Tag: soul

Traveler: Your Guide to Memphis

Posted on by Editor

There are two types of people in this world: those who love Nashville and those who prefer Memphis. I fall into the latter. Located on the banks of the Mississippi River, Memphis is one of the South’s most diverse cities. The music history is rich. Jazz and blues incubated on Beale Street. Stax Records brought the soul. The trail of tears crossed the Mississippi. With so much to see and do, it’s important to go in with a plan and some sights in mind.

Getting There

Unless you’re coming from nearby, the most obvious choice would be airplane. Memphis has a major international airport, so you should have no problem getting a flight. If you are coming from down South, take Highway 61. It might take a bit longer, but you’ll come up the blues trail. Be sure to make a pit stop in Clarksdale, MS. It’s full of juke joints and good eats. You’ll pass the crossroads where Robert Johnson allegedly sold his soul … It’s now a parking lot.

Accommodations

The Peabody Ducks. Photo credit: Roger Schultz via Foter.com / CC BY.

Memphis is not an expensive city to visit and there are ample places to stay. I stayed at my friend Tim’s house, but that’s not an option for you: He’s a private person and doesn’t take kindly to unannounced strangers.

A good place to start on a moderate budget is downtown. Most of the hotels have decent prices and are also close to all the sights. If money is not a problem, check out the Peabody Hotel. It is a National Historic Hotel and famous for its ducks. The penthouse is home to a family of ducks. Every morning at 8 am, they take the elevator to the lobby. They march to the central fountain and then swim for the rest of the day. At exactly 5 pm each night, they take the elevator back upstairs. It’s been happening for countless generations. A duck walk of fame surrounds the building. Of course, the ducks aren’t the only reason it is listed as a National Historic Hotel. The Peabody is beautiful and emanates old school glamour.

If you are the adventurous type, check out the Big Cypress Lodge at the Bass Pro Shops at the Pyramid. I know, it sounds bonkers. Bass bought the Pyramid that formerly housed the Memphis Grizzlies. They retrofitted it as a massive retail store and hotel. It is amazing. They spared no expense. The closest comparison is Disneyland’s Splash Mountain. There are water features and catfish and dioramas. An enormous faux cypress tree reaches the upper decks of the pyramid. It’s worth a visit, even if you decide on a more practical sleeping arrangement.

Food

Photo courtesy of Central BBQ. 

Though famous for its barbecue, Memphis has wonderful food, all the way around. But, playing to its strengths, Central BBQ is a good spot to try out some different styles. Be warned: It’s popular and it gets crowded. Don’t be afraid of their hot barbecue sauce. It wasn’t very spicy. The mustard and vinegar sauces are worth a dip or two. Be sure to check out the great Mississippi Blues Map mural in the backroom.

How about a bit of soul food for brunch? Check out Alcenia’s. For $12.95, you can consume a week’s worth of calories. I had the sausage omelet with fried green tomatoes, a biscuit, potatoes, and coffee. I still had at least one more side choice. All of their food is good. The chicken and waffles are top notch. You’ll also get a kiss on the cheek if Miss BJ, the proprietor, is there. Plan on spending some time at this joint. It isn’t fast food, but it is well worth the wait. Don’t hold it against them that Guy Fieri recommended them. I know he’s a divisive figure, but he’s right about Alcenia’s.

Soul Fish Café was my favorite restaurant this time around. The blackened catfish is absolutely phenomenal. (The fried catfish was also delicious.) I can’t recommend the Soul Fish Café enough. The tables fill up fast, but there’s usually room at the counter. Highly recommended.

In short, I would be enormous if I lived in Memphis.

Drink

Beale Street. Photo credit: charley1965 via Foter.com / CC BY-SA.

If you’re going to Memphis as a tourist, you need to do some touristy things. One of those things is getting drunk on Beale Street — the Bourbon Street of Memphis. Lined with bars, Beale Street is where you’ll find dueling pianos and Stax cover bands. There’s Almost Elton, an Elton John cover artist, and a gazillion blues groups. You can drink in the street, so it’s a good time and it’s probably not somewhere the locals want to hang, but it’s worth visiting while on vacation.

The Cooper-Young neighborhood is another great area for drinks. The Slider Inn is a popular joint. There’s also Young Avenue Deli, which has pool tables and airs the games. Don’t worry if you don’t like sports, the games are muted. Another Cooper-Young neighborhood joint is the Celtic Crossing. On the weekends, they have live Celtic music, often accompanied by clogging.

Best of all, beers are cheap in Memphis. You won’t break the bank with a wild night on the town.

Coffee

Photo courtesy of Café Keough.

