Laurie Anderson's Concert for Dogs and Return to Knoxville

2016 is bringing back one of my favorite people to Knoxville, artist Laurie Anderson, part of another impressive lineup at the Big Ears music festival March 31st to April 2nd. She and Phillip Glass will perform their most recent collaboration.

Anderson has the most unique, wide-eyed wonder and wisdom in her words and music and now film. Tonight in Times Square as part of a public arts series Midnight Moment, a 3-minute shortened version of her highly acclaimed new documentary "Heart of A Dog" will be spread all across the towering Times Square screens. And just prior to this screening, Anderson will perform a concert for dogs - I love this sentence from this NYTimes piece:

"Dogs and their owners are invited to sit on the red steps of Duffy Square while she performs music that, to passers-by in Times Square, may not sound like much because of the low frequency."

Yes, dogs are invited. Such a show (her 2nd actually) has such whimsy, and stands so far out away from what others do. I prefer to also imagine the dogs will likely be very pleased, unlike cats who would probably go online and start a twitter backlash about it.

Her movie features her dog of course, and also the dog's death, and that of her husband Lou Reed, and essentially deals with how we deal and do not deal with death and grief, and also life and love.

A fascinating interview with her in studio q is here and is well worth the listen.

Here's a trailer for her film.

Knox News Sentinel Kills Best Knoxville Newspaper

The news business seems more business than news.

Cable, network and local news devote most of their time to being entertaining. Showbiz ain't news.

Newspapers are dwarfed by online media, despite their efforts to evolve into online media. Somehow the concepts of paid writers and editors have lost all appeal to publishers. Case in point: the Knoxville News Sentinel just killed their own publication, Metro Pulse due to .... well, publisher Patrick Birmingham, aka President of Knoxville's Chamber of Commerce. Metro Pulse folks were gagged as soon as the closure was announced under penalty of loss of severance packages. Classy.

One constant writer with MP, Mike Gibson shared his take on the demise via comments at KnoxViews:

"And I want to say this: Patrick Birmingham is a spineless, half-bright corporate weasel. He never knew what the hell Metro Pulse was, or what to do with it. He and Scripps' team of pencil-necked corporate bean counters were always harassing the editors for not meeting some imaginary profit projections, goals conceived in an airless vacuum chamber on the planet Venus by drug-addled baboons. He was also prone to making veiled innuendoes these last three-four years or so that he wanted to somehow merge Knoxville.com and MP, or else combine parts of the staffs, or some other damned idiot thing. Last year, after MP had just finished turning a fairly reasonable profit, he rewarded the staff by threatening to break the paper's lease at 602 S. Gay Street and move the entire operation into the Sentinel building, thus destroying any hope for maintaining editorial independence.

"My observation is that Birmingham is the idiot who is most responsible for this atrocity. Metro Pulse was indeed turning a profit (although its projections for the coming year were only break-even, that still means it was a very viable concern in the context of print media. At the very least, it was a property that one should have reasonably been able to shop to another interested party.) The lion's share of blame should be cast at Birmingham's weasel feet."

At last check, over 10,000 Tweets agree.

And the new-ish blog YouAreNotPayingAttention.com has a good perspective too:

"I struggle to find a comparison between a publication that has been with Knoxville for over 20 years and an absolutely horrid excuse for journalism that has nothing to do with its namesake. Perhaps it would be in the interest of those operating the Knoxville.com Facebook to consider posts about Knoxville and those who make up its populace before posts wishing Usher a happy birthday. In a land of steak, Scripps took away all knives and forks but assures us that the spoons provided should be able to handle our eating needs.

This is more than “just an arts and culture paper”. Be it out of lack of knowledge or lack of concern, Scripps (and the KNS by proxy) are responsible for a magnitude of damage to Knoxville. Small niche businesses are impacted because their demographic is not the KNS. Local non-commercial stations like WUTK are impacted as one of the station’s tags, “Winner of the Metro Pulse ‘Best of Knoxville’ award (x) years in a row” is no longer a relevant statement — not to mention the mountain of cross-promotion that both medias provided one another. I fail to have even the slightest trust in the culinary opinions of a media outlet that has covered everything /but/ Metro Pulse today. Your parent publication created this issue — have a sense of ownership. Open a dialog. That’s what social media is for versus “McDonalds invites icky questions about its food”.

The real sad thing is that the Scripps Co., owners of the KNS, are clueless as to what to do with a newspaper so they are abandoning the ones they own and are trying to get into tv or radio or ... something:

"The E.W. Scripps Co. will say goodbye to newspapers, including the Knoxville News Sentinel and the Memphis Commercial Appeal, and hello to radio in a merger and spinoff transaction with the parent company of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newspaper."

Farewell news of Knoxville. Those of us who live in East TN and write about it all on our on will soldier on.

Attention Knoxville - It's Your Fault

Dear Knoxville voters -

You really, really need to do better in choosing your representatives ... unless maybe you agree with Senator Stacey Campfield that signing up for health care is the same as participating in the Holocaust. The state's Republican Party says his comments are: " ... ignorant and repugnant."

Thank you,
 Ashamed Resident

A Gift of Purity from Knoxville's Li'l Christmas Elf

Knoxville's Li'l Christmas Elf, Senator Stacey Campy, has A Very Special Christmas Wish for the Poor and the Sick.

"Sen. Stacey Campfield, R-Knoxville, said he plans to push three bills calling for drug testing in the 2012 legislative session - one dealing with persons on welfare, one for those drawing unemployment compensation and one for those receiving workers' compensation benefits.

As Southern Beale says:

"I find it very strange that Republicans don’t believe government can do anything right … except decide who can marry, who can raise children, what you can watch on TV, what books you can read, which religion is the right one, when life begins, how much compensation is enough if you are injured by corporate negligence, and if your pee is pure enough to collect your unemployment which, by the way, is a benefit you paid for. Government is great at all of that stuff.

---

"So who stands to gain in Tennessee? Look no further than Tennessee Republican Congress Critter Diane Black, whose husband is CEO of Aegis Sciences, a company which does drug testing. Former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is on Aegis’ board of directors — presumably advising the company on how to screen for drugs via videotape. /snark"

Too bad Elf Campy and Santa Ramsey, I mean, Senator Ramsey, did not check the pee of government employee and judge Richard Baumgartner, who was gacked out of his brain on drugs while running Knoxville's drug court that even the guilty verdicts in the Christian-Newsom murder case he handled were overturned. That would have saved the state tons of money, prevented all the re-trials headed Knoxville way, and spared the pain and suffering of many, many people. And remember, Baumgartner will still get his full pension and have his record of drug offenses wiped clean in just 2 years time.

Merry Christmas from Elf Campy!!

And The Knox Horror Grindhouse Winner Is ... In My Home!!!

Already a banner year here at the house when it comes to all things Horror for Halloween 2011, I've more great news to share - this weekend my friend Clint Keller picked up the award for the best grindhouse-style trailer at the Knoxville Horror Fest Grindhouse Grind-Out for his epic tale of a maniac mechanic, called, naturally "Mechaniac". And the Best Actor award went to my roommate and semi-adopted brother (or did he adopt me?) Timothy Mooney.

Tim effortlessly portrays a crazed killer mechanic who does not like it when folks don't take care of their cars. He's not about being Green, but he will make a deep red bloody mess out of you. Heh heh.

Ah, but enough talk - here's the grainy, film-scarred trailer of what has to be the best grindhouse movie you never saw!