2016_Issue 27 Creative Loafing Charlotte by Creative Loafing Charlotte

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 VOL. 30, NO. 27

1 | DATE - DATE, 2015 | CLCLT.COM

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 VOL. 30, NO. 27

1 | DATE - DATE, 2015 | CLCLT.COM

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Creative Loafing © is published by CL, LLC 1000 NC Music Factory Blvd., Suite C-2, Charlotte, NC 28206. Periodicals Postage Paid at Charlotte, NC. Creative Loafing welcomes submissions of all kinds. Efforts will be made to return those with a self-addressed stamped envelope; however Creative Loafing assumes no responsibility for unsolicited submissions. Creative Loafing is published every Wednesday by Womack Newspapers, Inc. No portion may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher. First copy is free, all additional copies are $1. Copyright 2015 Womack Newspapers, Inc. CREATIVE LOAFING IS PRINTED ON A 90% RECYCLED STOCK. IT MAY BE RECYCLED FURTHER; PLEASE DO YOUR PART.

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Bob Log III performs at Snug Harbor on Aug. 30.

COVER STORY THE MAN BEHIND THE MURALS: Will Puckett bids farewell to the Queen City.

BY RYAN PITKIN THIS WEEK’S COVER, FEATURING PHOTOS OF WILL PUCKETT SHOT BY RYAN PITKIN AND PARTS OF PUCKETT’S MURAL, WAS DESIGNED BY DANA VINDIGNI.

NEWS&VIEWS

FOOD

13 THANK ME LATER 14 THE BLOTTER 15 NEWS OF THE WEIRD

DINNER WITH THE DUMPLING LADY: The

dynamo behind the dumplings. BY ALISON LEININGER

ARTS&ENT FINDING ONES INNER ARTIST: There’s nothing fishy about Ciel Gallery’s Clambakes.

BY PAGE LEGGETT 24 FILM REVIEWS

MUSIC

CHATHAM COUNTY LINE CHARTS A CHANGING COURSE: Turning inward with Autumn.

BY PAT MORAN 32 SOUNDBOARD

ODDS&ENDS

20 TOP 10 THINGS TO DO 34 MARKETPLACE 34 NIGHTLIFE 35 CROSSWORD 36 SAVAGE LOVE 38 HOROSCOPE

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NEWS

COVERSTORY

Will Puckett bids farewell to the Queen City BY RYAN PITKIN

OU COULD SAY Will Puckett and his family had come full circle on their experience living in Charlotte’s NoDa neighborhood on a recent Monday evening. His sister, Bobbie Puckett, was hanging out with his wife, Lauren, and two daughters, 3 and 5 years old, while they ate from a Domino’s box on the floor. Will poured another Premium Roast Coffee Stout from a NoDa Brewery growler, exhausted from the day’s work, which included finishing a piece of art for his mother-in-law while packing all of his belongings and getting them ready for transport overseas. The next day, he and his family would move to Scotland after spending 10 years in NoDa. The communal-style dinner was due mostly to the fact that all of the furniture had been packed already, but the scene was reminiscent of their arrival to Charlotte’s arts district a decade ago, when Will, Lauren and Bobbie lived together in an old, oneroom church on Yadkin Avenue, unsure of the future and completely unaware of the mark they’d leave on the ever-changing neighborhood. The art project still laid unfinished on the driveway and boxes full of life’s junk drawer items were strewn about the kitchen when Will sat down to oblige CL on our lastminute interview request. He welcomed the break; a chance to sit back, drink a couple beers and talk about his legacy in NoDa, how his view of art has changed in recent years and why he decided to leave Charlotte for 10 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

Edinburgh, Scotland. If you’ve driven around NoDa at any time since 2010, you’ve almost certainly seen Will’s work. The nearly 1,200-squarefoot mural on the north-facing wall of JackBeagle’s is the most recognizable of his public works, and the one that launched him into a full-time career in painting, but it’s just a fraction of the approximately 40,000 square feet of space he’s covered in the Charlotte area. In the NoDa/Villa Heights area alone, he’s done the JackBeagle’s mural, the entire atrium floor at NoDa at 28th Street, the murals on each side of North Davidson Street under the Matheson Bridge, an Obama mural next to Charlotte Fire Department No. 7, the mural above the Neighborhood Theatre marquee, the front entrance of JackBeagle’s, a painting of Ms. PacMan above the entrance at Abari Game Bar, a mural at the Johnston YMCA playground and multiple works at Cordelia Park. Just down North Davidson Street at 15th Street, he’s adorned a large wall at Area 15 with a mural depicting some of the goings-on within. In the countless hours he’s spent alone with his work on Charlotte’s streets, he’s made some friends, if that’s what you call them. “It gets very strange,” Will says. “I had guys threaten to fight me. I’ve had plenty of people buy me beer, which is awesome. People tell me how awful things are and how wonderful things are. I’ve been offered a few weird sexual exploits; women offering to take me home. I’ll take a growler of beer but, no thank you, ma’am. I appreciate the offer.”

WILL HAS BEEN drawing and painting

all his life. He grew up attending CharlotteMecklenburg Schools; J.H. Gunn Elementary School, Northeast Middle School (Northeast Junior High School at the time) and Independence High School. He married Lauren 14 years ago — they celebrated their anniversary on arrival in Scotland, three days after we spoke — and moved to NoDa in 2005. Will has worked his share of seemingly random jobs; from a model who’s walked runways in Paris and New York to a farmhand. He had always cultivated his love for art, however, and hoped to do it professionally someday. As he became known around NoDa for the odd art job here and there, that possibility began to present itself in a more realistic fashion. Only a few weeks after moving into the neighborhood, the owners of NoDa at 28th brought him in to paint the floors of the indoor atrium that connects the businesses inside. The mural depicts a range of things from jazz musicians to hair stylists in action, and although it’s now heavily damaged, it

Will and Lauren Puckett, immortalized in Will’s mural on the side of JackBeagle’s.

RYAN PITKIN

Visit clclt.com for a slideshow of Will and Lauren Puckett’s public works. has outlived most of the businesses in the location — even Amelie’s was then named Marguerite’s French Bakery. “Up until that time I’d just paint anything that I could do that would give me some sort of practice; a surfer going down stairs, kids’ bedrooms. That was the first real job I had,” Will says. In 2008, he began talks with incoming ownership at the not-yet-opened JackBeagle’s restaurant about doing something with the huge wall space facing the since-closed Salvador Deli. He did the job for free, but it paid off in the end — even before that. Halfway through his work, the folks at Salvador Deli got a call from Mint Museum inquiring about the artist across the alley, and Will was soon doing a paid job for them. Multiple other potential clients asked about him, as well, and by the time he was done with the JackBeagle’s wall, Will was ready to quit his job and take on painting full-time. Whatever’s come since then, the JackBeagle’s wall holds a special place in his heart. “For me it was a great catalyst for the neighborhood to stake a claim in the public arts, to want to bring people to show that they were in this mural or that this thing was happening. Outside of being an interesting piece, hopefully, I got a lot of community support from it, and that was the most beneficial thing about it,” Will says. “It’s meant to be a time capsule for what was going on: that block party scene that was happening there at the time — to show construction, to show people coming together, to show celebration.” A lot has changed in the neighborhood since then. As galleries closed, the art moved into public spaces; to the streets and to the bars and boutiques that were replacing

the galleries. For a guy who had always bristled at the thought of an art gallery, the transition worked well. “There’s been a very small, intimate organicism that goes with it, and here within the neighborhood it has, to me, felt more approachable,” Will says. “Galleries had not always been my favorite spaces, especially as a young artist. They were very intimidating as a kid who grew up in the sticks — going to the white wall spaces with fancy people was intimidating. Even approaching them as an artist wanting to showcase there was troublesome for me. During this period of transition in the neighborhood, there has been some loss of those spaces, but there’s an embracing of the arts here in the community.” As the neighborhood changed, however, so did Will. About four years ago, as he put the finishing touches on his MeckDec mural under the Matheson Bridge, he began to feel a longing for something new. He decided to return to school, attending UNC Charlotte to finally finish the undergraduate studies he began in 1997. He could never have known just how new of a road that would send him down.

WHILE PURSUING AN art history degree at UNC Charlotte, Will became interested in contemporary art theory and the works of theorists like Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault. The studies changed his worldview, he says, and made him rethink his work as an artist. “I found that as a younger artist I was very caught up in a romantic-era idealism of the artist as bohemian — that I needed to struggle and paint and be shirtless and drink all the time,” Will says. “All the sudden I was given this new insight into this really remarkable discourse about why we think

the way we do and why people are practicing the way that they are.” He immersed himself in the work of structural anthropologist Claude LeviStrauss, specifically his work on pastiche — “repeating what your father tells you,” as Will puts it — and bricolage — “reaching out into other tribes to make new and push forward.” He began making abstract art based on citation analysis of other works, mapping the citations and influences of things through time and place. “I’ve found a discourse there that I really love, particularly this idea of appropriated practices; how we take from the past and remake and redo,” Will says. “In taking what I read and using citation analysis, I take a single artifact or article and work backwards from all the people that they have cited and drawing maps through geography and time to create these shapes that I can then fold on themselves and create abstractions, so that I can project and go backwards where these ideas have come from, but then do abstract paintings too. It’s not so much a data visualization as much as it is using research as an art practice.” It’s heady stuff, to be sure, but it’s where Will has found happiness with his work, so much so that he’ll now be pursuing an MA in Contemporary Art Theory and a PhD in Philosophy studying the same types of things at University of Edinburgh (pronounced Edenburrah, you damn tourist). “My perspective of the art I was trying to make was really blue collar, which I’m not putting down at all, I’m actually very fond of it. I just work with paint. I do big paintings, but the composition was much like an architectural project; you meet with your client, you talk about what you want and what you don’t want. Then you sort of develop some things and reorganize,” he

says. “It was very much a working man’s art, which I have been very lucky to be able to do, but in gaining new knowledge and new exposure, it has just changed some stuff.” Will now wants to curate while continuing to create his own art and study and write about theory.

AS FOR LAUREN, who has built a name

for herself locally as an artist in her own right, she’s supportive of Will’s plan, but not quite as ready to leave the public art projects behind. Lauren was recently hired for some work at the new Mercury NoDa apartments, for which she contributed three stained-glass faces looking out on 36th Street and a large stained-glass water tower at the entrance of the parking garage. She enjoyed the work so much that she’s already applied to do more in the States and will fly back at a moment’s notice if given the opportunity for another one. “That was my only real public art project, so I really got the itch to want to build these big stained-glass pieces now,” Lauren says. “I’m still technically a resident of the U.S. I can fly in and design and come back.” She’s ready for a new life in Scotland, however, and said that she and Will specifically picked the neighborhood they’ll be living in because it reminded them of NoDa in the early days. Both will be doing all they can to replicate the feeling of community they’ve experienced here over the past decade. Lauren has also become a successful real estate agent in recent years (she’s also a pilot, the woman honestly deserves her own separate article) and looks forward to delving SEE

MURAL P. 12 u

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 11

NEWS

COVERSTORY

NAVEL GAZING Will Puckett on the works of Will Puckett Squid mural — North Davidson and 28th Streets (no longer there) “This one I did way early and I totally misspelled something. It was a bunch of squids and I misspelled invertebrates. That was terrible, just terrible. I corrected it but the mural itself did not stay up very long. “

