Riverfront Times, February 8, 2023

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Publisher Chris Keating

Editor in Chief Rosalind Early

EDITORIAL

Managing Editor Jessica Rogen

Editor at Large Daniel Hill

Digital Content Editor Jaime Lees

Dining Editor Cheryl Baehr

Staff Writers Ryan Krull, Monica Obradovic, Benjamin Simon Theater Critic Tina Farmer

Music Critic Steve Leftridge

Contributors Thomas K. Chimchards, Mike Fitzgerald, Reuben Hemmer, Andy Paulissen, Delia Rainey, Mabel Suen, Graham Toker, David Von Nordheim, Theo Welling Columnists Chris Andoe, Ray Hartmann, Dan Savage

Editorial Interns Katie Lawson, Braden McMakin

ART & PRODUCTION

Art Director Evan Sult

Creative Director Haimanti Germain

Production Manager Sean Bieri

Graphic Designer Aspen Smit

Things Fall Apart

MULTIMEDIA ADVERTISING

Associate Publisher Colin Bell

Account Manager Jennifer Samuel

Directors of Business Development Tony Burton, Rachel Hoppman, Chelsea Nazaruk

BUSINESS

Regional Operations Director Emily Fear

CIRCULATION

Circulation Manager Kevin G. Powers

EUCLID MEDIA GROUP

Chief Executive Officer Andrew Zelman

Chief Operating Officers Chris Keating, Michael Wagner Executive Editor Sarah Fenske

VP of Digital Services Stacy Volhein Audience Development Manager Jenna Jones

VP of Marketing Cassandra Yardeni www.euclidmediagroup.com

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FEBRUARY 8-14, 2023

FRONT BURNER

FOUR QUESTIONS for Keisha Scarlett, new SLPS Superintendent

Previously On LAST WEEK IN ST. LOUIS

MONDAY, JANUARY 30 Ice fell from the heavens, and St. Louis woke up to streets that didn’t look bad — but, this time, were. In one horrifying case, that meant a 30car pileup in west county. Here we were saying nice things about January

Last week, Keisha Scarlett, who has worked in the Seattle Public Schools for 24 years, was announced as the new superintendent of St. Louis Public Schools. She takes her new post July 1. This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

How did this opportunity come up on your radar, and why was it appealing to you?

I knew that it was time for a superintendency for me. It’s a dream of mine to become a school superintendent. … Honestly, it wasn’t until October that I really paid attention to St. Louis. It was after the Central Visual and Performing Arts school violence situation. I watched the staff and the superintendent and the school board –– for some reason, I was glued to the television. If it can happen there, it can happen here. I just looked at the grace and the strength and the partnership across the city from that and how everyone rallied together. And 15 days later, Seattle Public Schools had our own school shooting that resulted in a fatality. It just became so salient. Around that time is when I noticed that there was a posting for the position of superintendent.

What are some of the biggest challenges facing St. Louis Public Schools?

I think the challenges that are facing St. Louis Public Schools are the same challenges that are being faced across urban school districts. Student achievement with the pandemic. School safety, both in making sure that schools are safe and caring and welcoming environments. But also the safety of ensuring that, internally, the school is safe, and then the external school communities are safe, so students are having safe passage. Lastly, I would say the decline in enrollment and people’s perceptions of school quality, and what I believe is a deserved counter-narrative about what’s happening in schools.

I saw that you’re a big hip-hop fan. I do love hip-hop. I am known to frequent a concert. I love all kinds of live music, though.

I read that you jumped up on a Tupac stage?

So Tupac came to my college for homecoming. I stood in line so I could be one of the first people, and I was really close to the stage. You haven’t met me, but I’m about six feet tall. It wasn’t too hard for me to jump up on stage when they allowed some people to jump up there, so I took my chance. I tried to be my very best backup dancer at age 19. He didn’t take me on tour with him after that. That was my moment. [laughs] — Benjamin Simon

TUESDAY, JANUARY 31 It’s still cold out there — and a bit icy, too. Also: President Biden says he’s officially ending the COVID state of emergency in May. A dozen progressives complained bitterly on Twitter; the rest of America could barely be bothered to look up from Netflix.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 1 Post-Dispatch reports that Joe Edwards is dismantling his empire, selling nine properties to Wash U. Can he sell them the Loop Trolley, too? Oh, we own that one.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 2Punxsutawney Phil sees his shadow. That blasted woodchuck is surely wrong; what do rodents know about winter? Also, around 10:30 p.m., officers tried to stop a robbery suspect, but the driver fled, crashing his pickup into the Soulard Market, taking off on foot and exchanging gunfire with officers. Two cops were injured; everyone singing karaoke at Carson’s was rattled.

ESCAPE HATCH

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 3 Post-Dispatch’s Jacob Barker and Austin Huguelet blew open the worst-kept secret in St. Louis politics: Could former congressman Lacy Clay be Public Official No 1, the pol who took $10,000 from a confidential informant, only to return the cash and ask for two checks instead? To which we ask, could the pope be Catholic? Quote-ofthe-week honors go to former Clay chief of staff Darryl Piggee, who says Public Official No. 1 sounds like an honest dude. “Fortunately, whoever that guy was was smart enough and honest enough not to commit the crime.” Anyone getting OJ Simpson “If I Did It” vibes? Also, is there any scandal brewing here that doesn’t involve Brandon Bosley?

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 4 A fighter jet took down the Chinese spy balloon …. after it stole all of Missouri’s secrets Anyone else surprised that our local rednecks didn’t take matters into their own hands? What’s the point of being so committed to the Second Amendment when the Chinese are out there replicating all the stuff on Google Earth with complete impunity?

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 5 Positively glorious weather. See what we said about not trusting that wuss of a groundhog?

We ask three St. Louisans what they’re reading, watching or listening to. In the hot seat this week: three members of the intelligentsia.

Jeff Sjerven, bookseller, Left Bank Books

Listening to: Jay-Jay Johanson

“His voice is velvety smooth. He’s a crooner with a catchy sense of melody. Try ‘Heard Somebody Whistle.’ Or the album Silver Screen.”

Luimil Negrón, educational researcher

Reading and Watching: Too many YouTube videos and tabloid articles about Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa and his ex-lady Isabel Preysler

“Eight years ago, Vargas Llosa dumped his wife of 50 years for Preysler, a renowned social climber and the mother of Latin ‘singer’ Enrique Iglesias. Then Preysler and Vargas Llosa broke up, and last month Preysler started doing torrid confessionals in the tabloids about their breakup. It is like watching a train wreck. I can’t look away. I never thought people in their 70s and 80s could act this foolish.”

Dusty Freund, Managing Editor, Boulevard Magazine

Reading: Bittman Bread, a cookbook by Mark Bittman and Kerri Conan “I was particularly inspired by their idea of cooking your pizza sauce down into a paste. The results are magical.”

Keisha Scarlett loves hip hop and once danced onstage with Tupac. | COURTESY PHOTO

SOMETIMES IT’S THE LITTLE THINGS THAT COUNT

WEEKLY WTF?!

Men @ Work

Date of sighting: February 2

Location: Columbia Avenue, near Kingshighway

Text of sign: NO PARKING MEN WORKING ON TREES

Issuing agency: City of St. Louis Forestry Division

Specificity of sign: high

Why signs like these must go: St. Louisans should know better to park their cars atop piles of sticks and timber.

Perhaps: Instead of trees, these men should be working on themselves.

SO ST. LOUIS e Gig Economy

An anonymous story about something that could only happen in the Gateway City

In early 2021, I started driving Uber for social interaction. I had a company car, and my employer paid for my gas.

I’d been driving for about two weeks when around 7 a.m. one day in south city a kid jumped into my car. I asked him his destination, and he said, “Head north.”

A few blocks later, his phone dinged, and he said he needed to go back. I turned around. He disappeared back onto the same corner from which he’d materialized. I got the minimum fare and another Uber experience to wonder about.

“There’s a bag full of pills back here,” my next passenger said, scooting away from them, her face scrunched up in disgust.

At the next light, I looked into the backseat. The kid who’d canceled the ride had left a shopping bag full of what must have been at least 100 pills in my car.

I dropped the woman off, and

once back home, quite foolishly, popped one of those suckers.

For the next six weeks, I didn’t drive much. I didn’t do much of anything except lay around high.

I never found out what the pills were, though they were almost certainly heroin, fentanyl or something of the like. They made time fly by. I looked haggard as hell, and my bosses thought I was one of those employees for whom working from home meant always working.

In March 2021, I was down to the last dozen. Instead of taking three a day, I took two and a half, then two, then one, then only a part. As addictions go, it was a smooth landing.

By then, the pandemic had eased. I went back outside. I started running.

I’ve never told anyone this before. Writing it down now is like writing down a dream. Dreams are very real, but they also didn’t happen.

Send your So St. Louis story to jsrogen@riverfronttimes.com.

Exposing Josh Hawley’s Fake Stock Ban

Lucas Kunce is back on stage with a refreshing dose of populist reality

Written by RAY HARTMANN

Insurrectionist Senator Josh Hawley did what he does best recently, which is to hoodwink people with a level of mendacity that would make Donald Trump blush.

Hawley garnered a fair amount of national attention in January by naming a bill to ban congressional stock trading after former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. That was clever. Pelosi didn’t achieve her stature as one of the best speakers ever without a knack for attending to members’ needs.

The art of monetizing public service is as old as government itself. But it’s only recently that an idea has surfaced to rein it in — at least symbolically — in the wake of some egregious cases of selfdealing by members of Congress on both sides of the aisle.

So, now there’s loud talk about the need for piety. Where there’s loudness and piety, Hawley can’t be far behind. He has smartly pushed his way to the front of the line — his favorite position until the rioters show up — and now fancies himself the enemy of ill-gotten wealth.

What a strange place for a wealthy banker’s son. But that’s not important here. What matters is the salient point that the news media and almost everyone else has missed: If politicians can still squirrel away their stock portfolios in blind trusts, banning their stock trading doesn’t even rise to the level of cheap talk.

Hawley’s proposal rightly “would ban members of Congress and their spouses from holding, buying or selling stocks or equivalent economic interests while

serving in Washington,” the Hill reported. But here’s the catch: As with similar measures proposed by Democrats, there’s an exception reading, “or transfer them to a ualified blind trust.

That exception falsely presumes that members of Congress slimy enough to enrich themselves with insider stock trading would rediscover their virginity by honoring rules that only ostensibly insulate wealthy people from the decisions of their blind trusts. That’s a case of misplaced trust.

Think of stock trading as a pig. Think of blind trusts as lipstick. Mind you, there’s nothing wrong with the utilization of a blind trust in most contexts. But they’re not about to deter the malfeasance of those vile enough to self-deal from the halls of Congress.

That’s where Lucas Kunce comes in. ou remember unce, the fire breathing former Marine who came out of nowhere in 2022 to mount a long-shot campaign to become the Democratic candidate for the seat of retiring Senator Roy Blunt? That would result in Missouri becoming the Benedict Arnold State, with Senator Eric Schmitt joining Hawley to provide an insurrectionist tandem second to none.

Kunce ran a remarkable campaign buoyed by a stunning amount of national media coverage and small-ticket donations. But his withering populist attacks on the Democratic establishment earned him a last-minute opponent in Trudy Busch Valentine, an heiress whose chief ualifications were a large stack of Democratic political IOUs and an even larger stack of large-denomination bills.

Valentine was airlifted into the race. She’s a very nice person, and she unru ed the feathers of wine-and-cheese Democrats who weren’t at all prepared to back someone who struck them as an ill-mannered creep. Never mind that Valentine was applying to become head of surgery without having attended medical school.

Money won. Populism lost. Film at 10.

Kunce spoke a language heretofore known as plain-talk Missourian in a way few Democrats dare to do, a quality that struck me nearly two years ago as “putting on a clinic” for detached party regulars.

I thought Kunce’s approach was great. In a related development,

he lost.

And now Kunce is trying again. He announced another Democratic race for U.S. Senate, this time against Hawley. It’s as quixotic as the last one in that Missouri has become so red politically that Hawley markets treason as a selling point.

But here’s the good news: Kunce is still Kunce. As he demonstrated recently with a blistering Twitter attack on the phoniness of Hawley’s latest stagecraft, all he is saying is give populism a chance.

Here’s what Kunce tweeted:

“Josh Hawley’s latest campaign prop is a fake ‘ban on stock trading’ for members of Congress that is riddled with family and blind trust loopholes. It’s just another lie to help this fraud get reelected, while rich politicians keep on stealing from us.”

I spoke with Kunce last week after seeing that. True to form, Kunce has chosen to boldly go where no man has gone before. His message to members of Congress — or future ones — is quite simple:

“There should be complete divestment. No stock ownership — period — for them and their close families,” he told me. “Now, when you say something like that, all these members of Congress who have become millionaires while in Congress whine and howl and complain and say, ‘That’s not fair, that’s not American. We need freedom, etc., etc.’

“I’m sorry, if you want to trade stocks, don’t join Congress. You join Congress to make decisions. You’re in Congress to make decisions for the people, not for your stock portfolio.”

I wasn’t able to reach Democratic arty o cials for comment. OK, I didn’t try. Kunce is so much more interesting.

Being a little less of a populist than Kunce, I think it’s important to note that the problem is not

the wealth of politicians. It’s their willingness to abuse their position to enhance that wealth. But to that point, Kunce did cite the perfect example of a wealthy person who is not part of the problem:

“One of the people talking about this is Mitt Romney,” Kunce told me. “He was quoted as saying a blind trust is an age-old ruse, if you will. You can always tell a blind trust what it can and cannot do. So if these members of Congress have a million dollars in Facebook stock, and then they put it into a blind trust, they know everything that went into it, and it’s still there. And they’re going to make decisions based on their stock portfolios.”

There was also this from Kunce:

“A blind trust isn’t some sort of mechanical mechanism. It’s run by a person, usually somebody that you know. You know every single item that went into it, because it’s your entire portfolio just being moved under the control of someone else. If you know the other person, you can tell them what to do. And even if you don’t tell them what to do, you still know what you own.

“For example, Joe Manchin’s coal company and all of his stuff, he put those assets into a blind trust, he still knows that that’s what it is, and he makes decisions based on that. This also allows you to give things to your sons and daughters or brothers and sisters, which is another example of what these rich people do.

“They transfer stuff around the family and get away with it.”

Boy, would it be fun to see Kunce debate Hawley about this. Admittedly, not as much fun as a debate on “manliness,” the topic for which Hawley, as an author, has recently established the new gold standard for self-unawareness. He’s better suited for a career as a supermodel for prissy chic.

Kunce, by contrast, is a dramatically cut former Marine who could pulverize “manly” Hawley with his pinky finger. h, dear God, if Hawley won’t debate blind trusts with Kunce, please put the two of them in a cage match.

Maybe that would get mainstream Missouri Democrats on board. n

You remember Lucas Kunce, the fire-breathing former Marine who came out of nowhere in 2022?

Family Members Search for Justice

e family members of Gary Muehlberg’s victims want him to face them in court

Written by RYAN KRULL

Family members of the victims of alleged serial killer Gary Muehlberg are saying that Muehlberg should have to face them in court — and in person.

“I think meeting all of us face to face is the least he should have to do,” said Saundra Mihan, whose 18-year-old daughter, Robyn, was abducted by Muehlberg in March 1990 and left dead on the side of a county highway four days later. “No cop-out for him,” she added.

Police say that last year Muelhberg confessed to fi e murders committed between 1990 and 1991. In addition to Robyn Mihan, police say Muehlberg has confessed to killing Brenda Pruitt, 27; Sandy Little, 21; Donna Reitmeyer,

Terror in The Grove

A caller threatened to shoot up three LGBTQ bars in e Grove

Written by RYAN KRULL

An unidentified person called three LGBTQ bars in The Grove neighborhood on January 28 and threatened to shoot them up, multiple bar owners say.

