Nashville Scene 5-21-26

Summer Guide

Swimming,

WITNESS HISTORY

This Simpson racing suit was worn onstage by Morgan Wallen on the 2025 leg of his I’m the Problem Tour, which featured a rotating lineup of guests, including Country Music Hall of Fame members Brooks & Dunn, plus Miranda Lambert, Thomas Rhett, and Koe Wetzel.

From the exhibit American Currents: State of the Music

artifact: Courtesy of Morgan Wallen

Street View: How Unusual Animals

End Up in Hermitage

District 12 Councilmember Erin Evans deals with domestic animals and exotic pets that run (or crawl, or slither) loose in her district

BY LENA MAZEL

My Golf Cart: It Just Makes Sense

When I drive my golf cart, my neighbors flash me a ‘one-finger peace sign’

BY JULIA BENSFIELD LUCE

Pith in the Wind

This week on the Scene’s news and politics blog U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen Abandons

Reelection Bid in Redrawn District

Longtime Memphis congressman no longer campaigning after GOP passes new map BY ELI MOTYCKA

COVER PACKAGE: SUMMER GUIDE

Public Pools, Past and Present

Modern instructors look to address Nashville’s scarcity of lessons, pool space and lifeguards

BY HANNAH HERNER

Skateaway

After regaining her wheels, audience editor Annie Parnell tours Nashville’s skating scene

BY ANNIE PARNELL

Caving In

How to stay cool outdoors all summer long

BY LAURA HUTSON HUNTER

Play Ball

Here are a few local options for catching some action on the diamond this summer

BY LOGAN BUTTS

What’s Going On

Our summer events calendar, featuring the season’s best concerts, film screenings and more

BY SCENE STAFF CRITICS’

PICKS

Musicians Corner, The Mountain Goats, Summer at the Library, Anila Quayyum Agha: Interwoven and more

ART

Steel Magnolia

María Magdalena Campos-Pons brings Nashville to the 61st Venice Biennale

BY LAURA HUTSON HUNTER

MUSIC

Return of a Queen

Nashville expat RobinAugust kicks off a new era with a mini tour and dynamic new single

BY DARYL SANDERS

Giant Steps

Epilogue: The Cellar Tapes expands Don Williams’ legacy

BY BOBBIE JEAN SAWYER

The Spin

The Scene’s live-review column checks out Mdou Moctar at Drkmttr BY STEPHEN TRAGESER

FILM

Boots on the Ground

Boots Riley’s I Love Boosters is a punkish, unpredictable ride

BY CRAIG D. LINDSEY

Let’s Get Physical

From The House With Laughing Windows to Family Movie Night Menus, here are some of the best recent physical-media releases and re-releases

BY JASON SHAWHAN

NEW YORK TIMES CROSSWORD AND THIS MODERN WORLD

MARKETPLACE

ON THE COVER:

Bhavik Modi; photo by Angelina Castillo

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EVENTS WE’RE INTO

NASHVILLE OPERA AT CHEEKWOOD Join Cheekwood Estate & Gardens on May 28 at 6 p.m. for Nashville Opera at Cheekwood. Enjoy powerful performances and unforgettable stories surrounded by vibrant summer blooms in one of Nashville’s most beautiful outdoor settings. cheekwood.org

NASHVILLE PRIDE KICKOFF PARTY Nashville Pride will host a kickoff party June 23 at 6 p.m. at the Virgin Hotel. Enjoy an evening of live entertainment, a cash bar and a chance to celebrate Pride weekend. Buy your tickets today at nashvillepride.org.

In my 35+ years living and working in Nashville, I’ve navigated the twists, turns and now expansive growth of this wonderful place. Let me help you make the best choices in your biggest investment — real estate. I’m so grateful for my clients’ great reviews, repeat business and continued referrals. I’d love the opportunity to help make your Real Estate Goals a reality!

BONNAROO RETURNS JUNE 11-14

Bonnaroo returns to Manchester, Tenn., June 11 to 14 for a long weekend full of unforgettable live music. Experience electrifying performances by Noah Kahan, Role Model, Teddy Swims, The Strokes and more. bonnaroo.com

and entertainment.

WIN TICKETS TO EM BEIHOLD AT THE BASEMENT EAST Em Beihold, the American singer-songwriter behind the hit “Numb Little Bug,” is bringing her signature sound to The Basement East on June 2. nashvillescene.com/freestuff

WHO WE ARE

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF D. Patrick Rodgers

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How do you find out what’s happening in your community?

When a school board rezones a neighborhood, local news is how families find out in time to respond.

When a health clinic opens, it’s how neighbors learn it exists.

When disaster strikes, it’s how people know where to go and what to do.

But that only works if the information is reaching people in ways that are useful.

We are asking residents across Middle Tennessee to share how they get local information and what may be missing.

HOW UNUSUAL ANIMALS END UP IN HERMITAGE

District 12 Councilmember Erin Evans deals with domestic animals and exotic pets that run (or crawl, or slither) loose in her district

BY LENA MAZEL

Street View is a monthly column taking a close look at development-related issues affecting different neighborhoods throughout the city.

IT’S THURSDAY, and District 12 Metro Councilmember Erin Evans is chasing after a rooster again. He’s been hiding out in the woods of Hermitage for a few weeks, ever since he showed up at a community center Easter egg hunt.

This is nothing new to Evans, who also contended with mysterious sheep and a runaway emu in District 12 last month.

“The most prominent thing in my first term was the cattle,” she says, referring to a herd from a nearby farm — led by a crafty, fence-breaking steer — that would intermittently but persistently show up in Hermitage backyards.

“Residents would send me pictures of the cattle on their lawns,” she says. Evans would help coordinate reconnaissance efforts and would call Metro police to herd the cows off the roads.

Lost and abandoned animals show up across the whole city, but Hermitage seems to be a particular hot spot for them. People often abandon pet ducks and geese who cannot survive outdoors at Percy Priest Lake. And the mix of farmland and growing neighborhoods means that city and country meet in District 12 in unexpected ways when animals escape.

When the animals show up in her district, Evans starts making phone calls. For animals in danger of being hit by cars, she calls the Metro Nashville Police Department — there was a time when she got a midnight call from a resident about a donkey on Old Hickory Boulevard. Otherwise, it’s usually Metro Animal Care and Control or the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency.

Some animals can be harder to place, like the domesticated Burmese python spotted living at a gas station on Old Hickory Boulevard. (“It had slithered around a gas pump and was just hanging out there,” says Evans.) For those animals, specialized rescues usually step in.

In the case of Evans’ rooster, that meant a call to animal sanctuary Piccolo Farms in Whites Creek. Established in 2018, the rescue now houses more than 200 animals, says Bonnie Glueck, who runs the sanctuary with her husband Jeff. They are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and are supported entirely by donations, all of which go to the animals’ upkeep.

Talking with the Scene by phone — with the sounds of farm animals and parrots in the background — Glueck puts the Hermitage animals in perspective. She tells the Scene there’s a little-known but persistent problem in Middle Tennessee: the overwhelming volume of pigs and roosters that are surrendered or abandoned every year.

“Pigs are the biggest need,” says Glueck. “That’s the animal that we get called for the most, and they’re the ones that get dumped all the time.”

“I can’t fault the people who buy these little piglets, because they’re so dadgum cute,” she says. “But they don’t do their research. We all make mistakes, we make choices that we shouldn’t make, and that’s what happens with a lot of these pigs.”

If abandoned pigs are caught, they usually end up at Piccolo Farms. The sanctuary currently has about 60 permanent pig residents, Glueck says.

The rooster problem is a little more complicated.

“Davidson County makes the rooster problem,” says Glueck, referring to a 2009 ordinance that set requirements for Nashville backyard chickens while also banning domestic roosters. That was fine in theory, Glueck says, except “they don’t mandate where those chickens come from.”

“People go out and buy ‘hens,’” says Glueck. When “hen” chicks turn out to be roosters, “There’s no place but here that takes them.”

“If people don’t know about us, then they dump them,” she says.

The Piccolo Farms’ rooster flock is even bigger

than its herd of pigs: More than 80 roosters currently live there.

Despite fielding multiple calls about animals every day, Glueck has sympathy for the people who leave pets by lakes and in parks, as they may not know a sanctuary is an option. Sometimes, she says, “They just don’t know what to do.”

Glueck says it’s difficult to say why animals end up in certain areas more than others — or why Hermitage might be so popular. Antioch seems to also be a hot spot for finders, and wildfowl often end up at lakes — not just at Percy Priest, but also at smaller lakes in Franklin and elsewhere. That said, it’s difficult to tell whether animals have been dumped in a certain spot or they just wander there.

Glueck hopes Nashville can reform its chicken laws in the future, and that people can be more informed about the commitment of buying pigs, who are highly intelligent and can grow to be much larger than owners suspect.

But in the meantime, it looks like the city will rely on concerned citizens — and one quick-acting councilmember — to get its abandoned animals and feathered escapees somewhere safe.

When asked whether the cow, python, rooster and emu management is part of normal Metro Council duties, Evans is matter-of-fact.

“I think my problem is nobody told me what ‘normal’ was at the beginning,” she says. “I was thinking, ‘Well, nobody else is here with these cattle — I guess that’s my job?’”

“I feel like I take other duties as assigned,” she says. “When there’s a gap in the department and it’s something happening where there needs to be an action taken, then I’m like, ‘Well, I guess that’s me.’”

When the aforementioned rooster was spotted at a condo in Donelson after being on the loose for days, Evans called Jessica Schultz, a local animal rights attorney who focuses on cruelty cases and had been tracking the rooster since it appeared at the Easter event.

With the help of two condo residents and a maintenance person, Schultz caught the rooster in her net. From there, he went straight to Piccolo Farms.

For Evans, the animals are part of what makes Hermitage unique — and a reminder of the area’s agricultural history. “It’s a weird juxtaposition between Old and New Nashville,” she says. “There are these animals going into these new developments, and then there are people still out there farming.”

But with the rooster safe in its new home, she can go back to her day job and council duties. That is, until the next animal comes along. ▼

PET OF THE WEEK!

Name: BUSTER

Age: 3 yrs.

Weight: 13 lbs.

MEET BUSTER! a sweet and playful 3-year-old kitty who’s ready to find a family of his own. This curious guy loves exploring, chasing laser pointers, and hanging out with his people. He has a fun, easygoing personality and does a great job balancing playtime with plenty of relaxed cuddle time nearby. Buster is the kind of cat who will keep you smiling with his playful side, then happily curl up close by to keep you company. If you’re looking for a friendly, affectionate companion with lots of love to give, Buster would love to meet you!

Call 615.352.1010 or visit nashvillehumane.org

Located at 213 Oceola Ave., Nashville, TN 37209

Adopt. Bark. Meow. Microchip. Neuter. Spay.

NEWS: SATIRE

MY GOLF CART: IT JUST MAKES SENSE

When I drive my golf cart, my neighbors flash me a ‘one-finger peace sign’

BY JULIA BENSFIELD LUCE

Neighbors have spent recent weeks negotiating the fate of large trees slated for removal by Nashville Electric Service. After fallen limbs aggravated ice storm outages, NES widened its buffer into private property in an effort to protect power lines from future damage. Before January, the utility’s buffer was six feet, a loosely enforced bubble that let many trees grow over and through utility lines. Work crews are now patrolling the city, cutting back trees that encroach on a 15-foot ground-to-sky bubble surrounding roadside power lines. Neighbors have little legal recourse, as the city charter allows Metro to essentially condemn a tree as a public hazard if it threatens utility functions. Metro councilmembers have pushed back in defense of the city’s valuable tree canopy and are considering a resolution asking NES to scale back its war on trees.

an independent bookstore for independent people

UPCOMING EVENTS

6:30 PM TIM O'BRIEN at PARNASSUS The Tim O'Brien Songbook

10:30 AM

PARNASSUSBOOKS.NET/EVENTS FOR TICKETS & UPDATES

THURSDAY, MAY 21

SATURDAY, MAY 23

SATURDAY STORYTIME with KIM HOWARD at PARNASSUS The Naked Streak

THURSDAY, MAY 28

6:30 PM STEVEN ROWLEY with LINDSAY LYNCH at PARNASSUS Take Me With You & Our Guncle

6:30 PM

AYELET WALDMAN

with LIBBY CALLAWAY at PARNASSUS A Perfect Hand

6:30 PM BEN RHODES at PARNASSUS

6:30 PM

AUSTIN KLEON at PARNASSUS

FRIDAY, MAY 29

Satirist Julia Bensfield Luce is a regular contributor to McSweeney’s and author of her own humor Substack, The Dummiss. Julia, her husband and her friends are the self-proclaimed geniuses behind SkyMall Product Review, one of the stupidest blogs of the mid-Aughts (according to NPR’s Marketplace).

SPRING IS BEAUTIFUL in Nashville. The best way to experience it, of course, is from the front seat of my brand-new golf cart. You’ve probably seen me out and about — cruisin’ in the sunshine, spinnin’ my wheels on top of a speed cushion or hollerin’ for help from the bottom of a pothole. I get so many amazing questions and anonymous threats about my golf cart. Allow me to explain why driving my doorless golf cart in a state where driver’s education is (literally) optional just makes sense!