RYAN PITKIN

Will and Lauren will rent out their NoDa home while they’re gone, and the lucky renters will enjoy plenty of the Pucketts’ original art inside and outside the home, like this train in the front yard. MURAL FROM P.11 t

into that market once they get settled in Scotland. “We were really interested in investing in a community and bringing the art back,” she says. “We were thinking if we’re going to invest in real estate, because I understand real estate, let’s really create this community around us and let’s feed into it and make it something unique.” Although she loves the community they’ve been a part of in NoDa and Charlotte, Lauren sometimes sounds as if the only qualms she has with the big move is that it didn’t come sooner. “Moving overseas for an extended period of time in another country and culture was always on our radar,” she says. “We really always thought we would do it in a more bohemian sense where we would just go off and wander, but this opportunity has a lot more structure and is based on education. I think it works out better. Now it’s just so exciting because we have a drive and goals and there’s a motivating factor.” And the little ones? They’re just as excited as mom and dad to arrive in a new, magical land. “Here we are moving to Edinburgh and my daughters think I’m going to Hogwarts. Hell, I kind of feel like I’m going to Hogwarts,” Will says. Might we suggest House Ravenclaw? RPITKIN@CLCLT.COM 12 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

Chair painting, 505 S. Cedar St. “That one is totally simple. Nobody would know I did it. It’s completely against any sort of stylistic tendencies in anything I’ve ever done — just a big plain painting. It’s a big painting of a chair on the wall across from the Draught patio. It’s nothing spectacular, it just looks like somebody put a stencil up and sprayed it but it was a hand-painted painting I did and it is what it is.” JackBeagle’s mural, 3213 N. Davidson St. “Every single person in that mural is a real person who lives or lived here. I see people getting their picture taken in front of it a lot. Nobody recognizes me, which is the beauty of being an artist, you’re removed from it. I get to see people and chat them up. ‘Oh man, you’re getting your picture taken with this painting? That’s awesome.’ Nobody knows me, it’s great.” Jacques Derrida portrait, Chop Shop (no longer there) “Jacques Derrida, a deconstructivist philosopher, I painted a picture of him and he’s drinking a PBR, but it’s a very cutish thing. I did a similar one of Steve Zissou near Kitty Hawk. Little things like that always make me laugh; the juncture between lowbrow PBR and high-brow philosophy. Those projects have always been really neat for me to be a part of. Obama mural, 32054 N. Davidson St. “I was always very proud of the Obama painting right across the street from JackBeagle’s. I was hired by the DNC for that. That was big. [puts two thumbs up with a huge smile] I don’t know how this translates in your reporting but this is two big thumbs up. That was really neat.”

VIEWS

THANK ME LATER

NOT HERE TO PAY YOUR APP FEE A black girl on Gentrification Street job, hustling freelance articles and my IT TOOK ME precisely one hour on a grandfather graciously sliding me a $50 Saturday afternoon to begin then quickly every time I see him, I don’t feel easy about conclude my apartment hunting. The day footing the bill at rates I worked hard to began beautifully. I dropped by at work and escape during my time in New York City. made my way to the mecca, also known as Plaza Midwood, where the hipsters thrive And on that matter, I am further and the walkable tree-lined streets welcome concerned about the growing displacement you like a scene out of Pleasantville. affecting brown communities being There was not a drop of naivete in my taken over in the name of development blood. I knew staying in the vicinity would and progress, exasperating the sprawl of require shelling out quite a bit of cash for the disenfranchised neighbors relegated to zip code, but I’d save money on Uber rides, I Charlotte’s outskirts where access to resolved. Plus, my commute would be cut in transportation and healthy food sources are half and I’d feel once again like I belonged largely inaccessible in a city that’s been to an evolving city, where sidewalks forced to cap its minimum wage. reign (not unlike my notoriously Taking that apartment would un-sidewalked community in mean that I’m part of the University City. Who the hell problem. And yet, I felt left plans these things anyway?). without much choice. I’d My attitude was suffer the consequences optimistic and buoyant. of finding affordability in I could do another year, Charlotte proper, where I reasoned, paying some 34,000 units have gone faceless developer a missing for those living monthly fee to live in his at or below 50 percent of luxury accommodations the median area income; or with all the necessary SHERRELL I would adopt the oxymoron complements a twentyDORSEY of black gentrifier, attributing something lifestyle requires: my presence as a protest in the face instant, single friends (mostly of displacement faced by the immigrant white with the one racially-ambiguous brown girl on the leasing brochure) to enjoy and brown communities that once occupied the communal pool and fire pit; a coffee bar Plaza Midwood, East Charlotte, NoDa, for those late nights staying up to mastermind Brightwalk and West Morehead before it a financial strategy that includes rent, 401k, all became colonized by the amenities I bi-weekly nail appointments, hot yoga, unabashedly enjoy. CrossFit, pressed juices and hypothetical Like with all of my tough choices in need children. And, of course, a sense of privilege of quick, adult-esque answers in my life, I in a community painstakingly bereft of folks left the high-strung leasing agent and called in my melanin grouping to share residence. my mother. I’d be happy. Poor. But happy, nonetheless. I am convinced God invented mothers And then, the leasing agent happened. for reasons beyond rearing humans into Overly enthusiastic about convincing me decency. My mom was made with take-noto toss my money at LED vanity lights, prisoners, never-back-down, super juice and granite countertops and the makings of an blended with the unapologetic ability to tell adulthood packed into 500 square feet of me to cut the crying and commit to being a commitment deferred, she led me on a tour grown up. of gentrification in action. It was time for a house, to be settled, She ran the numbers, and I subconsciously and to stake my claim in the community I ran out of excuses as to why I needed to so passionately want to see grow, inclusively, dedicate the majority of my paycheck to and with those most vulnerable building serve my lofty desire for status over a zerotheir lives within the communities they’ve balance student loan account: the app fee of lived in for generations. $149; the admin fee of $250; the security I’ll be purchasing Uptown on the line deposit of $250; and lastly, a monthly price where development has met disinvestment. tag of $1,200 to rent self-respect — not If I don’t do it now, I’ll be completely priced including valet trash (these jerks don’t pick out. And I refuse to pay an app fee for a seat up the recycling), the internet, or the $25 monthly parking fee. at the table. Even in holding down a full-time BACKTALK@CLCLT.COM CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 13

NEWS

BLOTTER

BY RYAN PITKIN

LAUNDERED GOODS A thief was

probably hoping for a tablet or some other valuable goods when they broke into a car and stole a suitcase near the airport last week. A 46-year-old man reported that someone had used a pry tool to break into his rental vehicle and make off with a suitcase. The man told police that there was nothing in the suitcase except the dirty clothes that he wore during a recent three-week trip.

NAILED IT It’s usual for people to shoplift by shoving things down their pants, but it’s important that one is careful about what they’re putting down there. Last week at a Home Depot in east Charlotte, a customer reported seeing someone get gutsy with their stolen goods. The customer told employees that she saw a man put a nail gun down the front of his pants and walk out of the store, hopefully very slow. LOCKED OUT A 37-year-old woman

was late into work last week after a vandal obstructed her access to her car. The woman filed a police report stating that some

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unknown suspect had glued the doors of her car shut overnight.

VACANCY A man didn’t take the news well

at Carolinas Medical Center – Main last week when hospital staff told him he wouldn’t be going home anytime soon. According to the police report, the 59-year-old man was told he would not be discharged “due to his mental state,” but they didn’t do much to enforce this decision, as the man simply got up and left against all suggestions that he not do so.

HAMMER TIME Another man at Novant

Health Presbyterian Medical Center in Elizabeth can take the above-mentioned man’s spot after an episode he carried out at the hospital last week. According to the police report, a man entered the emergency room with a hammer and began threatening to hit a Presbyterian Police officer. The police subdued the man, but not before he bit one of the officers.

POISON CONTROL It’s well known in

the community of toxic mixers that you just don’t leave your toxic mixture laying around where anyone can get to it. Yet that’s exactly what happened in east Charlotte last week. According to a police report that creates more questions than it answers, someone called 911 when a 20-year-old woman “unintentionally drank a toxic mixture.”

mother went to police last week after her daughter’s bullies made themselves easy to catch. The woman told officers that a group of kids destroyed her daughter’s cellphone. She knew it was them, because the notso-smart children posted videos of them shattering the phone on social media.

THREAT OF THE WEEK A Ballantyne woman found out just how her neighbor feels about her dog last week in no uncertain terms. The woman told police that the neighbor approached her while she was walking her service dog and yelled, “Your damn dog barks all the time. I will kill your fucking stank-ass and your stank-ass dog.”

Blotter items are chosen from the files of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department. All suspects are innocent until proven guilty.

NEWS

NEWS OF THE WEIRD

The Salvation Army is hosting an

AUCTION Every Mon-Fri

BY CHUCK SHEPHERD

LATEST RELIGIOUS MESSAGES India

has supposedly outlawed the “baby-tossing” religious test popular among Hindus and Muslims in rural villages in Maharashtra and Karnataka states, but a July New York Times report suggested that parents were still allowing surrogates to drop their newborn infants from 30 feet up and awaiting the gods’ blessing for a prosperous, healthy life. In all cases, according to the report, the gods come through, and a bedsheet appears below to catch the unharmed baby.

GOVERNMENT IN ACTION More federal civilian employees have “arrest and firearms authority” than the total number of active-duty U.S. Marines, according to a June report by the organization Open The Books, which claims to have tallied line-byline expenditures across the government. Several agencies (including the IRS and EPA) purchase assault weapons and other military-grade equipment (camouflage, night-vision goggles, 30-round magazines) for their agents, and even the Small Business Administration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Department of Education buy their agents guns and ammo. IMMIGRATION San Diego Padres outfielder Melvin Upton Jr. was traded on July 23 to the Toronto Blue Jays — in the middle of a series between the Padres and the Blue Jays in Toronto. Normally, such a player would merely gather his belongings and walk down the hall to the other team’s locker room. However, while Canada treats Blue Jays’ opponents as “visitors,” Blue Jays players, themselves, are Canadian employees, and if not residents must have work permits. Upton had to leave the stadium and drive to Lewiston, New York, which is the closest place he could find to apply to re-enter Canada properly. He made it back by game time. SHREWD TOURISM CAMPAIGNS

(1) Since Bulgaria, on Romania’s southern border, lies close to Romania’s iconic Transylvania region, Bulgarian tourism officials have begun marketing their own vampire tourism industry — stepped up following a 2014 archaeological find of a 4th-century “graveyard” of adolescents with iron stakes through their chests. (2) The new tourism minister of Thailand is threatening to close down the lucrative sex business in Bangkok and Pattaya, even with the country still rallying from a 2014 near-recession. Ms. Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul insisted that visitors are not interested in “such a thing (as sex)” but come for Thailand’s “beautiful” culture.

PAID TO GO AWAY Sports Illustrated

noted in May that some universities are still paying out millions of dollars to failed coaches who had managed to secure big contracts in more optimistic times. Notre Dame’s largest athletic payout in 2014 was the $2.05 million to ex-football coach Charlie Weis — five years after he had been fired. That ended Weis’s Notre Dame contract (which paid him $15 million post-dismissal), but he is still drawing several million dollars from the University of Kansas despite having been let go there, also.

THE CONTINUING CRISIS (1) A year-

long, nationwide investigation by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, reporting in May, found more than 2,400 doctors penalized for sexually abusing their patients — with state medical boards ultimately allowing more than half to continue practicing medicine. Some doctors, a reporter noted, are among “the most prolific sex offenders in the country,” with “hundreds” of victims. (2) District Judge Joseph Boeckmann in Arkansas’s rural Cross County resigned in May after the state Judicial Discipline committee found as many as 4,500 nude or semi-nude photos of young men who had been before Boeckmann in court. Some were naked, being paddled by Boeckmann, who trolled for victims by writing young men notes offering a “community service” option.

REDNECK CHRONICLES (1) Knoxville, Tennessee, firefighters were called to a home in July when a woman tried to barbecue brisket in her bathroom — and, in addition to losing control of the flame, melted her fiberglass bathtub. Firefighters limited the damage — by turning on the shower. (2) One day earlier, in Union, South Carolina, a 33-year-old woman called police to her home, claiming that she had fallen asleep on her couch with her “upper plate” in her mouth, but that when she awoke, it was gone and that she suspects a teeth-napping intruder. HOW TO TELL IF YOU’RE DRUNK The owner of the Howl At The Moon Bar in Gold Coast, Australia, released surveillance video of a July break-in, later inspiring the perpetrator to turn himself in. The man is seen trying to enter the locked bar at 3 a.m., then tossing a beer keg at a glass door three times, finally creating a hole large enough to climb through, acrobatically, and fall to the floor (lit cigarette remaining firmly between his lips). Once inside, he stood at the bar, apparently waiting for someone to take his order. When no one came, he meekly left through the same door. The owner said nothing was taken, and nothing else was damaged.