All three bars that received threats are on Manchester Avenue in an area of St. Louis known for its LGBTQ nightlife. The strip is also frequently home to drag shows, which legislators in Jefferson City sought to place new rules on last month.

and a fifth ictim who remains unidentified. In all fi e cases, Muehlberg picked up the women near the Southside Stroll, then the city’s red light district, brought them back to his house in north county and killed them. He then left their bodies in conspicuous containers throughout the metro area, including between a pair of mattresses in Silex, Missouri; in a homemade box in O’Fallon; and in plastic trash bins in St. Louis city and in Maryland Heights. The M.O. earned him the moniker “The Package Killer.”

Muehlberg’s confession is thanks to O’Fallon Police Department Sergeant Jodi Weber, who started looking into the cold case in 2008. After more than 10 years of detecti e work, eber finally matched material found with the

Around 4 p.m. at Prism, bartender Jordan Cox answered the phone.

“The caller off the bat started talking about how they were the Joker, and they were going to blow up the bar, send bombs and shoot up everybody,” Cox said, adding that it sounded like at least two people were on the other line.

Just John owner John Arnold said that his bar received a menacing message on its voicemail, also around 4 p.m.

“[The message] said they were going to come in at 3 o’clock in the morning and shoot the place up,” Arnold said. “And that they were tired of us ‘faggots.’”

Bizarrely, the voicemail mentioned a Just John employee by name, whom the caller said they liked. “And they told us to make sure he wasn’t there,” Arnold said.

Prism owner Sean Abernathy said that he and his staff had to make a splitsecond decision on what to do next, as

victims’ bodies to Muehlberg’s DNA last year.

The RFT sought comment from Mihan and other family members of Muehlberg’s victims after a hearing Thursday morning in St. Louis County Circuit Court, during which the question of whether Muehlberg would have to appear in person in the same courtroom as victims’ families arose. Muehlberg’s public defender, Stephen Reynolds, conferred with Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Joanna Brueggemann and Judge Brian May on the matter.

Muehlberg previously said in an interview with the RFT that he wants to plead guilty to the murders and have the case adjudicated as quickly as possible. “If you can arraign me, let me enter my

there were two private events happening at Prism that night, one of them just beginning as the call came in.

Abernathy said he informed the police and had extra security quickly brought in. The bar also shut down to the public, and only those on the lists for the events were admitted.

At Just John, Arnold told the staff that there had been a threat. Security was extra vigilant, making doubly sure there was no way to get inside without passing them.

Around midnight at Prism, St. Louis police officers showed up with members of law enforcement who Abernathy said looked like they worked for agencies other than the local police.

“Apparently the federal government is involved at this point as well,” Abernathy said. Someone with law enforcement told Abernathy that, in addition to the menacing phone call, investigators had

plea and sentence me at the same time — I’m all for it,” he said in November. He is currently serving a life sentence in Potosi Correctional Center for a murder he committed in 1993 that is unrelated to the Southside Stroll killings.

At Thursday morning’s conference, the judge, prosecutor and public defender discussed what Muelberg’s guilty plea will look like.

e s pretty infirm, eynolds said of the 73-year-old Muehlberg, adding that prosecutors in St. Charles and Lincoln County believe that a video plea is “the way to do this.”

However, Judge May said he wants to hear from the victims’ families before he decides if Muehlberg will have to show up to court in person or not.

“I would like to hear from these victims’ families, what their position is,” May said, after pointing out that they had been waiting 30 years for closure and that while he is a big proponent of conducting some court business via Webex video conferencing, he understands the families may have opinions on the matter.

Little’s stepsister Barb Studt, with whom Little lived for a time prior to her killing, tells the RFT about Muehlberg, “I feel that he should have to face us all.”

Little’s half-sister Geneva Talbott agrees.

“I want to look him dead in the eyes. Deep into his shit soul,” she said. n

received some other information about a possible threat to Prism.

“It appears that Prism STL, Just John and Rehab all received calls from an unknown subject threatening to harm employees/patrons and/or threatening to shoot up the establishments,” the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department confirmed. There are no updates at this time and “the investigations remain ongoing.”

Arnold said that he has co-owned Just John since 2009, and in that time, people have called in to the bar and spouted slurs at him and his staff. “But never have we been threatened to be shot up,” he said.

“We’ve always wanted to have a safe space for people to come and be themselves, and we don’t plan on changing that. We might beef up security somewhat, but they’re not going to close us down because of a threat like that.” n

Gary Muehlberg confessed to five murders he committed in the early 1990s. | COURTESY PHOTO

Historic Mass Overdose Event Leads to Changes

Written by MIKE FITZGERALD

Afull year has passed since the February weekend when 11 people suffered accidental fentanyl overdoses. The incident occurred at the Parkview and Park Place apartments on Forest Park Avenue and was caused by tainted crack cocaine.

Joseph Yancey recalled what went through his mind when he heard the first reports of fatalities — eight in all.

“It was horrific, it was tragic,” Yancey said. “Because none of these people knew what they were getting. But it was not surprising.”

Yancey, 70, had just come out of retirement as CEO of a behavioral health care organization to head up a new group: Grassroots Reinvestment for Optimal Well-being – St. Louis, a.k.a. GROW – St. Louis. Its stated mission: use housing, treatment and harm reduction to fight the opioid overdose crisis killing increasing numbers of people in St. Louis, St. Louis County and across Missouri.

Yancey is part of a new approach to the opioid crisis being tried in St. Louis. Spurred by the Parkview and Park Place deaths and the infusion of the first payouts from the National Opioid Settlement, the city and county are joining together with new programs to promote an all-ofgovernment approach to the opioid crisis.

This time around, however, a bracing new awareness is informing the war on opioids. It’s the recognition that the vast majority of substance abuse stems from untreated trauma and mental health problems.

“The bottom line is people in pain will seek relief even if it kills them,” Yancey said. “Or even kill themselves if it means not to hurt again. The genesis is pain. The genesis is trauma.”

The new interventions are desperately needed. Deaths from overdoses of opioid drugs — which include many prescription painkillers, heroin and fentanyl, a drug 100 times more powerful than morphine — have risen dramatically among the region’s Black community; all eight of the

men and women who died at Parkview and Park Place were Black.

Yancey, who is Black, admitted he wasn’t shocked by the mass overdose tragedy — the worst in St. Louis history — nor by the media silence that followed the initial news reports.

“No, it didn’t surprise me,” Yancey said. “The media, just like every other system, is not structured and developed with any thought of people of color in mind. You see it with everything.”

Before he took over GROW – St. Louis, Yancey said he told the Missouri Department of Mental Health — which is funding the new group — that the focus must be on mental health issues, such as childhood trauma and untreated bipolar disorder, that lead people to seek relief with street drugs in the first place.

“My point was if we’re going to do this, then it’s going to have to be very, very different,” he said. “Because everything that’s been done before has not made an impact.”

The truth of Yancey’s statement is underscored by the latest figures from the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services.

The Show-Me State officially recorded 2,153 drug overdose deaths in 2021, a 15 percent increase from the year before. Nearly 70 percent of the OD deaths are blamed on the use of synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, state figures show.

What’s more, St. Louis city leads the state with the highest rate of drug overdose deaths per 100,000 people — 96.83, which is more than double the statewide OD death rate. In 2021, nearly 300 people in St. Louis city died from drug overdoses.

GROW – St. Louis is focusing on five neighborhoods in the city and county whose residents are especially susceptible to substance-use disorder. The orga-

nization’s funds are aimed at community groups that provide outreach, housing, access to treatment and harm-reduction services to the populations they serve.

“Because if you bring it from the outside, people don’t trust that crap. They don’t give a damn,” Yancey said. “Let’s help build their capacity. Let’s empower them in the communities they serve, as a connecting point, as a true trusted connector point. So if we do get people connected, then they stay.”

Meanwhile, the city has already started spending $3 million in state, federal and opioid settlement funds to set up a new behavioral health bureau within the city health department. The bureau is centered on substance-use disorders, with a special focus on the opioid crisis. The city has already started to recruit 14 new positions to support the bureau’s work.

The bureau has paired these efforts with an in-depth analysis of city data. It’s also working with local partners to gain access to additional data that could be useful in monitoring and evaluation, according to Kim Vanden Berg, a city spokeswoman.

In addition, the bureau has held more than 100 meetings with partners across the city and region to build rapport and set up an Opioid and Substance Use Task Force using a cross-systems approach to combat substance use, according to Vanden Berg.

St. Louis County plans to spend its first $4.8 million tranche in opioid settlement funds to pay for an Opioid Remediation Fund and a Substance Use Action Plan, both of which will be overseen by the county’s Department of Public Health.

The action plan will be centered on education, prevention and harm reduction. The latter is exemplified by the widening distribution of the opioid over-

dose-reversal drug Narcan, according to Damon Broadus, the department’s director of health promotion and public health research.

Broadus notes that in 2020 the county handed out 750 Narcan kits. In 2023 the county plans to hand out more than 7,000 Narcan units.

“Narcan is our greatest opportunity right now,” he said.

The county also plans to set up an opioid review board, “So we can look at the crux of what’s really going on from a mortality view,” Broadus said. “What’s really driving the fatalities?”

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that more than 107,000 people in America died of drug overdoses in the 12-month period ending August 2022.

Fentanyl and other synthetic opioids were involved in more than two-thirds of the nation’s overdose deaths, which may involve multiple drugs at the same time, according to the CDC.

As for the criminal investigation into whoever was responsible for the circumstances that led to the eight Parkview and Park Place overdose deaths, it remains ongoing, said Andree Swanson, spokeswoman for the St. Louis office of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

“DEA is committed to bringing to justice the criminal offenders who cause harm to our communities,” Swanson wrote in an email. “As with all of our investigations, we will continue to follow every lead possible.”

Chuny Ann Reed, 47, a resident of Parkview’s top floor, was arrested almost immediately after the mass overdose and charged with distributing crack cocaine laced with fentanyl.

Reed was awaiting trial on the charges as a federal detainee at the Pulaski County Detention Center, in Southern Illinois, when, in late July, she suddenly grew ill and died.

An autopsy determined that she had died after a tumor in her carotid artery cut off the flow of blood to her brain. Reed remains the only person charged in connection with the Parkview deaths.

Yancey expressed optimism that progress can be made in the fight against St. Louis’ opioid crisis. After 43 years helping people with substance-use and mental health problems, Yancey said, “I’ve never ever seen the spotlight around the disparities around behavioral health that I see today.”

Yancey cautioned there are no magic solutions when it comes to ending the drug overdose epidemic.

“It’s not going to be like flipping a light switch,” he said. “It’s going to take some time.”

e city and county are taking a new approach to the opioid epidemic a er eight people died in a mass overdose last year

Parkview Apartments was the scene of the deadliest mass overdose in St. Louis. | THEO WELLING

Dance of Death

e Bleeding Hearts Ball was edark and sexy

Words by ROSALIND EARLY

Photos by THEO WELLING

The Bleeding Hearts Ball combines the delightfully macabre with witchy-gothic vibes and belly dancing for a uni ue e ening. The ball first started in 2008 and has been going strong for 15 years. The evening included dance performances by numerous artists — including Mistress of the Night Ami Amore and the infamous Lunar Fusion Dance — as well as off-beat vendors, food and drink, and music courtesy of DJ Skeletal.

The party was at Mad Art Gallery (2727 South 12th Street) on Saturday, February 4, and vampire, gothic or Victorian dress was encouraged. After the performances, guests had a sultry dance party of their own. n

A CELEBRATION OF THE UNIQUE AND FASCINATING ASPECTS OF OUR HOME

Things

Things Fall

Police o cers with their guns drawn swarmed ade li abir s apartment. They were e erywhere. utside the door. utside the window. In front of his neighbor s door. erywhere. They yelled o er a loudspeaker in rabic, a language he sometimes struggled to understand. They told him he had to lea e his apartment.

The police said that abir had been e icted and there were warrants out for his arrest. ut abir didn t trust these people with guns. e trusted his friends, the people who brought him food, stayed with him in the hospital and fed his kids. It took time before he told you about his life in udan. nd after abir s decades of li ing through the udanese ci il war, gaining his trust wouldn t happen by putting a gun in his face.

low udanese refugee.

I m scared, abir told the robot. e asked his friend to come inside, to walk out with him. The friend ne er did come. Instead came the o cers with guns. That s when t. ouis police killed ade li abir.

When abir walked off the plane in t. ouis in , no family members or friends waited for him at the airport. e likely didn t know a thing about the rch or toasted ra ioli or anything else about t. ouis. hy

o abir didn t lea e. e hid in the apartment as the people with guns outside of his window only seemed to multiply.

o one knows what went through abir s head that day. aybe he thought about his four kids. aybe he was confused. aybe he didn t reali e that he had been e icted.

hate er he thought about, he must ha e flashed back to udan.

i e years before, abir emigrated from his ra aged homeland to the nited tates. illages were burned to the ground, and citi ens were shot on sight by go ernment troops. abir came to merica to escape from that terror, where people in uniforms

regularly pointed guns at him.

n this day, eptember , , the challenges of abir s new life and the years of trauma from war and migration came to a boil. abir, more than anything, needed help.

few hours after the o cers with guns surrounded his apartment, they sent in a remote control robot to communicate. It rolled in with a fu y microphone and a fu y camera, and the oice coming from it was the oice of abir s friend, a fel-

BY BENJAMIN SIMON

would he is home was a illage in the l urumik district of the lue ile state, more than , miles away, where the Ingessana people li ed, barely north of the outh udan border.

abir was from a hilly rural area known for seasonal farming, according to a friend also from udan. e says abir worked with li estock, farmed a plot of land for a few

ILLUSTRATION BY TYLER GROSS

Bade Ali Jabir fled government violence for a new life in St. Louis — only to die in a hail of police gunfireapart

BADE JABIR

Continued from pg 15

months and then stored the food for the rest of the year.

The area was known for its music. “His culture,” says the Sudanese friend, “they like to sing and dance.” It was communal. Neighbors would make their own alcohol for these special occasions, and everyone would come together to sing and dance as a village and as a family.

But then he had to leave. Jabir was born in 1961, and armed conflict and genocide loomed in the background of his entire life. He lived through two civil wars before government bombings forced him to flee in . The lue ile state was situated in a precarious place. Despite siding with the South Sudan-based Sudan People’s Liberation Movement during the wars, the state was excluded from South Sudan when it seceded in 2011. Relations between the Sudanese government and the Blue Nile state were tense.

Then, on the night of September , , gunfire rained down. The Sudanese government bombed the Blue Nile state, razed mosques and schools, and indiscriminately killed kids and the elderly. People were burned in their homes. Those who stayed had little to eat and almost no clean water. Between 2011 and 2013 alone, nearly , people fled, some walking for days to Ethiopia or South Sudan.

So Jabir left, too. He found himself in a U.N. refugee camp in Ethiopia. Indran Fernando, Jabir’s caseworker at the St. Louis-based International Institute, calls conditions in the camp “hellish.” During the day, Jabir worked long hours in the hot sun. There were days when the camp had so little food that he had to choose whether to feed his kids or give the food to people who were starving to death.

When Jabir arrived in St. Louis in 2017, he left behind everyone he knew: his father, his brothers and sister, his three sons from a previous marriage. His mother and brother had recently died and his wife passed away while giving birth to twins. Jabir came to a new country, a single father of four young kids. In his culture, women take care of the children, Fernando says, and Jabir seemed to have little experience parenting.

Jabir didn’t have family waiting for him in St. Louis, but he did have Fernando and the International Institute. The institute, which did not respond to multiple

requests for comment, is paid by the federal government to give short-term help to refugees resettling in St. Louis. Fernando was in charge of acclimating Jabir to St. Louis, getting him a job, signing him up for medical services and teaching him things like how to use an ATM and hygiene expectations.

And for Jabir, newly settled into an apartment just off South Grand in Dutchtown, plenty of things felt unfamiliar. The humid weather. The taste of fast food. The beer. The health care system. The work expectations. The concrete and speeding cars outside of his window. The English language, which he didn’t understand, making it hard to do almost anything ––order food at a restaurant, read signs on the road, say hello at the grocery store.

Even seemingly basic tasks in America were new to Jabir. Fernando remembers that Jabir didn’t know how to sign his name. The first time he spoke through a telephone, he seemed in awe. He poured water on the ground as if it were a dirt floor, others say. He didn’t know how to use appliances like a refrigerator, bathtub or washer and dryer.

