Exploring sustainability e orts at Neuho District, conservation of the Duck River, restoration of TSU’s Tiger Bay Wetlands and more
WITNESS HISTORY
Jim Lauderdale wore this Manuel Cuevas-made western shirt, embellished with rhinestones and Chinese yin-yang symbols, in the 2019 music video for “Listen,” a song reflecting wisdom he learned from the Chinese martial art of tai chi.
From the exhibit Sing Me Back Home: Folk Roots to the Present
artifact: Courtesy of Jim Lauderdale artifact photo: Bob Delevante
City to Clear Old Tent City
Residents plan for next steps as police and social workers manage a 60-day countdown at large downtown encampment BY
ELI MOTYCKA
Nashville Crowds Rally Against Trump, Musk Nashvillians gathered Saturday at Centennial Park and at a town hall headlined by Freddie O’Connell and Elizabeth Warren BY ELI MOTYCKA, PHOTOS BY HAMILTON MATTHEW MASTERS
Pith in the Wind
This week on the Scene’s news and politics blog
COVER PACKAGE: THE GREEN ISSUE
Neuhoff District Unveils Sustainable Transformation
Germantown’s adaptive reuse project puts the river front and center BY MARGARET LITTMAN
The Rising Duck Tennessee’s ‘crown jewel’ river has won over tourists, environmentalists and the governor BY
ELI MOTYCKA
Chemicals Are Forever
Advocacy groups look to raise awareness about the effects of PFAs through sludge regulation BY
HANNAH HERNER
Tiger Bay Wetlands Open Up a New World for TSU
Restoration efforts have been halted by cuts to federal funding BY JULIANNE AKERS
Nashville Cherry Blossom Festival, Caroline Rose, Denzel Curry, Bridesmaids and more
FOOD AND DRINK
Duck Dynasty
Choy wins thanks to stellar, modern interpretations of classic Chinese American BY KAY WEST
YONIC
With Love From the 56
On the unexpected joys of taking the bus BY LISA
BUBERT
CULTURE
In the Club: Music City Modern Quilters Guild A crafty community that’s progressive by design BY HANNAH HERNER
BOOKS
So Many Secrets
Plum portrays the splintering effect of trauma BY LOU TURNER; CHAPTER16.ORG
MUSIC
Vinyl Destinations
Your guide to Record Store Day 2025 in Nashville BY HANNAH CRON
High School of Rock
The Linda Lindas keep growing on No Obligation BY HANNAH CRON
The Spin
The Scene’s live-review column checks out Melissa Carper and Theo Lawrence at Analog BY P.J. KINZER
YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD TAPROOMS
FILM
Let’s Get Physical
From Michael Mann’s The Keep to Bruce Vilanch’s memoir, here are some of the best recent physical-media releases and re-releases BY JASON SHAWHAN
NEW YORK TIMES CROSSWORD AND THIS MODERN WORLD
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Cheekwood in Bloom • PHOTO BY HAMILTON MATTHEW MASTERS
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VIVIAN LUX
Introducing Vivian Lux, an exquisite collection of eight luxury homes nestled in vibrant East Nashville. This boutique development redefines luxury with a modern design that seamlessly blends sophistication and contemporary flair. Strategically zoned as MUL-A, with select units eligible for non-owner occupied short-term rental properties, Vivian Lux presents an ideal opportunity for homebuyers and investors alike. Listed by Shannon Ryan.
TOWNHOMES FROM $759,900 EAST NASHVILLE
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East End Village is an innovative health-oriented townhome community connected to the outdoors with beautifully landscaped grounds, walking trail, dog park, reflection pond and a pool (coming Summer 2025). The homes are built by a local builder who is deeply committed to the vision for East End Village, making intentional design choices that promote better health and energy efficiency.
TOWNHOMES FROM $315,000 INGLEWOOD
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CITY TO CLEAR OLD TENT CITY
Residents plan for next steps as police and social workers manage a 60day countdown at large downtown encampment
BY ELI MOTYCKA
NASHVILLIANS WALK DOGS and bike up and down Anthes Drive on a cool Monday morning at Old Tent City, one of Nashville’s longest-standing encampments, right on the Cumberland River. Word spread last week that the city planned to clear the site within 60 days.
More than 100 people live on 20 acres here according to estimates from residents. It’s been a particularly precarious six months — in the fall, the state demolished several shelters built by residents, including a two-story home constructed from salvaged wood. At the time, the city set and changed several timelines, emphasizing that no residents would be forced out.
On March 31, Metro’s Office of Homeless Services announced plans to concentrate outreach efforts at Anthes Drive in a “housing surge.” The city’s outdoor homelessness strategy is a knot of interdependent decisionmaking from different groups. The Homeless Planning Council’s 25 members help guide the city’s Continuum of Care, another web of groups and members with its own committees. One of these, the Local Prioritization Team, chose Old Tent City as the next site for clearance, preceded by concentrated efforts to meet and house those who lived there. This decision followed guidelines set by the council’s Coordinated Entry System and the separate Shelter, Weather, Outreach and Prevention Committee. Direct deliberations about which sites to choose for closure are shielded from the public.
“The Continuum of Care has a scorecard they evaluate: danger to individuals, urgency for housing, other criteria to select camps, do a housing surge, then start over and do it again,” says Metro Councilmember Jacob Kupin, whose District 18 includes Old Tent City. “This one has been on the radar for some time. The flooding this weekend is an example of why it’s unsafe to live right on the riverfront.”
Residents say drugs, too, affect many people at the site. Chris, a combat veteran originally from Ohio, has lived at the camp on and off since being released from prison in October.
“It’s just a bad situation,” says Chris, who asks the Scene to use only his first name. “Some people fall on hard times, for some people it’s a drug thing. Some people have been here for years, how are they going to pack up and leave in 60 days? I just don’t believe that they’re gonna have housing for everybody. I carry my tent with me. Soon I’m going to get my VA check. My plan is to buy a camper and travel across the United States.”
Chris also mentions a string of recent deaths
the site. He speaks with the Scene next to a tent staffed by two city outreach workers taking residents’ contact information and handing out muffins and juice. Every so often, a Metro Nashville police officer patrols Anthes Drive, the camp’s main artery stretching from Second Avenue to campsites on the river.
Chris says residents are trading rumors about pending real estate plans along Anthes Drive. Under former Mayor John Cooper, the city bought the old Tennessee School for the Blind at 88 Hermitage Ave. for $20.3 million in 2022. The site, just uphill from Old Tent City, completes the footprint necessary for Wharf Park, another aspiration under Cooper that would see the current encampment developed into a scenic riverfront centered on a recreational boathouse.
Kupin says any real estate plans are separate from the housing surge. Metro’s priority here, he says, is to concentrate services here to get as many Old Tent City residents into housing as
NASHVILLE CROWDS RALLY AGAINST TRUMP, MUSK
Nashvillians gathered Saturday at Centennial Park and at a town hall headlined by Freddie O’Connell and Elizabeth Warren
BY ELI MOTYCKA, PHOTOS BY HAMILTON MATTHEW MASTERS
LARGE CROWDS TOOK to Centennial Park on Saturday to protest federal funding cuts, steep
also backs the city’s ability to get housing for those who need it.
“We want to ensure housing for every person staying in this encampment, so closing an encampment is not a quick process,” the mayor says in a press release. “Our prioritization committee identifies areas that need attention, and then there is outreach to residents of the camp, and each one will receive temporary housing assistance and the social supports they need.”
Nashville’s 2024 Point-in-Time Count found 2,094 people living outside on Jan. 25, 2024. This year’s count took place overnight on Jan. 23; the city has yet to release the finalized report. These reports, often understood as a minimum estimate of the outdoor unhoused population, have hovered around 2,000 for the past decade. The same reports estimate that around half of the Nashvillians living outside live within an encampment. ▼
The decades-old Southern Festival of Books, an anchor of Nashville’s literary community, is among the potential victims of the latest round of cuts proposed by President Donald Trump and the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency Tim Henderson executive director of Humanities Tennessee, sent out a memo “with great urgency” last week, informing community members that the organization had received notification that its National Endowment for the Humanities grant, worth about $1.2 million annually, had been terminated. Writes Scene columnist Betsy Phillips: “The ecosystem of writers and historians and museums and libraries that sustains me is being killed off. … How can you be a writer with no way for your audience to find you? How can you be a historian if all the libraries and archives are shuttered? How do you live with people who would vote for this?”
The Metro Nashville Police Department released its final report on the 2023 Covenant School Shooting, which the department calls a “planned, calculated attack” by a killer seeking “notoriety.” The MNPD’s 48-page report comes with the closure of the criminal investigation, which, in short, states that 28-year-old Audrey Hale planned and acted alone in the killing of six people at the Green Hills private school and church campus. Police say Hale intentionally left evidence behind to be analyzed and publicized, and that Hale wanted to be the subject of books and movies, hoping that the act would be memorialized and inspire other killers.
A proposed settlement agreement with former Nashville General Hospital CEO Dr. Joseph Webb caused quite a bit of consternation at last week’s Metro Council meeting. Councilmember Courtney Johnston was one of the chief opponents of the nearly $900,000 settlement. Concerned that her vehement opposition might have swayed too many councilmembers to her side, Johnston changed course. “I know that I’ve swayed some people to a no,” said Johnston. “I’m going to change my vote to a yes, actually.” Meme-worthy moments ensued. Ultimately, the council approved the settlement, with a single “no” vote from Councilmember Erin Evans. Read more in the latest installment of contributor Nicole Williams’ Metro Council column, On First Reading
at
possible. Mayor Freddie O’Connell
PHOTO: ELI MOTYCKA
OLD TENT CITY IN SEPTEMBER 2024
import tariffs, civil rights violations and potential constitutional violations by Donald Trump’s current presidential administration. Many protesters also singled out tech billionaire Elon Musk, accusing both Trump and Musk of commandeering American democracy for personal profit.
National progressive group Indivisible convened the Centennial Park event at noon on Saturday in conjunction with more than 1,300 “Hands Off!” protests against the Trump administration across the country. One patrolling Metro Nashville Police Department officer told the Scene that police estimated total attendance at 1,500 people. Despite the event’s proximity to downtown and the city’s many college campuses, older attendees appeared to greatly outnumber young people.
A separately planned town hall with Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell and Democratic U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren followed at 2 p.m. at Pearl-Cohn High School. While Nashville’s mayor is technically a nonpartisan office, O’Connell publicly endorsed Warren’s presidential campaign in February 2020.
At both events, signs, cheers and speeches veered in many directions, united broadly under attendees’ opposition to drastic measures taken by the federal government 10 weeks into Donald Trump’s second pres-
idential term. Many told the Scene they showed up to fight a feeling of powerlessness and paralysis brought on by recent news headlines. Warren specifically drew local residents frustrated with Tennessee’s almost entirely Republican congressional delegation. (U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen of Memphis is the state’s only Democratic representative at the federal level.)
“It’s been overwhelming to see what has been happening, and I knew if I came to see her, I’d feel motivated to pick a place to start and get going,” said Heather Sublett, a Sumner County resident who mentioned recent Trump decisions around foreign policy, tariffs and mass deportations. “It’s not the Democratic party that radicalizes me. It’s the Republican Party and the Republican politicians that radicalize me.”
Warren focused her message on strengthening the American middle class and skewered Trump and the GOP for giving handouts to the wealthy.
“It is time for the federal government, instead of investing in millionaires, to invest and make a partner with our communities that want to build more housing,” said Warren over raucous applause in the Pearl-Cohn gym. “We can help make families more secure. It’s time to say on Social Security that millionaires and billionaires should pay their fair share.” ▼
SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN
PROTESTERS AT CENTENNIAL PARK
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APRIL 22 WILL MARK the 55th annual Earth Day — an occasion inspired in part by the catastrophic 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill and born out of the environmental activism movement of the 1960s.
Neuho District Unveils Sustainable Transformation
Germantown’s adaptive reuse project puts the river front and center
BY MARGARET LITTMAN
MEAGAN HALL IS the development and communications director for the Cumberland River Compact. When she learned that the nonprofit’s offices were moving to Germantown’s Neuhoff District, she wasn’t sure what it would mean for her commute.
Heading home to Donelson from the Compact’s then-offices in the Trolley Barns near downtown could take as long as 45 minutes. She wasn’t looking forward to commuting all the way to Germantown, thinking it would add even more time stuck in traffic.
To Hall’s surprise, the move to Neuhoff District has been a net positive in her life. Now she brings her bike on the train from Donelson to downtown, and then bikes along the Cumberland River Greenway to work, where she uses Neuhoff’s tenant bike valet to lock her bike, change her clothes and go to work. (A shower is
The Issue
Exploring sustainability e orts at Neuho District, conservation of the Duck River, restoration of TSU’s Tiger Bay Wetlands and more
guided yoga class and more. Attendees can expect food trucks, beer, wine and cocktails, along with musical performances from artists including Scene faves Erin Rae and Kyshona.
Here in Nashville, the Centennial Park Conservancy will host its annual Earth Day celebration on Saturday, April 19, at the Centennial Park Bandshell. The free event will include a tree giveaway, kids’ activities, an electric-vehicle car show, exhibitors, vendors, speakers, a
In this week’s Earth Day-inspired Green Issue, you’ll find details about the sustainability efforts at Germantown’s Neuhoff District, conservation of Middle Tennessee’s exceptionally biodiverse Duck River, the effects of “forever chemicals” on the environment, and restoration
of Tennessee State University’s Tiger Bay Wetlands in North Nashville. In the online version of this week’s issue, you can also find an updated version of our Green Directory — a roundup of eco-friendly shops, services and nonprofits in Nashville. D. PATRICK RODGERS, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
NASHVILLE EARTH DAY
11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday, April 19, at the Centennial Park Bandshell nashvilleearthday.org
available too, but she hasn’t used that yet.) After work, she meets friends, runs errands or rides her bike for recreation.
