And my nominees are…
The Detroit Film Critics Society, of which I am a proud member, has announced its nominations for 2009, and just like the group, it’s pretty eclectic. The full list can be found elsewhere, but just for giggles, I’ve included my personal picks, many of which made the final list, and some that didn’t. The most…
ANOTHER RECORD STORE RIP
We just heard today that one of the area’s best, foremost record stores — Rock-a-Billy’s in Utica — is shuttering. It’ll be done by the end of the month, in fact. Its entire stock, thousands of great titles that run the musical gamut, is on sale from now to Christmas, a total store liquidation. It’s…
IDIOT BOXING & TIM ALLEN IN ST. LOUIE
Allen doesn’t live here anymore. ST. LOUIS — Tim Allen has found a new sound to replace the unintelligible, Neanderthal male grunts that propelled him to the ’90s sitcom classic Home Improvement and, ultimately, to stardom. It’s “doh-de-doh-de-doh.” On the current 10-city standup concert tour to promote his forthcoming movie Crazy on the Outside, in…
O Sh*t! Ro Spit & Monica Blair take on Jay-Z & Alicia Keys
Earlier this year, Jay-Z, the self-appointed Don of hip-hop, and still arguably one of the best in the game (recently coming out of retirement a la Michael Jordan), collaborated with Grammy Award winning songstress and native New Yorker Alicia Keys to make the epic anthem “Empire State of Mind.” You might remember their inspired MTV…
The Jacksons meet reality TV
The real thing: Jackie, Marlon, Tito and Jermaine. “You Only Think You Know Them” is the tagline A&E is using for The Jack5ons: A Family Dynasty, the new six-part reality series (if you can call anything regarding the Jackson family “reality”) premiering at 9 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 13, with back-to-back hour-long episodes on the cable…
Troops down, fears up
As the United States draws down forces in Iraq, concerns for the refugees and religious minorities there are growing. A bill introduced last week by U.S. Rep. Gary Peters (D-Bloomfield Township) seeks to protect and support the millions of Iraqis who have already been displaced by the war, or who could become victims of sectarian…
Comics
The Boiling Point – by Mikhaela Reid
Swift sentences
Two Detroit men charged with kidnapping Walter Swift and stealing his furniture and other items — an incident highlighted in a recent MT cover story about the difficulties exonerated prisoners face once they are released ("Swift’s Justice," Nov. 18) — pleaded guilty last week in Wayne County Circuit Court. Detroit residents Leonard Duplessis, 23, and…
Hush
This guy Frank Warren knows a thing or two about secrets. He probably even has a few secrets on the topic of secrets. He definitely has some of his own — he publishes one in each PostSecret book. Before becoming a New York Times bestseller, his book, PostSecret, was but a Blogspot blog. It’s still…
Seasonal celebration
The holiday season brings parties, religious observances and shopping frenzies, but one annual event combines all three traditions with a more sobering cause. Thursday marks the 61st anniversary of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, a cause being pursued in many parts of the world. The venerable Michigan Coalition for Human Rights is hosting…
Night and Day
WEDNESDAY-SATURDAY DECEMBER 9-12 Larry Coryell KILLER GUITAR WANKERY Elsewhere in this issue, we profile Detroiter Ralphe Armstrong, who joined the jazz-rock fusion scene in the early ’70s. There from the beginning was guitarist Larry Coryell, who’d brought his bag of rock and blues licks to the bands of Chico Hamilton and Herbie Mann (on Memphis…
Oakland bounty!
Oakland bounty! Notable eateries in Birmingham, Troy and the Bloomfields Andiamo Italia West 6676 Telegraph Rd., Bloomfield Twp.; 248-865-9300: The sunflower-yellow-and-purple color scheme and huge tilted mirrors that allow patrons to glimpse those sitting behind them have given the space a slickly contemporary look. The food is in contrast: it’s the solid Italian fare of…
High profiling
There’s a moment on saxophonist James Carter’s 2004 album Live at Baker’s Keyboard Lounge where bassist Ralphe Armstrong steals the show. It’s on the well-named "Foot Pattin’." After a quartet of tenor saxophone solos — by Carter, David Murray and the since-departed greats Franz Jackson and Johnny Griffin — Armstrong steps up to wolf down…
A west side winner
Bistro 222’s reasonable prices and stylishly retrofitted space are complemented by imaginative Californian-Italian cuisine. Starters ($6-$8) are highlighted by “April’s crispy calamari,” a mess of little cephalopod rings accompanied by a marinara sauce enlivened with red peppers, olives and garlic. Much of the fare is assertively spiced, such as the zesty and generous portion of…
Where the auction is
"Who’ll give me a dollar?" shouts the auctioneer through a loudspeaker. His twangy voice rings out from a warehouse’s open bay door and into the street out front. It’s bidding time at J-B Auction on Central at St. Stephens in southwest Detroit. On deck is a box of assorted glassware. A dirty sock somehow made…
Everybody’s Fine
Robert De Niro is the broken-down patriarch Frank, a humble widower with fading health. His four grown children are scattered across the country, and each has an excuse for skipping a family get-together. Since they won’t come to him, Frank sets out to visit his wayward children, riding a Greyhound all the way from New…
Food Stuff