My family owns two cars and one golf cart. The cars are for driving on city streets. The golf cart is also for driving on city streets. It just makes sense.

MONDAY, JUNE 1

All We Say: The Battle for American Identity

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 3

Don't Call It Art: 10 Ways to Create Like a Kid Again

3900 Hillsboro Pike Suite 14 | Nashville, TN 37215 (615) 953-2243 Shop online at parnassusbooks.net

My golf cart adds to the whimsy of my community, which is neither a golf course nor a Club Med.

Don’t worry. I only drive my golf cart on quiet residential streets that are also used as high-speed cut-throughs for Amazon drivers, commuters, tour buses, carjackers, emergency responders, drag racers and me, in my normal car, when I need to get my kids to school fast

seats of my golf cart. When they aren’t staring into the Middle Distance, they’re waving at cars. Nobody waves back, because car drivers are busy looking at their phones and forgetting to brake. Once my toddler waved “hi” to a Waymo and the Waymo downloaded her face. Community is everything to me!

When I drive my golf cart, pollen blasts up my nostrils at 25 to 30 mph. It just makes sense.

When I drive my golf cart, I put my infant in my lap. It just makes sense.

When I drive my golf cart, my neighbors flash me a “one-finger peace sign,” which is like a regular peace sign but there’s no pointer finger involved. It doesn’t really make sense to me, but I assume it’s a sign of respect.

On Sundays, the kids and I putter to my local bakery, where — hours earlier — a drunk driver smashed through the front window for the third time in a week. We park on the sidewalk because sourdough is everything to me. Also, I do whatever I want.

When my out-of-town friends see pictures of me in my golf cart and my cool hat, they say, “Wow! You can do whatever you want in Tennessee!” Then they move here and buy all the houses.

Listen, I understand that transportation is super important to the long-term growth of our great city. There are people advocating tirelessly for more public transportation, safer walkways and more bike lanes. Me? I choose golf cart.

A disappearing audience, MAGA civil war and a failed foray into feature filmmaking have spelled disaster for conservative media group The Daily Wire Famed right-wing pundit Ben Shapiro built the company into an online juggernaut in the early 2020s and relocated his business from Los Angeles to Nashville six years ago, when the company dominated across platforms by pioneering culture war ragebait and taunting liberals. Since The Daily Wire’s relocation, Nashville has become a choice spot for conservative celebrities, who praise the city’s combination of entertainment and dining options while crediting Tennessee’s conservative lawmakers and the state’s cultural associations with “traditional” lifestyles and Christianity.

Knox County Schools have banned Roots — the Alex Haley classic recently championed by conservative lawmakers as a state book of Tennessee — after an anonymous complaint objected to its presence in school libraries. The confusing hypocrisy shines a light on Republicans’ self-destructive and logically inconsistent political ideology, writes Scene opinion columnist Betsy Phillips, and highlights the state’s censorship crisis that has focused on book-banning. For that reason, banning a state book could be seen as an ingenious form of political protest, Phillips continues, turning state leaders’ folly inside-out as an embarrassing public spectacle.

My golf cart is “street legal,” which means I’m allowed to do whatever I want, especially if it looks cool on Instagram and I can wear a vintage hat instead of a helmet.*

I’m actually super progressive. It’s just that I don’t like helmets, buses or being told what to do. It just makes sense!

Construction of Oracle Corp.’s pedestrian bridge could begin as soon as this summer, and newly released renderings give a glimpse into the sprawling Cumberland River project. The tech giant is eyeing a project start date in August, according to permits recently filed with the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation. The permit notes construction will take two years to complete. According to the state permit, the bridge — which will connect the East Bank to Germantown — will be 16 feet wide and will stretch approximately 863 feet across the Cumberland.

@parnassusbooks @parnassusbooks1 @parnassusbooks @parnassusbooksnashville

My young children sit in the reverse-facing

*With a series of modifications, golf carts are legal as “low-speed vehicles.” ▼

May 2 - September 6

All aboard! With 10 trains, 850 feet of track, and 25 iconic destinations, this is Cheekwood’s largest outdoor train exhibit yet, spanning the entire Bradford Robertson Color Garden. This installation is in addition to our permanent TRAINS!, which will also be running this summer for double the fun. Reserve tickets at cheekwood.org.

U.S. REP. STEVE COHEN ABANDONS REELECTION BID IN REDRAWN DISTRICT

Longtime Memphis congressman no longer campaigning after GOP passes new map

BY ELI MOTYCKA

U.S. REP. STEVE COHEN dropped his reelection campaign Friday, essentially announcing his own retirement after 20 years representing Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District. The state’s Republican supermajority redrew the seat — which has long been a majority-Black district in Memphis protected from gerrymandering by the Voting Rights Act of 1965 — during this month’s rapid-fire special session on redistricting.

“I don’t want to quit,” Cohen told reporters in his Washington, D.C., office, according to the Associated Press. “I’m not a quitter. But these districts were drawn to beat me.”

Cohen announced retirement with one caveat — should Democrats’ court challenge succeed in stopping the new maps, he plans to reenter the race. As of Friday, Cohen was no longer listed as a qualified candidate in the district.

Even before redistricting, Cohen faced a stiff primary challenge from state Rep. Justin Pearson (D-Memphis). On May 12, Pearson announced that he will continue his campaign in the new 9th District, which stretches from East Memphis to Williamson County. The district is now one of three seats, along with the 5th and 8th, that include Memphis’ large share of predominantly Democratic voters. As a majority-Black district, the city was protected from redistricting by Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, a major victory of the civil rights movement, until a Supreme Court decision

U.S. REP. STEVE COHEN SPEAKS TO PROTESTERS OUTSIDE THE STATE

struck down that provision in late April.

During the special session, Cohen was a fixture in the halls of the Tennessee State Capitol, opposing the late GOP move to shift districts toward Republican voters. He showed off his oratory skills, honed over two decades in congressional committees, as state Democrats’ guest at the week’s contentious hearings. Cohen is the first Jewish person to represent Tennessee in U.S. Congress and the last remaining Democrat in the state’s congressional delegation after legislators in 2022 redrew Tennessee’s 5th Congressional District, leading to the retirement of Democratic U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper.

“Serving in public office is hard and important work,” Pearson said in a statement following Cohen’s announcement. “Steve has served for 43 years from the County Commission to Congress. I wish him the best in his retirement and hope that he will be willing to help us rebuild and mobilize Democrats across the state and nation to end the tyranny of this federal government and also address the crises plaguing our communities.”

Besides Pearson, state Sen. London Lamar (D-Memphis) will vie for Democrats’ nomination in the district. State Sen. Brent Taylor (R-Memphis) and state Rep. Todd Warner (R-Chapel Hill) also moved swiftly to file necessary paperwork setting up campaigns in the now-open seat. ▼

Summer Guide

Public Pools, Past and Present

Modern

Swimming, caving, skating, baseball and other ways to spend your summer

THE FIRST DAY OF SUMMER is just one month away. Sure, summertime in Tennessee means a heat index that can make you feel like you’re daytripping on the surface of Venus. And yeah, it’s mosquito season. But Tennessee summers also mean lazy days by the pool, glorious sunsets and a packed event calendar.

In this week’s issue, audience editor Annie Parnell takes a tour of the city’s skating scene, and reporter Hannah Herner dives into the complex history of public swimming pools while also listing some spots where you can take a dip. For fans of America’s pastime — particularly those lamenting the fact that Nashville has no major league team — associate editor Logan Butts has a lineup of ways to see some non-MLB baseball this summer. Meanwhile, arts editor Laura Hutson Hunter figured out a way to spend time in nature while maintaining indoor-kid status. (Spoiler: caves.) We’ve also got a long list of some of the season’s best events, from concerts to film screenings and beyond, curated by our editors.

So lather up with sunscreen, remember to stay hydrated, and dig into our annual Summer Guide.

BY HANNAH HERNER

occasion.

In 1961, when Gentry was 9, civil rights leaders Kwame Lillard and Matthew Walker sought to integrate the pool but were barred from admission. The story of access to pools in Nashville is incomplete without noting when, following their attempts, the city closed all of its 22 pools — 15 for white people, seven for Black people — rather than integrate them. Gentry and much of Nashville’s Black community were forced to migrate to Tennessee State University’s pool, a safe place that Gentry remembers accommodating the larger crowd. Meanwhile, white families flocked to private swim clubs.

While the rest of the city’s pools reopened in 1963, Centennial Park’s pool never did. Nashvilians can pay to access the YMCA pools or a number of private pools, but many of the city’s original pools were permanently closed in the years following integration. Nashville is left with six indoor and four outdoor pools managed by Metro Parks and Recreation and a city population that has quadrupled in size since the 1960s.

Longtime local swim instructor Emily Khan notes not only the dearth of pool space but also the lack of quality lessons and lifeguards in Nashville. By February, slots for her summer backyard swim instruction were filled. She teaches 95 children per week, with 30 more on the wait list.

Drowning is the number one cause of death

for children ages 1 to 4, and 55 percent of U.S adults have never taken a swim lesson, according to 2024 data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About half of white adults have had swim lessons, whereas only about 1 in 3 Black adults and 1 in 4 Hispanic adults report having taken a swim lesson.

That’s why Khan started parent and child swim lessons, and lessons in Spanish. Khan also facilitates swim clubs at some area high schools and middle schools that don’t have sanctioned swim teams through her nonprofit Nashville School Swim Club. Even at diverse schools like Isaac Litton Middle School and Stratford High, the majority of her team is white.

Khan says she’s lucky to have access to two lanes at Margaret Maddox YMCA in East Nashville — she made a deal that if she could use the lanes, she’d make sure they have lifeguard staff.

“I don’t know what the solution is,” Khan says. “I can point to all the problems, but I’ve built my own little niche in my neighborhood and become a pillar of the community. … It’s been absolutely fantastic for me, but I have no ambition to get any bigger than what I am.”

Antwan Majors, special program coordinator at Napier Community Center, started a lifeguard program in 2023 that pays teens to train in an eight-week course. He’s also planning to offer swim lessons this year for the lowest price yet — $10, with the help of grant funding. Lessons are also offered at Centennial Sportsplex

Summer Guide

through the SwimAmerica program, which offers sliding-scale pricing. The typical $60 fee at Napier is high, Majors notes, especially for families with multiple children.

It can be difficult to get parents to commit, especially with the additional upkeep required for Black children with natural hair, Majors says — but he sneaks in a bit of swim instruction on typical days at the pool. The kids want to play with the kickboards, and he teaches them how to use them first.

“I have games and stuff I play with the kids, but it’s all still teaching,” Majors says. “We teach them when we can without the group, without the sign-up. We’ll just keep them coming that way.”

Majors says he sees the fallout of a lack of pool access for the Black community. Even when the pools were integrated, learning to swim was often cost-prohibitive.

“It’s almost like going to the water is taboo,” he says. “If your parents didn’t swim and never took you around the water, how likely are you to swim?”

Despite the additional barriers, Gentry’s father was a swim coach at TSU and Gentry himself went on to work as a lifeguard at Hadley Park and Rose Park, starting at age 15.

“Everywhere we went, swimming was a big part of it,” Gentry says. “Everybody said that Black folk didn’t know how to swim, but a lot of us did.”

Metro Parks swimming pools

Skateaway

After regaining her wheels, audience editor Annie Parnell tours Nashville’s skating scene

BY ANNIE PARNELL

I’ve been roller skating on and off since middle school, but my skate career saw a couple setbacks over the past year. Moving to Nashville and losing all my gear in a house fire made me feel like a beginner again — on top of figuring out the local spots, I had to start from scratch, finding a new set of skates and relearning the muscle memory of being on wheels after months away.

Thank goodness for Asphalt Beach. At veteran skater Steve Larios’ shop in East Nashville’s Five Points, you can get fitted for your own gear and get advice from expert staffers who skate around the building throughout their shifts. Plus you can meet the shop’s cats Sean Kelly, Biggie and Fabiola — a survivor of the March 2020 tornado that destroyed the business’s previous building. With a new pair of quads in hand, I found a city full of prime skating spots at my doorstep.

Cornelia Fort Airpark is a classic for a reason: Its wideopen spaces and flat, paved runways make for an ideal spot for beginners to practice laps. But local skate coach Alyssa Kontos (on Instagram as @rollerpony) also recommends the outdoor roller hockey rinks at YMCA Bellevue and Hendersonville’s Volunteer Park at Arrowhead, which are open to the public when they haven’t been booked for games or practices. The group Skate Nashville holds meetups throughout the city, and Shelby Park Community Center hosts bring-your-own-skates family skating hours from 12:15 to 3 p.m. on Wednesdays and 10 a.m. to noon on Saturdays.

