Vol. 2, Issue 26 - June 30, 2016

AIMING FOR THE SKIES SINCE LAST YEAR

JUNE 30, 2016 KNOXMERCURY.COM V.

2 / N. 26

Inside the effort to study and protect natural sounds and night skies in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park • BY É N YOUNG NEWS

Knox County Jail Policies Draw Fire Over Prisoner Profiteering

JACK NEELY

A Short of History of Downtown Bowling, Plus: Ingrid Bergman’s Mistake

MUSIC

Alt Rapper Aesop Rock Has Finally Learned What Really Matters

OUTDOORS

In Search of the Most Perfect Swimming Holes in East Tennessee

Historic July Celebrated here since 1793, the Fourth of July may be Knoxville’s oldest holiday.

But it’s not our only thing to celebrate in July. with whom Sanford was a close friend. Sanford is buried in Knoxville, at Greenwood Cemetery.

This Fourth of July is also the 155th birthday of Lawrence Davis Tyson (1861-1929), the World War I general and Democratic U.S. Senator from Knoxville described in recent KHP History Pages.

The same day is the 149th birthday of James G. Sterchi (1867-1932), founder of Sterchi Brothers Furniture. Son of Swiss immigrants, Sterchi (rhymes with “turkey”) made a major success of his business, spawning more than 60 stores throughout the South. In the 1920s, when they built their big headquarters building on the 100 block of Gay Street (now Sterchi Lofts), Sterchi claimed to be the world’s biggest furniture retailer. In the 1920s and early ‘30s, Sterchi played a surprising role in the popularization of country music, which expanded the market for their line of phonographs.

July 15 is the 114th birthday of attorney Harvey Broome (1902-1968), the Fountain City resident who was a promoter of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and co-founder of the national Wilderness Society.

July 17 is the 256th birthday of Samuel Carrick (1760-1809), who founded Blount College, which later evolved into the University of Tennessee. He also founded Knoxville’s first church, First Presbyterian. During his lifetime, Blount College became known as East Tennessee College, but was always located on Gay Street, on the present site of the Tennessee Theatre. Carrick never knew about UT’s current campus, but Carrick Hall, home of more than 1,000 students, is named for him.

Members of the Great Smoky Mountains Conservation Association, in the 1930s, including Harvey Broome at left, who would also become known for his national role in co-founding the Wilderness Society. Others include Mrs. Charles Myers; Mildred Query; pharmaceutical executive David Chapman, for whom Mount Chapman and Chapman Highway are named, in the foreground; and well-known Smokies photographer James Thompson, at right.

July 27 is the 135th birthday of John T. O’Connor (1881-1968), Knoxville mayor. Born in Knoxville’s old Irish Town neighborhood on the north side of downtown, O’Connor was a Southern railway machinist, union organizer, and boxer, who in his youth was known as “Punch.” A popular mayor, he ran for Congress as a Democrat in 1936, and almost won that traditionally Republican district. The popular John T. O’Connor Senior Center, near old Irish Town, is named for him.

July 19 is the 172nd birthday of Andrew Jackson Albers (1844-1910). Son of German immigrants, the Cincinnati-born Albers was a Union naval pharmacist during the Civil War, Photo courtesy of Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection captured and imprisoned by the Confederates. cmdc.knoxlib.org At war’s end he came to Knoxville, where he co-founded the Sanford, Chamberlain, and July 27 would also be the 89th birthday of Albers wholesale pharmaceutical company. folksinger and civil-rights organizer Guy Carawan, who died last year. He They built the Gay Street building now known as Tailor Lofts, which survived helped popularize the anthem “We Shall Overcome,” and is one of four people, the Great Fire of 1897. The Albers Drug Company, as it was eventually known, including Pete Seeger, who copyrighted the iconic song to assure that it could was one of Knoxville’s most durable businesses. When his wife, Ella, died at a never be abused. In recent decades, he was a director of the Highlander Center, young age, Albers created an extravagant iron fountain in her memory at Old still located near New Market. A singer and multi-instrumentalist, he was a Gray Cemetery. It was removed more than 50 years ago, but a current capital frequent performer in Knoxville, often with his wife Candie and son Evan, both campaign is raising funds to replace it. of whom are also accomplished musicians.

The same day is the 140th birthday of H.P. “Harry” Ijams (1876-1954), commercial artist and ornithologist who founded Ijams Nature Center.

July 23 is the 151st birthday of Edward Terry Sanford (1865-1930), Knoxville’s contribution to the U.S. Supreme Court, where he served as associate justice from 1923 until his sudden death in 1930, which happened to occur the same day as the death of the chief justice, former President William Howard Taft,

Also: On July 13, theater scholar Dean Novelli will give a talk on the history of the Lamar House, at the East Tennessee History Center. Now almost 200 years old, the Lamar House is best known as home of the Bistro and the lobby of the 1909 Bijou Theatre, but it was originally a hotel with associated ballroom and saloon, and may be the most storied building in Knoxville. The title of his talk, “Andrew Jackson Never Slept Here,” references an old misunderstanding about the building.

Source: Calvin M. McClung Historical Collection

The Knoxville History Project, a new nonprofit organization devoted to the promotion of and education about the history of Knoxville, presents this page each week to raise awareness of the themes, personalities, and stories of our unique city.

Learn more on www.facebook.com/knoxvillehistoryproject • email jack@knoxhistoryproject.org 2

KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

June 30, 2016 Volume 02 / Issue 26 knoxmercury.com

CONTENTS

“Success is a project that’s always under construction.” —Pat Summitt

10 Soundscapes, Lightscapes, and Escapes COVER STORY

Photo bySean Pavone via Thinkstock

Future generations stand a strong chance of losing an experience that so many visitors to the Smokies have taken for granted since the national park was chartered in 1934: The ability to find peaceful solace and refuge from the city with unimpeded natural sounds and a heavenly glimpse at the Milky Way overhead. Fortunately, the National Park Service isn’t sitting idle on these issues. It’s researching the impacts of the encroaching world and working with nearby communities in efforts to make smart development decisions, curb the proliferation of light pollution, and hopefully sustain the natural resources that draw millions of people to the Smokies and help fuel many local economies. Élan Young heads to the mountains for our report.

NEWS

8 Prisoner Profiteering Knox County Public Defender Mark Stephens and members of the grassroots Knox County Incarceration Collective are publicly criticizing the Knox County Sheriff’s Office for policies they say sacrifice families, inmate health, and public safety to the almighty dollar, as S. Heather Duncan reports.

We’re Hiring!

Phase 2 of our Master Plan for Media Domination includes expanding our staff—and we’re posting job listings at our new Careers page: knoxmercury.com/careers.

DEPARTMENTS

OPINION

A&E

4 6

6

16

30

Letters to the Editor Howdy Start Here: Dumpster Dive, Public Affairs, Quote Factory PLUS: “Photo Recollection: Knoxville Streets,” a photo series

by Holly Rainey. ’Bye Finish There: Sacred & Profane by Donna Johnson, Crooked Street Crossword by Ian Blackburn and Jack Neely, Spirit of the Staircase

by Matthew Foltz-Gray

Scruffy Citizen Jack Neely takes a stroll at World’s Fair Park to find unity near the Court of Flags.

17 18 19

CALENDAR Program Notes: R.B. Morris is Knoxville’s first poet laureate.

Plus: House in Tyson Park and The Best Show, PERIOD. Shelf Life: Chris Barrett reviews some favorite new CD releases at the Knox County Public Library.

Music: Nathan Smith talks with alt rapper Aesop Rock about what really matters.

Movies: April Snellings gives director Nicolas Winding Refn the benefit of a doubt for his The Neon Demon.

20

Spotlights: A1 Lab Arts’ A.One/ Pro/Form/Arts/Fest, Asheville’s The Honeycutters, and Tour de Rocky Top

OUTDOORS

28

Outside Insider Kim Trevathan goes in search of the most perfect swimming holes in East Tennessee.

June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 3

LETTERS Delivering Fine Journalism Since 2015

EDITORIAL

PADDLING CONTROVERSY

I greatly enjoyed Kim Trevathan’s “Speed Boater” article about the Powell River Canoe And Kayak Regatta in your May 5 edition.

Although this article was quite informative, it left out two critical pieces of information regarding this race: (1) the date it took place, and (2) the winning time of the first place finisher in the 55 and over category.

Perhaps this is Kim’s way of holding us in suspense.

In this article, Kim referred to his “10 foot-long touring kayak.” In paddler’s lexicon, that is an oxymoron. A 10-foot-long boat fits squarely within the recreational or “play boat” category. It is not a “touring kayak” by any stretch of the imagination or hull.

The term “touring kayak” is widely viewed as referring to boats that are at least 14 feet long (see paddling.net/ touring-kayak).

Richard Redano Knoxville

CORRECTIONS

In our news feature about the fate of UT’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion and the Pride Center [“Pride Forum,” News Feature, June 23, 2016], we had a trio of mistakes: • Beauvais Lyons should have been identified as incoming Faculty Senate President-Elect, effective July 1. The current Faculty Senate President is Bruce MacLennan.

• The bill defunding the ODI, now Public Chapter 1066, should have been referred to as House Bill 2248, not House Bill 1066.

• Finally, due to a production error, the news feature was cut short in print. The following should have appeared at the end of the article: “So far they’ve raised more than $9,600 of a $25,000 goal through an online fundraiser at youcaring.com/ pride-center-ambassadors-573257.

Braquet figures it will take a minimum of $14,000 to cover costs of a graduate assistant and a $4,000 operating budget over the next year, though that’s a bare-bones assessment.”

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

EDITOR Coury Turczyn coury@knoxmercury.com SENIOR EDITOR Matthew Everett matthew@knoxmercury.com CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Jack Neely jack@knoxhistoryproject.org STAFF WRITERS S. Heather Duncan heather@knoxmercury.com Clay Duda clay@knoxmercury.com CONTRIBUTORS

ALL HAIL MUMFORD AND MATT!

Please join us in heartily congratulating our comic-strip artist Matthew Foltz-Gray—on June 17, he received a Silver Medal in the 2016 Comic and Cartoon Art Annual competition by the Society of Illustrators. More specifically, it was his strip titled “The Game of Snooze” that won, and it is currently on display at the MoCCA Gallery at the Society of Illustrators in New York City through August 20, 2016. That’s a pretty big deal!

His Spirit of the Staircase is a truly unique comic strip that utilizes its full page of space in artful ways—a rarity in these days of ever-shrinking newspaper comics. Right now you can only find Spirit in the Mercury, but soon you’ll be able to purchase a book collecting its first year, to be published

by Karate Petshop. We’ll keep you posted!

—Coury Turczyn, ed.

OPEN CALL FOR TALENT

Help us make the Mercury the best paper in East Tennessee!

If you have an idea for a spectacular new department or column, then pitch us. All ideas will be considered!

Or, if you’re an experienced reporter looking for assignments, let us know about your areas of expertise.

We especially would like to find contributors in the following areas: • business • state politics • arts & entertainment • general funniness Send your pitch letter and writing samples to: editor@knoxmercury.com

HAVE YOU GOTTEN YOUR AWESOME KNOXVILLE MERCURY T-SHIRT YET?

We’ve probably mentioned this before.

But even if you already own one of our highly collectible launch T-shirts, you’ll certainly want to pick up one of our new, extremely fashionable gray T’s. Guaranteed to make you 30 percent more sexy among people who like to read about Knoxville! Meanwhile, you can also shop for all of our Knoxville Mercury goods and services. We’ve got koozies, and amazingly enough, classified ads! And remember, all proceeds go to a worthy cause: keeping your favorite weekly paper in business.

Go to: store.knoxmercury.com.

Chris Barrett Ian Blackburn Brian Canever Patrice Cole Eric Dawson George Dodds Lee Gardner Mike Gibson Carey Hodges Nick Huinker Donna Johnson

Rose Kennedy Catherine Landis Dennis Perkins Stephanie Piper Ryan Reed Eleanor Scott Alan Sherrod April Snellings Joe Sullivan Kim Trevathan Chris Wohlwend

DESIGN ART DIRECTOR Tricia Bateman tricia@knoxmercury.com GRAPHIC DESIGNERS

Charlie Finch Corey McPherson CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS

David Luttrell Shawn Poynter Justin Fee Tyler Oxendine CONTRIBUTING ILLUSTRATORS

Ben Adams Matthew Foltz-Gray

ADVERTISING PUBLISHER & DIRECTOR OF SALES Charlie Vogel charlie@knoxmercury.com SENIOR ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES Scott Hamstead scott@knoxmercury.com Stacey Pastor stacey@knoxmercury.com

BUSINESS BUSINESS MANAGER Scott Dickey scott.dickey@knoxmercury.com

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR GUIDELINES

• Letter submissions should include a verifiable name, address, and phone number.

We do not print anonymous letters.

• We much prefer letters that address issues that pertain specifically to Knoxville or to stories we’ve published.

• We don’t publish letters about personal disputes or how you didn’t like your waiter at that restaurant.

• Letters are usually published in the order that we receive them.

Send your letters to: Our Dear Editor Knoxville Mercury 706 Walnut St., Suite 404 Knoxville, TN 37920 Send an email to: editor@knoxmercury.com Or message us at: facebook.com/knoxmercury

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 706 Walnut St., Suite 404, Knoxville, Tenn. 37902 knoxmercury.com • 865-313-2059 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR & PRESS RELEASES editor@knoxmercury.com CALENDAR SUBMISSIONS calendar@knoxmercury.com SALES QUERIES sales@knoxmercury.com DISTRIBUTION distribution@knoxmercury.com

BOARD OF DIRECTORS Terry Hummel Joe Sullivan Jack Neely Coury Turczyn Charlie Vogel The Knoxville Mercury is an independent weekly news magazine devoted to informing and connecting Knoxville’s many different communities. It is a taxable, not-for-profit company governed by the Knoxville History Project, a non-profit organization devoted to exploring, disseminating, and celebrating Knoxville’s unique cultural heritage. It publishes 25,000 copies per week, available free of charge, limited to one copy per reader. © 2016 The Knoxville Mercury

HOWDY DUMPSTER highlights DIVE Weekly from our blog Read more at knoxmercury.com/blog NEW (WILD) GAME There’s a new aroma in the Old City–one that wafts with the familiar charred scent of well-cooked steaks. But it’s one that also carries accents of animal proteins that haven’t often or regularly found their way to the public kitchens of Knoxville. When Chef Tim Love threw open the doors of Lonesome Dove Knoxville Friday night, he did it with the help of cattle, of course, along with some goats, pheasants, elks, rabbits, rattlesnakes and more.

Sidewalk biking on Clinch Avenue in downtown, PHOTO RECOLLECTION: KNOXVILLE STREETS by Holly Rainey (loveh865.com)

QUOTE FACTORY “ Pat Summitt was a great leader, a great coach and most of all a great spirit. She was a towering figure who was also humble and down to earth. She always made it clear that her work was not about her—it was about her players, her teams, and her commitment to excellence in sports, education and life.”

—Mayor Madeline Rogero on the passing of former Lady Vols coach Pat Summitt on Tuesday.

PUBLIC AFFAIRS

6/30 MEETUP: SOCIAL MEDIA DAY THURSDAY

6-9 p.m., The Mill and Mine (227 West Depot St.). Free.

Isn’t every day a social media day? Well, this event is a chance to see your online friends in a whole new light—natural light. It’s social networking in the real world, just like in the old days—”an opportunity for social media advocates to create community by making offline connections with like-minded digital enthusiasts.” Info: thinkpyxl.com/smdayknox.

7/1 DOWNTOWN’S PARKING D-DAY FRIDAY

All day and from here on out, Downtown & Cumberland Corridor. Check for rates.

Today the city will roll out new parking rates (short-term meters will charge $1.50 an hour, versus $1 an hour to park in a garage) and new parking enforcement: six Public Building Authority officers will patrol downtown while four PBA officers will be handling the Cumberland Avenue area. You can park, but you can’t hide.

7/4 FESTIVAL ON THE FOURTH MONDAY

4 p.m., World’s Fair Park. Free.

This special edition of the city’s July Fourth celebration promises some “special surprises” in observance of Knoxville’s 225th anniversary. What could they be?! Only one way to find out. Meanwhile, at 8 p.m., the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra will perform patriotic and Americana pieces conducted by the KSO’s new Musical Director Aram Demirjian. Fireworks start at 9:35 p.m.

UT DIVERSITY ADVISOR University of Tennessee President Joe DiPietro announced last week the appointment a part-time advisor on diversity and inclusion, naming Norma Anderson to the post starting July 1. Anderson will focus on high-level advising on things like “aligning initiatives with the mission and goals of the university;” “enhancing the university’s reputation as an employer of choice;” “evaluating the university’s climate for students, faculty, and staff;” and “developing programs and policies.”

LOCAL EATERIES GET REAL About a dozen Knoxville area eateries are among the first locally to earn REAL Certification for offering healthy and sustainable menu options, a desgination from dietitians who evaluate everything from individual menu items to the proximity of farms where produce comes from. The list includes Bistro at the Bijou; Blackberry Farm; Farm-to-Griddle Crepes; Juice Bar; Knox Mason; Northshore Brasserie; Paleo Foods Cafe; The Plaid Apron; Sunspot; Tomato Head; and Whole Earth Grocery and Cafe.

7/5 CITY COUNCIL MEETING TUESDAY

7 p.m., City County Building, Main Assembly Room. Free.

City Council will have its first hearing of a proposed Alternative Financial Services Zoning Ordinance, which would keep businesses like pay-day lenders and check-cashing services at least 1,000 feet apart. There will be a workshop on the ordinance on Thursday, June 30 at 5:30 p.m. in the Main Assembly Room of the City County Building. Info: knoxvilletn.gov.

June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 5

SCRUFFY CITIZEN

Dead Dogwood and Modern Mapleways Ingrid Bergman’s mistake, and downtown’s first bowling alley

BY JACK NEELY

M

arket Square’s recent film shoot reminded me of an even more famous movie star who was on the same square with an entourage about 46 years ago. Ingrid Bergman came to Knoxville in 1969 to make a movie with Anthony Quinn and, as their fistfight choreographer, Bruce Lee. It was called A Walk in the Spring Rain.

Bergman came back in 1970 to promote the film with a premiere at the Capri in Bearden. It was April, Dogwood Festival season, and somebody thought wouldn’t it be great to get Ingrid Bergman, star of Casablanca and Notorious and Spellbound and Joan of Arc, to plant a dogwood tree on Market Square. She smiled and obliged, as you’d expect Ingrid Bergman to do. She was just nice.

