“I guess they call them ‘biker instrumentals’ because when I hit one of those really nasty low notes, it sounds just like a Harley starting up,” surf-rock pioneer Davie Allan explains, when asked about the overdriven guitar pyrotechnics for which he’s famous. Make that not famous, actually. Dick Dale is well-known as a surf-guitar king. […]
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Buncombe County Commission
In the horse-and-buggy era, Asheville was a famous destination for urban tuberculosis sufferers who hoped to heal their soot-scarred lungs in pure mountain air. But today, in the automobile age, the area is on the verge of being designated a “dirty-air community” by the federal government. Ironically, the very same growth in traffic congestion that […]
Notepad
Forewarned is forearmed Somewhere between the hysteria and the apathy surrounding the Y2K bug, the reality of the situation waits to be addressed. And while many of us are starting to find some light at the end of the millennial tunnel, others — including certain local and national governmental offices — are still lost in […]
Letters to the editor
Read Greenspan’s lips When he left his post recently, Chairman of the Federal Reserve Alan Greenspan was heartily praised by Republicans and Democrats alike for his policies, the ones that have helped give us such a healthy economy. In May, he appeared before the House Ways and Means Committee to give them a status report […]
New winds aloft
WNC Regional Air Pollution Control Agency Director Jim Cody usurped the power of his board of directors last month, just days after he informed them of his intention to resign, effective Sept. 1, from the troubled agency. On June 17, when agency staff discovered a mobile asphalt plant operating in Buncombe County without a permit, […]
Notepad
Smoggy mountain breakdown The smog in North Carolina is pretty bad, says an environmental and consumer watchdog group — and it’s getting worse. The state ranks third in the nation for increased smog pollution, with electric-power generation from coal-burning plants up 28 percent since 1992, according to North Carolina Public Interest Research Group’s David Ponder. […]
Letters to the editor
Cut the ridicule and discuss the forest There has been a rash of letters [and commentaries], flying between members of the local timber industry and conservation leaders [Xpress, June 16, June 30, July 7, July 14]. Steve Henson and Tom Thrash have written in, stating that the conservation community is promoting an extreme agenda for […]
Notepad
Take a walk on the wild side Not many people know the history and design of the Botanical Gardens at Asheville as well as local writer/gardener extraordinaire Peter Loewer. As the author of several gardening books, including the popular The Wild Gardener (Stackpole, 1991), Loewer will lead a walking tour of the gardens on Sunday, […]
Letters to the editor
Don’t blame Nature The drought of 1998 and high temperatures this spring have become the official explanation for our recent shortages of clean water and breathable air. Because Nature remains largely beyond human control, it has become a handy scapegoat for public officials (and polluters) who wish to divert attention from their own acts and […]
Buncombe County Commission
“Government is an extension of God,” asserted the Rev. Jimmy Dykes of the North Asheville Baptist Church, at the beginning of the Buncombe County commissioners’ July 6 meeting. All heads were bowed as Dykes prayed, “Our Father … You are Lord over Buncombe County.” Local clergy are customarily invited to give the invocation before each […]
Notepad
The more things change … Back in 1971, North Carolina’s public-university system faced a record surge in enrollments as the Baby Boom generation came of age, leading state legislators to add 10 campuses to the existing six-school system. Now, those Boomers’ kids are starting to hit college age, and they’re expected to flood the state’s […]
Letters to the editor
Viewing pleasure In response to the anti-Honda-Hoot letter: Personally, all the tourists that come here each summer bother me. Lines in many shops are longer, and the traffic problems are worse downtown. That said, I find that many of the motorcyclists are fun to watch and talk to. Any city in America with anything going […]
Turning the world inside out
As much as any painting of its time, sculptor John Chamberlain’s “Jim 1962” — forged from the twisted planes and crumpled contours of fenders, bumpers and other wrecked-car parts that gleam crookedly in eerily cheerful, carnivalesque colors — reflects the abstract expressionist movement that rose to the forefront of the American art world around midcentury, […]
Handmade in Appalachia
Unless you’ve just flown in from Oz, you know that the Southern Appalachians boast a long line of talented craftspeople who create beautiful things (like brooms, turned Windsor chairs, jewelry, baskets, woodcarvings), and that the center of this arts-and-crafts community is (are you ready?) Asheville. For the past 52 years, in July and October, the […]
Thick with contradictions
On a bike, a kid can pedal from one world to another just by crossing the street. No signs demarcate one neighborhood from the next, but that’s OK: A child knows where the borders are, just as well as if a huge stripe were painted there. It’s a child — 10-year-old Jeru Lamb — who […]
Letters to the editor
Aah, for an all-terrain airboat There are many of us who, unlike Mr. Sternberg, have frequented the banks and waters of the French Broad River over the years, to fish and paddle and picnic with family and friends — and, in some cases, to live and raise children nearby. Many of us purchase annual fishing […]
Buncombe County Commission
Citizens opposed to zoning are persistent, to say the least. About a dozen Fairview residents proclaimed their “No Zoning” stand by holding up bright-red placards at the Buncombe County commissioners’ June 22 meeting, when Chairman Tom Sobol called the meeting to order. Commissioner Bill Stanley presented a pProclamation honoring the Special Olympics South Africa Delegation […]
Letters to the editor
This garden is a shelter from the storm Recently, Jeff Ashton, who writes “The Practical Gardener” for the Mountain Xpress, coordinated a project that brought a lot of delight to Helpmate’s shelter. The Helpmate shelter is a safe place for women and their children to go as they flee their violent homes. The staff of […]
The heart is a lonely hunter
A 7-year-old girl named Morag is out hunting with her great-grandmother in the Canadian woods. “Crack!” goes the rifle. Down thuds a bird. Holding the now-dead bird upside down, droplets of blood spotting her boots, the great-grandmother, Eileen, comes and stands in front of Morag. “You needn’t look so melancholy,” she says. “This is nature.” […]
An interview with Jean McNeil
Born in Canada, author Jean McNeil now lives in London. While Hunting Down Home is her first novel, she’s also authored Rough Guides to Costa Rica and Latin America, as well as serving a stint as a BBC correspondent in Rio de Janeiro. Mountain Xpress interviewed McNeil by e-mail about her travels, her experiences with […]
Painless philosophy
If you could get a good look at the last stage of life, would it help you recognize life’s very purpose? Just exactly what understanding would that kind of vision get you? Those are the questions considered near the end of A Map to the End of Time (W.W. Norton Publishers, 1999) by the author, […]