“If you don’t have your own equipment, and you want to try out roller skating, I always recommend people to

just go to the rink,” says Kontos. Rivergate Skate Center and Skate Center Brentwood both have adults-only skate nights, and Rivergate has also started hosting ’90s/2000sthemed throwback nights, with the next one on June 8.

Jason Cockerham, who owns Rivergate and has worked in local roller rinks since high school, particularly recommends the Tuesday night adult skates and Thursday family nights for beginners. For young skaters, the rink offers skate trainers, a kind of PVC pipe walker on wheels that helps kids maintain their balance. He says Nashville’s skate scene has grown with the city — these days, a melting pot of regional skate styles shows up at the rink, including fast-paced California skating and Chicago-style JB dance moves.

Austin Black, a Skate Nashville member who skates both inline and on skateboards, also thinks the scene has changed. Mainly he says that since the ’90s, past animosity between skateboarders, roller skaters and BMX riders has dissolved: “We’re all coexisting.”

After local professional inline skater Tony Woodland

Summer Guide

started running greenway skate outings, Black got involved hosting them and says “anyone who wants to be there” can attend — no matter your preferred type of wheels. He recommends greenways for the intermediate to advanced skater who’s comfortable navigating hills and tight curves, but the group’s outings vary by skill level. He also says not to discount the skate park — if you’re willing to go during a less busy time, spots like Two Rivers Skate Park and Sixth Avenue Skatepark at Rocketown can be “very suitable” for beginners.

When it comes to advice, Kontos, Cockerham and Black all say experienced skaters in the community are welcoming and excited to meet newbies. Don’t be intimidated by how cool they look, and don’t be afraid to ask for help — most of them, Kontos says, are “thrilled to help new skaters” learn. I can personally say that after gracefully falling my first time at Rivergate, I got a supportive thumbs-up from someone skating by.

“It’s a family feel,” says Cockerham.

Black also emphasizes the freedom and confidence-building that skating offers: “It’s been a good hobby to me.” His general recommendation is to “just get outside.”

“You don’t have to compete with anybody else — you don’t have to be the best,” he emphasizes. “Enjoying that community is what we’re after.” ▼

’90s/2000s Skate Party

7-10 p.m. June 8 at Rivergate Skate Center

Caving In

How to stay cool outdoors all summer long

BY LAURA HUTSON HUNTER

IT HAPPENS EVERY year. After a certain point, usually around mid-July, I start to dread the outdoors. The reasons are both obvious and endless: the heat, the sweat, the mosquitoes, the ridiculous amounts of sunscreen required. Summer has always seemed like more of an obstacle course than a season. But right around the time I realize I’ve already told anyone who’ll listen that my favorite form of sun protection is a house, I start feeling guilty. Who am I to keep my family hemmed in by air-conditioning and walls? What about nature? It’s become a real conundrum.

But fear not, I’ve found a loophole, and there’s a way to spend quality time outdoors while technically remaining inside — caves.

Caves are great because they’re always about 55 degrees, you’re always in the shade, and sometimes there are bats. Middle Tennessee happens to be home to a handful of amazing caves that are worth exploring — especially when you need a cool spot in the summer months. Not all of the caves mentioned here are open to the public year-round, but they are during the summer. Be sure to check out each cave’s site for details before your trip. Here’s our primer.

CUMBERLAND CAVERNS

1437 Cumberland Caverns Road, McMinnville cumberlandcaverns.com

Cumberland Caverns is about a two-hour drive from Nashville, and it’s a great place to start when you’re just getting into caving. There are three different categories of cave tours available, and each category has four options. So even if you end up caving here a handful of times, each experience will feel brand-new. The walking tours are the gentle way in, and most are open to cavers of all ages. For the more adventurous among us, there are adventure tours and overnight packages.

THE CAVERNS

555 Charlie Roberts Road, Pelham thecaverns.com

About an hour-and-a-half from Nashville near Fiery Gizzard State Park, The Caverns are best known these days as a music venue. (Flock of Seagulls play May 22! There’s also CaveFest, which Gillian Welch is headlining this year, in October.) But there are also plenty of cave tours available, from a simple guided tour to the intense Tombstone Pass Adventure Cave Tour, which is recommended only for cavers 16 and older and requires helmets, head lamps and knee pads (all provided). That one comes with a warning that you will definitely get muddy.

JACKSON CAVE AT CEDARS OF LEBANON STATE PARK

328 Cedar Forest Road, Lebanon tnstateparks.com/parks/cedars-of-lebanon

About an hour east of Nashville, Cedars of Lebanon State Park is an easy day trip, but as with all state parks, a caving permit is usually required. Caves in Tennessee state parks are open from May until August, and large groups (usually 10 or more) need to register in advance. Visit tnstateparks.com/activities/caving before you start planning.

DUNBAR CAVE STATE PARK

401 Old Dunbar Cave Road, Clarksville tnstateparks.com/parks/dunbar-cave

About an hour northwest of Nashville, Dunbar Cave State Park is perfect for cavers who moonlight as birders. A checklist of all the birds you might spot is available on the Dunbar Cave website, and includes dozens of hawks, warblers, geese and owls.

LOST CREEK CAVE AT SCOTT’S GULF WILDERNESS STATE PARK

3990 White’s Cave Road, Sparta tnstateparks.com/activities/caving

Lost Creek Cave is one of the biggest caves in Tennessee, and has five separate entrances — including one that’s underwater — and seven miles of mapped passages. It’s also a home to the endangered species Indiana bat. To check out Lost Creek Cave, you’ll need to register via the Tennessee State Parks site at least three days in advance.

A general tip for all the cave-curious: Check out Nashville Grotto. This crew of caving enthusiasts was established in 1953 as a chapter of the National Speleological Society. They meet on the first Tuesday of every month at Radnor Lake Visitor Center. Meetings start at 6:30 p.m., but visitors are encouraged to drop by early and hang out — curious cavers are usually full of questions, and Nashville Grotto welcomes them all. ▼

Summer Guide

Discover the best of Williamson County with Williamson’s Best, your ultimate guide to the area’s top businesses, services, and experiences. From local boutiques to standout restaurants, we want to highlight the places that make our community special — and now, it’s your turn to choose the winners! Voting for Williamson’s Best is now open. Check out this year’s groups and categories, and follow us on social media for updates!

@williamsonscene

Summer Guide Play Ball

Here are a few local options for catching some action on the diamond this summer

BY LOGAN BUTTS

NASHVILLE HAS LONG BEEN rumored as a future destination for a Major League Baseball expansion franchise. But despite work from Music City Baseball, the organization spearheading the MLB-to-Nashville movement, there remains one major hurdle — a viable ownership group with big-league money Music City Baseball leadership — which includes real estate developer John Loar and former U.S. Attorney Gen. Alberto Gonzales — has amassed a long list of advisers and ambassadors, partnered with property developer Lincoln Property Co. to look at downtown locations, conducted market analysis, and recognized the city’s deep Negro Leagues connections by naming the potential new team the Nashville Stars. But the money still isn’t there. At least for now.

It’s hard to beat an afternoon at the ballpark with a hot dog and a cold drink in hand; it’s something baseball enthusiasts and novices alike can enjoy. If you’re feeling bummed about our lack of a top-flight team — and don’t want to make the trip to see our closest MLB neighbors in Atlanta, St. Louis or Cincinnati — check out these local options on the diamond this summer.

The Nashville Sounds were holding down the local professional sports scene long before the Titans, Predators and Nashville SC arrived to suck up all the oxygen. For nearly 50 years, the boys of summer have ground through the sweltering dog days to provide Nashvillians with a fun trip to the ballpark. As residents of the Triple-A level of the Minor League Baseball system, the Sounds are one step away from the big leagues, meaning the product is higher quality than your average podunk minor-league squad in the middle of nowhere. There are 51 Sounds home games between the publication of this article and the end of the summer, so you have plenty of chances to head to First Horizon Park.

For those seeking a more old-school outing, the Nashville sandlot baseball scene is thriving. The Nashville Dollys, a community-service-focused independent sandlot club, have amassed quite a following online. They’re sort of like Nashville’s answer to the Savannah Bananas, but less try-hard and with cool, retro, Dolly Parton-inspired jerseys. The East Nashville Misfits, self-described as a “sandlot drinking team that happens to play baseball,” are another fun option.

A six-team local sandlot league — with top-notch squad names like Blue Jean Baseball Club and Reba Reds (who indeed have a Reba McEntire logo) — plays on Sundays throughout the summer at parks in East Nashville. On Saturdays, the league hosts an open sandlot game at Cleveland Park, where anyone can join the proceedings. Visit @nashvillesandlot on Instagram for more information or to sign up for a free-play game. Just make sure to bring a glove.

Reaching back even further into the history of the sport is the Tennessee Association of Vintage Base Ball. Established in 2012, the TAVBB plays under late-19th-century rules and with equipment from that era, including custom-made bats crafted by Murfreesboro-based Smacker Bat Co. Several of the league’s teams reside in Middle Tennessee — the Nashville Maroons, Phoenix of East Nashville, Stones River Scouts, Cumberland Club of Nashville, Franklin Farriers and Quicksteps of Spring Hill. The TAVBB season concludes with the annual Sulphur Dell Cup at Rippavilla in Spring Hill. Although our local collegiate baseball and softball squads have mostly seen their seasons come to an end, you’ll be able to see Belmont softball All-American pitcher Maya Johnson take the mound professionally this summer. Johnson became the first-ever mid-major player to earn a “Golden Ticket” from the Athletes Unlimited Softball League, which confirms their selections in the AUSL draft. She was taken third overall by the Oklahoma City Spark. The AUSL season begins on June 9. ▼

What’s Going On

Our summer events calendar, featuring the season’s best concerts, film screenings and more BY

SCENE STAFF

SOME OF THE YEAR’S best concerts are happening this summer, not to mention outdoor movie screenings, experimental performances and family events. Read on for our top picks of the season.

MAY 22

Musicians Corner Memorial Day Weekend feat. Amanda Shires, Nicole Atkins, Madi Diaz, Sam Palladio, more in Centennial Park (through May 24)

MAY 23

Chris Stapleton at Nissan Stadium

MAY 26

The Mountain Goats at Brooklyn Bowl

Arlo Parks at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

MAY 27

Chicago at the Grand Ole Opry House

MAY 28

Bleary album release at The Blue Room at Third Man Records House at the Belcourt

Nashville Opera at Cheekwood America at the Ryman

MAY 29

Echo & The Bunnymen at Brooklyn Bowl

Barbie at the Belcourt

GalaxyCon at The Fairgrounds Nashville

Musicians Corner feat. Cedric Burnside, Amythyst Kiah, more in Centennial Park Ava Swan w/Volunteer Department at Drkmttr

MAY 30

Masters of the Universe at the Belcourt Wild River at the Belcourt

Esencial Latin Dance Party at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

Fulton Lee at The Basement East 32nd annual Ode to Otha at 1711 Sweetbriar Ave.

MAY 31

Steve Earle at the Ryman

Lois Lowry author event at The Temple Congregation Ohabai Sholom

Satantango at the Belcourt

Tekkonkinkreet at local Regal locations

Mo Sabri w/the Nashville Symphony at the Schermerhorn

JUNE 1

First Cow at the Belcourt Croupier at the Belcourt

Jim Lauderdale at Skinny Dennis

JUNE 3

Khalid at Municipal Auditorium

JUNE 4

Jill Scott at the Ryman (also June 5 & 7)

David Sedaris author event at Parnassus Books

Manual Cinema’s The 4th Witch at OZ Arts (through June 6)

Trainspotting at the Belcourt

Movies in the Park: A Cinderella Story at Elmington Park

Tipify B Side Sessions feat. Marissa Nadler, Nicole Atkins & more at Vinyl Tap CMA Fest in downtown Nashville and at Nissan Stadium (through June 7)

JUNE 5

Big K.R.I.T. at Eastside Bowl

Starlito and Bandplay at Exit/In

Nicholas Krolak album release at Nashville Jazz Workshop

Luenell at Zanies (through June 6)

Musicians Corner feat. Nashville Symphony, Amy Stroup, John Paul White, more in Centennial Park (through June 6)

JUNE 6

Nashville Symphony at Two Rivers Mansion

Third annual Sakura Cup Sumo Tournament at Music City Fit Expo

Tower Defense w/Hydras at The 5 Spot

Laser Prince laser show at Adventure Science Center

JUNE 7

Pallbearer at Row One Stage at Cannery Hall

JUNE 9

Private Parts at the Belcourt

Charlie Puth at Ascend Federal Credit Union Amphitheater

Ca7riel & Paco Amoroso at the Ryman

JUNE 10

The Last Dinner Party at The Pinnacle Opry 100 Honors: Don Williams at the Grand Ole Opry House

Summer Guide

JUNE 11

Bonnaroo at The Bonnaroo Farm (through June 14)

Movies in the Park: Hannah Montana: The Movie at Elmington Park

Carín Léon at Bridgestone Arena

JUNE 12

John Mulaney at the Ryman (through June 14)

Street Theatre presents The View Upstairs at the Barbershop Theater (through June 27)

