Nashville Scene 11-19-20

NOVEMBER 19–DECEMBER 2, 2020 I VOLUME 39 I NUMBER 41 I NASHVILLESCENE.COM I FREE

CITY LIMITS: THE GRAND OLD PITY PARTY PAGE 9

Our thank-you letters to the people, places and organizations that make Nashville special cover_11-19-20.indd 1

MUSIC: HOW BLACK WOMEN CAN POWER COUNTRY MUSIC’S FUTURE PAGE 40

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NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

CONTENTS

NOVEMBER 19, 2020

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Walk a Mile: Richland-West End ...............6

A Sailor’s Guide

CITY LIMITS

In the 11th installment of his column, J.R. Lind heads west to the neighborhood surrounding Elmington Park

ART

Eleanor Aldrich is formal and mysterious at Channel to Channel

BY JOE NOLAN

BY J.R. LIND

The Grand Old Pity Party ...........................9 Tennessee Republicans overwhelmingly refuse to acknowledge Biden’s victory

BY STEPHEN ELLIOTT

Pith in the Wind .........................................9

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BOOKS

THIS WEEK ON THE WEB: Elliston Place Buildings, Including Site of The End, Sell for $1.6 Million COVID-19 Breaks Out on Tennessee’s Death Row

Memphis Calling

This week on the Scene’s news and politics blog

Robert Gordon revisits his rollicking tale of a revolutionary musical city

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BY DAVID WESLEY WILLIAMS AND CHAPTER 16

Hey, Thanks

A POEM BY CHET WEISE | ILLUSTRATED BY PONI SILVER

Thanksgiving Takeout, ScaledBack Holiday Style

‘pop life’ ‘the calculus of sunlight / tastes like bubblegum’

COVER STORY Our thank-you letters to the people, places and organizations that make Nashville special

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Book Club: Theater Makers on What You Should Be Reading ON THE COVER:

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Illustration by Mary Spaar

MUSIC

Moving Forward ....................................... 40

CRITICS’ PICKS Watch Chaz Cardigan stream from Analog, go to Cheekwood for Holiday LIGHTS, catch Nashville Ballet’s virtual season opener Community, build your own streaming Ava DuVernay film festival, check out Little Hollow, Tennessee from Nashville Rep, listen to KCRW’s podcast Lost Notes: 1980 and more

Lilli Lewis and Kamara Thomas discuss how Black women can power the future of country music

BY MARCUS K. DOWLING

The Shape of Country to Come .............. 41 Meet Reyna Roberts, Adia Victoria, Brittney Spencer and other Black women who are changing country and roots music

BY MARCUS K. DOWLING

The Spin ................................................... 42

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The Scene’s live-review column checks out D. Striker at The 5 Spot and Rahsaan Barber at the Nashville Jazz Workshop

FOOD AND DRINK

What It Takes to Open a New Restaurant in a Pandemic

BY P.J. KINZER AND RON WYNN

We see how the sausage is made at the brandnew Zeppelin

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BY MARGARET LITTMAN

FILM

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Primal Stream 30

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An escapist sitcom, classic fantasy and ’80s satanic horror, now available to stream

GIFT GUIDE

BY JASON SHAWHAN

VODKA YONIC

NEW YORK TIMES CROSSWORD

Lighting the Way

On finding my Hindu faith during the pandemic

BY POOJA SHAH

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Mile

with J.R. Lind

With feet on the street, we discover Nashville’s own unique beat – one mile at a time

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PET OF THE WEEK! HI FRIENDS – the name is Helen Hunt! I recently returned to Nashville Humane after living in a Foster Home. (I’m told I was the perfect house guest, too) Here’s what my foster had to say about me: “Helen is a 6 month old Brittany Spaniel/Cattle Dog mix who loves her soft blankets almost as much as she loves to be outside! She is also absolutely killing it in the potty training category! She is such a LOVE and filled with cuddles! She will be a wonderful addition to any family!” It’s true, everyone - I know the answer to Who’s A Good Girl! To meet me, please go to nashvillehumane.org/booking to schedule an appointment to visit NHA. Thank You! Call 615.352.1010 or visit nashvillehumane.org Located at 213 Oceola Ave., Nashville, TN 37209

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FROM BILL FREEMAN BOB FISHER WILL RETIRE FROM BELMONT THIS SPRING — WHO WILL FILL HIS SHOES? Belmont University’s business-savvy president, Dr. Robert “Bob” Fisher, is retiring this spring, and he will certainly be missed.

During his 20-year tenure, Fisher has had many notable achievements — enrollment at the private university has increased from less than 3,000 to 8,400, and he brought the presidential debates to Belmont twice. So it’s clear that Fisher was indeed the right man for the job, and he showed up at just the right time. As for who will fill his shoes, I don’t envy Belmont’s board when I think of the task before them — finding someone with the passion and leadership skills of Bob Fisher.

One of the many admirable things about Fisher was that upon his arrival here, he immediately studied our community and integrated himself into it. He was chair of the Greater Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce and the PENCIL Foundation, co-chair of the Mayor’s Task Force on Public Education, and much more.

In 2000, when Fisher took the helm, Belmont University was a relatively new university, having transitioned from a college in 1991. Many people in our city thought of Belmont as a good little Christian school, but Fisher saw greater things in its future — like a law school, a pharmacy school, a film program and more. Those visions became realities under his watch.

A recent Belmont press release touts some more of Fisher’s accomplishments, like leading Belmont through a $1 billionplus expansion with new construction, renovations and property acquisitions — including the Curb Event Center, where October’s presidential debate was held. Fisher clearly sees the big picture, and his business savvy and financial resourcefulness seem unmatched. He has a fine gift for developing and implementing strategies that others likely would have shied away from. Fisher desired to position Belmont as second only to Vanderbilt — which I believe he has successfully done.

A 2018 Nashville Post article notes that Fisher, prior to being hired by Belmont, had given an honest assessment of the university’s strategic plan, which at the time called for enrollment to hover around 3,000. “I don’t think it’s a very good idea,” Fisher remembered telling his interviewers.

“You can be a great liberal arts college at 3,000, but you can’t be a great professional university at 3,000.” From there Fisher encouraged, planned and implemented multiple new programs over the years, and built the Belmont legacy to the very best of his ability. He was even nicknamed “Bob the Builder” by board vice chairman Gordon Inman — during Fisher’s tenure, the school has added 10 new buildings.

Though new programs have been added during his tenure, Fisher realizes that Belmont’s brand is still largely music. The Mike Curb College of Entertainment and Music Business offers programs from songwriting to audio engineering, and has inspired students from across the nation to attend. They’ve seen Belmont alums like Trisha Yearwood and Brad Paisley make good, and they want to do the same.

But perhaps Fisher will be most

BOB FISHER appreciated and remembered for putting Nashville and Belmont on the proverbial map with those two aforementioned presidential debates at the Mike Curb Event Center. According to a Tennessee Lookout interview on Oct. 9, Fisher said he went after the debates to “shine a light on our great state, putting the eyes of the world on Tennessee.” On the first day Fisher met Mike Curb, he walked with him to the place he envisioned the center being built and asked Curb to imagine turning on his TV and hearing news of Belmont-hosted debates.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Bob Fisher has worked very hard to make a difference for Belmont and for Nashville. He has exceeded all expectations, sidestepped the naysayers and helped Belmont reach goals many never thought possible. He invested himself fully to benefit others. Finding someone to fill his shoes? That will be a challenge! But the right person will recognize they have the opportunity to build from Fisher’s fine legacy and work with a school and a community now ready for almost any challenge.

Bill Freeman Bill Freeman is the owner of FW Publishing, the publishing company that produces the Nashville Scene, Nfocus, the Nashville Post and Home Page Media Group in Williamson County.

Editor-in-Chief D. Patrick Rodgers Senior Editor Dana Kopp Franklin Associate Editor Alejandro Ramirez Arts Editor Laura Hutson Hunter Culture Editor Erica Ciccarone Music and Listings Editor Stephen Trageser Contributing Editors Jack Silverman, Abby White Staff Writers Stephen Elliott, Nancy Floyd, Steven Hale, Kara Hartnett, J.R. Lind, William Williams Contributing Writers Sadaf Ahsan, Radley Balko, Ashley Brantley, Maria Browning, Steve Cavendish, Chris Chamberlain, Lance Conzett, Steve Erickson, Randy Fox, Adam Gold, Seth Graves, Kim Green, Steve Haruch, Geoffrey Himes, Edd Hurt, Jennifer Justus, Christine Kreyling, Katy Lindenmuth, Craig D. Lindsey, Brittney McKenna, Marissa R. Moss, Noel Murray, Joe Nolan, Chris Parton, Betsy Phillips, John Pitcher, Margaret Renkl, Megan Seling, Jason Shawhan, Michael Sicinski, Ashley Spurgeon, Amy Stumpfl, Kay West, Andrea Williams, Cy Winstanley, Ron Wynn, Charlie Zaillian Art Director Elizabeth Jones Photographers Eric England, Matt Masters, Daniel Meigs Graphic Designers Mary Louise Meadors, Tracey Starck Production Coordinator Christie Passarello Events and Marketing Director Olivia Moye Promotions Coordinator Caroline Poole Publisher Mike Smith Senior Advertising Solutions Managers Maggie Bond, Sue Falls, Michael Jezewski, Carla Mathis, Heather Cantrell Mullins, Stevan Steinhart, Jennifer Trsinar, Keith Wright Advertising Solutions Manager William Shutes Sales Operations Manager Chelon Hill Hasty Advertising Solutions Associates Aya Robinson, Price Waltman Special Projects Coordinator Susan Torregrossa President Frank Daniels III Chief Financial Officer Todd Patton Corporate Production Director Elizabeth Jones Vice President of Marketing Mike Smith IT Director John Schaeffer Circulation and Distribution Director Gary Minnis For advertising information please contact: Mike Smith, msmith@nashvillescene.com or 615-844-9238 FW PUBLISHING LLC Owner Bill Freeman VOICE MEDIA GROUP National Advertising 1-888-278-9866 vmgadvertising.com

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NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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CITY LIMITS

Walk a

Mile

RICHLANDWEST END

In the 11th installment of his column, J.R. Lind heads west to the neighborhood surrounding Elmington Park

BY J.R. LIND | PHOTOS BY ERIC ENGLAND

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with J.R. Lind ve. ral A

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Once a month, reporter and resident historian J.R. Lind will pick an area in the city to examine while accompanied by a photographer. With his column Walk a Mile, he’ll walk a one-mile stretch of that area, exploring the neighborhood’s history and character, its developments, its current homes and businesses, and what makes it a unique part of Nashville. If you have a suggestion for a future Walk a Mile, email editor@nashvillescene.com.

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ven on unseasonably warm and clear days — the kind of day when you might wake up and take a look outside and suspect in your liminal confusion that you Rip Van Winkled your way from November to April — the autumn sky looks different from the summer one.

Scientists would probably say something about precession and axial tilt, how the sun’s relative angle to the Northern Hemisphere shifts the sky from its summer Capri blue to the azure of the Argentine flag. But on a cloudless morning at Elmington Park, the sun just beginning to top the office towers farther east on West End, the science isn’t nearly as important as the romance.

The knotty and twisted oaks — now largely denuded of their leaves, exposing the witches’ fingers of their tiniest branches — stretch their shadows like tendrils across the famously open and expansive field of the park. To certain eyes, this spot looks ideal for a languid game of cricket (and indeed, sometimes is used for such a purpose).

Elmington Park opened in 1927. It was originally part of Edwin Warner’s Elmington farm, as was Richland Golf Club (thus the anachronistic Golf Club Lane remains a mile south). At the time, Richland’s clubhouse stood at the southern edge of the park. The history of the Richland club could be its own

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THE ROUTE: Starting at Elmington Park, west on West End, then right on Craighead. Right on Central, then following the greenway back to West End, turning right and returning to the start.

ABANDONED SCOOTERS: 0 CRANES: 0

story — Tennessean publisher Luke Lea offered the then-Nashville Golf Club acreage in then-remote Belle Meade, the club split over the offer, and a judge ruled neither the breakaway club nor the rump of the original could use the old name, and thus Richland Country Club and Belle Meade Country Club were born. But Richland’s presence on West End wasn’t meant to last forever.

In 1935, the city approached the club to sell the property where its clubhouse sat, as the growing population needed a new high school. West End High School, designed by renowned Nashville architect Donald W. Southgate in the Colonial Revival style, was part of a burst of school building projects during the 1930s fueled by a study showing Nashville ranked at or near the bottom among Southern cities in nearly every metric of public education. Then-Mayor Hilary Howse, buffeted by New Deal-era Public Works Administration and Works Progress Administration grants, set the school system on an ambitious infrastructure program. West End High — with its distinctive bell tower holding a bell cast in the 1880s for North Nashville’s Buena Vista Seminary — operated as a high school until the 1960s.

The school was renowned for its basketball team, which won four state titles in the 1940s and ’50s. (Its last, in 1954, is known in lore as the “All the way for Doc” team, as beloved retiring principal W.H. “Doc” Yarbrough made a surprise appearance at the state final, spurring the Blue Jays to the championship.)

Eighty-three years after it was completed, the building still functions as a school, now West End Middle. Despite the noise of morning rush on nearby Interstate 440 and the usual bustle of West End Avenue, the area around Elmington Park nonetheless has the calming charm of a quaint town straight out of Thornton Wilder, with its well-maintained

park, shady trees, postcard-perfect school and little pluralistic village of houses of worship: West End Church of Christ, looking like it was translated from some Connecticut township to the intersection of Bowling and West End; the Georgian brick of Congregation Sherith Israel with its contemporary annex; the more fully embraced modernism of Blakemore United Methodist.

Farther west, stately new townhouses line the north side of the road, each unit distinct from the next, but nevertheless built wall to wall. The homes share a bricked courtyard with fountains and topiary. The whole scene wouldn’t be out of place in Belgravia or Mayfair.

The school itself now decamped to Gallatin, the former campus of Welch College (née Free Will Baptist Bible College) sits at the corner of Craighead and West End, its buildings also designed by Southgate. Since the college’s move, some of the buildings have given way to development, but others still stand. The library, for example, with its grandiose porte-cochère, looks mostly wellmaintained (though plywood has replaced glass in some places), and a lonely white cross stands sentry still in its gable window.

Craighead is the gateway to the Richland-

West End neighborhood proper. In 1905, a group of investors led by Guildford Dudley Sr. purchased the land, originally part of the farm of John Brown Craighead, and laid out parcels and a grid of streets, neat as a pin — it was one of the first planned subdivisions in Nashville.

Other than a narrowing of the medians and other concessions to the automobile (a proper driveway is rare in the neighborhood; instead, staircases lead from the elevated yards to the sidewalk so as to facilitate the boarding of streetcars), the neighborhood is much the same as it was a century ago. The trees here have hung onto their leaves longer than their cousins along traffic-filled West End, heavy with golden orange adornments. Magnolias are common, but their waxy, dark-green leaves are drooping in anticipation of winter.

Central Avenue is a tunnel of autumn colors, and the families who have lived along the street and on Richland Avenue one block to the north are a biographical encyclopedia of Nashville. The aforementioned Mayor Howse lived nearby, as did a famous bootlegger. Howse, famously anti-Prohibition, allegedly procured his booze from this rumrunner, and thus the man wasn’t harassed by

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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“RED LACE,” KATARINA RIESING (COURTESY OF ASYA GEISBERG GALLERY)

CITY LIMITS

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revenuers. Neighborhood legend says tunnels utilized for illicit liquor transport undergird the 3700 block of Richland. The Cain of Cain-Sloan lived here. The Lentz of the Lentz Public Health Center lived here. Locally loved horror host Cecil Creep did too.

The houses on Central — mostly foursquares but also bungalows, many built with the famous stone of Crab Orchard — are the oldest in the neighborhood (except for Craighead’s 1809 farmhouse, a few blocks north on Westbrook). They look meticulously maintained, but it wasn’t always thus.

There was a steep period of decline in the neighborhood in the 1950s and ’60s; many of the homes were subdivided into rooming houses to serve the G.I. Bill-boosted college attendance boom. Many spent decades neglected. One home, frequented by Jimmy Buffett in the 1970s, was condemned because an opossum fell through the roof.

But the steady use as student housing had a benefit. Perhaps the homes weren’t kept to their Gilded Age standards, but unlike so many others of that vintage in Nashville, they were never torn down, because the steady flow of renters made them cash cows for their owners. Starting in the ’70s, less peripatetic types bought the houses, restoring them to their former glory.

Families are back now (one along Central is growing, with a bright-pink balloon out front announcing a new baby girl), and the neighborhood has settled into upper-class stability. (A sign posted to a telephone pole promises $500 for the return of Rosie the Chihuahua — that’s like $100 per pound.)

Farther west on Central, the bungalows are more numerous, their pastel exteriors contrasting with the ever-brighter orange of the changing leaves and the golden carpet of ginkgo leaves on the sidewalk. Some of the bungalows clearly spent time as duplexes, with door-shaped windows giving away their past as houses with separate entrances.

If the townhouses on the western edge of the neighborhood evoke the swing of London, the church at the east end of Central Avenue evokes the English countryside.

The Gothic-style Concordia Lutheran Church was built in 1938 using bricks from the old Louisville and Nashville Railroad roundhouse, which was being demolished.

(Some houses in the neighborhood also include this brick, which has an interesting

weathering pattern, no doubt from decades of steam engines.) The church’s plot, like its residential neighbors, is elevated from street level, and parts of the church are built into this little hill. There are tiny windows at ground level. It looks like a place where Bilbo Baggins might worship. Befitting the Gothic look, the belfry in the bell tower is open to the world.

The 440 Greenway runs alongside West End Place, rolling out of the tree buffer just across from Concordia (and a home, clearly formerly with an upstairs apartment, as a door to nowhere opens from the second floor into oblivion). When 440 (then known as 440 Parkway) was originally conceived, a salve to the many angry homeowners was that the road would be bordered by an expansive trail system (and those ubiquitous noiseblocking walls). It took nearly 30 years, but a portion has finally been built.

The greenway connects back with West End at the former site of the Jewish Community Center, which was bombed in 1958 — ostensibly because it hosted antisegregation meetings — by a group calling itself the Confederate Underground. (So underground were they that they apparently didn’t realize that the most accomplished member of Jefferson Davis’ cabinet was a man named Judah Benjamin.) Undeterred, the JCC reopened the next day. This critical piece of Nashville’s civil rights history no longer stands — the JCC moved to Percy Warner Boulevard in the ’80s. Instead, there are some truly uninteresting condominiums.