When Henry Neuhoff brought German immigrants to town to build a meat-processing plant on the banks of the Cumberland River in 1906, he wasn’t thinking about their commute. It would have been unimaginable that the revitalization of his buildings would be heralded as a pinnacle of sustainable design. Indeed, for some it is hard to reconcile the
site’s past as a slaughterhouse and center of industrial Nashville with a nature-centric vision forward. But thanks to the tenacity of those who wanted better for the city, the planet and the river, that’s exactly what Neuhoff District is becoming.
“Working in a place that prioritizes outdoor space, common areas for people to gather, being outside, biking, it’s really refreshing,” Hall says. Neuhoff’s history is long and complex and has been well-documented. Briefly, when a segment
of the McRedmond family purchased the land from other family members in 1998, philanthropist Stephen McRedmond launched an effort to transform the brick buildings, giant columns and ramp system into a mixed-use development with an emphasis on water conservation and sustainability. He understood that architecture like Neuhoff would never be built again, and that its location, closer to the Cumberland River than you are now permitted to build, was unique.
PHOTO: ANGELINA CASTILLO
NEUHOFF DISTRICT
After McRedmond was shot and killed in 2011, his siblings — Linda McRedmond Orsagh and Anita McRedmond Sheridan — and others wanted to preserve his legacy and his vision. Anita and her husband Mark Sheridan moved into Neuhoff (a process that took a year to create a habitable space) because Stephen believed having someone on site was essential to next steps. They converted spaces for artists, including the Nashville Jazz Workshop, and the “pink building,” which became home to John Prine’s writing studio. During this transition time, when many of the hodgepodge of buildings were falling into disrepair, they looked for a developer to help them realize Stephen’s vision. They spoke to many, Orsagh says. And while some thought they might save part of some of the buildings, most thought the idea was
cost-prohibitive. Or they just didn’t get it.
Then Jim Irwin heard about Neuhoff. Based in Atlanta and known for his work on adaptive reuse projects like Ponce City Market that have helped transform neighborhoods, Irwin is now president of New City LLC, a real estate company he founded to develop projects with historical character and sustainable aims. Irwin remembers touching one of the brick walls at that first meeting and feeling the building sway. He saw what a mammoth undertaking it would be to transform the 914,000 square feet.
“They asked me, ‘Can you save it?’” remembers Irwin. “And I said, ‘Of course! Who’s telling you that you can’t?’”
From there, New City got to work.
Different aspects of Neuhoff District now have been awarded various sustainability credentials,
from LEED certifications to the National Green Building Standard. Those third-party kudos help demonstrate that the development is as light on the earth as it purports. But what really matters is the way people interact with the space.
Neuhoff prioritizes walking or biking for everyone, not just people who commute to their jobs there, like Hall. There is parking (five stories underground, a feat that required deconstructing the existing building, storing it nearby, excavating 50 feet into the ground, and then reconstructing it identically to what it had been) and electric vehicle charging stages. But you don’t see cars or a lot when you arrive. Eventually, a pedestrian bridge will connect the east side of the river (at the Oracle campus) to Neuhoff on the west. New City is giving the portion of land on which that bridge will stand to Metro government. The hope is for river access and docks for kayaks, paddleboards and dragon boats in the future too.
The Cumberland River Compact staff had been involved with McRedmond family members over the years, discussing ways in which the project could best support the river. When Anita introduced Irwin to the nonprofit, he wanted the organization to relocate to Neuhoff. He thought their perspective and connection to water and environmental stewardship was important. “We don’t want this to just be another office development,” he says. “We want it to really be about taking actual material steps to include important community elements.”
The Cumberland River Compact was founded in 1997 to improve water quality in the river. Over the years, the Compact has launched the Water for Schools initiative, promoting rain barrel and green roof use, No Mow April, depaving and tree planting, and many other programs to build a healthier watershed. With growth, its offices moved from various remote locations to the Bridge Building downtown — where its River Center hosted public River Talks and programming — to the Trolley Barns. At Neuhoff, with views of the river it serves, the Compact will be able to resume River Talks this fall, and its May 15 Hellbender on the River fundraiser will take place at The Platz at Neuhoff, right outside.
“It’s a vision of how you can have a vibrant
city that has a lot of people and a lot of energy, and a natural system running through the middle of it,” says Mekayle Houghton, executive director of the Cumberland River Compact. “We don’t have to have one or the other. We can have it both together and figure out how to make it work.”
While many people think of the East Bank across from downtown as the primary public access place for the river — given the current construction there of the Tennessee Titans’ forthcoming Nissan Stadium and the East Bank development — Houghton says Neuhoff already offers the public a convenient option.
“Neuhoff shows that redevelopment — when our riverfront converts from industrial to mixed-use — that we can build in a way that ultimately results in improved water quality,” Houghton says. “The development doesn’t always have to mean we have worse water quality.”
There are connections to the Cumberland River Greenway and places to sit and read among the native-plant gardens and old columns. Architectural elements frame the river, offering views that show off the waterway. That’s rather than views turning away from the river, as was the case in the city for many years.
Much of Neuhoff’s furniture is built from salvaged materials from the site. To leave the columns and other elements, the demolition crew worked meticulously, removing bits of concrete, like a sculpture, rather than smashing it all and moving on.
“I think it’s really tragic that if you were put in a blindfold in a grocery store in Seattle and take the blindfold off, and put it back on, and were teleported to a grocery store in Miami and take your blindfold again, you wouldn’t know where you were,” Irwin says. “That’s a function of the modern real estate infrastructure that creates that commoditization. That’s why I love projects like this, because it is definitionally impossible to commoditize this.”
Disclosure: Margaret Littman is a member of the Cumberland River Compact advisory board. She volunteers on certain activities, but does not have a vote or control on Compact decision-making.
PHOTOS: ANGELINA CASTILLO
JIM IRWIN PRESIDENT OF NEW CITY LLC
MEKAYLE HOUGHTON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE CUMBERLAND RIVER COMPACT
NEUHOFF DISTRICT
The Rising Duck
Tennessee’s ‘crown jewel’ river has won over tourists, environmentalists and the governor
BY ELI MOTYCKA
IT DOESN’T TAKE a hydrologist, geologist or biologist to sell a pristine river carrying a steady current through green meadows lush with clover.
“When settlers came in, the prime land was right next to the river. You had the water, you had direct access, you could fish and hunt,” explains Van Ayers, a Bedford County farmer whose family has lived near the Duck River for more than a century.
What was obvious to early Tennesseans — and the Indigenous peoples who lived with the river millennia before white settlers — has recently become the grist for water reports, conservation recommendations and lawsuits that codify the Duck’s flowing benefits.
Twenty years ago, Congress tasked each state with compiling a report on potentially threatened or endangered wildlife. In 2015, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency included the Duck River in its Wildlife Action Plan as one of the state’s key natural habitats lacking sufficient conservation protections. According to the report, the river supported 151 species of fish, 51 species of mussels and 22 aquatic snail species. The Duck has received particular attention for its thriving freshwater mussels, a sensitive and delicate bivalve that signals exceptional water quality. Humans started to get in the way.
More people means more water, a pumping-and-treating job that falls to local municipalities facing pressure to accommodate the past decade’s population boom in Middle Tennessee. When the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation approved a water withdrawal permit to Marshall County in August 2021, lawyers got involved. The munici-
Chemicals Are Forever
Advocacy groups look to raise awareness about the effects of PFAs through sludge regulation
BY HANNAH HERNER
PERFLUOROALKYL AND POLYFLUOROALKYL substances were once considered miracles of human convenience. They can prevent eggs from sticking to pans, make coats waterproof and provide foam to fight challenging fires. The chemicals — also known as PFAs or “forever chemicals,” due to their persistence in the environment and the human body — often come from industrial sources, wastewater treatment plants and construction materials. But they can even be found in toilet paper, pharmaceuticals, pesticides and some cosmetics. Many of them are toxic, and many of them accumulate in the body, says Scott Banbury, lobbyist with the Tennessee chapter of
pality appealed TDEC’s water withdrawal limit, prompting intervening suits from the Southern Environmental Law Center representing the Tennessee Wildlife Federation and The Nature Conservancy.
More permit requests followed, from public utilities in Columbia, Bedford County and Coffee County.
“The Duck River is facing immense pressure from Middle Tennessee’s fast-paced growth,” the SELC wrote in 2024 as it prepared another round of lawsuits to limit water withdrawal. The SELC has been known to refer to the Duck as the “crown jewel” of Tennessee’s river system.
“Eight utilities want to drastically increase the amount of water they take from the river. The utilities seek to increase their daily water consumption by 19 million gallons, for a total of 73 million gallons of water to be pumped from the river each day.”
Gov. Bill Lee joined the Duck River hype train in November. Lee issued an executive order
environmental conservation group the Sierra Club.
“Scotchgard, it’s amazing,” Banbury tells the Scene “I can spray it on my couch and it won’t get stained. But [people were] not realizing that, later on down the road, we’ll find out that this isn’t really good for people or animals and ecosystems. It’s hard to walk it back. It’s a big industry with a lot of money.”
It’s challenging to show causation — after all, you can’t just feed someone PFAs and see what happens — but according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, exposure to PFAs is associated with increases in cholesterol, a lower antibody response to some vaccines, changes in liver enzymes, and even kidney and testicular cancer. Plus, PFAs have been linked to pregnancy-induced hypertension and decreases in birth weight.
One way PFAs get into the water and land is through sludge — all of the solids left over after wastewater treatment plants screen the water out. For years, advocacy groups like the Sierra Club have been working to pass legislation to more strictly regulate the sludge (also known as biosolids, or more colloquially as “shit”), which is often dumped in rural areas of the state to fertilize the land.
delegating conservation efforts to a Duck River Watershed Planning Partnership through 2026, including water-loss limits and habitat restoration efforts. He wants to preserve canoeing, fishing and mussel-tagging for future generations, according to the accompanying announcement video that features Lee engaged in various scientific and recreational pursuits in fishing couture. The initiative is the most that Lee, who hems and haws about the existence of climate change, has ever done for the environment. Most of today’s conservatives continue to focus on the preeminence of preserving nature for human enjoyment, like hunting and hiking, over communicating honestly with voters, even as the environment’s ongoing destabilization becomes more obvious and severe.
The order aids efforts to keep water in the Duck and earned a shoutout from the SELC, which drew an immediate connection to climate change via last summer’s drought and a subsequent rash of dead mussels.
The group brought a bill again in this year’s legislative session, sponsored by state Sen. Janice Bowling (R-Tullahoma), in an attempt to regulate the biosolids.
Under Senate Bill 1263, Grundy County — a rural area that sees a lot of biosolid dumping — would be able to enforce Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation rules requiring the biosolid to be spread within a certain period of time, and if it’s applied to grazing land, animals would not be able to graze right away. The bill has made more headway this year than in previous years, passing the Senate Energy, Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee before being rolled to the 2026 session in the House.
Meanwhile, a competing bill that would prevent regulation of PFAs is making its way through the legislature. Senate Bill 880 would prohibit state agencies from instituting regulations on pollutant waste until officials prove an exposure to the toxin caused “manifest bodily harm” to people.
Maine became the first state in the country to ban the spreading of biosolids in 2022 due to PFAs. Late last year, Texas farmers entered a lawsuit claiming biosolids
The attention has given way to popularity. Navigating one of Tennessee’s cool, winding rivers stands alongside climbing, hiking, fishing and hunting as a choice outdoor recreation activity. Nashvillians have long enjoyed the Harpeth’s winding curves on Davidson County’s western edge. Now the Duck is a destination day trip for river enthusiasts.
“Thirty years ago, you could float the river and see no one,” says Ayers. “Now it’s just packed — people buy a kayak from Walmart and pack a cooler full of beer. It’s an easy, inexpensive way to get outside.”
Ayers mentions a string of recent drownings and the ongoing struggle to find balance between public benefits and the public good. “I think the state’s still lacking to some extent on monitoring with the TWRA,” he says, “definitely on the real heavy weekends, to the point that they have a boat in the river and are writing tickets.” ▼
poisoned their livestock and land.
Because of the type of bonds that make up these chemicals, they are currently impossible to break down. The ultimate solution is to keep PFAs out of products unless they’re absolutely necessary. But that lofty goal will take time, according to Dan Firth, Holston Valley chair of the Sierra Club Tennessee chapter.
“The goal right now is really to bring awareness to the problem,” says Firth. “You’ve got to start somewhere. If you’re not testing it, and you’re not looking for it, all you’re doing is ignoring it.”
For some rural Tennesseeans, it’s hard to ignore — it stinks.
“A lot of counties across Tennessee have been very concerned about land application of biosolids,” says Banbury. “It’s a nuisance. They come and dump the sewage sludge out on property. They’re supposed to spread it out right away so that it starts to actually incorporate itself into the soil. Unfortunately, the companies that do it are sometimes lazy, and they just dump it on the property, and it sits there in a stinky pile for a long time.” ▼
PHOTO: ANGELINA CASTILLO
DUCK RIVER
APRIL 25
STAVROS HALKIAS
MAY 7
RHIANNON GIDDENS & THE OLD-TIME REVUE
SEPTEMBER 14 & 15
FESTIVAL NASHVILLE
BILLY STRINGS & BRYAN SUTTON WITH ROYAL MASAT
TICKETS AVAILABLE BY TICKET REQUEST ONLY
SEPTEMBER 21
TV ON THE RADIO ON SALE FRIDAY AT 10 AM
OCTOBER 10
THE PRINE FAMILY PRESENTS YOU GOT GOLD ON SALE FRIDAY AT 10 AM
NOVEMBER 14 & 15
49 WINCHESTER ON SALE FRIDAY AT 10 AM
DECEMBER 10-20
AMY GRANT & VINCE GILL
CHRISTMAS AT THE RYMAN ON SALE FRIDAY AT 10 AM
.ADONIS. DAPHNE WILLIS TAMARA STEWART DIAMOND DEJ
BLAIR STRING QUARTET THE SHIRT TUCKERS
MIMI MCCARLEY THALIA EWING MICHAEL ROSE DEANNA WALKER
Live music afterparty featuring food from and The Shirt Tuckers
Tiger Bay Wetlands Open Up a New World for TSU
Restoration efforts have been halted by cuts to federal funding
BY JULIANNE AKERS
WHEN STUDENTS AND FACULTY at Tennessee State University found out they received a $4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to restore the campus’s Tiger Bay Wetlands in North Nashville, they were overjoyed. They began conducting research on trees and started reaching out to consultants to help with the revitalization effort.