Musicians Corner feat. S.G. Goodman, Grizfolk, more in Centennial Park (through June 13)

JUNE 13

Walk Bike Nashville’s Open Streets Downtown

Nashville Roller Derby at The Fairgrounds

Nashville

JUNE 14

Dave Eggers author event at the Frist

JUNE 15

615 Week at various venues (through June 20)

JUNE 16

Dolly Parton’s Threads: My Songs in Symphony at the Schermerhorn (through July 31)

Dailey & Vincent at the Ryman

JUNE 17

Susannah Felts author event at Vinyl Tap Hamilton at TPAC’s Jackson Hall (through June 28)

JUNE 18

The Protomen at Marathon Music Works (through June 20)

Dave Atell at Zanies (through June 20)

Movies in the Park: Zootopia 2 at Elmington Park

JUNE 19

Actors Bridge Presents Joanna Murray-Smith’s Honour at the ABE Studio (through June 28)

JUNE 20

100 Taylor Arts Collective Art Market at 100 Taylor

The Church in The Caverns

Spencer Cullum’s Coin Collection album release at Random Sample

Blue June Music Fest feat. Phosphorescent, Adia Victoria & more at The Basement East

JUNE 21

Diarrhea Planet at Eastside Bowl

JUNE 23

Los Lonely Boys at Harken Hall

JUNE 24

Joe Jackson at the Ryman

Widowspeak at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

JUNE 25

Superdrag reunion at Eastside Bowl (through June 27)

Movies in the Park: Back to the Future at Elmington Park

JUNE 26

Nashville Flea Market at The Fairgrounds Nashville (through June 28) Waterfest at Peay Park

Rodney Crowell at 3rd and Lindsley

An Indigenous Present opens at the Frist (through Sept. 27)

Molly Martin album release at The ’58 at Eastside Bowl

JUNE 27

Nashville Pride at Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park

Alan Jackson at Nissan Stadium

Deady at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

Young the Giant at Ascend Federal Credit Union Amphitheater

JUNE 28

Colson Whitehead author event at Fisk

University’s Jubilee Hall

Pop-Up Shakespeare: Twelfth Night at Phat Bites

Pentagram at Eastside Bowl

Support LOCAL INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM

JUNE 30

Post Malone w/BigXthaPlug and Carter Faith at Nissan Stadium

Sam Bush at the Ryman

JULY 1

Sarah McLachlan w/Allison Russell at FirstBank Amphitheater

JULY 2

LSD Clownsystem at Exit/In

JULY 3

Todd Rundgren in The Caverns

Let Freedom Sing! Music City July Fourth in downtown Nashville (also July 4)

JULY 4

Red, White & Boom at Adventure Science Center

Music City Hot Chicken Festival at East Park

JULY 6

JULY 24

Nashville Flea Market at The Fairgrounds Nashville (through July 26)

AUG. 7

Tomato Art Fest in Five Points, East Nashville (through Aug. 8)

Burger Week (through July 12)

JULY 7

Amy Ray Band at The Basement East

Sierra Hull at the Ryman

JULY 9

The Bug Club at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

Screamin’ Cheetah Wheelies at 3rd and Lindsley (through July 11)

JULY 10

Stardust: An Immersive Live Music Experience at Adventure Science Center

JULY 14

The Infamous Stringdusters at the Ryman

JULY 15

Paul Simon at FirstBank Amphitheater

JULY 17

Tori Amos at the Ryman

JULY 18

Kurt Vile w/Being Dead at the Ryman

Tomahawk w/Melvins at Brooklyn Bowl

Be Your Own Pet 20th anniversary show at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

JULY 21

Of Montreal at The Mil at Cannery Hall

Qveen Herby at Marathon Music Works

JULY 23

Kindling Arts Festival (through July 26)

Bit Brigade performs MegaMan X at Eastside Bowl

Nation of Language at The Basement East

Wombo at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

Styrofoam Winos at The Blue Room at Third Man Records

Men at Work w/Toad the Wet Sprocket & Shonen Knife at The Pinnacle

JULY 25

Liverpool vs. Sunderland at Geodis Park

Guilty Pleasures: The Final Countdown at 3rd and Lindsley

JULY 27

Pavement at the Ryman (through July 28)

Sleepytime Gorilla Museum at The Mil at Cannery Hall

JULY 28

Oliver Tree at Marathon Music Works

JULY 29

The Pussycat Dolls w/Lil Kim & Mya at Ascend Federal Credit Union Amphitheater

JULY 30

Vince Gill at the Ryman (also playing July 31 through Aug. 1 and Aug. 6 through Aug. 8)

AUG. 1

Bob Dylan w/Lucinda Williams at Ascend Federal Credit Union Amphitheater

Fleurs de Villes The Gilded Age at Cheekwood

Barry Manilow: The Last Nashville Concert at Bridgestone Arena

AUG. 2

Rhiannon Giddens Presents American Tunes: Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing in The Caverns

AUG. 4

Tame Impala w/Djo at Bridgestone Arena (through Aug. 5)

Metric, Broken Social Scene & Stars at the Ryman

AUG. 5

Dogstar at the Ryman

AUG. 6

The Black Keys at The Pinnacle (through Aug. 7)

AUG. 8

Tape B at Ascend Federal Credit Union Amphitheater

Lip Critic at Eastside Bowl

AUG. 10

Clipping w/Open Mike Eagle at The Basement East

AUG. 11

Foreigner at the Ryman

AUG. 12

American Football at Marathon Music Works

AUG. 13

Gladys Knight at the Ryman My Chemical Romance at Nissan Stadium

AUG. 15

TLC, Salt-N-Pepa & En Vogue at FirstBank Amphitheater Foo Fighters at Nissan Stadium

AUG. 16

Squeeze at the Ryman

AUG. 19

Buddy Guy 90 at the Ryman Poppy at Marathon Music Works

AUG. 20

Shakespeare in the Park: A Midsummer Night’s Dream in The Bandshell at Centennial Park (through Sept. 20)

AUG. 22

Big Thief at the Ryman (through Aug. 23)

AUG. 27

James Austin Johnson at Zanies (through Aug. 29)

AUG. 29

Please Don’t Destroy at TPAC’s Polk Theater Brandi Carlile at Bridgestone Arena

AIRPARK Concerts CORNELIA

Thursday, May 21

OPENING RECEPTION Tim Biskup

Drifting Agency 5:00 pm · HALEY GALLERY

Saturday, May 23

SONGWRITER SESSION Ray Fulcher NOON · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 23

IN CONVERSATION WITH Clint Black

Killin’ Time: My Life and Music 6:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Sunday, May 24

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT Chuck Mead 1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 30

SONGWRITER SESSION Chris Wallin NOON · FORD THEATER

Saturday, May 30

POETS AND PROPHETS Salute to Songwriter Ashley Gorley 2:30 pm · FORD THEATER

Sunday, May 31

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT Dean Berner 1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Sunday, June 7

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT Charlie Worsham 1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

WITNESS HISTORY

Saturday, June 13

SONGWRITER SESSION Carl Jackson NOON · FORD THEATER

Saturday, June 13

HATCH SHOW PRINT Block Party 3:00 pm and 6:00 pm

HATCH SHOW PRINT SHOP

Sunday, June 14

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT Christian Sedelmyer 1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Saturday, June 20

SONGWRITER SESSION Tenille Townes NOON · FORD THEATER

Sunday, June 21

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT Charlie McCoy 1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Monday, June 22–Saturday, June 27 FAMILY PROGRAM String City

NASHVILLE’S TRADITION OF MUSIC AND PUPPETRY 10:00 am and 11:00 am FORD THEATER FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Sunday, June 28

MUSICIAN SPOTLIGHT Mark W. Winchester 1:00 pm · FORD THEATER

Locals Kids Always Visit Free

Plan a trip to the Museum! Local youth 18 and under who are residents of Nashville-Davidson and bordering counties always visit free, plus 25% off admission for up to two accompanying adults.

MAY 22-24

[ON

MUSIC

THE CORNER] MUSICIANS CORNER FEAT. AMANDA SHIRES, NICOLE ATKINS, MADI DIAZ & MORE

Widely loved concert series Musicians Corner has established a tradition of putting together some of the best lineups you’re going to see anywhere, full stop — for free, and at times that make it easy for families to enjoy them together. That continues with this year’s Memorial Day weekend extravaganza happening in Centennial Park. While there are some standout touring acts, including venerable New Jersey rockers The Verve Pipe and Philly hip-hop-and-soul duo Küf Knotz & Christine Elise, the overwhelming majority of the talent is homegrown. Among the parade of highlights, songsmith extraordinaire Amanda Shires headlines Friday’s show, following her 2025 album of revitalization Nobody’s Girl, with support including singer-songwriter Leah Blevins, who is fresh off the release of her Dan Auerbach-produced second LP All Dressed Up. Saturday’s stylings range from the bewitching torch songs of Nicole Atkins (who also has a new LP in the works) to Mariachi Viva Mexico and beyond. And Sunday your options include surf-psych-soul trio Ducky Neptune, co-star of ABC’s Nashville Sam Palladio and rocking singer-songwriter Madi Diaz, who appears in the wake of her latest LP Fatal Optimist. Don’t be surprised if she also busts out a selection from Enema of the Garden State, her acoustic Blink-182 tribute released right after Fatal Optimist as a benefit for the Defending Our Neighbors Fund. For the full lineup and schedule, visit musicianscorner.com STEPHEN TRAGESER

MAY 22-24 AT CENTENNIAL PARK

2500 WEST END AVE.

SUMMER AT THE LIBRARY FEAT. WISHING CHAIR PRODUCTIONS & MORE PAGE 18

MILESTONES OF THE LAST QUARTER

CENTURY: THE WILD BUNCH PAGE 20

MARCUS KING W/PENELOPE ROAD PAGE 20

THURSDAY / 5.21

MUSIC

[FLYING HIGH] THE BLACK CROWES

The Black Crowes bring their Southern Hospitality Tour to Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena Thursday night, and it’s a bit of a homecoming for Chris and Rich Robinson. Nashville — and specifically producer Jay Joyce’s Neon Cross Studios — is where the brothers got their mojo back with the brilliant 2024 album Happiness Bastards, which was their first album of new material since 2009. The album earned the legends of Southern rock a Grammy nomination for Best Rock Album in 2025. They returned to Music City last year to work with Joyce again, and the result is their incendiary new record A Pound of Feathers, which was released in March and is arguably even better. Chris says the two recent albums recorded in Nashville “might be the two most consistently strong records we’ve ever made back to back.” Thursday’s concert is the third stop on a 40-plus-city tour whose bill includes Texas rockers Whiskey Myers and Oklahoma country-rock band Southall. Fans can expect to hear material from Happiness Bastards and A Pound of Feathers, as well as favorites and deep cuts from The Black Crowes’ eight earlier studio

albums. In addition to the Robinsons, the band’s current lineup includes bassist Mark “Muddy” Dutton, keyboardist Erik Deutsch, guitarist Nico Bereciartua and drummer Cully Symington.

DARYL SANDERS

6:30 P.M. AT BRIDGESTONE ARENA

500 BROADWAY

FRIDAY / 5.22

MUSIC

[PRICE OF FAME] STEVE CONN

Nashville keyboardist, singer and songwriter Steve Conn’s 2018 track “Famous” takes a look at the big world of fame that exists outside Nashville. “Famous” finds Conn musing about his legacy, and he imagines a world in which he’s honored with a PBS special and a specially endowed chair at Louisiana State University. Conn was born in Pineville, La., and moved to Nashville in 1993 after making his bones as a session musician in California. He’s a fine keyboardist whose style evokes everyone from Allen Toussaint to Randy Newman, and Conn’s songwriting often works in the territory favored by Newman and Donald Fagen and Walter Becker. His 2018 album Flesh and Bone bears comparison to both Newman and Steely Dan, and you’ll appreciate his harmonic sophistication on the record’s “You Don’t Know,” which is about barely making it in a world that doesn’t care. Flesh and Bone sports the work of great Nashville players like drummer Bryan Owings and bassist Ron Eoff. Friday at Fox & Locke, Conn brings along guitarist Joe Davies, drummer Jack Bruno and bassist Mike Joyce. Conn has also released some of his father Vertis Roy “Peanut” Conn’s recordings on a compilation titled Tell My Baby That I Love Her, which includes a live radio show from the early 1950s.

