I Love Juice Bar, Next Door, Mama Gaia, French Truck Coffee, Curb Market, Crosstown Cafe, and Crosstown Brewing Company.

“Our vision was to curate a really great mix of offerings to add to the food scene,” says Crosstown’s Todd Richardson. Richardson says that about 65 percent of the retail space has been rented. He’s in talks with what he calls a “really great ice cream concept” and a pizzeria.

With all that plus a bank and barber and apartments, it seems like there would never be a reason to leave the Concourse. Richardson says that’s not the goal at all. “We’re not trying to create a city within a city. We want something that draws interest and has the greatest impact on the neighborhood.”

South Main Market

Shooting for a summer opening is the South Main Market. Rebecca Dyer has been busy converting the building at 409 S. Main into an event venue. Once she has the third floor ready, she’ll then re-renovate the first floor into the market. (“If I survive,” she says.)

The market will feature 12 to 15 kitchens. Think Boston’s Faneuil Hall. Dyer says she’s already got 11 chefs signed on, all local. “It’s going to be very varied,” says Dyer. That means each kitchen will serve a distinct cuisine — no three cupcake spots or duplicate falafel shops.

“We don’t want our chefs to compete with each other,” Dyer says. “We want to give our customers the best opportunity for dining.”
The Liquor Store
Lisa Toro, who owns City & State with her husband Luis, estimates that 50 percent of the businesses on Broad Avenue are owned by women. In that ladies-doing-for-themselves can-do spirit, Toro helped form an all-woman angel investment group. Their first investment is the Toros’ latest project The Liquor Store.

Toro describes it as a modern take on a diner. There will be blue-plate specials but with cured meats and fresh vegetables. There will be a bar as well, offering boozy milkshakes and soda fountain cocktails. The diner is being carved out of an old liquor store space. Floors are being ripped up, electrical and plumbing added.

The Toros hope to be open by early spring. — Susan Ellis

Film …

It’s safe to say that 2016 was a less than stellar year in the world of film. Will 2017 be better? Early signs point to probably not. The slate of announced films for the year so far is more of the same: Franchises, sequels, reboots nobody but a branding specialist could possibly want, and superheroes, superheroes, superheroes.

In January, a few 2016 films currently in limited release will make it to Memphis, such as Hidden Figures, starring Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monáe as unsung black women engineers and mathematicians who helped America land on the moon, and A Monster Calls, a modern Irish fairy tale about loss and grieving. Then there’s Monster Trucks, a big-budget film so bad Paramount took a preemptive $100 million write-down on their earnings report. I have to see it, but there’s no reason you should.

In February, the pop S&M sequel Fifty Shades Darker is sure to both light up the box office and contribute to this reviewer’s depression. Hopefully The Lego Batman Movie will cheer me up. If that doesn’t work, there’s the Oxford Film Festival, which just announced a stellar lineup, and Indie Memphis’ new Indie Wednesday series, which will bring in quality arthouse and indie films from all over the world to Studio on the Square, Malco Ridgeway, and Crosstown Arts.

March brings Logan, Hugh Jackman’s final turn as X-Man Wolverine; Kong: Skull Island, a King Kong spinoff with an all-star cast; and the controversially Scarlett Johansen-led anime adaptation Ghost in the Shell. In May, the Marvel drought ends with Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, which will be answered in June by DC’s Wonder Woman movie. Pixar’s weakest series, Cars, gets a third installment before Marvel fires back with Spider-Man: Homecoming, which looks promising in previews. Later that month, I’m looking forward to War for the Planet of the Apes, which concludes the underrated Planet of the Apes reboot trilogy, and the Stephen King epic The Dark Tower.

All I know about August’s Baby Driver is that Edgar Wright of Scott Pilgrim fame is directing, but that’s enough to get me excited. September looks bleak except for the unexpected remake of the ’90s cult film, Flatliners, and the only oasis in the wasteland of October is Denis Villeneuve directing Harrison Ford in Blade Runner 2049.

