In the Shadows

Live Concert Series, Pt. 9

Past Perspectives of The Four Tops

Sometimes even my memory gets lost in old reflections. Or rather, it forgets reflections of my life that when I remember, I can’t believe I ever let slip away. Slip away.

Like seeing The Four Tops in person back in 1982.

Knoxville, for reasons unknown to most of its citizens, became host for the International Exposition, a form of The World’s Fair, in that year. The city erected a gold-domed globe-ular orb in that cusp between the city proper and the University of Tennessee: a valley dip near the river but mainly just a crossing for those liking to dabble in either setting.

What are those damned globe-structures called, anyway?

I loved this breach of town, this arm-folded crease where nothing much seemed to happen, but if you looked closely enough, you might see old stone apartment buildings worth risking a high deposit for. I knew two people who lived in the building I still see from this perspective: a libertarian guy named George who scoffed once at my “Free El Salvador” t-shirt, and a woman named Phoebe, whom my wife won’t let me talk about in her presence, so not here either since on Saturday mornings, she reflects through my reflections.

One street over, amidst what I always see as autumn trees on rainy cobbled lanes, sat a club, The Lord Lindsey, owned by a fellow named Kristopher, who also ran the town’s only Michelin-rated restaurant — The Orangery — and a host of other enviable properties. The Lord Lindsey was a disco of sorts, catering to a mixed crowd of social climbers and college students who wanted to escape the more mainstream bars on the fabled strip. It employed a DJ, but it was this old Victorian house itself that I always see. Once, when my wife and I danced there, a former mayor watched us with something looking like delight. I regretted then that I hadn’t voted for him in his last, lost election (he brought the fair, after all), but he didn’t seem to mind anything right then, admiring, like I was, my dancing gorgeous partner.

If you ambled down this street a couple of more blocks, there was another club that billed itself “Knoxville’s Most Unique Disco”: The Europa Club. In the immortal lyrics from…

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