Sic transit gloria.

Turning west back on West End, Richland Place is this month’s entry as the building that could be a secret government facility, low-slung for a two-story building and mostly windowless. Back across the street, Elmington Park is coming to life, with a coterie of runners and dog-walkers taking advantage of the warm morning.

The great lawn yawns with emptiness, but eventually it will wake, and Nashvillians will head there to expend their pent-up energy in a variety of ways. (Ironically, given the history, driving golf balls is banned.)

And though it’s so close to the city’s teeming core, Richland-West End will once again realize its original purpose as a quiet — well, quietish — respite from all that busyness.

EMAIL EDITOR@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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CITY LIMITS

THE GRAND OLD PITY PARTY

Tennessee Republicans overwhelmingly refuse to acknowledge Biden’s victory

BY STEPHEN ELLIOTT

B

y the time you read this, some top Tennessee Republicans may have acknowledged the obvious: Democrat Joe Biden is the next president of the United States.

But we’re not holding our breath.

The most powerful people in Tennessee — including Gov. Bill Lee, U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn and Sen.-elect Bill Hagerty — have spent the days since Election Day (and especially since Nov. 7, when major media outlets called the race for Biden) sowing distrust. They’ve refused to accept the results of an election that Republican election officials, independent observers, courts across the country and even the U.S. Department of Homeland Security have all deemed overwhelmingly fair and secure.

Blackburn, Hagerty and the state party are begging their supporters to donate to Donald Trump’s “legal defense fund” — left out of their tweets and emails is the fine print, which indicates much of the money actually goes to retiring Trump’s campaign

PHOTOS: MATT MASTERSW

REPUBLICAN STATE REP. BRUCE GRIFFEY ADDRESSES PROTESTERS AT A PRO-TRUMP “STOP THE STEAL” RALLY ON NOV. 14

debt, not waging losing legal battles.

Outgoing Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander, who rose to power as governor in the 1970s by teaming with Democrats to oust corrupt lame-duck Gov. Ray Blanton, offered something far less consequential this time.

“The orderly transfer or reaffirming of immense power after a presidential election is the most enduring symbol of our democracy,” Alexander said.

And though Republicans won almost every race in the state — Trump easily won Tennessee again, Hagerty easily beat Democrat Marquita Bradshaw, and the GOP caucuses in the state House and Senate held on to their giant margins — the parade of sore winners continued. Nearly the entire Republican caucus in the Tennessee General Assembly, from Lt. Gov. Randy McNally and House Speaker Cameron Sexton down to dozens of backbenchers, signed on to open letters proclaiming their unending devotion to Trump, American voters be damned.

The Senate Republicans said that they

“absolutely and unequivocally” stand with Trump and his attempt to reverse the results of the election. Shortly after, House Republicans said they “unequivocally and staunchly” stand with Trump. Left to the linguists is the determination of whether “staunchly” or “absolutely” more closely ties a group to Trump.

It’s a delusion: Those in power are either deluding themselves or attempting to delude Tennesseans. Biden’s margins in several key states are far greater than what election experts expect audits or recounts to uncover.

But the response has not been unanimous.

Three of the Senate’s 27 Republicans declined to sign the letter, while seven of the House’s 73 Republicans sat it out.

One of the holdouts, GOP Sen. Richard Briggs of Knoxville, calls the decision “very simple.”

“No one presented evidence to me of massive voter fraud that would change the results of the election,” he tells the Scene.

Another, Republican Rep. Michael Curcio of Dickson, told WPLN that “proliferating unsubstantiated claims does not serve the public interest.”

But at the highest levels, only former Republican officials have accepted the results.

Former Gov. Bill Haslam and former U.S. Sens. Bill Frist and Bob Corker all congratulated Biden — a routine response in most years, but an aberration among Tennessee Republicans this time around.

It should come as no surprise that Tennessee Republicans are reacting this way.

They’ve spent the past four years filing meaningless resolutions sucking up to the president. They also have experience obstructing the removal of another loser in a prominent position: Nathan Bedford Forrest, the Confederate general and Ku Klux Klan leader whose honorary Capitol bust — and legacy — legislative leaders just can’t quit.

EMAIL EDITOR@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

PROTESTERS PRAY AT THE “STOP THE STEAL” RALLY

THIS WEEK ON OUR NEWS AND POLITICS BLOG: At least 11 men on Tennessee’s death row at Nashville’s Riverbend Maximum Security Institution have tested positive for COVID-19. The unit housing those prisoners went on lockdown Nov. 9 after Donald Middlebrooks, who was sentenced to death for a 1987 murder, tested positive. Pervis Payne, who was scheduled to be executed in December until Gov. Bill Lee delayed it due to coronavirus safety concerns, also tested positive. Nashville-based federal public defenders Kelley Henry and Amy Harwell tested positive too, leading a client of theirs incarcerated in Texas to petition the court to delay her execution, scheduled for Dec. 8. Twenty-seven people incarcerated by Tennessee have died from COVID-19. … A majority of Davidson County’s Board of Public Education abstained from a vote to award two contracts to a company that has been accused of wage theft. Labor advocates celebrated the motion, a de facto denial of the contracts to Orion Building Corporation, but city attorneys warn it would invite a legal challenge.

For more than a year, Armando Arzate has been trying to convince the school board to hold Orion Building Corporation accountable for failing to pay him the $43,000 he is owed for work done at McMurray Middle School. He launched a wage-theft campaign with the help of labor rights advocates Workers’ Dignity to agitate for his back pay. A Metro attorney warned the school board members that if they failed to award the contract, either by voting to deny the motion or by abstaining, it could open the door to a successful legal challenge from Orion. While the school board could deny contracts based on problems in the bidding process, they could not deny based on the past accusation of wage theft. “The situation at McMurray Middle School should not be a factor in this decision,” the attorney said. …

Even though the original plan called for it to be open for celebrations honoring the August centennial of women’s suffrage, Church Street Park remains fenced off, now a month after its second promised opening date in October. The nonprofit Historic Capitol Corridor Foundation now says the $500,000-plus upgrades won’t be ready until at least March. …

“Perhaps you’ve seen us bounding across your front lawns with our governmentissued smartphones and messenger bags.”

Contributor Ben Oddo writes about his nine weeks as a census taker — which, for the most part, went well!

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nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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hey, thanks

Our thank-you letters to the people, places and organizations that make Nashville special

We all know 2020 has been a rough one. But amid the curveballs this pandemic has thrown us, the election-inspired animus and everything else, there have been people, places and institutions that have made things just a little bit better.

Ahead of Thanksgiving, we at the Scene are taking a look around the city and issuing thank-you letters to the organizations and people (and yes, animals) who make the world a better place. You’ll find letters of thanks to nonprofits like Free Hearts, which is run by formerly incarcerated women, as well as to individuals like the experts from Meharry Medical College, who are helping administer COVID-19 tests. We also acknowledge the good work of drive-in movie theaters, community food resources, housing advocates and many more.

Read along with us as your old pals at the Scene look at our special city and say, “Hey, thanks.”

Illustrations by Mary Louise Meadors

Hey Thanks, Poll Workers, If the past month has been stressful for you, imagine what it’s been like for the folks who worked the polls through early voting and on Election Day. In the face of a raging pandemic and record voter turnout, our fellow Nashvillians — young and old, Republican and Democrat — worked long shifts for little pay so that we all could have our say.

They masked up and risked infection and exhaustion to put on an election, even though Kanye West was on the ballot and more than 2,500 people actually voted for him. Our outgoing president is turning his petty ire on the process — and Republican officials in many states have made it a mission to make voting more difficult — but these folks are a moving example of what we should be fighting to expand to more people: participation in a government of the people, by the people and for the people.

They deserve some rest and our thanks.

—Steven Hale Staff Writer, Nashville Scene

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Hey Thanks, Housing Advocates,

Hey Thanks, Dolly Parton, You are a legendary songwriter, performer, humanitarian, fashion icon, actor and businesswoman who inspires people the world over. It’s likely that at many Thanksgiving dinner tables, family members find that you’re the one topic they can agree on.

I never thought it possible, Dolly Parton, but this year you’ve outdone yourself.

In early April, you announced that you donated $1 million — one-million flippin’ dollars — to Vanderbilt University Medical Center in support of COVID-19 research. When I heard this news, my first thought was that we are not worthy of your generosity. But part of your magic is making people from all walks of life feel special and valued — there have been a lot of forces working against us on that front this year. In your wisdom, you also wrote us a song. “When Life Is Good Again” is a soothing ballad that reminds us that it’s OK to flounder when times get tough, and someday, this will all be in the rearview mirror.

Early on in the pandemic, you launched the web series Goodnight With Dolly, reading us The Little Engine That Could, Llama Llama Red Pajama and more from your bed in your adorable mint-green pajamas. That helped me rest a little easier, Dolly. Thank you.

Then came your delightfully matter-of-fact pronouncement about the Black Lives Matter movement, issued in Billboard’s excellent cover story in August: “And of course Black lives matter,” you said. “Do we think our little white asses are the only ones that matter? No!” I know you are a woman of God, and out of respect, I will not deify you.

But I will add to the chorus of voices — old and young, rich and poor, city and country — extolling your generous heart. Thank you, Dolly, for believing in our doctors, our children and the rest of us.

You can bet your ass I’ll be hunkering down in a tinseled-out living room to watch Christmas on the Square, your new Netflix special, this holiday season.

The most basic requirements for living are a luxury to many — even more so in this period of uncertainty, which has left millions without work.

Far too often, I take for granted a paycheck and an apartment, and the pandemic has heightened my awareness of that privilege. So, yes, I’m grateful to have them, but even more so I’m grateful for the people fighting so that others can have them too.

There are the volunteers and staff operating homeless shelters across the city, including the emergency shelters set up specifically for people sick with COVID-19. Their work grows even more vital as temperatures drop. And their willingness to potentially expose themselves to a deadly disease in order to make sure as many of their neighbors as possible have a clean, warm place to sleep calls for even more gratitude than normal.

There are the lawyers, including from the Legal Aid Society, helping Nashvillians who face eviction navigate a daunting legal system. Despite various eviction moratoriums related to the pandemic, some evictions are still being processed, and both the lawyers and residents must brave sometimescrowded courts to fight back. The Nashville Conflict Resolution Center is among the groups distributing rent assistance to residents who can’t pay their bills.

Without this work, and without additional assistance from the federal government, an unprecedented housing crisis could face our city and others in the new year.

It’s easy to forget, when cooped up at home, about the people who don’t have one. So in this season of gratitude, thank you to the people who make it their daily mission not to forget.

—Erica Ciccarone Culture Editor, Nashville Scene

—Stephen Elliott Staff Writer, Nashville Scene

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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PHOTO: DANIEL MEIGS

Hey Thanks, Free Hearts, Tennessee disenfranchises its residents at obscenely high rates. A report from The Sentencing Project released in October showed that ours is one of three states — along with Mississippi and Alabama — where “more than 8 percent of the adult population, one of every 13 people, is disenfranchised” due to a felony conviction. More than one in five Black adults in Tennessee is barred from voting for that reason. In all, going into this year’s elections, more than 450,000 Tennesseans were unable to vote because of a felony conviction.

Changing that will ultimately require action from the legislators who write our laws and crafted the Byzantine process for getting one’s voting rights restored. But in the meantime, a Nashville organization called Free Hearts, which was founded for and by formerly incarcerated women, has gone about helping people restore their voting rights as soon as possible. In addition to working with formerly incarcerated people as they navigate the system, Free Hearts started the Fines and Fees Fund to collect donations that would go toward paying off the debts that are keeping Tennesseans from participating in elections. Because of Free Hearts’ work, some people were able to vote for the first time in this year’s elections.

But the work doesn’t end. There is always another election — at the local, state or federal level — on the horizon, and in this state there are hundreds of thousands of people barred from voting. As we work to ultimately tear down the barriers between formerly incarcerated people and the ballot box, we can also work to help people get around those barriers. Free Hearts is doing that right now, and we can all show our gratitude by giving what we can to the effort.

N OWW I N G SHO

Hey Thanks, Drive-In Movie Theaters, Hey Thanks, COVID-19 Testing Site Workers, Receiving a COVID-19 test isn’t a pleasant process. Even with shorter nasal swabs, there’s always a peculiar sensation that can range from feeling like an uncomfortable tickle in the back of your nose to a forceful jab into your gray matter. But the rest of the process is relatively painless — I drive to my preferred assessment site and never have to leave my vehicle, from when I fill out the paperwork to when I get the test. I don’t need to pay, don’t need an appointment, don’t even need to be displaying symptoms. None of that would be possible if it weren’t for the tireless testers and staffers at these city-operated sites.

A special shout-out is owed to the local experts from Meharry Medical College, the historically Black Nashville medical school that rose to a unique challenge during the pandemic. In addition to operating a site on the Meharry campus, staff joined efforts at the Metro testing sites at Nissan Stadium and the former Kmart in Antioch, collecting tests on busy, traffic-jammed days and eerily quiet ones alike. Meharry also established mobile sites and advised city officials on outreach to communities in Nashville, assisting the city in spreading awareness and testing capabilities to the Black, Latinx and immigrant communities, which have been hit hardest by the virus. Meharry is even involved in research that could lead to a COVID-19 vaccine, so really, props are due all around.

But here’s a special thanks to the Meharrians working outdoors, clad in protective equipment, shielded just barely from the elements beneath massive tarps, and getting up close and personal with Nashvillians who need to know their COVID status. The work these folks are doing is demanding, but it keeps our city informed while the pandemic continues. Let’s all put that knowledge to good use.

—Steven Hale Staff Writer, Nashville Scene

PHOTO: DANIEL MEIGS

—Alejandro Ramirez Associate Editor, Nashville Scene

With a few exceptions, I’ve gone to the drive-in pretty much weekly since May. My religious affiliation is Magical Realist Moviegoer with a minor in Methodism, so understand that for me the drive-in is like going to church. And drive-in theaters have been doing quite a bit of emotional heavy lifting during the ongoing Brechtian endurance test that is 2020.

They have been a place to collectively experience art while still remaining safe — which by itself is a major achievement, considering how we’ve all been left on our own as far as any kind of cohesive public health policy.

And because of the giant question mark that derailed the global multiplex program, something unexpected happened. As streaming films expanded their upfront footprint, repertory cinema became a big thing again on our outdoor screens. Film festivals throughout the country started exploring previously unexplored cinema options. Before the lopsided experiment that tied reopening to the fortunes of Christopher Nolan’s Tenet, no-budget horror and genre films readily topped box office reports, allowing the modern drive-in, with its focus on family and mainstream titles, to reconnect with their progenitors from previous decades. It’s been a wild ride, and it’s been essential for anyone who cares about the art form of cinema in keeping their shit together.

The fact that a moviegoer could experience work so weird and innovative as Possessor, The Wretched and She Dies Tomorrow right out there in front of nature was deeply thrilling — and that’s beyond the thrill that colors everything you do in Plague Times. Evil Dead and Evil Dead II made for a great double feature, especially when the audience had higher mask compliance than any other public space I’ve personally been in since March. And I’ll lay some shocking truth on you, and anyone who’s ever had to clean up after a screening of it would agree: The Rocky Horror Picture Show at a drive-in is the way to do it.

The Stardust, the Montana, the Pink Cadillac, the Franklin, the Moonlite and the Macon have been keeping things going, providing something more than just more streaming. They’ve helped maintain sanity for everyone who feels the confines of the pandemic and wants to break free for a bit without running the risk of getting each other sick. Y’all have my thanks, my support, and snack money for as long as it’s needed.

—Jason Shawhan Contributor, Nashville Scene

nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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Hey Thanks, Your Majesty Derrick Henry, Hey thanks, @NashSevereWx, Hey Thanks, Community Food Resources,

PHOTO: ALISON McNABB, TENNESSEE TITANS

—J.R. Lind Staff Writer, Nashville Scene

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I’m privileged in that I’ve never had to spend Thanksgiving without enough food to eat, or had to spend any day worrying where my next meal might come from. Many Americans — and indeed, many Nashvillians — aren’t so fortunate. According to the United States Department of Agriculture, 10.5 percent of households were food insecure at some point during 2019. Think about that: More than one in every 10 American households didn’t have access to adequate food due to a lack of money or other resources at some time over the course of the year.

I think most of us long for a utopian society in which none of us goes hungry. But in the absence of such a utopia, I am deeply grateful for organizations that work to feed those who struggle to feed themselves.

That includes established longtime nonprofits like Second Harvest Food Bank of Middle Tennessee (secondharvestmidtn.org), which for more than four decades has endeavored to feed hungry Tennesseans.

But it also includes newer grassroots organizations — groups of people who have seen a need in their own communities and worked to meet that need with help from friends and neighbors. Those include groups like the Nashville Free Store (nashvillefreestore.com), which works out of all-ages venue Drkmttr on Dickerson Pike, providing groceries, toiletries, school supplies and more to the folks who need them. Their motto? “Whatever you need, no questions asked.” There’s also the Nashville Community Fridge (@nashvillecommunityfridge on Instagram), which operates out of two locations — Drkmttr as well as Elephant Gallery in North Nashville — and provides fresh produce, bread, eggs and more to anyone in the neighborhood who needs it.

Then there’s Gids Citi (rebuildnorthnashville.com), an initiative from the North Nashville-based, Black-led community organization Gideon’s Army where folks can sign up to shop for clothing and other resources.

Another North Nashville-based initiative is Bliss and the Trash Plants (@blissandthetrashplants on Instagram), an effort run by community organizer Bliss Cortez that works to redistribute unused food and plants to folks in need.

This is of course just a small sampling of the groups working to serve underfed Nashvillians. I am grateful to each of them, as well as to all the other organizations and individuals who help feed their communities, often in the absence of recognition or praise. Thank you for putting others before yourselves. Thank you for understanding what community means.

—D. Patrick Rodgers Editor-in-Chief, Nashville Scene

Can we talk about the term “hero” for a second?

It’s a term that gets abused a lot. Certainly sports fans hear it tossed around casually to describe a person running with a ball or kicking a ball or catching a ball — it’s almost always in the context of someone having a ball, unless it’s an Olympics year — even though all the “hero” has done is perform a feat of physical prowess.

In this pandemic year, hopefully we’ve moved beyond mere athleticism as the bar for our heroes. I’ve been moved to tears by the self-sacrifice of health care workers, for example, who have sometimes quarantined themselves away from family in order to care for seriously ill COVID-19 patients.