Jabir was also isolated. Bilingual International Assistant Services Executive Director Jason Baker says the Sudanese community in St. Louis is “very small.” Few people were familiar with his home, or spoke his first language (Gaam), or understood his trauma, or knew about his culture, or

could e en find udan on a map.

Christopher Prater, a Washington University physician who works with immigrant communities through nia ealthcare, says he sees “high rates” of anxiety and depression among refugee communities.

“Could you imagine,” says Prater, “stepping into a world where you don’t understand anything? And all of that happens at once?”

Jabir found himself alone, raising four kids without much of a blueprint, in a country he did not know, without family to help, without knowledge of the language, in a place that seemed to move a little too fast.

St. Louis.

When the social worker met Jabir at his apartment around October 2018, it was a cold day. His kids were playing outside, but some didn’t wear coats. One was barefoot. The social worker could tell none of them had bathed recently.

In Jabir’s apartment, the situation was even more dire. The apartment was a mess. The social worker found toilet paper stuffed into the bathtub and roaches, rats and mice running across the floor. The kids had plenty of clothes, but Jabir used them as rags.

The social worker pauses before sharing those details, wondering how it will reflect on abir. ut she decides to continue.

“I want to showcase that mental health is real,” she says. “And I want to show that the police didn’t care that he had a mental health problem, and that they still proceeded to do what they did.”

By all accounts, nothing made Jabir happier than his kids. He was affectionate with them. Fernando watched Jabir console them after nightmares. e fluffed up their pillows before bed. He hugged them and stroked their hair. They were among the few things that could make Jabir smile when they played his favorite songs or made a joke. “I’m doing this for my kids,” he often told the social worker. When Child Protective Services later threatened to take away his kids, he pounded his chest. Over his dead body, he said. “I am their father and their mother.”

“This is my speculation, but the vibe that I got was just adjusting to living in America was really hard for him,” a neighbor says. “I am not sure that he ever really felt like this was home.”

But Jabir didn’t complain, Fernando says. He tried. He held a ob, at first. e rode his bike to Arab grocery stores and picked up groceries. He took English classes and cooked chicken, on occasion, for his family.

“He was just endlessly patient,” Fernando says. “Trusting, generous, unflappable. That s how I would characterize him. He had been through such di cult hardship that he expected very little from this country.”

Despite his efforts, Jabir struggled to care for his kids amid all of these adjustments. The news reached a social worker with the Islamic Foundation of Greater

Jabir wasn’t without help. Immigrant organizations, religious groups, members of the Sudanese community, doctors, therapists and, most importantly, neighbors did what they could. After a social worker met with Jabir, the Islamic Foundation covered the family’s rent, bills, clothing and doctor appointments.

In 2019, the foundation helped relocate Jabir and his kids across the city to the Garden Apartments on Hodiamont Avenue. The north city complex has been home to many refugees and new immigrants in recent years. Yet, in 2018, the International Institute suffered a spate of negative press after Syrian refugees placed there complained that they feared for their safety. In one instance, four Syrian kids were attacked by neighborhood youth, and one ended up in the hospital. The International Institute no longer contracts with the complex.

For Jabir, however, the move seemed to make sense. The Islamic Foundation paid a Sudanese neigh-

Bade Ali Jabir, shown in an undated photo, immigrated to America in 2017. | COURTESY PHOTO

bor at Hodiamont to watch the kids, take them to dentist visits, visit their school and clean the apartment. Some of the kids called her “mom” in Arabic.

Over the years, she wasn’t the only person who became attached to Jabir. Another neighbor went to the house every day to clean, buy groceries, watch the kids and feed him medicine. A fellow Sudanese refugee brought Jabir his favorite food –– chicken wings with lemon pepper. A woman who lived across the city visited him weekly for fi e years.

But no matter how much money, time or help Jabir received, little seemed to improve.

On good days, Jabir enjoyed being outside. He didn’t go far, just a few steps away from his unlocked door, either sitting in a dining room chair or leaning against the brick wall of his apartment. It was his escape. He would bask in the fresh air. Skinny and wiry with soft facial features, he often wore a button-down shirt, black aviator sunglasses even if the sun was setting and a dark brown coat even if it was blazing hot. “Pondering life,” one neighbor called it.

In America, there was a short list of things that seemed to make Jabir happy: his kids, company from friends, Arab tea with lots of sugar, chicken, Sudanese music videos, memories of Sudan and sitting outside.

If you approached Jabir on these days, he was warm, easygoing and calm. When a fellow Sudanese refugee brought him food, Jabir would bow his head, out of respect.

He cherished the opportunity to socialize with his people. If you came to see him, he’d grab a chair from his dining room and set it so you could sit beside him. Then he might share his memories from Sudan. He might walk over to his neighbors, the Sudanese family, and laugh with them.

“He was just a kind person,” says neighbor Dalia Atak. When kids came over to visit, he would announce their name with an upbeat, high-pitched voice, and then gift them a piece of watermelon or croissant. He cherished the opportunity to share food. Food wasn’t just something to eat. It was a form of affection. When his kids returned with food, he often told them to share with others in the community.

“Something I saw was endless generosity,” Fernando says.

But Jabir could also seem lost. The last two years of his life, Jabir rarely left the house. He wouldn’t

walk to the park across the street or ride his bike. Someone would get groceries for him, take his kids to school and drive them to the doctor.

On his worst days, Jabir wouldn’t go outside and sit on the lawn. The door would be closed but never locked. Inside, it was pitch black. Bare, no decorations. Mice scurrying around, holes in the walls, doors off the hinges, sink clogged, water dripping from the ceiling, sometimes a bed in the living room and one time a raw chicken on the floor.

If you asked how he was doing, he would always say the same thing –– “good.” But he didn’t seem good. He might curl himself into a ball on the couch or bed, a blanket cloaked over his head. Sometimes, Jabir would hide like this for days on end.

At times, Jabir seemed to be somewhere else. If people tried to engage in conversation, he would go on incomprehensible rants or simply not respond. “It was like, ‘Who is this guy?’” the fellow Sudanese refugee says.

He seemed paranoid. He feared signing documents, and he told Atak that imaginary people in the apartment spoke to him. He wondered whether the people who lived above him had put a curse on him –– and if that’s why he felt sick.

Toward the end of his life, these bad days became more frequent.

The worker at the Islamic Foundation wonders if it dated back to a bike accident he had with a car when he lived on Grand. After that, he stopped riding his bike and stayed home more. Or maybe he just felt lost in America. Regardless, he fell into a gradual, but steady, decline.

In the summer of 2021, a neighbor of Jabir’s reached out to Christopher Prater, the Washington University primary care physician. Jabir needed help. He was in constant pain, with a serious health problem that left his body swollen and bloated.

But there was one issue: Jabir wouldn’t leave the apartment.

“There was something about him that made him very hesitant and fearful to leave,” Prater says.

So they scheduled a video call with an interpreter. As Prater walked through introductions, Jabir struggled to understand the interpreter’s Arabic. He made baffled faces and spoke little.

“It was very clear to me that this was someone who didn’t quite trust what was going on,” Prater says.

ithin fi e minutes, abir left

the room and ended the call.

But Jabir needed care. Prater says Jabir suffered from a kidney disorder called “nephrotic syndrome,” where the body cannot filter protein, causing too much liquid to build up. As a result, the body experiences severe swelling and when that swelling goes unchecked, the liquid can sneak into the lungs, making it hard to breathe.

rater wasn t the first physician to try to help. When Jabir arrived in St. Louis, he was offered in-home case management and in-home therapy services, Prater says. But Jabir refused almost everything.

That summer of 2021, he’d checked himself out of the hospital against medical advice after doctors tried to put a needle in him. He thought they were trying to kill him.

“He clearly has had trauma like most refugees, and particularly his case, a refugee of a civil war survivor,” Prater says. “But for someone to have such mistrust that they weren’t even able to engage in care is very unique.”

Prater saw more than just physical ailments. He thought Jabir probably suffered from depression, anxiety and PTSD. To treat him, Prater had to earn Jabir’s trust. On two separate weekends, he brought his kids to Hodiamont Avenue with fruit and a gift. They played soccer with Jabir’s kids, and Prater introduced himself. One time, Jabir was quiet and hard to reach. Another time, Jabir warmed up to Prater, showed his personality and laughed with the kids.

On January 1, 2022, Prater got a call from the same neighbor who’d initially reached out about Jabir. Jabir, she said again, hadn’t taken his medication in months, hadn’t left his apartment in days and refused to visit the hospital.

He looked like a ballooned version of himself –– his lips, his belly, his legs swollen –– with so much liquid built up that he had gained about 20 pounds. Parts of his body were so swollen that they were rock-hard.

When Prater arrived with Sudanese friends of Jabir’s, the door to the apartment was closed and the lights were off. It was so dark, rater had to shine a flashlight. He found Jabir sitting on his bed, hunched over. They could hear him breathing heavily, heaving in and out.

“This gentleman,” Prater remembers, “needed medical urgent care.”

By this point, Jabir recognized Prater. He agreed to visit the hospital –– but only if friends drove him.

Jabir spent the next few weeks in the hospital. He returned more energized and happier, a neighbor said. He expressed a desire to clean his apartment.

But it didn’t last. That was the last time Prater saw Jabir.

“I probably knew his health best of anyone –– anyone, ever, in his life,” Prater says. “And I never saw him in the o ce. o that, I think, paints a picture about how neglectful he was of his health. I mean, we tried to engage him and were not able to. And again, I’m not blaming him. I think he had serious mental health issues that we just couldn’t ever break down. But for me to be the person that knew him best medically, that’s really — that’s sad.”

On May 28, 2022, Jabir reached a turning point: He punched someone in his complex.

The police arrived, without an interpreter, according to the social worker. In a report filed about the incident, the o cers said Continued on pg 18

In 2019, Bade Ali Jabir moved from Dutchtown to the first floor of the Garden Apartments in St. Louis’ West End neighborhood. | BENJAMIN SIMON

BADE JABIR

Continued from pg 17

that Jabir brandished a knife and resisted arrest.

This was abir s first arrest. The police took him to jail, where he was charged with felonies for unlawful use of a weapon and resisting arrest, along with two misdemeanor counts of assault in the fourth degree.

The rest of the details are murky. Documents from the 22nd Judicial Circuit Court show that a warrant was issued for Jabir’s arrest on May 31. He was denied bond. But community members said he was released within a day or two. Neighbors were told that no charges had been filed. ne searched his name on case.net and found nothing, assuming the situation blew over. (The charges didn’t appear on case.net, according to multiple community members, until the day after he was killed.)

When Jabir came back, he didn’t seem like himself. He was even worse than before: ashamed, rejected, resigned, one neighbor says. “It just was different.”

But the arrest set other things into motion. Child Protective Services took Jabir’s kids and put them in foster care. (Three of the four remained in foster care, not seeing their father for months before his death; the fourth, a teenager, soon slipped away and reunited with his father.)

Then on July 22, Jabir received an eviction notice.

A week before the killing, at the end of August, Jabir was kicked out of his apartment. The social worker called CPS and the police with the hopes they would place him in a shelter. But nothing happened. Some believe he stayed with friends. One night, a neighbor saw him sleeping in the grass. He might have stayed in the anitor s room. In his final few days, he started breaking into his old apartment and spending the nights there with one of his kids.

On Tuesday, September 6, Jabir

once again broke into his apartment.

What happened next is unclear. Police say they arrived after receiving a disturbance call related to Jabir. The landlord informed them that Jabir had been evicted, but would not leave. When police approached, Jabir “became combative and armed himself with a knife and pole,” Department of Public Safety spokesperson Monte Chambers says. They brought an interpreter, but Jabir “ignored the o cer. The o cers left and charged Jabir with resisting arrest, trespassing to the first degree and assault to the fourth degree, Chambers says.

Others heard it was a less fraught interaction. The landlord says an o cer spent hours in Jabir’s house. The next day, the same o cer recited facts about Jabir’s life to a social worker.

The varying accounts just add to the confusion surrounding what happened the following morning –– when heavily armed police arrived at Jabir’s apartment.

The social worker with the Islamic Foundation had a plan for Wednesday, September 7: She was going to get Jabir help. She planned to check him into a shelter and take him to a psychiatric unit. There he could get on medication, move to a new apartment and get his kids back.

“I had it in my mind, Wednesday was game day –– we’re gonna get him out and get him the help that he needs,” the social worker says.

After the social worker arrived at work that morning, a family friend called her around 8:15 a.m. The friend said that police with automatic weapons had surrounded Jabir’s apartment.

Chambers says the Fugitive Apprehension Street Team had come to arrest Jabir for his outstanding warrants from May and the day before. When they arrived that morning, Jabir “armed himself

with an unknown object and barricaded himself in the apartment bathroom,” Chambers says in a January 27 email to RFT

But police have given different accounts of why they came to Jabir’s apartment that day. A week after the shooting, police told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that they received a burglary call at 8:30 a.m. in the complex (though St. Louis police calls for service and police call records obtained by the Post-Dispatch indicate there was no burglary call at 8:30 a.m.). When they got there, police said they found Jabir and learned he had been evicted and had felony warrants. That’s when the standoff started.

Regardless of what happened, it doesn’t change one thing: The police surrounded Jabir’s apartment. To community members, the show of force seemed excessive.

“Like, what are they doing?” the family friend says. “Are they here for an eviction? Like, this isn’t an eviction process. Do they realize he’s just a 61-year-old man? Why are they coming out like this? Do they think he has a bomb? Do they think he has a gun? Like, what is happening?”

The social worker rushed to the complex. When she got there at 8:45 a.m., she found multiple armed o cers in bulletproof vests outside the door and windows to the apartment.

The social worker says she was “furious.” She stormed past the gate around the complex, past the police o cers, with no intention of stopping until she made it into the apartment and left with Jabir. “This was just ridiculous,” she recalls. “This man hasn’t done anything.”

But the police stopped her. They told her they’d knocked on Jabir’s door; he had a knife in his hand. They tried to shock him with a Taser, but Jabir dodged the attack (community members say he didn’t understand the purpose of the Taser; he thought they were trying to kill him).

Police told the social worker Jabir had a long “rap sheet,” but when the social worker searched his name later that afternoon, she couldn t find anything. They said not to worry –– they would get him out safely and take him to the hospital.

None of it made sense to the social worker.

“This is stupid. Let me just go in and get the guy out. I know him,” she pleaded. “... I’ve never seen Bade with a knife.”

Retelling the story, she pauses.

“Anyhow, it escalated.”

Multiple people at the scene asked if they could go inside and get Jabir out. They told police that Jabir dealt with mental illness and police should call the Crisis Response Unit, which handles mental health crises. They told the po-

Police in tactical gear crowd Jabir’s apartment on September 7, the day he was killed. ey used a robot (center) to communicate with Jabir. | COURTESY PHOTO

“I’m scared,” the social worker heard Jabir say. “Please come into the home with me and walk out with me. I want to go back to Sudan.”

lice that Arabic was Jabir’s second language, not his first, and that he sometimes struggled to communicate in Arabic. He might not understand them, they said –– especially in a high-stress situation. They told them that Jabir was not dangerous. He was frail, sick and 61 years old, in no condition to take down do ens of police ocers. He was merely afraid, a man from a war-torn country, who had seen armed people come into his village and kill his neighbors.

He needed empathy –– not force.

A few hours into the standoff, police sent in a remote-controlled small robot on wheels with a microphone and camera, allowing Jabir to speak with another Sudanese refugee from a nearby village.

“I’m scared,” the social worker remembers Jabir saying. “Please come into the home with me and walk out with me. I want to go back to Sudan.”

But nothing changed. Police didn’t budge. They didn’t allow anyone inside, and they didn’t call the Crisis Response Unit. Chambers tells the RFT that the Crisis Response Unit does not respond to “barricaded person or ‘7250’ situations” because team members are “not trained negotiators.”

