METROPOLITIK: ELECTION COMMISSION PUTS ANTI-TAX MEASURE ON BALLOT, DECLINES THE SAME FOR COUNCIL
MAY 20–26, 2021 I VOLUME 40 I NUMBER 16 I NASHVILLESCENE.COM I FREE
MUSIC: THE LATEST ON NEW RELEASES FROM LAMBCHOP AND THE BLACK KEYS
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Summer GUIDE
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NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
CONTENTS
MAY 20, 2021
7
31
Metropolitik: The Mess Drags On .............7
The Curvature of the World
CITY LIMITS
BOOKS
After putting an anti-tax measure on the ballot, the Davidson County Election Commission declines to do the same with a Metro Council alternative
Great Circle explores the interconnected lives surrounding a fictional woman aviator
BY STEVE CAVENDISH
32
The Fight Over Tennessee’s Death Penalty Goes On .........................................7 The cases of Pervis Payne and Sedley Alley highlight issues of intellectual disability and possible innocence
BY EMILY CHOATE AND CHAPTER 16
MUSIC
Respect Your Elders ................................ 32
BY STEVEN HALE
The Black Keys acknowledge their muses on Delta Kream
Walk a Mile: Buena Vista Heights ............8
BY GEOFFREY HIMES
In the 17th installment of his column, J.R. Lind visits a North Nashville neighborhood home to Black churches and Jewish cemeteries
The New Weird American Songbook ..... 33 Lambchop calls on the evocative power of the piano for Showtunes
BY J.R. LIND
BY BRITTNEY McKENNA
Pith in the Wind .........................................9
The Spin ................................................... 34
This week on the Scene’s news and politics blog
The Scene’s live-review column checks out Ron Gallo at The Basement
11
BY OLIVIA LADD
Food and Drink ........................................ 11 Shopping.................................................. 12 Outdoor Activities ................................... 14 Music........................................................ 16 Visual and Performing Arts .................... 18 Film .......................................................... 22
FILM
COVER STORY Summer Guide
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CRITICS’ PICKS Watch 8 ½ at the Belcourt, see R.LUM.R debut new songs at City Winery, check out a Next Chapter Society book club meeting, shop at Wicked Market, watch That Damn Michael Che and Pause With Sam Jay on HBO and HBO Max, procrastinate with Travel Oregon, download Cicada Safari to track the infamous insects and more
THIS WEEK ON THE WEB: Donate to Fund The Story of Linda Martell DA’s Office Disavows Man’s Conviction for 2000 Killing of Nashville Sex Worker Celebrate Black-Owned Restaurants and AAPI Culture at Local Dining Opportunities Far Out Free Fest Headed Back to a Browser Near You ON THE COVER:
The Shindellas Photo by Eric England
35 Spring Fling Suzanne Lindon’s Spring Blossom provides a female perspective on a French trope BY CRAIG D. LINDSEY
Primal Stream 55 A Rainer Werner Fassbinder biopic and some classic airplane camp, now available to stream BY JASON SHAWHAN
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NEW YORK TIMES CROSSWORD
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MARKETPLACE
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CULTURE
For the Soul: Nashville’s ‘Ghost Surgeon’ and His Vision for Affordable Health Care The Matthew Walker Comprehensive Health Center has served uninsured Nashvillians for half a century and counting BY ASHLEY CURRIE AND URBAANITE
With feet on the street, we discover Nashville’s own unique beat – one mile at a time
nashvillescene.com | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | NASHVILLE SCENE
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FROM BILL FREEMAN BRINGING NASCAR BACK TO NASHVILLE FAIRGROUNDS SPEEDWAY COULD BRING A WINDFALL FOR NASHVILLE On May 11, Metro Nashville’s Board of Fair Commissioners held a public hearing on Speedway Motorsports Inc.’s plan to bring NASCAR back to Nashville. The meeting attracted a large crowd, and though contentious, it was apparently not as contentious as some might have expected. Of the large group of racing enthusiasts who showed up to speak, NASCAR legend Darrell Waltrip was the first. He urged Nashville residents and the fair board commissioners to take the “golden opportunity” being offered. He stated plainly, “I don’t think it would be wise to ignore what SMI is bringing to the table.” Dale Earnhardt Jr. has said he will race here once a year if NASCAR returns to the Fairgrounds Speedway. Having raced at the Fairgrounds Speedway himself back in the mid- to late ’90s, Earnhardt is an advocate for returning NASCAR to Nashville, saying he never understood why it left. Many others spoke during the Tuesday meeting. Many of the concerns were driven by neighbors’ proximity to the speedway — not necessarily because they were opposed to bringing racing back to Nashville. Residents have questions about noise levels, traffic and parking, which is understandable. But seeing as how the track has been in operation since its opening in 1904, no one could have bought a home in the area without knowing the speedway was clearly right around the corner. When asked about the noise, Bristol Motor Speedway general manager Jerry Caldwell said that there is nothing to mitigate sound at the track currently, but showed conceptual renderings that include a 20-foot wall from the middle of turn one continuously through the middle of turn three of the half-mile short track. Other residents voiced concern over the prospect of adding additional races to accommodate NASCAR’s return. Caldwell said, however, that the company expects to maintain the current number of races allowed — 10 race weekends annually — while using one of those weekends to slot in a NASCAR race. Traffic, noise and scheduling are all understandable concerns for nearby residents, but the benefits that this proposal would bring to Nashville are undeniable. Not only would the speedway and the city’s bottom line benefit from this partnership, but all of Nashville would see a windfall in the form of economic, social and tourism improvements. If we look at other cities hosting NASCAR races, there is verifiable evidence of positive economic impact. According to RacingNews.co, Southern California’s Auto Club Speedway contributes more than $105 million in economic impact to San Bernardino County each year. In 2016, the Las Vegas Cup Race, known as the Kobalt 400, resulted in an economic impact of $139 million for the city — and because the race also had 7.2 million television viewers, the city gained $5 million in media value.
When NASCAR fans travel to Nashville for a race weekend, they will spend money in our city’s shops, restaurants and hotels. They will quite likely attend shows or concerts while in town, and if they enjoy themselves, they’ll undoubtedly make plans to return. Racing enthusiasts and racing professionals are sometimes generous in giving back to area residents. Auto Club Speedway, for example, supports the reading enrichment program Lefty’s Reading Challenge, which provides thousands of dollars and books for area schools each year. Just last year, Bristol Motor Speedway helped out much closer to home with a food and donation drive that brought truckloads of food and supplies to needy Nashvillians following the devastating 2020 tornado. The combination of camaraderie, hard-earned skill and tough competition is unique to racing, and racing fans have enjoyed it for generations. I remember Dale Earnhardt Sr. running on our track in the ’70s and early ’80s — he won the Busch Nashville 420 in both 1980 and 1983. I have great memories of taking my sons to watch the races at our beloved speedway, and I remember fondly how they talked about it for days afterward. It’s a family tradition in the Freeman household, and NASCAR’s return will ensure that racing will continue to be a family tradition for many generations of Nashvillians to come. I hope that Nashville residents and our city leaders will do everything within their power to take advantage of this rare opportunity to bring world-class racing back to Nashville.
Bill Freeman Bill Freeman is the owner of FW Publishing, the publishing company that produces the Nashville Scene, Nfocus, the Nashville Post and Home Page Media Group in Williamson County.
Editor-in-Chief D. Patrick Rodgers Senior Editor Dana Kopp Franklin Associate Editor Alejandro Ramirez Arts Editor Laura Hutson Hunter Culture Editor Erica Ciccarone Music and Listings Editor Stephen Trageser Contributing Editor Jack Silverman Staff Writers Stephen Elliott, Nancy Floyd, Steven Hale, Kara Hartnett, J.R. Lind, William Williams Contributing Writers Sadaf Ahsan, Radley Balko, Ashley Brantley, Maria Browning, Steve Cavendish, Chris Chamberlain, Lance Conzett, Marcus K. Dowling, Steve Erickson, Randy Fox, Adam Gold, Seth Graves, Kim Green, Steve Haruch, Geoffrey Himes, Edd Hurt, Jennifer Justus, Christine Kreyling, Katy Lindenmuth, Craig D. Lindsey, Brittney McKenna, Marissa R. Moss, Noel Murray, Joe Nolan, Chris Parton, Betsy Phillips, John Pitcher, Margaret Renkl, Megan Seling, Jason Shawhan, Michael Sicinski, Ashley Spurgeon, Amy Stumpfl, Kay West, Abby White, Andrea Williams, Cy Winstanley, Ron Wynn, Charlie Zaillian Editorial Intern Diana Leyva Art Director Elizabeth Jones Photographers Eric England, Matt Masters, Daniel Meigs Graphic Designers Mary Louise Meadors, Tracey Starck Production Coordinator Christie Passarello Events and Marketing Director Olivia Britton Promotions Coordinator Caroline Poole Publisher Mike Smith Senior Advertising Solutions Managers Maggie Bond, Sue Falls, Michael Jezewski, Carla Mathis, Heather Cantrell Mullins, Jennifer Trsinar, Keith Wright Advertising Solutions Managers Olivia Bellon, William Shutes, Niki Tyree Sales Operations Manager Chelon Hill Hasty Advertising Solutions Associates Aya Robinson, Price Waltman Special Projects Coordinator Susan Torregrossa President Frank Daniels III Chief Financial Officer Todd Patton Corporate Production Director Elizabeth Jones Vice President of Marketing Mike Smith IT Director John Schaeffer Circulation and Distribution Director Gary Minnis For advertising information please contact: Mike Smith, msmith@nashvillescene.com or 615-844-9238 FW PUBLISHING LLC Owner Bill Freeman VOICE MEDIA GROUP National Advertising 1-888-278-9866 vmgadvertising.com
©2021, Nashville Scene. 210 12th Ave. S., Ste. 100, Nashville, TN 37203. Phone: 615-244-7989. The Nashville Scene is published weekly by FW Publishing LLC. The publication is free, one per reader. Removal of more than one paper from any distribution point constitutes theft, and violators are subject to prosecution. Back issues are available at our office. Email: All email addresses consist of the employee’s first initial and last name (no space between) followed by @nashvillescene.com; to reach contributing writers, email editor@nashvillescene.com. Editorial Policy: The Nashville Scene covers news, art and entertainment. In our pages appear divergent views from across the community. Those views do not necessarily represent those of the publishers. Subscriptions: Subscriptions are available at $150 per year for 52 issues. Subscriptions will be posted every Thursday and delivered by third-class mail in usually five to seven days. Please note: Due to the nature of third-class mail and postal regulations, any issue(s) could be delayed by as much as two or three weeks. There will be no refunds issued. Please allow four to six weeks for processing new subscriptions and address changes. Send your check or Visa/MC/AmEx number with expiration date to the above address.
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NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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Over the last two centuries, depictions of the people, landscapes, and wildlife of the West fostered a sense of American identity that was rooted in a pioneering
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Downtown Nashville, 919 Broadway, Nashville, TN 37203 FristArtMuseum.org @FristArtMuseum #TheFrist #FristAmWest
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CITY LIMITS METROPOLITIK
THE MESS DRAGS ON
After putting an anti-tax measure on the ballot, the Davidson County Election Commission declines to do the same with a Metro Council alternative BY STEVE CAVENDISH
“J
im DeLanis has been running a circus over here.” The steam was still coming out of Councilmember Bob Mendes’ ears as he talked after the May 13 meeting of the Davidson County Election Commission. For the second time in four days, the commission led by DeLanis had failed to put a proposed charter resolution that was passed by the Metro Council in early April onto the ballot. After watching anti-tax group 4 Good Government and attorney Jim Roberts try to get a measure to gut the city’s property tax increase on the ballot in the fall, Mendes and others began working on a measure to blunt the impact of the newest property tax repeal effort. Specifically, Mendes’ amendment says that if both measures pass, the council’s authority in Section 3 of the charter should be preserved. In short, if they conflict, the tie goes to the elected body and the authority issued to it by the state. Mendes’ proposal passed the council by a 40-0 margin — and that includes votes by all of the body’s conservatives. Is it an end run? Absolutely. Is it necessary? Well, there’s a reason you don’t want amateurs tinkering with the language of the charter using imprecise wording. Vague lan-
THE FIGHT OVER TENNESSEE’S DEATH PENALTY GOES ON The cases of Pervis Payne and Sedley Alley highlight issues of intellectual disability and possible innocence BY STEVEN HALE
P
ervis Payne was less than a month away from his Dec. 3 execution date when Gov. Bill Lee called it off. Prison officials had already come to see Payne on death row to ask him to choose between lethal injection and the electric chair. When Lee granted Payne a temporary reprieve on Nov. 6, he didn’t cite the serious and longstanding questions about Payne’s guilt or what his attorneys say is well-documented intellectual disability — the reprieve came “due to the challenges and disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.” There was little reason to believe that the governor would have stopped the execution if not for the virus ravaging the world. He has allowed four executions to proceed since taking office in 2019 and has apparently been unmoved by calls for mercy or arguments about a punishment so arbitrary that two researchers in 2018 dubbed it the “death penalty lottery.” But in
guage may be the currency of most politicians and hacks, but it’s anathema to anyone who has to use it in a legal context, like running a city government. Proper legislation does things like define terms and sections of the code that would be affected. And 4 Good Government’s proposed changes to the Metro Charter are the legal equivalent of a Facebook post from your angry relative. DeLanis had already forced the 4GG proposal onto the ballot over the course of the past month, using two new Republican appointees to act as his yes men. DeLanis removed the commission’s previous outside counsel, Republican former Tennessee Supreme Court Justice Bill Koch, for not agreeing with his efforts. And now with the prospect of his preferred measure having competition on the ballot, he took aim at the council measure. “I just can’t vote for putting this on the ballot — I think it would be a horrible mess,” DeLanis said during Thursday’s meeting. He obliquely referenced Mendes from the chair, saying that even the council amendment’s own authors “couldn’t tell him what’s in it,” referring to a question in the previous meeting that Mendes had not answered to DeLanis’ satisfaction. “I’ve talked to smart lawyers, and they can’t tell me what’s in it,” he said, without naming the lawyers or their specific criticisms.
