Velvet Redux: Live MCMXCIII
In muso terms, the Velvet Underground couldn’t play for shit. Maureen Tucker’s inability to execute a simple drum roll meant guitar trills had to signal the endings of songs. John Cale’s viola playing could’ve made Jack Benny wince. Nobody had a voice you could describe as soaring or even tuneful — during the childlike “I’m…
Backslash
ITMFA! — Go John Conyers! As you’ve probably heard by now, he’s bustin’ the Shrub’s chops — check out sixthreefive.com. He’s introduced House Resolution 635, which would mandate that “Congress [may] establish a select committee with subpoena authority to investigate the misconduct of the Bush Administration with regard to the Iraq war … and report…
The Miller
We’ve certainly met Rhett Miller’s muse before — standing by the jukebox of our favorite Friday night dive, she’s easily mistaken for Matthew Sweet’s girlfriend or the trashy kid sister of Jesse’s girl. But Miller’s record on themes of “love, war and death” is presented in precisely that order; “her,” “she” and sometimes “you” rarely…
Immigrants and us
More than half a million in Los Angeles, 300,000 in Chicago, 50,000 in Denver, 30,000 in Washington and Milwaukee. Tens of thousands more in Detroit, Phoenix, Houston, Dallas, Reno, Newark and New York City, as well as places like Grand Rapids and Nashville. Sparked by the punitive Sensenbrenner bill, which would criminalize undocumented workers and…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): When I was a kid, I read Highlights magazine. My favorite feature was the section that asked Zen-like questions like "Can you laugh and cry at the same time?" or "If you were a talking parrot, what words would you want to learn?" For this week’s horoscope, I’ve borrowed the spirit…
‘Jesus is my homie’
On a particularly blustery and gray Motor City day, several dozen Christian teenagers are freezing their blessed butts off in front of City Hall. They’re here for Battle Cry (battlecry.com), a teen Christian “reverse rebellion” against the sinful, corruptive, unstoppable monster of pop culture. Per their press release: “Fueled by their faith, young rebels rally…
Nice pairs
Papa Joe’s Gourmet Market is an extreme food emporium that should be visited by anyone who’s serious about food — and who isn’t? Bill Schwab is their sommelier and maître de fromage (that’s “wine and cheese expert” for you Anglophones). On Friday and Saturday, April 21 and 22, Schwab will be introducing some unique wine…
Coney Island High
Leo’s, located on Main Street in downtown Royal Oak, is the archetypal suburban coney island. Bright and clean and filled with a fleet of cushy booths stocked with condiments, it offers a tasty lineup of coney dog classics, Greek specialties, melt sandwiches and breakfast plates 24 hours a day, seven days a week. On a…
Cinci’s bastards
The Heartless Bastards are late getting to their show at Little Brothers in Columbus, Ohio, the price of the previous day’s layover at home in Cincinnati. But the trio’s tardiness is understandable — for a band that’s been touring hard for nearly a year, those 24 hours in their own apartments, bars and bedrooms seemed…
He’s a tramp
Dear Michael Bublé, I love you. No, seriously, I like, really, really love you. Your cornflower-blue eyes. Your soft schoolboy pout. Your voice like warm, sweet honey that makes my knees buckle. Seriously, I fucking love you. And I don’t even care that you’re Canadian. And when we get married, I’ll even change my last…
Food Stuff
Full plates for local foodies.
The great divide
Red state, blue state. Letterman, Leno. Prius, Escalade. … You probably know where you stand. But have you taken a side in one of the most potentially polarizing debates á la mode: cake or pie? Perhaps you think there’s already enough separating you from your neighbors. Why add baked goods to the mix? Why cake?…
Tranny talk
I’m a self-identified she-male who is not a prostitute, and I have a little more advice for the would-be trannychaser in last week’s column. First off, you need to know the odds — there are a lot more of you than there are of us. For every tranny who posts an ad, there are 20…
The Scat Pack
Rhe problem with Adam & Steve is that it wants to be a sugary-sweet rom-com just like the ones that Hollywood churns out for breeders, but various other shit (and piss, and vomit) just keeps getting in the way. The movie is the directorial debut of veteran queer cinema actor Craig Chester, and what he’s…
Beans and nothingness
The kitchen is not his. The kitchen is small, rarely employed for anything greater than toast and coffee or the reheating of day-old pizza. There are nuggets of dog food lost between the stove and the dishwasher. The nicotine on the windows diffuses the afternoon light into soft yellow hues and there’s a package of…
Going Moo
Moo Moo’s Organic Bistro is two-thirds kitchen. The quaint Grosse Pointe Park restaurant sports a dining area that can accommodate, say, a dozen people. The front of the house is, in fact, utilitarian — a courtesy almost — for those who want to sit down to eat. There are a few high tops, antique tin…
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One
You can’t quite call this a documentary, as most documentarians try to keep themselves out of the narrative. But here, Greaves is the man in charge of a fictitious film about a married couple’s quarrel in Central Park, and the film about the film. In between the filming, we get the good stuff: The actors…
The high price of being too cool
Can you ever be too cool for your own good? Is that part of the problem for millions of young black men who seem far from the workaday mainstream, off in a world of hustling, jail and unemployment? Or is that just a stereotype that’s part of the problem — and no explanation at all?…
Rainbow’s end
Author goes home to find the story behind pot-farm shootout.
