Maybe you’ve walked by and spotted us rehearsing through the wide-open windows at Turntable Coffee Counter, seen the light spilling onto the shadowed sidewalks outside, or heard the occasional shout of laughter drifting down the mostly deserted downtown streets.
Read MoreThe American Dream is a national narrative that has been retold and repurposed for more than 100 years, often as a way of keeping hope in a difficult world.
Read MoreAs you enter the city limits of Jackson, Tennessee, on either direction of Highway 45 there is a sign that gives passersby a brief insight into a school, a team, and a tradition that has its home just two miles from the South Fork of the Forked Deer River. If you continue driving south from that river, you will cross the bridge just past the fairgrounds, and enter the territory known as Hawk Nation–the domain of South Side High School and the Hawks.
Read MoreMichael Smith has always been a singer. When we met up to share some Shawarma House and talk about his music, Smith—also known by his stage name, Almost Isaac—told me that when he was a kid, it was a near-impossible task to get him to stop singing. “People couldn't shut me up. We had a rule at my kitchen table that if you start singing, you get three warnings. On the third warning, you had to go back into the back hallway of our house and scream at the top of your lungs for 45 seconds. And I was the only person that ever had to do it.”
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