Nashville Scene 4-27-23

FOOD & DRINK: EXPLORING MIDDLE

TENNESSEE’S RICH

LAOTIAN FOOD SCENE

PAGE 27

MUSIC: DIVING INTO THE LATEST RELEASES FROM MYA BYRNE AND COUNTRY WESTERNS

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THE OTHER NASHVILLE

Facing a housing crisis and an opioid epidemic, Nashville’s unhoused community lives in the margins of society

BY BRITTNEY McKENNA

CITY LIMITS

Tennessee’s Republican Supermajority Ends Session With a Bumpy Landing ....... 6 The legislature’s final week was marked by infighting, scandal and no movement on guns — with Gov. Bill Lee calling for a special session

BY CONNOR DARYANI

A Legislative Session Marked by Protests and Direct Action 7

Following the Covenant School shooting and the expulsions of Jones and Pearson, Tennesseans flooded to the Capitol this session

BY KELSEY BEYELER

How One Nashvillian Played an Important Role in the World Cup’s Opening

Vanderbilt professor Samar Ali is president of Millions of Conversations — and co-writer of a powerful moment featuring Morgan Freeman

This week on the Scene’s news and politics blog

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COVER STORY

The Other Nashville

Facing a housing crisis and an opioid epidemic, Nashville’s unhoused community lives in the margins of society

BY BRITTNEY M c KENNA

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CRITICS’ PICKS

The Minks, Independent Bookstore Day, Nashville Jazz Workshop, Doña Perón, Fruit

BOOKS

A Celebration of Everything Alive and Whole

U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón on music, animals and the chaotic joy of spring

BY SARA BETH WEST; CHAPTER16.ORG

MUSIC Homeward Bound ...................................

32 Mya Byrne draws strength to be herself on Rhinestone Tomboy

BY RACHEL CHOLST

Western Union

Freed from lockdown, indie-punk lifers Country Westerns double down on their second LP

BY CHARLIE ZAILLIAN

The Spin

33

Landlord Price-Fixing Lawsuit Consolidated in Nashville

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The Scene’s live-review column checks out Record Store Day performances by Jamiah, Alanna Royale and many more at The Groove and Vinyl Tap

AND HANNAH CRON

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MARCH FOR OUR LIVES RALLY, APRIL 3

TENNESSEANS ON BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE DESIRE GUN REFORM, BUT LAWMAKERS DECLINE TO CONSIDER GUN RESTRICTIONS PRIOR TO ADJOURNMENT

In a somewhat unsurprising turn, before the state legislature adjourned for the year, legislators declined to consider gun restrictions despite calls to do so by Republican Gov. Bill Lee. Lee has therefore called for a special session, saying, “There is broad agreement that dangerous, unstable individuals who intend to harm themselves or others should not have access to weapons.” I’m relieved the governor finally recognizes this piece of the puzzle. As I’ve said before, gun reform is a sensitive issue — as are many issues. But not all sensitive issues could cost us our lives if left unaddressed without basic laws to increase protection.

As reported by CNN, “States with weaker gun laws have higher rates of firearmrelated homicides and suicides.” A study conducted by Everytown for Gun Safety showed that California, where gun laws are tighter, has a low rate of 8.5 gun deaths per 100,000 residents — well below the national average of 13.6 per 100,000. “Hawaii has the lowest rate of gun deaths in the country with the second strongest gun law score,” the data shows.

Like many, I am angry and distraught over the Covenant School shooting. Still, it should not be the only reason legislators consider some form of gun reform. As reported by Forbes, “In 2020, 32.1 percent of U.S. adults experienced both a mental health condition and substance abuse.” According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, 37 percent of adults incarcerated in state and federal prisons have a diagnosed mental illness — and 70 percent of youth in the juvenile justice system have a mental health condition.

NewsChannel 5’s Phil Williams recently tweeted, “Five years today, a mentally disturbed man slaughtered innocent people at a Nashville Waffle House — and Tennessee lawmakers just adjourned a fifth legislative session without dealing with the issues raised by the mass shooting.” There is great cause for concern when someone with severe mental illness is able to handle a gun.

Gov. Lee has asked legislators for a set of “new, stronger” order-of-protection laws, also known as extreme risk protection. This is an effort to keep guns out of the hands of those who pose danger to themselves or others. But Republican lawmakers see this as a form of “red-flag” law. Rep. Jason Zachary (R-Knoxville) said legislators are discussing how to make sure someone who poses a “direct, credible, imminent threat” does not

have access to a gun, but he also believes “the Republicans in the House are not going to support a red-flag law.” In addition, the National Rifle Association has asked people to call their lawmakers to oppose potential extreme risk laws.

This issue is very important to Tennesseans, and it’s not going to simply disappear this time.

Musicians Amy Grant, Sheryl Crow, Jason Isbell and dozens more have taken action by drafting a letter asking lawmakers to pass “common sense gun safety legislation” — including “extreme risk protection laws and legislation strengthening requirements around secure storage of firearms.” The group echoes the thoughts of many Tennesseans.

The Tennessean reports that multiple recent polls “show a majority of Tennesseans on both sides of the aisle would support some form of extreme risk legislation.” One recent poll shows that support for policies like closing background check loopholes, safe gun storage and extreme risk protection orders was overwhelming among all likely voters — including “Trump voters, Republicans, conservatives, and households with guns.”

A recent Power Poll says in part: “We had gun control protests. … We experienced bruising conflict between city and state, Republicans and Democrats. … That the chaos was broadcast far and wide sent shivers up and down the spine of our city. We gazed in wonder. Was this us? Aren’t we the friendly city? Aren’t we the happy, wellmeaning, highly functional, make-it-happen pro-business city that accommodates all newcomers with a slightly lefty set of social values? … Maybe we’ve reached a new level of political and social behavior ruled more by anger and extremist ideology. Maybe we’ve handed the discussion off to the 10 percent who occupy the far reaches of the left and right.”

I don’t think that last part is accurate.

I prefer to believe we are still, as a whole, a well-meaning people who want to preserve the lives of those precious to us. When the special legislative session comes, I hope Tennessee lawmakers will find it in their hearts to take action based on the voice of the people, and not on love for the sound of their own voices.

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VUYANI DANCE THEATRE

TENNESSEE’S REPUBLICAN SUPERMAJORITY ENDS SESSION WITH A BUMPY LANDING

The legislature’s final week was marked by infighting, scandal and no movement on guns — with Gov. Bill Lee calling for a special session

BY CONNOR DARYANI

The Tennessee General Assembly adjourned late on April 21 following a long and harrowing week of rapid-fire legislation, Republican infighting and scandal.

Following the Covenant School shooting on March 27, the General Assembly began a sprint to the finish line, with the Republican supermajority refusing to hear any form of gun control legislation despite pressure from not only protesters — who filled the gallery of the House chamber for nearly every floor session for weeks — but from Gov. Bill Lee himself. What’s more, just after the session’s conclusion, the governor called for a special session.

The final week was a long one, with floor sessions that lasted anywhere from three to eight hours. More than 100 bills were heard over the course of the week, and drama outside the chamber didn’t stop either.

Here are some highlights from the final week of 2023’s regular legislative session.

SCANDAL

The House Republican Caucus almost made it through the session without any sexual harassment scandals.

But on Thursday, NewsChannel 5 reported that Rep. Scotty Campbell (R-Mountain City) was found by a House ethics subcommittee to have violated workplace policies against sexual harassment. For weeks, Campbell, who was the vice chair of the House Republican Caucus, allegedly repeatedly sexually harassed at least one 19-year-old legislative intern. The committee report was delivered to House Speaker Cameron Sexton weeks before the news broke.

Five hours after NewsChannel 5’s story ran, Campbell resigned.

GUNS

Gov. Lee on April 19 released a statement calling for the Tennessee General Assembly to pass extreme risk protection legislation — which aims to remove guns from people who are deemed a threat to themselves or others — before session’s end. While Lt. Gov. Randy McNally — himself plagued by scandal this session — voiced support for the proposed legislation, which was never given a bill number or a sponsor, Republican members of the House quickly came out in opposition. Ultimately, no extreme risk legislation was heard.

On April 20, Sen. Jeff Yarbro (D-Nashville) proposed similar legislation in the Senate, recalling Senate Bill 1029 from the Senate Judiciary Committee, where Chairman Todd Gardenhire (R-Chattanooga) deferred all gun-related legislation to 2024. The move failed.

One gun-related piece of legislation did find success. House Bill 1189 passed in the Senate on April 18 after passing in the House in March. Sponsored by Sen. Joey Hensley (R-Hohenwald), the legislation protects gun manufacturers, dealers and sellers from lawsuits in relation to illegal activity carried out with the products they sell. This happened as teachers in the gallery held signs calling for legislation to protect them from guns.

Following the adjournment of the session, Lee said he would call a special session soon in order to address gun legislation.

THE NUMBERS GAME

The state’s $56.2 billion budget passed through the House on April 19 and the Senate on April 20, concluding the only action the legislature is constitutionally required to complete while in session — everything else is just extra credit. This year’s budget includes funding for the governor’s Trans-

portation Modernization Act, the $140 million Lee promised in order to put a school resource officer in every public school, $50 million for building a new state prison, more than $400 million in business tax cuts and a whole lot more. It also includes $2 million for an audit of Tennessee State University, the state’s only public HBCU. Democrats have called this a waste of money considering the denial of funding for Rep. Antonio Parkinson’s (D-Memphis) legislation to require rape test kits to be tested within 30 days.

The legislature also passed a pair of tax-related bills. The first, House Bill 323, permanently overhauls tax breaks for corporations. Also attached to the bill is a one-time, three-month grocery tax holiday, which is set to kick in late this summer and is estimated to save an average of $100 per family. Another bill, Senate Bill 626, provides tax breaks for corporations like FedEx by capping the amount any one entity has to pay in jet fuel taxes at $1 million. Jet fuel taxes are used to fund airports, and with the loss of that revenue stream, the funding will instead come from the general fund, moving the burden from corporations to individuals.

CULTURE WAR

Tennessee led the nation in anti-LGBTQ legislation this year, with 26 bills targeting the LGBTQ community. So it was no surprise that the Republican supermajority squeaked out three more pieces of legislation this week targeting LGBTQ communties, even as they were in a rush to get home.

Senate Bill 1237 requires athletes in private K-12 schools to participate in sports based on the biological sex assigned to them at birth. House Bill 239 adds “sex” as a defined term for statutory construction purposes — anti-trans politician language for not allowing a person who is transgender to change their gender on driver’s licenses and other documents. Senate Bill 466 allows antitrans teachers to misgender students with no fear of any sort of repercussion. All three bills are on their way to the governor’s desk.

SCHOOLS

Finally, a small lineup of school-related bills passed through the legislature. One of the more significant pieces of legislation was Senate Bill 12, which expands Gov. Lee’s controversial private school voucher program. The program barely passed the House in 2019, and the legislature didn’t seem much more enthusiastic about this measure, which expands the program from Davidson and Shelby counties to include Hamilton County. The House tried to add an amendment to include Knox County, but upon negotiating with the Senate removed that stipulation.

Also on their way to the governor’s desk: Senate Bill 281, which increases teacher pay but prohibits union dues from being directly deducted from a teachers payroll; Senate Bill 1441, which requires parents to opt in for their students to be involved in certain conversations at school, such as discussions surrounding sexual orientation; and Senate Bill 102, which pairs nicely with the aforementioned SB466 by prohibiting schools from requiring teachers to go through implicit bias training.

FORMER REP. SCOTTY CAMPBELL

PHOTO: HAMILTON MATTHEW MASTERS

A LEGISLATIVE SESSION MARKED BY PROTESTS AND DIRECT ACTION

Following the Covenant School shooting and the expulsions of Jones and Pearson, Tennesseans flooded to the Capitol this session

BY KELSEY BEYELER

Thousands of protesters made their way to the state Capitol over the past few weeks following the Covenant School shooting and the subsequent expulsions of Reps. Justin Jones (D-Nashville) and Justin Pearson (DMemphis). Representing a wide spectrum of ages, religions, races and political affiliations, protesters traveled from all over Tennessee and across state lines to attend demonstrations. They protested inside and outside the Capitol for hours on end, even as the House and Senate engaged in lengthy sessions, and the state’s Republican supermajority largely avoided consideration of gun-related legislation. Some demonstrators were removed from the chambers by the Tennessee Highway Patrol due to their protests.

