Queen City Nerve - July 27, 2022

VOLUME 4, ISSUE 18; JULY 27 - AUGUST 9, 2022; WWW.QCNERVE.COM

The Next Chapter

TONY MARTIN LOOKS FOR AN HEIR TO HIS ANNTONY’S EMPIRE

By Karie Simmons

A SOCIAL JUSTICE PYSCHEDELIC THERAPY PARTY THE PROBLEM(S) WITH CATS

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TABLE OF CONTENTS NEWS & OPINION

4 Not There Yet by Mona Dougani Advocates for medical marijuana thought this was going to be the year 6 CATS Got Your Tongue? by Isaac Naylor Things appear to be coming to a head at Charlotte’s transportation office

ARTS & CULTURE

8 Tune In, Turn Out, Drop In by Pat Moran CohobaFest is a social justice psychedelic therapy party 10 Lifeline: Ten Cool Things To Do in Two Weeks

MUSIC

12 Pushing Positivity by Ryan Pitkin Brio. releases debut album just when it’s needed most

FOOD & DRINK

16 The Next Chapter by Karie Simmons Tony Martin looks for an heir to his Anntony’s empire

LIFESTYLE

18 Puzzles 20 Aerin it Out by Katie Grant 21 Horoscope 22 Savage Love Thanks to our contributors: Grant Baldwin, Aerin Spruill, Isaac Naylor, Monda Dougani, Terry Suave, Sophie Ming, Kenny Sun, Lewis Dameron, Bryan Ledgard, Timo Tijhof, and Dan Savage.

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No Plastic Bags

14 Soundwave

NEWS & OPINION FEATURE

bipartisan support, and bipartisan opposition, but its eventual success there was largely due to Rabon’s encouragement. However, the bill stalled in the House.

“The Senate has already agreed that we like the bill,” Rabon said in an interview. “The House, it’s now in their hands, and then if they want to make changes, we’ll come back, we’ll sit down together, and we will work out the differences if there are any.

Let’s hope there aren’t any.”

With neighboring state Virginia legalizing the recreational use of marijuana in July 2021, advocates in this state were hopeful the Senate bill would create some momentum.

“I had my hopes, I had my hopes,” Suttle said, noting the bill had the support of Rabon, who chairs one of the Senate’s most powerful committees.

“I did hope that it would be this year and I’m still hopeful that we can have the talks and make the movement that we need to make this year to get the legalization we deserve for the state we love.”

Trina Sargent, who moved from Ohio to North Carolina a month ago, said she began using medical marijuana a little over a year ago for pain management through Green Compassion Network,

Ohio’s medical marijuana program.

Sargent, who suffers from fibromyalgia, anxiety, PTSD and other ailments, said medical cannabis helped her with muscle pain and sleep. Now that she is in North Carolina, she no longer has access to medical marijuana.

“It’s hard. It’s very hard because I don’t have it,” Sargent said. “My body’s aching all the time. My stomach is bothering me and my sleep patterns are way off. It is really bothering my system.

“People don’t realize what just marijuana can actually do for the human body. I never took it for recreational uses. Never did that. I researched it before I tried it, before I did anything. I was very careful and not having it now it’s changing my body completely. I keep looking on the internet, to find out, ‘Hey when is the law going to be passed?’”

But even if the Compassionate Care Act had passed this session, both Sargent and Suttle would not have qualified for use due to the narrow scope outlined in the bill.

It’s a frustration.

“I stood up in the first Senate hearing that we had on medicinal cannabis and told them that the way the bill is written right now with Senate 711,

THE COMPASSIONATE CARE ACT WOULD LEGALIZE MEDICAL MARIJUANA FOR A LIMITED SCOPE OF PEOPLE.

ADOBESTOCK

NOT THERE YET

Advocates for medical marijuana thought this was going to be the year

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BY MONA DOUGANI

Chris Suttle planned his funeral five years ago.

The commercial insurance consultant was diagnosed with a frontal lobe brain mass in 2017.

Doctors left him with two choices: undergo a full craniotomy and biopsy the mass to see if it was aggressive or simply wait out his fate.

Instead, the Chapel Hill resident started using cannabis. He said he believes that with cannabis his symptoms diminished significantly.

“I started my own microdosing procedure with no knowledge of whether this was going to work or not,” Suttle said. “When I went back, we did the scan, the tumor had not shrunk, but it also had not grown and all the swelling in the brain was gone.

My speech was back, my vision was back, I wasn’t blacking out, I didn’t have word aphasia anymore.”

Suttle continued the microdosing procedure for another six months and when he returned for another scan he said his tumor had shrunk by a minute amount (.02%), which he said he believes is related to his cannabis use. “[My doctor] was amazed,” Suttle said. “You have to remember the last time my doctor saw me was when they gave me this diagnosis.”

The experience inspired Suttle to start lobbying for cannabis legislation. Five years later, he’s still at it. He thought that this year, his efforts were going to bear fruit, but his hopes were dashed when the North Carolina General Assembly declined to move on a bill that would have legalized the medical use of marijuana in the legislative session that recessed a few weeks ago. Although lawmakers are due back in Raleigh on July 26 to tie up loose ends from their work this year, it’s unlikely that they will take up significant legislation at that time.

For Suttle and others with similar diagnoses who want to try using medical marijuana for their conditions in North Carolina, they will likely have to wait another year.

Who qualifies?

The Compassionate Care Act, proposed in 2021, would legalize medical marijuana for a limited scope of people with certain diagnosed medical conditions.

State Sen. Bill Rabon (R-Southport), a primary sponsor, said the bill would make medical marijuana “very tightly regulated” and would be one of the strictest in the nation.

The bill passed the North Carolina Senate with

NEWS & OPINION FEATURE I would not qualify,” Suttle said. “Therefore I would be dead.”

Medicinal vs. recreational

Status of hemp vs. marijuana in NC

Medical marijuana has not been the only hot topic this legislative session. In an unprecedented turn of events there have been changes around hemp in this year’s version of the Farm Act. On June 22, hemp language was taken out of the 2022 Farm Act, which was already in statute, leaving some state lawmakers and advocates disappointed.

In response to the removal of the language, Sen. Brent Jackson (R-Autryville) a primary sponsor for the bill, and a proponent of hemp cultivation, said he felt like “pigs walking into slaughter,” during a House Agriculture meeting on June 22.

He was not the only one that felt this way. Some local dispensaries, selling CBD, Delta-8, and other hemp derived products said they felt uneasy about the future of their businesses.

For Jennifer Wilson, co-owner of Nature’s Releaf Hemp Store, the erasure of THC language would mean re-evaluating her and her husband’s entire business.

“If you get rid of hemp, you get rid of the store.

We would have to turn into something else,” Ian Brown, an associate from the business said in an interview with NC Health News.

In the past three years, the store which opened in June 2019 has established three locations and is planning a fourth.

Being able to offer a variety helps a variety of

people, argued Leea Carver, another associate from Nature’s Releaf. “You can’t expect one product to help everybody. You need different things to help with different ailments and different people. If you get rid of any THC language, we’re only able to carry one thing, and we’re only gonna help one kind of person.”

In a last-minute reprieve for hemp farmers and distributors across the state on June 29, the North Carolina General Assembly passed Senate Bill 455, legalizing hemp statewide just a day before a pilot program that had legalized it in the first place was set to expire.

With no foreseeable movement from the Compassionate Care Act this year, advocates for medical marijuana have still not given up.

“We need to protest and we need to make it strong,” Suttle said, adding that he had and others had a protest planned for Raleigh on July 26, as this paper went to print.

Some have their eyes on a bigger prize, however.

In April, Charlotte-based Crowntown Cannabis co-owner Michael Sims said inaction from the state legislature would “not only kill us, they [would] kill this industry, they [would] kill our business.” After the passage of Senate Bill 455, he was thankful for

the last-minute vote, but skeptical of the intentions of state lawmakers.

“I’m happy with the turnout of this issue, although this could have been resolved months ago. Once again certain NC politicians used the existence of our industry as leverage to get a vote on the horrendous SB711,” Sims said, referencing the Compassionate Care Act. He’s been a staunch opponent of bill, stating that it only works in a way that would effectively shut out independent hemp farmers and others in the hemp industry from participating, and could push them out of the cannabis industry altogether.

“We still need to fight aggressively to get access to legal adult-use cannabis,” he continued. “The citizens of this state overwhelmingly want cannabis to be completely legal. Today is a win but we know better than to let our guard down.”

This article originally appeared at North Carolina Health News, an independent, non-partisan, notfor-profit, statewide news organization dedicated to covering all things health care in North Carolina. Ryan Pitkin contributed reporting to this story.

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Though Sargent is a big proponent of medical marijuana for pain management, she said she does not think marijuana should be used recreationally.

“I just would like to see this law pass. I don’t (use it) for recreation, no, absolutely no, no, no and no,” she argued. “I know people are going to try to find it no matter what, but I don’t agree with them passing the law on recreational use. ”But for medicinal purposes, it should be passed because there are people that are really in pain.”

Though there is case-based evidence about the effectiveness of medical marijuana, Allyn Howlett, one of the nation’s leading cannabinoid researchers and professor of physiology and pharmacology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, said marijuana cannot be classified as medicinal because it has not yet been approved for that use by the Food and Drug Administration.

“I just don’t think it should be called medical if it is not going to be going through the Food and Drug Administration and provide the same kinds of data and the same guidelines that all medicines do when they get approved to be used in patients,” Howlett said.

For Dr. James Taylor, an anesthesiologist with a pain practice in Southern Pines, North Carolina’s legalization of hemp in 2015 has helped him treat patients with cannabidiol (commonly known as CBD) products. Without it, he argues he would have had to increase patient narcotics requirements, disrupting their treatment process.

