2017 Issue 49 Creative Loafing Charlotte

CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 VOL. 30, NO. 49

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EDITORIAL

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A MEMBER OF:

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Katie Childress, 11, was among the proud feminists last weekend at the Women’s March on Charlotte.

NEWS&VIEWS 12 A FEDERAL CASE Mary Virginia Federal, Charlotte’s matron saint of music and more, turns 100

BY STEVE GOLDBERG

16 MARCH OF THE MATRIARCHS Thousands take to the streets of Charlotte to support women’s rights

BY RYAN PITKIN 10 EDITOR’S NOTE 10 BLOTTER 11 NEWS OF THE WEIRD

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FOOD 18 FIT FOR A QUEEN Restaurant Week features 10 days of dining deals

BY CHRISSIE NELSON 20 THREE COURSE SPIEL: RICHARD JONES OF SUB ONE

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ARTS&ENT 24 MAKE THE CONNECTION 8 things to do for free

during Connect with Culture Day

BY CL STAFF

27 ARTSPEAK: MARK DOEPKER ON ART, POLITICS AND RACIST HATERS

BY MARK KEMP 26 FILM REVIEWS

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MUSIC 28 FILLING A VOID Hattie’s looks to step up as Charlotte’s next music venue in light of recent closures

BY RYAN PITKIN 30 MUSICMAKER: DJ

at the Milestone

Spider & Michael Price do Digital Noir

BY PAT MORAN 32 SOUNDBOARD

22

ODDS&ENDS 22 10 THINGS TO DO 34 MARKETPLACE 34 NIGHTLIFE 35 CROSSWORD 36 SAVAGE LOVE 38 HOROSCOPE

COVER DESIGNED BY DANA VINDIGNI

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COVER PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE FEDERAL FAMILY CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 VOL. 30, NO. 48

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NEWS

EDITOR’S NOTE

NEWS

BLOTTER

the banners, the paint came with it, and the victim was left with a two-tone Nissan.

STAND UP Resistance is our birthright MORE THAN 10,000 people of all ages, is our collective birthright. We marched to races and gender identity marched into show that patriotism sometimes means not Romare Bearden Park in Charlotte last accepting what’s been imposed upon us.

Saturday in a show of love and unity that We held signs to demonstrate that peace sometimes means fighting with every ounce could only be described as breathtaking.

The Women’s March on Charlotte was an of vigor one can muster. We locked arms to act of peaceful resistance the likes of which show that love can prevail over hate.

Creative Loafing’s news editor Ryan Pitkin I have never seen in my half-century on this planet. It was an extraordinary show of was at the march all morning, and on page 16 dignity in a time of extraordinary indignity in he’s compiled some the images he took, along our city, state and nation, and it was repeated with the thoughts and fears and hopes that many of the marchers expressed. in cities across the United States.

Those marchers aren’t the only ones in After spending Saturday listening to many of the marchers, hearing an inspiring Charlotte trying to spread love and justice.

One Charlotte family has been spreading speech from Mayor Jennifer Roberts, it far and wide for almost a century. having lunch with close friends The matriarch of that family, Mary at Rí Rá Irish Pub, and then Virginia Federal, turns 100 this spending the evening with week. Mrs. Federal, the mother another friend putting of beloved local musician the past few days into Lenny Federal, moved to the perspective, I went back Queen City with her Irish home. And then, for yet family in 1917, when she another two hours, I was just six months old. In spoke by phone to my 1942, she married Robert dear friend Ipeleng Joseph Keegan Federal, and Kgositsile, who lives in a rich family legacy began to Oakland, California.

MARK KEMP unfurl.

At one point, Ipeleng The Federals — the name divulged a recent epiphany. itself denoting a union that takes “Resistance,” she told me, “is care of its constituent parts — became my birthright!”

It was not just mindless sloganeering. Her well-known musicians, judges, teachers, father is the influential South African poet nurses, soldiers, social justice warriors and Keorapetse Kgositsile, a key member of the more. The family is such an integral part of African National Congress who was exiled the fabric of Charlotte that the Federals have from his country in 1961 and spent much their own float in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

“My dad was very interested in politics and of the ’60s and ’70s in New York City before ultimately returning to Johannesburg in he wanted his children to be interested in their 1990 and becoming the nation’s poet laureate country,” she tells journalist Steve Goldberg in 2006. “In a situation of oppression,” he in this week’s cover story. Federal has seen 25 once said of his calling, “there are no choices presidential elections in her lifetime, but reveals beyond didactic writing: either you are a tool to Goldberg that she’s distressed about the of oppression or an instrument of liberation.” recent one. “He’s so disrespectful to everybody.

Ipeleng’s mother is the late Melba Johnson I’m just so sorry that he won,” she says.

Federal has voted in every presidential Kgositsile, executive director of the Council election since she turned 21 in 1938, the year on Interracial Books for Children.

So when Ipeleng says “resistance is Ipeleng’s father was born into apartheid in my birthright,” it resonates deeply. That Johannesburg.

On Friday, as we prepared this issue, birthright was enormous for a young girl who just wanted to be like other girls growing the new president was being inaugurated. I up in New York in the 1980s. After years of lapsed into momentary despair and wrote wrestling with the weight of such a legacy, she an obit for our nation on Facebook. Over the weekend, Jay Leach, minister of the Unitarian is only now able to fully embrace it.

Just as we are only now able to fully Universalist Church of Charlotte, who’d just returned from Washington, D.C., where he embrace ours.

In Charlotte, and in town and cities all and his wife Melissa were among the throngs across the nation on Saturday, women and of demonstrators, wrote seven words under men; blacks, whites and Latinos; LGBTQ my obit that changed my outlook.

“We cannot indulge the luxury of despair.” and cis-straight; abled and disabled; gradeThose seven words — and the stories in school children to nonagenarians gathered en masse to acknowledge that resistance this issue — can change your outlook, too.

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BY RYAN PITKIN

THAT’S A DOWNER There are countless ways that drug dealers come up with to hide their stash, whether it’s a hidden compartment in their car or even keeping an entirely separate dope house to do business in. One ecstacy dealer was caught in west Charlotte last week trying to hide their stash by disguising it — as a different drug. According to a report, the suspect was charged with trafficking a schedule I controlled substance (the worst you can be caught with) after they were found in possession of 1,315 MDMA pills that were reportedly disguised to look like Xanax bars (a schedule IV controlled substance).

FIXER UPPER Employees at Sam Ash Music Store in southwest Charlotte called police after a wannabe guitar repairman made off with some merchandise from the store under false pretense. The employees on shift told officers that a man walked into the store and selected a guitar case and a guitar.

They watched as he attempted to place the guitar inside of the case before realizing it wouldn’t fit. He then selected a second case and placed the guitar inside then made his way to the front. When employees yelled after him, he waved some paperwork their way stating that he was hired to repair the $1,400 guitar but was out of the door before anybody could check the papers.

PUTTING IN WORK Gone are the days when a simple key scratch down the side of a vehicle or a knife to a tire would qualify as sufficient revenge for a cheating lover or other personal nemesis. A scorned suspect took things a step further in Mint Hill last week when they stripped the paint completely off of one 55-year-old woman’s car. The woman reported to police that she believes someone dipped banners in acid and placed them over the hood and trunk of her Nissan Versa. When the vandals removed

HIGHEST BIDDER The only thing worse than figuring out that your gift has been re-gifted is to find out someone out there is re-gifting gifts intended for you.

Now, we’ll try to make sense of that last statement. A 30-year-old north Charlotte man reported to police last week that he believes he found out who stole his Pokemon cards last November. He said someone stole two packages containing about $120 worth of Pokemon cards just after Thanksgiving last year. He didn’t report the theft until he came across the exact cards (which are relatively rare) while shopping around on the Offer Up app last week. He believes the seller is the thief … and the plot thickens. Actually it doesn’t. That’s it.

CON KIDS PART II Last week in The Blotter, we reported a kid or group of kids who had been parading around west Charlotte neighborhoods under the pretense of raising funds for their schools with pizza and cookie sales but pocketing the $17 checks. The con game apparently happened last November, but reports have begun coming into police about it this month as the customers have realized no returns are coming on their investment. This week, it seems the game was more widespread than originally believed. A woman in northeast Charlotte reported putting in two $17 orders for cookie dough with a child who came to her door and hasn’t received her dough yet.

A similar report regarding $17 cookie dough also came in from northwest Charlotte.

GET THE GOOD STUFF A group of burglars that struck at a home in Tryon Hills last week seem like the kind of kids we’d like to hang out with. A 35-year-old woman reported that someone broke into her home sometime between 5 and 7 p.m. last week, and the list of items stolen during the breakin, while seemingly random, leads us to believe that criminals just want to have fun.

According to the report, the items stolen include bottles of alcohol, ice cream bars, Nerf guns, a piggy bank full of loose change and an unknown amount of pickles.

PIGSTY A 21-year-old woman who lives in University but rents out a property in west Charlotte filed a police report last week after finding that her west Charlotte renters weren’t exactly model tenants. The woman reported going to check up on the house and finding that a known suspect had punched holes in the walls and urinated all over the carpet. What else is one to do when they get the water shut off?

NEWS

NEWS OF THE WEIRD

routinely issue such tickets — five to 10 each winter, based on a town ordinance — to send drivers like Trupiano a message that unattended cars are ripe for theft, which burdens Roseville’s police department. A police spokesman said the driverless warmups are illegal even for locked cars. Editor’s Note: In Charlotte, CMPD has reportedly written tickets to residents guilty of this crime even after their car was stolen.

CUTE CATS AND CRIMINALS (1) Jasper Fiorenza, 24, was arrested in St. Petersburg, Florida, in November and charged with breaking into a home in the middle of the night. The female resident said she awoke to see Fiorenza and screamed, but that the man nonetheless delayed his getaway in order to pet the woman’s cat lounging on her bed. (2) In December, Durham, Ontario, police officer Beth Richardson was set for a disciplinary hearing for “discreditable conduct” because, earlier in 2016, after being called to intervene at a drug user’s home, she had noticed the resident’s cat “cowering” in a corner and had taken her to a veterinarian, but without asking the owner’s permission.

QUESTIONABLE JUDGMENTS David

BY CHUCK SHEPHERD

POST-TRUTH SOCIETY In January, the U.S. Court of Appeals finally pulled the plug on Orange County, California, social workers who had been arguing in court for 16 years that they were not guilty of lying under oath because, after all, they did not understand that lying under oath in court is wrong. The social workers had been sued for improperly removing children from homes and defended their actions by inventing “witnesses” to submit made-up testimony. Their lawyers had been arguing that the social workers’ “due process” rights were violated in the lawsuit because in no previous case on record did a judge ever have occasion to explicitly spell out that creating fictional witness statements is not permitted.

HOW THE WORLD WORKS Former

elementary school teacher Maria Caya, who was allowed to resign quietly in 2013 from her Janesville, Wisconsin, school after arriving drunk on a student field trip, actually made money on the incident. In November 2016, the city agreed to pay a $75,000 settlement — because the police had revealed her blood-alcohol level, which is private medical information, to the press in 2013. The lawsuit against the police made no mention of Caya’s having been drunk or passed out, but only that she had “become ill.”

THE REDNECK CHRONICLES (1) John

Bubar, 50, was arrested in Parsonsfield, Maine, in November after repeatedly lifting his son’s mobile home with his front-end loader and dropping it. The father and son had been quarreling over rent payments and debris in the yard, and the father only eased up after realizing that his grandson was still inside the home. (2) The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission reversed itself in December and allowed Mary Thorn of Lakeland to keep her 6-foot-long pet alligator Rambo at home with her despite a regulation requiring that a gator that size needs a more spacious roaming area. Thorn and Rambo have been together for over a decade.

UNCLEAR ON THE CONCEPT “I’m (as) tired of hearing the word ‘creep’ as any black person or gay person is of hearing certain words,” wrote Lucas Werner, 37, on his Facebook page in December after he was banned from a Starbucks in Spokane, Washington, for writing a polite dating request to a teenaged barista. Managers thought Werner was harassing the female, who is at least the age of consent, but Werner charged illegal “age discrimination” and made a “science” claim that “age gap love” makes healthier babies.

POLICE

REPORT Taylor Trupiano grudgingly paid his $128 “traffic” fine in December, issued by a Roseville, Michigan, officer who caught his car warming up unattended — in his own driveway. Police

Martinez, 25, was shot in the stomach during a brawl in New York City in December. He had inadvertently initiated the chaos when, trying to park in Manhattan’s East Village just after Saturday midnight, he moved an orange traffic cone that had obviously been placed to reserve the parking space. He apparently failed to realize that the parking spot was in front of the clubhouse of Hells Angels, whose members happened to take notice.

THE ENTREPRENEURIAL SPIRIT An unnamed pregnant woman convinced a reporter from Jacksonville, Florida, station WFOX-TV in December that the “positive” urine tests she was advertising on Craigslist were accurate and that she was putting herself through school by supplying them, making about $200 a day. The seller claimed that “many” pregnant women market their urine for tests — even though the main use of the test seems to be “negotiation” with boyfriends or husbands.

