Whew, the states are just flying by… from Illinois into Indiana, where I stayed a few days with a friend, and together we ran down into Kentucky to see Hamilton at the Kentucky Center for the Arts in Louisville. Whaaat!! I have been looking forward to this show for many months – like, from back before I moved into this van. As well as looking forward to seeing this friend again!
hooray!!
with Jacinda at intermission
We had a good visit, catching up on all the things that we don’t find time to talk or chat online about in our regular lives. I got to meet some lovely children. And oh, the show… will be reviewed eventually at my book blog, and I’ll repost here when that happens. (It will be a while.) In a nutshell, it was pretty much everything I hoped it would be. It was well worth it to know the soundtrack in advance, and that soundtrack was enriched during the live performance. I am the luckiest woman.
Upon leaving dear Jacinda, I made a stop in Bloomington to see the track where the Little 500 bike race (of Breaking Away fame) takes place. (The quarry that figures in the movie has since been filled in.)
In the Shreve High football stadium,
I think of Polacks nursing long beers in Tiltonsville,
And gray faces of Negroes in the blast furnace at Benwood,
And the ruptured night watchman of Wheeling Steel,
Dreaming of heroes.
All the proud fathers are ashamed to go home,
Their women cluck like starved pullets,
Dying for love.
Therefore,
Their sons grow suicidally beautiful
At the beginning of October,
And gallop terribly against each other’s bodies.
I have been having the nicest visit in Pittsburgh with my friend Karen! (She is much better at taking pictures than I am, too, so that’s a boon here.) We’ve been seeing a lot! First of all, I got into town specifically to go see Matthew Ferrence read from his book Appalachia North at City Books. I am so excited about this book – my review is forthcoming at pagesofjulia, and hopefully a fuller version elsewhere as well.
Karen, Matt, Julia
top billing
Matt reads
Matt’s reading was truly special. He picked short pieces from his book to read – out of order – and rolled straight from one into the next seamlessly; and indeed they read seamlessly, too, so that he patchworked a fresh, new essay from the book as if designed for it. I was very impressed; this seems like an art form in itself, choosing selections to read, in a way that so neatly showed what his book is about. I am a fan all over again. Don’t miss this read, y’all. I’ll try and repost a link here to the review when it goes live.
From here Karen took me on a driving tour of Pittsburgh in the dusk, including up to Mount Washington, where we rode the incline down to the edge of the Monongahela River and back up again. My fear of heights was present but not prohibitive. It was a gorgeous view of the city!
Pittsburgh from above
with Karen on the incline
Although we’ve just begun our tour, I feel warm already toward this city with its beautiful, old architecture and humble, working-class story. Rivers and hills and old brick: what’s not to love?
After leaving FAME I was really losing my mind, you guys. I had to go park and have some quiet time before I could move on, to Muscle Shoals Sound Studio. David Hood, Jimmy Johnson, Roger Hawkins, and Barry Beckett started their careers as studio musicians at FAME, but left in 1969 to open their own studio, where they served as both owners and studio musicians; this is where they became known as the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section (inducted into the Alabama Hall of Fame as such). They were hailed as some of the finest studio musicians out there, with acts as big as the Rolling Stones coming into town to record in their studio. An anecdote from the documentary:
Paul Simon called Stax Records, said “Hey, man, I want those same Black players that played on ‘I’ll Take You There.'” They said, “That can happen, but these guys are mighty pale.”
(The joke here is that the four of them are white.)
I first learned about the Muscle Shoals Sound from a song.
Here, the tour was $15, and presented in a style much more suited to beginners: where Spencer at FAME is a sound engineer and apt to speak a bit over our non-professional heads (though happy to explicate where asked), the unnamed young man at Muscle Shoals Sound expected much less expertise. By this time, at my third stop of the day (and having some pre-study time put in, as a fan of these bands and having watched the documentary), Spencer’s style suited me a little better. But being in the place was, again, heady and nearly overwhelming. Here we talked a lot about the Swampers (nickname for the Rhythm Section, as immortalized in “Sweet Home Alabama” – go listen again and you’ll hear it), as well as Cher, the Stones, and Linda Ronstadt, among many others. I was amazed to hear we’d just missed David Hood, who’d been in recording just this week.
