The keyboard player and singer’s tenure with George Porter and Papa Grows Funk stemmed from his love of New Orleans R’n’B, particularly the triumvirate of Art Neville, Allen Toussaint, and Dr. John. His years on Bourbon Street taught him the value of a timeless song….
I’ve had many ideas about how to structure the documentary and this one sections the story thematically in six parts, one for each chess piece. I kind of intended the thematic possibilities to correspond with the way the chess pieces move. Pawn Family history. Empowered…
29 January 2017 For Gus Twenty-four years ago today, my Dad’s first cousin, Jerry Gustave Hasford, passed away on the Greek island of Aegina. If he were alive now, Gus would be seventy years old. I don’t know much about Aegina, and I never met…
A long time ago I worked as a carny throughout the south. I worked the booths sometimes, but one night a new kid got sick who ran the big ferris wheel. It was a giant of a thing, and the line was always two miles…
And if sometimes I can’t seem to talk You’ll know this blackboard lacks A piece of chalk — Stan Ridgeway in Don’t Box Me In “This is why I haven’t written. I can’t. Not without losing the thread, without going off kilter. I can’t talk…
Lenny calls from the airport. “Brother, there’s no one left to hold my hand.” I hear what sounds like slot machines in the background. “Arcade,” Lenny says. “I can be in Tucson by morning,” he says. I flip a coin in my imaginary mind. “Better…
A hoax is contrived in order to deceive or mislead, an imposition carried out under fair pretenses. A hoax requires a level of skill and dedication that goes beyond casual fib, skillful exaggeration, calculated evasion, and bold lie. Most advertising is a hoax. The purpose…
Photo credit: Paul Townsend Editor’s note: Go here to read parts I-III. By 1980 I had learned to cope with my PTSD and didn’t need the alcohol crutch anymore. I still had anger issues and did some pretty crazy things mostly because I didn’t fear death….