PERSPECTIVE While poor, often uneducated murder defendants in some states receive marginal, part-time legal representation by lawyers at the bottom of their profession who are usually unable to keep their murder clients off of death row, Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted of three murders in the 2013 attack and facing a possible death sentence, once again will be represented for free by a team at the top of the profession — headed by the chief of the New York federal public defender’s office. Tsarnaev was previously represented by a team topped by the chief of the Boston federal public defender’s office.

LEAST COMPETENT CRIMINALS (1)

Matthew Bergstedt, 27, was charged with breaking into a house in Raleigh, North Carolina, in December, though he failed to anticipate that the resident was inside stacking firewood, which he used to bloody Bergstedt’s face for his mugshot. (2) On Dec. 5 in New York City, a so-far-unidentified man made five separate attempts to rob banks in midtown Manhattan over a three-hour span, but all tellers refused his demands, and he slinked away each time. Police said a man matching his description had successfully robbed a bank four days earlier.

RECURRING THEMES (1) What was

billed as the United Kingdom’s first “Rage Cage” opened in Nottingham, England, in December, allowing patrons to vent with crowbars, baseball bats and hammers to smash crockery, electronics and glassware — at prices ranging from about $15 to about $40. (2) In October, a bookstore in Cairo, Egypt, set aside a small, soundproof room where patrons could go scream at the top of their lungs for 10 minutes about whatever stresses them. The store owner pointed to an academic study demonstrating screaming’s “positive effect” on the brain. The prototype store is still Donna Alexander’s Anger Room in downtown Dallas, thriving since 2011, offering a variety of bludgeoning weapons, and especially active this election season, with target mannequins gussied up to be “Trump” and “Clinton.”

THE PASSING PARADE (1) Two weeks

after a Pakistani International Airlines crash killed all 47 on board, some employees of the company figured they needed to dispel the bad karma for their own safety and thus sacrificed a black goat on the tarmac at Islamabad airport next to an ATR-42 aircraft, the same model that crashed. (2) Badminton player Mads Pieler Kolding, in a January match in India’s Premier Badminton League, returned a volley at a world’s record for a shuttlecock — 265 mph.

NOTW CLASSIC (March 2013) In January

(2013), the National Hockey League labor dispute ended, and players returned to work, but as if on cue, some owners resumed their suspect claims that high player salaries were killing them financially. However, the Phoenix Business Journal reported in December 2012 that the NHL Phoenix Coyotes’ bookkeeping methodology allowed them to turn a profit for the season only if the lockout had continued and wiped out all the games. In other words, based on the team’s bookkeeping, the only way for the Coyotes to make money was to never play.

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left): The Federal Army in the late 1970s (clockwise, from

NEWS

, Lenny, Keegan Sr., Kathleen, and Mary Virginia Michael, Ann, Mark, Joan, Marian, Keegan Jr., Molly

Federal.

FEATURE

A FEDERAL CASE Charlotte’s matron saint of music and more turns 100

BY STEVE GOLDBERG

O

N A COOL OCTOBER night at a family party celebrating Charlotte musician Lenny Federal’s 50th birthday, his mother Mary Virginia Federal remarked to a guest, “We left Charlotte with three kids and came back with nine.” With perfect timing, her husband Keegan leaned in to add, “You do 12 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

know that we’re Catholic, right? I don’t want to seem irresponsible.” He slapped his knee and laughed at his own joke, and the guest couldn’t help but join in.

That was 15 years ago. Keegan Federal has since passed on. Lenny is now 65. And this week, Mary Virginia turns 100.

The invitation to her birthday celebration

on Jan. 28 includes the note, “No gifts please.”

While the request is certain to be ignored by many, one truth is very clear to those attending: Mary Virginia Federal IS the gift.

A week after the swearing in of a new president, whose hallmark is conspicuous consumption, and for whom the primary descriptor of his cabinet choices is the number

of commas between their dollar signs and decimal points, it is comforting to highlight the accomplishments of a woman whose wealth is measured by the love she sends to others and the vast return she receives on that investment. If you buy that premise, it could be argued that Mary Virginia Federal is the richest woman in Charlotte.

The Federals, above, with the Divine Miss M (pictured at bottom, to the left of Mary Virginia); at right, the Federals on their wedding day, and Mary Virginia as a child.

Through the cornucopia that is her family, Federal has made significant contributions to this city, not the least of which is its music tableau. She is the mother of prominent local musicians Michael and Lenny, who have been, individually and together, a staple of the Charlotte music scene for over 40 years.

More than that, Mrs. Federal is the matron saint of a family so deep and wide now that it’s commanded its own float in Charlotte’s St Patrick’s Day Parade for the past decade.

From their Irish origins to their arrival in North Carolina by way of Pennsylvania, the Federals are – and this is meant in a good way – the kudzu of County Clare; evergrowing, ever-impactful. Save for a relatively brief interruption, for the past century the Federal story is a Charlotte story.

Those nine children that Mother Federal mentioned are Keegan Jr., 74; Michael, 71; Ann, 69; Molly, 67; Lenny, 65; Kathleen, 63; Marian, 61; Joan, 59; and Mark, 57. With the exception of Keegan, who is based in Georgia, all live in Charlotte.

From that core are 25 grandchildren and 19 great-grandchildren, to date. Those offspring are more spread out, but they all know the way home and travel here frequently for family events.

This family is so vast the U.S. Census Bureau has a dedicated Federal counter.

But wait, there’s more. The branches of the Federal Army, as Keegan Sr. liked to call them, extend exponentially through marriages and all the relations they entail, as well as through legions of friends old and new who have gladly enlisted. On any given sunny St. Patrick’s Day, the Federal Clan can swell to 200 or more.

“I do not know any other families who have had a float like that and have brought their family together from all over to participate in it every year,” says Charlotte Mayor Jennifer Roberts. “They are very unique in that way.”

One tends to feel adopted around the

Federals, and that is never more evident than when Mary Virginia would go to the Double Door Inn or Comet Grill to see one or more of her offspring perform music. Family members have learned to wait their turn as others mob to share time with her. And without forethought, she treats each one as if he or she is the most important person in the room at that moment.

“I try,” she says. “Because it’s so terrible when you’re talking to someone and they’re looking around. Have you ever had that experience? It’s a terrible feeling.”

To use a current buzz term, she’s mindful.

But that isn’t new, nor is it a fad for Federal.

It is at the center of her ability to connect.

“When I’m talking to somebody, I’m thinking about them.”

Consciously or otherwise, her family does the same.

When asked who her favorite child is, she is quick to say there isn’t one. “You can’t have a favorite. They are all my favorites.”

Three of Federals daughters sitting in the room with her shake their heads, quickly acknowledging the veracity of that statement.

IF IT’S A LONG way to Tipperary, as the song goes, it’s but a wee bit closer to County Clare, which lies just west on the Atlantic coast in Ireland. That’s where Mary Virginia Federal’s paternal grandfather, Michael Buckley, lived before he emigrated to Reading, Pa., in 1849 with his mother and two brothers.

Her parents grew up in Philadelphia but moved to Richmond, Va., where Mary Virginia was born. The family relocated to Charlotte in 1917 when she was six months old. Two younger siblings, brother George and sister Trudy, were born here.

FROM THEIR IRISH ORIGIN S TO NORTH WAY OF PEN CAROLINA B NSYLVANIA, Y THE FEDERA THIS IS MEA L S ARE – AND NT IN A GOOD W A Y – THE KUDZU COUNTY CLA OF RE; EVER-GR OWING, EVER -IMPACTFUL .

As her second birthday approached, in 1919, a photo portrait was scheduled, and Mary Virginia Buckley traveled with her mother and aunt Jenny from the family home on Dilworth Road West near Magnolia Avenue to uptown Charlotte to purchase a new pair of shoes for the occasion. The shop on Tryon Street featured long rows of backto-back seating that divided the store with customers on both sides.

When Mary Virginia’s aunt responded to hearing the cost of the shoes by saying, “Oh, isn’t that fierce?” a woman on the other side recognized the Philadelphia colloquialism and accent. It was Margaret Federal, and her family had roots there as well. The Buckleys and Federals soon discovered that the families had been acquainted back in Pennsylvania.

Margaret Federal had several of her eight children in tow, one of them being Robert Joseph Keegan, who was 16 months older than Mary Virginia. The families became close friends and saw each other often. Yet no one at the shoe store that day would have ventured that this was the day Mary Virginia met her future husband.

To hear her tell it, it took Keegan a while to figure that out himself.

“We were always with the same group of kids and we were the only Catholics in the crowd,” she says of their school days, but adds that Keegan never asked her out.

Things began to change during a skating excursion on what she calls “a good hill” near the then-new Mint Museum, the state’s first art institution, which opened in 1936.

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DERAL IS “LENNY FE DY GRANDDAD E H T T S U J AS FAR AS OF MUSIC E S WHO HAV MUSICIAN RE. HE’S PLAYED HE ST RE THE MO E H D E Y A L P ONGEST OF AND THE L ANYBODY.”

Lenny (left) and Michael Federal with their guitar-slinging mom Mary Virginia at the Double Door Inn three years ago.

When one eventually had the family of the boys relocating from Charlotte returned for 22 years, first to with his car Columbus, Ga., in 1948, to give the where six more children tuckeredwere added to the fold out skaters before his work moved a ride home, S the family again, this E R R A NICK K they piled time to Chicago, in INN OWNER R O O D E L DOUB in quickly, 1966. leaving her The medical facility without a seat. in Columbus didn’t quite name the T h a t ’s w h e n maternity ward for Federal, but “I was one Keegan invited her to sit on his lap, telling a of the best customers they had at St. Francis friend later that Mary Virginia was “a good Hospital,” she says with a laugh. sport” about it.

After four years in Illinois, a chance Recounting the story, she chuckles at his opened for the family to return home to choice of words. “A good sport? Can you Charlotte and the Federals jumped at it. Well, imagine that?” most of them anyway.

Strong, lean, and athletic, Keegan would By that time, elder son Keegan Jr., known be the president of his senior class at Central in the family as Bobby, was in law school High School in 1934. Still, she says, it took at Emory University in Atlanta and getting a while for him to finally ask her out on a his MBA at Georgia State. While the family proper date. Both were out of school and was living in the suburbs of Chicago, second working, he for General Dyestuff Company son Michael followed them after spending a as a chemist and her in the office at Fidelity couple of years at Loyola University in New & Casualty, an insurance company. But once Orleans; he chose to stay in Chicago, where he he got up the nerve, he knew she was the one. began performing his music in clubs.

They married on Nov. 7, 1942, almost 24 Michael had learned to play guitar while years after they’d first met at the shoe store. going through another Federal tradition – At the time, the United States had surged the priesthood phase – during his first three deeper into World War II. He had already years of high school at St. John Vianney joined the Army Air Corps where he rose to Minor Seminary, in Savannah, Ga. (Keegan First Lieutenant and served for four and a Jr. and Lenny had also given the priesthood half years. consideration.) The guitar stuck for Michael; Returning home after the war, Keegan thoughts of becoming a priest did not. rejoined General Dyestuff and the family grew Working a crowd stuck for Michael, who to include three kids. Keegan’s continued would soon be starring as Claude opposite Joe success and promotion at General Dyestuff Mantegna’s Berger in the Chicago production 14 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

of Hair as the 1960s drew to a close.

MICHAEL FEDERAL’S musical interests

had a huge influence on the family’s fifth child and third son, Lennox, named for an uncle who was the Archbishop of Salt Lake City but called Lenny by most.

“I always looked up to him,” Lenny says. “I always thought what he was doing was cool.

He was playing and it looked like fun. He left a guitar at the house and I started to learn a few chords.”

But Lenny was more into sports than music at that point, and his mother has the newspaper clippings to prove it. Her scrapbook proudly includes one from 1968 that proclaimed Lenny “King of the 95 Pounders” after he won a wrestling tournament. He wound up earning a wrestling scholarship from Western Illinois University.

The times, they were a changing, and Lenny never forgot the impact that one band, in particular, had on his brother upon his return. “Michael had just gone off to school,” Lenny remembers. “He actually went and saw the Beatles and he came back a different guy.”

When the family returned to Charlotte in 1970, Michael’s train was about to roll from the Second City to the first one, New York, where he would join Barry Manilow and Melissa Manchester in the band that made Bette Midler divine. They had met after Miss M attended a performance of Hair while in Chicago for a gig.

Meanwhile, back in Charlotte, Lenny had begun hanging out at a hippie coffee shop called Muthers, run by the late John Mullis.

“John was one of the first people I met when I came to town,” Lenny remembers.

“I tried out for his band, Trout Fishing in America [named for hippie writer Richard Brautigan’s book that was popular at the time]. I enjoyed what they were doing and they said they needed a drummer. I was playing guitar at the time but onstage I was playing the drums.”

When the band hired a “real drummer,” as Federal puts it, karma came together.

Restaurant owner Nick Karres was thinking about adding live music to a joint he’d opened in 1973, the Double Door Inn. Lenny, who had been a customer there, was looking for a place to play.