The Stones’ Sticky Fingers: three tracks recorded here, including “Brown Sugar”
Jerry Wexler and Willie Nelson
foreground to back: Wurlitzer; Rod Stewart photo; control room
Cher’s handwritten note on her album 3614 Jackson Highway (after the studio’s address) – first album recorded here
iconic storefront
David Hood’s corner
original studio lounge/speakeasy, from when this was a dry county
Muscle Shoals Sound Studio
On my way into and out of town, I saw signs for places I’ve been hearing about in Truckers and Isbell songs for years: Russellville, Tuscumbia, Seven Mile Island; Lauderdale, Colbert, and Franklin counties. Wilson Dam, immortalized in a pair of Truckers songs by Cooley (“Uncle Frank“) and Isbell (“TVA“), respectively.
“all that backed up water had to have someplace to go”
I’ve seen some birds, particularly around the dam: American white pelicans, great blue herons, Canada geese, a few Eastern bluebirds, and throughout the area, lots and lots of American robins.
I am now exhausted and reeling from this brush with greatness. How will I recover? I just feel so lucky that there’s such good music in the world, and that I get to know about it.
If I have not entirely killed my audience with these two gushy posts, let me leave you with a Jason Isbell Tiny Desk Concert that you will not regret.
Whew. What a place for me to visit. I can scarcely say in a little ol’ blog post what this all means to me, but the Drive-By Truckers and Jason Isbell are some of the most important artists to me in the world. And their world to a large extent begins in a little town called Muscle Shoals, Alabama.
Muscle Shoals is also the nexus and birthplace of a huge amount of great music – seriously, if there’s music you love in the world, I’d bet money some of it originated in this little town. And the roots of so much good music. Again, I won’t attempt to tell you the whole story myself. You should check out an excellent documentary titled, yes, Muscle Shoals to get the scoop.
I knew that I had to visit on this trip, as a paying of respects.
I started my day at the Alabama Music Hall of Fame, which has not yet inducted any of my most personally held favorite Alabama musicians, but boy are there some good ones in there, though: Hank Williams, Emmylou Harris, Lionel Richie, Tammy Wynette, Percy Sledge, Sam Phillips, Nat King Cole, Rick Hall, Wilson Pickett, Eddie Hinton, Spooner Oldham, and the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section including David Hood (father to Patterson Hood, frontman of the Truckers). And so many more.
As a destination, the Hall of Fame is a bit run-down, but full of history and artifacts and lore. If you’re a fan of even a couple of these guys, I think it’s worth a visit. The $10 entry feels a hair steep, maybe, but I’m glad this place is here so I shrug and I pay it. I got some shots.
dress worn by Emmylou Harris
“This odd looking steel guitar, called ‘The Contraption,’ enabled Pappy Neal McCormick to change tunings rapidly while performing on network radio and television shows. Each neck would be tuned to a different key, and he could rotate the instrument quickly to the appropriate neck so as to avoid the need to retune.”
Eddie Hinton, hero to the Truckers and to me. he didn’t get much of a display despite being an inductee.
Isbell is not inducted – YET – but he got a mention right by the front door.
Next I visited FAME Studio, the fabled beginning of the famous Muscle Shoals sound. Rick Hall and two partners opened FAME in 1959; by 1961 he was solo, and immediately making history. I took a $10 tour that was worth every penny and then some – don’t ask what I then spent in the gift shop on a book, an album, a couple of stickers and a t-shirt. Tour guide Spencer was entertaining and chock-full of names and stories; it was a lot to take in and I couldn’t stop grinning. I was star-struck just being in the same room where so many greats have recorded. Aretha Franklin, Etta James, Percy Sledge, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, Lynyrd Skynyrd, the Truckers, Isbell, Spooner Oldham, Band of Horses, Phish, Gregg Allman, Steven Tyler…
the Wurlitzer where Spooner Oldham added the licks to hits by Percy Sledge and Aretha Franklin
where all the magic has happened: Studio A
they’re very proud of Isbell, who recorded his first three solo albums here
Isbell’s handwritten lyrics, “Outfit”
Isbell’s handwritten lyrics, “Decoration Day”
piano that Alicia Keys recorded on
art on control board by Steven Tyler, who turned out to be a really cool guy, they say
control board with Rodney Hall (Rick’s youngest son) at work
Studio B, the newer, larger space, is a mess right now as they bring in some new equipment
There’s more. But I’m going to break this post into two parts, lest I overwhelm you.
