PROFILES

Amy LaVere

A signature presence on the Memphis indie music scene, LaVere has reached larger audiences since the 2007 release of her album Anchors & Anvils. Playing a peanut-colored bass seemingly made larger by her diminutive frame, her lilting voice can flash with shades of Billie Holiday or Rickie Lee Jones. In February she appeared on "Late Night With Conan O'Brien," where she opened her country/jazz/rock songbook to the shuffling murder ballad "Killing Him." While her musical identity is hard to fit into American radio categories, European audiences are enthusiastic: LaVere now has a second bass on standby overseas.


In $5 Cover: LaVere plays a fictionalized version of herself, struggling to keep a low-pay, high-stress catering job while her wayward heart triangulates between a budding romance with real-life boyfriend Paul Taylor and two other actors. Featured songs: "Killing Him," "Never Been Sadder."


In $5 Cover Amplified: An autumn trip to her Texas-Louisiana border-town roots finds LaVere happiest on the road as she meditates on the chasm between the expectations and realities of love.


On Memphis music: "All of Memphis is quite inspiring in its own way, even when you're out in Germantown playing a private party. In and of itself, that's a Tennessee Williams play out there."


Latest news: With a new five-song EP, "Died of Love," available digitally and at shows, LaVere has tour dates booked throughout summer in the U.S. and Europe, and is writing songs for a planned 2010 CD release. Learn more at amylavere.com.


--John Hubbell


Amy Lavere's website



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$5 Cover Amplified Summary:

Intimate, thoughtful, always entertaining and often formally daring, the 12 documentaries that comprise the anthology "$5 Cover Amplified" reveal a modern Memphis music scene that is as creative, passionate and vibrant as in the city's commercial heyday, when Elvis, Isaac Hayes and Al Green demonstrated that visionary art and popular culture could be inseparable as the 'A' and 'B' sides of a vinyl record.

Produced as a complement to Craig Brewer's episodic MTV drama series/ new media experiment, "$5 Cover," the "Amplified" series of documentary portraits chronicles the rousing art, uncertain careers and sometimes problematic home lives of a diverse, distinctive and often eccentric group of Memphis music-makers.

Mesmerizing Valerie June croons confessional lyrics from beneath a Medusan tangle of dreadlocks that's as thick as her family ties and her musical roots. The puckish Tommy Chong-meets-Pippi Longstocking "clown prince of rap," Muck Sticky, proves to be as dedicated to the welfare of his mother and sister as to his own pursuit of happiness. Punk rock pioneer Jack Oblivian, who plays to sell-out nightclub crowds in Europe, makes ends meet in Memphis by cleaning houses. "Crunk" hip-hop artist Al Kapone is shown to be a tough but loving father, bringing new urgency to the concept of rapper as "role model." Troubadour of heartbreak Harlan T. Bobo is portrayed impressionistically, through stop-motion animation, allegorical fantasy and other conceits.

Whatever the focus or style, the direction of Alan Spearman, an award-winning photographer/filmmaker with The Commercial Appeal, ensures that each segment is as visually assured as it is musically irresistible. "$5 Cover Amplified" was co-produced by Spearman, Andria Lisle and John Hubbell, and edited by Eileen Meyer; their familiarity with the Memphis "scene" ensures unprecedented authenticity as well as access.

John Beifuss- The Commercial Appeal