Fear and Loathing in Mississippi (part 2)

Friday night

Big Jack works the crowd like a snake charmer. He boogies us up. He mellows us down. He swings us sideways and back up again in little steps you hardly notice until you feel your backbone vibrating. We drink with the rhythm. The Kentucky Tavern tastes like gasoline – but with oaky undertones and a just a hint of carbona at the finish. My cough is gone by midnight.

I want to dance, but the women are wearing mom jeans and there is no room to move. Some big old white man takes exception to Buzzard laughing at his wife. Buzzard head butts him. Ho-Fo-Sho, a 300 pound, gap-toothed, Refrigerator Perry look-alike we met earlier in the evening, takes the opportunity to dump approximately 3 liters of beer from the world’s largest fishbowl down the front of the dude’s Tommy Bahama, and into the crotch of his Dockers. It’s time to go. McRik pulls the Imperial up front, we jump in and roll to the promised land.

Annie Bell’s, (above) situated on the edge of town, evokes a more modern vibe than the rest of Clarksdale – it's a near-urban, funkadelic, 1975 disco kindda thang. I think there was even a disco ball hanging from the ceiling, but it could have been the KT playing tricks on me.

As we walked from the Imperial, Shawnté (like enchanté) -- a very tall, very drunk, young lady, asks me if I’d like to buy her a drink of corn. I say “sure, I’d like to try some myself.” I assume she means inside Annie Bell’s, but she steers me toward her car for “a short ride” to get some. I decline, and she asks “what do you think is going to happen to you?”

My mind reels as I consider the possible answers to that question, but I decline anyway. She needs $7.50 for the corn. I give her a ten and catch up to Buzz and Mic inside. Ours are the only three pale faces in the joint. Annie Bell’s is a local hangout and not on the blues tour, but they have a good sound system and a hyped up DJ. Annie Bell’s is for dancing.

I take the stage first, joining about eight women and one other dude, while Buzz and McRik get some beers and chat up the bartender and a couple patrons. I wasn’t aware I could line dance, but apparently I can if properly fueled. Soon two of the brothers at the bar insist that my boys dance with their dates. Incredibly, they do. It’s a kind of an “Animal House,” with a reverse-role racial thing goin’ on. Soon all three of our fat white asses are shaking in approximate time to some music we’ve heard that night – if not the current offering. We made many new friends. Shawnté does not return with the corn.

The next thing I remember I’m in my room at the Uptown. I know that’s where I am by the absence of hangers, and the 13” TV. Soon it will be Saturday morning and the festival will begin.

Fear and Loathing in Mississippi (part 1)

Day 1: Friday

We arrive in Memphis. Buzzard rode the dog – 4 days over the mountains from Oakland and across the plains with a ¼ pound of Mendocino county home-grown taped to his thigh – just below his new hip. McRik flew in from Hong Kong with a case of Kentucky Tavern in the trunk of his cousin’s red ’62 Imperial convertible, which he had picked up in Little Rock. I flew in with a nasty cough, my Wayfarers, and golf clubs. It was going to be a long, difficult trip.

We met in the parking lot of Soulsville and took a quick tour. They have the invoice for the charter flight that was Otis Redding’s last trip, the Hammond M3 that Booker T. played when he recorded “Green Onions,” and Isaac Hayes’ gold-plated ’72 Eldorado. Graceland is for pussies.

We loaded the Imperial and headed south on Highway 61. (cue music.) We quickly drop to sea level as we track along the big muddy and enter the Delta. I’d always thought Kansas was flat but the sunken loam of the Delta seems to flatten even the tree and buildings that rest on it. It is sucking us in.

The Imperial braked from 80 as 61 crossed Highway 49 entering Clarksdale. Robert Johnson sold his soul on this spot. We hoped to get through three days still in possession of ours – if, indeed, we still had them.