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CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 15

FOOD

FEATURE

Zhang Qian aka the Dumpling Lady.

ALISON LEININGER

DINNER WITH THE DUMPLING LADY The dynamo behind the dumplings BY ALISON LEININGER

N A LEAFY side street in Plaza Midwood sits a red cube o f a trailer. On the front, a shaded map of the Chinese province of Szechuan is punctuated by a black-and-white yin/ yang symbol. That marks the capital city of Chengdu, where owner Zhang Qian (pronounced zhon chen, last name first), the 16 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

self-proclaimed Dumpling Lady, learned her craft. Inside is a compact kitchen, recently inspected and ready to roll. Here stands the manifestation of a plan to bring authentic Szechuan flavor to the streets of Charlotte. Zhang, 28, and her husband John Nisbet are a study in contrasts. She is small, intense and dynamic, where the Raleigh native is tall, lanky and more laconic. This last could be

due to the 50-hour workweek he puts in as a management consultant before spending his weekends helping the Dumpling Lady become a fast-growing local phenomenon. The two met in Chengdu, where he applied as an English teacher in Zhang’s small school. It took four years and several lengthy separations before Zhang took the leap of moving with her fiancé to the United

States. During the three-month waiting period before her visa allowed her to work, she struggled to contain her energy. “It is really hard for me to sit at home,” she says. “If I have something to do, I don’t eat, I don’t drink, I just want to finish it. I always keep myself busy.” Nisbet concurs, “She has the most incredible work ethic I’ve ever seen.”

Zhang finally began working as a Mandarin teacher, but quickly became restless. Aside from being uncomfortable with American parent-teacher relationships, she says, “I will get bored if I do the same things again and again.” At this time, she found herself battling homesickness in the kitchen of their small brick house, finding comfort in cooking and sharing familiar flavors. Surprisingly, Zhang came late to the kitchen. As part of the first generation under China’s one-child policy, she was doted on, encouraged to study rather than learn to cook and keep house. She laughs heartily in recalling the first time she really cooked, preparing dinner for her future husband and nearly setting the place on fire by spattering hot oil onto the flaming burner. She was 25 years old, the age by which most Chinese girls are expected to marry. Now, about four years later, a dinner invitation from the Dumpling Lady has very different results. The kitchen may still be tiny, but Zhang moves with confidence, adding red pepper flakes and chili paste without measuring. A Super G Mart calendar on the fridge attests to the authenticity of her ingredients. The sounds and smells of garlic and ginger landing in hot oil fill the small space as Zhang moves food rapidly from prep bowl to pan. Less than half an hour later, the dining table boasts a half-dozen dishes, from gingery snow peas to a vinegary chicken salad and a spicy beef dish swimming in chili-tinted oil. Each is scooped into individual bowls of rice in an orgy of savory spiciness. The requisite ingredients for Szechuan cuisine include chili paste, red pepper flakes, ginger, garlic and the aptly named peppercorns that heighten the heat with their unique tingling

Zhang Qian and John Nisbet.

Dumplings from The Dumpling Lady.

ALISON LEININGER

“She has the most incredible work ethic I’ve ever seen,” says Nisbet. sensation. The Dumpling Lady leapt into the spotlight when Nisbet and Zhang began selling handmade dumplings at the Saturday farmers’ markets in Davidson and South End’s Atherton Mill. It may have been the samples of sweet pork belly, the shrimp and swordfish, or the deep red sauce dousing

it all, studded with red pepper flakes and fragrant of sesame and ginger. Shoppers snapped up dumplings by the dozen, and week after week they quickly sold out. When the couple took time off this summer for their belated honeymoon in Jamaica, addicted customers quizzed other vendors to confirm they would return.

ALISON LEININGER

But those Saturday markets were about more than feeding addictions. Once she sold out, Zhang would get busy making connections. Today her dumplings are filled with meats from Mary L Farm, seafood from Lucky Fish and produce from Street Fare Farm. Though local sourcing is partly a marketing strategy, she says the idea hit home “especially after I started going to the farmers’ markets and meeting the other vendors. Part of the reason is to support local agriculture.” She had to curtail sales of meat-filled dumplings due to county Board of Health regulations, but with the premiere of the red Dumpling Lady trailer, Zhang will be expanding her menu. Not only will meat be back on the menu, but it will be joined by ramen and other noodle dishes. The beef noodle dish with bamboo shoots is a staple of her birth city, Neijiang; the burning noodles (which more than live up to their name) hail from the nearby city of Yibin. And yes, there will be ramen, complete with creamy-yolked, soy-sauce tinged eggs. During the week, the Dumpling Lady will

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 17

FOOD

FEATURE g r i l l

m a r k e t

A slice of

aly has come

to Charlooe at Circles Grii in e Fountains.

More grub prepared by Zhang Qian.

THE DUMPLING LADY Facebook: The Dumpling Lady. Instagram: The Dumpling Lady CLT. 980-406-8461. the dumplinglady. com.

park at the NoDa Company Store on Yadkin Avenue, and on Saturdays she’ll be dishing out delicacies at Atherton Market. Nisbet will continue to sell vegan dumplings at Davidson farmers’ market, ensuring the city is well-

8129 Ardrey Kell Road Charlotte, NC 28277 (980) 245-8005 www.circlesgrillmarket.com

ALISON LEININGER

supplied from north to south. Back in the couple’s cozy dining room, conversation turns to Zhang’s favorite American foods. “Buffalo wings,” she says without hesitation, ever the fan of chiliinduced heat. “I’d never had them before, so I asked for the spiciest, and it made tears come out,” she says. “She ate them all,” adds Nisbet. “That’s why she cried; she ate the whole thing.” It seems an apt metaphor for a woman who takes life in big bites. Thankfully, with dumplings, she’s willing to share. BACKTALK@CLCLT.COM

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THURSDAY

CLEAR MOUNTAIN VIEW MUSIC FESTIVAL

THURSDAY

P.S. YOUR CAT IS DEAD

What: Now in its fifth year, this music festival offers a variety of Americana and rock to sooth the soul. Thursday night’s headliner is Big Daddy Love, a stop on the band’s farewell tour of sorts as they prepare for a hiatus. They’re back on Friday along with Hackensaw Boys and Dirty Grass Soul. Saturday closes out with Simplified and Dirty Grass Soul again.

What: Queen City Theatre Company is kicking off it’s 10th season with a dark comedy. This one follows a man who is down on his luck — he’s been robbed twice, his girlfriend cut ties with him and he’s just been sacked. To make matters worse, a burglar breaks into his home and ties him up — all the while lending a listening, flirtatious ear to his troubles and informing him that his cat is dead.

When: Aug. 25-27. Where: 356 London Road, Lawndale, NC. More: $15-$170. clearmountainviewmusicfestival. com.

When: Aug. 25, 7:30 p.m.; Aug. 2627, 8 p.m.; Aug. 28, 7 p.m.; Through Sept. 3. Where: Duke Energy Theater, 345 N. College St. More: $23-$25. blumenthalarts.org.

— JEFF HAHNE

20 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

— ANITA OVERCASH

THINGS TO DO

TOP TEN

The Kominas WEDNESDAY

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

THE 48 HOUR FILM PROJECT COLLECTION

GOODYEAR ARTIST RESIDENCY SHOWCASE

JOSEPH MICHAEL MAHFOUD

What: These films are the byproduct of hardwork and talent from Charlotte-area independent filmmakers. That’s not to forget the ability to work well under preassure, a skill set necessary for participation when given only 48 hours to complete a film based around an assigned genre and featuring certain required additions. There’s a Q&A to follow the screenings.

What: No longer held in the defunct Goodyear space, but still retaining the Goodyear name, this showcase is always fun and interesting to see. This go round will display works from the artistsin-residence for the months of July and Aug., including Micah Cash, Ramya and Chris Thomas. There’s paintings, drawings, photography, sculptures, installations, virtual stories, and film screenings at 7 p.m. and 8 p.m.

What: The winner of several Aboriginal Music Awards as a Mohawk Indian musician, Joseph Michael Mahfoud presents a Herculean task on this night — paying tribute to the music of Stevie Ray Vaughan. An online video of Mahfoud rifling through “The Travis Walk” with ease is impressive. It only lacks a bit of soul, so he gets the benefit of the doubt — there was only one SRV.

When: 6:30 p.m.-9 p.m. Where: Booth Playhouse, 130 North Tryon St. More: $10. 704-372-1000. blumenthalarts.org. — OVERCASH

When: 6 p.m.–9 p.m. Where: Goodyear Arts, 516 N. College St. More: Free admission. — OVERCASH

When: 10:30 p.m. Where: Evening Muse, 3227 N. Davidson St. More: $8-$10. 704-376-3737. eveningmuse.com. — HAHNE

Bob Log III TUESDAY

P.S. Your Cat is Dead THURSDAY

NEWS ARTS FOOD MUSIC ODDS

Joseph Michael Mahfoud SATURDAY

SUNDAY

SATURDAY

TUESDAY

10 YEARS OF TEASE What: It’s been 10 years since Big Mammas House of Burlesque started doing shows and generating a fan following in Charlotte. The lady behind the magic, Deana Pendragon aka Big Mamma, is a dazzling character with a voice to back her show antics. This special burlesque show also celebrates her birthday and as the event’s Facebook post has already revealed: “Someone’s getting covered in cake!!!” When: 9 p.m. Where: Visulite Theatre, 1615 Elizabeth Ave. More: $20. 704-358-9200. visulite. com. — OVERCASH

WEDNESDAY

SHAKESPEARE ON THE ROCKS What: The folks at Warehouse PAC are presenting this outdoor performance of William Shakespeare’s classic comedy, A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The possibilities are endless as local improv entertainers and aerial artists team up to take on the roles of couples in love, envious onlookers and twisted fairies. Live music, too. When: 7 p.m. Where: The Warehouse Performing Arts Center, 9216 Westmoreland Road, Suite A. More: Free, but $5 suggested donation. — OVERCASH

WEDNESDAY

BOB LOG III What: It’s a one-man show that’s earned the reputation as being a guitar dance party like no other. A freaky, circus-like, and somewhat spacey experience — Bob Log III is known for wearing a cannonball suit and a motorcycle helmet. Aside from the outrageous elements, Log III is impressive on the slide guitar. He also sings and plays the drums with his feet. He’ll be joined by Kevin Dowling, Fitness Hour and Human Pippi. When: 10 p.m. Where: Snug Harbor, 1228 Gordon St. More: $8. 704-561-1781. snugrock. com. — OVERCASH

GOD SAVE THE QUEEN CITY RESIDENCY What: The band has been off the radar for quite a few years, but this final night of the God Save The Queen City residency at Snug Harbor is a don’t-miss with the “return of” the Houston Brothers headlining. Also on the bill are the talented pop-rock songwriting of Jason Scavone and the talented jazz of Fat Face Band. There’s also a “special guest” listed, but your guess is as good as ours who that might be. When: 10 p.m. Where: Snug Rock, 1228 Gordon St. More: $2-$10. 704-561-1781. snugrock.com. — HAHNE

THE KOMINAS What: Earlier in the year, this Pakistani-American punk band was kicked out of a Donald Trump Rally. It’s unlikely that Trump would understand the bands’ satire behind lyrics like “Sharia Law in the USA” or “No One’s Gonna Honor Kill My Baby But Me.” The Bostonbased band was featured in the documentary, Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam. With The Foxfires, Lara Americo and more.