Reporting on the planting was one cynical note from a guy who wasn’t usually cynical. News-Sentinel columnist Carson Brewer said whoever planned the thing didn’t know anything about dogwoods, because the hole they dug wasn’t nearly big enough. It’s hard for dogwoods to thrive unless you give their roots plenty of room.

I never knew any more about it until the other day, thanks again to the library’s “From Paper to Pixels” project, I found a follow-up article by Brewer, three months later. That July was particularly hot and dry. The dogwood, planted by the immortal Ingrid Bergman just three months before, died. Just like Brewer figured it would.

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

It was good news, in a way. I didn’t want to think it was whacked down by some thoughtless crew making way for a corn-dog truck, never knowing that Ilsa Lund had planted it. Still, the dead tree might have been worth saving for a Museum of Oddities.

Of course, even if a dogwood were planted perfectly in 1970, it probably wouldn’t have lasted this long. If an iconic celebrity, Meryl Streep, say, or Adele, shows up and seems willing to plant a tree in a public place, hand her an oak.

Speaking of trees, the big bowling alley known as Maple Hall opened this week, in the basement of the formerly problematic J.C. Penney building, and I enjoyed spending an hour down there a few evenings ago. I’m not much of a bowler, but it’s a good thing to see something downtown that’s not primarily concerned with ingestion, as proof that we do have other interests.

It’s fun to be in a big room where actual bowling is in progress, even if you’re at the bar talking with M.D. Kirkpatrick and Red Hickey about the rare albatrosses of Kaua’i.

However, downtown bowling may not be as exotic as several observers have assumed.

Bowling is Knoxville’s oldest sport. The oldest one, at least, that does not involve inducing animals to do things they’re disinclined to do.

I can’t claim Peter R. Knott’s

Bowling Saloon is the first bowling alley in Knoxville, but it’s the earliest one I know about. It was operating on Market Square about 160 years ago.

Maple Hall isn’t the first bowling alley downtown, or the first one in a Gay Street basement. By the 1890s, when skeptical Knoxvillians were leery of that complicated Yankee sport, football, there was a multi-lane bowling alley in the basement of the Imperial Hotel, on the corner of Gay and Clinch.

Bowling was such way of life by 1900, especially among certain German immigrants, that a Knoxville Bowling Club, having outgrown downtown, set up its own headquarters on Linden Avenue, and hosted all-day bowling tournaments.

By some accounts, bowling caught on in the whorehouses of the old South Central Bowery district in the early 1900s. They included saloons, of course, but a few big ones also had casinos, vaudeville shows, and movies.

Some prosperous whorehouses were so crowded with delights you wonder if they had room for actual whores.

According to some memories recorded many years later, at least one of them had a bowling alley.

The Medical Arts Building’s basement hosted two lanes by 1931, and advertised bowling for good health. It offered two lanes and a miniature golf course. I gather it may have been intended mainly to help doctors blow off some steam.

In 1932, the new Commerce Avenue Bowling Alley opened, near Gay, in a building long since torn down for Summit Hill Drive, and became an institution. Probably the only two-story bowling alley in Knoxville history, it hosted six lanes on each floor, all maple.

By then, bowling was getting popular in suburban areas, like Chilhowee Park, so to distinguish

itself, Commerce appealed directly to commuters who had to come downtown, in a 1940 ad. “Business Men and Women, BOWL at our conveniently located alleys.” It closed in 1944, during the war, like a lot of things did.

Meanwhile, the Knoxville Bowling Center opened in 1939 at the northern fringe of downtown, at Broadway and Lamar, a serious-business bowling place that hosted regional tournaments.

In 1941, downtown Knoxville saw its last big bowling alley opening before this week. The legendary Bowlitorium opened at 411 1/2 Main Ave. It was a second-floor walk-up place, but it had 10 lanes, and it was very proud of itself.

A big display ad from Sept. 10, 1941, hailed it: “You’ll find a brandnew pleasure in bowling—a new exciting experience when you roll these new, modern, sparkling Brunswick bowling lanes—the modern mapleways that have streamlined the thrill of bowling.”

It included a luncheonette, with “the most delicious sandwiches and soda fountain drinks,” along with ice cream and of course cigars. During the war, Bowlitorium advertised “Bowling During Blackout.”

It lasted until 1951. By then, bowling had become suburban. Even the Knoxville Bowling Center had been cannibalized for the Magnolia Lanes.

So Maple Hall’s fascinating, especially for those interested in adaptive reuse, but it isn’t downtown’s first bowling alley. It’s just the first one most of us have seen, so maybe I’m splitting hairs.

By the way, Maple Hall has a special place in sports history. That lower level roughly approximates the third-base line of what was called, in the years just after the Civil War, “the Old Base Ball Grounds.” It was a popular field. Architecture ruined it. ◆

Bowling is Knoxville’s oldest sport.

The oldest one, at least, that does not involve inducing animals to do things they’re disinclined to do.

Final weeks! Closes July 17

Winston-Salem, NC | reynoldahouse.org/anseladams Ansel Adams: Eloquent Light has been organized by the Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Fort Worth, Texas.

Reynolda House gratefully recognizes the many generous sponsors who helped bring this exhibition to North Carolina, including Major Sponsors the Charles H. Babcock, Jr. Arts and Community Initiative Endowment, Jerome and Beverly Jennings, and Modern Automotive; and Contributing Sponsor Phoenix Packaging, Inc.

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6/27/16 4:44 PM

June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 7

Photo by Clay Duda

Prisoner Profiteering Knox County Jail policies draw fire for isolating inmates and overcharging their families for services

BY S. HEATHER DUNCAN

N

o letters. No in-person visits. And every call or message has a cost.

Once you’re inside the Knox County Jail, those who are outside seem much farther away than a few feet of concrete.

Knox County Public Defender Mark Stephens and members of the grassroots Knox County Incarceration Collective are publicly criticizing the Knox County Sheriff’s Office for policies they say sacrifice families, inmate health, and public safety to the almighty dollar.

Stephens says the Sheriff’s Office make it difficult or miserable for inmates to communicate with their families for free, forcing them to pay for the privilege as the county takes a cut of the profits. Historically, at least half of those in the Knox County jail, the work release center, and the Roger D. Wilson Detention Facility are awaiting trial and have not yet been convicted of a crime.

“The current visitation policy is maybe one of the most detrimental policies to be implemented at the detention facility and jail of any I’ve seen in the 35 years I’ve practiced,” Stephens says. “If we don’t have any compassion for individual defendants

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

within our system, surely to God we have compassion for the children and loved ones of those individuals.”

Defense lawyers and activists claim the county’s money-grubbing extends to deliberately underfeeding inmates to boost revenue from the jail commissary, where those with enough money can supplement scanty meals with snacks. Knox County Sheriff’s Office communications director Martha Dooley provided a copy of the nutritional policy, which requires dietary allowances to be reviewed at least annually by a nutritionist to meet nationally recommended allowances for basic nutrition. But Stephens says 80 to 90 percent of his clients complain of hunger, and his poor clients almost always visibly lose weight in jail.

And who actually pays for any extra food and communication? The families of inmates too poor to afford bond. “Instead of paying the light bill, they put $25 on Johnny’s (jail) account or talk to him on the phone,” Stephens says.

Even putting money in the account costs money: $4.95 from a jail ATM; by credit card for a 10 percent surcharge; or by mail order or

cashier’s check for $2.50.

Sheriff Jones provided a response through Dooley: “Our written policy speaks for itself. If you don’t like our policy and procedures, then don’t break the law.”

The Incarceration Collective, a group of former inmates and family members who seek to improve jail conditions, held a meeting that lasted several hours last Thursday to spread the word about these and other jail policies.

“We should not be bringing another private partner into a prison,” says JT Taylor, who is helping facilitate the collective for the East Tennessee Peace and Justice Center.

“They’re making money off of exploiting people not having human contact with their loved ones.”

IN THE MAIL

The mail policy posted on the Sheriff’s Office website—allowing only postcards to be sent in or out of the jail, rather than letters in envelopes— is the subject of an ongoing lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court against Knox County and Sheriff Jimmy “J.J.” Jones by the nonprofit Prison Legal News in October. For that reason, Dooley says, the Sheriff’s Office won’t speak about the mail policy. She referred questions to Knox County Law Director Bud Armstrong, who also declined to speak about it.

Tina Sparks, a member of the Incarceration Collective whose late husband was an inmate years ago, called the postcard policy an “impersonal and degrading” invasion of privacy. In particular, the retired kindergarten teacher is horrified that children who can’t write are unable communicate with their jailed parent by sending pictures.

“The children are already stressed and don’t understand, and this just adds to their feelings of distress—and that of course affects the inmates,” says Sparks. “That to me is one of the most heart-wrenching parts of the whole thing.”

However, the mail policy may be changing. Stephens says clients have told him that in the last few months the jail seemed to be inconsistently reverting to a version of its old policy, allowing letters but reading them first.

“It is so new, that we hear different things from different clients,” he says.

Letters between inmates and their attorneys are supposed to be permitted

and private, but Stephens says one of his clients has recently shown him evidence that legal correspondence was read by jail staffers.

“You have to be able to communicate with your client in a confidential way,” says Stephens, pointing out that a letter from him could, for example, identify a new defense witness. “You just can’t have the jail opening legal mail. That’s not acceptable.”

Paul Wright, editor of Prison Legal News and director of the nonprofit Human Rights Defense Center, argues the postcard policy is designed to push prisoners toward types of communication from which the jail profits, part of a national trend to “monetize all human contact between prisoners and their families.”

Prison Legal News also sued Sullivan County over the same type of policy a few years ago. Its jail dropped the policy but the case is ongoing, Wright says.

“What is terrible is how elected officials like the sheriff of Knox County have, for lack of a better term, prostituted themselves and their government office on the altar of greed, and sell these hedge fundowned companies monopoly contracts to exploit the poorest citizens in their jurisdictions—their own taxpayers and voters—like modern-day slave chattel,” Wright wrote in an email.

In 2014, privately-owned Pay-Tel Communications became the first company to begin providing video visitation at the jail in place of in-person visits. The format allows friends and family to talk with inmates via real-time video either from home or at kiosks in the jail. At the time, sheriff’s officials told the Metro Pulse newspaper that this would save hassle for inmate families and reduce jail staffing needs.

VIDEO ISOLATION

In January, the county contracted the job of providing video visitation—as well as the broader inmate management system, inmate electronic messaging, inmate banking and trust account management, and electronic medical records—to Texas-based Securus Technologies.

In response to pre-bid questions from Securus, the county indicated that during a one-year period between June 2014 to June 2015, residents at the three Knox County detention facilities participated in 16,632 on-site

video “visits” (using kiosks provided at the jail facilities), and 3,927 “remote video visits.” (These require a highspeed Internet connection with a camera and mic function, which few of these families have, Sparks points out.)

Securus’s contract involves managing huge amounts of inmate data until 2020, with optional contract extensions of up to two additional five-year terms. Securus provides similar services to 2,600 facilities nationwide, including 39 others in Tennessee, according to the company’s winning bid.

Under the contract, both Securus and Knox County profit from inmate communications. Under its terms, the county gets up to half the revenue from emails and 61 percent of the profits from inmate calls monthly.

According to the Sheriff ’s Office website, inmates may send and receive emails for 40 cents each.

The county’s cut of the call revenue may change, though. Michael Grider, spokesman for the Knox County Mayor’s Office, says the Securus contract is being amended in light of an FCC rule that went into effect this spring. The FCC moved in October to cap the amount inmates can be charged for local and in-state long distance calls at 14 cents a minute for an inmate population the size of Knox County’s, and banned flat-rate call charges. (An April copy of the call rates at the Knox County jail indicates local calls and in-state long distance calls were being charged at the flat rate of $2.85 each.) The cap has been challenged in court, leaving requirements in limbo.

The FCC described its decision as a justice issue: an effort to “rein in the excessive rates and egregious fees on phone calls paid by some of society’s most vulnerable.” While it did not ban commissions to jails and prisons, the FCC reaffi rmed that these are profits and said it “strongly encourages parties to move away from site commissions and urges states to take action on this issue.”

The FCC has also indicated its interest in regulating video visitation, although it hasn’t yet done so.

At the Knox County Jail, remote video visits cost 19 cents a minute for up to 30 minutes each, according to the Sheriff ’s Office website. When Pay-Tel was running the video visitation in 2014 and 2015 it generated about $23,500 in revenue over a

year, according to Knox County documents. (Pay-Tel was charging $6 per 30 minutes.)

Video visits at the jail kiosks are free, but Stephens say they have been plagued by malfunctions like mics that don’t work, and are deliberately placed next to restrooms where the conversations can be easily overheard. On the other end, the inmate kiosks are set up in a communal space where other inmates can listen and check out the female visitors, causing confl icts. “It couldn’t be any more humiliating, and it’s calculated,” he says.

Drew Krikau served 30 months in the jail between 2009 and 2014, just before the postcard and video visitation policies took effect. He says those changes would have left him much more depressed. He says friends inside have told him the video connection is poor, causing dropped visits which must still be paid for.

Only two 30-minute video visits are permitted a week, so losing half of one is not a minor deprivation.

Stephens says his office has repeatedly complained to the sheriff about the video visitation policy to no avail.

Research has shown that visits from family and friends significantly reduce inmate recidivism. For example, a 2011 study by the Minnesota Department of Corrections found even one visit reduced the likelihood of a prisoner’s being convicted of a new felony by 13 percent. Parole violations were 25 percent less likely.

When Josh Thornhill was in jail awaiting trial four years ago, his older brother came to visit him. “It meant everything to see him in person,” Thornhill says. “When you’re inside you feel completely alone from the world. You have no breath of fresh air.

You don’t know if you can trust people, if you can go to sleep…. It’s like a constant level of threat.”

Stephens noted that even convicted prisoners at the jail rarely serve more than a year, and most will try to reintegrate into their former lives.

“What is happening is so cruel,” he says. “When you isolate someone like we are currently isolating them, you minimize the chances of a successful reintegration. When you say you can only visit your children two times a week and only 30 minutes for a fee, I don’t see that increasing public safety.” ◆

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY 9

Inside the effort to study and protect natural sounds and night skies in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park • BY É N YOUNG Photo by Jon Bilous via Dreamstime

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“Noise and light pollution, just like air pollution, are not things that can simply be fenced out of protected areas. Rather, preserving these resources takes effort both within the park boundaries and collaboration from surrounding communities.”

—SCOTT MCFARLAND, a specialist with the National Park Service’s Natural Sounds and Night Skies Division NSNS specialist Scott McFarland (top) teaches elementary and middle school students about the field of acoustic ecology and one method for collecting field recordings. McFarland has set up multiple sound recording stations throughout GSMNP, such as this one at Bullhead Trail. natural resources that draw millions of people to the Smokies and help fuel many local economies.

SOUNDS OF SILENCE

Photos courtesy of Scott McFarland

efore I became a parent, I traced in green highlighter roughly two-thirds of the official trails on my now out-of-date trail map of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, worn thin in the creases from more than a decade of use. From all those hikes, it’s the memory of particular natural sounds that holds the most power over me, able to catapult me right back into a high-elevation forest with wind rustling the treetops or next to a rushing stream lined with boulders softly furred with moss.

The first time I heard the eerie flute-like call of the wood thrush on Cucumber Gap trail near Elkmont, the world stopped. The spring ephemerals were on the verge of blooming, and the sound conveyed the essence of life awakening from winter.

Spring was suddenly not a season, but now a process—one that was happening around me and also included me as a participant rather than simply the observer I had only ever been before.

It was the wood thrush’s call that released me from my other self—the one with the chatterbox mind. I was momentarily transported, yet simultaneously more present: aware of slanted light, the rhododendron-lined path, and the sense that the impersonal woods had been transformed into an intimate space. I never saw the bird, but it had managed to stir in me something I’d not experienced often, nor could sustain: a greater sense of belonging, not just to a place, but to a specific moment in time.

Lightscapes, or night skies unpolluted by light, are equally important resources in allowing transcendent experiences in nature.

I’m hardly the only one who has watched meteors trace arcs like flaming arrows shot from invisible bows from atop Mt. LeConte, which at 6,593 feet is the third-highest peak in GSMNP and is often blanketed in fog.

However, because I also know the flat, muted skies of cities, each truly dark sky I witness is nothing short of a special occasion. But many urban dwellers have missed out on the kind of natural nighttime darkness that allows them to see more than a few bright stars. According to the International Dark-Sky Association, the U.S. population has grown at an average rate of 1.5 percent annually, while the amount of outdoor lighting in use has

grown by about 6 percent per year.

Now, eight out of 10 kids born in the U.S. live where they can never see the Milky Way. But it only takes one clear, brilliant night sky to change someone’s life. The park has on occasion provided inner-city kids visiting Great Smoky Mountains Institute at Tremont their first chance to gaze into starry depths.

As the National Park Service celebrates its centennial with much fanfare this year, the agency is also taking a sobering look at the next hundred years of management to protect its resources for future generations. While conserving flora and fauna has long been commonly understood as one of the missions of the NPS, fewer people know that the agency must also protect natural sound and dark-sky resources from the encroachment of modern life—yet

without any of the authority of a regulatory agency outside its own boundaries.

For now, the Smokies are still one of the darkest places in the eastern U.S., and there remain many places where hikers can escape the sounds of revved engines. However, future generations stand a strong chance of losing an experience that so many Smokies’ visitors have taken for granted since the national park was chartered in 1934: The ability to find peaceful solace and refuge from the city with unimpeded natural sounds and a heavenly glimpse at the Milky Way overhead. Fortunately, NPS isn’t sitting idle on these issues. It’s researching the impacts of the encroaching world and working with nearby communities in efforts to make smart development decisions, curb the proliferation of light pollution, and hopefully sustain the

If there’s anyone who knows whether trees that fall in the Smokies make sounds when no one is around to hear them, it’s Scott McFarland, a specialist with the park service’s Natural Sounds and Night Skies (NSNS) Division, whose Southeast Region office is based at GSMNP (see sidebar).

Recording the park’s soundscapes is a job he’s well suited for as both a biologist and engineer, able to work efficiently to solve just about any technical issue that arises. His office at Twin Creeks Science and Education Center shows many signs of the engineer: a dozen or more red and black wires sprouting from battery boxes, and a large durable plastic briefcase with the field equipment he’ll set up today. It contains a sound meter, microphone, tripod, lithium iron phosphate battery, and cables.

In 2006, researchers used similar equipment to record natural ambient sound at seven locations in the park.

Porter’s Creek went over its natural decibel range the least often, and Cades Cove, not surprisingly, went over its natural decibel range the most often.

