Metro Pulse/Music/Eye on the Scene

One day our prince will come

Last Friday night, the downtown club and caterer, Fairbanks, closed the doors of its Clinch Avenue location. The business plans to reopen soon in the old Terrace Theatre in Bearden's Homberg Place.

The club had become home for a number of different subculture events, including weekly swing, hip-hop, classical piano, jazz, Latin, and KnoxGothic dances and shows.

Owner Thomas Dillon was reluctant to give specifics for the move. "It's important for us that the community understand we're not bailing out of downtown. We're in transition. I don't want our move to have a negative effect on downtown," Dillon says. "I believe in what's going on downtown, and I'm looking forward to going back there in the future. Three to five years from now, when there's a neighborhood there, we'd love to be able to step back in."

Dillon did not have a precise date for when the new Fairbanks would be open, but he said he hopes it'll be in just a few weeks. The new place will continue hosting dances; he wasn't sure if it would work as a restaurant as well.

In the meantime, some regular events have relocated. KnoxGothic's monthly Sanctus will be held at Blue Cats June 15.

Kid Invader

You wouldn't expect the local British Invasion cover band, The Invaders, to be much for hip hop (or, maybe you would), but the group was tickled pink to have Kid Rock join them on stage at Charlie Pepper's on the Strip Saturday for a few songs.

Mr. Rock was in town for the Kenny Chesney concert. Dressed in an orange football jersey with "ROCK" printed on the back, Kid Rock sang "Jumpin' Jack Flash," "Saw Her Standing There," and "Satisfaction" with the band. "He was a really great guy, good sport, and it was a special treat for all of us," The Invaders report on their website, www.theinvaders.net. In case you missed it, the website has some pictures of the show.

Pics galore!

A few weeks ago, Eye publicized Knox Pics (http://shc.post891.org/KnoxPics/) a website that features photos from local shows. A. Marc Shamblin of Ambient Life Photography has similar websites. The Digital Knoxville Music Archive (http://ambientlife.com/htm/locals/locals.htm) has shots from several local shows, including Cheryl Renee, Jobe, Leslie Woods, Blue Mother Earth, Left Foot Down, Kim Baxter, Jodie Manross and Louise Mosrie. The Knoxville Blues Society site (http://ambientlife.com/htm/blues.htm) features pics of blues artists, both local and at-large. Marc also has some pictures of his apartment, in case you're interested.

Go.

Thursday: Kids today! They don't know the true meaning of Ska. But what you gonna do? You could long for the days of the Skatalites or you could see how they do it at the Southern Ska Tour at Brickyard Blues.

Friday: Scott Miller has a great new album out and he's playing with his great band the Commonwealth at the great club Blue Cats.

Saturday: The Piedmont Charisma and Ibrahim are well worth the ticket price but I'm most intrigued by opening act Ether Bunnies, "a multi-instrumental trio demonstrating a variety of epileptic bird calls over appalachian coma hyms." At the Pilot Light, naturally.

Sunday: For $5 you can hear Majority Rule, Past Mistakes and The Bloodiest Night of My Life at Old City Java. The preacher is right—these are indeed the end days.

Monday: Oh Lordy, Madame is Forty! Well, not really. But perhaps s/he'll stumble into you after a long night of drinking gin, listening to Robinella, and pining for lost loves. At the Preservation Pub.

Tuesday: theplansoff with the Means at the Pilot Light.

Wednesday: Rent a flat above a shop/ Cut your hair and get a job/ Smoke some fags and play some pool/ Pretend you never went to school/ But still you'll never get it right/ 'cos when you're laid in bed at night/ watching roaches climb the wall/ if you called your dad he could stop it all/ yeah You'll never live like common people / You'll never do whatever common people do/ You'll never fail like common people/ You'll never watch your life slide out of view/ and then dance and drink and screw 'cos there's nothing else to do.

—Madame "burning love letters to keep warm" Georgie with Joe Tarr