Gilles’ Wife
It’s the ’30s, and pregnant Elisa (Devos) lives on the outskirts of a French mining town where she raises her twin daughters, tends to the family garden and adores her bruiser of a husband, Gilles (Clovis Cornillac). Conversation in any form is nearly absent from this household, and yet all seems well — until Elisa’s…
The Odissi-philes
Mick Jagger dropped by, and so did modern dance mavens Paul Taylor and Mark Morris. They all showed up in Bangalore, India, to visit Nrityagram, the artistic community that gives its name to a dance company. The name, quite literally, means dance (‘nritya’) village (‘gram’), says Surupa Sen, artistic director of the company, who is…
Foxy fakes
When TV stations replay the PR firm’s handout.
Lucky Number Slevin
First-time screenwriter Jason Smilovic packs so much dialogue into this picture that you have to wonder how many Red Bulls the cast needed to spew it all out so fast. At least Slevin, with all its twisting, turning, bobbing and weaving, is like a funnier, yet not quite as clever Usual Suspects. Our hero gets…
Jeffrey Morgan’s Media Blackout
Obviously this is MB66! Knut — Terraforma (Hydra Head) :: Think their band name is obvious? Towers Of London — How Rude She Was (TVT) :: England’s answer to the Faces had the Faces been a bunch of boozy Brits. Sh*t Faces — Drink It Again, Rod (Rummy Bros.) :: Shay, wait a minute… Psychotic4…
Letters to the Editor
Man of the purple In response to your interview with Dr. Glaeser (“Men of the people,” Metro Times, April 5), I am both offended and, surprisingly enough, encouraged. Offended, because an intelligent, articulate man of influence, an educator, has made a very self-righteous determination as to the negative fate of very many people who reside…
Phat Girlz
Actress and comedian Mo’Nique comes off as sweet as pecan pie, but cross her and she’ll cut your lame ass down with comebacks. Her new movie is part screwball comedy, part polemic on our skinny-obsessed pop culture (amen). Unfortunately, the movie never really gets its groove on. What Phat Girlz really could stand — aside…
Head Cheese
At last year’s Warped Tour, Bedouin Soundclash’s set was just about the only thing that made that the Pontiac Silverdome’s steaming asphalt bearable. The Canadian trio’s vibrant reggae slink is shot through with punk ethos and silvery pure melody. They’re tough like Bad Brains, but easier on the ears than the laughter of your new…
The Food Issue
If you cooked like this, you’d already be home.
Take the Lead
Admit it: You’ve watched Save the Last Dance on cable (and secretly liked it) and used to daydream about going to a school where kids spontaneously bust out ballet moves in the cafeteria. Teen-dance-movie fans (closeted or otherwise), take note: Antonio Banderas has strapped on his dancing shoes, and he’s brought along an eager cast…
Art Bar
Poet Ruth L. Schwartz writes of the glimpse of possibility, of something sweeter than we already have that comes to us, grows in us. The unrealizable part of it causes bitterness; the other opens outward, the cycle complete. This is both a poem about a tangerine and about more than that. Tangerine It was a…
Comics
The Boiling Point – by Mikhaela Reid The Perry Bible Fellowship – by Nicholas Gurewitch
No steam-cleaned suits!
The reason pop heads steer clear of the traditional blues is that it offers no surprises — you know exactly where the chords will fall and how the narrative will end. Then some guy will tell you how his woman is messing up his head but he’s going to play a guitar that’s coincidentally shaped…
Party by the bagful
Zachary Smith’s friends used to have a delicious deal. All they had to do was hand over a $20 bill and some wine, and he took care of the rest, running out to the grocery store and returning with a party by the bagful. Smith doesn’t have time for that since opening the Chef Zachary…
Dancehall days
When it comes to dancehall, there aren’t many sound systems that warrant as much respect as Stone Love. SL has, in fact, ruled the worldwide dancehall scene for the last 30 years; they’ve shaped dancehall culture, set DJ trends, and can control a reggae crowd like nobody else. So when local promoters manage to book…
She Wants Revenge
Half of you will want to set this self-titled She Wants Revenge record on fire, like pictures of a particularly douchey ex-boyfriend. The others will want to burn copies for all your friends. Like singer Justin Warfield, you’re afraid to commit. This post-punk droner’s sadistic fantasies might get you hot, but also make you glad…
Night and Day
Friday • 14 West Indian Girl MUSIC West Indian Girl has won over indie hearts everywhere. And it’s no wonder: After years of traveling the country as solo performers, troubadors Robert James and Francis Ten finally crossed paths in Detroit, where together they created a ’60 psychedelia-meets-jam band sound that neither annoys nor waxes on…
…just visiting
This is the eighth album from Zo! in five years, and he isn’t totally a one-man show anymore. Little Brother’s lead emcee Phonte makes a guest appearance. And Virginia-based chanteuse Tiffany Paige add body and curves to a few tracks. The record opens with a surly instrumental version of “Caught up in the Rapture.” Between…
The ugly truth about the layoffs
When I think about the careers of many of those working in the auto industry in these parts today, I can’t help but think of Louis Slotkin. You may never have heard of him. He was an early atomic scientist who was working with two small hemisphere of deadly plutonium on a spring morning in…
On the Jungle Floor
Van Hunt’s an artist, not a star, and his sophomore album, On the Jungle Floor, expands musically on his 2003 self-titled debut. Shadows of Hendrix and Prince are as apparent here as Lenny Kravitz and Curtis Mayfield’s were on the first. Both albums are very good, if not separate personalities, though Hunt’s growth probably won’t…
Boho cookin’
We’ve been there: Low funds and an empty stomach. For young folks living in the city or off at college, it’s not uncommon to have to cobble together a meal from what a handful of change will buy at the corner party store. Many of us muddle through and later look back with fondness on…