Over the next year, these boxes will record all of the 2006 locations again, plus a few new ones. With this data, he’ll be able to accurately assess the park’s soundscapes, to see if noise encroachment has grown louder over the past decade, and in turn help him develop recommendations for management.

Data collection in Cades Cove will run June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 11

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North Carolina’s Maggie Valley, near the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, lights up the area—and the night sky.

Photo by Michael Warren via Thinkstock

through January 2017, and he hopes to wrap up the next phase to begin outreach and education to the community in late 2017 or early 2018.

“Even if the data collection was complete, there’s not yet a mechanism for comparing it to other national park units,” McFarland says. “However, initial data from Cades Cove shows that it has reached acoustic energy levels 20 times greater than some remote locations in the park.”

One of the new locations he’ll record is Bone Valley, the area furthest from any road. To get there, he’ll backpack in 65 pounds of sound equipment in addition to his personal gear. For today, at least, we’ve got an easy drive to Cades Cove where he’ll install a sound unit that will record continuously for one year from its hidden location off of Spark’s Lane.

After each new location is recorded— most only needing one month of audio—the data is sent to Colorado State University where more than 500 students in a listening lab will get college credit for analyzing it.

Even with much yet to learn about the state of the park’s natural soundscapes, noise pollution elsewhere has already proven to be damaging to humans and animals. The World Health Organization reported the effect of noise pollution on the population in western parts of Europe and found that at least one million Healthy Life Years—a European public health metric used as a measure of economic productivity— are lost annually from traffic-related noise.

“Noise impacts the entire community,” says Jeff Titon, a retired ethnomusicology professor at Brown University and current Basler Chair of Excellence for the Integration of the Arts, Rhetoric and Science at East Tennessee State University. His career has focused on the role that sound plays in the shared environment. “Noise interference from airplanes, trucks and other vehicles, chainsaws and construction, adversely impacts the way all the creatures (humans included) communicate with each other in that environment.

Sounds are directly related to ecosystem health.”

In the 1990s, GSMNP visitors were often rattled by the sound of low-flying air tour helicopters, which some residents experienced as a near-constant nuisance. What began

“Preserving dark skies isn’t necessarily about the environment, and it doesn’t have to come at the cost of economic development.”

—JOHN BARENTINE, program manager for the International Dark-Sky Association as citizen complaints eventually contributed to a state law that prohibited air tours from using a runway or heliport any closer than 9 miles from the national park boundary. Since states do not have jurisdiction over air flight, which is regulated by the FAA, the state law could not prohibit flights over the park, but it could regulate the land used by air tour operators. The state law restricting heliports to 9 miles from the boundary prevented the state from interfering with the FAA’s jurisdiction over the Sevierville airport, which is 10 miles from the boundary.

Later, the National Parks Air

Tour Management Act of 2000 amended federal aviation law to prohibit a commercial air tour operator from flying over a national park or tribal lands, with exceptions for the Grand Canyon and Alaska. Air tours can still provide clientele with beautiful views of the Smokies, even though they can no longer fly overhead. If it weren’t for the collective action that led to these laws, then the deafening sound of air tour helicopters hovering over the mountains would be a common part of the visitor experience and part of the incremental loss of unimpaired natural sounds.

Instead, today’s most human-gen-

erated noise in the mountains comes from motorcycles stripped of manufacturers’ mufflers. McFarland is quick to point out that the NPS has nothing against motorcycles that bear the manufacturers’ tailpipes, which have been engineered for sound reduction.

Sometimes McFarland’s work takes him to busy roadways where he’ll set up a station with a sign that reads vehicles’ decibel levels. It’s a conversation starter to talk to people about the issue of noise, and he’s met motorcyclists who are unaware and sometimes alarmed that the rumble of their bikes might be audible 10 miles away.

During the 20 minutes in Cades Cove it took McFarland to set up the sound station, 10 airplanes flew overhead, or so he told me. Since I am hard of hearing, I couldn’t catch them all, but mainly I wasn’t paying attention. This made me realize how conditioned I am to hearing planes in the distance as background noise.

Back in the office, he’d shown me a map of the U.S. bearing so many lines that all but a few outlying cities were blotted out. It looked more like an Etch-a-Sketch drawing than a map.

This was the FAA’s flight path map.

As I stood in Cades Cove, I understood firsthand the correlation between an abstract concept and a living, breathing soundscape.

HELLO, DARKNESS

Like soundscapes, lightscapes can incorporate cultural light sources, such as candles, and may be integral to historical places. Also, like human-generated sound that distracts attention away from the natural scene, light that intrudes into a nighttime scene amounts to light pollution.

Flagstaff, Ariz.—the city nearest Lowell Observatory—has led the global dark-sky movement with help from the International Dark-Sky Association (IDA). After years of debate around the issue, Flagstaff became the first place in the world to gain IDA status in 2001. Globally, 57 communities, parks, reserves, sanctuaries, and developments of distinction have met strict requirements to gain various levels of IDA status, a certification that increases both protection and awareness of night-sky resources. McFarland says

A view of the Milky Way from Clingmans Dome in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park—one that can’t be seen in more well-lit populous areas.

Photo by Appalachianviews via Dreamstime

he hopes the Smokies will soon join the list, as he is now seeking IDA status for the park.

Night-sky darkness is measured using the Bortle scale, a nine-level numeric scale that quantifies observability of celestial objects and the interference caused by light pollution.

Bortle Class 1 skies are the darkest skies on Earth, and in the U.S. they only exist in western states. On the opposite end are Bortle Class 9 skies, which are inner-city skies. McFarland says that GSMNP has a predicted Bortle Class 4 throughout most of the park, but it can hit Class 3 in the southwest corner of the park. However, in the northern portions of the park, the Bortle Class can reach 5-6 due to lighting from nearby communities.

“Preserving dark skies isn’t necessarily about the environment, and it doesn’t have to come at the cost of economic development,” says John Barentine, program manager for IDA. “Fundamentally, it’s about being a good neighbor. Respect for one’s neighbors means being considerate with the use of one’s own property, whether commercial or residential. By simply containing light at night to that property, using the right amount for the task, and being mindful of the hours of night it’s in use, we can have dark skies, good relations among neighbors, and the right conditions for growing business opportunities.”

Pro-dark sky should not be mistaken for anti-development.

According to the Texas Tribune, when the owner of Pioneer Energy Services, a San Antonio-based oil company, was approached about helping to protect the sky near McDonald Observatory by adjusting the lighting to one of his rigs, he became a convert. Not only was the owner interested in protecting the darkness of the West Texas night sky that had brought him personal fulfillment, but it also turned out that using more focused lighting, along with warmer-spectrum LED bulbs, helped improve worker safety and saved his company’s energy costs.

Additionally, dark-sky tourism, also called astro-tourism, is gaining popularity as people seek immersive dark-sky experiences found in relatively few places, and which presents an economic opportunity for the Smokies.

Even average tourists are pursuing places where the authentic outdoors speaks for itself, which is the message

“We’re essentially losing our sense of place in relation to the universe. If we want our children to be able to reach for the stars, they have to be able to see them.”

—DON BARGER, senior regional director, National Park Conservation Association suggested by “The Peaceful Side of the Smokies” campaign promoted by Blount Partnership.

Adjacent to Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area (about 75 miles northwest of Knoxville) is the Pickett State Park and nearby Pogue Creek Canyon State Natural Area, also known as Pickett-Pogue, which is the only place in Tennessee with IDA designation. One reason it succeeded in this effort was by securing broad support from surrounding municipalities that instituted regulations to ensure its long-term protection.

This sort of community-wide support is usually the hard part.

Of all the IDA-certified places on Earth, only 14 are communities.

Barentine says it’s harder for communities than parks to gain IDA status because coordinated participation from local governments is essential.

However, even communities that are not seeking IDA status ought to still take care of their night sky assets, an argument made by Bernard Arghiere, a resident of Asheville who worked with the community to adopt what he says is a much improved lighting ordinance. As then-president of the Asheville Astronomy Club, Arghiere was an avid stargazer himself, but he found broad support surrounding

issues of night blindness, glare, and light trespass.

When he took up the issue, the number-one offense to residents who complained to city staff was the prevalence of dusk-to-dawn lighting.

These lights are strong, producing almost 10,000 lumens, which is the equivalent of six 100-watt bulbs clustered together. They are also unshielded and mounted on a tall pole. The intensity and lack of focus means they spill light upward into the sky and also onto neighboring properties. The city ended up banning all new dusk-to-dawn lights and phased out existing lights within five years of the new ordinance.

“Streetlights are more difficult to regulate because of all the jurisdictions involved,” notes Arghiere. Even still, he helped Asheville adopt stricter standards for streetlights rated greater than 4,300 Kelvins, the metric used to rate bulb color temperature.

(The higher the Kelvin rating, the bluer the light and the worse for the night sky.) The city of Asheville was going to purchase 6,200 Kelvin LEDs, but Alghiere looked at studies from municipalities in San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, and Los Angeles, and found that all had rejected the same bulbs because they were too bright, emitting more light pollution than was necessary. He showed this to Asheville’s City Council and they changed their order.

Not every city has dark-sky advocates organizing around community lighting issues, but areas that benefit economically from a national park or wilderness area have more reasons to be concerned about light pollution. As a longtime advocate for national parks, Don Barger, senior regional director for the Southeast Regional Office of the National Park Conservation Association, often speaks eloquently about what he perceives is the highest value that a dark sky can have on human beings—a sense of place that is palpable to this park and to this region. But he notes that it doesn’t end there. With the incremental loss of the dark sky, we may risk losing touch with our sense of place on a grander scale.

“We’re essentially losing our sense of place in relation to the June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 13

universe,” he says. “If we want our children to be able to reach for the stars, they have to be able to see them.”

STARS AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL

Because the NPS is not a regulatory agency, it must work to gain support of the community to see changes.

Within the next few years, McFarland hopes to begin the outreach to the surrounding communities through public presentations and conversations with local officials and citizens to help build awareness for natural sound and night sky protection.

“Getting the word out and educating people about the importance of protecting night skies and natural sounds for ourselves and wildlife is equally important to the scientific measuring and monitoring,” he says. “Noise and light pollution, just like air pollution, are not things that can simply be fenced out of protected areas. Rather, preserving these resources takes effort both within the park boundaries and collaboration from surrounding communities.”

Sustainable Lighting General Guidelines The NPS’s Natural Sounds and Night Skies division recommends the following guidelines for preserving the night sky.

1) Light only if you need it.

2) Light only when you need it.

3) Aim light where it is needed.

4) U se appropriate color spectra. (Amber bulbs, typically below 2700 Kelvin) 5) Use the minimum amount of light necessary.

6) C hoose energy efficient lamps and fixtures.

“Using the proper housing puts the light where it is needed instead of upward and outward, which is just wasted energy and will allow for lower wattage bulbs to be used,” says Scott McFarland, NSNS Division Specialist for the Southeast Region.

“Amber lighting is also key, as light on the bluish-white end of the spectrum contributes to glare, hampers nighttime visibility, and scatters further into the air.”

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Mt. LeConte 7mi

Asheville 50mi

Before making management recommendations to protect the park’s lighting, McFarland will first request a park-wide light audit in which every light bulb, fixture, and automatic lighting schedule will be evaluated.

After all, the park can’t reliably recommend changes without first doing a full inventory of its own contribution to light pollution and making fixes. Eventually, this process will result in best practices and recommendations for the community with specific guidelines. For now, the NSNS can only offer general guidelines for sustainable lighting. (See info box.)

According to IDA, lighting has become more energy efficient, but we are also a society that is using more and brighter lighting at night than we used to. Parking lots, even empty ones, are lit five to 10 times more brightly than they were 25 years ago.

We’ve been conditioned to equate lighting with safety, but the IDA is following studies that suggest that increased brightness only increases the perception of safety. Furthermore, as air pollution increases, it exacerbates light pollution by refracting light. Meanwhile, the reddish-orange glow from Knoxville, and even Atlanta, burns on in the Smoky Mountain horizons.

In 2007, the Blount County Planning Commission took a proactive stance on regulating outdoor lighting by passing an amendment to zoning regulations. It was part of a larger discussion of design standards for commercial developments and addresses 13 requirements.

“County decision makers realized that there would continue to be pressure for commercial development along our main highways in rural areas,” says John Lamb, director of the Blount County Planning Depart-

Greenville 81 mi

Bryson City 10mi

Atlanta 135 mi

ment. “Commercial lighting stands out in less dense, rural areas, and a decision was made to address the issue with new regulations.”

Indeed, the regulations mitigate extra lumens (the unit of light measurement) from reflecting into the atmosphere by requiring that structures greater than 1000 lumens (about the brightness of a floodlight) to be mounted facing the ground with no upward angle to minimize scattering of light.

The city of Maryville adopted very similar standards several years earlier. The only difference is that the county standards limit the amount of light “trespass” at a property line to one-half foot-candle, while the city standards allow one foot-candle. (A foot-candle is the amount of illumination given by one candle-powered light source at a distance of one foot.)

Whether these regulations will be enough to reduce light pollution as development creeps toward the park along Highway 321 or the proposed (and controversial) Pellissippi Parkway (I-140) extension, is unclear. Big-box stores tend to shine a lot of cooler-spectrum light over empty parking lots, and the community is already bracing for the potential loss of a drive-in movie theater due to light trespass from a planned Walmart nearby (as reported in the Mercury last year).

Based on his cursory review of these regulations, Barentine, with the IDA, thinks stricter measures would be in order to obtain IDA Community status, which takes political will and coordination. With future development that doesn’t further restrict lighting through proper bulbs and housings, the Bortle Class on the northern edge of the park could continue to increase and threaten GSMNP’s ability to gain or maintain IDA status.

Mt. Buckley 1mi

Knoxville 38 mi

Pigeon Forge 16mi

The All-Sky Data Mosaic was taken from on top of Clingmans Dome in 2008 and shows the relative brightness of the night sky. The white areas represent the most amount of artificial light while the blue areas indicate a relatively unimpaired night sky.

However, a dark-skies initiative could potentially enhance the results of a national marketing outreach for The Peaceful Side of the Smokies.

Kim Mitchell, tourism director for Blount Partnership, agrees that a long-term commitment to protecting the park’s assets is an important part of the area’s economic vitality.

“Our goal is to always protect the integrity and beauty of the GSMNP,” she says. “An excellent example is the annual Synchronous Fireflies experience. This event, which is extremely popular, is now regulated to help ensure the experience is not only authentic and enjoyable for our guests, but also continues to protect the natural environment in which this event takes place. Our responsibility is to protect the lands and wildlife for the next generation no matter what the cost.”

THE FOREVER BUSINESS

It’s too soon to say what the park’s soundscapes and lightscapes will be like by the NPS’s bicentennial a century from now, but noise has already proven to be difficult to define, let alone regulate. Additionally, the IDA believes by 2025 no dark skies will exist in the U.S. Without widespread cooperation among communities in the foothills of the park, the challenges that it faces—already the most-visited in the entire NPS system—could continue to grow. The NPS and its employees are, as McFarland put it, “working in the ‘forever’ business,” striving every day to protect for future generations what public pressure might inadvertently destroy.

This work requires a long-term view, according to GSMNP Superintendent Cassius Cash.

“We don’t always think about the role natural sounds and dark night skies play in a park experience,” he says. “But the captivating sounds of mountain streams and birds are an important part of what personally connects us to landscapes. As we enter into the second century of service for the National Park Service, it’s critical that we preserve these resources for the next generation of visitors and the species that depend on sounds and light to communicate.”

When escaping to the GSMNP, it can take time for the noise of contemporary culture—audible and digital— to wear off, which may be reason enough for visitors to stay overnight in the backcountry. Even though I’ve gingerly tucked away my aging park map until I can return to the trails without the demands and logistics of early parenthood, I am comforted by the thought that the same woods will

be there waiting for me when I do. Or will they? Knowing how challenging it might be to protect these precious resources, I wonder whether my son will grow up to be able to experience the park as I have, or whether he’ll be able to grasp what was lost if he can’t experience a dark sky firsthand or be alone with the sounds of nature free of the sounds of engines.

As a regular hiker, I learned to trust that if I stuck with it long enough, eventually I would become acutely attuned to my surroundings as the concerns of the busybody world were sweated out of my pores. Spending time in nature without the distractions of unnatural sound and light has long been part of American wilderness ideal. Nature’s role in awakening the senses is part and parcel to our ability to make new discoveries and create works of genius. Whatever we may individually seek to gain by protecting natural sounds and night skies, it’s certainly much bigger than can be seen or heard. ◆

Sound, Light, and the National Park Service’s Mission Soundscapes and lightscapes function as both nice-sounding words and technical terms. The park service defines soundscapes as the human or animal perception of acoustic resources, which includes both natural sounds like wind, water, and wildlife, as well as cultural and historic sounds such as battle reenactments and tribal ceremonies. It defines lightscapes as night-sky resources and values that exist in the absence of human-caused light.

The Park Service Organic Act of 1916, on which the National Park Service was founded, requires that the agency care for the public lands and “…leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.” In other words, the national parks are meant to be preserved and they are also meant to be enjoyed. It’s the word “enjoyment” that is of particular interest to many, including Don Barger, senior regional director for the Southeast Regional Office of the National Park Conservation Association (NPCA). He remembers hearing a talk by former NPS director Roger Kennedy who said, “Enjoyment as contemplated by the Organic Act means informed delight, not feckless merriment.”

Barger explains that visitors ought to be enjoying unimpaired resources.

“If the resources are impaired, then the NPS has failed not only the physical responsi-

bility to the resources, but it has also failed the responsibility to visitor experience,” he says.

However, the impetus to protect these assets could just as easily be driven by matters of human and animal survival. While research from the World Health Organization, among others, connects peaceful sounds and nighttime darkness with decreased anxiety and overall wellbeing in humans, for wildlife they are matters of survival. Wildlife rely on natural sound and patterns of light and dark for navigation, to cue behaviors, or to hide from predators. When these are disrupted, it changes the way the entire ecosystem functions. But it’s only in the last 15 years that the park service has responded to the need to protect national parks from encroaching noise, and more recently light.

In 2011 the NPS established its Natural Sounds and Night Skies (NSNS) division, and now its team of roughly 20 employees operate out of Fort Collins, Colo. They are responsible for various aspects of protecting natural sounds and night skies in all 400-plus park service units, but only one critical staff member is dispatched in each of the three regions across the U.S.: Alaska, Pacific West, and Southeast— the office for which is headquartered at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

—Élan Young

June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 15

A&E

P rogram Notes

Strange Vicinity R.B. Morris is named official Poet Laureate of Knoxville

E

ven before Mayor Rogero made the announcement last week, many of us figured R.B. Morris was already Knoxville’s poet laureate. Morris has been an advocate of poetry in Knoxville for decades, but he came at it from a different direction, seemingly calculated to challenge preconceptions of poetry and poets. Morris says it was his older brother, Chuck, himself a poet, who introduced him to Joyce, Yeats, Rimbaud, and the Beat writers.

