Queen City Nerve - May 1, 2024

PUBLISHER

JUSTIN LAFRANCOIS

jlafrancois@qcnerve.com

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

rpitkin@qcnerve.com

NEWS & OPINION

4. The Heart and the Hub by Ryan Pitkin Catawba Cultural Center serves as the core of Catawban community

6. Between the Scenes by Matt Cosper KC Marie serves as local link from DIY music to visual art

8. Lifeline: Ten Cool Things To Do in Two Weeks

10. Locals Lovin’ Life by Jeff Hahne 11 Charlotte-area bands and artists to catch at the inaugural music fest

12. Fighting Femme by Pat Moran Femme Fest empowers women in music

Soundwave

FOOD & DRINK

Vibe Check by Candice Kelly Unlocking the secrets behind Haberdish’s memorable dining experience

LIFESTYLE

Puzzles

20. The Seeker by Katie Grant

Horoscope

Savage Love

Thanks to our contributors:

Grant Baldwin, Katie Grant, Candice Kelly, Matt Cosper, Jeff Hahne, Melanie Mae Bryan, Geddie Monroe, Evan Dennis, Nicolás Delgadillo, Dustie Bayer, Dan Russell-Pinson, T. Charles Erickson, Nicholas Padovani, Chris Stessens, Graham Morrison, Brandon Burdette, Houston Ray and Dan Savage.

THE HEART AND T HE H UB

Catawba Cultural Center serves as the core of Catawba community

BY RYAN PITKIN

It was more than 35 years ago that Dr. Wenonah G. Haire was working at her dentistry practice in Rock Hill, South Carolina, when a fellow tribal member of the Catawba Indian Nation came by to visit.

He told Dr. Haire that he was concerned for the future of the tribe, as he had noticed young people becoming disconnected from the culture. By the late 1980s, Catawba had already been embroiled in a years-long court battle to regain federal recognition, with no clear end in sight.

For the younger generations in the tribe to be losing important skills and knowledge regarding Catawba culture in that climate could spell a death knell for a people that settled in this area more than 6,000 years ago.

As it turned out, the following conversation would drastically change the course of Haire’s life over the next 35 years.

“I was in between patients, and [my visitor] said, ‘We got to do something about the culture. We’re losing it,’” she recalled. “I’m like, ‘I agree,’ so he said, ‘Well, we decided you’re going to be the one that’s going to do it.’ I was like, ‘Do you not see the patients waiting out here?’”

Haire laughs thinking back to that moment now and what it led to, which was the founding of the Catawba Cultural Preservation Project in 1989. To this day, Haire still serves as the executive director of the project, and she’s done so from her office in the Catawba Cultural Center, a small building on the Catawba Reservation in York Country that serves as the hub for the Catawba Cultural Preservation Project and the Catawba community more broadly.

On May 9, the Charlotte Museum of History will honor the Catawba Cultural Center with its Excellence in Preservation Award, a top award handed out at its annual Charlotte Gem Preservation Awards, which recognize outstanding contributions to historic preservation in the Charlotte region,

encouraging preservation of the area’s historic buildings and streetscapes.

What the Catawba Cultural Center represents, however, goes much deeper than the preservation of a physical space.

In a release announcing the award, the Charlotte Museum of History announced that judges had recognized the center and the folks who run it for their “exemplary efforts in preserving and promoting the cultural and material heritage of the Catawba people, who are indigenous to the Piedmont region of the Carolinas. Mecklenburg County is part of the Catawba’s historic homelands and remains a part of the modern Catawba Nation’s federally recognized service area, making Catawba Nation history a fundamental part of Mecklenburg County history.”

Deep roots along the Catawba

The building that houses the Catawba Cultural Center began its life as a two-room school for Catawba children in 1948, when the local Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints constructed it to provide an education to Catawba children on the reservation during segregation.

Unlike many of the boarding schools built for indigenous children across the Midwestern United States and Canada in the previous century, schools that shared a dark history of disturbing assimilation practices and family separation, the Catawba school had a positive impact on the community, as most members of the congregation that built it were tribal members.

After the Catawbas’ federal recognition status was terminated in 1959, the tribe donated the land where the center sat on Reservation Road back to the church.

“We had so much confidence in our relationship with the church, and that the church was

predominantly Catawban, that we were like, ‘We’re going to give this land to you for a dollar in exchange for you protecting it, holding that trust for us,’” explained DeLesslin “Roo” George-Warren, longtime staff member at the center and currently a council member with the Catawba Nation Executive Committee.

After the Civil Rights Act of 1964 brought an end to segregation in the South, Catawba children continued to attend the Cultural Center for educational purposes, as the local school district in Rock Hill refused to send its school buses onto the reservation to pick up children or drop them off.

“There was a time that there were no public teachers,” said Haire. “They had a teacher that came, and I don’t know whether it was out of her goodwill or if somebody garnered money for it, but that same teacher would teach all grades. And so I always thought about that, ‘Wow, we didn’t even have teachers.’”

Eventually, as tribal members continued to move away from the reservation and the remaining children began attending public schools, the building fell into disrepair.

In the early 1990s, the school was moved from its original location to where it sits today on Tom Steven Road. Haire remembers tribal members lining the

streets to witness the historic move.

“It took an entire day to get it from Reservation Road over to here, which is not even five minutes away,” she recalled. “There were people lined up on the street in their lawn chairs, watching this building, because this was a very important building to them, and they were very glad that it wasn’t going to be just torn down.”

The former schoolhouse became the Catawba Cultural Center, where it has served as a hub for the tribal public ever since.

Following some key add-ons and renovations funded by federal ARPA dollars in 2020 and 2021, the Catawba Cultural Center is now buzzing with activity on a daily basis.

Keeping the culture alive

When Queen City Nerve visited on a recent Friday afternoon, a couple of staff members were finishing up a basket-weaving project using rivercane. The craft store was open, highlighting numerous artistic pieces for sale by tribal members, while downstairs, next to the library, the archive held countless documents, crafts, photographs, books and other invaluable pieces of Catawba ephemera.

“On any given day, all of these things could be

PHOTO COURTESY OF CMOH

THE ANNUAL YAP YE ISWA FESTIVAL IS HELD AT THE CATAWBA CULTURAL CENTER.

NEWS & OPINION FEATURE

happening,” explained George-Warren. “You could have someone who was just driving down the road, saw the sign for a Catawba Cultural Center and Reservation, said, ‘Oh, that’s interesting. I just want to pop in. Let’s see what’s happening here,’ while you might also have a school group in the big room, maybe 50 kids all excited because they’re on a field trip and we’re doing drumming, we’re doing dancing, and telling them about our history and our stories.

“While simultaneously, you might have someone downstairs who is either picking out a kid’s storybook about native people or someone else who’s in our archives who’s trying to hear old recordings of their grandparents. Then in the afternoon, you might have representatives from federal agencies who are sitting down for a meeting with tribal leadership to talk about how we can work better together.”

With adult workshops, Head Start preschool classes, programming for tribal elders, outdoor educational programming and the Catawba Cultural Preservation Project all operating out of the center, there’s always something going on.

The basket-weaving project in itself was symbolic of how the Preservation Project is not only preserving but rescuing aspects of Catawba culture. The baskets are made with rivercane, a highly valuable but now scarce resource for the Catawba people.

“Rivercane is this incredible material that can be used to make baskets and mats and weapons and structures and music, art and culture,” explained

George-Warren. “But through all these different colonial processes, a lot of that knowledge got left behind, let alone the fact that rivercane is very difficult to find now, particularly at the size that you need it for [those projects].”

Catawba members have partnered with the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians to work together in revitalizing rivercane patches along the Catawba River and plant new patches elsewhere in recent years, but the process has been slow-going.

George-Warren saw the project that was finishing up during our recent visit as representative of the larger mission of the Catawba Cultural Preservation Project.

“We’re bringing the knowledge back about how do we actually make rivercane baskets, how do we actually make rivercane mats, which we see in our historical record,” he said. “We know that it’s there, but the knowledge is lost. Just as they’re weaving those baskets, they’re reweaving this culture. It’s so symbolic.

“It’s just a casual Friday afternoon here where people are making some baskets, but at the same time, the importance of it is so huge,” he continued. “I mean, this is the first time in over 100-150 years that a Catawba has made a rivercane basket or a rivercane mat.”

Still work to be done

Looking back on 35 years of the Catawba Cultural Preservation Project, Haire said she has watched progress be made from the time in the late ’80s when she and other members of the tribe who had formed a board for the project would meet at one

another’s homes to launch their new mission.

She said the will was always there for a project of this size, but not the resources to make it happen.

“I remember a potter telling me, well, several of them telling me that because they were busy surviving, they weren’t able to do what was in their heart,” she said. “As time went on, when we first started out, a lot of the elders were very intent on trying to bring that back and make sure they put a focus on it because they were no longer working, so they could donate.”

Haire pointed to Evelyn Brown George — a master potter who was born in 1914 and continued to work as a dance instructor, teaching children traditional Catawba dance moves, until her death in 2007 at the age of 93 — as an example of the elders’ dedication to keeping Catawba culture alive.

As time has passed, she has seen more young people get involved in learning and practicing Catawba culture, an observation that has comforted her after many years of working at the center.

“Over the years, there are younger generations coming in here,” she said from her office, which is filled with enough mementos collected over the decades to qualify as its own Catawba archive. “I’m seeing that and this is good. I’m not ready to lay the torch down, but I feel like if I did or if I had to, it would go on. For a long time, I was really scared because I kept thinking, ‘Everybody’s off doing their own little things, and nobody’s thinking about the core of who we are as a people is our culture.’ If you don’t have your culture, you’re no more than an organization.

“I was really worried because people were doing the same thing the elders said, busy with their lives,”

she continued. “I wasn’t faulting them, because that’s what they had to do to get their families going. But now we’ve got younger generations, my granddaughter makes some exquisite pottery and does a lot of other things … We’re having tribal members coming back to the Nation and getting involved, which I really, really like. It brings new ideas and new blood in, too, so you don’t get stagnant.”

Haire’s latest project has involved working on what she calls The Palisade, a living village on the Catawba Cultural Center’s property where folks can get a more immersive perspective of Catawba life and history.