the months since Payne saw his name taken off the execution calendar, his attorneys — and an increasingly large base of supporters — have continued to highlight the profound problems with his case. Payne was sentenced to death in 1988 for the murder of a white woman named Charisse Christopher and her 2-year-old daughter Lacie Jo. Prosecutors portrayed him as a drug-using and violent predator who was looking for sex. It’s an allegation as old as America — a sex-crazed Black man accused of attacking a white woman — and it came in Shelby County, the jurisdiction with the most recorded lynchings in the state’s history and a disproportionate number of death sentences. But Payne has always maintained his innocence, saying that he came upon the horrific scene while checking to see if his girlfriend was at her apartment across the hall. His attorneys have long argued that Payne’s intellectual disability made him particularly vulnerable to wrongful conviction. And in January, they received information they said bolstered his innocence claim. DNA testing on previously untested evidence from the crime scene, including the murder weapon, found “male DNA from an unknown third party.” The attorneys went on to say that the DNA was “too degraded to identify an alternate suspect via the FBI’s database.” But it cast more doubt on the conviction that sent Payne to death row more than 30 years ago. At the same time, Payne’s legal team is pursuing his intellectual disability claim. An effort that began in November came to fruition last month when the state legislature passed a bill that would give Payne and a
The Scene asked Mendes about DeLanis’ critique. “The charter-revision commission, which has two former Metro legal directors on it, voted unanimously to support it,” Mendes says. “If it was unclear, I’d expect the charter revision commission to have found it, as that’s their entire job. He’s extrapolating that broad comment from a question he asked at the last meeting where he said, ‘Is this going to impact the satellite cities?’ It’s such a bizarrely uninformed question, my answer was, ‘I hadn’t thought about that.’ Metro Legal has since clarified that there’s no impact on the satellite cities, and somehow he extrapolates that into [the idea] we didn’t know what we were passing. It’s nonsense.” During the meeting, Mendes was similarly blunt, calling DeLanis’ delaying tactics “pre-baked political theater” and “antidemocratic.” “Even your own counsel couldn’t tell you it’s not legal to put it on the ballot,” Mendes said. That counsel, Vanderbilt professor Jim Blumstein, was hired after DeLanis dismissed Koch. He’s being paid a significant fee plus a per-hour rate for support help from the firm of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings. Blumstein spent most of his analysis during the meeting sounding like the academic he’s been for the past half-century, opining for the better part of an hour on legislative processes, ballot processes and the “special need” for voters to know what they are voting for. Oh, and Blumstein happened to provide opinions for DeLanis that supported the chairman’s political positions. DeLanis and the two other Republicans ultimately voted to seek a declaratory judgment from Chancery Court instead of putting the council measure next to 4 Good Government’s amendments, adding more
PERVIS PAYNE
small number of other men on death row the ability to ask a court to decide whether they meet the criteria for intellectual disability. The governor signed the bill into law, and earlier this month Payne’s attorneys filed a petition in Shelby County Criminal Court asking a judge to declare him ineligible for execution based on the constitutional prohibition against executing intellectually disabled people. Several state religious and political leaders have called on Shelby County District Attorney Amy Weirich not to contest the matter. She hasn’t shown such an inclination previously. Her office opposed Payne’s request for the testing that turned up another man’s DNA. While Payne’s legal team and his family fight to stop him from being executed, another team of lawyers is working on behalf of a man who already was. Sedley Alley was executed in 2006 for the brutal 1985 rape and murder of Suzanne Collins. Alley con-
billable hours to the growing pile. Metro and the Nashville Business Coalition have already filed suit against the commission over 4GG’s spot on the ballot. “This commission is not deciding on the merits of that referendum, it’s just deciding whether it goes on the ballot and whether it has met the legal requirements that we are allowed to consider before placing it on the ballot,” DeLanis said, putting the council’s proposal under the microscope in a way that he never did with 4GG’s proposal. His tactic appears to be causing a delay to prevent the two from showing up side by side. But if that happens, that means Nashville would have not one but two countywide elections within the span of weeks or even days. The cost for taxpayers? Maybe an extra $1 million. It’s something that DeLanis, an unelected appointee, will never have to be accountable for. When pressed on this, DeLanis punted after the meeting, telling the Scene that although of course he was concerned about cost, “We have to deal with the issues as they’re given to us.” (We’ll note, for ironic purposes, that DeLanis’ law firm, Baker Donelson, has been involved for the better part of the past decade representing Metro in a lawsuit against the state in an effort to get schools fully funded. If 4 Good Government’s property tax measure were to pass, one of the biggest hits would likely be to the Metro Nashville Public Schools budget and teacher pay.) It would be naive to say that politics have never played a part in the election commission’s work, but it’s hard to point to an instance where they’ve been this naked. At least now, with everything in litigation, we can quit pretending that this was about anything else. EMAIL EDITOR@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
fessed to the crime, but attorneys argue that his case has all the signs of a false confession. He told many people in the years after his conviction that he had no memory of the crime. “If I did do it, I deserve what I get,” Alley reportedly told his daughter April before the execution. “But I don’t remember doing it.” Believing he was innocent, Alley’s attorneys asked the courts and eventually then-Gov. Phil Bredesen to order DNA testing in his case before putting him to death. Those requests were denied. But Alley’s advocates vowed to continue seeking the truth. “God help the people in this process if the DNA proves he didn’t do it,” said Kelley Henry, the Nashville-based assistant federal public defender who represented Alley, according to The Tennessean. “We will test the DNA.” Thirteen years after Alley was executed, his daughter and a legal team including attorneys from the Innocence Project — which has also taken up Payne’s case — announced their renewed effort to see their goal through. They also sought relief from a Shelby County court and from the governor, asking for DNA testing in the case. In November, a Memphis judge dismissed the petition, saying the Alley estate lacked standing to file for the testing. Earlier this month, the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals upheld that decision. It’s been more than a year since the state of Tennessee executed someone. But the fight over the past and future of the state’s death penalty goes on. EMAIL EDITOR@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
nashvillescene.com | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | NASHVILLE SCENE
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CITY LIMITS
BUENA VISTA HEIGHTS In the 17th installment of his column,
Walk a
J.R. Lind visits a North Nashville neighborhood home to Black churches and Jewish cemeteries BY J.R. LIND | PHOTOS BY ERIC ENGLAND
Mile
McKinney Ave.
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Once a month, reporter and resident historian J.R. Lind will pick an area in the city to examine while accompanied by a photographer. With his column Walk a Mile, he’ll walk a one-mile stretch of that area, exploring the neighborhood’s history and character, its developments, its current homes and businesses, and what makes it a unique part of Nashville. If you have a suggestion for a future Walk a Mile, email editor@nashvillescene.com.
C
ass Street divides what seems like a pair of cemeteries. Walking west, that of The Temple — a Reform Jewish congregation — is to the left. On the right is burial ground for Sherith Israel and the West End Synagogue, the Orthodox and Conservative congregations sharing a space. (Per Metro’s property records, there’s actually a fourth tract — the trustees of the Hungarian Beneficial Association technically own the southeast corner of the shared cemetery.) It’s almost certainly just coincidence the more liberal strain of Judaism is on the left with the more conservative traditions on the right, but it seems serendipitous, at least. A mix of cinder-block and clapboard homes — and of course infixed new-builds muttered around — overlooks the cemeteries and their tall and spreading magnolias and oaks. The markers on The Temple side are more elaborate; those in the Sherith/ West End ground are more traditional, though the latter’s ancient trees are joined by seedlings. Both cemeteries are pleasant and park-like, in the spirit of the age — the late 19th century — they were first set aside
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THE ROUTE: From 15th Avenue, follow Cass Street southwest, then left on 18th Avenue North and right on Clarksville Pike. Turn right on 24th Avenue North and then right on McKinney. Cross 18th to Cecilia Avenue, and then turn right on 15th to return to the beginning. CRANES: 1 ABANDONED SCOOTERS: 0
for the mitzvah for burial. Turning on 18th Avenue North, sprays of feral roses tumble over the wrought-iron fence in a series of ambrosial cataracts. As gardeners know, left to their own devices, roses will stretch and spread into tentacled bushes barely resembling the delicate bouquets of the florist. Nashville’s road planners showed shocking disdain for perpendicular intersections in this part of town, the avenues intersecting the streets obtusely and acutely, the grid abandoned for its Dada cousin. This arrangement gave rise to necessarily architecturally interesting floor plans for the businesses along Clarksville Pike here: triangles, yes, but also higher-order non-quadrilateral polyhedrons, featuring equally interesting paint schemes. Lucky’s, a place for custom wheels and various other automotive upgrades, is greener than the eyes of Iago’s mocking monster. Pastel pinks and blues and notquite-neon yellow frame windows elsewhere. A pontoon boat waits incongruously in a side yard left perfectly sized for the vessel by yet another sloping street. A billboard urges the late Head Honcho and Lil’ Ham to RIP, though the familiar abbreviation in this case means “Ride in Paradise.” Much of this area was once owned by the publishing arm of the Seventh Day Adventists, including the large commercial and office space at 23rd and Clarksville Pike, now called Doss’ Corner and home of the eponymous barber shop. For decades that land and the building, constructed in 1910, were owned (technically) by the incumbent Roman Catholic Bishop of Nashville, having been willed to the diocese by the heirs of the Baltz family. Walter Colson’s body-shop empire spans
both sides of Clarksville Pike just northwest of 23rd, but for a small corner left for Royalty Eats — a pair of food trucks sharing the space, which includes what looks like a perfectly pleasant covered patio on a concrete pad.
An abandoned pay-phone stand and two stone pillars (one tagged with the mark “TRUE GODZ”) welcome the walker to Buena Vista Heights as 24th Avenue North climbs steadily up and north from Clarksville Pike. The sidewalks are of a certain
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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CITY LIMITS
age but mostly well-cared-for and wide, and trees offer shade from the tight front yards. Older homes — including an expansive 1920 four-square — eventually give way to the blinding white brick of new construction, with more new homes going up on lots left empty by the bulldozer and wrecking ball. Gentrification — or “redevelopment,” to use a less charged term — is happening block by block, or even more tightly, in this part of town, the bigger new homes (not quite skinny enough to carry that damned sobriquet) casting shadows literal and metaphorical on the stubborn old houses nearby. On McKinney, there’s a regular rhythm to it: new, old, new, old, new, old. The older homes almost invariably bear some form of “No Parking” signage, be it something somewhat official-looking or, in one case, black spray paint on the yard’s front wall. Across from St. Matthew African Methodist Episcopal Church, with its ship-hull roof, a pair of stone entrance markers are now in a backyard, but they mark a path to
something that’s disappeared, just as the stairs from the sidewalk farther up McKinney lead to a home that’s no longer there. As McKinney moves east, the chug of construction equipment continues and the charm of whichever older homes remained farther back disappears. Springing up on the hillsides are houses that wouldn’t be out of place in any middleclass subdivision in any ring-county suburb. McKinney stubs out at 18th, and moving eastward requires just a little jag across the catty-corner to Cecilia Avenue. Church & Son, serving the neighborhood since 1951, welcomes one to “The Bottom” (and now we here?) at the corner of Cecilia and 15th and proudly proclaims itself “Home of the World-Famous Gus Burger,” named for Gus Church himself. It’s apparent why the Churches declared this area The Bottom — with the Cumberland River slicing Davidson County in half and its many tributaries making for home, there are plenty of places around that call themselves some kind of bottom — as 15th Avenue North sits up, almost as if it’s crossing a levee for some unseen watercourse. The second floor of a modest and small apartment block next to Church & Son is at street level, the ground sloping sharply into the shared courtyard. The burnished-copper-colored brick of 15th Avenue Church of Christ contrasts with its shimmering midnight-black asphalt parking lot, which slopes down (naturally) to an expansive church yard. It’s quiet on this sunny spring Friday, but it’s easy to imagine the chattering voices of a post-service lunch echoing back up the hill. Those voices might make their way to the quiet stillness of the cemeteries next door, the rocks on the gravestones — a Jewish tradition of remembrance that signifies the permanence of memory while also allowing visitors to participate in the mitzvah of burial — as quiet and still as the morning, a sharp contrast to the change occurring to the neighborhood to the northwest. EMAIL EDITOR@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
THIS WEEK ON OUR NEWS AND POLITICS BLOG: Even now that we’re deep into May, Davidson County is at press time still well short of the goal of a 50 percent COVID-19 vaccination rate by May 1 set by Mayor John Cooper, so here come the incentives. The mayor’s office, in cooperation with local beer joints, breweries and coffee shops, launched a program offering a free beer or cup of coffee at various places with proof of vaccination. It’s a shot with a beer back! … A decade after an internal report and an investigation by two of Metro Nashville Police Department’s most renowned detectives, Davidson County District Attorney Glenn Funk is asking a court to vacate the conviction of a man who served time for the 2000 killing of a sex worker. In 2011, veteran detectives Pat Postiglione and Mike Roland told then-DA Torry Johnson and thenMNPD Chief Steve Anderson they determined Paul Garrett, who was then nearing the end of a sentence for voluntary manslaughter in the death of Velma Tharpe, was innocent of the crime. Johnson tasked an ADA with checking their work and she too determined: “At best, we can have no confidence in [the conviction]. At worst, the investigation conducted by Pat and Mike, along with a review of the original file, leads to the conclusion that he is innocent.” Nevertheless, a year later, the DA’s office defended the conviction at appeal. Following a new review by the DA’s Conviction Review Unit, Funk is asking the court to exonerate Garrett, who was released in December 2011. The two detectives on the original case, in the meantime, were both caught in falsehoods. One resigned in 2005 following allegations that he lied during a homicide investigation and the other was demoted from detective to patrol officer in 2006 after giving false testimony in a murder trial, falsely claiming that a defendant had confessed to him. … In a contentious meeting of the Board of Fair Commissioners, neighbors and race fans squared off about the potential for a return of big-time racing at the Fairgrounds Speedway, as Mayor Cooper continues to pursue an agreement with Speedway Motorsports Inc. — which owns Bristol Motor Speedway — to operate the track. Many of those who spoke in support of the proposed deal and the future of racing at the speedway said they were involved with racing at the century-old track but lived outside the neighborhood and county, while many of those who voiced opposition to racing at the track said they lived within blocks of the fairgrounds. Under the proposal, there would be 10 race weekends — the same amount as now — but four would include races expected to draw capacity crowds. Some residents of the fairgrounds neighborhood said existing races, mostly local and regional operations, are already too loud and disruptive and that an upgrade to more popular NASCAR races would make the situation worse. … Contributor Betsy Phillips (with some help from Mark Twain) writes that Gov. Bill Lee’s announcement that the state will be cutting off enhanced unemployment benefits July 3 is just a demonstration of his idea of freedom: one he shares with the river pilot described in Twain’s Life on the Mississippi: “He is free if no one can tell him what to do, but everyone has to listen to him,” she writes. “He doesn’t actually have to care about the well-being of his fellow Tennesseans. That would be encroaching on his ‘freedom.’ ” NASHVILLESCENE.COM/PITHINTHEWIND PITH@NASHVILLESCENE.COM • @PITHINTHEWIND
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GUIDE
With vaccination rates on the rise, COVID case numbers falling and all public health restrictions now officially lifted, there’s reason to believe summer 2021 — though obviously not what any of us would call “normal” in the pre-pandemic sense — will be a hopeful time with plenty of reason and opportunities to party. In our annual Summer Guide, we’ve got a whole slew of recommended activities for those looking to get out and, you know, do stuff. From art openings and plays to outdoor activities, farmers markets, craft markets, concerts, food events and more, here’s a roundup of some of the most intriguing activities of the season. Dive in.