Which brings me to the guys behind @NashSevereWx, Nashville’s favorite Twitter account for weather news. In the moments before the March 3 tornado ripped through the city, their warnings saved lives. This is not an abstract claim: On the day following the storm, walking through the wreckage in East Nashville, I personally talked to at least a dozen folks who told me that they knew to seek safety thanks to the @ NashSevereWx feed. People without power (and thus without broadcast TV to warn them) instinctively turned to their phones for a trusted voice in a dangerous moment.

I can state without a single bit of doubt that @NashSevereWx saved lives in that storm. I know, because storm victims told me so. But I’m reluctant to call the guys who run the account heroes, mainly because they run away from the term as fast as possible. In the days that followed the tornado, as praise was heaped upon the guys behind the account — David Drobny, Will Minkoff and Andrew Leeper — the trio did everything they could to deflect credit to the National Weather Service, area meteorologists and almost anyone else who helps in emergency preparedness.

Humility is part of their charm.

And I get their point. They’re just a group of avid weather enthusiasts — albeit ones who have won awards from the NWS — who were doing their job. But maybe, just maybe, we can agree that sometimes, like during the night of March 2 and early hours of March 3, their actions are heroic.

So thanks, @NashSevereWx, for being the best part of Twitter. You make us laugh with wry jokes and funny GIFs, but when the sky comes crashing down, we know the three of you will help us stay safe.

—Steve Cavendish Former Editor, Nashville Scene

PHOTO: DANIEL MEIGS

Perhaps my gratitude should instead be directed at the 30 NFL teams who passed on Derrick Henry in the 2016 draft. Thirty general managers — 31 if you count the Titans’ Jon Robinson, who picked three other players before he took you at 45 — looked at a 6-foot-4, 250-pound Heisman Trophy-winning running back who moves like some sort of Dr. Moreauian combination of a rhino and a cheetah and said, “Nah, not gonna work in the NFL.” It’s what they’ve said about you all along. In middle school: “He looks like a man among boys, but he’ll never get away with it in high school.” In high school: “He looks like a man among boys, but he’ll never get away with it in the SEC.” At the University of Alabama: “He looks like a man among boys, but he’ll never get away with it in the NFL.” And then you promptly stiff-armed the criticism like it was a foolish Buffalo Bill and scampered away from the naysayers, who chased you hopelessly like so many Jacksonville Jaguars.

The GMs and the scouts were too clever by half. They said you’d wear down because Nick Saban relied on you so much at Alabama. They ignored the fact that you look like some sort of sacred statue carved by angels. They said you were too tall, you ran too upright to succeed at the highest level. You do run upright, it’s true — right up and through 350-pound defensive linemen. They said you had trouble blocking for quarterbacks and catching passes, essential skills in the 21st-century whizbang offenses of the NFL. OK, so maybe you don’t have the soft hands of a lotion commercial, but you do make the passing game better. Your ability to rip off big gainers in any down and distance opens up play-action passing for Ryan Tannehill. Your propensity for wearing out defenses makes things so much easier for your offensive teammates (and gives valuable rest to your own defense).

But really, your greatest asset is that anyone can appreciate how you play. No one needs an in-depth understanding of blocking schemes or route trees or any of the subtle, cerebral parts of the game to grasp why you are good.

Big man run fast. That’s it.

There’s no need to have a Tony Romo-esque encyclopedia of football’s esoterica stashed in one’s brain to explain your greatness. A toddler’s grasp of physics is all it takes, because every 3-year-old has set up a row of blocks and crashed them down with a toy truck.

But you also offer so much more. Delightful shade — the white suit you wore to Baltimore that eerily paralleled the infamous outfit worn by Ray Lewis before Super Bowl XXXV, or the time you told the Ravens safety Earl Thomas to engage in coprophagia during a post-game interview. That was the game you not only rushed for an astounding 195 yards, but also, of all things, threw a touchdown pass. In four-plus seasons wearing twotone blue, you already have a career’s worth of highlights (and a rushing title to boot).

Here’s to many more, Your Highness.

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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Hey Thanks, Supporters of Independent Music Venues,

Hey Thanks, Restaurants and Bars That Follow the Rules, To local restaurant owners and proprietors — we know it couldn’t have been easy, worrying about the livelihoods of your employees while you remained shuttered. Especially considering the fact that a few flagrant offenders in the COVID Canal of Lower Broadway jumped through a loophole to claim they were “full-service restaurants” by serving their booze as Jell-O shots instead of in a glass. We’re fine with counting banana pudding as a vegetable at a meat-and-three, but that’s just some bullshit right there. (OK, that’s a hyperbolic example. But really, “full-service”? There’s no way that some of those places make more money off their food than from Firebaaawll shots and longnecks.)

At the same time, some of our favorite craft cocktail bars waited out the progression through the reopening phases, watching their hard-earned dreams erode like the sandstorm in The Mummy. We really appreciate how restaurants invested in their and our safety by upgrading HVAC systems, ordering sanitizer by the drum and standing up to patrons who rejected mask mandates and showered your kind employees with spittle during their tirades.

We’ve enjoyed dining al fresco in new unusual locales like the sidewalk next to Lockeland Table, and we love the fact that Margot Cafe has finally fully embraced its French-bistro vibe. Driving home with a deli container filled with a couple of properly crafted cocktails from a favorite bar like The Fox Bar & Cocktail Club, Mother’s Ruin, Pearl Diver or Pinewood Social is a treat that helped get us through some of those long nights, and it’s a privilege we won’t surrender easily in the future. But we all know it’s not the same thing as actual interaction with a talented and amiable mixologist.

We also know about the tightrope you walked to take care of your employees, in terms of both their physical and fiscal well-being. When they could earn more money staying at home collecting enhanced unemployment benefits, but you needed to use a percentage of your PPP bailout to allow the loan to convert to a grant, we realized that model might work better for a hardware store — somewhere business owners could just lock the front door during the shutdown — than a business with a walk-in fridge full of perishables. Then when they let you reopen at limited capacity, it was like death by a thousand paper cuts as neither you nor your workers could earn a living wage off of mostly deserted dining rooms.

Hopefully folks left overly gratuitous gratuities. But when this is all over, we need to keep tipping like high rollers who just hit a 10-team parlay. And then we need to all get together and take a serious look at the whole business model of the hospitality industry, because this just isn’t tenable long-term.

Thanks for hanging in there, restaurants who’ve taken the pandemic seriously and played by the rules.

Hey Thanks, Trader Joe’s Crew Members, When I first heard about the wonders of Trader Joe’s, I was skeptical. Could great food, prices and employees really be under one roof? It was true, and like so many others, I was immediately smitten with the Green Hills store when it opened in 2008.

From fresh-cut flowers to pumpkin pancake mix and reliable wine options, my twice- and thrice-weekly trips were made even better when you offered samples of new products that weren’t on my list but went straight into the cart. You wore Hawaiian shirts and gave out stickers to kids. You were always courteous and friendly, escorting me to those dark-chocolate-covered espresso beans I could never find. Thanks to you, grocery shopping was no longer a chore but an adventure.

I hope Trader Joe’s knows how fortunate they are to have you, so-called crew members, representing the company, and now more than ever. Since the pandemic began, you have gone above and beyond to keep me and other customers safe and comfortable. I wasn’t surprised to learn that “my” store was a leader, companywide and citywide, in limiting the number of shoppers inside. And in the earliest days of the COVID-19 shutdown, when everyone was on edge, you gave us bouquets!

After eight months, you still do all you can to make our experience less stressful in this COVID-weary world. Thank you for adhering to your one-in-one-out policy and for keeping your shelves stocked and your store clean.Thank you for always smiling and asking “How’s your day?” Everything you do sets the tone and creates an environment where people act responsibly, follow the one-way arrows and respect one another.

From the moment you greet us in the line to the second you fetch our carts, you are there for all of us. I’m a fan for life.

—Holly Hoffman Associate Editor, Nfocus

My family was not a concertgoing family when I was a kid, and listening to music was a solitary experience. I didn’t start seeing shows until I was old enough to go on my own, and what I saw completely changed my perspective on music.

At clubs in Nashville and in my hometown of Murfreesboro, I got to be part of an audience. I got to feel the crackle of the give-and-take with the crowd — that feeling musicians speak about missing so much during the pandemic. Well, I felt it most of the time: Mom-and-pop venues, even the ones a step or three above the houses where I also saw shows, gave some space to musicians who weren’t very good — who sometimes kept coming back, and got progressively better. I got to know people who I only saw at shows, including musicians. I got to feel like I was part of a community.

These places, from tiny do-it-together spots and dive bars to rooms where 1,500 people pack in for a buzzed-about touring act, constitute an ecosystem that is vital to the music industry.

Chances are taken in these spaces that you won’t see any other segment of the business taking. You won’t see any of that at a venue where the goals are set by a major corporation, any more than you would at a sleek mixed-use development built where a venue once was.

Most of the live-entertainment economy remains in suspended animation, and I’m deeply grateful to anyone who’s done something to help sustain it. Thank you to venue owners who made the difficult decision to close temporarily in response to the pandemic, and who set up crowdfunding campaigns with a promise to give money to your staff. Thank you to everyone who works to make it safe to see a show in a venue that has reopened for a limited-capacity audience. Thank you to everyone who’s bought a T-shirt or a mask from a venue, bought a ticket to a livestream or otherwise contributed to those campaigns. This includes Zeppelin-loving Michigan rockers and internet whipping boys Greta Van Fleet, who gave $10,000 to The East Room’s community fund.

Thank you to the National Independent Venue Association, formed in part to lobby Congress for federal aid. Thanks to everyone who wrote their representatives in NIVA’s #SaveOurStages email campaign. Thanks to U.S. Sens. Amy Klobuchar and John Cornyn, who sponsored a bill specifically to help venues, and to the bipartisan group of co-sponsors, even though another round of financial aid still seems a long way off.

Thanks to the representatives of 15 Nashville venues who formed the Music Venue Alliance Nashville and lobbied Metro’s COVID-19 Financial Oversight Committee for help. Thanks to Metro Council for quickly approving the committee’s proposal to give venues access to a small amount of funds — every little bit helps. Thanks to the Nashville Convention & Visitors Corp for turning its attention away from Lower Broadway and “room nights” to help MVAN organize and promote a six-week streaming festival called Music City Bandwidth.

Even in this strange, unpleasant time, venues are still broadening my understanding of what it means to enjoy music — as a member of a community. I’ll be grateful when it’s safe to get back inside a venue on a regular basis.

—Stephen Trageser Music Editor, Nashville Scene

—Chris Chamberlain Contributor, Nashville Scene nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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Hey Thanks, Lap of Love, Without a doubt, the most difficult decision a longtime pet owner can make in regard to their elderly animal is knowing when it’s time to say farewell. That’s the dilemma my significant other faced recently, as her 17-year-old retriever mix — a beautiful blond grandpa named Dexter — began to grow too feeble and beset with health issues to enjoy his life.

Lap of Love Veterinary Hospice and In-Home Euthanasia is a nationwide service with vets employed right here in the Nashville area. When my girlfriend had questions about whether it was the right time to say good night to her old pal, Lap of Love’s reps had all the answers. And when it was actually time to send Dexter off, Lap of Love’s Dr. Abra Osorio made a home visit, guided us patiently and compassionately through the process, and made our guy as comfortable as possible — all while we were masked up and doing our best to maintain proper COVID-19 protocols. Lap of Love also offers transport and crematory services, should you decide that’s the route you want to take. And while the group’s veterinarians primarily work with dogs and cats, they also offer their services for other species — just call and ask.

Nothing about the process of pet euthanasia is easy, but I can’t imagine it going any more smoothly than it did for us. And that was a true gift.

—D. Patrick Rodgers Editor-in-Chief, Nashville Scene

Hey Thanks, Feral Cats, In early August I found a catnip plant dug up in my garden. I had planted it for Billy, my cat companion of 16 years.

He had died suddenly weeks before. My grief had consumed me, even as the global grief of the pandemic made my own feel insignificant. I pressed the plant back into the soil, and a fresh wave of sorrow threatened to push through the surface.

But I made a plan.

I put a bowl of cat food out that night, and a big gray kitty crept up to the porch and licked the bowl clean. He had the characteristic look of a tomcat — big-headed with jowly cheeks, a muscular body and a thick neck. Scrambles, as we named him, started showing up at the door all day and night. One ear torn, an eye clouded by a cataract, he hissed at me when I went to get the mail. I did not mind. I gave him everything he wanted. He was a survivor, and I his humble human servant.

First we thought he was a misanthropic loner, grumpily scavenging for whatever scraps the world would throw at him.

Our surveillance camera captured him holding staring contests with a large white-faced opossum, chasing off mourning doves at dawn, snarling at an uncommonly long black cat with tall white socks.

But the world can be surprising. In late August, Scrambles showed up with two kittens and a mama cat (we named her Omelet — we like eggs) and stood guard as they ate. We brought Scrambles and Omelet to get fixed at the Joy Clinic in Lebanon, and we adopted the kittens. Two weeks ago, Scrambles showed up with two more babies and another female, and the three of them sleep on our back porch each night. Is he the social-service net of the neighborhood cats, guiding single moms to a food source and safe place to rest? Time will tell.

So thank you, feral cats of Nashville. You may piss in our flower beds and stalk our wildlife, howl in heat and screech in the night. But you are scrappy survivors, and you’ve provided me with much-needed entertainment — and a sense of purpose — in my cloistered life this year.

—Erica Ciccarone Culture Editor, Nashville Scene

Hey Thanks, Catio, It started about a month ago. Out of the blue, freshly woken from a nap, my daughter told me that she wished she had a pet. She’s at an age when everything she says is so cute it’s almost upsetting. When people mimic baby talk, they sound like her. When she talks about wearing a mask to protect against “the bi-rus,” when she tells me her favorite color is rainbow, when she calls the inflatable Thanksgiving turkey outside her day care “that biiiiig chicken.” It’s a lot. So when she told me she wished she had a pet, my immediate thought was Jesus Christ, that’s cute.

But my second thought was me too. I remembered a Critic’s Pick that Scene contributor Charlie Zaillian wrote in the spring, back in the early days of the pandemic when we first began filling the Scene’s Critics’ Picks section with offbeat ideas for biding time and trying to cheer ourselves up. He recommended taking a trip to see you, Catio — he said you were a great time, and described you as “a big room full of happy, loving felines.” Still, I wasn’t sure what to expect. No offense, but the concept of visiting a cat cafe during a pandemic struck me sort of like a cuddle party — sounds sweet, but might be pestilential.

But I needn’t fear, Catio. You’ve got social distancing down to an art, with timed appointments and mask requirements and cleanliness galore. And that’s no small feat with dozens of purring, playful cats underfoot! We walked in, and my daughter was instantly in heaven. She stood there for a few seconds, wide-eyed, before breaking into delighted giggles and running by cat after cat like she was high-fiving dancers on Soul Train. After several minutes of this revelry, I asked her which cat was her favorite. She picked the one she said was “the most beautiful” — a sleek white kitten who looks like an ancient Egyptian drawing of a cat. We took her home that night.

“What will you name her?” I asked my daughter, hoping for something adorable like Butterbit or Owlie. But my child, in addition to being ridiculously cute, is also a way too cool for a Butterbit. She decided that Hala was the kitty’s name, then twirled in a circle like she does when she’s really pleased with herself.

If I thought my kid was cute before, it’s nothing compared to this new level of cuteness — thanks to the mixture of pride and delight she feels in her new status as a kitty owner.

Thanks for the upgrade, Catio.

—Laura Hutson Hunter Arts Editor, Nashville Scene

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NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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for 30 Years.

nashvillescene.com

Together in Gratitude, Together in Song: An Interfaith Thanksgiving Virtual Concert

S unday , n ovember 22

at 4:00 pm t une in on Zoom Register via thetemplehub.org

We are thrilled to gather together (virtually) for this 4th annual free concert of liturgical, choral, and instrumental music showcasing the shared ideologies of thanksgiving and gratitude.

Please join us for this exciting and unique online musical experience.

Participating Congregations Bellevue United Methodist Church Belle Meade United Methodist Church Blakemore United Methodist Church Calvary United Methodist Church Congregation Micah

Congregation Sherith Israel First Unitarian Universalist Church Hillwood Presbyterian Holy Trinity Community Church

Islamic Center of Nashville Lee Chapel AME Church The Temple West End Synagogue West End United Methodist Church

Coordinated by the: West Nashville Clergy Group nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

15

— Marty Stuart From the film Big Night (At the Museum), in reference to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum.

Country Music Hall of Fame member Marty Stuart has long been recognized as a peerless musician and artist, and torch-bearer for the history of the art form. He recently hosted Big Night (At the Museum), a 90-minute premiere on YouTube, in support of the museum. The film, centrally themed around treasured instruments from its collection, has garnered in excess of 1.5 million views. The full program is streaming now on demand, on the Museum’s YouTube channel.

DOWNTOWN NASHVILLE Visit CountryMusicHallofFame.org to buy tickets.