Visit Coffeehouse Row. (Nobody in Memphis calls it this, but I think it has a nice ring.) On the way to Cooper-Young, you’ll drive down Cooper Street. You have three different, but good, coffee choices. The first is Muddy’s Bake Shop. This is a cutesy place. You can get cupcakes here. If it were an online retailer, it would be Etsy. Next, you have Other Lands. It’s a bit grittier. They sell beer. If it were an online retailer, it would be Craigslist. Your final choice is Tart. It’s the artsy coffee house. They have a huge outdoor patio that’s great for smoking cigarettes and getting deep. If it were an online retailer, it would be Ziibra. But Café Keough is my favorite coffee shop. It’s downtown and one of the only places with bagels. The place is huge and has a comfortable atmosphere. They also have great t-shirts.

Live Music

Boogie on Beale Street. Photo credit: Heath Cajandig via Foter.com / CC BY.

Hi Tone is one of the best rock ‘n' roll venues in America. We caught a great show while in town — local band the Dead Soldiers were back in town after a long tour. They brought the house down. There were sing-alongs and inside jokes, as drunk people fell off their chairs waving their hands in the air. (It was like they just didn’t care.) There was a lot of love in that room, and it was a pleasure to bear witness. Also, the beers were cheap. I loved it.

Wild Bills is the best blues joint in town. It’s a bit isolated, but they have some great acts. They also serve 40s. Be warned that the music doesn’t start until 11 pm. 

If you make it to Beale Street, you’re going to catch a lot of live music. Every storefront offers up something new — traditional jazz, blues, rock ‘n' roll, and soul. The history of Memphis music is proudly displayed seven nights a week on Beale Street. The Southern Folklore Center also puts on some great daytime concerts. Located downtown, they curate an excellent roster that ranges from gospel to blues and everything in-between.

Local Flavor

Graceland living room. Photo credit: Rob Shenk via Foter.com / CC BY-SA.

Memphis has four must-see destinations. You need to go to Graceland. Don’t worry about the plane tour and all the add-ons. They pile up quick. Just go and see the mansion. It’s $36, and well worth it. It comes with a guided iPad tour that is narrated by John Stamos. (Yes, Uncle Jesse from Full House.) The tour is informative and Stamos’s voice sounds a bit like George Clooney, which I had never noticed. The Jungle Room is one of the coolest living rooms ever. The Pool Room is lined in fabric and feels like a 1970s opium den. Elvis didn’t care what was cool. He liked what he liked and the results are a one of a kind home.

Next, you have to visit Sun Studio. So many iconic records were recorded there. It’s where Elvis and Johnny Cash got their start. Howling Wolf cut some amazing sides at Sun before heading up to Chicago. To stand where so many greats have stood before is a powerful feeling.

The Lorraine Hotel, now the National Civil Rights Museum. Photo credit: Andy Miller.

Any Memphis trip is incomplete without a visit to the Lorraine Hotel. This is where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot. It’s now the National Civil Rights Museum. It’s heavy. And it will depress you. That being said, it is important to remember our past mistakes in order to learn from them, especially in today’s extreme world.

Finally, you need to visit the Stax Records Home of American Soul Museum. Isaac Hayes's gold-plated Cadillac is on display and Otis Redding cut his classics in those same halls. If you were ever on the fence between Motown and Stax, you will leave with two feet in Stax’s backyard.

Lede photo credit: BlankBlankBlank via Foter.com / CC BY.

Son Little and the Truth of Absolutes

Posted on by Editor

Son Little (aka Aaron Earl Livingston) is one of those artists who transcend time, place, and genre. That makes his music hard to define, though not hard to appreciate … much like the artist who makes it. Livingston was born in Los Angeles, but grew up on the East Coast — somewhere between New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania – eventually calling Philadelphia home. In Philly, he found artistic camaraderie with RJD2 and the Roots, eventually taking up the Son Little moniker for his own work.

After his breakthrough EP, Things I Forgot, dropped last year, the soul-blues innovator was tapped to produce Mavis Staples' four-song Your Good Fortune EP that came out earlier this year. Now, he's back with a full-length, self-titled effort that continues to muddy the waters that flow between the roots of American music.

Are you a guy who feels like it all goes back to the blues?

It probably goes back beyond the blues, but I think our music here in America informs the whole world. If it's the family tree, the blues is definitely in the roots.

And do you feel like contemporary R&B has strayed from those origins, for the most part?

I think that's true, to a certain extent. I don't know if it's mincing words to start talking about pop music, but that line is maybe blurred a little bit — between R&B and pop. I think sometimes genres have become a sort of wallpaper. The blues is something that indicates rural living, country. And, when you want to portray modernity or you want to convey a metropolitanism, you would avoid the blues. So I think maybe, in that sense, contemporary R&B is affiliated with a feeling of sophistication or urban-ness that you can't signify by using the blues.