These protests have been charged with a palpable energy — there has been grief and anger as well as love and connection as folks have become galvanized over the Covenant tragedy and expressed a collective desire for gun reform. Community members screamed, cried and sang together. On April 18, demonstrators linked arms to create a three-mile human chain extending from the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt to Legislative Plaza downtown. Musicians including Margo Price, Brittany Spencer, Maggie Rose, Drew Holcomb, Ruby Amanfu and many more have performed at events and led crowds in songs as acts of peaceful protest. Stars including Sheryl Crow and Amy Grant, leading a coalition called Voices for a Safer Tennessee, signed onto a letter calling for “common sense” gun reform and met with Gov. Bill Lee and other state leaders to discuss gun violence.

“It’s been empowering to see the sustained movement, particularly being led by young people and impacted families,” says Jones, who was reinstated to his seat by the Metro Council less than 100 hours after his expulsion. “That’s what a movement is, and it’s really changing the political priorities in that building and really shifting the conversation.”

Despite the overwhelming turnouts and pleas from citizens — including parents of Covenant students — Republican lawmakers have refused to make the changes.

“Any red flag law is a non-starter for House Republicans,” reads a statement issued by the House Republican Caucus. (So-called red flag laws are designed to temporarily remove firearms from someone perceived to be a danger to others or themselves.) This statement comes even as Gov. Lee pushed for “extreme risk” gun legislation — and after Republican Senate leadership pushed remaining gun-related bills to 2024. A

statewide poll conducted by Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Center for Child Health Policy, which was released before the Covenant School shooting, shows that school gun violence is a top concern for parents, and a majority of respondents support stricter gun measures.

“We had everything,” says Sarah Neumann, the mother of a Covenant student. “We had good security. We had locked doors, we had intense active shooter training. The teachers heard AR-15s shot in the school and had to practice locking down for that. They had everything. Our cops are heroes. They didn’t hesitate a second. It’s not enough. We don’t have banned assault weapons. Sure, we’re gonna add the bulletproof glass now, but what about when they’re on the playground?”

House Republicans have faced widespread criticism for their inaction on gun laws and their efforts to expel those who have become nationally recognized as the Tennessee Three — Jones, Pearson and Knoxville Rep. Gloria Johnson (who joined her fellow Democrats in their protests on the House floor March 30 but avoided expulsion by a single vote). Though House Republicans have largely remained stonefaced amid the protests — even as protesters in some cases called them fascists — the effects the demonstrations have had on lawmakers are apparent. A leaked audio recording revealed internal tension among House Republican Caucus members.

“This rush to get out to save face, I think, for them, is not going to work,” Johnson tells the Scene. “This issue is not going away, and we’re just going to build this movement until action is taken.”

The movement-building that Johnson mentions requires an immense amount of work and organization.

“You didn’t see all of that coordination behind the scenes,” says Sen. Charlane Oliver (D-Nashville). Oliver tweeted about some of that work and the players involved, among them District 29 Metro Councilmember Delishia Porterfield and At-Large Councilmember Zulfat Suara, who worked with Oliver for the swift reinstatement of Jones, as well as on other legislative matters. (Notably, Porterfield lost to Jones in the Democratic primary for the House District 52 seat last year, but in a show of goodwill, she nominated Jones back to the seat.)

“That’s what Black women do, we spring into action,” says Oliver. “We don’t ask questions, we already know. Our moral compass, as people in society who are constantly unprotected in America, we have this intuition that fuels us into action. And you don’t have to

question where our allegiance lies. You don’t have to question our stances on something, because you’re going to see it in our actions. And a lot of those actions get taken for granted, because they are the things that keep the big things going. It’s making the phone calls, it’s creating a spreadsheet, it’s coordinating the protests, and making sure all the moving parts are moving. But what you’ve seen is what’s on camera, on national TV.”

Though gun control is the issue folks have rallied around the most during this year’s legislative session, the protests have created op-

portunities to advocate for other measures.

“The same people that block gun laws block health care,” Bishop William Barber II told a crowd on April 17 as part of a “Moral Monday” protest he led. “The same ones that block health care, block voting rights. And the same ones that block voting rights, they block living wages. And the same ones that block living wages, they block dealing with the environment. And if they are cynical enough to be together, we got to be smart enough to come together and stay together.”

APRIL 3

MARCH 28

APRIL 6

PHOTOS: HAMILTON MATT MASTERS

HOW ONE NASHVILLIAN PLAYED AN IMPORTANT ROLE IN THE WORLD CUP’S OPENING CEREMONIES

Vanderbilt professor Samar Ali is president of Millions of Conversations — and co-writer of a powerful moment featuring Morgan Freeman

BY STEVE CAVENDISH

As a sports fan, I loathe opening ceremonies.

It’s always fun to see the athletes arrive at the Olympics, but the pageantry built around some arbitrary theme? I’ve never understood the appeal. Let’s get on with the games.

This was even more true for the World Cup held in Qatar in November and December. The competition began under a cloud given the controversy surrounding how multiple stadiums were built using imported labor. The workers often lived in terrible conditions, and hundreds of deaths were reported. Throw in U.S. involvement in the region, fighting almost nonstop since 9/11, and I was uninterested in pomp. I just wanted to watch some soccer.

So I was struck as Morgan Freeman walked onto the field and began a conversation with Ghanim Al-Muftah, a 20-year-old Qatari YouTube star very popular in the Arabic world, about the fractured nature of our perceptions about the Middle East.

When the man who’s so effectively played God in two movies speaks, you listen.

“How can so many countries, languages and cultures come together if only one way is accepted?” Freeman says.

“We were raised to believe that we were scattered on this earth as nations and tribes so that we could learn from each other and find beauty in our differences,” Ghanim replied.

“I can see it,” said Freeman. “What unites us here in this moment is so much greater than what divides us. How can we make it last longer than just today?”

“With tolerance and respect, we can live together in one big home,” Ghanim said.

“In Arabic, ‘Beit Ash-Sha’ar’ is the Bedouin tent, and when we call you here, we welcome you into our home.”

Even for a cynic like me, unity and peaceful coexistence are powerful messages. So

I was stunned to find out that the scene was written in part by a Nashvillian.

Samar Ali is a research professor at Vanderbilt University and the president of Millions of Conversations, a nonprofit organization attempting to depolarize communities. (Disclosure: Samar Ali sits on the Nashville Banner’s advisory board.) She got a call last year from her friend Gregg Hurwitz — an author best known for the Orphan X book series — who said he and screenwriter Laeta Kalogridis had been approached to write part of the World Cup opening ceremony. Hurwitz is a frequent collaborator with Millions of Conversations

and needed Ali’s years of experience as an attorney, business developer and diplomat in the Middle East.

That scene with Freeman and Ghanim was inspired by a focus group Ali had conducted a few years ago for MOC on perceptions of Muslims in America. A woman looked at Ali and said, “We fear you. How does it feel to be so hated?” But by the end of the conversation, the woman’s attitude had shifted completely. “When you first came here, I was afraid of you,” she said. “And now I’m afraid for you because of people like me.” It was one of the experiences that confirmed Ali’s belief that Millions of Conversations could have an impact.

“That’s one of the first stories someone told me about her work when we first started working together,” Hurwitz says. “And that always stuck in my head, that notion of, ‘Can I be part of your community?’ There’s a call, but there’s also a brave and courageous vulnerability, anytime you’re trying to cross between groups.”

World Cup organizers wanted to focus on unity, something central to Ali’s work, as a theme for the month of competition. Part of their challenge in delivering that message was made easier when Freeman was hired and gave them a chance to think bigger.

“Part of what he represents is where he’s from as a Black man from Mississippi, in terms of also thinking about truth and reconciliation in our own country,” Ali says. “His ability to deliver and just his presence were immense.”

“There’s always a place on a screenplay or TV show, once it’s cast, it’s different,” Hurwitz says. “Once you know, ‘This is the [performer’s] age, this is their temperament, this is going to be their strong spot.’ And we knew that what we wanted was a Morgan Freeman archetype. And we happened to actually get Morgan Freeman.”

For whatever issues there may have been around the World Cup, Ali says it was a chance to hold a microphone on the world’s stage, even for just a few minutes. Even if it was wrapped in a shell of pageantry, the chance to deliver a message of peace was irresistible. After months of work, to see it actually performed in the stadium was “an overwhelming experience” for Ali.

“I cried,” she says. “It was an out-of-body experience. It was wild. There’s just no other words for it.”

I’ve known Samar for more than a decade. One of the things that always impresses me is the level of thoughtfulness she brings to anything, even a ceremony at the beginning of a soccer tournament.

“There’s a Quranic verse that talks about celebration, celebrating differences,” she says. “And so there was a debate back and forth, whether or not to include that in the dialogue. And it was decided, yes, that was part of the inspiration, which is also similar to verses in the Bible and similar to verses in the Torah. It is embodied in the spirit of many faiths, which is, God didn’t create us all to be the same, because that would make a very boring world. And so he created us with differences to explore those differences, and to be curious about it.”

If Ali gets her way, that exploration will go a long way toward diminishing fear and hatred.

EMAIL EDITOR@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

While the city (and country) stays locked on big local stories about the state legislature and the Metro Council, candidates for Nashville’s next mayor have started to separate themselves from the roughly dozen-person field. Councilmember At-Large Sharon Hurt announced a coordinated endorsement from 35 local pastors last week, including Dr. Forrest Harris of American Baptist College and Jerry Maynard, bishop at Cathedral of Praise and an active lobbyist and sometimes politician. Matt Wiltshire boasts the race’s top fundraising numbers, while District 19’s Freddie O’Connell snagged the endorsement of fellow Councilmember Bob Mendes, a leading critic of the deal for a new $2.1 billion stadium for the Titans. State Sen. Heidi Campbell snagged Cyrus Shick as her campaign manager — Shick returns to his hometown after spending a decade hopping around the country leading campaigns for battleground Democrats. Jim Gingrich hopes to appeal to disgruntled residents with “Fed Up,” a folksy TV ad circulating on cable. … All this jockeying takes place amid the backdrop of Vanderbilt’s most recent Nashville political poll, which reflects residents’ increasingly pessimistic attitudes about the direction of the city and priorities of its leaders. Half of respondents think Nashville’s growth has negatively affected their day-to-day lives, and 79 percent think the city is growing too quickly. … The new Titans stadium has become a flashpoint for these debates, which continued this week at a specially called meeting of the Metro Council. Critics have referred to the structure of the deal as a “money hose” for the team and a city-subsidized invitation for developers waiting to make the East Bank into an extension of downtown tourism. … In the courts, the ACLU, along with other advocacy organizations, filed suit to block Tennessee’s newly passed law banning genderaffirming care for trans youth. A family in Nashville and a doctor in Memphis are plaintiffs in the case. … A national case regarding rent collusion has landed in the courtroom of U.S. District Court Judge Waverly Crenshaw, who will begin proceedings next month. Plaintiffs, which include more than 20 renters from across the country, allege that their corporate landlords’ use of an algorithm to set rents amounts to a price-fixing conspiracy and violates consumer protections under antitrust laws. At the center of the arguments is RealPage Inc., which offers a real estate analytics tool that takes in data from different markets and advises owners on rentsetting, at times recommending landlords keep units vacant to optimize rental profit. Prominent local attorney Tricia Herzfeld represents Brandon Watters, the sole plaintiff from Nashville. … While the racism, misogyny and hypocrisy of this year’s state legislative session feels particularly egregious, it is not, writes Scene contributor Betsy Phillips. Tennessee lawmakers have long been drunk on power, and the wanton abuse of their positions is nothing new.

FOR WHATEVER ISSUES THERE MAY HAVE BEEN AROUND THE WORLD CUP, ALI SAYS IT WAS A CHANCE TO HOLD A MICROPHONE ON THE WORLD’S STAGE, EVEN FOR JUST A FEW MINUTES.