We checked into the Uptown Motor Inn; your basic 1960, one-over-one, motel. The clerk was behind Plexiglas and all rooms face the parking lot, which was already a tailgate blues party at six. McRik broke out the KT. I filled my sterling hip flask. It was going to be a long night and I would need plenty of whiskey for my cough.

Clarksdale is not another place. It is another time. I’d say 1962 -- perfect for the Imperial and perfect for our mood, which is old school verging on primal. We needs us some blues, so we go to Red’s.

Red’s is on the edge of town in a low slung red brick building that looks like an abandoned feed store. (above) There are ribs cooking out front in the double smoker and only a hand-lettered bed sheet tacked at the end of the wall to tip its identity.

Inside, Big Jack Johnson and the Cornlickers are pounding a beat. Tearin’ it up in a room that is smaller than the average CEO’s office. A couple of old couches, a few tables, some miss-matched chairs, and a half dozen bar stools hold the crowd – a mix of black locals and middle aged white folks in town for the Juke Joint Festival that has drawn us to the Delta. The festival starts tomorrow, but tonight we belong to Red. Beers are $2. The only liquor is what you bring with you, and we are well armed.

Road trip

I’m headed out on a 17 day road trip tomorrow morning and am unlikely to have anything new to say until I get back.

I’m flying to Memphis where I plan to visit the Stax Museum of American Soul Music (Soulsville), then heading down to Clarksdale, Mississippi for the Juke Joint Blues Festival. I plan to visit Holly Springs (long-time home of R.L. Burnside) and Oxford while in Mississippi, and before heading down to New Orleans.

There will be a dinner at Emeril Lagasse’s in NOLA and at least one day of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.

After that I will work my way through Mobile, Birmingham and Atlanta, on the way to Myrtle Beach to take in the rich cultural attractions of that megalopolis.

God willing, I shall return to New York on May 4th and will give you a full report then – if it warrants it.

Thilla in Manila

There is a terrific new special running on HBO now called Thriller in Manila. While it focuses on their third fight, in October 1974, the film examines the long relationship between Mohamed Ali and Joe Frazier, their previous fights, the extreme animus between them, and the unusually polarizing quality the two camps had on American society in the last days of the Viet Nam era.

Which leads me to a confession: back in the day, if you were young and had even one once of hipness, you had to be an Ali fan. Ali was pretty. Joe was ugly. Ali was cool. Joe was country. Ali was radical. Joe was family values. Ali was fast and creative. Joe was a brute. I rooted for Joe.

This was partly just my contrarian nature, and partly because I didn’t really like Ali all that much. Yes, he had a certain undeniable charm, and I respected his decision not to go into the Army, even if it was the Muslims pulling his strings. But he talked too much for my taste and disrespected all his opponents, which was taken to the nth degree when Frazier gave him a shot to win back his title in 1971. Ali started out calling Joe ugly and progress through gorilla and Uncle Tom.

It was shameful in any event, but especially so since Joe had fought to help Ali get his license back and even gave him money when the ex-champ was broke. Joe deserved better and Ali’s claims 30 years later that he done it, “to sell tickets,” had a very hollow ring.

Then there was Joe himself. What a force of nature. He may not have been the best looking man in the ring, but he worked harder, punched harder, and took more hard shots than anyone, and he never gave up. Really, if it were not for that one weird fight with Foreman, when George knocked him down six times, I think Joe would rank right up there in the top three heavyweights of all times – ahead of Ali.

Some call it fraud

If you are still interested in understanding the current financial mess I recommend that you view a recent segment of Bill Moyer’s Journal. It’s a half-hour long, but it is a fascinating thirty minutes. His guest is William Black (left), now an economics professor, he was a senior litigator during the savings and loan crisis in the ‘80s. He has just written a book called, "The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One."

