Metro Pulse/Music/Eye on the Scene

Open Door

After a year of false starts, the Gay Street club Three Nineteen will finally open with a St. Valentine's weekend bash.

The club, located at 319 N. Gay St., had been expected to open last spring, but delays in getting building and fire code approvals kept it closed. The final delay occurred as the club's owners tried to decide what to do about a lower-than-hoped-for occupancy level. Without an emergency exit, the club can only fit 50 people. A door that could have been used for an emergency exit opens onto another property, and that owner didn't want the door used for such purposes, says Kari Hoffman, one of the club's owners.

"Probably, we're not going to get a second exit," Hoffman says. "So we're just going to go with occupancy that we have."

The grand opening will happen Friday, Feb. 16, starting at 8 p.m. Called "Get A Big Heart On," the show is an irreverent celebration of St. Valentine's Day. The festivities begin with a small carnival (Tarot cards and such). An erotic poetry reading will go from 9 to 11 p.m. Then Evil Twin (the band too wild for Atlanta) will take the stage at midnight. Admission is $10.

The club's owners eventually plan to apply for a beer permit, but for now it's BYOB. Hoffman says Three Nineteen will also have regular nights for business, but those have not been set yet. "I really want to try to pull this event off and get a little momentum," Hoffman says.

Word On the Street

On Feb. 17, local hero R.B. Morris will be playing a show at Patrick Sullivan's with a sizable band including Knoxville Latino bluesman Hector Qirko and nationally known guitarist Kenny Vaughan. It'll be R.B.'s last appearance in his hometown before he goes into the studio in New York in March to cut his third national-release CD with Hal Wilner, coordinator of music on Saturday Night Live and producer of recent albums by Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson. Like Zeke And the Wheel, the new CD will be on the Koch label. R.B. has always thought of himself as a poet first, and says the new CD will have more spoken-word performances than his previous two big-time albums. It may bear some similarities to his local releases The Knoxville Sessions and Local Man.

No Blueground. No Undergrass.

Word has just come through that the Blueground Undergrass show planned for Feb. 8 at Moose's Music Hall has been canceled due to a "scheduling conflict." No make-up date is planned and ticket holders can call Tickets Unlimited (656-4444) for refund information. We now return you to your regularly scheduled column...

Eye on the (Adult Web) Scene

A look at local music web sites by Electroboy:

One thing that web music has in common with other web phenomena, and non-web phenomena too, is that sex sells. Many of the top-rated web bands are in the "adult-themed" genre, and they're doing quite well, thank you.

M.O.B. Affiliated is a good example. A Knoxville rap/hip-hop group, they're currently sitting pretty at #15 on the MP3.Com USA charts—very pretty indeed, when you realize that numbers 16 and 18, respectively, are Faith Hill and Madonna. It's high-quality groove by "Mr. Whitefolks," "Lil Reese" and "Dirty O." Check out their chart-topping "Work That Ass (Strip Club Anthem)" at www.mp3.com/MOBAffiliated. You'll find yourself singing along for days, and getting strange looks from your coworkers. There's also a CD, Ghetto Life, for the ridiculously low price of $5.99.

But M.O.B. Affiliated isn't just a band—as far as I can tell, they're the beginnings of a vast rap empire, with their page linked to Str8Gutta Entertainment, where you can buy not one, but two CDs (Hard Knox Huslaz vols. 1 & 2—same ridiculously low price) featuring the members of M.O.B. Affiliated along with several other rappers. Don't miss "Dirty South," an ode to a side of Knoxville that doesn't get all that much attention, at www.mp3.com/str8gutta.

Speaking of parental-advisory chart-toppers, Knoxville's own Twisted Mr. currently sits atop the "Adult Comedy" charts with its "The Masturbation Song," a stirring tribute to cybersex. It's downhill in the taste department from there, but it's undeniably funny—and lots of people are listening. In the band's own words: "Do NOT click this unless you're into this sort of thing. Otherwise you're going to be grossed out." Thus warned, you can check out their stuff at www.mp3.com/TwistedMr.

Go.

Thursday: Inherit the Wind at Clarence Brown Theatre. The stage version of a Tennessee trial about evolution.

Friday: Les Percussions de Guinée at Pellissippi State Performing Arts Center. Dance and percussion translate to joy, regardless of your native tongue.

Saturday: Vacationsists League at Barnes & Noble. Interesting local rocky-folkies give a free show.

Sunday: Knoxville Jazz Orchestra at Fairbanks. Celebrate V-day early and help send these talented musicians abroad.

Monday: Ruth Fuson and Jack Fuson at St. John's Cathedral. This noon-ish vocal recital is a nice, quiet way to ease into the work week.

Tuesday: Angel!

Wednesday: Drink too much and call old lovers. No, wait, that's my plan and I don't want to bring the room down. How about: Gran Torino with Jodie Manross at Moose's Music Hall. Up-tempo rock-funk to make your heart go pitter-pat.

—Emma "Did the world need a masturbation song?" Poptart