EDD HURT

8 P.M. AT FOX & LOCKE

4142 OLD HILLSBORO ROAD, FRANKLIN

ART [SURREALITY]

INTERNATIONAL SURREALISM FROM TATE: FIFTY YEARS OF DREAMS

The first group exhibition of surrealist art

opened at Galerie Pierre in Paris in November 1925. Celebrating a century of visionary somnambulism, the Frist on Friday brings a landmark Tate collection survey to Nashville that traces the movement’s provocative, irreverent and disturbing meanderings throughout Europe and across the globe. International Surrealism From Tate: Fifty Years of Dreams gathers together paintings, photographs and sculptures as well as publications and archival materials. The show is organized according to the various moods and modes that make up surrealism’s wildly divergent production: dreams, automatism, desire, mysterious natural energies and radical libertarian politics. The established European figures are the highlights here: Dalí, Magritte, Ernst and Miró, but the exhibition’s surprise offerings include less celebrated international figures like Mexican photographer Kati Horna, Mozambican painter Malangatana Ngwenya, Japanese artist Osamu Shiihara and Sri Lankan photographer Lionel Wendt. Surrealism was always a process-based approach more interested in perspective and state of mind than in establishing a particular, recognizable visual aesthetic. It’s a movement that’s periodically dismissed before it inevitably returns to haunt the culture anew. JOE NOLAN

THROUGH AUG. 30 AT THE FRIST 919 BROADWAY

[RED RIVER VALLEY]

MUSIC

MICHAEL MARTIN MURPHEY

There’s a song on Kacey Musgraves’ new album Middle of Nowhere called “Everybody Wants to Be a Cowboy,” which pokes fun at bargoers on “the East Side” who like to dress the part of a cowboy or cowgirl while never doing a day of ranch work in their lives. (I, in my Tecovas boots that have never seen the inside of a barn or stable, felt very called out.) Cowboy cosplay is nothing new, but it’s not something Musgraves or her fellow Texan Michael Martin Murphey could ever be accused of. Murphey, who cut his teeth on his grandpa’s ranch and was raised on the songs and stories of the old-timers who worked the land, is one of the great keepers of the cowboy song tradition. Known for his songs “Wildfire,” “Carolina in the Pines” and more,

Murphey has devoted his career to preserving cowboy songs and poetry. On Friday, the singersongwriter will bring that treasured storytelling tradition to Harken Hall for a special evening of music and memories from the Cosmic Cowboy himself. BOBBIE JEAN SAWYER

7 P.M. AT HARKEN HALL 514 MADISON STATION BLVD., MADISON

THEATER [CHECK IT OUT] SUMMER AT THE LIBRARY FEAT. WISHING CHAIR PRODUCTIONS & MORE

The school year may have just ended, but Nashville Public Library is gearing up for a busy summer. The Summer Reading Challenge runs June 1 through July 31, and is open to all ages. Studio NPL offers free programs for teens, focusing on STEM, digital media and creative workshops. And of course, Wishing Chair Productions offers a terrific lineup of professional puppet shows and story times. In fact, this award-winning troupe recently unveiled a brand-new show called Rock-A-Billy Road: A Musical Shindig With the Gruff Family Goats. Created by veteran Wishing Chair performer Pete Carden (aka “Library Pete”), this clever production offers a fresh take on the classic tale of “The Three Billy Goats Gruff” — with Carl P., Wanda and Jerry Lee Gruff trying to win over “a stubborn Elvis-inspired troll, using kindness and teamwork.” The show features 10 new toe-tapping songs and is built around three vintage Tom Tichenor marionettes, never

before seen on the Wishing Chair stage. You can catch Rock-A-Billy Road this weekend, and be sure to keep an eye out for other upcoming performances — including The Stonecutter (a Bunraku-style puppet show, based on an Asian folktale) and String City (a delightful chronicle of country music history, presented at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum). AMY STUMPFL MAY 22-23 AT NASHVILLE PUBLIC LIBRARY 615 CHURCH ST.

ART [THIS LITTLE LIGHT] ANILA QUAYYUM AGHA: INTERWOVEN

Anila Quayyum Agha is an artist with a strong point of view. She was born in Pakistan, moved to the U.S. in 1999 and currently lives in Indianapolis. Her art is informed by her experiences as a woman and an immigrant, but also by California’s Light and Space art movement. She works with thread, beads and upholstery needles, but also with laser-cut paper and LEDs. In other words, Agha is a true global artist for the 21st century. Her exhibition at the Frist’s Gordon Contemporary Artists Project Gallery, Interwoven, is a nationally touring midcareer retrospective, and Nashville is its final stop. One work in particular will surely draw in audiences of all kinds: All the Flowers Are for Me is one of Agha’s signature laser-cut steel light boxes, and it filters light through a lacy IndoIslamic pattern to create something stirring that will make you think about perception and how it can be changed by visibility. Come

t

From platinum-selling chart-toppers to underground , household names to undiscovered gems, Chief’s Neon Steeple is committed to bringing the very best national and regional talent back to Broadway.

MAY LINEUP

History Of Country Music Presented by CJ Field

5.22 Nashville Live Band Karaoke

5.23 Mo Pitney

5.26 Buddy’s Place Writer’s Round w/ Brett Sheroky, Tana Matz, Nate Fredrick

5.27 Uncle B’s Damned Ole Opry Plays and Sings The Judds!

5.28 Annie Bosko, Rachel Thibodeau

5.29 Nashville Live Band Karaoke

to the auditorium from noon until 1 p.m. on Friday to hear Agha speak about her own work. Registration is required. LAURA HUTSON HUNTER THROUGH AUG. 30 AT THE FRIST 919 BROADWAY

SATURDAY / 5.23

FILM

[IF THEY MOVE, KILL ‘EM] MILESTONES OF THE LAST QUARTER CENTURY: THE WILD BUNCH

There’s nothing like a One Last Ride movie. Sometimes it’s a pure good-vibes hangout film, where the gang reunites for one final heist/ game/weekend/etc. The other type of One Last Ride movie — my favorite version of the trope — finds a group, usually made up of grizzled character actors, deciding that their time is up and they’re going down with the proverbial ship. Perhaps the ultimate version of this story is The Wild Bunch, Sam Peckinpah’s foundational 1969 revisionist Western. The Wild Bunch’s (fairly despicable) gang of aging antiheroes goes out in a bloody blaze of glory, taking the film’s (even more despicable) collection of terrorizing bounty hunters with them. Peckinpah’s film was a lightning rod at the time of release thanks to its trailblazing editing style and lack of anyone to root for. It was the perfect Western to lead American cinema into the bleak, innovative ’70s. There are no raindrops falling on the heads of Butch and Sundance in this shoot-’em-up. The Wild Bunch is screening on 35 mm as part of the Belcourt’s Milestones of the Last Quarter Century series. For showtimes, visit belcourt.org. LOGAN BUTTS

MAY 23-24 AT THE BELCOURT

2102 BELCOURT AVE.

SUNDAY / 5.24

FILM

[HISTORY IS NOT THE PAST] MILESTONES OF THE LAST QUARTER CENTURY: I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO

Returning to the Belcourt this week is I Am Not Your Negro, a documentary that saw Haitian filmmaker Raoul Peck (Lumumba) take an unfinished work by the late, gay African American author James Baldwin and craft a cinematic essay that salutes Baldwin’s provocative legacy and examines race and racism throughout American history. With an off-camera Samuel L. Jackson giving Baldwin’s incendiary words a voice, Peck compares and contrasts how Black and white faces have been seen and perceived in popular culture, specifically in Hollywood. When the movie dropped a decade ago, Orange Boy was just about to start his first term of chaos and disorder, fueled mainly by ignorance and bigotry from his MAGA base. Now he’s back in the White House, doing the same shit but on a more destructive scale. Props to the Belcourt for bringing back this 93-minute wake-up call to those who need to know that racist white people have been messing shit up since way before that blowhard got into office. Visit

belcourt.org for showtimes. CRAIG D. LINDSEY

MAY 24 & 26 AT THE BELCOURT 2102 BELCOURT AVE.

[FOREVER YOUNG]

MUSIC

THE MILLION DOLLAR BOB DYLAN 85TH BIRTHDAY BASH

Skinny Dennis is hosting a celebration of Bob Dylan’s 85th birthday Sunday evening that will benefit Second Harvest Food Bank. Billed as The Million Dollar Bob Dylan 85th Birthday Bash, the show will feature more than 30 artists performing songs from across Dylan’s fabled career. Singer-songwriter-guitarist

David Newbould was inspired to organize the birthday bash after the success of the Neil Young 80th birthday celebration he spearheaded in October. As they did at the Young birthday show, Newbould’s band — Adam Dalton (guitar), Bear Mitchell (bass), Jeffrey Howell (keys) and Dylan Sevey (drums) — will serve as the house band for the event and be joined by Paul Niehaus on pedal steel. Lisa Oliver-Gray, Jonell Mosser and Ginger Sands will serve as backing vocalists. In addition to Newbould, Dalton, Sevey, OliverGray and Mosser, artists who will take a turn at the mic include Robyn Hitchcock, Emma Swift, Tristen, Grant Lee-Phillips, Tommy Womack, Nicole Atkins, Anana Kaye, Irakli Gabriel, Kevin Gordon, Lera Lynn, Eric Slick, Mike Delevante, Scot Sax, Jon Byrd, Ziona Riley and John Jackson, who played guitar in Dylan’s band from 1991 to 1997. Admission is free, but there will be food donation bins, donation buckets and a merch for sale to benefit Second Harvest. DARYL SANDERS

7 P.M. AT SKINNY DENNIS

2635 GALLATIN PIKE

MONDAY / 5.25

FILM

[THRICE IN A LIFETIME] MILESTONES OF THE LAST QUARTER CENTURY: STOP MAKING SENSE

As part of its excellent ongoing Milestones of the Last Quarter Century series, the Belcourt on Monday will run three screenings of what is, in my estimation, the greatest concert documentary in cinematic history. With his 1984 Talking Heads doc Stop Making Sense, director Jonathan Demme kicked off a generationally outstanding decade-long run of films that also included Something Wild, The Silence of the Lambs and Philadelphia, among others. Writing about the film in 2014, the Scene’s late, great editor-in-chief Jim Ridley noted, “In some ways it’s the perfect expression of Demme’s career-long fascination with the building of communities and with performing troupes as families (and vice versa). The director’s love of people and performers radiates from the film, and he caught the band at its joyous peak.” Indeed, the film’s roughly 90 minutes amount to a serious feat of showmanship, musicality and production. As frontman David Byrne — clad in that iconic oversized suit — builds his ensemble member by member across the set list’s first six songs, Stop Making Sense plays out with the narrative tension of a feature film. Following

Jim’s death in 2016, the Belcourt showed a slate of the beloved local critic and journalist’s favorite movies, and this one rounded out the series. It screens now once again in honor of Jim — a onetime fixture at the Belcourt and the namesake of the theater’s lobby. D. PATRICK RODGERS 2:30, 8 & 10:05 P.M. AT THE BELCOURT 2102 BELCOURT AVE.

TUESDAY / 5.26

FILM

[JESSICA, ONLY CHILD, ILLINOIS, CHICAGO] MILESTONES OF THE LAST QUARTER CENTURY: PARASITE

Several of my most memorable filmgoing experiences have taken place at the Belcourt — a midnight screening of my favorite movie Scream, a buzzing theater for opening night of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood on 35 mm, taking off work to watch Heat on a summer afternoon for my birthday. One trip to the local arthouse I’ll never forget is when I saw Parasite in the fall of 2019, before the Oscar wins and director Bong Joon Ho’s invigorating speech on overcoming the “1-inch-tall barrier of subtitles.” Going in, I knew almost nothing about this twisty social thriller other than it had rave reviews. When each new layer of the story revealed itself — literally and metaphorically — I found myself leaning closer and closer to the screen. By the time the camera went barreling down into the basement for the third-act double reveal, I thought I was going to levitate out of my seat. I’ll never forget those two-plus hours. Here’s your chance to re-create that experience; don’t pass it up. And make sure to check your basement for any unwanted guests. The Best Picture winner is showing as part of the Belcourt’s Milestones of the Last Quarter Century series. For showtimes, visit belcourt.org.

LOGAN BUTTS

MAY 26 & 29 AT THE BELCOURT 2102 BELCOURT AVE.

MUSIC

[IN THE COMMUNITY] THE MOUNTAIN GOATS

The New York Times’ recent list of the 30 greatest living American songwriters ruffled some feathers, but such exercises exist to create controversy and expand the canon. You might cavil about the absence of, say, Bobby Braddock and Dan Penn, and you could make a case for

John Darnielle, the leader of the long-running indie-rock-folk band The Mountain Goats, as another great who didn’t make the list. If songwriting is about a combination of craft and art that gives people a feeling of community in a hostile world, Darnielle, who is 59, is beyond doubt one of the finest songwriters currently working. He’s as much of a Gen-X stalwart as Stephen Malkmus, and The Mountain Goats have been incredibly prolific, with 23 studio albums to their credit. If you don’t know The Mountain Goats’ work, I suggest you start with 2022’s Bleed Out, which rocks out with electric guitars. That album’s “Wage Wars Get Rich Die Handsome” describes the debased Trump era — you can imagine Trump listening to it and thinking what a sincere tribute it is to his genius. The Mountain Goats’ latest album, 2025’s Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan, adds strings and woodwinds to a set of trenchant songs. EDD HURT

8 P.M. AT BROOKLYN BOWL

925 THIRD AVE. N.

WEDNESDAY

/ 5.27

MUSIC [KING AND THE ROAD] MARCUS KING W/PENELOPE ROAD

Following Penelope Road still feels like being in on a secret — the way breakout artists cultivate inner-circle fandom, just before they break out. This smooth young quintet out of Atlanta shows off rotating vocalists in jazzy standouts “Like You Love Me” and “Chance Encounter,” singing about Georgia nights and fleeting meet-cutes with all the marvel you’d expect from a band of childhood friends. Its members now in their early 20s, the group is signed to Warner Records and set to follow its two EPs with a debut album. Talent, chops, original sound and bright future — they have it all, and droves of fans are soon to follow. Their current gig on tour opening for established blues-rock singer-songwriter and top-flight guitarist Marcus King should help with that. Penelope Road shares both the bill and plenty of soulful Southern DNA with King, who will headline Municipal Auditorium on May 27. King will put on a strong show, but show up early for the openers — while they’re still openers.