Chambers adds via email that the police cannot allow bystanders “to negotiate with a barricaded person, for they may unintentionally escalate the situation. Secondly, we do not introduce individuals in barricaded or hostage situations as they may become potential hostages.”

Instead, the police responded by bringing more police. Around 10:30 a.m., police called a SWAT team and additional o cers to the scene, Chambers says. The social worker saw even more –– K9 dogs, people with U.S. Marshal jackets and lines of SUV cop cars. Between 11 a.m. and noon, they pushed the social worker and everyone further away from the apartment. They barricaded off the complex with yellow tape.

There was nothing community members could do.

“You guys are doing this wrong,” the social worker told them. “This is all wrong.”

Atak, another neighbor, arrived around noon, four hours after the standoff began. She couldn’t believe her eyes. The night before she had talked to Jabir and made plans to help him find a new home. Now, dozens of police swarmed the man she had known for years, whom she describes as harmless. This must have been a misunderstanding, she thought. She volunteered to help Jabir safely out of

the apartment. But the police denied her, too.

So Atak climbed the stairs of another building in the apartment complex. She watched as they threw multiple canisters of tear gas into the apartment, making everyone in the complex burst into tears.

Six hours after it began, after 2 p.m., she watched police enter the apartment. dditional o cers in all black with riot gear, bulletproof vests and helmets crowded outside.

“Kobb al-sakina,” the police said four times — “drop the knife” in Arabic.

Four seconds passed.

Then gunshots. POPOPOPOPOP. bout nine shots, fired in rapid succession. There were a few seconds of quiet. Crickets hummed in the background. And then three seconds later, there was one more pop a final shot.

Minutes later, EMTs rolled Bade Ali Jabir’s body into an ambulance and dro e away without flashing their lights.

Afew hours after Bade Ali Jabir was killed by police, St. Louis police Lieutenant John Green, commander of the Force Investigation Unit, stood in front of cameras at Hodiamont. A bright blue sky hung over him, with the brick apartments behind. e answered fi e questions and spoke for just over two minutes.

“Earlier this morning, our fugitive apprehension team was here to arrest a Sudanese Black male, 61 years of age, for some felony warrants,” Green said. “When they arrived, he refused to come out and barricaded himself into the apartment.”

Green ran through all of the tactics they tried. They sent in robots, he said, which Jabir “defeated,” putting them in different rooms. They used tear gas and Jabir “hid” in the bathroom.

That’s when SWAT entered the apartment, according to Green, where they found Jabir armed with a knife and a pole. He said they used Tasers, bean bags and tear gas to subdue him.

None of these measures worked.

“They end up shooting him,” Green said.

hen asked if the o cers acted in self-defense, Green responded, “Yes.”

abir would be the first of two people shot by police that week; Darryl Ross, a 16-year-old, was shot fi e days later, on eptember 12. Five people were killed by police in St. Louis in 2022 –– equal to the total number in the United

Kingdom and Japan combined. In a country where police killed 1,192 people in 2022, the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department was the nation’s deadliest department, according to Mapping Police Violence. From 2013 to 2022, the department killed 48 people, or 15.9 people per 1 million residents. It was the highest rate in the country by a wide margin. The next highest was the Tulsa Police Department at 9.4 per 1 million.

In St. Louis, the overwhelming majority of people killed have been Black. A study conducted by ArchCity Defenders found that between 2009 and 2019, 72 percent of people killed by police in St. Louis were Black, even though Black people make up less than half of the city’s total population.

Franklin Zimring, a professor of law at the University of CaliforniaBerkeley, studied police killings for his book When Police Kill. In a country where millions of citizens have guns and police are “armed and ner ous, he finds the story of Jabir’s killing all too familiar. Standoffs, he says, rarely help.

“[Standoffs] generate impatience on both ends,” Zimring says, “and sometimes increase the emotional pressure to resolve, and that kind of emotional pressure generates impulses that are problematic if not restrained by clear administrative rules.”

The most effective response, he says, is to let the standoff get “boring.” But too often police escalate the standoffs. He says they often cite the presence of a knife as a ustification for killing someone. A knife, though, rarely poses a threat to police, he argues.

“No police life insurance agency worries about knife threats from civilians as a cause of uniformed police o cer death, he says. “They have to get awfully close.”

For those who knew Jabir, the police narrative just doesn’t add up.

“They portrayed Bade as some super warrior or superhuman,” able to fend off Tasers, tear gas and an hours-long standoff, the social worker says.

Jabir could barely work a phone –– how could he dodge and “defeat robots?” Police say he trapped himself in the bathroom –– but how could he trap himself in the bathroom if the hinges were off the doors? Did Jabir even know he was wanted by the police?

Why didn’t the police listen to those who knew Jabir best?

Why couldn’t they just wait until he came out?

Why couldn’t they subdue him without lethal force?

“It just seems like there were so many opportunities to take a different direction and then the other direction was taken,” a neighbor says. “... And now there are four kids without a father or a mother.”

Community members want to see the body camera footage and autopsy. They want clarity. They don’t want police reports. They want evidence of what truly happened inside of Jabir’s apartment. Friends of Jabir say the police have been conducting an internal investigation since the shooting, but nothing has surfaced.

Chambers, the police spokesman, says after the report is complete, it will be turned over to the circuit attorney to determine if there is criminal liability.

But to those who knew Jabir, the killing has haunted them. Jabir was a friend, a father of four, a fan of Sudanese music videos, a human being who was gentle, fearful, quiet, confused, complicated, resilient and loved.

The social worker can still see his body after the killing. His face without a jaw. His stomach, chest, lungs and leg riddled with bullet holes.

During an interview at a coffee shop nearly two months after the killing, Atak cries uncontrollably. “We’re like family,” she says.

The fellow Sudanese refugee, who is now a foster parent to Jabir’s two sons, woke up every night for two weeks straight after the shooting with Jabir in his dreams.

Many use the word “tragic.” ade li abir fled war and left his home with hopes of finding a safer place for his kids. Instead, he was killed by the same people meant to protect him.

The door to Jabir’s apartment is open. Wide open.

But on this day in December, Jabir isn’t inside. He isn’t outside either, sitting in his chair basking in the fresh air. In the place where Jabir once sat are a handful of buckets stacked on top of each other, spattered in paint. A couple of doors lean against the brick wall. Cardboard boxes with more blotches of paint, a hose, a wooden panel and bits of debris litter the grass.

The apartment is being redone –– ready for its next occupant. There’s no indication that Jabir once lived there, that Jabir was shot to death there. The yellow tape, the broken windows, even the bullet holes are gone. Just a few buckets and a newly remodeled apartment that Jabir once tried to call home. n

CALENDAR

BY RIVERFRONT TIMES STAFF

THURSDAY 02/09

Disaster Date

Do you like watching awkward gatherings ell then you ll lo e Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, a classic of stage and screen from playwright Edward Albee. George and Martha are both connected to a university, George as a professor, Martha through her father and George. At a faculty party, Martha invites new professor Nick and his young wife Honey back to her and George’s house for a nightcap. The night begins with George attempting to shoot Martha (it’s all a joke, kind of) and ends with Martha making fun of Nick because he was too drunk to commit adultery with her. It will make you cast a gentler eye over all the bad parties you ever went to. Stray Dog is putting on the wild after-party at Tower Grove Abbey Tennessee enue, 1995) from Thursday, February 9, to Saturday, February 25. The showtimes are p.m. Thursday through Saturday. There is an additional performance on Sunday, February 19, at 2 p.m. Tickets are $25 to $30 and are available at straydogtheatre.org.

Let’s Be Frank

There ha e been so many film interpretations of Frankenstein, the perennial classic from Mary Shelley, that it’s hard to keep track of them all. But do yourself a favor and check out The Curse of Frankenstein at the ebster ilm eries inifred oore uditorium, ast ockwood enue ebster Groves). This 1957 classic British film is the ur ater of ammer Horror” because Hammer Film Productions, the folks behind the film, put out a string of bangers based on Dracula, the mummy and e en more rankenstein flicks. This was the film that started it all. Catch it on Thursday, February , at p.m. Tickets are to and free for ebster ni ersity students. isit webster.edu film series for more information.

Boys in Blue

The Blue Man Group is a col -

lection of highly skilled, worldclass percussion musicians who also have considerable talents when it comes to engaging with an audience. But they’re also just dudes who paint themselves blue and bang on shit, which is why kids totally love them, too. The group is headed to the Fabulous Fox Theatre (527 North Grand Boulevard, 314-534-1111) and will be performing from Thursday, February 9, through Sunday, February 12. But the Fox is hosting a special Blue Man Group Kids’ Night on February 9 at 7:30 p.m., where the wiggly little ones are welcome to come and be amazed by the magic of the blue dudes for free. That’s right: A kids’ ticket is free with the purchase of an adult ticket. The offer is for kids ages 17 and under, so even your elder munchkins can get in on the fun. Prices range between $45 and $75 for a pair of tickets with a kids’ ticket (before service fee). You can’t get these tickets online, though — they’re only available through the o s bo o ce or by calling MetroTix at 314-534-1111.

FRIDAY 02/10

Naughti by Nature

Mardi Gras is the best time of the year to be a little bad, which is why the oken rt actory hio Avenue, 314-771-9000) is hosting Naughti Gras this weekend for all of you naughty little sinners to enjoy. The titillating art party is always packed full of some of the most deviant people in town, and the entertainment is top-notch. Stop in for sexy performances, eye-popping art and more than a little bit of nudity. Attendees often like to get in on the fun, too, with risqué clothing and face masks that hide their identities. The party happens on both Friday, February 10, and Saturday, February 11. Tickets are available at kokenartfactory.com and are priced at $50 per night or $60 for both nights.

SpongeBob Gets Lit

Grab your spongiest yellow shirt

and your squarest pants because this Friday, February 10, a SpongeBob SquarePants party is going down at Red Flag (3040 Locust treet, . hether it s atrick tar s flowery attire or the eyes bugging out of Mr. Krabs’ head, the characters of this iconic cartoon always seemed destined to get the rave-attire makeover. hich is probably why, following the runaway success of the recent Shrek Rave, Red Flag is doing it again by hosting Bikini Bottom Rave. (Note: Turning Squidward Tentacles’ bland brown shirt into a costume might require imagination.) Come dressed in swimwear, come dressed in character, just don’t come thinking you’re too cool for your surroundings. News flash ou re not. oors are at p.m., and tickets are $20 to $35 at redflagstl.com.

SATURDAY 02/11

Flavor Country

It’s no secret that St. Louis is one of the great food cities in the . .,

ere’s no rave like a SpongeBob SquarePants rave at Red Flag. | TYLER MERBLER

even if it doesn’t get as much press as the coastal elites. Many of our neighborhoods house great spots to grab a bite, but how many can boast ha ing a distinct fla or of their own? Not many come to mind — except for Soulard. So it makes sense that the historical area hosts Taste of Soulard, a self-guided tasting tour and pub crawl that allows guests to experience the neighborhood’s a un fla ors. n aturday, February 11, and Sunday, February 12, guests can purchase a ticket that will allow them to sample from a plethora of delicious offerings (and get one drink) from six venues, including everyplace from Broadway yster ar to the ood hack Soulard. Trolleys will even be around to transport attendees from spot to spot, in case those drinks start to add up too effectively. Tickets are $25, and the event runs from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Loveless in the Darkness

If you can’t get them to hold your hand because they love you, maybe you can get them to hold your hand because they re terrified.

St. Louis’ premier haunted house the Darkness (1525 South Eighth Street) is opening for one night only on Saturday, February 11, for a scary-special date night. The long-running house of horrors is always a destination spot for St. Louisans around Halloween time, but now spooky season is stretch-

ing into love season with the My Bloody Valentine haunted house event. Dinner and a movie is played out. If you want to give her a Valentine’s Day date she’ll never forget (even if she wants to), grab a couple of the 1,250 tickets they’re selling at scarefest. fearticket.com — if you dare.

SUNDAY 02/12

Game Day

Looking for somewhere to watch the big game? This just might be your spot. This Sunday, February 12, the 24:1 Cinema (6755 Page Avenue, 314-721-2241) will host the Big Game Day Party as the Philadelphia Eagles take on the Kansas City Chiefs. You won’t miss a thing at this party, as this Pagedale-based movie theater will play the game over four large-scale screens.

hile watching the game, attendees can also enjoy football square games and food and drinks from Fields Foods. General admission tickets are $25 and cover admission, all-you-can-eat food and non-alcoholic drinks. VIP tickets, which include alcoholic drinks, cost $35. Doors open at 4 p.m., an

hour and a half before the game. More info at 24-1cinema.com.

TUESDAY 02/14 Gong Song

If there’s one instrument that is synonymous with love, it’s the gong. o round, so flat, so percussive, these ancient chunks of metal stand alongside the harp and the violin in terms of sheer, sex-soaked romance. So it makes sense that the Center of Sound (4405A Meremac Bottom Road, ak ille is hosting Valentine’s Day Gong Love, an hour long auric field cleansing event sure to get you and yours in an amorous mood this Valentine’s ay. n Tuesday, ebruary , take some time among the many hunks of clanging metal that will be on hand, from wind gongs to planet gongs to Nepalese gongs and more. And, of course, don’t forget the chimes! There will also be lots of chimes, and everyone knows nothing says romance like chimes. Except for gongs, of course. The event costs just $30 to attend and lasts only an hour, but how much more time could you possibly need? For tickets and more information visit centerofsound.com. n

e Blue Man Group is a crowd pleaser for adults and kids alike. | KYLE FLUBACKER ere’s no better place to catch the Chief’s than the big screen. | ERIK DROST

Catch the classic horror film on ursday at Webster University. | COURTESY PHOTO

Too Delicious To Be Simple

Simply Delicious’ explosive Creole flavors make a daytime-fare masterpiece

Written by CHERYL BAEHR

Simply Delicious

1115 Pine Street, 314-802-7287. Mon.-Fri. 8 a.m.-3 p.m.; Sat.-Sun. 8 a.m.-4p.m.

Brandi Artis describes her restaurant, Simply Delicious, as a reflection of her on a plate. If you take the ougie reakfast ammy as a point of reference, this means rtis is a comple , multi layered delight who brings oy to anyone who encounters her.

The sandwich — a master class of sweet and sa ory begins with two butter soaked slices of griddled sourdough bread that are slathered with fig am and stacked with slices of thick bacon. uscious rie cheese melts o er the bacon, and an o er easy egg, when bitten, pro ides a rich, yolky sauce that gets into e ery nook and cranny of this daytime masterpiece.

For Artis, the desire to share such deeply personal dishes as the stunning ougie reakfast andwich has been brewing inside her e en before she opened her first t. ouis restaurant, ens reole itchen. Though she and her wife, rittany, came to t. ouis in order to open the reole restaurant inside ity oundry, rtis always knew it was ust one of the endea ors they hoped to share with their new hometown. That’s how she s been operating her entire culinary career. ansas ity nati e, rtis attended the ni ersity of issouri olumbia to study elementary education and child psychology for two years, then realized it wasn’t her path. Food had always been a passion of hers, so she left i ou to go to both culinary and bartending schools and worked her way up through kitchens around ansas ity while run-

ning her catering business, imply Delicious.

fter se eral years in the business, rtis left ansas ity and the restaurant industry and mo ed to hicago to pursue a career in retail. he worked in that field until a family emergency made her rethink her path. er and her wife s son was born at weeks and one day, weighing in at only one pound. is health was fragile in the early months of his life, so rtis left her paid ob to be a full time mom and pursued real estate in order to ha e more fle ible hours. It didn t turn out that way the hicago real estate market pro ed to be a high intensity business that took her away from her family more than she wanted. In need of balance, rtis brought back imply elicious, operating out of bars and clubs and taking on catering clients with much success.

Though things were going well with Simply Delicious, the Artises decided to mo e to t. ouis in order to be closer to family rtis family is in ansas ity, while rittany s parents are in t. ouis . In researching how to make the mo e work, they came across the ity oundry opportunity, and sketched out a plan for ens

reole itchen with their then business partners that was based on the popular reole brunches rtis prepared for her imply elicious clients.

ens opened last anuary to instant acclaim, but that would not satisfy rtis. till intent on opening another restaurant that would paint a fuller picture of her culinary style, she signed a lease on a downtown building last t.

atrick s ay rittany s birthday and got to work con erting the space into Simply Delicious, which opened on ugust last year.

