Zesto Drive-Ins are an institution in Atlanta, and occasionally pop up elsewhere (Evansville, Indiana and Columbia, South Carolina come to mind), and they were “fast food” before there was fast food. Now they seem to be expanding in Atlanta, and while the classic original locations are the best for their architectural value, the new ones have an attractive retro look as well. The burgers are good too, and at a reasonable price.
This year’s Southeast Urban Music Conference was held at the Park Tavern in Piedmont Park in Atlanta, and because of that was kind of reminiscent of SUMC’s early days when I first became involved. The outdoor patio is a remarkable place for artist performances.
The Memphis All-Star Mass Band. Filled with high school kids and college students/alumni of various HBCU bands. Playing “Baby, Come To Me” by Regina Belle
Starting the first day of Southeast Urban Music Conference in Atlanta with a good breakfast at West Egg Cafe. June 21, 2011.
At the Entertainment Networking Summit in Brinkley, Arkansas, June 18, 2011
Sun Studios, early morning. Memphis, TN, May 31, 2011.
The Legendary Sun Studios, home of Elvis, Carl, Cash, Conway. This is where mainstream rock-and-roll began.
For the masses.
You are the reason I listen to rock and punk. Without you, there would be no punk. Because of you, there is punk.
Juneteenth, Douglass Park, North Memphis, June 18, 2011
Juneteenth Festival, Douglass Park, North Memphis, June 18, 2011
Dr. Coby Vernon Smith, noted Memphis activist and educator, is the first African-American student to attend Southwestern University at Memphis, which is today Rhodes College. In the spring of 1967, with Charles Cabbage and John Burrell Smith, he founded an organization called the Black Organizing Project in Memphis. Feeling that the mainstream civil rights movement was primarily geared to integrating the black upper class with white society, BOP took on the task of organizing the ghettos, particularly youth. In the Riverside neighborhood around Carver High School the name BOP was gradually replaced by The Invaders, and it would be this name that was spread by local media and which would be remembered. The Invaders marched for the Memphis sanitation workers in 1968, taught Black history classes in storefronts in North Memphis and South Memphis, marched with hospital strikers, and marched across Arkansas with Lance “Sweet Willie Wine” Watson in 1969. Although the media attempted to consistently link the Invaders to violence and hatred of whites, reporters rarely allowed the Invaders to rebut such charges, or to state what their organization stood for. At a time here in 2011 when the rights of union members and sanitation workers in Memphis are under attack from politicians, it is important for Memphians to remember the lost legacy of The Invaders.