ELI MOTYCKA

8 P.M. AT MUNICIPAL AUDITORIUM

417 FOURTH AVE. N.

J u N e 16

T o J uly 31

B achelore TT e /F amily / g roup p ackages & vip e xperie N ces availa B le

B uy T icke T s N ow aT Nashville S ympho N y . org / T hreads

ON MAY 7, the second day of the Venice Biennale’s opening preview, artist María Magdalena Campos-Pons slowly circled a path around a gathering crowd, her husband and collaborator Kamaal Malak strumming a bass guitar nearby. She began quietly, but her low whisper grew into a joyful cry as she acknowledged the 61st Biennale’s curator, Koyo Kouoh, who died from cancer in 2025.

“I know that Koyo is walking with us,” she said in a sonorous stream-of-consciousness chant. “As we join in this caravan of love, this caravan of peace, this caravan of hope, this caravan of affirmation of the beauty of the complexity and the many colors, shades, forms of being human, I know that our sister is out there, smiling, laughing, moving, circling in a dance of pure joy!”

A performance from Campos-Pons is a magnetic, magnanimous affair. It’s a perfect fit for the Venice Biennale, long considered to be one of the most important events in the international art world — it is called “The Olympics of Art” as frequently as the Oscars are referred to as “Hollywood’s Biggest Night.” When Kouoh invited Campos-Pons to participate in the Biennale, she put her in league with an elite group of some of the world’s most prominent artists. Visibility on the scale of the Venice Biennale is difficult to replicate.

As she led her caravan of participants through Venice, Campos-Pons wore a ceremonial robe adorned with animals and flowers. A group of purple irises — the state flower of Tennessee — was at the front, directly over the artist’s heart. Since moving to Nashville in 2017 to serve as the Cornelius Vanderbilt Endowed Chair of Fine Arts at Vanderbilt University, Campos-Pons has enthusiastically called the city home. Through Vanderbilt, Campos-Pons founded the Engine for Art, Democracy and Justice (EADJ), and she oversees the West End Avenue art gallery Begonia Labs. She also curated the 2023 Tennessee Triennial, was the subject of a major museum exhibition that traveled from the Brooklyn Museum to the Frist to the Getty Center in L.A., and was awarded a prestigious MacArthur “Genius Grant” Fellowship.

But perhaps even more impressive than her professional achievements is the rigor with which Campos-Pons cultivates community. Her practice consistently centers artists and curators whose work she believes in, and the Venice Biennale might be her biggest contribution to Nashville’s art ecosystem yet. Only a select few artists are invited to participate in the Biennale. Although Campos-Pons was among the 110 artists handpicked by Koyo Kouoh to represent the theme In Minor Keys, Campos-Pons also invited many Nashville-based artists to participate in

STEEL MAGNOLIA

María Magdalena Campos-Pons brings Nashville to the 61st Venice Biennale

BY LAURA HUTSON HUNTER

a concurrent exhibition. As a result, their work will be seen by the same audiences and enter into the same conversations surrounding one of the art world’s most significant global events.

“I’m forever grateful to Dr. Campos-Pons for inviting me to show work in Venice for EADJ during the 61st Biennale,” photographer LeXander Bryant tells the Scene via email from a plane back to Nashville. Bryant was among the more than 50 artists Campos-Pons and Malak invited to participate in Resonance, a group exhibition that will be on view for the first few months of the Biennale.

“Nothing could have prepared me for the overwhelming amount of art and artist programming on display,” he says. “There’s nowhere else in the world like Venice, and the city’s local culture created a very unique one-ofone experience.”

Bryant’s work includes a selection of cyanotype prints pulled from his series Dirt Road Baby. “I wanted to present work that was a clear representation of me being from the American South,” he says. “All of the cyanotype prints were created using images captured in my hometown of Jackson, Ala. This exhibition connects my experiences of living in the American South to that of the Global South.”

Vadis Turner, who recently shared exhibition space with Campos-Pons in the Frist’s exhibition In Her Place, is another Nashville-based artist whose work is part of Resonance. Her work,

“Gold Bow Tondo,” uses gilded satin ribbon to upend the masculinist legacy of the grid in art.

“It feels like an important time to put ourselves in the way of being moved, and to witness how human connection can transcend borders,” Turner tells the Scene. “Magda is bringing so many voices from Nashville to Venice. She doesn’t have to — she chooses to, with a spirit of generosity and ‘radical love.’ Until I can repay her, I intend to pay it forward.“

Jana Harper, another artist whose work was in In Her Place, is showing three works that come from her ongoing research around water systems along North America’s Indigenous Anishinaabe migration route. The central work in this series, “Song for the Water,” features photographs printed on silk panels. Vesna Pavlović will show selections from her series No Ordinary Sunset, and will lead a participatory performance this weekend.

Resonance also includes work from artists whose scope extends well beyond Nashville — Campos-Pons positions artists she has developed relationships with locally alongside established, generationally important artists like Carrie Mae Weems and Deborah Willis. Their inclusion produces a compressed version of the exchange that makes the Biennale such a major cultural phenomenon.

As for her own contribution to the Biennale, Campos-Pons has created Anatomy of the Magnolia Tree for Koyo Kouoh and Toni

Morrison, a multipanel painting that honors Kouoh alongside the late Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison, and Malak composed a 47-minute sound piece that plays on a loop at the Biennale’s entrance. A garden of resin, glass and metal magnolia blossoms is assembled around the massive installation in something that curator Grace Aneiza Ali has described as a “monument in floral form.”

“In my lifetime, I have seen a lot of discomfort, a lot of suffering, a lot of necessary ruptures between people,” Campos-Pons tells the Scene from her room in Venice, where she will stay until the exhibition concludes in November. “What I try to model and to live through and with is a proposition in which if we collaborate — if we support each other — life is better for every one of us. I believe that profoundly.

“Our journey is brief,” she continues. “Our present is just a temporary light that passes. We are here for a period of time, and we turn into something else. And in this embodiment of who I am, in this consciousness, I know that it is very important that the work that I do — not only for the betterment of myself, but for the betterment of everyone around me — is valuable. I mean, is that not what Christianity proposed? To help each other, lift each other, bring everyone with you to the place that you know that is better, and say, ‘You have enough, distribute to others.’” ▼

12 Against Nature "A Steely

Experience" + Make Me Smile - The Music of Chicago

Backstage Nashville! Daytime Hit Songwriters Show featuring Trent Tomlinson, Trannie Anderson, Rob Hatch, Ray Stephenson + Julia Hutchinson

The Long Players performing Jackson Browne's "The Pretender" featuring Jim Photoglo, Eddie Perez, Carmella Ramsey, Rick Schell, Jody Nardone, Michael Kelsh & Scott Laurent

with

MUSIC

RETURN OF A QUEEN

Nashville expat RobinAugust kicks off a new era with a mini tour and dynamic new single

BY DARYL SANDERS

SINGER-SONGWRITER-GUITARIST RobinAugust is running late for her interview. Her coffee maker died an untimely death, and she needs to grab a latte from the neighborhood coffeehouse before jumping on the phone with the Scene. It’s early in the morning in Los Angeles, where the onetime riot grrrl has been living for the past year, and she wants to be properly caffeinated before discussing her new single “Parasite” and her upcoming mini tour to support it.

“This is what I’m supposed to sip during the interview,” RobinAugust says with a laugh, latte in hand.

“Parasite” is the fourth single she has released for L.A.-based Position Music. Co-writ-

ten with Emma Ruchefsky, it’s a sophisticated slice of pop-rock that speaks to the Nashville native’s growth as an artist and writer since her days as founder and co-leader of the allgirl teen punk band Queens of Noise. That band began as a Runaways tribute group, but soon evolved beyond that to write their own punk-influenced material. They released an EP Loretta in 2019 and a couple of singles, including “Up Against the Wall” on Ben Blackwell’s Cass Records in 2020.

After high school, the group went on hiatus, and RobinAugust moved to Boston to attend Berklee College of Music and study songwriting. During that time, she began to move in more

Playing 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 27, at The ’58 at Eastside Bowl

of a pop-rock direction, which led to the release of her acclaimed debut album Avocado Head in 2022. Avocado Head was a concept album about the end of a high school romance that not only showed her prowess as a vocalist, but also her gifts for melody and arranging.

She left Berklee after two years and returned to Nashville, where she continued to work on her songwriting. During that time, one of her best friends at Berklee, Violet Lewis, became an A&R exec at Position Music.

“Violet and I met at this event called Career Jam at Berklee,” RobinAugust recalls. “She watched an A&R [executive] speak and thought, ‘That’s what I wanna do,’ and then quite literally

turned the corner and met me. We became best friends, and she became head of the A&R club at Berklee. After she graduated, she started working for Position, and I was the first artist she signed. She really championed me.”

Her first single for Position was “Bad Idea,” which the company released in October.

“‘Bad Idea’ captures the impulsive, nagging, ‘fuck it’ feeling you get when haunted by the ghost of your ex,” she explains. “At the time, I was desperate to do literally anything to stop thinking about him. It’s messy, loud and reckless — just like I was when I wrote it.”

She followed “Bad Idea” with “Slipping Away” in December and “Hospital Bed” in January. “Parasite” will hit streaming services May 27. She explains that the song is “kind of like a summary of all of my insecurities,” written during one of her first writing sessions in L.A. She was literally having an anxiety attack during the session and had to step outside to call her therapist.

“It’s about relationships,” she says. “I was losing my mind that day. I was just crying so much. I was really going through it while I was in the session with people who were, at the time, strangers. I was panicking that, because I was so anxious and sad all the time, I didn’t deserve love or that I was going to be left by the people that I wanted the most.”

RobinAugust — whose merch once included a T-shirt that read “Too Loud for the Quiet” — may be intense, but her intensity fuels her artistry. Her feelings run deep. The song starts sparsely with vocal and guitar, then builds to a full-blown arrangement. The chorus is a metaphor for her anxiety: “I’m a pill that won’t go down / Swallow me whole, then spit on the ground / I’m a pill that won’t go down / I wanna be wrong, can we turn this around.”

“The chorus is me having a panic attack about being not lovable because I’m so emotional,” she says. “I was genuinely having those emotions while singing it.”

RobinAugust and her Nashville-based band — guitarist Lucas Johnstone, bassist Sam Johnstone and drummer Grifin DiNardo — will celebrate “Parasite” with a headlining show in The ’58 at Eastside Bowl on release day. It’s the first of a four-show mini tour that will take her to New York City, Columbus, Ohio, and back to L.A.

“Columbus is so random, but that’s where my family is,” says RobinAugust, “and we were like, ‘May as well, while we’re on our way [to New York].’”

Fans can expect to hear a lot of her new material at the show on the 27th. Her set list will include a couple of songs from Avocado Head, and she’ll be performing “Parasite” and “Bad Idea.” The remainder of the set will feature unreleased material, some of which will appear on an EP that Position Music plans to release later this year. ▼

LISTENING TO DON WILLIAMS, known as country music’s “Gentle Giant” for his humble nature, serene songs and velvet baritone, is a balm for the soul. The Texas-born singer-songwriter became one of the most successful country stars of the 1970s and ’80s without a trace of flash or gimmicks: just one unmistakable voice and the plainspoken poetry of songs like “I Believe in You,” “Til the Rivers All Run Dry,” “Come Early Morning” and “Amanda.”

Williams, who died at the age of 78 in 2017, spent his career in service of songs, so it’s fitting that some of his best tunes were never even heard by his legions of fans — until now. Epilogue: The Cellar Tapes, out May 29 via Craft Recordings, is a collection of previously unreleased tracks from the country legend.

The existence of the recordings wasn’t exactly a surprise to the Williams family. Don Williams’ son Tim Williams, who serves as executive producer on the album, had known the multitrack tapes were stashed beneath the living room floorboards of his childhood home in rural Tennessee. But upon finally listening to the recordings and discovering that the clarity of his dad’s golden voice still remained intact even after more than 30 years in storage, Tim Williams knew they needed to be shared with the public. While the vocal performances and some instrumental performances were usable, other instrumental tracks were unable to be restored, and he began the work of reconstructing what had deteriorated with newly recorded performances. When it came time to mix the album, Tim Williams turned to his dad’s friend and longtime producer Garth Fundis.