If you e dined at ens inside ity oundry, you are already well ersed in rtis e plosi e fla ors. These pro ed to be the tip of her culinary prowess iceberg. almon cro uettes, ser ed on the breakfast side of the menu alongside eggs, potatoes and toast, are flecked with zesty herbs and bound together by ust enough cornmeal to gi e te ture to the otherwise percent salmon fritter. i uant remoulade sauce, ser ed on the side, pro ides a sharp counter to the croquette’s richness. Paired with a side of her chimichurri, feta and cr me fra che co ered papas bra as breakfast potatoes, it s a ibrant start to the day.

ro es, a glorious marriage of a croissant and a wa e, are another successful breakfast offering. earing the shape, iron markings and golden e terior te ture of a wa e, this outstanding hybrid features a pleasantly yeasty, multilayered interior that captures the essence of a arisian croissant. s stunning as the main e ent was, I found myself posi-

Continued on pg 27

Simply Delicious features breakfast, lunch and brunch fare in downtown St. Louis. | MABEL SUEN

e eatery has its own line of drinks. | MABEL SUEN

SIMPLY DELICIOUS

Continued from pg 25

tively giddy about the accompanying soft scrambled eggs so fluffy, custard-like and plated up at the instant they began to set up, these are the Platonic form of what a scrambled egg should be (credit must be given to Elcid Strickland and e ill, the cooks on the line the day of my isit, for their flawless execution).

Artis and her team are equally adept at lunchtime offerings. An appeti er of goat cheese fritters, the ot oat, encases the silken cheese in a crispy, seasoned breading when deep fried, the goat cheese becomes almost li uidy, yet is somehow still contained by its flaky shell. Hot honey sauce counters the decadence. This same condiment is featured on the It s ot, oney, a spicy chicken sandwich that puts all others in the genre to shame.

ere, a well seasoned fried chicken breast is smothered in 4 Hens oo oo ueen auce, a mouthwatering glaze that hits every palate point with spice, tanginess, richness and even a little sweetness. Melted pepper jack cheese covers the chicken, which is then dri led with hot honey, housemade ranch and outstanding sliced pickles that have the slightest hint of curry.

riff on surf and turf, imply Delicious’ Bad and Bougie pairs a beautifully seasoned and flawlessly cooked to medium rare, as requested) beef burger patty with Cajun-seasoned grilled shrimp and zesty remoulade sauce. I was worried this might be over the top but was dazzled by how well the fla ors of the beef, shrimp, sauce

and those delightful curry-scented pickles interacted. Also surprising was the fact that the burger is not as messy as anticipated. Strickland and Hill put just enough sauce and shrimp on the sandwich for impact without turning the dish into a knife-and-fork endeavor. It’s an impressive feat.

Artis shows her artistry on more straightforward dishes, too. The ittle iss ougie, a salad of sha ed brussels sprouts, craisins and orange segments, is accented with sliced almonds and goat cheese, then topped with a

perfectly cooked filet of candied salmon (shout out again to Strickland and Hill for nailing that salmon temperature). Cilantro honey vinaigrette adds such a delectable sweet zest I found myself dipping anything I could find in it. rtis

shakshuka is equally vibrant. Drawing on the Lebanese side of her heritage, the chef has concocted a beautiful daytime dish of warmly spiced tomato sauce and herbs; its rustic texture serves as a base for poached eggs, feta cheese and cilantro.

That shakshuka is positively soul-

ful, the sort of dish you taste and understand that the person preparing it has done so not simply to serve a good meal but to give the ones they love a piece of themselves. That Artis has made this approach the entire construct of her restaurant means we get to share in her passion on every single plate — not simply a delicious experience but a pri ileged one, too. n

Simply Delicious

Bougie Breakfast Sammy.........................$22

Shakshuka ................................................$20

Croffle plate ..............................................$18

Bougie Breakfast Sammy features sourdough bread, fig jam, thick-cut bacon, heirloom tomato, over-easy eggs and Brie. It is served with breakfast potatoes. | MABEL SUEN

Green embellishments accent the interior. | MABEL SUEN

Brandi Artis is chef and co-owner. | MABEL SUEN

Celebrating Japanese Cuisine

Katsuya brings bento boxes, katsu and sushi to the Loop

Written by CHERYL BAEHR

Teddy Lee spent two decades bringing St. Louis-area diners sushi, first at the original Wasabi downtown and eventually at other local spots. e was a dedicated craftsman, but he could not shake the feeling that he was meant to show diners a different side of his culinary skills the one where his passion lies.

“My enthusiasm is in Japanese cuisine, but I didn’t want to do just sushi and ramen,” Lee said. “There are a lot of sushi and ramen restaurants around here, but no one is doing bento bo es and kastu, which is one of the most popular foods in apan. I wanted people to know there is more to apanese food than sushi and ramen.”

Together with his brother-inlaw, ack i, ee is showcasing the range of Japanese cuisine at Katsuya (6301 Delmar Boulevard,

SHORT ORDERS

University City; 314-296-3368), the fast casual restaurant they opened on January 2. Located in the elmar oop in the former TNT Weiners storefront, Katsuya is a celebration of its namesake traditional style apanese cutlets, as well as apanese and orean side dishes and sushi, which are all ser ed in bento bo es for a multifaceted e perience.

ee is serious about his katsu. Rather than using store-bought, dried and pre ground panko, he sources his own milk bread from a local orean bakery, then grinds it in a machine he imported from apan. e insists the e tra effort pays off in a superior experience.

It makes such a difference, ee said. If you use dry panko from a supermarket, you get a lit-

tle crunchiness, but you don t get any softness. It s like when you eat fried chicken it s crispy, but it doesn’t have the softness. This has both.”

atsuya, which means katsu house” in Japanese, features a comprehensi e selection of katsu, including pork, chicken, shrimp, tofu, cheese a orean influenced

Katsuya is now open, featuring traditional Japanese katsu, sushi and snacks. | BRADEN MCMAKIN

e takoyaki are fried balls of minced octopus dipped in a wheat-based batter. | BRADEN MCMAKIN Teddy Lee, Angie Phong and Jack Li are thrilled to provide traditional katsu. | BRADEN MCMAKIN

Up Your Game

Written by ROSALIND EARLY

Our adopted football team, the Kansas City Chiefs, are once again playing in the Big Game this Sunday, February 12. And no matter if you have watched every (scripted?) tackle and touchdown this season, or you once thought game-day parties had something to do with Superb Owls, one thing’s for certain: The real stars on Sunday are the snacks.

These St. Louis-area restaurants are offering classic game-day snacks: tacos, pizza, wings, jalapeño poppers and more. This way, even if St. Louis doesn’t have any representation on the field, it will at least have some in your (arguably more important) buffet. But be warned, most of these places require your game day eats be pre-ordered.

At Hi-Pointe Drive-In (multiple locations including 1033 McCausland Avenue, 314-349-2720), you can grab BBQ Pork Skins, which are actually potato skins with Sugarfire pulled pork, cheddar cheese, scallions, bacon bits and the St. Louis Sweet BBQ sauce. If you have a large party to feed, you can get 12 smash burger sliders for $30. Plus Hi-Pointe is offering Taco Mac n’ Cheese, a mac and cheese base that adds taco meat, jalapeños, tomatoes, taco sauce, avocado ranch and tortilla chips. The 24-inch Hero Sub Sandwich features shaved prime rib, smoked ham, smoked turkey and toppings. Orders should be placed by phone by Friday, February 10 and picked up on Sunday, February 12. Call the location that you want to pick up from.

If you’d prefer a classic pizza-and-wing

KATSUYA

Continued from pg 29

selection, Lee notes) and menchi, which is a mixture of ground pork, chicken and onion formed into a patty. All are served in a bento box and come with rice, salad, pickled vegetables and a side dish, which changes daily. In addition to the daily side dish, guests can also add on other sides such as miso soup, egg rolls, gyoza, kimchi and takoyaki, a ballshaped Japanese snack made with minced octopus.

Though Lee did not want to

mixture, head to Pizza Champ (2657 Lyle Avenue, Maplewood), where you can grab two 18-inch pizzas and 12 wings for $62. Pizza options include triple pepperoni, extra cheese, Pizza Champ sausage or classic Margherita. You can place your order at pizzachampstl.com starting at noon on game day. If you want to dine in, there will be four TVs broadcasting the game on Pizza Champ’s enclosed patio.

Taco lovers can grab a Game Day Dip Trip for $75 at Mission Taco Joint (multiple locations including 908 Lafayette Avenue, 314-858-8226). This spread includes fire-roasted poblano salsa, guacamole, queso and two bags of tortilla chips. Add a gallon of Mission Margarita for $99.

For those who want a meal, the Taco Party Packs come with all you need for 10 to 15 servings of tacos and costs $250. Preor-

open a sushi-focused restaurant, he and Li decided it was important to take advantage of their extensive training in the craft and offer a selection of rolls. Highlights include the Katsuya Roll, which features tuna, salmon, crab, tempura shrimp, avocado and scallions, as well as a spicy tuna roll and a fried Philly roll. Like the katsu, all are served in a bento box with gingerdressed salad, seaweed salad, edamame and a daily side dish.

“It’s a little bit of everything,” Lee said of Katsuya’s bento box format. “It’s a very popular way of eating in Japan. And it’s not expensive because we want to ap-

der online through Sunday, February 12.

For those who like the classic snack Red Hot Riplets, Chicken Out (multiple locations including 6197 Delmar Boulevard, University City; 314-384-1010) is offering White Chicken Chili Red Hot Riplet Wraps. The chicken tenders are dusted in crushed Red Hot Riplets and wrapped in a flour tortilla along with lettuce, tomato, mozzarella and Andalouse sauce. Chicken Out is also offering other specials like a 2-foot Chicken-BaconRanch Sub and orders of 12 Fry’d Chicken Sliders. Orders must be placed by phone by February 10 and picked up on February 12. Call the location you want to pick up from.

Sugarfire Smokehouse (multiple locations including 9200 Olive Boulevard, #114, Olivette; 314-997-2301) is offering

peal to college kids and introduce this way of eating to as many people as possible.”

This is not ee s first foray into restaurant ownership. In 2015, he and a couple of business partners opened the Korean food truck KBop to great success and became a thriving presence in the city’s mobile-food scene. Though he loved the food and the experience of getting to know people throughout the city, he felt limited by the food truck format and is excited that Katsuya’s full kitchen allows him the chance to really stretch as a chef. Still, he and Li are limiting the menu to katsu, sushi and

its popular Franken-Tots as a game day special. The tater tots are loaded with brisket chili, mac n’ cheese and shredded cheddar, and cost $8 to $40 depending on size. You can also get other game-daythemed foods like an “In the Pocket,” a cream cheese Rangoon stuffed with pulled rib and scallions, and served with smoked sweet and sour sauce ($18 per dozen). Also check out the “Hot Route,” which consists of smoked and fried wings that are served with sweet or hot barbecue sauce. Orders must be placed by phone by February 10 and picked up on game day.

If you want to take things back to basics, Lion’s Choice (multiple locations) is offering a Pride Pack that includes eight original-sized sandwiches in a branded, insulated bag. It’ll only set you back $29.95. n

sides because they want to focus on doing those things as well as possible.

And if the reception means anything, it’s a bet that has paid off.

“Business has been great, but what really strikes me is that on Fridays or Saturdays, it’s 80 or 90 percent Asian diners, and here we are in the Midwest,” Lee said. That means they find comfort in what we are doing and see this as authentic, which makes me very happy.” n

Katsuya is open Monday through Saturday from 11 a.m. until 9 p.m. and Sunday from 11 a.m. until 8 p.m.

ese St. Louis restaurant specials make cheering on the Chiefs that much more delicious

Mission Taco is o ering a chips and salsa and queso package on game day. | COURTESY MISSION TACO

Simple, Stylish and Surprising

e brand new Vandy in the Grove showcases the skills of STL Barkeep

Written by SARAH FENSKE

Just one block outside the ro e s main drag, a terrific bar has opened — a serious place for drinks on the edge of what’s often a gloriously unserious neighborhood.

The Vandy (1301 South Vandeventer Avenue, 314-472-5321) opened January 17 in a building you might never have noticed, and even now could easily pass by. The sign carved above the door said only “John B. Gutmann Construction Co.” But inside is a strikingly modern cocktail bar with a huge whiskey list, a tightly curated roster of classics and friendly bartenders who manage to love mixology without ever tripping into being pretentious about it.

Indeed, the Vandy’s look is stylish, not fancy. A long wooden bar that practically shines in the candlelight dominates the shotgunstyle room. Tea lights perched in-

Alpha Dog

Maker’s Locale, opening this fall, will bring together Steve’s Hot Dogs, the Fountain and Alpha Brewing on Delmar

Written by JESSICA ROGEN

Two beloved food giants in the region are teaming up to bring the city even more of what St. Louisans love: great food under one roof.

Last week, Danni Eickenhorst, CEO of HUSTL Hospitality Group, announced that Steve’s Hot Dogs and the Fountain on Locust would be joining forces with Alpha Brewing Company Distillery to create a new

side retro beer cans (Pabst’s Red, White & Blue Beer and Schmidt Beer both made appearances on a recent night) accent the space.

The opposite wall is lined with 10 small high-top tables for people wanting a more intimate experience. And along the front wall is a piece of decor sure to launch 1,000 Instagram posts — a mirror decked out with the Vandy’s Art Deco-style logo. Charmingly, the logo also makes an appearance on the ice cube in your cocktail.

food mecca. The concept will be named Maker’s Locale (5232 Delmar Boulevard), which will be located within the Delmar Maker District and is slated to open this fall.

Maker’s Locale will have a shared 8,000-square-foot beer garden and patio, and include an events space that will extend off from Third Degree Glass Factory. The Fountain off Locust will serve ice cream, cocktails and boozy ice cream drinks, and there will be a separate Steve’s Hot Dogs as well.

“For so much of my life, I’ve driven past this area and haven’t had a reason to stop,” said Steve’s founder Steve Ewing in a statement. “I’m excited for the opportunity to be a part of this reinvention of Delmar, building on the momentum happening here in the Maker District. This is a historic moment in the history of that area, as so many people are working to bring people together along Delmar in new ways.”

Both Steve’s Hot Dogs and the Fountain are co-owned by Eickenhorst. She shared images of her breaking ground on the project on her Facebook page. n

the Vandy’s current menu aren’t the befuddling array of obscure spirits and bitters you often get at ambitious cocktail bars. Instead, the bartenders offer top-notch interpretations of the classics: an old-fashioned, a margarita, a Bee’s Knees. Six are intended to stay throughout the seasons; the fi e here for now ha e a arnial theme ri ng on ardi ras, with a “Soulard Sidecar,” a “Lafayette Sazerac,” a Vieux Carre, a French 75 and a “Tornado” — sort of a hurricane for smart people, with passionfruit, hibiscus and lime subbing in for the usual super-sweet juice blend.

Come spring, the bartenders promise, that seasonal list will incorporate produce from local gardens.

You can also choose among three zero-proof cocktails, wine by the glass and a roster of local beer, including offerings from 4 Hands, Narrow Gauge and nearby Rockwell, which previously colonized this long-neglected block.

The Vandy comes from STL Barkeep, which is owned by married couple Matt and Jess Longueville.

If you’ve had a cocktail at the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis or Garden Glow or just about any event at Tower Grove Park, you’ve already sipped their offerings, and the Vandy provides a place for the roving bar operation to store its paraphernalia as well as showcase its work.

What’s being showcased might surprise you. The 11 cocktails on

If you want to keep things super simple, though, the Vandy could easily be your new favorite whiskey bar. The menu offers a series of reasonably priced flights to and an astonishing array of whiskeys by the ounce, from Mellowcorn all the way to Angel’s Envy.

There’s no food, but you have the Grove for that — just a block away, and yet seemingly another world. n

For now, the Vandy is open Tuesday through Saturday, with hours beginning at 4 p.m.