And then the grant was terminated. Though the grant was funded by the USDA Forest Service, it was disseminated to universities by the 1890 Foundation, an organization
supporting historically Black colleges and universities — making it aligned with the kinds of diversity, equity and inclusion efforts that have been a target of federal cuts by the Trump administration.
“To see that money go away and lose that ability to restore and rehabilitate the wetland, it hurt,” says Dr. Tom Byl, a TSU agriculture and environmental science professor who works in the wetlands. “It was to help this neighborhood. We need green space.”
While the funding was revoked, Byl says the 40 acres of urban wetland remain a valuable resource to students, the local environment and researchers across the globe.
The wetland is home to an extensive list of plant and animal species including beavers, muskrats, turtles, snails, sandpipers and redwinged blackbirds, who often make nests in the habitat’s swaying cattails. Byl says the area’s swamp milkweed attracts monarch butterflies, an insect that scientists are currently trying to get placed on the endangered species list.
Byl says the wetland also faces a fair amount
of stormwater runoff and prevents trash and other waste from ending up in the Cumberland River and contaminating Nashville’s drinking water.
“You’ll see trash, you’ll see all sorts of things in here that’s really kind of depressing,” he says. “This is a beautiful wetland. … It now needs our help to clean it up.”
TSU students participate in classes and internships to learn more about the wetland and how the area can be restored in the future. Byl says while from the outside it may look like they’re only taking water and testing sediments, the work transports students to a different world.
“I really love making the outdoors my classroom,” says Aaliyah Cotton, a senior environmental science major at TSU. “I feel like I learn best in environments like this. It makes sense to me, and I retain more than when I’m looking at a slide. I love it, and it’s one of our only designated greenspaces, so it just means a lot.”
“It’s cool to see it change with the seasons,” Cotton adds. “Like in the summer, it’s really pretty out here, in the spring too. So just seeing
it change, and changing with it.”
Students and faculty continue to research different threats to the ecosystem, like harmful algal blooms and invasive species. Meanwhile, several bills targeting the protection of wetlands are advancing in the state legislature.
Republican-backed bills like Senate Bill 670/ House Bill 541 would roll back protection for a majority of the state’s wetlands. The legislation would prohibit the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation from classifying certain properties as wetlands unless the property is classified as wetland under federal law. Democrats argue that the legislation sides with property developers and could lead to the destruction of wetlands across the state, polluted drinking water and a higher risk of floods.
“Because the grant has been frozen, we’re all kind of holding our breath and saying, ‘What next?’” Byl says. “It’s slowing us down from what we want to do, but we’ll make do. I mean, we’ll find a way. We always do. Mother Nature will definitely continue to do whatever Mother Nature wants to do.” ▼
PHOTOS: ANGELINA CASTILLO
TIGER BAY WETLANDS
DR. TOM BYL SPEAKS WITH TSU STUDENTS
Anthony Parnther, conductor Demarre McGill, flute Titus Underwood, oboe Anthony McGill, clarinet Andrew Brady, bassoon The Lawrence
Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor Oliver Herbert, cello Tony Siqi Yun, piano
S. Levine Memorial Concert
SATURDAY, APRIL 12
FESTIVAL
[CHERRY BOMB]
NASHVILLE CHERRY BLOSSOM FESTIVAL
When it started more than 15 years ago, the Nashville Cherry Blossom Festival began with the goal of planting 1,000 cherry trees in the city while celebrating Japanese culture. Now the event has blossomed into a festival that takes place each spring at downtown Nashville’s Public Square Park and features a full day’s worth of fun activities. The tree-planting goal has been surpassed, but each year the festival continues to grow. The festivities begin at 9:30 a.m. with a 2.5-mile walk. This year’s events will feature a cosplay contest, a traditional Japanese tea ceremony, a puppet show from the Nashville Puppet Truck, a panel on manga, and entertainment from choirs, dancers, sumo performers, belly dancers and more. The festival is free, but you can purchase a $5 Fans of the Festival wristband for discounts and perks from food vendors and shops. AMANDA HAGGARD
9:30 A.M. AT PUBLIC SQUARE PARK
UNION STREET AND THIRD AVENUE NORTH Visit calendar.nashvillescene.com for more event listings
THURSDAY
/ 4.10
MUSIC
[AMPED UP] TY SEGALL
NASHVILLE SYMPHONY: MENDELSSOHN’S FIFTH PAGE 18
TITAN OF TWANG: A CELEBRATION OF DUANE EDDY PAGE 20
BEN KWELLER PAGE 22
The style of revivalism you hear on singer, songwriter and guitarist Ty Segall’s 2024 album Three Bells references both early prog rock and the genre’s mature phase of the 1970s. Three Bells runs a hefty 64 minutes, but it’s a consistently entertaining record that shows off Segall’s refined taste in post-Beatles songwriting and King Crimson-style guitar polyrhythms. The songs on Three Bells are pastiches that sound authentic, which means Segall takes care to get the details just right. I hear hints of The Pretty Things and the half-forgotten English progblues band Patto throughout Three Bells, but Segall’s take on early prog is filtered through garage rock. As you might guess from its title, the album’s song “Eggman” comes across like Hawkwind paying tribute to The Beatles by amping up all those Revolver and Abbey Road usages in a kinetic fashion the Fab Four never really approached. Meanwhile, “Repetition” is even more Beatle-esque, with sinister vocals and another Robert Fripp-style guitar lick. Segall
has also released an instrumental album, 2024’s Love Rudiments, and he has another full-length, Possession, set for a May release. He’s trading his electric guitar for an acoustic on his current solo tour and featuring some songs from the 2022 acoustic collection “Hello, Hi.” EDD HURT
8 P.M. AT THE BASEMENT EAST 917 WOODLAND ST.
MUSIC [IT MIGHT JUST BE OK] AN EVENING WITH CAROLINE ROSE
Over the past decade, Caroline Rose has made half a dozen records that could each be a fundamental statement for an artist’s career. The stylistic setting has changed with each release, running the gamut from New Wave-y R&B bops to expansive experimental soundscapes to December’s Live in Color album, recorded with the London Contemporary Orchestra at the Barbican Theatre. Don’t mistake this for aimlessness or an identity crisis: It’s a reflection of how Rose contains multitudes as well as a testament to the strength of their lyrics and power of their performance skills, which are some of the best I’ve had the good fortune to witness. Released in February, the Bandcampand-physical-media-only release Year of the Slug
goes in yet another direction. It’s a collection of mid-fi tracks self-recorded in GarageBand with sparse yet creative arrangements and doubletracked vocals that make me think of Elliott Smith as Rose sings about trying to find your balance in our jacked-up world. Rose’s solo “An Evening With” tour is visiting only indie venues, emphasizing yet again the massive importance of the indie players in this business, and it starts Thursday at The Blue Room. STEPHEN TRAGESER
8 P.M. AT THE BLUE ROOM AT THIRD MAN RECORDS
623 SEVENTH AVE. S.
[GLASING HOT]
NASHVILLE COMEDY FESTIVAL: NIKKI GLASER
Nikki Glaser has been on a hell of a run. In 2024 alone, she released a stand-up special on HBO, was one of the most talked-about dissers on Netflix’s The Roast of Tom Brady, became the host of FBoy Island spinoff Lovers and Liars and finished up her Alive and Unwell Tour. She capped off her run in January with a successful stint as host of the 2025 Golden Globes, a performance that earned Glaser a three-year deal as the Globes host. Now she’ll bring her act to Music City in what is among the most anticipated events of this year’s installment of the Nashville Comedy Festival — a lineup
to Nashville. Fotocrime is the brainchild of longtime underground guitarist Ryan Patterson, who once recruited the three members of Music City metal band Yautja to be part of his other project Coliseum. Fotocrime even played its very first live gig at East Nashville oddities shop Hail Dark Aesthetics in 2017. Though the noir synthpunk trio has had a revolving cast, each release seems more fully realized than the last. Local support from Soot and Yammer Jaw will round out Thursday night’s lineup. P.J. KINZER
8 P.M. AT DRKMTTR
1111 DICKERSON PIKE
FRIDAY / 4.11
MUSIC
[PAST LIVES] L.S. DUNES
that also includes comedy legends like Wanda Sykes (April 13) and Jay Leno and Arsenio Hall (April 12). Glaser is coming into the festival on a hot streak, so it will be exciting to see what the famously irreverent stand-up has up her sleeve. Find the full Nashville Comedy Festival lineup at nashcomedyfest.com. LOGAN BUTTS
7 P.M. AT THE RYMAN
116 REP. JOHN LEWIS WAY N.
MUSIC [UNNECESSARY BLEAKNESS] BLEAKNESS W/FOTOCRIME
While most artists rely on rapid-fire velocity or cranked-up distortion to musically express ideas of raw anger, truly imaginative musicians can find other sonic vehicles for their rage. The Parisian antifascist post-punkers in Bleakness have made a name for themselves by sounding simultaneously gloomy and furious. The French unit’s gruff vocals and ringing, ice-cold-tone guitar riffs have drawn a lot of comparisons to sinister punk acts like Blitz, Specimen and The Mob. Similar to their French contemporaries (and labelmates) in Syndrome 81, the skinhead unit has drawn high praise for their politically charged death rock/oi sound. Now touring for their fourth album, Living Shadows, Bleakness will make their Nashville debut at Drkmtter. Louisville’s Fotocrime, by contrast, is no stranger
The post-hardcore Avengers come to Nashville this week. No, seriously. Headlining Saturday at The Basement East, L.S. Dunes features members of Circa Survive (singer Anthony Green), My Chemical Romance (guitarist Frank Iero), Coheed and Cambria (guitarist Travis Stever) and Thursday (bassist Tim Payne and drummer Tucker Rule). Many of the elder emos who once haunted Hot Topic and spent summers counting down the days until Warped Tour can agree — that’s a killer lineup. The band tours this spring in support of Violet, a sophomore LP that debuted earlier this year on Fantasy Records. Those looking for an introduction to the band should spin spooky, melodic rock number “Paper Tigers” off the new album, or the fan-favorite debut single “Permanent Rebellion,” which dropped in 2022. Indie-rock band From Indian Lakes plays main support; folk-punk artist Derek Zanetti (known for releasing music under the name The Homeless Gospel Choir) opens the show.
MATTHEW LEIMKUEHLER
7 P.M. AT THE BASEMENT EAST 917 WOODLAND ST.
[BREAK MY OWN]
MUSIC
TAYLOR BICKETT
Taylor Bickett kicks off a string of solo acoustic dates on April 11 at The Basement. Bickett went viral on TikTok for “Quarter Life Crisis,” and her acid wit carries through much of her writing. However, this tour has a mission: Bickett’s song “The Crime” parses a painful personal experience, but the story is one that too many women are familiar with. For every ticket sold in the U.S., Bickett will donate $1 to The Circle, a charity founded by Annie Lennox that seeks to prevent violence against women. Amid the laughter and knife-sharp pain, Bickett’s voice is singular and worth catching in person.
RACHEL CHOLST
7 P.M. AT THE BASEMENT 1604 EIGHTH AVE. S.
CIRCUS
[SWEATING TO A DANCE SONG ON THE CLUB’S PA] NOT A PHASE: AN EMO CIRCUS SHOW 2.0
When you think about it, a 2000s emo-themed circus show makes sense. Besides the fact
that several of the genre’s biggest acts openly embraced circus-y, vaudevillian aesthetics — check out early Panic! at the Disco or My Chemical Romance’s The Black Parade, the era’s defining artistic statement — both art forms celebrate performers who harness big emotions and then do the absolute most. Last year, members of Nashville’s underrated circus community brought the two together with the Not a Phase show at Eastside Bowl, which ended with an aerialist dressed as My Chem’s Gerard Way swinging around the Eastside Bowl rafters to “I’m Not Okay (I Promise).” That is to say, it was a perfect evening. The second edition will feature an entirely new mix of songs alternating between old favorites and “lesser-known and newer — but banger” tracks, and the performers run the gamut of circus arts and apparatuses. You don’t have to pile on the eyeliner and swoop your bangs in front of one eye to attend, but it’s better if you do.