Fundis, who’s produced hit records for Keith Whitley, Alabama and more, got his start working at Jack Clement Recording Studios, known today as Sound Emporium, while Williams was recording his first album. Their quick friendship would soon grow into one of the most foundational partnerships of both men’s careers.

“Tim said, ‘Come listen and hear the vocals and then tell me you’re not excited.’ So I did,” Fundis tells the Scene. “It was exciting for me to wind back in my memories of when we recorded some of those songs.”

Together, Fundis and Tim Williams recruited members of Don Williams’ touring band to perform what needed to be retracked; some of the original performances you’ll hear are by great players who have since passed away. The final result includes Joe Allen on bass, Kenny Malone on drums and Charles Cochran on strings, piano and organ. The album also features performances from legendary steel player Lloyd Green as well as guitarists Jimmy Colvard, Dave Kirby and Billy Sanford, alongside new tracks from Tim Williams.

Recorded at the height of Don Williams’ career between 1979 and 1984, the songs on Epilogue exemplify his greatness. “I’m the One,”

GIANT STEPS

Epilogue: The Cellar Tapes expands Don Williams’ legacy

BY BOBBIE JEAN SAWYER

penned by Williams and Wayland Holyfield, had long been a favorite of Tim’s. He produced an alternate version of the song for the album, reimagining the musical elements of the tune for a more stripped-down production that puts the focus on his dad’s vocals.

“Daddy would bring home stuff at various stages when he was working on an album,” Williams recalls. “I had the cassette of that song, [and] I rode around and listened to it 40 years ago. I always really liked the song. I didn’t understand why it wasn’t on an album.”

Williams’ version of “Leaving Louisiana in the Broad Daylight” is another standout. Written by Rodney Crowell and Donivan Cowart, the song was originally recorded by Emmylou Harris in 1978 and made famous by The Oak Ridge Boys the following year. The song’s prevalence on the country charts may have contributed to Williams’ decision not to release his version at the time. Now, nearly 50 years later,

Williams’ delivery of the country classic feels like a gift from the beyond.

Williams’ long-standing reputation as an ace purveyor of country songs is on full display throughout the album. The music is quintessential Don Williams, down to the songwriters featured on the record — most notably Country Music Hall of Famer Bob McDill, who penned some of Williams’ most beloved songs, including “Good Ole Boys Like Me.” The stellar McDill compositions “How Can I Miss What I Never Had” and “I Wish I Was Crazy Again,” previously recorded by Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings, are highlights of the album.

“[Don] taught me a lot about the quality of good songs,” Fundis says. “He gave me not just his friendship, but a philosophical look at music and the reason to record certain songs.”

Posthumous albums can often feel unfinished or raise concerns about altering artistic intent. That’s not the case with Epilogue: The Cellar

Tapes, which is crafted with such care for Don Williams’ legacy it sounds like it could be a longlost record plucked from the early ’80s. Both Tim Williams and Fundis say that’s by design.

“I think [fans] will be relieved to know that [the album] doesn’t sound like filler or something that got tossed away,” Fundis says. “The songs are great. It’s from some of the same songwriters that Don went back to over the years, and there’s really some quality performances in Don’s vocals in particular.” ▼

Epilogue: The Cellar Tapes out Friday, May 29, via Craft Recordings

MUSIC: THE SPIN

A LITANY AGAINST FEAR

BY STEPHEN TRAGESER

AS MAY 13 DREW to a close, a cool breeze blew the sweet scent of earth warmed gently by the sun — the perfume of a gorgeous spring evening — across East Nashville, caressing windchimes and tickling garbage can lids.

Outside all-ages nonprofit venue Drkmttr, a construction crew set up bollards down the middle of Dickerson Pike, and the sequential flash of their safety lights lit a path toward downtown like the entrance to a carnival ride. A little while later, the jackhammering started.

But it didn’t do as much as you might expect to disturb Mdou Moctar’s solo performance. Though the Tuareg guitar wizard from Niger was performing without the three members of his backing band (who have been melting faces on the road under the name Takaat, including at a Nashville stop a few months ago at Random Sample), he was by no means quiet. Moctar also enlisted the sizable audience to keep time for him, and pretty soon the sounds of tormented asphalt vanished beneath layers of drones and quicksilver melodies, all shifting with and against the hypnotic beat.

Preparing hearts and minds for this communal happening was Atlanta singer-keyboardist Quincy McCrary, who you might recognize as a onetime member of Jack White’s band. McCrary reminded us it was Stevie Wonder’s birthday; he was in a soulful mood, and you could readily hear the influence of the GOAT of GOATs in his technically dazzling performances delivered without fuss, playful arrangements drawing on gospel and soul, and judicious use of wild synth textures in addition to his electric piano sound. These characterized McCrary’s original songs like “Another Day” (a protest against hate and brutality from Cornerstone, his 2019 album as Qemistry) as well as his selection of covers. Those included Sam Cooke’s sadly extra-relevant “A Change Is Gonna Come,” Jimi Hendrix’s wistful love song “Little Wing” and Mr. Wonder’s own “Knocks Me Off My Feet,” introduced with a special shoutout to the masterpiece Songs in the Key of Life No changeover was needed since both artists had compact setups, and following a brief break, Moctar took the stage to substantial

cheers. He gave his thanks and explained that he needed us to be part of the band since it was a solo show. Speaking for myself (though I imagine a lot of us were in the same boat, except for that one guy who brought his own hand drum), I was prepared to just spend the night sitting at the master’s feet while he unraveled the mysteries of the guitar universe. Still, I was game to clap, but this was more than garden variety, is-everyone-still-awake-out-there crowd participation. Moctar drew us directly into his performance, letting us experience some of what it’s like to internalize the intoxicating pulse of desert blues. And he was definitely paying attention. At one point, we lost the beat; laughing, Moctar asked us to start the song over again with him.

At the top of his set, he played an acoustic-electric guitar fed through his stack of effects pedals into a small amp. The sound was nonetheless massive, with the combination of delay, flanging and gain right on the edge of feedback blending into a thick texture that sometimes felt like listening to a guitar on tape being played backwards. Using a deceptively light touch for such nimble music, he worked with the sound like a skilled rider works with a horse (or in the case of the Tuareg people, a camel). Toward the end of the night, he plugged in his trusty Stratocaster and sharpened the sound up a bit, and for his encore, he fired up a drum machine and went into full-throttle Agadez wedding party mode

Moctar’s music keeps evolving, and last year’s Tears for Justice (his most recent release) is an acoustic reimagining of the album before that, 2024’s very electric Funeral for Justice. Look up the translations of the lyrics and you’ll find the songs offer sharp commentary on the lasting damage European colonialism did to Niger, how Tuareg culture is threatened by modernization and more, in addition to songs about love and other aspects of life. Except for anyone at the show who memorized the songs or spoke fluent Tamasheq, we had to rely on the tone of Moctar’s singing and playing for an indication of what a given song was about. But even that act of listening differently, done together with a room full of mostly strangers, felt important at this time when social division — increasingly in the form of naked racist or homophobic hate — is treated as political capital and wreaking havoc practically everywhere you turn. It’s a beautiful thing we were lucky to get to do together, even if just for an evening. ▼

BOOTS ON THE GROUND

Boots Riley’s I Love Boosters is a punkish, unpredictable ride

BY CRAIG D. LINDSEY

IF RYAN COOGLER IS now considered the Steven Spielberg of Bay Area filmmakers of color, Boots Riley should be hailed as the Bay’s answer to Tim Burton.

Though it was shot in Atlanta, Riley’s latest film I Love Boosters has the Marxist, maximalist hip-hopper/writer-director once again presenting his Oakland home base as a dizzying dreamland — bringing to mind the colorful, chaotic mischievousness of visual auteurs like Jacques Demy, Ray Harryhausen and, of course, Burbank’s own Burton — where unfazed Black folk go through some bizarro stuff. It’s almost like Riley and Atlanta star/creator Donald Glover are locked in a battle over which multihyphenate can make his predominantly Black region look the most like an Afrofuturistic amusement park.

Just as his 2018 debut Sorry to Bother You was Riley’s wackadoo take on Black folk struggling to keep their integrity (and sanity) in a white-dominated society, I Love Boosters — yet another title taken from the discography of Riley’s hip-hop crew The Coup — is a story of Black struggle. But this time around, Riley shows some love to the working-class sistas who gotta steal and scheme and squat in an abandoned chicken shack in order to keep it pushing.

That’s where we find Corvette (Keke Palmer, in deadpan desperado mode), who — along with her besties Sade (Naomi Ackie) and Mariah

(Taylour Paige) — boosts clothes from high-end stores and sells them on the low. Corvette would rather design clothes than steal from the stores of her idol, self-centered fashion impresario Christie Smith (a flaky, foulmouthed Demi Moore). But since a gigantic boulder carrying her bills and debts is always following her, Corvette unfortunately has to get her jack on.

Seemingly the only movie about fashion this year that doesn’t star Anne Hathaway, Boosters sees Riley making some satirical jabs at the fast-fashion industry. With glowing help from production designer Christopher Glass and clothing designer Shirley Kurata, Riley has The Velvet Gang (that’s what they’re called) shoplifting from so-called chic outlets whose knack for periodically draping everything in one color exposes how they’re really temples of brain-dead conformity and low wages. (A fussy, bespectacled Will Poulter shows up as the passive-aggressive manager of one store.)

Things get metaphysical when the ladies team up with a fed-up Chinese factory worker (Poppy Liu) who goes after Smith’s empire by taking her clothes and sending them back to her homeland. She does this with help from a circular teleportation device that can also turn people into their stylish, authentic selves. Much like when South Park’s Trey Parker zapped strangers with an orgasm gun in his porn-industry satire/

LET’S GET PHYSICAL

From The House With Laughing Windows to Family Movie Night Menus, here are some of the best recent physical-media releases and re-releases

BY JASON SHAWHAN

NOT GOING TO LIE: It feels weird to gather together the interesting things in the realm of Blu-rays, books and Ultra HD given what all is going on in the world. But after The Devil Wears Prada 2 wrung me out to dry with a very real focus on what being part of the mediasphere is like these days, I’m grateful to have a venue for this. And I’m glad to maybe direct your attention to some interesting things in the non-streaming realm.

superhero spoof Orgazmo, the gang goes around town giving huge money shots to those in dire need of a makeover.

Just like when he introduced those revolting (in every sense of the word) horse people in Sorry to Bother You, Riley gets a bit ahead of himself when he slides into twisted science-fiction territory, amping up the allegorical anarchy that Boosters already has in spades. (I’m Black — don’t start!) Nevertheless, Boosters has a punkish, unpredictable energy that still makes it a fun watch. After all, this is a movie where we get an uncoiled, unrecognizable Don Cheadle, covered in dreads and prosthetics as a shady, pyramid-scheming life coach — not to mention Sorry star LaKeith Stanfield as a demonic fuckboy who sucks the soul out of women in a seductive but gruesome way.

Smooth-talking, ain’t-shit men are among the myriad things that turn these ladies of color (also including Eiza González as a vaping, highly informative ally) into a band of avenging antiheroines. Along with giving us another round of absurdist, anti-capitalist agitprop with I Love Boosters, Riley has also done something I haven’t seen a Black male filmmaker do since F. Gary Gray had Queen Latifah and Jada Pinkett Smith go on a girl-power-fueled bank-robbing spree in Set It Off: He made a Black-as-hell heist movie that also passes the Bechdel test ▼

CASTRATION MOVIE ANTHOLOGY I: TRAPS (MUSCLE DISTRIBUTION BLU-RAY)

One of the most important statements in current trans* cinema, Louise Weard’s multipart epic (Anthology III comes out later this year) is an expansive, extended look into how people are living right now, and it’s essential viewing. Over the course of Anthology I’s two-disc, five-hour soak in this moment in history, you’re going to encounter nearly every kind of story that you could imagine: psychodrama, tragedy, cringe comedy, the most wrenching truth that you’ll feel like a trespasser for witnessing, deadpan physical comedy, and a sense that you’re seeing something special. Muscle Distribution does CMA1 right, with an array of supplements and commentaries that give you an almost cosmic sense of context. Given how genuinely scary things are right now, a work of art this defiant and singular is something that anyone interested in the possibilities of what film can do should check it out. And major snaps to upstart distributor Muscle for showing physical media the respect it deserves.