GREGG HURWITZ AND SAMAR ALI

5.06

5.11

BELEW, AND THE YOUNG FABLES

5.5 CHRISTIE LENÉE

BOOZY BRUNCH

Book your event

5.6 INEBRIATED SHAKESPEARE PRESENTS ROMEO & JULIET

5.7 MENTAL HEALTH NIGHT

5.7 VIEUX FARKA TOURE

5.9 ZOE NY WITH STEFANIE JOYCE

5.10 AN EVENING WITH EILEN JEWELL

5.12 VANCIE VEGA & THE “NOT DOLLY” SHOW

5.13 CRAIG WILSON MEMORIAL CONCERT BRUNCH

5.14 MOTHERS DAY BEATLES BRUNCH FEATURING: JOHN SALAWAY & FRIENDS

5.14 LUKE WINSLOW-KING

5.16 MISHKA

5.17 PETE MULLER WITH SPECIAL GUEST IAN FLANIGAN

5.17 THE CAROL KING & JAMES TAYLOR STORY

Facing a housing crisis and an opioid epidemic, Nashville’s unhoused community lives in the margins of society

BY BRITTNEY McKENNA

PHOTOS BY ERIC ENGLAND

THE OTHER NASHVILLE

IT’S A COLD, damp March Monday morning when we meet up with a middle-aged man experiencing homelessness in south Madison. The man, whom we’ll call Charlie to protect his anonymity, lives in a culvert. It’s actually one of two neighboring culverts — the other collecting runoff rainwater from an adjacent strip mall — and sits just a stone’s throw from Gallatin Pike and its relentless traffic.

Cars idling at the nearby traffic signal would never know Charlie was there. He built his spot behind thick, gnarled shrubbery and used found materials to conceal the entrance to his shelter. Major storms over the weekend left Charlie tired and feeling unwell, a sentiment expressed by other members of Madison’s unhoused population later the same day.

Eight feet tall and about three times as long, the cinder-block culvert — known to Charlie’s community as “The Pit” — provides enough shelter for him to make it through the night safely. He’s worked hard on building it out too, using wooden pallets, metal signs, old wire racks and a number of tarps to create a bedroom-size space. There is a spray-painted, neon-colored mural on one wall of an object resembling an old Game Boy. Charlie grins and says the artwork “came with the place.” A salvaged piece of metal restaurant shelving serves as a ladder in and out of The Pit, one of several clever acts of engineering.

There’s also drug detritus littering the ground: used foil, halved plastic straws, empty baggies. Charlie is addicted to fentanyl and explains that, while smoking wastes more product, he chooses it over “banging” (injecting an opioid with a needle) because the latter poses a greater risk of overdose as well as complications from contaminated needles.

I was able to meet Charlie and the rest of the people interviewed in this piece thanks to the efforts of “Mother Hubbard,” an outreach worker who asked to remain anonymous. Charlie gave Hubbard his nickname when he started making morning visits to various encampments. Others affectionately call him “Hobo Cop.”

Via several months of grassroots, on-theground work, Hubbard earned the trust of dozens of people experiencing homelessness by continually showing up to share both his time and his resources. On our second day in the field, a man at an encampment in Hermitage thanked Hubbard for delivering naloxone the day before, saying that three doses of the nasal spray had saved a man’s life just a few hours later.

In late March, the FDA approved the first over-the-counter naloxone nasal spray, providing greater access to the life-saving drug in the midst of an epidemic that claimed 101,750 lives nationally in the year leading up to October 2022. Groups in Nashville distributing naloxone and encouraging other harm-reduction practices include Street Works, Mainline Harm Reduction and the state-established Syringe Service Programs. A March report by the Scene’s Hannah Herner notes that 53,000 naloxone kits were handed out across the state in 2021.

While homelessness exists in most Nashville neighborhoods, the unhoused community in Madison is robust and growing quickly — a phenomenon that typically makes news as being a nuisance to nearby homeowners and businesses. As a Madison

resident, Hubbard chose to focus his initial efforts on his own neighborhood, particularly as one encampment nearly touched his backyard. The following chronicles just a handful of the many stories from many people experiencing homelessness in Madison.

THE FIRST DAY we visit encampments, we’re told there is a “drought” in the area. In other words, the area’s primary heroin and fentanyl dealers are low on product. Worse, what product they do have is far less potent than usual, meaning that a lot of folks are dope sick and experiencing symptoms of withdrawal.

Charlie and Hubbard explain an underground economy that some unhoused folks participate in to fund their addictions and pay for basic living necessities, saying most opt for panhandling or boosting. Panhandling is, of course, the practice of asking for change and petty cash at designated spots. One panhandler, whom we’ll refer to as Dan, has territory in front of a prominent grocery store.

“Sometimes it takes me four hours to make $10,” says Dan. “Sometimes I make $20 or $30 in 30 minutes.” He adds that the store’s owner frequently calls the police on him. The inconsistent income is proving more and more difficult for Dan, as the fentanyl currently on the streets only lasts him “three or four hours,” whereas product previously available could get him through 12 hours of work. Dan also works construction projects and eagerly seeks out odd jobs, which Hubbard helps him find.

Boosting, which is more lucrative but also more dangerous, involves going to big-box stores like Walmart and Target — typically at locations outside of Madison, for anonymity — and shoplifting items that are then sold to a kind of shoplifting kingpin known only by a nickname. Charlie boosted the night before we speak, but had no luck.

Charlie notes that addicts tend to stick with others who use their substance of choice and are “racist of other people’s drugs.”

“I hate crackheads,” he says. “Alcoholics hate heroin addicts. It’s a real thing. I can definitely tell you that drunks don’t like heroin addicts. But not too many people are like, ‘Oh, I like the heroin addicts. They’re all right.’”

That doesn’t mean there isn’t any intermingling between groups. Dan shares that a friend struggling with alcohol dependence died in a hit-and-run on Gallatin Pike a year

earlier. Pedestrian deaths continue to rise in Nashville, with a record-setting 49 recorded in 2022. People experiencing homelessness are more likely to die in car-pedestrian accidents, and are also more likely to die from violence.

“People used to live on that porch,” Dan says, pointing to the First Assembly of God building. “A couple of drunks lived out there.

My buddy got hit by a car that summer and died crossing the turning lane. Someone was texting or something. He was an older guy. He was out here for years. If he hadn’t died, he was going to be a vegetable. He was funny. He could do magic tricks.”

A month after our initial meeting, Hubbard shares that he is with Dan at Skyline Hospital. While panhandling, Dan

PEDESTRIAN DEATHS CONTINUE TO RISE IN NASHVILLE, WITH A RECORD-SETTING 49 RECORDED IN 2022. PEOPLE EXPERIENCING HOMELESSNESS ARE MORE LIKELY TO DIE IN CAR-PEDESTRIAN ACCIDENTS, AND ARE ALSO MORE LIKELY TO DIE FROM VIOLENCE.

was viciously mauled by a loose pit bull.

One resource that brings much of the community together is a free meal program on Mondays at Madison First Baptist Church, which sits next door to First Assembly of God. Dozens of people attend each week. This week they’re waiting on plates of fresh tacos and chips, as well as coffee and dessert. Some people choose to take their meals to go, but many stay and socialize.

At lunch, I sit next to a man in his mid50s we’ll call Hal. Another man at the table asks Hal to tell me about the “blessing” he received the day before.

Hal was downtown when a nicely dressed man in a late-model Audi pulled up beside him and asked if he was homeless. Hal said yes, at which point the man tossed him a thick envelope and drove off. Inside was what appeared to be several thousand dollars. Hal was thrilled — that kind of money would change his life. But it was nothing more than a cruel prank. Hal soon realized the bills were counterfeit.

“Guess it wasn’t much of a blessing,” he says.

“JACK” IS A 55-YEAR-OLD man living at one of Madison’s larger encampments, in a wooded area near Rivergate Mall. He’s lived there for a year and estimates that a dozen other people call the encampment home, though he notes its population used to be closer to 100.

Jack’s shelter has makeshift seats for guests, and the decor includes geodes, antique glassware, small Lego models and assorted religious items, like a painted concrete Buddha. He also makes his own artwork, a hobby he says helps “occupy [his] days.” He’s midway through working on a ballpoint-pen sketch of a dragon-like creature, which he’s rendered in skilled, minute detail. Signs of Jack’s fentanyl addiction also dot his shelter.

Asked how he likes living there, Jack gestures to the broader encampment. “It’s a dump,” he says. “Look at the place. It was already a dump when I came out here. It was 100 people living here at one point, and they destroyed the place. Two friends and I cleaned out 47 bags of trash in this area just right here. That didn’t even put a dent in it.”

Jack’s wife currently works through an

outreach program with a nearby church that provides her with housing support and a steady wage, resources made available to her after she completed a rehabilitation program. Jack is wary of such programs and opted not to participate.

“We’ve been separated for eight months now, but she still works there,” he says. “They got her a Section 8 apartment that she lives in, but I’m not allowed to go there because I didn’t complete the program. So I’m living out here.”

Jack sees the city-sanctioned closure of encampments and ensuing placement of residents in temporary housing as creating more problems than it solves. For starters, he says, once temporary housing expires, most people end up right back on the street, with new encampments popping up in other spots. In Jack’s experiences with temporary housing, resources like health care, child care and job training were not provided, despite strong demand among those displaced. And he believes the forced close proximity within temporary housing can create issues for residents too, particularly when it comes to substance abuse and violence.

“There was no job training, no jobs, no transitional housing [after temporary housing expired],” he says. “It’s just, ‘Here’s a place to stay, good luck.’ They dump them all together, a bunch of junkies, into an apartment complex. [I’ve heard about] several deaths and ODs. A baby died out there [at a transitional housing facility in North Nashville]. Then they all come back on the streets after 30 days.”

While details are not confirmed at press time, Hubbard has heard through several channels that Jack’s camp will be cleared and destroyed by the end of April.

AFTER WRAPPING UP with Charlie, we visit Billy and Sara, a couple in their late 20s whose shelter is in a small wooded area behind a Mexican restaurant, hidden from view by trees and brush. Billy built their shelter, which uses tarps and metal signs for a roof and a zippered portion of an old tent as a door. Inside are a couple of rolling suitcases holding their belongings, sleeping bags and a few personal items, like a box of cereal and a camping stove. They agree to speak through the flap of their tent while

SYRINGE FOUND AT A CAMP

AN ENCAMPMENT

WITNESS HISTORY

The Museum’s weekly programs feature performances and perspectives from the artists who have shaped, and continue to shape, country music—like two-time Grammy winner, Rodney Crowell, who was featured in the Museum’s Poets and Prophets series in 2022 and shared stories from his influential five-decade career in music.

Inside Stories and Live Songs Every Weekend

they “get well,” or smoke enough fentanyl to feel functional.

Before this spot, Billy and Sara spent time at the Madison Square Inn. They also lived in their car in the parking lot of the Dickerson Pike Walmart. They maintained that situation for four months before being forced to leave the property due to a 2022 law passed in Tennessee that made camping on public land a felony, which is punishable by up to six years in prison as well as the revocation of voting rights.

After a conflict with his mother, Billy had to give up the couple’s vehicle. He then lost his job as a manager at a downtown location of Jersey Mike’s, as he didn’t have a way of reliably getting to work for his shifts. Sara soon found herself in prison for shoplifting, and Billy struggled to hold down a job while caring for their two young children.

“I was making it,” he says. “But then it’s like, ‘Do I take the kids to day care so I can work?’ Hell, it took almost my whole paycheck to pay for day care. We want them to be at a decent day care, not just a hole in the wall. I was making $18, then $20 an hour. After I paid for their day care, I had about 100 bucks [a month] left to live on.”

Billy and Sara became addicted to fentanyl after the sudden death of their third child during infancy. Both had used Suboxone and Subutex for what Sara estimates was eight years, but neither had tried heroin or fentanyl. They point to the devastating grief of losing their baby as a precipitating factor in where they are now. When I acknowledge that many people struggle to find a healthy way to cope with grief, Billy looks away and says, “Well, we didn’t do it the right way.”

Bringing heroin into their lives kicked off a long string of consequences for Billy and Sara. Increasingly, their money went toward buying more heroin, as heroin is a drug that people develop a tolerance to.

“One of my friends brought it around,” Sara says of the first time she used heroin. “We had just moved into a new house. For about a year I hid [using] from [Billy]. Then he found out that I was doing it, and of course, he started doing it. Then they evicted us like three days before COVID happened and put a stop on evictions.”

While both Billy and Sara first used heroin as a means of escaping the world, they now smoke because they’re addicted. Sara estimates they spend $30 to $40 a week on drugs but admits that the “addicts” in them would spend more money if they had it.

