Drag king
Off the beaten path, but well worth the extra mileage, lies the Gold Dollar. The facade is an unassuming Cass Corridor watering hole, but it disguises an intimate and eclectic aural haven. The former drag bar is now an adventuresome live music venue with a clubhouse vibe. In addition, It has a well-lit and guarded…
Black celebration
Located in the basement of an old downtown hotel, the City Club (or Leland Club to scene veterans) is Detroit’s oldest and greatest Goth club. Don’t worry about getting frisked at the door; it’s all part of the the charm.
Far out music
“Downtown Ypsilanti’s oldest drinking establishment features food, beverages and live entertainment seven days a week. The atmosphere is relaxed and casual, catering to a diverse clientele. The original woodwork and tin ceiling have been carefully maintained. The Tap Room features a selection of 63 bottled beers and 9 drafts, 4 of which rotate on a…
News Hits
Darth Vega Strikes back Ever since the bitter labor dispute with the Detroit News, Free Press and Detroit Newspapers (which handles business operations for both dailies) broke out more than four years ago, union workers have been calling DN honcho Frank Vega by the nickname "Darth Vega." Showing a little in-your-face attitude, Vega returned the…
Hanging Up
Let’s face it. The best feel-good movies usually make us feel a little bad before they lay the good part on us. Diane Keaton’s Hanging Up definitely meets that criterion and then some. Keaton directs and stars in this often painfully real tale of three sisters, three cellular phones and two tragic, aging parents. Walter…
DVD donnybrook
If you recently bought a DVD player, you might not be aware of the enormous legal drama your shiny new copy of The Matrix or Scream 2 has produced. There’s a battle over how people play back these disks. And the Internet’s independent programming community is caught in the middle, fighting big business for their…
The Cup
Tibetan Buddhist lama and director Khyentse Norbu’s first film manages to take both the high and low roads to understanding – in fact, by the time he’s done with his delightful tale, high and low seem one and the same. And learning, laughter and compassion get intertwined like the fingers of a chanting monk. Set…
Pitch’d
ONE NIGHT IN DETROIT Every so often a night happens in Detroit that could take out any night in any other major city, full of such amazing and original music that you can’t do anything but be proud that it comes from this city – and then you can struggle to catch it all. Saturday…
Fringe Tucked In
The offbeat quarterly Speak may not wow us with its Ray Gun approach to page layout and wacky fonts, but it sure has its ink-smudged fingers on the pulse of what’s going on across the spectrum of culture, politics and the arts. It publishes a wild variety of writers that includes Greil Marcus (last issue),…
Food Stuff
EAT A MEATLESS PIZZA For vegetarians and people who keep kosher, the idea of ordering a pizza topped with anything other than vegetables is pretty much unheard of. That is, unless they pay a visit to Southfield’s Jerusalem Pizza, located at 10 Mile and Southfield. This carryout pizza place caters to those who don’t eat…
The Thin Blue Line
Fred A. Leuchter Jr., the “Mr. Death” of Errol Morris’ latest documentary, doesn’t seem like a particularly bad person. In fact, for someone whose area of expertise is the devising of more efficient instruments of execution, he has an unexpected – if decidedly bent – humanitarian streak. Though he doesn’t question the central premise of…
Fear of flying
Dec. 31, 1999 was a heavy news day, to say the least. Boris Yeltsin resigned. Telegenic millennium celebrations were either under way or about to get under way around the globe. And terrorists released the 155 passengers they had been holding for more than a week on a hijacked Air India jetliner. The U.S. State…
Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr.
Fred A. Leuchter Jr., the “Mr. Death” of Errol Morris’ latest documentary, doesn’t seem like a particularly bad person. In fact, for someone whose area of expertise is the devising of more efficient instruments of execution, he has an unexpected – if decidedly bent – humanitarian streak. Though he doesn’t question the central premise of…
On Death and denial
Errol Morris has been making subversive documentaries since the late 1970s, but with his latest film, Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr., he tackles the highly sensitive topic of the Holocaust by interviewing people – especially Leuchter – who would deny that the mass killing of Jews in 1940s Germany…
Pitch Black
Pitch Black gave us hope that a sci-fi movie was finally going to make good use of all those special effects at filmmakers’ disposal and knock our socks off. But, alas, my socks are still on. This flick knows the sci-fi horror formula, but not much else. From its washed out, constantly hazy camera shots…
Movie day
Mental Hygiene: Classroom Films 1945-1970 By Ken Smith Blast Books 240 pages, $24.95 It’s hard to imagine even the most overworked, nicotine-craving faculty-lounge habitué loading some of the short flicks discussed in Mental Hygiene into a projector without experiencing some slight pang of conscience. Aside from emphasizing societal norms and espousing conformity (in the world…
Judy Berlin
Writer-director Eric Mendelsohn’s debut film, set in the fictitious Long Island hamlet of Babylon, is a bittersweet love letter to suburbia, an ode to its manicured beauty and orderly lifestyle where everything – and everyone – has its place. In an impassioned moment, David Gold (Aaron Harnick) tells Judy Berlin (Edie Falco) how he’d like…