“These patients are kind of on the edge. They’re really high for overdose and suicide [risk] and to kind of mess with their medication management in a political way, it has risk associated,” Taylor said.

“So I’d be concerned, but I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

Though he does agree with medical marijuana legislation, he thinks revisions need to be made to the bill to ensure hemp farmers and those already in the hemp industry, like himself, have a seat at the table.

As it is written, the current bill requires five years of experience in the medical marijuana industry.

Because medical marijuana is currently illegal in North Carolina, those in the hemp industry would

not be able to provide services.

“Since we don’t have marijuana here, it almost gave it to out-of-state, big companies to say, ‘Only out-of-state big companies who’ve been doing this medical marijuana for five years are allowed to come into our state and provide the services.’ It really kind of was unjust to the farmers, processors, the extractors and the people like myself, who’ve been working for the last six years in the state to develop the hemp industry, which is the same thing as the medical marijuana industry except all this product doesn’t have the THC in it,” Taylor said, referring to the psychoactive ingredient, tetrahydrocannabinol.

“We don’t need out-of-staters coming in to tell us how to run a medical marijuana program.”

Nonetheless, Taylor said he is excited that the conversation is starting to happen in North Carolina.

“I applaud them for putting physicians on the commission and I would encourage them to make sure that number stays high,” he said. “With a medical marijuana program, you really want it being physician-led versus political- or business-led, so I thought they did a nice job of pulling physicians and getting physicians involved in this whole process.”

NEWS & OPINION FEATURE

CATS GOT YOUR TONGUE? Things appear to be coming to a head at Charlotte’s transportation office

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BY ISAAC NAYLOR

Tardy buses and spotty service are the hallmarks of Charlotte’s transportation network. Ask anyone who has stood next to those mysterious roadside bus signs and they will tell you that waiting is unavoidable.

The Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS) is responsible for citywide transportation. Serving 3,628 bus and rail stations scattered across the greater Charlotte area, the 69-route network boasts an average of 320,000 weekly riders, totaling more than 16.5 million riders annually.

CATS is a vital service for many Charlotte residents, myself included, that has recently been profoundly disrupted. I am a poor undergraduate student who cannot afford a car or recurrent Uber trips, so my only other option is to rely on the unreliable: buses. And with gas prices where they’ve been lately, more people may be finding themselves in my position.

The lack of reliability on bus scheduling is an institutional problem, and I’m tired of my phoned-in complaints being met with the same response. After three to five business days, a CATS supervisor usually calls me back to say the same meaningless phrase: “We have identified the operator and have assigned a supervisor to address the issue. We apologize that this inconvenience occurred.”

For those who drive to work or school every day, the problem of inadequate transit may seem unfamiliar or even irrelevant. However, clean and dependable buses affect traffic patterns too.

The more people take transit, the lighter traffic congestion becomes.

So what’s the hold up?

Historically, mass transit in Charlotte was privatized until 1976 and limited to the Uptown area until the founding of CATS in 2000.

However, the modern bus network has become a shuttle for the city’s poor Black and brown residents, which might explain the reluctant response to its punctuality problem. According to CATS, 78% of bus riders are Black, 63% are commuting to work, and 47% earn less than $25,000 per year.

From personal experience, wait times for buses range from five to 35 minutes, with an average of around seven to 10 minutes. The longest I have waited for a bus was two hours. CATS claims that its buses run without delay 85% of the time, which was

PHASE 2 OF THE GOLD LINE OPENED IN AUGUST 2021.

a claim made in 2018 that remains on their website four years later. The organization defines on-time performance as arriving “no more than five minutes past its scheduled time.”

One inescapable eyesore on the transit system is cleanliness, or lack thereof. Even before the pandemic necessitated Plexiglass as germ barriers, many buses have food and garbage littered atop seats coated in thick layers of dirt.

However, COVID-19 changed everything for CATS. The pandemic has hit public transport hard nationwide, causing a dip in ridership that will most likely last for the foreseeable future. In 2020, Axios reported that the pandemic dealt an $8 million loss to Charlotte’s mass transit system.

According to CATS data, ridership in April 2019 stood at 1.8 million but the pandemic slashed that number down by more than two thirds. Yet, CATS has been spiraling downward long before the pandemic. In July, WFAE reported that ridership has been decreasing since 2014, when the Federal Transit Administration reported 23.9 million bus trips from CATS compared to 5.9 million in 2021.

However, the end of COVID regulations has ushered in a gradual recovery. WCNC reported that the system has begun to see a rebound from rock bottom, with ridership in April 2021 up 22% from April 2020, when the uncertainty surrounding the then-novel coronavirus scared away most riders.

However, a return of some riders has not coincided with a stable supply of drivers. In early June, a CATS supervisor told me the network is experiencing a labor shortage of drivers to fill every shift, resulting in spotty service and the need for frequent adjustments. WBTV reported that CATS buses missed 8,873 trips from January through March 2022. Some riders call these route failures “ghost buses.”

The latest explanation from CATS CEO John Lewis has shifted blame from the pandemic to unionized workers purportedly abusing the sick-leave policy, which affords ​​40 paid sick days a year.

More than a third of drivers working weekday shifts and 20% of total drivers called in sick on June 22. Lewis claims the “attendance policy loopholes” for CATS employees could result in more service cuts, potentially shortening weekday service to Saturday levels for several months.

This could be related to repeated calls from drivers for policies that keep them safer and maintain cleaner conditions on their buses. If Lewis wants folks to show up to work, he should work to provide a better work environment for all his employees.

Bus drivers deserve better leadership that delivers higher wages rather than demonizing unions. Lewis is among the highest-paid public servants in Charlotte, making an annual salary

PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

NEWS & OPINION OP-ED of $238,761. Meanwhile, according to CATS, the average bus operator makes about $44,835 annually — just under $22 per hour.

Regardless of poor management, the Lynx Blue Line light rail is one of the redeeming qualities of the CATS network. Although the light-rail cars can be as filthy as the buses, the trains rarely run late.

Additionally, track-side stations are well-lit and surveilled, providing an atmosphere of safety.

However, that does not mean the Blue Line is flawless. Trains occasionally break down on the tracks and have to be repaired on-site, which can cause long delays for riders in both directions. Still, more mobility exists with the light rail than the streetcar.

The CityLynx Gold Line streetcar that opened Uptown in 2015 has not become a promising

addition to the city’s transportation fleet. Low ridership brought on by the pandemic and delays caused by traffic tie-ups have forced CATS to run fare-free service for the streetcar since Aug. 30, 2021.

Even before the pandemic, the CityLynx Gold Line moved a mere 1,748 daily riders based on data from CATS. Phase 2 opened in August 2021 to much acclaim, extending the existing track in Uptown east to Elizabeth and west to West Trade Street near Johnson C. Smith University. However, streetcar service is still plagued by delays and low ridership.

The streetcar has turned into a garnish on the urban landscape rather than a practical transport option for inner-city residents — just another specter of gentrification.

Despite this, Charlotte City Council in June approved funding for Phase 3 of the Gold Line after Lewis promised that new pre-construction design research would aim to make the streetcars operate

more like the Blue Line rather than fending off traffic, which has been a main cause for delay on the existing track.

Lewis has been noticeably quiet about publicly addressing issues with CATS as drivers, city leaders and local media outlets have begun to shed light on them, but things appear to be coming to a head now. Just three days after a WBTV Investigation revealed a private contractor was running Charlotte’s bus system, Charlotte City Manager Marcus Jones announced that an evaluation of CATS “organizational structure and leadership team” was underway.

In the coming months, city leaders will lobby state lawmakers in Raleigh to approve a penny sales tax increase on the local ballot to fund a $13.5 billion transit plan to expand bus and light rail service, among other things.

However, before that happens, city elections — which will have been decided on July 26,

between the time this paper gets sent to print and when it hits the streets — and county elections in November will determine the likelihood of this modest tax proposal becoming a reality.

Charlotte voters will decide whether CATS funding is a priority worth improving to achieve a more connected city.

Functional public transportation is at the heart of any modern metropolis. However, Charlotte’s tax dollars should not fund a substandard service if significant improvements continue to go unfulfilled.

After calling their customer service line many times, the CATS representative knows me by name.

For anyone who needs to contact CATS for service information and estimated wait times, the number is 704-336-7433, or reach them via email at telltransit@ charlottenc.gov.

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“MANPOWER PROBLEM OR WILLPOWER PROBLEM?” -CARTOON BY ISAAC NAYLOR

ARTS FEATURE

TUNE IN, TURN OUT, DROP IN

CohobaFest is a social justice psychedelic therapy party

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BY PAT MORAN

“I started peeling back the layers, the labels, the expectations,” says Dominican American psychotherapist and licensed social worker Victor A. Cabral, “until I got to the core of who I was, and … that was love.”

The quote is from the documentary Transcendence, which explores the reemergence of therapeutic and ceremonial psychedelic medicine through the experiences of Black people, indigenous people and people of color (BIPOC). The film is a work in progress, produced by Cabral, and a working clip from it will be shown in Charlotte on July 30 at the OBRA Collective gallery within the Visual & Performing Arts (VAPA) Center in Uptown Charlotte.

The screening is just one part of a party called CohobaFest, a night of arts, community, and psychedelic education hosted by a local nonprofit organization called Cohoba. The organization, which includes licensed clinical social workers, massage therapists, a digital marketer and an art director on its staff, advocates for equitable psychedelic assisted therapy — and you are cordially invited to the party, says Cohoba co-founder, nonprofit manager and licensed clinical social worker (LSCW) Laura Camilo.

“I want people to understand that we exist.

It’s our community coming out,” Camilo says. “We want to bring this conversation [about psychedelic therapy] out of the shadows, and we want to highlight the fact that people from different walks of life are partaking in psychedelic experiences.”