First known as a musician—fronting Cumberland Avenue bands like Shaky Little Finger, a memorable bar band of the 1970s—Morris did some wandering in the early ’80s, living alone in the mountains and traveling to San Francisco, where he met some of the Beat poets—Nicosia, Corso, Ferlinghetti. He founded and edited an edgy poetry journal called The Hard Knoxville Review. It published local poets but also promoted Knoxville icon James Agee’s early poetry, like “Permit Me Voyage.” It began Morris’ career as a public advocate for Agee’s work. He wrote and acted in The Man Who Lives Here Is Loony, a play about Agee, and spearheaded the establishment of the university-city project now know as Agee Park, at James Agee Street and Laurel Avenue.

Fort Sanders, Morris’ birthplace, has been central to much of his persona.

His non-academic perspective seemed always closer to the beer joint than to the ivory tower, so it was surprising when he assumed the role of Writer in Residence at the University of Tennessee’s Hodges Library in 2004. During his four-year tenure there, Morris hosted published poets

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in the library’s auditorium, sometimes drawing unusual crowds. One guest reader in the series, wearing eyeglasses and lacking a guitar, was almost unrecognizable as alt-country songwriter Steve Earle. Morris and Earle worked on several public-poetry projects in Knoxville.

Morris has also published his own poetry, in chapbooks (Early Fire, The Mockingbird Poems, Keeping the Bees Employed), while he has put out occasional albums with his band, the Irregulars. His first solo album, Take That Ride (1997), earned national praise. Empire (2008) included the original song, “That’s How Every Empire Falls,” which was recently recorded by British pop legend Marianne Faithfull.

In her inaugural address in 2011, Rogero quoted from his song, “Then There Is a City.”

Morris has enjoyed an unusual career, by any measure. About this latest honor, he sounds humble and a little taken aback. “I do live here, and I’m over 18, so I’m eligible,” he says. He’s still discussing his agenda with city officials.

“I hope it will bring some attention to all the poets and songwriters and others out there. Knoxville has its strange and unusual literary legacy, and I hope it’s something we can gather together.”

He wants to enhance poetry in the schools, and to the elderly.

Suggesting the impact of mural projects, he says, “I’d like to see words as part of the geography.”

And, characteristically, he tosses off an obscure couplet from Agee: “In what city shall that be/And in what strange vicinity?” ( Jack Neely)

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Music: Aesop Rock

Period Piece Last year, Knoxville burlesque queen Siren Santina and her colleague Pepper Mills staged a surprising revue in Mills’ hometown of Indianapolis, Ind. The Best Show, PERIOD: A Burlesque Tribute to the Greatest Wonder of Womanhood featured performances by more than a dozen burlesque artists, all of them based loosely on menstruation.

“We were a little surprised at the response,” Santina says. “We didn’t realize it would connect with that many people. So we decided to go ahead and do it in my hometown as well and bring in a different set of performers and different interpretations.”

The Knoxville production of The Best Show, PERIOD is set for Saturday, July 2, at 11 p.m. at the Edge (7211 Kingston Pike). The new version features all-new acts and performers, including an instructional bit, a duet featuring a real-life couple,

a piece on menopause, and at least a couple of male artists.

“We have a wide variety of points of view on the subject,” Santina says. “You can see a little bit about the personality of the performer in which aspect they chose to use in their act. … It starts with the theme of menstruation but you can see how it spreads to so many other aspects of womanhood and women’s lives and how it touches all these other facets of their experience of being a woman.”

Tickets to The Best Show, PERIOD are $10, available at the door. $30 VIP passes are available at thebestshowperiod.com. There will also be a collection of new and unwrapped sanitary products for distribution to the homeless and the working poor. “The cost of maintenance is something that doesn’t get discussed,” Santina says. “It’s treated as a luxury and not as a need.” (Matthew Everett)

House Party Dance music can often seem, to the uninitiated, esoteric and occult, with all the late-night clubs, youthful ecstasy, and endless lists of genres, subgenres, and microgenres that accompany it.

Sometimes it feels like you need a magic key or secret code to unlock its mysteries.

At its heart, though, club music is a communal, inclusive phenomenon. That’s what some of Knoxville’s top house and techno DJs hope to demonstrate this weekend with an all-day dance party at Tyson Park inspired by Atlanta’s huge House in the Park Labor Day event.

House at Tyson Park, which runs from noon to 8 p.m. on Sunday, July 3, will feature Kevin Nowell, Rick Styles, Mark B, JMo, Gregory Tarrants, Alex Falk, Dialectic Sines, Saint Thomas LeDoux, and Nikki Nair. It’s being organized by the Art of House, a group of local house and techno DJs; TEKNOX, an

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underground house and techno “music party series” based at the Birdhouse in Fourth and Gill; and Headroom, a “nomadic party crew” that hosts dance nights at regional nightclubs and Burning Man-style events. The event is free.

“It’s something I’ve thought about doing since the ’90s,” says Nowell, of the Art of House, in an email interview. “I was talking to a friend about how I would like to do a party for my birthday weekend and have DJ friends from across the country. Most venues here do not see value in underground music and want to charge huge room fees and I wanted it to be free, so I figured if I had to pay out of pocket to keep it free, a park party made a lot of sense. Atlanta’s House in the Park event has also been a huge inspiration, with the way that event shares the positive message of the music I love.” (M.E.)

Movies: Neon Demon

Shelf Life

A&E

make music out of your days and, in turn, how you might do the same.

These Foolish Things Some new favorite music available at the Knox County Public Library

BY CHRIS BARRETT

THE JAYHAWKS PAGING MR. PROUST (THIRTY TIGERS, 2016)

My wife and I fled Michigan for East Tennessee on April Fools’ Day in 1993. It snowed most of the drive. The soundtrack for that great cat migration was a cassette of the Jayhawks album Hollywood Town Hall. The Jayhawks played on the Cumberland Strip later that year and a fledgling Knoxville newsweekly saw fit to assign me a telephone interview feature of the band, even though I did not have a telephone. Since those days, any new Jayhawks record lands a little like a letter from home. I can almost sense them approaching, with their sly, artful titles that allude to things past and lost time.

Paging Mr. Proust is the band’s second album made without founding member Mark Olson, who, along with Gary Louris, has also been half of the band’s primary songwriting team.

Since Olson is unlikely to read this or to ever be in nose-punching proximity, I’m comfortable asserting that the group does not seem much diminished by his absence. Olson and Louris were also on the outs when the band made Sound of Lies in 1997, and Matthew Sweet sang vocals and harmonies against Louris’ high, fi ne voice. On the new record, Mike Mills—late of R.E.M.—and Chloe Johnson—wife of R.E.M.’s Peter Buck, who produced the record and contributes some sweet 12-string guitar—round

out the vocals. Longtime members Karen Grotberg (keyboards), Tim O’Reagan (drums), and Marc Perlman (bass) remain steadfast; the group sounds like a content and functional family, bereaved of no member. The songs that Louris wrote for this record, alone or with bandmates, are perfect for the band’s layered singing style and playing. Louris writes interesting and intimate lyrics.

Recurring themes include loss, longing, and human frailty in general.

But eventually the appeal of this music is the delicate manner in which he alternates between the complementary sounds of his voice and his old Gibson SG guitar. This is a good record to stay put to.

MATTHEW SHIPP TO DUKE (ROGUEART, 2015)

One could argue that every record by pianist Matthew Shipp is a tribute to Duke Ellington on some level. Nevertheless, it is always a pleasure when a favorite thinker concentrates on familiar material. You gain a sense of that person’s priorities and intentions and the paths between them. You can convince yourself that it gives you access to some of their tools, both analytical and expository. So when Shipp finds these rivers of melody running upstream in “In a Sentimental Mood” or leaps across chasms of quiet that you had never noticed in “Solitude,” you can begin to imagine how he might

BRAD MEHLDAU BLUES AND BALLADS (NONESUCH, 2016)

Don’t be disappointed by the fact that pianist Brad Mehldau has not taken up barrelhouse or stride piano on this new album with the word blues in the title. Of course he could play those styles, but indulging the nostalgia of others does not appear to be part of the Mehldau method. Mehldau is a master of deconstruction. He brings us the American songbook in its subatomic particles; those songs, like Cole Porter’s “I Concentrate on You” and Maschwitz and Strachey’s “These Foolish Things (Remind Me of You),” have never seemed more durable or deserving of attention. With his Brooks Brothers camouflage over a skater’s tribal tattoos, Mehldau has established himself as a vital and effective intergenerational ambassador for this music. And it is entirely possible that future generations will consider Mehldau to be the definitive interpreter of the music of John Lennon and Paul McCartney. His version of “And I Love Her” is the most recent addition to a dossier in defense of that position.

EL VY RETURN TO THE MOON (4AD, 2015)

This record has been hailed as the swinging side project that allows singer/composer Matt Berninger to be all the musical things he can’t be when he’s fronting the National. Alas, he sounds as uptight as ever. But he also sounds very good, singing these short, bright, varied pop songs he’s written with sidekick Brent Knopf.

Not many pop singers currently working have as much depth, power, and control as Berninger. May we agree that it’s acceptable to namecheck influences like Mike Watt and Hüsker Dü and the Cramps while singing intelligibly and in tune?

Neither member of EL VY has said much on record about plans for the future. But it’s pleasing to think of them returning to this vehicle in the near future. And it would be fun to hear them drive it more like a rental car and less like mom’s car. ◆

Knoxville’s BEST live music venue 6 nights a week!

Happy Hour 3pm to 8pm Huge selection of Craft, Import & Local beer Locally roasted coffee

wed june 29• 7pm

Inward of Eden w/ random hero, ilia, & transparent soul $8 adv / $10 day of All Ages ( rock )

thur june 30 • 8pm

matt woods w/ austin lucas $10 ADV | $12 Day Of all ages ( rock )

fri JUly 1 • 8pm

disco dance party ft. EASTWIND BAND free • All Ages happy hour 3pm-8pm ( disco & funk )

free summer concert

tues july 5 • 7pm

songwriter night w/ host Karen E. Reynolds FREE • all ages ( singer songwriter )

* Sat. June 25 - Sat. July 2 only! *

50% off select brands like Schecter, Silvertone, and more in our retail store!

Knoxville’s Best Musical Instrument Store

8502 KINGSTON PIKE • (865) 281-5874 openchordmusic.com

June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 17

A&E

Music

Aesop’s Fables After two decades in music, alt rapper Aesop Rock has learned what really matters

BY NATHAN SMITH

I

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

Soundcloud.

Despite the pressures that changing technologies can put on musicians and culture creators, Aesop Rock’s own sound has maintained a freshness and consistency few rappers ever attain. He boasts a mammoth vocabulary, twisting words into impressionistic images that are often inscrutable but always indelible. But with The Impossible Kid, the style with which Aesop Rock delivers his stories has changed. His music has always been deeply personal, but this time, the narratives are a little more direct.

“It wasn’t really intentional, or something I even really considered until I started sharing the final

solo endeavors. I like knowing that I combed every second of the work, from the lyrics to the production to picking the scratch sounds and all that. I can call it a solo album and really mean it.”

Despite the pressure to keep up with ever-changing industry trends, Aesop Rock’s disengagement from the hype cycle is part of what gives his music meaning. “[The Internet] makes it easy to get caught up in a moment or a phase, when really, the goal should be to make something that outlasts all of it,” he says. “At the end of the day, nothing will outlast a great beat with a great rhyme.”

Even then, it’s hard not to get lost in the thorniness of making music in the 21st century. As more about the way we create, deliver, and receive music changes, the more artists like Aesop Rock question and reflect on the value of their own work.

“I think the best way to not get too caught up in it is to keep my head down and work on my craft in a way that feels real to me,” he says. “How do I make my stuff matter? Why should people bother? Those are questions with no answers, but they can cripple your entire process. All I can do is what I do and hope it rises to the top.” ◆

WHO

Aesop Rock with Rob Sonic, DJ Zone, and Homeboy Sandman

WHERE

The International (940 Blackstock Ave.)

WHEN

Saturday, July 2, at 9 p.m.

HOW MUCH

$18/$20 at the door Photo by Ben Colen

t’s been almost 20 years since Ian Bavitz, the rapper better known as Aesop Rock, released his debut album. Hip-hop is often thought of as a young man’s game, but with his latest album, this year’s The Impossible Kid, the New York-born and now Portland, Ore.-based emcee shows no sign of dropping the mic any time soon.

Aesop forged his sound in the early 2000s as part of Definitive Jux, the New York record label founded by rapper/producer El-P. During its ’00s heyday, Def Jux influenced a generation of “alternative” rap fans with forward-thinking releases by the likes of Cannibal Ox, Murs, and RJD2.

Aesop’s first release on the label, 2001’s Labor Days, was a watershed moment not just in his own career, but also for hip-hop listeners who wanted more than just what major labels had to offer.

Since then, the rap landscape has fundamentally shifted, particularly for artists and audiences of the underground persuasion.

“The biggest change is the existence of the Internet,” Aesop says in an email interview. “I think it makes these phases of what’s hip come and go quicker. Information and music and influences are just getting shot around instantaneously, and I think it makes the sounds of the times evolve way faster.”

Aesop came of age in a distinctly physical era for outsider rap, a time when turntablism was still in practice and mixtapes were self-released CD-Rs. But rappers wanting to experiment with form today are lucky if their music ever makes it off

product with people,” he says. “People will say, ‘This project sounds so much more blank than your previous work,’ and I’ll just say, really? I didn’t know! I never can tell what I’m doing. I just try to get it out of me.”

Aesop’s longevity as a rapper and recording artist likely owes something to his proclivity for collaboration. In the four years since his last solo album, 2012’s Skelethon, he’s cut albums with Kimya Dawson of the Moldy Peaches under the name the Uncluded, with Rob Sonic under the name Hail Mary Mallon, and with Homeboy Sandman as LICE. That’s without mentioning his long record of features and guest verses, which run the gamut from Rhymesayers labelmates Atmosphere to indie chamber-folk band the Mountain Goats.

Even as he leans more into collaboration, Aesop shows a growing need for autonomy and independence as a solo artist. He’s often made his own beats, for example, but The Impossible Kid is his first studio album that’s entirely self-produced.

“The collabs are more fun,” he says. “But finishing a solo record has a sense of accomplishment unlike any other. At some point I just got into the idea of making my solo albums truly

INFO

internationalknox.com

Movies

Photo by Gunther Campine.

Crimes of Fashion Nicolas Winding Refn’s Neon Demon is gorgeous and gore-soaked

BY APRIL SNELLINGS

B

y the time the end credits roll on Nicolas Winding Refn’s dark, lurid fairy tale The Neon Demon, women’s bodies have been coolly evaluated, idolized, ridiculed, painted, invaded, broken, and ultimately consumed—by men, of course, but just as often at the perfectly manicured hands of other women. By turns seductive and repulsive, Refn’s second post-Drive feature almost willfully baits those who’ve accused the director of misogyny, but it’s also a keenly observed treatise on female jealousy and toxic competition.

Don’t spend much time thinking this over, though—it’s all spelled out in flashing peach- and plum-lit letters, so it’s more fun to untangle the film’s narcissistic contortions than look for anything as subtle as subtext. Refn’s first full-fledged horror movie holds up a mirror to a cult of beauty that stretches far beyond the fashion industry, then spends just as much time checking its own hair and makeup. It’s kind of wonderful.

The plot, insomuch as there is one, centers on a moony teenage runaway named Jesse (Elle Fanning, in a remarkable performance—watch her eyes during those languid, uncomfortably long takes). Fresh off the bus from Georgia, Jesse has no skills or special talents— having just turned 16, she hasn’t even

finished high school—but she’s stunningly pretty, and she knows her face and body are marketable commodities.

When we first meet her, she’s arranged in a pool of cherry-red blood that drips from her slashed throat as a sinister-looking young man snaps photo after photo. The strobes and clicks evoke a film noir crime scene, but this is simply a photo shoot meant to showcase Jesse’s beauty and the young man’s photography skills. Crime scene, fashion shoot—Refn’s movie imagines them as the same thing, even as it revels in their color and textures.

Yes, most of the movie is that obvious.

Inexperienced as she is, Jesse’s combination of effortless beauty and ephemeral innocence make her L.A.’s rising It Girl. This puts her in the crosshairs of frenemies Sarah (Abbey Lee) and Gigi (Bella Heathcote), a pair of mean girls who have pupated in L.A.’s fashion industry and emerged as lovely monsters. When makeup artist Ruby (Jena Malone, professional scene-stealer) takes an interest in Jesse, her mentorship seems like a benediction to the girl, who otherwise must contend with predatory photographers, self-absorbed stylists, and the sleazeball manager of the seedy motel she calls home. (Imagine a crack house run

A&E

by Blanche Devereaux, and you’ll get a sense of the motel’s design scheme.)

Given the way Ruby eyes Jesse on their first meeting, I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that Ruby has an agenda of her own. “Are you food, or are you sex?” she asks the young model in an early scene. It’s a question about lipstick, but it’s a pretty literal summary of the film’s overarching theme.

Most of the bloodshed is reserved for the giallo-tinged excesses of its final half hour, but The Neon Demon is a horror movie nonetheless. Jesse moves through a world of monsters.

When she’s not dealing with a cougar infestation in her motel room or keeping a wary eye out for the boorish motel manager played by Keanu Reeves, she must contend with her trio of fiendish peers—one woman is a veritable Frankenstein’s creature of nips, tucks, and other surgical alterations, while another sucks at wounds like the best of Dracula’s brides and yet another likes to get it on with corpses.

It would be ridiculous (okay, more ridiculous) if it weren’t so archly funny.

Whether Refn is attacking our tendency to objectify beautiful women or indulging in it is up for debate, but I’m inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt on this one. The film’s climax is so ludicrously gruesome and over-the-top that it affirms earlier hints that The Neon Demon is really a dark comedy; its single act of relatable, real-world sexual violence, on the other hand, plays out entirely offscreen, and is both profoundly frightening and utterly horrific.

This is a film aimed squarely at the midnight movie crowd, and mainstream audiences won’t have much patience for its sleepy pace and dream-logic indulgences. The faint of heart and weak of stomach should also steer clear—the necrophilia scene you’ve probably heard about is even grosser than you might imagine, and the movie ends with a glorious gross-out that could be the summer’s most effective appetite suppressant.