November will kick off with the Indie Memphis Film Festival, before Marvel and DC go at it again with Thor: Ragnarok and Justice League. The holidays will bring the as yet untitled Star Wars: Episode VIII, directed by Breaking Bad badass Rian Johnson, and Mark Wahlberg going bionic in The Six Billion Dollar Man.

Basically, the year in film will be like everything else in 2017: Hope for the best, cherish the bright spots, but expect the worst. — Chris McCoy

Music …

As productive as this year was for Memphis music, you can expect 2017 to be just as fruitful for the local scene. From where to be to who to watch, here are some early tips for following Memphis music in 2017.

What to Buy and Why:

Valerie June will be releasing her new album, The Order of Time, on January 27th, her third full-length and first for Concord Music Group. June recently toured with Sturgill Simpson and Norah Jones, but she’ll come back home for a show at the Hi-Tone on Friday, February 17th. As for her new album, the song “Astral Plane” is already being heralded by NPR, which is a good indication that the three years that have passed since Valerie June released an album weren’t in vain. Expect big things in 2017 from one of our city’s most intriguing songwriters.

Another band with a considerable amount of hype behind them that’s releasing a record in 2017 is Aquarian Blood. The band’s debut effort will be released through Goner and is expected to be out in February. Aquarian Blood has released singles on Goner and New Orleans label Pelican Pow Wow, but their first LP has been months in the making, and should showcase the Midtown supergroup and musical freak show.
Southern Avenue is also set to release a new record in 2017, after burning up the Midtown bar circuit with their take on modern Memphis soul. Their debut record is coming from the fine folks at Stax. Being promoted as the first Memphis band to be signed to Stax since the ’70s, you can expect Southern Avenue to kill it in 2017, but don’t count on the band being in town very often.

Where to Be

The FedExForum has an impressive lineup early next year, including the Red Hot Chili Peppers on January 12th and Garth Brooks doing an entire weekend February 2nd-4th . Minglewood also continues to impress, with Lil Boosie, Juicy J, and Ben Folds all scheduled to play in the first few months of the new year. You can also expect shows to start cropping up at both the Galloway House and the Clayborn Temple downtown, and don’t forget about the excellent River Series at the Maria Montessori School; the laid-back, all-ages shows are becoming a staple for live music enthusiasts. And you can always catch a good mix of local and traveling talent at Overton Square and on Beale Street.

Memphis music will be well represented at the largest music festival on planet Earth — South by Southwest — this year. Music Export Memphis will host the Memphis Picnic at SXSW on March 14th in Brush Square Park. The lineup is still being finalized — expect an announcement around mid-January — but the event promises a totally Memphis experience, complete with the Amurica photo trailer booth and Gus’s Fried Chicken on site. — Chris Shaw

Categories
News The Fly-By

Stopping Traffic

CREDIT: Mary Cashiola

When Kingsley Hooker moved onto Goodland Circle 30 years ago, the homes on nearby Goodwyn had beautiful, open lawns. Hooker, an entrepreneur with a genteel Southern drawl, says that in recent months, he has seen walls and fences go up around many of the homes on the East Memphis street.

“When I first moved here, none of them had fences, other than maybe a token brick wall that you could step right over. There weren’t any of these great, imposing iron fences. It looks like something medieval,” he says.

But when Goodwyn residents proposed another wall — at Goodwyn and Southern to shut off through-traffic — nearby neighbors really took notice.

“Southern is a major artery,” Hooker says. “We shouldn’t be deprived of our most direct route to go someplace.”

In August, the Midland Goodwyn Neighborhood Association filed an application to close Goodwyn, citing safety concerns due to high-speed traffic. Goodwyn, just south of Chickasaw Gardens, is one of several thoroughfares between Central and Southern.

“About 50 percent of the neighbors living on the street have small children,” says Will Deupree, the association president. “There are 12 streets between Highland and Parkway that run between Central and Southern, and Goodwyn is the only one without sidewalks.”

The application was signed by prominent Memphians Kemmons Wilson Jr., county commissioner George Flinn, and Brad Martin, former chairman of the board for Saks Inc.Though it cited traffic concerns, the proposed closure was seen by some nearby residents as a response to a rape earlier this year on the street and was characterized as elitists trying to wall themselves away from the community at the expense of everyone else.