While the idea was first floated nearly 20 years ago, Haire and her staff have been working with the Rock Hill Convention & Visitors Bureau to make it a reality. She hopes to see it open in the next 18 months.

Beyond that, she’s enjoying her time at the Catawba Cultural Center, especially now that it’s adding to the quality time she spends with her family rather than taking away from it as it did in those early days when she launched the Catawba Cultural Preservation Project.

“I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time here,” she reflected. “I’d be about 2 in the morning here working on things, and I didn’t get to go to a lot of my children’s ballgames, and that part I really regret. But now I’ve been vindicated, because I have a daughter working here, I have my nephew here, my grandson, and I see that, I just feel like it’s a full circle, which is the native way, coming back to the full circle.”

RPITKIN@QCNERVE.COM

BETWEEN THE S CEN ES

KC Marie serves as local link from DIY music to visual art

BY MATT COSPER

Cut-and-paste, psychedelia, pop art pastiche. The rock ‘n’ roll show poster is a curious category of cultural artifact, dispatched from a thousand different scenes and subcultures of the underground.

The artists who create them are the propagandistsin-chief for the movements represented by the bands, the fans, the hairstyles and clothes. Before anyone ever hears a new band play a note, they’ll see the posters stapled to telephone poles, slathered with wheatpaste and slicked onto construction barriers, or simply stacked by the register at a record store.

The images make a promise; they are aspirational, telling viewers what to expect, what the group and their acolytes are gathering to conjure together. It’s up to you whether you want to buy the ticket and take the ride.

Bands may ultimately rise to fame and glory, or the local equivalent, but the artists who set the scene are often anonymous. For the most part, these artists are also musicians, or at least dedicated superfans; they are deeply embedded in a scene where music influences visual art, which influences fashion, which influences music, which … on and on and on ad infinitum.

Sound, images, fashion, etc. … these all form the language with which subculture talks about itself to itself. The secret codes can be guessed at by those on the outside but only truly understood by the initiated.

In recent years, the visual artist and musician KC Marie has worked her way into the local punk rock scene and is emerging as an important creator and transmitter of those subcultural codes.

A short hiatus

Born and raised in Huntersville, a middle daughter born to local theatre royalty (her mother, father, and older sister are all in the theatre scene, it’s sort of the family business) she was always an

artist, performing and creating props and scenery from an early age.

However, it wasn’t until Marie was introduced to ceramics by an art teacher at Hopewell High School that art felt like something personal, something entirely her own. Remembering that experience she says, “Here was something that I wanted to make, not for a show, not for somebody else — mine.”

After high school, things threatened to stall out for the budding artist. “I assumed I’d go to school for theatre, my older sister went for theatre, that was the track I was on, but I didn’t love theatre that much. It was a fun thing to do, but the competition of it all, the cattiness of everything, I was not that kind of person. And I didn’t know if professionally I wanted to be in that world, that stress and anxiety all the time.”

So Marie took a year off after high school. With the self deprecation that I will become well acquainted with during our conversation, she admits that a lot of that time she wasn’t doing much of anything. But any artist knows that what often seems like inaction is actually marination, and the “not much” that she was doing would set the scene for her next act in a major way.

Marie’s friends were all in bands, so she spent a lot of time seeing local shows. She remembers fondly an all-ages venue on the border of Huntersville and Cornelius called The Bonus Room.

“It was an old movie theater, so that was kind of neat,” she says. “That was literally what we’d do every weekend, like, ‘This is where we go hang out and watch my friends play kind of bad metal music.”

Marie’s desire to be a part of the music scene led her to making show art and designing merch for bands.

“It was all kind of by accident. I wanted something to do. I wasn’t in a band, so I made art for bands. I feel like I accidentally made a job for myself.”

Having spent the early part of her graphic design

career making mostly just the images that her clients called for, Marie explains that it’s really only been since the COVID-19 pandemic that she has felt herself coming into her own style as a visual artist.

This visual style, like much of her creative output, is about defying expectations and insisting that there is beauty to be found off the beaten track in the nooks and crannies. There is a neat mesh in her artistic output of fine-line work and attention to anatomical detail with offbeat and unexpected subject matter drawn from the natural world.

Marie calls it “scrungly”, a neologism that uncannily captures the feeling of coziness and creepiness that her visions of rats, lobsters and slugs evoke. It is that tension, that frisson, that makes Marie’s vision so compelling.

When we talk, Marie rejects my attempts to play amateur psychiatrist and frame her odd-man-out aesthetic as emerging from the discomfort of being a middle child. She does, however, recognize that she has struggled to find her own place, and that

this struggle has influenced her work.

This becomes a running theme during our conversation. Marie has worked hard to stake her claim as someone who has a right to be in maledominated spaces. While it is certainly not the whole story, I sense that frustration with a certain boy’s club attitude has motivated her creative life. Her initial forays into creating poster art weren’t because she didn’t want to be performing. She remembers her male friends back in the day casually (and cluelessly) saying, “No bitches in the band, bro.” She laughs telling the story, but you can see that moving past these experiences has been a thing.

Getting onstage

Marie plays actively in bands now; she’s done so for years. She played bass in the now defunct indie rock band Yes Chef! and currently plays guitar in punk-rock outfit Raatma.

Raatma plays minimalist stompers in the classic punk formula of loud, fast and furious. Their EP Slugs

PHOTO BY NICOLÁS DELGADILLO

KC MARIE PLAYS IN ONE OF HER BANDS

ARTS FEATURE

Don’t Cry is raw and righteous and remarkably tight for a band that, according to Marie, is built mostly out of the punk ethos of enthusiastic amateurism.

In fact, you get the sense that Marie is underselling herself. I won’t print the awful things she said about her guitar playing because they’re just false. What stands out most on the record though is the riot grrrl flavor that sweats out of the songs. Marie jokes that she and Callie Grace (Raatma’s singer, who shares principle songwriting duties with Marie) call the band’s real genre “feminine rage.”

Grace confirms this, adding, “KC supported me in learning to scream … Through Raatma the both of us are at times reclaiming some of our negative experiences within the music scene, making a space for ourselves through an expression of longstanding, often internalized rage. I wouldn’t be able to do it with the confidence I have without her and the rest of the gang.”

Bart’s Mart, the beer store/music venue in the Eastway Crossing shopping center, has become an artistic home of sorts for Marie. She has worked there as a bouncer, and designed and executed the art on the front window and a truly rad mural behind the bar, composed of collaged wood panels with painted depictions of a scrungly rat and a borderline demonic goat.

After discussing the relative merits of Kratom

Seltzer with Bart’s Mart owner Justin Graham, I asked him about Marie’s relationship with the bar. “KC hasn’t just contributed to our branding. KC’s art is our brand. It’s fun and creative. Just like our customers. We are grateful that Bart’s can be another canvas for KC and are proud to represent her creativity every day.”

It’s clear that Marie loves the place, and that it is a center of gravity for her community, an inclusive and welcoming room, just a little rough around the edges. Most of what she says to me about her ambitions aren’t really about her so much as about the community she has found for herself.

She talks about her friends and how the art she makes is directly connected to those relationships. Grace is clearly one of those important relationships that is both a friendship and a creative partnership.

“KC has worked so hard to make her space in the community, and the way she opens it up to invite and encourage so many other people to make art and join those spaces as well is so admirable,” Grace says. “And if you keep an eye out, you’ll see some sick slugs everywhere you go.”

This is true, to be sure. The picnic table at Bart’s Mart where I interviewed Marie is covered in her slug drawings. It’s a whole thing. Our conversation is peppered with references to gardening and dirt and how time spent with animals and plants offers both

peace and inspiration. She is a proud rat mom with four rat friends living with her currently (Myrtle, Meredith, Egg and Trash). She also has two dearly departed rat friends tattooed on her chest, Eric and Tiny, her “Heart Rats”.

Looking to the future, Marie says she has no intentions of leaving Charlotte.

“This is where I belong,” she says, dreaming about what a future here might look like. The world of tattooing has its appeal, as it is a trade where alternative visual artists can have some control over their working lives while making a solid living.

And yet this is another place where the specter of macho bullshit raises its ugly head, as Marie repeats what has become a mantra of sorts while discussing the balancing act she performs trying to merely exist in maledominated spaces like the punk scene of tattoo culture.

“Can I exist in this space without you being weird!? Without

you being a creep!?” She yells it with appropriate theatricality and with the edge of a laugh but there is a tension there. This really isn’t a joke.

And the challenge with tattooing is that you can’t really fake it til you make it. It’s much more difficult to develop the skills and contacts you need without a proper mentor. How does one find mentorship in environments that range from hermetically sealed to downright dangerous?

There is something worth thinking about here, something about culture and how it perpetuates itself. Culture is what we do every day, where we do it and who we do it with. It’s how we respond to the world around us.

When Marie talks about her band there is a strong impression that, for her, music is primarily a medium for community. It’s what she does with her friends. When she talks about performing it’s about performing with her friends and for her friends.

For all the frustration she has experienced she raves about the post-COVID punk scene in Charlotte, calling it “the most diverse, helpful, communityaware group of people I’ve ever met.”

Typical of the idealistic and radically egalitarian ethos of punk rock, Marie gets something similar from being in the audience as she does being onstage. The community piece is where the hook is for her.

“You know when you’re at a show and you’re screaming along? It’s the same release as performing … We’re all having this collective experience. That’s beautiful!”

INFO@QCNERVE.COM

PHOTO BY DUSTIE BAYER

KC MARIE IN FRONT OF HER RECENTLY FINISHED BART’S MART MURAL.

PHOTO BY DAN RUSSELL-PINSON

KC MARIE PERFORMS WITH RAATMA.