“Lenny is just the granddaddy of music as far as musicians who have played here,” says Karres, who closed the Double Door earlier this month, on Jan. 3, after 43 years as a Charlotte music institution. “He’s played here the most and the longest of anybody.”

When Michael eventually came home to Charlotte in 1979, he and Lenny got to know each other better as fellow musicians. Their youngest brother, Mark, became the business manager for a new five-piece band they called the Federal Bureau of Rock N Roll.

AS SOMEONE WHO grew up in Charlotte,

Mayor Roberts has more than a passing knowledge of the Federal brothers in performance.

“They’re not just great musicians,” Roberts says, “but also great personalities.”

Music had always been a part of the Federal DNA. Keegan Sr. loved his Irish heritage and the songs that came with it. He was quick to sing along to “Danny Boy” when given the chance, or just on a whim.

Mary Virginia’s sense of rhythm came

from playing piano and from her ballroom dancing prowess. Their skill, desire and talent have moved seamlessly from generation to generation.

Among the grandchildren, Michael’s son is the front man in Case Federal and the Agents. Keegan Jr.’s daughter Cameron is a member of the Georgia-based Little Country Giants with her husband Russell Cook.

Molly’s son J. Keegan Federal plays guitar; Marian’s son Seth Phillips plays saxophone, while his brothers Michael and Matt both play guitar; and all of Joan’s kids – Brendan, Ellen, Mary Suzanne, Kristen – can carry a tune. Lenny’s son Mark knows more than a few chords but like his dad at a young age, hasn’t yet decided if music is in his future.

Sometimes the Federals’ musical talent manifests late, as it did with Mary Virginia’s third daughter, Kathleen, now 63, who started playing guitar and writing songs only a few years ago. She and her husband Barry Finnegan just returned from a trip to Nashville where they did some recording.

There’s so much musical talent in the family that, two years ago, the younger generation of Federals inaugurated an event called Big Ol’ Happy Family Jubilee, a sort of Fedstock, to give them all a chance to play together in various combinations. Of course, the best seat in the house is always reserved for Mary Virginia.

If music’s connective social and healing properties run strong among the Federals, so does its sense of community, and much of that comes from the mother ship.

An attorney in Atlanta, Keegan Jr. spent eight years as a superior court judge in Dekalb County. He gained national notoriety for hiring a young homeless man, who’d stood before Judge Federal on burglary charges, as a bailiff rather than jailing him.

The idea was to give the man a chance to turn his life around.

Ann Federal was a special education teacher for 24 years. Molly worked as a paralegal. Kathleen is the human resources director at Habitat for Humanity. Marian is senior vice president of community relations at Wells Fargo. Joan retired from work in community development for the YMCA. Mark works in the golf industry but spends much of his time on family efforts such as the St. Patrick’s Day Parade and fundraising for the Holy Angels Home for the differently abled in Belmont. Counting husbands, wives, and children, there are a a bevy of educators, nurses, military veterans and others who chose occupations that serve others.

When the common thread of this collection of vocations was brought to their attention, Ann, Joan and Marian were authentically bemused. That, perhaps, is the most special thing about the Federal Clan. They don’t really see their family as all that special. And their humility starts at the top. Mary Virginia Federal is clear on how important her family is to her, but like the eye of a hurricane, she doesn’t seem aware of how the swirl around her affects everything else.

WOODROW WILSON was the 28th

president when Mary Virginia Buckley came into the world, and it should be noted that her mother and other women in North Carolina did not have the right to vote either for or against him. That right didn’t come until six months after her third birthday, when the 19th Amendment to the Constitution was finally ratified in August 1920 after 41 years in political purgatory following the time it was introduced.

The struggle for women’s right to vote in North Carolina was a precursor to the state’s current legislative agenda of plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose, the French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr’s realization that the more things change, the more they remain the same.

When presented with the opportunity to be the 36th and final state necessary to ratify the amendment in 1920, more than half of North Carolina’s legislature showed its proclivity to be on the wrong side of history by sending a telegram to the Tennessee representatives who were also in session, asking them to stall against the inevitable.

The Volunteer state decided not to piss into the wind, and women across the country, including in North Carolina, received protection against voting discrimination by gender, no thanks to our state’s leaders.

In Mary Virginia Federal’s lifetime, there have been 25 presidential elections and she’s been eligible to vote in 20 of them. Her first after turning 21 was in 1940, when Franklin D. Roosevelt defeated Wendell Willkie for a third term. She voted last November and says she has cast a ballot in every election

she’s been able to.

“My dad was very interested in politics and he wanted his children to be interested in their country,” Federal says. Not identifying herself as Democrat or Republican, Federal takes the privilege seriously and says she votes for the person over the party.

When asked about the most recent presidential election, Federal’s disappointment in how far down the process has sunk in her lifetime is unmistakable. “I think he’s the most disgusting person I’ve ever heard on television,” she admits when pressed for an opinion. “He’s so disrespectful to everybody. I’m just so sorry that he won.”

She repeats the word sorry several times.

Mary Virginia Federal’s granddaughter Caroline, Michael’s daughter, has already worked for two former presidents, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. She first interned at the Carter Center for Human Rights in Atlanta, and more recently has held several positions at the Clinton Global Initiative.

Since then, the Appalachian State University graduate earned her Master’s in comparative politics at the London School of Economics and is now at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she is part of an MIT program targeted to bring diverse talent

together to explore and find workable solutions for global issues.

Caroline’s grandmother is proud of her. Although Mary Virginia Federal once claimed she didn’t want to live to see her centennial birthday, that’s all changed now.

Today she sports a t-shirt that reads, “I intend to live forever.”

Mary Virginia may not have lived to see Hillary Clinton become the first female president of the United States – and Federal says she doesn’t want the job herself (we asked) – she just might see her granddaughter take that job.

Wouldn’t that be a nice birthday gift to hang around for?

Mary Virginia and Michael Federal in the Charlotte St. Patrick’s Day Parade (right).

All photos courtesy of the Federal family.

CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 15

NEWS

CHS R IA R T A M E H T F O H C R MA ort

FEATURE

streets in Uptown to supp Thousands take to m equality women’s rights, de and

Prisca Kim said that, despite the fact that her 2-year-old son JJ cannot talk, she wanted to teach him early the importance of speaking up for women’s rights.

BY RYAN PITKIN

“

First of all, I’m here for myself as a woman. Also, I want my son to experience standing up for women at a young age. I want him to learn that women make up half the world and without women, this world would fail.

-Prisca Kim

“

Prisca Kim

for 25,000 enough on Saturday m g lon f of ld he ’s rights in ra e Th town in support of wo inen Up h ug ro th ch ar ed with m cid to le peop on Charlotte, which co ch ar M ’s en om W e th g durin throughout the world.t Ward Park, and simultaneous marches th a gathering at Firset into the center The march began wim arching up 7th Stre at 10 a.m. folks began was so long that at one time it extended of Uptown. The march int to the end point, as marchers were from the beginning pomare Bearden Park nearly an hour after still streaming into Ro d arrived there. the crowd on the head of the line ha with some people in es e ok sp g in af Lo e rs, about tiv ea Cr were first-time prot pete om wh of y an m nce was , rie ay rd Satu e out and what the ex m co to em th d ire sp in what like for them.

Carole Morris said she was an “at-home liberal” but was inspired by the election of Trump to become more active.

“

Carole Morri

s

I didn’t really get out and do much before but I think the stakes are just too high. It’s great to know there are so many people that are willing to organize and make sure that we’re fighting for what we believe in over the next four years. A bunch of mad women is nothing to mess with.

- Carole Morris

“

“

Arnold Ong brought his son Kai to stand in solidarity with women.

16 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

“

g.

Arnold and Kai On

I wanted to support 50 percent of our world population.

I believe in equal rights for everyone — all people of all backgrounds, creeds and religions — so I’m here to help support that. Today is especially important because it’s the day after the inauguration, and so I think it’s important that we voice our concerns to the newly elected president that this is a democracy, that he represents all people.

-Arnold Ong

At just 15 years old, Kristalynn Oliver-Mays and her group of friends thought it was important to join the march as women who will be voting against President Trump’s potential re-election in four years.

“

We’re here because we believe in the social, economic and political equality of the sexes. We believe that Trump has no permission to tell us what to do with our bodies and the government has no permission to tell us what we can do. We’re women, we deserve the same rights as men do and as the youngest generation we need to make it clear that we’re not going to stand for this any longer and that equality is happening and it will come. We will overcome this and he will not have eight years in office.

-Kristalynn Oliver-Mays

“

This was really exciting. I didn’t expect to see this many people here today. I came in solidarity — not only as a woman but as a person of color — for immigrants, for the LGBT community and for any group that was marginalized during this election cycle.

-Karla Theodore

“

Sally Schrader was not able to march alongside her daughter and granddaughter — who were marching in Vermont and New York, respectively — but seeing the generational gap bridged at Saturday’s march in Uptown inspired her.

“

Karla Theod ore (left).

It’s very unifying that the generations are all uniting. If you look around here, you’ve got the little bitty kids and the seniors and even disabled people in wheelchairs are represented. It’s just really a cross section of people who are concerned about our future.

- Sally Schrader

“

“

It’s my first time protesting ever in my life. I’m overwhelmed, and I’m glad to be here today because I don’t feel so alone in this now.

-Kim Bohannon

“

“

I am not a marcher, I am not a protester, but I couldn’t be still and quiet for this.

-Brenda Stubbs

Brenda Stubbs (left) and Kim Bohannon

d Scott

.

ft) an ewell (le H y e o J

y.

Lindsle

Joey Hewell and his husband Scott Lindsley pointed out that the crowd was filled with white women, who, for better or worse, get reactions when they turn out like they did on Saturday.

“

Look at who it actually is that’s out here. I feel like a lot of times when people march they don’t have the support of a bunch of white women. There’s a bunch of white women out here and kids and families. I feel like that’s the best way to be heard, unfortunately, in this country; when you offend white women.

- Joey Hewell

“

Neither Brenda Stubbs nor her friend Kim Bohannon had ever protested before Saturday, and both had been slow to express their sadness and outrage since Trump’s election.

However, the Women’s March on Charlotte inspired each to join the masses of those with similar anxieties about the country’s future under Trump.

These are your neighbors. These aren’t people you can point to from the other side of the tracks that you love to hate. These are people you know, these people are in your church, these kids go to your kids’ schools.

-Scott Lindsley

“

.

Sally Schrader

“

“

“

th friends.

er) wi r-Mays (top cent Kristalynn Olive

Karla Theodore moved to Charlotte from Miami nine months ago. She wasn’t sure what to expect on Saturday, as many of her friends didn’t know about the march. She even tried to convince her Uber driver to take the rest of the morning off and join the march.

CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 17

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18 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

BY CHRISSIE NELSON

T

WICE A YEAR, restaurants

across the Charlotte area offer 10 days of prix fixe menus to diners from across the economic spectrum.

Restaurant Week, which is popular in cities across the country, is fondly known here as Queen’s Feast. The goal is to make some of Charlotte’s fine-dining establishments accessible to all, evoking the feeling that any diner can enjoy meals fit for a Queen.

More than 130 restaurants participate throughout Charlotte and the surrounding nine counties, but let’s be real, it can be a

little overwhelming. To make things easier for you, I have narrowed this sprawling event to just four of my favorite participating Queen’s Feast restaurants, each one offering something a little bit different.

Variety: Mimosa Grill. This is a choice Queen’s Feast experience because of the wide variety of offerings on the Restaurant Week menu. Instead of just two to three choices, Mimosa Grill offers up its entire menu to diners on this special week, giving a true experience of the restaurant by showcasing the full range and quality

Dessert dishes at Passion8.

CHRISSIE NELSON

of dishes. Appropriately, Mimosa adds a surcharge to the prix fixe price depending on the dish (entrees like scallops, steaks and other seafood get about a $6 uptick) but even with the surcharges, the meal is still a deal.

Adding to the delicious meal we had at Mimosa was its stellar service; the waiter was poised and professional, and brought us extra dessert on the house when she heard our lively debate over apple cheesecake and banana crème brulee.

Where: 327 S. Tryon St. More info: mimosagrill.com Must orders: Lobster Macaroni & Cheese, Charlotte’s Hushpuppies, Pecan Crusted North Carolina Mountain Trout, and Pan Roasted Diver Sea Scallops.

Frugal going fancy: Lumiere. Don’t be fooled by the strip-mall location, this classic French restaurant in Myers Park is the real deal. With entrees sometimes creeping into the $40 range, Lumiere is a must-visit during Queen’s Feast because you can get the fine-dining, white-tablecloth experience without the price tag. Plus, the food is really, really good. Year after year, Lumiere has been consistently rated as one of Charlotte’s top restaurants. We had a Friday late-night dinner date at Lumiere two years ago during Queen’s Feast and it’s a meal I still dream about (it was late-night because that’s how competitive the reservations were). The food was decadant and the service impeccable.

