Hardback Cafe

Both short poems here evoke Autumn. The second will always also make me think of a time, now long-ago, when deep friendships were woven among a sometimes dark but always sparkling set of folks all in some way engaged in serving the public and one another. Cooking, cleaning, fixing, mixing, teaching, copying, and ever and always entertaining me, we navigated the days and deepest nights.

The second poem, “After R.M. Rilke” by Primo Levi was left for me to see first as I returned to that tribe after a year away wandering. It has a sweet timelessness about it to me. Of course I’m writing here of the early ‘90s and the World of Franklin and Rosemary that centered, for me, on The Hardback Cafe.

The first poem I only came to know years later as I thought to look for it. It time-travels back in a most haunting way, bringing something new into the past.

“Day in Autumn” by Rainer Maria Rilke

Lord, it is time. Let the great summer go,
Lay your long shadows on the sundials,
And over harvest piles let the winds blow.

Command the last fruits to be ripe;
Grant them some other southern hour,
Urge them to completion, and with power
Drive final sweetness to the heavy grape.

Who's homeless now, will for long stay alone.
No home will build his weary hands,
He'll wake, read, write letters long to friends
And will the alleys up and down
Walk restlessly, when falling leaves dance.

Primo Levi answers in “After R.M. Rilke”

Lord, it’s time; the wine is already fermenting.
The time has come to have a home,
Or to remain for a long time without one.
The time has come not to be alone,
Or else we will stay alone for a long time.
We will consume the hours over books,
Or in writing letters to distant places,
Long letters from our solitude.
And we will go back and forth through the streets,
Restless, while the leaves fall.

Happy, Happy Autumn to my Friends and Allies-Stand strong in this Time of Reckoning. We Know Our Strength and now have so much more to Defend.

The poster brings back a whole other set of recollections lodged in that same loony space and time.

Like Picasso, Hemingway was an as***le but this story bears some resemblance to me of Hardback Times. It is titled, "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place," (1933) / Ernest Hemingway. I can see someone reading it sitting at the table under the chalkboard while drinking that jet-fuel coffee. Maybe you'll enjoy. Sure do miss that place.

yale.learningu.org

32 years ago I wandered home to Chapel Hill after a time of living, working, and researching in Central America. The journey home was circuitous, slow, and mainly unplanned. There had occurred some unexpected complications and my departure was fast. A Civil War that had drug on horribly and painfully for 31 years was the reality (it stretched out 4 more years before a ‘peace’ accord was signed and the nature of violent conflict there shifted).

He Guatemala in 1992 was unstable and unpredictable, characteristics that are historically endemic in that beautiful - beloved - blessed-and-cursed-in-so-many-ways-place. I wasn’t ready to leave but the precariousness of life there had, at least so I (we) believed, ensnared me (us). So I (we) split like so very many others have done, and will yet do, in search of the safety and security of ‘The Colossus of The North’ - El Norte.

Unlike the great majority of those that flee northward I had no legal obstacles. But like so many I DID have immediate financial challenges. So fortunate was I that friends in the ‘Southern Part of Heaven,’ Chapel Hill, had pitched in to pay for a plane ticket to get me from Arizona, where I sought first refuge, back to North Carolina. Kirk Ross retrieved me from Charlotte for the last leg home. I had no place to hang my hat nor lay my head so of course I went straight to the Hardback Cafe. Jamie McPhail had written this poem by Primo Levi on the message board out front. It is etched in my soul and every Autumn I return to it as a poem of homecoming - the very truest homecoming of the heart. It is also a reminder of my great good fortune to have had so many brave hearts be part of my life in so many times and places.

The Fall is for gathering and inventorying and reflecting - to ponder over coffee or wine with like souls. Thanks Jamie. Thanks to all y'all Hardbackers - real, imagined, and honorary - who have seeded my life with light and love and adventure.

The poem below is by Primo Levi, a favored Hardback author.

Hey stop, look, & listen!

The Mayflies USA - The Apple (Official Video) Stream "The Apple": https://songwhip.com/themayfliesusa/the-appleMore music: https://songwhip.com/themayfliesusaVideo edited by Cogan McMichaels ...

