Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Water Valley This Weekend


The last Farmers' Market of the season!

Saturday, October 3rd, 8am-12pm: Farmers' Market Fiesta and Antique Tractor Show
Downtown Water Valley under the Magnolias on Main

-last farmers' market: Brown Family Dairy, dressed quail, local honey, and more!
-potluck party: bring a dish or just yourself!
-antique tractor show: pre-1970 tractors from Yalobusha County

Sponsored by the Water Valley Main Street Association (www.watervalleymainstreet.com)

Friday, September 25, 2009

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Kitty Snacks Kegger #2

Kitty Snacks #2 Release Party!

Tuesday, September 29 at 8 p.m. at Southside Gallery on the Square in Oxford with an afterparty at Ajax Diner right down the street at 10 p.m.

Readings by John Brandon (Arkansas) and Mary Miller (Big World), short films, raffles and booze at Southside Gallery from 8-10 p.m.

Admission: 10 bucks (gets you a limited copy of the magazine, free booze, and a raffle ticket)

The afterparty will start around 10 p.m. at Ajax and will feature Oxford's best country band Cowboy Maloney's Electric City...and it's free.

So come to Southside to get a copy of the magazine, mingle, drink, hear some readings, watch some films, and hang out. Then head down the street to Ajax for some music and more booze.

Kitty Snacks #2 features work by:

Mary Miller
John Brandon
Leni Zumas
Kevin Wilson
Ryan Dilbert
Suzanna Best
Krammer Abrahams
Savannah Louise
Isadora Bay
Ben Segal
Howie Good
Meg Pokrass
Phil Estes
Jimmy Chen
& Hastings Hensel

a comic by Kent Osborne

interviews with filmmakers Ross McElwee,
Matt Wolf, and Matthew Robison

art by Len Clark and Josh Burwell

If you can't make it to the party you can purchase a copy online at kittysnacks.blogspot.com or at Square Books.

Shannon McNally news

Shannon McNally interview Sunday September 27th on Mississippi Public Radio at 3 p.m. http://www.arts.state.ms.us/podcast/index.htm

newsletter imageShannon will be discussing her new record 'Coldwater' and life in Mississippi with Malcolm White.

BLUES LEGEND SAM CARR DIES

 Rotating Header Image

Sam Carr, RIP

photo by Bill Steber

I’m sad to report the death on Monday of veteran Clarksdale area drummer Sam Carr, best known for his work in the Jelly Roll Kings together with Big Jack Johnson and Frank Frost. He had been ill for a long time, and died of congestive heart failure. A biography I wrote of Carr is at the website of the Mississippi Arts Commission.

Drummers and bassists generally don’t get the acclaim received by vocalists and lead guitarists, but in his final decades Sam and his wonderful skills were widely celebrated. In 2007 he was awarded a Mississippi Governor’s Award for the Arts, he was featured on the cover of Living Blues Magazine, he received multiple Living Blues awards and was a multiple nominee for W.C. Handy Awards (now Blues Music Awards), and for the last several years the Hopson Plantation in Clarksdale honored him with “Sam Carr Day” on the Sunday after the Sunflower River Blues & Gospel Festival.

He was also honored on a Mississippi Blues Trail marker in Lula, not far from his longtime home in Dundee, and was in attendance at the unveiling of a marker in honor of his father, blues legend Robert Nighthawk, in Friars Point.

Sam was one of the few drummers who continually captured my attention during performances, and he was by no means flashy, though he did sometimes demonstrate his skills by playing on the wall behind him. In the last couple years Sam generally lacked the energy to play for an entire evening, but he was always impressive when he did come on to the stage. He was scheduled to perform next month at the Arkansas Blues & Heritage Festival in Helena, where he had played the blues since he was a child. He’ll be greatly missed.

PUERTO RICAN PUNKS INVADE OXFORD


The Davila 666 show tonight is one of the most anticipated of the fall here in The Ditch and should prove to be a wild, noisy, kick-ass night at the Blind Pig. The garage rock band out of Puerto Rico lists their influences from Iggy Pop to Lil Wayne with a little Bob Dylan thrown in. They calls themselves "Menudo on a lot of drugs.'' But if you listen to them play -- plenty of clips on youtube -- they prove to be a lot more interesting to that. Show starts late night on a rainy eve. Plenty of good cold beer on tap and loud music to shake away the gray days this week.

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Monday, September 21, 2009

Thursday, September 17, 2009

State Wildlife and Fisheries to Oxford: Check Yourself

Before you wreck, uh, everything, you morons.

So last week, the powers-that-be here in the Ditch decided it would be a fabulous idea to arm a group of 20 self-appointed super hunters to gun down deer within city limits for such egregious offenses as daring to eat plants to sustain themselves. I know the parents in Grand Oaks subdivision were super thrilled that bow hunters would be slinging arrows of death around their children to make the world safe for shrubbery.

Turns out: that is a monumentally stupid idea, even according to the state of Mississippi.

As the Tupelo Daily Journal revealed today,
the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks said, and I'm paraphrasing here, "Oh no, they din't."

So, great move, new mayor. Way to ring in your term.

Monday, September 14, 2009

Sunday, September 13, 2009

SQUARE BOOKS 30TH ANNIVERSARY


Stop by Square Books on Monday night for a 30th Anniversary party featuring many local authors and plenty of booze. Three decades in the book business is quite a milestone and an even bigger deal with one of the best independents in the nation. Starting at 6, there is a short reading of a poem/story/essay about Square. The reading will be followed by a documentary on the Howorths and the bookstore. The film by Joe York is just terrific and funny and should be the highlight of the evening along with some Four Roses -- the official bourbon of William Faulkner.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Real Southern Movies


The other day I heard that the city of Oxford was trying to lure Hollywood back to the Square with tax breaks and other incentives. It's been some time since they shot Intruder In the Dust -- a real classic -- and with some of those good incentives, we might just see a return of shooting in and around the city.

My only hope is that we don't find filmmakers who want to make films like Time to Kill or Fried Green Tomatoes with that ole cornpone quaint South that only exists in the minds of outsiders. I'm no fan of it in fiction or film.

I long for the great Southern films of the 1970s. Can anyone forget The Bandit racing through Oxford and saying how the girls loved him at Ole Miss?

But Smokey and the Bandit only continued a great tradition of B-movies and television of that period that many have forgotten. Everyone remembers watching Dukes of Hazzard but how many recall Six Pack Annie?

It seems many of my favorites starred the great Burt Reynolds. If you haven't seen Gator or White Lightning you've really missed out.

The films of this period showed the grit and realism of the fading South I remember as a kid. This is a world of muscle cars, beautiful girls in hot pants, and dusty back roads.

Forget the sippin' sweet tea on the porch swing with your momma. I want to hear the sound of big engines rev up on the Square. Where's Burt when you need him?

Top 5 Burt Reynolds Southern Classics (Anyone up to organize a Burt Fest at the Lyric next year? It's about time.)

5. Longest Yard
4. Deliverance
3. Gator
2. White Lightning
1. Smokey and the Bandit