Our rundown of some of the best food, shopping, arts, music, film and outdoor events of the season
PHOTO: ERIC ENGLAND
Food & Drink RETRO SNO
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CHECK OUT RETRO SNO’S FIRST PERMANENT LOCATION If you’ve seen the delightfully colorful Retro Sno truck driving through town or posted up at an event, you know it’s pretty difficult to miss. But if you’ve somehow never managed to track it down, good news — Retro Sno has set up shop in the Nations (806 51st Ave. N.) at its very first permanent location. Open 1 to 8 p.m. on weekends and 2 to 7 p.m. on weekdays, the truck will peddle its Retro Snoballs and Stuffed Snoballs in flavors like Dreamsicle, Germantown Chocolate and Citrus Sunrise all summer long. D. PATRICK RODGERS
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SIP SOME BEERS OUTDOORS One positive outcome of the pandemic is the collective rediscovery of so many simple joys. Like sitting outside and sipping a cold one. A year of capacity restrictions prompted many of our local craft brewers to put nearly as much time and attention into creating cozy outdoor seating as they put into the mind-boggling varieties of beer they brew. At TailGate Brewery’s West Side headquarters (7300 Charlotte Pike), there are now a gobsmacking number of picnic tables overlooking a hillside that offers some of the best sunset views in town. Yazoo Brewing Company’s patio offers similarly woodsy views (and regular food-truck visits) out in Madison (900 River Bluff Drive). Scene readers regularly rank the patio at Diskin Cider (1235 Martin St.) among the city’s best, and the patio at Jackalope Brewing Company’s Ranch in Wedgewood-Houston (429B Houston St.) offers up funky vibes and bright colors to go with smooth brews. J.R. LIND
Wine director Matias Yerrick and the team at the restaurant in the 21c Museum Hotel Nashville (221 Second Ave. N.) were feeling some lack-of-travel ennui, so they developed the Destination Known Wine Dinner series. Yerrick and executive chef Matthew Bell select a location each month and plan a meal around it — then they walk from table to table to talk to you about what they’ve chosen and why. As is the case at Gray & Dudley and the 21c in general, you should expect lesser-known varietals, procedures and processes. On June 17 they’ll take you to Oregon, on July 22 to Sicily (a good fit if you quarantined with Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy) and on Aug. 19 to Beaujolais, France. Destination Known Wine Dinners take place the third Thursday of the month through October and are $65 including food, wine and tax (but not tip), which is a lot cheaper than that delayed vacation. MARGARET LITTMAN
CHECK OUT THE MUSIC CITY FOOD TRUCK PARK On Fridays and Saturdays for the next several months — plus Friday through Monday on Memorial Day weekend — you can count on the Music City Food Truck Park to be buzzing in East Nashville (400 Davidson St.). Vendors known to show up in recent weeks have included Bradley’s Curbside Creamery, Chivanada and Chivanada II, Bob’s Fish Fry, Pinchy’s Lobster Co., Steaming Goat Food Truck, Moosic City Ice Cream and Waffles, The Mac Shack and many more. With more than 70 picnic tables and a 4,000-square-foot deck, even folks skittish about returning to in-person events ought to find plenty of room for distancing. For hours, schedules, details and vendors, visit bestfoodtrucks.com/ musiccityfoodtruckpark. D. PATRICK RODGERS
Shopping CHECK OUT SOME CRAFT MARKETS Finally! We can shop! In person! Without shipping charges or waiting on the UPS! Every month, Shops at Porter East (701-801 Porter Road) host the First Sunday at Porter East street fair. All the Porter East shops participate, along with a rotating list of several other local makers. Past participants have included TNT Goods, Tenn Prairie, Restoration Rose, Elevator Vinyl and more. The next installment is set for June 6. Speaking of monthly events, after being closed for more than a year, the Nashville Flea Market has reopened as an outdoor-only event at The Fairgrounds Nashville (625 Smith Ave.). The market’s opening weekend is May 22 and 23, and it will take place the fourth weekend of every month thereafter. If you’re
GO TO BREW AT THE ZOO (JUNE 4) OK, if we’re being honest, the pandemic didn’t really disrupt our beer intake. Supply and demand remained steady. But there sure weren’t any exotic animals around. Now, with things seemingly on their way back to normal, you can head out to the Nashville Zoo (3777 Nolensville Pike), enjoy a craft beer from one of dozens of local breweries, and take in some animal life that’s more exotic than the squirrels in your backyard. General-admission tickets to the June 4 party are $75, and food trucks and more dining options will be available. STEVEN HALE
GO TO RED, WHITE AND BOOM AT ADVENTURE SCIENCE CENTER (JULY 4) Nashville’s annual July Fourth fireworks celebration — which regularly draws huge crowds to downtown and the surrounding areas — was a television-only event last year, moved to a screen like so many other things. But this summer, it’s back. Families looking to take in the fireworks display away from the crowds of Lower Broadway can check out the Adventure Science Center’s Red, White and Boom (800 Fort Negley Blvd.), which will offer extended museum hours, free parking, music and food trucks. Tickets will cost $40 for adults and $30 for youth through the month of May before a $5 increase. The best part: Proceeds from the event will help the Adventure Science Center recover from last year’s financial blow. STEVEN HALE GO TO THE MUSIC CITY JERK FESTIVAL 2021 (JULY 10) The annual Music City Jerk Festival isn’t just a celebration of the spicy goodness that is Jamaican jerk chicken — it’s a showcase for Caribbean food featuring vendors from across Nashville. Tickets are free to the general public, so show up to Cumberland Park (592 S. First St.) ready to eat. The event kicks off at 1 p.m. on July 10. ALEJANDRO RAMIREZ CHECK OUT GRAY & DUDLEY’S DESTINATION KNOWN WINE DINNER SERIES If you’re itching to travel but still aren’t quite ready to take the post-pandemic plunge, Gray & Dudley can ease the pain of a summer without plane tickets.
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BEN SIMMONS, FLYING S FARMS AT EAST NASHVILLE FARMERS MARKET
CHECK OUT SOME FARMERS MARKETS Gardening boomed last summer as folks stayed home and made time for a hobby that distracted them from the madness happening out in the wild. But if your green thumb didn’t stick, Nashville has several local markets that offer all the goodness of homegrown groceries without the weeding, watering and warring with squirrels. The Nashville Farmers’ Market (900 Rosa L. Parks Blvd.) is open year-round with items including handmade pasta and locally produced meat and cheese, but now that we’re well into growing season, farms have also started bringing in their large selection of produce — strawberries, asparagus, carrots, beets, onions and greens. Soon, expect tomatoes, peppers, corn and other warm-weather fruits and veggies. Several local farms also deliver to one or more of the many neighborhood markets. There are nearly a dozen throughout Davidson County, and here are some highlights: East Nashville Farmers Market (at South Fifth and Woodland streets) is 3:30 to 6:30 p.m. every Tuesday; 12South Farmers Market in Sevier Park (3000 Granny White Pike) is 4 to 7 p.m. every Tuesday; Hip Donelson Farmers Market at Two Rivers Mansion (3130 McGavock Pike) is every Friday 4 to 7 p.m.; Richland Park Farmer’s Market (4701 Charlotte Ave.) is 9 a.m. to noon every Saturday; St. George’s Farmers Market in Belle Meade (4715 Harding Road) is 3 to 6 p.m. every Thursday; and Crieve Hall’s Farmin’ in the Hall (451 Hogan Road) is 4:30 to 7 p.m. every Thursday. Vendors and selection vary by location, so I recommend you follow your nearby market on Instagram to get up-to-date info about in-season produce and weekly specials. MEGAN SELING
PHOTO: ERIC ENGLAND
GO TO THE MUSIC CITY HOT CHICKEN FESTIVAL (JULY 4) Since its humble beginnings 15 years ago, the Music City Hot Chicken Festival has grown into one of the city’s Independence Day mainstays — a good way to get a solid base down in the early afternoon before a day of steady boozing and patriotism. It kicks off with the beloved fire engine parade at noon before the gates at East Park (700 Woodland St.) swing open for cayenne-soaked fun with free samples for the first 500 folks. There’s entertainment, beer and the tough competition of the amateur cooking contest. Let us now praise famous hen. J.R. LIND
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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*Note: Life jackets are required by River Queen Voyages
into the more curious side of crafts, there’s shopping to be had every full moon at the Wicked Market. Wicked makes its way around town, popping up at a new location every month with witchy jewelry, candles loaded with crystals and “bone art.” (The bone art is from Howl Revival and it’s prettier than it sounds.) Spring/summer dates are May 26, June 24, July 23 and Aug. 22. The May 26 Wicked Market will take place at Rosemary & Beauty Queen (more on that in our Critics’ Picks on p. 25), and you can find locations for subsequent installments via thewickedmarket.com. The American Artisan Festival returns to Centennial Park (2500 West End Ave.) this year after organizers had to cancel last year’s event. It runs June 17 to 19, and while shopping is the star of the weekend, the fest will also have interactive exhibits, demonstrations, art installations and live music. Porter Flea is returning after a year off, too — the Porter Flea Pop-Up is an open-air one-day event on Aug. 7, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the outdoor sheds at The Fairgrounds Nashville. MEGAN SELING
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Outdoor Activities EXPLORE SOME TRAILS Think you managed to hike every trail during the pandemic? Are you weeping because there are no more woods left to conquer? Try a hike you might have missed! Hidden Lake (near the intersection of Highway 70 and McCrory Lane) has a variety of trails with plenty to see — not just magnificent bluffside overlooks of the winding Harpeth River below, but also creepy abandoned buildings, a dance floor in the middle of a forest and a sunken train tanker car that looks suspiciously like a U-boat. Out in Fairview, Bowie Nature Park (7211 Bowie Lake Road), clocking in at more than 700 acres, features relatively flat terrain, plenty of nature and some hidden lakes of its own. Ashland City’s Cumberland River Bicentennial Trail (177 Chapmansboro Road) runs on an abandoned railroad right-of-way
alongside the eponymous river for an easy ramble with lots of trailside waterfalls. Looking for something more adventurous? The natural bridges of Big South Fork National Recreation Area (4564 Leatherwood Road in Oneida) and Pickett CCC State Park (4605 Pickett Park Highway in Jamestown) are an easy drive to the northeast. J.R. LIND
GO FOR A SWIM By far my favorite place to take a dip in Nashville is Anderson Beach on the south side of Percy Priest Lake. It’s close enough to my house that I can sometimes grab a swim early in the morning before work and get back in time to start the day. But in the heat of the summer, it’s the perfect place to spend a day — there’s enough beach that it seldom feels crowded, and there are a ton of grills and picnic tables to accommodate everyone. It’s $5 for a day pass, which is well worth the cost, but if you plan on going more than a few times, pick up a summer pass for $40. If you’re looking for a place to jump in the water for free, hit up Lock 3 Beach on Old Hickory
GO KAYAKING OR CANOEING Middle Tennessee’s hot, steamy summers are considerably more tolerable if you spend them on the water. There are enough different waterways and outfitters that you can do so on multiple weekends and have a unique experience each time. Cumberland Kayak leads trips on the Cumberland to downtown as well as farther-flung excursions such as to Burgess Falls in Cookeville. River Queen Voyages is leading kayak scavenger hunts on the Cumberland and this year rolled out a pedal pontoon boat. Named the Dedebird, the pedal pontoon is essentially the river version of a pedal tavern — without the Broadway traffic in its way. Nashville Paddle Co. (full disclosure: I’m a co-owner) teaches stand-up paddleboard (SUP) classes, including SUP yoga and SUP fitness at Hamilton Creek Recreation Area on Percy Priest Lake. If you want to get out of the city, head to Run-A-Muck Outfitters, where you can rent a kayak or canoe to paddle on the Red River. If you prefer to cast a line, Run-AMuck offers fishing expeditions on Sycamore Creek too. While there, check out Port Royal State Park before you head home, cooled off and refreshed. MARGARET LITTMAN
PHOTO: ERIC ENGLAND
ANNIE KLAVER*, RIVER QUEEN VOYAGES
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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Photo of Waylon Jennings by Raeanne Rubenstein.
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HEAD BACK TO THE CLUBS While it’s far from time to declare the pandemic over, vaccination rates are slowly increasing and infection numbers are dropping. The ecosystem of independent music venues in Music City and around the country is reopening for limited-capacity audiences, and calendars are filling out like tomato plants in good dirt. Until very recently, we had no idea when we’d once again get to recommend you go to club shows — like stellar songsmith John R. Miller’s album release show July 18 at 3rd and Lindsley, or rock champs Bully playing at Mercy Lounge on Aug. 13 (the Aug. 14 show was long sold out at press time). If you’re going out, be aware that many venues will still have special COVID precautions in place, like mask requirements and/or some form of a pod seating scenario — be sure to check venue websites to make sure you’re on the same page. Limited capacity means a sold-out show might be for 100 people or less at some venues, so make plans early. Also be ready to tip generously; venue staffers are just getting back to semiregular gigs after more than a year. If you feel safer staying in for now, expect some streaming options to remain. We’ll do our best to post current info at nashvillescene.com/music, but keep an eye on artists’ and venues’ social media and websites for up-to-theminute details. It’s a great time to visit anyhow, to show your support by buying merch or music. Whatever you do, don’t be a jerk. STEPHEN TRAGESER
KELLEY’S BERRY FARM
Lake in Hendersonville. Or head over to Long Hunter State Park near Hermitage and Mt. Juliet to cool off in the water at Bryant Grove, where there is also a great volleyball court nearby. AMANDA HAGGARD
been quenched. Just mind your soft parts — a closerange round in the wrong spot will leave you wincing for days. Visit xtremepaintball.net for more info. D. PATRICK RODGERS
GO CREEK WADING It’s hot, and you need a creek! Luckily, there are several accessible and kid-friendly spots around town. Ellington Agricultural Center in Crieve Hall (440 Hogan Road) has Seven Mile Creek running the span of its greenway. It’s a perfect spot to sit down, catch some minnows and sip a beverage within five minutes of your car. Park up by the horses (bonus — horses!) and walk down the hill toward Edmondson Pike, and you can’t miss it. Looking for a larger spot on the northwest side of town? Beaman Park in Ashland City (5911 Old Hickory Blvd.) has Henry Creek running through it and is a nice reprieve from a somewhat difficult hike (Ridgetop Trail, 5.5 miles). But if you have little ones (or just don’t want to hike, and who can blame you), park at the Creekside Trailhead and hit a very accessible part of the water just a few minutes in. If you’re looking for a spot near your own house, try out the greenways. Chances are there’s a creek near the trail — you just might have to venture through some wooded spots to get there. ELIZABETH JONES
