The popular Oxford Radio show Thacker Mountain Radio is wrapping up its fall season tonight in a rocking fashion. This edition will feature a reading by the incredibly talented Jayne Anne Phillips, as well as a performance from the Grammy-nominated North Mississippi Allstars and the Clarksdale mainstay Christone “Kingfish” Ingram and the Blues Posse. The show is tonight at Off Square Books at 6 p.m.
Thacker Mountain Radio is also one of Oxford’s prime spots for hobnobbing with the creative powers that make this town unique. Producer of the show Kathryn McGaw said that attending a live performance is an original experience.
“What’s cool about coming to the live performance, though, is that you experience being part of our community,” McGaw said.
“It’s a great opportunity to spend time with amazing authors, musicians and people. To me, Thacker Mountain Radio is Oxford in an hour.”
Jayne Anne Phillips will be doing a reading from her latest book, “Quiet Dell.” The novel, set during the Great Depression, follows the Eicher family, victims of a real-life, gruesome murder that occurred near her childhood home of Clarksburg, W. Va., and Emily Thornhill, a reporter covering the investigation.
“It’s the culmination of six years of work,” Phillips said.
The novel is inspired by the stories Phillips heard about the murder as a child, according to an interview Phillips gave with Lynn Neary on NPR.
“The tragedy of their loss was somehow answered for me in the writing of them,” Phillips said.
“They became real to me and alive and saved, in a sense.”
While this is her first time on Thacker Mountain Radio, Jayne Anne Phillips is well acquainted with Oxford.
“I have an old connection to Oxford,” Phillips said. “I think I’ve come to Oxford for just about every single book.”
Phillips has nothing but praise to shower on the city and the businesses that inhabit it. “Square Books is one of the best book stores in the country,” she said.
The headline act for the event will be the North Mississippi Allstars, who are starting the second leg of their tour promoting the album “World Boogie is Coming.” Natives of Mississippi, brothers Luther and Cody Dickinson play a raucous brand of hill country delta blues, which they learned from following the great musical tradition of the Mississippi Delta.
While they are officially a two-piece band they always host a rotating cast of power players in the blues world. Tonight they will be accompanied by electrifying guitarist Lightnin’ Malcolm, a disciple of the Mississippi hill country styled blues.
Tonight’s performance kicks off a six month tour that starts in Oxford and finishes in Byron Bay, Australia.
The other musical act of the evening will be Christone “Kingfish” Ingram and the Blues Posse. Kingfish is a 14-year old phenom who brings down the house with his fast and fluid lead guitar and soulful voice. The other half of the posse is David “Space Cowboy” Isaac.
If you can’t catch the show tonight, there is a live broadcast on Rebel Radio, FM 92.1, as well as a re-broadcast on Mississippi Public Radio, FM 90.3. Thacker Mountain Radio will be back Feb. 6 and will run on until April 25, kicking off the Friday of the Double Decker Arts Festival.
-Michael Prestwich
maprestw@go.olemiss.edu