COLE VILLENA
8 P.M. AT EASTSIDE BOWL
1508 GALLATIN PIKE N., MADISON
MUSIC [CLASSICAL DIVERSITY]
NASHVILLE SYMPHONY: MENDELSSOHN’S FIFTH
Thankfully, the Nashville Symphony does not embrace or accept the noxious and offensive notion that diversity is the same thing as discrimination. They continue to explore a vast array of musical approaches and idiomatic references, with their latest being displayed over two nights. This weekend’s program features, among other selections, Chinese folk music being played alongside traditional Western classical composition and instrumentation. Joan Huang will be headlining Tu-Jia Dance, a showcase for the Tuija people of Western Hunan’s dance traditions, while Jasmine Barnes’ Kinsfolknem blends solo prowess with exacting ensemble precision, featuring Titus Underwood (principal oboe, Nashville Symphony), Demarre McGill (flute), Anthony McGill (clarinet) and Andrew Brady (bassoon). The finale will be a glorious rendition of Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 5, written to commemorate the Protestant Reformation. The piece draws primary inspiration from Bach while spotlighting a familiar hymn that is universally performed in multiple religious services and by various denominations, the Lutheran chorale “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.” It will be a shining night that demonstrates the special qualities of particular sounds while also demonstrating how divergent themes can be creatively explored and presented in one program. RON WYNN
APRIL 11-12 AT THE SCHERMERHORN
1 SYMPHONY PLACE
SATURDAY / 4.12
ART [DADA-IST]
SECOND SATURDAY ART CRAWL
If you haven’t quite gotten into the swing of the downtown art crawl moving from First Saturday to Second Saturday, I can assure you that the revived creative trek of artist studios,
CAROLINE ROSE
APRIL 18
CLEM SNIDE WITH ABE PARTRIDGE
APRIL 23
DEAD BOYS WITH BURN KIT
APRIL 26
WEBB WILDER ALBUM RELEASE PARTY
galleries and hotel art programs has more than found its groove. Local photographer Caroline Allison curated the Archive of Atmospheric Memory exhibition at Arcade Arts in Gallery 56. Already a contender for best show title of the year, this display of mysterious, surreal press photographs lives up to its name. It’s an exhibition of vintage and antique images that speaks to up-to-the-second themes about generative art as well as to photography’s historically less-than-earnest commitment to the real. Archive of Atmospheric Memory will have you questioning everything before you crawl to Tinney Contemporary for Cosmic Downloads. Sky Kim’s paintings are studded with crystals and arranged in compositions informed by sacred geometry and astronomy. Kim’s mandala-like works combine watercolors, earthly elements and light in formalist displays that speak to balance and renewal. I can’t think of a better way to kick off the spring art season downtown. Visit dadanashville.org for the full crawl schedule and specific venue addresses.
JOE NOLAN
6 P.M. AT THE DOWNTOWN ARTS DISTRICT
MUSIC
[OPEN YOUR EYES] STRFKR
Indie sleaze, as we once knew it, is dead — the late-2000s aesthetic was killed off by the ever-changing hierarchy of trends around 2012. But amid a recent resurgence of the cultural phenomenon, a handful of bands are keeping the era alive today. Portland indietronica quartet STRFKR popped up in the midst of the movement, and the band has managed to haul the last remaining fragments of OG indie sleaze into 2025. Parallel Realms is the group’s latest installment in a progressively imaginative and introspective discography. The album, which, according to the band, is a collection of songs that “hadn’t made sense until now,” is a pretty far cry from their gauzy electropop debut Starfucker, but it still carries the cadence of the group’s “music that people could dance to” roots. Back in September, STRFKR cancelled the remaining leg of its 2024 U.S. tour — just four days before the band was set to swing around to Music City. Luckily for Nashvillians, in November, the band rebooked every city it missed. BAILEY BRANTINGHAM
8 P.M. AT BROOKLYN BOWL 925 THIRD AVE. N.
[KEEP ON WALKIN’]
MUSIC
DENZEL CURRY
Denzel Curry is bringing his signature energy to Nashville on April 12 as part of his Mischievous South Tour, celebrating his latest project, the mixtape King of the Mischievous South Vol. 2. Over the past decade, the Floridaborn MC has become one of hip-hop’s most dynamic and forward-thinking artists. From his breakout 2016 album Imperial — which earned him a co-sign from Rick Ross and a spot on XXL’s annual Freshman Class list — to the conceptual brilliance of TA13OO, ZUU and Melt My Eyez See Your Future, Curry has consistently evolved while staying true to his Florida roots. King of
the Mischievous South Vol. 2 is a triumphant return to the sound that helped launch his career, proving he’s still pushing boundaries while standing alongside rap’s biggest names. The Pinnacle is about to witness why he’s one of today’s most electrifying performers in hip-hop.
JAYME FOLTZ
8 P.M. AT THE PINNACLE 901 CHURCH ST.
[SOLIDARITY]
COMMUNITY
TRANSISTANCE: THE NASHVILLE TRANS SOLIDARITY PROJECT LAUNCH PARTY
A local initiative promoting transgender allyship launches Saturday with a night of music, local art and baked treats at DIY creative space Drkmttr. Called Nashville Trans Solidarity Project, the collective aims to take “the guesswork out of being a trans ally” by providing safe-space signage for local businesses and distributing a digital zine that offers guidance for supporting members of the trans community. The event will feature performances from Travi Sexton, Dialup Ghost and Afrosheen; attendees can expect participation from local vendors and nonprofit organizations, per a release. A flyer promoting the event encourages showgoers to “come dressed as your most authentic self. Drag is encouraged and celebrated.” Those unable to attend the show can learn more about the initiative at bizkits.biz/learn. MATTHEW LEIMKUEHLER
7 P.M. AT DRKMTTR
1111 DICKERSON PIKE
FILM
[THERE IS A COLONIAL WOMAN ON THE WING] SNL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE: BRIDESMAIDS
Of the nearly two dozen films showing as part of the Belcourt’s ongoing SNL Cinematic Universe series, just two received Oscar nominations for Best Original Screenplay: 1984’s Beverly Hills Cop, penned by buddy-cop genre pioneer Daniel Petrie Jr., and 2011’s Bridesmaids, co-written by Annie Mumolo and star Kristen Wiig. (The latter film also received an Academy nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role, thanks to Melissa McCarthy’s inspired performance as foulmouthed oddball Megan.) Unlikely though the nomination might have seemed, it wasn’t a fluke — the Bridesmaids script features an all-killer barrage of now-iconic set pieces, from Wiig’s pill-induced airplane freakout to that scatological bridal-shop scene ending with Maya Rudolph … well, you know. Thanks also to its stacked ensemble cast, Bridesmaids proved to be a box office smash that remains endlessly rewatchable. The fine folks at the Belcourt Theatre will show the Paul Feigdirected masterpiece two times this weekend in its 1966 Hall. See belcourt.org for showtimes.
D. PATRICK RODGERS
APRIL 12-13 AT THE BELCOURT 2102 BELCOURT AVE.
SUNDAY / 4.13
THEATER
[DISCO INFERNO]
THE DISCO BALL: SPELLBOUND
Kindling Arts has long embraced the offbeat and unconventional, empowering and celebrating some of Nashville’s most innovative artists since 2018. So it should come as no surprise that the organization’s annual fundraiser also pushes a few boundaries. This year’s installment promises a particularly magical evening as Kindling takes over Eastside Bowl for The Disco Ball: Spellbound. Guests are invited to dress in their favorite “enchanted forest disco look” (think flowing robes and otherworldly glam!) and can look forward to a bewitching lineup of performances from Amm Skellars, IMGRNT, Spencer Grady, Demillion, Nichole Ellington Dupree, Delta Granta and more. Candace-Omnira LaFayette is set to host the enchanting program, and DJ Amy Darling will be on hand to keep the party going with “sonic sorcery.” It’s sure to be a fabulous event, and best of all, proceeds will go to support Kindling Arts Festival 2025: Fortunes & Fates, which will run July 24 through 27. AMY STUMPFL
6 P.M. AT EASTSIDE BOWL
1508 GALLATIN PIKE S., MADISON
MUSIC [REBEL ROUSER]
TITAN OF TWANG: A CELEBRATION OF DUANE EDDY
Sunday night, an array of recording stars will gather at the Grand Ole Opry House to honor one of the most influential guitarists in the history of popular music, the late Duane Eddy. The event, billed as Titan of Twang: A Celebration of Duane Eddy, is the brainchild of Eddy’s manager Trudie Myerscough-Harris. “I first had the idea for the show last July,” Myerscough-Harris tells the Scene. “I asked Deed, Duane’s wife, what she thought, and she loved the idea.” Jim Lauderdale will serve as emcee for the show, which will feature an all-star cast of friends and admirers of the guitar god, many of whom recorded with him, including Peter Frampton, Albert Lee, Vince Gill, Joe Bonamassa, Steve Earle, Molly Tuttle, JD McPherson, Beth Nielsen Chapman, Buddy Miller, Grace Bowers and Bill Lloyd. The special guests will each perform two numbers — songs popularized by Eddy or songs of their own recorded with him. They will be backed by a stellar house band led by Jim Hoke and featuring Garry Tallent, Dave Pomeroy, Dan Dugmore, Richard Bennett and The McCrary Sisters, among others. The show will also contain some special video tributes from friends and fellow artists unable to participate and will conclude with a grand finale led by Frampton and including all the guests. DARYL SANDERS
7:30 P.M. AT THE GRAND OLE OPRY HOUSE
600 OPRY MILLS DRIVE
DENZEL CURRY
PHOTO:
TUESDAY / 4.15
FILM [I AM A GOLDEN GOD] STAFF PICKS: ALMOST FAMOUS
night shred-fest. I’ll see you vipers in the pit.
JASON VERSTEGEN
8 P.M. AT THE COBRA
2511 GALLATIN AVE.
There’s nothing quite like driving down the road and scream-singing along to a classic song with your buds. I like to think of it as a sort of friendship test; if we can’t roll down the windows and yell the lyrics to a slightly embarrassing crowd-pleaser, then I don’t know if I can trust you fully. There’s a reason these scenes are a go-to movie cliché. It can be a cheap way to get you to commit emotionally to the characters. But when done right, it turns out like the scene in 2000’s Almost Famous — Cameron Crowe’s autobiographical-ish tale of his time as a teenage music journalist — when the principal characters come together by singing along to Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer” (an elite car-singing song). It’s a very Crowe moment in that it’s almost overwhelmingly earnest, but it still works thanks to charismatic performances (namely Kate Hudson in an Oscar-nominated role as Penny Lane), Crowe’s detailed specificity and, of course, killer tunes. Almost Famous has a lot of great moments like this — that’s what makes it a classic. LOGAN BUTTS
8 P.M. AT THE BELCOURT
2102 BELCOURT AVE.
[MOON
ROCK]
MUSIC
HASHTRONAUT W/DEAD RUNES, KARMA VULTURE & ELECTRIC PYTHON
MUSIC
[CORNHÜSKER DÜ] BIB
Oftentimes ultra-aggressive acts can soften with age. But the gargantuan riffs on Bib’s recent releases still have as much crunch as they did a decade ago when the band released its demo tape. The Nebraska band’s noisy guitar distortion, enormous drumming and echoing vocal delay are still the trademark of their unique sound. Often drawing comparisons to outsider ’80s hardcore bands like United Mutation or Land Speed Record-era Hüsker Dü, the band seems more than comfortable in their space as weirdos even within their own fringe scene. Gruelingly chaotic and ugly, Bib’s music may not be for everyone. But in a community where most artists flame out quickly, 10 years into their existence, Bib is still touring and making music for the freaks who love the band’s sonic assault. Supporting Bib will be Fairview’s bombastic Bolt Swallower, who recently released a new eight-song tape of cacophonous hardcore punk. The audio anarchists seem bent on testing listeners’ threshold, eschewing any and all pleasantries in favor of the sort of raw sounds you might hear from early Japanese noise-core releases, early Boston hardcore punk bands or California legends Man Is the Bastard. Local newcomers The Family Dog fill out the bill, so show up early! P.J. KINZER
8 P.M. AT DRKMTTR
1111 DICKERSON PIKE
WEDNESDAY
/ 4.16
MUSIC
[DOLLAR STORE] BEN KWELLER
Could there be a more stacked night of redeyed riffs and bong-bastic beats? Seriously, stoners, this show’s a must-see. Hailing from the Mile High City, Denver’s Hashtronaut tops the bill of heavy hitters. Last year was a breakout one for the group following the release of their debut album No Return on Blues Funeral Recordings, as well as an unexpected cover of Jethro Tull’s “Bungle in the Jungle” that turns the quirky radio rocker on its sinister head. Puff, puff, pass — the rest of the lineup is homegrown. Local trio Dead Runes also found themselves busy throughout 2024, having released their own stellar debut album, Raidho The brutally disorienting outro on “My Freya” is worth the price of admission alone. Fellow Music City mega-weights Karma Vulture and Electric Python are set to kick off the Tuesday
Ben Kweller has been making music a long time. Not as long as Paul McCartney, but longer than Olivia Rodrigo. Longer still if you count his post-grunge vehicle Radish, which formed in 1993 when Kweller was 12. Long enough for Kweller, now 43, to have released six studio albums, started a family and tragically lost a son, 16-year-old Dorian Zev Kweller, also a musician. Ben Kweller’s forthcoming seventh record, Cover the Mirrors, is a reckoning of a reckoning, and fittingly, it calls on a roster of collaborators — Waxahatchee, MJ Lenderman, The Flaming Lips — to aid in the back-breaking task of grief. With Nashville slated as only the second stop on his tour, it’s hard to know what to expect from a musician who can be anthemic, subdued and snarling all in the span of three songs. But then again, the assignment is simple. As simple as the call to song in times of despair. You go and you listen. MALCOLM MOUTENOT
8 P.M. AT THE BASEMENT EAST 917 WOODLAND ST.
APRIL LINE UP
4.17 Jammy Buffey w/ Special Guests Brendan Mayer and Coral Reefer Legend, Roger Bartlett
4.18 Ty Herndon – Celebrating 30 Years of “What Mattered Most”
4.19 Waymore’s Outlaws –Runnin’ With Ol’ Waylon
4.26 Melodies for Miracles: A Benefit for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
4.27 Corb Lund & Hayes Carll: Bible on the Dash Tour
4.28 Buddy’s Place Writer’s Round w/ Alyssa Bonagura, Fraser Churchill, Sean Kennedy
The Warren Brothers
4.13 Pick Pick Pass w/ Kevin Mac, James LeBlanc, Jacob Lydia 4.15 Showtime: Nashville w/ Riley Anderson, Skyelor Anderson, Duke Jones, Will Moseley
4.30 Uncle B’s Drunk with Power String Band Show feat. Bryan Simpson w/ Mae Estes, Lera Lynn
DUCK DYNASTY
Choy wins thanks to stellar, modern interpretations of classic Chinese American
BY KAY WEST
WHEN BUILDING THE menu for Choy — an elevated, contemporary Chinese American restaurant — the priority was clear. Start with the one dish that is rarely found in Nashville — a dish central to Chinese restaurants at every price and service point in major-market cities like New York, Chicago, Washington, D.C., San Francisco and Los Angeles.