He pulls no punches, calling the current situation a fraud that was organized, planned and executed from the top of a number of major financial institutions, and with the aid and support of legislators and regulators. He points fingers directly at Larry Summers, Bob Rubin, Phil Graham, Hank Paulson, Tim Geithner and a number of other well known people -- including George Bush, who transferred 500 FBI agents out of the financial fraud investigations unit after 9/11, and never replaced them. The net result is that today we have 1/5 as many FBI agents working this beat, while the AIG bleeding alone is greater than the entire S&L debacle.

And while he worked to elected Barack Obama, he has some sharp criticism for the way he is dealing with the problem now that he is in office.

Even if you don’t believe, as I do, that many financial executives and Congressmen are criminals, you may find Black persuasive when describing how intellectually dishonest we are in our attempts to even understand the problem. His comparison of the financial mess with the way we analyze aircraft accidents is very apt.

This is well worth your time.

Picking your team

Picking the team you want to win is both an art and a manifestation of all one’s experiences and prejudices – at least it is for me. I have a very firm set of rules, but their application and hierarchy are very subjective and subject to change at any time.

Let’s start with the basics: my earliest memories are of sitting on my father’s lap watching the Cleveland Browns. They are the nucleus of my sports universe. The Cleveland Indians and the Ohio State football team are very close to this core, as well. I root for them always over any team, without exception. The same is true for the Cleveland Cavaliers but I can’t put them at the same level – in fact, without a spellchecker you might not even recognize my version of the word meaning French swordsmen.

Next, regardless of sport, I root for teams from northeastern Ohio first, and then any team from Ohio over any team from someplace else. My next order of allegiance goes to the Big Ten, and then to teams from the Midwest, which I define as falling within an area bounded by Pittsburgh on the east, West Virginia on the south, Nebraska and Kansas on the west, and the Canadian border; however this area does not include Missouri or the Dakotas.

From here my allegiances become more variable, but there are some rules. I will generally root for an eastern team over a western team, and a northern team over a southern team. That said, I don’t think I’ve ever rooted for a team from New England other than the Celtics – and that was a long time ago and only because they had John Havlecheck. Actually I always root for the American League winner in the World Series, so I have rooted for the Sox.

I have never rooted for a team from New York.

I will almost always root for a public university over a private school, and never, ever, root for Duke, USC, Stanford, or Miami. I will occasionally root for Notre Dame but only if they are playing one of the aforementioned private institutions, or a Florida team in a bowl. I think of the-team-from-up-north as being in this category, although their Big Ten-ness trumps their other negative qualities when they play outside the conference.

Race plays a role -- especially in basketball. I don’t like all white or all black teams as much as integrated teams. Uniforms can tip the balance; as long as Phil Knight is dressing Oregon like circus clowns they will not have my support. Coaches can sway things too. Jim Calhoun at Connecticut is a negative example, Mike Singletary is a positive example, as I would otherwise never favor the 49ers.

Some teams I just hate. The Raiders, the Cowboys, the Dodgers, the Mets (although it is mostly their fans that I hate), the “U,” (in fact, pretty much any team from Florida except the Dolphins, and that’s only because of Paul Warfield).

Once there is no Midwestern team involved it can get complicated as some of these rules can conflict with some others. When there is no clear cut rule to apply, I root for underdogs – especially at home.

I have no idea if the above is the sign of a sick and overly idle mind or just my version of how sports fans think in general. Please enlighten me.

Go Spartans

If there is any justice in the world, Michigan State will beat UNC tonight at Ford Field in Detroit. It’s not just that the people of Detroit could use a victory, but also that a defeat will feel like another nail being pounded into the communal coffin if the sunbelt ballers get to put on their special tee shirts and ball caps under falling blue and white confetti.

It’s been a rough year in Motown. MGM is even trying to sell their Detroit casino. When you can’t make money gambling you know times are tough.

I have nothing against the North Carolinians. They have a nice team. And if this were the University of Michigan playing, say, Tehran Tech, I’d be out recruiting my own personal berka-clad cheer leading squad to root the Persians on to victory.

But these are the Sparties. The sons of the Midwest working class. Magic’s team. Go State!