When WV musicians Connie Townsend and Dave Parker took the stage at Handsome Willy's, a strange thing happened. Amidst the rubble and the ruin of the CBD's dark heart, a kind of old-timey magic took place. Townsend has a voice, like June Carter or Allison Kraus, that carries with it all the beauty, sadness, and strength an Appalachian life conveys. Backed by Dave Parker's guitar and dobro work, it was hard to seperate Townsend's originals and the band's traditional covers, so seemlessly do their tunes fit into the Old Timey cannon. Sitting out underneath the stars, you got taken away from all the mess and suddenly realized that dignity that comes from maintaining in the face of adversity, the pride that comes from remembering while others forget. In short, you get a taste of what it's like to be an Appalachian. And if you've never seen sunlight catch a drop of dew on the petals of a mountain laurel or waited out the long, grey winter at the end of a red dog road, Wild Ginsang Music is as close as you can get.
Jessie and Jamie of The Love do melodies. Listening to them is like spending a pleasant Saturday with the person you slept with for the first time the night before. The coffee and muffins. The drive through the country. The lunch in the park. Languid perusals of second-hand books. Another night together. You have had bad times and you will have them again, but you know how to enjoy the now.
“If Gil Scott-Heron and The Pixies were stranded on a rooftop, this is what their call for help would sound like.”—NOLAFugees.com
When you gut a man’s home after it has been destroyed by 9 feet of flood water, you get to know a man. When you hear a man drop “Apocalypse Dance Party” in the immediate aftermath,
you get to like a man.
FloweringJasmine: A Photo Essay Bill Lavender, on public art and protest, political opportunism and his NIMBY neighbors, and the erection of a quasi-public utility in the Bayou St. John.
Down in Plaquemines Ruth Caffery explores New Orleans' largely forgotten and completely destroyed neighbor past the bend in the River.
The Lower 9 @ 400tx.com: Photographer Jeff Smith's ongoing documentation of the devastation.
Flood of Sand Bill Lavender had thought he'd seen
it all. Then he turned toward
Warrington Drive.
Pastor Bruce Ruth Caffery, on one minister's struggle
to save his neighborhood.
When WV musicians Connie Townsend and Dave Parker took the stage at Handsome Willy's, a strange thing happened. Amidst the rubble and the ruin of the CBD's dark heart, a kind of old-timey magic took place. Townsend has a voice, like June Carter or Allison Kraus, that carries with it all the beauty, sadness, and strength an Appalachian life conveys. Backed by Dave Parker's guitar and dobro work, it was hard to seperate Townsend's originals and the band's traditional covers, so seemlessly do their tunes fit into the Old Timey cannon. Sitting out underneath the stars, you got taken away from all the mess and suddenly realized that dignity that comes from maintaining in the face of adversity, the pride that comes from remembering while others forget. In short, you get a taste of what it's like to be an Appalachian. And if you've never seen sunlight catch a drop of dew on the petals of a mountain laurel or waited out the long, grey winter at the end of a red dog road, Wild Ginsang Music is as close as you can get.
Jessie and Jamie of The Love do melodies. Listening to them is like spending a pleasant Saturday with the person you slept with for the first time the night before. The coffee and muffins. The drive through the country. The lunch in the park. Languid perusals of second-hand books. Another night together. You have had bad times and you will have them again, but you know how to enjoy the now.
“If Gil Scott-Heron and The Pixies were stranded on a rooftop, this is what their call for help would sound like.”—NOLAFugees.com
