Normally, I'm not stuck on Birmingham stuff for the blog, but I've been pondering it quite a bit lately. I guess it could be part of a subconscious effort to reconcile myself with living here...or maybe have the opposite effect.
I've been talking a lot lately to people about downtown real estate, and there seems to be a common misconception that a building downtown, say, on 20th street, costs a normal amount of money. Well, that's just not true. For whatever reason, the beautiful, tree-lined artery of downtown Birmingham plays host to some really cheap buildings. Some friends with a new business downtown told me their building was on the market for $150,000. That's a three-story building, on 20th street. In need of a new roof, sure, but I think that would be pretty affordable considering the purchase price.
What's more, part of the main drag is in a mistical, magical no-man's land where zoning is a foreign concept. I recently had the privilege of touring an old storefront on the north side of 20th that was being renovated as a residence. 
The facade had been redone in a gorgeous dark wood, and the interior was open, airy and modern. To top it off, a rooftop balcony offered views of the entire skyline. Tax assesor's value? $74,000.
And I'm sure some of you heard about the City Federal auction at the beginning of the summer. In a prime example of executive arrogance, the Atlanta-based firm Synergy decided to hold an absolute auction on their lovely new condos. A great way to make some quick cash, right? Sort of. They sold 11 condos in 29 minutes. The only problem is, they were supposed to sell 20, but decided to close the auction after one of the half-million dollar residences sold for $80,000. Aaah! So, the conclusion: Birmingham Real Estate is too good to be true. Magic.
Friday, July 17, 2009
another magic aspect of Birmingham
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
now i know why it's called the magic city.
Because you can host an entire music festival and not pay anyone.
Excepting artists who had the foresight (or suspicious business practices) of demanding cash in advance of playing (like Young Jeezy), and the smaller acts who have no manager/middleman, checks were bouncing left and right in the weeks following Birmingham's "premier" music festival.
I'm not really sure where anyone expected the money to come from. You can't advertise REO Speedwagon and Styx as your headlining acts and expect to make ANY money. It seems like bad decision (holding it in June instead of, say, October) was piled upon bad decision (settling on mediocre bands booked by people who don't even live here), until the ominous end that no one ever really thought would come sent it all crashing down.
I know a few bands who got their money, but they were the smaller acts that cashed their checks the Monday after. Bands with the thousand-dollar checks were left hanging. And Bottletree, caterer of the event, got stiffed for about half the bill, leaving them unable to pay staff and recoup costs from virtually closing down the bar that weekend. So where do we go from here? Everyone's got ideas. One of the Bottletree folks airs his rant here. His, however, seems a bit narrow in focus. Yes, Bottletree has rejuvenated Birmingham's music scene. Yes, we deserve a more relevant festival lineup. But you have to live in a pretty insulated world to believe that most people in Birmingham give a flip about bands "like Wilco, Drive By Truckers, Mos Def, Broken Social Scene, Cat Power, The Roots, Vampire Weekend, Beastie Boys, MGMT, Crystal Castles, TV on the Radio, Andrew Bird, Neko Case, Grizzly Bear, Of Montreal, Sharon Jones, Nick Cave, Mastodon, Band of Horses, Les Savy Fav, Phoenix, Bat for Lashes, Lucero, Dan Deacon, Dr. Dog, Explosions in the Sky, Wolf Parade, Animal Collective". I mean, I am young, white, middle-class, and into music, and about half those bands' music I have never heard, and of the other half about 50% of those might induce me to buy a ticket. But not a $30 one.
So, everyone's got a favorite solution. What almost nobody's got is the stamina/blindness to keep a dead festival breathing for 20 years. And their check from playing City Stages.
Type rest of the post here
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
megachurch or christian corporation?
Megachurches: huge groups of people that gather in a stadium-like setting to listen to a preacher who typically has some sort of celebrity status and typically delivers crowd-pleasing sermons.
Peter Drucker calls megachurches “the most important social phenomenon in American society in the last 30 years.”
Don't ask me if megachurches are good or evil. All I know is the first megachurch, a rented drive-in where Robert Schuller preached to hundreds sitting in their parked cars, looks a lot like entertainment. And not a lot like community. But I'm no expert: ask the folks at triple canopy, who put together an essay and slideshow detailing the parallel evolution of the megachurch and the corporation.
Perhaps the most patent aspect of all this is how deeply megachurches are rooted in a passing trend. The current business model they emulate is just that-current. And destined to be outdated by the end of the decade. Will megachurches prove to be a passing fad? Probably.