So proceed with caution, but lord, it’s pretty. Whatever else it might be, The Neon Demon is a gory, glittery confection—and really, those two adjectives tell you everything you need to know. ◆ June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 19

CALENDAR MUSIC

Thursday, June 30 MY BROTHER’S KEEPER WITH KIRK FLETA • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-a-week lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE BARK • Scruffy City Hall • 6PM • Bark is a side project of the Tim Lee 3, featuring Tim and Susan Lee on mostly bass-and-drums arrangements, embellished with some economical guitar lines—imagine Joy Division playing White Stripes songs. • FREE PIPER MONTANA SMITH • Regal Cinemas Pinnacle Stadium 18 in Turkey Creek • 6:30PM • Part of the Sounds of Summer concert series. • FREE BLUE LINE BLUES • Market Square • 7PM • There is a thin line between law enforcement and music when Blue Line Blues gets together to perform down-home blues and bluegrass tunes. • FREE THE MIDNIGHT RUN BLUEGRASS BAND • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria (Maryville) • 8PM AUSTIN LUCAS WITH MATT WOODS • Open Chord Brewhouse and Stage • 8PM MATT HICKEY • Wild Wing Cafe • 8:30PM • FREE FRONT COUNTRY • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 10PM CULTURE VULTURE WITH PACE HOUSE • Preservation Pub • 10PM PSYCHIC BAOS WITH THE CANCELLED AND CRISWELL COLLECTIVE • Pilot Light • 10PM • 18 and up. • $5 Friday, July 1 AUSTIN LUCAS • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-a-week lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE MISS NIKKI • The Alley • 7PM 3 MILE SMILE • Jimmy’s Place • 7PM • FREE FROG AND TOAD’S DIXIE QUARTET • The Crown and Goose • 8PM • Live jazz featuring a mix of original music, early jazz and more. • FREE THE EAST WIND BAND • Open Chord Brewhouse and Stage • 8PM • Classic disco and funk tunes. All ages. • FREE THE MATT HICKEY BAND • Two Doors Down • 9PM VIETJAM • Scruffy City Hall • 9PM THE LAWSUITS • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 10PM THE J. ERIC BAND • Wild Wing Cafe • 10PM • FREE THE PARTIALS • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up.

HURRICANE RIDGE • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 3PM • FREE FRESH FROM THE GRAVE! • Karns Community Center • 6PM • Featuring music by A March Through May, My Crimson Wish, We Were Myth, Tides of Treason, Pistol Whip Badgers, Oceans of Apathy, Inquiry with G.O.D. All ages. • $5 OCEAN STARR CLINE • Sugar Mama’s Bakery • 7:30PM THE JAYSTORM PROJECT • Brackins Blues Club (Maryville) • 9PM FIRESIDE COLLECTIVE • Boyd’s Jig and Reel • 10PM • FREE NOTS WITH THE BLAINE BAND AND WYLD STALLYNS • Pilot Light • 11PM • Memphis garage punk band NOTS returns to Knoxville with support from newly reunited locals Wyld Stallyns and Blaine Band, who plays your best friends’ best bands’ best songs badly. 18 and up. • $6 Saturday, July 2 CHRIS LONG WITH THE CLASSIC Q BAND • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-a-week lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and 20

KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE BENDER BASS AND COMPANY • Jimmy’s Place • 4PM • FREE SEVEN BRIDGES: THE ULTIMATE EAGLES TRIBUTE • The Shed at Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson (Maryville) • 6PM • $10 RICKY MITCHELL • Last Days of Autumn Brewery • 7PM LOCUST HONEY • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 7PM • As Locust Honey, Chloe Edmonstone and Meredith Watson bring their experience in Old-Time, Bluegrass, and Pre-War Blues to both their original material and the traditional songs and tunes of the American Southeast. • FREE LACEY CAROLINE • Preservation Pub • 8PM • 21 and up. • FREE AESOP ROCK WITH ROB SONIC AND DJ ZONE • The International • 9PM • 18 and up. • $18-$20 • See Music story on page 18.

CYPHER: A HIP-HOP SHOW • The Birdhouse • 9PM • Open mic for the first half of the night, then two featured artists to close out the night. 18 and up.

MIDDLEFINGER • Two Doors Down (Maryville) • 9PM JOHN PAUL KEITH • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 10PM • John Paul Keith, the brilliant singer-songwriter and blistering guitarist who exploded out of a self-imposed musical exile in Memphis with 2009’s critically acclaimed Spills and Thrills and 2011’s The Man That Time Forgot, returns with Memphis Circa 3AM — his most accomplished and moving collection of songs yet. Less a tribute to the spirit, soul and sound of the city than the living, crackling embodiment of it, Memphis Circa 3AM finds Keith reaching the songwriting depths and musical heights that his previous two releases foreshadowed. • FREE DJ STAN DUH MAN • Wild Wing Cafe • 10PM • FREE BATH SALT ZOMBIES • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up.

• $5 KATY FREE WITH HAROLD NAGGE • Sugar Mama’s Bakery • 8PM PROJECT WOLFPACK • Quaker Steak and Lube • 8PM • FREE NICK LUTSKO AND THE PUPPET PEOPLE WITH NEW RADIO DIALECT • Scruffy City Hall • 9PM THE TOMMIE JOHN BAND • Brackins Blues Club (Maryville) • 9PM NIHILIST CHEERLEADER • Pilot Light • 10PM • 18 and up. • $5 DEVAN JONES AND THE UPTOWN STOMP • Boyd’s Jig and Reel • 10PM • FREE Sunday, July 3 SHIFFLETT’S JAZZ BENEDICT • The Bistro at the Bijou • 12PM • Live jazz. • FREE SUNDAY JAZZ BRUNCH • Downtown Grill and Brewery • 12:45PM • Knoxville’s coolest jazz artists perform every Sunday. • FREE JAYSTORM • Jimmy’s Place • 7PM • FREE MISTY MOUNTAIN STRING BAND • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 8PM • Drawing influence from old-time music, Americana, bluegrass, and songs of labor and protest, Misty Mountain String Band doesn’t stray far from their upbringings in Kentucky and West Virginia.

YUNG JOC WITH BANDZ, KLEAN KEEM, AND CM3 • NV Nightclub • 8PM • Yung Joc’s 2006 debut album New Joc City entered at #1 on both the Billboard Top R&B/Hip Albums and Top Rap Albums charts and #3 on the Billboard 200 chart. New Joc City featured the multi-platinum selling, #1 Billboard Hot Rap Track “It’s Going Down,” which won a BET Award for Hip-Hop Track of the Year and garnered several nominations including the Grammy Awards, American Music Awards, MTV Video

Music Awards (Best Rap Video) and more. • $15-$25 CUMBERLAND STATION • Preservation Pub • 10PM WIZARD RIFLE • Pilot Light • 9:30PM • Drawing from the sounds of Lightning Bolt, Karp, Sonic Youth, Black Sabbath and High on Fire, Wizard Rifle cannot sit still sonically for more than two seconds. Prepare thineself …

• $8 Monday, July 4 MIGHTY MUSICAL MONDAY • Tennessee Theatre • 12PM • Wurlitzer meister Bill Snyder is joined by a special guest on the first Monday of each month for a music showcase inside Knoxville’s historic Tennessee Theatre. • FREE JIMMY AND THE JAWBONES WITH LAMAY AND REESE • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-a-week lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE

VIENNA COFFEE HOUSE JAZZ TRIO • Vienna Coffee House (Maryville) • 5PM • Every Monday. Visit viennacoffeehouse.net. • FREE TONY FURTADO • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 7PM • Very few musicians of any stripe so personify a musical genre as completely as Tony Furtado embodies Americana roots music. Tony is an evocative and soulful singer, a wide-ranging songwriter and a virtuoso multi-instrumentalist adept on banjo, cello-banjo, slide guitar and baritone ukulele who mixes and matches sounds and styles with the flair of a master chef. • FREE BRANDON HARMON AND THE HALFWAY HEARTS • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up. • $3 Tuesday, July 5 THE PINE BOX BOYS WITH HALEY GREENE • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-a-week lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and

A1 LAB ARTS A.ONE/PRO/FORM/ARTS/FEST Center for Creative Minds (23 Emory Place) • July 1-30 • a1labarts.org

A1 Lab Arts kicks off a month-long festival of video, film, and performance art with a First Friday preview of goodies to come. The A.One/Pro/Form/Arts/Fest will “celebrate the history of media and art” with showings of “bad” student art films, “funky documentaries,” surreal Betty Boop cartoons, early sitcoms first screened in movie theaters (like the Three Stooges), performance art, and the X-rated films of the edgy British director Ken Russell. Among the highlights of the schedule is Russell’s The Devils, on July 16, featuring sexuality among nuns, which Warner Bros. refused to release uncut in the U.S., and a July 22 screening and discussion of the evolution of experimental 2D animation, using techniques from painting directly on film to moving sand around light screens.

Friday’s free opening event, 7-8:30 p.m., pairs refreshments with a multimedia projection of excerpts from the month’s events, allowing you to target what you want to revisit in its full glory later. Those screenings are mostly on Fridays and Saturdays, starting at 8 p.m., and cost $5 for folks who aren’t members of A1, a nonprofit that supports new art forms and creative artists. The door price includes popcorn and peanuts; you can bring your own beer. All events are at the Center for Creative Minds at 23 Emory Place. Visit the A1 website for more info. (S. Heather Duncan)

22

Spotlight: The Honeycutters

24

Spotlight: Tour de Rocky Top

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE TONY FURTADO • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 7PM • Very few musicians of any stripe so personify a musical genre as completely as Tony Furtado embodies Americana roots music. Tony is an evocative and soulful singer, a wide-ranging songwriter and a virtuoso multi-instrumentalist adept on banjo, cello-banjo, slide guitar and baritone ukulele who mixes and matches sounds and styles with the flair of a master chef. • FREE MARBLE CITY 5 • Market Square • 8PM • Live jazz every Tuesday from May 3-Aug. 30. • FREE ROB NANCE AND THE LOST SOULS • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 10PM • Rob Nance began his journey into music and songwriting growing up in North Carolina firmly rooted in the musical traditions of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Since his debut, Lost Souls and Locked Doors, his music has evolved into a richer, more focused sound that can at times sweep from introspective folk ballad to experimental instrumental within the same set. Now with Signal Fires, Nance takes a major step forward.

THE PINE BOX BOYS • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up.

• $3 Wednesday, July 6 MILE TWELVE WITH HUSKY BURNETTE • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-a-week lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE FROG AND TOAD’S DIXIE QUARTET • The Crown and Goose •

6:30PM • Live jazz featuring a mix of original music, early jazz and more. • FREE TENNESSEE SHINES: THE HONEYCUTTERS • Boyd’s Jig and Reel • 7PM • $10 • See Spotlight on page 22.

THE WILL OVERMAN BAND • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 7PM • The music of Will Overman Band, call it “amped-up folk rock”, is as energetic as it is passionate.

The Charlottesville, Va based band has a unique sound that can be both haunting and evocative, yet sincere and sweet. • FREE JOE THE SHOW • Wild Wing Cafe • 8:30PM • FREE ANDREW LEAHEY AND THE HOMESTEAD • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up. • $3 Thursday, July 7 THE WILL OVERMAN BAND WITH RYAN SOBB • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-aweek lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE MONTANA SKIES • Scruffy City Hall • 6PM • Called everything from chamber rock to psychedelic stringsrest assured, this ain’t your granny’s chamber music.

LEGACY • The Shed at Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson (Maryville) • 6PM • FREE THE BLUE EYED BETTYS • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 7PM • With Daniel Emond on banjo, Sarah Hund on fiddle, and Ben Mackel on guitar, The Blue Eyed Bettys delight with their folky-bluegrass sound. But what always seems to grab audiences immediately are their powerful vocals in three part harmony. • FREE

CALENDAR

THE BACKSEAT DELILAHS • Brackins Blues Club (Maryville) • 8PM KIMBER CLEVELAND • Wild Wing Cafe • 8:30PM • FREE JIMMY AND THE JAWBONES WITH THE WILL OVERMAN BAND • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up. • $3 Friday, July 8 JOE’S TRUCK STOP WITH JAY CLARK AND THE TENNESSEE BEAVERS • WDVX • 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-a-week lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE JEREMY NAIL • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 7PM • FREE BRANDON FULSON • Jimmy’s Place • 7PM • FREE ERIC CALDWELL • Sugar Mama’s Bakery • 7:30PM FROG AND TOAD’S DIXIE QUARTET • The Crown and Goose • 8PM • Live jazz featuring a mix of original music, early jazz and more. • FREE KITTY WAMPUS • Buckethead Tavern • 8PM • Classic rock, blues, and R&B. BONE THUGS-N-HARMONY • The International • 9PM • Bone Thugs-n-Harmony is an American hip hop group from the Glenville section of Cleveland, Ohio. They are best known for their fast-paced rapping style and harmonizing vocals. In 1997, the group was awarded the Grammy Award for Best Rap Performance with their song “Tha Crossroads”. Since its conception in the early 1990s the group has been honored with numerous other awards. Bone Thugs are also the only artist to do acts with Eazy-E, 2Pac, Notorious B.I.G., and Big Pun. Bone

Thugs-N-Harmony are also recognized as one of the most successful hip-hop groups selling 50 million records. 18 and up. • $25-$75 PARMALEE • Cotton Eyed Joe • 9PM • 2016 ACM “New Vocal Duo/ Group of the Year” nominee Parmalee is one of Country music’s most successful new acts. • $10 AARON KIRBY AND SOUTHERN REVELATION • Two Doors Down (Maryville) • 9PM THE BURNIN’ HERMANS • Scruffy City Hall • 9PM SOULFINGER • Brackins Blues Club (Maryville) • 9PM • Funky big-band soul and R&B. MUX MOOL WITH FRAMEWORKS AND FAST NASTY • The Concourse • 10PM • Mux Mool’s homespun electro hip-hop is the product of an introverted mind, an extroverted imagination, and a bottomless cultural appetite. 18 and up. • $10-$15 TIME SAWYER • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 10PM • Time Sawyer is interested in “real people and real songs” and that’s just what the listener finds in their music – a sense of realness. Time Sawyer blends a grassroots feel with heart-felt lyrics to put on a high-energy, entertaining show.

DAVE LANDEO AND THE SOUL BEATS • Wild Wing Cafe • 10PM • FREE THE DEAD RINGERS • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up.

• $5 PANDAS AND PEOPLE WITH THE COPPER CHILDREN • Boyd’s Jig and Reel • 10PM • FREE Saturday, July 9 CUMBERLAND RIVER WITH JEREMY PINNELL • WDVX •

Listen to WUTK for your chance to be one of our 50 final qualifiers to win a trip to Floyd Fest 16!

Be the correct caller when we ask for listeners to call in. Follow WUTK on Facebook and Twitter!

A registration box will be located at Blackhorse Pub and Brewery at 4429 Kingston Pike through July 6. We will draw the winner’s name live on location Friday, July 8 at Blackhorse.

From your festival hookup in Knoxville...

www.TennesseeTheatre.com Streaming 24.7.365 at WUTKRADIO.COM June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 21

CALENDAR 12PM • Part of WDVX’s Blue Plate Special, a six-days-aweek lunchtime concert series featuring local, regional, and national Americana, folk, pop, rock, and everything else. • FREE THE HIT MEN • Concord Park • 6PM • Part of Knox County’s Second Saturday Concerts series at the Cover at Concord Park. • FREE LEON RUSSELL • The Shed at Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson ( Maryville) • 6PM • Leon Russell is a music legend and perhaps the most accomplished and versatile musician in the history of rock ‘n roll. In his distinguished and unique 50 year career, he has played on, arranged, written and/or produced some of the best records in popular music.. • $20 THE BLUEGRASS DRIFTERS • Sugarlands Distilling Co. (Gatlinburg) • 7PM • FREE WITCHHELM WITH MOUNTAIN KING, SPLIT TUSK, SWALLOW THE SKY, AND RAT PUNCH • The Bowery • 7PM • Witchhelm, a heavy doom band from Ohio, headlines with support from Knoxville’s heavy hitters. 18 and up. • $10

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

HANDSOME AND THE HUMBLES • Jimmy’s Place • 7PM • FREE DAVID BENEDICT AND MICHAEL MOORE • Vienna Coffee House (Maryville) • 7PM • This duo has developed a distinctive style of original and traditional acoustic instrumental and vocal music–equally pulling from the genres of jazz, old-time, bluegrass, classical, and popular music. Now at the cusp of their debut duo album, Each by Side, David and Michael offer a compelling, entertaining, and unique display of the musical possibilities in the mandolin and guitar idiom. • FREE PALE ROOT • Sugar Mama’s Bakery • 8PM MOJO: FLOW • Two Doors Down (Maryville) • 9PM THE JONNY MONSTER BAND • Brackins Blues Club (Maryville) • 9PM DIXIEGHOST • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 10PM THE POP ROX • Wild Wing Cafe • 10PM • FREE CHARGE THE ATLANTIC WITH OPPOSITE BOX • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up. • $5

12PM • Live jazz. • FREE SUNDAY JAZZ BRUNCH • Downtown Grill and Brewery • 12:45PM • Knoxville’s coolest jazz artists perform every Sunday. • FREE RICKY MITCHELL • Sugar Mama’s Bakery • 6PM • FREE BARLEY’S TAPROOM AND PIZZERIA • 8PM • MAGNOLIA MOTEL WITH ROYAL BUZZ AND SAVANTS OF SOUL • Preservation Pub • 10PM • 21 and up. • $3

OPEN MIC AND SONGWRITER NIGHTS

Thursday, June 30 VIENNA COFFEE HOUSE OPEN MIC NIGHT • Vienna Coffee House (Maryville) • 7PM • Visit viennacoffeehouse.net. • FREE Tuesday, July 5 PRESERVATION PUB SINGER/SONGWRITER NIGHT • Preservation Pub • 7PM OLD-TIME JAM SESSION • Boyd’s Jig and Reel • 7:15PM • Hosted by Sarah Pickle. • FREE OPEN CHORD SONGWRITERS NIGHT • Open Chord Brewhouse and Stage • 7PM • Hosted by Karen E. Reynolds. • FREE

Sunday, July 10 SHIFFLETT’S JAZZ BENEDICT • The Bistro at the Bijou •

Photo by Leah Beilhart

THE HONEYCUTTERS Tennessee Shines at Boyd’s Jig and Reel (101 S. Central St.) • Wednesday, July 6 • 7 p.m. • $10 • wdvx.com

The Honeycutters, from Asheville, have been working the Southeast roots-music circuit for nearly a decade. Up until last year’s Me Oh My, they were a slightly above-average bar band. On Me Oh My, though, the band’s country-folk classicism came into focus—singer/songwriter/guitarist Amanda Anne Platt, the Honeycutters’ creative engine, turned out a remarkable batch of bittersweet, world-weary songs about love, loss, leaving, and lessons learned. The band behind her also refined its sound, erasing the boundaries between old-time music, ’70s folk, and old-fashioned honky-tonk and coming up with something that’s graceful, contemporary, and traditional.