Photo: Emma Delevante / Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum

16

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

CRITICS’ PICKS BOOKS

W E E K L Y

R O U N D U P

O F

T H I N G S

T O

D O

[YOU SEXY BITCH]

STREAM AUTHOR EVENT WITH MICHAEL IAN BLACK VIA PARNASSUS BOOKS

FA S T / F O R WA R D via OZ Arts

[PICK IT UP]

WATCH MOLLY TUTTLE’S SERIES ...BUT I’D RATHER STREAM WITH YOU

The guitar skills Molly Tuttle has been honing since her early childhood are jaw-dropping, and she’s made history with them. In 2017, the California-born, PHOTO: ZACH PIGG

THURSDAY, NOV. 19

MOLLY TUTTLE

Berklee-educated, Nashville-residing flatpick champion was the first woman to be nominated for the International Bluegrass Music Association’s Guitarist of the Year

award. She won, and won a second time in [THE ART OF THE FUTURE] 2018. Her technical prowess is all the more STREAM OZ ARTS’ FAST/FORWARD impressive because she pairs it with an In the face of these uncertain times, it acute sensitivity to what makes songs work. seems that artists are uniquely equipped You can hear that in her developing voice to respond to our ever-changing landscape. as a songwriter, showcased on her 2017 OZ Arts hopes to spotlight that particular EP Rise and 2019 full-length When You’re brand of creative ingenuity with its virtual Ready. It’s also crucial to her new covers premiere of Fast/Forward: Nashville Artists LP ...But I’d Rather Be With You, featuring Look to Our Future. Hosted by Nashville her nuanced takes on songs as diverse as poet and author Ciona Rouse, the evening FKA Twigs’ smoldering slow jam “Mirrored will present artists from a wide range of Heart,” Rancid’s country-kissed punk singdisciplines with short-form works that along “Olympia, WA” and the yearning “explore personal vulnerability, civic late-period Grateful Dead tune “Standing on responsibility and the sheer madness of the Moon.” Over the next few weeks, you’ve the unexpected.” The online event will got an opportunity to watch Tuttle put include the title song from the upcoming those skills to work in a live setting via her Steal Away, composed by Dave Ragland streaming series ...But I’d Rather Stream with choreography by Shabaz Ujima; a With You, performed live at The Basement. self-choreographed solo work from dancer The inaugural set on Nov. 19 features Becca Hoback; excerpts from This songs by artists from Tuttle’s native Holding, introduced by visual artist Bay Area, the second set on Dec. Jana Harper and choreographer EDITOR’S NOTE: 3 highlights songs advocating Rebecca Steinberg; a spokenAS A RESPONSE TO THE for social change, and the word performance from ONGOING COVID-19 PANDEMIC, final show on Dec. 17 is an Cameron Mitchell and Jems WE’VE CHANGED THE FOCUS OF THE CRITICS’ PICKS SECTION TO old-school pickin’ party with Destiné; an acoustic selection INCLUDE ACTIVITIES YOU CAN some guests to be announced. from theatrical band Fable PARTAKE IN WHILE YOU’RE AT See mollytuttlemusic.com or Cry; a multimedia-music HOME. the page for the event on the performance by Gardening, Not streaming platform Mandolin Architecture; and an original solo for ticketing options. 7 p.m. on Nov. piece from dancer Joi Ware. Tickets 19, Dec. 3 & Dec. 17 via The Basement start at $15, and ticket holders will be able to watch the filmed performance through STEPHEN TRAGESER Nov. 22. Visit ozartsnashville.org for details.

7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 19, via OZ Arts DANCE

MUSIC

In an interview with the Scene back in October, comedian and writer Michael Ian Black said: “What we can do is rethink traditional gender roles so that we inch closer to a world in which men feel free to be their full selves, which means understanding, accepting and even welcoming their own vulnerabilities.”

That’s the goal of A Better Man: A (Mostly Serious) Letter to My Son, Black’s tender, funny, hopeful book, conceived as a letter to his 18-year-old son and dedicated to “tomorrow’s boys.” Through a mix of memoir, comic commentary and fatherly advice, Black makes the case against the cultural pressures that harm men, from impossible ideals of strength and independence to what he sees as damaging rhetoric about toxic masculinity. (“You’re not toxic, although I admit, you don’t always smell so great after track practice.”)

Thursday, Black is joining fellow author Wes Moore for a live conversation about the book via Facebook Live on the Parnassus Books Facebook page. 6 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 19, via Parnassus Books MARIA BROWNING

AMY STUMPFL

nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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17

11/16/20 3:04 PM

[GET LIT]

GO TO CHEEKWOOD FOR HOLIDAY LIGHTS

I never know what will give me that very first Christmasy feeling of the year. It was a bit easier to find in my Northeastern homeland — be it through chilly morning walks, actual snowfall or maneuvering through rows of evergreens that a handsome German vendor set up outside the Park Slope YMCA in Brooklyn. I am an avowed atheist who loves Christmas, so I go after that tug-tug-tug of the yule log hard. (And no, I do not wait until after Thanksgiving.) A reliable source of holiday cheer is Cheekwood’s Holiday LIGHTS extravaganza, where you can stroll along a mile-long path and enjoy millions of lights.

Previous years have featured oversize lighted flowers and vines, orbs that appear to float in the garden’s pools and a North Pole Express scene. This year has the added attraction of the estate’s Chihuly exhibition, and the glass artist’s ostentatious sculptures should reflect the luminous display nicely. To leave room for social distancing, Cheekwood is selling tickets by appointment and staggering entry, so visit cheekwood.org to claim yours. Through Jan. 10 at Cheekwood Estate & Gardens, 1200 Forrest Park Drive

PHOTO: NATHAN ZUCKER

ERICA CICCARONE

With its upcoming season premiere, Nashville Ballet is exploring themes of community and human connection, all while showcasing the work of artists who’ve built their careers right here in Music City.

Community features a mixed repertory program that includes artistic director Paul Vasterling’s acclaimed Appalachian Spring, which first premiered to local audiences in 2017 and is set to Aaron Copland’s stunning Americana score. The evening includes three additional pieces: Deconstructed Bach (choreographed by Charlotte Ballet artistic director and former Nashville Ballet dancer Christopher Stuart); Bootleg Sugar Lips (with choreography by veteran Nashville Ballet dancer Mollie Sansone and music by Cristina Spinei); and The Talk (with choreography by former Nashville Ballet dancer Gerald Watson and music by Dave Ragland). Along with the performances, Nashville Ballet is offering a series of community-building activities.

Community takes place virtually for three performances, and tickets are $20. Visit nashvilleballet.com for a complete schedule and details. Nov. 20-22 via Nashville Ballet

scene — doesn’t appear to be available to stream anywhere. If you can’t track down a hard copy of that one, jump forward to 2016’s Oscar-nominated and absolutely essential 13th (available on Netflix), which examines the United States’ history with prison labor and the intersection of systemic racism and mass incarceration. From there, pick one of DuVernay’s first two features: 2010’s I Will Follow (available to rent for $4 on Amazon Prime), a day-in-the-life drama made on a shoestring budget; or 2012’s Middle of Nowhere (also $4 on Prime), a David Oyelowo-featuring drama about a Compton, Calif., nurse dealing with her husband’s eight-year prison sentence. Follow that up with 2014’s incredibly powerful Best Picture nominee Selma ($4 on Prime, YouTube and iTunes), which features Oyelowo in a stunning portrayal of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Bring your DuVernay fest home with 2018’s Oprah Winfrey- and Reese Witherspoon-starring adaptation of Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time, which is free with a Disney+ subscription. While that one is far from the writer-director’s best work, it’s an imaginative and kidfriendly watch that ought to go over well with any fantasy-loving little ones in your life. D. PATRICK RODGERS

AMY STUMPFL [WE MUST MARCH!]

BUILD YOUR OWN STREAMING AVA DUVERNAY FILM FESTIVAL

As Thanksgiving nears, one more thing that this infernal pandemic has taken from us becomes evermore apparent — holiday movie season. Of course, the Belcourt Theatre has reopened with drastically reduced capacity and myriad safety precautions in place (more details on that in last week’s issue), and some folks might feel comfortable heading into chain cinemas.

But the safest place to see a movie is still from the comfort of your own couch, and thus we’ll continue our series of build-yourown-streaming-film-fest Critics’ Picks based around the work of filmmakers from Bong Joon-Ho to Stanley Kubrick. For this, our 27th installment, let’s take a look at the filmography of a Southern California native who excels at documentaries and narrative features alike — Ava DuVernay.

Unfortunately, DuVernay’s 2008 debut fulllength documentary This Is the Life — about Los Angeles’ 1990s alternative hip-hop

[MAKING HISTORY]

LISTEN TO SHABAKA AND THE ANCESTORS’ WE ARE SENT HERE BY HISTORY

British Barbadian saxophone virtuoso Shabaka Hutchings currently fronts three radically different groups. There’s the rockleaning trio The Comet Is Coming — which brought its celestial prog-EDM heroics to both Big Ears and Bonnaroo in 2019 — as well as the hip-hop-inflected dual-drummer ensemble Sons of Kemet. (As the legend goes, Hutchings learned clarinet as a

THEATER

CATCH NASHVILLE BALLET’S VIRTUAL SEASON OPENER COMMUNITY

[WELCOME TO LITTLE HOLLOW!]

CHECK OUT LITTLE HOLLOW, TENNESSEE FROM NASHVILLE REP

Theaters may be dark, but local playwrights are still hard at work during this strange season. In fact, Nashville Rep will premiere its latest effort — Little Hollow, Tennessee — on Nov. 28.

Billed as a “hybrid theater production of interlocking and stylistically diverse videos that tell the story of a disappeared town,” this unusual piece centers on the owner of a living museum who is forced to move to online programming in the wake of a global pandemic. Audiences can expect something of a “choose your own adventure” experience, with everything from historical commentary to short reenactments. The work was created by Nashville Rep’s New Works 615 — the local cohort of its Ingram New Works Project, which is led by Nashville Rep’s Erica Jo Lloyd and playwright-in-residence Nate Eppler. Writers include Lloyd, Brooke Bethel, Eric Butler, Brooke Ferguson, Taylor James Foster, Josh Inocalla, Evelyn O’Neal Brush, Mary Siroky, Nikkita Staggs, River Timms and Becky Wahlstrom. Visit nashvillerep.org/littlehollow for details.

The production is free, although donations are welcome. Premieres Saturday, Nov. 28, via Nashville Rep AMY STUMPFL BOOKS

HOLIDAY

Chaz Cardigan is a modern Music City success story. The pop singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist born Chaz McKinney is only 25, but he’s pounded the pavement for the better part of a decade.

He started writing and recording originals on a TASCAM four-track recorder at age 11, moved to Nashville from Central Kentucky after high school, and eventually caught the ears of both Capitol Records and Loud Robot, with whom he signed a unique dual deal in 2019. The dozen introspective, hookheavy tunes between Cardigan’s pair of 2020 EPs — Vulnerabilia and Holograma — are emotionally candid and musically omnivorous. They’re written in bedrooms but fit for arenas. Tune in on Thursday to hear the material performed with a full band at Analog, the cocktail lounge of the Hutton Hotel. Buy tickets through the venue’s website, analognashville.com. 7 p.m.

Thursday, Nov. 19, via Analog CHARLIE ZAILLIAN

[COMMUNITY AND CONNECTION]

MUSIC

WATCH CHAZ CARDIGAN STREAM FROM ANALOG

DANCE

[SWEATER WEATHER]

FILM

MUSIC

CRITICS’ PICKS

[FORCE OF HABIT]

READ THE HABIT TRIP

We’ve all developed new habits during the pandemic. Some good, like exploring our neighborhoods on foot and cooking with every last ounce of whatever was left in the pantry. And some — say, clicking “next episode” for yet another dose of The Queen’s Gambit at 1 a.m. — not so much. We know which habits are good, but implementation can be hard. That’s where The Habit Trip comes in. Written by author, coach, personal trainer and East Nashville resident Sarah Hays Coomer, the book helps analyze your habits relating to sleep, fitness, relationships, money, spirituality and more, and then helps you take steps to make the kind of changes you want (and/or need). And she does it without the saccharine self-help talk that turns off some from the genre. The Habit Trip is a fill-in-the-blank workbook — Coomer doesn’t have all the answers.

But she does talk about pivot points a fair amount, and since she was working on this book before “pivot” was the word of

youngster by playing along to Nas, Biggie and Tupac verses.) Now comes Shabaka and the Ancestors, a collaboration with a coterie of players from South Africa. The project is more understated than both Comet and Kemet — but no less spellbinding. Its mammoth second LP We Are Sent Here by History fortifies Hutchings’ free-flowing playing with deep, haunting vocalizations, a stealthy rhythm section and a naturalistic recording that puts the listener right in the room. “Modern jazz is a lonely road,” a character on David Simon’s moody New Orleans tableau Treme once remarked.

That may be, but Hutchings is building quite the happening settlement alongside it.

CHEEKWOOD’S HOLIDAY LIGHTS

18

CHARLIE ZAILLIAN

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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CRITICS’ PICKS the year, she obviously has some ideas on what’s going to be necessary around the bend. If you’re thinking about ways you can use 2020’s uncertainty as momentum for change, Coomer’s direction can help turn ideas into concrete plans. The Habit Trip will be released on Dec. 1, and is available for preorder at The Bookshop, Parnassus Books and wherever books are sold.

PODCAST

MARGARET LITTMAN [RETURNING THE BORROWED NOSTALGIA]

LISTEN TO KCRW’S PODCAST LOST NOTES: 1980

prominent ‘sidemen.’ ” CPM will kick off the project with a virtual panel discussion led by Kristine McCusker, a professor and ethnomusicologist who serves as coexecutive director of the Oral History Association, and CPM graduate and local musician/activist Tiffany Minton. Panelists include multi-instrumentalist Ellen Angelico, vocal coach/artist/consultant Judy Rodman and musician/drummer/DJ Megan Coleman. The panel will stream live online via the Center for Popular Music’s website (mtsu.edu/popmusic) and will also be available to watch after its initial broadcast.

Tuesday, Nov. 24, via MTSU’s Center for Popular Music BRITTNEY MCKENNA

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Lost Notes, a podcast produced by Santa Monica public radio station KCRW, is catnip for music nerds. Over two seasons, the program has highlighted stories about [WORTHY] popular music that aren’t written into VISIT THE NEW WOOLWORTH WINDOW history — or at least not embedded into GALLERY the popular recollection. The third season, It’s hard to imagine a more appropriate a seven-episode series published to the pairing than this: Woolworth on Fifth, the web in September, is extra compelling. site of the lunch-counter sit-ins that brought Poet, author and cultural critic Hanif desegregation into the public discourse in Abdurraqib covers musicians for whom Nashville, is launching a gallery in its front something significant happened in 1980, window, and the first exhibit pays tribute and how that played a role in setting the to Black victims of gun violence. “Target tone for the music of the decade to come. #2,” by Nashville native Ashley Doggett, is One episode considers the eponymous a portrait of a young man wearing a hoodie album that Sugarhill Gang made to follow with a target across its front. The painting up breakout single “Rapper’s Delight,” and is rendered in dreamy reds, pinks and how it exemplifies the weird and sometimes turquoise, and the man’s gaze is solemn shady happenings as hip-hop became part but focused on the viewer. Its combination of commercial pop music. Another episode of the traditional and contemporary puts covers Stevie Wonder’s phenomenal Doggett in line with important artists like comeback Hotter Than July. Yet another Kehinde Wiley and Kara Walker. “Doggett’s covers the end of disco, hastened by racist paintings are each battlegrounds on which and homophobic histrionics from white racist narratives might be contested, male tastemakers, and the way Grace reclaimed, and overthrown, one-by-one,” Jones flipped the narrative on its head with says the exhibition statement. Using a a trilogy of albums beginning with 1980’s storefront window as a display case is a Warm Leatherette. There’s tremendous smart and meaningful way to engage with sadness in reckoning with the ends of things the public while giving local artists extra — the deaths of Minnie Riperton, Ian Curtis, visibility. Through Jan. 4 at Woolworth on John Lennon and Darby Crash are focal Fifth, 221 Fifth Ave. N. LAURA HUTSON HUNTER points. But there’s also profound hope in what these iconic musicians’ work — and the way it lives in fans’ and collaborators’ hearts — tells WOOLWORTH us about music as a cultural WINDOW GALLERY expression. In the bargain, Abdurraqib’s curation and presentation serve as a strong reminder of why we need poets to help us process what’s going on in our culture. Listen on KCRW’s website or wherever you get podcasts. STEPHEN TRAGESER

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[AURAL HISTORY]

“TARGET #2,” ASHLEY DOGGETT

WATCH WOMEN MUSICIANS IN NASHVILLE ORAL HISTORY PANEL DISCUSSION

A new endeavor from MTSU’s Center for Popular Music seeks to shine a spotlight on the stories and experiences of local women musicians. The Women Musicians in Nashville Oral History Project will compile firsthand accounts from local players, offering “a new collection of narrative histories from some of the music industry’s most

VINYL RADIO

12-13 Tommy Emmanuel & Jerry Douglas: Christmas & More!

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COVERED. CHECK OUT THE NASHVILLE SCENE FOR NEWS, REVIEWS AND FURTHER COVERAGE OF MUSIC CITY.

NASHVILLESCENE.COM

FOOD AND DRINK

We see how the sausage is made at the brand-new Zeppelin

BY MARGARET LITTMAN

“W

hy are you opening a new restaurant during a pandemic?

How are you opening a new restaurant during a ZEPPELIN pandemic?”

505 THIRD AVE. N. These are the MAKE A RESERVATION AT ZEPPELINNASHVILLE.COM first two questions I asked Scott Baird.

For me, the past eight months have been filled with reporting on businesses pivoting to stay open, doing my own professional pivots, and trying to remember what day it is. It’s difficult to get my head around the undertaking of launching a new restaurant

in a new-construction building — a hotel, no less — while navigating Metro Nashville’s socalled Roadmap to Reopening.

The short answer, of course, is that there were signed leases, bills to pay and investors to satisfy.

Baird agreed to give the Scene the long answer. He invited us to look at what it has taken to open Zeppelin, the rooftop dinner spot at the new TownePlace Suites Nashville hotel on Gay Street. Over the months that I have been gathering string on Baird and his company Big Little Fish, the following happened: His initial chef left and he hired a new one; he realized he is going to have to completely redo the restaurant’s brand-new floors; he navigated differences of opinion on furniture finishes and art; he made too-

large kitchen appliances fit; and he juggled hiring and training, plus the usual construction delays. The original opening date was supposed to be in March. And then June, in time for the CMA Music Festival, and then the Fourth of July. Doors finally opened Nov. 6. And of course, there are the peculiarities of the pandemic.

“I thrive in chaos,” Baird says.

The hotel was developed by Deep Cove Partners and the Gettys Group, who also designed the space. Those two Chicago-area firms also own the two acres next to the TownePlace Suites, which they plan to develop into another hotel. Early on, the groups opted not to work with Marriott International — which operates the TownePlace Suites brand — to run on-site restaurants.

“We thought we needed a buzzworthy team,” says Reeve Waud, a partner at Deep Cove. When Waud and Roger Hill, chairman and CEO of the Gettys Group, met the team at Big Little Fish — which includes Baird, Will Friedrichs and Brett Orlando — they found their buzz.

Baird lives in Northern California, but he had worked on other local projects in the past, including running the Christmas pop-up bar at the Noelle hotel. He felt he had

an understanding of the city’s strengths in restaurants and bars, and where there was opportunity. Like Waud and Hill, he saw potential in Nashville’s energy and audience.

The hotel is an area that some are now calling the Capitol District, between Germantown and downtown, near Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park and with a view of something folks don’t normally put in the brochures, Baird concedes. “There’s gonna be photographs of this place, and it is going to look amazing, and people are going to say, ‘That place is on top of the TownPlace Suites across the street from the jail?’ ” The hotel is walking distance from many downtown attractions and First Horizon Park — and, yes, near the Downtown Detention Center. But it’s far enough away from the congestion that it can offer parking and reasonable room rates. And that will appeal to a certain kind of traveler, Hill believes.

