Both Kinds Of Music...
Oct. 4th, 2021 02:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
waitingmanMemphis & Nashville 2012...
Oct. 3 Wednesday – Memphis to Nashville
When the sun came out on Memphis, we could see that our motel was surrounded by empty & derelict buildings – sure signs of an economy in trouble, but great for ‘Urban Decay’ photos, of which we each took a few
Just a stone's throw from the local school?
Looking for a good view of the river, we eventually found Tom Lee Park with a view to three bridges, as well as some of the more striking landmarks like the Pyramid Hotel. Tom was a black man who rescued people from an overturned paddle steamer in 1925 & just for once, wasn't forgotten, sidelined, or worse, arrested/lynched for it... The statue by the riverside depicting his actions is striking & a beautiful tribute
Then back to Sun Studios to enquire about tours. As we walked in the door, one was just about to start, so we joined the surprisingly large group in a gallery room upstairs with old recording machines, original vinyl pressings & other memorabilia from the 50s, when Sam Philips began by recording blues artists like Howlin’ Wolf & then had Elvis, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, Muddy Waters & Ike Turner come through the doors over the next ten years. The studio itself was a great room too, with an offset ceiling made to a design from an early edition of Popular Mechanics magazine, more vintage equipment & an X on the floor marking the spot where EP stood when recording vocals, so of course one of us had to pose there with the old condenser microphone stand. The tour was a cheap thing to do, but the gift shop at the end of it wasn’t... Still, a fun time for both of us
Where the magic happened... Still in use today, as evidenced by the 'Shure' sound baffle - pretty 'sure' they weren't around in 1955!!
Brunch at Miss Polly’s Bar & Diner on Beale St, where we had hot wings, steak’n’ham’n’eggs, while being amused by the banter between staff & various locals who dropped in. Then a quick trawl through A. Schwab’s – an old mixed-business store on Beale (in fact the oldest store on Beale St, whose motto is 'If you can't find it at Schwab's, you're probably better off without it'), then off to the Gibson guitar factory... well, one of them anyway... the one where they make all the hollow-body electric guitars. During the fascinating tour, which took you through the whole process of manufacture, Julia had to keep grabbing hold of my hands as they kept straying to racks filled with either completed guitars, or even just the ones that were half-finished. It was like being in a candy shop with your jaws wired together. The tour took us onto the factory floor where most of the processes are still measured & done by hand. No vacancies were advertised... dammit. Afterwards in the guitar shop, I became quite well acquainted with an ES3399 model hollow-body electric that played nicely just on its own & sounded great through an amplifier. After about half an hour of playing it & others (just for research purposes of course), Julia had to drag me away, so I took a photo of the ES3399 & promised to come back in about three years with the required couple of thousand dollars I just didn’t have on me today...
Some day...
When in Memphis, I suppose you have to make the pilgrimage to Graceland - it would be like going to London & not seeing Buckingham Palace. So we Navmanned our way through some incredible neighbourhoods that were 50/50 derelict or decaying houses & beautifully restored ones, often right next to each other on the same street. We found Elvis Presley Boulevarde & followed it through these run-down areas until it met up with a bypass that Jeeves Navman had neglected to mention &, all of a sudden, the surrounding buildings were freshly painted, well-maintained & the very image of prosperity along the next mile or so to Graceland. Have to give the tourists a good impression I suppose - but those of us with Navmans which prefer back streets, are not so easily fooled! Anyway, we pulled into the Graceland carpark & its attendant souvenir shops, balked at the $10 charge for just parking there, found a spot on the street just a short walk away, then took a photo of the Graceland sign at the side of the road. That’s as close as we got to the place. Heartbreak Hotel (& RV Park), which was indeed at the end of Lonely St, just had to be snapped as well
But that was it for Elvis-related activity. Neither of us are big fans of his work & there’s so much other music that’s come out of this city than just him... The Amazing Rhythm Aces spring to mind... Where’s their souvenir & t-shirt shop??!!
And so, to Nashville, about three hundred miles away. After driving in circles for a few minutes, we found the right way to the freeway & headed east. About halfway there, we passed a group of 4WDs parked under an overpass that were obviously police radar cars, but I didn’t think we were going fast enough to attract attention. One of the cars disagreed & headed out after us, so we pulled over & waited to see how much the ticket would be... Luck was with us though – the police officer asked to see my license & passport, asked where we’d picked up the car from & if we’d been pulled over any other time during our trip... which we hadn’t. He then warned us to keep an eye on our speed & let us go, though he disconcertingly followed us for about five miles afterwards, but I think he was just looking for a place to turn ‘round to rejoin those other 4WDs. I mean I hope he was...