Yes, that’s the bar’s logo on the ice cube. | SARAH FENSKE

e crew breaks ground on the new project. | COURTESY DANNI EICKENHORST

The Better Ron DeSantis

We’ll take the St. Louis vegan mastermind behind Hungry Planet over the Florida governor any day

Written by RYAN KRULL

If you’ve ever enjoyed a Lion’s Choice plant-based sub or a vegan soft taco from Mission Taco, you have Ron DeSantis to thank.

No, not that Ron DeSantis. The other on e antis. The year old chief culinary o cer for t. Louis-based Hungry Planet, a company that has taken on a lofty goal: to create plant-based meats that not only taste as good as conventional meats but are also healthier than the real deal.

Thus far, the company has found success in collaborations with restaurants such as Mission Taco and Lion’s Choice but also in creating a product people buy from stores to use in their own kitchens.

DeSantis won’t say exactly how Hungry Planet pulls off the feat of reducing calories without sacrificing fla or That means I d ha e to let you into the Coca-Cola recipe vault,” he joked. However, he said that it doesn’t matter if he’s developing plant-based beef, chicken, crab or sausage, the same rule holds true. It’s all about taste and texture.

Some conventional meat substitutes try to skate by only on taste, he said, but consumers will only

put up with that for so long.

“Our texture is three dimensional,” he said. “Every bite, every chew, the experience is just, ‘Hey, this is really great. It’s exactly like conventional meat.’”

He adds another not-so-secret secret: experience. “I’ve been cooking for over 45 years, and I’ve learned that the fewer ingredients in the food, the simpler the food is, the more people enjoy it,” he added.

DeSantis grew up in upstate New York in a big Italian family where everyone was always cooking. However, they weren’t the reason he got into food service.

In 1975, he joined the Marine Corps and was assigned to be a cook. ither you get an or you get a ladle,” DeSantis said. “I took the ladle.”

The ladle has served him well.

Before coming to work for Hungry lanet in , he taught at the Culinary Institute of America and was the director of culinary excellence at Yale, where he oversaw the preparation of 15,000 from-scratch meals a day. He also cooked at Camp David and at the White House.

DeSantis said that his plantbased “ah ha” moment came in the 1990s when he was teaching a Techniques of Healthy Cooking class at the Culinary Institute of America.

“I said to myself, ‘Hey, Ron, you have to practice what you preach,’” he said. “So I started to eat more plant ingredients and dial down the animal ingredients.” His kids were younger then, and he quickly learned how to serve up plant-based crowdpleasers.

DeSantis said he now eats about 90 percent plant-based in his own diet. He can’t pass up a good “Sunday sauce” or the occasional helping of ribs.

He now lives in Connecticut, where his family is, and works remotely for Hungry Planet, freuently flying into t. ouis to work with its culinary team on recipe developments and training.

On the topic of the other Ron DeSantis increasingly in the news, Chef DeSantis said that he doesn’t want to get into talking politics, but is adamant that if the Florida governor ever wants to learn how to make great plant-based food, “I’m there for him. I’d be more than happy to give him lessons and some tips.”

DeSantis’ parents live north of Orlando, in the district where the now go ernor first ran for congress in .

“They brought me home one of those cardboard things that they stick in people’s front lawns. One that said ‘Ron DeSantis for Congress,’” he said. “So I got one of those in my garage.”

He added, “I just remind people that I am the original Ron DeSantis. He’s a younger guy than I am.

He can be the governor. I’m the original.”

Not long after DeSantis went to work for Hungry Planet, he had the opportunity to be a guest chef at the White House. A sign at the entrance to the dining area said, “This Week’s Guest Chef is Ron DeSantis,” which led to many curious staffers and politicos poking their heads into the kitchen.

After one night of cooking at the White House, DeSantis went out into the dining area to see how people had liked his fare. A group of diners at one table raved about the vegan crab kung pao.

“Oh, you had the plant-based fish he replied.

“No, no, no, I had the crab,” they replied.

Chef DeSantis decided he wasn’t going to argue the point.

“That was a huge win that we were able to prepare a vegan dish and the guests eating it had no idea they’re eating plant-based,” he said. “They were just eating delicious crab.” n

Ron DeSantis is the chief culinary o cer for St. Louis-based Hungry Planet. | COURTESY PHOTO

Lion’s Choice features Hungry Planet fare in a sub that debuted earlier this year. | COURTESY PHOTO

Adult-Use Goes Legal Early

Missouri lets dispensaries start selling adult-use marijuana three days early, just in time for the weekend

Written by MONICA OBRADOVIC

Customers eager to get their hands on their first legal blunts trickled into t. ouis area dispensaries Friday af ternoon as the state began granting licenses to sell recre ational cannabis.

The start of adult use recre ational mari uana sales last ri day came as a bit of a surprise. The issouri epartment of ealth and eniors er ices, or , was obligated by issouri s newly passed legal weed amendment to start issuing licenses on onday.

ut then o cials tweeted that they d start appro ing com prehensi e medical and adult use license re uests three days early.

o legal weed day came a little earlier than e pected. nd those who could take time in the middle of the day to shop pot were, at first, a rare few.

ines at city disapensaries weren t long early riday after noon. ost dispensaries had no lines at all.

ut budtenders don t e pect it to stay that way. e eral area dis pensaries ha e e ents and spe cials planned for the weekend or early onday to celebrate the roll out of recreational cannabis.

o far, o cials ha e ap pro ed facilities to sell recre ational mari uana, including dispensaries, manufacturers and culti ation facilities.

or most, riday was a long time coming.

This is a huge day for us, said

nna rush, assistant store man ager of ifteen rimo annabis in south t. ouis.

It feels ama ing, said hil il liams, assistant manager of u ury eaf. It s honestly a dream come true, especially if you know someone who s gotten in trouble for the plant.

wade annabis in the oop completed its first sale of recre ational mari uana around noon riday. The customer, aleb her ley, said he d tra eled to other states such as ashington, Illinois and olorado, to purchase weed, but riday marked his first li censed purchase in issouri.

It s ery nice you can ust go in side of a store now and take a or minute sale in order to get whate er I want, herley said.

It s a world apart from what it used to be like.

lan to isit a dispensary some time soon ere s the skinny ring a issouri I you ha e to be or older to purchase can nabis or cannabis products and

[EDIBLES]

Tasty High

When Sinse Gummies needed new flavors, it brought in a St. Louis expert

Written by MONICA OBRADOVIC

As a chef at some of St. Louis’ most storied restaurants, Bob Brazell has mastered several different realms of cookery. But a recent partnership with a local cannabis company set him on a new challenge.

Sinse Cannabis needed someone to help craft flavor profiles for a new line of gummies and reached out to Brazell to tap into his culinary skills. While Brazell admits he’s never made a cannabis product before (at least not professionally), he was up to the challenge.

What resulted from Brazell’s leap are Sinse Gummies, a new line of edibles tailored toward specific patient needs with flavor profiles developed by Brazell. The gummies use THC distillate, full extract canna oil or a combination of both to help consumers with anything from chronic pain to trouble sleeping.

REEFERFRONT TIMES 35

bring plenty of cash though some dispensaries are accepting cards and or ha e T machines.

nd be aware, there are restric tions on how much you can buy. appy bla ing n

anything that I won’t eat.”

Sinse has so far launched three specialized gummies with Brazell:

• A sativa mixed-berry gummy for energetic and uplifting highs; made from equal parts THC and CBD.

• An indica wild berry gummy for a more relaxing experience, also equal parts THC and CBD.

• A high-potency indica sweet grape gummy tailored for chronic pain and sleeplessness. This flavor is made for those accustomed to cannabis who need a higher dose, with 30 mg of THC distillate per gummy.

Brazell chose flavors based on what was already popular in the market, but expanded them. He wanted the THC gummies to taste as good as they feel, he said; the taste is just another part of the experience.

“This was something new for me, which is always a little intimidating,” Brazell said. A long-time St. Louis restaurateur, Brazell earned his chops at the now-closed Monarch and Niche restaurants. He currently co-owns Byrd & Barrel (temporarily closed on hiatus), Tamm Avenue Bar and the Tenderloin Room.

Though cannabis was a whole new culinary frontier for Brazell, he approached Sinse’s gummies the same way he did food at his restaurants.

“I wouldn’t want to put anything out that I don’t enjoy,” Brazell said. “Just like in a restaurant, I’m not going to serve

“Sometimes, you get a gummy and the flavor’s not really there,” he said. “It’s kinda faint and tastes more like weed than anything. That was the thing for me — I wanted the flavor to match the experience that the customer or patient has.”

He may be a little biased, he said with a laugh, but he’s also honest. The gummies are “a really good experience,” he said. “I guess that’s a better word for ‘good high.’”

All of Brazell’s Sinse Gummies are now available at Swade Cannabis locations, with more flavors to be released at a yet-to-be-determined date. n

Adult-use sales are o cially on. | VIA FLICKR / ELSA OLOFSSON

Bob Brazell’s gummies come in a variety of flavors and potencies. | COURTESY PHOTO

Pop Up Art

InSITE STL is the force behind six temporary public art installations taking over downtown St. Louis

Written by BENJAMIN SIMON

You may have seen them popping up throughout downtown St. Louis: Brand new public art is appearing on street corners, in store-front windows, on gigantic buildings, even bright-yellow LED lights on multi-story parking garages.

But these pieces of art didn’t appear there randomly. They represent a years-long process from InSITE STL to bring temporary public art to downtown St. Louis through the Regional Arts Commission’s Downtown STL Public Art Initiative.

Now there are six installations of large-scale artwork scattered throughout the downtown area. But they’re not all murals. There are a wide range of artworks, from murals to digital projections to LED lights.

“Public art is not only beautification but encourages deeper thinking, understanding, interpretation, and interaction with and of the environment around you, in this case downtown St. Louis,” wrote Chloe Smith, grants and programs manager with the Regional Arts Commission.

The idea, though, isn’t to create long-lasting pieces of art that become embedded into the fabric of St. Louis. The goal is actually the opposite: to create short-lived art, temporary art, that may only last one year.

“This gave the artists the freedom to choose sites and projects that interested them and would not be inhibited by the special considerations that have to be made when a piece is intended to be permanent,” Smith said.

The process began in 2018, with an open call to St. Louis-area artists. InSITE STL received more than 100 applications, and the Downtown STL Public Art Initia-

CULTURE

tive Advisory Committee whittled that number down to 10 people. The finalists then had to present their projects, with a budget, samples and Photoshop renderings.

The Advisory Committee settled on six projects that will dot downtown. Jenny Murphy painted murals in three different groundfloor windows. Timothy ortlock is projecting digital artwork on a Washington Avenue building. The Van Dyck Murphy Studio created a sculpture using a 3D printer outside of the historic Wainwright Building in the courtyard, though their pro ect won t be finali ed for a few more weeks.

Jacob Stanley developed Ribbons of Light, an LED sculpture on the parking garage of ark acific Apartments at the intersection of Tucker and Pine.

hen tanley first saw the call for artists in 2018, he knew he had to apply.

“I was like, well, this call kind of sounds like it’s for me,” Stanley said.

Stanley is a sculptor who “speciali es in temporary large scale public art” all across the country, from a bridge in Richmond, Virginia, to the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Tennessee. This form of short-term art allows him to push his craft while dodging the restrictive requirements and permits that come with permanent art.

“If you say it’s temporary, you can be riskier,” he said. “‘Well, if you don’t really like it and people complain, I’ll take it down next weekend, and it’s up for a week.’ … On a more conceptual level, I love the spontaneity of it, so that you had to be there in the moment.”

Pretty quickly, he developed an idea for his St. Louis project: He wanted to decorate “boring concrete boxes.”

I specifically sought out parking garages because no one is like, ‘This parking garage is beautiful,’” Stanley said.

He wanted to juxtapose the artwork with the building. He wanted curvy lines that would “soften” these “boring concrete boxes.” He didn’t want Cardinals, Blues or Saint Louis University colors, either. He chose yellow, a color that would grab attention without “screaming I love sports,” allowing the viewers to create their own narratives.

ight has so many specific connotations, whether that’s spiritual, whether that’s uplifting, whether that’s just shock and awe,” he said. “It’s a good entry point. You don’t need a PhD or a degree in art history to appreciate it.”

Kelley Van Dyck Murphy and Jonathan Murphy wanted to do the opposite. They wanted to bring more attention to a 132-year-old building that is often overlooked: the Wainwright Building — considered one of the first skyscrapers in the country.

“We were really interested in proposing a project that would call attention to this beautiful old building that people often pass by and don t really know the significance of it,” Van Dyck Murphy said.

But Van Dyck Murphy sought to contrast the historic building with a modern form of art. As an assistant professor of architecture at Washington University, she has been working on a research project using ceramic 3D printing. She decided to create an ornamental architecture that would complement the Wainwright Building out of terracotta clay from a 3D printer.

“I think that’s super interesting about the 3D printing with clay. … It’s a blend of old and new — or really ancient and new,” she

said. “Because terracotta has been around forever, [and] that building is from the turn of the century. Then we’re using this new technology to create something.”

The designs may seem simple and uncomplicated. Isn’t it easy to just plop something out of a 3D printer? Didn’t Stanley just hang up the lights and call it day?

Far from it. Stanley’s installation, for example, required precise attention to detail. He had to take photos of the building, draw it in hotoshop, figure out how to bend three inch conduit, ip tie the lighting, bisect the curves with the windows, make custom C-clamps, get ahold of the garage’s architectural drawings, draw the building to scale on paper and then paste the lights over the drawing.

Then he had to transfer all of this work onto the parking garage. I had a ery big igsaw pu le to put together on the actual building itself,” he said.

It was a windy road. Initially, RAC hoped to unveil the installments by 2020, but the pandemic hit, delaying the process by a year and a half. When Stanley did get started again, multiple setbacks hampered the process. He had to switch parking garages twice and wait on LED lights from China, and when he finally got up there in the fall, he needed two boom lifts to even complete the project.

But it all came out OK. In January 2023, months after he started, Stanley finally finished the pro ect. ow, there are waves of yellow LED lights covering what was previously a big beige box building above a Papa John’s, brightening up St. Louis.

“We choose to make buildings cheap and ugly, or utilitarian ugly,” Stanley said. “But we also could choose to make them filled with life.” n

Jacob Stanley’s sculpture Ribbons of Light is located on the parking garage of Park Pacific Apartments. | JACOB STANLEY

7.5 Years For 30 Deep Grimeyy

e day before sentencing, the popular St. Louis rapper announced a new album with an Instagram post from jail

Written by RYAN KRULL

Popular St. Louis rapper Arthur Pressley, better known as 30 Deep Grimeyy, was sentenced in federal court on February 1 to more than 7 1/2 years in prison for being a felon in possession of a firearm.

The felon-in-possession charge, which Pressley pleaded guilty to last October, stemmed from a January 5, 2021, police stop during which Pressley and three other men in a 2008 Pontiac G8 were pulled over in north city.

On the backseat, between Pressley and another man, sat a Beretta M9.

Pressley, 25, subsequently admitted to trying to forge a bill of sale from three months prior to make it look like the gun wasn’t his but instead belonged to the man seated next to him.

However, numerous social media posts showed Pressley with the gun, including in October 2020 when it was purchased.

Most sentencing hearings for felons in possession last around an hour, but Pressley’s took all morning, starting at 9:30 a.m. and not wrapping up until around 2 p.m. The hearing was also more well-attended than the average sentencing hearing, with about 30 people — almost all Pressley supporters — in the courtroom’s public seating area.

The recommended sentencing guideline for Pressley’s crime and his criminal history was between 41 and 51 months. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Cassandra Wiem-

MUSIC

unlike Kanye West’s Yeezy brand.

When prosecutors played clips of Pressley’s music, they said that he was rapping about real crimes that his peers had committed.

Kagan retorted that rapping about something doesn’t prove a person is involved in those activities. He also questioned why all this was even being brought up when Pressley was being sentenced for the crime of being a felon in possession of a firearm.

“I feel like I’m on trial for murder, ressley said at one point.