Some Local Music From the ‘80s-‘90s: Hardback Tapes. Here’s a list, Left/Right, Top to Bottom:

Left Side:
Zen Frisbee Boot
Jim Smith/Uphill
Jim Smith
Helena Merikana (Matt Barrett)
Reverb-a-Ray
Mumblefish
Bill McCormick
Sharkquest
81 Mulberry
dottie Bea
Loose Screws & Friends
Carlos Salvo
Eight Eyes
X-Rayons
Bryan Lee
Billy Miller
Lud
Milagro Saints

Right Side:
Hobex
Evil Weiner
Teasing the Korean
Novice
LOCAL
Trailer Bride
Bellísimo de La Lounge
Yellow House
Yellow Stuff
Jim Smith
Lud
Lud
Dom Casual
Mumblefish
H.M.S. Cervix
Hege V
Luann McCarthy
Jen Wallwood

Mark Yancy (Yancey?) - he disappeared into Florida I believe.

Sometime during the early part of my Chapel Hill sojourn I learned of ‘Libba’ Cotten. As with much classic music it was likely Dennis Gavin down at The Fair Exchange that turned me on to her music. Then slowly the connection began to settle in. Eventually it seemed art was kind of oozing forth-The cranked up, The Art Center could respond, offered up its walls and tables, the space, and that Coffee, it’s cool vibe and shade, that glorious front porch, WXYC broadcast The Sounds, Zines like ‘Ransom Street,’ ‘Stay-Free!’ and ‘Trash’ joined more respectable mags like ‘The Indy,’ and ‘The Spectator’ to promo projects of all stripes, ‘The Triangle Cómic Review’ made us laugh and think, and there, on the south side of Franklin was campus supplying a steady stream of listeners, lookers, do-ers, and future ne’er-do-wells. And of course and the progenitor of it all, , offered up their venues as sacred spaces where friends sang to friends and fellow travelers traveled - After all, we were ‘The Next Seattle.’ Thanks go to Tom Maxwell for chronicling a seminal decade (1989-99) of that ‘Really Strange and Wonderful Time’ with such care.

And in that mix was the Spirit of Elizabeth Cotten. And of that ‘Spirit’ Laird Dixon, with help from Frank Heath, placed Mrs. Cotten at the Center of All Things. (See Laird’s artistic rendering of her in the photos below and at this link, read that tale as brought forward by the inimitable David Menconi at the link: https://artsorange.org/down-on-copperline-libba-cotten-cats-cradle/?fbclid=IwAR0QhqQ5zZRcmem4GGBasQqIAubP8uCnTeDfoBj0BXIxy2AGHuBxHnsz58c

Now on to our On This Day: (June 29) in 1987 Elizabeth Cotten passed away. Her ‘parlor ragtime’ guitar brought us ‘Freight Train,’ ‘Shake Sugaree,’ and other ‘almost-lost’ songs. She was born in 1893 in , then called West End, on Lloyd St. alongside the Railroad tracks. The Seegers - players and folklorists - heard her at 60+ years and shone a light on her talent.

https://www.ncdcr.gov/blog/2016/06/29/carrboros-libba-cotten-composer-freight-train?fbclid=IwAR3DupdeBptxqyFFz82D90WEFbGvuI41pUqLA-ynWR5OTc8y-WluTPrEwiohttps://www.ncdcr.gov/blog/2016/06/29/carrboros-libba-cotten-composer-freight-train?fbclid=IwAR3DupdeBptxqyFFz82D90WEFbGvuI41pUqLA-ynWR5OTc8y-WluTPrEwiohttps://www.ncdcr.gov/blog/2016/06/29/carrboros-libba-cotten-composer-freight-train?fbclid=IwAR3DupdeBptxqyFFz82D90WEFbGvuI41pUqLA-ynWR5OTc8y-WluTPrEwio. ~Alvis

https://blogs.lib.unc.edu/ncm/2015/07/01/27757/

Chapel Hill’s (debatable) reign as the new Seattle – NC Miscellany Chapel Hill’s (debatable) reign as the new Seattle “The ‘Seattle’ phenomenon spawned a series of imitators in the music press…. For some time, Chapel Hill appeared to enjoy frontrunner status and a spate of pieces appeared touting central North Carolina as the place to watch…. “The mos...

Mary Hall — All-Star

And we read BOOKS!!! Especially the Bee—U—T—Ful Jamie McPhail!! (Another photo out of nowhere - photographer not known by me)

Long lost photo looking into the kitchen/dish area of The Hardback. Pretty sure this is Dex. I do not know who was the photographer.