TRY NASHVILLE EQUINE TREK Summer’s a great time for hikes and nature walks, but thanks to Nashville Equine Trek you can stray from the usual outdoor exploration by adding a horse (or two) to the mix. Horseback-riding service Nashville Equine Trek was founded by a pair of longtime friends and equestrians who are happy to share their knowledge and horses with locals and visitors alike. Rides usually take place at Percy Warner Park, and you can book a three- or eight-mile trail ride via their website (nashvilleequinetrek.com). They have two horses ready to go, so couples looking for an outdoor date should take notice. ALEJANDRO RAMIREZ
PREPARE FOR BATTLE AT XTREME PAINTBALL If you don’t mind a bit of a drive — and are prepared to withstand some pain — Xtreme Paintball in Lebanon (212 Old Laguardo Road W.) makes for a pretty rad and intense way to spend an afternoon with friends. The Xtreme folks provide all the necessary gear — masks, guns, ammo — and can accommodate groups of up to 40 people at its two separate courses (Crash Site and Apocalypse, aka Nuke Town), both of which are set in wooded areas full of obstacles and props and look like something right out of Resident Evil. Guides will provide you and your team with all the safety tips and game-play instructions you need, and additional ammunition is available if you go sicko mode and run out of ’balls before your bloodthirst has
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GET FREE AT ROCK HAVEN LODGE FAMILY NUDIST PARK There’s nothing like a global pandemic and year of forced isolation to make you reconsider your goals. If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to roam the outdoors bare naked, you are in luck. Middle Tennessee’s own Rock Haven Lodge Family Nudist Park is back open for your swimming, sunning and frolicking pleasure. You can also play tennis, race remote-controlled cars and walk the winding trails of the 45-acre Murfreesboro resort (462 Rock Haven Road). But be aware: Nudity is not just encouraged but required! Happily, owner Susie Palmer and her staff are welcoming and strive to maintain a safe atmosphere for all, and that includes following some new COVID-19 protocols. Be sure to read about these via the lodge’s website (rockhavenlodge.com) and call ahead to make reservations, as capacity will be limited. It’s been a tough 14 months. You deserve to get free. ERICA CICCARONE
GO BERRY PICKING It’s just a fact: Berries picked with your own hands taste better, and the cool, fresh bite of a big strawberry or blueberry is a great way to fight the summer heat. Strawberry season is in full swing right now, and blueberries should hit their prime in June. Kelley’s Berry Farm is a massive spot in Castalian Springs (50 Riverview Estates Lane), and it features three types of berries on plenty of land so you can remain socially distant even on busy weekends. Or hit up picktnproducts.org to find a spot closer to you. Most farms sell by the pound. Pro tips: Bring rainboots as the grounds can get muddy, and a lot of farms are cash only. ELIZABETH JONES
Music CELEBRATE SPRINGWATER’S GRAND REOPENING Not even a pandemic could kill Centennial Parkadjacent dive bar Springwater (115 27th Ave. N.), which proudly touts its reputation as the oldest bar in continual operation in Tennessee (with the building having housed a bar since the 1890s). For more than four decades, the watering hole’s tiny venue area has played a mighty role in Music City’s ever-evolving creative community, offering space for folk-schooled songwriters, punks, metalheads, experimental electronic musicians and more to mingle and hone their craft. Springwater celebrates a return to inperson performances with shows June 4-6 featuring notable locals like philosophically inclined rock ’n’ soul-tinged groups The Altered Statesman and Styrofoam Winos and grunge expanders Vera Bloom. Visit thespringwater.com for tickets and complete scheduling info. STEPHEN TRAGESER
VISIT THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AFRICAN AMERICAN MUSIC AND CELEBRATE BLACK MUSIC MONTH The National Museum of African American Music (510 Broadway) does an amazing job of bringing to life the stories of Black American musicians who’ve done so much to shape culture around the world. The Celebration of Legends benefit concert, set to be livestreamed June 17, kicks off NMAAM’s Black Music Month event series. Tribute performers weren’t announced at press time, but the museum will present its Rhapsody and Rhythm Awards to the Fisk Jubilee Singers, Quincy Jones, Chaka Khan, Smokey Robinson and Lionel Richie during the ceremony. Panels will convene online for the museum’s inaugural State of Black Music Summit on June 18, covering the intersection of Black music and many aspects of culture and commerce. And on June 19, the museum will host its official Dedication Ceremony followed by a Juneteenth Block Party. Many more details are to come — visit blackmusicmonth.com for updates. STEPHEN TRAGESER RUMMAGE IN THE CRATES FOR RECORD STORE DAY’S RSD DROPS Last year’s RSD Drops events — in lieu of the traditional one-day Record Store Day blowout — allowed for some impressive and much-needed flexibility as independent record stores struggled to navigate local regulations and safely serve the recordbuying public. This year, Drops events are happening again on June 12 and July 17. Each of your local stores will have their own protocol for fair and COVIDsafe access to the special-edition titles available on those days. Many will have additional sales promotions as well as live music: East Nashville’s The Groove (1103 Calvin Ave.) announced a party for June 12 featuring Ian Ferguson, Bryant Taylorr, Teddy and the Rough Riders and many more. Be sure to watch your favorite stores’ websites and social media for details. As far as titles, there are several with strong Nashville ties, including home-recording guru and power-pop maestro R. Stevie Moore’s double LP compilation On Earth and a John Prine tribute compilation called Kiss My Ass Goodbye, filled with deep cuts and featuring Scene faves like Chris Crofton, Heaven Honey, Will Kimbrough and Justin Collins. Both of those records are set for the July 17 Drops batch; see recordstoreday.com for the full list. STEPHEN TRAGESER
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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CHECK OUT EXIT/IN’S OUT/BACK CONCERT SERIES Aside from a brief performance during an April 7 press conference, there hasn’t been live music that the public could see at Exit/In (2208 Elliston Place) since March 2020. The historic club celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, while the business owners maintain their effort to purchase the property the club sits on. Meanwhile, the Exit/In crew has announced a gradual return in the form of a concert series called Out/Back, to be held throughout June in a space behind the club and its sister bar Hurry Back — not far from the erstwhile alley entryway that gave the venue its name. Among the highlights are June 9’s show with girl-group-inspired trio The Shindellas (they’re the ones on our cover this week) and June 30’s Hip-Hop on Elliston showcase featuring Daisha McBride and Reaux Marquez. See exitin.com for all the details. Unrelated to this series, a boatload of artists like Aaron Lee Tasjan and Luke Schneider are joining in An All-Star Benefit to Preserve Exit/In, an outdoor fundraiser set for East Park (700 Woodland St.) on May 30. STEPHEN TRAGESER
29-31 and features CCM standouts like Newsboys and Lecrae at Hideaway Farm in Bon Aqua (9676 Old Highway 46). Blended Nashville comes to First Horizon Park (19 Junior Gilliam Way) Aug. 13-14, with superstar DJ Kaskade, country trap rapper and producer Blanco Brown, king of crunk Lil Jon and more. Meanwhile, Deep Tropics brings electronic dance producers like Clozee, Claude VonStroke and Yung Bae to Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park (600 James Robertson Parkway) Aug. 27-28. Many of the largest festivals are squeezed into the last few weeks of summer. Bonnaroo brings Lizzo, Tame Impala and many more to the aforementioned Bonnaroo Farm in Manchester Sept. 2-5, while Weedeater, Hans Condor and more converge on Cookeville’s June Bug Boogie Ranch (115 Waterloo Road) for Muddy Roots Sept. 3-5. Nashville Pride Festival’s music lineup is TBA, but mark your calendar for the return of the party Sept. 18-19 at Bicentennial Mall Capitol State Park. The roster is also TBA for AmericanaFest, but the massive gathering comes back to venues across Music City Sept. 22-25. And that rolls right into Pilgrimage, with Maren Morris, The Black Keys and more, headed to Franklin’s The Park at Harlinsdale Farm (239 Franklin Road) Sept. 25-26. STEPHEN TRAGESER
PHOTO: ERIC ENGLAND
Performing and Visual Arts THE SHINDELLAS
GEAR UP FOR AN UNCONVENTIONAL FESTIVAL SEASON Large-format shows are going to be some of the most tricky to pull off safely in the late stages of the pandemic, but it has been done. See examples like the outdoor, above-ground shows at The Caverns down in Pelham, Tenn. (555 Charlie Roberts Road), whose full summer calendar includes a show with Margo Price on May 28. There’s a similar run you can look forward to at Manchester’s recently renamed The Bonnaroo Farm: The Concerts on the Farm series boasts shows from jam-grass phenom Billy Strings on May 28, country singer Jon Pardi on
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May 29 and folk-popsters The Avett Brothers July 2-4. Several full-on festivals are forging ahead, with COVID adjustments, as well. Japanese Breakfast and Soccer Mommy headline the revived Outloud Festival, a celebration of LGBTQ+ artists and allies happening June 4-5 at the Main Event Parking Lot near Nissan Stadium (1 Titans Way). Musicians Corner is returning to in-person programming at Centennial Park (2500 West End Ave.) with a threeday comeback event June 11-13 and a revamped September Sundown series on Thursdays and Fridays Sept. 2-Oct. 1; lineups were TBA at press time. And there’s plenty more, including Nashville
Jazz Workshop’s Jazz AM series, a kid-friendly run of music-and-movement programs on the first Saturday of each month, beginning June 5 at Hadley Park (1037 28th Ave. N.). Cornelia Fort Pickin’ Party is back at Cornelia Fort Airpark (1099 Shadow Lane) with Kyle Tuttle and Greenwood Rye on June 12; the lineup for the July 17 and Aug. 28 events is TBA. Hometown hip-hop heroes like Trapperman Dale, Daisha McBride and Brian Brown are top picks among the diverse array of artists on the Dear Music Festival bill, happening in two lots near Nissan Stadium and at Riverfront Park June 2527. Lifest, aka “Christian Bonnaroo,” happens July
CHECK OUT THE FIRST SATURDAY ART CRAWLS Even for the most introverted among us, the social aspect of gallery openings is at least half the fun. Nashville is lucky to have big clusters of galleries that are eager to showcase their strongest artists. David Lusk Gallery in Wedgewood-Houston (516 Hagan St.) is a fantastic example: Structure, Identity, Transformation, a group show curated by Lusk artist Brandon Donahue and featuring work by Shaun Leonardo, Leila Weefer, Paul Stephen Benjamin and Dell Hamilton, opens in June, and is likely to be among the strongest shows of the season. Waiting in the Lusk rafters are solo shows by two other local art stars: dreamy painter Emily Leonard in July, and visionary painter David Onri Anderson in August. As usual, you can check contributor Joe Nolan’s monthly Scene column, Crawl Space, for details on all the best shows to catch in both Wedgewood-Houston and downtown along Fifth Avenue. LAURA HUTSON HUNTER
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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nashvillescene.com | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | NASHVILLE SCENE
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PHOTO: ERIC ENGLAND
SUMMER SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL; KENNY DOZIER (LEFT), TOM MASON
SEE ART BY CHARLES RENNIE MACKINTOSH, BETHANY COLLINS AND KARA WALKER AT THE FRIST From June 11 until Sept. 12, the Frist Art Museum (919 Broadway) will welcome exhibits from Art Nouveau artist Charles Rennie Mackintosh and contemporary artist Bethany Collins. Designing the New: Charles Rennie Mackintosh and the Glasgow Style incorporates 165 significant works of fine and decorative art — including architectural drawings, books, ceramics, furniture, posters, textiles and watercolors — from the artist who is considered the master of the British interpretation of Art Nouveau. In the contemporary gallery, Bethany Collins: Evensong will put on display the artist’s textbased, conceptually driven work. But the big show of the summer comes July 23, when the Frist will open Kara Walker: Cut to the Quick, which is co-curated by Frist director and CEO Susan Edwards and poet Ciona Rouse. Expect a broad overview of the artist’s work, including the complete series of Emancipation Approximation panels, and smart programming that incorporates Walker’s relevance in contemporary art history. Cut to the Quick will be on display until Oct. 10. LAURA HUTSON HUNTER SEE SYMPATHETIC MAGIC AT VANDERBILT FINE ARTS GALLERY For centuries, artists have turned to magic for inspiration — some have even been considered magicians themselves. In the genre- and generationspanning exhibit Sympathetic Magic — on display
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Aug. 26 through Oct. 17 at Vanderbilt’s Fine Arts Gallery (1220 21st Ave. S.) — artworks from Vanderbilt’s collection that range from ancient Egyptian and pre-Columbian votives to divination systems from China, Africa and the American South will be on display alongside work by contemporary artists like Jeffrey Gibson, Kara Walker and Jana Harper. Think of Sympathetic Magic: Works of Faith, Healing and Transformation as a kindred spirit to the excellent Symbols and Archetypes: Two Millennia of Recurring Visions in Art exhibit from 2019, which put top-level contemporary art alongside archival footage of moon landings and illuminated manuscripts. LAURA HUTSON HUNTER
SEE ENACTOR AT OZ ARTS (JUNE 24-26) Nashville is brimming with talented dancers, and Becca Hoback is among our very best. Enactor is a trio of solo dances that explore the relationship between the body, womanhood and a rapidly changing society. Choreographed by Roy Assaf, Ben Green and Ana Maria Lucaciu, Enactor was born out of Hoback’s community-engagement initiative Body View, which unpacks how participants relate to their bodies and “experience art and physicality as outlets for creative self-expression, processing, presence and connection.” See the performance June 24-26 at OZ Arts (6172 Cockrill Bend Circle). ERICA CICCARONE SEE SLOPPY BONNIE: A ROADKILL MUSICAL FOR THE MODERN CHICK AT OZ ARTS (MAY 20-JUNE 5) OZ Arts is transforming its parking lot into an
SEE THE SUMMER SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL (AUG. 12-27, AUG. 26-SEPT. 12) After 2020’s Bardless summer, the Nashville Shakespeare Festival is back at its newish digs: a massive 3D-printed stage at the oneC1TY development near Charlotte Avenue and 28th/31st Avenue Connector. This year, the nonprofit is tearing a page out of its playbook to make room for a new collaboration with Kennie Playhouse Theatre and the beloved American playwright August Wilson. The eighth in Wilson’s Pittsburgh Cycle, Jitney (Aug. 12-27), follows the hustle and bustle of the lives of a tight-knit group of cab drivers who work in the Black neighborhoods where legal cabs won’t go. For the second production of the festival, Nashville Shakes will present the crowd-pleasing Twelfth Night (Aug. 26-Sept. 12), featuring original music by Tom Mason, who will portray Feste in the play. You can set up your picnic blanket and chairs in the yard, visit the food trucks, and enjoy an evening of drama under the stars. Oh, and it’s free. ERICA CICCARONE
outdoor honky-tonk for Krista Knight’s “roadkill musical for the modern chick.” Learn more in our Critics’ Picks (p. 25).
