Tapestry

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Octobber 4, 2007:

• The boozin' and crusin' days of early stock-car racing
• The band that tought Nirvana's Kurt Cobain to play guitar comes to Birmingham
• Community Calendar
• Hyper-connectivism in music with Charles Norman Mason and Ed Robertson

This weekend, Talladega becomes one of Alabama's largest cities as tens of thousands of spectators head to the Superspeedway there to witness two races: the Mountain Dew 250 and the UAW Ford 500. But these aren't your granddaddy's NASCAR races. Fan demographics have changed since the days of dirt tracks and moonshine. That's right, moonshine - good old fashioned hooch - played an integral role in the creation of stock-car racing. Author Neal Thompson writes about the days of prohibition and the illegal sale of booze as a catalyst for the birth of NASCAR in his new book Driving with the Devil. He tells WBHM's Steve Chiotakis about how all that figured into its life and longevity.

Neal Thompson interview

The Melvins are known as the godfathers of doom metal. But don't feel bad if you've never heard of them. The group has never attained mainstream popularity - they probably never sought it - but over the last 25 years they've put out dozens of CDs and helped inspire the 90's Grunge scene that produced bands like Nirvana and Soundgarden. The Melvin's latest project is "A Senile Animal", and next week they'll bring that sound to Birmingham for a concert. Founding members Buzz Osbourne and Dale Crover stopped by our studios to talk with WBHM's Hunter Bell.

Interview with the Melvins

The Melvins play the Bottletree October 11th.

To hear the audio portion of the Community Calendar from Tapestry, click here.

Want to know more? Activeculture.info is a one-stop source for finding out what's going on in the Birmingham metro area.

Next week, the Birmingham Art Music Alliance will honor two local composers: Charles Norman Mason of Birmingham Southern College and Ed Robertson of the University of Montevallo. Between them, the pair has won armfuls of awards including the 2005 Samuel Barber Rome Prize for Mason and the Carnegie Foundation's Alabama Professor of the Year for Robertson. Mason says describes his style of composition as "hyper-connectivism" - but what does THAT mean? We invited Mason and Robertson to our studios to talk about their process. (AUDIO MONTAGE) Next Thursday night, at Samford University, a collection of local musicians will perform the works of Mason and Robertson at an awards recognition concert.

Tapestry is produced by Tanya Ott and Michael Krall with help this week from Steve Chiotakis, Hunter Bell, Islara Vazquez and Christie Smith. Next week on the program, "Mr. Dial has something to say". We talk with the maker of a new documentary that's getting a lot of attention. I'm Greg Bass, and we'll see you next week.