Peking Duck traces its origin back centuries to Beijing, marked by the same identifier whether from a takeout-only hole-in-the-wall or a fine-dining destination — shiny, ruddy-hued crackling skin. Carved strips of the roast meat are placed on a steamed crepe-style pancake spread with hoisin, topped with sliced cucumber and scallion, folded and picked up by hand.
Since Choy opened in July, Peking-Style Whole Roast Duck has been the star of the show. Like many of the other dishes on the succinct menu, it culls local product and regional technique to give Chinese American classics a sense of place. Thus, the Peking Duck gets a taste and whiff of good ol’ Tennessee barbecue, which has made fans of some of Nashville’s best-known pitmasters.
Executive chef Brian Griffith refutes the term “serendipitous” to describe the meeting of his bona fides with Choy co-founder/owner Moni Advani’s quest for the culinary leader of the team — but there’s no question the timing was perfect.
Advani’s history with the building at 121B
12th Ave. N. dates back to 2008, when he owned the nightclub Anthem. In 2015 and 2017, respectively, he partnered with Maneet Chauhan to open Chauhan at 123 12th Ave. N. and Mockingbird at 121. Anthem ran its course, closing in 2014, and the subsequent Tànsuǒ never really took off. Intent on mining fond adolescent memories he had of mom-and-pop Chinese restaurants in Murfreesboro, but lifting the experience to align with his older, worldlier self, Advani contacted Brandon Jew, the James Beard Award-winning chef-owner of San Francisco’s Mister Jiu’s, the only Michelin-starred Chinese restaurant in the U.S. Jew agreed to serve as a consultant; better yet, he told Advani and his partner Nishaan Chavda that his executive sous chef of four years was seeking a change and a return home to Tennessee. Enter Knoxville native Griffith, whose national and global résumé lists Denver, Portland, Copenhagen, extensive travel through Asia and legendary Italian restaurant Oliveto in San Francisco. In 2020 he landed at Mister Jiu’s, where he addressed Peking Duck — which he calls a labor of love and hate.
The process is intense wherever it is executed, but at Choy, it goes like this: A 7-pound whole fresh duck arrives from Joe Jurgielewicz & Son farm in Pennsylvania Dutch Country. The skin is blown up in three parts to separate it from the meat; the cavity is trussed with a skewer and blanched in vinegar, salt and spices to open
glory to the lucky diners. Then it heads back to the kitchen for carving and is returned with a basket of steamed pancakes, a ramekin of duckliver mousse, house-made peanut butter and hoisin sauce, pickled cucumbers, cilantro and scallions.
The process and fact that one duck can feed four makes the $130 tag a steal. Here is where I confess that I did not, in fact, have the duck. With my own first memory of Peking Duck at glamorous Shun Lee Palace in New York City as well as cardboard takeout boxes from my own corner Chinese restaurant on the East Side of Manhattan, I longed for that duck. But alas, I was faced with a [Scene-imposed] budget quandary, so I made the executive decision to forego the duck and cover more of the menu. Honestly, I don’t regret it.
From the minute I left behind the cacophony of the uber-developed, traffic-clogged mean streets of the “North Gulch” and passed through the heavy metal door of Choy into the stunning, sophisticated interior reminiscent of midcentury Shanghai luxury I know only from movies, I was in a place of pure Zen. Seated in a plush, leather-upholstered half-moon booth around a table positioned at just the right height, we were served a complimentary flute of fresh-brewed cold tea with a splash of NA bubbles. Now that’s Southern/Chinese hospitality, folks.
the pores. Remove the head, truss the body and pull every single remaining feather with fish tweezers.
The bald bird is glazed in a mix of rice bran syrup, dark soy and spice mix, then hung in the cure room under fans to dry out the glaze, the crucial step to the skin’s glass shatter. In about 10 days, the duck is ready to rumble — a 17-minute roast, then 15 minutes at 450 degrees and a 25-minute rest before being presented in glossy
Our booth was across from the bar — which runs the entire length of the opposite wall — but not once did we have to raise our voices. Lighting is seductively low throughout the room — the other side has more booths as well as intimate nooks wallpapered in gold — with a dramatic wash of red along the rear wall.
Should you choose not to duck, or if you’re with a large party and want to supplement, here is what you should try.
Choy 121B 12th Ave. N. choynashville.com
YELLOWTAIL YUSHENG
Do not miss the yellowtail yusheng — a tri-layer of pristine yellowtail, juicy and sweet Asian pear and watermelon radish coins on a pool of white soy and sweet potato vinegar, topped with a delicate sprig of tangerine lace microgreen.
Sourdough scallion pancake does not foretell the puffy round of bread dusted with dehydrated scallion powder; pull off hunks to scoop the creamy onion soubise.
Smashed cucumbers are as close to a salad as Choy comes; these thin-skinned Persians are gussied up with avocado and flash-fried strips of yuba (tofu skin). They lead the menu, but I should have followed my instinct down to the vegetable of the moment, Sichuan-spiced cabbage. (Or the Mapo Tofu, which Griffith touts as the best thing on the menu. Next time.)
Pressed pig ear terrine is a quick no for many. I said yes, and if you’re a fan of offal, go for it — raw celery ribbons add crunch to the slippery slices; chao tian jiao chili oil brings the heat. Beef Chow Fun is a people-pleasing sure bet. The wide noodles are made fresh every morning, and flank steak is sourced from Evans Meats
and Seafood in Birmingham, Ala. With alliums caramelized in beef fat, bright-green broccoli and a handful of bean sprouts, it all hits the wok for a fast, high-heat searing in tallow, tossed with dark soy, oyster sauce and sesame. Served in a shallow bowl, it is showered with grated fresh horseradish.
With one silky bite of the salt-baked whole Bucksnort trout, I forgot the duck. The lotus-leaf wrap is rolled back to reveal glistening coral meat dotted with bright-green ginger-garlic-scallion relish. Spoon salty smoked trout roe across the top, but save some for the layer under the spine, which a server will expertly pull away for you.
The most-asked question of any food writer covering a city without a Chinatown is this: Where can I get good Chinese food? It’s an impossibly subjective question. But if you’re in Nashville, seeking stellar, chef-driven modern interpretations of classic Chinese American, in a sumptuous setting with a sommelier-stocked wine cellar, impeccable service, feet-on-thefloor ownership and Peking Duck, there’s only one answer. Choy for the win. ▼
WITH LOVE FROM THE 56
On the unexpected joys of taking the bus
BY LISA BUBERT
Vodka Yonic features a rotating cast of women, nonbinary and gender-diverse writers from around the world sharing stories that are alternately humorous, sobering, intellectual, erotic, religious or painfully personal. You never know what you’ll find in this column, but we hope this potent mix of stories encourages conversation.
MY CAR BROKE down for the second time, leaving my husband stranded on a dark Virginia highway. This was after we’d spent $2,000 to fix the brakes. And now we were facing a $7,000 quote to fix a car that was worth half that. You know that scene in Office Space where they beat the printer mercilessly in a field? If only.
While I would have happily left the car in Virginia, my husband is an enterprising Mr. Fix-It. We had the car shipped home, where it sat in the driveway with all the other things that needed to be fixed. Meanwhile, I took the bus.
I am a perfect candidate for the bus. My home and work are both near stops for WeGo route 56, and I get my bus pass for free — a Metro employee perk. I’m a longtime environmentalist who loves the idea of the bus, but I waffled when it came to actually taking the bus.
I’m reckless with time. My first job required an hourlong commute by car and put me in the habit of waiting to leave until the last second, then dodging traffic like a bat out of hell for the thrill of arriving with one minute to spare. I maintain this terrible habit even now, when my commute is a 10-minute drive down Gallatin Pike.
Leaving at the last minute does not work for the bus. No matter how fast you walk, what time the bus is supposed to be at your spot, or where you see the bus on the app’s “live location,” in Nashville, you don’t schedule the bus, the bus schedules you.
I now leave 20 minutes earlier for work than I used to. At first, I hated this. Not that I did anything special with those 20 minutes — I would normally just stare at my phone. Now I spend that time leisurely walking to the bus stop. When I arrive, I leisurely walk from the stop to work, satisfied with the fact that I am not late. Nothing else in life has made me feel as content, unhurried and unbothered as the bus.
The bus forces me to slow down and plan ahead, but not too much. You’ll get there when you get there. I never thought I lived in a walkable city until I was forced to walk in my city. On my walk, I see trees, I hear birds, I wave to neighbors. I literally stop to smell the roses, because why not? I’m in no hurry. My chains to the rock of time have been torn asunder by the almighty WeGo, and I am a devout apostle.
Still, people are surprised when I say I like riding the bus. The subtext beneath their surprise is the question: Aren’t I afraid?
Because to ride the bus is to rub elbows with strangers. A woman who carries her possessions in a suitcase and shopping bags. A teenager with a skateboard going to school. An old man who repeats the opening lines to “Baby Got Back” in a British accent before devolving into laughter and clearing out the seats around him. A woman gets on, wrinkles her nose, and passes around her personal supply of Febreze because “somebody didn’t wash their ass.”
Public spaces, like the bus or the library, allow us to come as we are, regardless of who we are or how much we can pay. In a public space, we can’t always avoid people or situations that challenge us. Big Tech promised us a frictionless experience of life, forgetting that friction is what makes life worth living. And there is nowhere more full of life than a public space.
One weekend, I needed to run errands. With a car, this task would take two hours. But I was still sans car, and I had the whole Sunday to burn. So I saddled up my backpack and walking shoes and got on the bus. I rode to Turnip Truck. I’d never eaten from the hot bar because I never intended to linger, me and my car with so many things to do. But that day, on foot, I bought a small cup of soup and ate it upstairs while I read a book and peoplewatched. I put my groceries in my backpack and walked to Five Points, where I refilled my soaps at The Good Fill before wandering into Thunder Moon Collective. Then — ah, what the hell, a coffee at Bongo Java, where I shared a table with two college students gossiping about their friends.
I needed to pick something up on Chapel Avenue, and took a 20-minute stroll through Lockeland Springs, waving to neighbors on their porches. I turned toward Eastland, where I saw the WeGo 4 roll by — which meant there would be another 45 minutes until the next one. I popped into Ugly Mugs for a tea and more reading. I had just about finished my book when it was time to head to the stop and ride home.
Five hours to run errands on one of the more glorious Sundays in recent memory. My car has since been fixed, but I still visit the bus. We are now old friends. I have my preferred seat and window into the neighborhood, and it’s more crowded with newcomers today than yesterday. I like seeing the new faces. Maybe one day you’ll see mine, from a seat or the street, waving with love from the 56.
Lisa Bubert is a local writer, librarian and Metro worker. ▼
THIS WEEKEND | FREE TO ATTEND FESTIVAL!
SPRING E DITION
APRIL 12+13
ONE C1TY / 8 CITY BLVD / 10 AM - 4 PM
SHOP FROM 100 LOCAL AND REGIONAL ARTISTS SHOWCASING THEIR HANDMADE GOODS INCLUDING HOME DECOR, CLOTHING, PET PRODUCTS, JEWELRY, FINE ART AND MORE!
CLAREMONT STREET BAO | DADDY’S DOGS HAUTEWHEELS ROLLING SANDWICH CO.
GOURMET POPCORN | THE MAC SHACK PIE TOWN TACO | QUIRK ‘N CO DONUTS ROLLIN’ THAI | MAG MILE PIZZA | NEW BERLIN
CULTURE:
In the Club is a recurring series in which the Scene explores Nashville’s social club offerings.
IT’S SHOW-AND-TELL TIME at the Music City Modern Quilters Guild’s monthly meeting. Each participant lifts their creation high above their head, letting the painstakingly sewn fabric fall in front of their bodies.
A chorus of oohs, ahhs and various compliments ensue. The 17 participants showcase a range of projects, including wall hangings, original patterns, repurposed family heirlooms, brightly colored prints and improv — or patternless — quilts. Some quilters cut out shapes to make a picture.
When they’re finished meticulously cutting out pieces of fabric and fastening them together, either by machine or by hand, most of the quilters send their work off to a longarmer — that is, someone who operates a longarm sewing machine ideal for large projects. They add the perimeter and batting to complete the quilt.
All the projects share something that makes them modern, whether it’s a color palette or a design.
While show-and-tell is a key part of the group’s monthly meetings, which are usually held at a library, the group also offers instruction. For example, members have given presentations on how to dye fabric or make a quilt coat. Some meetings, however, are left open for members to troubleshoot projects they’re stuck on and get advice.
It’s the breadth and depth of knowledge that brought the group’s youngest participant, Britney Singer, to the guild.
“A lot of my friends don’t do crafting projects and sewing,” she tells the Scene. “But here, there are so many people I can ask questions. Everyone is so friendly. There are so many different skill sets here.”
Many of the quilters learned from Instagram and YouTube, and they hone their skills with sew-alongs, where group members work on separate projects concurrently. For others, it was a grandmother or grandfather who taught them to sew.
Quilting involves a lot of math to ensure shapes line up flush with one another. Board member Jennifer Burke goes by the motto, “One time is a mistake, twice is a design choice.”
“I think that’s where the beauty of quilting comes in,” adds guild president Melanie Bontusa, “because how you respond to fuck-ups is what makes it cool and unique.”
Guild member Shannon Lookenott picked up sewing in 2020 at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Her husband had a heart condition, she says, and that made isolating particularly important for them. She started making masks,
MUSIC CITY MODERN QUILTERS GUILD
A crafty community that’s progressive by design
BY HANNAH HERNER
and eventually moved on to quilts. At one point, she was making about a quilt a month — that’s a lot in quilt terms.
Lookenott’s designs feature contrasting bright print-on-prints. One of her latest designs comes through a process she calls “rage-quilting,” along with “fussy cutting,” a quilting technique that involves framing a particular part of the print in her quilting shape.