“We just do enough to where we can function,” Sara says. “I don’t know if you’ve ever seen anybody go through withdrawals, but you can’t function.”

“It’s like the flu times 10,” Billy adds.

Billy and Sara’s story is emblematic of those of so many others — their best intentions are constantly thwarted by the logistics that so many of us take being able to manage for granted. Sara was able to find work at a laundromat in Bordeaux but was let go for being unbathed and wearing dirty clothes. She also struggled to reconcile her shift times with the hours offered by public transportation. Billy has $1,200 in EBT credit, but the debit card addressed to his mother’s house never arrived. After he borrowed Hubbard’s phone to request a new card, the representative on the EBT helpline hung up on him. He still does not have access to his funds.

“No matter what you try, there’s something in your way,” Sara says. “I tried to go to McDonald’s and get a job, and they wouldn’t hire me because I have a recent theft on my record. Gas stations don’t want to hire me or anything like that. It’s not like this is something that we want.”

“They say, ‘Oh, you’re homeless?’” Billy adds. “Automatically it’s like, ‘You’re just a piece of shit. You don’t count.’ So, what do you do? You can’t give up. You give up, and you’ll die out here.”

Shortly before press time, Sara entered a court-ordered rehab program to avoid prison time for her theft charge. After finishing the program, she can have the charge expunged from her record — and regain access to employment — but not before paying several hundred dollars in fees, which she does not know how she’ll manage. Billy chose to enter a rehab program the same day.

AT A LARGER ENCAMPMENT in Hermitage in early April, residents are more wary of outsiders. Many assume us to be “body catchers” for rehab facilities, as some rehabs — for-profit facilities, in particular — employ patient brokers who earn commissions for each new patient, with those patients in turn earning insurance money for the facility. It’s a system built to create “repeat customers,” as one man at the camp puts it. But a man we’ll call Roland wants to talk. He explains that he’s caring for his 17-yearold daughter, also an addict, and he needs to find a job to support her. He especially expresses interest in getting a job at Amazon, saying he would gladly find another place to camp to be closer to Amazon’s Madison warehouse. Others chime in about the myriad warehouse and construction opportunities in Madison, with many hoping to relocate to the area.

In response to what he’s seen, Hubbard has assembled a small team of outreach workers under the name The Beat, whose mission statement is as follows:

The Beat is a Madison-based, donation-driven, grassroots collective. They are peer-to-peer outreach workers, former substance users, ex-school administrators, psychologists, doctors, therapists and local business owners. Their mission is to advocate for those suffering from the effects of the national housing crisis, the unchecked opioid epidemic and the stigmatization of mental illness. The Beat coordinates care for and partners with these neighbors. The Beat sees the true human being that lives within their affliction.

Hubbard says The Beat has already gotten 15 people, including one minor, off the street and into rehab beds in the past three months. Twelve of those people are still in treatment.

Charlie plans to enter rehab in June. Hubbard has coordinated with Charlie’s family, with whom he speaks daily, to make this happen for Charlie, who hopes to join The Beat as an outreach worker when he is clean.

“I can’t reach that goal now because I’m not in a good place,” he says. “But one day, I will help people, and that will be my life on earth. If I should make it past this.”

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Bruce Munro (British, b. 1959), Whizz Pops, 2012, Mild steel frame, acrylic and glass spheres, optical fiber and light source, On loan from Bruce Munro Studio. Photography by Mark Pickthall.

Jorge Lopez-Yañez, tenor | Cesar Sanchez, tenor | Bernardo Bermudez, tenor

*Presented without the Nashville Symphony.

CRITICS’ PICKS

WEEKLY ROUNDUP OF THINGS TO DO

THURSDAY / 4.27

[AUSTIN ROOTS ROCK ROYALTY]

MUSIC

THE BAND OF HEATHENS

Award-winning Austin roots-rock legends The Band of Heathens will make a stop in Nashville Thursday night in support of their new album Simple Things, which at press time sits atop the Americana Radio Albums Chart. The album’s first single “Don’t Let the Darkness” was No. 4 on the Americana Radio Singles chart. After their last record, 2020’s Stranger, was made with eclectic producer Tucker Martine, Simple Things finds the group leaning more into their country-rock roots. The album features 10 inspired songs — co-written by singer-songwriter-guitarists Gordy Quist and Ed Jurdi — that address the importance of “simple things” like friends and family. “Each record, I think, is a reaction to the record before,” Quist tells the Scene from Minneapolis, the first stop on the tour. “I think this record sounds a little bit more like the band sounds live.” This is BOH’s first full-blown tour since the pandemic, and Quist says the band is excited to hit the road. “There’s just a whole new appreciation for being able to get in the same room with people and connect over music,” he says. Them Coulee Boys are the openers. 8 p.m. at The Basement East, 917 Woodland St.

DARYL SANDERS

[IT ALL COMES BACK]

MUSIC

FRUIT BATS W/ESTHER ROSE

You can always count on Fruit Bats. Stretching back to 2001, every single album from the experimental folk-rock band has been a gift, and their live set brings their carefully crafted songs into danceable performances. Even while echoing the sounds of the ’60s and ’70s, the powerhouse five-piece led by Eric Johnson is far from predictable. Somehow, with each album, the band’s sound manages to feel fresh. Their latest release, A River Running to Your Heart, is another triumph of breezy canyon vibes that serves Fruit Bats’ legacy well. Esther Rose will open Thursday, giv-

ing attendees a sweet alt-country entryway. Consistency might not be the most exciting cornerstone of indie rock, but it’s good to know there are folks out there we can trust to deliver. 8 p.m. at Brooklyn Bowl, 925 Third Ave. N. TOBY LOWENFELS

FRIDAY / 4.28

[EXPLORING A LEGACY]

DANCE

BALLET HISPÁNICO: DOÑA PERÓN

For more than 50 years, Ballet Hispánico has been dazzling audiences and making

BALLET HISPANICO: DOÑA PERÓN

good on its mission to bring “communities together to celebrate and explore Latino cultures through innovative dance productions, transformative dance training and community engagement.” This weekend, you can check out one of the company’s latest works with the Nashville premiere of Doña Perón. Choreographed by acclaimed Belgian Colombian choreographer Annabelle Lopez Ochoa and set to the music of Peter Salem, the piece first premiered in April 2022, delivering “an explosive portrait” of Eva “Evita” Perón, one of the most celebrated yet controversial figures in Argentinian history. Local audiences will certainly remember Lopez Ochoa’s incredible adaptation of A Streetcar Named Desire, which was also composed by Salem and made its U.S. company premiere at Nashville Ballet in November 2019. It’s particularly exciting to see this prolific female choreographer taking on such a strong, female-led story in the male-dominated field of dance. April 28-29 at TPAC’s Polk Theater, 505 Deaderick St. AMY STUMPFL FILM

[FREAKIN’ OUT ON THE AVENUE] MIDNIGHT MOVIES: BASKET CASE 2 & FREAKED

This weekend at the Belcourt, the Midnight Movies are all about freaks of nature. On Friday, we’ve got Basket Case 2, Frank Henenlotter’s equally messed-up 1990 sequel to his 1982 mutant horror flick about

a guy who keeps his extremely deformed twin brother in a wicker basket. This one has them living in a safe haven full of other hideous folk. Let’s just say if you’ve ever wanted to see a pile of skin and bones fuck another pile of skin and bones, this movie is for you. On Saturday, we’ll get a glorious 35 mm screening of Alex Winter and Tom Stern’s crazy-ass 1993 cult comedy Freaked, with Winter as a spoiled sitcom star who gets mutated by a freak-show proprietor (Randy Quaid) who has a bevy of geeks (some of them played by Mr. T, Bobcat Goldthwait and an uncredited Keanu Reeves) at his disposal. As batshit-insane as these movies are, they’ll remind outcast viewers that they’re not alone in this world. Midnight Friday and Saturday at the Belcourt, 2102 Belcourt Ave. CRAIG D. LINDSEY

ART [IN THE ALTOGETHER]

SAMANTHA ZARUBA’S PERSISTENT ACHE OF BABY TEETH

Local artist Samantha Zaruba paints nudes. So much so, in fact, that her Twitter display name is “Samantha paints naked people.” This weekend, as part of the massive, threemonth Tennessee Triennial — a statewide visual-arts program with the inaugural theme “RE-PAIR” — Zaruba will present her interactive exhibition Persistent Ache of Baby Teeth at Coop Gallery. “Zaruba’s latest series examines our relationship to our bodies in the modern era,” reads her

APRIL 28-29

TPAC’s Polk Theater

FRUIT BATS PHOTO: CHANTAL ANDERSON

artist’s statement, “and is a revival of work she started while studying Art at UMass Amherst.” On Friday at 6 p.m., the artist will lead a special edition of her “Paint Your Noodz” class, geared specifically toward survivors of sexual assault and domestic violence. Saturday will feature a “mirror and emotion workshop” at noon, to be followed by a public viewing of work from 6 to 9 p.m. Zaruba, who won Best Visual Artist in the Scene’s 2021 Best of Nashville Readers’ Poll, says this interactive presentation is all about having participants “shed their current identities.” Her art is colorful, alive and deeply intimate, and proceeds from sales of her original pieces will go toward the ACLU of Tennessee. Visit coopgallery.org for more details, and get ready to shed your former self. April 28-30 at Coop Gallery, 507 Hagan St. D. PATRICK RODGERS

[CUSSING AND A GRINDING]

MUSIC

RAY WYLIE HUBBARD

Ray Wylie Hubbard will turn 77 in November. Somehow, he’s getting younger by the year. Underrated but no longer underappreciated, the grizzled Texas tunesmith continues to record and tour with a level of energy, creativity and productivity that commands respect from his peers. True, Hubbard is not as acclaimed or recognizable as folks like Bob Dylan or Paul Simon, but despite never having released a hit album or single (maybe other than “Snake Farm” — because it just sounds nasty), RWH is now considered a living legend, at least by those who appreciate his

“alternative legend-ness.” Young musicians — including Larkin Poe, Ashley McBryde, Lzzy Hale and Aaron Lee Tasjan — adore Hubbard, and veteran icons such as Ringo Starr, Willie Nelson and Wynonna Judd respect and record with the man. Hubbard is a pleasant gent who’s earned his street cred, and he would likely refrain from verbally ripping into image-conscious bro-country stars. But you do have to wonder if he had them in mind when he wrote this lyric to the 2022-released song “Fancy Boys”: “Hank Williams died on New Year’s Day / In a Cadillac Fleetwood / And now fancy boys prance around on stages / Where Waylon once stood.” If you failed to buy a ticket to any one (or all) of the three sold-out RWH concerts at 3rd and Lindsley, fear not. Old Ray might be pushing 77 — but he’s got a lot of tourin’ left in him. 8 p.m. at 3rd and Lindsley, 818 Third Ave. S. WILLIAM WILLIAMS

[YOU’RE EITHER WITH ME …]

MUSIC

LAURA JANE GRACE

Punk trailblazer Laura Jane Grace is bringing explosive artistry to the Blue Room with her first headlining show in Nashville since 2019. Grace came onto the scene in the early 2000s fronting Against Me! and has since established a career as a solo artist and leading Laura Jane Grace and the Devouring Mothers. Fans and critics alike especially gravitated toward Against Me!’s 2014 album Transgender Dysphoria Blues, a raucous romp through Grace’s journey of self-discovery. Her most recent body of work, 2021’s At War With the Silverfish EP,

is a return to the acoustic punk of Against Me!’s early days with a matured perspective. Portland, Maine-based indie-rock trio Weakened Friends is set to open. 8 p.m. at The Blue Room at Third Man Records, 623 Seventh Ave. S. HANNAH CRON

SATURDAY / 4.29

[PSYCHEDELIC

MUSIC

ROCKERS]

THE MINKS

Nashville-based rock quartet The Minks will celebrate the release of their second album Creatures of Culture with a show at The Beast Saturday night, and it is an album worth celebrating. The Minks — Nikki Barber (rhythm guitar, lead vocals), Ben Giesecke (lead guitar, vocals), Henri Young (bass, vocals) and Dylan Sevey (drums, vocals) — teamed with producer Robbie Crowell on the record, and the result is a neo-psychedelic work of art that is bewitchingly groovy and highly addictive. “He didn’t try to make us sound different than ourselves, but he brought these great ideas,” Barber, who is the group’s principal lyricist, says of working with Crowell. The producer will be sitting in with the band at the show, playing mostly keys, but also saxophone on a couple of songs as he did on the record. Regarding the show, Barber adds, “I’m excited because we’re doing the record from start to finish, which is something that we’ll probably never do again.” Molly Martin and Chrome Pony are also on the bill. 8 p.m. at The Basement East, 917 Woodland St.