To that end, the Transcendence clip screening at Cohoba’s home in the VAPA Center will be followed by a discussion moderated by massage therapist Rykia Clark. Before that, the open house will feature a workshop called The Basics of Herbalism: Teas, Tinctures and Elixirs by herbalist Elena Vargas of Virsiren Herbs. “[Vargas’] focus is working with Latin women and conditions that are common [with them] like lupus and diabetes,” Camilo says. At the same

time, CohobaFest will also host the talents of local BIPOC artists and allies in a psychedelic gallery show, curated by Cohoba’s art director, and Camilo’s husband, Jonathan Camilo. Featured artists include Asia Hanon, Ian Wegener, Yael A. Hernandez, Arthur Brouthers, Tiar Tiana, Megan Gonzalez and more. “[The pieces] are very much about celebration, resistance and joy for people of color,” Camilo says.

Many of the artists also have ties with nonprofit and interdisciplinary Latinx arts group OBRA, which stands for Observe, Bridge, Respond, Art. The festival illustrates the close link between Cohoba and OBRA, who are neighbors at VAPA, Camilo offers.

“With OBRA’s mission to promote immigrant rights and culture in the art world, and with Cohoba’s mission to bring mental health support to marginalized people, which includes immigrant populations, it was a natural fit to work together,” she says.

This is not your cliché psychedelic party — an opportunity for attendees to microdose mushrooms or nibble on weed edibles. Any information offered in consultations/sessions, or in this case a community celebration, does not encourage or condone the use, purchase, or sale of illicit substances, Camilo emphasizes.

In addition to being a fun and educational experience, CohobaFest is a bit of a family affair. The communal affair wraps up with a performance by Drums 4 Life followed by dancing and mingling to tunes spun by DJ Rio Cruz, a.k.a. Dario De La Cruz, Cohoba co-founder and LCSW Daniel De La Cruz’s cousin.

Park High School. She characterizes her upbringing as slightly sheltered until graduation in 2006, when she became aware of the ongoing plight of the Dreamers — immigrants who arrived in America as youths and qualify for the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act — who are consistently and currently under attack by conservative lawmakers and judges.

Attending UNC Charlotte, Camilo interned at the Latin American Coalition. She immersed herself in supporting the immigrant rights movement while earning a bachelor’s degree in Latin American Studies. Seeing the horrifying results of stripping people of their documentation, Camilo realized she was not cut out to do legal advocacy work. Her attention turned to the community support issues.

She also turned her attention to the world of psychedelics. She enjoyed her first experience with

psilocybin mushrooms, but her path soon led to disappointment. She felt the spiritualism of the psychedelic experience was tied to watered down Buddhism or Hinduism — or a hodgepodge of New Age beliefs.

“I think I wasted a lot of time going to kundalini yoga classes,” Camilo says. Then she discovered that Yogi Bhajan, the founder of kundalini yoga in the west, has been implicated in dozens of sexual assault and harassment claims.

“It was also a very white space, and I didn’t feel the people of color who were there were supported the way they needed to be,” Camilo says. “I started to realize it was a lot of noise. I’d take substances that supposedly dismantle the way that way you think about things, then you end up in a community where all people are repeating the same things anyway.”

A social justice and psychedelic education

A Dominican American born in New York, Camilo was raised in the Dominican Republic until she was 6 years old. Her family moved around, landing in Charlotte just in time for her junior year at Myers RYKIA CLARK WILL MODERATE A DISCUSSION AT COHOBAFEST.

COURTESY OF COHOBAFEST

ARTS FEATURE

community mental health model.

“It [becomes important] when you can start to see more change in populations, particularly with Charlotte,” Camilo says. “We’re still stratified in this city — who lives where and who can access resources.” Resources are often scant when it comes to treating underserved, and often immigrant, communities.

“We want to raise money so that we can sustain and serve people, particularly those with PTSD,” Camilo says, noting that the cost of a full round of psychedelic therapy sessions for a PTSD patient ranges from $5,000 to $7,000.

Originally, CohobaFest was going to be a more modest community affair, she says. On a training trip to New York in 2018, she and De La Cruz met fellow Dominican American Cabral and learned about his documentary Transcendence. The film follows Cabral and a group of men in his hometown who meet occasionally to trip and discuss their reactions and experiences. ”Then [the film] branches out into the bigger story: The psychedelic renaissance, and how it’s affecting people of color,” Camilo says.

“CohobaFest didn’t start out as a party. The idea was to bring Victor Cabral’s documentary

Transcendence, screen it, and get a conversation going,” Camilo says. Instead, CohobaFest is going to be part of the larger documentary. “There will be some filming going on at the fest. It’s all totally meta.”

Then the Cohoba members realized that since they were in an arts building, surrounded by several creative people, why not utilize the talent and good energy suffusing VAPA? Why not get to know folks in a creative way, and turn a screening into a celebration?

“I want to make cultural events a big part of Cohoba,” says Camilo, who points out that the nonprofit also hosts social and informational Charlotte Psychedelic Society meetings the last Wednesday of every month. “We’re talking mental health and therapy, but it’s a community mental health model that we’re trying to build.”

“We’re talking about trauma and all these very difficult things that people have stacked up against them right now, but celebration can be a huge cornerstone of resistance for marginalized people.”

She repeats a saying she heard and later embraced during her MAPS training: “People say POC means people of color but I like people of celebration.”

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Camilo and De La Cruz also filed their nonprofit paperwork in late 2019. By January 2020, Cohoba had launched, chosen a board and started having Disappointed and at a low ebb in her life, Camilo board meetings. fortuitously met fellow Dominican American Daniel Camilo and De La Cruz chose the name Cohoba De La Cruz at an east Charlotte house party in 2015. for their nascent nonprofit because it draws on their At the time, De La Cruz was also at UNC Charlotte Dominican ancestry. Cohoba is the name of a Taino working on a Master of Social Work (MSW) degree. ceremony in Santo Domingo where people inhaled He was also interested in the intersection of social a psychedelic snuff powder. It is posited that DMT justice, equity and power, as well as the burgeoning (N, N-Dimethyltryptamine) was the psychoactive psychedelic therapy industry. Noting she had already ingredient in the powder. done social justice work, De La Cruz convinced “When you ingest DMT, it slows everything Camilo to return to school to earn an MSW. down, and gives you a much longer trip,” Camilo At UNC Charlotte, Camilo completed her MSW says. She notes there is a Cohoba deity and a Cohoba research capstone, a task akin to a final project, ritual, but we don’t know exactly what the Taino in psychedelic-assisted therapy and potential believed. applications for Charlotte’s Latinx communities.

Since Cohoba can’t do psychedelic assisted Upon graduation in 2018, she and De La Cruz therapies yet, it is focusing on harm reduction. began talking about founding a nonprofit, one “When people hear harm reduction they’re that would combine their interests in social justice thinking about how it applies to alcohol and and psychedelic therapy. They started attending opiates,” Camilo says. “Any person can go to their conferences that would keep them appraised of qualified therapist and say, ‘I’m planning on going national developments in their field, particularly on a cocaine and alcohol binge this weekend, but I the distinct possibility that the FDA would soon don’t want to die. How do I do this?’” approve the use of MDMA (3,4-Methyl​enedioxy​ Since abstinence doesn’t work, harm reduction methamphetamine) for study and clinical therapy. theory allows therapists to give people necessary information so they understand dosage, substances they shouldn’t be taking together, and more. Cohoba Making plans for molly MDMA, known on the street as molly or ecstasy, is currently applying that model to psychedelics.

“You [also] bring in issues about the law and in not a classic psychedelic, like psilocybin or peyote, that is used ceremonially by indigenous people, but what happens if a person feels they need to go to Camilo and De La Cruz focused on MDMA-assisted the hospital — can you take them to the hospital therapy because it’s slated for legal clearance in and not get arrested?” Camilo says.

June 2023.

Camilo, who is particularly interested in helping Psychedelic therapy in color people with PTSD, notes that MDMA is being studied Cohoba is a by-and-for BIPOC nonprofit, especially for use in treating PTSD. because there’s a deeper understanding between a MDMA’s effect on any user is that it opens them person of color working with a practitioner of color, up to themselves and other people.

Camilo says. “Therapy should be a two-way street, a “You peel back layers in a way,” Camilo says. dynamic of both people opening up. What happens “People with PTSD have trouble allowing themselves when you add race to that?” to be with traumatic memories. It’s like your whole She cites an example that occurred during body is fighting, so that you never have to think her MAPS training. A white therapist said that about it again.” since therapy is an inner-directed experience, Unfortunately, that’s not how trauma resolves externals like race and color shouldn’t be considered itself. It needs to be seen and examined, Camilo important. Black and POC therapists pointed out maintains. MDMA allows people to do that for a that race is not an external characteristic in today’s longer amount of time and in a deeper way. world. It has a profound effect on the way people Camilo and De La Cruz began training with are treated.

MAPS (Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic “PTSD can happen from a bad car crash or an Studies), the national organization that has been abusive relationship,” Camilo says. “ It can also advocating for research and policy implementation happen from being a person of color in this country.” for MDMA therapy since it was founded in 1986 by To that end, Camilo’s interests go beyond psychedelic pioneer Rick Doblin. In the meantime, individual therapy. Cohoba’s mission also adopts a

WED

7/27

THE BLACK KEYS, BAND OF HORSES

There was a zeitgeist high-water mark in 2011 when, together or apart, The Black Keys ruled the roost, inspiring newcomers, helping out inspirations like Dr. John and getting their music into a shit ton of commercials. Where 2010’s Brothers was a soul inflected take on blues rock, the following year’s El Camino upped the ante with its T-Rex meets raunchy spaghetti western soundtrack. A decade later, they can turn their inspirations like ZZ Top’s frontman/ guitarist Billy Gibbons into collaborators on Dropout Boogie. The result is nothing new, but it’s suitably greasy.

