Of the three venomous snakes in VA, copperheads can be found statewide.
Photo courtesy of Edward Wozniak D.V.M., Ph.D.
Virginia summers are notorious for a rise in snake sightings, and while you may be aware of this, your pet sure isn’t. One local vet sees between four to eight snake bites a week during the summer.
“I would say that we see a lot of snake bites, but not necessarily compared to those seen from last year,” says Tripp Stewart, the owner of Greenbrier Emergency Animal Hospital. “That being said, we do see quite a few, anywhere from four to eight in a week and sometimes even six to seven animals in a weekend.”
Charlottesville Veterinary Hospital has seen about two incidents in the past few months and Monticello Animal Hospital has around one incident per month, according to their receptionists.
The bites are not concentrated in any specific area, says Stewart, but the veterinarian is more likely to see animals coming from farms than those strolling on sidewalks in downtown Charlottesville.
“Copperheads are most active at sunset and just after dark, especially after a warm summer rain,” says John Kleopfer, herpetologist for the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. “Fortunately, copperhead bites are usually not considered lethal; however, the effects of a bite can vary between individuals and dogs.”
There is no evidence that copperhead populations increase during this time of year, says Kleopfer, but he notes that rumors about snakes sure do circulate from the public this time of year.
The eastern cottonmouth and timber rattlesnake are the other two venomous species in the state. “Of the three species of venomous snake in Virginia, copperheads are the only species which occurs statewide,” says Kleopfer. —Melissa Angell
Copperheads easily blend into the environment, so it’s important to watch your step in the woods. Photo courtesy of Tim Ross and Wiki Images
Maria DeHart (round sunglasses) marches on towards the Governor’s Mansion.
Photo Courtesy of Dave Parrish Photography
Four “brides” decked out in distressed wedding gowns joined the March on the Mansion demonstration July 23 to protest Governor Terry McAuliffe’s relationship with the fossil fuel industry.
UVA third-year Maria DeHart was one of four women sporting glitzy wedding dresses that were caked in debris, torn and accessorized with chains. They walked in unison with a gangly depiction of a skeleton that was labeled as McAuliffe.
“There were four brides performing a ‘marriage’ with a puppet of McAuliffe,” says DeHart. “My costume represented the coal industry, and the other brides were oil, natural gas and pipelines.”
Over the past two semesters, art students teamed up with student leaders in environmental justice groups at Virginia Commonwealth University to form the Trillium collective, which aims to combine creative arts with environmental and social justice strategies. The collective created the mobile art demonstration.
“The piece that I was a part of was called the ‘Toxic Marriage,’ and it aimed to show the toxic/corrupt relationship between Governor McAuliffe and the fossil fuel industry in Virginia,” DeHart tells C-VILLE.
More than 600 protesters demanded that McAuliffe recognize the welfare of civilian lives over the interests of the Virginian fossil fuel industry.
DeHart attended the protest as a member of both UVA’s Climate Action Society and the statewide college-run group Virginia Student Environmental Coalition.
“It was really, really hot in that dress but it was so worth it,” she says. “Our outfits attracted so much attention, and the image of us walking in formation was very powerful.”
DeHart is no stranger to environmental demonstrations—one of which led to her arrest. But she says her arrest contributed to her fervor, and actually sparked her interest in attending the protest.
DeHart, who says she didn’t receive any animosity from counter-protesters, hopes the governor will have a change of heart.
“The governor did not respond to our message to him, but he definitely heard us and knows who we are,” she says. —Melissa Angell
Amy Laufer takes a selfie in front of the Virginia delegation.
Photo Amy Laufer
Ever wonder how delegates at the conventions all seem to spontaneously raise their “Make America First Again” or “Change Maker” signs at the same time?
Well, Charlottesville School Board Chair Amy Laufer is attending the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia and she clues us in: They get texts telling them what to chant and when to hoist signs—and when not to, like during Michelle Obama’s speech July 25, when the Virginia delegation was in danger of blocking the teleprompter, according to a dispatch from Laufer.
“As soon as the totals were done and Bernie conceded, the H signs were distributed and we all chanted Hillary, Hillary!” Laufer writes.