DARYL SANDERS

CARS [GET YOUR MOTOR RUNNIN’] SUMMER DEMO SERIES AT LANE MOTOR MUSEUM

Gearheads and vintage car enthusiasts seeking a unique automobile experience need look no further than Lane Motor Museum’s inaugural Summer Demo Series featuring the ultra-rare Gyro-X. Built in 1967, the one-of-a-kind two-wheeled vehicle is the radical result of a collaboration between famed designer Alex Tremulis and gyroscope expert Thomas Summers. The

Gyro-X utilizes a large gyroscope — similar to those found in airplanes — to provide stability while the automobile is in operation. (If you’re having trouble picturing what a two-wheeled car would look like, the museum has a video titled “Lane Motor Museum explains their 1967 Gyro-X” on its YouTube channel.) The odd concept car was created to provoke revolutionary ideas in the transportation industry during that era. Through painstaking restoration, founder Jeff Lane and the archivists at Lane Motor Museum have resurrected the Gyro-X to its original specs, just as it was exhibited in the late ’60s. The monthly family-friendly series will include some of the museum’s most distinctive automobiles and take place outdoors in the museum’s back parking lot.

Noon at Lane Motor Museum, 702 Murfreesboro Pike JASON VERSTEGEN

BOOKS

[SOMETHING FOR YOUR TO-READ STACK] INDEPENDENT BOOKSTORE DAY

There’s nothing more satisfying than browsing through bookshelves, and enough people agree that Independent Bookstore Day has become a nationwide celebration. Local bookstores are essential community hubs that foster culture, curiosity and a love of reading, and Nashville is blessed with several bookish sanctuaries. These places of refuge, escapism and education can only flourish when the community stands with local businesses (RIP, Davis-Kidd Booksellers). Luckily, quite a few of those local spots have plans for the 10th annual Independent Bookstore Day. Parnassus Books, a longtime Green Hills staple, has an all-day celebration planned, featuring author appearances, exclusive IBD merchandise and an online auction. The simply named The Bookshop is a newer space in East Nashville, but arguably no less beloved — a rising indie tide lifts all hardback boats. The Bookshop is celebrating all day as well, offering exclusive merch (in limited quantities) and giveaways galore, including a certain number of free “No Shelf-Control” iced drinks from neighboring Hanna Bee Coffee. No word yet on IBD plans at Novelette or Fairytales Books, but support our local indie booksellers none-

SAMANTHA ZARUBA’S PERSISTENT ACHE OF BABY TEETH PHOTO: ELISABETH DONALDSON

PHOTO: KYLER VOLLMAR

THE MINKS

theless! And if you aren’t able to make it out on Saturday, you can always support indies — from the comfort of your reading nook du jour — at BookShop.org. All day at various locations KARIN

MATHIS

MUSIC

[GOOD SHOW]

THE SADIES

My introduction to Ontario left-of-country foursome The Sadies was hearing their 2006 live record The Sadies: In Concert Vol. I, an album that feels more like 1966 West Coast psychedelia than Canadian roots music. The Sadies have always mined all kinds of influences, looking to create something entirely new. Founded by brothers Dallas Good and Travis Good in 1994, The Sadies have always stuck their digits into as many pies as they could. They’ve worked with Detroit soulman Andre Williams, Neil Young, X’s John Doe, Jon Langford of The Mekons and Neko Case. The band put out their 11th full-length, 2022’s Colder Streams, as their first recording in five years and a return to their spacious psych country. Tragically, Dallas Good died unexpectedly before the release. Jon Byrd & Paul Niehaus will open. 8 p.m. at City Winery, 609 Lafayette St. P.J. KINZER

[LEMONADE RECIPES]

MUSIC

MICHIGANDER

We’ve all been knocked back and had to start over. Nashville-residing songsmith Jason Singer — who makes music in a postPixies power-pop vein and is known to most as Michigander, a moniker that references his birthplace — has recently had some harrowing experiences with having to try again. As he recently explained to WNXP’s Jason Moon Wilkins, Singer was ready to hit the ground running after the COVID lockdown doldrums, and he had Michigander’s fourth EP It Will Never Be the Same all ready to go last year. Two truly terrifying and unrelated accidents — falling and breaking his leg while filming a music video, followed by his wife getting hit by a car and suffering a traumatic brain injury, from which she’s slowly but surely recovering — forced him to postpone the release and the tour. The EP was finally released March 31, and Singer and his band were able to take their heartfelt tunes, which focus on the complexities of a variety of relationships including those with yourself, on a cross-country tour. They’ll make their homecoming on Saturday at Exit/In with tourmate and fellow Nashvillian Abby Holliday, whose music explores similar themes with more dance-music influences blended in. 8 p.m. at Exit/In, 2208

Elliston Place STEPHEN TRAGESER

ART [TWO POTTERS

It’s a weird, wonderful work of a young artist in Buchanan Arts’ Young Artist Program. The program provides classes and materials to kids in middle and high school. Fees for these are donation-based, so that no child is excluded because of cost. Buchanan Arts is hosting a benefit to support this worthwhile program on Sunday, and stand-up comedy will be provided by Nashville’s own hilarious Josh Black. Keep an eye on Buchanan Arts’ Instagram (@buchanan_arts_nashville), where they’ll be revealing “experiences” you can bid on in a silent auction. So far they’ve announced dinner for two at Joyland and a watercolor class with Ripley Whiteside. Best of all, you’ll be supporting the next young genius and their vision of a frowning cat unicorn to rule us all. 2-6 p.m. at Buchanan Arts, 1409 Buchanan St. ERICA

CICCARONE

SUNDAY / 4.30

MUSIC

want to know where Miller got the line about the “pompatus of love” for his 1973 smash single “The Joker,” refer to The Medallions’ 1954 doo-wop song “The Letter.” 7:30 p.m. at FirstBank Amphitheater, 4525 Graystone Quarry Lane, Franklin EDD HURT

POETRY [GET LIT]

NASHVILLE POETRY FESTIVAL

[KEEP ON ROCKING]

THE STEVE MILLER BAND

WALK

INTO

A BAR …] COMMUNITY, CLAY AND COMEDY: A BENEFIT FOR BUCHANAN ARTS

For the past two months, I’ve been taking a pottery class at Buchanan Arts, the newish North Nashville pottery studio. The nonprofit provides quality instructors — shoutout to Cesar Pita! — chill vibes and all the materials you need to develop your skills as a ceramicist. My favorite part is exploring the pieces of other students that sit around the studio waiting to be glazed. One particular piece caught my attention last session: a tiny cat with a unicorn horn and a displeased expression on its face, sitting atop a throne.

It might be reductionist to advise you that the only essential album by Wisconsin-born singer, guitarist and songwriter Steve Miller is his 1978 Greatest Hits 1974-1978. Cut under the name of The Steve Miller Band, it collects the leader’s best — which means his catchiest and also his dumbest — post-blues, post-psychedelic forays into escapist pop. Miller grew up in Texas, where he learned guitar basics from the likes of T-Bone Walker. After a stint paying his dues in the 1960s Chicago blues scene, Miller traveled to San Francisco, where folkies like the Grateful Dead were stretching out blues and rock ’n’ roll songs. The songs on Greatest Hits 1974-1978 update California pop in a way that combines Chicago blues with Jan and Dean and The Beach Boys. My favorite big Steve Miller Band hit is 1976’s “Rock’n Me,” a simple tune that’s about feeling good in various locales across the United States — with tricked-up variations on equally basic blues and rock patterns. Miller nodded to Nashville with his 1970 quasi-country album Number 5, cut at Madison’s Cinderella Sound Studio with session cat Charlie McCoy and studio owner Wayne Moss. If you

Since its founding in 2018, the Free Nashville Poetry Library has been a bastion for the weird and wonderful literati of our town. Hosting events throughout the year and collaborating with literary and arts organizations of all stripes, the library creates space for wonderful work to be created and celebrated. We’ll see the fruits of their labor at this year’s Nashville Poetry Festival. Set outside The Packing Plant in Wedgewood-Houston, the festival will be chock-full of local artists and organizations who are doing good. You can meet youth-focused organizations like Girls Write Nashville and Hey! Young Writer; authors including graphic memoirist Malaka Gharib; indie ventures like Graeme Morris’ super cool Risology Club and the analog-philes of Low Culture Committee; indie presses Eulalia Books and April Gloaming and much, much more. You’ll be able to check out readings by C.I. Aki, J. Joseph Kane, Lagnajita Mukhopadhyay, Klyd Watkins and Dan Hoy. There will be zines and comics. There will be live typewritten poems and bad portraits of participants. There will be deep-poet voices and dramatic stagings and awkward conversations among introverts. You get all that for a $5 suggested donation, which will go toward the Nashville Free Poetry Library located inside The Packing Plant. Organizers pledge to use the funds to purchase new indie titles for the library, build new shelves and bring out-of-town poets here for events. Rent a book while you’re there. 2-7 p.m. at The Packing Plant, 507 Hagan St. ERICA CICCARONE

[JAZZ CELEBRATION]

MUSIC

NASHVILLE JAZZ WORKSHOP

April is Jazz Appreciation Month, with April 30 set aside as International Jazz Day. There’s no better place to recognize it than at Nashville Jazz Workshop, the city’s premier combination advocacy, instruction, mentorship and concert venue for the genre.

This year’s festivities will include a great concert in which the workshop’s co-founders, pianist Lori Mechem and bassist Roger Spencer, will be participants along with other notable artists in presenting some of the classic tunes in the jazz catalog as well as the Great American Songbook. For a complete rundown of workshop activities, visit the NJW website (nashvillejazz.org). 5 p.m. at Nashville Jazz Workshop, 1012 Buchanan St. RON WYNN

MONDAY / 5.1

THEATER

[JAMES’ JOURNEY]

STUDIO TENN: THE ODYSSEY OF TYRELL JAMES

One of the great things about Studio Tenn’s New Works Series is that it provides a unique opportunity for local theater lovers to get to know some really promising new playwrights and fresh Southern voices. Next up in the series is a reading of LaDarrion Williams’ The Odyssey of Tyrell James. Set in Memphis, the story follows a young Black man struggling to survive the chaos of the streets. But when Tyrell finds himself mysteriously teleported to an 1800s antebellum plantation, he learns important lessons of “self-acceptance, forgiveness and honoring one’s heritage.” Presented as a 90-minute reading, it will feature a brief talkback with the playwright — who originally hails from Alabama, and is currently based in Los Angeles — along with director Bakari J. King and Studio Tenn’s New Works Director, Webb Bankemper. Tickets are free (although a $10 donation is encouraged), and a cash bar will be available. 7 p.m. at The Mockingbird Theater at The Factory at Franklin, 230 Franklin Road, Franklin AMY STUMPFL

TUESDAY / 5.2

THEATER

[FRIEND LIKE ME] ALADDIN

Disney’s stage adaptations of their familiar animated movie musicals are a nice entry point for newcomers to the world of musical theater (you probably already know the plot!). But

PHOTO: HEATHER POLLOCK

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SAT 4.29 KARROT: A TRIBUTE TO KORN VULGAR DISPLAY • GUILLOTINE

SUN 4.30 JOHNNY SAM HALL AND HIS BIG BAD WOLVES • SHEDONIST

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seasoned theatergoers know the shows are often Tony-winning spectacles with a few surprises for audiences. Aladdin, for example, has some new characters who bring predictable but fun side plots and a few new songs (“Somebody’s Got Your Back” is especially cute and catchy), and it has the high production value you’d expect from a Mickey Mouse-backed endeavor. The show’s highlight is its take on Robin Williams’ irreplicable, larger-than-life Genie. Rather than trying to evoke Williams’ signature performance or do whatever Will Smith did in the 2019 live-action film remake (which I did not watch, to be fair), the stage show just asks a Broadway actor who oozes charisma and showbiz pizazz to … strut around the stage like a Broadway actor while oozing charisma and showbiz pizazz. The original Broadway Genie James Monroe Iglehart won a Tony for his performance back in 2014, and when you see a Genie stomp, twirl and belt their way around “Friend Like Me” — which was turned into a 10-minute show-stopping number — it’s easy to see why. May 2-7 at TPAC’s Jackson Hall, 505 Deaderick St. COLE VILLENA