“As a consumer, I want to feel smart about it. It is the same way I feel smart when I go shop at Costco.”

The idea is, of course, to welcome those guests from the hotel to have a drink or a bite to eat, but more so to welcome locals who live in the area and are looking for a neighborhood hangout — then surprise

PHOTOS: DANIEL MEIGS

WHAT IT TAKES TO OPEN A NEW RESTAURANT IN A PANDEMIC

CHARRED CARROTS

nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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FOOD AND DRINK

22

ZEPPELIN STAFF MEETS BEFORE SERVICE

HAMACHI CRUDO Thebault, includes dishes such as hamachi crudo and charred carrots. If you want something heartier, there’s a patty melt.

But the whole vibe stays away from heavy dishes, meat-and-three-style classics, and the “chicken fingers and flatbreads” Baird sees more often than he would like.

“Delicious, not precious” is Baird’s food mantra, one that he has put on T-shirts at several of his other past projects.

Baird is quick to correct me when I refer to Zeppelin as a restaurant in a hotel. “It is a restaurant attached to a hotel,” he says, while drinking coffee topped with a splash of Coca-Cola to combat a 3 p.m. energy dip.

By that he means that the restaurant doesn’t offer all-day dining or room service that can overtax the staff. It is currently open for dinner only (although a rosé-heavy brunch

PHOTOS: DANIEL MEIGS

them with good food and drinks.

Zeppelin will have seating for 165 and an 18-seat bar (when there are no longer social distancing and capacity limitations). The aesthetic is arty and fun, but not over-thetop. (Yes, there is pink glitter on the floor of the women’s bathroom, but this is not White Limozeen.) It is a spaceship from California — soothing but not sleepy, and wide open thanks to the patio and the windows with unobstructed views.

Baird says the hotel was running at 12 percent occupancy when it first opened.

Waud says TownePlace Suites chainwide are running at more than 50 percent occupancy. (For comparison, Davidson County’s 2019 hotel occupancy rate was 75.3 percent.)

“This thing is not going to support my family,” says Baird. “It may be supportive, but it could not pay my bills alone. If I think about all of that, the noise is too much; it is too scary. The deck is already stacked against me. I can’t charge what is fair, because people don’t understand what these things cost. If I actually charged what it really costs to get food on plates, nobody would eat in restaurants, it’s too expensive.” Baird estimates that after calculating high-quality ingredients (he’s asked Folk chef Philip Krajeck for introductions to local farmers) and paying fair wages, it would cost $100 per person to eat.

The margins of operating a restaurant, Baird says, are 9 cents for every dollar he sells — as opposed to the 40 cents he would make if he ran a bar. That means he needs a chef who not only can bring the lighter West Coast-influenced menu he envisioned, but also control food costs and not let one oyster go to waste.

At the end of September, Baird and his team opened Moonshot Coffee on the first floor of the new hotel. Chef Jeffrey Rhodes, who was at Liberty Common beforehand, departed before Zeppelin opened and didn’t return messages requesting an interview.

Baird says the two didn’t have the same vision for a menu that would bring something different to the city.

A few weeks after Rhodes left, Big Little Fish snagged Aaron Thebault to wear the white toque. Earlier this year Thebault moved to Nashville from Chicago, where he worked at renowned restaurants including Spiaggia and Girl and the Goat. He arrived as the chef at the new Joseph hotel, but found the always-open schedule of the hotel’s food service difficult to balance with the demands of having a newborn.

After meeting with Baird and Friedrichs, he thought the Zeppelin direction and the schedule was a fit. And getting someone like Thebault on board is part of that “buzzworthy” approach Waud wanted.

Stephanie Izard, celebrity chef and owner of Chicago’s Girl and the Goat and Little Goat, praised Thebault in an email to the Scene.

“When Little Goat opened, we were so busy that I was not able to stop by Girl and the Goat for over a month,” Izard says.

“Thebault … took charge of the Girl and the Goat kitchen, and managed to keep the restaurant running seamlessly without any plan in place.”

At Zeppelin, there is a plan. The menu, designed collaboratively by Baird and

SEARED PORK CHOP on the patio is on the post-COVID wish list).

There’s a separate entrance and elevator (on Third Avenue North) so diners don’t need to walk through the hotel to get to the restaurant. There’s a full bar too, and Baird brings his background in mixology to the wine and cocktail lists.

While Nashville unemployment rates hover around 10 percent, Baird says it has been a challenge to staff up. Experienced hospitality workers have returned to reopened restaurants or gone to work at other new restaurants, like Sean Brock’s The Continental in the Grand Hyatt. Some workers are receiving unemployment and not searching for new positions, while others have opted to work in industries with less exposure to the public. That means Zeppelin is training folks without a lot of restaurant

experience, although many have worked in hospitality in bars on Broadway.

Andrew Hoffman, the former managing partner with Comal in Berkeley, Calif., has worked with Baird on other projects, and he isn’t fazed by that. He’s seen Baird train green hospitality staff before and thinks Baird is the right person to make Zeppelin successful.

“I have worked with a ton of creative bartenders who make nice drinks, and that’s what they have done,” Hoffman says. “That is where Scott starts, not where he stops.

What you need right now is the ability to be creative. We are in a sea shift with restaurants, and the ones that are going to make it are going to be creative and scrappy. That is great for Scott.”

EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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Thank you to all of our members and donors for your financial contributions, the love and support you’ve shown us this year.

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BELLE MEADE PREMIUM CIGARS

BELLE MEADE PREMIUM CIGARS AND GIFTS | Beale Meade Plaza | 4518 Harding Rd, Nashville TN 37205 | bellemeadecigars.com

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Belle Meade Premium Cigars and Gifts is a locally owned store that sells the finest cigars, gifts, pipes and tobacco-related products. Stop by today to purchase the finest tobacco in town ... you don’t even have to leave the store to sample your purchase! Complete with a smoking lounge where cigar connoisseurs relax, smoke and enjoy themselves. Come to Belle Meade Premium Cigar and Gifts this holiday season.

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OLAVIE BODY SCRUB AND BODY WASH

ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com Who doesn’t love a party for one every once in a while? The Olavie antioxidant sugar body scrub provides a luxurious exfoliation experience, while soothing the skin to a glowing finish. The scrub plus Olavie’s antioxidant grape seed body wash provide just that. Give that party for one to a loved one this year, you will be glad that you did! Scrub $39, Body Wash $22

BARNES AND NOBLE AT VANDERBILT

BARNES AND NOBLE AT VANDERBILT | 2501 West End Ave, Nashville, TN 37203 | vanderbilt.bncollege.com/ shop/vanderbilt/home

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Featuring a vintage-inspired graphic celebrating Vandy football, this is a versatile hoodie with a brushed fleece lining (100% cotton). We are open for safe holiday shopping. Parking is free in the 2525 garage. A great selection of general reading and children’s books, toys, games, and Vanderbilt-identified merchandise.

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FROTHY MONKEY TRAVEL TUMBLER

FROTHY MONKEY | frothymonkey.com/ product/traveltumbler Frothy Monkey Travel Tumbler with a sleek coffeeinspired illustration by @chrismonachino.

This white MiiR brand tumbler with gold graphic is insulated, leak-proof and will fit in most cupholders. It is sure to keep 12 ounces of your favorite hot or cold beverage at a tasty temp for hours. $30 at frothymonkey.com or at any Frothy Monkey location.

MAISON BONANGE CHOCOLATE BARS

LITTLE GOURMAND | Market & Cafe: 2209 Bandywood, Ste. D, Nashville, TN 37215 | Patisserie Française: 717 Craighead St., Nashville TN 37204 | littlegourmand.us

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14 different bars, all organic and made and packed with care in the heart of the Cité Royale of Versailles. Classic and adventurous flavors such as ginger, fennel, cardamom, geranium flower, bergamot or thyme. They are molded in the image of the Marble Court of the Château de Versailles and the emblem is a representation of a little angel affiliated with Marie-Antoinette.

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COCO BOW TIE AND MASK CLIFTON + LEOPOLD | cliftonandleopold.com

Clifton + Leopold was born from a love of classic men’s accessories and the desire to make them more reflective of the world today. A world that is more diverse, bold and inclusive. Our ties, bow ties, pocket squares and scarves are handcrafted in the U.S. for dapper humans everywhere.

OLIVE OIL W/BOURBON VANILLA FROM OLIVERAIE JEANJEAN

LITTLE GOURMAND | Market & Cafe: 2209 Bandywood, Ste. D, Nashville, TN 37215 | Patisserie Française: 717 Craighead St., Nashville TN 37204 | littlegourmand.us

It makes perfect sense on pan-fried scallops or a baked white fish. It will delight a fruit salad, a cake, a red fruit sorbet or a chocolate ice cream.

Oliveraie Jeanjean was established in 1994 south of Nimes. The Jeanjean family have passed their passion for their work from father to son. All olives are carefully selected and pressed directly in their own mill.

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GHD CURVE AND GHD AIR HAIR DRYER

ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com The ghd curve and ghd air hair dryer are the perfect combo to start the day off for that in-salon, glossy finish. Our 1 ¼ inch soft-curve curling iron maintains heat constantly and evenly across the barrel, achieving gorgeous, shiny curls in five to eight seconds, saving both your hair and you time.

Automatic shut off after 30 seconds for peace of mind. Hair dryer $199 curling iron $199

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CANDLE - DEUX

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CLIFTON + LEOPOLD | cliftonandleopold.com Clifton + Leopold was born from a love of classic men’s accessories and the desire to make them more reflective of the world today. A world that is more diverse, bold and inclusive.

Our ties, bow ties, pocket squares and scarves are handcrafted in the U.S. for dapper humans everywhere.

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CHOCOLATE & CHAMPAGNE PAIRING GIFT BOX (24 PCS)

LITTLE GOURMAND | Market & Cafe: 2209 Bandywood, Ste. D, Nashville, TN 37215 | Patisserie Française: 717 Craighead St., Nashville TN 37204 | littlegourmand.us Champagne, like chocolate, is a celebration of true craftsmanship. It inspired Neuhaus to create exquisite multilayered pralines, each crafted to be savored with sparkling wine. Belgian Top Sommelier Yanick Dehandschutter collaborated with Maîtres Chocolatiers to provide a series of pairing recommendations to create the best possible flavor combinations.

OI HOLIDAY SET

GREEN PEA SALON | 1113 12th Ave South, Nashville, TN 37203 | 4105 Charlotte Ave, Nashville TN 37209 | greenpeasalon.com

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BUCHES DE NOEL (CHRISTMAS YULE LOGS)

LITTLE GOURMAND | Market & Cafe: 2209 Bandywood, Ste. D, Nashville, TN 37215 | Patisserie Française: 717 Craighead St., Nashville TN 37204 | littlegourmand.us SAINT GERMAIN: Three chocolate Bavaroise (dark, milk and white), chocolate genoise and chocolate frosting. PIGALLE: Mango Bavaroise, Passion fruit, Joconde biscuit, Yuzu cream. Each cake is $69.99 plus tax and has to be preordered before Dec. 12. Serve 8/10 Complimentary tastings in both stores on Saturday, Nov. 28.

PARNASSUS BOOKS | 3900 Hillsboro Pike, Ste. 14, Nashville TN 37215 | parnassusbooks.net/holiday2020

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The perfect gift for the book lover on your list! (Maybe that’s you.) Get a handselected book delivered to your door — or available for in-store pickup — every month.

Choose from First Editions Club (literary fiction), ParnassusNext (YA) or Spark Book Club (middle-grade). Available in 3-, 6-, or 12-month increments.

The perfect product combination for all hair types, this OI holiday set is designed to indulge those who desire beautiful, shiny and fragrant hair. These bestsellers are the perfect choice for nourishing and softening your hair. Includes OI Shampoo, OI Conditioner and OI Oil. Add a Green Pea Salon gift card and you’re gift-ready!

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FIRST EDITIONS CLUBS

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ULTRALUXE BB OIL

ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com Give the gift of more youthful and radiant skin from the inside out. BB Oil by Ultraluxe is the perfect oil to repair any and all skin types.

A blend of six natural oils provides instant hydration to plump your skin, soften lines and wrinkles. With Vitamin E, soothing lavender and rosemary, this will be the gift that they keep asking for. BB Oil $50.50

BREAD CSA SUBSCRIPTION

BAKERY BY FROTHY MONKEY | 12South, Nations, East, Downtown, Franklin, Chattanooga | frothymonkey.com/bakery Give the gift of freshly baked artisan bread with a Frothy Monkey Bread CSA Subscription. The CSA program also offers loaves not typically available for retail such as challah, gluten-free and specialty seasonal sourdough. 12- and 26-week subscriptions are available with weekly pickup at the new Frothy Monkey in East Nashville. Visit frothymonkey.com/ csasubscriptions for more details.

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KERASTASE HOLIDAY KITS ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com

Nothing says “happy holidays” more than a personalized at-home hair-care system. The variety of Kerastase gift sets contain our bestselling shampoos, conditioner, heat protectants and hair primers. Satisfying their hair with any of their hair needs or desires, leaving them with exceptional hair.

-Blonde Absolute $90 -Resistance $80 -Nutritive $80 -Extentioniste $90 -Discipline $90 -Reflection $80

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WEDNESDAY DEC 2 6:00PM FACEBOOK LIVE with MOLLY SECOURS White Privilege Pop Quiz

Only you can define you

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holiday cards & 10% OFF boxed Moleskine planners 2020-2021 25% OFF Moleskine academic planners

OPEN FOR BROWSING! Tuesday - Saturday : 10:00am - 6:00pm Sunday : Noon - 6:00pm

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SIGNED JON MEACHAM BUNDLE

PARNASSUS BOOKS | 3900 Hillsboro Pike, Ste. 14, Nashville TN 37215 | parnassusbooks.net/holiday2020

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Need a gift idea? Book bundles to the rescue!

A trio of books signed by historian and bestselling author Jon Meacham is one of our most popular bundles. But there are lots to choose from — cookbooks, cocktails, Nashville, kids and more!

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PARNASSUS MERCH

PARNASSUS BOOKS | 3900 Hillsboro Pike, Ste. 14, Nashville TN 37215 | parnassusbooks.net/holiday2020 Show your book love with some great Parnassus merchandise! Consistently named one of the best independent bookstores in the country, Parnassus is a local treasure — and from T-shirts to adjustable masks, there are plenty of ways to sport your book love in style.

MARIANELLA’S HAND SANITIZER

ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com

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This year give that loved one the hand sanitizer that feels as fancy as it looks and smells. Marianella’s amazing hand sanitizer is something everyone needs on hand. With 70 percent alcohol and aloe gel that not only hydrates hands as you sanitize but also smells of spruce and lavender once it dries.

Marianella’s 2 oz. $14, 8 oz. $24

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NOURISH NASHVILLE COOKBOOK

NASHVILLE SCENE | nourishnashville.com It’s no secret, Nashville is delicious. Now you can make some of Music City’s best dishes from the comfort of your own home! The Scene’s new cookbook, Nourish Nashville, is available now. Inspired in part by the time we’ve all had to spend at home during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic — experimenting and honing our home-cooking skills while social distancing — this cookbook features 40-plus of the city’s most celebrated chefs sharing their most beloved recipes.

ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON ROBE ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com

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Transform your home into your very own spa by wrapping up in one of our cozy luxurious robes that get softer with each wash. From Small to 3xl, everyone deserves some relaxation. $175

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NEST HOLIDAY CANDLE

GREEN PEA SALON |1113 12th Ave South, Nashville, TN 37203 | 4105 Charlotte Ave, Nashville TN 37209 | greenpeasalon.com The legendary Nest Holiday Candle is a host/ teacher/sister/mom/bff gift pleaser, this year in beautiful new recyclable packaging.

This candle is joined by a series of new fragrances and scents that will please anyone on your list. Call ahead for multiple orders!

NATUROPATHICA CBD ELIXIR AND CBD KAVA BALM ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com

Take a deep breath and chill — you now know what to get everyone on your list. Our CBD Kava Balm and Microdose Elixir instantly relieve muscle tension and melt the worries away. Chill CBD is also the perfect addition to add to a massage, facial and soak. Exfoliating brush $29, CBD elixir $88, CBD Kava Balm $76

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MISS KITTY’S BOUTIQUE

MISS KITTY’S DOG RESORT | 4308 Kenilwood Dr, Nashville, TN 37204 | misskittysnashville.com Our dog clothing changes with the season and ranges from practical items like sweaters and rain gear to wedding dresses, tuxedos and accessories.

We also stock jerseys and tees for our college and professional sports teams in Nashville!

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Give the gift of Nfocus This holiday season, order a subscription of Nfocus for yourself or a friend, or sign up to become a member and receive perks all year long.

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ULTRALUXE TRIPLE ACID EXFOLIATING PADS AND ACID CLEANSER

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ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com

SCENE MEMBERSHIP

NASHVILLE SCENE | nashvillescene.com/support

The Nashville Scene has been serving our city for three decades and counting. A strong, independent voice, the Scene covers news, music, film, food, art, culture, and state and local politics. Now more than ever, we need your support so that we can continue to provide Nashvillians with free, independent press from a source you can trust. Please consider becoming a member today and enjoy year-round perks, so that we can keep supplying our city with journalism and keep putting news in your hands.

MISS KITTY’S BAKERY

MISS KITTY’S DOG RESORT | 4308 Kenilwood Dr, Nashville, TN 37204 | misskittysnashville.com Pitter Pats are our signature cookie and continue to be a top seller. Little dogs love the heart-shaped treats because they’re thin like wafers, perfect for itty-bitty pups who don’t have the jaw strength for big bones.

One bite, and you’ll see why our clients call them puppy crack!

The top duo gift this holiday season. Acid Cleanser gently washes away impurities and rejuvenates dull skin to a soft, smooth, glowing complexion.

The Triple Acid Exfoliating Pads have a unique combo of salicylic, lactic and mandelic acids that evens skin tone, removes impurities and refines pores ... pads can be used 1-2 times per week.

Exfoliating Pads $48, Acid Cleanser $ 37

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ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON GIFT CARD ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON | 6000 Highway 100, Ste 102, Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com

An Escape gift card is one of the easiest gifts to give and one of the best gifts to receive.

From our full-service hair salon, to our healing therapeutic massages, to our advanced skincare and luxurious body treatments, who doesn’t need the gift of wellness? Gift cards available in store or online at escapenashville.com

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THE HERMITAGE

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This season, give your favorite history lover the gift of membership to Andrew Jackson’s Hermitage. The home of the seventh president offers regular and seasonal tours and exhibits, special events and educational opportunities, plus tastings at the all-new Natchez Hills Winery located onsite. Members receive unlimited admission and great perks year-round. All funds directly support the mission to preserve, educate and inspire.