The first day was tough, she reports: “The Hillary people are so excited for this historic moment but it is tempered by the tough looks and hard voices that are yelling about Bernie.” Obama’s speech was a turning point, says Laufer, “when she was talking about her daughters and what an example this will mean for generations. ”
She started July 26—Clinton nomination day—with a Women’s Caucus breakfast with former secretary of state Madeline Albright, interim DNC chair Donna Brazile and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. “Each had such a different voice and style: Albright had such a command of Hillary’s history, Brazile shouted out the names of women that have come before [such as] Rosa Parks, Pelosi talked about policies on the Hill,” says Laufer.
Despite her bus being an hour late getting her to the convention hall, Laufer, a Clinton delegate, made it in time to cast her vote. And after Clinton was officially the nominee, all the women of the House of Representatives, led by Pelosi, came onstage. Laufer notes that there are no congresswomen from Virginia, although former Albemarle Board of Supervisors chair Jane Dittmar is running for the 5th District.
The lows from the day, says Laufer, were seeing a group of Sanders supporters who had walked out of the convention surrounded by heavily armed police. And some of his supporters were still feeling the Bern on the subway, when “rude things” and “expletives were shouted at me,” she says.
“In reflection, the truth is they are a very small number,” she says. “When I was on the bus to the convention, I sat with several Bernie people and actually his brother Larry was in the seat in front of me, and he was telling us about coming out to vote for his brother and it was all very friendly.”
Says Laufer, “In the end, history was made,” and she says she is grateful for the “amazing opportunity to be on the front lines.”
Other Charlottesvillians are at the convention, and Sanders supporter Nic McCarthy has posted a video on Facebook of the “Bernie or bust” protest outside the Wells Fargo Center. “They’re not making it easy for protesters to be heard,” he says.
“It puts us Bernie delegates in a really, really hard place,” says McCarthy, who says he will support the nominee.
Emily Pelton is one of the founding members of the Virginia Winemaker’s Research Exchange, a group making an impact on the future of wine. Photo: Eric Kelley
The idea for a research exchange sparked when a few local winemakers gathered to share their bottles and ideas. For the first couple of years, the group included Kirsty Harmon (Blenheim), Emily Pelton (Veritas), Matthieu Finot (King Family), Ben Jordan (Early Mountain), Scott Dwyer (Pollak), Jake Busching (Michael Shaps), Michael Heny (Horton) and Stephen Barnard (Keswick). They’d bring a unique wine experiment for the group to try, and these friendly exchanges helped hone each winemaker’s approach.
Without a control bottle, it was difficult to tell if the experiment created the difference in taste, or if it was something else giving the wine its flavor—like a different barrel or the growing conditions that year. “It’s important to have a formal process,” says Dwyer. “Before, when we were doing it informally, there wasn’t a control process.” So, each of them carried out a specific trial that harvest, and came back with a control bottle to taste side-by-side with the experiment bottle. Thus the Winemaker’s Research Exchange was born.
“Now, we each test a single variable,” says Dwyer. They bring a control bottle and an experiment bottle, with the only difference being their chosen variable.
What are they looking for? Each winery is interested in different research, and the beauty of this exchange is that the wineries can focus on a project important to them.
Some have chosen to test fermentation vessels. How will the same grapes taste when they are fermented in, say, concrete containers versus steel containers?
Some wineries are looking for ways to use less sulfur without sacrificing the wine’s stability. If grapes are not pressed immediately after being harvested, they’ll be prone to spoilage, and this is a key moment when most winemakers use sulfur to preserve their fruit.
Some of the trials test other natural antioxidants and preservation methods. If a different preservation method yields an equally delicious or better wine with lower sulfur levels and fewer inputs, then all winemakers in the state benefit from that research and can choose to use that method if they wish.
Other wineries have chosen to test ways to improve the color of wine. It’s long been a trick in the northern Rhône region of France to add a small percentage of white grapes to a red wine fermentation. This adds some aromatics and helps stabilize the color. Can Virginia wineries use grape co-fermentations to improve color?
Usually, a winery will have the resources to perform one or two experiments each harvest. With the research exchange, winemakers benefit from the results of dozens of experiments each harvest—far expanding the experimental scope of what one winery can accomplish each year.
You can find published academic studies on some of these topics, but the exchange takes it one step further and brings these trials to life with tastings. Sure, a winemaker can read a scientist’s description of how wine will be different if fermented in concrete versus steel, but tasting this difference can really drive home the concept and influence a winery to change its status quo.
“At the end of the day, the tasting is really emphasized,” says Pelton. “We want to make sure that you are actually tasting the variable that you are testing.”