More: $39.50 and up; July 27, 7 p.m.; PNC Music Pavilion, 707 Pavilion Blvd.; livenation.com

THUR 7/28

CROSSROADS CINEMA: THE BREAKFAST CLUB

Writer/director/producer John Hughes dominated the 1980s by treating his often teenaged protagonists with empathy and respect. The Breakfast Club was not as big a hit as Hughes’ Home Alone, or as indelibly stamped on a generation as Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, but it’s his masterpiece. The strength of this coming-of-age comedy/drama is its simple plot — a group of people isolated in a room reveal truths about themselves and begin to understand one other. It’s a scenario tackled by everyone from Rod Serling to Eugene O’Neill, and Hughes contribution stacks up to theirs.

More: Free; July 28, 8 p.m.; Camp North End, Ford Building, 1774 Statesville Ave.; camp.nc

‘THE MAIDS’ Courtesy of XOXO

WORMHOLES Photo by Lewis Dameron

8/4 - 8/14

8/5

THUR-SAT AUG 7/28 - 7/30 8/4 - 8/14

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ARIES SPEARS

Blessed with quick wit, charisma and a ferociously aggressive style of comedy, Aries Spears first connected with audiences as a cast member of MADtv. In addition to wicked impersonation of celebreties such as James Brown, Al Pacino, and his childhood idol Eddie Murphy, the recurring sketch, “Talkin’ American” featured Spears as Mr. Daichai, and proved to be MADtv’s most popular bit. He’s currently developing a film project based on a character that he created on MADtv, as well as a thriller about a young Black man immersed in hiphop culture.

More: $25-30; July 28-30; Comedy Zone, 900 NC Music Factory Blvd.; cltcomedyzone.com

‘THE MAIDS’

Jean Genet’s The Maids, staged by Charlotte experimental theater troupe XOXO, is based loosely on two sisters who murdered their employer in 1933.

It’s often seen as a kind of funhouse mirror where the two murderous maids imitate one another and their intended victim. The scenario is a great fit for XOXO who intuitively occupy the space where illusion and reality conjoin until it’s impossible to see where one ends and the other begins. Director Matt Cosper and his talented cast promise “bold physicality, wicked humor and a talent for making the familiar strange and the strange familiar.”

More: $32; August 4-14; Mint Museum Randolph, 2730 Randolph Rd.; xoxoperformance.org

FRI 8/5

FRI 8/5

SOLIS, WORMHOLES, MODERN MOXIE

LIVE FROM THE BOILER YARD: WILL WILLIS

The Visulite hosts a stellar bill of homegrown bands.

Visceral yet melodic, Modern Moxie proceed with wit intelligence and swagger to craft some of Charlotte’s best pop-rock tunes. Husband and wife duo, Leonardo and Kellie Solis confound all expectations about experimental electronic pop with their spacious. Leonardo provides lush production and spectral synths while Kellie composes gauzy pop delivered in her vulnerable and feathered alto.

Wormholes features instrumentalists/vocalists Ben Verner’s and Chris Walters’ atmospheric dreamscapes thread a torturous course through post-rock cacophony and psych-pop haze to the well of human emotion.

More: $10-14; August 5, 8 p.m.; Visulite Theatre, 1615 Elizabeth Ave.; visulite.com

Born and raised in western North Carolina, Will Willis draws from the hardscrabble folk and downto-earth country traditions of the region. He filters those influences through a snappy pop-rock filter to craft catchy songs that recall the kind of 1970s soft rock hits that dominated the Guardians of the Galaxy soundtrack. His summer single “Honey Bee” harnesses the dynamic rock snap of The Raspberries to a jaunty guitar pop tune that compliments his foggy fine-grained vocals as he sashays and swaggers through nostalgia and heartbreak.

More: Free; August 5, 6 p.m.; Boiler Yard, Camp North End, 300 Camp Road; camp.nc/events

FRI 8/5

SAT 8/6

‘GALLERY’ AN ART SHOW

TRIBUTE TO THE ART OF SONG FEAT. KENNY ROBY

Hem-Synch is a process that synchronizes the two hemispheres of the brain using binaural beats. You listen to two tones with slightly different frequencies at the same time, and to create a brain illusion that aids relaxation and sleep. Another Hemi Synch, without the hyphen, is a Charlotte art collective that is also looking to synchronize the hemispheres, but the desired effect is presumably more stimulating than relaxing. The collective’s month-long gallery experience highlights boundary-pushing visual works from artists Mono Feo, Patrick Brown, Moonspeed, Grant Foster, AJ Strickland and more.

More: $7-10; August 5, 9 p.m.; Petra’s, 1919 Commonwealth Ave.; petrasbar.com ACTING UP! DRAMA CAMP AdobeStock

Randy Franklin and Friends have gathered an impressive array of songwriters for their annual Crisis Assistance Ministry benefit. The standout in this bill is former Six String Drag frontman Kenny Roby. After seven years of silence, Roby launched a solo career making dark but transformative music and we’re all the richer for it. Over deceptively calm arrangements, Roby crafts concise and vivid wordplay weighted with powerful emotions. His stories are richly resonant, with thumbnail sketches of hardscrabble characters either embracing denial or holding out for a glimmer of hope.

More: $20-25; August 6, 7:30 p.m.; Evening Muse, 3227 N. Davidson St.; eveningmuse.com

8/6

8/6

SAT 8/6 FAMILY FIRST : ACTING UP! DRAMA CAMP

8/5

SUN 8/7 JUDY COLLINS

Back in 2020, Chatham County Line’s Dave Wilson called Judy Collins “a magical artist with a magical voice.” Wilson collaborated with Collins on Winter Songs, the sophisticated singer-songwriter’s first number one album in America. Through six decades, Collins made her mark in numerous genres with lyrical maturity and breathtaking vocals. She recorded the first cover of “Turn! Turn! Turn!” years before The Byrds tackled it. She highlighted political topics in her 1970s work, and recorded complex narrative pieces for pop albums. Collins also was the inspiration of Crosby Stills & Nash’s classic “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.”

More: $25 and up; August 7, 7 p.m.; Knight Theater, 430 S. Tryon St.; blumenthalarts.org JUDY COLLINS Photo by Bryan Ledgard

8/7

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A 12-year-old boy chases after a wounded gunfighter, pleading with the desperado to come back home. An angelic 13-year old turns on her prey, erasing any doubt that she’s a bloodthirsty vampire. A 7-year-old gradually befriends a dumpy alien. All of these performers — Brandon DeWilde, Kirsten Dunst and Drew Barrymore — made indelible impressions as child actors. Maybe you kids have that spark and talent, too. This workshop, facilitated by Open Cage Production artistic director Tiffany Bryant-Jackson helps them access their inner thespian for fun.

More: $10; August 6, noon; Harvey B. Gantt Center, 551 S. Tryon St.; ganttcenter.org WILL WILLIS Promotional photo

KENNY ROBY Photo by Timo Tijhof

MUSIC FEATURE

PUSHING POSITIVITY

Brio. releases debut album at a time when it’s needed most

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BY RYAN PITKIN

Sitting in an empty reception room on the fifth floor of the Mint Museum in Uptown Charlotte, Ismael Abdallah, also known by his musical pseudonym Brio., is fresh off the bus from New York City. He left Manhattan at around 11 p.m. the previous night and, after three unexpected stops during the trip, didn’t arrive in Charlotte until 2:30 p.m.

The rapper/producer is still full of energy, though, despite the fact that he will be right back on the bus for another dozen hours or so to make the return trip later that night.

If there’s one word to explain Abdallah, it would be “patient.”

He’s making this quick trip to his hometown to perform at an opening reception for his friend, local fashion designer and ROOLE founder Gordon Holliday, who curated the Yasuke exhibit showing in the Mint’s M5 gallery through Sept. 15.

Abdallah sees Holliday’s journey as indicative of how success comes to Charlotte creatives who work steadily toward their goals.

“It takes a level of consistency. It takes a level of resources. It takes a level of utilizing those resources. It takes a level of drive,” he tells me. “For instance, we’re having this conversation in the Mint Museum, bro. Gordon is my brother. We went to high school together. He’s been working on ROOLE since he got out of high school. You get what I’m saying? He graduated in 2011. This is 10-plus years on it now. And now we’re in the Mint Museum. You get what I mean?”

Brio. will see his own patience pay off on Aug. 23, when he drops We Need To Talk, his debut fulllength album.

He’s liable to keep tweaking the record forever, but early in July, he finally buckled down and gave himself a release date for the project after making some changes to the tracklist that he felt finally

made the album complete.

The project has been seven years in the making, featuring at least one track that was recorded in 2015, but one could argue that Brio.’s entire career has been building to this point.

“I just really got so real with myself about how I wanted to sound, how I wanted my shit to be put out, and really just questioning, beyond the artist that you want to be, it’s like, what do you really

want to put out and be remembered for?” he says of the recording process. “That took me really having to take a harsh look at the mirror with my work. I knew I could be putting in more time; I could be doing better in certain areas. I just wanted to challenge myself to really perfect the shit. And I’m just saying all that to say that I’m extremely confident about this project.”

Making moves

Having returned to his hometown of Charlotte from Atlanta in 2015 to release his Lite Bleu EP, by 2019 Abdallah started to feel restless again. He had begun playing more shows in New York City and loved the response he had gotten.

At the end of that year, he joined longtime friends and collaborators, producer Kirk Collins and singer Makeda Iroquois, in making the move to Brooklyn.

He felt the birthplace of hip-hop was the right place to showcase his own alternative form of the art, which he calls progressive rap — a term that came from his godmother.

