REUNITED…AND IT FEELS SO GOOD…
‘Tis the season, it appears, for rock ‘n’ roll reunions. Not only are Rhythm Corps and Sponge performing a Detroit show this weekend (see item below), but Luke Mucus & The Phlegm, one of the first “punk rock” bands to appear on the Michigan State University campus in East Lansing during the late ‘70s, are…
MUSICAL WARMTH PREDICTED FOR MITTENFEST II
One of the major musical pre-Christmas events takes place this weekend in nearby Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti. Mittenfest II, a two-day, three-venue holiday benefit music festival, is described by organizer/promoter Brandon Zwagerman as “an ode to the winter season, our hand-shaped peninsula, the local music community, and non-profit youth writing center called 826michigan.” Things kick…
COMMON GROUND FOR RHYTHM CORPS FANS
You may or may not have heard that Detroiter rockers-made-good Rhythm Corps will be doing a reunion show at the Royal Oak Music Theatre on Saturday, Dec. 22nd, performing with another band of Detroit rockers-made good, Sponge. What you definitely may not know is that you can have an active hand in putting together Rhythm…
Russell it up
An Eastern Market classic changes hands.
The skinny on fatness
After having two kids, being a full-time mom and a wife to a man who worked insane hours, I gained about 40 pounds. They crept on; I didn’t hog out on anything, but there you go. I knew I should do something about it, but I just had other shit to do, you know? Then…
Jeffrey Morgan’s Media Blackout
A rapid roundup of recent releases.
Flavor & fun
Neighborhood Italian joint has eclectic and “from scratch” fare. A fresh Caesar or Caprese salad will run you $6, and a pizza with feta, grape tomatoes, roasted banana peppers, kalamata olives and more is $8. Tender, fluffy gnocchi of ricotta and spinach come surrounded with a rich sauce, and veal saltimbocca arrives on soft layers…
Boogie fever
Like any legendary locale ingrained in our consciousness, New Orleans’ Bourbon Street is far from what it once was. Whereas barrelhouse pianists like Archibald, Tuts Washington and Cousin Joe Pleasant once philosophized over bluesy runs and shook the rafters with thunderous boogies, it’s now a place where karaoke and cheap T-shirts are hawked. Where Blaze…
Wall flowers
Photos by Jake Cooley and Gary Eleinko BULLSEYE Edward Duffy, who owned a pipe company on West Jefferson Avenue, near Clark, was a big collector of work by 1960s and ’70s Cass Corridor artists. An op art mural on the side of the company warehouse, painted by Robert Sestok, is striking evidence of that. Sculpture…
Peerless Vampire killers
The Internet, it seems, giveth and giveth and giveth … without ever really (it seems) taking away. When it comes to buzz-chugging “Bands of the Moment,” you end up with a metric crap-ton of middle of the road — especially when it comes to thin ‘n’ handsome foursomes playing rock-based music springing from Brooklyn and…
Back to Front
The Temptations could always out-sing, out-dance and out-dress any group in sight, as evidenced by the recent DVD, Get Ready! The Definitive Performances, 1965-72, which has scanned upwards of 107,000 copies to date. Time has taken its toll, of course, and original Tempts members Paul Williams, future solo artists David Ruffin and Eddie Kendricks, and…
You can’t make this up
Imagining a President Huckabee.
Margot at the Wedding
Accompanied by her adolescent son (Zane Pais), New York-based fiction writer Margot (Nicole Kidman) travels to her childhood home to attend the wedding of her sister Pauline (Jennifer Jason Leigh — Baumbach’s wife). Clearly rebounding from a string of failed relationships, Pauline has chosen an unemployed depressive for her beau. Slovenly artist-musician Malcolm (Jack Black)…
Stalking stalkers
Jim McFarlin is a media critic for Metro Times. Send comments to letters@metrotimes.com.
The right profile
Julien Temple’s long-awaited doc on the life of one of punk rock’s greatest icons is often a contradictory, convoluted mess. Not one talking head here is identified by name or significance. Best — and what especially makes Temple’s film more than a throwaway — is the vintage musical footage. While Clash fans will find Temple’s…
Food Stuff
Picklers’ paradise, Christmas without cooking, and more.
Afro fly
Former P-funk keyboardist Amp Fiddler has earned his own footnote in Detroit music history, mentoring the production careers of J Dilla and the other luminaries of Detroit’s underground hip-hop scene. On his own, the man proved he could funk with the best of them — even if he already sounded like the best of them…
Asian influence
A growing minority tries to define its politics.
Free at Last
Philadelphia Freeway, came out in 2003. But the rapper doesn’t let that deter him from releasing another excellent album. Here he chooses to address the changes head on, both the external (his tenuous relationship with Beanie Sigel; the fact that he’s “back without a track from Kanye” or Just Blaze) and the internal (his realization…
Broadcast news
Would push to ease FCC regulations really serve the public?
