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Jammin’ at Hippie Jack’s

I’ve hooked up with a great guy called Ryan who has been kind enough to let me sleep on his couch for a few days in Nashville. He’s lived all over the south – Texas, Alabama, Florida and Tennessee and has somehow avoided getting a southern twang – quite an effort I reckon!

Tonight he took me to the Tennessee State Museum which, for the last five years, has opened its doors to a show called Jammin’ at Hippie Jack’s which is aired on PBS.

The show features musicians from all over on an amazing stage which would do Punch and Judy proud. Onstage tonight was singer-songwriters Phil Lee and Verlon Thompson.

Phil Lee mixes British invasion influences with country, rock and medicine show styles. Basically he’s nuts! On stage he joked that people call him “Creepy… but in a good way!”

Verlon Thompson was the highlight though. He’s written songs for the likes of Kenny Rogers and Jimmy Buffet, but he is most notable for being the sidekick of legendary songsmith Guy Clark.

He was a great story teller and did a great rendition of The Ballad of Stringbean & Estelle, the story of David “Stringbean” Akeman, the famous Opry singer who was murdered in 1973.

Modest and unassuming, Akeman enjoyed hunting and fishing. Accustomed to the hard times of the Great Depression, Akeman and his wife Estelle lived frugally in a tiny cabin in Ridgetop, Tennessee where their only indulgence was a Cadillac which Estelle used to drive Akeman to his Opry performances in. Akeman didn’t trust banks with his money and so rumours went around that he kept large amounts of cash on his property.

On a Saturday night in late 1973, Akeman and his wife returned home after he’d performed at the Grand Ole Opry. Both were shot dead shortly after by the Brown boys who lay waiting for them hoping to rob Akeman of his paycheque. Their bodies were discovered the following morning by their neighbour, Grandpa Jones.

The Brown boys never got the paycheque which was in Akeman’s top pocket and left only with a chainsaw and some firearms. In 1996, 23 years after the murders, $20,000 in paper money was discovered behind a chimney brick in Stringbean’s home.

Marvin Brown died of natural causes in 2003, at the Brushy Mountain Prison, in Tennessee while John Brown was just again denied parole in August

Check out Verlon Thompson’s rendition:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIWQ40TD9co

I had to wonder when we first entered the museum as to where Ryan was actually taking me when we came down the stairs to see this:

We also visited another bar, the Family Wash, which featured a band with a guy dressed as a martian. Each to their own I guess 🙂