LOOLOWNINGEN, SECRET GUEST, QUAD

Tokyo trio Loolownington are more plaintive and tuneful than their self-description as “avant punk blues” suggests. The scampering “Number 2 Dream” entwines galloping percussion and plaintive Japanese language vocals, reserving weird, splooshy electronic thuds for the end. Likewise, the catchy, shape-shifting “The Inversion” is more playful avant-garde pop than punk. On tracks like “Dry Jest,” Charleston’s Secret Guest combine wiseacre/ vulnerable indie-rock vocals with the loopy, cowboy alt-rock of ’90s bands like Camper Van Beethoven. Charlotte’s The Quad is a quintet that crafts accomplished progressive pop rock that suggests MGMT crossed with Tame Impala. More: $12.50; May 1, 9 p.m.; Snug Harbor, 1228 Gordon St.; snugrock.com

ONGOING SUN Ongoing SAT-SUN WED

DIA DE LOS CASI MUERTOS

5/4

KINGS DRIVE ART WALK

Translated as “Day of the Almost Dead,” Dia de los Casi Muertos is a multimedia project that serves as a celebration of life through stunning visual displays and immersive experiences that embody the rich cultural tapestry of the Dia de los Muertos holiday. The opening reception at VAPA Center will include performances from Nouveau Sud Circus Project, a contemporary social circus initiative rooted in the “underground” dance/acrobatic/physical theatre scenes present in the vast array of cultures in the urban regions of Charlotte.

More: Free; May 4, 6-10 p.m.; VAPA Center, 700 N. Tryon St.; tinyurl.com/DiaDeLosCasiMuertos

5/3 - 5/18

‘THOUGHTS OF A COLORED MAN’

The North Carolina premiere of a play that became a Broadway sensation in 2021, Keenan Scott II’s Thoughts of a Colored Man features a slice of life in rapidly gentrifying Brooklyn through seven Black men’s remarkable stories. Woven together with spoken word these men share their dreams, struggles, and triumphs in a world that often refuses to listen to them. Directed by Sidney Horton, this Three Bone Theatre features a talented ensemble of Charlotte actors performing what has been called “the most important play of the 21st century.”

More: $15-$30; May 3-18, times vary; The Arts Factory at West End Studios, 1545 W. Trade St.; threebonetheatre.com 5/1

5/4-5/5

CINCO DE MAYO CELEBRATION

5/5 5/7-5/12

‘HADESTOWN’

Launched as a spring expansion of Festival in the Park, which has been creating space for local artists and makers since fall 1964, the Kings Drive Art Walk takes place along the Little Sugar Creek Greenway, a reclaimed natural waterway between East Morehead Street and Pearl Park Way Bridge along Kings Drive. With a focus on fine and emerging artists, the festival creates a beautiful and easily accessible arts outing for the whole community. The artist lineup for the 2024 KDAW includes artists who work with paint, crafts, drawing and graphics, photography, mixed media, wood, metal, glass, clay, sculpture, jewelry, fiber and leather, watercolor and more.

More: Free; May 4, 11 a.m.-6 p.m., May 5, 11 a.m.-5 p.m.; Little Sugar Creek Greenway; festivalinthepark.org

Celebrate Mexican culture, music and food in the heart of SouthPark with vibrant live music performances, tacos and other food items, family activities and more. The impressive musical lineup includes rock en Espanol bands like the internationally touring Ronda Machetera and local Latin ska/reggae legends Bakalao Stars joining El Embajador de la Música Mexicana with Susana Cardenas, Mariachi Los Gavilanes and DJ Poke. Show up ready for the cumbia dance contest, a doggie costume contest, a children’s arts and craft area, a photo booth and lots and lots of great Mexican food.

More: Free; May 5, noon-6 p.m.; Symphony Park, 4400 Sharon Road; cincodemayocharlotte.com

Hadestown isn’t just underground … it’s the underworld. This acclaimed musical from celebrated singer-songwriter Anaïs Mitchell and innovative director Rachel Chavkin intertwines two mythic tales — that of young dreamers Orpheus and Eurydice, and that of King Hades and his wife Persephone — on a hell-raising journey to the underworld and back. Mitchell’s beguiling melodies and Chavkin’s poetic imagination pit industry against nature, doubt against faith, and fear against love. The third year of this North American tour stars Amaya Braganza as Eurydice, Lana Gordon as Persephone and Will Mann as Hermes, with Matthew Patrick Quinn and J. Antonio Rodriguez returning as Hades and Orpheus respectively.

More: $30 and up; May 7-12, times vary; Belk Theater, 130 N. Tryon St.; blumenthalarts.org

‘HADESTOWN’

Photo by T. Charles Erickson

THUR

FOO FIGHTERS

It’s tough to justify suggesting anyone go to PNC Music Pavilion these days, as it has become by far the worst music venue in town to get in and out of, we’ll make an exception for the legends that are Foo Fighters. The band released its latest album, But Here We Are Now, in June 2023, marking their first new music drop since the tragic death of drummer Taylor Hawkins in 2022. Currently in their 30th year as a band, the Fighters still got it, as they were recently named Best Rock Act at the 2024 iHeartRadio Music Awards. The show is already sold out but we were still able to find tickets available on StubHub and other resale sites at press time.

More: $74 and up; May 9, 7 p.m.; PNC Music Pavilion, 707 Pavilion Blvd.; foofighters.com

SUN

5/12

LORDS OF ACID WITH PRAGA KHAN

Break out the Hot Topic faux leather wear and your knee-high black Doc Martens. (I had a pair and it took forever to lace those fuckers up.) Belgian dancefloor bangers Lords of Acid debuted in 1991 with Lust, a collection of filthy/silly coital-obsessed acid house tunes like “Rough Sex” that are repetitive but fun. LOA launched with an experimental, industrial sound that included rampaging jackhammer beats and screeching banshee vocals before returning to friendly funny/sleazy fare like “Pussy.” Praga Khan is LOA’s original co-founder, noted for her dominatrixstyle fashion sense.

More: $35.25; May 12, 7:30 p.m.; The Underground, 820 Hamilton St.; fillmorenc.com

TAYLOR WINCHESTER, WARP STREET, LEO SOLIS

Accompanied by cantering strums and coiling flatpicking on his acoustic guitar, alt-folk artist Taylor Winchester delivers spare catchy tunes like “Wild and Free,” where his fine-grained vocals delve into spirituality, harmonious intentions and turning inward to find guidance. With grimy guitar riffs, chiming mandolin and swooping pedal steel, tunes like “Twelve Seventy Two” from Charlotte countrynoir rock quartet Warp Street suggest a collaboration between The Dream Syndicate and Neil Young’s Crazy Horse. Known for crafting ethereal soundscapes for wife Kellie’s sensual pop songs in Solis, Leonardo Solis unleashes his solo sonic wizardry.

More: $7; May 10, 8 p.m.; Petra’s, 1919 Commonwealth Ave.; petrasbar.com

TUES

FRI 5/10 5/14 5/9

L7, THELMA AND THE SLEAZE

A legendary band of sisters, grunge pioneers L7 fused punk and metal into pointed rock tunes, launching a series of abortion rights concerts in 1991. With crunchy riffs and catchy choruses, the all-women four-piece delivered feminist manifestos to the same kind of entitled assholes that control the Supreme Court and the Republican Party today.

“Turn the tables with our unity/ They’re neither moral nor majority,” frontwoman Donita Sparks sang in 1992 on “Pretend We’re Dead.” The message rings true today. Queer all-women Nashville fourpiece Thelma and the Sleaze deliver rampaging take-no-shit Southern rock.

More: $27; May 14, 7:30 p.m.; Neighborhood Theatre, 511 E 36th St.; neighborhoodtheatre.com

TAYLOR WINCHESTER

Photo by Brian ‘BT’ Twitty 5/10

Photo by Nicholas Padovani

LOCALS LOVIN’ L IF E

11 Charlotte-area bands and artists to catch at the inaugural music fest

BY JE FF HAHNE

When Charlotte-based Southern Entertainment first announced Lovin’ Life Music Fest would be happening in the Queen City from May 3-5, a lot of music fans wondered who would be on the lineup and how many of those bands might be local. After all, if you’re going to represent for Charlotte, you should truly represent.

It didn’t take long before organizers announced that there would be a local stage, with a search for area artists to help fill the time slots. So, while there will be plenty of eyes on the headliners — Post Malone, Stevie Nicks and Noah Kahan — as well as other national acts like Maggie Rogers, Dominic Fike, Young the Giant and The Beach Boys, those in attendance should pay attention to the all the locals helping put Charlotte and the surrounding area on the map for more than just one weekend. With more than 40 artists performing at First Wad Park over the course of three days, it’s not easy to narrow down which acts to catch and which acts are worth skipping. Assuming that there are spaces in

your schedule where you don’t quite know who to see, it’s good to have an idea of who’s playing.

So, here’s a quick rundown of some artists you should keep an eye (and ear) out for this during the three-day festival.

The Avett Brothers Sat. 5/4 | 6:45-8:15 p.m.

Northwood Ravin Stage

Sure, the Avetts have been a nationally touring act for years, but they never fail to bring the spirit of the Carolinas everywhere they go. Concord’s finest will take the stage just one week before kicking off their national tour. It’s the first time the band will perform music from its new, self-titled album that’s due out on May 17.

The Avetts have already released two songs from the album: “Love of a Girl” and “Country Kid,” and if you haven’t seen the video for the latter, filmed at Frye’s Skating Rink in Concord, be sure to check it out. The only question is, why aren’t they headlining one of the main stages?

Natalie Carr Sat. 5/4 | 6:30-7 p.m.

Music Everywhere CLT Stage

Blending elements of pop and R&B music, Natalie Carr has grown a substantial following in Charlotte over the last few years. Her diligent work ethic, onstage charisma and vocal sensibilities merge together to command the attention she’s been focused on building.

Her music has just enough elements of a variety of genres to appeal to a mass audience. It’s no surprise that’s she’s been working with some of Charlotte’s best musicians in her backing band.

DaBaby

Northwood Ravin Stage

Fri. 5/3 | 7-8 p.m.

Charlotte-based rapper DaBaby was set to headline shows and festivals across the country when his plans were derailed by homophobic comments he made at Rolling Loud in 2021. Over the last three years, he’s focused on touring overseas and slowly building back his profile in the States. Time will tell if his attitude toward others have changed, but this is DaBaby’s first hometown show in quite some time. At one time regarded as one of the hottest new rappers on the scene, it will be interesting to see if DaBaby can restore the shine to his career.