Nu-soul, neo-blues, modern blues, “soulful new Americana,” “soul music for the hip-hop generation" … How do YOU describe your music? Or how would you like it described? And have there been tags applied that are uncomfortable?

You can't really control what people call it, so I don't worry about that too much. But there have been some descriptions that I really like. There's a guy here in Philly I was talking to a few weeks ago. He told me that he had listened to the record and it was like Sam Cooke in outer space. [Laughs] I really like that.

We did a show in Woodstock, NY, and this guy came up after and said something like Howlin' Wolf meets Fugazi, or something like that. I like that. I think there are a lot of ways to describe it. There are a lot of ways to describe anything. And they can all be right … or all be equally wrong.

While there's nothing retro about what you're doing, it is still more authentic and informed by the past, but it's completely of the here and now. I feel like Alabama Shakes are doing something comparable. And Fink is in the neighborhood, too, but not as complex in the craftsmanship.

I love the Alabama Shakes record. You can hear the development from the last one. They are becoming more unique, in a way — their voice, collectively. And Brittany, of course individually, is becoming more specific.

I do feel like there's a similar approach. They probably get lumped into being retro but, especially with this record, it's clear that's not what it is. For some people, maybe it is retro for people to write songs with a guitar and go play their shows with guitar and bass and drums. That's maybe a retro idea and maybe we're at a point where, just doing that alone, is seemingly retro. But despite the fact that there's nothing new under the sun, I think everyone's different and we can all find our own way of doing that very thing that's so familiar. Despite everything, a singer is who they are and sounds how they sound. If you're willing to be your own thing, you can find that.

What Leon Bridges is doing, that's retro. Or Nathaniel Rateliff's new record.

People are definitely doing that.

… but this ain't that.

Right. At the same time, it's 2015. It's not 1960 no matter what you do, no matter how hard you try to make something sound like a time that's passed. The time has passed. You're still making something new or unique. With a lot of that stuff — Iike with the Alabama Shakes — I'm interested to see what develops from the point that Leon Bridges is starting at. I'm excited to see what he does next. Where do you go with that?


So that's style. Now let's get into substance. When Ferguson was the topic of the day, there was some criticism that artists weren't doing their part, weren't showing solidarity. You address your experience of that and Eric Garner in “Oh Mother.” Do you feel any sort of imperative to take that stuff on … Black Lives Matter or whatever speaks to you?

No. I don't actually. I understand people's criticism of artists, in that respect, because I think people have come to depend on artists to make statements and speak for us as a whole. But, like anything else, I think it's a little lazy to just expect that someone else is going to do something. For people who make that criticism, if what you want said isn't being said, then say it yourself. If it really means that much … if it's imperative that it be said and it's not being said, then you need to say it.

But, that said, no matter how I feel about an issue, I also have rules about the way I make music and express myself. The main rule is that I don't force myself to do anything. If I'm compelled to speak about something, then I will speak. I'm not going to speak because other people think I should.

You are just Aaron, when it comes down to it.

Yeah, that's the thing … I wrote those things because I felt compelled, as a person, to express myself about them. And it's great if those things resonate with people, but I wouldn't have done it if I didn't feel the need, internally, to do that.

In an interview I read, you talked about being able to see more than one side to things. Absolutes and firm truths don't really exist, do they? It's all subjective perception.

If you're realistic about it, it's pretty hard to come to any other conclusion. [Laughs] If I have an absolute belief in something and there's no proof, so to speak — it's my conviction and faith that I'm holding on to — you may have the exact opposite feeling and who am I to tell you you're wrong? And who are you to tell me I'm wrong? I think, in a lot of cases, that's how we end up killing each other and confusing ourselves and forgetting what's important.

I'm curious about something … As you travel around the country, hitting truck stops and diners on highways in the Heartland, do you feel eyes on you?

Yeah, sometimes, because I don't look like them. I try to be an easy person to talk to and I'm interested in people who are different than me. So I think, sometimes, maybe part of it is people who grow up, say in the Northeast, we're the most neurotic part of the country. [Laughs] We're all in our heads and we care and wonder and try to predict what other people think of us probably too much. So, sometimes, with things like that, I wonder how much is just all in my head. If someone's looking at you, they're curious — maybe more than anything else.

For a long time, I was never south of Virginia, so I had a made up version of what the South is or what the Midwest is. We think of everyone in a sort of monochromatic way: “People in the South are this. People in the Midwest are this.” But we're not allowing people in those places to be all the different things that people in those places are. That's actually been one of my favorite aspects of my career. I've now been to a lot of those places, not just big cities. I've been to Milwaukee. And I've been to Iowa. And I've been to North Carolina and places like that and really got to experience what it's really like there.

All photos by the supremely talented Laura E. Partain. You can find her on Instagram and Tumblr.