When: 9 p.m. Where: The Milestone, 3400 Tuckaseegee Road. More: $5-$7. 704-398-0472. themilestoneclub.com. — OVERCASH

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 21

ARTS

VISUAL ARTS

A work by Ciel Gallery instructor and artist, Caroline Brown.

CAROLINE BROWN

PAGE LEGGETT

Page Leggett’s “Happy.”

FINDING ONES INNER ARTIST

CIEL GALLERY: A FINE ART COLLECTIVE

There’s nothing fishy about Ciel Gallery’s Clambakes

128 East Park Ave. 704-496-9417. cielcharlotte.com. See Brown’s work

at carolinecbrown.com.

BY PAGE LEGGETT

HAVE TAKEN pottery, drawing, watercolor, oil and encaustic classes in my ongoing attempt to find some art form I’m good at. In each case, I was the shittiest person in the class. Years ago, a pottery teacher told me (in a total grasping-at-straws moment) that my hands might be “too small” for pottery. (Word to Donald Trump: Pottery is not the right art form for you.) He eventually used my wheel and my mounds of clay for demonstration purposes and let me keep the pots he made. Humiliating? Sure. Luckily, I’m not proud. But now that I’ve discovered the monthly mixed media “Clambakes” at Ciel Gallery, I don’t need the teacher to start — or finish — my art. Because with mixed media, it’s not possible to mess up. This is wabi-sabi (the Japanese art of accepting the imperfect). When I think I’ve fucked up a canvas beyond repair, instructor Caroline Coolidge Brown, says, “Just glue something down on top of that.” Or “Paint over it!” It is the ultimate, liberating art form. 22 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

A mishap can become something beautiful. You make a mistake? Paint over it! These gessoed canvases are indestructible. Ciel Gallery provides all the materials (brushes, paints, stamps, ink pads, magazine pages, ephemera), wine and snacks. All you have to do is show up. I asked Brown if this was truly an art form anyone can do. I was sort of hoping she’d say, “No way. You, my dear, have real talent.” Instead, she said, “It absolutely is! What I love about mixed media is that the techniques are really simple. It’s all in how you put them together.” Brown calls these masterpieces we make each month “visual journals.” Each class has a theme — maps, water, love, for instance — and the students, usually six to eight of us, create something with that theme in mind. No journal? No problem. (I don’t have one, either.) Brown provides everything you need. She brings all the supplies, but should you decide to take up visual journaling at home, you won’t spend a fortune getting started. “You can use easy, cheap materials,” she said. “We use craft paint, cheap brushes

and magazine images.” Visual journaling, she said, “gives you the space to experiment, to respond to poetry or images and to write down the critical things in your head and then paint or glue over them. I find it really cathartic. And the pages that I start out with those negative thoughts, usually become really playful after I get rid of the nastiness in my head.” She has a page in her journal dedicated to the “Patron Saint of Getting My Shit Together.” Another is themed “Embrace the Suck.” At $33 per class, this is the cheapest therapy you’ll find.

I CANNOT OVEREMPHASIZE how much I’ve sucked at every art form I’ve tried and how good (in my opinion) I am at this. Brown swears that if you can use scissors and scribble, you can be successful in her class. Mistakes don’t count. I think it’s a great lesson that can be applied to life. My teacher agrees. “I hope everyone gets this message,” Brown said. “I tell students that we don’t have mistakes; we have happy accidents. My style of painting tends toward messy layers

anyway, so I consider all those layers to be the rich, composted soil of the painting.” Not everyone loves to make a mess and see a mess (even a controlled one) on a finished canvas. Brown said one retired accountant she taught couldn’t get comfortable with paint bleeding from one page of her journal to the next: “I kept telling her that the pages were just talking to each other.” Visual journaling is a democratic art form. Brown has some students who are experienced painters showing in galleries alongside total beginners. Like me. “Both sets of students are using the same paint and bubble wrap to make patterns,” she said. While literally anyone can create a mixed media work, Brown actually has credentials. She graduated from Duke University with degrees in studio art and art history and worked in art museums (The Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C. and The Pensacola Museum of Art in Florida) “teaching people about other people’s art,” she said. But five years ago, she had what she described as “an epiphany walking up the driveway and looking at my flowerbed of

Another work by Leggett.

colorful zinnias.” “I wanted to paint them,” she said. Her first canvases — and her first solo show — were all dedicated to flower paintings. The tanking economy put a dent in people’s fine art budgets and sent Brown into the classroom as a teacher. “Teaching has been a tremendous gift to me,” she said. “Plus it gets me out of the studio; painting by yourself all the time gets a little lonely.” Her classes are anything but. She brings wine and snacks and has a great mix on her iPod. “I may get in trouble for saying this, but this is my answer to those paint-anddrink classes in which everyone paints the same exact painting. To me, that’s just not creative.” Agreed. Time flies at the clambakes. No one is paying attention to the clock or looking at their phones. There are no distractions. Brown said: “It’s a loose structure of ‘Here’s your prompt, here’s what I want you to try, but then see where it takes you.’ Then I circle back and say: What’s working? Where are you stuck?’” “The blank white canvas can be a scary place,” Brown said. “I think visual journaling

PAGE LEGGETT

is a gateway to creativity in any kind of art.” Not for me, it isn’t. After spending a lifetime trying to find some art form I could do, I’m sticking with this.

YOU, TOO, ARE an artist! Caroline Brown’s monthly “Clambakes” at South End’s Ciel Gallery can turn anyone into an artist. About the name, she said, “With mixed media, you’re throwing everything into a pot.” And you never know what you’re going to get when you dig in. It’s the same as being at a clambake (or making “Frogmore stew”) and then laying it all out on newspaper. Some people get more shrimp; others get more potatoes and corn. There’s a different theme each month. Upcoming dates and themes: • Sept. 15 – Cacaw: Put a bird on it! • Oct. 13 – Body: Head, shoulders, knees and toes • Nov. 10 – Feast: Edible still-lifes • Dec. 15 – Hark: Tinsel and snowflakes

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CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 23

ARTS

FILM

PARAMOUNT

Toby Kebbell and Jack Huston in Ben-Hur.

FAITH NO MORE Christian classic loses its way in new retelling BY MATT BRUNSON

ACK IN 1959, when William Wyler’s mammoth production of Ben-Hur debuted, it was comedian Mort Sahl who quipped his review of the film: “Loved him, hated Hur.” 24 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

Sahl was clearly in the minority — the movie proved to be a box office blockbuster and nabbed a record-setting 11 Academy Awards (including Best Picture and Best Actor for Charlton Heston) — but if the 89-year-old

comic cares to repeat his crack for the 2016 version of Ben-Hur (** out of four), he will likely find he has more company this time around. This new adaptation of Lew Wallace’s 1880 novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the

Christ is by no means a terrible picture, but it’s a terribly mismanaged one, operating in fits and starts under the auspices of director Timur Bekmambetov. Bekmambetov’s last stateside assignment

was Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, and perhaps adding some bloodsucking vampires to wreak havoc alongside the bloodsucking Romans might have been the way to go. As it stands, there’s not much here that’s particularly noteworthy, with the best scenes crammed into the first stretch that illustrates how two mutually adoring brothers, the Jewish Judah Ben-Hur (Jack Huston) and the (adopted) Roman Messala Severus (Toby Kebbell), are eventually transformed into sworn enemies. Along the way, Messala becomes a favorite officer of Pontius Pilate (Pilou Asbæk) while Judah has several run-ins with a soft-spoken carpenter named Jesus (Rodrigo Santoro). Huston and Kebbell are acceptable in the central roles, and their performances might have carried even more weight had this project debuted on the small screen, where it would have been accorded a more comfortable fit. Morgan Freeman appears as Sheik Ilderim (the role for which Hugh Griffith won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar in the ’59 version), and having this secondary character also narrate the picture seems like an odd decision until you remember that Freeman once played God and who else but God should narrate such a Biblical undertaking? As for the Son of God, Santoro’s shuffling, mumbling work as Jesus makes us long for the days when Hollywood epics were only allowed to show Christ from behind and sans dialogue. Still, dramatizations of His crucifixion never fail to stir the soul, and the one featured in this film is no exception. Other set-pieces don’t fare as well. In fact, what’s most shocking about Ben-Hur is how thoroughly it bungles the two most iconic and riveting sequences from ’59: Judah’s torturous stint as a galley slave aboard a Roman ship and, of course, the chariot race between Judah and Messala. The chariot race is hampered by having the other participants sneer like cut-rate villains in an Andrew Garfield-era SpiderMan yarn (“Enjoy this lap, because I will keeeel you in the next one!” bellows a bald baddie at Judah, forgetting to add a maniacal “Muahahaha” at the end), but in the case of both lengthy sequences, the decision to film in extreme close-up was ill-advised, and these murky and incoherent bits are further crippled by obvious CGI (one galley shot hints that Bekmambetov wanted to make Hardcore Ben-Hur) as well as rapid-fire editing that recalls those Ginsu blades in action on late-night infomercials. Because of this, viewers with stomachs sensitive to roller coaster sensations might want to skip the movie altogether — indeed, I can imagine Sahl walking out during either of these segments while muttering, “This BenHur makes me want to Ben-hurl.”

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CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 25

ARTS

HAPPENINGS

COMEDY Bonkerz Comedy Club Adam Murray. Aug. 2627, 8 p.m. 5624 Westpark Drive. 980-288-5653.

Twenty-Two Let the Good Times Roll. Local artists have used their creative talents on skateboards. Through Sept. 4. 1500 Central Ave. 704-334-0122. gallerytwentytwo.com.

The Comedy Zone Charlotte Theo Van. Aug. 25, 8 p.m.; Aug. 26, 7:30 p.m. and 9:45 p.m.; Aug. 27, 7 p.m. Fight Night Competition. Aug. 28, 7 p.m. Clap It Up. Aug. 30. Almost Famous Comedy Show. Aug. 31. 900 N.C. Music Factory Blvd., Suite B3. 980-321-4702. cltcomedyzone. com.

Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture Shaping the Vessel: Cummings + Mascoll + Samuel. The exhibit features 26 wood works by three artists, including Frank E. Cummings III, John Mascoll and Avelino Samuel. Through Jan. 16, 2017. 551 South Tryon St. 704547-3700. ganttcenter.org.

McGlohon Theater Comics at Fault presents Stand up Against MS. A night of comedy and music featuring Comics at Fault, Courtney Puckett, Dave Meyers and more, to help raise money and awareness for the National MS Society. $30. Aug. 27, 7-10 p.m. 345 N. College St. comicsatfault.com/comedy-for-causes.html.

Jerald Melberg Gallery Two to Watch. Through Sept. 10. 625 S. Sharon Amity Road. 704-3653000. jeraldmelberg.com.

FILM Charlotte 48 Hour Film Project 500 local artist gathered for one weekend of shooting film. In 48 hours, they took a genre, a prop and a line of dialogue and turned it into a 7-minute short film. The teams are showing their creations Aug. 26 and vying for a spot at Cannes 2017 Film Festival. $8.21. Aug. 26, 6:30 p.m. Booth Playhouse, 130 N. Tryon St. 704-372-1000. blumenthalarts.org. Hollywood Shoots Itself Film Series Screening The Bad and the Beautiful (1952). Aug. 27. Main Library, 310 N. Tryon St.

