Goodbye, Connie Calloway
With their latest posturing at a hearing before State Superintendent Mike Flanagan, the so-called leaders of Detroit Public Schools are shamelessly wasting what little face the district still has. There are a couple issues. First the district doesn’t want a financial manager that the state wants to install. And the district wants a trial-like hearing…
Kenn Cox — another jazz loss
Barbara and Kenn Cox. We just received the sad word that Detroit musician and musical activist Kenn Cox died Friday morning after a long illness. What comes to mind first is that Cox, 68, was as passionate about the way the music was represented as he was about presenting it. That’s why, along with his…
Noveau Asian
Mon Jin Lau seats 175 (not counting the spacious warm-weather patio) in several large and lively rooms. It’s is one of the most extravagantly decorated of all the Chinese restaurants on this side of the river, with striking modern art on the walls, stone columns, art-deco chandeliers and palm trees all set against vibrant colors.…
Band of gypsies
On a recent Saturday afternoon, guitarist Evan Perri rested on a sectional sofa that consumed most of his bachelor pad in Grosse Pointe Park. Perri fiddled with the strings on his new acoustic guitar while discussing his fascination with the late Gypsy jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt, and the popularity of the Hot Club of Detroit,…
Howling for the holidays
If it’s almost Christmas, then that means it must be Howling Diablos time. The band’s legendary holiday blowouts are possibly only rivaled by the pre-flight bashes thrown by Santa’s reindeer (hey, there’s a reason why Rudolph’s red-nosed!). Much like the Diablos’ own fan base, the celebration’s been gaining momentum for years, outgrowing two private homes…
Hang time
Hangouts come in many forms, from bars and barber shops to the stoop on a porch’s steps. No matter where they’re found, though, they’re all simply places where people can be around their friends. That’s the case at the Chip-in Sportsmen’s Club on Seven Mile Road near Dequindre, the stomping ground for a group of…
High anxiety
My girl thinks life’s a gas; I think it stinks
Will Weighs in
“If there’s been a movie in my career that I could say changed my life, it’s Seven Pounds,” Will Smith says through the patented smile that perpetually lights up his face. Like it or not, Smith’s been part of our lives for two decades now, ever since “Parents Just Don’t Understand” ruled MTV back in…
Motor City Cribs
Supergrouper Marty Morris’ interior decorating chops
Talkin’ Trash
One summer during the early ’90s, after I’d moved to New Orleans from Indiana to co-found the primitive rock ‘n’ roll combo, the Royal Pendletons, with several fellow Midwestern expatriates and one crazy Cajun, we returned to our homeland for a tour that included, among other things, an extended stay at the Hentchmen’s Ypsilanti apartment…
Night and Day
WEDNESDAY • 17 JINGLE MINGLE SPIKIN’ THE EGGNOG The Social Connection is generously sparing your company the expense of throwing an office holiday party by hosting its own, complete with DJ, premium bar (sorry, that’s a cash bar), Christmas-carol karaoke and custom pics with Santa. The best part? You can drunkenly kiss people under the…
Jeffrey Morgan’s Media Fizz-out
Y’know what I hate? I hate reading 199 mean-spirited columns before I get to a kindler gentler Jeffrey Morgan’s Media Blackout #200! Forrest J. Ackerman — 1916-2008 (RIP) :: In fond remembrance of Sci-Fi’s munificent Ackermonster who first discovered author Ray Bradbury and then went on to create the vastly influential magazine Famous Monsters of…
Now what?