Pelton has been delighted with the success of the project. “The coolest part was how many people showed up to our tastings,” she says. The wines are tasted and evaluated blind. “It’s hard to pour your wine blind in front of your peers,” say Pelton. “And yet, we kept having large turnouts.”
The blind tasting helps keep the topics in focus. “We didn’t want it to turn into a competition,” says Dwyer. “We wanted it to be an open exchange of research.”
Aside from the obvious benefit of personal palate development, the organized tastings give winemakers valuable feedback. “If 75 percent of the tasters preferred the trial over the control, that means something,” Dwyer says.
Setting up organized trials took time and organization, and in 2014 the group received a grant from the Monticello Wine Trail and founded the Winemaker’s Research Exchange. The power of this idea gained so much momentum that in 2015 the Virginia Wine Board funded the group. “It got more rigorous,” Dwyer says.
“In year two, we tightened up our consistency by ensuring that all analysis was done at the same laboratory,” says Pelton.
The wine industry around the state took note. “The Virginia Wine Board was excited to see the initial research and encouraged a statewide project,” Pelton says. “They are investing in quality wine and they pushed us to grow.” This year the group expanded to include all of Virginia, and formalized its name as the Virginia Winemaker’s Research Exchange. The VWRE split the state into five regions, each with its own regional director.
This all points to good things for Virginia wine-lovers. Rarely in the wine world do you find such a systematic focus on quality improvement. The VWRE is also committed to transparency: Its results are available on its website, winemakersresearch exchange.com.
Midway into the group’s third formal year, it’s attracting attention from several other states—mostly from winemakers curious about their specific trials and winemaking organizations interested in the overall model. This idea, hatched by a few innovative Monticello winemakers, is not only benefitting Virginia wine, but also has the potential to benefit the United States’ entire wine industry.
Erin Scala is the sommelier at Fleurie and Petit Pois. She holds the Diploma of Wines & Spirits, is a Certified Sake Specialist and writes about beverages on her blog, thinking-drinking.com
Critically acclaimed French crime drama Dheepan opens in the U.S. after being awarded the Palme d’Or in 2015. Photo: IFC
Jacques Audiard’s Dheepan comes stateside after claiming the 2015 Palme d’Or, a prize well-earned for this masterful, seemingly effortless balancing act of ripped-from-the-headlines narrative with slow-burn psychodrama. Though stylistically similar to politically minded social realists, Audiard never betrays individuality in the name of scoring ideological points. The film neither ignores nor tempers the politics inherent in its tale of refugees in France, having survived their own civil war only to be caught in the middle of gang violence in what was supposed to be their new life.
Dheepan is the story of three strangers in a Sri Lankan Tamil refugee camp who assume the identity of a deceased family—husband, wife and daughter—and use their passports to secure passage to Europe. The “wife,” Yalini (played by Kalieaswari Srinivasan) expects to reach England to reunite with her family, yet has no choice but to go to France with her new “husband,” Sivadhasan (played by Antonythasan Jesuthasan), who assumes the name of the deceased Dheepan, and their assumed daughter, the orphaned Illayaal (Claudine Vinasithamby).
The three have differing levels of success pretending to be a new person. Dheepan begins work as a caretaker for a housing development that is plagued by criminal activity and gang violence. There are hints at his previous military activity with the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka, a part of life he is ready to leave behind, yet as long as his new circumstances remain unstable both domestically and financially in a violent neighborhood, his past cannot help but boil over. Yalini is the least prepared to leave her identity; she sees a future that does not involve her fake family and she is always ready to remind them that they have no blood relation. Nine-year-old orphan Illayaal, meanwhile, is at the mercy of both her new parents and her new country. She is initially afraid of her new school and is shunned by the other girls, but eventually wants to fit in and is forced to ask the emotionally distant Yalini for a kiss like the other children get from their mothers.
Some have viewed Dheepan’s action- packed resolution as inappropriately over the top, counteracting the slow burn of the film’s character study. It is true that the pace quickens as Dheepan and Yalini slowly realize they cannot stay out of the way in their new home. But Audiard has a plan here: Dheepan initially insists that the shootouts are different than the civil war in Sri Lanka. Yalini cannot make that distinction, and, over time, neither can Dheepan. Audiard appears to suggest that problems of inequality and conflict are fundamentally human, even if their manifestation differs from nation to nation. Indeed, the artificial, performative life in the development is not limited to the refugees—one gang member confides in Dheepan that virtually all of the hired muscle comes from elsewhere, making them transplants filling a predetermined role.
