Walking in Memphis

The drive to Memphis from Nashville clocked in at under four hours. We stayed at the Court Square Inn in downtown, right near Beale Street (which is where mostly all of the scene in Memphis is). We were greeted in the lobby by a young black woman, whose personality we could not ascertain, until she laughed at Binh's karaoke to "Man in the Mirror". MJ comes through again...

We immediately headed to Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken, which I had seen on some Travel Channel show and which is written about in almost any travel book. Although it was only a mile away from our motel, we were informed that it was "too far to walk", something I suspect we will hear a lot outside of New York City. Walking into Gus's you could quickly see how Memphis bears a different soul than Nashville. A mix of black and white patrons hankered over picnic-checkered table cloths, some cheering on Tiger Woods, playing on the TV in one corner, others, like Binh and Mackenzie, admiring beach volleyball in the other corner. For a review of the food, see Binh's post, "On Southern Cuisine".

Later that night when it was time to go out we darted for Beale Street, which is a stretch of two or three blocks, roped off for pedestrians only. Like Bourbon Street in New Orleans (but much smaller and tamer), you can walk down the street with a drink in a plastic cup, which can be purchased in to-go windows throughout. Similar to Nashville, live music can be heard blaring out of almost every place on the street, but the music, somewhat suprisingly to me, was quite different.

Memphis, while clearly still a little bit country, is way more about the blues, and soulful blues at that. Both places we went to on this Sunday night featured bands with singers who crooned from the raspiness of their hearts. The guitar work was distinctively clean and the bands tight, but loose enough to allow for extended blues jams and stage play. One particularly memorable scene occurred at the Rum Boogie Cafe when the house band began playing a cover of Prince's "Purple Rain". A typically white country couple got up to dance their two step to the bluesy take on Prince and were followed to the front by an African American couple who grooved in a more hip-bumping, finger snapping style. The contrast of the two dancing couples with the backdrop of the blues band playing a Prince cover pretty much sums up what we found beautiful about Memphis.

And the dry ribs were damn good too.