[BAD FOR BUSINESS]

MUSIC

SABRINA CARPENTER

Listening to Sabrina Carpenter may bring to mind a number of other current pop artists: Ariana Grande, Selena Gomez, even Olivia Rodrigo. But her latest album proves she’s more than “that blond girl” in the latter’s songs. Her 2022 album emails i can’t send has its danceable moments, (“Fast Times” and “bet u wanna”) but Carpenter isn’t afraid to bare her soul, either. “Because i liked a boy” sums up the crossfire she found herself caught in during the past few years, and the longing in “skinny dipping” and “how many things” will put you in your feels. It’s her fifth studio album, another entry in an already decade-plus career for the 23-year-old who’s probably best known for her role on the Disney Channel reboot Girl Meets World. Carpenter is going for it in the pop space, and I respect the heck out of her for it. Her show at the Ryman is bound to serve tea, a great outfit and another special verse on “Nonsense.” 7:30 p.m. at the Ryman, 116 Rep. John Lewis Way N. HANNAH HERNER

MUSIC

A PHASE BUT A LIFESTYLE] THE SUMMER SET W/GRAYSCALE & TAYLOR ACORN

[NOT

Between new Fall Out Boy and Brendon Urie’s breakup with himself, it’s feeling suspiciously like 2009, and emo kids just can’t catch a breath. Now The Summer Set is back from hiatus and thriving, returning to Nashville to promote their 2022 album Blossom alongside Grayscale and Taylor Acorn. A beloved product of the Aughts, The Summer Set delivers honest lyrics and a signature brand of feel-good pop that led the quartet to an incredible string of success throughout their career — including sold-out, worldwide tours and working alongside numerous musical acts like The Cab, Mayday Parade and Sleeping With Sirens. Welcome back, TSS; I’d turn around and come back to you any day.

7:30 p.m. at The Basement East, 917 Woodland St. KARIN MATHIS

MUSIC [A FLUID SUCCESSION OF PRESENTS]

KAMASI WASHINGTON W/AMI TAF RA

If you’ve ever daydreamed about what it would be like to be a jazz fan at a pivotal time in the music’s history, it’s worth pointing out that you’re living in one. During the past decade, a diverse array of musicians has been reimagining the historic and multifaceted collection of traditions called “jazz,” and a prominent figure among them is tenor saxman, composer and bandleader Kamasi Washington. The spotlight trained on him in the wake of his breakout 2015 triple album The Epic — a fitting title for such an expansive, exploratory and stylistically diverse work — and he’s been steadily refining and growing his approach since then. Among his recent projects is a supergroup of sorts called Dinner Party, in which he’s partnered up with Terrace Martin, Robert Glasper and 9th Wonder to showcase the intimate connections between jazz and another rich and storied Black art form, hip-hop. Dinner Party released a new LP called Enigmatic Society April 14, right before appearances at Coachella and on Jimmy Kimmel Live!

Washington returns to Music City on Tuesday as part of a decidedly more intimate run of shows at several of the City Winery locations. He’ll be joined by Moroccan Dutch vocalist Ami Taf Ra, who explores the relationship between jazz and traditional music from the Arab world. 7:30 p.m. at City Winery, 609 Lafayette St. STEPHEN TRAGESER

PHOTO: RUSSELL HAMILTON

KAMASI WASHINGTON

Saturday, April 29

SONGWRITER SESSION

Trannie Anderson

NOON · FORD THEATER

Sunday, April 30

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT

Billy Justineau

1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 6

SONGWRITER SESSION

Madeline Edwards

NOON · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 6th

HATCH SHOW PRINT

Block Party

3:00 pm · HATCH SHOW PRINT SHOP

LIMITED AVAILABILITY

Sunday, May 7

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT

Mike Rogers

1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 13

SONGWRITER SESSION

Jenn Schott

NOON · FORD THEATER

Sunday, May 14

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT

Joseph Wooten

1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 20

SONGWRITER SESSION

Alex Hall

NOON · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 20

NASHVILLE CATS

Brent Mason

2:30 pm · FORD THEATER

Sunday, May 21

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT

Laura Weber White 1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Check our calendar for a full schedule of upcoming programs and events.

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Puma Blue w/ Lutalo

Shame w/ Been Stellar

The Nude Party w/ Fonteyn

Peter Cat Recording Co. w/ Altered Statesman

Hoodoo Gurus

Bury Tomorrow w/ Hollow Front, Afterlife, & Siamese

Parker Millsap

Festival de Rock en Español

joan w/ Harriette NEKROGOBLIKON feat. Special Guests + Inferi, Aether realm, Hunt The Dinosaur

Sueco w/ Teenage Disaster

Danielle Bradbery w/ CB30

The Ritualists w/ Rusty Shipp (7pm) Wayne Graham w/ Jeremy Short (9pm)

GET HAPPIER FRIDAYS: Bre Kennedy, Wayland, OTNES, Crocodyle (6pm)

VOLK w/ The Love-In (7pm)

NINE POUND HAMMER w/ Hans Condor & Eagle Johnson (9pm)

Stoop Kids, Madeleine, Jake Etheridge (7pm)

Stevie Rae Stephens, Becca Tremmel, The Imaginaries, Zach Meadows, Andi Jane and the Honky Tonk Cabaret, Anthony Adams (7pm)

The Talbott Brothers, Fox & Bones (7pm)

Logan Halstead (7pm)

GET HAPPIER FRIDAYS: Gloom Girl MFG, Highway Natives, The Weird Sisters, Pet Envy (6pm)

Eggy (8pm)

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Alex Cuba w/ Gustavo Moradel, Karina Daza, Marta Albarracin (7pm)

VINJE w/ Meryl Rudy (7pm)

Claire Vandiver w/ Suzie Chism (7pm)

Shakira Chinchilla, Johnny Sam Hall & His Big Bad Wolves, Henry Cruz Band

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LAO’D AND PROUD

Exploring Middle Tennessee’s rich Laotian food scene

BY CLARA WANG

Restaurants serving Laotian food, like C.R. Noodle House in La Vergne and King Market in Antioch, have been in the Nashville area for more than a decade. But many people may not even know what Lao food is, or that a steady stream of immigrants from Laos — a small landlocked country at the heart of the Indochinese Peninsula, bordered by China, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam — has been flowing here for more than two decades.

In fact, Middle Tennessee houses one of the largest Laotian communities in the U.S., with roughly 7,000 Laotian Americans spread out around Nashville, Murfreesboro, La Vergne and Smyrna. (Members of the Laotian community will participate in the

Lao New Year Celebration May 26 through 28 at Wat Lao Buddharam in Murfreesboro.) If dishes like larb, papaya salad or curry sound familiar, then you’ve probably had Laotian food in Nashville before — just in a “Thai” restaurant.

Americans are becoming more receptive to more and more international cuisine thanks to globalization and the COVID-19-inspired wave of traveling through food. And more Laotian restaurant owners who used to hang their hats on the more recognizable “Thai food” label are opening Lao-specific restaurants. Now a new generation of young Laotian Americans in the Nashville area is embracing their heritage, culture and food.

FOOD TO FEED EVERYONE

Laotian food incorporates the best parts of many Southeast Asian cuisines. Flavors are bright and fresh, often steeped in the savory umami of fish sauce (a staple) or fired up with the heat of tiny crushed cayenne peppers. Dishes are universally garnished with Thai basil, mint and kaffir lime leaves. Padaek, or fermented freshwater fish paste, is used in everything, and gives Lao papaya salad a unique saltiness compared

to the sweeter Thai version. Sticky rice is another staple, and traditionally eaten with the hands in tiny balls that are used to grab food from communal plates. Rice noodle soups, like khao piak (Lao chicken noodle soup), are slightly more savory than pho, and their curries use more lime and padaek. Their national dish, larb — which represents “luck” — is a chopped pork salad served either raw or cooked, typically accompanied by a soup made from the bones of the meat being used.

C.R. Noodle House, founded by Somphong Rattanavong 12 years ago and named after his children Crystal and Ron, sits in a converted Asian grocery store in La Vergne (down the road from a Thai restaurant with Laotian owners). Somphong’s immigration story resembles that of many of the firstgeneration Laotian immigrants I spoke with — he landed in New Mexico thanks to a church sponsorship after fleeing the communist regime in 1981, and moved to Tennessee in 1990 to work in the factories around La Vergne before opening the restaurant. Ron, who was born in New Mexico after the family immigrated from a Thai refugee camp, now runs the restaurant, but his father still goes

to Saeng Produce every morning to handpick fresh produce. Somphong wakes up at 7 a.m. three times a week to cook their signature pho (which Ron says is thicker and more seasoned than Vietnamese pho).

“It makes him happy to see the community say his food’s good,” Ron says of his father. “It’s a compliment to him.”

Back around the time when C.R. Noodle House opened, owners of many Laotian restaurants — such as Thai Papaya, Thai Esane and King Siam — advertised their food as “Thai” due to wider recognition, similar to the way their Thai or Korean predecessors would often open Chinese restaurants. Both Ron and another Laotian community organizer, Loi Sivilay (vice president of strategic development for the National Association of Asian American Professionals of Tennessee), attribute the recent shift in attitude to globalization and COVID-19. Many Americans unable to travel during lockdown were inspired to try different types of cuisines. Eateries like SaBaiDee Cafe, Laovin It, South Ahan, Sitane Market & Deli and Xingha Sab Bor Lao proliferate in Middle Tennessee cities including Columbia and Murfreesboro.

“A lot of Thai restaurants around here

THE LAO NEW YEAR CELEBRATION WILL TAKE PLACE MAY 26-28 AT WAT LAO BUDDHARAM IN MURFREESBORO

C.R. NOODLE HOUSE’S PANANG DUCK PHOTOS: ERIC ENGLAND

are owned by Laotian owners,” says Sivilay. “Now more and more Laos food is being celebrated.”

Over a huge meal of Laotian specialties at C.R. Noodle House with Ron, his family and a few Laotian community members, I spoke to Sivilay’s daughter Taylor Akhom and her friend, who are both freshmen at Belmont University. These second-generation Laotian American Gen Z-ers feel at ease with their Laotian heritage. Akhom occasionally wears Laotian traditional dress just because, and when asked about Laotian food, Akhom cites a romantic scene between Peter and May from 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming

“Larb got very popular after Spider-Man. … ‘I larb you.’”

THE NEXT GENERATION OF LAOTIAN AMERICAN FOOD

Chef Nokie Bayluangrath started the food truck Laovin It in 2016 to service the Nashville area, and opened South Ahan in Columbia in March of this year. (While she’s focusing on South Ahan at the moment, she plans to resume operations with Laovin It in Nashville soon.) Laovin It serves up street classics like chicken basil fried rice, sai oua

(Laotian sausages) and hearty beef pho with shrimp. The bricks-and-mortar South Ahan continues the tradition with additional Thai and Vietnamese selections.

Bayluangrath was born in Laos and moved to Alabama from a Thai refugee camp when she was 3. Her family relocated to Nashville in 1992.

“When we first moved to [the] Nashville [area], there weren’t even a handful of Laotian restaurants within driving distance,” says Bayluangrath. “Now there’s one on every corner, especially in Murfreesboro.”

When Bayluangrath was growing up, her mom worked in a Thai restaurant and was a renowned cook in the Laotian community. Bayluangrath inherited her cooking skills — along with her recipe for jeow bong (spicy chili paste), which she also sells on her website. She’s excited to continue spreading knowledge of Lao food and hospitality.

“It’s very unique being Laotian here in Nashville, because people don’t know about our culture, they don’t know who we are,” says Bayluangrath. “I guess that’s why I’m in this career field.”

“But we love to cook, we love to serve others through food, we have big hearts.”

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615 DELI — THE MILANESA SANDWICH— $9

The rock-solid Belmont-area deli isn’t just for students

BY KELSEY BEYELER

Don’t write off 615 Deli as a spot solely for Belmont University students. It certainly is that, but the great little sandwich shop on Portland Avenue near Belmont’s campus boasts a huge variety of options for 10 bucks or cheaper. The menu features breakfast items, sandwiches, wraps, burritos, burgers, salads and more. So far, everything I’ve tried has been solid.