VISUAL ARTS Bechtler Museum of Modern Art All That Sparkles: 20th Century Artists’ Jewelry. This exhibit focuses on the art of jewelry, featuring work from Harry Bertoia and Claire Falkenstein, as well as Bechtler Collection artists Alberto Giacometti, Alicia Penalba, Raffael Benazzi, and Niki de Saint Phalle. Through Jan. 8, 2017. The House That Modernism Built. The exhibit presents Bechtler Museum of Modern Arts’ rich mid-20th century art collection alongside furniture, textile and ceramic holdings on loan from other institutions and private collectors. The show will emphasize process, examining how designers and artists tackled projects, and how the innovations in other disciplines from the sciences to the humanities influenced their direction. Through Sept. 11. 420 S. Tryon St. 704-353-9200. bechtler.org. 26 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

Mint Museum Uptown Romare Bearden Gallery. A permanent gallery devoted to the work of Romare Bearden (1911-1988), who was born in Charlotte. Bearden is best known for his groundbreaking use of collage and vibrant portrayals of American life, depicting subjects that range from contemporary urban scenes to nostalgic recollections of the rural South. Here & Now: 80 Years of Photography at the Mint. The first survey exhibition of photography drawn solely from the Mint’s permanent collection. It’s comprised of approximately 100 of the Mint’s most stunning and provocative photographs. Through Sept. 18. 500 S. Tryon St. 704-337-2000. mintmuseum.org. Shain Gallery Abstract Invitational. The Abstract Invitational will feature 10 emerging abstract artists. Through Aug. 31. 2823 Selwyn Ave. 704-334-7744. shaingallery.com.

MORE EVENTS 3rd Annual Walk/Run For Sickle Cell The Run/Walk For Sickle Cell helps us increase awareness and raise much-needed funds for sickle cell services. $25. Aug. 27, 8-11 a.m. Romare Bearden Park, 300 S. Church St. BYO Wine Dinner 4 Corbuzz’s monthly Bring Your Own Wine Dinner, an evening of sharing, wine, stories and new friendships. It’s a simple plan: bring your favorite bottle (or two) and know that everyone else will be doing the same, all with an eye to sharing and good cheer. Corkbuzz will be opening some of their own favorite collectible wines to get the evening started. Chef Allen Evans has created a wine-friendly four-course menu. Reservations required. $75 per person plus tax and gratuity. Aug. 25, 7 p.m. Corkbuzz, 4905 Ashley Park

Lane, Suite J. charlotte.corkbuzz.com. Centennial Beer Release & #instabeerupclt In honor of the National Park Service’s 100th birthday, Blue Blaze Brewing will be releasing a Centennial hopped beer with a portion of proceeds being donated to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy and National Park Foundation. #instabeerupclt will be at the brewery helping to celebrate NPS100. From 4 p.m. to 9 p.m., A Worthy Dog will be serving gourmet, loaded hot dogs, alongside T2C who will be serving Texas and North Carolina styles of barbecue from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. DJ, Smitty will play from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. that evening as well. Aug. 25, 4-10 p.m. Blue Blaze Brewing, 528 S. Turner Ave. blueblazebrewing.com. Charlotte Knights vs. Durham Bulls Aug. 25, 7:05 p.m. BB&T Ballpark, 324 South Mint St. milb.com/index.jsp?sid=t494. Charlotte 49ers Volleyball Join the Charlotte 49ers Volleyball team at this home match. Tickets can be purchased at the box office one hour prior to the game or by calling 704-6874949. $1-$5. Aug. 26, 12 & 7 p.m., Aug. 27, 7 p.m. UNC-Charlotte’s Halton Arena, 9201 University City Blvd. Color Fun Fest 5K & Carnival Wear your whitest running clothes and get ready to be showered with over 10,000 pounds of color as you navigate the 1.8 mile course. Choose between the day or neon night time version, in which all color glows brightly under industrial strength blacklights. Adults, $19; Kids 12 & under get in free. Aug. 27, 6:30-10:30 p.m. Charlotte Motor Speedway, 5555 Concord Parkway South colorfunfest5k.com/charlotte Dark History Walking Tour The RaconTour Dark History Tour is a one-hour storytelling adventure through the dark history of Charlotte. Starts from the southwest corner of Trade Street and Tryon Street (the corner with the clock) and proceeds west, then north, then east back to Tryon over about five blocks. This tour takes about one hour. $5 per person. Aug. 26, 8-9:30 p.m. facebook.com/RaconToursCLT. Extreme Midget Wrestling Described as “the baddest little show on earth.”$15-$18. Aug. 25, 8:30 p.m. Amos’ Southend, 1423 S. Tryon St. 704-377-6874. amossouthend.com. Great Gatsby Gala The award-winning 1920s themed event returns for its 28th year,

benefitting the National MS Society Greater Carolinas Chapter. Dance to the 15piece Russ Wilson Orchestra, enjoy heavy hors d’oeuvres from Charlotte restaurants, open bar wine & beer, a fantastic silent auction and much more. VIPs enjoy exclusive access to the Speakeasy Lounge offering a private pre-event reception, exclusive hors d’oeuvres, signature cocktails from the private bar, and a gift. Black tie or 1920s attire. Regular tickets $75 or two for $120; VIP Speakeasy tickets $125. Aug. 27, 6-11 p.m. Wells Fargo Atrium, 301 S. Tryon St. gatsbygala.org Panther Nation Bar Crawl Ticket price includes free entry into participating venues, exclusive drink specials, and a koozie. Registration will be at Tilt on Trade from 6 p.m.-8 p.m. Participating venues include Tilt on Trade, Roxbury, BlackFinn, SIP, Tin Roof, 204 North, Whisky River. $10-$15. Aug. 25, 6 p.m.-2 a.m. Purchase tickets at www.celebrationsdesigned.com. Silent Disco At Silent Disco, you get to choose which DJs music you like best. Rather than using a traditional speaker system, live music is broadcast and picked up by specially designed wireless headphones worn by the audience. Those without headphones hear no music, giving the effect of a room full of people dancing to silence. Free. Aug. 26, 9 p.m.-2 a.m. Rooftop 210, 210 E. Trade St., Suite 230B. Southern Women’s Show This event is jampacked with jewelry and handbags, make-up tips and tricks, gourmet treats, runway fashion shows, cooking classes, speakers and celebrity guests. $6-$10. Aug. 26-27, 10 a.m.-7 p.m.; Aug. 28, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Charlotte Convention Center, 501 S. College St. 704-339-6000. charlotteconventionctr.com. Walk A Mile in Her Shoes A fun one mile walk and silent auction at the NoDa Brewery. The best part about the walk? All walkers will be wearing high heels. The purpose of this event is to raise awareness about rape and gender violence in the community. All proceeds from the event will be benefiting Safe Alliance. Safe Alliance provides a continuum of critical crisis services to those victimized by domestic violence, sexual assault or child abuse. Men: $25 Ladies: $10. Aug. 27, 9 a.m.12 p.m. Noda Brewery, 2921 North Tryon St. safeallianceevents.org.

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 27

MUSIC

FEATURE

PATRICK SHANAHAN

Chatham County Line performs at McGlohon Theater on Aug. 26.

CHATHAM COUNTY LINE CHARTS A CHANGING COURSE Turning inward with Autumn BY PAT MORAN

F DAVE WILSON had GPS back in 1999, he might not have called his then-newly formed bluegrass string band Chatham County Line. Wilson (guitar/lead vocals), John Teer (mandolin/fiddle/vocals), Chandler Holt (banjo/vocals), and Greg Readling 28 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

(bass/pedal steel/keyboards/vocals) had just transitioned from “a group of guys jamming, to an honest to goodness band,” says Wilson, when they started rehearsing at Holt’s farmhouse out in the country. On the ride from Raleigh, Wilson and Teer would frequently miss the turn and cross the county line.

“We’d see the big ‘Chatham County Line’ road sign and realize we’d gone too far. The third time it happened, we looked at each other, and we knew we had our band name.” Ever since, Chatham County Line has never shied from going outside the lines. Ostensibly a traditional bluegrass combo with all-acoustic instruments, the foursome

has tethered the upbeat tempos and rapid-fire instrumental runs of their chosen genre to compassionate, conflicted narratives about the cares, concerns — and transcendent joys — of adulthood. The band’s approach is “kind of period,” Wilson says. “When we record and perform live, nothing is plugged in. We play the old time instruments. But we

CHATHAM COUNTY LINE $19.50 and up. Aug. 26, 8 p.m. McGlohon Theater, 345 N. College St. 704-372-1000. blumenthalarts.org.

look at things from a modern perspective.” The band’s latest — and seventh — studio release Autumn continues this trend. Though the album was recorded in two sessions at Fidelitorium Recordings in Kernersville in the fall of 2014 and 2015, it also draws its name from the autumnal, reflective feel to the set’s homespun yet intricate original tunes, Wilson says. He believes the songs’ various themes point to the time of year when thoughts turn inward, and he maintains that after 17 years together, the band continues change with the seasons — they’re still growing up. “I’m speaking of us as individuals,” he says. “When you play music for a living, you seem to think you’ll be a kid forever. (But now), people are having kids. Greg has a six-year-old starting school. Chandler has a two-year-old who’s always trying to play his banjo.” “The truth is you always have stuff to learn, and you can always grow and get better or smarter or more responsible,” Wilson says. “It’s become a great adventure to do that with these three other guys.” Wilson’s musical adventure began when he was growing up in Charlotte. His mother Dede Wilson, an esteemed poet whose fourth book, Eliza: The New Orleans Years has been produced as a one-woman show at venues including the defunct Carolina Actors Studio Theatre, “used to write silly songs, that she would sing to me in the cradle,” Wilson says. He recalls his father taking him a few years later, “to see Chet Atkins play at Spirit Square. I was just blown away by what that man could do on a guitar.” In 1996 Wilson was playing guitar with Teer in Raleigh-based Americana band Stillhouse when the pair met up with Holt and Readling. The foursome ditched electric guitars and struck out in an acoustic direction due to “youthful guidance from happenstance,” Wilson remembers. “We went to a Del McCoury show in Durham and saw the way they performed around the single mic with traditional instruments. Everything just clicked into place at that moment.” Seventeen years later, elements are still falling into place for the four band mates. As on Chatham County Line’s previous albums Wildwood and Tightrope, Wilson produced the

Autumn sessions, recording them piecemeal. “We did a couple of three day sessions that we shoehorned in when we weren’t playing on the road.” “We’ve always looked at this band as an offshoot to our day-to-day lives,” Wilson explains. “We enjoy that we have this great outlet for our musical exploits, but at the same time, no one is missing his kid’s second birthday party.” This grounding in everyday life informs Autumn’s 11 ruminative songs, nine of which were written or co-written by Wilson. Though the band can tear into a rollicking ramble like the instrumental “Bull City Strut”, “Jackie Boy”, Wilson’s plangent lament for a deceased — and beloved — dog, best characterizes the album. Wilson noticed that many of my friends’ pets were ageing and dying, and says that such a bittersweet moment can also be a lesson — life’s notice that we have to move on. He believes there’s comfort to be found in “the incredible gift” of memories. “Your memories are something that can never be taken from you.” “I’m sentimental,” Wilson confesses. “ The world is fragile, (but) people can also be very gracious to each other. When beautiful things happen it’s hard not to see our shared humanity.” If the Indian summer of “Jackie Boy” represents light, “Dark Rider” is the other side of the album and the season it is named after. Over a gathering storm of stuttering banjo, stinging mandolin and rattlesnake guitar, Wilson sings about a spectral figure who rides the midnight hour, hunting for souls. The song is like a cautionary tale told around a campfire. “I love ghost stories,” Wilson says. “This is just my way of adding another one to the fold. I’ve always felt the greatest tool in parent’s toolbox is the threat of the boogieman. If you don’t act right, some greater force or mystical power is going to correct you and keep you on the path. That’s basically what religion does in a lot of ways as well.” “Life has so many dark moments,” says Wilson summing up the contrast of sun and shade in Chatham County Line’s autumnal new album. “You spend a third of your life with your eyes closed, and the other part is the light that brings all healing and good to the world.” “I can’t explain where songs come from. Sometimes they’re just there. You pick up a guitar, play a little bit, and something happens.” “Besides,” he adds laughing, “after this long hot summer, who isn’t looking forward to fall?”