GO TO NASHVILLE REPERTORY THEATRE’S SIXTH ANNUAL BROADWAY BRUNCH (AUG. 22) Nashville Rep’s annual fundraising gala is a great party that’s always packed with local talent. This year’s Broadway Brunch will be hosted at City Winery (609 Lafayette St.) by Scene favorite Megan Murphy Chambers, whose signature style and sass earned her a Best Comedic Actor nod in last year’s Best of Nashville issue. It’s a great opportunity to dig into your pockets to support one of Nashville’s beloved professional theater groups, so they can get back onstage and create magic. ERICA CICCARONE GO TO TOMATO ART FEST (AUG. 13-14) All longtime Nashvillians know that there are two
main rules for Tomato Art Fest weekend, which this year takes place Aug. 13 and 14. First, you must adjust any plans that involve driving through East Nashville’s Five Points neighborhood — the roads are all blocked off, and day-drinking pedestrians are wobbling around even earlier than usual. Second, do not underestimate how hot it will be. The midAugust street fair is notoriously steamy, and the preponderance of the color red makes the fest feel extra fiery. There’s a costume contest, a best-redhead contest, tons of bloody marys and more tomatothemed art than you ever thought possible. So make sure you’ve got plenty of water, sunscreen and whatever clothes (or lack thereof) make you feel most comfortable. Festival specifics are still being worked out, but updates will be posted at tomatoartfest.com in the coming weeks. Aug. 13-14 in East Nashville’s Five Points Neighborhood LAURA HUTSON HUNTER
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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SEE NASHVILLE OPERA’S CINDERELLA AT ASCEND AMPHITHEATER (JUNE 12) Gioachino Rossini’s Cinderella — or La Cenerentola in Italian — may not include a pumpkin coach, a fairy godmother or the words “bibbidi bobbidi boo,” but there is bound to be magic under the stars when Nashville Opera performs it at Ascend Amphitheater (310 First Ave. S.) in mid-June. The production will have artistic director John Hoomes at the helm and will star mezzo-soprano Emily Fons. Fons, who Opera News hailed as one of the best singing actors of her generation, will be joined onstage by Matthew Grills, Jonathan Beyer, Stefano de Peppo and others. The Opera promises that the production will cross the music of Rossini with “the madcap beach-party movies of the ’80s.” Consider our curiosity piqued! ERICA CICCARONE
Film GO SEE A MOVIE IN THE THEATER To the delight of cinephiles citywide, the Belcourt Theatre (2102 Belcourt Ave.) announced its reopening in April, and the Hillsboro Village arthouse is currently offering limited-capacity in-person screenings of new releases and classics alike. This week, the nonprofit cinema center opens the French flick Spring Blossom (read our review of that on p. 35) and the harrowing Mexican-French shock thriller New Order, with Fellini’s iconic 8 1/2 (see our Critics’ Picks on p. 25) playing over the weekend. Filmgoers
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can count on plenty more new releases and repertory screenings to be announced as the weeks progress, with the Belcourt’s virtual screening room also still available for the time being. On the megaplex front, Regal’s Opry Mills location (570 Opry Mills Drive) has been open since April, and both Regal Hollywood 27 (719 Thompson Lane) and Regal Green Hills (3815 Green Hills Village Drive) are slated to reopen this Friday, May 21. That’s in addition to AMC’s handful of area locations, which are all up and running. Both Cruella and A Quiet Place Part II are set to open in theaters everywhere on May 28, with June premiere dates planned for In the Heights and Pixar’s Luca. New installments in the Conjuring, Fast & Furious and Purge series are all set for the summer as well, with Marvel’s Black Widow landing on July 9 and the LeBron James-starring Space Jam: A New Legacy hitting on July 16. Other anticipated summer releases include M. Night Shyamalan’s Old, James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad, Nia DaCosta’s Candyman and Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch. Naturally, all release dates are subject to change, so keep an eye on theater websites — and the pages of your friendly neighborhood alt-weekly — for updates. D. PATRICK RODGERS
CHECK OUT MOVIES IN THE PARK We at the Scene are delighted to bring our long-running Movies in the Park series back to Elmington Park (3531 West End Ave.) this summer, and the lineup is one of our very best ever, if we may say so ourselves. After kicking off with Disney’s monumentally popular Frozen II on June 3, the
GO SEE A DRIVE-IN MOVIE As summer begins to unfurl its warm winds and extended daylight, the drive-ins are reasserting themselves. Keeping the collective movie experience going during the pandemic, these were the places that gave people somewhere to go when stircraziness set in. And with the school year unwinding, there’s going to be a lot more options. The Hi-way 50 in Lewisburg (1584 Fayetteville Highway), the Moonlite in Woodbury (931 W. Main St.), the Stardust in Watertown (310 Purple Tiger Drive) and the Birdsong in Camden (907 Shiloh Church Road) are all up and running for the summer. The Montana in Estill Springs (10251 Tullahoma Highway) never even stopped for the winter, which deserves some respect. And while the beloved Pink Cadillac in Centerville (2506 Highway 100) has not set a reopening date for the summer, we hope to see them (the longest-running drive-in in the Middle Tennessee area) again. Upcoming events outside of film include a Bon Jovi streamed concert event at several locations, as well as a filmed production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream benefiting the Watertown High School’s theatrical department at the Stardust on May 20! JASON SHAWHAN
series will continue with Greta Gerwig’s fantastic Oscar-winning 2019 Little Women adaptation on June 10. The June 17 installment will feature 2017’s Marvel Cinematic Universe fave Thor: Ragnarok, and MIP will wrap with the iconic and beloved 9 to 5 on June 24. As always, there will be food vendors (Daddy’s Dogs! Ben & Jerry’s! The Loveless
Cafe! More!), games and more. The event starts every Thursday in June at 5 p.m., with the movies screening at sundown. Find more information at nashvillemoviesinthepark.com, and hey, it’s free! D. PATRICK RODGERS EMAIL EDITOR@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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For those who are ready to venture out and catch a live, in-person show, OZ Arts has been doing a great job with COVID precautions, including everything from limited capacities to distanced seating. In fact, the contemporary arts center has transformed its parking lot into a unique outdoor honky-tonk theater experience for Thursday night’s opening of Sloppy Bonnie. Billed as a “roadkill musical for the modern chick,” this irreverent tale follows a sassy bride-to-be who sets off on a rip-roaring quest to track down her fiancé (it’s complicated), only to find that “her cookie-cutter femininity causes havoc, turning her into an accidental serial killer.” The show was created by Vanderbilt’s writer-in-residence Krista Knight and composer Barry Brinegar and is directed by the always-insightful Leah Lowe, and the cast includes Nashville newcomer Amanda Disney, with Curtis Reed and James Rudolph II taking on more than a dozen roles. Tickets are $20 to $30, with limited capacity for outdoor performances and an ASL-interpreted performance on Thursday, May 27. Visit ozartsnashville.org for complete details. May 20-June 5 at OZ Arts, 6172 Cockrill Bend Circle AMY STUMPFL FILM
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WATCH 8 ½ AT THE BELCOURT
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I first watched 8 ½ in bed on my Cabiria, feel like collaborations with the star laptop eight years ago. I had been on a of those films, his wife Giulietta Masina. captivating first date with a man whose cat Mastroianni is iconic in the role of Guido, was named Fellini, and was embarrassed but the film is singularly Fellini, to admit that I did not know the and it rightfully catapulted his director’s work. I was about to EDITOR’S NOTE: AS A name to the adjectival status set out on a new chapter of my RESPONSE TO THE ONGOING “Felliniesque.” As master life, leaving the city where I COVID-19 PANDEMIC, WE’VE of the carnival, he created a had long lived and loved, and CHANGED THE FOCUS OF THE CRITICS’ PICKS SECTION TO slyly structured film — one having such an exceptional INCLUDE ACTIVITIES YOU CAN that feels like it is at once first date before skipping PARTAKE IN WHILE YOU’RE AT meandering, careening and town seemed obscene. The HOME. headed exactly where it is man was a stage actor and had supposed to be. It always helps something of a carnival air about me remember that the people in my him — unruly, effervescent, tragic. I life — my friends and muses, my torturers never saw him again, but it turned out that and accusers — are part of one big parade he was my perfect introduction to Federico that I can only make sense of if I am willing Fellini and 8 ½, which you can catch at the to descend into near madness. I’ll follow Belcourt as part of the theater’s Weekend him anywhere. Screenings are at 1:45 p.m. Classics: At the Movies series this weekend. on Saturday and 7:20 p.m. on Sunday. May The 1963 Oscar-winning picture shows the 22-23 at the Belcourt, 2102 Belcourt Ave. great Marcello Mastroianni as a director named Guido who is unmoored personally, ERICA CICCARONE juggling the many women in his life, and artistically, struggling to find the subject of [GAGA FOR GOO GOO] his next film. As Guido navigates the circus CHECK OUT GOO GOO CLUSTER’S of his present — including a seemingly POP-UP AT YAZOO BREWERY endless parade of characters — 8 ½ flits Goo Goo Cluster’s downtown flagship between reality and illusion, memory and store may be closed for renovations, fantasy. His producers harangue him, his but you can still find one of Nashville’s women judge him, his film eludes him, but favorite treats — known as “The he finds solace in his vivacious dreams. Original Southern Confection,” they date With a pioneering stream-of-consciousness back to 1912 — popping up at various style, 8 ½ is a visual feast that never leaves locations and events all summer long. you feeling like you’ve overeaten. Fellini’s First up this weekend, Goo Goo will be at great early works, La Strada and Nights of Yazoo Brewery in Madison, tapping the
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SEE R.LUM.R DEBUT NEW SONGS AT CITY WINERY
There aren’t a whole lot of things in the realm of making music that Reggie Lamar Williams Jr., better known as R.LUM.R, doesn’t do exceedingly well. He’s a standout songwriter who can deftly peel apart the layers of human interactions and set them to an infectious R&B-schooled hook; he’s got a gentle voice that he can turn into a mind-boggling falsetto at the drop of a hat; and he has the instrumental chops (and guts) to present very different versions of the same tune at a concert. Back in 2017, R.LUM.R told contributor Lance Conzett about making the choice to establish himself in Nashville, a city without a template you had to follow if you wanted to have a career, and that decision to go with his gut paid off in millions of streams and fans around the world. COVID-19 nixed his opportunity to do a headlining tour behind his 2019 debut fulllength Surfacing, but he spent the downtime working on a whole new batch of songs. He’s chosen to introduce those in an intimate setting: an acoustic set in the Lounge, City Winery’s smallest space. Joining him is fellow Nashville pop polymath Jake Germany, better known as Phangs, who will be coming through on the heels of “Product of the ’90s,” a collaborative single with fellow songsmith Phoebe Ryan. Tickets for Monday’s show sold out with a quickness, so a second night was added on Tuesday — head on over to citywinery.com/nashville to snag them while you can. 7 p.m. Monday, May 24, and 8 p.m. Tuesday, May 25, at City Winery, 617 Lafayette St. STEPHEN TRAGESER
[UNDER BLUE MOON I SAW YOU]
SHOP AT WICKED MARKET
Wicked Market is a pop-up that happens on every full moon, but with a spirit of playful witchiness that remains constant. The transient nature is key to the Wicked mission: Founders Ericka Hammond, Abby Walters and Kayleigh Walder are longtime members of the service industry, and so partnering with various local bars and restaurants allows them multiple opportunities to support that community as best they can. For May’s full moon — the flower moon, for those who are wondering — the shop will be at East Nashville’s Rosemary & Beauty Queen. Last month’s fete was at Bastion, and featured vendors slinging jewelry, artwork, tarot card readings, vintage clothing and these amazing resin sculptures made by an artist named Krystal Waters. The vibes are strong. Follow Wicked Market on Instagram (@thewickedmarket) or check the website — thewickedmarket.com — for an up-todate list of vendors, and see where it lands on the next full moon on June 24. 5-10 p.m. Wednesday, May 26, at Rosemary & Beauty Queen, 1102 Forrest Ave. LAURA HUTSON HUNTER
6:00PM
REA FREY in conversation with LISA PATTON Until I Find You
WEDNESDAY, MAY 26 11:00AM
LISA GENOVA in conversation with LISA MONTEGGIA Remember
6:00PM
ALEXANDRIA BELLEFLEUR Hang the Moon
GET TICKETS & LEARN MORE AT PARNASSUSBOOKS.NET/EVENT 3900 Hillsboro Pike Suite 14 | Nashville, TN 37215 (615) 953-2243 Shop online at parnassusbooks.net
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BOOKS
TUESDAY, MAY 25
LISTEN TO REIGNING SOUND’S NEW ALBUM, A LITTLE MORE TIME WITH REIGNING SOUND
EDD HURT [CHE AND JAY]
WATCH THAT DAMN MICHAEL CHE AND PAUSE WITH SAM JAY ON HBO AND HBO MAX
HBO is beginning to become the place where African American Saturday Night Live writers can let their natural hair down and get their full-fledged Blackness
in conversation with DAVID MARANISS Freedom
[SOUND OPINIONS]
Reigning Sound leader Greg Cartwright sings in a mild tenor voice that puts me in mind of the style of Nashville retro-rocker Paul Burch. The similarities end there: Cartwright, who formed Reigning Sound in Memphis 20 years ago, favors poppy garage rock with a decided Bluff City flavor, while Burch seems quintessentially Nashville in his fusion of country and early rock ’n’ roll. Reigning Sound’s first few albums, cut with a lineup that included Memphis musicians, feature Cartwright’s songwriting and guitar work and a brace of cover versions on the order of Flash and the Memphis Casuals’ 1966 “Uptight Tonight,” written by Jim Dickinson, as well as songs by The Rolling Stones and Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs. These days Cartwright leads the band — which has undergone personnel changes over the years — from his home in North Carolina, and the Sound’s new full-length A Little More Time With Reigning Sound, out May 21, brings the group’s original Memphis lineup back on board. A fine songwriter, Cartwright wrote a tune called “Wait and See,” the best track on Mississippi soul singer George Soulé’s 2006 Nashville-recorded full-length Take a Ride. In addition, Cartwright & Co. backed Shangri-Las singer Mary Weiss on her 2007 album Dangerous Game, with many of the album’s songs penned by Cartwright. A Little More Time finds the band in fine form — if there must be newfangled garage rock, let it be as blithe and pop-friendly as the record’s “Let’s Do It Again” and “A Little More Time.” Listening to A Little More Time is like opening a time capsule filled with artifacts from 1966. All that’s missing is a Beatle wig and a Green Hornet mask.
COMEDY
PRESENT THIS COUPON FOR
the U.S. during the Vietnam war, the book follows four high-schoolers who use their record club as a way to process, react to and cope with a world in turmoil. Meetings are on the last Tuesday of most months through October. The club will discuss K.J. Charles’ gay romance Slippery Creatures in June; Maggie O’Farrell’s Shakespearean historical fiction Hamnet in August; Erika Sánchez’s National Book Award finalist I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter in September; and Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning The Underground Railroad: A Novel in October. Visit the club’s website (nplf.org/events/ncsbookclub) for details and registration information. 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, May 25, via Nashville Public Library STEPHEN TRAGESER SHOPPING
VOTED BEST FOR 15 YEARS!
MUSIC
: Winners’ Reader poll
last couple of kegs of its limited-release Yazoo Goo Goo Ale. Of course, you’ll also have the opportunity to create your own tasty goodies with family-friendly candymaking stations set up around the taproom. Individual passes start at $20, and there’s also a Family Pack Pass for $65, which includes a hands-on Make-Your-Own-Goo Goo activity for four people, a pair of fun “What a Cluster” pint glasses, plus two free Goo Goo Ales. To learn more, visit googoo.com. Noon-5 p.m. Saturday, May 22, at Yazoo Brewery, 900 River Bluff Drive, Madison AMY STUMPFL
MUSIC
CRITICS’ PICKS
[RENEWALS]
CHECK OUT A NEXT CHAPTER SOCIETY BOOK CLUB MEETING
The next-best thing to reading a good book is having someone to talk about it with. The Nashville Public Library has done a pretty amazing job of keeping its resources accessible throughout the pandemic (though you’re once again able to visit a growing number of library branches in person), which is a lot of help with that part about finding good books. Courtesy of the Nashville Public Library Foundation’s Next Chapter Society, there’s a way you can find folks to discuss those books with, too. The Next Chapter Society is a group of young professionals who support the library system and its programs. There is a fee to join the group, but the online monthly meetings of its book club are free and open to anyone — even if you haven’t read the book. The next meeting is coming up on Tuesday, May 25, when author Rob Rufus will join in the club’s discussion of his novel The Vinyl Underground. Set in
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[SHE FLIES WITH HER OWN WINGS]
PROCRASTINATE WITH TRAVEL OREGON
The high whine of a dial-up modem connecting to the internet always takes me back to my parents’ kitchen, where my father’s computer was inconveniently placed when I was growing up. I was a curious kid, and I knew the internet held all manner of secrets. But three doors led to the kitchen, where a parent or vengeful sibling could get a full view of whatever it was I was trying to do. Like so many others in my generation, I found a wholesome obsession in the 1985 game The Oregon Trail. As a quasi-19th-century pioneer, I forged many rivers, buried many a sibling and ox and stocked up on ammunition but never made it to the Willamette Valley. It was, and I say this with love, a ridiculously difficult game. Despite its frustrations, the appeal of The Oregon Trail has lasted long past its rightful obsolescence. Enter the Beaver State’s Travel Oregon: The Game. It’s got the 2-D graphics and linear travel path that makes me feel safe. It’s got all the trappings of the original, but it’s funnily updated. You don’t drive a covered wagon. You drive a station wagon. Instead of sudden death brought on by dysentery or measles, travelers are beset by more contemporary anxieties. Consuming too much kombucha will inevitably lead to a sour stomach, a broken aux cord can send a passenger screaming into the woods, and backseat drivers demand apologies and hot chocolate. As you make your stops at sites like Anthony Lakes, Shore Acres State Park and downtown Portland, you can hunt, fish, ice skate and more. Talk to locals for random facts about the state’s migratory birds, and gain invitations to special events, like a snowtubing party on Mt. Hood. Travel Oregon is a clever piece of marketing for the state — while trying to keep your car full of friends alive, you get taken in by the pixelated, rugged beauty of the mountains and shores. At each stop, you can choose to book your in-real-life vacation and navigate right to the Oregon Tourism Commission’s website. Whether you’re planning a trip, in it to daydream or simply want to buy flights of craft beer with money you earned arm-wrestling a guy at a truck stop, Travel Oregon is a great way to kill time while you avoid whatever very important work you are supposed to be doing. Visit traveloregon.com/thegame to get started. ERICA CICCARONE
[ALL CAPS WHEN YOU SPELL THE MAN’S NAME]
LISTEN TO CZARFACE AND MF DOOM’S SUPER WHAT?