Much of the morning’s proceedings involved testimony from ATF Special Agent Kirsten Ellerbusch, who began investigating the 30 Deep Gang in 2019.

At one point, Kagan asked Ellerbusch if it was illegal to receive a fake blowjob from a woman dressed like a corrections o cer outside the Thomas F. Eagleton Courthouse.

ken asked Judge Stephen Clark to impose the maximum possible sentence of 10 years. Wiemken said that the longer sentence was warranted because Pressley was a prolific possessor of firearms and a gang leader who had no respect for the law.

During the hearing, the prosecution displayed photos posted to social media that showed Pressley holding firearms. They also played excerpts from Pressley’s music videos, including one in which the rapper gets a simulated blowjob outside the very courthouse where the hearing was taking place.

“My rap name is an image I have to portray. I have a certain type of fan base, ressley told the udge.

He added: “I feel like I’m being targeted because of my rap name. I’m Arthur Pressley. I’m a human being.

Wiemken said that Pressley’s being a rapper was largely irrelevant, aside from the music videos that seemed to prove Pressley did possess weapons despite a prior felony conviction making his doing so illegal. She said that what should impact Pressley’s sentencing is that he was the leader of the so-called eep ang, whose members she alleged had committed assaults and other crimes involving drugs and violence.

Pressley’s attorney, Lenny Kagan, called the prosecutor’s argument an unbelie able leap.

He pointed out that when Pressley was arrested, authorities searched him and two residences of his, finding no drugs or guns of any kind.

“This is your alleged gang leader he said.

He pushed back on the idea that 30 Deep Gang was a gang at all, saying that it is a brand associated with Pressley’s rap persona, not

Ellerbusch said that she didn’t know if it was illegal, though it was in poor taste.

After deliberating in his chambers for more than an hour, Judge Clark returned to the bench to deliver his sentence of 92 months. He said that he’d determined that the 30 Deep Gang had been a street gang and that ressley was its leader.

Out in the courthouse lobby, prior to Judge Clark reading the sentence, Pressley’s manager, Jeremy Fips, who goes by JFips, highlighted the album Pressley just dropped the day prior, called Let Me In. “He wants to be let into the industry. That’s why it’s called Let Me In, ips said. The songs on the album are based on everything he s feeling right now.

For the album, Pressley worked with producer Alley Knock, who was also there in court to support Pressley.

“Me and him had a nice run together, and we will continue to ha e a nice run together, nock said.

Pressley announced the new album on his Instagram page, and included a photo of himself in the St. Louis City Justice Center in the post. “Had to leave my supporters wit umm he wrote.

Fips said about Pressley’s future: “He’s good. He’s got two more albums on the way. He’s going to count these days down. Do his time and get out.

In “ e Biggest Dookie,” 30 Deep Grimeyy raps outside the federal courthouse. | SCREENSHOT

“ My rap name is an image I have to portray. I have a certain type of fan base. ... I feel like I’m being targeted because of my rap name. I’m Arthur Pressley. I’m a human being.”

Love, Chaos, Beauty

St. Louis rap collective DOUG was inspired by Cherokee jam sessions — and e Hangover

Written by BENJAMIN SIMON

They are all music people. The kinds of people who may have full-time jobs, kids and partners but still carve out the time to join multiple bands, subgroups, trios and duos to make music. They seem to always be on Cherokee Street, they say, calling themselves “very southside St. Louis.” They’ve done a lot of jam sessions, they’ve rapped at a lot of bars, they’ve heard a lot of beats.

But this night on January 2021 at the Cola Lounge on Cherokee — well, that jam session was unlike anything they had ever experienced before in their lives.

“It was absolutely magical,” Wesley Ragland said.

“That moment, the chemistry was crazy. It was like some ‘Splash Brothers’ stuff,” Donovan Hunter said, referencing Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson, considered to be among the greatest shooters in NBA history.

That night, five men — Ragland, Hunter, Jose Marks, Jamell Spann and Mickey Hayes — just started jamming, Hayes on the guitar, everyone else on the mic. They went for more than an hour, Hayes hammering away on the guitar and the rappers following him, passing the mic back and forth, bar after bar after bar. Everything in that moment just seemed right.

Ragland and Hunter said it was the guitar. “I’ve never heard any rappers freestyling to an acoustic guitar,” Ragland said. “Like, this is different, you know?”

The moment spawned an idea: They should make a rap album together. But not just any rap album. They wanted to make the album over live instruments — guitars, drums, keys, basses. A live band, essentially, just like at the Cola Lounge.

Nearly two years later, that jam session has led to the group’s debut EP, a self-titled jazz-fusion-style rap album recorded under the name DOUG.

The official six-person roster is long for a rap group: MCs Hunter (Donovan RaMon), Marks (POET X), Spann (SPANN) and Ragland (WASLY); engineer/producer Owen Ragland; guitarist Mickey Hayes; and Dogtown Athletic Club helps with the instrumentals.

The result is an eclectic album that captures the variety of musicians — the jazzy strumming of Hayes, the pace-setting of Gram Tolish from Dogtown Athletic Club, the deep, raspy, melodic voice of SPANN, the fluid freestyling of Ragland.

But Hunter said it’s the live instruments that allow the group to roll and resonate with listeners.

“Just harmony and music and vibrations,” Hunter said. “When you got that live band, it’s always natural. So it’s always something that you can feel within your soul and your heart.”

DOUG’s core members started making music many years before this EP and many years before the phrase originated. Wesley Ragland, Owen Ragland and Jose Marks are brothers. Hayes went to Webster Groves High School with the brothers. Marks and Hunter said the first time they connected was in elementary school when they beat up a bully. The list goes on — it’s an intricate web of relationships.

They are unified by one word: “DOUG.”

This isn’t only an artist name, though. It’s a verb, a noun, a self-created nickname, a handshake, the name of their former house, a way of living, a culture, a brotherhood, an acronym for “Doing Our United Good” and “Driving Our Universal Growth” — and now, a band name.

Ask what a Doug is, and you’ll get a confusing response.

“Man, you a Doug,” Hunter said. “There are Dougs out there that don’t know they Dougs.”

“It’s like a culture,” Ragland added.

But understanding the idea of Doug is integral to understanding DOUG. The name developed as many as a half-dozen years ago. After watching The Hangover, Hunter said the image of the mildmannered bridegroom Doug, played by Justin Bartha, stuck in his head. Every time he saw his friend Marks, he made references to Doug. “Where’s Doug?” “Aye yo!” Then they started calling each other Doug. Then it just evolved.

“We just took it and ran with it man, I just wanted to make it a family and have deeper meaning to it,” Hunter said.

Sitting behind three separate video screens, Hunter, Ragland and Marks

demonstrate the DOUG handshake, a gesture they said represents love, respect and unity. Screen to screen, they simultaneously moved their arms, gripping the air as if they are shaking hands, bringing each other in for a fake hug and attaching their fist to their chests.

“It’s more than just a group, it’s a brotherhood,” Marks said. “So it doesn’t just come with the handshake. It comes with an acknowledgment of, ‘This is someone that I want to lift up and I want to see do good.’”

Now it’s a band. After their jam session at the Cola Lounge, the group started hanging out more. In the early days of 2021, for “DOUG days,” as they called it. They’d eat dinner, freestyle and make music.

“I think the feeling of improvisation and freestyling is something that is incredibly powerful, incredibly positive,” Ragland said. “It feels good when you’re

in a room seeing somebody create something from nothing.”

In those sessions, Hayes realized that the music needed to reach more people than his basement.

“Yeah,” he remembered thinking, “we need to actually do something with this.”

So after grueling days of work on a construction site, Hayes returned home and channeled his days of studying jazz guitar at Loyola University New Orleans to sketch out an entire musical score. It became the basis of the sound in the album.

Over the past two years, DOUG has been recording, mixing, engineering and producing a four-song EP. The hardest part hasn’t been the music or the chemistry or even finding space for six creative people to fit on an album. They recorded the songs in a single day.

It’s scheduling.

Everyone in the group has a full-time job outside of DOUG. Some have kids and partners. Hayes lives in New Orleans, where he teaches music and works as a bartender. They each have their own musical careers and subgroups and duos and trios.

“The challenge is just, how do you get seven, eight people to all line their schedules up?” Ragland said. “We’re all adults, we all work — but when we do so, the energy is so natural.”

The group plans to continue making music. They’re all working on separate projects now, but their group chats with each other are continuously blowing up with ideas. When Hayes returns to St. Louis in the summer, they hope to record another album.

But for now, they’re reveling in their creation. In some ways, they still seem like they’re riding the high from two years ago, from that jam session at the Cola Lounge, the night they discovered the sound that fit like nothing before.

“That band just gives it that full DOUG feel — everything natural,” Hunter said. “It’s all love. It’s rough. It’s love. It’s chaotic. It’s beautiful.” n

From le : Owen Ragland, Wesley Ragland, Donovan Hunter, Jose Marks, Jamell Spann and Mickey Hayes make up DOUG. | JESSICA PIERCE

“It’s more than just a group, it’s a brotherhood. So it doesn’t just come with the handshake. It comes with an acknowledgment of, ‘This is someone that I want to lift up and I want to see do good.’”

Stumbling Along

Written by TINA FARMER

Side by Side by Sondheim

balance and the energy required for the lively opening choreography. Best has no problem staying on key during her featured songs, though her voice occasionally waivers as she works to adjust her harmonies in the group numbers. The high notes are problematic throughout the show; Spanger in particular was flat on opening night, and both Miller and Sinlah struggle with breath control and support in their upper ranges. I expect as the run continues, each performer’s voice will get stronger and more true throughout their range.

Written by Stephen Sondheim.

Directed by Reggie

D. White.

Presented by the Repertory Theatre St. Louis through Sunday, February 19. Showtimes vary by day. Tickets are $23 to $92.

The Repertory Theatre St. Louis is a local institution recognized for long-standing excellence. Unfortunately, not every opening of every show is as smooth or error free as the company and audiences would like. Such was the case with Side by Side by Sondheim, a pleasant musical revue that opened a bit flat, despite having all the elements in place.

The revue shares selections from throughout Sondheim’s career, including a few numbers cut from shows. Two songs penned as the opening number for A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum follow “Comedy Tonight,” the actual first number of both that musical and the revue. Narrator Alan Knoll, a late addition to the cast, doles out the details with the glib, chatty approach of someone accustomed to presenting, while referencing some note cards. Director Reggie D. White chose wisely when adding the personable Knoll to the cast though Knoll’s use of note cards reinforces the feeling this show could use more rehearsal.

The songs themselves get off to an uneven start as the cast of Phoenix Best, Paul HeeSang Miller, Saidu Sinlah and Amy Spanger struggle to find harmonic

There are several numbers that will likely elicit applause with a bit more rehearsal. The duets “You Must Meet My Wife” and “If Mama Was Married” deliver the intended humor well. The contemplative “I Remember,” from the mostly forgotten Evening Primrose and the sassy, innuendo-filled “Can that Boy Foxtrot!” a song cut from Follies, as well as solos from Miller and Best, are unexpected highlights in the first act. That song, and the show, also gets a boost and much needed energy from Heather Beal’s choreography.

The second act features songs for which Sondheim was primarily the lyricist, including selections from West Side Story and Gypsy that are genuine crowd pleasers. Knoll and Miller have fun with a song about airline food and Best’s and music director Trey’von Griffith’s interpretation of “Send in the Clowns” features a rich, warm tone and a slight modulation that adds to the song’s emotional impact. A long medley featuring clever transitions from song snippet to song snippet closes out the evening on a relatively high note.

If you’re looking for a full musical experience, you may prefer waiting for a production of one of Sondheim’s works. Fans of Sondheim, however, will likely enjoy hearing selections from the composer and lyricist’s vast catalog, and the personal snippets, spilled like afternoon gossip by the jovial Knoll, provide an interesting narrative thread. n

e Repertory’s Side by Side by Sondheim has good elements but doesn’t quite come together

ings don’t quite meld together in the Rep’s latest. | PHILLIP HAMER PHOTOGRAPHY

HAPPY HOUR

Each week, we bring you our picks for the best concerts of the next seven days! To submit your show for consideration, visit https://bit.ly/3bgnwXZ. All events are subject to change, especially in the age of COVID-19, so do check with the venue for the most up-to-date information before you head out for the night. Happy showgoing!

THURSDAY 9

ANDREW BINDER JAZZ TRIO: 7 p.m., free. Evangeline’s, 512 N Euclid Ave, St. Louis, 314-367-3644.

ANTHONY B & THE BORN FIRE BAND: 7 p.m., $35$40. Broadway Boat Bar, 1424 North Broadway, St. Louis, 314-703-0616.

BRAD HUFFMAN: 4 p.m., free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

BRIAN OWENS PRESENTS MALENA SMITH AND JACK PORDEA: 8 p.m., $15-$20. Joe’s Cafe, 6014 Kingsbury Ave, St. Louis.

THEE FINE LINES: w/ Jeffy & the Sunken Heads, Cyanides 8 p.m., $10. The Sinkhole, 7423 South Broadway, St. Louis, 314-328-2309.

WHAT WE WON’T SEE: w/ Sole Loan, Skin Effect 9 p.m., $10. CBGB, 3163 S. Grand Blvd., St. Louis.

FRIDAY 10

ADAM SANDLER: 7:30 p.m., $36.50-$166.50. Enterprise Center, 1401 Clark Ave., St. Louis, 314-241-1888.

AL HOLLIDAY & THE EAST DIDE RHYTHM BAND: 8 p.m., $15-$20. Central Stage, 3524 Washington Avenue, St. Louis, 314-533-0367.

ALLIGATOR WINE: 10 p.m., free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

ANTHONY NUNZIATA: 7:30 p.m., $20. Blue Strawberry Showroom & Lounge, 364 N Boyle Ave, St. Louis, 314-256-1745.

AVIANA AND THE PURE ROOT: 9:30 p.m., $15-$20.

The Dark Room, 3610 Grandel Square inside Grandel Theatre, St. Louis, 314-776-9550.

BLANKE: 9 p.m., $15-$17. Old Rock House, 1200

S. 7th St., St. Louis, 314-588-0505.

CARYATIDS: w/ *56k, Miracle Whip, Big Waves of Pretty 8 p.m., free. Platypus, 4501 Manchester Avenue, St. Louis, 314-359-2293.

FANTASIA & JOE: 8 p.m., $64-$255. Chaifetz Arena, 1 S. Compton Ave., St. Louis, 314-977-5000.

THE HOMEWRECKERS: 5 p.m., $10. The Attic usic ar, . ingshighway, nd floor, St. Louis, 314-376-5313.

THE JAZZ TROUBADOURS: 7 p.m., free. Evangeline’s, 512 N Euclid Ave, St. Louis, 314-367-3644.

J.D. HUGHES: 4 p.m., free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

NON-EUCLIDEAN GEOMETRY ALBUM RELEASE: w/ Blond Guru, Lofty’s Comet 8 p.m., $10-$15. Off Broadway, 3509 Lemp Ave., St. Louis, 314-498-6989.

ROBERT NELSON: 7 p.m., $25. National Blues Museum, 615 Washington Ave., St. Louis.

SLAZINIK: w/ You Died, Kilverez 8 p.m., $10. The Sinkhole, 7423 South Broadway, St. Louis, 314-328-2309.

VOICES OF MISSISSIPPI: 8 p.m., $40-$50. The Sheldon, 3648 Washington Blvd., St. Louis, 314-533-9900.

SATURDAY 11

ALL ROOSTERED UP: noon, free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

CASTING RUNES: 7:30 p.m., $5. Spine Indie

Bookstore & Cafe, 1976-82 Arsenal St., St. Louis, 314-925-8087.

CHEROKEE STREET BRASS BAND BLOWOUT: w/ Red & Black Brass Band, Funky Butt Brass Band, Saint Boogie Brass Band 7 p.m., $15-$40. The Golden Record, 2720 Cherokee Street, St. Louis.