VIEW FROM THE COUCH For reviews on the latest in home entertainment, visit

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30 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

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MUSIC

SOUNDBOARD

AUG. 25

AUG. 27

BLUES/ROOTS/INTERNATIONAL

CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH

River Jam Series w/ Accomplices (U.S. National Whitewater Center)

Stonecrest Summer Concert Series w/ Leslie & Friends (Stonecrest Shopping Center)

COUNTRY/FOLK

The Band Stringfield (Tin Roof) Christy Snow (The Evening Muse)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B *Jeezy (The Fillmore Charlotte, Charlotte)

POP/ROCK Beside the Silence, Louder than Quiet, Absence of Despair, Kairos & Cross Stich (Milestone) Lisa DeNovo Band (RiRa Irish Pub) *Shiprocked (Snug Harbor)

AUG. 26 CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH Jazzy Fridays (Freshwaters Restaurant) Stonecrest Summer Concert Series w/ Leslie & Friends (Stonecrest Shopping Center)

COUNTRY/FOLK Cory Morrow with Nick Jamerson (Puckett’s Farm Equipment) George Banda Special CD Release Show (The Evening Muse) The Lenny Federal Band (Comet Grill)

POP/ROCK Back To School Beatles Bash w/ Abbey Road Live! (Visulite Theatre) Evergone & The Noble Giants (The Evening Muse) *The Kyle Perkins Band, Wolves and Wolves and Wolves and Wolves & The Bleeps (Milestone) Paul Thorn (Don Gibson Theatre, Shelby) Pineville Rockin’ and Reelin’ Concert Series w/ Gump Fiction (Belle Johnston Park, Pineville) Porcelain Mary (Tin Roof) Rick Springfield (Charlotte Metro Credit Union Amphitheatre) Vices & Vessels, Never I, Ghosts Again, Innervisions & Above Livius (Neighborhood Theatre) 32 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

Darius Rucker (PNC Music Pavilion) Flying Wolves (Puckett’s Farm Equipment) Joseph Michael Mahfoud - An Evening of SRV, Blues and Soul (The Evening Muse) Lauren and Lane, Emily Mure (The Evening Muse) Stolen Hearts, Rhonda Robichaux & Jordan Middleton (Double Door Inn) Thirsty Horses (Tin Roof)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B Lyricist’s Lounge (Upscale Lounge & Restaurant) The Rare Soul Concert Series feat. Rhythm 4 U, Blanche J & R’mone Entonio (BluNotes, Charlotte) *Su Casa (Petra’s)

POP/ROCK *English Beat (The Underground) The Fill Ins, Deadlock, Glass Lashes, October & The Felons (Milestone) *God Save the Queen feat. Black Pistol Fire (The Fillmore Charlotte) LangTree Live Music Series w/ Swinging Richards (Langtree Lake Norman, Mooreseville) Randy Franklin and the Sardines (Comet Grill) River Jam Series w/ Mike Strauss Band (U.S. National Whitewater Center) Samosely, Claudia Cohen, Sustaining Point, TinRoof Sunday & Guests (Amos’ Southend) Scar Tissue: A Red Hot Chili Peppers Tribute (RiRa Irish Pub) The Fill Ins, Deadlock, Glass Lashes, October, The Felons (Milestone)

AUG. 28 CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH *Moonwalk: Celebrating the Life of Michael Jackson through Jazz w/ The Harvey Cummings Project (Neighborhood Theatre)

POP/ROCK Chas, Jon Linker (Tin Roof) *Goo Goo Dolls w/ Collective Soul (Charlotte Metro Credit Union Amphitheatre) Joules, Dr. Cirkustien, Lil Skritt & Your Fuzzy

FRI 8/26

ABBEY ROAD LIVE! SAT 8/27

BIG MAMMAS HOUSE OF BURLESQUE 10th ANNIVERSARY & BIRTHDAY THU 9/1

Friends (Milestone)

BJ Barham (Sept. 1; Visulite Theatre)

Omari and the Hellraisers (Comet Grill) Sense of Purpose f. Paul Agee, Chris Allen, Joe Lindsay, Jody Gholson (Tyber Creek Pub)

The Melvins (Sept. 6; Amos’ Southend)

AUG. 29

Dinosaur Jr. (Sept. 10; Neighborhood Theatre)

COUNTRY/FOLK

Heart, Joan Jett, Cheap Trick (Sept. 16; PNC

Open Mic with Al & Jeff (Puckett’s Farm Equipment)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B #MFGD Open Mic (Apostrophe Lounge)

Florida Georgia Line (Sept. 10; PNC Music Pavilion)

( american ) BJ BARHAM aquarium &

Justin Osborne ( susto ) THU 9/8

Zac Brown Band (Sept. 15, PNC Music Pavilion) Music Pavilion) Brad Paisley, Tyler Farr, Maddie & Tae (Sept. 17, PNC Music Pavilion) Schoolboy Q (Sept. 18, The Fillmore)

FRI 9/2 THE THU 9/15

WHIGS

Brian Wilson (Sept. 19; Belk Theater)

POP/ROCK Find Your Muse Open Mic Night w/ Jessica Martindale (The Evening Muse) Locals Live (Tin Roof) The Monday Night Allstars (Double Door Inn) Wicked Powers (Comet Grill)

Bad Boy Family Reunion (Sept. 20; Time Warner Cable Arena) Built To Spill (Sept. 21; Neighborhood Theatre) The Cult (Sept. 21, The Fillmore) Cable Arena)

CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH

Kishi Bashi (Sept. 28; Visulite Theatre)

Bill Hanna Jazz Jam (Double Door Inn)

Lauryn Hill (Sept. 29; CMCU Amphitheater)

Red Rockin’ Chair (Comet Grill) Tuesday Night Jam w/ The Smokin’ Js (Smokey Joe’s Cafe)

HAYES CARLL

I Love the 90s Tour (Sept. 23; Time Warner

AUG. 30

COUNTRY/FOLK

FRI 9/16

James Bay (Sept. 25; The Fillmore)

Jason Aldean (Sept. 29, PNC Music Pavilion) Gov’t Mule (Oct. 1; CMCU Amphitheater) Korn w/ Breaking Benjamin (Oct. 5; PNC Music Pavilion) Charlie Puth (Oct. 6; The Fillmore)

POP/ROCK Fairplay & Special Guests (Lucky Lou’s Tavern)

Bad Religion & AgainstMe! (Oct. 8, The Fillmore)

AUG. 31

Wednesday 13 (Oct. 10; Amos Southend)

POP/ROCK

Fillmore)

BitchnDudes, The Kominas, Lara Americo, The Cocker Spaniels (Milestone) *The CLT+ Local Artists Showcase feat. Den of Wolves, Molly Wops, Jade Moore, Lisa DeNovo, Railz the Principle & LeAnna Eden (The Evening Muse) The Foxfires, BitchnDudes, The Kominas, Lara Americo & The Cocker Spaniels (Milestone) Modern Heritage Weekly Mix Tape (Snug Harbor) Open Mic Night (Comet Grill) Party in the Park w/ Rick Strickland Band (Romare Bearden Park) Pluto for Planet (RiRa Irish Pub)

COMING SOON  Luke Bryan (Sept. 1; PNC Music Pavilion)

Andy Grammer & Gavin DeGraw (Oct. 22, The

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Die Antwoord (Oct. 25; The Fillmore) Bonnie Raitt (Oct. 26; Ovens Auditorium) Genitorturers (Oct. 26, Amos Southend) Rae Strummond (Oct. 26, The Fillmore) Phantogram (Oct. 29; The Fillmore) Machine Gun Kelly (Oct. 30, The Fillmore) Sonata Artica (Nov. 6, The Fillmore) * - CL Recommends

NEED DIRECTIONS? Check out our website at clclt.

com. CL online provides addresses, maps and directions from your location. Send us your concert listings: E-mail us at aovercash@clclt. com or fax it to 704-522-8088. We need the date, venue, band name and contact name and number. The deadline is each Wednesday, one week before publication. CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 33

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co-worker and I decided to take a peek inside MOST WEEKENDS WHEN I go home, I The Bar at 316. An LGBT-friendly bar located feel like I have no time to enjoy something in South End, I was stoked to visit it for the in the Queen City at all. Lately, however, first time. I assumed that I would find it I’ve made balance a top priority by: taking time for myself, committing to trying new somewhere along South Boulevard, so I was things and sharing weekend time with pleasantly surprised when we pulled up to a family. Needless to say, juggling the 2016 cozy two-story house on Rensselaer Avenue. Charlotte Pride Festival & Parade and my While there weren’t a lot of parking spaces, mom’s 50th birthday celebration was a and we had to buy some time at another bar unique challenge this past weekend. before they opened, we felt right at home as If you were in Charlotte and ventured to soon as we walked through the parlor door. Uptown, you probably had some difficulty Inside, on the first floor, we were met navigating the city streets. That’s because with an intimate atmosphere. The music a portion of Tryon Street was blocked off from the second floor flowed down the to make room for vendors during stairs, but it wasn’t too loud to watch the Charlotte Pride Festival a show on a large screen from the & Parade on Saturday and comfort of two large couches, Sunday. Last week, I shared play pool with friends or a couple memories from have a conversation over past Charlotte Pride a couple beers at the celebrations as well as venue’s small bar. After events I had already set grabbing drinks, my comy sights on for this worker and I decided to year. While I didn’t make venture up to the second it to every planned event, floor. There was another I did have the opportunity bar, — this one larger —a to go to a couple. AERIN SPRUILL stage, more intimate seating Friday after getting off and my favorite, a roof top deck. work I decided to kill some time A comfortable space, The Bar at 316 before jumping into a drinking is definitely a place you can feel free to be frenzy and walked to the McColl Center for Art + Innovation to meet a co-worker. I yourself and chill. Trust me, I’ll be making was beyond ecstatic to check out one of their another trip very soon. After all, I didn’t get newest installations called, Open Occupancy: to see the space through night vision. Artists Respond to HB2. Before I knew it, my boyfriend and I The seven installations are strategically were meeting up and heading to Bradshaw placed on every floor of the art center in Social House in Ballantyne to meet up with public restrooms. Artists respond to attacks some old co-workers that I hadn’t seen in surrounding NC’s House Bill 2 by infiltrating a while. Rumored to be a popular spot for the very spaces that are being threatened. cougars, I wasn’t too surprised when I was Talk about powerful! Through video, audio informed the next day that an older couple, and art, each piece seeks to question, reveal, who’d given their fair share of compliments, expand and transcend traditional narratives seemed to be fishing for a plus one at home of sexual orientation, gender identity and — if you catch my drift. Fortunately, no one expression. got recruited prior to making an early exit My favorite? A positive image installation for wind down time at home. created by artist, Andrea Vail. Surrounded The next morning, I wouldn’t say I was by silver streamers and a neon disco ball, hungover, but I wouldn’t say I was feeling viewers are invited to celebrate the beauty very chipper either as my boyfriend and of all of our differences in a mirror while I drove to Childress Vineyards and Badin listening to a play list that can be navigated Lake for my mom’s birthday. The entire day by following instructions located in the included wine, beer, football, jet skis and a bathroom. You know I had to capture the boat ride before we called it a night at my moment with a selfie. My co-worker and I parent’s house. Upon returning to Charlotte had to cut our trip short because the McColl by 2 p.m. on Sunday, I felt like a perfectly Center was closing at 5 p.m., but I would balanced weekend had come to an end, with highly suggest you check out the installation before it ends on September 10th. a few hours to spare. BACKTALK@CLCLT.COM After leaving the McColl Center, another