Platt and company keep the momentum going on On the Ropes, their fourth album, released in April on hometown label Organic Records. On the Ropes expands on its predecessor’s accomplishments. There are new flourishes of classic and Southern rock (check out the “Sultans of Swing” guitar licks on “Back Row”), and Platt’s new confidence as a singer and songwriter gives the whole thing a swagger that the Honeycutters have never quite shown before. (Matthew Everett)

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

Wednesday, July 6 TIME WARP TEA ROOM OLD-TIME JAM • Time Warp Tea Room • 7PM • Regular speed old-time/fiddle jam every Wednesday. All instruments and skill levels welcome.

BRACKINS BLUES JAM • Brackins Blues Club ( Maryville) • 9PM • A weekly open session hosted by Tommie John. • FREE ACOUSTIC OPEN MIC NIGHT • Asia Cafe West • 7PM • Bring an acoustic guitar and a few songs every Wednesday.

Sign-up sheet available 30 minutes prior to 7 p.m. start.

Three songs or 10 minutes per performer. • FREE OPEN CHORD OPEN MIC NIGHT • Open Chord Brewhouse and Stage • 8PM • It’s time once again for open mic night.

This time we’re welcoming both solo performers and bands to perform. Come 30 minutes early to sign up for a 15-minute slot. • FREE Thursday, July 7 VIENNA COFFEE HOUSE OPEN MIC NIGHT • Vienna Coffee House (Maryville) • 7PM • Visit viennacoffeehouse.net. • FREE IRISH MUSIC SESSION • Boyd’s Jig and Reel • 7:15PM • Held on the first and third Thursdays of each month. • FREE BREWHOUSE BLUES JAM • Open Chord Brewhouse and Stage • 8PM • Join Robert Higginbotham & the Smoking Section at the Open Chord for the Brewhouse Blues Jam. Bring your instrument, sign up, and join the jammers. We supply drums and a full backline of amps. Sign-ups begin at 7 p.m. before the show. Held the first Thursday of every month.

Friday, July 8 TIME WARP TEA ROOM OPEN SONGWRITER NIGHT • Time Warp Tea Room • 7PM • Songwriter Night at Time Warp Tea Room runs on the second and fourth Friday of every month. Show up around 7 p.m. with your instrument in tow and sign up to share a couple of original songs with a community of friends down in Happy Holler. • FREE Saturday, July 9 SCRUFFY CITY DRUM CIRCLE • Market Square • 7PM • Join us for a night of drumming and dancing at Krutch Park near Market Square in downtown Knoxville. Everyone is

welcome. You can drop off your drums at the park between 6 and 7 p.m. and we’ll keep an eye on them while you park. We’ll also have some spare percussion instruments on hand for lending. Bring a chair and a friend. • FREE Sunday, July 10 SING OUT KNOXVILLE • Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church • 7PM • A folk singing circle open to everyone. • FREE

DJ AND DANCE NIGHTS

Friday, July 1 GLOWRAGE PAINT PARTY • NV Nightclub • 9PM • Experience this full production, award winning, international touring dance party in Knoxville for an experience like no other—amazing LED visuals, full intelligent lighting, and gallons of washable glow paint.

Featuring music by Stoags, Lvnchbox, Rasch, and more.

Sunday, July 3 LAYOVER SUNDAY BRUNCH • The Concourse • 12PM • Enjoy good eats, refreshing libations, and the most appropriate afternoon tunage in the company of this city’s most dedicated loafers. We’ll be serving our normal brunch in all it’s glory, courtesy of Localmotive. Musical accompaniment by the likes of Slow Nasty, Psychonaut, and a rotating list of special guests. All ages. • FREE HOUSE IN TYSON PARK • Tyson Park • 10AM • This event has been created to celebrate the holiday weekend with friends, family, and the diverse sounds of underground dance music provided by Knoxville’s finest original house music DJs and producers. • FREE • See Program Notes on page 16.

SUNDAY, JULY 10 Layover Sunday Brunch • The Concourse • 12PM • Enjoy good eats, refreshing libations, and the most appropriate afternoon tunage in the company of this city’s most dedicated loafers. We’ll be serving our normal brunch in all it’s glory, courtesy of Localmotive. Musical accompaniment by the likes of Slow Nasty, Psychonaut, and a rotating list of special guests. All ages. • FREE

CLASSICAL MUSIC

Monday, July 4 OAK RIDGE COMMUNITY BAND INDEPENDENCE DAY CONCERT • Alvin K. Bissell Park • 7:30PM • Free patriotic music to celebrate July 4. • FREE KSO INDEPENDENCE DAY CONCERT • World’s Fair Park • 8PM • Enjoy patriotic tunes such as the Star Spangled Banner, Armed Forces Salute and recognizable tunes including “Rocky Top,” “America the Beautiful,” Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, and music from Olympic fanfares in honor of the summer Olympics. Newly named KSO Music Director Aram Demirjian will conduct the Orchestra in this patriotic performance. • FREE

THEATER AND DANCE

Friday, July 8 OAK RIDGE PLAYHOUSE: ‘FIDDLER ON THE ROOF’ • Oak Ridge Playhouse • 8PM • Tevye, an affable dairyman, must cope

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

with the strong wills of his three eldest daughters - each of whom wish to defy tradition and marry for love – while also attempting to maintain his family’s culture and faith as outside influences of Tsarist Russia encroach upon his little village. July 8-24. Visit orplayhouse.com.

Saturday, July 9 OAK RIDGE PLAYHOUSE: ‘FIDDLER ON THE ROOF’ • Oak Ridge Playhouse • 8PM • July 8-24. Visit orplayhouse.com.

Sunday, July 10 OAK RIDGE PLAYHOUSE: ‘FIDDLER ON THE ROOF’ • Oak Ridge Playhouse • 2PM • July 8-24. Visit orplayhouse.com.

COMEDY AND SPOKEN WORD

Friday, July 1 FIRST FRIDAY COMEDY • Saw Works Brewing Company • 7PM • A monthly showcase featuring local and touring stand-ups comics. • FREE OOH OOH REVUE: ‘IT’S SHOWTIME!’ • Cocoa Moon • 10PM • Knoxville’s exciting monthly fun and sexy variety show, with classy cabaret, song, dance, comedy and bedazzling burlesque every First Friday at Cocoa Moon. Visit oohoohrevue.com. 18 and up. • $10 Sunday, July 3 UPSTAIRS UNDERGROUND COMEDY • Preservation Pub • 8PM • A weekly comedy open mic.

Monday, July 4 QED COMEDY LABORATORY • Pilot Light • 7:30PM • QED ComedyLaboratory is a weekly show with different theme every week that combines stand-up, improv, sketch, music and other types of performance and features some of the funniest people in Knoxville and parts unknown. Free, but donations are accepted.• FREE Tuesday, July 5 EINSTEIN SIMPLIFIED • Scruffy City Hall • 8PM • Einstein Simplified Comedy performs live comedy improv at Scruffy City Hall. It’s just like Whose Line Is It Anyway, but you get to make the suggestions. Show starts at 8:15, get there early for the best seats. No cover. • FREE OPEN MIC STAND-UP COMEDY • Longbranch Saloon • 8PM • Doors open at 8:30, first comic at 9. No cover charge, all are welcome. Aspiring or experienced comics interested in joining in the fun email us at long branch.info@gmail. com to learn more, or simply come to the show a few minutes early. • FREE CASUAL COMEDY • Casual Pint (Hardin Valley) • 7PM • A monthly comedy showcase at Casual Pint-Hardin Valley featuring a mixture of local and touring comedians.

Sunday, July 10 UPSTAIRS UNDERGROUND COMEDY • Preservation Pub • 8PM • A weekly comedy open mic.

FESTIVALS

Thursday, June 30

CALENDAR

NEW HARVEST PARK FARMERS MARKET BLUEBERRY FESTIVAL • New Harvest Park • 3PM • In addition to local blueberries and blueberry plants for sale, other activities will includes special treats for kids, including a Cruze Farm ice cream eating contest at 4:30 p.m.; a blueberry smoothie recipe and food demonstration by the UT-Ag Extension Office; an herbal tea demonstration with Kathy from Erin’s Meadow Herb Farm at 3:30 p.m. ; a blueberry dessert contest; and a raising blueberries Q & A with the UT-Ag Extension Office. • FREE Saturday, July 2 RED, WHITE, AND BREW PARTY • Saw Works Brewing Company • 5PM • We are celebrating the 4th of July with BBQ pork, beer, and awesome music. Nathan McDowell and Matt Foster will be bringing the tunes, Park City Cigar will be selling BBQ pork baked potatoes, and Saw Works will have the beer. Come on down, and wear your red, white and blue for $3 pints.

Monday, July 4 FESTIVAL ON THE 4TH • World’s Fair Park • 4PM • The City’s Festival on the Fourth celebration in World’s Fair Park will feature Knoxville’s largest fireworks celebration, and in honor of the City’s 225th anniversary, the base of the Sunsphere will be illuminated with red, white and blue lights. The Fourth of July festivities begin at 4 p.m., rain or shine. The highlight of the evening will begin at 8 p.m. with the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra’s free Pilot Flying J Independence Day Concert. As part of the 225th anniversary celebration, the annual fireworks show will be louder, bigger and more colorful. The 15-minute show

will begin at 9:35 p.m. • FREE MABRY-HAZEN HOUSE FOURTH OF JULY CELEBRATION • Mabry-Hazen House • 6PM • On historic Mabry’s Hill attendees will enjoy a great view of the July 4 fireworks show, good food, and live music by the Lost Fiddle String Band. Tickets may be purchased in advance by visiting www.mabryhazen.com or call 865-522-8661 for more information. The event will take place rain or shine.

Tickets are non-refundable. • $60

FILM SCREENINGS

Monday, July 4 THE BIRDHOUSE WALK-IN THEATER • The Birdhouse • 8:15PM • A weekly free movie screening. • FREE MONDAY MOVIE MADNESS • Scruffy City Hall • 9PM • Campy horror, thrillers, and more every week. Plus beer! • FREE Tuesday, July 5 TWIN PEAKS VIEWING PARTY • The Birdhouse • 7PM • Bi-weekly viewing parties for every single episode of the cult TV series. Attendees encouraged to dress as their favorite characters. Trivia, Twin Peaks-themed giveaways, donuts and coffee, plus some surprises. Trivia begins at 7:00pm with viewing to follow at 8:00pm. • FREE

SPORTS AND

June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 23

CALENDAR RECREATION

Thursday, June 30 CYCOLOGY BICYCLES THURSDAY MORNING RIDE • Cycology Bicycles • 10AM • Join Cycology Bicycles every Thursday morning for a road ride with two group options. cycologybicycles.com. • FREE CLIMBING AT IJAMS CRAG • Ijams Nature Center • 5PM • Gear will be included (we provide helmet, harness, rope).

Please wear appropriate shoes, comfortable stretchy climbing apparel and bring water. Pre-registration is advised. You can register online or by calling 865-673-4687. riversportsoutfitters.com/events/. • $10 BILLY LUSH BOARD SHOP SUP AND SUDS • Billy Lush Board Shop • 5:30PM • Join us for your choice of a group paddle or SUP yoga class followed by cold beer from our taps at the shop. • $19-$25 NORTH KNOXVILLE BEER RUNNERS • Central Flats and Taps

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

• 6PM • Meet us at Central Flats and Taps every Thursday night for a fun and easy run leading us right through Saw Works for a midway beer. • FREE FLEET FEET GROUP RUN/WALK • Fleet Feet Sports Knoxville • 6PM • Join us every Thursday night at our store for a fun group run/walk. All levels welcome. fleetfeetknoxville. com. • FREE BEARDEN BIKE AND TRAIL LAPS ON CHEROKEE BOULEVARD • Bearden Bike and Trail • 6PM • Join us every Thursday evening at 6 p.m. to ride laps on Cherokee Boulevard.

Pace is at 14-18 mph - divides into groups. Leaves the store promptly at 6:30 p.m. Visit beardenbikeandtrail.com.

• $0 FOUNTAIN CITY PEDALER THIRSTY THURSDAY ROAD RIDE • Fountain City Pedaler • 6PM • This no-drop Thursday evening ride utilizes a 25-mile loop on scenic North Knoxville back roads and rolls east towards House Mountain. Ride starts at 6 p.m. from the shop. Visit facebook.com/Fountain-City-Pedaler-Bike-Shop. • FREE

TOUR DE ROCKY TOP Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria (200 E. Jackson Ave.) • Saturday, July 2 • 7:30 a.m. • $45-$60 • racedayevents.net/events/tour-de-rocky-top

If you’re looking to test your pedal-pushing prowess and physical endurance against the heat of a midsummer day, here’s your chance. Tour de Rocky Top returns for its ninth installment this weekend, just as the Tour de France kicks off. The schedule includes a platter of long-distance, fully supported road-bike rides stretching from Knoxville to Townsend and back again. The power-pedal group ride includes 31-, 50-, 62-, 85-, and 100-mile loop options, with a host of prizes (and rest areas along the way) to get folks motivated. Everyone who completes the 100-mile trek earns a finisher’s medal, and the first two cyclists to make it up world-famous Butterfly Gap—an intense 2.8-mile climb with an average 9 percent grade—will be crowned King and Queen of the Mountain. There’s also Barley’s pizza, beer, shot-glass swag and shirts being thrown around. If you have what it takes to hang, don’t miss out. Organizers are expecting about 400 cyclists to make one or any of the treks. (Clay Duda)

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

CEDAR BLUFF CYCLES BEGINNER ROAD RIDE • Sequoyah Park • 6:20PM • Join us every Thursday evening at Sequoyah Park for a beginner’s no-drop ride. Riders can ride at their own pace on Cherokee Boulevard and do as many laps as they choose. Visit cedarbluffcycles.net. • FREE CEDAR BLUFF CYCLES THURSDAY NIGHT RIDE • Cedar Bluff Cycles • 6:20PM • This is a great opportunity for less experienced riders to push their limits a bit. Visit cedarbluffcycles.net. • FREE SMOKIES CENTURY CHALLENGE HIKE: LITTLE BOTTOMS • Little River Trading Co. (Maryville) • 9AM • We’ll meet at the shop at 9 am and then carpool to the trailhead for the hike. Starting out of Abrams Creek Campground, this area of the Park see little use. This is an out and back hike, approximately 6.4 miles. • FREE Friday, July 1 RIVER SPORTS FRIDAY NIGHT GREENWAY RUN • River Sports Outfitters • 6PM • Greenway run from the store every Friday evening from 6-7:30 pm. Work up a thirst then join us for $2 pints in the store afterwards. riversportsoutfitters.com. • FREE RCS HIKING CLUB: MADDRON BALD TRAIL • 9AM • We’ll try to avoid the holiday traffic by hiking 7.2 moderate/ strenuous miles up Maddron Bald Trail to the Albright Grove Loop. We’ll see many giant poplars and silver bell trees. Bring water, lunch, snacks. For more info, contact Kate 865-573-9258 or Ray 865-314-2279. • FREE FRIDAY NIGHT MAGIC • Sci-Fi City • 6PM • Standard constructed Friday night Magic—bring out your Standard Legal deck and play for supremacy. Prize support is increased based on participation and can increase up to $200. All prizes are paid in store credit.

Saturday, July 2 SUP 101 • Outdoor Knoxville Adventure Center • 10AM • We cover all the basics of standup paddleboarding in this introductory class. No experience required. • $45 TOUR DE ROCKY TOP • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 7:30AM • $45-$60 • See Spotlight on page 24.

SECRET CITY TRIATHLON • Oak Ridge • 7:30AM • Come enjoy a multi-sport event in Oak Ridge with the Secret City Triathlon. Race packet includes performance shirt, water bottle and goodies from local Oak Ridge businesses. Swim 500 meters, bike 15 Miles, and run 5K. • $50-$70 BIKE ZOO SATURDAY MORNING RIDE • The Bike Zoo • 9AM • Join us every Saturday for a three-hour ride of 50 miles or more, usually at a fast pace of 18-20 mph. Visit bikeszoo.com. • FREE SMOKY MOUNTAIN HIKING CLUB: APPALACHIAN TRAIL • Smoky Mountain Hiking Club • 8AM • From Stecoah Gap we will climb slightly and pass by the Brown Fork Trail Shelter and Cody Gap. We will follow the ridge line part of the way with occasional glimpses of Fontana Lake below. Hike: 7.6 miles with 1700 ft elevation gain, rated moderate. Meet at the south Maryville WalMart, Highway 411, near the gas station at 8:00 am. Leader: Tim Bigelow, bigelowt2@mindspring.com. • FREE RUNNER’S MARKET SATURDAY GROUP RUN • Runner’s Market • 9AM • Every first Saturday of the month at 9:00 am, join us for a relaxed-pace run of 3 to 5.5 miles or beyond along the Third Creek and Sequoyah Hills Greenways. Afterwards, enjoy coffee and refreshments provided by the gang at Runner’s Market. Visit runnersmarket.com. • FREE CATALYST ADAPTIVE CLIMB • River Sports Outfitters • 10AM • Join us the first Saturday of every month as we climb with Catalyst Sports. This event is for anyone with

physical disabilities. All ages are welcome to come and climb our rock wall. • $10 Sunday, July 3 FIREBALL MOONLITE CLASSIC 5K • University of Tennessee • 9PM • New for 2016 is the KTC Summer Series including the Pilot Fireball Moonlite Classic 5K, Shawns.com Carter Mill 10K Splash, and the Pigeon Forge Midnight 8K. Register using the bundled, discount pricing at ktc.org.

Run two of the three and volunteer for at least one to earn a special prize to be distributed at the Hal Canfield Milefest in September.