Though named after its leading man, Dheepan is every bit an ensemble film that is concerned with everyone’s emotional and psychological journey. Some may find the finale of Dheepan’s one-man rebellion sensationalistic, but whatever your view, it is actually a much more admirable decision by Audiard to allow his subjects to be sympathetic on their own terms without resorting to obvious depictions of the dispossessed as inherently helpless.
Dheepan R, 115 minutes
Violet Crown Cinema
Playing this week
Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
The Shops at Stonefield, 244-3213
Central Intelligence
Finding Dory
Ghostbusters
Hillary’s America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party
A proposed citywide culling could help manage the deer population. File photo
Calling the potential deer culling in Charlottesville a “Trumpian solution to a practically nonexistent problem,” one city resident says policymakers should consider non-lethal alternatives before condoning a city-sponsored killing.
“We all live in Charlottesville because we appreciate the natural world and what it adds to our human life,” Holly Court resident Laura Jones wrote in a letter to City Council. “Deer are part of that world.”
She received a response from Kristin Szakos, who wrote that she has followed the issue for six years, both as a city councilor and a Locust Grove resident, and that she understands Jones’ “love of deer in [her] neighborhood.”
“I’m not a deer-lover,” says Jones, who adds that she has spoken up for those who do not wish to see wildlife slaughtered in their backyards. “Using a bowhunter to kill deer within the city limits is a dangerous idea and a medieval solution to a 21st-century problem.”
The only city ordinance that refers to bows and arrows says, “No person shall discharge arrows, nails or bullets from a bow or crossbow in or into any street or other public place…This section shall not be constructed to prohibit the use of bows and arrows on authorized archery ranges.” But City Attorney Craig Brown points out that a “public place” is not defined in the code, so whether hunting is allowed has been debated.
Charlottesville does not have ordinances regulating hunting, Brown says, “except for a prohibition on hunting birds and wild fowl,” and while it does have the power to adopt an ordinance on bowhunting within city limits, it has not done so.
Deer may be killed with a permit issued by the Department of Game & Inland Fisheries, however. Matt Knox, a deer project coordinator with the department, says 545 kill permits have been issued specifically for deer in Albemarle County since 2012, with 86 of those issued this year. Most of the addresses on the permits, though, are in Kewsick or North Garden, he says.
In Szakos’ e-mail response to Jones, the councilor said she first, “as an animal-lover,” was optimistic about finding a non-lethal way to control the deer population, but research has “led [her] to regard that path as unfeasible, expensive and ultimately ineffective.” Wrote Szakos, “I now believe that the only way to effectively reduce the population and address these issues is through hiring professional bowhunters to selectively kill deer.”
Their e-mail exchange happened just before the July 18 meeting in which David Kocka, a representative from the Virginia DGIF, presented the state’s DGIF report and said hunting is the most effective means of controlling the deer population.
The report did not have any Charlottesville-related deer population data, though Kocka did say the state’s deer population is stable and not increasing. In a submitted report to council members, but not in the presentation given to them, seven out of nine population-management options did not include human hunting or sharpshooting.
The report further informed Szakos’ opinion, she says, adding she learned cities that have hired sharpshooters to kill the deer have spent upward of $100,000 and have not been able to get the numbers down significantly. Opening the regional hunting season in the city may be the best alternative, she says.
“It wasn’t exactly what I was ready for,” she adds. “I’m still struggling with the idea of it.”
Though it doesn’t initially seem like it, Szakos says allowing locals to bowhunt deer within city limits could be more humane than current circumstances.
“We are culling them now with cars,” she says, adding that she lives on the bypass and has heard them get hit in the past. “I’ve discovered that deer can scream. It’s horrible to listen to them die.”
So far this year, 60 reports of dead deer in a right of way have been filed in Charlottesville, whereas only 47 were filed in 2015 and 11 in 2014, according to data from the Department of Public Works.
Numbers show that deer running into highways are a persistent problem, but relying on culling with cars is not enough, says Szakos. “We need to come up with something better than that. The status quo is not an option at this point.”
The DGIF report, she says, reminded her that humans are the natural predator to deer.