ENDS

CROSSWORD

A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT ACROSS

1 Virginia city or river 8 Religious day of rest 15 Triangular house part 20 Country east of Turkey 21 Turkey locale 22 Iranian faith 23 Waste time on trifling things in a brave way? 25 23-season baseballer Rusty 26 Fork sticker 27 The, to Gigi 28 Storage medium that can be written to 29 PC shortcut code 30 -- -Caps 31 Ship bunk 33 Bush’s successor ready to hit the hay? 37 Alamo rental 38 “Alley --” 40 Manning of the NFL 41 Brazilian berry 42 Repair of an angel’s blood vessel? 50 Snacked 51 Christens differently 52 Became solidified 53 Author Joyce Carol -55 Zing 56 -- out an existence 58 Justin Bieber fan, often 59 Paint coarsely 61 Viral Internet images, say 63 Carter’s successor used a hand motion? 69 Dallas-to-Nashville dir. 70 Just right 73 Zing 74 Miner’s strike 75 Deli meats turning bad? 80 Uppity type 82 Droopy 83 Agenda 84 On an ad -- basis 87 This, in Acapulco 88 Retro photo tint 91 Rialto city 93 Like droids 95 Long-running CBS series 96 Nietzschean superman from Vegas? 100 Golden State sch. 102 Hi- -- image 103 PC storage letters 104 Sci-fi beings

105 Bird crossbreed? 110 “Wrong” 112 Sorority letter 115 Relatives of sororities, for short 116 Jazz sax player Stan 118 -- Offensive 119 Hammer end 120 Slow -- (small primate) 121 Incense resin causes intoxication? 125 1985 Kate Nelligan drama 126 Marinara herb 127 Alfresco 128 Marsh plant 129 Lifeblood 130 Most moist

DOWN

1 Boats that inflate 2 Politician Hatch 3 Kind of acid 4 “Scream” actress Campbell 5 1969 Beatle bride 6 Aggressive stinger 7 Agog 8 Salt, in Sevres 9 “-- Lang Syne” 10 “Well done!” 11 Inn combo 12 “Ad -- per aspera” (motto of Kansas) 13 “Shop -- you drop” 14 Horse food 15 Doohickey 16 Capital of Kazakhstan 17 Animal of superstition 18 Nobelist, e.g. 19 Personifies 24 -- Martin 31 Oz creator 32 Boss -- (“The Dukes of Hazzard” role) 34 Honey liquor 35 Roker and Sharpton 36 Nose marrer 37 Lifting device 39 Vatican City sculpture 42 Thick, sweet liqueurs 43 Treasure State capital 44 Tooth cover 45 Query 46 Designer Cassini 47 Petition 48 1969 Beatle groom 49 Juveniles

54 “Aladdin” monkey 57 Historian’s units 59 Party for JFK 60 Sahara viper 62 Of apes 64 Fled to hitch 65 Vincent van -66 Uses a perch 67 Like steamy literature 68 Disunite 71 Not bright 72 Paranormal gift 76 Foreman fighter 77 Limb bone 78 Outing ruiner 79 Run up 81 Rialto signs 85 Bobby the Bruin 86 Is realized 88 Brawls 89 Salad endive 90 Having supporting columns 91 Prefix with dilator 92 Black, in verse 94 “Thanks -- God!” 97 Suffix with north 98 -- out (chill) 99 Be a ham 101 Stage skill 106 Davis of film 107 Cruel beasts 108 Suit twill 109 Actor Hawke 111 Quarterback Tim 112 Fix, as laces 113 Gives ear to 114 Kickoff 117 It’s in brass 119 Previous 121 Skier Tommy 122 52-wk. units 123 -- Valley, San Francisco 124 Hairy sitcom cousin

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Dear readers: This is the final week of my summer vacation — but you’ve been getting a new column every week I’ve been gone, all of them written by a Dan Savage, none of them written by me. Our final guest Dan Savage is an independent designer, illustrator, and animation director based in Brooklyn, New York. He created Yule Log 2.0 (watchyulelog. com), a collaborative art project where animators around the world reimagine the famous Yule log fireplace. He has worked with the New York Times, Herman Miller, and Google, he’s taught design and animation, and he’s won a bunch of design industry awards you probably haven’t heard of.

up with him. He really cares about me, and he didn’t do anything wrong. We’ve dated for four months, and I don’t know if I’m giving up too soon. Where would I be if previous boyfriends had ditched me for being inexperienced instead of showing me the ropes? Don’t I owe Guy the same thing? Too Down To Be Witty First off, I think a long time between relationships is good. I also think not having things in common can be okay if you create new hobbies and experiences you can share. Having said that, TDTBW, four months is plenty of time to know if it’s working. He sounds super boring. The sooner you break it off with him the better. You don’t want to hurt him any more than you have to, especially if he’s really into you, and the longer you draw it out, the more it’s going to hurt. No amount of “training” is going to get this dude hard. The only rope being shown here is his flaccid ding-dong. It doesn’t seem like you even want to be his friend if you broke up. I wouldn’t feel guilty at all about dumping him.

I’m a 41-year-old straight woman who stayed a virgin way longer than I should have (thank you, church and cultural slut shaming). I wasn’t 100 percent “good,” i.e., I was one of those “not PIV = not really sex” girls, so I indulged in outercourse and other “cheats.” When I finally realized that “not until marriage” wasn’t working for me and did the real thing, I discovered I loved it. Go DAN SAVAGE me, right? Unfortunately, My girl and I are I’m not good at dating, so I both 26, and we opened up usually go a long time between our marriage. Now I’ve got a relationships. The relationship girlfriend with whom I am getting to I’m in now is the first one I’ve had in have some of the kinky fun that was two years. “Guy” is nice to me — calls lacking at home. Here is my question: me beautiful, sticks up for me, comes Things are really casual between me and to watch me play with a community this new girl. I want to do some pegging, orchestra (my own family and friends but I don’t know who should buy the don’t even come to my shows). But we strap-on? Me, because it’s my ass and don’t have much in common (hobbies, my idea? Or her, because she would wear political outlook, religious beliefs) it and would also think it was super hot? and sometimes our conversations feel Should I buy the dildo and she buys the labored. But that’s okay, right? At least harness? Going halfsies on the whole I’m getting my sexual needs met, right? rig? What is the equitable way of doing Well, no. Every single time we’ve tried this? to have sex, Guy either can’t get hard Purchasing Erotic Gear Good or stays hard for only a few minutes. Etiquette, Dan? I’ve tried going down on him, using my hands, different positions—nothing You’re 26 years old, PEGGED, buy the works. He’s never had an orgasm with damn thing. How much could it possibly me. We don’t even kiss that much. I cost? I know if I were in your situation, I don’t say anything because I don’t want would want full control over what goes up to hurt his feelings and because I’m my ass. If she owns it, would she use it while really grateful to him for wanting to be you weren’t around? With strangers? No with me and being nice to me. He says thanks. Plus if you split the cost, who gets to sorry and that he’s asked the doctor keep it when you break up? Just buy it and about it, but we don’t get anywhere. It enjoy. If you struggle with picking it out, feels lonelier than when I was single. might I suggest starting small? To be blunt, I don’t want to date him Follow Daniel Savage on Twitter at @ anymore. But I feel too guilty to break somethingsavage.

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FOR ALL SIGNS: On Aug. 24, the planet

Mars (ancient god of war) conjuncts Saturn (ruler of limits and boundaries). Their coming together represents a debate between polarities: action vs. stasis, hot vs. cold, spontaneity vs. containment, individual needs vs. the collective. These planets meet in the sky approximately every two years. It urges us to develop the self-discipline and groundwork needed to become a courageous warrior for our personal or collective causes. Less positively, when the energies are right for war in the world or strife within a relationship, this conjunction can represent the spark.

ARIES: You have a long term goal to create something important involving new education, developing a website, legal and/ or church or religious matters. Know that the result will take longer than you expect. Think carefully about the foundation on which you will build. Now is the time to strengthen your foundation into a fortress. TAURUS: Your optimistic and happy

attitude attracts others to join your bandwagon and support your projects. You can envision a grand result and are able to express it in a way that others can understand. The reward will be great enough that everyone will benefit. This is a fine week for creative endeavors and for romance.

SCORPIO: This is a powerful time to

consider your spiritual purposes. It is all too easy for the Maya, the things of the world, to overwhelm every waking minute, leaving no time for the higher goals. If you notice fatigue, disappointment, or depression at this time, stop. Be still and listen for the voice deep within your soul that wants attention.

SAGITTARIUS: Please note the lead

paragraph because this phenomenon is occurring in your sign. You may be expecting to start a big project this month. The beginning is fraught with potential errors. It is especially important to prevent or correct mistakes at the start. If you don’t, later you may have to unravel the whole project back to this point.

CAPRICORN: You may have noticed that

GEMINI: Early in the week you may be strongly tempted to spend money for home improvements. The timing is not so good for this because your tastes or ideas may change over the next few weeks. Mercury will turn retrograde on the 30th and that with which you are enchanted could turn on a dime.

your unconscious mind has been trying to get your attention. One way is dreams, another is via daydreams, unusual coincidences, and yet another can be via peculiar accidents or illnesses. The message says, “Stop! Pay attention to the signs around you.” What are they telling you, in various kinds of ways? If you are participating in self-destructive behavior, seek a counselor at once.

CANCER: This is not your best week

AQUARIUS: It is possible that you have

unless you plan to get a lot of hard work accomplished. If you become aware that you are easily angered, use caution concerning tools or machinery. Your reflexes may not be on target. Avoid speeding because there may be police on every corner.

LEO: Surprise, changeability, and general rebellion are the qualities prominent this week. You may be the one who feels rebellious and wants to be left alone. Or it could be your partner or a good friend. If you have things on your mind regarding a relationship, they may fall right out of your mouth when you least expect it. Think carefully before you speak. VIRGO: Mercury will turn direct in your

sign on the 30th, so let all your decisions be small ones. There is a high probability that you may change your attitude about multiple things over the next month. Hesitate before you make major purchases, especially if they involve communication devices.

38 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

LIBRA: Unseen help will assist and cause you to thank your lucky stars for the blessings. Your guardian angel helps you out of a bad place. Spend some time focusing on your spiritual beliefs. You might be called upon to assist another toward a healing path. It is an opportunity to “pay it forward.” Don’t refuse.

hoped to begin a joint project with others at this time. The timing is not so great and the resources may be slim. You need to have the support of others behind you or this work won’t get off the ground. Try to determine what the objection is and determine what you can do about it. Start again under better aspects.

PISCES: Take every precaution not to abuse your body during this period. Drugs or alcohol could have peculiar side effects that you don’t understand. You are in a low physical cycle and will be unable to push yourself as hard as normal on any physical task. If you are affected emotionally, try not to worry about it. Your body/feelings will right themselves after the 15th.

Are you interested in a personal horoscope? Vivian Carol may be reached at 704-366-3777 for private psychotherapy or astrology appointments (there is a charge). www.horoscopesbyvivian.com.

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Bob Log III performs at Snug Harbor on Aug. 30.

COVER STORY THE MAN BEHIND THE MURALS: Will Puckett bids farewell to the Queen City.

BY RYAN PITKIN THIS WEEK’S COVER, FEATURING PHOTOS OF WILL PUCKETT SHOT BY RYAN PITKIN AND PARTS OF PUCKETT’S MURAL, WAS DESIGNED BY DANA VINDIGNI.

NEWS&VIEWS

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13 THANK ME LATER 14 THE BLOTTER 15 NEWS OF THE WEIRD

DINNER WITH THE DUMPLING LADY: The

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ARTS&ENT FINDING ONES INNER ARTIST: There’s nothing fishy about Ciel Gallery’s Clambakes.

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NEWS

COVERSTORY

Will Puckett bids farewell to the Queen City BY RYAN PITKIN

WILL HAS BEEN drawing and painting

Will and Lauren Puckett, immortalized in Will’s mural on the side of JackBeagle’s.

RYAN PITKIN

AS FOR LAUREN, who has built a name

MURAL P. 12 u

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COVERSTORY

RYAN PITKIN

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THANK ME LATER

NEWS

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BY RYAN PITKIN

LAUNDERED GOODS A thief was

was late into work last week after a vandal obstructed her access to her car. The woman filed a police report stating that some

unknown suspect had glued the doors of her car shut overnight.