The state of the last-minute auto loan
On the run
Field of contenders for mayoralty line up for a first look
Couch Trip
White Dog Criterion Kristy McNichol’s Julie Sawyer accidentally nails a dog with her car on a lonely California highway. The beautiful white German shepherd lives and she falls for him, and, of course, he for her. The little guy becomes her companion and protector — once going after an intruder with vigor. But when the…
Tour de Xmas
My facial features felt like frozen protrusions, as if stung by bees. Toes were beyond any description of pain; I imagined them plum-colored and shriveled-up like dead baby birds, inside those cleated shoes, affixed to those pedals. Lungs were numbed and throat was blocked by a petal of icy phlegm. Eyelids squeaked. Not a bit…
Comics
The Boiling Point – by Mikhaela Reid
Letters to the Editor
Congratulating us Re:”Measuring the Rouge,” (Dec. 10). Although I do not cotton to headlines with an “ing” in them, you are probably not responsible. So — I congratulate you on not just an excellent job of reporting but also policy analysis. Your article has it all, from the history of the case to whether the…
Ford had a plan
Henry Ford has always played the role of iconic figurehead and a longstanding symbol of Michigan’s promise. But despite his enormous impact and ingenuity, Ford has some shady and weird stuff in his story that can’t be explained away with pithy statements like, “Oh, it was just the times.” One might not expect a contemporary…
Virtual courts
Michael Loukas had his day in a southeast Michigan courtroom without ever leaving the Upper Peninsula.Representing himself in a breach-of-contract suit he filed against one of his former attorneys, Loukas argued his case to the judge and jury appearing only on a video screen. Loukas, 38, is serving a 20- to 40-year prison sentence for…
Don’t (land) bank on it
Property transfers stall in Wayne County
Places on the Side
Named after the Manistee County lakeside town that the six lifelong friends in this band call home, Bear Lake first earned mass critical acclaim with its debut album, Catch the Sun. Since then, the band’s continued to pull in new local fans at an impressive rate, thanks to its ethereal live shows. To refer to…
No news is bad news
Why reporting cutbacks affect us all
Food Stuff
ORDER UP — We hear from the folks at Westborn Market that they’re starting to offer online shopping options. Those who visit the market’s website will find several holiday gift baskets that can be ordered and shipped, fully assembled. If the mini-chain weren’t already convenient enough to visit, with its three locations in metro Detroit,…
Death Set the Beginning of my Journey
Sometimes you wish some bands would just shut the fuck up. Too often, poorly conceived black metal — in all its overblown, overtly serious ridiculousness — drives even major fans up the wall who try to bear it. Originality is frequently a concept more recent bands of the genre are eager to entertain. Instead, they…
On the Download
Having precious little metrics to judge the audience of this here column (presumably bathroom-sitters and bird cage enthusiasts primarily), I have to make a leap of faith: that you, dear reader, have not completely gorged yourselves on the infotainment leaping from the blogosphere and that there are some things you may not be aware of.…
Chinese Democracy
The trouble with spending 15 years on a record — and it has been that long since Guns N’ Roses released its last official new release, the punk covers album, The Spaghetti Incident — is that, when said album finally sees the light of day, unless it’s another Beggars Banquet or Led Zeppelin II, or…
A Dick of tricks
Richard Milhous Nixon was no ordinary politician; the notoriously secretive exec openly hated the press, yet in the aftermath of Watergate he was eager to get back in the spotlight and in need of a splashy way to do it. The opportunity for a political rehab came from the unlikeliest source in David Frost, a…
The Day the Earth Stood Still
It’s not Keanu’s fault. Really. As far as emotionless aliens go, he’s fine. Sure, actors such as Jeff Bridges (Starman) and David Bowie (The Man Who Fell to Earth) did something interesting with their extraterrestrial roles while Keanu … well, let’s say his performance here is a good exercise in minimalism. Still, you’ve got to…
Nothing Like the Holidays
For members of the Rodriguez family, no matter what they do beyond the walls of their home in Chicago’s Humboldt Park neighborhood, their most important function is in relation to each other. It doesn’t matter that the children of Eduardo (Alfred Molina) and Anna (Elizabeth Peña) are grown and gone. As soon as they walk…
DETROITERS TOP EMUSIC’S “BEST OF” LIST
‘Tis the season for “Best of the Year” lists, and Detroit music fans should be pleased to note that two of our own homegrown artists placed No. 2 and No. 3 on emusic’s “Best Albums of 2008” list. Out of 86 artists, Motor City electronic-pop god Deastro was number two with his Keeper’s album, while…