Politics are often a part of quilts. The winner of the 2024 QuiltCon (a yearly event presented by the national Modern Quilt Guild, of which the MCMQG is a part) was titled “What We Will Use as Weapons: A List of School Supplies” and featured outlines of items that might be found in a classroom, as a commentary on school shootings. Several other winners had social justice themes.
Living in western Williamson County, Lookenott makes a nearly hourlong commute to Nashville to commune with like-minded progressives. The rage-quilting has helped her cope with her disappointment in the recent election outcome.
“It’s a process where you can escape from what’s going on and be a person for a moment and express yourself in a creative way,” Lookenott says. “It’s so rewarding to just have that brightness out there when it’s a little bit darker right now.”
Music City Modern Quilters Guild mcmqg.org
Meetings are held 10:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. on the third Saturday of each month
The Music City Modern Quilters Guild is a decidedly progressive one, and moves in the direction of the national organization by hosting outside of the traditional quilting setting — churches. This group also caters to those who have conventional 9-to-5 jobs by meeting on Saturdays.
Members of the group also attend the yearly “airing of the quilts” in Gee’s Bend, Ala., where the Gee’s Bend quiltmakers are celebrated as some of the most significant contributors to
American art history.
Music City Modern Quilters Guild is modern by design, but like the quilting circles of the past, it’s a way to create community.
“It’s hard to make friends as an adult,” says board member Megan Ellinger. “We all moved here at some point and didn’t know anybody. At least we’ll have something to talk about. Now these are all my closest friends.”
Just don’t ask them to make a T-shirt quilt.
PET OF THE WEEK!
BAMBI
1 yr. 49 lbs.
is a sweet and affectionate pup who loves to give the best hugs! She’s a bit shy at first, but once she warms up to you, she’s all about snuggling and showering you with love.
Bambi may take her time to feel comfortable, but her gentle nature and big heart make her the perfect companion for someone who understands and appreciates her quieter side. She’s looking for a patient and loving home where she can continue to blossom and show just how special she truly is.
Call 615.352.1010 or visit nashvillehumane.org
Located at 213 Oceola Ave., Nashville, TN 37209
Adopt. Bark. Meow. Microchip. Neuter. Spay.
SO MANY SECRETS
Plum portrays the splintering effect of trauma
BY LOU TURNER
WRITTEN ENTIRELY IN second person, Plum is an immersive and propulsive novel that doesn’t shy away from the viscerality of abuse and its long-term impact on a life. Author Andy Anderegg places the reader in the immediacy of each moment of a young girl named J’s life as she comes of age, leaves home, creates new relationships and repairs others — including the fractured one with herself. It’s an achingly poignant story, but it’s told with a disarming and poetic frankness that makes it difficult to put down and deeply moving to read.
an independent bookstore for independent people
UPCOMING EVENTS
PARNASSUSBOOKS.NET/EVENTFOR TICKETS & UPDATES FRIDAY, APRIL 11
6:30PM
BRIAN SELZNICK at PARNASSUS Run Awy With Me
10:30AM
7:00PM
SATURDAY, APRIL 12
SATURDAY STORYTIME with PARNASSUS STAFF at PARNASSUS WEDNESDAY, APRIL 16
MELINDA FRENCH GATES with ANN PATCHETT at BELMONT UNIVERSITY The Next Day: Transitions, Change, and Moving Forward THURSDAY, APRIL 17
6:30PM
JENNIFER HAIGH
with KIM BALDWIN at PARNASSUS Rabbit Moon
6:30PM
KRISTEN ARNETT
10:30AM
FRIDAY, APRIL 18
with LYDI CONKLIN at PARNASSUS Stop Me If You've Heard This One SATURDAY, APRIL 19
SATURDAY STORYTIME
with HAYLEY ARCENEAUX at PARNASSUS Astronaut Hayley's Brave Adventure
4:00PM
JAMIE SUMNER
TUESDAY, APRIL 22
with CHRISTINA SOONTORNVAT at PARNASSUS Please Pay Attention
3900 Hillsboro Pike Suite 14 | Nashville, TN 37215 (615) 953-2243 Shop online at parnassusbooks.net
“There are so many secrets in your house, you do not even know them all,” Anderegg writes, setting the scene at the beginning of the novel and establishing J’s family dynamic. “You just know: don’t ask, don’t get told, don’t get hit, stay the course. Keep everyone fed. Keep no one hungry.” We observe how J has learned to anticipate her parents’ needs as an avenue to earning their interest in meeting her own needs. “Maybe you are running low on milk, or need something like some clear gelatin for your science project? There is always a way to get [your dad] to take care of himself, which is the thin string to: he might take care of you.”
This method, dysfunctional as it is, sometimes works out for J, but it doesn’t offer much protection for her unnamed older brother. When their father hits the ceiling of his anger, which is frequent and cyclical, he makes her brother a scapegoat for just about everything.
“You listen with your whole body to what happens in your brother’s room and you hear the air change when it’s over,” J reflects, “when your dad stops what he is doing long enough for it to seem bizarre even to him and he will let your brother go like he’d let a cat go after petting it.” Witnessing the difference in how her brother is treated catalyzes deep survivor’s guilt in J, which follows her throughout the book and strains not just their sibling connection, but all of her relationships.
This is just one of several ways Anderegg portrays the splintering effect trauma has on a person. We witness it in each member of the family, including J’s mom, who is described as “around here somewhere, like a phone that’s always ringing” — one of the many precise metaphors that surprise on every page, each one making the story more urgent and alive.
parents, she earns money by livestreaming on a webcam and chatting with men who send her money for her hair, nails and clothes.
This is how J pays her way through college and carves a way out of her home life — calling home only on “the parent days,” and eventually not at all. But she discovers that the freedom of adulthood she once dreamt of so feverishly is something she can’t move through without running into incessant obstacles set up by her past. “There’s nothing that can undo it, can reverse the way you are, which must be stored in your genetic code or deeper, in your fate, or in the shape of your eyeballs, damage so severe and so undoable a brain scan could reveal it.”
relationship with her brother.
Plum’s title comes from the novel’s opening image: J and her brother, at their father’s command, picking up plums that have fallen into the expensive mulch below. It’s the perfect microcosm for the ordinary ways that generational patterns of abuse often play out. It’s also a gorgeous example of Anderegg’s razor-sharp attention to detail and penchant for metaphor that make this remarkable story of resilience so gripping to read.
For more local book coverage, please visit Chapter16.org, an online publication of Humanities Tennessee. ▼
@parnassusbooks @parnassusbooks1 @parnassusbooks @parnassusbooksnashville
As J trudges through the precarious years of adolescence, she and her brother grow more isolated, each sequestered in their own methods of coping. When he leaves home, they lose touch completely; and what J hoped might be her strongest tether to the outside world is cut, causing her to question if she’s capable of making a life for herself. To gain independence from her
The challenges that come with adulthood cause J to realize that no matter how hard she works at her career or her long-term partnership, she must also work on her relationship to herself in order to heal and live a more fulfilling life. “You learn something called repair,” Anderegg writes, “where you don’t throw a person and your relationship in the road and drive off forever.” Looming largest on the list of demons J must face is her complex desire to rekindle a
Plum By Andy Anderegg Hub City Press 232 pages, $26
Saturday, April 12
WRITERS ROUND
The Songs of Bobby Bare
11:30 am · FORD THEATER
Saturday, April 12
NASHVILLE CATS
JayDee Maness
2:30 pm · FORD THEATER
Sunday, April 13
MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT
Todd Lombardo
1:00 pm · FORD THEATER
Saturday, April 19
SONGWRITER SESSION
Scoot Teasley
NOON · FORD THEATER
Sunday, April 20
MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT
Becky Buller
1:00 pm · FORD THEATER
Saturday, April 26
HATCH SHOW PRINT Block Party
9:30 am, NOON, and 2:30 pm
HATCH SHOW PRINT SHOP LIMITED AVAILABILITY
Saturday, April 26
WRITERS ROUND On the Rise
Featuring Seth Costner, Dan Harrison, Sydney Shae, and Zoee
11:30 am · FORD THEATER
Sunday, April 27
MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT Justin Moses
1:00 pm · FORD THEATER
Saturday, May 3
SONGWRITER SESSION Noah Thompson NOON · FORD THEATER
NOW ON SALE Raise a glass to the freshest sips of summer. This inaugural lakeside, golden hour fest will feature cocktail tastings and lots of fabulous surprises, benefiting The Westhaven Foundation.
NIGHT FOR HADLEY featuring RODNEY CROWELL, TY HERNDON, SEALS & CROFTS 2, RICKY SKAGGS, JEFFREY STEELE, GORDON KENNEDY, PORTER HOWELL & More!
FEEL
with LILLY WINWOOD with ANGELA AUTUMN + Special Guests RACHAEL DAVIS, JIM KELLER, JESS NOLAN
GOVRIK, TOM BUKOVAC,
MUSIC
VINYL DESTINATIONS
Your guide to Record Store Day 2025 in Nashville
BY HANNAH CRON
YOU’VE KNOWN THE drill since 2008: It’s April, and Record Store Day is here. We’ve got the details on everything happening around town on Saturday, April 12, and all the hot special releases you won’t want to miss.
McKay’s (636 Old Hickory Blvd.) will carry RSD exclusives when they open early at 9 a.m. They’ll also have a Grateful Dead-themed exclusive Record Store Day at McKay’s poster available for purchase. Alison’s (994A Davidson Drive) won’t have exclusives but will offer 15 percent off their stock on Saturday (open extended hours from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.) and Sunday (open noon to 3 p.m.). Third Man Records (623 Seventh Ave. S.) will be carrying exclusive titles including their own special release of The Kings of America, an Elvis Costello live album captured at The Royal Albert Hall in 1987. They’ll open at 11 a.m. and have bands — Slush, The Family Dog and Stunt Girl — playing live in the storefront starting at 1 p.m. The Groove (1103 Calvin Ave.) will have the RSD exclusives at their annual celebration co-hosted by Acme Radio Live. The live music will start at 11:30 a.m. with performances by Julia Cannon, massie99, Case Arnold, Josey Toney and more, with Aaron Lee Tasjan topping the bill. Shoppers can also check out goods from Moons and Junes Vintage, Candle With a Handle and other vendors and get a bite from Bad Luck Burger Club or No Fuss Taco. Groove patrons can also enter a charity raffle benefiting Nashville Humane Association, which will have adoptable puppies onsite. You read that right — this is not a drill, adoptable puppies!
Just a few blocks away, Grimey’s (1060 E. Trinity Lane) will also have a plethora of RSD exclusives when they open at 10 a.m., and Headcount will be on site with information about how to engage with your right to vote.
Vinyl Tap (2038 Greenwood Ave.) will carry RSD exclusives beginning at 9 a.m., and they’ll have a special celebration in partnership with the folks at Music Valley Archive. In addition to
MVA’s signature Nashville-themed tees, patrons can shop vendors from Forestdale Incense to Horse Girl Vintage to Like You Mean It Records and beyond. Dreamburger, Clownsums Diner, Pizza Lolo and more will feed hungry music fans, and if you’re feeling spontaneous, you can pick a flash piece from Adventure Tattoo to commemorate the day. As if that’s not enough, a small sampling of Vinyl Tap’s live performance lineup includes punks Winona Fighter, songsmith extraordinaire Tristen, the duo of Robyn Hitchcock and Emma Swift, blues hero Bobby Rush and local “Weird Al” Yankovic tribute Weird Pals, alongside appearances from queens of drag Lucy Skrews and Coqueta and DJ sets from Alanna Royale and Mayor Freddie O’Connell, among others.
Analog Your Life (2546 Lebanon Pike) will have a “curated selection of RSD releases,” plus a 15 percent-off sale on non-RSD titles when they open at 9 a.m. Elevator Vinyl inside Lykke Haus Vintage (500 Trinity Lane) will not have the regular RSD releases, but beginning Friday they will have a limited stock of the RSD Essential vinyl edition of Smashing Pumpkins’ Siamese Dream Phonoluxe (2609 Nolensville Pike) will not have exclusives, but will be putting out a large collection of used records during their normal operating hours on Record Store Day. Dead End Records (100 Taylor St., Suite A22A) will carry a selection of RSD exclusives, and shoppers who want to plan ahead can check out a spreadsheet on their website detailing which titles they’ll have in stock when they open at 10 a.m. They’ll also have live music from Titans of Siren and Billie Sheers, plus goodies from Bearded Iris, Craig’s Over Easy and Strings for Hope for shoppers to browse. Daydream Records (which recently moved into bigger digs at Suite 104A inside the Shoppes on Fatherland, 1006 Fatherland St.) will not have RSD exclusives, but will have a large collection of jazz records and other new arrivals out on April 12 — plus a sale with items
marked 10 to 50 percent off the following day. Hi-Fi Frontier (inside Dashwood Vintage at 2416 Music Valley Drive) won’t have exclusives either, but they will have a vendor market and coffee bar from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., when they’ll offer 15 percent off all media including a fresh batch of new arrivals; they’ll also have live music starting at 2 p.m. (artists TBA).
The Great Escape (whose multiple nearby locations include the flagship store at 5400 Charlotte Ave. as well as 105 N. Gallatin Road in Madison and 810 NW Broad St., Suite 202, in Murfreesboro) usually carries RSD exclusives, but we hadn’t received confirmation of their status at press time. You have a wide variety of additional mom-and-pop record stores to choose from in our area. We hadn’t received information at press time about Jimbo’s (inside Vinterest at 2416 Music Valley Drive) or Swaggie Records (211 Union St.). But if you’re out shopping on Record Store Day (or any other day, for that matter), you should stop by and see what’s on offer. These events have lots of moving parts, so keep an eye on your favorite stores’ social media for more details and updates.