Into Nashville as the sun went down & into another Super 8 Motel, this one with a king-size bed in our room... we’ll need 2-way radios to talk to each other. A quick change of clothes & then down to Broadway, or ‘The Strip’, depending on which sign you read. After a detour due to roadwork, we found parking a block or two away from the action, then plunged in, looking for dinner & a show... or two. Even on a Wednesday night in the ‘off’ season, with no big names in town, no festivals... the street was crowded, more so than Beale St had been. We settled on Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville for dinner. Unlike his Vegas venture, this one had no slot machines, none of his music playing, but an acoustic duo doing covers & an appealing menu. Jambalaya for the lady & I had a seafood mac’n’cheese, both of which were quite good, as was the cocktail I ordered as accompaniment. Dammit, I really didn’t want to like the place, as I’m not overly fond of Jimmy’s music & am less of a fan of him personally since I’d discovered in Vegas that he owns a casino, but this Nashville experience was pretty impressive...
Back out onto the street in search of some music. Every second place had various combos playing & we kept an ear out as we walked for something that appealed. What Julia found appealing was the large candy store that had no music, but large toffee apples in more flavours than I would have thought of. Eventually though, we came to the Bootlegger’s Inn, where the band inside struck up ‘Ring of Fire’ as we passed. That was as good a sign as any, so we walked in, found a table & enjoyed their last three songs. Another band was soon setting up for the 10-2am shift, so we ordered more drinks & waited to see if they were as good as the first one. They were... the guitar & bass players especially & the female singer kept up a practised banter between songs. The standard of musicianship was incredibly high for an unknown band in a little bar on a weeknight. You’d never hear anything that good in Australia in a similar place, or time... These guys played more covers, but really well & were fun to watch as well as hear. They even did a Keith Urban song without knowing there were two Australians in the bar... Unfortunately, as the hour grew late, the bar began to empty out & soon it was we two Australians & not many others. And we were getting tired. As they launched into a requested Gretchen Wilson song, we dropped $10 in their bucket & headed out
Walking back up to the car was like walking through a radio shop with everything tuned to different (country) stations. So many venues, so many bands, all of which sounded good. At the very least it was nice to be surrounded by so much country music & know that there was no chance of hearing anything by Kasey Chambers...
An abortive attempt to drive past the Ryman Auditorium, or Grand Ol’ Opry, as it’s also known – we’ll look for it tomorrow, then back to the motel... Sleep
Oct. 3 Wednesday – Memphis to Nashville
When the sun came out on Memphis, we could see that our motel was surrounded by empty & derelict buildings – sure signs of an economy in trouble, but great for ‘Urban Decay’ photos, of which we each took a few
Just a stone's throw from the local school?
Looking for a good view of the river, we eventually found Tom Lee Park with a view to three bridges, as well as some of the more striking landmarks like the Pyramid Hotel. Tom was a black man who rescued people from an overturned paddle steamer in 1925 & just for once, wasn't forgotten, sidelined, or worse, arrested/lynched for it... The statue by the riverside depicting his actions is striking & a beautiful tribute
Then back to Sun Studios to enquire about tours. As we walked in the door, one was just about to start, so we joined the surprisingly large group in a gallery room upstairs with old recording machines, original vinyl pressings & other memorabilia from the 50s, when Sam Philips began by recording blues artists like Howlin’ Wolf & then had Elvis, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, Muddy Waters & Ike Turner come through the doors over the next ten years. The studio itself was a great room too, with an offset ceiling made to a design from an early edition of Popular Mechanics magazine, more vintage equipment & an X on the floor marking the spot where EP stood when recording vocals, so of course one of us had to pose there with the old condenser microphone stand. The tour was a cheap thing to do, but the gift shop at the end of it wasn’t... Still, a fun time for both of us
Where the magic happened... Still in use today, as evidenced by the 'Shure' sound baffle - pretty 'sure' they weren't around in 1955!!
Brunch at Miss Polly’s Bar & Diner on Beale St, where we had hot wings, steak’n’ham’n’eggs, while being amused by the banter between staff & various locals who dropped in. Then a quick trawl through A. Schwab’s – an old mixed-business store on Beale (in fact the oldest store on Beale St, whose motto is 'If you can't find it at Schwab's, you're probably better off without it'), then off to the Gibson guitar factory... well, one of them anyway... the one where they make all the hollow-body electric guitars. During the fascinating tour, which took you through the whole process of manufacture, Julia had to keep grabbing hold of my hands as they kept straying to racks filled with either completed guitars, or even just the ones that were half-finished. It was like being in a candy shop with your jaws wired together. The tour took us onto the factory floor where most of the processes are still measured & done by hand. No vacancies were advertised... dammit. Afterwards in the guitar shop, I became quite well acquainted with an ES3399 model hollow-body electric that played nicely just on its own & sounded great through an amplifier. After about half an hour of playing it & others (just for research purposes of course), Julia had to drag me away, so I took a photo of the ES3399 & promised to come back in about three years with the required couple of thousand dollars I just didn’t have on me today...