The first posthumous release of MF DOOM material arrives via his second collaboration with underground power trio Czarface, which includes Wu-Tang Clan’s Inspectah Deck and Boston duo 7L and Esoteric. The supergroup’s comic-bookvillain aesthetics were a perfect match for Viktor Vaughn himself, and So What? — which dropped May 7 though it was recorded in early 2020 — is a bittersweet listen despite the geeky references, playful samples and boom-bap menace that permeates it all. Eso, Deck and DOOM trade villainous bars with so much chemistry that world domination feels inevitable when they get together — building on the same dynamic that was present on 2018’s Czarface Meets Metal Face. The rap world has seen some tragic losses in the past few months, the most recent ones being DMX and Digital Underground’s Shock G, and in a strange way, by the presence of DOOM alone, Super What? spurs reflections on how the older generations of hip-hop still deserve our respect and attention. ALEJANDRO RAMIREZ NATURE
GAMING
on. Earlier this month, the channel’s HBO Max service gave us That Damn Michael Che, a six-part sketch-comedy/sitcom hybrid in which the button-pushing SNL co-head writer and Weekend Update coanchor comments on issues both racial and personal. He gets fellow SNL castmates Cecily Strong and Heidi Gardner and his Update partner Colin Jost to join in the madness, along with such guest stars as Method Man and Billy Porter. And on Friday, May 21, HBO premieres Pause With Sam Jay, a weekly talk show that’s more like a swinging party. Comedian and former SNL writer Jay will have comics and other pals come by her pad so they can discuss a wide range of topics, usually under the influence of alcohol. Watch both shows on HBO. CRAIG D. LINDSEY
MUSIC
CRITICS’ PICKS
[CICADA TECH]
DOWNLOAD CICADA SAFARI TO TRACK THE INFAMOUS INSECTS
After spending their pubescent years sucking on what I suppose can be described as a tree’s toes, the Brood X cicadas are beginning to make their debut in Nashville. Michael Raupp, an entomologist with the University of Maryland, describes it best: “You’ve got a creature that spends 17 years in a COVID-like existence, isolated underground sucking on plant sap, right? In the 17th year these teenagers are going to come out of the earth by the billions if not trillions. They’re going to try to best everything on the planet that wants to eat them during this critical period of the nighttime when they’re just trying to grow up, they’re just trying to be adults, shed that skin, get their wings, go up into the treetops, escape their predators. Once in the treetops, hey, it’s all going to be about romance. It’s only the males that sing. It’s going to be a big boy band up there as the males try to woo those females, try to convince that special someone that she should be the mother of his nymphs. He’s going to perform, sing songs. If she likes it, she’s going to click her wings. They’re going to have some wild sex in the treetop.” And now, an app generated by Dr. Gene Kritsky of Mount St. Joseph University in Cincinnati, Cicada Safari, will help you track these apparent sex deviants wherever they emerge. More than 30 sightings have been submitted by users in the Nashville region, so far nearby Ashland City, Goodlettsville and Columbia. Their photos display zombie-like creatures molting their outer skin in gardens, gutters, trees and porches for a sweet set of new wings that will lift the locust-like insect to the treetops where they continue the circle of life, only to die weeks later. You can get in on the action too. Cicada Safari is downloadable in any app store, and contributes to research that hopes to more accurately monitor cicada emergence patterns and the impacts of a shifting climate. Plus, you’ll need practice for the main event in 2024: The Great Southern Brood. KARA HARTNETT
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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The Matthew Walker Comprehensive Health Center has served uninsured Nashvillians for half a century and counting BY ASHLEY CURRIE For the Soul is a collaboration between the Nashville Scene and local culture website Urbaanite that uncovers local gems in Nashville.
T
he late Dr. Matthew Walker Sr., known as “The Ghost Surgeon,” created a legacy of service in Nashville, providing complicated surgical procedures in the face of racism to create one of the city’s indispensable health care institutions. The Matthew Walker Comprehensive Health Center, born out of Meharry Medical College, was established to provide access to health services to Nashville’s underinsured and uninsured communities — and continues to do so, half a century later. Urbaanite sat down with several people within the MWCHC family to learn more about the center’s founder, history and legacy. It was an honor to speak with Dr. Matthew Walker III just a month before his passing and hear him share with such pride his grandfather’s vision and legacy. As the saying goes, where there is vision, there is provision. This is exactly what guided Walker Sr. to move forward with the vision more than half a century ago, when he began to seek funding to start the center. Founded as the Meharry Neighborhood Health Center in 1968, the center was a beacon for families in North Nashville during a time when African Americans, including certified doctor and surgeon Walker Sr., KATINA BEARD, MATTHEW WALKER COMPREHENSIVE HEALTH CENTER CEO
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NASHVILLE’S ‘GHOST SURGEON’ AND HIS VISION FOR AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE faced much adversity. Known as “The Ghost Surgeon” back in the ’50s and ’60s, Walker Sr. actually had to perform surgeries on white patients in secret. White Americans often did not want African American doctors working on them, even if they were considered the best, like Walker was in the field of cancer-removing thyroid surgeries. His grandson, Walker III, remembered: “He would go into operating rooms to perform a very difficult thyroid surgery, and before the patients were awakened, he had to be out of the room. … I heard the story growing up, and I’ve had the story crossconfirmed many times by others.” The center is now located in the heart of North Nashville on the corner of Jefferson Street and 14th Avenue North, and cares for more than 17,000 people annually. “We always wanted to stay close to Meharry as it has always been where African American families resided,” says development manager Cathy Hunt. “We’ve always provided health care for those with and without insurance, but the focus was really on those having trouble getting insurance or [who] were underinsured. It’s fortunate that we’re here, but it’s also sad that we’re still here and that so many people are still having trouble getting insurance.” The center has personal significance for many across the city, including Walker Center CEO Katina Beard. “The center is special to me because we have such a rich history founded at the height of the civil rights era,” says Beard. “We continue to focus on serving our community with hands
and hearts of compassion.” MWCHC has maintained a mission of service and become a mainstay as Nashvillians navigate their lives and health in the midst of a pandemic. The center was on the frontlines providing COVID-19 testing, and now staff members are administering vaccines both on site and in the community. In addition, MWCHC is a full-service health care hub offering medical services and programming for all. “We aim to take care of people from the beginning of life,” says Hunt, “so we have pediatricians, lab services, dietary planning, all the way up to our family-practice physicians. We help with getting older and the common issues that come along with aging, like high blood pressure, diabetes and asthma — all very common in the African American community.” MWCHC has also found a unique, growing segment of patients in entrepreneurs, for whom finding affordable health insurance can be daunting. I remember when I first stepped out into entrepreneurship many years ago, I utilized MWCHC services and always had a great experience. “It’s the exact same quality you would expect at any other facility,” says MWCHC spokesperson Matthew Fox. “Our mission is to ensure patients feel welcome and know that they’re safe. We get a lot of people who may feel a bit hesitant to visit doctors, but they leave feeling truly cared for.” Listening to Dr. Matthew Walker III share such an incredible story brought to life the resilience of African American medical professionals and provided me with a newfound respect for them. Dr. Walker Sr. truly served his calling. As Walker III ended our conversation, he reflected on his own family legacy in medicine. “Our family legacy was built on my grandfather’s belief in teaching as many people that you can get your hands on because you want to create a village of excellence. He would always say, ‘Let excellence be your baseline.’ ” For more local culture stories, visit urbaanite.com. EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM PHOTO: ERIC ENGLAND
CULTURE
5/17/21 3:19 PM
BOOKS
Me. You. Bed. Now!
THE CURVATURE OF THE WORLD
Great Circle explores the interconnected lives surrounding a fictional woman aviator BY EMILY CHOATE
“I
was shaped to the earth like a seabird to a wave,” writes Marian Graves — the fictional aviator at the center of Maggie Shipstead’s ambitious novel Great Circle GREAT CIRCLE — in a logbook found BY MAGGIE SHIPSTEAD KNOPF, 608 PAGES, $28.95 at an abandoned weather station in SHIPSTEAD WILL DISCUSS HER NOVEL ONLINE 7 P.M. the Antarctic. “I have made a promise THURSDAY, MAY 20, VIA PARNASSUS BOOKS to myself: My last descent won’t be the tumbling helpless kind but a sharp gannet plunge — a dive with intent, aimed at something deep in the sea.” In a century-spanning narrative, Great Circle traces Marian’s single-minded pursuit of flight and the lives of numerous characters connected to her. Their stories offer something like intersecting coordinates on the map of Marian’s life, which culminates in her famously tragic attempt to fly a record-setting longitudinal “great circle” around the planet in 1950. While Marian disappears over the Pacific during the final leg of her route, her story continues to resonate with a certain slice of the public, creating fodder for conspiracy theories and artistic reinterpretation. Pulling into focus the sheer scale of Shipstead’s story is the connection between Marian and Hadley Baxter, a scandal-ridden actress. Hadley lucks into the chance to portray Marian on screen more than 60 years after her famous flight, thereby salvaging her career and possibly pivoting her life in a less self-sabotaging direction. Drawn to Marian’s story as a child, Hadley recognizes salient but coincidental parallels between them. Hadley lost her own parents in a plane crash. Both women were raised by an uncle. The role of Marian tugs at something deeper inside Hadley as she faces an uncertain future. “I needed the relief of being someone who wasn’t afraid,” Hadley admits. “She was like me but wasn’t. She was uncanny, unknowable, except for a few constellations I recognized from my own sky.” Marian does resist being known, especially when other people persist in misunderstanding her or trying to pin her down. As infants, Marian and her twin brother Jamie are rescued from the wreck of a luxury ocean liner and brought to the wild forests of 1920s Montana, where their well-meaning but troubled uncle lets them roam freely. But the moment Marian reaches “an age when the future adult rattles the child’s bones like the bars of a cage,” her pursuit of flight takes permanent hold, perplexing those around her. In captivating chapters focused on Marian’s adolescence, her determination to become a pilot blazes across her whole being: “She couldn’t fathom that others did not see her for what she would
become, that she did not wear the fact of her future like some eye-catching garment.” Willful and resourceful, Marian leaves school to work, saving money for flight lessons. But her desire also makes her vulnerable. Soon she makes a risky bargain with a powerful bootlegger named Barclay Macqueen. Barclay offers her access to her dreams, but at a cost that young, inexperienced Marian cannot fully discern. She stumbles into more dangerous territory than her childhood dreams ever conjured. Propelled by a vast but assured narrative sweep, Great Circle encompasses myriad intersecting worlds. As a pilot-for-hire, Marian maneuvers icy, treacherous mountain ranges in Alaska. Her brother Jamie throws himself into the artist’s life, trying to earn a living without betraying his strong but evolving principles. Both twins enter the battle zones of World War II — Marian in Spitfire cockpits over Europe, Jamie at ground level in the Pacific. Hadley weathers the surreal daily aggression of a modernmedia siege. In each case, Shipstead has imagined and researched her settings in exhaustive detail. Shipstead’s last novel, 2014’s Astonish Me, displayed her gift for fine details and her strong grasp of emotional intelligence. But Great Circle requires a far grander, deeper vision. Here, Shipstead has strengthened and expanded her insight into her characters’ interior worlds alongside the widening scope of her subject matter. Her achievement lies in what her own character, Jamie, strives to capture as he paints portraits: “the tidal zone where a person’s inner and outer selves wash together.” At 600 pages, Great Circle also reflects Jamie’s unappeasable aim to fit the world’s “too-bigness” onto canvas. While he knows that it can’t be achieved, this desire fuels his vision. Likewise, Marian writes in her final voyage’s logbook: “I knew the horizon could never be caught but still chased it.” Marian recognizes that her plan to pilot the circumference of the globe springs from her “own inherently unachievable desire to understand the scale of the planet, to see as much as can be seen. I wish to measure my life against the dimensions of the planet.” Great Circle itself seems to take on the curvature of the world, which shapes the contours of Shipstead’s complex and richly expansive story. The act of reading this novel creates the cumulative effect of an endless unfolding, a single life’s possibilities never exhausted. Like Marian’s eye on that relentlessly chased horizon, Great Circle voyages onward, yielding indelible scenes of adventure, intimate heartbreak and transcendent longing. For more local book coverage, please visit Chapter16.org, an online publication of Humanities Tennessee. EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
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MUSIC
RESPECT YOUR ELDERS
The Black Keys acknowledge their muses on Delta Kream BY GEOFFREY HIMES
T
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DELTA KREAM OUT NOW VIA WARNER BROS./ NONESUCH PHOTO: JOSHUA BLACK WILKINS
he Black Keys weren’t sure they were going to release the results of their December 2019 jam with two veterans from Mississippi’s Hill Country blues scene. After all, the session was so impromptu that they didn’t even know what songs they were going to play. But because Kenny Brown and Eric Deaton had spent so many years playing with Hill Country blues legends Junior Kimbrough and R.L. Burnside, it made sense to pick songs recorded by their former employers. In the end, the Keys decided to release the results as Delta Kream on May 14. Not only because members Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney had first bonded by jamming on this same songbook as teenagers in Akron, Ohio, in 1996. And not only because the two guitars, bass and drums locked into such an exhilarating groove of droning, hypnotic buzz. But because the pair also wanted to repay a debt. “Yeah, there’s probably zero commercial potential for this record,” Carney admits over the phone from his Nashville home, “but it’s important to put it out now while we still have people paying attention to our band — if only to showcase these guys who did so much to inspire us. I only heard about R.L. Burnside as a teenager because Jon Spencer made A Ass Pocket of Whiskey with R.L. If not for Spencer, who knows when I would have heard of R.L. Maybe we can do the same for some 16-year-old kids today.” At the tail end of 2019, Auerbach was producing Sharecropper’s Son, a fine album by Louisiana soul-blues singer Robert Finley, out Friday, May 21. The band that Auerbach assembled in his Easy Eye Sound Studios here in Nashville included Brown (Burnside’s longtime guitarist) and Deaton (Kimbrough’s longtime bassist), and the producer was thrilled to be playing with these masters of the Hill Country blues. “I was having so much fun playing with them,” Auerbach recalls over the phone from the studio, “that I called up Pat and said, ‘You have to come over here.’ We never talked about making a record. It was just that all this fun shit was going on — and we took advantage of it. We didn’t touch a thing, even left the talking in. I hadn’t played these songs in years; we were just throwing them out there. It’s all muscle memory, I guess. We’d do each song twice and usually one was better than the other. I love playing those songs. For me, they’re classics — at least the originals were classics.” Ten of the 11 songs on Delta Kream were originally recorded by Kimbrough or Burnside, and “Coal Black Mattie” was recorded by both of them. This is not the music of the Mississippi Delta in the state’s northwest flatlands but of the north-central Hill Coun-