“[Hunting] reinforces to the deer that they are prey animals, which our deer have forgotten because there is nothing preying on them,” Szakos says. “By having predators in the ecosystem, it causes deer to act like prey animals and not be strutting down the sidewalk and intimidating pets,” which are both issues locals have complained about to council.
Jones is “very surprised,” she says, that council “swallowed [Kocka’s] data, hook, line and sinker,” without questioning the lack of city-related statistics or pressing the DGIF for non-lethal alternatives, but a vote was not taken and Szakos says they will hold a public hearing in the future.
Jones says Kocka touted “killing for convenience” because the report showed that Charlottesville does not need to reduce the deer population for biological reasons, but because locals are irritated with the animals for trivial things, such as eating their plants.
“It frightened me to live in a place where people value landscape more than life,” Jones says.
Kocka says it is nearly impossible to measure deer in any city or town because “populations are not static, to begin with.” He says controlling numbers of deer is based on a town’s “cultural carrying capacity,” or the idea that everyone has a certain tolerance for wildlife.
“That’s the crux of the issue,” he says. “When you start whacking them with your cars and they’re eating shrubbery around your house, that’s when a lot of people’s tolerance is exceeded.”
Celebrate diverse culture at the African American Cultural Arts Festival, help find homes for dogs at the BarkAID 5k and enjoy beer and bites at Ivy Provisions' Barn & Brew this week. Photo: File photo
Family
Chihamba’s 27th Annual African American Cultural Arts Festival
This year’s event features West African cuisine, a hair show, vendors, entertainment and more.
Saturday 7/30. Free, 10:30am-7:30pm. Booker T. Washington Park, Preston Avenue and 10th Street NW. chihambacharlot tesville@gmail.com.
Nonprofit
BarkAID 5K and 50 States Tour
Paws for Pits partners with internationally known hair stylist Patrick Lomantini for a 5K race and event that includes vendors, food trucks and kids activities. Proceeds benefit the local nonprofit that specializes in the rescue of “bully breeds.”
This ninth annual event held in conjunction with the African American Cultural Arts Festival seeks to educate and inform the public and features health screenings.
Saturday 7/30. Free, 10:30am-7:30pm. Booker T. Washington Park, Preston Avenue and 10th Street NW. chihambacharlot tesville@gmail.com.
Food & Drink
Barn & Brew
Ivy Provisions hosts Richmond’s Hardywood and The Rock Barn for a celebration of brews and pork. Tastings of beer and grilled cuts with full pours and dinner specials available for purchase.
Frequencies VIII featuring Ships in the Night (above), Jaguardini and Bristol claims The Ante Room on Thursday. Photo: Tristan Williams
Ships in the Night is the project of Alethea Leventhal, an experimental musician who pilots her music into uncharted dark waters. Her gauzy, earnest sonic constructions transcend the dismissive label of goth and place her at the intersection of decades-old new wave and the future of music. A recent show in Germany caused the webzine IndieBerlin to state: “Ships in the Night doesn’t only wear her heart on her sleeve…she inflates it to near bursting and waves it from a flagpole.”
Thursday 7/28. $7, 8pm. The Ante Room, 219 Water St. W. 284-8561.
Sally Rose rocks harder with Swagwüf at The Ante Room on Friday. Photo: Rich Tarbell
Sally Rose has all the charisma of a rock ‘n’ roll star paired with the grit and charm of an old-fashioned Southern girl. A woman of various musical incarnations, she brings attitude and solid chops to the bass in her rambunctious swamp-rock outfit, Swagwüf. The group returns after a summer tour to work on a full-length album.
Friday 7/29. $8, 8pm. The Ante Room, 219 Water St. W. 284-8561.
Jeyon Falsini wades through a crowd in front of his club, the Ante Room (at the time, the Main Street Annex), on the night of a big hip-hop show—Project Pat. He starts pointing out the players on the scene.
Seems like just about everyone is a party promoter.
There’s David Wayne, owner/operator of SB Entertainment and the official host of the night’s event. He’s polished—a chef by day, scenester by night—and as active in Richmond as he is in Charlottesville.
Then there’s Robert Douglas, aka Blacko, aka Blacko da Rappa. Douglas has the outsized presence of Blonko—although maybe not as loud or edgy—and the regional ambitions of Wayne. He runs Wild Boyz Entertainment. He’s also the agency’s chief talent.