“Fundamentally, I’m definitely hip-hop; I’m

BRIO. WILL DROP HIS DEBUT FULL-LENGTH ALBUM ‘WE NEED TO TALK’ ON AUG. 23.

hip-hop as hell, like, that’s on record. The things that you’re going to see on We Need to Talk, you’re going to see a lot more of my fundamental hip-hop core, which is a lot of things that got crafted and polished in New York just being able to connect with the concrete jungle up there and dive in and connect with the spirit of hip-hop up there and actually live and breathe and see the shit. But it’s alternative. It’s definitely something new. It’s definitely something that is pushing the envelope.”

Brio. has released four singles from the project in the lead-up to its release, and while his production still often features dark undertones, the lyrical content is consistent in its goal to push positivity and light in a world that’s seen a lot of darkness in recent years.

He sees the election of Donald Trump as a turning point for the culture, one that has inspired his generation (he’s currently 28 years old) and those who have come after to seek light in a different way.

“We had the conversation in 2016. It was like, ‘Oh yeah, now people will be able to really wake up to it,’” he recalls. “But no, four or five years later, now six years later, you really get to connect with that. Like,

PHOTO BY TERRY SUAVE

MUSIC FEATURE it’s a shift now, and you see the younger generations who were six years younger going through that and how they connect, how the tenacity is with their voice, how strong they connect — and this is kind of away from music in a way — just like how they connect with nature, the truth, honesty, things that are a little bit unexplainable in terms of older generations.”

Brio. also wants to push back against the “lustfilled, drug-laced, diluted tone” that he sees in much of mainstream rap music today. He cites societal issues that range from pandemic lockdowns and insurrection to police brutality and community violence as reasons why a more positive outlook is needed.

It’s part of the reason why he named his new album We Need To Talk.

“It’s about just speaking truth to that — clearing that shit at the end of the day, speaking healing to it, because I don’t think any of us have properly healed from this stuff,” he says. “So I feel like that’s something I’m connecting with a lot more as I say that it’s important, because us as a nation need to heal. Us as a people need to heal, you know what I mean?”

see too much value in it.”

It’s clear in his use of “we” in referring to the creative scene here that he still considers Charlotte his home, which would explain why he has no problem spending 24 hours on a bus round-trip to play a short set in support of a friend’s exhibit.

He’s been impressed to watch Charlotte’s hiphop scene and, more broadly, its cultural scene in general grow year over year from afar. Even when he’s not here, he keeps a close eye on what’s happening, and he likes what he sees.

But as with his approach to everything in life, he knows it will take time.

“It’s going to take some time. It’s going to take some real blood, sweat and tears. And everybody gets it out the mud here,” he says. “But I feel like the core and the people who are really tapped in with each other, because we’ve had to pretty much lift each other up here, we stay supportive and we stay connected.”

If one word could describe Brio., it would be “patient,” but if I can add another, I’d go with “positive.” And that’s something we need now more than ever.

RPITKIN@QCNERVE.COM

Keeping the Queen City connection

BRIO.

PHOTO BY SOPHIE MING

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While Abdallah doesn’t currently have a concrete plan to move back to Charlotte, he keeps his connections in the city strong, regularly traveling back and forth to play shows. He moved back to Charlotte in 2021, staying for about nine months before returning to NYC in February 2022.

He tells me that accessibility and marketability had been an issue for him in Charlotte, and in a familiar refrain I’ve heard from other local rappers who hit the road in search of more opportunities, he says his goal is to eventually return to help grow the scene as he sees more success.

“It’s just levels of accessibility, that’s the thing that’s kind of driven me to make the decisions that I’ve needed to make about where I’m going to live and where I want to start my career off or expand my career,” he says. “Markets just haven’t opened up yet for certain things in Charlotte, which is weird because it’s like all the money is here for it. But it’s only weird from our standpoint. As creatives and people who are one with the culture because we’re from here, one, and two, we’ve been able to see the city change. But on the other side of the coin, it’s like the people who are inhabiting the place don’t really

WEDNESDAY, JULY 27 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

L.A. Guns w/ Faster Pussycat (Amos’ Southend) Elders w/ Latepost, Ich (The Milestone) The Black Keys w/ Band of Horses (PNC Music Pavilion) Mother Iron Horse w/ Bone Church, Cosmic Reaper, Snake Mountain Revival (Skylark Social Club) Petrov w/ PANS, Quad (Snug Harbor)

JAZZ/BLUES

Sunny Side (Evening Muse) Kristen Randles w/ The Sean Higgins Trio (Middle C Jazz) Joanna Connor w/ Andrew Scotchie & the River Rats (Neighborhood Theatre)

THURSDAY, JULY 28 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Jordan Rudess (Neighborhood Theatre)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Vince Gill (Ovens Auditorium) Gareth Asher w/ Admiral Radio (Evening Muse) JD Pinkus w/ PW Long, D. Kosmo (Snug Harbor)

JAZZ/BLUES

Snarky Puppy w/ Bobby Sparks II, Jay D. Jones (Evening Muse) Maysa Leak (Middle C Jazz)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ Shadow Play (Crown Station) Chill Out ... You Buggin (Petra’s)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

The Aristocrats (Neighborhood Theatre)

LATIN/WORLD/REGGAE

Iration w/ Atmosphere (CMCU Amphitheatre)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Jason Aldean (PNC Music Pavilion) Aaron Burdett w/ The Unspoken Tradition (Visulite Theatre)

SATURDAY, JULY 30 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Halestorm w/ The Pretty Reckless (CMCU Amphitheatre)

American Aquarium w/ H.C. McEntire (Neighborhood Theatre) Julian Calendar w/ Fun Isn’t Fair, Pet Bug (Petra’s) Yesterday (Primal Brewery) Discord Theory w/ Hollyglen (Skylark Social Club)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Jagged Edge w/ K. Michelle, Lloyd, Bobby V, Brownstone, 702, Michel’le (Ovens Auditorium) Kenyon Dixon w/ Susan Carol (Evening Muse) Sean Kingston (The Underground) Mercury Carter w/ Simon Smthng, Leo Wolf, Benjamin Sochko (Snug Harbor)

JAZZ/BLUES

Maysa Leak (Middle C Jazz)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Ward Davis (Amos’ Southend) ChrisMcGinnisw/ToddJohnson,JacobDavisMartin(EveningMuse) Casey Clark w/ Sugabush (Smokey Joes Cafe & Bar)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Digital Noir w/ DJ Spider (The Milestone)

Underground Sessions Vol. 3 (SERJ) The Collection w/ Begonia (Visulite Theatre) IIOIOII w/ Solemn Shapes, 30 Year Sick (Tommy’s Pub)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Jerry Jubilee (Heist Brewery & Barrel Arts)

SUNDAY, JULY 31 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Blurry w/ Leaving for Arizona, A Life Worth Taking, Dear Kavalier (The Milestone) Occult Fracture w/ Hopeless Otis, StormWatchers, Evergone (Tommy’s Pub)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B Kenyon Dixon w/ Byron Juane (Evening Muse)

JAZZ/BLUES

Adrian Crutchfield (Middle C Jazz)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Shady Recruits (Heist Brewery & Barrel Arts)

JAZZ/BLUES

Michael Jons Band (Middle C Jazz)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Lil Degen w/ Acne, Apolloislame, Physical Digital (The Milestone) Autumn Rainwater w/ Oracle Blue, Ashlyn Uribe (Petra’s)

OPEN MIC

Open Mic Night w/ Chase & Aleeia “Sug” Bolton Brown (Tommy’s Pub)

FAMILY

iParty w/ DJ Matt Bennett (The Fillmore)

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FRIDAY, JULY 29 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Forrest Isn’t Dead w/ Oceanic (Evening Muse) Joystick w/ The Emotron, Corporate Fandango, B-Villainous (The Milestone) Half Past Dead w/ The Dirty Downlow, The Violet Exploit, Warpath, Canyon (Skylark Social Club) Thelma & the Sleaze w/ Tongues of Fire, Pleasure House (Snug Harbor) Run Engine w/ The Turnstiles (Tommy’s Pub)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Loumuzik (The Underground)

The Black Keys play PNC Music Pavilion on July 27.

PHOTO by Kenny Sun

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Truckstop Preachers (Comet Grill)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ Hazy Sunday (Petra’s)

MONDAY, AUGUST 1 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Equipment (The Milestone)

JAZZ/BLUES

The Conn/Davis Duo (Crown Station) The Bill Hanna Legacy Jazz Session (Petra’s)

OPEN MIC

Find Your Muse Open Mic feat. Don Merckle (Evening Muse)

TUESDAY, AUGUST 2 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Polyphia (The Underground) Counter/Action w/ Latepost, LocalViolence (Skylark Social Club) Standards w/ Glacier Veins, Oh! You Pretty Things (Snug Harbor)

FRIDAY, AUGUST 5 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Fantastic Cat w/ Andrew Duhon (Evening Muse) Regence w/ Jordyn Zaino, The Eccentrics, The Donner Deads (The Milestone) Sheer Terror (Skylark Social Club) Carlos Truly w/ Benet, Zodiac Lovers Band (Snug Harbor) SOLIS w/ Wormholes, Modern Moxie (Visulite Theatre)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Kehlani (CMCU Amphitheatre) Elijah Rosario w/ Gus Glasser (Evening Muse) Soelle w/ 1WayNorth (Neighborhood Theatre)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Sasha Alex Sloane (The Underground) Seneca Burns, CI Ape, Victim Complex, Physical Digital, No Scope (The Spoke Easy)

JAZZ/BLUES

Four80East (Middle C Jazz)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

LATIN/REGGAE/WORLD

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

SATURDAY, AUGUST 6

Cosmic Jam (Crown Station)

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 3 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Moving Boxes w/ The Sour, Virtual You, Beauty (The Milestone) Friendship w/ Tenci, Family Friend (Neighborhood Theatre)

JAZZ/BLUES

The Paul Dozier Group (Middle C Jazz)

