Memphis revisited

Me and the Woman didn’t need to revisit Memphis any time soon, but it turned out Nick and Val were visiting her grandparents in Arkansas, and then heading to New Orleans for some well-deserved vacation time. On their way they planned an overnight stop in Memphis, and since we were only a couple hours’ drive away we decided we needed a child fix, since we don’t get to see them that often.

No visit to Memphis should miss out on the live blues at night down on Beale Street. Things haven’t changed since we visited last year. It is still a bit seedy and a bit run down, but it is definitely alive with energy. We walked up and down Beale with the kids, and sat for a bit in one of the vacant lots between buildings where the local talent sets up their bands, and the bars on either side serve beer in “Beale Big Ass Beer” cups.

The lot we set a spell in was the exact same lot the Woman and I sat in just a year ago. We are pretty sure that the blues band was the same band we saw last July as well. I guess maybe things haven’t changed at all!

After enjoying the music, Nick and Val suggested we go to Gus’s Chicken which they had researched online as getting rave reviews. It was a small building not far from Beale, but was totally packed! I can honestly say it was the best fried chicken I have ever had – the coating was a fair bit spicy, and the chicken was totally cooked, and yet still moist. The flavor and texture was superb. They have 10 locations in the Arkansas, Missouri, and Tennessee area, so check them out if you ever see one.

The kids wanted to go to the National Civil Rights Museum, and we wanted to spend time with the kids. So despite having been their just a year ago, we tagged along. The museum is in the Loraine Hotel building where Martin Luther King was assassinated in 1968, and chronicles much of the Civil Rights Movements through connections with his activities. Fortunately for us, the entire museum had gone through a complete renovation. While we recognized a few of the foundation pieces that the story centers on, the renovation was so extensive that it felt like a completely new museum to us.

The portion of the museum that is the boarding house where James Earl Ray sat as he gunned down King was not renovated so not new at all to us. But, the entire experience of being at ground zero is so compelling and sobering that it is always worth another visit. Despite having been here before, the same emotions still came to the surface.

Nick and Val had two other places on their to-do list. The first was the Stax recording studio. Stax was founded in Memphis in 1957 by siblings Jim Stewart and Estelle Axton (STewart+AXton=STAX). Inspired by the success of Sam Phillips at Sun Studio, STAX focused on Memphis soul music, created by a racially integrated staff and artist base. While their artist base was large, their anchors were Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes and Booker T and the MG’s. Their artists came mostly from the neighborhood surrounding where the studio was located, and considered themselves in direct competition with Motown Records out of Detroit.

The studio was, and still is, in an old movie theater. A combination of events resulted in the studio’s demist in the mid-70’s. Their most prolific and best known artist, Redding died in 1967 and left a big hole in the STAX lineup. Also, Jim Stewart had made certain business deals with Atlantic Records who had assisted in providing STAX equipment in the early days in exchange for using the STAX studio to record many of their own artists. When it became clear in 1968 that STAX needed to end its relationship with Atlantic, Stewart found out that he had unwittingly given Atlantic the ownership of nearly all the material that had been recorded on their equipment. Stewart and Axton had been responsible for developing and recording the Memphis Soul sound for the better part of the last decade or so. Sadly, because of this error, they actually owned very little of their effort.

Luckily because Memphis in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s was not a hotbed of development, old buildings were unable to be rented for new use, and sat in a state of arrested decay. So we were able to stroll through the actual recording hall used by the label in the 60’s and 70’s. In the sound booth we saw the actual recording equipment used, and looking through the window from the sound booth, we saw the old Voice of the Theater speakers, as well as some of the studio instruments used. If you didn’t know better, you might think the studio was still in operation.

The studio includes an extensive collection of gold records, instruments, costumes, images and personal articles of the artists, all really interesting to stroll through. But the winner has to be the Isaac Hayes Eldorado with more chrome than Fort Knox has gold, and completely upholstered in sheep skin!

But the visit of the day was Sun Studio. For the same reasons as with STAX, Sun Studio (originally established by local DJ Sam Phillips) remained unrented and essentially untouched after Sam Phillips lost interest in the recording business, and branched out building a portfolio of radio stations.

Through the 50’s, artists that recorded at Sun include about everyone – Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Charlie Rich, Ray Harris, Roy Orbison, Ike Turner, Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley – and a cast of other truly talented artists whose names may not be as familiar.

Like STAX, the collection of artifacts is outstanding, and because of the fame of their artists, even more impressive. One of my favorite pieces is Elvis’ high school diploma from L.C. Humes High school in Memphis on June 3, 1953. Original recording equipment, original office totally furnished, original artists’ guitars and drum sets, all was great to see, touch and sit behind.

While we truly enjoyed the outstanding collection of artifacts, including this excellent young Ike Turner long before he started smacking up Tina, the best part of the tour was down in the actual recording studio. Again, all was pretty much like it was back in the 1950’s, and the tour just kept getting better.

Our tour guide led us in a very emotional historical tour of the recordings that were made here. With each grand story about the recording session, she would actually play some of the original master recordings from the Sun vault – they were so clean and the equipment so good, you actually felt like you were listening to the Million Dollar Quartet. That is the nickname given to the impromptu recording session after a party held by Sam Phillips (not uncommon back then apparently) where he invited, among others, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash and Elvis. By that time, Elvis had moved to RCA as a recording label, so no official recording could be produced and released, but that never stopped Sam Phillips. After the legal hold ups elapsed in the early 2000’s, these impromptu jam sessions were finally released.

The studio had many of the instruments used during that famous jam session. The actual stand up microphone that Elvis had used back in 1954 to record “That’s All Right” is still in the studio. That was the first mega-hit Elvis had both for Sun and for himself.

The Woman had to stand on the black electrical tape “X” where Elvis stood for that recording. She also had to grab and snuggle with the actual microphone he recorded with, assuming there were still little Elvis cooties on it. I don’t know if that is true, but in case it was, I got my share as well.

Just off Beale Street, across the street from the NBA arena where the Grizzlies play is the factory where world famous Gibson guitars are made. The good news they have tours of the facility. The bad news is that they don’t do tours on the only day we were scheduled to be in Memphis. We strolled around the plant and looked at what we could, but we will have to schedule a return visit someday to take in the intimate tour. I hear it is great!

Talk to you soon!