Monday, July 4 KTC GROUP RUN • Mellow Mushroom • 6PM • Join Knoxville Track Club every Monday evening for a group run starting at the Mellow Mushroom on the Cumberland Avenue strip on the University of Tennessee campus. Visit ktc.org. • FREE TVB MONDAY NIGHT ROAD RIDE • Tennessee Valley Bikes • 6PM • The soon to be famous Monday night road ride happens every Monday. We usually split into two groups according to speed. Both groups are no-drop groups. The faster group averages over 17mph and the B group averages around 14mph. • FREE BEARDEN BEER MARKET FUN RUN • Bearden Beer Market • 6:30PM • Come run with us. Every Monday year round we do a group fun run through the neighborhood. Open to all levels of walkers and runners. Everyone who participates earns $1 off their beer. Visit beardenbeermarket.com. • FREE FREEDOM RUN ONE-MILE AND TWO-MILE RACES • Farragut Town Hall • 9AM • Race in front of the Farragut Independence Day Parade this 4th of July at the first annual Freedom Run 1 Mile & 2 Mile. This flat and fast course is perfect for everyone from racers with their sights on setting the next state record to families out to enjoy the parade. The courses are USATF certified and eligible to set the next Tennessee State Record.

CLIMBING AT IJAMS CRAG • Ijams Nature Center • 5PM • Gear will be included (we provide helmet, harness, rope).

Please wear appropriate shoes, comfortable stretchy climbing apparel and bring water. Pre-registration is advised. You can register online or by calling 865-673-4687. riversportsoutfitters.com/events/. • $10 Tuesday, July 5 CYCOLOGY BICYCLES TUESDAY MORNING RIDE • Cycology Bicycles • 10:30AM • Join Cycology Bicycles every Tuesday morning at 10:30 am for a road ride with two group options. Weather permitting. Visit cycologybicycles.com. • FREE HARD KNOX TUESDAY FUN RUN • Hard Knox Pizzeria • 6:30PM • Join Hard Knox Pizzeria every Tuesday evening (rain or shine) for a 2-3 mile fun run. Burn calories.

Devour pizza. Quench thirst. Follow us on Facebook. • FREE CEDAR BLUFF CYCLES TUESDAY GREENWAY RIDE • Cedar Bluff Cycles • 6:30PM • Join us every Tuesday evening for a greenway ride at an intermediate pace of 14-15 mph.

Must have lights. Weather permitting. cedarbluffcycles. net. • FREE Wednesday, July 6 KTC GROUP RUN • Runner’s Market • 5:30PM • If you are visiting Knoxville, new to town, new to the club, or just looking to get more involved, this is the place to start. A festive and relaxed group get-together occurs every Wednesday afternoon at 5:30 pm at Runners Market. Visit ktc.org. • FREE FOUNTAIN CITY PEDALERS SHARPS RIDGE MOUNTAIN BIKE

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

RIDE • Fountain City Pedaler • 6PM • Join us every Wednesday evening for a mountain bike ride from the shop to Sharps Ridge. 6-10 mile ride with plenty of bail out points. Regroup as necessary. Lights required, call the shop if you need them. Visit fcpedaler.com. • FREE TVB EASY RIDER MOUNTAIN BIKE RIDE • Ijams Nature Center • 6PM • On Wednesday nights we hit the local trails for an easy-paced mountain bike ride. Riders of all skill levels are welcome. Check out our Facebook page or give us a call at 865-540-9979 for more info.

We meet near Mead’s Quarry. • FREE Thursday, July 7 CYCOLOGY BICYCLES THURSDAY MORNING RIDE • Cycology Bicycles • 10AM • Join Cycology Bicycles every Thursday morning for a road ride with two group options. A Group does a 2 to 3 hour ride at 20+ pace; B group does an intermediate ride at 15/18 mph average. Weather permitting. cycologybicycles.com. • FREE FLEET FEET GROUP RUN/WALK • Fleet Feet Sports Knoxville • 6PM • Join us every Thursday night at our store for a fun group run/walk. We have all levels come out, so no matter what your speed you’ll have someone to keep you company.

Our 30 - 60 minute route varies week by week in the various neighborhoods and greenways around the store, so be sure to show up on time so you can join up with the group. All levels welcome. fleetfeetknoxville.com. • FREE NORTH KNOXVILLE BEER RUNNERS • Central Flats and Taps • 6PM • Meet us at Central Flats and Taps every Thursday night for a fun and easy run leading us right through Saw Works for a midway beer. • FREE

CLIMBING AT IJAMS CRAG • Ijams Nature Center • 5PM • Come top rope with us at Ijams Crag. Thursday evenings.

Cost is $10 per person. Gear will be included (we provide helmet, harness, rope). Please wear appropriate shoes, comfortable stretchy climbing apparel and bring water.

Pre-registration is advised. You can register online or by calling 865-673-4687. riversportsoutfitters.com/events/. • $10 BILLY LUSH BOARD SHOP SUP AND SUDS • Billy Lush Board Shop • 5:30PM • Join us for your choice of a group paddle or SUP yoga class followed by cold beer from our taps at the shop. We will launch from the dock for a one-hour group paddle or yoga class then meet back in the shop for suds. • $19-$25 BEARDEN BIKE AND TRAIL LAPS ON CHEROKEE BOULEVARD • Bearden Bike and Trail • 6PM • Join us every Thursday evening at 6 p.m. to ride laps on Cherokee Boulevard.

Pace is at 14-18 mph - divides into groups. Leaves the store promptly at 6:30 p.m. Visit beardenbikeandtrail.com.

• FREE FOUNTAIN CITY PEDALER THIRSTY THURSDAY ROAD RIDE • Fountain City Pedaler • 6PM • This no-drop Thursday evening ride utilizes a 25-mile loop on scenic North Knoxville back roads and rolls east towards House Mountain. Visit facebook.com/Fountain-City-PedalerBike-Shop. • FREE CEDAR BLUFF CYCLES THURSDAY NIGHT RIDE • Cedar Bluff Cycles • 6:20PM • This is a great opportunity for less experienced riders to push their limits a bit. Visit cedarbluffcycles.net. • FREE CEDAR BLUFF CYCLES BEGINNER ROAD RIDE • Sequoyah Park

CALENDAR

• 6:20PM • Join us every Thursday evening at Sequoyah Park for a beginner’s no-drop ride. Riders can ride at their own pace on Cherokee Boulevard and do as many laps as they choose. Visit cedarbluffcycles.net. • FREE

JULY 1-30: A.One/Pro/Form/Arts/Fest, a month-long film, video, and performance art festival. An opening reception and preview will be held on Friday, July 1, from 7-8:30 p.m. See Spotlight on page 20.

ART

Central Collective 923 N. Central St. Between Here and There, new paintings by Steph Untz.

On display Friday, July 1, at 7 p.m.

Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts 556 Parkway (Gatlinburg) MAY 21-AUG. 20: Arrowmont’s annual instructor exhibit.

Art Market Gallery 422 S. Gay St. JUNE 28-JULY 31: Artwork by Sandra Abraham and Elaine Fronczak. An opening reception will be held on Friday, July 1, at 5:30 p.m.

Bliss Home 24 Market Square JUNE 3-JULY 30: Photography by Brian Murray. A First Friday reception will be held on Friday, July 1, from 6-9 p.m.

Broadway Studios and Gallery 1127 N. Broadway July 1-30: Paintings and drawings by Beverly Duncan Gleason. An opening reception will be held on Friday, July 1, from 5-9 p.m.

Center for Creative Minds 23 Emory Place

Downtown Gallery 106 S. Gay St. JUNE 3-AUG. 19: Through the Lens of Ed Westcott, an exhibition of photos taken by the official photographer for the Manhattan Project in Oak Ridge.

East Tennessee History Center 601 S. Gay St. APRIL 16-OCT. 30: Come to Make Records, a selection of artifacts, audio and video recordings, and photographs celebrating Knoxville’s music heritage and the 1929-30 St. James Hotel recording sessions.

Emporium Center for Arts and Culture 100 S. Gay St. JULY 1-29: A Sense of Community, a group show by the Townsend Artisan Guild; sculpture by Ty Crisp; Small Stories, mixed media and collage by Renee Suich; Faces of Jazz, photos by Daniel Taylor; and Service, Sacrifice, Honor, photographs of member of the military and their families by Cheryl Sharp. An opening reception will be

HANDCRAFTED PIZZA Enjoy delicious & unique pizza selections daily with one of our fine craft beers.

Breakfast / Brunch Everyday starting at 7am

Great Selection Of Craft Beer on tap and in stock

Live Music, Team Trivia, And Nightly Events check out our facebook page for upcoming events and specials

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June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 25

CALENDAR held on Friday, July 1, from 5-9 p.m.

Envision Art Gallery 4050 Sutherland Ave. JUNE 10-JULY 8: The Nature of Power, paintings by Marc H. Cline.

Gallery 1010 113 S. Gay St. JUNE 30-JULY 4: Rabbet, recent multimedia works by Kayla Rummp. An opening reception will be held on Friday, July 1, from 6-9 p.m.

Knoxville Museum of Art 1050 World’s Fair Park Drive MAY 6-AUG. 7: Full Stop, a large-scale installation by painter Tom Burkhardt, and Contemporary Focus 2016, with artwork by installation/video/sound artist John Douglas Powers. ONGOING: Higher Ground: A Century of the Visual Arts in Tennessee; Currents: Recent Art From East Tennessee and Beyond; and Facets of Modern and Contemporary Glass.

McClung Museum of Natural History and Culture 1327 Circle Park Drive JUNE 4-AUG. 28: Dinosaur Discoveries: Ancient Fossils, New Ideas. ONGOING: The Flora and Fauna of Catesby, Mason, and Audubon and Life on the Roman Frontier.

Between Here and Striped Light 107 Bearden Place New artwork by C.C. McBride and Adam Cooper, on display Friday, July 1, at 6 p.m.

FAMILY AND KIDS’ EVENTS

Thursday, June 30 LITTLE LEARNERS • Blount County Public Library • 10:30AM • Tuesdays and Thursdays, 10:30 a.m., “Little Learners,” recommended for ages 3-5. Interactive sessions focus on language acquisition and pre-literacy skills incorporating stories, music, motion, play, crafts and more. • FREE CHESS AT THE LIBRARY • Blount County Public Library • 1PM • For middle and high school students, with coach Tom Jobe. • FREE LEGO CLUB • Blount County Public Library • 4PM • LEGO Club will take place in the children’s library. Kids will complete different-themed and timed LEGO Challenges, as well as have some time for free building. The library will provide the LEGOs, so all you have to bring is your imagination. • FREE Friday, July 1 S.T.E.A.M. KIDS • Blount County Public Library • 4PM • For grades K-5. Every week will be a different adventure, from science experiments to art projects and everything in between. Materials will be limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis. • FREE Saturday, July 2 CHESS AT THE LIBRARY • Blount County Public Library • 10AM • For middle and high school students, with coach Tom Jobe. • FREE Tuesday, July 5 LITTLE LEARNERS • Blount County Public Library • 10:30AM • Tuesdays and Thursdays, 10:30 a.m., “Little Learners,” 26

KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

recommended for ages 3-5. Interactive sessions focus on language acquisition and pre-literacy skills incorporating stories, music, motion, play, crafts and more. • FREE Wednesday, July 6 BABY AND ME • Blount County Public Library • 10:30AM • Recommended for ages 2 and under. These lapsit sessions for baby and caregiver feature short stories, action rhymes, music and pre-literacy tips and tricks for caregivers. It is also a great time for caregivers and babies to socialize. • FREE Thursday, July 7 LITTLE LEARNERS • Blount County Public Library • 10:30AM • Tuesdays and Thursdays, 10:30 a.m., “Little Learners,” recommended for ages 3-5. Interactive sessions focus on language acquisition and pre-literacy skills incorporating stories, music, motion, play, crafts and more. • FREE CHESS AT THE LIBRARY • Blount County Public Library • 1PM • For middle and high school students, with coach Tom Jobe. • FREE LEGO CLUB • Blount County Public Library • 4PM • LEGO Club will take place in the children’s library. Kids will complete different-themed and timed LEGO Challenges, as well as have some time for free building. The library will provide the LEGOs, so all you have to bring is your imagination. • FREE Friday, July 8 ETTAC FRIDAY FUNDAY • East Tennessee Technology Access Center • 9AM • For parents of children with and without disabilities, the East Tennessee Technology Access Center opens its doors to them during the summer through July on Fridays with lots of activities to keep them entertained and stimulated. For children age 5 to 10. Parents must register for all sessions by the Thursday before the session. Call (865) 219-0130 and press 3, email lorriec@ ettac.org, or go to www.ettac.org. • $5 S.T.E.A.M. KIDS • Blount County Public Library • 4PM • For grades K-5. Every week will be a different adventure, from science experiments to art projects and everything in between. Materials will be limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis. • FREE

LECTURES, READINGS, AND BOOK SIGNINGS

Sunday, July 10 SMOKY JACK: THE ADVENTURES OF A DOG AND HIS MASTER ON MOUNT LECONTE • Union Ave Books • 2PM • Book signing and reading with Anne Bridges, and Ken Wise, authors of Smoky Jack: The Adventures of a Dog and His Master on Mount LeConte. • FREE

CLASSES AND WORKSHOPS

Thursday, June 30 GENTLE YOGA AND MEDITATION • Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church • 12PM • Call 865-577-2021 or email yogaway249@gmail.com. Donations accepted.

BELLY DANCE LEVELS 1 AND 2 • Knox Dance Worx • 8PM • Call (865) 898-2126 or email alexia@alexia-dance.com. • $12 KNOXVILLE CAPOEIRA CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 6PM • Visit knoxvillecapoeira.org. • $10

PORTRAIT AND LIFE DRAWING SESSIONS • Historic Candoro Marble Company • 12:30PM • Portrait and life drawing practice at Candoro Art & Heritage Center. $10. Call Brad Selph for more information (865-573-0709). • $10 THIRSTY (FOR KNOWLEDGE) THURSDAY • Old City Wine Bar • 6:30PM • Join our sommelier, Matt Burke, every Thursday in the cellar of the Old City Wine Bar for our ongoing wine education series. Free to listen and only $20-$25 to partake in the libations. • $20-$25 SUP YOGA • Concord Park • 6PM • Register at barrebelleyoga.com/class-schedule. • $25 SUP YOGA • Ijams Nature Center • 6PM • Register at barrebelleyoga.com/class-schedule. • $25 Saturday, July 2 IMPROV COMEDY CLASS • The Birdhouse • 10:30AM • A weekly improv comedy class. • FREE SUP YOGA • Ijams Nature Center • 9AM • Register at barrebelleyoga.com/class-schedule. • $25 YOGA AT NARROW RIDGE • Narrow Ridge Earth Literacy Center • 9:30AM • For information call 865-497-2753 or email community@narrowridge.org. • FREE Sunday, July 3 CIRCLE MODERN DANCE BALLET BARRE CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 1PM • This open-level barre class is designed to help students build and maintain strength, flexibility, and coordination for ballet technique.

This is a great class for beginning and experienced students alike. • $10 CIRCLE MODERN DANCE OPEN LEVEL MODERN TECHNIQUE CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 2PM • $10 CIRCLE MODERN DANCE IMPROVISATION CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 3:30PM • $10 Monday, July 4 SIX-WEEK CREATIVE WRITING INTENSIVE CLASS • The Birdhouse • 6PM • Entire course is $250. Participants must sign up for entire six-week course. Pre-registration required. Contact instructor Holly Haworth at olmountaingal@gmail.com or at (865) 801.0806. • $250 Tuesday, July 5 GENTLE YOGA AND MEDITATION • Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church • 12PM • Call 865-577-2021 or email yogaway249@gmail.com. Donations accepted.

KNOXVILLE CAPOEIRA CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 6PM • Visit capoeiraknoxville.org. • $10 ACROYOGA • Dragonfly Aerial Arts Studio • 7PM • • $15 SIX-WEEK NATURE-WRITING COURSE • Ijams Nature Center • 6PM • Entire six-week course is $250. For more information or to register, please contact Holly directly at olmountaingal@gmail.com or (865) 801.0806. • $250 PAINT THE PLANK! • Sugar Mama’s Bakery • 7:30PM • Our own Cap’n Weird Beard will instruct ye as ye paint along on one of our custom built, up-cycled pallet canvases for a mere booty of $20. Being the pirates we are, ye may also paint yer own thing on the canvas if it please ye!

The scalliwags behind the bar have plenty of rum and other grog as well as the perfect grub. ednesday, July 6 W CIRCLE MODERN DANCE INTERMEDIATE/ADVANCED MODERN TECHNIQUE CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 6PM • CIRCLE MODERN DANCE OPEN LEVEL BALLET CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 7:30PM • $10 Thursday, July 7 GENTLE YOGA AND MEDITATION • Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church • 12PM • Call 865-577-2021

or email yogaway249@gmail.com. Donations accepted.

BELLY DANCE LEVELS 1 AND 2 • Knox Dance Worx • 8PM • Call (865) 898-2126 or email alexia@alexia-dance.com. • $12 PORTRAIT AND LIFE DRAWING SESSIONS • Historic Candoro Marble Company • 12:30PM • Portrait and life drawing practice at Candoro Art & Heritage Center. $10. Call Brad Selph for more information (865-573-0709). • $10 KNOXVILLE CAPOEIRA CLASS • Emporium Center for Arts and Culture • 6PM • This class is an hour of student-led training and review of Capoeira skills and exercises. Come prepared to sweat. Visit knoxvillecapoeira.org. • $10 THIRSTY (FOR KNOWLEDGE) THURSDAY • Old City Wine Bar • 6:30PM • Join our sommelier, Matt Burke, every Thursday in the cellar of the Old City Wine Bar for our ongoing wine education series. Free to listen and only $20-$25 to partake in the libations. • $20-$25 SUP YOGA • Concord Park • 6PM • Yoga on a SUP board?

Come join us every Thursday at 6 p.m. at the Cove. We will meet at the River Sports Outfitters building. Cost is $25 and includes board, paddle and PFD. Register at barrebelleyoga.com/class-schedule. • $25 SUP YOGA • Ijams Nature Center • 6PM • Yoga on a paddleboard! Meet us at the Meads Quarry every Thursday at 6 p.m. and Saturday at 9 a.m. Cost is $25 and includes board and PFD. Personal boards are not permitted on the quarry. Get a great core workout and expand your flexibility. Register at barrebelleyoga.com/ class-schedule. • $25 CANCER SUPPORT COMMUNITY: KNIT YOUR WAY TO WELLNESS • Cancer Support Community • 1PM • Call 865-546-4661. All Cancer Support Community programs are offered at no cost to individuals affected by cancer.