OPEN MIC

Tosco Music Open Mic (Evening Muse)

THURSDAY, AUGUST 4 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Giovannie & The Hired Guns (Amos’ Southend) The Mongos w/ Catch Prichard (Evening Muse) Swansgate w/ Council Ring, McKenzie Van Oss (Petra’s) Born A New w/ Falsifier, Cell (Skylark Social Club) True Lilith w/ Wastoid, Ink Swell (Snug Harbor) Gladys Knight (Ovens Auditorium)

JAZZ/BLUES

Brandon Stevens (Middle C Jazz)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

NC Bluegrass Jam Night (Birdsong Brewing)

OPEN MIC

Open Mic Night w/ Chase & Aleeia “Sug” Bolton Brown (Tommy’s Pub)

The Conn/Davis Duo (Crown Station) The Bill Hanna Legacy Jazz Session (Petra’s)

JAZZ/BLUES

Eric Essix (Middle C Jazz) CLT Blues Society: A Mighty Fine Blues Jam (Neighborhood Theatre)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC

TUESDAY, AUGUST 9 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Daniel Champagne & Catherine Britt (Evening Muse) Dance Gavin Dance (The Fillmore) Acid Dad w/ Rugg, NA$A, Magic Candy (Snug Harbor)

Release the Pressure: Classic & Soulful Afro House Party (Crown Station) Hazy Sunday (Petra’s)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Jerry Garcia Band Cover Band (Visulite Theatre)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Sober Sunday Showcase featuring Carrie Ann // Alan Gilbert // Keegan Federal

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Chris Brown w/ Lil Baby (PNC Music Pavilion)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ Cosmic Jam (Crown Station)

MONDAY, AUGUST 8

VISIT QCNERVE.COM FOR THE FULL SOUNDWAVE LISTING.

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Emerald Empire Band (Heist Brewery & Barrel Arts)

MATUTE (Ovens Auditorium)

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Biitchseat (The Milestone) Enterprise Earth (Neighborhood Theatre) Pröwess w/ Reality Something, Cap Nunn (Petra’s) Styx w/ REO Speedwagon (PNC Music Pavilion) A Giant Dog w/ Jenny Besetzt, Hiram (Snug Harbor) Mucho Gumbo w/ The Pintos (Tommy’s Pub) Anything Goes (Guns ‘n’ Roses tribute) w/ L.A. Maybe (Amos’ Southend) Glide STP (Stone Temple Pilots tribute) (Visulite Theatre)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Ken Carson (The Underground)

JAZZ/BLUES

Gena Chambers (Middle C Jazz)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC

Bison Tails w/ Dr. Ozi (SERJ) Afropop Nation Sound System feat. Thunder, Beezy, DJ Kato (The Spoke Easy)

ACOUSTIC/SINGER-SONGWRITER Ashlar Sargent (Primal Brewery)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Bullfrog Moon (Birdsong Brewing) Randy Franklin w/ Kenny Roby and friends (Evening Muse)

SUNDAY, AUGUST 7 ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Wavebreak w/ Driving Underwater, Oh! You Pretty Things, Eavesdropper, Elucidate (The Milestone)

JULY-AUGUST MON, AUG 1

WED, JUL 27

SUNNY SIDE 7-PIECE JAZZ BAND FIND YOUR MUSE OPEN MIC FEAT. DON MERCKLE FROM NEW ORLEANS WED, AUG 3

THUR, JUL 28

TOSCO MUSIC OPEN MIC

GARETH ASHER

THUR, AUG 4

W/ ADMIRAL RADIO FRI, JUL 29

SNARKY PUPPY / PRINCE KEYBOARDIST BOBBY SPARKS II W/ GUEST JAY D. JONES

FORREST ISN'T DEAD W/ OCEANIC CHRIS MCGINNIS ALBUM RELEASE SHOW

W/ TODD JOHNSON & JACOB DAVIS MARTIN

W/ SUSAN CAROL

FRI, AUG 5

FANTASTIC CAT

AND ANDREW DUHON

S A T, J U L 3 0

KENYON DIXON

THE MONGOS W/ CATCH PRICHARD

ELIJAH ROSARIO W/ GUS GLASSER

S A T, A U G 6

TRIBUTE TO THE ART OF SONG FEAT. KENNY ROBY FOR CRISIS ASSISTANCE MINISTRY

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA The Petersens (Booth Playhouse)

eveningmuse.com

3 3 2 7 n d av i d s o n s t, c h a r l o t t e n c

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HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

JAZZ/BLUES

Jay Van Raalte and the Spectrum (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Alicia Keys (CMCU Amphitheatre) Kendrick Lamar (Spectrum Center)

Judy Collins (Knight Theater) Rett Madison w/ Liv Greene (Evening Muse)

FOOD & DRINK FEATURE

THE NEXT CHAPTER Tony Martin looks for an heir to his Anntony’s empire

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BY KARIE SIMMONS

Sit with Tony Martin for more than a few minutes and he’ll tell you a story or two … or three or four. But be warned, the Guyanese immigrant and founder of longtime Charlotte staple Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe is so multi-faceted — doctor, engineer, businessman, inventor, restaurateur — it can be tricky to keep up as he seamlessly flows from one unbelievable tale to the next.

Like the tire caddy story, for example. Martin says that, around the late 1960s to early ’70s, he had an idea for a foldable, wheeled tire caddy that could be used to transport a flat tire to the gas station instead of rolling it there. He claims a fellow engineer whom he confided in about his idea ended up patenting it for himself and selling the patent for an unknown amount.

“Do you know what it is today? All the suitcases you see with wheels and all the things you see, people strap their luggage on and they pull it. I invented that,” Martin said.

As a young engineer, Martin says he worked with Dr. Charles Kelman, an ophthalmologist known for developing new devices and techniques to treat cataracts. He says he worked on the tip of the needle that goes into the eye during cataract surgery.

He even claims that Anntony’s served as the inspiration for Boston Market following a visit to the South by that chain’s founders, though the timeline on that claim remains murky.

Of all Martin’s many stories, however, his best is the one about how he turned his idea to sell rotisserie chicken bathed in the flavors of the Caribbean with his homemade spices and sauces into an empire.

Over nearly 40 years, Martin has expanded Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe to 10 locations, including two that he owned and operated on East 7th Street in Elizabeth and West Sugar Creek Road in north Charlotte. He also launched a line of spices and sauces that today grace the shelves of Harris Teeter, Food Lion, Lowes Foods and Publix.

Yet, as he prepares to retire at the end of August, the father of six admits that he’s still unsure how this story will end.

The only remaining Anntony’s location on West Sugar Creek Road location will stay open after Martin retires, albeit under new ownership. He’ll maintain all the rights to his sauce business and trademarks, but his true wish is to hand the brand off to someone who will expand on it further than he was able to.

“It seemed like everything just got to a certain point and never really materialized into anything because I didn’t know how,” he said. “I was more into nutrition. I’m just the brains behind this stuff. I come up with ideas, and I can start it and get it going, but to expand it, it takes a different person.”

Now he wants to see someone take it “I developed the sauces, spices and marinades, nationwide. all with proper balance, nutrition meaning balance, where you don’t get heartburn or indigestion. And it is excellent for the body,” he said.

Tony’s secret sauce “It’s a combination of a range of ethnic Tony Martin arrived in the United States from backgrounds — Indian, African, Portuguese, Guyana — a coastal country on the northern Chinese and all this. They got a blend of nationalities mainland of South America that borders Brazil, Venezuela and Suriname and is part of the in Guyana. So the cuisine, I take what they have Caribbean region — in 1968. He was 21 years old and blend the spices to match what they use on a scholarship to study mechanical engineering. individually,” he continued. “I put it all together and At first, he worked in ultrasonics for Cavitron, then to make it a little spicy, I use a different type of a company that manufactures dental cleaning pepper, which is good for the body, like cayenne. But equipment, which is how he got involved with Dr. it’s a secret. Everything is.”

Martin said Tom Smith, former president of Charles Kelman’s cataract surgery project.

He pursued gynecology for a bit before changing Food Lion, tasted his sauce at a food show in the fields to become a doctor of naturopathy, a form of early 1980s and liked it. He suggested Martin open alternative medicine that uses natural remedies to a restaurant if he wanted to get his sauce on the supermarket’s shelves. help the body heal itself.

At that time, Martin had only been cooking His interest in nutrition eventually transitioned and selling his rotisserie chicken, marinated and to Martin developing his first products — a Caribbean all-purpose sauce and seasoning and a seasoned with Caribbean flavors, out of a pizza Jamaican jerk sauce and seasoning — that would parlor in Statesville, where he also had a medical later become the foundation for many of the recipes practice. He said he got the idea after seeing a rotisserie chicken cooking in a shop window in Paris. at Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe.

TONY MARTIN STARTED ANNTONY’S CARIBBEAN CAFE NEARLY 40 YEARS AGO.

PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

FOOD & DRINK FEATURE

A taste of the Caribbean

Martin initially grew a following for Anntony’s by serving rotisserie chicken and simple sides, but as time went on, the menu evolved and now offers a wide variety of Caribbean cuisine with a Southern twist — think greens, mac and cheese, coleslaw,

A ROTISSERIE CHICKEN DINNER WITH CALLALOO, CALYPSO RICE AND CORNBREAD.

black-eyed peas and cornbread.

General manager Linda Moss does most of the cooking. She and Martin have been working together since the 1980s and she knows all of Martin’s recipes, including for his sauces.

Standout items at Anntony’s include ribs, shrimp, and wings doused in his famous sauces and seasoning; as well as seafood platters, sandwiches and Cuban roast pork.

The most popular order is the rotisserie chicken dinner, which comes with either white or dark meat and two sides, including Callaloo (a staple Caribbean leafy green vegetable dish), calypso rice, black beans or plantains, among other options.