VACANCY A man didn’t take the news well

HAMMER TIME Another man at Novant

POISON CONTROL It’s well known in

HOARDER A man in west Charlotte must not be used to hearing “No” very often, as hearing the word last week sent him into a hissy fit that ended in hundreds of dollars of damage to city property. A CATS bus driver told police that she told the man he couldn’t keep a bus pass that had been fully used, and at hearing this, the man kicked the door of the bus, shattering it completely. SELFIE SMASH UP A 15-year-old girl’s mother went to police last week after her daughter’s bullies made themselves easy to catch. The woman told officers that a group of kids destroyed her daughter’s cellphone. She knew it was them, because the notso-smart children posted videos of them shattering the phone on social media. THREAT OF THE WEEK A Ballantyne woman found out just how her neighbor feels about her dog last week in no uncertain terms. The woman told police that the neighbor approached her while she was walking her service dog and yelled, “Your damn dog barks all the time. I will kill your fucking stank-ass and your stank-ass dog.” Blotter items are chosen from the files of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department. All suspects are innocent until proven guilty.

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FOOD

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ALISON LEININGER

DINNER WITH THE DUMPLING LADY The dynamo behind the dumplings BY ALISON LEININGER

Zhang Qian and John Nisbet.

Dumplings from The Dumpling Lady.

ALISON LEININGER

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16 oz IPA $2 Miller $3 Goose $3 Island Aluminum .50

High Life

& PBR’s

Bud Light

Half Priced Appetizers Mon-Fri 4-6pm

Premium Wings in 14 flavors! Hand Pattied Burgers!

4548 Old Pineville Rd 18 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

DAILY DRINK SPECIALS BLOODY MARY BAR 12 WIDESCREEN TV’S!

980-430-5403

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 19

THURSDAY

CLEAR MOUNTAIN VIEW MUSIC FESTIVAL

THURSDAY

P.S. YOUR CAT IS DEAD

When: Aug. 25-27. Where: 356 London Road, Lawndale, NC. More: $15-$170. clearmountainviewmusicfestival. com.

When: Aug. 25, 7:30 p.m.; Aug. 2627, 8 p.m.; Aug. 28, 7 p.m.; Through Sept. 3. Where: Duke Energy Theater, 345 N. College St. More: $23-$25. blumenthalarts.org.

— JEFF HAHNE

20 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

— ANITA OVERCASH

THINGS TO DO

TOP TEN

The Kominas WEDNESDAY

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

THE 48 HOUR FILM PROJECT COLLECTION

GOODYEAR ARTIST RESIDENCY SHOWCASE

JOSEPH MICHAEL MAHFOUD

When: 6:30 p.m.-9 p.m. Where: Booth Playhouse, 130 North Tryon St. More: $10. 704-372-1000. blumenthalarts.org. — OVERCASH

When: 6 p.m.–9 p.m. Where: Goodyear Arts, 516 N. College St. More: Free admission. — OVERCASH

When: 10:30 p.m. Where: Evening Muse, 3227 N. Davidson St. More: $8-$10. 704-376-3737. eveningmuse.com. — HAHNE

Bob Log III TUESDAY

P.S. Your Cat is Dead THURSDAY

NEWS ARTS FOOD MUSIC ODDS

Joseph Michael Mahfoud SATURDAY

SUNDAY

SATURDAY

TUESDAY

WEDNESDAY

When: 9 p.m. Where: The Milestone, 3400 Tuckaseegee Road. More: $5-$7. 704-398-0472. themilestoneclub.com. — OVERCASH

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 21

ARTS

VISUAL ARTS

A work by Ciel Gallery instructor and artist, Caroline Brown.

CAROLINE BROWN

PAGE LEGGETT

Page Leggett’s “Happy.”

FINDING ONES INNER ARTIST

CIEL GALLERY: A FINE ART COLLECTIVE

There’s nothing fishy about Ciel Gallery’s Clambakes

128 East Park Ave. 704-496-9417. cielcharlotte.com. See Brown’s work

at carolinecbrown.com.

BY PAGE LEGGETT

Another work by Leggett.

PAGE LEGGETT

is a gateway to creativity in any kind of art.” Not for me, it isn’t. After spending a lifetime trying to find some art form I could do, I’m sticking with this.

BACKTALK@CLCLT.COM

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 23

ARTS

FILM

PARAMOUNT

Toby Kebbell and Jack Huston in Ben-Hur.

FAITH NO MORE Christian classic loses its way in new retelling BY MATT BRUNSON

your delicious weekly alternative news source

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 25

ARTS

HAPPENINGS

COMEDY Bonkerz Comedy Club Adam Murray. Aug. 2627, 8 p.m. 5624 Westpark Drive. 980-288-5653.

Twenty-Two Let the Good Times Roll. Local artists have used their creative talents on skateboards. Through Sept. 4. 1500 Central Ave. 704-334-0122. gallerytwentytwo.com.

Jerald Melberg Gallery Two to Watch. Through Sept. 10. 625 S. Sharon Amity Road. 704-3653000. jeraldmelberg.com.

MUSIC

FEATURE

PATRICK SHANAHAN

Chatham County Line performs at McGlohon Theater on Aug. 26.

CHATHAM COUNTY LINE CHARTS A CHANGING COURSE Turning inward with Autumn BY PAT MORAN

CHATHAM COUNTY LINE $19.50 and up. Aug. 26, 8 p.m. McGlohon Theater, 345 N. College St. 704-372-1000. blumenthalarts.org.

VIEW FROM THE COUCH For reviews on the latest in home entertainment, visit

CLCLT.COM/CHARLOTTE/VIEW-FROM-THE-COUCH/

BACKTALK@CLCLT.COM

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 29

30 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

MUSIC

SOUNDBOARD

AUG. 25

AUG. 27

BLUES/ROOTS/INTERNATIONAL

CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH

River Jam Series w/ Accomplices (U.S. National Whitewater Center)

Stonecrest Summer Concert Series w/ Leslie & Friends (Stonecrest Shopping Center)

COUNTRY/FOLK

The Band Stringfield (Tin Roof) Christy Snow (The Evening Muse)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B *Jeezy (The Fillmore Charlotte, Charlotte)

POP/ROCK Beside the Silence, Louder than Quiet, Absence of Despair, Kairos & Cross Stich (Milestone) Lisa DeNovo Band (RiRa Irish Pub) *Shiprocked (Snug Harbor)

AUG. 26 CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH Jazzy Fridays (Freshwaters Restaurant) Stonecrest Summer Concert Series w/ Leslie & Friends (Stonecrest Shopping Center)

COUNTRY/FOLK Cory Morrow with Nick Jamerson (Puckett’s Farm Equipment) George Banda Special CD Release Show (The Evening Muse) The Lenny Federal Band (Comet Grill)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B Lyricist’s Lounge (Upscale Lounge & Restaurant) The Rare Soul Concert Series feat. Rhythm 4 U, Blanche J & R’mone Entonio (BluNotes, Charlotte) *Su Casa (Petra’s)

AUG. 28 CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH *Moonwalk: Celebrating the Life of Michael Jackson through Jazz w/ The Harvey Cummings Project (Neighborhood Theatre)

POP/ROCK Chas, Jon Linker (Tin Roof) *Goo Goo Dolls w/ Collective Soul (Charlotte Metro Credit Union Amphitheatre) Joules, Dr. Cirkustien, Lil Skritt & Your Fuzzy

FRI 8/26

ABBEY ROAD LIVE! SAT 8/27

BIG MAMMAS HOUSE OF BURLESQUE 10th ANNIVERSARY & BIRTHDAY THU 9/1

Friends (Milestone)

BJ Barham (Sept. 1; Visulite Theatre)

Omari and the Hellraisers (Comet Grill) Sense of Purpose f. Paul Agee, Chris Allen, Joe Lindsay, Jody Gholson (Tyber Creek Pub)

The Melvins (Sept. 6; Amos’ Southend)

AUG. 29

Dinosaur Jr. (Sept. 10; Neighborhood Theatre)

COUNTRY/FOLK

Heart, Joan Jett, Cheap Trick (Sept. 16; PNC

Open Mic with Al & Jeff (Puckett’s Farm Equipment)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B #MFGD Open Mic (Apostrophe Lounge)

Florida Georgia Line (Sept. 10; PNC Music Pavilion)

( american ) BJ BARHAM aquarium &

Justin Osborne ( susto ) THU 9/8

Zac Brown Band (Sept. 15, PNC Music Pavilion) Music Pavilion) Brad Paisley, Tyler Farr, Maddie & Tae (Sept. 17, PNC Music Pavilion) Schoolboy Q (Sept. 18, The Fillmore)

FRI 9/2 THE THU 9/15

WHIGS

Brian Wilson (Sept. 19; Belk Theater)

POP/ROCK Find Your Muse Open Mic Night w/ Jessica Martindale (The Evening Muse) Locals Live (Tin Roof) The Monday Night Allstars (Double Door Inn) Wicked Powers (Comet Grill)

Bad Boy Family Reunion (Sept. 20; Time Warner Cable Arena) Built To Spill (Sept. 21; Neighborhood Theatre) The Cult (Sept. 21, The Fillmore) Cable Arena)

CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH

Kishi Bashi (Sept. 28; Visulite Theatre)

Bill Hanna Jazz Jam (Double Door Inn)

Lauryn Hill (Sept. 29; CMCU Amphitheater)

Red Rockin’ Chair (Comet Grill) Tuesday Night Jam w/ The Smokin’ Js (Smokey Joe’s Cafe)

HAYES CARLL

I Love the 90s Tour (Sept. 23; Time Warner

AUG. 30

COUNTRY/FOLK

FRI 9/16

James Bay (Sept. 25; The Fillmore)

Jason Aldean (Sept. 29, PNC Music Pavilion) Gov’t Mule (Oct. 1; CMCU Amphitheater) Korn w/ Breaking Benjamin (Oct. 5; PNC Music Pavilion) Charlie Puth (Oct. 6; The Fillmore)

POP/ROCK Fairplay & Special Guests (Lucky Lou’s Tavern)

Bad Religion & AgainstMe! (Oct. 8, The Fillmore)

AUG. 31

Wednesday 13 (Oct. 10; Amos Southend)

POP/ROCK

Fillmore)

COMING SOON Luke Bryan (Sept. 1; PNC Music Pavilion)

Andy Grammer & Gavin DeGraw (Oct. 22, The

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34 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

RECYCLE ME, PLEASE (Only after you’re done reading me)

ENDS

CROSSWORD

A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT ACROSS

DOWN

SOLUTION FOUND ON P. 38.

CLCLT.COM | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | 35

ENDS

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36 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

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ENDS

STARGAZER

704-392-8099 MON-SUN 9AM-11PM LOCATED NEAR THE AIRPORT EXIT 37 OFF I-85 WE ACCEPT ALL MAJOR CREDIT CARDS

SOUTH ON BEATTIES FORD ROAD THEN FIRST RIGHT ON MONTANA DRIVE (LOCATED 1/2 MILE ON THE LEFT | 714-G MONTANA DR)

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1-704-943-0051 More Local Numbers: 800-777-8000

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FOR ALL SIGNS: On Aug. 24, the planet

SCORPIO: This is a powerful time to

SAGITTARIUS: Please note the lead

CAPRICORN: You may have noticed that

CANCER: This is not your best week

AQUARIUS: It is possible that you have

38 | AUG. 25 - AUG. 31, 2016 | CLCLT.COM

Are you interested in a personal horoscope? Vivian Carol may be reached at 704-366-3777 for private psychotherapy or astrology appointments (there is a charge). www.horoscopesbyvivian.com.

SUPER FRIDAY FOOTBALL PARTY FREE ADMISSION BEFORE AND AFTER THE GAME WITH TICKET STUB.

*LOCATED 2 BLOCKS FROM THE STADIUM AND WALKING DISTANCE OF ALL UPTOWN HOTELS*