A couple of Hardback Favorites..

Gone now six years -- happy birthday to one of The Hardback's earliest waits and a great friend. Jeffrey Scott Eason -- much missed.

David Bowie – Space Oddity (Official Video) The official music video for David Bowie - Space OddityTaken from Bowie's 2nd studio album 'David Bowie' released in 1969 (aka Space Oddity), of which this w...

“At the time he was supporting himself by bartending at the Hardback Cafe and Bookstore, a local haunt that a 2001 INDY Week article described as ‘ground zero for Chapel Hill’s slacker-indie rock scene.’”
https://www.wral.com/story/inside-the-artistry-of-nc-music-poster-veteran-ron-liberti/21380881/?fbclid=IwAR0pwAOx5HIlsSjS_jIMXl3B0mELitwgAd42QQeMzVmps-rBkKfXJSZCiMU_aem_AchsqQHE_huWjjH734fhNm9sOHIpas5kxvA5_UzzzaZiU2cI74qrLpZabiFYn30Y7wU

Inside the artistry of NC music poster veteran Ron Liberti Tucked into his cozy in-home studio, artist Ron Liberti slowly pours thick, black ink lengthwise across the top of a mesh screen.

Do This Now! In the name of Hardback Heritage go to this link and scroll down to vote for Jamie McPhail...you might hit up your other friends along the way like The Cave, OCSC, and Local 506.

Round of 32 Megavote Page - Triangle Blog Blog A group civics blog covering town council, education, transportation, and recreation in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, NC.

1/: The Hardback Cafe and Bookstore Closed on Tuesday, March 22, 1994. Coming suddenly, it was a body blow to heart and soul of back-alley downtown Chapel Hill spirit for some and West Franklin Street has never quite been the same. For me, I turned toward the west and, ultimately, Carrboro, with stops tending bar along the way at The Cave, Local 506, The Dead Mule Club, and Henry’s Bistro, eventually landing in my final (so far) job serving the public and friends at The Orange County Social Club, a kindred space. Many of those sparkling people also dispersed, taking diverse skills and attitudes into other venues and endeavors. Far flung and deep dug - from what I can tell Hardbackers fanned out and spread life-art all around. If you’re reading this the chance is good that you’re a proper misfit of the coffee, bookstore, and rock club stripe too.

2/: Some went far, far away - others remained at home. We come and go, connect and scatter, always pondering one last captured Hardback coffee and cocktail hour, a live show, or an exhalation from deep down. Recently the passings of comrades have been the cause of sad cleavings and collectings of our reminiscences and the stuff, sounds, and images that make those recollections click far too regularly.

The Hardback was a Third Place for a lot of people - not just a restaurant and not exactly a living room - though, of course, it could be both. It was Home pretty often just the same. The coffee was Jet Fuel, and in those days before we admitted that smoking was bad, the air there was dense and thick. The afternoon sun beaming through the front window, passing through the streaky clouds we made and turning a pint of Bass Ale into an Amber beacon of $3.00 Joy is so chiseled into my psyche as to be a punk slacker Caravaggio.

3/: When oh so briefly we thought we were going to be a TV show, Jim Smith wrote us a theme song: “We all read the local paper, we all read the New York Times, but the comics and the crosswords seem to monopolize our time. We make a team sport out of moral support so we all seem to do quite well. As long as we have some faith in ourselves then the world can go to hell. And we leave our ambition at the door around here. We like it best that way. We always find a friend in here — at the Hardback Cafe.” = Theme Song.

4/: Miss you all - deep emotions upon those that have literally left us - and hopeful reunions on those who disappeared — may you reappear over a pint or a Jet Fuel java yet again. We were a dark and shiny bunch and for a few seconds we caught lightning and poetry and art and music in a bottle.
~Alvis

(If you’ve read this far I’d cherish whatever you might add)

5:26 PM. The autumn copper sun shining in the front window, splashing across the black-white chessboard floor, bouncing up and angling a bright lazy beam through the toasted glow of a pint — of Bass Ale gracing the corner of the bar — in The Hardback Cafe. Feel with me the warm of the words and the music and the books and the well-read news and the puzzles and brain-twisters and guitar strings and drumsticks. And the swirling cream sinking to join the hot black coffee in a glass cup. Mesmerizing afternoon.