It’s best to wash it all down with “Swank,” the house lemonade made with brown sugar, lemons and limes.

Anntony’s also serves roti (Indian flatbread) and a few curry dishes that are Martin’s favorite, an homage to his late wife who was from India. He also likes the oxtails in brown gravy, a typical Jamaican and African dish, and says the Chinese-inspired noodles with vegetables called “Rasta Pasta” are

PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

popular, too.

“There’s a lot of things that we do that connect to the nationalities in the Caribbean,” Martin said.

“It’s a melting pot.”

“Caribbean has never been brought to this kind of level anywhere,” he continued. “You have a Jamaican restaurant, a Barbadian restaurant, Trinidad or Guyanese, but no one has taken the whole of the Caribbean and combined it into one.

And that’s what I did. I took all those dishes from all the islands and put it in my sauce and spices. So it’s a taste of every Caribbean island.”

Fueled by flavor

The concept of Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe intrigued a handful of potential investors over the years, including the team who launched Bojangles, who were interested in franchising his restaurant.

However, a deal never came to fruition because they were unable to come to a consensus on how to divide ownership, Martin said.

George Shinn, former owner of the Charlotte Hornets, was also interested in Martin’s sauce

KSIMMONS@QCNERVE.COM

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“I went to Barbecue King in South Carolina and bought a rotisserie machine. And the guy said, ‘Why don’t you stick with your medicine or do what you’re doing? Why are you going to get into the food business?’ I said, ‘It’s an invention. I invented this,’” Martin recalled. “This is not going to be a regular restaurant with hamburgers and stuff. This is a concept that nobody else has.”

As the story goes, Martin’s chicken was so popular it was outselling the parlor’s pizza and spaghetti, so in 1984 he opened Anntony’s Caribbean Chicken (named by placing his mother Ann’s name with his own) in a space next door.

He moved to Charlotte two years later to open Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe off East 7th Street in Elizabeth and, around that same time, struck a deal with Food Lion and went full-time into manufacturing his sauces and spices.

“People lined up around the block at my restaurant and then the food would run out midday and everybody would get mad because we had to close up and re-cook everything and it takes two hours to cook the chicken,” he recalled.

According to Martin, actor Liam Neeson ate his chicken while in Charlotte filming the 1994 drama Nell with Jodie Foster, and Whitney Houston came when she was passing through for a concert in Raleigh.

“She stopped by but she didn’t come out of the car. The guys came in and got the chicken and they said she’s in the car. By the time we got out there, they were gone. She was in a limousine,” he said.

Martin capitalized on the restaurant’s soaring popularity by expanding the Anntony’s brand through franchising to include three more restaurants in Charlotte, as well as locations in Lake Norman, Hickory, Asheville, Wrightsville Beach and Lake Wylie.

Kurt Levine took over the Elizabeth location in 2008 as part of a licensing agreement, but within the last year it has changed to Fit Kitchen Meal Prep.

Martin currently runs Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe off West Sugar Creek Road, which is the last remaining location.

business and expanding the restaurant concept, he says. Shinn offered to buy 51% of the company, but Martin turned it down, saying now that he was young and uneasy at the time about not being the majority owner.

At one point, Martin even flirted with the possibility of partnering with Tyson Foods to incorporate his sauces and spices into a new Caribbean chicken product. He said he was in talks with a company in Wilmington who was working out the logistics necessary to ramp up production for Tyson, but it took too long and Tyson’s interest fizzled out.

“There were a lot of opportunities, but I was doing it by myself. I didn’t have a team of people doing a lot,” Martin said. “And I was computer illiterate and couldn’t really keep up with the times and how to get it marketed.”

A couple from Cameroon, a country in westcentral Africa, plan to take over Anntony’s Caribbean Cafe on West Sugar Creek Road when Martin retires at the end of August. They’ll keep the restaurant’s name, concept and recipes the same while adding in a few of their own.

Now he’s looking for someone to purchase the rights to franchise the restaurant and take over his line of sauces and spices — someone who’s willing to expand the company in the way he alway hoped to do himself.

Martin said he would like to remain the face of Anntony’s, similar to how one of his friends and inspirations, George Couchell, continues to represent Showmars.

In 1982, first-generation Greek immigrant Couchell opened the first Showmars in Monroe.

Couchell would later visit Anntony’s regularly for ribs and the two became close friends over the years.

For a while, they appeared to be expanding their respective empires at similar paces, but then Showmars took off. Today there are over 30 locations across the Carolinas.

“He took the concept that he started and then farmed it out to his nephew or whoever it is that took it over,” Martin said. “Then they branched off, but I didn’t have that.”

Despite not being able to take Anntony’s to the level of Showmars, Bojangles or Boston Market, Martin said he looks back on his life with no complaints.

Whenever this story eventually does end — the story of how he brought the flavors of the Caribbean to the Carolinas — it will his best one yet.

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LIFESTYLE PUZZLES

LIFESTYLE PUZZLES

TRIVIA TEST

BY FIFI RODRIGUEZ

1. GEOGRAPHY: What is the largest island in Canada?

SUDOKU

BY LINDA THISTLE 2. MOVIES: What is the name of the bully neighbor boy in Disney’s “Toy Story”?

3. LANGUAGE: What is a cruciverbalist?

4. TELEVISION: Which TV sitcom character calls his son-in-law “Meathead”?

5. HISTORY: What is the Danegeld, a tax levied in Anglo-Saxon England from the ninth through 11th centuries?

6. MUSIC: Which pop music band was the first to appear on children’s lunchboxes?

7. U.S. PRESIDENTS: Which president is linked to the teddy bear?

8. ANIMAL KINGDOM: How big are baby kangaroos when they’re born?

9. FAMOUS QUOTES: Which 19thcentury author and philosopher once said, “One must maintain a PLACE A NUMBER IN THE EMPTY BOXES IN SUCH A WAY THAT EACH ROW little bit of summer, even in the ACROSS, EACH COLUMN DOWN AND EACH SMALL 9-BOX SQUARE CONTAINS middle of winter”?

10. AD SLOGANS: Which product’s ALL OF THE NUMBERS ONE TO NINE. advertising slogan is “Obey your ©2022 King Feautres Syndicate, Inc. All rights reserved. thirst”?

CROSSWORD

WWW.CANVASTATTOOS.COM

2019 2020 2021

MAKE JOKES

©2022 King Feautres Syndicate, Inc. All rights reserved.

Pg. 19 JULY 27 - AUGUST 9, 2022 - QCNERVE.COM

(980) 299-2588 3012 N. DAVIDSON STREET VOTED BEST TATTOO SHOP 2918 N. DAVIDSON STREET CHARLOTTE, NC 28205

LIFESTYLE COLUMN

AERIN IT OUT

MY KINDA CHURCH DJ Fannie Mae is onto something with Sainted

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BY AERIN SPRUILL

“This is a church kid’s dream where you can shake yo‘ ass and shake yo‘ feet and shake the devil off!” touted beloved QC innovator, creator, motivator, and percolator DJ Fannie Mae in an Instagram reel with renowned songwriter, recording artist, and entertainer Dennis Reed, Jr. The video ends with a spirited shake and pop of the oh-so-familiar praise tool of the saints — the tambourine. This video and one of Jesus bopping to a remix of “Here I Am to Worship” while donning a white robe, sash, puffer jacket, and a NY cap were my worship experience appetizers for Sainted: A Trap Choir Party, an event held early in July at The Underground.

From the jump, Sainted had me in a chokehold. I remember seeing promo videos and behind-the-scenes footage during the pandemic of what looked like virtual praise-and-worship events served with a side of trap music and seasoned with saints. As it turns out, my eyes and ears weren’t deceiving me, because that’s exactly what Sainted is all about. It’s an immersive party that highlights the church experience through music like trap, old-school funk, soul, and hip-hop with DJ Fannie Mae, a true innovator, at the helm.

You’ve definitely heard of DJ Fannie Mae in convos about Durag Fest, aka the “Met Gala of Durags,” or when she was recently crowned the official DJ of our new sports club, Charlotte FC. But one thing I’ve learned watching the evolution of Fannie from when I first saw her spinning at L4 Lounge (RIP) to now is that it’s impossible to put boundaries on what she’s capable of. She’s not just your average DJ that others aspire to imitate without successful duplication, she is a curator and facilitator of experiences.

And I can promise you, Sainted is like nothing like you’ve ever experienced before.

As a born-and-raised Southern Baptist who is well-versed in the bible study, Sunday school, morning service, fellowship, evening service, and then service at a guest church routine (rinse and repeat) I, too, am a selfproclaimed “church kid.” For a child that didn’t quite feel like she belonged in church, who battled the strict rules, and who was reprimanded regularly for “questioning God,” the music was my silver lining.

The way a single note could bring anyone to their knees. How choir directors played with rhythm. The game of cat and mouse between sopranos, altos and tenors.

The sweat and (literal) tears put into every song. The overwhelming emotion of “the spirit moving” well after a song concluded. All of it created an indescribable feeling that laid the foundation of my relationship with a higher power. Now blend that with my favorite “doing hoodrat things with my friends” bops and ya girl was sold!

The choir stepped on stage dressed in their Trap Sunday Best, from hot pink Bantu knots and intricate floral boot creations to bucket hats and a suit made of tangerine dreams. But let not your eyes distract you, this choir did not come to play. Meek Mill’s “Dreams and Nightmare,” Boosie Badazz’s “Wipe Me Down,” Weezy F Baby’s “Mrs. Officer,” the Proud Family theme song, the Girlfriends theme song, I could go on forever. The doors opened at 8 and they were still going hard at 11:22. But my favorite?! “Knuck If You Buck” by Crime Mob (hoe).