Angel Down
If metal is dead, someone forgot to tell Sebastian Bach. Although the title of his latest disc may be Angel Down, one song sums up the true essence of the former Skid Row screamer: “American Metalhead.” Fans of true old-school metal (i.e., Judas Priest, Iron Maiden) as well as those who see no irony in…
Lake effects
Green priest takes the plunge.
The Golden Compass
How much you’ll enjoy The Golden Compass, the latest in a long line of magical otherworldly adventures, depends upon your craving to see armored polar bears duke it out … and your patience to witness their onscreen arrival. Until then (about an hour into the film), Chris Weitz’s (About A Boy, American Pie) adaptation of…
Night and Day
Wednesday • 12 Aimee Mann NOT JUST FOR POP GEEKS She’s earned a Grammy, been nominated for an Oscar, but never in million years should you hold that against her. Those accolades are flukes because few as worthy as Mann ever nab such honors. She’s a Silverlake birdsong, an eagle-eyed fan of lit, an inspiration…
Romance & Cigarettes
At its heart, it’s a simplistic tale of love, betrayal and redemption. Nick is an ironworker on New York City’s network of bridges, and lives with his wife Kitty (Susan Sarandon) and three daughters — petulant punk Constance (Mary-Louise Parker), needy, love-struck Baby (Mandy Moore), and “not right” adoptee, Rosebud (Aida Turturro, who played Gandolfini’s…
Letters to the Editor
Dems that don’t Lessenberry, like Conyers, says trying to impeach Bush and Cheney now “would be a very bad idea”, (“Conyers’ Hard Choice” Metro Times, Dec.5). Conyers has a number of excuses: It’s too late, there aren’t enough votes, the Congress wouldn’t be able to work on anything else like stopping the war, blah, blah,…
No World for Tomorrow: Good Apollo I’m Burning Star IV, Vol. 2
The only thing that’s really “progressive” about Coheed & Cambria is the fact that their combined output has “progressed” enough to result in the release of this terrific new album. And, progressively speaking, the band has greatly improved with each new release. This is the second volume in the fourth and final chapter of The…
Nightmare on Highbury Court
Life was good for Roland and Marie Dreilich in the summer of 1999. In their mid-30s at the time, they’d already purchased two homes, taking advantage of the booming real estate market of the 1990s to acquire equity and move up the housing ladder. A blue-collar couple — he does drywall and she held a…
Alvin and the Chipmunks
You might think the novelty of super squeaky voices belting out pop hits would soon wear out, but producer Ross Bagdasarian Jr. has been squeezing every last penny from the concept for decades, ever since his father created the Chipmunks back in 1958. For whatever reasons, this gimmick spawned a beloved media empire, though full-length…
All fired up
Of all the people to find behind the counter at an antique store, most people wouldn’t expect to see two gruff, retired Detroit firefighters.Norm Smith, 65, and Joe Bozich, 69, owners of Junque Shop Antiques on Michigan Avenue near Central, are well aware of the prevailing stereotypes. “Usually, they think if two old guys own…
Woman’s work
“Well-behaved women seldom make history,” Laura Thatcher Ulrich’s quotable line, raises questions about what it means to make, and what it means to be seen or written into history. It refers to well-known mavericks (Queen Elizabeth, Zora Neale Hurston, Susan B. Anthony), demonized figures (Typhoid Mary and Salem “witches”), truly scary characters (Lizzie Borden, Imelda…
Frosty stay-at-homes
A Christmas Too Many Lionsgate And you thought the last season of Dancing with the Stars had more uncelebrated celebrities than ever gathered under one roof — that is, under one that wasn’t serving free holiday turkey and soup! Writer-director Stephen Wallis marches right past those folks and says, “No, give me the more forgotten!…
Motor City Cribs
Don Duprie’s blue-collar River Rouge pad.
Cheatin’ hearts
Should I tell him about what she’s been up to?
Comics
The Boiling Point – by Mikhaela Reid The Perry Bible Fellowship – by Nicholas Gurewitch
TWO “GREAT AMERICAN” BANDS FROM D-TOWN
Almost every rock fan in Detroit knows that the Muggs were one of the 12 finalists on Fox-TV’s The Next Great American Band TV show. Alas, the Muggs didn’t make it to the final finals (the judges especially had a difficult time with the lead vocals, but then they had the same problem with the…
DRE WINS IN DETROIT…
Hip-hop producer Dr. Dre was victorious in a second lawsuit involving his Up In Smoke tour and DVD. A $3 billion invasion of privacy lawsuit was filed against the hip hop star over a videotaped conversation featuring three former City of Detroit employees that was included on the DVD. The suit has been dismissed. According…
A ROCKIN’ GOOD DETROIT BAND…
Speaking of the Detroit Top 100 Songs, which we’ve still been doing a lot of around here lately, how come this rockin’ band never made the final cut? Cool stuff! Seriously, though, you can find even more vintage Detroit kiddies stuff at detroitkidshow.com. Good stuff for nostalgia addicts. Free Soupy Sales now!