Where: 1015 Providence Rd. More info: lumieremyerspark.com Must orders: Escargot Bourguignon, Fillet of Grass Fed Beef and Slow-Braised Beef Short Rib, Milk Chocolate Profiteroles.

Farm to fork: Passion8. If you’re looking for local, look no further than this restaurant, perched on Elizabeth Avenue, which has become a little Charlotte culinary mecca.

Passion8 exudes sophistication and romance with a hint of rustic. Husband-and-wife team Luca and Jessica Annunziata are passionate about food, emulating European hospitality with local ingredients from farmers and artisans in the Carolinas.

Where: 1523 Elizabeth Ave. More info: thepassion8.com Must orders: Pork Shank Osso Bucco, Baby

Scallop with caramelized Belgian endive, blood orange, serrano ham and black truffle potatoes from Lumiere.

CHRISSIE NELSON

Octopus Siciliana, Tiramisu.

The big add-on: Bonterra Dining and Wine Room. If you’re looking for a great date-night vibe or an elegant evening out with friends, I suggest a bottle of wine (or a glass, they have more than 200 choices) and a table next to a window. Housed in a historic church, the space’s casual elegance is matched by its contemporary, flavorful cuisine. Plus, the signature fried lobster tail available as an add-on to the Queen’s Feast menu is totally worth it.

Where: 1829 Cleveland Ave. More info: bonterradining.com Must orders: PEI Mussels, Prime NY Strip, Caramel Cheesecake.

Find the full list of participating restaurants at charlotterestaurantweek.com CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 19

FOOD

THREE-COURSE SPIEL

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This little sandwich shop ain’t no sinking sub.

ROCK STEADY After 25 years, Richard Jones’ Sub One keeps cruising

BY DEBRA RENEE SETH

SOME SHOPS just don’t need to advertise.

20 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

customers love about Sub One.

It’s word-of-mouth from respected locals that gives certain locally owned shops and restaurants long-term sustainability as others, despite elaborate attempts, struggle to stay afloat.

Word-of-mouth has kept the small deli Sub One, nestled into a tiny strip mall on Graham Street, a favorite go-to lunch spot for years.

Day after day, the scent of freshly sliced bread, meat, cheeses and onions fills the air around this Uptown sandwich shop as clientele ranging from banking executives to area storekeepers fill Richard Jones’ 25-yearold family jewel. During lunch rush, Jones, his son Derek and nephew Aaron serve their tasty sandwiches to the steady the hum of a cash register ringing up orders.

Despite the deli’s success, Jones maintains a humble and steady approach to his business. He wouldn’t even have his photo taken for this story. “I don’t do pictures,” he said as customers greeted him.

We sat down with Jones anway, to find out if his total lack of ego is what keeps his subs from sinking. You be the judge.

You’ve been running your business hands-on for about a quarter-century.

It was hard for us to even catch up with you because you’re always working. Do you ever take a day off, and if so, would we ever find you in another sandwich shop enjoying lunch?

(Laughs) Yes, I work everyday except Saturday open to close, but I don’t mind because I get to work with my son and my nephew doing what we love.

It’s a family business, and having inherited this business it means a lot to me. When I’m off I’m usually in church or just relaxing with family enjoying life. I never worry about the business when I’m off because I know my son and my nephew will run things without missing a beat.

And no, you won’t catch me in any other sub shops unless I’m out of town or something, then maybe. (Laughs) Business owners feel a lot of loyalty to their own brand.

Creative Loafing: Locals consider your deli one of the best places to enjoy a submarine sandwich, hoagie or whatever you want to call it. How do you take the basic ingredients that go into your sandwiches over the top?

Richard Jones: The only thing I can think of is we try to do as much as we can to put care and love into the food we prepare. We take our time with each customer and I guess that’s what keeps them coming back.

There’s this thing called the “intangible” and that’s the difference. You can’t describe it. You just feel it. I think that’s what our

A lot has changed in Uptown Charlotte since you’ve been in business and it looks like more change is yet to come.

What are your thoughts on all the growth in the area?

Well, yes a lot has changed in the area and the area has grown a bit, but we just keep doing what we’re doing.

Our steak sandwiches, chicken sandwiches — all those are the same and they won’t be changing. We’ll continue taking care of our customers and preparing the best food we can. But yes, I’m sure there will be changes.

CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 21

THURSDAY

26

BILLY JOE SHAVER What: At 77, he’s probably the best Texas outlaw country songwriter along with his fellow Texan Willie Nelson. Nelson has recorded Shaver’s tunes and dueted with the songwriter on his 2014 lament “Hard To Be an Outlaw.” Many others have recorded Shaver songs: Elvis, Kris Kristofferson and Waylon, who covered an album’s worth of ‘em. But only Shaver does Shaver perfectly, so you better catch him while you can.

When: 7 p.m.

Where: Neighborhood Theatre, 511 E. 36th St. More: $20. neighborhoodtheatre. com.

22 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

FRIDAY

27 QUEEN CITY COMEDY FESTIVAL

THINGS TO DO

TOP TEN

Adam Lazzara of Taking Back Sunday FRIDAY

FRIDAY

27 TAKING BACK SUNDAY

What: There’s plenty to cry about in America this week, and the best antidote is laughter. So join a gaggle of Charlotte squawkers, including Robot Johnson Sketch Comedy, the Chuckleheads, PJ Barnes, the hilarious Blayr Nias (whose mom told her, “I’m gonna give you the whitest name ever and then fuck up the spelling”) and more. There will be workshops, a live podcast recording, tons of performances with big blowout on Saturday night.

What: So you’re a Taking Back Sunday fan but you didn’t get your tickets to this special acoustic show before it sold out? You fucked up, my friend. And you know you fucked up. What’re you gonna do about it? You have two choices: Go online and buy a scalped ticket for $5 billion or go stand outside the Evening Muse. Hey, it’s the Evening Muse, so you can be damn sure you’ll be able to hear every word of “Make Damn Sure.” But don’t forget: You fucked up.

When: Fri. 7 p.m. - Sat. 11:30 p.m.

Where: Acting Out Studios, 8145 Ardrey Kell Rd. More: $15 - $65. queencitycomedy. com.

When: 8 p.m.

Where: Evening Muse, 3227 N. Davidson St. More: $25. eveningmuse.com.

FRIDAY

27 CHARLOTTE LEAGUE OF CREATIVE INTERVENTIONISTS LAUNCH PARTY What: The League of Creative Interventionists is a global network of people creating shared spaces to break down social barriers and build connections between people and communities. Charlotte chapter fellows Quintel Gwinn and Rebecca Henderson will host this launch party to learn about LCI and share ideas about how to creatively reimagine our city.

When: 7-9 p.m.

Where: Free Range Brewing, 2320 N. Davidson St. More: Free. freerangebrewing.com.

FRIDAY

27 BRAHMS VS. RADIOHEAD What: Brahms’ majestically gloomy First Symphony turned classical music inward and revolutionized what a symphony could be. More than a century later, Radiohead muted their rock guitars for the textured, insular OK Computer, a groundbreaking album that redefined rock. So why not mash the two together? In an exercise of musical alchemy, Conductor Steve Hackman and the Charlotte Symphony explore and experiment with these two introverted masterworks.

When: 7:30 p.m.

Where: Knight Theater, 430 S. Tryon St. More: $20. blumenthalarts.com.

Blayr Nias FRIDAY

Jack’s Militia SUNDAY

NEWS ARTS FOOD MUSIC ODDS

Poverty: A History of Racial Exclusion TUESDAY

SATURDAY

28

100 LOVE NOTES BOOK LAUNCH GALA

SUNDAY

29 EROTIC POETRY SLAM

What: Charlottean Hyong Li touched lives and made national headlines in November 2015 when he set out on the anniversary of his wife Catherine’s death handing out 100 distinct love notes that honored Catherine’s life and his love for her to strangers in Uptown. Those original love notes have now been turned into two books featuring the art of 17 artists, and Yi has founded the 100 Love Notes Foundation with a mission to spread love.

What: For a lot of folks, erotic poetry usually begins with the immortal words, “There once was girl from Nantucket.” This 12-poet competition broadens the amorous palette to include the outer reaches of the adult imagination, and places sexual love in the context of beautiful language. From the lewd and lascivious to the seductive and salacious, you’ll be sure to hear plenty of titillating turns of phrase tumbling off the tongue. There’s a $10 fee for slammers.

When: 7-9 p.m.

Where: Ciel Gallery, 128 E. Park Ave. More: $50 per ticket. $90 per couple. 100lovenotes.com.

When: 8 p.m.

Where: Apostrophe Lounge, 1440 S. Tryon St. More: $5-10. apostrophelounge. com.

SUNDAY

29 JACK’S MILITIA SEASON KICKOFF

SUNDAY

29 BREWS & VIEWS

What: With rumors of a Major League Soccer team coming to Charlotte beginning to look like more than rumors, soccer has been on everyone’s mind this winter.

Now meet the guys who have had soccer on their mind yearround since 2012. Jack’s Militia is a fan club for the Charlotte Independence, and will be meeting on Sunday to discuss any and all things Charlotte soccer before the U.S. men’s national team plays against Serbia at 4 p.m.

What: Things are about to get weird. This month’s Brews & Views film screening features two movies starring the always-awkward Michael Cera. First, in Youth in Revolt, intellectual teen Nick Twisp is out of his element when he and his mother move to a trailer park and he soon falls in love with his neighbor Sheeni. Then, in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Cera’s Scott Pilgrim has to fight off a bevy of exboyfriends in order to win the hand and heart of Ramona Flowers. Also, free pizza, so there’s that.

When: 2 p.m.

Where: Courtyard Hooligans, 140 Brevard Ct. More: Free. jacksmilitia.com.

When: 7 p.m.

Where: Petra’s, 1919 Commonwealth Ave. More: Free. petrasbar.com.

TUESDAY

31

POVERTY: A HISTORY OF RACIAL EXCLUSION What: You’ve wanted to make a difference in Charlotte but didn’t know how to get started? Here’s how: Get involved in the Movement for Black Lives. Although not associated with the national Black Lives Matter organization, The Charlotte Post has been hosting important community events recarding race under the BLM-Charlotte title. This week’s discussion revolves around poverty and economic mobility in the Queen City.

When: 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

Where: Plaza United Methodist Church, 5600 Plaza Rd. More: Free. tinyurl.com/zclc9js

CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 23

MAKE the CONNECTION Connect with Culture Day opens things up in the Charlotte arts scene

THE CHARLOTTE MUSEUM OF HISTORY The Hezekiah Alexander House, Mecklenburg County’s oldest surviving structure, dates back to 1774. On Connect with Culture Day the home site will be providing free, guided tours every half hour from 1 – 4 p.m.

Attendees will get insight into the lives of settlers from almost two–and-a-half centuries ago.

Also at the Charlotte Museum of History, get an appreciation for the diversity of east Charlotte as 10 east Charlotte restaurants will be on hand serving international food samples, including Vietnamese, Chinese, classic Southern, Italian, African, Israeli, Caribbean and more.

Burn off all those calories with some drumming and dancing afterward.

Carolinas Latin Dance starts things off with two Bomba dances from Puerto Rico, followed by Dr. Maha Gingrich and Dances of India performing 3,000-yearold dances that tell the story of ancient India through costumes, dance dramas and music.

Last but not least, get in on the fun with an interactive drum circle.

According to a release, “The circle is a symbol of wholeness and integration, with the center of a circle understood to symbolize Spirit – the Source. Because a circle has no beginning and no end, the agreement to connect in a circle allows energy to circulate from one person to the next.”

When: 1 – 5 p.m.

Where: Charlotte Museum of History, 3500 Shamrock Drive More: charlottemuseum.org

24 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

BECHTLER MUSEUM OF MODERN ART Everybody knows about the Bechtler Firebird, the massive, shiny sculpture that sits outside the Bechtler Museum of Modern Art. Now is your chance to go inside and appreciate the beautiful art indoors for free, like you do with the Firebird every time you walk by.

The Bechtler will be open with no cover between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday, and offering docent-led tours of the museum between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. These in-depth tours can last up to an hour, so be ready to learn.

As is often the case in The Bechtler, there will be interactive, kid-friendly art activities to participate in stationed throughout the museum. These stations will include Model Magic Maquettes, in which kids can sculpt their own art pieces using the Crayola modeling compound.

Also, kids will have a chance to make their own colorful keychains or create watercolor paintings, as inspired by the art hanging around them.

Museum staff will also be supplying attendees with Bechtler BINGO cards, so you can make a competition out of it with your friends.

When: 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Where: Bechtler Museum of Modern Art, 420 S. Tryon St. More: bechtler.org

CHARLOTTE BALLET The Charlotte Ballet will be connecting with culture all throughout the greater Charlotte area on Saturday, so we’ll list a few events here and let you decide the coolest (or closest) event to you.

At First Baptist Church-West in west Charlotte, learn the beauty, rhythms and music of West African dance. Artist Javonne Spearman, originally of Liberia, will take dancers through a series of movements based in traditional dance. Students of all ages are welcomed to take part in the sharing. No previous experience is required.