Douglas isn’t “da Rappa” all that often these days, he says. His performances are mostly as a deejay or vocalist for Double Faces Gogo Band. Performing isn’t even necessarily his focus anymore. He’s finishing up a business management degree at PVCC, and he’s looking to push Wild Boyz to ever greater heights.
Blacko, along with that throng of promoters, emcees, singers, deejays, videographers and producers milling around outside the Ante Room, is also looking to grow the scene for African-American music in Charlottesville and Central Virginia. He wants to push urban music—not just hip-hop—in an area where it’s scarcely given media attention, an area where it operates underneath the notice of the workaday crowds going about their business.
“It’s a few people that appreciate it,” Douglas says. “I have a following because of my background, because of the rap background and nightlife and doing the promotions. I have a good group of people in support, that’s what’s kind of keeping it going. We’re keeping it going.”
Blacko vs. Douglas
Why are there so many promoters on the C’ville hip-hop and R&B scene? Basically, you have to be a promoter to make it as a performer, according to Falsini.
The scene isn’t all that large, so if you’re a deejay or an emcee and you want to fill the Ante Room or the M&M Lounge for a hip-hop dance party, you have to promise the venue a full house. You have to share the risk.
“Robert and I got to a point where we liked working together, so we started hosting parties,” Falsini says. “He would get a deejay, put it all together, and those parties were successful.”
Photo: Jackson Smith
From there, Douglas launched Wild Boyz, a one-stop shop for nightclub parties. He still throws down at the Annex, but he’s also taken his act—both the parties and Double Faces Gogo Band, which he manages—to other venues like the M&M Lounge and Restaurant on Preston Avenue and the recently closed Fusion’s Restaurant and Lounge in Culpeper. Douglas says his goal is to keep pushing beyond C’ville’s borders.
“I’m trying to get us further and further up north, and to Richmond,” he says. “Wherever I deejay, I try to spread the word about the band, and I deejay every weekend.”
Falsini says Douglas sets himself apart from the sea of local promoters by working the scene like a job. He hosts parties on a regular basis, and he adds value in multiple ways. On top of promoting shows and booking the entertainment, he offers security, professional photography and videography and a photo booth for some events.
“Me and Jeyon, we go back,” Douglas says. “He did a lot of what helped me get started. I called him one day; he had an empty building. I said, ‘Can I throw a party?’ I never really tried it, but I said, ‘I got a band, you got a building,’ and it’s been going ever since. Look what he got, and look what we got.”
Douglas still considers the Ante Room home. Double Faces was the headliner at the grand reopening on February 27, when the venue rebranded from the Main Street Annex. And he says he’ll drop whatever he’s doing to be there when Falsini asks him to deejay an event. That’s saying something—when he’s not promoting parties, Douglas works in facilities management for UVA, and he expects to finish his business degree next year.
While he’s not sure where the degree will take him in terms of his next career move, he’s certain it can only help his efforts with Wild Boyz, which he says has taken on a number of new acts in the past several years and worked with other players in the promotions game.
But there’s more than a hint of competition on the scene. Streetz Blonko says his outfit, 700 Block Entertainment, has been more successful at pushing beyond Charlottesville than Wild Boyz.
“The difference is we do party promotions everywhere,” he says. “I’m from Charlottesville, but I’m trying to get major, go to New York, North Carolina, everywhere.”
Hip-hop in the ’ville
Nowhere in C’ville’s urban music scene is competition more alive and well than among local rappers. Douglas says that on top of losing some of his passion for rhyming, he gets turned off by the sheer number of people who think they can make it big as an emcee without putting in the work.
And those numbers are indeed large, according to Streetz.
“There’s a lot, yo,” he says. “I’ve been rapping since I was 9 years old. I went to prison for like nine years. When I came home in 2012, there were a handful of rappers. Now every other week I see another rapper, dozens more rappers.”
Streetz, whose biggest break was opening for Waka Flocka Flame in D.C. on September 14, 2013, says there’s definitely talent in town. The problem is the good emcees haven’t gotten the attention they deserve. That, plus the fact that the crowds are often small, drives some of them to larger markets.
Plus, there’s that whole competition thing.
“In the black community, there is a lot of jealousy,” he says. “Nobody wants to see the next person make it. Even if you hot, they aren’t going to share your shit on Facebook. It’s a hatred thing; it’s a jealousy thing. It hurts me real bad.”