try, where the rumpled topography created small farms rather than giant plantations, intact communities rather than ghost towns decimated by The Great Migration and a thriving music scene rather than a remembered past. This is a music of one or two chords and a throbbing beat, of a thick bottom sustained against a higher melody. This is the most African music in North America. You can hear that on “Crawling King Snake,” the first single from Delta Kream. “Junior has as much in common with Ali Farka Touré as he did with John Lee Hooker,” Auerbach adds. “When Junior plays ‘Crawling King Snake,’ it sounds nothing like the John Lee Hooker version. He strips it down to its essentials, and that gives it a great sense of space. Junior was in the middle of nowhere; his juke joint had no other buildings in sight, just rolling hills, a lot of despair and a little bit of joy. All of that’s wrapped up in this music.” Auerbach and Carney grew up within blocks of each other in Akron, acquaintances but hanging out in different scenes. “He was on the soccer team,” Carney explains, “and I was more of a hippie-rock kid.” Carney’s uncle was Ralph Carney, the saxophonist on records by Tom Waits, Big Star and Galaxie 500, a mentor who opened the nephew’s ears to less-than-obvious music. Auerbach’s dad represented Akron’s leading outsider artist, Alfred McMoore, whose catchphrase, “Your black key is talking too long,” would give the duo their name. The teenage Auerbach and Carney had different interests, but they overlapped in their enthusiasm for the Hill Country blues records coming out on Fat Possum in the mid-
’90s, like the aforementioned Burnside-Spencer collaboration. So when they got together to jam, that’s what they played. It helped that the stripped-down, guitar-and-drums sound of the music fit the two Akronites. “When I first heard this music,” Auerbach remembers, “I was this little 17-year-old blues fan. All of a sudden here was this music as raw and wild as anything I’d ever heard. It was primal. R.L., Junior and TModel Ford were to blues as the Sonics were to rock ’n’ roll: wild and deceptively simple. I think Junior and R.L. are every bit as important as Skip James and Howlin’ Wolf.” The Black Keys’ 2002 debut album The Big Come Up began with a Burnside song, followed by a Kimbrough song. Chulahoma, their 2006 EP, featured six compositions by Kimbrough and was named after the rural Mississippi town where Kimbrough’s juke joint stood. That was their last release on Fat Possum before moving on to Warner Bros. subsidiary Nonesuch and rock ’n’ roll stardom. But Auerbach and Carney both insist that the Hill Country blues has shaped all the music they’ve made. “Listening to so much Hill Country music,” Auerbach says, “trained my ear how to listen to rhythm and feel, how the guitars and the drums can lock in so tight you can’t tell where one ends and the other begins. And I realized that can be translated to any other style that Pat and I play. I want that to be as true for my keyboardists as for my guitarists in any project we’re doing.” “It’s the foundation of how we got together and how we play,” Carney agrees. “You listen to an album like Brothers, and it sounds different, but the connection is there: the dirgy
feel of that record, the overall dark, spooky sounds all goes back to the Junior shit.” Sharecropper’s Son, whose sessions led to Delta Kream, is the second album Auerbach has produced for singer-guitarist Robert Finley. It’s not a Hill Country project so much as a classic Memphis soul record in the vein of O.V. Wright. The new wrinkle is the more personal songwriting that Finley brought to the session. He sings of the hard times in the cotton fields on the title track and of the challenges of a backwoods kid in the city on “Country Child.” “This time,” Auerbach says, “I wanted Robert to come up here and write every song and tell his story, and have a personal connection to every song. He’s an incredible storyteller; he walks in and lights up the room. He’s got that kind of personality. He came to Nashville, and I paired him up with some songwriters I thought would be appropriate: Bobby Wood, Pat McLaughlin and myself. A couple songs Robert improvised on the spot.” Another Auerbach production released on his Easy Eye Sound label is Smoke From the Chimney, a posthumous release by the prolific singer-songwriter Tony Joe White (“Rainy Night in Georgia,” “Polk Salad Annie” and many more). Tony Joe’s son and manager Jody found his late father’s unreleased vocal-and-guitar songwriting demos and turned them over to Auerbach. These aren’t rejects or leftovers — these are some of Tony Joe’s best songs, even if he never got around to turning them into a polished album, and Auerbach has supplemented the demos with a swampy, funky band. “What I ended up doing was assembling the same band I would have assembled if Tony Joe was here in person,” explains Auerbach. “Straight-up badass musicians who would have understood Tony Joe’s aesthetic. It was all cut live with his voice in our earphones. Magically, his sense of rhythm was so solid, it was never a problem. ‘Bubba’ might be one of the greatest fishing songs ever. ‘Billy’ and ‘Del Rio’ are so beautiful that any good voice would enjoy singing them.” Another Auerbach production, Yola’s Stand for Myself, is due July 30. This followup to the Grammy-nominated AuerbachYola collaboration, 2019’s Walk Through Fire, promises to shift the singer’s focus from self-styled “country-soul” to Memphis soul. Already released is the album’s first single, “Diamond Studded Shoes,” a snappy, sassy R&B number that encourages working folks to fight back against the wealthy parading around in bejeweled footwear. “We cut right as the pandemic was starting, and things were getting a bit sketchy,” Auerbach says. “We cut it live, with musicians playing as Yola sang. [This album is] way dancier than the other one. Yola wanted to change, but it was a natural change. She’s using her platform and her voice, and I’m just happy to be along for the ride.” When The Black Keys play the Pilgrimage Music & Cultural Festival in Franklin in September, they promise to bring along Brown and Deaton for a mini-set of Delta Kream songs. Those blues numbers from Mississippi’s Hill Country will provide the key to understanding everything Auerbach and Carney have done throughout their entire career. As Alfred McMoore might have put it, “the black key.” EMAIL MUSIC@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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MUSIC
PHOTO: ANGELINA CASTILLO
SHOWTUNES OUT FRIDAY, MAY 21, VIA MERGE RECORDS
THE NEW WEIRD AMERICAN SONGBOOK Lambchop calls on the evocative power of the piano for Showtunes
BY BRITTNEY McKENNA
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o name an album Showtunes is to establish a certain set of expectations. The show tunes genre has a long, rich lineage, one that includes some of music history’s finest songwriters. The storied Great American Songbook is built on show tunes, many of which have become cultural touchstones. For Lambchop’s Kurt Wagner, an experiment and a coincidence led to the band’s latest album, which is called (you guessed it) Showtunes. Wagner and his collaborators built the eight-track album atop a foundation of piano and voice. In addition to being reminiscent of songwriter-composers like Cole Porter and Jerome Kern, it’s yet another new sound for the long-running collective that’s been exploring and expanding
on alt-country, soul, indie rock and more for more than three decades. “I’ve never been able to play the piano,” Wagner tells the Scene, calling from a family vacation out West. “How do you have two hands doing two different things? So I’ve never been able to do that. Pretty much what I would write was done with my limited skills on the guitar.” Wagner, a more inventive guitarist than he lets on, made an important discovery in 2019. He realized he could convert guitar audio tracks into MIDI information that could be used to trigger a variety of sounds through software. This revelation led to a prolific bout of writing, and the resulting songs had a flavor not quite like any Wagner had written before. While they’d likely sound odd in the context of musical theater, the process of writing for piano with the guitar guided the songs that would become Showtunes in a new direction. “When I found I could turn those notes into piano notes, everything changed,” he says. “Suddenly the sound of piano lent itself to a different type of writing. There’s all of these great writers, like Randy Newman or Tom Waits, where they would have these songs that were just them and the piano. I never thought that would be possible, and suddenly it was. Then it really got the ball rolling for me to create music.” Showtunes opens with lead single “A Chef’s Kiss,” a slowly building, noirish track
that considers the passage of time, as Wagner muses over gentle piano, “Life will be the death of us all.” It’s not West Side Story, but there’s a cinematic, anticipatory quality to the song that wouldn’t sound out of place as an overture to a film. In this case, it’s a fitting entry point into this new era for Lambchop. As is typically the case with Lambchop albums, Wagner worked with both new and longtime collaborators on Showtunes. He worked remotely with Ryan Olson of Poliça and Gayngs and Andrew Broder of Fog, both of whom he met in 2020. Wagner says that thanks in part to the pandemic bringing tours to a standstill, he began to connect with musicians who wouldn’t ordinarily have been free to contribute. “What’s important about those guys is they’re both producers of music as well as being musicians,” says Wagner. “So they come to the record-making process with a broader understanding of what they’re getting into. … That gives them a different sort of perspective on the thing that they’re working on, and I found that to be interesting. They looked at it with a larger lens.” Jeremy Ferguson of Nashville’s Battle Tapes Recording also served as co-producer, helping shape the songs to meet Wagner’s vision. And Yo La Tengo’s James McNew fulfilled a longtime dream for Wagner by contributing upright bass to the album — made possible by pandemic-driven remote work. “I’ve known James for so long,” Wagner
says. “He does stuff outside Yo La Tengo, and he’s always busy. So this was a one-time shot. Being able to make a record with James is a real bucket-list thing.” Wagner had originally conceived of Showtunes as a live performance for Wisconsin’s 2020 Eaux Claires festival, founded by Justin Vernon and The National’s Aaron Dessner. When the festival was canceled, Showtunes expanded into a larger, recording-driven project, though one that Lambchop will hopefully still have the chance to perform live. As more people get vaccinated and the COVID-19 pandemic appears to loosen its grip, Wagner is thinking ahead to playing Showtunes, as well as the band’s 2020 covers album TRIP. All the same, dreams of touring and live performances aren’t necessarily top of mind. He says he already has material for new albums in the can, and looks forward to continuing to focus on what he loves best: writing and recording new music. “There are artists who are performance artists,” Wagner says. “They live for performing and touring. I do enjoy performing, but I’ve been doing it a long time and I’m slowing down a little bit. [Laughs] I think of myself more as a recording artist, which sounds pompous and all that shit. But when we started, Lambchop was about making records. We just didn’t think anyone would actually listen to them.” EMAIL MUSIC@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
nashvillescene.com | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | NASHVILLE SCENE
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MUSIC
THE SPIN
FROM THE INSIDE BY OLIVIA LADD
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PHOTOS: LANCE CONZETT
he last time I caught a Ron Gallo show was mid-pandemic, on the internet via NPR’s World Cafe. In that setting, his lyrical commentary about the negative side of contemporary tech-fueled life felt more impactful than usual. On Saturday, I watched Gallo and his band perform in real life — almost surreal considering this was only my second in-person show since being vaccinated. It was Gallo’s second show of the afternoon; the two were his first as a visiting artist in a long while, as he recently ended a five-year run living in Nashville by moving back home to Philadelphia. Though the audience in the parking lot of The Basement was sparse and spaced out in pods, what trans-
backs it up. In his lyrical observations of himself and others, as noted by photographer Lance Conzett when we compared notes after the show, Gallo makes his sets feel like an inside joke the audience isn’t in on — yet he also manages to make that part of the appeal. Whether he’s laughing with you or at you, he’s making an interesting point you want to keep considering. The band became more comfortable onstage as the night went on. The Peacemeal song “Saturday Pt. 1” wrapped up the first half of the show, and then the group dug out an old favorite: “Young Lady, You’re Scaring Me” from Gallo’s breakthrough 2017 record Heavy Meta. In an instant I was transported to pre-pandemic times. The band slid into an extended jam between verses, guitar lines criss-crossing and surging life into the seated audience like a spiritual defibrillator. The ebb-and-flow groove of “Temporary Slave” morphed to an electronic beat behind the warbling guitar and psychedelic flourishes of “A Plate in My Honor.” During this
DOMESTICATING THE PUNKS: RON GALLO pired was a clear collaboration between the crowd and the band to create a meaningful experience despite the restrictions in place. Chiara D’Anzieri — Gallo’s collaborator, bandmate and wife, who also records and performs as Chickpee — opened the show with a brief set of bright, groovy indie-pop tunes. Some of those songs are slated for Imported, her first solo album of songs in English, set to be released later this year. The band, which included drummer Dom Billett and guitarist Jerry Bernhardt, rearranged themselves after a short break for Gallo’s set. They began with a few tunes from Gallo’s most recent LP Peacemeal, including “Hide (Myself Behind You)” and “Please Don’t Die.” Gallo sang both songs with a tremulous intensity that reflected the dual nature of the lyrics: Vulnerability is in the foreground, but it can still take effort to be so open. Vocal effects, synth tracks and bubbly harmonies reflected the sonic move he’d made from his grittier rock roots into electronic pop territory on the new record, made during the pandemic. Gallo’s wise-guy persona came through in both his witty stage banter and a sample of a voicemail that he played multiple times during the set without providing context. The next few songs reminded me that his sardonic and humanistic social commentary
part of the set, a Hawaiian-shirted fellow in the crowd, seemingly bursting with pent-up energy from the past year of isolation, danced all alone in front of the band, adding to the hilarity of the experience. After asking for requests — though the band admitted they hadn’t practiced most of the songs people wanted — Gallo & Co. drew the evening to a close. First there was “Can We Still Be Friends?,” a song about trying to forge bonds that extend beyond the music business. Then came the new, chilled-out version of the Gallo staple “All the Punks Are Domesticated.” It might be even more effective in this incarnation. The lyrics are a prime example of his sometimes-sarcastic observational wisdom, which he turns into piercing introspection. As we move uneasily through the late stages of this pandemic, these are both things that are worth keeping in mind, and the perfect note for the show to end on. EMAIL THESPIN@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
NASHVILLE SCENE | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | nashvillescene.com
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FILM
SPRING FLING
Suzanne Lindon’s Spring Blossom provides a female perspective on a French trope BY CRAIG D. LINDSEY
T
he new French film Spring Blossom couldn’t have come at a more apropos time. Suzanne Lindon — who also wrote and directed — stars as Suzanne, an awkward, grenadine-and-lemonadeSPRING BLOSSOM NR, 73 MINUTES; IN FRENCH sipping Parisian WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES teenager who is OPENING FRIDAY, MAY 21, AT easily bored by her THE BELCOURT; AVAILABLE adolescent life. For VIA THE BELCOURT’S VIRTUAL SCREENING ROOM her, teenage boys ON WEDNESDAY, MAY 26 are dull and her vapid girlfriends are even duller. She starts pursuing Raphaël (Arnaud Valois), a middle-aged theater actor who’s been in a rut as well. He’s in a local theater company, and on occasion, his director will tell him to pop into a scene during rehearsal and become a tree for no damn reason. Once Suzanne and Raphaël get together, they break out of their respective funks, even doing interpretive-dance routines that I’m assuming are there to show the audience how in-sync they are creatively and emotionally. This story of a 16-year-old girl falling in love with a 35-year-old man is being released
in U.S. theaters and video-on-demand sevices not long after the French National Assembly unanimously passed a bill making 15 the official age of consent and defining any act of sexual penetration between an adult and a minor under 15 as rape, punishable by up to 20 years in jail. This bill comes after a series of illicit scandals involving adults and minors — from writer Gabriel Mantzeff (who has written of his sexual relations with minors for decades) facing charges for promoting the sexual abuse of children to sexual abuse allegations against the former school-board president of France’s elite university Sciences Po. Blossom is less a response to those scandals and more a commentary on the decades of (male-created) French films and literature regarding underage girls and how they discover life and love via a relationship with an older man. In the movie, Lindon gives a wink or two to this unsuitable cultural trend. Hell, she lays a big, fat Easter egg in her protagonist’s bedroom: a poster for Maurice Pialat’s 1983 film To Our Loves, in which Sandrine Bonnaire plays a teenage girl — also named Suzanne — who has a sexual awakening. What’s more, you could even say Lindon resembles a young Charlotte Gainsbourg — who starred as as the teen-
PRIMAL STREAM 55
A Rainer Werner Fassbinder biopic and some classic airplane camp, now available to stream BY JASON SHAWHAN
H
ere it is: The 55th installment in our ongoing column on what to watch and where to watch it. This week we’ve got two films now available via video on demand — a Rainer Werner Fassbinder biopic and some classic ’70s airplane camp. As always, look back at past issues of the Scene for more recommendations of what to stream.