Deaf Andrews

Music Everywhere CLT Stage

Fri. 5/3 | 2-2:30 p.m.

Biking With Francis

Sun. 5/5 | 6:30-7 p.m.

Music Everywhere CLT Stage

Officially formed in 2022 before releasing their debut EP Honeydew in 2023, Biking With Francis describes their music as “combining the lushness of indie and bedroom pop with the bite of hip-hop influence to create a uniquely contagious sound.”

Fans of artists like Tyler, the Creator and Brockhampton, will appreciate the amalgam of ‘70s pop and hip-hop lyrical stylings. It’s music that doesn’t have to be perfectly produced or presented because the vibe and energy comes through so strongly. The band released a second EP, Brunette, this year. Catch their late-day set for the perfect wind-down of the weekend.

What happens when five best friends get together to craft a bunch of indie pop-rock? The result is the light and airy stylings of Deaf Andrews. The band is still getting its footing in the Charlotte music scene, but their songs are catchy enough to take note. The group’s lyrics spotlight feelings of love, recklessness and comfort while the music teeters between

upbeat playfulness and more introspective lulls. The quintet bounces between genres within songs but in a way that works well, taking the listener on unexpected journeys.

Stefan Kallender and House of Funk

Sat. 5/4 | 3-3:30 p.m.

Music Everywhere CLT Stage

Guitarist Stefan Kallander has been a fixture in the Charlotte music scene for … well, maybe longer than he’d like to admit. A member of Queen City funk outfit Bubonik Funk, Kallander started the House of Funk as more of a funk-driven house band for the city back in 2019. The group creates original

MUSIC FEATURE

grooves and mixes in funk classics and has been enjoying a residency at Middle C Jazz, welcoming a variety of the city’s finest musicians to join them from time to time. There’s no telling who might pop up on the festival stage, but you’ll enjoy the grooves regardless.

Modern

Alibi Sat. 5/4 | 8:30-9 p.m.

Music Everywhere CLT Stage

Indie-rock outfit Modern Alibi has steadily built a solid fanbase in the Queen City for the past three years. Originally started as a solo project for singer Holden Scott, the quartet merges heavy grooves and vintage rock guitar riffs with rich vocal tones in the vein of Arctic Monkeys.

The quartet’s combined stage presence chemistry and charisma has made them a force to be reckoned with on the local music scene. Getting a primetime Saturday night slot is well-deserved, and not bad for a band that’s only released one EP.

Oceanic

Music Everywhere CLT Stage

Sat. 5/4 | 4-4:30 p.m.

Versatile indie-pop trio Oceanic has grown not only their Queen City fanbase over the last few years, they’re also getting national attention after sharing stages with COIN and Vacation Manor. Their pop spirit is at the forefront while the guitar

playfully creates rhythms and soundscapes and the vocals find their way between straightforward presentations and falsetto daydreams.

The band works hard to incorporate their performing arts backgrounds into their live show with enthusiastic experiences. Not a bad way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

Petrov Sun. 5/5 | 4-4:30 p.m.

Music Everywhere CLT Stage

It wasn’t that long ago, 2020 to be exact, that Petrov won Queen City Nerve’s Best in the Nest award

for Best Pop-Punk Band. The band has continued to garner praise in the years since, and rightfully so, from features on WFAE and NPR to a spot at the Hopscotch Music Festival and now Lovin’ Life.

Petrov’s churning melodies are balanced by the lyrics belted out by singer Mary Grace McKusick. They’ve released two EPs, Flower Bed and Sleep Year, on Charlotte’s own Self Aware Records.

SAINTED Trap Choir

Northwood Ravin Stage

Sun. 5/5 | 3-3:30 p.m.

SAINTED Trap Choir, led by DJ Fannie Mae and Grammy-winner Dennis Reed Jr., hit the national scene hard while competing on America’s Got Talent, where they were semi-finalists before returning in the Fantasy League spin-off.

The innovative group has performed with a number of national artists, including Alicia Keys, Sara Bareilles and Janelle Monae. The choir performs a variety of hip-hop, soul and pop songs (“Like a Prayer,” “Purple Rain,” “Hot In Here,” “Return on the Mack”) while incorporating choreographed dancing to create a new depth and energy in choral music.

Southside Watt Sat. 5/4 | 2-2:30 p.m.

Northwood

Ravin Stage

Some might refer to Southside Watt as a roots-rock band, but there’s more to it than that. Some tunes lean country, some lean folk, some offer twinges of rock. The combination is quick to gain attention. For a band that had its first gig before it was really a band, and then got booked consistently by accident before they even had the name Southside Watt, it’s been fun to watch the quintet solidify their sound and truly become a band worth listening to.

Music festivals are a great way to see some of your favorite artists in a short span of time while also providing an opportunity to check out those bands you’ve never heard, or heard of. The artists listed above are less than a dozen of the more than 40 artists performing over the course of three days. Take the time to plot out your schedule of all those bands you don’t want to miss, but leave room to fill in some of the blanks and wander around to give all those other artists a chance. You might just find your next favorite artist.

INFO@QCNERVE.COM

MODERN ALIBI

PHOTO BY BRANDON BURDETTE

PETROV

PHOTO BY HOUSTON RAY

SAINTED TRAP CHOIR

PROMOTIONAL PHOTO

FIGHTING FEMME

Femme Fest empowers women in music

BY PAT MORAN

2024 seems to be a banner year for women in the music industry. In February, women artists including Miley Cyrus, música urbana dynamo Karol G and singer-songwriter Victoria Monét swept the Grammy Awards. The unstoppable Taylor Swift won her history-making fourth album of the year, and Paramore became the first woman-fronted band to win Best Rock Album.

Under this note of triumph, however, currents of discord continue to sound. Two 2024 music industry reports, “Be the Change: Gender Equity in Music” in the United States and “Misogyny in Music” in the United Kingdom, confirm a shocking level of sexual harassment, abuse and gender discrimination in the industry. (Britain’s conservative government subsequently rejected all of the “Misogyny in Music” report’s recommendations.)

Callie Wolfe and Joseph Conde, cofounders of Charlotte alt-rock band Oh! You Pretty Things, are well aware that the music industry is still a boys club, riddled with discrimination against women and femme-presenting artists. As members of a

popular band with a growing regional audience, they’ve decided to leverage Oh! You Pretty Things’ burgeoning fan base to do something about their chosen industry’s gender inequities.

The result is Femme Fest, an all-day charity music show scheduled for May 11 at The Milestone, presented by Conde’s Showalter Records and sponsored by nonprofit House Shows for Hope. The festival features 10 bands or artists that have at least one female or femme-presenting member, or are members of the LGBTQIA+ community.

“The bands are in our local and … regional music scene,” Wolfe says. “We’re coming together to raise awareness and funds for local charities that support and contribute to those communities.”

Oh! You Pretty Things is on the eclectic and impressive bill, which also includes Queen City electronic music duo Girl Brutal, singer-songwriter Marissa Missing, Savannah alt-metal punk rockers Neckromance, raw Carolinas cabaret rocker Jordyn Zaino’s supergroup With Haste!, Charlotte’s anthemic feminist punk rockers Hey RICHARD, western North

Carolina’s indie-punk post-hardcore band Fantømex, Charlotte sludge-punk purveyors Wastoid, ferocious Savannah grunge outfit The Maxines, and Charlotte alt-indie rock band Leaving For Arizona.

All of the bands are playing for free, Conde says, although artists traveling to the gig from out of town will receive a gas stipend. Likewise, three photographers and a videographer slated to record the fest will also receive gas stipends, and The Milestone’s operation costs for the evening will also be paid from the fest’s total takings.

Once all that is covered, the rest of the proceeds will be evenly distributed between eight organizations, says Conde.

The recipients of the festival’s proceeds are Center for Reproductive Rights, Time Out Youth, Saffron, Femme House, Girls Rock Camp Alliance, Women in Music, Abortion Funds and We Rock Charlotte, where Hey RICHARD’s Krystle Baller serves as creative director. Conde says the fest sought to mix local charities with national and international organizations that help women entering the music industry.

“They can start offsetting the inequities in the amount of women that are producers or in the larger management roles,” Conde says. “We all listen to a lot of female artists, but women in the production and business side of the industry are particularly underrepresented.”

Wolfe feels there many talented individuals, female as well as genderfluid/nonbinary, that have so much potential as producers or designers.

“I don’t think it’s fair that they’re not given that same opportunity or representation,” Wolfe says. The situation particularly hits hard for Wolfe, who identifies as a member of the LGBTQIA+ community. Oh! You Pretty Things, a group where three-fifths of the members identify as non-binary or not heterosexual, is also sensitive to the music industry’s homophobia and transphobia.

Misogyny

sparks an all-inclusive festival

Conde says his awakening to music industry sexism occurred simply from being in a womanfronted band and being friends with other womenfronted or female majority bands. Women would tell him how often they would be brushed aside or not taken seriously by promoters, producers and fans

“Fans come up at a show and talk to a guy and [say], ‘Wow, you’re so great!’” Conde says. “Then they talk to a woman, and it becomes more personal and about their looks.”

As a performer, Wolfe has experienced how hypersexualization in the culture informs the way women are viewed when they’re onstage. Some less subtle misogyny can occur when fans approach her after a set.

“I’ll have someone come up to me and it’s almost like a quiz; ‘What kind of gear do you use?’” Wolfe says. “It’s like [they’re] testing me. There’s a, ‘Do you really know what you’re doing?’ vibe that I get.”

When it came time to put Femme Fest together, however, Conde and Wolfe really weren’t entirely

OH! YOU PRETTY THINGS

PHOTO BY MELANIE MAE BRYAN

WASTOID

PHOTO BY EVAN DENNIS

MUSIC FEATURE

sure how to proceed. The idea had begun to germinate when women’s abortion rights were overturned by the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision. Oh! You Pretty Things subsequently played a show at Petra’s where the band donated their merch earnings and door pay-out to Planned Parenthood.

Wolfe and Conde, who frequently hold long conversations together about the state of the world, decided to take the concept of using music to support women one step further.

In 2023, the band booked its first out-of-state tour, playing cities like Nashville and Chicago, and covering 2,700 miles in seven days.

