D12 ain’t no backing band
Remember those steel drums you heard in 50 Cent’s “P.I.M.P”? That was Denaun’s work. How ’bout 50’s side-group G-Unit’s biggest single “Stunt 101”? Yup, that was Denaun too. And Xzibit’s, “Multiply.” Guess who produced that one? Denaun. If that’s not enough, the emcee has just wrapped up projects with Method Man, Redman, Snoop Dogg, Bilal,…
We are all Highland Parkers
What most of Highland Park looks like, basically, is some little town overrun by the Nazis in World War II. Not the strip on Woodward that is all most suburbanites and many Detroiters ever see. I mean the residential streets. Turn west on Glendale, say, and drive around them, if you can screw up your…
Rally with a buzz
Grand Circus Park in Detroit will be abuzz with a war protest this Saturday. No, there will not be a demonstration against American military involvement in Iraq. This particular call to arms will fall under the “war on drugs” rubric. Rally organizer Jay Statzer says the gathering is intended “to further dramatize our worldwide demands…
Kwame’s call-out?
Our ears pricked last Friday as News Hits caught the tail end of Mildred Gaddis’ radio talk show on WCHB (1200 on your AM dial). We tuned in just as co-host Greg Bowens, one-time spokesman for former Mayor Dennis Archer, finished describing a bizarre encounter he claims occurred with Archer’s replacement, Kwame Kilpatrick. Bowens says…
Fiction hits home
How can a reporter at the nation’s largest daily newspaper get away with making up stories for a dozen years? Well, it’s much easier if bosses don’t bother investigating complaints that a reporter is making stuff up. Last week, USA Today reported that Jack Kelley, until recently the McPaper’s star foreign correspondent, “fabricated and plagiarized…
Sister act
When life’s self-imposed complexities begin to feel like sand in the gears, it’s time to free yourself from the philosophical drag show, shed the shackles imposed by our largely ephemeral sense of identity, and, in the immortal words of Mystikal, shake ya ass. It’s in this way that the Rogers Sisters operate as the musical…
Ultimed update
News Hits must admit to being utterly perplexed and confused by the world of health care finance. This confession is prompted by our attendance last week at a hearing in the courtroom of Wayne County Circuit Court Judge William Giovan, who is presiding over a case involving several local hospitals, Ultimed HMO, Wayne County and…
Wine, wine, for everyone!
People are often intimidated by the language of wine and by the mystique that surrounds the selection of a good bottle. Yes, there is plenty to learn about the regions of the world where grapes are grown, how the grapes are blended, how the aging process affects the finished product and how the vessels used…
The rhythm and the blues
When the curtain finally opens on Slum Village, the State Theatre is a shambles. The end of the evening is flavored with the palpable desperation of a tanking luxury liner. The picked-over fruit trays are wilting. The washroom attendant is blowing a jay. The rest of the stragglers are scrambling for the evening’s final fix…
Expats on show
British-born artist Dick Goody takes a shot at Americans in his brightly colored painting, “Sub Urban Vacuum,” which features a bimbo behind the wheel of a truck. “It relates to my anger at people who drive SUVs,” says Goody, one of five artists in Cross Currents, a new exhibition at the Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): In Montgomery, Ala., there is an intersection where Jefferson Davis Avenue meets Rosa Parks Avenue. The first street is named after the president of the secessionist slave-owning states in America’s Civil War. The other is named in honor of the black woman whose brave actions in 1954 helped launch the civil…
Letters to the Editor
It’s not over till it’s over So Jack Lessenberry has declared, with apparent seriousness, that “The United States of America has lost the war for Iraq” (“The week we lost the war,” Metro Times, April 14). Has Jack Lessenberry ever actually been to Iraq? I understand that Jack is an avid reader of The New…
Poster boy
Even if you haven’t heard the name “Mark Arminski,” you no doubt will recognize the eye-popping designs of his rock posters — the vibrant colors, striking images and bold lettering that mark his illustrations for everyone from the Ramones, Iggy Pop and the Cramps to Kid Rock, Liz Phair, the Smashing Pumpkins, the Black Crowes,…
Let your geek flag fly
It’s a cheap trick: three days of escapism in an air-conditioned hotel, a hologram come to life before your eyes, people sharing mutual space and ideas and caffeine-binges on a weekend devoted to books, computers, Japanese anime, costumes, role-playing games and, of course, sci-fi at the annual Penguicon Convention in Novi. Try showing up at…
Plus size, low rise and more
Q: Please tell women that low-rise jeans only look good on a handful of people. Whenever I go out, all I see is “girl love handles” (GLH) hanging over low-rise jeans. FOR THE LOVE OF HUMANITY, DAN! Someone needs to tell women who are overweight, tubby, fat or just not properly proportioned to STOP wearing…
Korean seasons
A Buddhist meditation on the cyclical nature of life with a lot of old-fashioned entertainment value. It’s divided into five sections reflecting the age of the protagonist as he grows from child monk (spring) to old master (winter), with a final prologue bringing the story full circle. In Korean with English subtitles.