THE HOUSE WITH LAUGHING WINDOWS (ARROW UHD) / THE STENDHAL SYNDROME (VINEGAR SYNDROME UHD/BLU-RAY)

It’s thematically overwhelming to have two of

the greatest horror films about art to surface in super-stacked special editions — this is about as perfect a double feature of Italian genre cinema as you could want. Pupi Avati’s 1976 The House With Laughing Windows is an irresistible slow burn about a remote Italian town with a secret, where art restorer Stefano finds himself working on refreshing a painting that bears witness to an unspeakable crime. Dario Argento’s 1996 The Stendhal Syndrome (his last truly great film) is about the mesh of great art and incapacitating trauma, when police inspector Anna Manni pursues a serial sex criminal into the psychological space that suffuses some of the greatest works of art in human history. Both films ask very difficult questions about what it means when it becomes impossible to separate the darker sides of the human experience from incredible and enduring works — the former literally, the latter in a more expansive and figurative sense. House is the more accessible of the two, and the more easily recommendable. But Syndrome really is an incredible work of art about metabolizing rape trauma and exorcising it through the visual arts in ways both respectable and grotesque. (It’s also a problematic film both for what it is and what it represents, as star Asia Argento — the director’s daughter — is a very complicated figure, and one who requires some extensive research to discuss.) But both films, presented in remarkable restorations with heaps of comprehensive extras, are touchstones in using the iconography and tools of horror to get at art with bloody, brutal insight. [Critic’s note: Though The Stendhal Syndrome was mostly shot with the performers speaking English on set, it is entirely post-synced by an unrelated dubbing cast. It is essential to watch it with its Italian audio and English subtitles, because it features Argento’s actual vocal performance, and it makes so much difference.]

A BOOK BY DESI ARNAZ — EXPANDED EDITION (HACHETTE, ALSO AVAILABLE IN SPANISH)

I guarantee you know someone who loves Lucy. Even today, the legacy of I Love Lucy, both as TV history and as a cultural document, endures, and there are all manner of books, films and websites devoted to this particular aspect of 20th-century media. And now, after 50 years, the public is getting expanded primary sources, with Desi Arnaz’s 1976 autobiography back in print with a whole bunch of added material (including extensive extracts from what would have been a second volume, which includes Arnaz’s thoughts on the Cuban

revolution and perspective from daughter Lucie Arnaz Luckinbill). This isn’t a trashy tell-all, nor is it reputation-burnishing hagiography, but something we don’t tend to get in modern autobiography — a fascinating life, interestingly told, that enriches our understanding both of I Love Lucy as a cultural phenomenon and what it meant to be a Cuban émigré in the ’50s while living life in the public eye. This is a work, especially in this new variation, that delivers a lot of information about a time and social space that (unless you grew up in it) you would not have ready access to. This was quite a surprise, and a captivating read.

FAMILY MOVIE NIGHT MENUS BY LEONARD AND JESSIE MALTIN (RUNNING PRESS)

There was a lovely time, long ago in the history of the Nashville Film Festival, when I got to meet Leonard and Jessie Maltin at a jurors’ luncheon. The father and daughter were a charming twosome — informed, friendly and devoted at a genetic level to making sure people have good and productive experiences at the movies. This book, which finds a way to build menus (with eminently possible recipes) around films, facilitates a dinner-and-a-movie night for anyone who wants to take strength in gathering their nearest and dearest together for a good movie and a good meal. It’s a great and practical idea, with the kind of approachable and knowledgeable vibes one expects from the House of Maltin. As someone who loves sharing film and food with others, I find this is a great text to have around in the kitchen (or next to your TV or projector). ▼

YOU MAKE IT POSSIBLE.

For almost 40 years, the Scene has covered Nashville with honesty, curiosity and grit. Membership ensure new can keep doing that — for you, for our city and for the stories that still need to be told. Help us meet our goal by the end of the year!

BACK OF THE BOOK

ACROSS

1 Ventricle suppliers

6 Accepted unquestioningly

11 Rx for a root canal

14 ___ Moshfegh, “My Year of Rest and Relaxation” novelist

16 Performer known for her runs

17 Sommeliers’ assets

18 Like some gins and cleaning products

19 Wipe clean

20 Fast fliers

22 Insect nicknamed for its small size

25 “Midsommar” director Aster

26 “Nova” network

28 Sport that takes place in an octagon, in brief

29 Ilk

31 Risks it

33 Leaning

34 Upper hand

35 “I, Robot” author Asimov

36 Big deals

37 Facilities, informally

39 Booking, for short

41 Torah writers

45 Unit for ultra-highspeed internet

49 This isn’t working!

50 Fault line?

51 Home security co.

52 Wail

54 Word seen between here and there

55 Joel’s smuggling partner on “The Last of Us”

57 Bouquet

59 Tzatziki scooper

60 Big payroll service co.

61 Number of Super Bowl rings for Tom Brady

62 Abbr. seen before a person’s name

63 With 65-Across, with extreme precision ... or a hint to reading 15 of this puzzle’s answers

64 Serious

65 See 63-Across DOWN

1 X, for one

2 Fields medalist Terence

3 Like a lake on a breezy day

4 Charge

5 Question from someone seeking reassurance

6 “Finally!”

7 Service with cups and saucers

8 Dear 9 Exercise

10 Negation word in French

12 Occasion

13 Previous times

14 Welcome sight in musical chairs

15 Source of a deal with The Devil?

20 Sham

21 Like most of Nevada

23 “Yeah, nice try”

24 Gymnasts’ rolls?

27 Kid who might get grounded

30 Take off the market

31 Reroute

32 Something a reality show lacks

33 Igneous rock that composes most of Venus’s surface

38 Be against, in a way

40 Achievement for Whoopi Goldberg and Rita Moreno, in brief

41 Planned

42 Officially give

43 Tool with coarse teeth

44 “It’s a ___!”

45 Portmanteau for a queer Fortnite player, say

46 Fish whose name is Spanish for “pretty”

47 “There’s no stopping me!”

48 Ruler with an iron fist

53 Meander

56 Fig. with two hyphens

57 Modern intensifying suffix

58 Journalist Curry

59 Glib

studentcrosswords.

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FORECLOSURE SALE NOTICE

WHEREAS, DEN 827A

Dewees LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company, executed a Construction Deed of Trust dated October 17, 2022, of record at Instrument No. 20221018- 0113835, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee, as subsequently modified by that First Amendment to Deed of Trust, of record at Instrument No. 202404080024599 said Register’s Office (“Deed of Trust”) and conveyed to Richard A. Bynum, as Trustee, the hereinafter described real property to secure the payment of certain indebtedness (“Indebtedness”) owed to Studio Bank (referred to as “Lender”); and WHEREAS, default in payment of the Indebtedness secured by the Deed of Trust has occurred; and WHEREAS, David M. Anthony (“Trustee”) has been appointed Substitute Trustee by Lender by that Appointment of Substitute Trustee of record at Instrument 20260422- 0033087, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee, with authority to act alone or by a designated agent with the powers given the Trustee in the Deed of Trust and by applicable law; and WHEREAS, Lender, the owner and holder of said Indebtedness, has demanded that the real property be advertised and sold in satisfaction of said Indebtedness and the costs of the foreclosure, in accordance with the terms and provisions of the loan documents and Deed of Trust.

NOW, THEREFORE, notice is hereby given that the Trustee, pursuant to the power, duty and authority vested in and imposed upon the Trustee under the Deed of Trust and applicable law, will on Friday, June 12, 2026, at 1:00 o’clock p.m., prevailing Nashville time, on the steps of the historic Davidson County Courthouse, 1 Public Square, Nashville, Tennessee 37201, offer for sale to the highest and best bidder for cash and free from all rights and equity of redemption, statutory right of redemption or otherwise, homestead, dower, elective share and all other rights and exemptions of every kind as waived in said Deed of Trust, certain real property situated in Davidson County, Tennessee, described as follows:

Legal Description: The real property is described in the Deed of Trust at Instrument 20221018- 0113835, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.

sure, in accordance with the terms and provisions of the loan documents and Deed of Trust.

NOW, THEREFORE, notice is hereby given that the Trustee, pursuant to the power, duty and authority vested in and imposed upon the Trustee under the Deed of Trust and applicable law, will on Friday, June 12, 2026, at 1:00 o’clock p.m., prevailing Nashville time, on the steps of the historic Davidson County Courthouse, 1 Public Square, Nashville, Tennessee 37201, offer for sale to the highest and best bidder for cash and free from all rights and equity of redemption, statutory right of redemption or otherwise homestead, dower, elective share and all other rights and exemptions of every kind as waived in said Deed of Trust, certain real property situated in Davidson County, Tennessee, described as follows: Legal Description: The real property is described in the Deed of Trust at Instrument 20221018- 0113835, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.

Land in Davidson County, Tennessee, being Unit 827 A on the Plan of Davis Estates, attached as Exhibit "B" to the Declaration of Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions for Davis Estates, a Horizontal Property Regime with Private Elements, of record in Instrument No. 20200527- 0054523, in the Register's Office for Davidson, Tennessee, to which reference is hereby made for a more particular description of said unit.

Being the same property conveyed to DEN 827 A Dewees, LLC by Quitclaim Deed from Rodney Davis and Deborah Davis recorded simultaneously herewith of record in Instrument No. 20221018- 0113834, Register's Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.

Map/Parcel No: 118- 02- 1N001.00CO

Land in Davidson County, Tennessee, being Unit 827

FORECLOSURE SALE NOTICE

WHEREAS, Davis Estates Nashville, LLC, a Tennessee limited liability company, executed a Construction Deed of Trust dated October 17, 2022, of record at Instrument No. 20221018- 0113837, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee, as subsequently modified by that First Amendment to Deed of Trust, of record at Instrument No. 202404080024598 said Register’s Office (“Deed of Trust”) and conveyed to Richard A. Bynum, as Trustee, the hereinafter described real property to secure the payment of certain indebtedness (“Indebtedness”) owed to Studio Bank (referred to as “Lender”); and WHEREAS, default in payment of the Indebtedness secured by the Deed of Trust has occurred; and WHEREAS, David M. Anthony (“Trustee”) has been appointed Substitute Trustee by Lender by that Appointment of Substitute Trustee of record at Instrument 20260422- 0033086, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee, with authority to act alone or by a designated agent with the powers given the Trustee in the Deed of Trust and by applicable law; and WHEREAS, Lender, the owner and holder of said Indebtedness, has demanded that the real property be advertised and sold in satisfaction of said Indebtedness and the costs of the foreclosure, in accordance with the terms and provisions of the loan documents and Deed of Trust.

vested in and imposed upon the Trustee under the Deed of Trust and applicable law, will on Friday, June 12, 2026, at 1:15 o’clock p.m., prevailing Nashville time, on the steps of the historic Davidson County Courthouse, 1 Public Square, Nashville, Tennessee 37201, offer for sale to the highest and best bidder for cash and free from all rights and equity of redemption, statutory right of redemption or otherwise, homestead, dower, elective share and all other rights and exemptions of every kind as waived in said Deed of Trust, certain real property situated in Davidson County, Tennessee, described as follows:

Legal Description: The real property is described in the Deed of Trust at Instrument 20221018- 0113837, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.

Land in Davidson County, Tennessee, being Unit 827B, on the Plan of Davis Estates, attached as Exhibit "B" to the Declaration of Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions for Davis Estates, a Horizontal Property Regime with Private Elements, of record in Instrument No. 202005270054523, in the Register's Office for Davidson, Tennessee, to which reference is hereby made for a more particular description of said unit.

Being the same property conveyed to Davis Estates Nashville LLC by Quitclaim Deed from Rodney Davis and Wife, Deborah Davis recorded simultaneously herewith of record in Instrument No. 202210180113836, Register's Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.

YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD

NOW, THEREFORE, notice is hereby given that the Trustee, pursuant to the power, duty and authority vested in and imposed upon the Trustee under the Deed of Trust and applicable law, will on Friday, June 12, 2026, at 1:15 o’clock p.m., prevailing Nashville time, on the steps of the historic Davidson County Courthouse, 1 Public Square, Nashville, Tennessee 37201, offer for sale to the highest and best bidder for cash and free from all rights and equity of redemption, statutory right of redemption or otherwise, homestead, dower, elective share and all other rights and exemptions of every kind as waived in said Deed of Trust, certain real property situated in Davidson County, Tennessee, described as follows:

Legal Description: The real property is described in the Deed of Trust at Instrument 20221018- 0113837, Register’s Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.

A on the Plan of Davis Estates, attached as Exhibit "B" to the Declaration of Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions for Davis Estates, a Horizontal Property Regime with Private Elements, of record in Instrument No. 20200527- 0054523, in the Register's Office for Davidson, Tennessee, to which reference is hereby made for a more particular description of said unit.

Being the same property conveyed to DEN 827 A Dewees, LLC by Quitclaim Deed from Rodney Davis and Deborah Davis recorded simultaneously herewith of record in Instrument No. 20221018- 0113834, Register's Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.

Map/Parcel No: 118- 02- 1N001.00CO

Land in Davidson County, Tennessee, being Unit 827B, on the Plan of Davis Estates, attached as Exhibit "B" to the Declaration of Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions for Davis Estates, a Horizontal Property Regime with Private Elements, of record in Instrument No. 202005270054523, in the Register's Office for Davidson, Tennessee, to which reference is hereby made for a more particular description of said unit.

Being the same property conveyed to Davis Estates Nashville LLC by Quitclaim Deed from Rodney Davis and Wife, Deborah Davis recorded simultaneously herewith of record in Instrument No. 202210180113836, Register's Office for Davidson County, Tennessee.