Back to listings

The Big Ticket

Robert Randolph and the Family Band w/ Xavier Rudd
The most amazing slide guitar player you’ll ever hear for free. Thursday, Oct. 14, 6-10 p.m. Market Square. Free.

Pauline York
Funky blues lady from Chi-town. Thursday, Oct. 14, 9 p.m. Brackins. $5.

Our Town
The WordPlayers take us back to Grover’s Corners. Oct. 15, 16, 22, 23, 7:30 p.m. and Oct. 17 & 24, 2 p.m. Erin Presbyterian Church. $10, $12. Call 539-2490 for reservations.

This Is Our Youth
Kenneth Lonergan’s first play of note. Friday, Oct. 15, 8 p.m. continues Fridays & Saturdays, 8 p.m. and Sundays, 2 p.m. thru Oct. 24. Clarence Brown Lab Theatre, UT campus. $3.

R.B. Morris w/ Maggie Longmire
If there’s such a thing as Knoxville music, they’re making it. Friday, Oct. 15, 9 p.m. Blue Cats. $7, $5 w/ college ID.

Sleepytime Gorilla Museum w/ Gypsy Hands Belly Dancers and It Is A Code
Apocalyptic carnival soundtrack. Friday, Oct. 15, 9 p.m. Pilot Light. $7.

Brewers’ Jam w/ Billy Joe Shaver, John Cowan Band, Jay Clark and the CCStringband, Garage Deluxe and Dixie Dirt
‘Unlimited samples’ of regional craft beer. Saturday, Oct. 16, World’s Fair Park, 3-9 p.m. $25 gate, $10 for under 21 and non-drinkers.

Wallace Coleman
This blues legend from Morristown plays to support Knoxville’s Promise. Saturday, Oct. 16, Star of Knoxville Riverboat. Folk & blues dock party, 7:30-9:30 p.m. Electric blues cruise, 10 p.m.-12 a.m. $15 adv., $20 day of departure. Call 523-2775 for reservations.

Actors Co-op’s Haunted Pie Social
Yummy pies, music and a short play to raise funds for this gutsy theater company. Saturday, Oct. 16, 8 p.m. Preservation Pub. $15 requested donation.

Jonathan Santlofer
Painter and author will speak and sign his suspense novel Color Blind. Sunday, Oct. 17, 2 p.m. Knoxville Museum of Art. Free.

Geoff Achison
Australia would seem an unlikely breeding ground for American roots music, but Geoff Achison—like fellow Aussie Dave Hole before him—proves that blues recognizes no geographic boundaries. Since 1994, the singer, songwriter, guitarist extraordinaire has released eight critically acclaimed albums under his own name, receiving recognition both here and abroad as one of the world’s most exciting touring bluesmen.
Achison’s music is a soulful melange of blues tastefully tinged with elements of reggae, jazz, and even classic rock. The music is nicely served by his vocals, a honeyed ferment of Joe Cocker and Robin Trower. But it is his guitar playing that demands the lion’s share of your attention, laconic Albert King-style solos that simmer then explode in galvanic flurries of notes. Deftly restrained on record, Achison’s playing reaches a frenetic fever pitch during performances, a virtuosic intensity guaranteed to leave mouths agape. (Mike Gibson)
Geoff Achison and The Souldiggers • Monday, Oct. 18, 9 p.m. • Preservation Pub • Free

Hank Days
With the changing of the leaves comes the season of festivals. Timing is everything, and, with the university football team playing elsewhere, organizers are leaping on the opportunity to lure the Big Orange army to their respective shindigs this weekend. The life and times of Hank Williams seems a better cause than most for merriment, and South Knoxville is paying its respects with the annual Hank Days festival at the old Candoro Marble Company. The inaugural event was held last year in celebration of the 50th anniversary of his death. This year, a handful of bands—The Breakfast Meats, Nancy Brennan Strange and Friends, Luke Brandon and the Bunkhouse Boys—are honoring the country music pioneer by playing his tunes. Homemade beans, greens and cornbread are being served on the festival lawn. The event overlaps Brewers’ Jam in World’s Fair Park, so honor Hank by honky-tonkin’ down South early before drifting downtown for the binge drinking gala of the year. It’d make Hank darn proud. (Clint Casey)
Hank Days • Saturday, Oct. 16, 12 p.m. – 7 p.m. • Candoro Marble Factory (intersection of Maryville Pike and Candora Avenue) • $4 suggested donation.

Mike Watt
It’s a rare pleasure to see a musician of Mike Watt’s achievement play in a venue as intimate as the Pilot Light. Bassist Watt (along with late, legendary guitarist D. Boone) was the linchpin of early SST-label punk pioneers the Minutemen beginning in 1979; and he would later become the driving force behind fIREHOSE, a late-‘80s SST staple that, though not quite as seminal or fiercely brilliant as the Minutemen, was nearly its equal in underground cachet and creative audacity.
In the years since fIREHOSE disbanded, Watt has released wave after wave of adventurous one-offs and solo projects, all of them anchored by his idiosyncratic four-string virtuosity and sharing the common wellspring of his kinetic imagination. His latest collaboration, the Secondmen with organist Pete Mazich and drummer Trebotic, just issued The Secondman’s Middle Stand, a concept album that tells of Watt’s near-death and subsequent recovery in 2000 from an internal abscess. Regardless of the venue or the project, Mike Watt ought not be missed. (MG)
Mike Watt and the Secondmen • Sunday, Oct. 17, 9 p.m. • Pilot Light • $12