MEETINGS

Thursday, June 30 ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS • The Birdhouse • 6PM • A meeting group for adults who grew up in alcoholic or dysfunctional homes. • FREE BLACK LIVES MATTER • The Birdhouse • 7:30PM • #BlackLivesMatter is working for a world where Black lives are no longer systematically and intentionally targeted for demise. Visit blacklivesmatterknoxville.org. • FREE Saturday, July 2 AL-ANON • Faith Lutheran Church • 11AM • Visit our local website at farragutalanon.org or email us at FindHope@ Farragutalanon.org. • FREE GERMAN TREFF • GruJo’s German Restaurant • 2PM • Whether you have lived in Germany and would like to share some memories, would like to explore your roots, practice the language, or if you are just curious and like to meet new people, this monthly meeting, held on the first Saturday of each month, is a great opportunity to have a wonderful time. • FREE NARROW RIDGE SILENT MEDITATION GATHERING • Narrow Ridge Earth Literacy Center • 11AM • Narrow Ridge invites you to join us for our Silent Meditation Gathering. The gatherings are intended to be inclusive of people of all faiths as well as those who do not align themselves with a particular religious denomination. For information call 865-497-2753 or email community@narrowridge.org. • FREE Sunday, July 3 THREE RIVERS! EARTH FIRST! • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 7PM • Call (865) 257-4029 for more information.

• FREE REFUGE RECOVERY • Losel Shedrup Ling • 8:30PM • A peerled weekly group gathering to supplement your dedicated

Thursday, June 30 - Sunday, July 10

practice (AA, NA, Smart Recovery, etc.) for recovery from addictions of all kinds. Contact David at 865-306-0279 for any further questions. • FREE Monday, July 4 GAY MEN’S DISCUSSION GROUP • Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church • 7:30PM • We hold facilitated discussions on topics and issues relevant to local gay men in a safe and open environment. Visit gaygroupknoxville.org.

Tuesday, July 5 ATHEISTS SOCIETY OF KNOXVILLE • Barley’s Taproom and Pizzeria • 5:30PM • Weekly atheists meetup and happy hour. Come join us for food, drink and great conversation. Everyone welcome. • FREE KNOXVILLE COMMUNITY STEP UP • Beck Cultural Exchange Center • 11AM • Our goal is to connect ex-offenders to established organizations offering the needed services that will provide the support and resources to prevent them from re-entry into the prison system. Membership is a one-time fee of $5.

STFK SCIENCE CAFE • Knoxville Zoo • 5:30PM • A free monthly discussion of science-related topics, hosted by the Spirit and Truth Fellowship of Knoxville. Email rsvp@ knoxsciencecafe.org. • FREE

ETC.

Thursday, June 30 MARBLE SPRINGS SHOPPING AT THE FARM FARMER’S

MARKET • Marble Springs State Historic Site • 3PM • All vendors will be selling fresh, locally-produced products, and artisan crafts. This year we will be allowing the addition of antiques vendors. • FREE BLOUNT COUNTY LIBRARY/AMERICAN JOB CENTER JOB FAIR • Blount County Public Library • 9AM • If you’re looking for a job or a career change but you’re not sure where to start, local employers who are currently seeking applicants will converge in one location next week to make the job search easier. For more information, e-mail Rosa Martinez at rosa.martinez@tn.gov or call 865-379-5525. Job seekers are encouraged to pre-register and create an individual account at this website: https:// www.jobs4tn.gov Participants should bring a copy of your résumé and dress for success. • FREE Friday, July 1 LAKESHORE PARK FARMERS MARKET • Lakeshore Park • 3PM • Offering a wide variety of hand-picked produce, artisan breads, grass-fed beef, natural pork and chicken, farm fresh eggs and farm-based crafts. • FREE NOSTALGIC NIGHTS FIRST FRIDAY OUTDOOR MARKET • Nostalgia on McCalla • 6PM • Guests can expect to see local art, vintage items, and handmade wares for sale.

During the festivities the Nostalgic Nights Outdoor Market will be open. Shop local artisans, vintage, retro, industrial, repurposed, shabby chic, and antique booths.

For questions about First Friday call 865-622-3252. • FREE Saturday, July 2 MARKET SQUARE FARMERS’ MARKET • Market Square • 9AM • The MSFM, a project of Nourish Knoxville, is an

SESSIONS Old Time Jam: Tuesdays Irish Session: 1st & 3rd Thursdays Scottish Session: 2nd & 4th Thursdays Mumbilly Session: 2nd Saturdays

located in the Old City jigandreel.com

CALENDAR

open-air farmers’ market located on historic Market Square in the heart of downtown Knoxville. Visit marketsquarefarmersmarket.org. • FREE SEYMOUR FARMERS MARKET • First Baptist Church Seymour • 8AM • Locally grown fruits, vegetables, eggs, honey, baked goods and crafts sold by the person who produced it. • FREE OAK RIDGE FARMERS MARKET • Historic Jackson Square • 8AM • The market offers seasonal vegetables, herbs, fruits and berries, honey, artisan bread and cheese, grass-fed beef and naturally raised chicken, pork and lamb, farm-based crafts, flowers and potted plants. • FREE

and berries, honey, artisan bread and cheese, grass-fed beef and naturally raised chicken, pork and lamb, farm-based crafts, flowers and potted plants. • FREE

Send your events to calendar@knoxmercury.com

Tuesday, July 5 EBENEZER ROAD FARMERS MARKET • Ebenezer United Methodist Church • 3PM • The market offers hand-picked produce in season, artisan breads and cheese, grass-fed meat and farm fresh eggs. • FREE Wednesday, July 6 MARKET SQUARE FARMERS’ MARKET • Market Square • 11AM • The MSFM, a project of Nourish Knoxville, is an open-air farmers’ market located on historic Market Square in the heart of downtown Knoxville. Visit marketsquarefarmersmarket.org. • FREE UT FARMERS MARKET • University of Tennessee • 4PM • For more information about the UT Farmers’ Market you can visit the market website: vegetables.tennessee.edu/ utfm.html or find it on Facebook. • FREE OAK RIDGE FARMERS MARKET • Historic Jackson Square • 3PM • The market offers seasonal vegetables, herbs, fruits

New Moon Sale July 5th thru July 19th

Two weeks of over the moon deals

Modern Fashion with a Southern Sensibility Featuring: Tory Burch, Milly, Heather, Nicole Miller, DVF, Kendra Scott, AS by DF, Sita Murt, Chan Luu, Shoshanna, and more!

Located in the District in Bearden at 145 S. Forest Park Blvd 865-588-1588 • www.est8te.com • Instagram: est8te_style Open 10am - 6pm Monday - Friday | 10am - 5pm Saturday June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 27

Photos by Kim Trevathan

OUTDOORS

Out side Insider

Jump In On the hunt for the perfect East Tennessee swimming hole

BY KIM TREVATHAN

B

oulder hopping up a dry creek bed on a quest to find a swimming hole, I was about ready to quit and hike out of the gorge. It was mid June and the water trickled through the rocks and formed stagnant pools ankle-deep at most. I felt a bit foolish in my swimsuit, hauling fishing gear across this rugged terrain, leading biologist Drew Crain to a place that Class V boater Kirk Eddlemon had told me about. We halted in the shade of spherical boulder, and I began to wonder if Eddlemon, author of two whitewater guidebooks, was playing a prank on us. The instructions had started by telling us to take the trail behind the outhouse at Lilly Bridge.

Outhouse trail indeed.

If I’d been alone, I would have turned around, but Crain’s optimism

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KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

spurred us forward. I’m glad it did. At this time of year—the heat unrelenting, the rain scant and fleeting—a good swimming hole can rejuvenate body and spirit.

Here’s what I look for in a swimming hole: cold clean water at a place isolated enough to require a little effort getting there. I don’t care about taking cliff-jumping selfies or socializing. I like listening to the sound of the water, and it’s a bonus if the pool is big enough for swimming a couple of strokes. Below are some recent forays to discover new favorites.

Here are a couple in the Smokies that probably won’t be too crowded on a weekday: Spruce Flats Falls and

Lynn Camp Prong Cascades below the Middle Prong Trail. To get to the pool below Spruce Flats Falls, park at the Tremont Institute and follow the signs for the falls. It’s about a mile there, the first half uphill. You’ll probably break a good sweat by the time you get there, an important component, I think, in the swimming hole experience. The pool there is about three times the circumference of a plastic kiddie pool and chest deep when I went on June 15. You’re in a shady glen below a 40-foot cascade that slides down a mossy wall of thunderhead sandstone. The pool is not clear, but it is cold, and total immersion will brace you for the return hike.

On Father’s Day at mid afternoon, the parking lot for the Middle Prong Trail was jammed. From the trailhead at the bridge, I hiked a half mile or so past the first wooden bench, and just beyond it, where a frayed metal cable juts from the ground, descended a steep bank of 30 yards to the midpoint pool of Lynn Camp Prong Cascades. This is a sunny spot with long, smooth bench-like rock to bask on before plunging into one of the hot tub-sized pools below a fall. I keep to

the eddies away from the turbulence, and I wear shoes when taking a dip, careful not to get a food wedged. Even though there was heavy traffic on the trail above, few people came down below, and the water is so loud here, you can shut your eyes and imagine yourself in a private paradise.

When I asked Eddlemon about swimming holes, he sent me directions to one of his favorites, a pool below Triple Drop, a class IV when it’s runnable at much higher water. He said something about hiking to the climbers’ wall and a half-mile up Little Clear Creek, a tributary of Clear Creek, in the Obed Wild and Scenic River area (near Crossville) where he’d given me a whitewater kayak lesson. I liked the fact that he always left things a bit vague so I’d have to work a little.

Going it alone this first time, it didn’t occur to me to look on map to see where Little Clear came in.

From Lily Bridge I hiked up Bridge Trail to the big wall where “Climb with a Ranger” takes place the first Saturday of every month. I took a left along the wall and walked until I

OUTDOORS saw a trickle of a waterfall in a splash of sunlight 50 yards below me.

Couldn’t be it, I thought.

I hiked along the wall going the other way until I came to the road.

Backtracked and descended to the sunny pool. A couple of frogs, yellow-eyed, stared up at me as they tread water. Crawdads the length of my finger scuttled over flat tan rocks.

Backing in, I submerged myself among the pool creatures and arose refreshed, despite thinking that Eddlemon had overstated the mystique of this pool. When I sent him a picture, he said, “What’s that?” and gave me the outhouse directions, starting from the other side of the bridge. This time I took Crain along.

We hiked on the trail behind the outhouse for about a half-mile and came out near the confluence of Little Clear Creek and Clear Creek. A knee-busting scramble over a rugged terrain took us through rhododendron thickets and over slippery rocks and dry washes of driftwood that looked like prime habitat for rattlers and copperheads, notorious in the Obed area.

At the spherical boulder where I was about to quit, Crain persuaded me to go on, at least to the next bend.

Weary, we left our fishing gear behind.

Crain got out ahead of me 30 yards, and from a high spot pointed like Ponce De Leon would have if he’d found that fountain: “There it is!”

I could not believe so much water could be pooled in such a dribbling creek bed. The falls came down at a gradual incline, the last part of it 10 or 15 feet tall, a series of shelves above an oval lagoon the size of a basketball court. We eased into water so cold we gasped and sputtered.

A smallmouth bass idled near the edge of the pond and feinted at a water scorpion (non stinging) that Crain tossed to him, striking and then spitting out the bug.

We were too lazy to go back for our fishing gear, but Crain said if this one was just hanging out here, unafraid, no telling how many fish were in there. On the return, we carried out some trash, including

Crain’s somewhat disturbing discovery of a diver’s hood inside a lidless cooler.

On June 20 Crain and I went to Gee Creek Wilderness Area off Highway 411 South past Etowah, the turnoff on Gee Creek Road near the hamlet of Delano. I’d been there in the winter but had never hiked past a certain point because advancing up the trail required multiple creek crossings.

A half-mile in, I was surprised by the sound of voices behind us. Closing in fast on us was a gaggle of tweens with beach towels. We picked up the pace, wanting to fish for the Gee Creek rainbow trout before we swam. We outpaced the noisy group and kept hiking until the trail ended at a big leaf magnolia tree and a fallen hemlock. We had only hiked 2 miles, but it involved a lot of uphill and some fancy footwork crossing the stream nine times.

On the way back, we fished four pools and each caught three small fish, five chub, what Crain called “trash fish,” and one rainbow. Below Twin Falls, the tweens, about 15 of them, including a couple of adults, were screaming and squealing and splashing. A church group from Florida, they said they were on their way to Atlanta.

Drew and I agreed that Gee Creek was a great swimming hole, remote and substantial, but it was half the size of Triple Drop falls, and it lacked the revelatory cachet that the hike up there produced.

Here in East Tennessee we have wealth pouring down out of the mountains and welling up out of the ground. It doesn’t cost a cent to partake in these riches, but if you do partake and go to a swimming hole that’s open to the public, be sure to use common sense safety measures and leave the place as clean or cleaner than you found it. ◆ A writing instructor at Maryville College, Kim Trevathan is the author of Paddling the Tennessee River: A Voyage on East Water and Coldhearted River: A Canoe Odyssey Down the Cumberland.

June 30, 2016

KNOXVILLE MERCURY 29

’BYE

Sacred & P rofane

The Enchantment of Valentine

Meeting a new friend with many gifts—and torments

BY DONNA JOHNSON

T

he first time I saw Miranda lying stretched out in a chair, I thought she was a large inflatable doll.

Above her head was a clock with no hands that said: “Menagerie, where time has no meaning.” Menagerie was part antique store, part cafe for people to come and drink coffee for hours.

Around Miranda were various items: a three-way mirror with pink gilt roses around the border, some delicate cup and saucer sets. The owner, Pat Gresham, presided over her store of various and sundry items as though it were a large tea party where everyone was invited.

I stared for a few seconds at the doll, and as if feeling my puzzled stare, she roused herself, shook the white hair that fell to her waist, and opened eyes that were such a pale blue I had the feeling that I was entering another world. This woman, who was about the same age as me at the time, mid-40s, put out her hand and said, “Why, hello. I’m Miranda.”

I took her hand and told her my name. Miranda had come to Menag-

erie for the same reason: to sell a few paltry items to Pat so that she could buy cigarettes.

After our initial meeting, I saw her often, sometimes in the middle of the night, walking a dog she kept muzzled. With her dark glasses and long woolen coat, she looked like some subterranean creature from another dimension.

One cold, blustery afternoon, I saw her getting ready to enter her building on Emerald Street. To my surprise and delight, she suddenly became very friendly and asked if I would like to come up for tea.

“I would,” I replied, and thus began my three-month journey with a woman whose gifts and torments seemed to have been given to her in equal measure. Her apartment was all angled ceilings and tiny rooms, like a French pension, and it was enchanting to me, as was Miranda herself.

“I’m schizophrenic,” she told me at my first visit, as if to explain all of the oddities about her. There was no stove in her small apartment, but she set to

BY MATTHEW FOLTZ-GRAY

30

KNOXVILLE MERCURY June 30, 2016

www.thespiritofthestaircase.com

work boiling water on the hot-plate she kept in the drawer of an antique cabinet. A vase of dried purple and yellow flowers sat in the window, and she tied her dog in an adjoining room.

“Don’t tell anyone,” she said, “but Valentine is part pit-bull. He will go for your throat if he thinks I am being threatened.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I replied, wondering if I shouldn’t get up and run.

“Sometimes children throw rocks at us and laugh,” she told me one evening as we sat in candlelight drinking cup after cup of hot coffee out of plain white mugs, smoking cigarette after cigarette after cigarette, sometimes in silence.

I didn’t know how to respond, so I said nothing as Miranda sat rocking back and forth, staring at the flame of the candle. We often sat like this.

Finally, Miranda showed me her art, for she had graduated from UT as art student. Her paintings were beautiful and disturbing—upside down women in blues and grays and lavenders, with perhaps a streak of orange; women with masks, women singing, shouting, weeping; but all of them, all of them, suffering some sort of agony.

I sometimes drove Miranda to her psychiatrist’s appointment, where he might spend less than 10 minutes with her, if that. By this time I was certain that Miranda had multiple personalities, now labeled associative identity disorder, and I wanted to discuss it with him. I was told he didn’t have time, i.e., didn’t want to be

bothered, which is frequently the case with psychiatrists and their patients.

These various selves would manifest themselves quite suddenly, with a shift of expression and mannerism to suggest that another person had entered the room. The first and most distinguishable was a person I described as Ramona, who was quite sultry. Miranda would slip her dress down low on her shoulders and reveal a large portion of her breasts. She would then giggle and glance across her shoulder at someone—who?—and motion for that person to follow her.

After a time, Ramona would sit back and begin rocking back and forth, back and forth, as Miranda resurfaced.

I never commented on this shift of personas but continued to drink my coffee and smoke my cigarettes while shafts of moonlight cast fabulous shadows against the angles of the room. These evenings were fascinating for me but quite less so for Miranda, I imagine. When I like a person I wear them out, until eventually they have to find escape from the burden of my company.

Miranda’s escape came in the form of hospitalization at Lakeshore.

Before she was hauled off in an ambulance, she threw the keys at me and said: “Take care of Valentine.”

Take care of Valentine? Who me?

I thought.

On the first day I put food and water in bowls, shoving them with my boot at Valentine, who just looked at me as he ate and drank. After 16 hours or

’BYE so of him not going to the bathroom, I put on my coat and my courage and said: “Either you’re going to kill me or we’re going to go outside and have a nice walk.” It wasn’t without fear that I walked over to the dog, gently patted him, put him in muzzle and leash, and walked him out into the clear, warm night of August, where fireflies darted in and out of the trees. We walked and walked that night, Valentine and I, while I told him stories—stories about other dogs I had had, stories about what it was like to be a person, questions to him about what it was like to be a dog in a muzzle, and musing about what it would be like to trade places.

Miranda came home shortly after that, but not before I had completely redecorated her apartment, hung all her pictures on the wall, and replaced her velvet curtains with light, airy sheer curtains. Miranda was aghast

when she entered the room, though she tried to be polite.

“It’s pretty,’ she stammered, but soon after expressed fatigue, and I departed.

Shortly after that Miranda dropped me. Not only were our cozy, little evenings in the candlelight all gone, but so was Miranda. When I approached her on the street, she fled from me in terror. I had become the enemy, the tormentor, and there was no going back.

In retrospect I can’t say I blamed her. I had encroached on her world in an unforgivable way, threatened her in ways I could not even perceive.

Sometimes I imagine I see Miranda and Valentine in the blur of the summer heat, but no, it is only the shadow of time, for enchantment like that only occurs by grace, as gifts to receive and cherish, but never to capture and contain. ◆

BY IAN BLACKBURN AND JACK NEELY

June 30, 2016

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