Category: All The Way From Memphis

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Funny Story

I went to elementary school with the author (Mark Greaney) of the book this movie is based on.

Ryan Gosling is THE GRAY MAN and Chris Evans is his psychopathic adversary in the Netflix/AGBO spy thriller directed by Anthony and Joe Russo – available globally July 22 on Netflix.

Also starring Ana de Armas, with Regé-Jean Page, Billy Bob Thornton, Jessica Henwick, Dhanush, Wagner Moura and Alfre Woodard. Based on the novel The Gray Man by Mark Greaney, the screenplay is by Joe Russo, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely.

THE GRAY MAN is CIA operative Court Gentry (Ryan Gosling), aka, Sierra Six. Plucked from a federal penitentiary and recruited by his handler, Donald Fitzroy (Billy Bob Thornton), Gentry was once a highly-skilled, Agency-sanctioned merchant of death. But now the tables have turned and Six is the target, hunted across the globe by Lloyd Hansen (Chris Evans), a former cohort at the CIA, who will stop at nothing to take him out. Agent Dani Miranda (Ana de Armas) has his back. He’ll need it.

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I Hope They Consulted Fat Elvis

I haven’t watched many of these, and almost always prefer footage of the original artists to their biopics. From Vince Mancini’s The Academy Can’t Quit Biopics, Even When They’re Bad:

Biopics now seem to exist somewhere outside of movies, belonging more to public relations; flashy advertisements for their stars and validations of their subjects’ legacies. Missing is the expectation that we’re actually going to gain any insight about their subjects… So it is we’ve gotten decidedly un-illuminating, subject-friendly portrayals such as Bohemian Rhapsody and Rocketman.

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Speaking o’ Memphis

Here’s a radio show of some 60’s-70’s rarities.  I love the ones by the Breakers and Flash and the Memphis Casuals.  I bet they kicked ass live (I’m not old enough to have seen them, although I did see about half of the others on this list).  Unlisted after the Tommy Hoehn song is a pretty terrible cover of “I Walk the Line” by a band called Hot Dogs, who had some good songs;  why on earth was that chosen?  I find Chris Bell’s acoustic version of “I Am The Cosmos” too slow, sludgy, and depressing–which I guess makes sense, as he was chronically depressed.   It’s the sound of Quaalude abuse.  The official single version moves along better, although there’s still about as much sludge as I can endure.

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New Memphis Power Pop

Delayed by the pandemic, of course. Your Academy is a Memphis supergroup of sorts, made up of likeminded middle-agers. I think the video’s been up a year but the vinyl is new. What a set of pipes on that Brandon McGovern! (I’ve always loved his voice.)

Extensive band bio and purchasing options on Bandcamp.

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Whoa Indeed

Paul McCartney + Todd Rundgren + Memphis = Van Duren.  Van made probably the best album from the ’77-’78 local power pop “scene.”  I use quotes because that “scene” consisted of three bands, a revolving cast of girfriends, about 20 midtown weirdos, and no clubs that would book those bands more than once.  So barely a scene at all.  Which is why everyone tried relocating, with varying degrees of failure.

Great song, although he might have overused the “whoas.”

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Eggleston and Big Star

I was fashionably late to both the Big Star and the William Eggleston party, but at least I made it. Here’s some really cool images from way back when. As a music aficionado who has a penchant for all things single lens reflect, this is right up my alley. Click here for more Memphis goodness.

Apologies if y’all have seen these before, I’m still learning about the epic times in Memphis back in the day.

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Who Moved Stonehenge?


”Archaeologists believe they may have discovered the true origins of the ancient Stonehenge monument after unearthing evidence some of the materials may have served a previous purpose elsewhere.
Experts have long worked at the site to find out more about why and how the ancient wonder was built – with some of the volcanic bluestones used in the structure being brought 160 miles to the site from their point of origin in Wales.Now researchers have uncovered signs the smaller bluestones originally formed an even older, long-lost monument in the Preseli Hills in Pembrokeshire, Wales.During filming for the BBC documentary Stonehenge: The Lost Circle Revealed, a team led by Professor Mike Parker Pearson uncovered signs the stones had been left in the western Welsh moorlands.
Professor Alice Roberts said the archaeologists “were always up against it”, adding: “they had a terrible time. They’ve been doing this for about 10 years.
“They looked in lots of different places and didn’t find anything. They were almost on the brink of giving up and then they looked at this particular place called Waun Mawn.”
“They decided that they were going to dig anyway and just see if they can find anything, and they found these ghosts of stone holes,” Prof Roberts said. “And they were exactly the same diameter as the outer circle at Stonehenge.”
Archaeologists used 3D scanning techniques, traditional field archaeology, and laboratory analysis to discover when and where the stones for Stonehenge were quarried and where they first stood.
But while the question of where the stones came from may have been answered, why they were transported to England may remain a mystery for now.
Prof Roberts said: “Of course there are questions about why these stones would have been brought from West Wales to Salisbury Plain … but ultimately it’s pre-history and we don’t know.”

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Dammit, Nigel.

More here.