In east Charlotte, ballerina Candace Ricketts will lead storytime at Independence Regional Library. Ricketts will be reading some of her favorite children’s stories to kids, who are encouraged to dress up as their favorite children’s story characters — or as whatever they want. Ballerina Paige Hinkley will be hosting a similar event at South County Regional Library in south Charlotte, or catch Cara Kanswick leading storytime at University City Regional Library.

When: 10:30-11:30 a.m.

Where: First Baptist Church-West Family Life Center, 1801 Oakland Ave. When: 11 a.m.-12 p.m.

Where: Independence Regional Library, 6000 Conference Drive When: 2-3 p.m.

Where: South County Regional Library, 5801 Rea Road When: 10:15-11:15 a.m.

Where: University City Regional Library, 301 East W.T. Harris Blvd.

More: charlotteballet.org

SYMPHONY GUILD OF CHARLOTTE The Symphony Guild of Charlotte is hosting one of its Musical Petting Zoo events at ImaginOn for free on Connect with Culture Day. The guild experience is part of the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra’s Lollipop Concert Series, a series aimed at engaging children in all their senses.

At the Musical Petting Zoo, children get a hands-on introduction to the instruments of the orchestra. Teach your kids to toot their own horn a bit by letting them see what it’s like to try on someone else’s. The press release states that “the cacophony of laughter, shrieks of delight and clarinet squawks are not to be missed,” but it may be wise for parents to bring a couple earplugs along just in case.

The orchestra includes string instruments (violins, cellos, etc.), woodwind (flutes, oboes, piccolos), brass (trumpets and trombones) and every kid’s favorite: percussion. There’s no musical experience needed, so come let out some anxiety by banging on some drums or blowing down the house on a tuba, you know you’ve always wanted to.

Volunteers are still wanted, so visit the website listed below to sign up.

When: 11 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Where: ImaginOn, 300 E. 7th St. More: symphonyguildcharlotte.org/youthmusic/musical-petting-zoo/

We all need a good connect, and the Arts and Science Council of Charlotte is hooking everyone up with a free day of arts fun in venues around Mecklenburg County.

We’ve picked eight diverse ideas ranging from history to music to photography, but the list below is just a brushstroke in the mural that will be Connect with Culture Day. Visit www.artsandscience.org for a complete list of events.

LEVINE MUSEUM OF THE NEW SOUTH This award-winning museum’s current exhibits, “Cotton Fields to Skyscrapers,” “Nowhere | Now Here,” and “Looking at Appalachia” will be open to the public during Connect with Culture.

The Levine’s main exhibit, “Cotton Fields,” offers the most in-depth look at post-Civil War Southern history (and in particular, Charlotte-area history) in the nation, featuring more than 1,000 images and other artifacts, videos and oral histories. A more recent addition is “Nowhere | Now Here,” created by Victoria Byers and 15 Mexican- and Honduran-descended students; it explores the 1990s Latino influx through photos of immigrants who have made homes in North Carolina’s small towns.

The Levine’s newest exhibit is “Looking at Appalachia” — images from regional photographers of an Appalachia that looks markedly different from the one branded into American minds by the “War of Poverty” legislation of the 1960s.

Those images showed only a slice of Appalachia, leading to stereotypes of its people that live on today. “Looking at Appalachia” blasts those stereotypes with a more comprensive view.

“We will also host the Long Overdue Bluegrass Band, presented by the Charlotte Folk Society, from 11:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.,” says Levine spokesperson Mandy Drakeford.

When: 10 a.m. - 2 p.m.

Where: 200 E. 7th St. More: museumofthenewsouth.org

GANTT CENTER FOR AFRICANAMERICAN ARTS+CULTURE Not only will the Harvey B. Gantt Center unveil four exhibitions on Jan. 28, but visitors can take in gallery talks and guided tours all for a grand total of zero dollars.

What you’ll see are massive sculptures, a variety of paintings, mixed-media pieces — all created by contemporary AfricanAmerican artists in their prime.

The exhibitions include Alison Saar’s “The Nature of Us,” Jordan Casteel’s “Harlem Notes,” Zun Lee’s “Father Figure,” and an overview called “The Future is Abstract.”

One of the more celebrated artists among the four is Los Angeles-based Saar, whose work reaches back to African cultural traditions, the natural world and her African-American ancestors to bring to life the experiences of African-American women living today.

Saar’s works often center on the meaning and importance of hair in African-American culture. For example, a drawing from 1997 features butterflies, flowers, mushrooms, cobwebs, skulls and other items trapped in a woman’s head of hair.

“It’s about the complexity of women’s lives and about how there’s all this stuff that becomes entangled in your hair,” Saar once said of the piece, adding that hair is “a spirit catcher in a way. . . it catches your fears and it catches your dreams.”

When: 10 a.m. - 5 p.m.

Where: 551 South Tryon St. More: ganttcenter.org

THE LIGHT FACTORY The Light Factory, housed within the Midwood International Cultural Center, is hosting a Darkroom and Cyanotype experience and open gallery for Connect with Culture Day. In a world where everyone is taking Snapchat selfies that can immediately be filtered to make you look like any number of different animals, this event will give you a whole new appreciation for photographic work.

Guests will be taught how to make a photogram, which is a photographic image made without a camera. All we ask is that at least one person yell “Do it for the ‘Gram” while in the process of making a photogram and then let us know later how that was received.

Attendees will also learn how to properly execute the cyanotype process, one of the very first photographic processes, discovered by Sir John Herschel in 1842. The cyanotype process was mainly used as a way to copy blueprints and other notes and diagrams. It involves applying a photosensitive solution to a receptive surface and allowing it to dry in a darkroom.

The 40-year-old Light Factory is the best place in Charlotte to learn about photography, so it’s a must for photographers of all experience levels to take advantage of this free event.

When: 2 – 3 p.m.

Where: The Light Factory, 1817 Central Avenue More: lightfactory.org; 704-333-9755.

DISCOVERY PLACE EXPERIENCE: CRAZY CATAPULTS Are you about to hurl? As in hurl some heavy objects great distances?

When most of us think, “catapult,” we envision a giant siege engine battering down the battlements on an episode of Game of Thrones (something like what’s pictured above). Discovery Place Science’s educators take a much more family-friendly approach to these remarkable devices, first invented around 400 B.C. in the Greek town of Syracuse.

Crazy Catapults is a hands-on learning event at the Free Range Brewery in NoDa, where families can master Isaac Newton’s Laws of Motion, the concept of simple machines, and the physics of trajectory while building their own miniature catapult to take home.

After testing your practical application of Newtonian physics by playing a friendly game of catapult cornhole, you can put your newfound knowledge to use the next time you storm your neighbor’s castle.

But don’t forget Newton’s third law: “for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

When: Saturday, January 28, 2-5 pm Where: Free Range Brewing, 2320 N. Davidson St. More: discoveryplace.org

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ARTS

FILM

DECENCY TRUMPED Keaton sizzles in capitalist cautionary tale

BY MATT BRUNSON

H

ARVEY WEINSTEIN, the controversial studio head who’s so skilled at manipulating Oscar voters that he could probably score a Best Actor nomination for that untalented imbecile Rob Schneider if he ever put his mind to it, seems to have taken a rare misstep with The Founder (*** out of four).

Releasing films for year-end, one-week runs in Los Angeles to qualify for copious movie prizes is a tried and true tradition, but between reportedly holding those early Founder screenings for a select few insiders and doing nothing to generate any buzz, Weinstein appears to have allowed this one to die on the vine. It’s been a complete no-show during awards season — in fact, according to IMDb, its only mention has been from something called the AARP Movies for Grownups Awards, not exactly an outfit that gets plastered across posters and ads.

Harvey probably isn’t shedding any tears — The Weinstein Company has a strong Oscar contender in Lion — but it’s a shame The Founder has slipped through the cracks, since star Michael Keaton delivers a performance that’s among the year’s finest.

With a script by Robert Siegel, who himself was cheated out of an Oscar nom a few years ago for penning The Wrestler, The Founder doesn’t traffic in hagiographic nonsense as it looks at Ray Kroc, the man famous for making McDonald’s as representative of America as the Statue of Liberty or the U.S. Constitution.

Instead, it reveals him to be a thoroughly unpleasant individual, with initial viewer enthusiasm over his unflagging energy and eye for opportunities eventually swamped by utter disdain for his willingness to stab good people in the back.

Ray Kroc has always been championed as the founder of McDonald’s, but those of us who knew little (and cared even less) about fast-food history will perhaps be stunned to learn that he had nothing to do with its conception and initial success.

The first restaurant was created by siblings Dick and Mac McDonald (terrific turns by Nick Offerman and John Carroll Lynch), and they were the ones who came up with the streamlined service, the golden arches, the disposable packaging and (obviously) the name. Kroc’s contribution? Franchising. He’s the one who tirelessly worked to blanket the country with McDonald’s eateries, but to do so, he had to repeatedly go against the 26 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

THE WEINSTEIN CO.

Michael Keaton in The Founder.

informative. Had it gained any traction, it could have been the Wall Street for a new generation, with Michael Keaton’s Ray Kroc replacing Michael Douglas’ Gordon Gekko as the capitalist pig most adored by conservatives across the land. Perhaps it’s no coincidence the movie is receiving its national rollout on the same day that the ultimate capitalist pig is set to take the Oval Office — a crock of a different nature.

Ruby Rose, Nina Dobrev, Tony Gonzalez and Vin Diesel in xXx: Return of Xander Cage. brothers’ wishes, including replacing quality milkshakes with powdered products (since the use of real milk and cream was eating too much into the profits).

Kroc’s antics land Mac in the hospital, but he isn’t done yet, as he works with a financial wizard (B.J. Novak) with the purpose of breaking his original contract with the brothers, receiving all the profits himself, and working it so the McDonalds can no

PARAMOUNT

longer use their own name on their original restaurant. On the homefront, his life is equally blessed, as he ditches the plain-Jane wife (Laura Dern) who supported him over the years for a glamorous woman (Linda Cardellini) he swipes from a trusting business partner (Patrick Wilson).

Clearly, for those with any semblance of a soul, The Founder isn’t the feel-good movie of this (or any) year, but it’s clear-eyed and concise — to say nothing of important and

Hardcore porn for action junkies, xXx: Return of Xander Cage (**1/2 out of four) should also get a rise out of more casual viewers burned out on Oscar bait and looking for a mindless time at the movies.

It’s as ridiculous and over-the-top as the 2002 original that built on star Vin Diesel’s blip of short-lived superstardom, but it improves ever so slightly on its predecessor thanks to a more interesting roster of supporting characters. (I never saw the second film in the series, 2005’s roundly panned, Diesel-less xXx: State of the Union.)

Samuel L. Jackson is back as the federal agent who first introduced extreme-sports enthusiast Xander Cage (Diesel) to the world of international espionage, although this time, it’s another hard-nosed government operative (Toni Collette) who’s giving Cage his marching orders.

The plot involves the attempts to retrieve a deadly object known as Pandora’s Box — a

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device that turns satellites into bombs — but never mind all that. xXx3 is basically an excuse to show cool people doing cool stunts, and on that level, it largely works.

It’s also an excuse to show that the laws of science and logic don’t really matter, particularly in the sequence set inside a damaged airplane (given the absence of gravity inside the vessel, did the plane somehow end up in outer space?) or the bit in which a couple of characters surf the waves atop ski-equipped motorcycles.

Donnie Yen provides the martial arts mastery, Ruby Rose contributes the smirks, and The Vampire Diaries’ Nina Dobrev donates some nerdy humor.

As for Vin Diesel, he’s mainly there to support his own flailing career, which, the Fast & Furious flicks aside, has largely been on life support. Acting like it’s still 2002, Diesel’s Xander Cage allows countless hotties to hang all over his body and partakes in outlandish stunts that would give even James Bond pause.

Speaking of 007, there’s even a scene that apes Casino Royale, with a shirtless Xander Cage sauntering out of the ocean.

But as my wife muttered as she observed his flabby flesh, “Meh. He’s no Daniel Craig, that’s for sure.”

BUGGED OUT Mark Doepker talks about art, politics and racist haters

BY MARK KEMP

I

N OCTOBER, Mark Doepker was driving his VW bug Uptown when a man accosted him and destroyed a piece of his art — a Black Lives Matter cube he’d installed to the top of the car.

Doepker said the man, John Schmidt, who owns Midtown Search Group LLC, a boutique executive staffing company, had a problem with the message on Doepker’s car.

“He told me I was creating a disturbance in his city, and then he used the ‘N’ word” in place of Black when referring to BLM, Doepker said. “I said, ‘I’m creating the disturbance?’ We almost got into a fight. But I wasn’t going to give him a fight.”

Schmidt was later arrested and will face Doepker in court Feb. 10.

We thought we’d catch up with Doepker, 40, to see what he’s been up to — art-wise and otherwise — since the encounter.

Creative Loafing: Have you had your life threatened for your art lately?

Doepker: I’ve had several vulgar remarks and middle fingers. For some reason, some people around here can’t believe a white boy would have this kind of art on his car.