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Nashville Zoo Membership benefits include: • Free admission and parking during regular hours for one year • Free or discounted admission to most special events.

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Happy Holidays !

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Meet the Owners Q & AS WITH LOCAL BUSINESS PEOPLE

SCENEGIFTGUIDE.COM

Christopher Lester

SHOP OWNER AT CLIFTON + LEOPOLD cliftonandleopold.com

Kelly Mason

SHOP OWNER AT GREEN PEA SALON greenpeasalon.com

Jennifer Sheets

CO-OWNER/CREATIVE DIRECTOR AT FROTHY MONKEY frothymonkey.com

Guenievre Milliner

SHOP OWNER AT LITTLE GOURMAND littlegourmand.us

Q: What Inspired you to open your store?

Q: What Inspired you to open your store?

Q: What Inspired you to open your store?

Q: What Inspired you to open your store?

A: Clifton + Leopold is the cumulation of all the were A:equally To create a space where our team and clients A: What inspired the store to open: We are really share A: Imyhavepassion always been a foodie and wanted to things I love — dapper dresswear, handcrafted qualhappy and to celebrate the best in the focused on bringing people together and serving for French food. ity, the maker’s movement, my entrepreneurial spirit, and a community of like-minded people. So, when I got tired of coming up with reasons not to launch the store, I finally stopped and did it.

salon industry. We also knew we wanted to share the best products we could find with our clientele, so it’s fun to always be on the search for these products.

Q: What trends are you loving right now?

A: It’s funny to think about trends when we’ve spent most of the year in our own space, but I’m

Q: What trends are you loving right now?

A: Sustainable, organic, healthy, good for the environment. Quality and affordability are coming

loving some overarching themes for sure — bold patterns, high-waisted pants, the move to more androgenous styling, the French tuck, and the universal desire everyone has to wallpaper their bathroom.

closer together for some of the best products we’ve seen to date.

Q: A: Shopping local means everything to me both as a shop owner as well as a consumer. We make What does “shop local” mean to you and your store?

100% of our products here in the South, so when someone buys a piece from Clifton + Leopold, they’re supporting 50-plus people in our community. As a consumer I just feel better when I shop local. I feel like I’m doing something good for a fellow human and that just feels, well, good.

Q: A: The support of your own neighbors, local businesses, and local families — people in our comWhat does “shop local” mean to you and your store?

munity that contribute to the fabric of what makes our Nashville life so rich.

our neighbors. Coffee and community inspire everything we do.

Q: What trends are you loving right now?

A: We love how innovation and creativity have fueled us in 2020.

Q: What does “shop local” mean to you and your store?

A: Shop local to us (Frothy) means that the money being spent in our stores stays in our community for the most part. We live here, our kids go to school here and we invest in relationships with nearby farmers and purveyors who can grow along with us. If we didn’t have the support of our local community we wouldn’t be here.

Q: Favorite items in your store right now?

Q: Favorite items in your store right now?

Best gift item in your store?

Best gift item in your store?

A: We always have some amazing coffees, but my favorite giftable item we have right now is our A: We have exclusive lines like Malin + Goetz, Bread CSA, because who doesn’t want to be given a and the whole Nest candle line — an absolute favor-

Q: What trends are you loving right now?

A: I think that in a very special year we all need comfort, so I would say chocolate is my favorite “trend” for the holidays this year.

Q: A: Shop local — supporting small, locally owned businesses is more important than ever. My husWhat does “shop local” mean to you and your store?

band and I try to shop and eat local as much as we can, we are giving back to local nonprofits. This is the only way to make it through these hard times.

Q: A: My favorite items are the incredible jams from La Confiture Parisienne and the Hedene honeys. I Favorite items in your store right now?

Best gift item in your store?

didn’t really enjoyed honey before these, now I am a fan. And the lovely boxes of Neuhaus chocolates are my favorite gift for the season.

fresh loaf of bread on the weekly? Runner up is the ite for giving — but their new Blue Cypress and Snow adorable Cold Brew Can Glass featuring an illustraClassic Candle is a showstopper!

Q: Favorite items in your store right now?

Q: Favorite “Nashville” thing you do when not tion by @drawmatthewdraw.

Best gift item in your store? working?

A: Don’t make me choose my favorite kid! I have working?

Q: Favorite “Nashville” thing you do when not Q: Favorite “Nashville” thing you do when not —A:we areWe extremely currently don’t go out a lot except for work an attachment to so many pieces in our current cautious. But in normal times, collection. I can’t get enough of the oversized ’70smy favorite thing is enjoying a cocktail and appetizworking? inspired bow ties — Hollywood, Coco and Cher. But ers at the beautiful Hermitage Hotel, then going to a A: Supporting our local neighborhood restauif I was honest, Icarus is probably my favorite piece concert at the Ryman or a Broadway show at TPAC. rants by grabbing a few friends and meeting up, if A: My favorite “Nashville” thing to do outside of right now. Sometimes I wear it around the house Can’t wait to go back! the weather holds — on my motor bike. work is to dig through vinyl at Grimey’s and catch just because it makes me feel so damn happy. On some live music. I’m looking forward to being able the gift front, hands down it would be one of our to do those things again! candles. Who doesn’t love a good candle? And what a great way to create your own personal sanctuary, or tell someone else how much you love them, by giving them a way to create theirs?

ADVERTORIAL | INTERESTED IN ADVERTISING IN THE SCENE SHOP LOCAL GIFT GUIDES? EMAIL MIKE AT MSMITH@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

Shop local

GIFT GUIDE

Meet the Owners Q & AS WITH LOCAL BUSINESS PEOPLE

SCENEGIFTGUIDE.COM

Tami Sprintz Hall

SHOP OWNER AT ESCAPE DAY SPA + SALON 6000 Highway 100 Nashville, TN 37205 | escapenashville.com

Gina Wells

OWNER AT MISS KITTY’S DOG RESORT 4308 Kenilwood Dr., Nashville, TN 37204 misskittysnashville.com

Cigars From A. FUENTE • ASHTON • CAO • COHIBA • DAVIDOFF LIGA PRIVADA • MONTECRISTO • PADRON • TATUAJE ZINO & MANY MORE

BELLE MEADE

PREMIUM CIGARS & GIFTS Belle Meade Plaza 4518 Harding Road, Nashville, TN

615-297-7963

Q: What Inspired you to open your store?

A: Fifteen years ago we started escape day spa and salon to provide a place where one could truly

Q: What Inspired you to open your store?

A: We opened our resort because we didn’t feel like there was a place we trusted to leave our

escape their every day. You can come for one hour or you can come for the entire day and feel like you’ve had a mini vacation.

little 3-pound dog for grooming, lodging or other services. Her name was “Miss Kitty”, hence the company name, Miss Kitty’s Dog Resort.

Q: What trends are you loving right now?

Q: What trends are you loving right now?

A: I think my favorite hair trend right now is the being A: ofWetheirlovefour-legged that people take the care and welllived-in color you get with balayage. The hand paintfamily members more ing technique of highlighting hair is so natural and mimics natural highlights from the sun. It also allows your hair to look more natural as the highlights grow out and go longer in between appointments

seriously than ever before. Pup parents are more educated and want more information before making the important decision about leaving their pup in the hands of others.

Q: Q: What does “shop local” mean to you and your store?

A: Shopping local means supporting Nashville A: In January 2021 we celebrate 30 years in families that are supporting the Nashville community. business right here in Nashville. We have clients

What does “shop local” mean to you and your store?

It also means that more dollars stay in the community to help the community grow and stay healthy. My parents started a local business, Sprintz Furniture, when I was in high school that today is still very successful. I learned at a young age that supporting local businesses was vital for the people of our city to do for our community. When I have a choice to shop, personally I always choose local first!

Q: A: My favorite gift we have at escape is always my favorite gift this time of year and that is a gift Favorite items in your store right now?

Best gift item in your store?

card! Especially now with so much stress and anxiety, a gift card to get away and spend some time on yourself is the perfect antidote.

that have been coming to us for 30 years and some of them are on their third- or fourth-generation pup. We’ve loved them all from when they brought them home as young puppies, loved them through their lives, and then been there when they had to say goodbye.

Q: A: Pup Holiday Gift Baskets! The baskets are individually made for small pups and big pups, with Favorite items in your store right now?

Best gift item in your store?

wonderful things inside to eat, play with, and enjoy!

Q: A: My favorite “Nashville” thing to do outside of work is still downtown people-watching, although

Favorite “Nashville” thing you do when not working?

it’s much less eventful that it used to be!

ADVERTORIAL | INTERESTED IN ADVERTISING IN THE SCENE SHOP LOCAL GIFT GUIDES? EMAIL MIKE AT MSMITH@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

I

OP

Vodka Yonic

EN

NOM

VODKA YONIC

IONS AR T E NA

LIGHTING THE WAY

On finding my Hindu faith during the pandemic

BY POOJA SHAH

Vodka Yonic features a rotating cast of female writers from around the world sharing stories that are alternately humorous, sobering, intellectual, erotic, religious or painfully personal. You never know what you’ll find here each week, but we hope this potent mix of stories encourages conversation.

So much good has been done for Nashville this year by the countless people and organizations feeding our city, and we want to honor them for showing up when we needed them most. The Phila Awards celebrates the life of Phila Rawlings Hach by honoring those people and organizations continuing her legacy of using food and cooking virtuously.

The Nation United

In honor of the United Nations dinner Phila catered at Centennial Park, this award celebrates a person, group, or organization using food to bring people together to discuss issues related to justice, equity, and inclusion.

The Patti Myint

This award celebrates the person, group, or organization that best exemplifies Patti Myint and Phila’s spirit for using their food/cooking skills to improve, assist, and/or support their community.

The Ruth

In honor of Phila’s partner in thyme for almost 60 years, this award celebrates a person, group, or organization that uses food/cooking/restaurants to inspire, empower, or support women seeking a better future.

The Serving Spoon

In honor of Phila’s desire to feed everyone she met, this award celebrates a person, group, or organization that uses food/cooking/restaurants to address hunger, food insecurity, and/or self-sufficiency.

SUBMIT YOUR NOMINEES HERE TODAY: nashvillescene.com/phila-awards The Phila Awards and Phila’s Phund are initiatives of Fare Nashville; a comprehensive plan to embed a just, affordable, and accessible food system for all Nashvillians.

To learn more, visit: www.FareNashville.org

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M

y parents’ morning routine is ingrained in my memory: wake up, shower, light a diya, pray and sip on a cup of chai before work. I admired their regimen, often embarrassed that my mornings consisted of endless Instagram scrolling and chugging a cup of coffee before logging on. No matter how much older I got, or where I lived, there was little room for prayer in my schedule.

Ironically, my parents named me Pooja, which means prayer or worship. Since birth, I was bestowed with this inherent responsibility of being connected to my Hindu faith by virtue of my name. And my family lived the part, too. I was born in India, where religion was a key facet of life: frequent walks to the temple, evening aartis and vegetarianism as the default diet.

After immigrating to the States to pursue the American Dream, my parents traded their temple visits for trips to the mall and their Indian cuisine for Taco Bell and McDonald’s. But one thing remained consistent: lighting their daily diya near the altar of God. My mom even has a precise process: roll pure cotton into a wick, immerse it into a jar of ghee to create a candle, place in an earthen clay bowl or brass holder and ignite with a match. She then closes her eyes, folds her hands and recites a prayer until the flame extinguishes itself.

For my parents, faith is an integral part of their identity. The diya represents purity and goodness as well as evil dispelled by the power of light. They viewed this task as a customary part of our Hindu household and emphasized its symbolism.

Faith for me has been more complicated.

When I moved to Boston from New York for college, my mom packed a dainty new diya into a box and urged me to light it each morning before class. “Sure,” I told her, knowing perfectly well it would collect dust. Years later, my parents gave my fiancé and me a personalized diya with our initials carved into it as a housewarming gift when we moved into our first apartment.

It’s small and delicate — and found a permanent home in my dresser.

Although I don’t identify as an atheist, I’ve never described myself as a believing Hindu, because I long saw it as the faith I was born into. I often felt I had little choice

but to conform to Hinduism given how religious my family is. Growing up, I would reluctantly go to Diwali celebrations and auspicious prayer ceremonies without fully understanding what they meant or what we were worshipping. I never thought to ask, and honestly didn’t care.

I battled my own angry tirades with God (or gods, considering the Hindu belief of multiple deities), which further widened the gap between what I chose to believe and practice. Childishly and without substantial evidence, I blamed the misfortunes of my life on God and could not reconcile why negative events occured. Instead of relying on religion to alleviate my burdens, I viewed it as a burden itself.

But the past eight months of pandemicrelated lockdown have forced me to reevaluate my faith and my spirituality — after all, there was only so much banana bread I could bake. Isolated in a tiny apartment with my partner and unable to interact with the world, I looked to the higher powers for solace and comfort in an otherwise grim time.

One morning in mid-April as the pandemic raged, I woke up to my usual dose of MSNBC news, which reported another devastating day of 3,000-plus deaths from COVID-19 in New York City alone. In that moment, I gravitated toward the box that housed my untouched diya. By now, the world was growing accustomed to these staggering numbers and the global panic they brought on. Loved ones were hooked to ventilators, news coverage showed heartbreaking photos of morgues and hospitals at maximum capacity, health care workers were beleaguered, and the economy tanked.

That morning, the diya became a beam of light for me. I lit the wick to feel closer to home.

In the days that followed, I formed a habit of lighting it each morning after I showered and prepared for another work-from-home day — it was the only constant in an otherwise unprecedented time. This simple change motivated me to voluntarily reunite with my cultural and religious identity on my own terms. I sought out English translations of ancient texts and scriptures that explained the customs and traditions that I witnessed my family practice. I phoned my parents to ask thoughtful questions about why they viewed certain omens as “good” or “bad” and the significance behind the traditions they observe. I fought to change my onceadversarial position with God and solve the enigma of my relationship with my spirituality.

To this day, I have deliberately lit more than 210 diyas. This Diwali, I plan on telling my parents about my growing interest in my faith. I know they will be delighted.

EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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11/16/20 3:06 PM

ART

A SAILOR’S GUIDE

Eleanor Aldrich is formal and mysterious at Channel to Channel

BY JOE NOLAN

“ON THE BOAT,” ELEANOR ALDRICH

and white stripes — a few punches of red make for dramatic complements. The face is covered in a hirsute mask that suggests the shape of a bird’s head in profile. There’s dreadful horror in the monstrous visage, realized by the beak-like brushstrokes of blackish-brown that obscure the sailor’s eyes, nose and mouth. But Aldrich’s faceless, isolated figures haunt That Feeling When with a wide range of nuanced moods –— lonely contemplation, quiet desperation, silent relaxation — despite their lack of expressions.

Aldrich’s show also includes a handful of works that complement the portraits, but mix up the artist’s more familiar elements.

In these works, Aldrich paints on surfaces that have been covered in uniform vertical strips of caulk. The textures don’t play into the subjects of these paintings so much as create a consistent 3D pattern across the whole surface of a wood panel covered with canvas.

Two of the most interesting works in this style give us graphic renderings of domestic interiors laid out in blocks of color and elemental shapes. “Kitchen Sink” and “Ironing” depict counters, faucets and ironing boards through a distorted perspective that’s unnervingly deep and narrow, vertiginous and claustrophobic.

The caulk brings lots of texture to these works, and Aldrich’s paint appears to be applied in chromatic washes of yellow, pink and blue that seem serene given their offkilter surroundings. In fact, Aldrich uses the repeating vertical textures to create vividly colored lenticular illusions in these works, which only reveal themselves as viewers move past the paintings.

In addition to their formal qualities and their narrative content, Aldrich’s works also comment on traditional gender roles in Western society. Her narrative portraits are mostly inspired by the covers of Nancy Drew novels. Drew, the “girl detective” who first appeared in print as a female counterpart to the Hardy Boys’ detective stories, was independent, strong-willed and adventurous — a genuine action hero for young girls. Aldrich’s portraits capture similarly feisty sleuths in silicone, caulking and enamel paint, which Aldrich applies using grouting tools. In short, the artist uses the kind of traditionally masculine materials and tools you’d find at a hardware store to paint a young feminist hero.

The relationship between materials and subjects is repeated in Aldrich’s lenticular domestic scenes, where the trappings and settings of “women’s work” are rendered with “masculine” materials.

This thoughtful contrast between subjects and the stuff they’re made of brings a conceptual depth to these works that might be overlooked given their arresting surfaces. Aldrich’s paintings are super stylized, but also smart in substance. And in the five years I’ve been watching her practice evolve, it’s only become more singular.

EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

“FIGHTING IRISH (RED STRIPES),” ELEANOR ALDRICH

T

he first time I saw Eleanor Aldrich’s work was in 2016, when her exhibition Denisovans was at Channel to Channel. That display showcased the artist’s outrageously ELEANOR ALDRICH: THAT painterly works, FEELING WHEN and included a ON VIEW THROUGH DEC. 3 number of portraits AT CHANNEL TO CHANNEL; with titles like “Big GALLERY HOURS ARE Blond” and “Teen WEDNESDAY-SATURDAY, 10 A.M.-6 P.M. Angst.” In that show — and since — Aldrich has also made sculptures, painting-sculpture hybrids and texture study paintings of flesh pressed through the weave of a hammock or the mesh of a lawn chair. It’s likely that all of these works scratch Aldrich’s obvious itch for making heavy, physical pieces that seem to ooze out of the picture frame.

But it’s in Aldrich’s portraits that her boldly colored and deeply textured surfaces become charged. With portraits, these elements are balanced against the stillness of her subjects, whose faces are always obscured by hair or clothing, or by blurs of pure painterly abstraction.

Aldrich’s That Feeling When, which opened at Channel to Channel on Nov. 7, features sculptures and studies of flesh against lawn chairs, but it’s dominated by a selection of portraits that represent a return to form for the artist — and it’s some of her strongest work to date.

“On the Boat” is the best work in the show, and it’s among the best paintings Aldrich has produced. The portrait depicts a woman sailing. She pulls on a rope, her face covered in the torrent of her windwhipped chestnut hair. She braces her foot against the railing of the ship, which is pitched at a dramatic angle — viewers might imagine waves and gales and salt and spray, but Aldrich doesn’t actually paint any of them. Her portraits give us little narratives packed with big drama, and it’s those elements that make these works so much more interesting and engaging than pieces that seem mostly preoccupied with texture for its own sake.