After Tuskegee, I hit Montgomery. The main goal here was civil rights monuments and memorials. My parents took me on a road trip the summer I turned ten – between fourth and fifth grades, then? – all over: my father’s notes say “Alabama, Appalachia, DC, Plymouth, Boston, Caper Hill July 4 reunion, VT etc., Port Gibson.” It was a full and rich outing, but perhaps too much for me to take in: I remember a small number of events/people very clearly and have forgotten much of it. But one of the lasting images I have is of the then newly-opened Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery. It was designed by Maya Lin, who also designed the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., and improbably I recall knowing that detail at the time, too (we visited the latter memorial on the same trip, of course). I remember the flat marble table-top with its carved names and running water, and the water-wall with Martin Luther King, Jr.’s words inscribed. It’s odd what we remember. Clearly, this place made an impression.
The Southern Poverty Law Center describes the memorial:
A circular black granite table records the names of the martyrs and chronicles the history of the movement in lines that radiate like the hands of a clock. Water emerges from the table’s center and flows evenly across the top. On a curved black granite wall behind the table is engraved Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s well-known paraphrase of Amos 5:24 – We will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
So I returned, nearly thirty years later. I left Hops in the van catty-corner to the memorial center. I started out outside, at the Lin-designed memorial I remembered: it seems smaller now, because I’m bigger, and the names are harder to read; there are chinks and chips in the lip of the table-top. But it’s the same, still there. I walked up a short walk to enter the memorial center, which I don’t remember at all, although surely we would have gone inside when I was small? My two-dollar entry fee was waived because I am a member of the Southern Poverty Law Center, like my father before me (he remembers our fees waived back then, too), so I made a small donation instead.
The forty-one names that are inscribed on the memorial – forty-one men, women and children killed for their civil rights work, or simply for being Black – are given a bit more backstory inside, on plaques. There’s a short film (twenty minutes?), which is well worth watching, about those deaths and others, and the continuing need for movement. There’s the opportunity to sign one’s name to the Wall of Tolerance.
It is a somber place to visit. Some of the names were familiar (Emmitt Till, Medgar Evers, MLK); some told familiar stories even if the names were not familiar (four girls killed at a Birmingham church bombing: Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley. three civil rights workers killed and buried in an earthen dam: James Earl Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Henry Schwerner). A number of names and stories, of course, were new to me. And yet somehow not new: individual faces on a problem I’ve learned about before, since at least the summer I turned ten. It’s a problem we’re not done with yet. You can read all the names and brief stories here.
From the center, I wandered on through the neighborhood. Something else I did not recall from my last visit to Montgomery was how rich and densely-packed were the civil rights landmarks in this neighborhood. From the center (Hops and Foxy still waiting on that corner), I walked just a few blocks to the Freedom Riders Museum, in the former Greyhound bus station where Freedom Riders were attacked (closed, but with a very good stretch of educational signage outside that I’m most grateful for); Rosa Parks’s bus stop (on Court Square, once site of one of the largest slave markets in the South); Martin Luther King, Jr.’s church (now Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist); and the Alabama State Capitol (where the Selma to Montgomery march concluded). I was floored that all these major sites were packed so closely together. It was a heady little walk I took. I’ve made one photo gallery here for you of Montgomery’s richness (including additional historical markers, on practically every street corner, it seemed).
civil rights martyrs, Civil Rights Memorial Center
Civil Rights Memorial
names
streets of Montgomery
Freedom Riders Museum
“colored entrance”
Freedom Rides
Court Square (Rosa Parks’s bus stop is across the way)
slave trade at Court Square
Alabama State Capitol
Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church
I’m left a little muddled in my impressions of this city, which was the first capitol of the Confederacy and the site of the start of the Civil War, as well as the birthplace of important parts of the civil rights movement. It’s a lot to take in.
I finished my day with a few artists: the graves of Hank and Audrey Williams, and the Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum, in a former residence (also closed, but I walked the grounds).
Audrey Williams (left), Hank Williams (right)
Oakwood
Oakwood
Fitzgerald Museum
is that supposed to be Zelda in the window? scared the shit outta me
Hops really wanted to go in
Zelda’s garden
After a full day, Hops and I were grateful to crash out in this comfortable and comforting little space. good night