But I get much more positive reactions than negative stuff. I can count the negative things I’ve heard on one hand, but for the most part, people really like it. One woman reached into the window and hugged me at a stop sign. Another woman bought me gas at a gas station.

But I am more careful now. Before that guy broke the piece off my car, I was seeing only the good things. But then I started getting prepared for the opposite reaction.

I think we can all learn from what this guy did. My recommendation to the court was to have the guy accompany the sculpture to a college campus so he can sit next to it and have students ask him why he did it. They could play the newscast of it on a screen next to him.

You’re from Michigan. Can you imagine this happening there?

There’s racism everywhere. I went home for Christmas, and not far from where I grew up there’s a rebel flag flying. I don’t know why someone from Michigan would fly a rebel flag. But it does seem to be amped up here

Jim the hair guy

Presents Mark Doepker self-portrait

in the South.

I was working a job here where my coworkers were good ol’ boys, and they knew racism got under my skin, so they took it as far as they could.

What are you working on right now?

I want to expand from the portraits I do, which are 18-by-22 inch drawings, into larger wall sculptures. I have a show up right now until Feb. 8 at Gallery 27 in Lincolnton, and then after that, I’d like to put together an entire show of 8-feet-tall portraits.

They’re basically straight from my drawings, which I do using live models — all real people you may know or you’ve seen around Charlotte. I have two [of the sculptures] up at Aerial Charlotte across from McColl Center uptown. I had wanted to have another new one done for the show in Lincolnton, but scheduling got in the way.

I hope to enter a couple of them in a March show at Hart-Witzen.

Must be a pain in the ass carrying them around in your little bug, no?

COURTESY OF MARK DOEPKER

I make them to fit into my car. A woman from Nebraska bought two of them and it took three big crates to get them there.

With a new president who’s basically condoned racist behavior, do you think the more ominous political environment will have a big effect on art in Charlotte?

It already has. The show that I have and the shows of other artists I know – we’ve incorporated it into our work. I was part of a show at UNCC that had to do with the protest. Everything was about the election and the protests and the racial undercurrents.

So we can assume you’ll continue speaking out in your artwork, right?

Of course, the latest piece I’ve done is of a woman who has a big natural afro and the title is, ‘Don’t Touch Her Hair.” I have a friend who tells me stories about how people try to touch her hair or pet her, so I wanted to do something about that. And I named it “Don’t Touch Her Hair,” not “Don’t Touch My Hair.” I wanted it to be me saying it.

1213 STUDIO A co-op salon and spa in the heart of Plaza-Midwood

1213 STUDIO.COM CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 27

Jackie DeLoach sits atop her bar on The Plaza.

MUSIC

RYAN PITKIN

FEATURE

FILLING A VOID Hattie’s looks to step up as Charlotte’s next music venue in light of recent closures

BY RYAN PITKIN

W

HEN JACKIE DELOACH

opened Hattie’s Tap & Tavern, she had no intention of ever owning a music venue. However, the city’s music scene has changed drastically over the last two years, as venues old and new have shut their doors, leaving local bands with fewer options to showcase their talents.

Now, with the help of experienced local soundman Zac McBee, DeLoach is trying to help fill the vacuum that’s been left behind.

Over the next year, she and McBee will be 28 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

implementing a renovation of sorts with the hopes of turning the cozy Plaza bar into one of Charlotte’s next great music venues.

DeLoach opened Hattie’s — named after her grandmother — in October 2014 with the intent of cultivating a laidback atmosphere where folks of all backgrounds could catch a game or even play one — as a collection of old video game systems has steadily grown from the corner and now lines a wall of the bar.

Sitting smack in the middle of two

artistic neighborhoods like Plaza Midwood and NoDa — where relatively small venues like The Evening Muse, Snug Harbor and Petra’s continue to carry the torch for the local music scene — it was inevitable that musicians would come around.

Local band Wicked Powers played the bar’s opening, and two weeks later DeLoach invited Le Anna Eden and the Garden Of — the subject of last week’s Creative Loafing cover story — to play during DeLoach’s birthday celebration.

Four months later, she and a friend built a

small stage in the bar and began booking acts regularly on Friday and Saturday nights.

“In the beginning I just wanted to have good beer; a location where basically the people that work at the banks and the kid that works in the kitchen can sit down at the bar and have a conversation,” DeLoach says.

“Then it evolved with the neighborhood being the way that it is that more bands wanted to play so I wanted to try to outfit the place to be more of a venue.”

DeLoach had worked in the bar and

restaurant industry for 13 years in Washington what we’re doing. We could still continue D.C. and Charlotte. While she had booked just doing bands on Friday and Saturday, but bands at a few bars in both cities, the logistics knowing that all of these amazing venues are behind what happens when the act gets on shutting down, we want to be able to provide stage were new to her. Near the end of 2016, as to that community still,” DeLoach says. “We Hattie’s became a more popular spot for local have the opportunity to do that so we’re musicians to play and DeLoach was regularly going to take it. Charlotte is losing a lot of booked solid for weeks in advance, she found really good locations and really good venues herself calling on friend and bar regular McBee and we want to make sure that the bands more and more for help with everything from that were comfortable in those locations can sound work to plumbing. come here and still feel that vibe.”

“It got to the point where I was like, Equally important to DeLoach however, ‘You know what? How about I just be facility is to keep that open-minded approach she manager and whatever you need me to do we’ll came in with when she opened Hattie’s over just knock it out and keep it going,’” McBee two years ago. The ADD nature of the bar — says of DeLoach’s decision to bring him on full which has hosted everything from weekly yoga time in November of to Game of Thrones last year. watch parties in the The opportunity past year — earned came at a great time it a Critic’s Pick as “CHARLOTTE IS LOSING for McBee, who was Best Multitasker just a month from Bar in last year’s A LOT OF REALLY GOOD watching the doors Creative Loafing Best close on The Double of Charlotte issue, LOCATIONS AND REALLY Door Inn, where he and DeLoach has no had done sound work intention of losing GOOD VENUES AND WE for five years. that creative spirit The Double by focusing solely on WANT TO MAKE SURE Door’s closing was music. just one in a string “What’s really of recent losses to nice too is that, THAT THE BANDS THAT the local culture that even though we are McBee had witnessed going very venue WERE COMFORTABLE IN firsthand. In 2015, capable, we’re still The Chop Shop in going to have that THOSE LOCATIONS CAN NoDa — and the neighborhood feel,” stage he built there DeLoach says. “We’re COME HERE AND STILL just four years earlier still going to be the — was bulldozed to original Hattie’s.

FEEL THAT VIBE.” make way for light We’re not going to rail construction and move that way. We JACKIE DELOACH, OWNER OF HATTIE’S related development. want to make sure Now, he’s looking that we keep that. I TAP & TAVERN forward to starting don’t want to take anew. away the home-away“I just needed a from-home feel.” new home,” he says.

For most projects like the one McBee will While local musicians do enjoy playing at be undertaking over the coming months, a Hattie’s on a regular basis, the lack of sound bar would have to shut down, but DeLoach treatment, a master console and other critical is committed to keeping things going, so equipment has made it tough for the bar to McBee will be working around the bargoers’ find its sound, as can be agreed upon by anyone drinking schedules. He usually starts his who has stood close enough to the stage while work early, and never begins something he a punk band has lit into their guitars. won’t be able to clean up by happy hour.

Since coming on in November, McBee “I don’t sleep,” McBee says. “So I get in here has worked with DeLoach to create a plan early and I can knock out things or prep it up before the big push. That’s my main goal. By 4 (see sidebar) that he hopes will make Hattie’s o’clock I need to be cleaned up and out of here.” a legitimate venue by May. He’s already It’s not just the music that will benefit begun bringing equipment over from The from McBee’s work, he also has plans to Double Door Inn, most of which he already start construction soon on a kitchen. The owns or is in the process of purchasing. new wing will be attached to the side of the “It’s a really good opportunity for me building but separate in the sense that food because I get a second chance to do things will come in through a window, as Hattie’s from the beginning in a way. I’m not redoing has always been a dog-friendly indoor the system, I’m putting in a brand new establishment and plans to keep it that way. system,” McBee says. “All the other places that It’s all an effort to make sure Hattie’s earn I’ve worked in, I’ve had to rip everything out and keeps a spot on the circuit, whether that and use the same stuff and just put it together be the southeastern regional tour circuit or better. Now I can make sure the puzzle pieces your bar-hopping circuit on a Saturday night. are really in there as compared to ones that “We want to be on your bar hop trail,” were thumbed in there because I couldn’t McBee says, impersonating a typical match it, and that’s how all these venues are.” conversation he’d like to hear more of. “’Let’s It’s an investment that DeLoach is hang out in Plaza, then we’ll hang out in willing to make, and it’s become all the more Hattie’s, then we’ll hang out in NoDa. Or important to her as she’s watched venues let’s walk outside and change our mind in like Double Door, Amos’ Southend and Chop the parking lot and walk right back in to Shop either shut down or prepare to do so.

Hattie’s.’ That works too.”

“That’s a huge reason for why we’re doing

UPSTAGING How to turn a bar into a legitimate music venue “Clarity is key.”

That’s a phrase that Zac McBee kept coming back to as he walked around Hatties Tap & Tavern showing Creative Loafing all the things he plans to do in the bar to make it a legitimate music venue by the time summer rolls around.

“We can have clarity and you don’t have to peel people’s faces off,” McBee said. “Customers are not just here to see music, they’re here to have an experience.

They’re here to have a date or to meet their old best friend and have a good time.

If the music’s blaring so damn loud, it’s hard for them to do that.”

Listed below are some of the key elements of the work McBee will be doing in the coming months.

Stage The stage currently sits eight inches high and echoes loudly when people walk around on it. McBee plans to raise it nearly a foot to about 18 inches. He’ll put a halfton of sand under the stage to deaden the echo and place two 14-inch sub-woofers under it as well.

“The subs that are going up under the stage, they’re auxiliary. You want that punch in your chest, and that’s where it’s going to come from.”

Sound McBee plans to stagger sound treatment panels across the ceiling in a checkerboard fashion. The panels are two feet by four feet, one inch wide and fireproof. The duvetyne fabric on the panels is made to absorb light and, more importantly, sound.

“That’s how you really shape your room, it’s not your speakers or anything like that. Your room changes its tone the more people you have because you have a bunch of water bags, that’s all we are.

If you can control the initial sound of it through treatment, it tones it down a little

bit. But you don’t want to go super crazy to make it completely dead.”

Speakers “We’re going to have four speakers on the left and four speakers on the right, and these are going to be zoning speakers.

We’ll have to quit playing bar music through the PA system, because when you crank it up it gets to be too much and you can’t communicate. Those speakers are designed to pierce through a crowd.”

Curtains McBee will install curtains around the entire stage, with a track that will allow staff to shrink the stage at will for smaller events.

“The side curtains are going to be able to trolley inward and outward to the wall.

If you have smaller acts — if we have spoken word or we have people doing a Ted Talks or Moth Radio Hour or something like that — they can just tell their stories.

Maybe some acting, and you don’t want that huge stage feeling, you can bring it in a little bit and have it focused.”

Cameras McBee’s original plan includes placing all TVs inside and outside on a splitter so that they can run simultaneously with a 6K projector he’ll be installing soon. This will be effective for Game of Thrones watch parties or other presentations.

Later on, McBee plans to aim a camera at the stage and connect it to the splitter as well, so folks taking a smoke break or just a breather won’t miss any of the onstage action.

“We’ll throw the volume outside, so if it’s too crowded and you don’t feel like dealing with all that at this moment and you want to take a break, go outside, the band’s going to be paying on the TV and the music will be playing for you, too.”

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COURTESY OF MICHAEL PRICE

Michael Price and Suzann Knudsen.

MUSIC

MUSICMAKER

DIGITAL NOIR UNLEASHES THE DARK SIDE Goth and Industrial are undead and thriving at the Milestone

BY PAT MORAN

GOTH, INDUSTRIAL, darkwave, death rock – like a demon spawned in the fires of Hades, the music cherished by Charlotte’s dark community goes by many names.

Regardless of terminology, fans know the drill: swirling synths, guttural bass, mechanized beats and sepulchral vocals either from the violated tomb or the soulless matrix – take your pick. Dark music will be on the upswing at Digital Noir, an evening of atmospheric dance music hosted by two mainstays of the city’s dark subculture, DJ Spider and Michael Price. The event begins at 9 p.m. Saturday at the Milestone on Tuckaseegee Road.

DJ Spider is the alter ego of Suzann Knudsen, who started spinning records in her birthplace of St. Thomas in the U.S Virgin Islands. By the time she landed in Charlotte, Knudsen had discovered the comic convention and cosplay scenes, which subtly influence her attire in the DJ booth. Price draws on his background in visual arts to create backdrop videos and lighting design, elements essential to Digital Noir’s stygian atmosphere.

Creative Loafing contacted Price and Knudsen to discuss things that go bump in the night, and on the dance floor.

Creative Loafing: How did you two get together for Digital Noir?