As usual, the full list of special RSD titles can be found on the Record Store Day website, but if you need some guidance, here are a few of our favorite titles for every kind of listener. For fans of the “it girls” and pop princesses, check out Charli XCX’s teasing single “Guess” (featuring Billie Eilish) or Taylor Swift’s slow burn “Fortnight,” both available as exclusive 7-inches.
Deadheads will have their pick of the On a Back Porch Vol. 1 compilation LP or a complete show on a behemoth five-disc set, aptly titled Beacon Theater, New York, NY 6/14/76. If you identify as a weird little guy or know someone who does, check out Gorillaz’s Demon Days Live From the Apollo Theater two-LP set. Fan of more straightforward hip-hop? Take a look at Cypress Hill’s Live at the Fillmore or a number of RSD exclusive titles from rapper and TV detective Ice-T:
Go ahead and say “dun-dun” and then check out Live at The Miles Davis Hall — Montreux 1995 and Power Rarities. If you’ve got kids or you have repressed childhood trauma, you’ll be excited to know that there’s another Bluey release on this year’s list: a “Burger Dog” 7-inch picture disc. If you find that life is best soundtracked by … well, soundtracks, check out the Wicked: The Soundtrack double LP (ability to sing the Defying Gravity riff sadly not included) or John Williams’ classic soundtracks to the first three Harry Potter films, each available as a two-disc set.
Listeners who prefer their collection to have a bit more local flair will love Brittany Howard’s Live From Austin City Limits album and rising star Medium Build’s acclaimed EP Marietta. This year’s RSD Ambassador is none other than famously tatted rapper-turned-country-star Post Malone Per tradition, he’ll have an exclusive release for Record Store Day, and it’s none other than his Tribute to Nirvana, which is actually pretty sick if you can dissociate it from the rest of Posty’s career while you listen.
Prefer to stick to the classics? You’ll have plenty of options to pick from, including releases of classic albums and rare live recordings from artists like David Bowie, Fleetwood Mac, George Harrison, Joni Mitchell and Talking Heads Whatever you choose, go forth and listen to some good music, all while supporting the local record stores we know and love. ▼
Record Store Day takes place at indie record stores across Nashville on April 12 See the full list of special releases at recordstoreday.com
Playing 8 p.m. Tuesday, April 15, at The
HIGH SCHOOL OF ROCK
The Linda Lindas keep growing on No Obligation
BY HANNAH CRON
BETWEEN LESSONS, lectures and extracurricular activities, young people everywhere lose themselves in daydreams of stardom, imagining crowds roaring as they score a buzzer-beater or fans cheering as they shred a wicked solo. Few experience the realization of these fantasies as acutely as Los Angeles rockers The Linda Lindas. Before even graduating high school, they opened for Green Day and Paramore, worked on a movie with Amy Poehler and garnered praise from the likes of Kathleen Hanna, Rage Against the Machine and Sonic Youth.
After a public performance of their breakout hit “Racist, Sexist Boy” went viral in 2021, the quartet of Bela Salazar, Eloise Wong and sisters Lucia and Mila de la Garza signed to Epitaph Records and released their debut album Growing Up. Released in October, their second
album No Obligation exhibits an exponential growth in the group’s musical chemistry. While the lyrics often directly reflect the experience of being a young person, it’s not hard for anyone to find themselves in songs like “Once Upon a Time,” which is about strategies for navigating conflict, or even the groovy Spanish-language track “Yo Me Estreso” that features “Weird Al” Yankovic’s accordion licks. With riffs and runs that harken to classic punk and riot grrrl records and an electric attitude, The Linda Lindas prove they are not to be underestimated. They’ve grown up since Growing Up, and they aren’t afraid to show it.
“We were a lot more intentional with what we were doing,” says Lucia on a call that includes the whole band ahead of their April 15 show at The Basement East. “We really wanted to show people — after doing a lot of touring on Growing Up, we had gotten a lot more experience and kind of gotten a better idea about what we wanted out of our second album. And because our first album kind of came out straight out of the pandemic … the writing process was super isolated, and we knew that we wanted to have a lot more collaborative writing
on the second album. We knew that we wanted to have a lot more intention with our live sound on the second album.”
Wong chimes in, noting that her contributions to Growing Up are some of the first songs she’s ever written.
“With No Obligation, I had a better idea of how I wanted my songs to sound,” Wong says, “and how I wanted to sound on them — and how I envisioned them.”
“We like to take advantage of the difference in our voices,” adds Salazar, “and also the quantity of voices that we have.”
No one deserves the pressure of being called “the voice of a generation,” but The Linda Lindas certainly provide a valuable perspective into the mind of Gen Z. They are funny, friendly and fiercely impassioned about important causes like racism and sexism. And if you disagree, you can get lost.
“I feel like on a personal level, we’re not, you know, speaking for our generation,” Lucia says, “but I do think that we are kind of naturally all living in this time [when] we feel it’s very important to be truthful and speak up about things that matter to us.”
Though they might address prescient fears and relatable frustrations, the group doesn’t just do it to make a statement. They do it for themselves.
“I think music provides an outlet to express a lot of those things,” says Wong. “It’s nice to be able to, like, yell onstage and just get everything out.”
In a time when so much pressure comes from social media and internet culture to perform and present your life in the most digestible way, The Linda Lindas aren’t folding. Like the rockers before them, they are making a mess — a beautiful, fun mess. And like their idols, they are paving the way for the next generation of punk. They have no obligation to be role models or muses, but they are inspiring their multigenerational fan base anyway.
“Sometimes I see little kids in the front row, and we’ll start playing, and they look shocked — or like, in awe or scared,” says Mila. “It’s awesome to watch.”
“It’s really special, especially seeing kids that are really into loud music,” adds her sister Lucia. “The ones that are brave enough to dance around or be loud too.” ▼
Basement East
PHOTO: ZEN SEKIZAWA
SPARRING PARDNERS
BY P.J. KINZER
“I don’t know why we have so many lying and cheating songs on this album,” Melissa Carper told the crowd assembled at Analog at Hutton Hotel from beneath the wide brim of her hat. By this point on Thursday night, I had lost count of how many songs she mentioned that were about infidelity and distrust, but that theme goes back to the earliest days of country music. Carper honors that lineage by playing the sort of tunes I might have expected to hear on the radio in my grandmother’s living room, which was faithfully tuned to 650 WSM her entire life.
The singer-songwriter and stand-up bassist, an Arkansas native residing in Austin, Texas, was dressed in a manner normally acceptable only for Dust Bowl ranch hands and players onstage at a honky-tonk. But she and her fellow Austin transplant Theo Lawrence made Analog, a venue inside a hotel up the street from the honkytonks, close enough. Lawrence, a songsmith and guitarist who grew up in Paris — the one in France, not Texas, Tennessee or elsewhere — has been writing songs with Carper since 2023. Much like the cicadas, the two Texans spent the end of last summer here in Nashville making a racket, though it had more of a groove to it.
crowd was larger than I might have expected under the circumstances, and was bopping along with rollicking country champs Mose Wilson and Hannah Juanita when I arrived. The pair have established themselves independently but play together frequently, and announced that they recently recorded a few duets, a few of which they sprinkled into the set. Wilson also announced that his new album is set for release in July.
Lawrence and Carper opened their set with “Thank You, but No Thank You,” the first song released from their album Havin’ a Talk, forthcoming via Lawrence’s own Tomika Records. It’s a fun song full of clever wordplay, sweet harmonies and high-spirited fiddling. The set bounced between each artist’s solo work and the new songs they’ve worked on together over the past two years. Both excel at making music that’s witty and inviting. Carper’s playfully brash songs will rattle around in your head for days. Lawrence’s vintage croon recalls both the twang of Johnny Horton and the countrypolitan charm of Ray Price. Lawrence’s fellow Frenchman Thibault Ripault backed the singers on a second guitar, and drummer Camille Lewis (also of Austin’s Sentimental Family Band) and fiddler Katie Shore each took turns singing songs themselves. Keyboardist Emily Gimble shared a wild connection to the group’s Texas forefathers, mentioning that her granddad played with Bob Wills before taking the lead on her own version of Wills’ classic “A Sweet Kind Love.”
The songs feel very traditional, clearly in-
Their sessions marked the fourth time Carper made a record at The Bomb Shelter with Andrija Tokic, a studio wiz who has spun pure gold with artists ranging from international sensations The Alabama Shakes to punk hero Jay Reatard and criminally overlooked locals The Outlaw Lovers. The show on April 3 marked the first time Carper and Lawrence played those songs in town since the recording.
After tornado sirens rang all through the night before and flash-flood warnings buzzed all day, the skies were dreary and I assumed sleep-deprived fans might be on the dreary side too. While the room wasn’t overflowing, the
spired by the country music of the ’50s and ’60s, but never cartoonish in the way that gives “revivalists” a bad name. And not all of the tunes are about cheating and lying. In one song, they discuss vacation destinations; in another, Carper and Lawrence fight over the same woman’s affection. The duo has a knack for going back and forth with sharp but good-natured jabs. And what’s more, you could feel their kinship seeing them interact onstage and tell stories about making music together. It’s clear the pair are a mighty creative match, and the full album can’t come soon enough. ▼
PHOTO: @VONRPHOTO
GO AHEAD AND DUET:
THEO LAWRENCE AND MELISSA CARPER
LET’S GET PHYSICAL
From Michael Mann’s The Keep to Bruce Vilanch’s memoir, here are some of the best recent physical-media releases and re-releases
BY JASON SHAWHAN
JOIN US FOR a brief journey through some of what’s new and interesting in the world of physical media, from sexploitation classics and lost films maudits to historical moments in American cinema.
THE KEEP (Vinegar Syndrome UHD/Blu-ray)
The fact that this even exists is still staggering. Long consigned to the realm of video whatsit by a negative initial reception and director Michael Mann’s own frustrated experiences making and finishing it, 1983’s The Keep was one of those special kinds of films, passed to friends and genre enthusiasts with affection and enthusiasm. Somehow Vinegar Syndrome made it happen, and in 4K no less — selling out its initial allotment of 12,000 units within hours. It’s a longtime favorite of mine, a wild WWII story of Nazis FAFOing with a pair of ancient magickal forces and an amazing score by Tangerine Dream (the fave lineup of Franke, Froese and Schmoelling). Vinegar Syndrome’s scan will keep this film alive and kicking in the psyches of all who see it (though sadly that initial theatrical six-track Dolby Mix is not to be found), and there’s some interesting and insightful supplements (as well as a great essay from former Scene contributor Bilge Ebiri). Don’t miss it.
BWANA DEVIL (Kino Lorber/3D Film Archive 3D Blu-ray)
The very first feature-length 3D film is now finally available to home-viewing audiences in that format, 73 years down the road. It’s historic, really, and even people who don’t enjoy stereoscopic cinema would have to marvel at the history present here. Based on the same historical events as 1996’s The Ghost and The Darkness, Bwana Devil is about lions
versus colonialism, and it’s an intense ride. It helps that star Robert Stack remained part of mass culture thanks to his time on Unsolved Mysteries, and he brings a loutish charm to the role of a man who must protect the reach of corporate interests across Africa. (A side note, for anyone concerned about exactly how racist this film’s portrayal of nonwhite folk is: The answer is “fairly racist,” though not so much toward the African population. It’s much more so to the primarily Indian workforce the railroad companies imported at that time. Which is equally disheartening and fascinating for modern viewers.) The 3D is impressive in that it means watching the birth of a new medium of film storytelling, and though the lions were apparently very mellow critters, they are edited and photographed in a way that makes them rather scary. As with any restoration the 3D Film Archive has worked on, there are supplements about the history of the film’s production as well as the technological processes director-producer Arch Oboler used to make the film.
THE VIXEN TRILOGY (Severin UHD/Blu-ray)
One of the big indications that the nation is in a dire place and that people are freaked out is how all of a sudden, deals are being made for films that were thought to be lost in the void of standard definition. When it was announced that Severin Films had managed to work out an arrangement with the estate of legendary filmmaker Russ Meyer for proper restorations and HD releases of three of Meyer’s films, jaws dropped and fingers were crossed that it might actually be happening. And it did, with 1968’s Vixen!, 1975’s Supervixens and 1979’s Beneath the Valley of the Ultravixens each tuned up and raring to go. This is the beginning of something historic — quality preservations of that which is
past, made ready for whatever the future entails. See also: our talk with David Gregory of Severin and Vixen! star Erica Gavin in the Jan. 30, 2025, issue of the Scene
APRIL FOOL’S DAY (Kino Lorber UHD)
One of the things that a quality 4K scan of a film can show is just how much love went into making the film the first time around. This 1986 whodunit from Fred Walton (When a Stranger Calls and When a Stranger Calls Back) had some noticeable ambition (using a handheld video camera for some sequences, shooting in cinemascope) and a pretty effective final act (to say nothing of its deleted original ending, sadly lost forever). This new transfer is gorgeous in a way that its many decades on VHS and DVD never really dwelled on. It’s a fun film, and the extras disc has some good bonus features, but the 4K encode is nearly miraculous, letting us into one of the more artfully shot slasher classics of the ’80s.
WHO
KILLED TEDDY BEAR? (Cinématographe UHD/ Blu-ray)
One of the masterpieces of ’60s sleaze, Joseph Cates’ down-and-dirty tale of the streets (around Broadway) of NYC could easily have skated by on being a low-key document on what the mean streets of that time looked like. But Who Killed Teddy Bear? is an effective and edgy psychodrama with great turns from Juliet Prowse and Sal Mineo, the latter determined to close the door on his teen-idol days and let his psychotronic theater dreams explode onto the screen. This film has everything — a promenade through Times Square adult bookstores of the ’60s (classics of literature shelved next to mercenary filth, in one of several scenes that had been missing from previous video
incarnations), a look at discothèques before disco music existed, an indictment of how little things have progressed when authority talks to women, running into young Phoebe Cates at the zoo, and what is apparently the first on-screen appearance of tighty-whities in American cinema. And Cinématographe has pulled out all the stops with an exquisitely bound edition that offers the film in 4K and on Blu-ray, with smart extras including a commentary from Liz Purchell and KJ Shepherd of Cruising the Movies and an essay from occasional Scene contributor Kyle Turner. Nobody does design and packaging like Cinématographe.