In Aldrich’s work, formal elements like color and especially texture are pushed to the forefront, and viewers visualize the peril on display in “On the Boat” only after they’ve stopped to marvel at the frostinglike smears of gooey color that render the scene. Aldrich’s sailor is wearing blue jeans, which the artist paints in a patchwork of blues and whites iterated across a repeating texture of horizontal bands. Aldrich mixes her paint with materials like caulk and silicone to realize the alchemy of plastic-y pigments that don’t drip or splatter with the frenzied stylistics of action painting. This combination of profusions of paint organized in measured textures can be literally mesmerizing, as Aldrich’s undulating surfaces lull viewers with a ceaseless promise of pure sensuality.

The sailor’s sweater is suggested by another succession of thick black, yellow

nashvillescene.com | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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11/16/20 3:08 PM

BOOKS

MEMPHIS CALLING Robert Gordon revisits his rollicking tale of a revolutionary musical city

BY DAVID WESLEY WILLIAMS

T

he title told it all, like some sci-fi B movie of your teenage dreams, with electric guitars for ray guns and aliens who answered to names like Dewey, Furry and Sputnik: It Came From Memphis.

Well, of course it did. Blues, rock ’n’ roll, soul. Music that shook the world. But Robert Gordon’s book, originally published in 1995 and back in an updated version from Third Man Books, isn’t about Memphis’ biggest stars and greatest IT CAME FROM MEMPHIS: hits. It’s about the UPDATED AND REVISED wild spirit of the

BY ROBERT GORDON place, the profound THIRD MAN BOOKS weirdness. It’s about 392 PAGES, $19.95 racial and cultural collisions. “Though no city has had more of a lasting impact on modern culture, Memphis has never been a company town,” Gordon writes. “The forces have all been independent, renegade.”

Gordon answered questions via email.

The back-cover blurb on my original edition began, “This is a book where Gus Cannon is more important than Elvis” — not exactly a marketer’s dream of a sales pitch. Yet the book is beloved, revered and now reissued. What were your expectations back then and now? I was so pleased to have a book deal, my first, a dream come true, that my expectations were met when the contract arrived. Thereafter, it was all gravy. My parents couldn’t really fathom who the audience would be. I just figured that, like me, others were interested in obscure but important and influential artists from Memphis. And would like a book of rollicking tales.

How did you approach this new version, and how much has the book’s lead character, Memphis, changed since 1995? In the new final chapter, I address the ongoing similarities in Memphis. I had a natural through line because the stars of the book — the great unknown band Mud Boy and the Neutrons, who took the mantle from the old blues singers — their children have become accomplished musicians, and in addition to their own pursuits, the children keep the songbook of their dads alive. Old songs keep getting older, aging like whiskey in a barrel.

And the city itself — quite honestly, it’s come a long way. As a whole (and speaking so broadly is dangerous), the hate and pretense that used to dominate here are greatly diminished. The city’s acceptance of its blues heritage is an implicit 180-degree turnaround of attitude. For much of its history, Memphis feigned, poorly, being a cultured European outpost — high tea at the Peabody, classical music over indigenous sounds. But Memphis is finally more comfortable with its role as capital of the Mississippi Delta, and I think citizens have — broadly speaking — accepted the history of hatred we’ve inherited and are working to turn it around.

38

‘POP LIFE’

‘the calculus of sunlight / tastes like bubblegum’

BY CHET WEISE | ILLUSTRATED BY PONI SILVER

Does Memphis have another revolution in it, sonic or otherwise? Another Sun or Stax Records?

A Sputnik? The revolutions you cite, none of them had any planning. You couldn’t go to Sun at any point and say, “Oh yeah, I see what you’re doing, you’re going to really change the world with this.” Most people told Sam Phillips he was a fool, and they made fun of Elvis Presley — until his success, which caused them fear.

Most of these revolutions were a reaction against Memphis’ long-standing hatred of African American culture. In my lifetime, that’s been the revolution: seeing what was once despised become respected. But the hatred lingers and is deep-set here, always combustible, so yeah, I have no idea how it will be expressed, but I think Memphis hasn’t finished speaking its mind yet.

Here’s hoping the book finds and inspires a new young audience. That in mind, how would you explain Memphis, in one song or album or artist, to some young kid just starting to really explore music? I’m going with my gut response here, even though it’s not a blues: “Last Night” by The Mar-Keys. It’s sort of blues plus youth. The sense of barely contained, barely controlled chaotic energy. Pretty much everyone has to move to it, however familiar or unfamiliar it may be. It’s a song that puts a smile on your face, and within its two minutes and 40 seconds, it convinces you to dance, to respond. That’s quite a lot of power in a pretty short amount of time, and I think that’s indicative of Memphis. It’s not the place you’d expect to have had such an impact on Western culture, global culture, really. But it’s the place that did.

To read an extended version of this interview — and more local book coverage — please visit Chapter16.org, an online publication of Humanities Tennessee.

EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

i am a child again the calculus of sunlight tastes like bubblegum we stay patient like a ventilator blooms into a prayer tree the airplanes fly from limb to power line my parents feed them wonder bread by habit, i check the twitter feed i am an adult again born and grown old ten thousand times in the last ten months this is a problem of numbers in rows like sunflowers their sum differences the size of a space of a letter to be apart instead of a part friends laughing marshmallows or gone like the bees in first grade my teacher gives me a pencil says whisper into the end wish for anything i choose rapture time has come for us we can risk joy again

Chet Weise’s poems and stories appear in Copper Nickel, Constant Stranger: After Frank Stanford, Peach Mag and elsewhere.

Poni Silver is an award-winning fashion designer (Black by Maria Silver), drummer and illustrator.

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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| NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | NASHVILLE SCENE

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MUSIC

MOVING FORWARD

Lilli Lewis and Kamara Thomas discuss how Black women can power the future of country music

BY MARCUS K. DOWLING

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KAMARA THOMAS is that, across this generation of artists, we remember that tradition. The entrepreneurial spirit of Black female artists has sustained us so long outside of the spotlight. Because of this, once we’re in that light, the industry can’t manufacture a separate story from the unique and connective one we have, and are controlling, about ourselves and our work.”

Thomas reflects on how we’ve been building slowly and steadily toward these circumstances over several years.

“Black folks, in general, have been reclaiming spaces that we ancestrally know are ours,” says Thomas. “Mirroring American society at present, we’re taking things because industries aren’t necessarily incentivized to give them to us. Currently, we’re laying the foundation and welcoming those who want to build with us.”

Thomas isn’t alone in this notion. On a recent episode of the NPR program Amplify With Lara Downes, the host spoke with Rhiannon Giddens, whose career has focused on highlighting the vital importance of Black musicians’ contributions to the traditions that make up country music. “There’s a shared space existing,” Giddens said.

“There’s a chance for a great spiritual awakening in country music led by kindness and inclusion. We still have to figure out the path to get there, but at least we have the tools.”

You don’t have to look further than Apple Music for the best example of this notion at work. Rissi Palmer, a Black female country artist who has had multiple singles on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, has a weekly online radio program on Apple Music Country called Color Me Country. The show puts a spotlight on Black female voices in the genre.

The program’s name is an homage to another Black female country singer, Linda Martell. Martell released one album, Color Me Country, in 1970, and she sang its single “Color Him Father” as the first Black woman to perform on the Grand Ole Opry.

Palmer’s show intentionally provides a platform for Black women and showcases their voices and art as worthy of celebration within the genre.

“Outside of the fact that I’m Black, outside of the fact that I’m a woman, I’m also a musician,” Palmer told roots-music-focused media group The Bluegrass Situation in September. “[Color Me Country] is where people

PHOTO: LI -PISKALO JONES

C

ontextualizing how and why Black artists will play a major role in country music’s dynamic future begins in the distant past. The Carter Family’s music was crucial in defining country music as a marketable genre in the 1920s and ’30s, and their work is still a fundamental influence today. Early in their career, they relied on a Black man named Lesley Riddle to help them gather songs in Black communities all over Appalachia.

Some of the best-known tunes in the Carters’ repertoire — including “The Cannonball,” aka “Cannonball Blues” — came from this relationship, and Riddle was a significant influence on Mother Maybelle Carter’s distinctive guitar style.

Amid intense and profound calls for justice by and for the Black people of this nation, there’s a growing sense that the time is coming for Black women to have a seat at country music’s table. Many have aspired to succeed in the country world in years past, moved by the music as much as their white peers, though none has been afforded the support that leads to a long and widely renowned career. Not unlike Riddle, the group of Black women currently making country and country-adjacent music — artists like Mickey Guyton, Yola, Rhiannon Giddens and Brittney Spencer — brings a wealth of talent and deeply rooted traditions to this movement.

Lilli Lewis is a wide-ranging musician who uses soul, blues and more in her work, and she’s also general manager and head of A&R for Louisiana Red Hot Records. Kamara Thomas is a country and roots recording artist who founded the organization Country Soul Songbook to lift up the voices of Black, brown and LGBTQ people in roots music.

They envision a future where Black female artists excel across the music business, in a society radically and positively altered by the multitude of forces that have been at play in 2020. However, their confidence is muted by a note of caution. Both women speak powerfully about being made emotionally fragile by years of interactions with the those in the country music industry who didn’t value them as artists. They note, though, that the twin impacts of the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements have buoyed their resolve and reenergized their passion.

“There’s a head game that exists where you think, ‘The industry doesn’t value me, so I must not be valuable,’ ” says Thomas.

“However, we’re waking up now and noticing that the problem isn’t us. Instead, the problem is the country music industry’s framework. Once you see the problem, you can’t unsee it.”

“Country and Americana share space with the profound legacies of entrepreneurial female artists like Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith,” says Lewis. “All that’s happening now

LILLI LEWIS

can just talk. And not just talk about race, but music and being a musician. A space free from worrying about alienating anybody or offending anyone. It’s just honest.”

Thomas sees that Black women are ready to take command, in part because they have experienced the hardships and challenges of the music business firsthand.

“Our voices are empowered because — unlike country music’s airtight-seeming white patriarchy — we can lead because we see a clear perspective on America’s best future through our lives, which serve as a lens that society needs right now,” Thomas says.

“With our vision, we’re wielding our power by seeing into the future.”

Another key aspect of a larger role for Black women in country music’s future is the genre’s expansion into the streaming world.

Traditionally, success in country music has been driven forcefully by radio airplay.

Nielsen Music’s 2019 Year-End Report notes that six of the 10 most-played artists on all radio stations over the previous decade were country artists. It’s well-known that country radio hasn’t been welcoming to women, with negligible visibility for women of color.

But country’s focus on streaming is growing. In recent years, Spotify, Amazon Music and Apple Music have all established offices in Music City. That same 2019 report from Nielsen also mentions that Luke Combs’ 2019 album What You See Is What You Get set a new record for release-week streaming of a country record, with 74 million streams of songs from the LP. And data from another 2019 study conducted

by Nielsen and radio programming group P1 notes that more than half of the country music radio listeners surveyed, ages 18-44, report streaming music every day.

In his recent Time Magazine piece “The Pandemic Could Have Hurt Country Music.

Instead, the Genre Is Booming,” writer Andrew R. Chow notes that attitudes toward overt pop influences in country music have shifted over the past 20 years.

“That border is coming down, and a lot of that has to do with streaming,” says Melinda Newman, Billboard’s editor for West Coast and Nashville divisions, quoted in Chow’s piece. “People who stream don’t look at genre.”

They don’t look at race, either. Chow’s

piece notes Black male country star Kane Brown as a beneficiary of the streaming windfall. He collaborated with established rapper Swae Lee and rising R&B star Khalid on the single “Be Like That,” which has been streamed some 97 million times since its release in July. At the same time, white stars like Sam Hunt also rack up massive stream counts while building a signature sound on music developed by Black artists.

However, history proves that Black women can level up and drive that conversation in a new direction. A Black woman singing a country song — Whitney Houston’s cover of Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You” — is among the longest-running songs on Billboard’s Hot 100 pop singles chart. At 14 weeks, its reign at No. 1 is matched or beaten by only nine other songs, including the current record-holder, Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road.”

Black women deserve a stake in country music’s future as an opportunity to reclaim the pop-culture-defining energy “borrowed” from them. See Elvis Presley’s smash hit with Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog” — as he helped shape the popular notion of rock ’n’ roll, Presley also had a massive influence on country musicians — as well as the music that the Carter Family learned from Black communities.

As the country industry evolves, what Thomas calls “ ‘old-boy country music’ that perpetually appeases the status quo” will exist alongside a Black female-led movement that Lewis describes as having “a multidimensional source of allyship-aided empowerment that exists without established industry norms.”

“Once unleashed, it’ll represent the future,” Thomas adds. “Successful white artists will continue to invite Black female artists to do stuff with them, plus all sorts of bold actions will be taken by artists, in general, wanting to free themselves. It will be a community where power doesn’t as much benefit old structures as it does aid in people achieving freedom. … Black women will achieve this success because the world has changed to a place where Black people are receiving the respect they demand. In spite of the country music industry, Black women will define country music’s future.”

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NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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MUSIC

THE SHAPE OF COUNTRY TO COME

Meet Reyna Roberts, Adia Victoria, Brittney Spencer and other Black women who are changing country and roots music

BY MARCUS K. DOWLING

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istorically, Black women who make country music have been denied opportunities for commercial success or creative satisfaction. But at this potentially transformative FIND LINKS TO THESE time in American ARTISTS’ WORK AT history, which NASHVILLESCENE.COM/MUSIC has been shaped in part by by the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements, their astounding talent now commands a great deal more of the acclaim it deserves.

As the resounding call for Black freedom trickles its way into country music, a possible result of this cultural shift is a more equitable stake for all Black artists. But women stand to gain the most. Following decades of consistently being overlooked and undervalued, there’s an unprecedented opportunity for their art’s depth, scope, grace and excellence to impress and impact country music’s fan base.

“We used to be told, as Black female artists, not to rock the boat, not to stick out,” says Rissi Palmer, speaking with the Scene via phone. The Billboard-charting country singer’s Apple Music Country program Color Me Country highlights many emerging and established Black women in country, folk and Americana. “Now, in this environment, Black female artists are being pushed to be themselves. There’s a long-overdue party started, and I’m glad I’m still here and able to be invited.”

If you’re paying attention to radio spins, streaming numbers and industry hype, Black women making country and countryadjacent music — women like Palmer, Yola, Mickey Guyton, Kamara Thomas and Americana super-quartet Our Native Daughters (Rhiannon Giddens, Amythyst Kiah, Leyla McCalla and Allison Russell) — have likely been drawing your attention this year. The time is ripe for them to gain a kind of equity in the industry that wasn’t afforded to Black artists who came before. They’re far from the only ones well-prepared for an opportunity to break out into the mainstream. Here are eight more for your consideration.

BRITTNEY SPENCER

Why she’s on your radar: Baltimore native Brittney Spencer covered superstar quartet The Highwomen’s “Crowded Table” and posted it to Twitter on Oct. 10. Highwomen Maren Morris and Amanda Shires retweeted her recording. Thousands of retweets, likes and replies later, Billboard featured her.

Why she will keep your attention: Spencer told Baltimore’s WJZ-13 TV that she loved the Dixie Chicks, now just known as The Chicks, and gospel music as a youth. This influence shines through in her harmonies as an adult.

Her new single “Sorrys Don’t Work No More” is a ballad featuring a vocal performance that soars over somber piano chords.

REYNA ROBERTS

KÄREN McCORMICK

Why she’s on your radar: A native of Brazza-

BRITTNEY SPENCER Spencer’s voice is a profound instrument that gracefully explores emotional depths and carries gravitas. Morris made a direct invitation for Spencer to come sing with The Highwomen. One can only imagine the bounty that collaboration will yield.

ADIA VICTORIA

Why she’s on your radar: In addition to guestediting an issue of the Scene in September, Adia Victoria has written poignant pieces on the Black experience in America published on sites like The Bitter Southerner. As far as her blues-infused music is concerned, her T Bone Burnett-produced single “South Gotta Change” is one of 2020’s most hauntingly powerful folk-rock recordings.

Why she will keep your attention: Victoria goes far beyond being a great writer, singer and poet who examines our time and the effects the past has upon it. She imagines a better future in her art. Even when it conveys a sense of dread, her body of work is ultimately looking forward.

REYNA ROBERTS

Why she’s on your radar: Reyna Roberts is a young artist on a hot streak of delivering country music primed for the mainstream.

She was featured on Rolling Stone Country over the summer, and ESPN has used her single “Stompin’ Grounds” in its Monday Night Football broadcasts.

Why she will keep your attention: Songs like “Stompin’ Grounds” are influenced by the same sort of razor-sharp, unabashedly pop-schooled style that brought artists like Shania Twain to massive acclaim. Just as importantly, the song presents a strong Black voice taking pride in being from the South.

For even more evidence of her depth and range, hear Roberts’ cover of Chris Stapleton’s new single “Cold.”

ville, Congo, who grew up in Cheney, Wash., Kären McCormick is informed by a range of cultures — she’s met all kinds of people, and has incorporated a little something from all of them into her music. You might have caught the music video for her single “Retro,” the title track of a new EP, when it was featured on CMT in October.

Why she will keep your attention: McCormick showcases clear and constant influences from powerful mainstream performers who stand out amid dramatic musical settings, like Carrie Underwood, Faith Hill and “Our Song”-era Taylor Swift. McCormick’s polished production and insistent hooks have an undeniable appeal.

CHAPEL HART

Why they’re on your radar: Sisters Devynn and Danica Hart, who make up the trio Chapel Hart with their cousin Trea Swindle, blend lush harmony singing with the raucous stomp of rock-influenced contemporary country. Their recent rollicking single “Jesus & Alcohol” features ZZ Top’s Billy F. Gibbons, a real-life ordained minister who plays one in the music video.

Why they will keep your attention: The group, currently based in New Orleans, thrives on an appreciation of traditional sounds and a deeply rooted desire to push the boundaries.

As Danica Hart told the Picayune Item, the daily newspaper covering the county that’s home to the group’s hometown of Poplarville, Miss.: “Growing up, I was a rebel. I was a Baptist, but I was a rebel Baptist. I went to church a lot, but I drank a lot too. …

People won’t write about that, because they feel like they don’t go together.”