Price: We’d known each other for a while.

Spider was doing Return of the Batz and I 30 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

was doing a night called Installation — and they were sort of similar. She had pulled a Brett Favre and retired and I was getting to the point where I had been DJing with others and I was DJing by myself. She decided to kill Return of the Batz, and I killed Installation, and out of the ashes came a new night called Digital Noir, kind of a mash-up of the two.

You’re sharing the DJ booth for this event. How does that work?

Spider: We each come to the music from different angles. Michael’s much more the industrial side. I tend to be more on the swishy synth-pop side of things. I’m like the swishy nougat center and he’s the hard crunchy side. Everybody can make requests, and if I don’t have it, chances are he has it.

Our dynamic is interesting because it’s the male/female dynamic. I like to sing along. I think like a girl, so I know what girls like to dance to. Guys tend to be a little more stompy, so they get down to harder music.

Can we expect you to dress up in an outfit for the night, drawing on your cosplay background?

Spider: I dress appropriately for the night. I won’t go with a superhero-oriented outfit for Digital Noir. It will definitely be on the dark and spooky side, but also fun.

How would you characterize Charlotte’s dark music scene?

Price: To me, it’s a family. Before, there might have been a little bit of competition, but right now it’s the tightest I’ve seen in forever.

We have bands sprouting up, collaborations between them, collaborations between DJs like Spider and myself; even the place where we perform has become almost the headquarters of the scene. It’s The Milestone, which has been considered a punk club. I feel like we have a home there.

How did you get into industrial?

Spider: The thing that triggered everything and really blew my mind was Nine Inch Nails’ Pretty Hate Machine. There was anger, angst, sorrow, loneliness — and you could dance to it! That’s the one that flipped my switch and made me look at the darker side of things.

Price: For me it was first time I heard Skinny Puppy in 1991. I heard the album Rabies, and it changed things. When I heard that album, it turned the tide.

Best goth song ever?

Spider: The one I always come back to is Sisters of Mercy’s “Lucretia My Reflection.”

It defines the goth-rock era for me. It triggers emotions and memories of going to my first goth clubs.

Price: Whichever one I happen to be listening to at the moment.

CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 31

MUSIC

SOUNDBOARD

JAN. 25 POP/ROCK Circa Survive (Amos’ Southend) Karaoke with DJ Pucci Mane (Petra’s) Luke Wade w/ Matt McAndrew (Neighborhood Theatre) Modern Heritage Weekly Mix Tape (Snug Harbor) Modern Primitives w/ The Raineers, Farewell Albatross, Foretune Teller (Visulite Theatre) Open Mic Night (Comet Grill) Open mic w/ Jared Allen (Jack Beagles)

JAN. 26 BLUES/ROOTS/INTERNATIONAL Latin Music Concert Series: The Music of Mexico (Mint Museum Uptown)

CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH Hypnotic Brass Ensemble (McGlohon Theater)

COUNTRY/FOLK

COMPLIMENTARY MOVIE PASSES

Billy Joe Shaver w/Darrin Bradbury (Neighborhood Theatre)

POP/ROCK

INVITES YOU AND A GUEST TO A SPECIAL SCREENING OF

FOR A CHANCE TO WIN PASSES FOR TWO VISIT clclt.com/charlotte /freestuff RATED PG FOR RUDE HUMOR AND SOME ACTION. Please note: Passes are limited and will be distributed on a first come, first served basis while supplies last. No phone calls, please. Limit two passes per person. Each pass admits one. Seating is not guaranteed.

Arrive early. Theater is not responsible for overbooking. This screening will be monitored for unauthorized recording. By attending, you agree not to bring any audio or video recording device into the theater (audio recording devices for credentialed press excepted) and consent to a physical search of your belongings and person.

IN THEATERS FEBRUARY 10 LEGOBatman.com #LEGOBatmanMovie

32 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

Annabel Lee, No More People, Guerrilla Fist, Shadows of Deceit (Milestone) The Infamous Stringdusters w/ The Brothers Comatose (Visulite Theatre) Jettison 5 (Jack Beagles) Jon Linker Band (RiRa Irish Pub) Karaoke with DJ ShayNanigans (Hattie’s Tap & Tavern) Leisure McCorckle (Comet Grill) Melt, Naked Naps, TKO Faith Healer, Vanity Plates (Petra’s) Shiprocked (Snug Harbor) Sister Hazel (Amos’ Southend) Songwriter Open Mic @ Petra’s (Petra’s) Thirsty Horses (Tin Roof) Upstate Rubdown w/ Damn Tall Buildings (Evening Muse)

JAN. 27 CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH Jazzy Fridays (Freshwaters Restaurant) Charlotte Symphony Altsounds: Brahms vs.

Radiohead (Knight Theater)

COUNTRY/FOLK The Lenny Federal Band (Comet Grill) Colt Ford w/ Out of the Blue (Coyote Joe’s) Greg Payne and the Piedmont Boys w/ Tyler Hatley, Ziggy Pockets (Neighborhood Theatre)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B Vita and the Woolf w/ Mammoth Indigo, The Van Allen Belt (Snug Harbor)

POP/ROCK Another Lost Year w/ Never Say Die, VYCES (Amos’ Southend) Cosmic Charlie (Visulite Theatre) Crystal Fountains (Cabarrus Brewing Company, Concord) Grey Revell (Hattie’s Tap & Tavern) Hey Johnny Park w/ Carolinacation (The Underground) John the Revelator (Jack Beagles) Jucifer, Violent Life Violent Death, AuxiliA, Born Hollow (Milestone) Mic Larry (Tin Roof) Rumours (The Fillmore) Smash City (RiRa) Subliminal Confession w/ Driskill (Evening Muse) Taking Back Sunday Acoustic w/ The Molly Wops (Evening Muse) Thirsty Horses (Tin Roof)

DJ/ELECTRONIC Mirror Moves (Petra’s) Silent Disco (Rooftop 210)

JAN. 28 BLUES/ROOTS/INTERNATIONAL Lord Nelson (Jack Beagles)

CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH Charlotte Does Aretha (Stage Door Theater) Daniel Weatherspoon (BluNotes) UNC Clef Hangers A Capella (Knight Theater)

COUNTRY/FOLK Flat Blak Cadillac (Puckett’s Farm Equipment)

DJ/ELECTRONIC Digital Noir featuring Michael Price and DJ Spider (Milestone) Markus Schulz (Label)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B Baby Hold on to Me Inspired by the Music of Gerald Levert $40-$89.50. (Bojangles Coliseum) Lyricist’s Lounge $7. (Upscale Lounge & Restaurant) Su Casa (Petra’s)

POP/ROCK Appetite For Destruction (Amos’ Southend)

JAN. 29 CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH Skate Money Allstar Band, The Coconut Groove Band (Amos’ Southend)

COUNTRY/FOLK Steep Canyon Rangers (Knight Theater)

POP/ROCK Omari and the Hellrasiers (Comet Grill) Dead Horses w/ Beau + Luci (Evening Muse) Deathcrown, Nemesis, Avalon Steel, KRVSADE, Violent Gods (Milestone)

JAN. 30 CLASSICAL/JAZZ/SMOOTH Pat Metheny (Knight Theater)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B Knocturnal (Snug Harbor) Session: A Listening Party hosted by Le Anna Eden, featuring Darian La Sparrow, Black Linen and DJ SPK (Petra’s)

Drapes, Tiny City, David Z. Cox (Snug Harbor) Open Mic with Jeff Claud (Puckett’s Farm Equipment) Red Rockin’ Chair (Comet Gril) Spencer Rush (Tin Roof)

COMING SOON Parquet Courts w/ Mary Lattimore (Feb. 2, Neighborhood Theatre) Legends of Southern Hip Hop w/ Scarface, 8Ball & MJG, Mystikal, Bun B, Trick Daddy, Juvenile, Pastor Troy (Feb. 3, Bojangles’ Coliseum) Welshly Arms (Feb. 8, The Underground) Hiss Golden Messenger (Feb. 12, Neighborhood Theatre) Justin Hayward (Feb. 16, McGlohon Theater) Chuck Johnson & Charleyhorse (Feb. 16, Evening Muse) Marc Maron (Feb. 16, Knight Theater) Shovels & Rope (Feb. 21, Knight Theater) Tommy Emmanuel (Feb. 24, McGlohon Theater) Juicy J w/ Belly and Project Pat (Feb. 25, The Fillmore) Southside Johhny & the Asbury Jukes (March 2, McGlohon Theater) Landlady (March 4, Evening Muse) Cold War Kids w/ Special Guest Middle Kids (March 5, The Fillmore) The Dig (March 8, Evening Muse) St. Paul & The Broken Bones (March 11, The Fillmore)

#MFGD Open Mic (Apostrophe Lounge)

POP/ROCK Find Your Muse Open Mic w/ The Dawn Drapes $3. (The Evening Muse) Locals Live: The Best in Local Live Music & Local Craft Beers (Tin Roof) Reagan Youth, Pleasures of the Ultraviolent, Dirty South Revolutionaries, No Anger Control (Milestone,)

JAN. 31 COUNTRY/FOLK Red Rockin’ Chair (Comet Grill) Tuesday Night Jam w/ The Smokin’ Js (Smokey Joe’s Cafe)

POP/ROCK Heather Himes of Dust & Ashes w/ The Dawn

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THIS FRIDAY

COLT FORD

LIMITED ADVANCE TICKETS $17 ALL OTHERS $20

❈ ❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈ ❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈

FEBRUARY 10

TRACEY LAWRENCE LIMITED ADVANCE TICKETS $15 ALL OTHERS $17

❈ ❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈ ❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈

FEBRUARY 17

THE LACS

LIMITED ADVANCE TICKETS $15 ALL OTHERS $17

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MARCH 3

TYLER FARR BEN GALLAHER WITH SPECIAL GUEST

LIMITED ADVANCE TICKETS $22 ALL OTHERS $15 MARCH 10

❈ ❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈ ❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈❈

TUCKER BEATHARD LIMITED ADVANCE TICKETS $15 ALL OTHERS $18 MARCH 17

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1/26 2/18

INFAMOUS STRINGDUSTERS DRAKE WHITE AND

3/1 3/4

KT Tunstall 3/12

THE BIG FIRE

LIMITED ADVANCE TICKETS $12 ALL OTHERS $15

SON VOLT WILD1-2-3NIGHTS

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.

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Bassh (The Underground) The Big Lonesome (Evening Muse) Bubonik Funk w/ Dead Sea $crilla, Jack the Radio, Beach Bath (Snug Harbor) Mike Strauss Band (Cabarrus Brewing Company, Concord) MoSART [secondary event] (Comet Grill) New Local (Hattie’s Tap & Tavern) The Occasional Gentleman, High Strung and The Comets (Visulite Theatre) Sirsy (Evening Muse) Wes Cook (Tin Roof)

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JANUARY 28 FEBRUARY 4, 11, 18 & 24

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CLCLT.COM | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | 33

ENDS

MARKETPLACE

JOBS | POSTINGS | LISTINGS | RENTALS

ENDS

NIGHTLIFE

SOTR: HARRY POTTER EDITION The Q.C. is a magical place

PHOTOGRAPHY Family Engagement Real Estate Events and more

www.JeffHahnePhotography.com

704-737-2145

The Perfect Combo.

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

or whatever you like — this was more than EVER SINCE I VISITED the Wizarding a mere coincidence. On Friday, when she World of Harry Potter at Walt Disney World handed over the tickets, I thought, “This Resort’s Universal Studios in Orlando, Fla., must be how Charlie felt when he finally this past summer, I’ve been reliving the magic. Writing with my wand pen, playing found the golden ticket to Willy Wonka’s around with “spells” for a laugh, using my Chocolate Factory. interactive elder wand and lounging around I arrived by way of Uber to Discovery Place in my Hogwarts alumni sweatshirt. Little around 5:45 p.m. and the general admission did I know the magic of Harry Potter would line was already wrapped around the block. I follow me home to Charlotte. met my plus one, another co-worker, hopped Around Christmas time I came across in the much shorter ticket-holder line and a Facebook event for Science on the Rocks bypassed the crowd. Per usual, the place (#SOTR): Wizarding World. And before I was already crowded and the lines were knew it, all of my closest friends were tagging fairly long. The only major difference? Our me on the event and in the comments below. favorite Harry Potter characters had come One thing was clear: Even if I went by alive for the night. Harry Potter fans had myself, and even though I hadn’t read the come from all over dressed from head to toe books — an HP faux pas, I know — I needed as if it were Halloween. I began to wonder: to be there. After all, I do have a tattoo Did these people buy their outfits paying homage. specifically for this event, like If you’re new to Charlotte many do for Comic-Con? and haven’t heard of #SOTR Overwhelmed by the before, here’s the skinny: crowd and Harry PotterEvery third Friday of themed everything, we the month, Discovery Place transforms from a a made a dash for the family-friendly museum shortest line: a potioninto a 21-and-up, adultsmaking class. Unicorn only space for the night. tears, bouncing spider Imagine reliving some of juice, dragon’s blood and your favorite childhood “deez nuts” (Pretty sure AERIN SPRUILL science and technology someone made that last one museum adventures with an up). Those were just a few of the alcoholic beverage in your hand? ingredients that could be used to That’s what #SOTR is all about. create your very own potion. After we were The theme changes from month to done, the potions master topped off our month. The first time I went, it was Smoke drinks with a little magic: dry ice. and Mirrors. I explored gravity-defying Other highlights of our magical ride exhibits, Bill Nye the Science Guy corn hole included: a live game of Quidditch, dragon’s boards, and tried a Vaportini — a vaporbreath popcorn, Quidditch beer pong, based cocktail. The second time, I was with alcoholic butterbeer and a taste of Bertie my mom and the theme was the Birds and Bott’s Every Flavour Beans — I got lucky and the Bees. You can surmise how awkward it ended up biting into “dead fish.” Yum. After was watching visitors put on drunk goggles a beer, we realized we were starting to feel and attempt to put a condom on a banana hot and claustrophobic, so we left. with the woman who gave birth to me.