Kringle mingles — The Whitney’s Santa Claus Brunch will bring the fat man to town for Sunday brunches at the Whitney. Dec. 13 and 20, between 10:30 a.m. and 3 p.m., he’ll stroll around the Whitney in Detroit posing for pictures with youngsters and wishing holiday cheer to all. The brunch is $29 per person,…
The Strip
The Strip almost exclusively centers on the sad sack, misfit twentysomethings who work at EletriCity, a poor man’s version of RadioShack. There’s the dim-witted slacker, the awkward Indian immigrant, the manager going through a middle-aged crisis (The Kids in the Hall’s Dave Foley), the wannabe actor, Rick, who has delusions of grandeur about his talents…
Blond ambition
Rock ‘n’ roll singer Vivian George may have native Canadian blood running through her veins — she was born in Toronto — but the singer-songwriter has Detroit securely in her heart. When she first visited the city as a youngster, George immediately felt a kinship, a sense of belonging and — as tacky as it…
Touch of Orson
It’s 1937, and Welles is in the process of mounting his audaciously pruned version of Julius Caesar, staged in modern fascist dress. Starring as Brutus, directing the action, sleeping with a long list of actresses and ingénues, hogging the limelight and feuding with his partner John Houseman (Eddie Marsan), Linklater captures the mad energy and…
Not so pretty in pink
Has feminism been replaced by the pink-ribbon breast cancer cult? When the House of Representatives passed the Stupak amendment, which would take abortion rights away even from women who have private insurance, the female response ranged from muted to inaudible. A few weeks later, when the United States Preventive Services Task Force recommended that regular…
Pus Pustules
The new LP by Cotton Museum, the solo Michigan noise project by Chris Pottinger, reveals the electronic producer’s gifts as an artist of extremes. On one side is a shapeshifting sound piece that swings between fluttering ambient metal and grinding industrial klang; on the other are engraved drawings of Pottinger’s hyper-gory, ooze-excreting creatures that populate…
Their sole issue
Q: I am a 23-year-old male who has been in a relationship with a great woman for four years now. She is an amazing person, and we often talk about marriage. The issue is this: I have a foot fetish and she is fully aware of it. She doesn’t like the idea of me kissing…
All the Way from Michigan Not Mars
"My friends are having babies. You know, people are buying homes. … I never needed that foundation." It’s 15 minutes into All the Way from Michigan Not Mars, a concert doc that spans tour stops, set-list discussions, meditative car rides, and kite-flying interludes following the release of These Friends of Mine — a collaborative effort…
Made in Detroit
After nearly three decades behind a counter slinging snarky opinions and cult video rentals, the Thomas Video crew have shattered the space-time continuum by producing a movie themselves (Brainwater Enterprises). Directed by Ryan Meade, produced by and starring wiseacre store owner Jim Olenski and his rock ‘n’ roll and business life partner Gary Reichel, and…
‘Lookin’ Back’
For decades, interviewers have been asking Bob Seger when he’s going to release a box set or, at the very least, a compilation of material from his early, rockin’, pre-superstar years. He’s released two "greatest hits" collections but neither reached back beyond his 1975 breakthrough Beautiful Loser album to spotlight the tunes that made him…
SOS: Save our state
Last week I went to see Andy Dillon, the speaker of the House, to talk about what will happen to us in Michigan next year. Most people have no idea what’s coming. They know that times are bad; they may know schools and cities took a big hit when Lansing finally managed to balance its…
Motor City Rides
Just within the last few years there’s been a countrywide explosion in the crafting movement. Your typical craft fair offers everything from T-shirts to posters to housewares to accessories that are way cooler than anything you’re going to find at Urban Outfitters. Imagine if the aesthetics of the DIY indie-music scene and Martha Stewart had…
She comes in colors
Back in May of this year, former Television guitarist Richard Lloyd performed at the Corktown Tavern. The event was memorable for two reasons: 1) Lloyd was terrible; drunk to the point of on-stage puke-burps, obnoxious; 2) Colonel Galaxy, longtime husband and manager of artist and one-time punk-rock pinup Niagara, was there talking about how his…
Cheat Code
Left 4 Dead 2 Valve Xbox 360, PC Face it, a zombie apocalypse is around the corner, so we’d better prepare. They will outnumber us, but we’re smarter. We’ve also got superior firepower, which we’re going to need, because through sheer numbers they’re physically stronger than us. If it comes down to it, we’ll outrun…
Letters to the Editor
Doubting Harris Re: Jack Lessenberry’s "Detroit’s sad Gypsies" (Dec. 2), your adoration for Joe Harris is obvious, and a bit overboard. He tries to take credit for predicting the City of Detroit’s current economic meltdown. As early as 2005, then City Auditor General, and I think mayoral candidate Joe Harris was predicting deficits of 200…
Young at heart in Detroit: Poet Al Young, that is
And where does sunlight go? What does it do? Light feeds each breath we take, light circulates and in its round-and-round produces you and me and everything that jumps or waits. or so muses the poet Al Young in a recent poem at his extensive Web site, alyoung.org. Between his Mississippi earliest years and the…