My go-to order is the Milanesa, a sandwich with breaded chicken, jalapeños, bacon, pepper-jack cheese and mayo on ciabatta bread. The chicken is always crispy, the bacon adds an extra layer of savory flavor, the peppers liven up the sandwich, and the cheese ties it all together. I add hot sauce to just about everything I eat, and I appreciate that 615 Deli provides several varieties. Another source (Scene contributor Connor Daryani) tells me the deli’s breakfast burrito is one of the best in town.

The food is affordable, tasty and filling, and it’s enough to make me a happy, repeat customer. Because of its proximity to Belmont, it can get busy on weekday afternoons while classes are in session. But with summer break coming up, there will be plenty of opportunities to check it out without getting lost in the onslaught of students.

615 DELI 1703-B PORTLAND AVE.

PHOTO: ANGELINA CASTILLO

C.R. NOODLE HOUSE’S

SIGNATURE PHO

CHEF NOKIE BAYLUANGRATH

PHOTO: EDDIE BAY

PHOTO: ERIC ENGLAND

2023 Spring Farm Dinner

A CELEBRATION OF EVERYTHING ALIVE AND WHOLE

BY SARA BETH WEST

In her career as a poet, Ada Limón has been much celebrated. Her 2018 collection, The Carrying, won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry, and her work has been nominated for the National Book Award and Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award as well. She was named the 24th U.S. Poet Laureate in 2022. Her latest collection, The Hurting Kind, has been lauded for the way it blends the mysterious with the ordinary, the everyday with the exceptional. Her work is known for being accessible while still elevating readers, urging them into wonder and curiosity.

Originally from Sonoma, Calif., Limón now makes her home in Lexington, Ky. She recently spoke with the Scene by phone. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

The idea of making music or singing crops up frequently in your work. Do you see yourself as making music with your poems? Unlike the incredible musicians we have both in Tennessee and Kentucky as well as all over the world, poets don’t get to work with all the music. We don’t get to have the guitarist and the bass line and the drums. We have to make all of that on the page. And so the whole poem has to be the song, and it has to have all the instruments and all the harmonies and the melodies. And I feel like when I’m writing, I’m aware of that. There is a type of singing that’s happening, and the singing is spoken, of course. But there is a level in which the musicality is high, especially in the work I’m most drawn to.

The other part of that is there’s a way that singing calms us, like the way you sing to a child or the way you come into communion or in community with other people. Singing together is such a powerful bond, and I think that way of making music on the page and offering something back to the world is a kind of rebellion, but also a celebration at the same time — a rebellion against everything that is suffering. But then also, a celebration of everything that’s alive and whole.

In both The Hurting Kind and The Carrying, the opening poems focus on a woman seeing and knowing an animal and then turning that knowing gaze back on herself — wanting to be similarly known and seen. What makes animals such an effective tool for this reflective process? It’s true. It didn’t take me very long to realize that The Hurting Kind is a book of animals. I knew it.

This is a book of animals, but it’s also about ancestors. It’s the animal ancestors, right?

So much so that I remember thinking, I want to write a poem about my brother and snakes, because I felt like there were no snakes. I needed to have some snakes. So I was actually making some poems based on the recognition I was in the Kingdom Animalia. I think my curiosity and my interest in them is that we just don’t know anything, and the best scientists and all of the people who work really closely with animals, they know a lot. But there is still such a mystery.

In the past couple of years, when I’ve started seeds under a grow lamp, I loved watching them slowly become the thing that would go into the ground, somewhat like the way a poem can live inside you for a while before it’s ready to take shape. How has the act of gardening or being in the natural world spoken into your work over the years? Yeah. It’s funny. I think that there are years when I’ve traveled, and so I’ve planted but then never tended. And then I just see what happens. And then there have also been moments when it has become an obsession, and I want everything to be perfect, to grow the most perfect tomato you’ve ever seen. But what I love about it is that you just can’t control it.

It’s not unlike poetry. It’s not unlike writing. You can think that you know the outcome, but in reality, nature is going to do its thing, and a poem is going to do its thing. You might think, Oh, I’m going to start out by writing this poem with this memory. And then in reality another poem happens on the page right in front of you, and you weren’t even prepared for what it was going to tell you or teach you. Often people will call what we write drafts, but to me a draft is a little more finished. So when I do workshops, especially if I say we’re going to write something in five minutes, and then move everything around, I say they’re not drafts — they’re seeds.

To read an uncut version of this interview — and more local book coverage — please visit Chapter16.org, an online publication of Humanities Tennessee.

HOMEWARD BOUND

BY RACHEL CHOLST

Mya Byrne is racking up plenty of firsts. She is the first openly trans artist to be played on WSM. Her album Rhinestone

Tomboy, out Friday, will be the first album on legendary indie label Kill Rock Stars’ Nashville imprint. The music video for Byrne’s song “It Don’t Fade” includes a kiss with her partner, fellow songwriter Swan Real; the video premiered on CMT, and as best they can tell, it is the first kiss shared between two trans women on a national broadcast. The pair repeated their kiss during their performance at Bridgestone Arena for the Love Rising concert on March 20 — almost certainly the first to occur on that stage.

But even as Byrne celebrates her album and embraces representing trans women in country music, she and others in the trans community are bracing themselves for a backlash. The Tennessee state legislature passing laws banning certain drag

performances in public spaces and genderaffirming care for youth is a symptom of social and political problems that run much deeper.

“Our joy is resistance,” Byrne observes. “The real revolutionary thing is just showing up as a trans person in any space. You’re fighting the power by just walking down the street.”

Byrne brought that sense of joyful urgency to her performance at Love Rising, a benefit for a variety of nonprofits that offer resources to LGBTQ Tennesseans.

“I really wasn’t sure what I was going to say, to be perfectly honest,” Byrne recalls. While many of the performers and organizers encouraged those in the crowd to register to vote, Byrne exhorted the audience to take direct action and protest.

She points out that gerrymandering and other kinds of interference can limit individuals’ electoral voices, but people can make their power seen and felt in statehouses where laws attacking trans au-

tonomy are up for debate. This sentiment comes through loud and clear in Byrne and Paisley Fields’ recent collaboration “Burn This Statehouse Down.” But for the most part, Byrne recalls the love she felt in the arena, both from the audience and from Swan Real.

“The power of my love with my partner Swan when we sang ‘Easy to Love’ together, and I just started crying. … Those 15,000 to 18,000 people disappeared, and it was just her and me, singing to each other in that moment. And when we kissed, it was for real.”

Byrne grew up in New Jersey, steeped in Jewish culture and her parents’ love of Coltrane, The Beatles, The Byrds, Beethoven and Crosby Stills and Nash. As a teenager and young adult in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Byrne would take herself into the city, getting off the PATH train at the Christopher Street stop and exploring the singer-songwriter scene in Greenwich Village. To get to the Village, you go left when leaving the station; Byrne jokes that if she had turned right instead, toward the Christopher Street piers that were home to trans revolutionaries like Sylvia Rivera, she would have met role models much, much sooner.

By the mid-Aughts, Byrne was integral to a downtown scene of musicians that included Aaron Lee Tasjan, who produced Byrne’s album. Though the two were friends, Tasjan — who is gay — and Byrne were not out to each other at the time. The scene changed drastically after 9/11, and even more following the recession in 2008, with money for the arts drying up and venues closing down. While her band The Ramblers became a staple of New York’s roots-rock scene, Byrne found her opportunities restricted when she came out as trans in 2014. She sought a reinvention on the West Coast, where she turned her attention to rock and punk music in general and queercore specifically. With no representation for trans women in country music, Byrne felt it was best to focus her efforts where she would be welcomed. Eventually, she connected with queer country artist Cindy Emch of Secret Emchy Society, and began re-engaging with her country roots. The deal was sealed when Byrne began playing with queer country pioneer Patrick Haggerty as part of the Lavender Country revival — they met through mutual queercore friends. Onstage with Haggerty — who died last year at age 78 — Byrne met Paisley Fields.

In 2019, Emch reconnected Byrne with Mercy Bell, a Nashville-based singersongwriter who Byrne also knew from New York. Through a queer country showcase that fall — set up by Karen & the Sorrows’ Karen Pittelman and also featuring Bell and Fields — Byrne played Nashville as herself for the first time. She finally felt like she’d come home, musically.

Byrne began working on what would become Rhinestone Tomboy during COVID lockdown, but felt it wasn’t coming together. As conversations about diversity began rippling through American society in 2020, queer country artists found a huge boost of well-deserved recognition. Byrne and Tasjan reconnected, with Tasjan enthusiastically agreeing to work with Byrne on the album.

“It was the most comfortable space,” says Byrne. “Because of this space that Aaron created for me, I was able to fly. I was able to do things I never thought I could do.”

Together, Byrne and Tasjan created a cosmic country tapestry that threads the needle between their past on the Lower East Side and their futures in Nashville. There are tinges of power pop, with crunchy guitars and ferocious solos, though the roots are firmly planted in folk and country. Byrne sounds confident and relaxed as she sings about perseverance, self-belief and the work it takes to keep relationships strong.

She actively seeks to share her platform with other trans artists — particularly trans women. But she can’t do it alone.

“I wanna see people like Chris Stapleton stand with me,” Byrne says. “I am no longer going to beg cis people to stand with us, but I do want to collaborate. By doing that, you say, ‘I stand with trans people. … If you don’t stand with trans people, you don’t stand with me.’”

Byrne has a message for her trans audience as well.

“Just remember that we are winning. If we weren’t at this precipice, people wouldn’t be pushing back so hard to eradicate us. We are legion, we are everywhere.”

Mya Byrne draws strength to be herself on Rhinestone Tomboy

RHINESTONE TOMBOY OUT FRIDAY, APRIL 28, VIA KILL ROCK STARS NASHVILLE PHOTO: LAUREN TABAK

THE SPIN

FOR THE RECORD

BY STEPHEN TRAGESER AND HANNAH CRON

Saturday at Vinyl Tap, the vibe for Record Store Day was family-friendly and generally laid-back, despite the crowd filling what seemed like every available inch inside the combination bar, venue and record store, as well as most of the roped-off outdoor space populated with vendor pop-ups. A large tent covered a substantial portion of the tree-lined backyard, including a concrete pad housing the building’s HVAC units that is conveniently large enough to accommodate a full band and a P.A. as well.

Moods and styles varied widely among the musicians on the bill. Here was Faux Ferocious, kicking up an ominous cloud of choogling psych punk, there was thoughtful singer-songwriter and Dr. Dog drummer Eric Slick, riffing on ’70s pop and R&B with his snare-tight band and reveling in being a frontman with Nile Rodgers-meets-Todd Rundgren guitar solos. But the common message was gratitude for community, and the opportunity to be together and use art to process the sometimes-overwhelming complexities of the world we live in.

Among myriad highlights was William Tyler and the Impossible Truth’s set of cosmic pastoral majesty morphing into a William Tyler Band and Friends-type show — e.g., an occasion when Tyler & Co. serve as a backing band for some great singers. Slick came up to take the lead on John Cale’s wistful “Big White Cloud,” while Erin Rae did Patty Loveless’ buoyant 1989 hit “Timber, I’m Falling in Love.” Earlier, Rae played a set of her own gently folk-rockin’ tunes, including the perennial favorite “Modern Woman,” a slyly funny song digging at the absurdity of holding onto sexist ideas.

Lexi Von Simmons, a top-rated contender in local drag competition Sissi who was also part of a crew invited to perform at Lizzo’s recent Knoxville show, teed up stellar soul singer-songwriter Alanna Royale and her phenomenal band. They kicked off with “Cruel Cruel World,” a fast-paced number examining how hard it is to persevere when our social and political issues feel so huge. Everyone has good reasons to be angry about Tennessee’s newly passed legislation limiting gender-affirming care for youth, but it’s very personal for Royale: She explained that her trans brother suffered profound dysphoria and struggled with addiction before his transition. “I don’t want to watch people get ground to fucking dust,” Royale said. “People like my brother, who’s now 2,000 days sober and in law school, deserve to live, and live righteously.”