Closing off the street would also set a dangerous precedent. “What if the shoe were on the other foot?” asks Haynes resident Jean Ables.

Ables, a caretaker and gardener, has lived on Haynes her entire life. Her 90-year-old mother, who lives across the street, has lived in the neighborhood since she was 16. Ables’ daughter lives on Haynes, as well.

Were Goodwyn to be closed at Southern, traffic would most likely be diverted to Greer on one side of Memphis Country Club or Haynes on the other. Both streets are more narrow than Goodwyn and often have cars parked on them.

“If we closed our street and dumped our traffic onto their street, how would they feel?” Ables asks. “If they close Goodwyn, it’s going to be horrific on Haynes.”

The staff report from the Memphis and Shelby County Office of Planning and Development, generally known as OPD, recommended rejecting the application for many of the same reasons. City traffic engineering figures from 1999 put 2,263 vehicles traveling down Goodwyn each day. The average daily traffic count for Greer — though done in 2002 — was 3,283 vehicles daily.

The closure would negatively impact the response time of the fire station near Southern and Highland, as fire trucks currently use Goodwyn to get to dwellings north of Central. The report also noted that the closure would create a dead-end street longer than those permitted by local subdivision regulations.

Nearby residents were prepared to oppose the plan at a Land Use Control Board meeting November 8th, but it appears the issue has been averted — at least for now.

The Midland Goodwyn association is planning to defer its application until December’s Land Use Control Board meeting and is exploring speed humps, curbs, and sidewalks instead.

“If we can get sidewalks and everything, we don’t want a gate,” says Deupree. “The concern is, is the city ready to put infrastructure into our street?”

If not, the association will likely go forward with the street closure application. But the infrastructure overhaul seems to have city support. In its report, OPD suggests that the neighborhood association pursue “full improvement” with curbs, gutters, and sidewalks.

“Any closure of Goodwyn Street would have a negative impact on the surrounding neighborhoods by diverting traffic to other neighborhood streets,” reads OPD’s report. “An indirect, but just as significant impact resulting from the closing would likely be numerous requests from neighborhoods citywide to close their streets, jeopardizing the public street network in Memphis by limiting the ability of citizens to move about the city.”

But maybe Hooker puts it best.

“Sure, some people drive a little too fast. Some people drive a little too fast everywhere. Are we going to lock up all the streets where people drive a little too fast?” he asks. “If we did that, we wouldn’t be able to get anywhere in this town.”

Categories
News

Goodwyn Street Hearing Postponed 30 Days

A hearing scheduled this Thursday, November 8th, about the closing of Goodwyn Street at Southern Avenue has been postponed for 30 days. The Land Use Control Board (LUCB) has re-scheduled the hearing for December 13th at 10 a.m.

In an e-mail sent to members of a committee resisting the street closing, activist Gwen Lausterer said that those pushing for the closing “will withdraw their request for a wall [at Southern] if we will back them for speed bumps and a sidewalk.” The e-mail included the statement that the LUCB staff has “already submitted its Report to the Board recommending that the application be REJECTED.”

The Midland Goodwyn Neighborhood Association, which is close to Chickasaw Gardens but has a separate association, has been trying for years to close the street in order to control speed and traffic. Residents are sharply divided over the issue, with opponents saying the measure is all about race and class and that the closure is to keep residents of the poorer neighborhood south of Southern from being able to enter the exclusive Chickasaw Gardens area.

However, in an e-mail to the Flyer, Will Deupree, president of the Midland Goodwyn Neighorhood Association, explained, “Our design left open a walkway for all pedestrian foot traffic, bike riders, and families who want to use Goodwyn. We were only closing it to cars. We do not want a gated community. We want the street open at Central and on Midland so all neighbors and Memphians can access the street.”

Deupree also emphasized that the street closing is “not about crime” or, specifically, the rape that occurred on Goodwyn last May. “Having a gate would not have prevented this crime by any stretch of the imagination nor will it protect the residents of our street from crimes in the future … ”

For more information, contact Gwen Lausterer at glausterer3@comcast.net or wdeupree@bellsouth.net