DeLILA BLACK

Why she’s on your radar: When you catch a glimpse of a music video that features band members on electronic drums, guitar and bullwhip, it’s natural to be intrigued. The vid in question accompanies a demo of “You’re So Common (Demon Fighting),” a piece that bends country roots in a New Wave direction as the singer advocates for freedom from oppression with hardcore punk intensity. The song also earned effusive praise

from Tony Visconti, a producer best known for his work with David Bowie and T. Rex. Why she will keep your attention: Black — who was born in Haiti, lived in New York for a time and now resides in London — is a vibrant exponent of the Black queer punk movement. She’s also an accomplished performance artist who brings a visceral aggression to the sound she’s calling “Electro-Mountain, Country-Noire, Punk-Country, Afro-Billy, Roots-Rodeo-Rocknroll.”

ASHLIE AMBER

Why she’s on your radar: Ashlie Amber is one of an increasing number of country artists who are making their impact through streaming services. The pandemic has prevented the Colorado native and former American Idol contestant from performing in public for most of this year, but each of her two singles has still earned more than 100,000 Spotify streams.

Why she will keep your attention: Her latest single “Fight With You” has a ’90s R&B flavor, akin to someone like Toni Braxton. That fits naturally into a pop-country context established when country stars of the ’90s started incorporating those same sounds.

Her focus on country songs as a vehicle for good storytelling shines through every song.

TIERA

Why she’s on your radar: Alabama-born singer-songwriter Tiera is the host of The Tiera Show on Apple Music Country. She’s also been featured on the websites of People and CMT and participated in the CMA Awards post-show coverage on Entertainment Tonight’s website.

Why she will keep your attention: Tiera’s recent single “Found It in You” is the total package, representing a writer who has learned how to write for their own voice at a young age. It’s also a nimble, irrepressibly feel-good love song. Tiera’s appreciation of both Dolly Parton and Rascal Flatts — both masters of pop country, though of different flavors — aligns her exceedingly well with Gen Z country fans. If your country-loving daughter, little sister or niece isn’t already a fan, expect that she will be soon.

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MUSIC

THE SPIN

FULL STREAM AHEAD

BY P.J. KINZER AND RON WYNN

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he Country Music Association leaves a lot on the table every year with its annual awards ceremony. There’s seldom any substantial recognition of people who aren’t white men. Black and brown musicians get the least attention, in no small part because few are ever afforded the opportunity to reach the upper echelons of the genre.

On top of that, the CMA failed to acknowledge during this year’s awards on Nov. 11 three late songwriting legends. John Prine, Jerry Jeff Walker and Billy Joe Shaver had a major impact on the genre, if from the periphery rather than the center. If anyone could pay an appropriate tribute, it’s D. Striker, aka Jeff Meltesen, whose brand of sometimesmeta country celebrates what makes the music resonate with legions of fans while frequently lampooning the establishment.

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SUITS ME: D. STRIKER D. Striker has performed each Friday the 13th since 1998 to celebrate the release of a new issue of his country fanzine RR. It’s become a Nashville tradition, woven into the lore of the day alongside bad luck, discount tattoos and chopping up teenagers at Camp Crystal Lake. The first RR party of the year was scheduled for March 13 — one week after the deadly tornado and a few days after venues across the country began to shutter in an attempt to halt the spread of COVID-19. Striker managed to put on a livestream in lieu of that show, one of the first of the pandemic era here in Music City.

Eight months later, on Nov. 13, the city was still very much under pandemic conditions, and Striker & Co. went down to The 5 Spot for a second online performance.

The half-hour cable-access-style program deviated from previous RR parties, with the band playing only a few songs from the Striker catalog and punctuating each tune by cutting away to a video of the singer, fully masked up, interviewing naked-faced patrons outside bars tied to the most confirmed cases of COVID-19 by the Metro Health Department.

In each of the clips, filmed on location in Midtown and Lower Broadway, inebriated party animals slurred through excuses for being at a crowded bar during a global pandemic. The show became a Casey Kasemstyle countdown of viral transmission, eventually revealing that the bar on Metro’s list associated with the most cases of COVID-19 went to — wait for it — Loser’s.

The whole show clocked in at 27 minutes.

Still, the band managed to squeeze in most of

its crowd-pleasers, including the whip-smart “(I’m Hungover in the) Walmart Breakroom.” Sure, it was fun. But the main point wasn’t lost: The whole shebang was an important reminder that if we want to see live music in person again — and, y’know, keep people safe from a deadly virus and return to some level of normality — everyone has to start taking COVID guidelines seriously.

Rahsaan Barber’s impact on the Nashville jazz scene has been immense on several levels: He’s a vital saxophone soloist, label head and composer, as well as a prolific session player and an educator. He’s now studying for his doctorate at the University of Memphis while maintaining his ties to the Tennessee Jazz and Blues Society. His multiple talents were on display Sunday, when he was front-and-center at the season finale of the Nashville Jazz Workshop’s Jazz on the Move series, focused on the life and work of legendary saxophonist and composer Sonny Rollins.

The event, coordinated in conjunction with the National Museum of African American Music, featured Barber at the head of an outstanding group including pianist Bruce Dudley, bassist Roger Spencer and drummer Chester Thompson, with special guest guitarist Lindsey Miller on a select few tunes.

The performance was filmed at the Steinway Piano Gallery and streamed via NJW’s YouTube channel and Facebook page.

Barber blended extensive historical knowledge with instrumental tips and expertise during the spoken portions of the program.

His discussion explored how Rollins’ style merges elements of swing and bop, with influences from Coleman Hawkins and Charlie Parker, among others. Barber also examined Rollins’ original and distinctive approach to soloing, and his willingness to explore songs outside conventional jazz sources. The ensemble offered a prime example of the latter with “I’m an Old Cowhand,” a rendition of which appears on Rollins’ classic Way Out West LP. The group morphed to perform the piece in the pianoless trio configuration of the original, with a fine bass solo from Spencer.

Spencer and Thompson worked in tandem to propel Barber’s robust interpretation forward.

Other highlights of the set included a sterling duet between Barber and Miller on “God Bless the Child” and outstanding ballad work from Barber on “You Don’t Know What Love Is.” The finale “Tenor Madness” featured some crisp piano licks and textures from Dudley, sparked by Thompson’s rhythmically potent drum parts.

Barber has continued to mature as an improviser. His playing throughout reflected a quality that he emphasized has long been a hallmark of Rollins’ approach — finding a way to tell a story in a memorable fashion.

It’s not a matter of technical expertise, but of emphasizing individuality and soulfulness.

Sadly, Rollins is now retired from playing.

But Sunday’s program and the consistent brilliance displayed by Barber & Co. offered a poignant and powerful reminder of all that Rollins has given jazz fans and fellow performers throughout his decades-long career, and what you can hear any time you put on a Sonny Rollins record.

EMAIL THESPIN@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 – DECEMBER 2, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

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FILM

PRIMAL STREAM 30

An escapist sitcom, classic fantasy and ’80s satanic horror, now available to stream

BY JASON SHAWHAN

W

hat do you watch in times of extensive emotional stress?

Do you run the risk of having something you love forever tainted by trauma? I ask this because of the extended election timeframe back at the beginning of the month, because it was a deeply fraught time and we were all going through it — whether in piecemeal glances stolen at smartphones or in continuous television feeds, clicking our internal systems for an emotional refresh to try and gather and process information as quickly and comprehensively as possible. How exactly do you try to metabolize these two separate existences — what you’re watching and what you’re living — when the stakes are crazy high?

What it reminded me of was something a friend told me about coming back down after an intense and soul-shaking psilocybin mushroom experience. (Note: If you’re going to dabble in psychedelics, don’t do so and then casually watch something like Mulholland Drive, which is built on compelling the viewer to confront their own absolute moral truth.) In that instance, it was a third-season episode of The Simpsons, “Mr. Lisa Goes to Washington” (currently streaming on Disney+), involving an essay contest, government corruption and the horror of political music parody. But it was that particularly beloved episode that allowed a troubled soul to reconnect with reality in a gradual way, and as such it helped immeasurably.

That’s not to compare the experience of election results to a mushroom trip (though your experience may vary), but it provides us with an opportunity to get at our relationship to the media we love. The night of Nov. 3, I ended up making a very deliberate decision, and restarted Happy Endings (currently streaming on Hulu), an a-mah-zing series that I love dearly (Max and Grant 4-evah) and hadn’t rewatched in several years. It’s a known quantity — a great show with good characters and a brisk pace that keeps the viewer occupied. It is a show unconducive to dawdling on the phone in the background, and that was ideal.

But in the back of my mind was, “What about Dr. Strange?” That — also streaming on Disney+ — was the film I took some friends to see on election night 2016. It’s a fun and inventive film that I have been unable to watch at any point since. That’s nothing on that film, but merely the circumstances under which I watched it. Similarly, WreckIt-Ralph (Disney+ as well) is forever blended with the euphoria of the 2012 election (going to the movies on election night was a thing for a while there), and I can never watch Hardcore Henry (Netflix) again, because after I watched that movie and turned my phone back on, I had dozens of voicemails and texts telling me that my mentor, editor and

MARY POPPINS friend, former Scene editor-in-chief Jim Ridley, had passed away.

So the stress is double: on Happy Endings to keep the soul afloat, and on the universe to not torpedo my love of the show. Which is a lot of stress, thankfully lessening as election week stretched on. It’s also an indication of how privileged I am to be able to frame the genuine horror of the past four years in this way. But I can’t express the roiling bile and acid seeping up from my gut and scorching my throat — or the millions of pointilist papercuts of anxiety, or the fear that Supreme Court subterfuge is going to disassemble my family — because that’s not something visual that can be directly related to by everyone. I’m interested in the art that helps people keep their shit together.

Below are a couple more recommendations on what to stream. As always, you can look back at past issues of the Scene for scores more.

MARY POPPINS ON DISNEY+ It’s the childhood dream that goodhearted leftists and subs tap into — a magical being who values kindness and musical numbers, teaches human decency, aides in class consciousness and giving help to the helpless, and refocuses the family on internal cohesion and allegiance rather than a subjugation to dominant capitalist ideology. Mary Poppins is of a piece with the classic art-film archetype in which a mysterious stranger helps each member of a family through unlocking their emotional blockage, for better

or worse — see also, to varying methodology and results, Teorema (Criterion, Mubi), The Guest (Netflix), Boudu Saved From Drowning (Criterion, Kanopy) and its remake Down and Out in Beverly Hills (HBO Max).

HACK-O-LANTERN ON SHUDDER If you want to see a movie with a character who gives off the vibe of Divine playing Emperor Palpatine, look no further than 1987’s Hack-O-Lantern. It has satanic goingson in and near a California orchard, many ’80s outfits and looks (big ups to the partygoer whose outfit involved her dressing as a bowl of salad), weird children and nudity so gratuitous that it loops around and becomes Roxy Music-album-cover iconic.

EMAIL ARTS@NASHVILLESCENE.COM

HACK-O-LANTERN

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ACROSS Key for Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture” A house may be built on it Burlesque accessories Web-footed mammals A goose egg Gimlet garnish — Locale suggested by this puzzle’s theme Malcolm Gladwell best seller that explores the 10,000hour rule Ice cream container Virginia Woolf’s “___ Dalloway” Statue of ___, figure atop the U.S. Capitol ___ culpa Autobahn hazard Elflike Big hopper Things with perks?

— “I need to speak with you,” briefly Capote sobriquet Cartomancy tool Brand of spread for sandwiches and toast Bouncer’s equipment — Ingredient in a Cuban sandwich Spanish 23-Across: Abbr.

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NO. 1015

They can be treated with warm compresses

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DOWN English town known for its salt ___ de sel Goes the distance ___ Gawande, author of the 2014 best seller “Being Mortal” Embodied Catch Take five S.I. V.I.P.s Balls of yarn, fake mice, etc.

Gossip Big Alaska export “You think that’s true about me?”

“SpongeBob SquarePants” setting ___ Rebellion, 1808 uprising in New South Wales Language that gave us “spunk” and “slogan” Piece of information Performers of the ceremonial haka dance Noted example of corporate misconduct Stone with curved bands Violinist Zimbalist Dweller in a eucalyptus forest

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Capitulates Have a loan from Strand at the airport, maybe Letter-shaped part of a sink Whirled powers?

What it takes two to tie Time it takes light to travel .3 mm: Abbr.

Novelist Santha Rama ___ Grades

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Hot alcoholic drink 1973 #1 Rolling Stones love ballad Fishing spots Traditional gemstone for a seventh wedding anniversary Gas Galas Make a decision Sardonic Italian god

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE A L O E

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“RED LACE,” KATARINA RIESING (COURTESY OF ASYA GEISBERG GALLERY)

Rental Scene

Welcome to Dupont Avenue Apartments

Your Neighborhood Local attractions: · Cedar Hill Park · Amqui Station and Visitor’s Center · Madison Farmers Market (Sundays June through August) Neighborhood Dining and Drinks: · Chef’s Market · Blue Crab Shack The Ville · Grams Coffee and Tea

FEATURED APARTMENT LIVING

Enjoy the outdoors: · Treetop Adventure Park (Hermitage, TN) · River Queen Voyages · Nashville Fly Board Best place near by to see a show: · Grand Ole Opry

Best local family outing: · Urban Air Trampoline and Adventure Park (Old Hickory, TN) Your new home amenities: · On-site laundry · Dog park

Favorite local neighborhood bar: · Dee’s Country Cocktail Lounge

601 N. Dupont Avenue. Madison, TN 37115 | www.dupontavenue.com | 615.285.5687

To advertise your property available for lease, contact Keith Wright at 615-557-4788 or kwright@fwpublishing.com

British Woods 264 British Woods Drive Nashville, TN 37217 1 bed / 1 bath 725 sq ft $1084+ per month

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Gazebo Apartments 141 Neese Drive Nashville TN 37211 1 Bed / 1 Bath 756 sq ft $1,119 +

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www.Gazeboapts.com | 615.551.3832 46

NASHVILLE SCENE | NOVEMBER 19 - NOVEMBER 25, 2020 | nashvillescene.com

Madison Flats Brinkhaven Ave Madison, TN 37115 1 bed / 1 bath 630 sq ft $960

2 bed / 1 bath 810 sq ft $1130

5 floor plans

www.madisonflatsapartments.com | 615.285.5981 The Residence at Old Hickory Lake 2401 Lakeshore Drive, Old Hickory, TN 37138 Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No. 20A54 JACQUELINE RUTH JONES, ET AL.

SMITH

Vs.

1 bed / 1 bath

2 bed / 2 bath

3 bed / 2 bath

$1,325 to $1,555

$1,695 to $1,805

749 sq ft

1092 - 1211 sq ft

$2,319 to $2,324 1382 sq ft

KIARA ALANA BIDDIX

LEGAL NOTICE

InjuRy Auto ACCIdEnts WRongFul dEAth dAngERous And dEFECtIvE dRugs

Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No. 20A54

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KIARA ALANA BIDDIX

www.rockylawfirm.com LEGALS

LEGAL NOTICE NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN THAT Sterling Nashville West Property, LLC is pursuing a Petition for Termination of Use of Land as Burial Ground and for Removal and Reinterment of Remains of Decedents in the Chancery Court for Davidson County, Tennessee (case #200166-III). Petitioner seeks to relocate a cemetery at 7114 Charlotte Pike, Nashville, Tennessee in Davidson County. Petitioner believes that persons buried at the cemetery may include John M. O’Brien (1874 to 1957), Mattie J. O’Brien (1876 to 1952), John Thomas O’Brien (1936 to 1936), and Frances Inez Stephens (1928 to 1930). Petitioner seeks to reinter the graves at a location nearby the current cemetery, but outside of trees and development. The Court entered an Order of Publication that Interested Per-

SMITH

Vs.

In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon KIARA ALANA BIDDIX. It is ordered that said Defendant enter HER appearance herein with thirty (30) days after December 3, 2020 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on January 4, 2020. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville.

Richard R. Rooker, Clerk W. North Deputy Clerk Date: October 15, 2020 Laura Tek Attorney for Plaintiff NSC 11/5, 11/12, 11/19, 12/3/20

5 floor plans

www.residenceatoldhickorylake.com | 615.258.6088

Nob Hill Apartments 180 Wallace Rd. Nashville, TN 37211 1 bed / 1 bath 690 sq ft $1003 to $1303

2 bed / 2 bath 950 sq ft $969 to $1366 2 floor plans

www.nobhillnashville.com | 615.768.8862

Richard R. Rooker, Clerk W. North Deputy Clerk Date: October 15, 2020

4G LTE Home Internet Now Available!

Laura Tek Attorney for Plaintiff NSC 11/5, 11/12, 11/19, 12/3/20

Non-Resident Notice Fourth Circuit Docket No.19D2032 Nancy Eileen Duke vs.

Larry Wayne Duke In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon Larry Wayne Duke. It is ordered that said Defendant enter His appearance herein with thirty (30) days after December 10, 2020 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on January 11, 2020.

It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville.

Richard R. Rooker, Clerk W. North Deputy Clerk Date: October 30, 2020 Cynthia Bohn Attorney for Plaintiff NSC 11/12, 11/19, 12/3, 12/10/20

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NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN THAT Sterling Nashville West Property, LLC is pursuing a Petition for Termination of Use of Land as Burial Ground and for Removal and Reinterment of Remains of Decedents in the Chancery Court for Davidson County, Tennessee (case #200166-III). Petitioner seeks to relocate a cemetery at 7114 Charlotte Pike, Nashville, Tennessee in Davidson County. Petitioner believes that persons buried at the cemetery may include John M. O’Brien (1874 to 1957), Mattie J. O’Brien (1876 to 1952), John Thomas O’Brien (1936 to 1936), and Frances Inez Stephens (1928 to 1930). Petitioner seeks to reinter the graves at a location nearby the current cemetery, but outside of trees and development. The Court entered an Order of Publication that Interested Persons enter an appearance on or before 30 days after the last publication of this Notice and file an answer to the Petition, or judgment by default may be taken against them for the relief requested in the Petition.

This Notice will be published for four consecutive weeks.

NSC 10/29, 11/5, 11/12, 11/19/20

In this cause it appearing to the satisfaction of the Court that the defendant is a non-resident of the State of Tennessee, therefore the ordinary process of law cannot be served upon KIARA ALANA BIDDIX. It is ordered that said Defendant enter HER appearance herein with thirty (30) days after December 3, 2020 same being the date of the last publication of this notice to be held at the Metropolitan Circuit Court located at 1 Public Square, Room 302, Nashville, Tennessee, and defend or default will be taken on January 4, 2020. It is therefore ordered that a copy of this Order be published for four (4) weeks succession in the Nashville Scene, a newspaper published in Nashville.

Rental Scene

Studio 325 sq ft $850

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