Student unions
Jill, 18, had never met anyone like her boyfriend. He was older — he said he was 21 — and different from the others, more patient. Her girlfriends had all had sex before, and had constantly pushed her to join their club. She gave up her virginity, and with it the last vestiges of childhood.…
Equinox Flower
Three daughters make decisions contrary to their parents’ wishes. The fact that the parents and daughters all know each other in overlapping combinations would suggest a comedy of manners but everything’s played more or less straight. Some people regard this film as another of Ozu’s masterpieces. In Japanese with English subtitles.
Nine lives
John Colbert sits at a table inside Baker’s Keyboard Lounge, the club he co-owns. He’s riffling through a brown leather briefcase. Sitting across from him is jazz historian Jim Gallert, a guy who has patronized Baker’s for 30 years. They’re discussing the final arrangements for the club’s 70th Anniversary celebration: four days of stellar shows…
Connie and Carla
Nia Vardalos, as with My Big Fat Greek Wedding, writes and stars in Connie and Carla. Unlike Wedding, which was based on Vardalos’ life, this outing is purely fiction (unless Vardalos was chased by mobsters and tried to hide out as a drag queen). Unfortunately, everything this film is trying to do has been done…
N&D Center
28 WED • ISSUES AND LEARNING Yoga Master Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev — Try pronouncing Vasudev’s name three times fast. Your tongue may end up as contorted as your limbs during one of his classes. Vasudev is an internationally recognized yoga guru and founder of the Isha Foundation, an international public service organization dedicated to Indian…
Man on Fire
In Mexico, Creasy (Denzel Washington) is a man attempting to drown his demons and his traumatic past in alcohol. Samuel Ramos (Marc Anthony) hire him to bodyguard Ramos’ young daughter. When she’s abducted, he leaves a trail of righteous destruction behind him.
Blondie déjà vu
“Comeback” is one of those touchy words, like “new hair growth” or “botoxicating.” While artists are thrilled to come back after a dry spell, they’re not likely to fess up to the substandard work that knocked them off the radar in the first place. Prince won’t go near the C-word. And don’t expect return specialist…
Kill Bill Vol. 2
Thurman’s cool, lily-white Bride seems the photographic negative of Grier’s hot, full-bodied mamas in iconic blaxploitation flicks. But Tarantino is an ironist who juxtaposes, twists and expands stock characters and plots into something unique. Plugging his pale bride into a blaxploitation-esque plot is this year’s model of his genius.
Q: Who the hell is Dykehouse?
Mike Dykehouse takes flight. Leaving his body tucked in a booth at Ann Arbor’s Red Hawk Grill, he’s off rummaging through his personal history to recall a childhood scene in Kalamazoo that segues into how “machine fetishes” and “cartoon sex” play a part in his work, shining a critical light on his life and music,…
City lover
What does it mean to love a city? Can you really identify with a multitude of inhabitants, their hopes and despairs and all their damned tics? Can you sing the praises of the high rises and the lowlifes, the glitter and the grit? Well, maybe love isn’t the right word. Can you feel possession? Can…