“As we started going on the road more and playing out of town shows, we started to find bands that we sound similar to, [as well as] bands that are female majority or female fronted,” Conde says.

Soon, he and Wolfe had compiled a list of artists they wanted to ask to play a charity festival in Charlotte.

“At the end of every show [we played with] these bands, we’d ask them, ‘Hey, we’re thinking about putting together a Femme Fest,” Conde says.

Some bands refused to join the bill because of things Conde and Wolfe consider insignificant. For instance, The Milestone doesn’t have a green room, and Femme Fest didn’t have a budget for catering. But the bands that did commit were completely into the fest’s goals and concept.

“As soon as we started to describe it, they were, ‘Oh fuck yes, we’ll do it!’” Conde says.

In the meantime Oh! You Pretty Things had been making a name for itself at The Milestone, so much so that the band started thinking of Charlotte’s venerable music club as a kind of home base. That in mind, they reached out to Milestone owner Wyley Buck Boswell, who confirmed the venue for Femme Fest.

During this process, extra funds were donated to Femme Fest through the nonprofit House Shows for Hope, which is run by Peter Ippolito, the lead singer of revered Taylorsville-based pop-punk band Home For The Day. Conde and Wolfe had met Ippolito when both Oh! You Pretty Things and Home For The Day played at The Underground in Charlotte’s AvidXchange Music Factory in November 2022. Ippolito’s nonprofit stages house shows in Taylorsville to raise money for organizations including Toys for Tots.

“Peter helped us raise an additional $300,” Conde

says. Femme Fest has also set up a donation link, so people who can’t make the show, or just want to support the organizations the fest benefits, can donate instead of buying a ticket.

Since Ippolito is well versed in the way of nonprofits, he also offered Conde valuable advice on how to set up the charity festival.

Finally, after reaching out to 20 or so bands, Conde and Wolfe got 9 acts to commit. Including Oh! , You Pretty Things, the festival boasts 10 unique acts.

The sounds and dreams of Femme Fest

Wolfe isn’t picking favorites on the Femme Fest bill, but With Haste! is one band she’s particularly excited to see and support. Fronted by inspired rock troubadour Jordyn Zaino, the band includes Petrov

Brutal, Nelson hopes to expose people to what she calls “weird and kooky electronic music.”

“Something about digital noise is so compelling to me and I hope I can inspire others to explore a different side of music,” Nelson says.

Wastoid vocalist Mike Smith says his band embodies an energy that is “fueled by failure, anger, and civil disobedience.”

Smith also feels honored that his band was considered for the festival.

“Femme representation is very important to us and we want the femme community to have a safe space at … shows,” Smith says.

“As a gay, female musician, I’m stoked we’re raising money for music programs geared towards girls and LGBTQ youth,” says Leaving For Arizona drummer Aubrey Hollopeter.

guitarist Syd Little, synthesizer player Allison Friday, bassist Oscar Gerardo Castillo, multi-instrumentalist

Kealz and second guitarist Carlos Cortez. Femme Fest will be the band’s first Charlotte show.

“[Zaino] was on the bill for the first Oh! You Pretty Things public show that we did in 2019,” Wolfe says. “I adore her and I’m excited to support her new endeavors.”

Grace Nelson, one half of electronic music duo Girl Brutal, has run sound for the Oh You Pretty Things! at The Milestone a handful of times. When Conde presented the idea of Femme Fest to her, she jumped at the chance to come on board. With Girl

Fantømex consists of vocalist Abigail Taylor, guitarist Isaac Crouch, bassist Max Miller and drummer Edwin Mericle. Mericle says accepting the offer to play Femme Fest was a no brainer because of the phenomenal bands on the bill as well as the worthy charities that will benefit from the gig.

“Whether it’s supporting women’s reproductive rights or providing a safe place for the LGBTQIA+ community or putting a pair of drumsticks in a young person’s hands, we’re down for all of it,” Mericle says.

“With two of us having young daughters, we would do anything to see that they can grow up safe and

happy and have the opportunities to rock as loud as they want.”

“We love a good festival, so the fact that it’s a charity show and a femme-fronted festival really puts the cherry on top,” adds Neckromance vocalist Ava Foster. Foster supports anything that brings female and femme-presenting musicians to the forefront.

“This industry so frequently undermines music created by women and queer people, and it’s heartbreaking to see so many artists not get the recognition they deserve,” Foster says.

Conde and Wolfe are hoping Femme Fest is a success so that next year it can go bigger, maybe expanding into a two-day festival so that potentially more money can be raised for the causes it champions.

“I would love to see this grow into a charity work tour, playing multiple cities, with big bands, high turnout and the proceeds going to charity,” Conde says. “There’s unlimited growth for this, and it’s for a great cause.”

Nelson hopes Femme Fest will foster appreciation for different kinds of music.

“I hope that this can inspire other aspiring artists to bring their visions to life … and have a community of amazing people that will always back them and lift them up,” Nelson says.

“I hope [that people have] an amazing day of 10 bands melting everyone’s faces clean off,” says Mericle. “We also hope we can show that … you can create a better world for everyone. You can make your voice heard. You can be a badass.”

“As a female that is trying to pave her way in the music industry I just want to, with whatever power I can, make a difference in some way, shape and form,” Wolfe says. She has a simple message for upcoming women and LGBTQIA+ musicians, producers and anyone else who wants to get involved with the music industry.

“I want them to know they belong,” Wolfe says

The eclectic, impassioned lineup of artists on the Femme Fest bill will provide a powerful all-day show, but Femme Fest’s mission and message goes beyond music and the music industry.

Zooming out, seeing the erosion of women’s equality and reproductive rights in America while the ACLU tracks 487 anti-LGBTQIA+ bills in state legislatures across the nation. In this context, a committed gathering like Femme Fest can also support and issue a rallying cry for embattled communities. Femme Fest is a promise and a conviction that the barriers erected by the boys’ club are coming down.

FANTØMEX

PHOTO GEDDI MONROE

WEDNESDAY, MAY 1

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

The Black Crowes (Ovens Auditorium)

Alpha Wolf (The Underground)

Jesus Is the Path to Heaven w/ Prosperity Gospel, Blankey Fort, Boy A/C (The Milestone)

Loo Lowningen & the Far East Idiots w/ Secret Guest, Quad (Snug Harbor)

JAZZ/BLUES

Jazz Nights at Canteen (Camp North End)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Beats @ Birdsong (Birdsong Brewing)

Hippie Sabotage (The Fillmore)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Lisa De Novo and Friends (Goldie’s)

COVER BANDS

Gena Chambers ’80s Night Rock Party (Middle C Jazz)

OPEN MIC

Singer/Songwriter Open Mic (The Rooster)

Songwriters Circle & Variety Show Open Mic (Starlight on 22nd)

THURSDAY, MAY 2

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Clearbody w/ Enumclaw, Graham Hunt (The Milestone)

JAZZ/BLUES

DSG in Queen City (Middle C Jazz)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

NC Bluegrass Jam Night (Birdsong Brewing) Jordan Davis (Skyla Credit Union Amphitheatre)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

SHIPROCKED: Electroclash (Snug Harbor)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Dizgo (Heist Brewery)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Kyle Dills Band w/ Chris Moreno (Goldie’s)

Human Pippi w/ Distracted Eyes, Invader Houses (Goldie’s)

COVER BANDS

Confetti Cannon & Scott Lowder: Pop Punk Tribute Night (The Rooster)

FRIDAY, MAY 3

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

The Lenny Federal Band (Comet Grill)

Dr. Blood’s Orgy of Gore w/ Nox Eternus, Nemesis, Mafia, Clot (The Milestone)

Encre Noire w/ Caught Off Guard, SWAE, The White Horse (The Rooster)

BAT w/ BloodRitual, Sultry (Snug Harbor)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Smoakland w/ Sippy (Amos’ Southend)

Vulllgur (Blackbox Theater)

Breakaway Another World After Party feat. Habstrakt (The Underground)

Jacob Collier (Skyla Credit Union Amphitheatre)

JAZZ/BLUES

Dante Fowler w/ Unheard Project (Camp North End)

Sean Mason (Middle C Jazz)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Bee Taylor w/ Chelsea Nolan (Evening Muse)

Alan Doyle w/ Adam Baldwin (Neighborhood Theatre)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Mike D & the Rhythm Kings w/ Caleb Davis (Goldie’s)

Overtime (Heist Brewery)

Red Eye Gemini (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

SATURDAY, MAY 4

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Red Dress Amy w/ Southern Groove Machine (Evening Muse)

Alvvays (The Underground)

Carolina Vet Fest (The Rooster)

Bodega w/ Patois Counselors, Not Flailing (Snug Harbor)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Purgatory (Amos’ Southend)

Delta Heavy (Blackbox Theater)

Kyle Gordon (Neighborhood Theatre)

Azul w/ SHANKAI & the Goonie Tunes, The Bergamot (Snug Harbor)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Byron Juane w/ Lily Massie (Evening Muse)

JAZZ/BLUES

Sean Mason (Middle C Jazz)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Jason Moss & The Hosses w/ The Aqualads, Tommy Brill (Petra’s)

CLASSICAL/INSTRUMENTAL

Legacy (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

LATIN/WORLD/REGGAE

Andres Cespeda (The Fillmore) COVER BANDS

Spiderwebs w/ The Bald Brothers (Goldie’s)

SUNDAY, MAY 5

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Queensryche (The Fillmore)

Woolbright w/ Alright, Scoby, Brizb (The Milestone)

The Nighthawks (Neighborhood Theatre)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

The Bobby Nsenga Experience (Blackbox Theater)

Hazy Sunday (Petra’s)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

YT Boi Guttah w Jacc D Frost, Jupiter May, Smeag

Scientist, Lo (The Rooster)

Soul Sundays feat. Guy Nowchild (Starlight on 22nd)

JAZZ/BLUES

Omari & the Hellhounds (Comet Grill)

Marcus Click (Middle C Jazz)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Alison & Jake w/ Don Kodzai (Goldie’s)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Celestial Company (Free Range Brewing)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

John Craigie w/ Taylor Kingman (Visulite Theatre)