Regardless of the theme, or how “unique” When we walked out the door we noticed the attractions have been, I always seem to the general admission line still had a few have a good time. stragglers waiting patiently to see if they Even though you can buy the tickets to would be able to get in at the last minute. #SOTR for $8 before the event online, I put One of them even asked us to sell her our off buying tickets for the first Harry Potterbands! Even if your muggle brain has no themed event. BIG MISTAKE! I checked back idea what I’ve been going on about this at the beginning of January and it was sold entire time or you’ve lived under a rock and out. I. Was. Devastated. And to top it off? don’t know what Harry Potter is, wristband Voldemort’s successor was being sworn into hustling should tell you how popular Science the office of POTUS on the very same day. on the Rocks events are. Be sure to catch the But there was nothing this muggle could do next one. about it.

Just when I’d abandoned hope, a coworker informed me she wasn’t going to be able to go, and had two tickets that I could have. Call it fate, a Patronus Charm

34 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

What would you like to see added to the Charlotte nightlife scene? Share your ideas with me at backtalk@clclt.com.

ENDS

CROSSWORD

THE SCIENCE OF TRUMPETERS ACROSS

1 Like galaxies and nebulae 7 Cry after a long wait 13 Beef or pork alternative 20 Nabokov novel 21 Obi-wearing companion 22 Volcanic flow 23 Is a hammy actor 24 Start of a riddle 26 Extras for iDevices 27 See 8-Down 29 -- out a win (just prevail) 30 Long Island town with a Triple Crown racetrack 31 Riddle, part 2 36 Corn bread 37 Barracks site 38 Shaker -- (city in O.) 39 Sweet roll 41 Scuff up, e.g.

42 Opposing voters 45 March Madness, with “the” 48 More spiteful 51 Jack up, e.g.

52 Riddle, part 3 57 Brow shape 58 Boxer’s prize 59 Astral bear 60 “Robinson Crusoe” novelist 61 Riddle, part 4 65 Banquets 66 “Alfie” lyricist -- David 67 Scrubs sites, for short 68 Ending for pay 69 Blockhead 73 Riddle, part 5 81 Front wheel convergence 82 Not of the cloth 83 Jedi’s furry friend 84 Butter lookalike 85 End of the riddle 89 Shrimplike crustacean 90 Exploding water balloon sounds 91 Triple-time dance, in Dijon 92 Ira Levin’s “-- Before Dying” 93 Angry feeling 96 Used a sofa 97 Danson of “Cheers” 98 Trunk growth 100 Seat of Grand County, Utah 102 Start of the riddle’s answer

110 Apartment window sign 112 Hoover offering, for short 113 Blockhead 114 Go bankrupt 115 End of the riddle’s answer 119 Nobel winner Eugene 121 Northern French port 122 Prix fixe part 123 Moo makers 124 Arid quality 125 Eternal City citizens 126 Enters, as a PIN

DOWN

1 Shoe gripper 2 Pizzazz 3 Skiing locale 4 Mirage carmaker 5 Ending for Manhattan 6 Black currant liqueur 7 Like tumblers 8 With 27-Across, Pavarotti number, e.g.

9 Ignited, as a fire 10 Fire leftover 11 Bedclothes 12 In bad taste 13 “Evita” role Guevara 14 Grand slams, e.g.

15 “-- cost ya” 16 Put in a vise 17 Blast sound 18 Actress Lynch of four Harry Potter films 19 Talk on and on 25 Playboy founder, familiarly 28 Tool for moving just-baked bread or pizza 32 Publisher Conde -33 Persian king 34 Tiny, for short 35 2012 rival of Romney 40 FDR’s plan 42 Hunter of Moby Dick 43 Screenwriter Ephron 44 Nervous twitches 46 Baby cow 47 Entr’-48 Ford make until ‘11 49 Celtic language 50 Emu cousin 53 “Bring It On” star Kirsten

54 Suppositions 55 Light bed 56 “-- So Fine” (Chiffons hit) 58 Trying tot 62 Lat-building exercises 63 Building pest 64 Get it wrong 65 Clamorous criticism 68 Often-requested Italian song 69 Extreme degree 70 Debtor’s note 71 With 99-Down, brunch time, often 72 Parts of clown outfits 73 “It -- be!”

74 Bops 75 Prosperity 76 Pointed tools 77 Minimization of job-related hazards 78 Jai follower 79 Hedge plants 80 Father’s Day callers 82 Averse (to) 86 Big dishes 87 At any time 88 Dry riverbed 89 Onetime 93 “Someone informed me ...”

94 Housetop laborer 95 A bit crude 97 Electronic music genre 99 See 71-Down 101 Irish writer Brendan 103 Biblical exile 104 Origami need 105 Routinely 106 Pharmacy measures 107 Hook worms 108 Palmer or Lehmann 109 “Juno” star Page 111 Campbell of “Party of Five” 116 The, to Luc 117 It spits out $20 bills 118 Big gun gp.

120 Fife refusal

SOLUTION FOUND ON P. 38.

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#ITMFA Savage revives ‘Impeach the Motherfucker’ DAN SAVAGE

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I am quite the follower on social media — Facebook and Twitter in particular. I make no trolling comments, no #MAGA hashtags; I just look with my male gaze. Like Laura Mulvey says, the male gaze is only natural. I’ve lost interest in pornography, so I use everyday pictures of women, typically selfies. It helps me to know the story behind the face and body. None of these pics are pornographic — just feel-good selfies by young women posted on social media. I don’t communicate with these people, because that would be creepy. I’m not worried about whether this is abnormal.

I just wondered if people would be okay with this, if people were aware of behavior like mine when they post, and if I should ask these girls for their permission to wank to their selfies?

a difference between knowing some stranger might be wanking to your pics and hearing from one of those wanking strangers. Being asked by a wanker for permission to wank drags the social-media poster into the wanker’s fantasies — and not only is that creepy, NAW, it’s also no way to show your gratitude. If some stranger is going to make your day by posting a hot pic, why would you ruin theirs — or make them think twice about ever posting a revealing pic again — by telling them exactly what you’re doing while you gaze at their pics?

Finally, NAW, your question inspired me to read feminist film theorist Laura Mulvey’s 1975 essay “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” in which she coined the phrase “male gaze.” Mulvey describes the male gaze as phallocentric, patriarchal, pervasive, and socially constructed — she never describes it as natural.

Listening to pundits discuss the president on the radio, I was inspired So long as you’re wanking by your brilliant alone, wanking with a acronym (DTMFA) reasonable expectation to yell, “Impeach the of privacy, and not motherfucker already!” bothering anyone who isn’t a sex partner or a I’d love to see a line of DAN SAVAGE sex-advice professional with bumper stickers and your wanking, NAW, you can T-shirts bearing that wank to whatever you’d like — sensible message: ITMFA! We except for images of child rape, aka need a shorthand for the obvious “child pornography.”

— think of the boost to productivity You remind me of the proverbial shoe we’d get if we could cut half-hour salesman with a foot fetish. Let’s say a guy conversations about the president to working in a high-end shoe store has an five simple letters: ITMFA! I appeal intense attraction to feet. Is it inappropriate to you to bring this acronym into our for him to get an obvious boner while helping everyday vocabulary.

DUMPED MY MOTHERFUCKER ALREADY women try on shoes? Of course it is. It would also be inappropriate for him to drool or DEAR READERS: DMMA wrote me that pant — and it would be super inappropriate letter in 2006. She wasn’t referring to Donald of him to ask the women he’s serving if he Trump, our current awful president, but can jack off about their feet after his shift.

George W. Bush, our last truly awful president.

But if he can be completely professional, if I thought DMMA’s idea was great. I put up a he can go eight hours without giving off any website (impeachthemotherfuckeralready. signs of secret perving, that guy can (and com) and raised more than $20,000 selling probably should) sell shoes. And he’s free to ITMFA lapel pins and buttons. I donated upload mental images to his spank bank for half the money to the ACLU and the other later — we’re all free to do so, NAW, and it’s half to two Democratic candidates for the only creepy if the people whose images we’re US Senate. (My readers helped turf Rick uploading/repurposing are made aware that Santorum out of office!) we’re uploading/repurposing them.

I’m bringing back my line of ITMFA So in answer to your question, NAW, buttons and adding T-shirts and, yes, under no circumstances should you ask the hats to the ITMFA collection. Go to girls whose selfies you’re wanking to for impeachthemotherfuckeralready.com or, if their permission. People who post revealing that’s too much typing, ITMFA.org to order pictures to social media — men and women some ITMFA swag for yourself or someone — know they run the risk of their pics being you love. wanked to by random strangers. But there’s NOT ANTHONY WEINER?

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FOR ALL SIGNS: Venus, known to the ancients as the goddess of love, makes an unusual number of aspects to the other planets this week. This suggests that many of us will be preoccupied with issues and interests concerning our involvement with others. Venus rules not only romantic love, but also the principle of relatedness among people, whatever that relationship may be. Venus is also interested in money and the resources we share. These two human activities, love and finances, lend themselves to overt and subtle issues of control. Now is a good time to take a sober look at our relationships and make improvements in our behavior that will prevent trouble in the future.

ARIES: Mars, the warrior, enters your sign this week and will be traveling with you for seven weeks. This energy is especially helpful in defining our boundaries. Periodically we need to examine who we are and also who we are not.

to serve or suffer. To “serve” is to give oneself wholly to a task that will help one or more others. To “suffer” generally refers to emotional or physical ailments. If you are feeling blue, look for the nearest person who needs help and offer it.

GEMINI: You are experiencing a change in the areas of shared resources, investments, alimony, debts or inheritance. At this time you are mentally quarreling with yourself or with others over finding a solution to the problem. You want things as they were and that is not possible.

SAGITTARIUS: Circumstances involving

CANCER: Your good judgment is in one

CAPRICORN: You occasionally confuse

at one or more relationships. Even the very closest friends cannot know each other from the inside. Sometimes we forget this fact and need to remember that we are actually separate beings, helping when we can.

LEO: You and a partner may have a tiff

over how to manage joint resources, debt, and shared income. At this time the issue is relatively minor. Don’t gloss over it or you encounter a bigger conversation and disagreement later.

VIRGO: This is a week in which you will tend to be thinking obsessively. It is an opportunity to learn how to better control your mind. Shift your attention to something less dramatic, such as whatever is happening this moment, rather than worrying over what happens in the future.

LIBRA: For any number of reasons, circumstances may leave you out of the social loop this week. It’s possible that you do not feel well. Astrologically this is a time for

38 | JAN. 26 - FEB. 1, 2017 | CLCLT.COM

SCORPIO: You have a choice about whether

TAURUS: You may be taking a sober look

place while your heart is in another. It could be highly distracting. Concentrate while driving or handling tools. If possible, don’t force a decision just now. You might benefit by writing a note to yourself from the voice of logic and a separate letter that speaks for the soul so you can gain a bit of clarity.

DISHING FRESH FOOD AND BEVERAGE NEWS WEEKLY.

self-reflection and not self-condemnation.

Having a quiet week is appropriate at this time. Don’t turn this into a negative belief about yourself.

love life and money may feel a bit tight. You may experience an emotional droop near Jan. 27, in which you perceive yourself to be alone in the world. This is a temporary mood, so don’t take it seriously. All is not lost. what you think with who you are. There are those who will disagree with you this week.

Just don’t let it become a battle to the death.

Your identity is not at stake in this situation.

You may not like what is happening, but you do not have to become a virtual freight train.

AQUARIUS THE WATERBEARER: (Jan 19 -- Feb 18) Necessary expenses (those not of the “fun” type) may develop this week.

If not that, you could be just having a little blue mood. It is one of those times when we become aware that our loved ones can never know or understand fully what is inside of us.

PISCES: This is a week of “nose to the

grindstone”. You are in a serious frame of mind and feel a strong need to get things accomplished that began earlier in the year.

At this point, if you are to accomplish the task, you must pour on considerable energy and resources.

Want a personal horoscope? Hit up Vivian Carol at 704-366-3777 or go to www. horoscopesbyvivian.com.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 5TH

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