IT SEEMED LIKE A BAD IDEA AT THE TIME by Bruce Vilanch (Chicago Review press)
A comedic institution since the ’70s, Bruce Vilanch is one of those legends of the game who has stories about everybody, and he’s worked on so many different kinds of projects — films, variety shows, TV, standup comedy, songwriting — some of which are deservedly famous, others of which are rather infamous. So in approaching this memoir, Vilanch has let the first volume focus on the projects that didn’t work. That means The Star Wars Holiday Special That means Can’t Stop the Music. That means The Paul Lynde Halloween Special. And a whole lot more. That approach is smart, because Vilanch is funny, and his recounting of these doomed (or at least negatively inclined) projects often yields more laughs than going back and watching the material that inspired it. But he dishes the dirt (respectfully), and as soon as I finished this book, I was ready for the second volume, wherein he’s going to be talking about the projects that did succeed. And you know I want the story behind the songs he wrote for Eartha Kitt, as well as the theme song to Cat’s Eye ▼
THE KEEP
WHO KILLED TEDDY BEAR?
1 That’s gotta hurt
5 Certain voice-overs
9 Neutrogena dandruff shampoo
13 Make less distinct
14 “A cunning hunter, a man of the field,” in Genesis
15 Find more value from
16 Brought into being
17 Like one with renewed beliefs
18 Word from on high
19 H.S. exam for which 5 is the highest score
21 Seller of Poäng and Ekenäset chairs
23 School play?
24 Look to pick things up
26 Onetime leader of the Sinaloa Cartel
28 The great outdoors
30 Tying one’s shoes, e.g., for most people
31 Tops at golf clubs
32 Absorbed
34 48 of them make a cup: Abbr.
36 Untidy room, metaphorically
37 Pains
40 Portuguese greeting
41 Reid of “Urban Legend”
43 Indian crepe served with chutney
44 Meat designation on a food cart
46 Graphite, essentially
48 Exact replica
50 Fire breather of myth
51 At all
52 Dorm enforcers, for short
53 Betray, with “out”
55 Discarded tech devices
59 Not satisfied
61 Swallow
63 Strengthen one’s commitment
64 Scrutinizes
65 Eager
66 Send out
67 Have an inclination
68 Hitch together
69 Digs for bears DOWN
1 “Waterloo” band
2 Sound on a bridle path
3 Offended
4 Given name of Che Guevara
5 One with obligations
6 Troupe for troops, in brief
7 Adriatic port city
8 Dissociative void, as in the film “Get Out”
9 ___ Talks
10 Highlight of many a Jimi Hendrix concert
11 What might lead to a breakout success?
12 “Unhand me!”
15 Gape or gasp, say
20 [I’m trying to listen!]
22 Send
25 Little time off
27 QB’s call
28 “No way, nohow!”
wordplay. Crosswords for young solvers: nytimes.com/ studentcrosswords.
and 2016 Olympics
31 Winter hours in L.A.
33 Intensifying suffix, in modern slang
35 Comedian ___ Vulcano
38 Really dig
42 One of eight on a cuttlefish
45 Worn away
47 Top scores, e.g.
49 Settle a score for
50 Part of a pizza
Snapchat’s ghost, e.g.
56 Indeterminate amount
57 Look-alike
58 Specialty M.D.s
60 Extremity
62 Vessel with a round bottom
said indebtedness having become immediately due and payable by default in the payment of a part thereof, at the option of the owner, this is to give notice that the undersigned will, on May 8, 2025, commencing at 1:30 p.m. at the main north door of the Williamson County
A
LAND
SON
of
in
of Williamson County, Tennessee, being Lots No. 1 and 2, of a subdivision of the P.M. Chaffin Farm, and described as follows: Beginning with a point in the center of Temple Road in line with the stone wall along Temple’s East boundary line, said point being the same point as the point indicating the Northeast corner of a parcel designated for future development, (adjacent to the Mary L Rudolph property), of Temple Hills Country Club Estates of record in Plat Book 11, Page 136, sheet#3 of 5, Register’s Office of Williamson County, TN, running thence with the center of said road South 80 degrees 15 minutes East 350 feet to an iron pin; thence Southwardly 1555 feet to an iron pin; thence North 60 degrees West 256.0 feet to a corner post in Temple’s East line; thence North 4 degrees East 1455 feet to the point of beginning. Being the same property conveyed to M5 Rochester Close, LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company, by Deed from Katherine Harper Morales, unmarried, dated 02/19/2021 and appearing of record in Book 8433 page 266 Register’s office for Williamson County, Tennessee; and then conveyed to 6394 Acquisitions, LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company, by Quitclaim Deed from M5 Rochester Close, LLC, recorded October 17, 2024 and appearing of record in Book 9587, page 284, said Register’s office. WITH A MUNICIPAL ADDRESS OF 6394 TEMPLE ROAD, FRANKLIN, WILLIAMSON COUNTY, TENNESSEE 37069. The foregoing shall be sold together with any and all other property, real and personal, which constitutes the Property as that term is defined in the Deed of Trust, but specifically excluding any cash, accounts, deposits, escrows, refunds reserves, impounds and other cash or cash equivalents. Interested Parties: 6394 Acquisitions LLC M5 Rochester Close, LLC Benjamin & Darlys, LLC Capital Funding Financial, LLC Jesse D. McInerney Cara E. McInerney The
and any matters having priority over the Deed of Trust and matters which may affect or encumber the Property following the sale, such as rights of parties in possession; rights of tenants in possession under unrecorded leases or rental agreements; visible and apparent easements; portion of the property within any roadway; any encroachment, encumbrance, violation, variation, or adverse circumstance affecting the title that would be disclosed by an accurate and complete land survey of the land; all leases, grants, exceptions or reservations of coal, lignite, oil, gas and other minerals, together with all rights, privileges and immunities relating thereto, appearing in the Public Records; all matters shown on any applicable recorded plat; taxes or assessments that are not shown as existing liens by the records of any taxing authority that levies taxes or assessments on real property or by the public records; proceedings by a public agency that may result in taxes or assessments, or notices of such proceedings, whether or not shown by the records of such agency or by the public records; taxes assessed by correction pursuant to the provisions of T.C.A. §67-5-603, et seq.; matters that an accurate survey of the premises might disclose; any facts, rights, interests, or claims that are not shown by the public records but that could be ascertained by an inspection of the Property or that may be asserted by persons in possession of the Property; any encroachment, encumbrance, violation, variation, or adverse circumstance affecting the title that would be disclosed by an accurate and complete land survey of the Property and not shown by the public records; any mineral or mineral rights leased, granted or retained by current or prior owners; prior liens, claims and encumbrances including, without limitation, leases and other agreements; assessments, building lines, easements, covenants, and restrictions that may exist; any lien or right to lien for services, labor or material imposed by law and not shown by the public records; and, statutory rights of redemption of any governmental agency including, but not limited to, the right of redemption of the Internal Revenue Service pursuant to 26 U.S.C. §7425(d)(1), of the State of Tennessee pursuant to T.C.A. §67-1-1433(c)(1), or of any other taxing authority. Joseph R. Prochaska, as Successor Trustee Reno & Cavanaugh, PLLC 424 Church Street, Suite 2910 Nashville, TN 37219 Telephone (615) 866-2322 Publication On: April 10, April 17, and April 24, 2025
Mouselike mammal
EDITED BY WILL SHORTZ
PUZZLE BY KIRAN PANDEY
SUCCESSOR TRUSTEE SALE Default having been made in the payment of the debts and obligations secured to be paid by a certain Deed of Trust made as of February 19, 2021 (“Deed of Trust”), by M5 ROCHESTER CLOSE, LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company (“Borrower”), in favor of Thomas Pennington, Trustee for the benefi of CAPITAL FUNDING FINANCIAL LLC, a Florida limited liability company (“Lender”), recorded February 24, 2021 at Book 8433, Page 269 in the Office of the Register of Deeds for Williamson County, Tennessee (“Register’s Office”); and said Trustee in the Deed of Trust having been replaced by the appointment of Joseph R. Prochaska as Successor Trustee by appointment of record at Book 9361, page 682 in the Register’s Office; and the owner of the debt secured having requested the undersigned to advertise and sell the property described in and conveyed by said Deed of Trust, all of the said indebtedness having become immediately due and payable by default in the payment of a part thereof, at the option of the owner, this is to give notice that the undersigned will, on May 8, 2025, commencing at 3:30 p.m. at the main north door of the Williamson County Judicial Center, 135 4th Ave South, Franklin, Williamson County, Tennessee 37064 proceed to sell at public outcry to the highest and best bidder for cash, by Trustee’s deed pursuant to the terms and conditions announced at such sale, all of Trustee’s right, title and interest in the following described property situated in Williamson County, State of Tennessee (“Real Estate”), to wit: LAND SITUATED IN WILLIAMSON COUNTY, TENNESSEE:
A tract of land in the 6th Civil District of Williamson County, Tennessee, being Lots No. 1 and 2, of a subdivision of the P.M. Chaffin Farm, and described as follows:
Beginning with a point in the center of Temple Road in line with the stone wall along Temple’s East boundary line, said point being the same point as the point indicating the Northeast
corner of a parcel designated for future development, (adjacent to the Mary L Rudolph property), of Temple Hills Country Club Estates of record in Plat Book 11, Page 136, sheet#3 of 5, Register’s Office of Williamson County, TN, running thence with the center of said road South 80 degrees 15 minutes East 350 feet to an iron pin; thence Southwardly 1555 feet to an iron pin; thence North 60 degrees West 256.0 feet to a corner post in Temple’s East line; thence North 4 degrees East 1455 feet to the point of beginning.
Being the same property conveyed to MS Rochester Close, LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company, by Deed from Katherine Harper Morales, unmarried, dated 02/19/2021 and appearing of record in Book 8433 page 266 Register’s office for Williamson County, Tennessee; and then conveyed to 6394 Acquisitions, LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company, by Quitclaim Deed from M5 Rochester Close, LLC, recorded October 17, 2024 and appearing of record in Book 9587, page 284, said Register’s office.
WITH A MUNICIPAL ADDRESS OF 6394 TEMPLE ROAD, FRANKLIN, WILLIAMSON COUNTY, TENNESSEE 37069.
The foregoing shall be sold together with any and all other property, real and personal, which constitutes the Property as that term is defined in the Deed of Trust, but specifically excluding any cash, accounts, deposits, escrows, refunds reserves, impounds and other cash or cash equivalents.
Interested Parties: 6394 Acquisitions LLC
M5 Rochester Close, LLC
Benjamin & Darlys, LLC Note Investor, LLC Jesse D. McInerney
Cara E. McInerney
The Real Estate will be sold to the highest and best bidder for cash (or for credit against the Obligations if Lender is the highest bidder).
All bidders must (a) register at the sale; (b) execute a bidding agreement; (c) provide the Trustee with sufficient information to the Trustee so that he may determine that the bidder is not on the list of sanctioned entities maintained by the Office of Foreign Assets Control
of the U.S. Department of Treasury; and (d) provide the Trustee with a bidder’s deposit of $750,000 by cashier’s or certified check, payable to the Trustee (except for the party secured by the Deed of Trust). The bidding agreement may be obtained in advance of the sale by request to the undersigned. Additional terms may be announced at the sale. The right is hereby reserved to postpone or adjourn this sale, without further publication or notice, by public announcement at the time and place appointed for such sale or for such postponed or adjourned sale. All announcements made at the sale shall take precedence over the terms and conditions of this notice.
In said Deed of Trust, Borrower expressly waived the statutory right of redemption, and any and all rights of homestead; dower; all other exemptions and marital rights. Title is believed to be good, but the undersigned will sell and convey only as Trustee. Title is to be conveyed without any covenant or warranty, express or implied, and any matters having priority over the Deed of Trust and matters which may affect or encumber the Property following the sale, such as rights of parties in possession; rights of tenants in possession under unrecorded leases or rental agreements; visible and apparent easements; portion of the property within any roadway; any encroachment, encumbrance, violation, variation, or adverse circumstance affecting the title that would be disclosed by an accurate and complete land survey of the land; all leases, grants, exceptions or reservations of coal, lignite, oil, gas and other minerals, together with all rights, privileges and immunities relating thereto, appearing in the Public Records; all matters shown on any applicable recorded plat; taxes or assessments that are not shown as existing liens by the records of any taxing authority that levies taxes or assessments on real property or by the public records; proceedings by a public agency that may result in taxes or assessments, or notices of such proceedings, whether or not shown by the records of such agency or by the public records; taxes assessed by correction pursuant to the provisions of T.C.A.
§67-5-603, et seq.; matters that an accurate survey of the premises might disclose; any facts, rights, interests, or claims that are not shown by the public records but that could be ascertained by an inspection of the Property or that may be asserted by persons in possession of the Property; any encroachment, encumbrance, violation, variation, or adverse circumstance affecting the title that would be disclosed by an accurate and complete land survey of the Property and not shown by the public records; any mineral or mineral rights leased, granted or retained by current or prior owners; prior liens, claims and encumbrances including, without limitation, leases and other agreements; assessments, building lines, easements, covenants, and restrictions that may exist; any lien or right to lien for services, labor or material imposed by law and not shown by the public records; and, statutory rights of redemption of any governmental agency including, but not limited to, the right of redemption of the Internal Revenue Service pursuant to 26 U.S.C. §7425(d)(1), of the State of Tennessee pursuant to T.C.A. §67-1-1433(c)(1), or of any other taxing authority.
Joseph R. Prochaska, as Successor Trustee Reno & Cavanaugh, PLLC 424 Church Street, Suite 2910 Nashville, TN 37219 Telephone (615) 866-2322 Publication On: April 10, April 17, and April 24, 2025.
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