MONDAY, MONDAY 6

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

North By North w/ Late Bloomer, Jay Hoff (Tommy’s Pub)

JAZZ/BLUES

The Bill Hanna Legacy Jazz Session (Petra’s)

TUESDAY, MAY 7

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Red Rocking Chair (Comet Grill)

Lacuna Coil w/ New Yaear’s Day, Oceans of Wonder (The Underground)

Bandshee w/ Once Below Joy, Trick Threat, Space

Daddy & the Galactic GoGos (The Milestone)

The Wilson Springs Hotel (Neighborhood Theatre)

Levitation Room w/ Rugg, Pocket Strange (Snug Harbor)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Dar Williams (Booth Playhouse)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Madison Beer (The Fillmore)

OPEN MIC

Open Mic Night feat. The Smokin J’s (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

Tosco Music Open Mic (Evening Muse)

WEDNESDAY, MAY 8

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Insomnium (The Underground)

Volcandra w/ Micawber, Fault Reset, Angel Massacre, Encre Noire (The Milestone)

Sweeping Promises w/ Cor de Lux, Grocer (Snug Harbor)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Johnny Manchild w/ Holdfast (3102 VisArt)

Galen Deery w/ Momophobia, Nervous Surface (Amos’ Southend)

Kristy & Friends (Goldie’s)

Josh Daniel w/ Jim Brock, Kerry Daniels (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

JAZZ/BLUES

Jazz Nights at Canteen (Camp North End)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Beats @ Birdsong (Birdsong Brewing)

Jimmy Gnecco w/ Forrest Tabor (Evening Muse)

BoyWithUke (The Fillmore)

Shindig! A Night Of Early 2000s Music w/ DJ Bonzai & DJ Host Modern (Tommy’s Pub)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Sarah Jarosz (Neighborhood Theatre) OPEN MIC

Singer/Songwriter Open Mic (The Rooster) Variety Open Mic (Starlight on 22nd)

THURSDAY, MAY 9

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

This Island Earth w/ Caught Off Guard, The White Horse, R.P. Allen (The Milestone)

P.O.D. (Neighborhood Theatre)

Foo Fighters (PNC Music Pavilion)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Nolan Taylor w/ Zandi Holup (Amos’ Southend) Without the Numbers w/ The Parks Brothers (Goldie’s)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

The Bleus w/ La Brava, Ghost Trees, James Johnson Jr. (Snug Harbor)

Aidan Bissett (Visulite Theatre)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

The Bootstrap Boys w/ String Theory (The Rooster) HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Rich Amiri (The Underground) FUNK/JAM BANDS

Airshow w/ Into the Fog (Evening Muse) Shana Blake’s Musical Menagerie (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

COVER BANDS

Epic Proportions Party Band Performs the Soul Legends (Middle C Jazz)

FRIDAY, MAY 10

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

The Lenny Federal Band (Comet Grill)

A Story Told with LOWBORN (Evening Muse) SiM (The Underground)

The Ghost Inside (The Fillmore)

Young Death God w/ Added Color, Mutual Assurance, The Groove Skeletons (The Milestone)

The Chats w/ Dirty Fences, Paint Fumes (Neighborhood Theatre)

TAI w/ True Lilith, Dad Bod, Ryan Lockhart (Snug Harbor)

Crenshaw Pentecostal w/ The Ben Walkers, George Hage (Tommy’s Pub)

The Record Company w/ Trapper Schoepp (Visulite Theatre)

JAZZ/BLUES

Marion Meadows (Middle C Jazz)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Taylor Winchester w/ Warp Street, Leo Solis (Petra’s)

Mothers Day Female Vocalist Showcase (The Rooster)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Treaty Oak Revival w/ Mitchell Ferguson (Amos’ Southend)

Jon Tyler Wiley & His Virginia Choir w/ The Barons (Evenig Muse)

LATIN/WORLD/REGGAE

Bad Bunny (Spectrum Center)

FUNK/JAM BANDS

Cha Wa w/ Celestial Company (Camp North End)

Sunset Revival w/ Ryan & woody (Goldie’s)

Mack Fowler & Company (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

Tamra Simone and The Finnas (Starlight on 22nd)

MIXED GENRE/EXPERIMENTAL/FESTIVAL

Merge: Symphonic x Electronic (Blackbox Theater)

SATURDAY, MAY 11

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

In This Moment (Ovens Auditorium)

Kublai Khan TX (The Underground)

Femme Fest 2024 (The Milestone)

The Council Ring (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

Donnie Doolittle w/ Secret Shame, Dipstick (Snug Harbor)

Heart (Spectrum Center)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Benjamin Tod & the Lost Street Band w/ Resonant

Rogues (Neighborhood Theatre)

JAZZ/BLUES

Marion Meadows (Middle C Jazz)

POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

R&B Vibes Reloaded feat. DJ Lowkey (The Amp Ballantyne)

Bella Moulden w/GoRyanGo, Andy Guy & the Fighting Few (Starlight on 22nd)

Requiem: Goth Dance Party w/ DJ Velvetine & DJ

Sanity Ana (Tommy’s Pub)

Maddie Zahm (Visulite Theatre)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Val Merza w/ Lisa De Novo, Zac Robins (Petra’s)

Lua Flora (Primal Brewery)

MIXED GENRE/EXPERIMENTAL/FESTIVAL

Merge: Symphonic x Electronic (Blackbox Theater)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Kin Faux (Evening Muse)

COVER BANDS

Rattle & Hum (U2 tribute) w/ Chasin Phoenix (Amos’ Southend)

Foo 4 You w/ Jake Haldenvang (Goldie’s)

SUNDAY, MAY 12

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Stabbing Westward (Neighborhood Theatre)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Jack Lawrence w/ Patrick Crouch (Free Range Brewing)

Shannon Lee Duo w/ Tommy Keys (Goldie’s) POP/DANCE/ELECTRONIC/DJ

Lords of Acid (The Underground)

Family Video w/ Scaryspies, Kismet (Tommy’s Pub)

HIP-HOP/SOUL/R&B

Soul Sundays feat. Guy Nowchild (Starlight on 22nd)

JAZZ/BLUES

Kim Waters (Stae Door Theater)

Omari & the Hellhounds (Comet Grill)

Marion Meadows (Middle C Jazz)

COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Sierra Ferrell (The Fillmore)

Charlotte Bluegrass Allstars (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar) COVER BANDS

Leonid & Friends (Ovens Auditorium)

MONDAY, MAY 13

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Contention w/ Fading Signal, Divine Right, End of Your Rope (The Milestone)

Imminence (Neighborhood Theatre) JAZZ/BLUES

The Bill Hanna Legacy Jazz Session (Petra’s) COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Alexander Stewart (The Underground)

TUESDAY, MAY 14

ROCK/PUNK/METAL

Red Rocking Chair (Comet Grill)

Echo & the Bunnymen (The Fillmore)

Basketball Divorce Court w/ The Briefly Dangerous, This Can’t Be Real (The Milestone)

L7 w/ Thelma & the Sleaze (Neighborhood Theatre)

Judas Priest (PNC Music Pavilion)

Alpha Strain w/ Once Below Joy, Momophobia, Nosey Neighbor (The Rooster)

Drain (The Underground)

Meridian Brothers w/ Guitar Wolf, Hans Condor (Snug Harbor)

SINGER-SONGWRITER/ACOUSTIC

Sam on Someday (Petra’s) COUNTRY/FOLK/AMERICANA

Mike Strauss Band (3102 VisArt) OPEN MIC

Open Mic Night feat. The Smokin J’s (Smokey Joe’s Cafe & Bar)

VISIT QCNERVE.COM FOR THE FULL SOUNDWAVE LISTING.

PHOTO BY GRAHAM MORRISON

FAMILY VIDEO PERFORMS AT TOMMY’S PUB ON MAY 12.

PROMOTIONAL PHOTO

TAMRA SIMONE & THE FINNAS WILL BE AT STARLIGHT ON 22ND ON MAY 10.

FOOD & DRINK

VIBE CHECK

Unlocking the secrets behind Haberdish’s memorable dining experience

BY CAN DICE KELLY

In 2016, Jeff Tonidandel of the TonidandelBrown restaurant group shared his vision for a new restaurant concept with Charlotte Magazine, “I want every meal over there to be like we’re having a Sunday dinner with the family.” Over half a decade later, that’s exactly what Haberdish has become.

When I first moved to NoDa earlier this year, Haberdish was one of the places everyone told me I had to try. I’ve always been a foodie, and while the food was good, I found myself wondering what made the experience of this restaurant and others like it so memorable.

Leveraging my background in organizational psychology, I set out to explore how a restaurateur crafts an entire world around the food, and how all of those elements work together to create an overall experience.

After all, it’s not just the crispy skin of a juicy fried chicken leg or the creamy bite of mac and cheese that keeps diners coming back; Haberdish has built a glowing reputation due to its distinct personality — a mix of aesthetic and atmosphere that Gen Z would identify succinctly as “a vibe.”

From the carefully curated ambiance to the personalized touches, every element of the Haberdish experience is designed to make guests feel right at home.

Designing the Haberdish experience

The upscale Southern experience of dining at Haberdish is a culmination of numerous tiny choices and details.

“We made thousands of decisions on space, from the lights to the materials, to the texture, to the host area,” Haberdish co-founder Jamie Brown, the other half of Tonidandel-Brown, told Queen City Nerve.

Nobel Prize-winning economist Richard Thaler calls these tiny decisions nudges — design choices that subconsciously influence our decision-making. Exploring these nudges can help patrons and aspiring entrepreneurs gain a deeper appreciation of what it takes to create a memorable dining experience.

Creating this vibe is no simple feat. During the design process Tonidandel and Brown considered not only the form of materials, but their function.

“The thing about designing a restaurant which is so different from a house is that you have to be so utilitarian because you have hundreds of people coming in,” Brown explained. “So for a lot of the choices, I may be like ‘Oh, this white door would be so much more beautiful, I wish we could do this,’ it’s just not smart. It’s just smarter to have black doors than white doors. A lot of decisions are moves toward darker things or textured things that don’t require much upkeep.”