CLOWNVIS: LOVER’S SOIREE: 8 p.m., $20. Red

Cherokee Street Brass Band Blowout w/ Red & Black Brass Band, Funky Butt Brass Band, Saint Boogie Brass Band

7 p.m. e Golden Record, 2720 Cherokee Street. $15 to $40. No phone. When you think of Mardi Gras, there’s one thing that always immediately springs to mind, an indelible association inseparable from the annual celebrations. No, we’re not referring to the exposed anatomy of loose and/or empowered women; get your mind out of the gutter. And no, we’re not referring to the heroic consumption of cheap alcohol, fans though we may be. And no, we’re not talking about the smell of pisssoaked concrete hanging in the night air — actually, let’s stop with the guessing game and just tell you: It’s horn music! A staple of any good Mardi Gras bash, the jazzy-funky stylings of a crack team of brass instrumentalists is consistently the best part of the season, and cel-

Flag, 3040 Locust Street, St. Louis, 314-289-9050.

COLTER WALL: w/ Vincent Neil Emerson 8 p.m., $34.50-$59.50. The Factory, 17105 N Outer 40 d, hesterfield, .

DAWSON HOLLOW: 8 p.m., $12. Blueberry HillThe Duck Room, 6504 Delmar Blvd., University City, 314-727-4444.

EDDIE 9V: 10 p.m., $12. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

FISHY WATERS: IN BED WITH THE BLUES: 7 p.m., $25. The Sun Theater, 3625 Grandel Square, St. Louis, +1 314-446-1805.

FORGOTTEN SPACE: CELEBRATING THE GRATEFUL

DEAD: 8 p.m., $25. Old Rock House, 1200 S. 7th St., St. Louis, 314-588-0505.

FRANK FOSTER: 8 p.m., $22. The Hawthorn, 2225 Washington Avenue, St. Louis.

FROST NIGHT 2023: 7:30 p.m., $10. Pop’s

ebrations in Mardi-Gras-capitol-of-theworld New Orleans are always teaming with second lines and krewe members blowing their horns. This Mardi Gras, St. Louis’ horniest party is going down at the Golden Record with the Cherokee Street Brass Band Blowout. Now in its second year after a sold-out soiree in 2022, the show sees the city’s finest horned acts join forces this weekend, with the Red & Black Brass Band, Funky Butt Brass Band and Saint Boogie Brass Band all slated to perform. Kick this season of celebration off right this Saturday by shaking your ass to some high-energy tunes by the city’s finest — and don’t forget your beads.

THAT 90S JAM: 9 p.m., $7-$15. Sophie’s Artist Lounge & Cocktail Club, 3224 Locust St second floor of . ack, t. ouis, .

THEY NEED MACHINES TO FLY?: w/ Dream Iridescent, the Otto Modest 8 p.m., $10. The Sinkhole, 7423 South Broadway, St. Louis, 314-328-2309.

VALENTINE’S SOUL JAM: 7 p.m., $59-$125. Stifel Theatre, 1400 Market St, St. Louis, 314-499-7600. WHITE REAPER: 7:30 p.m., $20. Delmar Hall, 6133 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, 314-726-6161.

SUNDAY 12

CAYLIN HERR: 1 p.m., free. Molly’s in Soulard, 816 Geyer Ave., St. Louis, 314-241-6200.

GUY DAVIS: 4 p.m., $25. National Blues Museum, 615 Washington Ave., St. Louis.

HUDAI: w/ Buried in Arms, Chain Link 8 p.m., $12. Red Flag, 3040 Locust Street, St. Louis, 314-289-9050.

JIM MANLEY & FRIENDS: 11 a.m., free. Evangeline’s, 512 N Euclid Ave, St. Louis, 314-367-3644. LOVE BALLAD SING-A-LONG BRUNCH: 10 a.m., free. Das Bevo Biergarten, 4749 Gravois Ave., St. Louis, 314-224-5521.

THAT GIRL BAND: 8 p.m., free. 1860 Saloon, Game Room & Hardshell Cafe, 1860 S. Ninth St., St. Louis, 314-231-1860.

MONDAY 13

ERIC MCSPADDEN & MARGARET BIENCHETTA: 5 p.m., free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

EXPERIMENTAL OPEN MIC III: 7 p.m., free. The Sinkhole, 7423 South Broadway, St. Louis, 314-328-2309.

MONDAY NIGHT REVIEW: 7 p.m., free. Hammerstone’s, 2028 S. 9th St., St. Louis, 314-773-5565.

SOULARD BLUES BAND: 9 p.m., $8. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

TUESDAY 14

ANDREW DAHLE: 9 p.m., free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

ANDY COCO & CO.: 5 p.m., free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

GOLLIDAY: 7 p.m., $15-$25. The Dark Room, 3610 Grandel Square inside Grandel Theatre, St. Louis, 314-776-9550.

JANET EVRA VALENTINE’S DINNER & SHOW: 7:30 p.m., $95.00. Blue Strawberry Showroom & Lounge, 364 N Boyle Ave, St. Louis, 314-256-1745.

LONELY HEARTS CLUB – VALENTINES DAY: w/ DJ Sex Nintendo, DJ Limewire Prime 8 p.m., free. The Sinkhole, 7423 South Broadway, St. Louis, 314-328-2309.

NOAH KAHAN: 8 p.m., $32.50. The Pageant, 6161 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, 314-726-6161.

SONGS IN THE KEY OF LOVE: 7:30 p.m., $30. Westport Playhouse, 635 W Port Plaza Dr, St Louis, 314-328-5868.

—Daniel Hill

Pre-Partying: Looking to get started early? The Mini Mardi Gras Music Crawl has you covered. From 4 to 6 p.m., Cherokee Street will play host to several St. Louis bands in the lead-up to the big party, with performances by Blvck Spvde, Kendrick Smith, Rum Drum Ramblers and others at venues including Hop Shop, Yaqui’s, the Whiskey Ring and more. Best of all, admission is free!

Nightclub, 401 Monsanto Ave., East St. Louis, 618-274-6720.

HOSTED BY GRAIN: w/ Anais Sin, Mike Herr, Aura 8 p.m., $10. CBGB, 3163 S. Grand Blvd., St. Louis.

JONATHAN KARRANT: 7:30 p.m., $20. Blue Strawberry Showroom & Lounge, 364 N Boyle Ave, St. Louis, 314-256-1745.

PROUD LARRY: 5 p.m., $10. The Attic Music ar, . ingshighway, nd floor, t. ouis, 314-376-5313.

SCOOTER BROWN: 8 p.m., $15-$20. The Dark Room, 3610 Grandel Square inside Grandel Theatre, St. Louis, 314-776-9550.

SMALL TOWN MURDER: 8 p.m., $39.50-$65. The Pageant, 6161 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, 314-726-6161.

STARWOLF: w/ Bo and the Locomotive, Nick Gusman and the Coyotes 8 p.m., $15. Off Broadway, 3509 Lemp Ave., St. Louis, 314-498-6989.

THY ART IS MURDER: w/ Kublai Khan TX, Undeath, I AM, Justice For The Damned 6 p.m., $29.50$49.50. Red Flag, 3040 Locust Street, St. Louis, 314-289-9050.

WEDNESDAY 15

THE BAYLOR PROJECT: 7:30 p.m., $42-$47. Jazz St. Louis, 3536 Washington Ave, St. Louis, 314-571-6000.

DAN NAVARRO: 8 p.m., $20. Blueberry Hill - The Duck Room, 6504 Delmar Blvd., University City, 314-727-4444.

DREW LANCE: 4:30 p.m., free. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811.

ESCAPE THE FATE: 5 p.m., $25-$60. Pop’s Nightclub, 401 Monsanto Ave., East St. Louis, 618-274-6720.

LOTUS: 8 p.m., $25. Old Rock House, 1200 S. 7th St., St. Louis, 314-588-0505.

MARGARET & FRIENDS: 3 p.m., free. Hammerstone’s, 2028 S. 9th St., St. Louis, 314-773-5565.

VOODOO ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND: 9 p.m., $10. Broadway Oyster Bar, 736 S. Broadway, St. Louis, 314-621-8811. n

Funky Butt Brass Band. | ERIC NEIMANS

OUT EVERY NIGHT

SAVAGE LOVE

Dom Vibes

BY DAN SAVAGE

Hey all: I’m away this week. Please enjoy this column from July of 2019.

Hey Dan: I’m a womanwho married young (21), and I’ve been with my husband for seven years. Within the last year, I’ve realized that my falling libido probably comes from the fact that I am not turned on by our boring vanilla sex routine. I get so little fulfillment that I’d rather not even do it. I’ve tried talking to him, but he says he prefers sex without foreplay or a lot of “complicated stuff.” I had some great casual sex before we met but it turns out I’m into BDSM, which I found out when I recently had a short affair. I’ve kept the secret and guilt to myself, but I have told my husband I’m into BDSM. He wants to make me happy, but I can tell he isn’t turned on doing these things. He denies it, because he’s just happy to have sex at all, but a butt plug and a slap on the ass does not a Dom make. I’ve tried to ask him if we can open up our relationship so that I can live out my fantasies. I would like to go to a BDSM club, and he isn’t interested at all. He was very upset and said he’s afraid of losing me if we go. He also felt like I was giving him an ultimatum. But I told him he was allowed to say no and that I wouldn’t leave if he did.

When I was younger, I thought there was something wrong with me because everyone else wanted monogamy, but it never seemed important to me. I’m not a jealous person, and I wouldn’t mind if he had sex with other people. In fact, the thought of it turns me on, but he says he isn’t interested. I know he loves me, and I love him. At this point my only solution has been to suppress this urge to have BDSM sex, but I don’t know if it is a good long-term solution. What should I do? Keep my fantasies to myself? Have another affair or ask him to have an open relationship again? We have a 3-year-old daughter, so I have to make our relationship work.

Want The Hard Truth

Two quick points before I bring out the big guns: First, marrying young is a bad idea. The younger two people are when they marry, according to a mountain of research, the likelier they are to divorce. It makes intuitive sense: The rational part of the brain — the prefrontal cortex — isn’t fully formed until we’re 25. We shouldn’t be picking out wallpaper in our early 20s, WTHT, much less life partners.

And second, basic sexual compatibility (BSC) is crucial to the success of sexually exclusive relationships and it’s a bad idea to scramble your DNA together with someone else’s before BSC has been established.

And with that out of the way…

“WTHT might be surprised to hear she is just a normal woman being a normal woman,” said Wednesday Martin, New York Times best-selling author, cultural critic and researcher. “Like a normal human woman, she is bored after seven years of monogamous sex that isn’t even herkindof sex.” You mentioned that you used to feel like there was something wrong with you, WTHT, but just in case you have any lingering “what’s wrong with me?!?” feelings, you’re gonna want to read Untrue: Why Nearly Everything We Believe About Women, Lust, and Infidelity Is Wrong and How the New Science Can Set Us Free, Martin’s most recent book.

“We know from recent longitudinal studies from Germany, Finland, the U.S., the UK and Canada that among women only, relationship duration and living together predict lower desire/boredom,” Martin said. “In fact, the Finnish study found that even when they had more/ better orgasms, women in monogamous relationships of several years’ duration reported low desire.” A straight man’s desire for his long-term, live-in female partner also decreases over time but not as dramatically as a woman’s does.

“Contrary to what we’ve been taught, monogamy kills it for women, in the aggregate, more than it does for men,” Martin said.

So that’s what we know now — that’s what the research shows — but most advice professionals, from the lowliest advice columnist to the most exalted daytime talk show host, have chosen to ignore the research or are unaware of it. So they continue to tell unhappily sexless couples that they’re either doing something wrong or that their relationship is broken. If he would just do his fair share of the housework or if she would just have a glass or two of wine — or pop a “female Viagra,” if big pharma could come up with one that works, which (spoiler alert) they haven’t and most likely never will — they’d be fucking like they did the night they met.

This advice not only isn’t helpful, it’s harmful: He does more housework, she drinks more wine, nothing changes, and the couple feels like there’s something wrong with them. In reality, nothing’s wrong. It’s not about a more equitable division of housework (always good!) or drinking more wine (sometimes good but not always), it’s about the desire for novelty, variety and adventure. Those are things a couple can build into their mo-

nogamous relationship, WTHT, but not if they’re only being told that dishes are the problem and/or wine is the solution.

So the big issue here is that you’re bored, WTHT. No foreplay? Nothing complicated? Even if you were 100 percent vanilla, that shit would get tedious after a few years. Or minutes. After risking your marriage to treat your boredom (with an affair), you asked your husband to shake things up — to fight sexual boredom with you — by incorporating BDSM into your sex life, by going to BDSM clubs and by at least considering the possibility of opening up your marriage. (Ethically this time!) And while he’s made a small effort where BDSM is concerned (butt plugs, slapping your ass), your husband ruled out BDSM clubs and openness. But since he’s only going through the BDSM motions because he’s just “happy to have sex at all,” what he is doing isn’t working for you.

At bottom, WTHT, what you’re saying — to me, not your husband — is that you’re gonna need to do BDSM with other people if your husband doesn’t get better at it, which is something he might learn to do at those BDSM clubs he refuses to go to. Which means he has it backward: He risks losing you if he doesn’t go.

“She once put her marriage at risk to get BDSM,” Martin said. “WTHT’s husband doesn’t need to know about the affair, in my view, and he doesn’t need to become the world’s best Dom. But he owes her acknowledgment that her desires matter. Get to that baseline, and other things tend to fall into place more easily. The discussion about monogamy becomes easier. The discussion about needing to be topped becomes easier. Working out a solution becomes easier.”

I’m not suggesting that an open relationship is the solution for every bored couple, and neither is Martin. There are lots of legitimate reasons why two people might prefer for their relationship to be, remain or become monogamous. But two people who commit to being sexually exclusive for the rest of their lives and also want to maintain a satisfying sex life — and, open or closed, couples with satisfying sex lives are likelier to stay together — need to recognize boredom as their mortal enemy. And while the decision should be mutual, and while ultimatum is a scary word, bringing in reinforcements isn’t just the best way to fight boredom in some instances, there are times when it’s the only way to save a relationship.

That said, a couple of weeks back I told a frustrated husband that his cuckolding kink may have to be put on the back burner while his children are young. The same goes for you, WTHT. But at the very least your husband has to recognize

the validity of your desires and could put more effort into pleasing you.

“In straight culture, people tend to define sex as intercourse because intercourse is what gets men off, and westillprivilege male pleasure,” Martin said. “But seen through a lens of parity, what WTHT wants is not ‘foreplay’ or ‘complicated stuff.’ It’s sex, and the sooner her husband lets go of this intercourse = sex fetish of his and acknowledges that her pleasure matters as much as his does, the sooner he’ll be a real partner to his wife.”

For the record: A relationship doesn’t have to be open to be exciting, BDSM doesn’t have to be complicated to be satisfying and date night doesn’t have to mean dinner and a movie. Date night can mean a visit to a BDSM club where your husband can learn, through observation alone (at least for now), how to be a better Dom for you.

You can find Wednesday Martin on Twitter @WednesdayMartin. You can find her books, blog posts, videos and more at wednesdaymartin.com.

Hey Dan: I am a 27-year-old man in an open marriage with a wonderful partner. They’re my best friend, I smile whenever they walk into the room and we have a ton in common. We don’t, however, have that much sex. I’m currently seeing someone else, and our sex is great. We’ve explored some light BDSM and pegging, and I’m finding myself really enjoying being a sub. I’m kind of terrified that, as a man, I might accidentally violate someone’s boundaries. I’m also autistic, which makes navigating cues from partners rather difficult. Completely submitting to someone else weirdly makes me feel totally safe and free for the first time. The problem is, my spouse is also pretty subby. When they do try to initiate sex, it’s often so subtle that I totally miss the signals. In the past month, I’ve had sex with my spouse maybe once, compared to four or five times with my other partner. My question is this: Have you seen examples of people in open marriages who essentially fulfill their sexual needs with secondary partners, while still maintaining a happy companionable partnership with their primary?

Sexually Understanding Butt-Boy

I’ve known people in loving, happy, sexless marriages who aren’t leading sexless lives; their marriages are happy and companionate, and both partners find ... Go to savage.love to read the rest.

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