Some day...
When in Memphis, I suppose you have to make the pilgrimage to Graceland - it would be like going to London & not seeing Buckingham Palace. So we Navmanned our way through some incredible neighbourhoods that were 50/50 derelict or decaying houses & beautifully restored ones, often right next to each other on the same street. We found Elvis Presley Boulevarde & followed it through these run-down areas until it met up with a bypass that Jeeves Navman had neglected to mention &, all of a sudden, the surrounding buildings were freshly painted, well-maintained & the very image of prosperity along the next mile or so to Graceland. Have to give the tourists a good impression I suppose - but those of us with Navmans which prefer back streets, are not so easily fooled! Anyway, we pulled into the Graceland carpark & its attendant souvenir shops, balked at the $10 charge for just parking there, found a spot on the street just a short walk away, then took a photo of the Graceland sign at the side of the road. That’s as close as we got to the place. Heartbreak Hotel (& RV Park), which was indeed at the end of Lonely St, just had to be snapped as well
But that was it for Elvis-related activity. Neither of us are big fans of his work & there’s so much other music that’s come out of this city than just him... The Amazing Rhythm Aces spring to mind... Where’s their souvenir & t-shirt shop??!!
And so, to Nashville, about three hundred miles away. After driving in circles for a few minutes, we found the right way to the freeway & headed east. About halfway there, we passed a group of 4WDs parked under an overpass that were obviously police radar cars, but I didn’t think we were going fast enough to attract attention. One of the cars disagreed & headed out after us, so we pulled over & waited to see how much the ticket would be... Luck was with us though – the police officer asked to see my license & passport, asked where we’d picked up the car from & if we’d been pulled over any other time during our trip... which we hadn’t. He then warned us to keep an eye on our speed & let us go, though he disconcertingly followed us for about five miles afterwards, but I think he was just looking for a place to turn ‘round to rejoin those other 4WDs. I mean I hope he was...
Into Nashville as the sun went down & into another Super 8 Motel, this one with a king-size bed in our room... we’ll need 2-way radios to talk to each other. A quick change of clothes & then down to Broadway, or ‘The Strip’, depending on which sign you read. After a detour due to roadwork, we found parking a block or two away from the action, then plunged in, looking for dinner & a show... or two. Even on a Wednesday night in the ‘off’ season, with no big names in town, no festivals... the street was crowded, more so than Beale St had been. We settled on Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville for dinner. Unlike his Vegas venture, this one had no slot machines, none of his music playing, but an acoustic duo doing covers & an appealing menu. Jambalaya for the lady & I had a seafood mac’n’cheese, both of which were quite good, as was the cocktail I ordered as accompaniment. Dammit, I really didn’t want to like the place, as I’m not overly fond of Jimmy’s music & am less of a fan of him personally since I’d discovered in Vegas that he owns a casino, but this Nashville experience was pretty impressive...
Back out onto the street in search of some music. Every second place had various combos playing & we kept an ear out as we walked for something that appealed. What Julia found appealing was the large candy store that had no music, but large toffee apples in more flavours than I would have thought of. Eventually though, we came to the Bootlegger’s Inn, where the band inside struck up ‘Ring of Fire’ as we passed. That was as good a sign as any, so we walked in, found a table & enjoyed their last three songs. Another band was soon setting up for the 10-2am shift, so we ordered more drinks & waited to see if they were as good as the first one. They were... the guitar & bass players especially & the female singer kept up a practised banter between songs. The standard of musicianship was incredibly high for an unknown band in a little bar on a weeknight. You’d never hear anything that good in Australia in a similar place, or time... These guys played more covers, but really well & were fun to watch as well as hear. They even did a Keith Urban song without knowing there were two Australians in the bar... Unfortunately, as the hour grew late, the bar began to empty out & soon it was we two Australians & not many others. And we were getting tired. As they launched into a requested Gretchen Wilson song, we dropped $10 in their bucket & headed out
Walking back up to the car was like walking through a radio shop with everything tuned to different (country) stations. So many venues, so many bands, all of which sounded good. At the very least it was nice to be surrounded by so much country music & know that there was no chance of hearing anything by Kasey Chambers...
An abortive attempt to drive past the Ryman Auditorium, or Grand Ol’ Opry, as it’s also known – we’ll look for it tomorrow, then back to the motel... Sleep