Brown shared how every decision, from painting the brick exterior to the outdoor seating to the restroom lighting was designed with guest experience in mind.

“You don’t want the experience in the bathroom to interrupt the dining experience,” Brown explained. “We want the whole thing to be a part of the vibe.”

From check-in to chicken

As guests step inside Haberdish, they’re greeted by a unique sight (or lack thereof): the absence of a traditional host stand. Instead, a tablet mounted on the wall serves as the check-in point.

“We want our hosts to be greeting people right away, without anything between them,” Brown shared. “I think it creates more intimacy.”

This strategic approach puts guests right at the center of the action, allowing them to take in the entirety of the restaurant in one fell swoop, setting the stage for what’s to come.

As guests absorb the atmosphere, they may notice the warm, inviting glow of the dining room as the evening progresses.

Haberdish host Forest Chilton describes the vibe in one word: “comfortable.”

“When the sun goes down, the low lighting is really nice and cozy,” he elaborated.

The restaurant uses yellow Edison bulbs in nearly all of its fixtures, and there are plenty of them.

“The sheer number of lights that we put in our restaurants is in the hundreds,” Brown

acknowledged. “You don’t see them all, as many are pointed into the ceiling or the wall.”

The lights are connected to a dimmer controlled by a timer, ensuring a gradual fade as the sun sets.

“Bright restaurants don’t feel romantic, warm, or cozy,” said Brown, “and we want that ambiance every night. If it feels too bright, we’re removing people from the experience.”

Once seated, guests move to the next part of the experience: the menu. For around $40 per person, they can choose from a wide array of Southern classics such as shrimp and grit cakes, fried chicken, BBQ ribs, okra, or banana pudding.

Each dish is served family-style, another intentional choice by the owners, as it’s the preferred style of eating for Tonidandel and Brown — the people, not the restaurant group, she explained.

“That’s how Jeff and I like to eat,” Brown told Queen City Nerve.

The communal serving style encourages guests to interact, share and connect over the meal, just as they would at a family dinner. It’s a subtle yet effective way to foster a sense of togetherness and make guests feel at home.

The magic of minor touches

Once the food has been devoured, a few finishing touches bring the overall experience together at Haberdish. Guests are treated to handwritten thank you cards crafted by the servers. These notes may celebrate a momentous occasion or simply express gratitude for stopping by.

Additionally, warm towels are provided to clean up after the meal. It’s a luxurious and unexpected amenity, one that leaves guests feeling pampered and cared for. These touches elevate the experience,

adding an upscale and personal touch typically found only at fine-dining establishments.

According to Deet Gilbert, associate professor at Johnson and Wales University, this type of personalized service is becoming more common.

“Our society has gotten more casual, and the desire for stuffy fine dining has diminished, but the willingness to spend money at a restaurant has not,” Gilbert said. “What you once saw only in fine-dining restaurants, you’re now seeing more in upscale casual restaurants.”

From the intimate check-in to the hot-towel finish, the cumulative impact of all these thoughtful details is what creates the Sunday dinner vibe Haberdish is known for.

Dr. Stephani Robson, senior lecturer emeritus at the Cornell Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel Administration, insightfully notes, “Our perception of the dining experience is very holistic. The more cohesive the experience is, the more we like it.”

The success of Haberdish demonstrates that, in today’s experience-driven economy, the businesses that thrive are those that understand the value of creating meaningful, memorable moments for their customers.

As Dr. Robson reminds us, “Restaurants are not in the business of selling food, restaurants are in the business of creating memories.”

The next time you’re grabbing a bite with a friend or loved one, take a moment to ask yourself, “What little nudges led me to visit this spot or try this dish?”

Once you know what to look for, you may be surprised with the role your subconscious plays in your love for restaurants.

INFO@QCNERVE.COM

PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

HABERDISH IS LOCATED AT 3106 NORTH DAVIDSON STREET IN NODA

SUDOKU

TRIVIA TEST

BY LINDA THISTLE BY FIFI RODRIGUEZ

1. GEOGRAPHY: Which of the Great Lakes is smallest in surface area?

2. TELEVISION: Which sitcom has the theme song, “Where Everybody Knows Your Name”?

3. ANATOMY: Which part of the human body is involved with ACL surgery?

4. GAMES: What is the victim’s name in the U.S. version of the board game “Clue”?

5. ANIMAL KINGDOM: What is the world’s largest species of frog?

6. SCIENCE: What do isobars indicate?

7. LITERATURE: In the novel “Don Quixote,” who is the human companion to the title character?

8. MOVIES: In which movie did actor Bill Murray live the same day over and over?

9. THEATER: Who is believed to be

CROSSWORD

Adv tise With Us

THE SEEKER POINT BLANK PERIOD

Advocating for equitable access to menstrual products

BY KATIE GRANT

As spring slowly unfolds in Charlotte, my wellness routine has evolved for the better. Each Tuesday evening, I leave my Uptown office, eager to embrace the spaciousness of the Mint Museum while on my yoga mat. When the clock strikes 5 p.m., I stroll across several blocks framed by skyscrapers — a short walk that allows me to mentally quiet the noise from the workday.

For a full hour, the atrium within the Mint transforms into a sanctuary of mindfulness, where members and nonmembers can partake in rejuvenating yoga sessions. Already a member? Then these classes are a complimentary treat, courtesy of the code MINT21, while nonmembers can join for a fee of $15.

However, due to the unpredictable seasonal weather, some outdoor plans have been canceled or postponed. Recently, on a drizzly afternoon with outdoor social plans suddenly altered, some friends and I were rerouted to Girl Tribe Co. in SouthPark.

While wandering the aisles of pastel, screenprinted tees and sweatshirts, I noticed a space on the left-hand side dedicated to a variety of (equally as pastel) menstrual products. I wandered over and learned the products were part of a Period Nirvana x Girl Tribe Pop-Up collaboration.

There, I chatted with Period Nirvana founder and menstrual product expert Kim Rosas, who told me that she launched the initiative in 2020 with the goal of making period management comfortable and convenient.

Period Nirvana, with its dual focus on education and retail, seeks to empower individuals in their menstrual journeys. The company aims to redefine the narrative surrounding menstruation through informative resources, a personalized matchmaking quiz, and curated product offerings.

At the heart of this endeavor lies a commitment to social inclusivity, ethical stewardship and environmental sustainability.

Having never been to a period pop-up, I was captivated by the spirit of advocacy and sat down to some reading about it later that evening.

There from my couch, I came across Period Project NC (PPNC). Founded by high school students Sarah and Rose in 2021, PPNC endeavors to combat menstrual poverty within schools, foster a culture of inclusivity and advocate for women’s rights across North Carolina.

With more than 120 ambassadors spanning 15+ schools, PPNC is paving the way toward menstrual equity and educational empowerment. The organization is highly relevant, having reached 10,000 students, some of whom live here in Mecklenburg County, as East Mecklenburg High School is one of the schools the organization currently serves.

According to Women’s Voices for the Earth, the most commonly recognized definition of menstrual equity is the “affordability, accessibility and safety of menstrual products.”

Yet, amidst these commendable efforts previously mentioned, a glaring injustice persists. In North Carolina, menstrual products remain subject to the burden of taxation, deemed “non-essential” goods, and taxed at a rate of 4.75%.

This discriminatory practice, often referred to as the “tampon tax,” is a harsh reminder of the systemic inequalities that persist within our society.

In the 2023 documentary Periodical, activists explore the science, politics and cultural aspects of menstruation. It aims to break down the stigma surrounding periods and celebrate them as a normal part of women’s health.

The documentary reminds us that menstrual products are a necessity for most women, for much of their lives — essential for attending school, working, etc. It also reminds us that every one of us is here because a woman somewhere missed their period.

The documentary highlights legal aspects of the issue, such as how the tampon tax violates the equal protection clause in both state and federal constitutions. This means it’s not just unfair or inequitable but unconstitutional and therefore illegal.

However, there is hope on the horizon. In North Carolina, SB 741, aptly titled “Tax Relief on Essentials for Working Families,” seeks to exempt diapers and feminine hygiene products from taxation, acknowledging their essential nature.

While this legislation represents a step in the right direction, excluding “grooming and hygiene products” underscores the ongoing need for advocacy and reform.

As I reflect on the intersections of advocacy and community engagement, I anticipate other impactful and highly relevant events this spring, like the upcoming Community Impact Film Series: Mental Health hosted by the Independent Picture House.

Scheduled for Saturday, May 11, this event promises to foster dialogue, raise awareness, and inspire action to support mental health initiatives within our community.

In the city’s cultural tapestry, each thread represents a unique opportunity for advocacy, empowerment, and social change. And as we each navigate these complexities, my hope is that by sharing this information, together we can continue to champion causes that resonate with us individually and uplift the community as a whole. Period.

INFO@QCNERVE.COM

LIFESTYLE

MAY

1 - 7 MAY 8 -14

ARIES (March 21 to April 19) You’re doing better on a flexibility issue, but you still need to loosen up a bit to show that you can be less judgmental and more understanding about certain sensitive matters.

TAURUS (April 20 to May 20) Your personal aspect continues to dominate this week, but try to make time to deal with important career-linked matters as well. A change of plans might occur by the weekend.

GEMINI (May 21 to June 20) Excuses are not really needed for much of the confusion occurring this week. However, explanations from all parties could help in working things out to everyone’s satisfaction.

CANCER (June 21 to July 22) A surprising (but pleasant) recent turn of events continues to develop positive aspects. But be prepared for a bit of a jolt on another issue that needs attention.

LEO (July 23 to August 22) Creating a fuss might bring you the attention that you want. But are you prepared for all the explaining you’d have to do? Better to use more subtle ways to make your bid.

VIRGO (August 23 to September 22) With education continuing to be a strong factor this week, this could be the time to start learning some new skills that can later be applied to a bid for a potential career move.

LIBRA (September 23 to October 22) You might do well to reconsider some of your current priorities before you get so deeply involved in one project that you neglect meeting the deadline on another.

SCORPIO (October 23 to November 21) With an important decision looming, you need to be careful about the information you’re getting. Half-truths are essentially useless. Get the full story before you act.