Damani Harrison, formerly of hip-hop group The Beetnix and recently departed artistic and education director at the Music Resource Center, sees the opposite. He sees a unified hip-hop scene. He reckons if he got all the rappers in town together who support each other, it would shock most locals.
“I don’t think there is media coverage about it,” he says. “But I want to show the community how many active rappers there are in the area, the amount of unity and love there is among them.”
Harrison says it would be difficult to ballpark the number of hip-hop acts in and around Charlottesville, but in his decade and a half at the MRC he says the number of local rappers he saw “was tremendous.”
“There is this massive hip-hop scene, and anyone that is in it knows about it through social media,” he says. “Every single day, I am seeing a high-quality video of someone from Charlottesville. I can’t keep up with the amount of people doing quality work. I am talking about legit, go to the studio, cameras and lighting videos.”
Harrison points to MRC alums C-Ryan and William “Chaos Chytist” Rhodes as examples of locals making nationally recognized hip-hop. “They just moved to Atlanta,” he says. “They make a lot of money now.”
Douglas himself has plenty of songs and videos floating around on the Internet, and he has a studio where he still records and produces for other hip-hop artists. But he says the main thing that has pushed him beyond hip-hop to music like go-go is the fact rap isn’t what it used to be.
“I think it’s because everybody just follows a trend,” he says. “Hip-hop isn’t original anymore. Everybody used to put their heart into it. …We used to stand in a circle and battle, and people used to show up to the showcases. The rappers don’t have that support no more.”
Ready to go-go
Jeyon Falsini, founder of the Main Street Annex—now the Ante Room—where Blacko deejays and where Double Faces Gogo Band performs, says to make it in the local hip-hop and R&B scene you have to be a promoter and rapper. Photo: Eze Amos
Charlottesville is relatively unique in having a go-go scene. The genre, which places heavy, layered percussion underneath R&B, hip-hop and other musical forms, was born in Washington, D.C., in the 1960s under the direction of the likes of Chuck Brown, the Young Senators and Black Heat. It’s never really taken off in other areas of the country. Arguably the biggest national hit a go-go band ever had was DJ Kool’s “Let Me Clear My Throat.”
Donnell Floyd, founder of D.C.-based Familiar Faces, is one of the performers currently carrying the go-go torch. He says there are three or four bands in the district, like Backyard and Rare Essence in addition to Familiar Faces, that can bring 300 to 400 people out to a show three times a week.
The topflight go-go bands play about 50 percent originals in addition to the covers, according to Floyd. Other bands, Double Faces included, stick to the crowd-pleasing covers. Floyd says go-go bands often get a bad rap because they rely so heavily on covers, but that’s the way it’s been back to the early Chuck Brown days.
Indeed, when Blacko talks about Double Faces’ music, there’s an edge of defensiveness.
“We cover everything—a lot of people don’t know that,” he says. “It’s really a lot bigger than what people think is just a go-go band. We’re go-go, but we’re bigger than that.”
Floyd, on the other hand, says there’s nothing wrong with being “just a go-go band.”
“I say the opposite. Go-go is like steroids for any music,” he says. “What makes go-go is what you put underneath, the percussion you put underneath the foundation. Chuck Brown put go-go underneath jazz and blues. Backyard puts it underneath rap and hip-hop, Rare Essence is under R&B. I wouldn’t say we are ‘not just a go-go band.’ We absolutely are. I sent my kids to college on go-go.”
For what it’s worth, Double Faces has had its share of success as well. An offshoot of the now defunct The X Band, the band’s been shifting between eight and 10 members for the last three and a half years. Dean “Phace” Smith is the frontman and constant, and Blacko’s been onboard as vocalist, deejay and manager since the beginning, transitioning from his role as keyboard player in The X Band. Some of Double Faces’ musicians come from gospel backgrounds, where Harrison says you often find the best players in town.
Blacko says he can book Double Faces for two or three nights a week during the summer, but it’s sporadic. Sometimes one gig a week is all he can ask for. The high point of the Double Faces run was probably playing the Tom Tom Founders Festival two years ago. But Blacko has hope the band can keep moving up.
“A lot of people that have checked us out are pleased, but a lot of clubs and venues haven’t gave us the shot yet,” he says. “A lot of people haven’t gave us that voice and let us be heard.”
The voice you will hear if you get the pleasure of seeing Double Faces is loud, party-driven and highly sexual. Indeed, a sub-genre that’s often tied to the likes of Floyd’s Familiar Faces is “Grown & Sexy” go-go, and Double Faces falls pretty firmly in that camp.