Songsmith and bandleader Annie DiRusso has polished her natural knack for working through things that make entering adulthood miserable, with sweet-and-sour hooks pushed through amps at maximum volume. Her set included early fan favorite “Don’t Swerve,” about unrequited love, and “Emerson,” a song about an uneasy relationship with nostalgia that’s on DiRusso’s new EP

God, I Hate This Place. Despite getting interrupted by a brief power outage, she and her band — who performed under the nom de plume “Dead Dogs,” and who played a second set later at The Groove — seemed to be having a blast.

Joelton Mayfield has been winning over audiences with his excellent Southernrock-schooled band and his songs about the

uphill battle of maintaining integrity and dignity in a world where vulnerable people too often get overlooked and sidelined. A friend opined that Mayfield is destined to break into the realm of Americana, where great songwriting draws flocks of fans to folks like Jason Isbell and Tyler Childers. That seems like a good bet, considering that Mayfield has songs in his catalog like “The

Reason,” which explores a huge range of emotional complexities in a small space. The crowd thinned considerably by 5:30 p.m., when masterful rapper $avvy took the stage to close out the show. But he was unfazed, and he stoked the party energy with a variety of crowd-participation moves and grooving, R&B-kissed songs from both his 2021 EP Boys Wear Pearls and his 2022 fulllength Poor. The whole room seemed to be bouncing as one by the time he wrapped his set with “Zack & Cody,” with a special guest appearance from his twin brother Fred

A couple miles away at The Groove, Acme Radio Live presented a solid lineup of locals representing a similarly broad spectrum of genres and sharing a similarly communityoriented mood. Rapper Brian Brown oozed charisma — not many artists could pull off performing an entire set while brandishing a Power Rangers sword, but he made it seem natural. Brown treated the crowd to January’s Two Minute Drill EP in its entirety, plus a few unreleased songs. Brown’s set was a roller coaster: Within 40 minutes he condemned gentrification and politicians who seem to have more interest in tourists than residents, blew out the candles on his 30th birthday cake and gleefully shouted out Jim Carrey. The bubble machines onstage were the cherry on top of the lively set, as Brown noted: “I’m rappin’ with bubbles? This shit crazy!”

Next up was R&B singer-songwriter Jamiah, whose early-afternoon set was postponed due to technical issues. A surprise downpour also punctuated her performance, but Jamiah took it all in stride, as she jokingly told the crowd, “The devil did not want me to sing, y’all!” Despite the setbacks, Jamiah performed a stunning run of her own songs, like her self-love anthem “Good on Me,” plus a few choice covers. If R&B-leaning pop stars like Ariana Grande are in your wheelhouse but you prefer a more intimate and organic presentation, you owe it to yourself to check out Jamiah as soon as possible.

Indie rockers Future Crib played next. Lyrically, singer Johnny Hopson & Co. aren’t bringing anything to the table that you’ve never heard before, but they pulled off some impressive sonic feats. Their sound bounced between dream pop, folk and even U2-esque arena rock. Last year, the group’s longtime drummer left to focus on his solo work, and the remaining members rotated between their instruments with nary a hitch.

Jive Talk made their commitment to putting on an electrifying show apparent from the second they took the stage in matching denim work shirts. Their performance was a little bit of The Killers, a little bit of the Bee Gees and a whole lot of the quintet’s own glowing energy. Lead singer Oliver Pierce tore up the stage in camo Crocs as the band reeled off songs from their latest single “Everything Always” to ones from deep in their catalog.

“I remember when I first moved here, I came to [Record Store Day at The Groove] and I thought, ‘By golly, I wanna play it,’” Pierce told the crowd. Though the number of live shows in Nashville for Record Store Day has dwindled a bit over the years, the ones that remain are doing their damnedest to make our diverse collection of music communities feel a bit more unified.

EMAIL THESPIN@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

PHOTO: CLAIRE STEELE

PHOTO: ROB HINKAL

PHOTO: ROB HINKAL

ALANNA ROYALE AT VINYL TAP

BRIAN BROWN AT THE GROOVE

Nashville’s longest running FREE movie screening returns this summer to Elmington Park, every Thursday in June. Enjoy games, giveaways and food truck fare before taking in a fan-favorite film under the stars.

BY CRAIG D. LINDSEY

Now that last year’s Oscarwinning, epic Indian smash RRR has convinced mainstream movie audiences that Bollywood cinema can be awesome as hell, relentlessly entertaining films featuring South Asians dancing, fighting and doing other badass things on screen will hopefully show up more often on U.S. screens. Focus Features is already coming out the gate with Polite Society, a coming-of-age yarn that, while not set in a South Asian country, does have brown-skinned characters doing wild and crazy shit for your amusement.

Set in London, Society is a tale of two sisters. Ria (Priya Kansara, wide-eyed and spunk-filled) is a British Pakistani teen who longs to be a stuntwoman. Calling herself “The Fury,” she even has a YouTube channel where she tries to pull off high-flying stunt moves. Ria also serves as a cheerleader for her older sister Lena (Ritu Arya), an art-school dropout stuck in a weed-smoking rut.

Ria smells trouble when her big sis starts dating a studly doctor (Akshaye

Khanna) with a mother (a scenery-devouring Nimra Bucha) who’s hellbent on getting her boy hitched. Along with her two best gal pals (Ella Bruccoleri and Seraphina Beh), Ria hatches a highly farcical plan to break up these two, especially when Lena drops her artistic aspirations and accepts ol’ boy’s proposal.

With Society, writer-director Nida Manzoor is obviously angling to be the female, Pakistani British Edgar Wright. Manzoor has admitted that Wright is one of her influences, along with the films of Jackie Chan (whose influence is also apparent in Polite Society). Just like Wright, she began her directing career helming a British sitcom — her own creation We Are Lady Parts — that aired in the U.K. on Channel 4.

Much like most of Wright’s filmography, Society is a hyper-stylized, super-selfreferential action-comedy in which a nebbish, somewhat deluded individual becomes a literal superhero when danger is afoot. Indeed, Manzoor pads this film with manic quick cuts, erratic sound effects and a whip pan or two. She also stages prop-obliterating fight scenes that you wouldn’t normally ex-

pect in a film about two young sisters beginning to drift apart.

And just like Wright, Manzoor doesn’t know when to quit. Wright tends to let his films get away from him, shying away from reality and getting batshit-insane in his third acts. That also happens here, as Manzoor predictably has our protagonist stumbling upon something that proves her sister’s mama’s-boy of a fiancé is not as perfect as he seems. (Yeah, it’s nuts.)

I see what Manzoor is doing with Society

She ramps up the girl power to 11, her young Pakistani protagonist literally fighting her way through traditional, oppressive norms in order for her and her sister to live their lives on their own terms. But things get a bit too fantastical, as if Manzoor knew she had to bring the heightened pyrotechnics for today’s comic-book-movie audiences. She’s all-in with the impressively staged nonsense near the film’s end.

While Society may be too wackadoo and over-the-top for my tastes, young women who’d like to see more ladies their age kick a little ass on screen might take a liking to it. Hell, this could even make a good double feature with Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret., also hitting theaters this weekend. All I’m saying is, don’t be surprised if you see a lot of teenage girls whizzing past you at the multiplex in the coming days.

POLITE SOCIETY NR, 103 MINUTES OPENING FRIDAY, APRIL 28, AT THE BELCOURT AND REGAL AND AMC LOCATIONS

ACROSS

1 Parts of a horse’s bloodline

6 Lavender, for instance

10 Gave birth to

13 One of the main roles on “30 Rock”

14 Vacation rental craft

15 Name in “one liners”

16 Officer in charge of a military unit

18 Maker of Colortrak TVs, once

19 H.S.T.’s successor

20 The First Lady of Civil Rights

21 TV’s Don Draper, for one

23 Bibliographical abbr.

24 Line at a pool hall

25 Collective opinion

30 Crack squad

31 Speak highly of

32 Grow (from)

33 One of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy

35 “Later!”

39 End of a movement

40 Most Yemenis

41 British Empire trade entity founded in 1600

46 Crow known to sing

47 ___-chic (fashion style)

48 Step on it

49 Weeper of Greek myth

51 Actress ___ Dawn Chong of “The Color Purple”

54 High school subj.

55 Mass method for seeking input

58 Whose sculpture faces a 2,000-footlong reflecting pool, familiarly

59 Eavesdropping sort, maybe

60 G.P.A. booster

61 “Far out!”

62 It keeps going in circles

63 Apprehension DOWN

1 Very high

2 Pressed, as clothes

3 What hearts and horses might do

4 “Green” starter

5 Sign that you have something

6 Hair piece

7 Word with split or loose

8 Sturgeon product

9 Really let have it

10 Student at Hogwarts

11 Noted criminal whose name starts with the same first four letters as where he was imprisoned

12 Fashion designer von Fürstenberg

14 ___ Rossi (wine brand)

17 Palindromic term of address

22 One serving a queen

23 Wax-wrapped wheel

24 Close 25 Portrayed

26 Hairy member of the Addams family

27 “Can’t you ___?”

28 Gently suggest, as an idea

29 Path to enlightenment

33 Number prominently featured on a GoFundMe page

34 Ramps might connect them: Abbr.

35 Many a jazz ensemble

36 Driver’s org.

37 Steak option

38 Unified

39 Like some black tea

40 Stuck (to)

41 Rockets frequently travel in this

42 Played it safe, in a way

43 Romantic ___

44 Former Apple laptop

45 Celebrity chef Matsuhisa, or his restaurant chain

46 Bit of gear in Dungeons & Dragons

49 “Seriously, don’t bother”

50 Brit’s “My word!”

51 “All ___”

52 “The Queen’s Gambit” actress ___ TaylorJoy

53 “Holy Toledo!”

56 Without a break

57 Tesla, for one

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE

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FAMILY COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK COUNTY OF ONEIDA

In the Matter of an Article

6 Custody/Visitation

Proceeding File #: 33868

Docket#:V-01489-22

Deborah Bryden (Petitioner)

Alex Bryden (Petitioner)

Rikki L. Swackhammer (Respondent)

Roy M. Swackhammer Jr. (Respondent)

Charles W. Rayburn Jr (DOB: 01/05/2010)

SUMMONS- GENERAL (IN PERSON)

To: Rikki L. Swackhammer 1828 Second Street Salisbury, NC 28144

Roy M. Swackhammer Jr. 1828 Second Street Salisbury, NC 28144

A petition under Article 6 of the Family Court Act has been led with this Court. YOU ARE HEREBY SUMMONED to appear IN PERSON before this Court on: Date/Time/Part: June 15, 2023 at 09:00 AM in Part VI

Purpose: Pre-Trial Conference, Respondent to Appear or Default, and First Appearance

Presiding: Peter Angelini, Court Attorney Referee Location: Rome- County Of ce Building, 301 West Dominick Street, Rome, NY 13440 Floor:

1 Room: VI to answer the attached petition and to be dealt with in accordance with the Family Court Act Please bring this notice with you and check in with the Court Of cer in the Part. If you fail to appear as directed, a warrant may be issued for your arrest. Dated: March 27, 2023 Amy Lawter, Chief Clerk

NOTICE: FAMILY COURT ACT §154(C) PROVIDES THAT PETITIONS BROUGHT PURSUANT TO ARTICLES 4, 5, 6, 8 AND 10 OF THE FAMILY COURT ACT, IN WHICH AN ORDER OF PROTECTION IS SOUGHT OR IN WHICH A VIOLATION OF AN ORDER OF PROTECTION IS ALLEGED, MAY BE SERVED OUTSIDE THE STATE OF NEW YORK UPON

A RESPONDENT WHO IS NOT A RESIDENT OR DOMICILIARY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

IF NO OTHER GROUNDS FOR OBTAINING PERSONAL JURISDICTION OVER THE RESPONDENT EXIST ASIDE FROM THE APPLICATION OF THIS PROVISION, THE EXERCISE OF PERSONAL JURISDICTION OVER THE RESPONDENT IS LIMITED TO THE ISSUE OF THE REQUEST FOR, OR ALLEGED VIOLATION OF, THE ORDER OF PROTECTION. WHERE THE RESPONDENT HAS BEEN SERVED WITH THIS SUMMONS AND PETITION AND DOES NOT APPEAR, THE FAMILY COURT MAY PROCEED TO A HEARING WITH RESPECT TO ISSUANCE OR ENFORCEMENT OF THE ORDER OF PROTECTION.

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