That chorus breakdown almost had me shouting! *One hand in the air, one on the hip, child.* Don’t worry seasoned saints, there were some gospel snacks for you, too. “Encourage Yourself” by Donald Lawrence and the Tri-City Singers was followed by a message that made me put my cup down and go grab not one but two WWJD bracelets and a tatted Obama church fan.

Donald Lawrence himself, who unbeknownst to me reps the 704 and was honored during the event, popped on stage and spoke blessings into the work that Fannie Mae is doing. “I think you’re really onto something. And it’s a way to speak to people in their own language. I mean, those of us that come from another era, we got to realize that they’re some people that are never, ever going to come to church. They don’t want to come if it stifles them … so we have to speak to them where we speak to them.”

Sainted really is a dream come true for this church kid.

All the good “chuch” music, none of the stuffy judgment.

It pushes against the boundaries that once felt so stiff and flips praise and worship on its head, creating something that draws those far away into the bosom of faith.

The only sin you may have to worry about is coveting thy fly neighbor DJ Fannie Mae. Can I get an, “Amen?!”

Church hats off to you, Sainted.

INFO@QCNERVE.COM

LIFESTYLE

JUL. 27 - AUG. 2

HOROSCOPE

BORN THIS WEEK: You have a keen, insightful

AUGUST 3 - 9

2022 KING FEATURES SYND., INC.

BORN THIS WEEK: You have a keen, insightful

intellect and enjoy debating your views with others who disagree with you. You also love to solve puzzles ARIES (March 21 to April 19) You face the — the more challenging, the better. possibility of raising your relationship to another LIBRA (September 23 to October 22) What appears level. However, your partner might demand that to be an unfair situation might simply be the result you make promises you’re not sure you’re ready for. of a misunderstanding. If you feel something is out of balance, correct it.

TAURUS (April 20 to May 20) As changes continue, expect things to get a little more hectic at your SCORPIO (October 23 to November 21) A stalled workplace. An unexpected travel opportunity could relationship won’t budge until you make the first open new career prospects. move. Your partner offers a surprising explanation about what got it mired down in the first place.

GEMINI (May 21 to June 20) Confront the person who caused your hurt feelings and demand a full SAGITTARIUS (November 22 to December 21) explanation for their actions. You’ll not only recover A coworker shares some startling news, but before your self-esteem, but you’ll also gain the respect of you can use it to your advantage, make sure it’s true. others.

The weekend favors family matters.

intellect and enjoy debating your views with others who disagree with you. You also love to solve puzzles ARIES (March 21 to April 19) You face the — the more challenging, the better. possibility of raising your relationship to another LIBRA (September 23 to October 22) What appears level. However, your partner might demand that to be an unfair situation might simply be the result you make promises you’re not sure you’re ready for. of a misunderstanding. If you feel something is out of balance, correct it.

TAURUS (April 20 to May 20) As changes continue, expect things to get a little more hectic at your SCORPIO (October 23 to November 21) A stalled workplace. An unexpected travel opportunity could relationship won’t budge until you make the first open new career prospects. move. Your partner offers a surprising explanation about what got it mired down in the first place.

GEMINI (May 21 to June 20) Confront the person who caused your hurt feelings and demand a full SAGITTARIUS (November 22 to December 21) explanation for their actions. You’ll not only recover A coworker shares some startling news, but before your self-esteem, but you’ll also gain the respect of you can use it to your advantage, make sure it’s true. others.

The weekend favors family matters.

CANCER (June 21 to July 22) That personal CAPRICORN (December 22 to January 19) Your problem in the workplace is compounded by usual conservative approach to family situations someone’s biased interference. Stand your ground, might not work at this time. Keep an open mind and you’ll soon find allies gathering around you. about developments, and you might be pleasantly surprised.

LEO (July 23 to August 22) You don’t accept disapproval easily. But instead of hiding out in your AQUARIUS (January 20 to February 18) Plans den to lick your wounded pride, turn the criticism might have to be put on hold because of a family into a valuable lesson for future use. member’s problems. Don’t hesitate to get involved.

Your help could make all the difference.

VIRGO (August 23 to September 22) That former friend you thought you’d cut out of your life is still PISCES (February 19 to March 20) Relationships affecting other relationships. Counter their lies with in the home and in the workplace need your careful the truth. Your friends are ready to listen. attention during this period. Be careful not to allow misunderstandings to create problems.

CANCER

(June 21 to July 22) That personal CAPRICORN (December 22 to January 19) Your problem in the workplace is compounded by usual conservative approach to family situations someone’s biased interference. Stand your ground, might not work at this time. Keep an open mind and you’ll soon find allies gathering around you. about developments, and you might be pleasantly surprised.

LEO (July 23 to August 22) You don’t accept disapproval easily. But instead of hiding out in your AQUARIUS (January 20 to February 18) Plans den to lick your wounded pride, turn the criticism might have to be put on hold because of a family into a valuable lesson for future use. member’s problems. Don’t hesitate to get involved.

Your help could make all the difference.

VIRGO (August 23 to September 22) That former friend you thought you’d cut out of your life is still PISCES (February 19 to March 20) Relationships affecting other relationships. Counter their lies with in the home and in the workplace need your careful the truth. Your friends are ready to listen. attention during this period. Be careful not to allow misunderstandings to create problems.

PUZZLE ANSWERS

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1. Baffin Island.

2. Sid. 3. Someone who designs or enjoys solving crossword puzzles.

4. Archie Bunker, “All in the Family.”

5. The tax receipts were used

Trivia Answers

to buy off Viking invaders and provide for defense.

6. The Beatles.

7. Theodore Roosevelt. It was invented in his honor after he refused to kill a bear on a hunting trip.

8. About 1 inch.

9. Henry David Thoreau.

10. Sprite.

LIFESTYLE COLUMN

SAVAGE LOVE THE BOYFRIEND EXPERIENCE At the end of the road

BY DAN SAVAGE

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A friend hooked me up with a much younger guy for weed. Let’s call him “Pretty Boy.” He knew something about me — Pretty Boy had been to a party at my house — and I knew something about him: He’s a burner, like our mutual. Consent is supposed to be a core burner value and before we hook up, Pretty Boy asks if he can bring his paddles. So, we had a talk and I tell him I’m open to a little pain, but I’m mostly meh about it. (Except love bites. I love me some love bites.) Long story short: Pretty Boy thinks he’s a great fuck ‘cause he’s got a great big one and can pound long and hard. My pussy ain’t been touched in almost three years but so far as I know “OUCH” is the universal safe word! Maybe I should’ve picked a better one because I had to say it so many times! I figured it was heat of the moment stuff, so I wasn’t mad,

and agreed to hook up again. Much more OUCH, but on both sides this time. (Love bites!) Next day I’m figuring out how to manage this. I find a thing called an Ohnut and I tell Pretty Boy I’m willing to plunk down the money. Whatever it takes to make his PIV pounding less OUCH. And then we have this conversation: Sore Lady: “So, surely this has happened before, yes?”

Pretty Boy: “Of course it has. LOL.” Now I’m mad. This motherfucker knew! He did it on purpose! I ask him point blank if he got off on it and he won’t answer, which means he did. Now I want to set him on fire. But here’s the thing: Pretty Boy is the finest thing I’ve ever had the pleasure of putting my hands on in my entire life. I warned him that I have a history of channeling my rage

into intricate revenge plots, most too crazy to carry out. I did rat him out to the dude who hooked us up. As for Pretty Boy, I could tell him to sit down, shut up, and hear my truth, but I already delivered that message. (See: OUCH.) I should probably slam the door and lock it, but he is the finest thing! And I’ve never had a hookup that wasn’t a little bit sketchy. But this is too much, right? RIGHT? BOYS ARE SUPPOSED TO ASK RIGHT, DAN?

P.S. I didn’t even cum either time!

So, Pretty Boy doesn’t care if you come or not, he ignores your feedback during sex, and he engages in rough sex knowing it’s sometimes painful — in a bad way — for his sex partners.

Fuck that guy.

By which I mean, of course, don’t fuck that guy.

But you’re obviously tempted to fuck that guy again, BASTARD, as you make clear in your letter. (A letter I spent an hour editing for, um, clarity.) You wanna fuck Pretty Boy again because he’s the “finest thing” you’ve ever gotten to touch. Pretty Boy is so hot, BASTARD, that you’re tempted to fuck him despite wanting to set him on fire — in a bad way — after you spoke to him about the sex being painful.

Look, BASTARD, having a hot FWB is great, but having a hot FWB — or boyfriend or girlfriend or enbyfriend — who’s a shitty, selfish, inconsiderate lover is a lot like owning a house with an amazing view that happens to be right next door to a trash incinerator. Sooner or later

you get used to the view and start taking it for granted, BASTARD, and the only thing you really notice after that is the stench.

Still, if you’re inclined to extend Pretty Boy the benefit of the doubt, BASTARD, it wouldn’t be hard to whip one up. He’s young! It’s entirely possible all the women he’s fucked up to this point in his short life liked his style, i.e., long and hard pounding! It’s also possible the women he’s fucked hated his style and, like you, hoped Pretty Boy would hear “OUCH,” stop, solicit their feedback, and correct course. Seeing that’s not something he’s either able or inclined to do, you’re gonna have to use your words and the actual leverage you have over him — your pussy, not your mutuals — to get him to fuck you without physically hurting you.

If he wants back in your pussy, tell him he has do it/things/you differently. More foreplay, going slower, using lube, not going all the way in (with or without an Ohnut) — whatever he needs to do to make sex more comfortable and pleasurable for you, that needs to be a clearly-stated (by you!) and enforced (ditto!) condition of him getting anywhere near your pussy ever again.

P.S. What happened to the paddles?

This is a preview of this week’s Savage Love. The full version is now exclusively available on Dan’s website Savage.Love; send questions to questions@savagelove.net; listen to Dan on the Savage Lovecast; follow Dan on Twitter @FakeDanSavage.

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