ENFANT TERRIBLE VIA VIDEO ON DEMAND
Remember when Bohemian Rhapsody came out and it was a quilt that totally betrayed the genius and sexual adventurousness of its subject, julienning the actual truth to make a palatable casserole of unchallenging moments? Well, Enfant Terrible — Oskar Roehler’s biopic about legendary German filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder — takes the opposite approach. Fassbinder was a brilliant writer and director, and his film, theater and television creations are enduring works well worth exploring for anyone who likes pitiless dissection of the human condition, as well as landmarks in queer representation. But he was also a selfish, insecure bully who delighted in breaking the wills of friends and lovers alike while hoovering a heroic amount of cocaine and barbiturates and falling into destructive relationships with what would end up a sizable body count.
ENFANT TERRIBLE
As RWF, Oliver Masucci (you might know him from Netflix’s Dark) commits fully, leading with the gut and the bile duct as he tears the supporting cast asunder. Though Fassbinder died at the age of 37, casting an actor in his early 50s works — time does the stunt work and makeup effects for a life devoted to art and sex and drugs. Moments from “life” play out on sets derived from Fassbinder’s other films, crafting a timespace where past and present flow between one another. The films are legendary works absolutely worth your time and attention (personal faves: World on a Wire, Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, Like a Bird on a Wire, Jailbait and Fox and His Friends). As they blend together, slipping in and out of RWF’s life like those he’s betrayed in the past, Roehler and his cast (particularly actual RWF/Herzog leading lady Eva Mattes as Ali’s Brigitte Mira, Antoine Monot Jr. as Peter Berling and Jochen Schropp as the tragic Armin Meier) move beyond traditional biopic tropes into something that feels like a portrait written in the spasms of nerves and sculpted out of pain. If it’s not up to the level of Bertrand Bonello’s Saint Laurent (still the best biopic of the past 20 years and easily one of the greatest films of the 21st century),
age love interest of a middle-aged man in Claude Miller’s The Little Thief and once did a downright disturbing duet with her dad Serge called “Lemon Incest.” It seems Lindon — who is not a teenager, but a grown-ass woman in her 20s — is wellaware how clichéd movies about intimate relationships between teenagers and adults have become, especially those that come from her homeland. And so she’s made a movie in which things are handled in a smarter, less played-out and dare I say more feminine manner. Unlike the Suzanne of Pialat’s film, this Suzanne has a stable, loving family, complete with oblivious but caring parents (Frédéric Pierrot and Florence Viala). It appears she’s simply looking for a connection with
a like-minded person. Nevertheless, once the foggy dizziness of new love clears from their brains, these two start wondering if this is, you know, a bad idea. It’s intriguing how Lindon subtly presents a very May-December romance in which the couple is reasonable enough to realize how indecent (and of course, creepy) this looks. Clocking in at 73 minutes, Blossom breezes by. Since Lindon doesn’t pack her film with tawdry love scenes, what we get is a love story that feels much more platonic than carnal. She and cinematographer Jérémie Attard make sure the visuals are crisp and colorful, creating perhaps the sunniest, most sensible movie about an inappropriate relationship I’ve ever seen. EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
it shares with that film a fearlessness in telling defiantly queer stories, and if it pulls back on the details, it paints the corrosive mood expertly. Enfant Terrible will be available on demand via all the usual ondemand options June 15, but for now you can stream it via L.A.’s Laemmle Theatres’ virtual screening room (laemmle.com).
the cockpit and kills or incapacitates the senior flight crew, she’s got to bring order to the skies. Along for the ride are Myrna Loy, Erik Estrada, George Kennedy (the defining presence of all the ’70s airplane crisis pictures), Large Marge herself Alice Nunn (with no lines but with an emotional support dog long before such a thing was a mainstream concept), a drunk Jerry Stiller who’s literally passed out during the whole crisis, Linda Blair having kidney failure, Norman Fell (America’s favorite strip club manager from Stripped to Kill as well as Three’s Company’s Mr. Roper) as a drunk lech, Helen Reddy as a singing nun, and Hollywood legend Gloria Swanson as herself (she wrote her own dialogue, and seems to know exactly the movie she’s in — like Gina Gershon in Showgirls). Anyway, it’s all about Karen Black, who’s battling embedded industry sexism and the trifling expectations of everyone around her. Karen Black can handle anything, and it’s really annoying when the film decides to spend half an hour with her wilting under pressure. She still emerges from this mess with dignity and steely reserve, like a slightly softer Mary Woronov. As a bonus, Airport 1975 comes with its own built-in drinking game, where you have a drink whenever you recognize a trope that Airplane! later popularized. The process photography is fascinating, still somehow more real than modern CG everything, and the idea of using a helicopter to lower someone into the jagged hole on the side of a plane careening toward the Rocky Mountains generates some tension that overrides the cornier tendencies of the script. But rest assured, if intentional comedy doesn’t do it for you, you could do worse than Airport 1975 or its even-more-ridiculous follow-ups. Karen Black, however, followed this up with Robert Altman’s Nashville — elusive, triumphant as ever.
AIRPORT 1975 VIA VIDEO ON DEMAND
There was a time when an airplane-related suspense picture was not just a tried-and-true subgenre that rolled in heaps of money — they occasionally even got nominated for Oscars. And then when Airplane! came out in 1980, it did to that entire genre what Bruce Campbell after Evil Dead II did to Bruce Campbell before Evil Dead II — that is, make it impossible for audiences to take them seriously anymore. Sure, there’s the Turbulence franchise (which is more a serial-killer/slasher series that unfolds in the aviation milieu) and Snakes on a Plane (which is an actual internet-comment-section tulpa), but even 40 years on, it’s impossible to imagine taking a cast-ofa-dozen-stars airplane drama seriously because of the impact Airplane! had. So 1974’s Airport 1975 is exactly the kind of camp riot you would want if you wanted to scientifically explore how ’70s one could get in less than two hours. Karen Black is a flight attendant in a sketchy relationship with Charlton Heston. She is dealing with institutionalized foolishness at every level of her life, so when her flight out of Washington, D.C., collides with a small two-man aircraft that leaves a hole in
EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM
nashvillescene.com | MAY 20 – MAY 26, 2021 | NASHVILLE SCENE
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being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on July 5, 2021. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville.
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PUZZLE BY BRENDAN EMMETT QUIGLEY AND BEN ZIMMER
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HAWRI KAK HUSSEIN vs. MATEEN BILBAS In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon Mateen Bilbas. It is ordered that said Defendant enter his appearance herein with thirty (30) days after May 20, 2021 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on June 21, 2021. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville. Richard R. Rooker, Clerk W. North, Deputy Clerk Date: April 22, 2021 Bethany Peery Glandorf James L. Widrig Plaintiff NSC 4/29, 5/6, 5/13 & 5/20/2021 Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No. 20D1328 THOMAS CHRISTIAN vs. KARLA CHRISTIAN In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon KARLA CHRISTIAN. It is ordered that said Defendant enter HER appearance herein with thirty (30) days after June 3, 2021 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on July 5, 2021. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville. Richard R. Rooker, Clerk M. De Jesus, Deputy Clerk Date: May 5, 2021
crossword_5-20-21.indd 37
Elizabeth Woodard Attorney for Plaintiff
Richard R. Rooker, Clerk M. De Jesus, Deputy Clerk Date: May 5, 2021 Elizabeth Woodard Attorney for Plaintiff NSC 5/13, 5/20, 5/27 & 6/3/2021
Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No. 21D104 MEGAN RENEE PRISCO vs. DANIEL EDWARD ARMSTRONG PRISCO In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon Daniel Edward Armstrong Prisco. It is ordered that said Defendant enter his appearance herein with thirty (30) days after May 20, 2021 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on June 21, 2021. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville. Richard R. Rooker, Clerk L. Chappell, Deputy Clerk Date: April 22, 2021 Paul W. Moser Plaintiff NSC 4/29, 5/6, 5/13 & 5/20/2021 IN THE JUVENILE COURT FOR DICKSON COUNTY, TENNESSEE AT CHARLOTTE Docket No.: 01-21-008-DN JESSIE SCOTT KEVIN SCOTT 1184 PACK RD. WHITE BLUFF, TN 37167 Petitioners, v ANDREA ZELTNER WHEREABOUTS UNKNOWN Respondent. IN RE: JACK INGRAM, Jr., DOB: 04/25/2007 A Child Under Eighteen Years of Age ORDER for PUBLICATION It appearing to the Court from the sworn allegations of the Pro Se Petition for Dependency and Neglect and Custody that the whereabouts of the Respondent, Andrea Zeltner, is unknown and cannot be ascertained with reasonable diligence, it is, therefore, ORDERED that Respondent be served by publication of the following notice for four (4) consecutive weeks in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper of general circulation published in Davidson County, Tennessee. It is further ORDERED that if Respondent does not enter an appearance or otherwise answer the petition, further personal service or service by further publication shall be dispensed with and service of any future notices, motions, orders or other legal documents in this matter may be made upon Respondent by filing the same with the Clerk of the Juvenile Court of Dickson County, Tennessee. NOTICE ANDREA ZELTNER Jessie and Kevin Scott, have filed a nashvillescene.com petition seeking custody of Jack Ingram, Jr. You are hereby ORDERED to appear for trial on that petition on June 22, 2021, at 1:00 PM, at Dickson County Juvenile Court, 500 Spring St., Charlotte, TN 37036, phone number 614-7890250, or to otherwise enter an appearance in this matter. If you fail
NOTICE ANDREA ZELTNER Jessie and Kevin Scott, have filed a petition seeking custody of Jack Ingram, Jr. You are hereby ORDERED to appear for trial on that petition on June 22, 2021, at 1:00 PM, at Dickson County Juvenile Court, 500 Spring St., Charlotte, TN 37036, phone number 614-7890250, or to otherwise enter an appearance in this matter. If you fail to do so, an order may be entered against you for the relief requested in the petition. You may view and obtain a copy of the petition and any other subsequently filed legal documents in the Juvenile Court Clerk’s Office at the address shown above. ENTER this the 4th day of May, 2021. Judge Honorable Michael Meise NSC 5/13, 5/20, 5/27 & 6/3/2021
Non-Resident Notice Third Circuit Docket No. 20D1966
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EDITED BY WILL SHORTZ
may be made upon Respondent by filing the same with the Clerk of the Juvenile Court of Dickson County, Tennessee.
BARBARA CARUTHERS vs. ISIAKA BAMIDELE In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon ISIAKA BAMIDELE. It is ordered that said Defendant enter HIS appearance herein within thirty (30) days after May 27, 2021 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on June 28, 2021. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville. Richard R. Rooker, Clerk L. Chappell, Deputy Clerk Date: April 29, 2021 William H. Stover Attorney for Plaintiff NSC 5/6, 5/13, 5/20 & 5/27/2021
Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No. 21D228 TINA GAYLE GRESHAM vs. CURTIS LEON GRESHAM In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon CURTIS LEON GRESHAM. It is ordered that said Defendant enter HIS appearance herein with thirty (30) days after June 3, 2021 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on July 5, 2021. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville. Richard R. Rooker, Clerk M. De Jesus, Deputy Clerk Date: May 5, 2021 John B. Iwu Attorney for Plaintiff NSC 5/13, 5/20, 5/27 & 6/3/2021
Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No. 20D54 DARIUS J PARHAM vs. NOVINA R KING
|InMAY 20 - MAY 26, 2021 | satNASHVILLE SCENE this cause it appearing to the isfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon NOVINA RAE KING. It is ordered that said Defendant enter HER appearance herein with thirty (30) days after June 10, 2021 same
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5/17/21 3:19 PM
Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No. 20D54
Marketplace
DARIUS J PARHAM vs. NOVINA R KING In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon NOVINA RAE KING. It is ordered that said Defendant enter HER appearance herein with thirty (30) days after June 10, 2021 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on July 12, 2021. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville. Richard R. Rooker, Clerk M. De Jesus, Deputy Clerk Date: May 12, 2021 Ellis H. Marshall. Ill Attorney for Plaintiff NSC 5/20, 5/27, 6/3 & 6/10/2021
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VP Global E-Commerce (GEODIS Logistics, LLC, Brentwood, TN): Reqs Bachelor’s degree (US or foreign equiv) in Sales & Marketing, Supply Chain Mgmt, or related; 8 yrs exp in product dev, transportation mgmt services, freight forwarding, customs clearance, or business dev role; 5 yrs knowledge of global shipping compliance; 5 yrs proven leadership of large eCommerce project initiatives; 5 yrs deep understanding of eCommerce cross border small parcel shipping; knowledge of developing complex contracts & working w/ legal counsel; 8 yrs exp working on a diversified/global team including cross-divisional internal resources & external resources; PC literate w/ experience w/ Microsoft Outlook, Word, Access, PowerPoint & Excel; excellent written & oral communication skills demonstrating proven ability to develop relationships w/ range of internal & external customers; excellent planning, organizational, leadership, & mgmt skills. Qualified applicants mail resume to Sharon Barrow, GEODIS Logistics, LLC, 7101 Executive Center Drive, Suite 333, Brentwood, TN 37027 Ref #: VPGLO16876 Lead Analysts, IT Financial Systems. Analyze and define SAP financial systems, business processes, and user needs for a major retailer. Employer: Tractor Supply Company. Location: Brentwood, TN. Multiple openings. To apply, mail resume (no calls/emails) to P. Hatcher, 5401 Virginia Way, Brentwood, TN 37027 and reference job code 0358.
Senior Developers, IT Business Intelligence. Develop and implement Business Intelligence, Data Warehouse, and Big Data analytic solutions for a major retailer. Employer: Tractor Supply Company. Location: Brentwood, TN. Multiple openings. To apply, mail resume (no calls/e-mails) to P. Hatcher, 5401 Virginia Way, Brentwood, TN 37027 and reference job code 0230.
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Senior Developers, IT Business Intelligence. Develop and implement Business Intelligence, Data Warehouse, and Big Data analytic solutions for a major retailer. Employer: Tractor Supply Company. Location: Brentwood, TN. Multiple openings. To apply, mail resume (no calls/e-mails) to P. Hatcher, 5401 Virginia Way, Brentwood, TN 37027 and reference job code 0230.
Sr. Developers, IT WCS Performance. Evaluate and optimize all consumer brand ecommerce sites for a major retailer. Employer: Tractor Supply Company. Location: Brentwood, TN. Multiple openings. To apply, mail resume (no calls/e-mails) to P. Hatcher, 5401 Virginia Way, Brentwood, TN 37027 and reference job code 20-0117. Sr. Application Engineer (Software Developer, Applications) needed for HCA/Management Services, Nashville, TN. Engage in analysis, design, programming, development and testing of JAVA/J2EE based applications. Will perform services as a Full Stack Developer using Spring Boot, Openshift, Micro Services, and WebSphere. Work with an Oracle database. The employee may work remotely from home within commuting distance of Nashville, TN up to 3 days per week. Must have a BS degree in computer science or engineering and 5 yrs. of overall progressive IT exp. developing JAVA/J2EE based applications which includes at least 2 yrs. of exp. in the skill sets listed above. Send resumes to: elaine.healy@hcahealthcare.com
Sr. Analysts, IT Marketing Data. Work with other IT professionals to design, implement, and support data solutions, data warehouses, data marts, and data stores for a major retailer while ensuring high levels of data availability. Employer: Tractor Supply Company. Location: Headquarters based in Brentwood, TN. May telecommute from any location in the United States. Multiple openings. To apply, mail resume (no calls/e-mails) to P. Hatcher, 5401 Virginia Way, Brentwood, TN 37027 and reference job code 0135.
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gazeboapts.com | 615.551.3832 nashvillescene.com | MAY 20 - MAY 26, 2021 | NASHVILLE SCENE
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