Now gone over 29 years. But not forgotten. Enjoy a Jim Smith penned ode to a place and time:

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

We have our first cup of coffee somewhere between 10 and 2
Recover from the night before while we waste the afternoon.
We talk politics and give ego trips
While the sun just spills on the floor.
We hear the sounds of entry
And all our heads turn towards the door.

Alvis plays the melodies
And we all know the words.
He plays upon our memories with
The songs that we’ve all heard.

And we leave our ambition at the door
Around here
We like it best that way
We always find a friend in here
At the Hardback Cafe.

We all read the local paper
We all read the New York Times
But the comics and the crossword
Seem to monopolize our time.

We make a team sport out of moral support
So we all seem to do quite well
As long as we have some faith in ourselves
Then the world can go to hell.

~ By Jim Smith

@@@@@@@@@@@@

Just shuffling through the leaves.

Rilke, “Autumn Day” and the golden afternoon sunlight in The Hardback - with a book.

Well-Deserved Honor for this sometime-Hardbacker. https://uncw.edu/news/2023/09/edgerton-caldwell-award?fbclid=IwAR1Zc9Pqb_SGuVpdmr1kQkWlIP3mqXrPZp0_8H2mm1_ywHtXlKHrjVia4Wg_aem_ARDuO13QTXavlaH1nct5YCeHNYfpXQJ6JjCVNZgVsjp4RaZLDH7_faMKw2GCmrnvTBc

Distinguished Professor, Noted Author Clyde Edgerton Honored for Life’s Work Clyde Edgerton is the recipient of the 2023 John Tyler Caldwell Award for the Humanities.

Riddle me THIS!

A little over 30 years ago I wandered home to Chapel Hill after a time of living, working, and researching in Central America. The journey home was circuitous, slow, and mainly unplanned. There had occurred some unexpected complications and my departure from Guatemala had been quick. A Civil War, Then 31 years in duration was the reality (it stretched out 4 more years before a ‘peace’ accord was signed and the nature of violent conflict there shifted). Guatemala in 1992 was unstable and unpredictable, characteristics that are historically endemic in that beautiful - beloved - blessed-and-cursed-in-so-many-ways place. I wasn’t ready to leave but the precariousness of life there had, at least so I (we) believed, ensnared me (us). So I (we) split like so very many others have done, and will yet do, in search of the safety and security of ‘The Colossus of The North’ - El Norte.

Unlike the great majority of those that flee northward I had no legal obstacles. But like so many I DID have immediate financial challenges. So fortunate was I that friends in the ‘Southern Part of Heaven,’ - Chapel Hill - had pitched in to pay for a plane ticket to get me from Arizona, where I sought first refuge, back to North Carolina. Kirk Ross retrieved me from Charlotte for the last leg home. He brought a homecoming gift of Lexington Barbecue. I had no place to hang my hat nor lay my head so of course I went straight to the Hardback Cafe. Jamie McPhail had written this poem by Primo Levi on the message board out front. It is etched in my soul and every Autumn I return to it as a poem of homecoming - homecoming of the heart. It is also a reminder of my great good fortune to have had so many brave hearts be part of my life in so many times and places. The Fall is for gathering and inventorying and reflecting - to ponder over coffee or wine with like souls and long-time friends and compatriots. Thanks Jamie. Thanks to all y'all Hardbackers - real, imagined, and honorary - who have seeded my life with light and love and adventure.

Hardback Song (by Jim Smith)
We have our first cup of coffee
Somewhere between ten and two
Recover from the night before
While we waste the afternoon
We talk politics and give ego trips
While the sun just spills across the floor
We hear the sounds of entry
And all our heads turn towards the door.

Chorus: Alvis plays the melodies
and we all know the words,
He plays upon our memories
With the songs that we’ve all heard…

Refrain: We leave our ambition at the door
Around here,
We like it best that way,
We always have a friend in here
At the Hardback Cafe

We all read the local paper
We all read ‘The New York Times,
But the comics and the crosswords
Seem to monopolize our time
We make a team sport out of moral support
So we all seem to do quite well
As long as we have some faith in ourselves
Then the world can go to hell.

So if the world is getting you down
Grab a cup of coffee and stick around
…At the Hardback Cafe..

Look closely - art from the past.

29 years and 1 week ago. ‘Creatures of Cool” ’The Independent, August 17-23, 1994.’

SON of Hardback?!!!