Jeyon Falsini says Double Faces is “really amazing” at taking contemporary songs and filtering them through its percussion section, which includes a drum kit, cymbals, cowbells and wood blocks.
“It’s percussion on top of percussion,” Falsini says. “I like to call it ‘black jam-band music.’ They jam out and do solos. It’s a great party sound, and I can always count on Double Faces bringing out a crowd. Always.”
Sometimes there are horns in go-go, but not in Double Faces. Guitars aren’t featured; keyboards provide much of the instrumentation.
In addition to the Ante Room, Falsini says go-go bands are finding a place at Rapture and the M&M Lounge. While the hip-hop scene in Charlottesville has had trouble maintaining consistent venues due to occasional outbreaks of violence, Falsini says the go-go crowds are more mature and easygoing—everyone’s just there to enjoy the music and dance.
Harrison says the go-go scene has value for black music fans in general.
“I see the stuff [Blacko] promotes, and I love what he’s doing out there; that is, actively attempting to keep live music in the urban community alive,” he says.
The next stage
DJ Blacko (aka Robert Douglas) performed July 8 at Fusion’s Restaurant and Lounge in Culpeper with The Double Faces Gogo Band. Photo: Ron Paris
When he started Wild Boyz Entertainment, Douglas says all he had “was a laptop and a dream.”
“Now I have a couple thousand followers,” he says. “When I first started, I had a couple hundred. I am running close to 20 grand a year off of entertainment, and I put myself through college.”
Which side of the business will flourish—hip-hop, R&B, deejaying or go-go—is anybody’s guess, but go-go seems to have as good a chance as any. Floyd figures the genre is still strong around D.C. Is it where it was at its height two decades ago? No. But in the last five years, he says, it’s done well.
As for Charlottesville’s scene, Douglas is likewise optimistic. He says Double Faces is taking more and more phone calls from people outside of Charlottesville, and more local doors are opening. “What the business degree has taught me is how to talk to the people we haven’t opened doors with,” he says.
But it takes hard work, Douglas continues. You have to work it like a job. You can’t run up a bar tab that’s bigger than your paycheck. And you can’t allow yourself to get paid in “beer and wingdings.”
Perhaps most importantly, you have to remember the crowds don’t just show up. You have to get out there and spread the word. You have to promote.
“I don’t want to speak ill, but everybody comes up and automatically wants to be in competition,” Douglas says. “It took years to get where we are, and we’re still not accepted everywhere around here. No one’s knocking down our doors. I booked these shows myself.”
GAGA for go-go
Go-go is a musical genre that places heavy, layered percussion underneath R&B, hip-hop and other musical forms.
Originated in Washington, D.C., in the 1960s
Dance music that emphasizes audience call-and-response
Go-go pioneers include Chuck Brown, the Young Senators and Black Heat
In the mid-1960s, “go-go” was the word for a music club in the D.C. African-American community
BLACKO’S PLAYLIST
DJ Khaled and Jay Z, “I Got the Keys”
Blacko’s take: “Jay Z’s latest track has been on repeat. It’s pretty dope.”
Fat Joe and Remy Ma, “All the Way Up”
Blacko’s take: “I like all kinds of music, though. My playlist consists of stuff from Lil Wayne to Hall & Oates.”
Backyard Band, Street Antidote
Blacko: “My Backyard repeat is the whole new Antidote CD. I listen to the whole CD…no favorites.”
Northeast Groovers, Any Track
Blacko’s take: “I just like when NEG let they beats ride and bring in the crank and 808s.”
Suttle Thoughts, “Love Is Stronger Than Pride”
Blacko’s take: “I listen to my man Steve Roy and Suttle Thoughts almost every day. This is a real laid-back joint. They’re my highway band.”
Double Faces Gogo Band, “We Do It”
Blacko’s take: “I wrote that one myself.”
You’ve heard it before
Photo: File photo
You may be more familiar with go-go style than you think. Here are some artists who have sampled Chuck Brown and the Soul Searchers’ percussion-heavy tracks.
Nelly’s “Hot in Herre” sampled “Bustin’ Loose”
Wreckx-N-Effect’s “I Need Money” sampled “We Need Some Money”
Run DMC’s “Run’s House” and Duran Duran’s “Come Undone” both nod to “Ashley’s Roachclip”