SAGITTARIUS (November 22 to December 21) Find out what everyone’s role is expected to be before accepting a workplace proposal. Getting all the facts now could prevent serious problems later on.

CAPRICORN (December 22 to January 19) A flexible position on a workplace matter could be the best course to follow during the next several days. A personal issue also benefits from an open-minded approach.

AQUARIUS (January 20 to February 18) Involving too many people in your workplace problem can backfire. Remember: Allegiances can shift. Ask trusted colleagues for advice, but don’t ask them to take sides.

PISCES (February 19 to March 20) Before submitting your suggestions, take more time to sharpen the points that you want to make. The clearer the presentation, the more of a chance it has to get approved when submitted.

BORN THIS WEEK: Your clear sense of who you are gives you the confidence you need for tackling difficult situations.

ARIES (March 21 to April 19) You might need to do a bit more investigating before making a career move. You do best when you come armed with the facts. Meanwhile, a personal matter still needs tending to.

TAURUS (April 20 to May 20) Your creativity plus your good business sense once more combine to give you an important advantage in a difficult workplace situation. Also, an ally proves their loyalty.

GEMINI (May 21 to June 20) Avoid rushing into something just because it offers a break from your usual routine. Take things a step at a time to be sure that you’re moving in the right direction.

CANCER (June 21 to July 22) Bouncing back from a disappointing incident isn’t easy, but you should find a welcome turn of events emerging by midweek. Spend the weekend with someone special.

LEO (July 23 to August 22) An incomplete project needs your attention before someone else takes it over and uses it to their advantage. There’ll be lots of time for fun and games once you get it done.

VIRGO (August 23 to September 22) Doubts involving a potential career change need to be resolved quickly so that they don’t get in the way when you feel like you’re finally ready to make the big move.

LIBRA (September 23 to October 22) Looking to blame someone for a workplace problem could backfire if it turns out that you’ve got the wrong “culprit.” Best to get more facts before acting on your assumptions.

SCORPIO (October 23 to November 21) Patience might still be called for until you’re sure that you finally have the full story, which could have eluded you up until now. Also, a trusted associate could offer valuable guidance.

SAGITTARIUS (November 22 to December 21) Reflect on your recent behavior to see if you could have caused the coolness that you might now be sensing from a loved one. If so, apologize and set things straight.

CAPRICORN (December 22 to January 19) Easing up on your social activities allows you to focus more of your energies on a long-neglected personal matter. You can get back into party mode by the weekend.

AQUARIUS (January 20 to February 18) A dispute with a colleague can be resolved peacefully once you both agree to be more flexible about the positions you’ve taken and allow the space for more open-minded discussions.

PISCES (February 19 to March 20) Volunteering to take on added responsibilities could be a risky way to impress the powers that be. Only do it if you’re sure that you won’t be swept away by the extra workload.

BORN THIS WEEK: Your sense of self-awareness allows you to make bold moves with confidence and security.

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UPCOMING SPECIAL ISSUES

JUNE 12 | SUMMER GUIDE

JULY 10 | CLT MUSIC ISSUE

AUGUST 7 | PRIDE GUIDE

SEPTEMBER 4 | FALL ARTS GUIDE

OCTOBER 16 | HALLOWEEN GUIDE

Trivia Answers

1. Lake Ontario.

2. “Cheers.”

3. The knee. 4. Mr. Boddy.

5. Goliath frog. 6. Atmospheric pressure. 7. Sancho Panza.

“Groundhog Day.”

Thespis, 6th-century poet

“Cowboy Carter.”

SAVAGE LOVE QUIC KIES

Anal retentive

BY DA N SAVAGE

I’m 53-year-old straight woman. I’ve been talking with a guy online for three years — text, voice, video. I am in love with him. He is my daily companion and he says he loves me. He lives 269 miles away. He doesn’t want to meet me, although he isn’t married, and lives alone. I’ve tried going out with other people, but I am stuck on him. I definitely want more. Do I leave him or keep trying?

Can you leave someone you’ve never met? I’m not sure — but you can do the next best thing(s): You can block his number, you can block him on your socials, you can block his email address.

I have a disgusting and embarrassing problem. I have chronic IBS, and every time my husband and I want to have PIV doggystyle, my butt smells and he loses his erection. I know: cringe. I have tried a number of things: changes to my diet, a treatment for SIBO, a colonoscopy/endoscopy, even using a bidet. Nothing has helped. The gastroenterologist proposed not having doggy-style sex, but that’s my favorite position! Please help.

You’ve tried everything — including a bidet (a sign of true desperation) — and nothing has worked. So, maybe it’s time to think outside the health care/ health interventions box. My suggestion: Get your husband a rubber hood and gas mask with a long breathing tube — hell, get his & hers rubber gimp suits and masks — and your husband can fling his breathing tube over his shoulder or get a longer one that runs down to the floor. You won’t be able to have doggy-style sex spontaneously if you need to get dress in full rubber before you get started — but it’s your favorite position, so why not make it an occasion?

I’m in love with my sex worker. Can it ever be more than it is?

It could — if the feelings are mutual and you’re not one of those guys who wants “his” sex worker

to stop seeing other clients. You’re dating her, not taking possession of her.

How to survive going long-distance — suddenly and temporarily — at the beginning of a relationship?

Lean into the big dirties — dirty texts, dirty pics, dirty video chats — and give DADT a chance.

Recommendations for other sex advice columnists with a female perspective? I’ve been reading your stuff for years, lots of value, but I need a fresh perspective and I know my specific questions would piss you off and I wouldn’t get good advice. The outline is that I, a cishet woman in her late thirties, have recently concluded that I don’t LIKE men. At all. I’m also still a virgin. I don’t know where this leaves me. I’m not asexual. The idea of fucking a stranger literally makes me feel ill with anxiety. But I don’t want to build “an emotional connection” with a man. Too much bitterness and mistrust. So, anyone you’d care to pawn me and my problems off on?

My recommendations: Lori Gottlieb, Carolyn Hax, Damona Hoffman, E. Jean Carroll, Xaviera Hollander, and — still, always, forever — Judith “Miss Manners” Martin.

Please share these pronouns with your readers, listeners, and followers: She/He/ Shay; Her/Him/Shem; Hers/His/Shems; Herself/Himself/Shemself. My thought is that these gender-free pronouns could be used rather than using plural pronouns. They could ultimately replace gendered pronouns for everyone. Thank you for sharing these gender-free pronouns with the world!

Shou’re welcome?

P.S. The supply of gender-free/gender-neutral pronoun options is outstripping demand: we’ve already got ve/ver/verself, xe/xem/xemself, per/

per/perself, fae/faer/faerself, ze/zir/zirself, to say nothing of neoproouns that are impossible to conjugate (or take seriously), and only “they/them” is in wide use. And people who prefer genderneutral pronouns seem to have settled on they/ them/themself not despite its association with a plural meaning, but because of it. (“I contain multitudes, bitches!”) Anyway, tossing your idea out there, per your request.

P.S. “Your” is a pronoun that can mean just one person or a group of people — so, wrapping our heads around singular and plural meanings of “they” doesn’t seem like an impossible task.

What do you call a sibling’s child who uses they/them pronouns? Merriam-Webster is musing about nibling, which feels weird but might be the answer.

If “nibling” weirds you out — perhaps due to its homophone (“nibbling: to bite gently; to eat or chew in small bits”) — you could go with the gender neutral expression my aunts and uncles used when referring to me and my siblings and our dozens of cousins: “that little shit/those little shits/ you little shits.”

I’m with someone who cannot take even the slightest bit of criticism. If I say, “I’d like if you consult my schedule first,” or, “Can you do that more slowly” — or faster, or to the left, or whatever it might be — he melts down and acts like he’s a total failure, everything is over, etc. I try to be incredibly gentle with anything I say, but he’s so sensitive we can’t really talk about anything at all. And of course, if I were to say that to him, he’d have a breakdown. How do I walk around these landmines?

A partner who can’t take gentle criticism without having a self-lacerating meltdown may be less terrifying than a partner who flies into a rage at the slightest criticism, but in both cases the goal (conscious or subconscious) is the same: to reduce their partners to nervous wrecks. Meltdowners and ragers alike want their partners walking on eggshells at all times in a desperate and futile effort to avoid setting them off. You can stay with a pathetic meltdown type — someone like your partner — on the condition they get 1. professional help and 2. a grip. But those more dangerous and damaging ragers won’t seek help until they’ve been dumped for the hundredth time.

My lover and I have a weird push/pull dynamic. He reaches out for me — he texts a lot — and if I don’t respond right away he keeps texting these very sweet, very sincere messages about how concerned he is about me. But once I get back to him, I can’t get him to talk about anything going on with him. He’s great at listening, not so great at talking. I tell him everything, but I know next to nothing about what’s going on with him, despite my questions about his life. What can I do to get him to open up?

No clue.

I’m a bi AMAB 26-year-old enby who moved back in with my verbally abusive mom after college. Things with her came to a boiling point, so I moved in with my partner of six months. They’re 100% supportive and caring, but I’m worried about putting too much pressure on our new relationship. It’s the best relationship I’ve ever been in, and I don’t wanna ruin it, but I can’t afford my own place and I can’t move back in with my mom. What do I do?

Six months is too soon to move in with a new partner — but what other choice do you have? If there are no sublets or roommate situations you can afford in your area and you can’t move home, you’ll have to accept your new partner’s generosity. Find ways to take the pressure off by spending time with other friends, giving your partner plenty of space and plenty of head.

Me and my wife are in this cycle where the sex drops off from once a week to once a month due to her not feeling sexy due to body image issues. We talk, I reassure her, we go back to having sex once a week, and then the cycle repeats. Any advice on how to break the cycle?

If body image is the issue, offer regular reassurance — not just when the sex drops off — and make sure your wife has time for solo activities that make her feel comfortable in her own skin. And broadening your definition of sex to include non-PIV options and/or asking your wife to help you have a wank once in a while (without any pressure to upgrade to intercourse) and/or offering to go down on your wife (ditto) might also help.

Got problems? Yes, you do. Send your question to mailbox@savage.love! Podcasts, columns and more at Savage.Love.