Down the drain code
At a northern Michigan golf resort a couple summers back, the Michigan Association of County Drain Commissioners enacted a mock public meeting. The character Ben Dover was described in a handout as a "perpetual victim" who is "tired of paying for drain projects." Dick Morer represented Michigan Conversation Group, "an association that likes to talk…
Classic Old-school Lowdown
32 Blues just keeps kickin’ out the good stuff. Fans of that old-style acoustic blues sound will get some deep chills listening to this one. The way James approaches the slide, nearly making the guitar cry out, while integrating some serious string shaking and bending at just the right moment, lets the listener know that…
God bless vouchers
Call it the DeVos Family Value. It is immense and it is pervasive, the dollars bubbling up across Michigan’s political landscape like so many pools of spring water, each seemingly distinct but actually all drawing from the same underground reservoir of vast wealth. It’s a multibillion-dollar family value built on Amway soap and a controversial…
Mirror-image Hip Hop
This is not a joke, though perhaps it should be and is best enjoyed as such. A 25-year-old Ivy League grad (whom Detroit heads will think sounds like he’s melding Eminem’s internal wordplay and Danny K’s retardedly great naïveté), actually convinced veteran hip-hop producer Prince Paul to hook up this EP of De la Soul-ish…
Angels on decks
Don’t call it a she thing. Motor’s all-female DJ night – “Halo: Angels on Vinyl” – is a pitch-perfect mix of intuition and sonic flight, featuring local favorites Magda, Punisher and Liz Copeland.
The great divide
The Rev. Eddie Edwards doesn’t have much patience for people wanting to blow wind about philosophical issues when it comes to school reform. The way he sees it, he’s dead center in a crisis, watching the youth in his Detroit community as their lives are wasted, even lost, because of the school system’s failure. And…
He found his mojo
You waited on Voodoo like a lost cat. You knew how revolutionary it would be, so you marked days on the calendar, held prayer vigils and tithed your affections to the anticipated rapture of D’Angelo’s second coming. You ladies licked your lips watching the video for "Untitled." You men joined the cult of Fitness Works.…
Cranking up the volumes
Five grand statements by Elizabeth Murray at Susanne Hilberry Gallery….
Living with fear
During the five years he has lived at the State Fair senior citizens complex on Detroit’s northwest side, Elmer McCreary said he has had to sleep in his car twice. The elevator was out of commission, and the lingering effects of a stroke kept the 84-year-old from climbing three flights to his apartment. But what’s…
Slipmat ‘n’ Slide
When younger artists collaborate with older musiciIsn’t it fascinating ans who inspired them to be creative in the first place? How about when collaborations cut across the arbitrary boundaries of genre as well as differences in age? Take Luke Vibert and BJ Cole. While Vibert has established himself at the forefront of British electronica (with…
Outside laughing in U.S.
Cultural imperialism, cancer and the PC establishment are funny to Canadians….
Profiles in arrogance
As part of their 1997 summer conference at Shanty Creek golf resort, the Michigan Association of County Drain Commissioners — a private organization made up of elected drain commissioners and drain work contractors — portrayed citizens at a public meeting using the following character profiles (constituents who know about the skit and are fighting drain…
Tintinnabulation
The two pieces on this latest Arvo Pärt offering from ECM are hinges in the Estonian composer’s oeuvre. Before "Für Alina" ("For Alina"), Pärt wrote serial music (as in Schoenberg, Webern, etc.). But after this stark work for piano, he embarked on a lifelong pilgrimage through endless metaphysical silences, with only his ear and the…
Attention Span
COUTURE SHOCK United Colors of Benetton has long been famous for its shocking ad campaigns: An umbilical cord being cut, an exploding car, etc. The maverick fashion company even made its own brand of condoms – in a rainbow of colors, of course. Obviously bored cranking out khaki pants and ski sweaters, Benetton is still…
Rich, generous goulash
Though the HACC was founded by immigrants, you don’t have to be Hungarian to feel at home here. The HACC’s fare is like what many of us think of as the best home cooking: Rich, generous, with a health-take-the-hindmost kind of feel. The HACC is open to the public Monday, Wednesday and Friday, with Wednesday…
Transglobal Crossover
In most countries, his records are filed simply under "K," and throughout much of Europe, Africa and the Middle East, they regularly top the pop charts. He is from Algeria and sings primarily in Arabic. His success has changed how the business world considers "world music." His name is Khaled, "the king of rai" and…
Can this party be saved?
Nobody has ever accused me of being normal. So rather than wait till the Republican presidential candidates descended on us, I came here to see them in something like their natural habitat. South Carolina, incidentally, is not like us. The big issue here is the Confederate battle flag flying over the state Capitol, something many…
Winner’s spoils
Creepy doesn’t begin to describe the feeling I get, having switched on television expecting "That ‘70s Show" and getting "Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire?" Creepier still is the Lizard of Fun’s enthusiasm for the beauty pageant-turned-meat market. "Don’t change the channel," it growls, burying the remote under the sofa cushions. "I’ve been waiting months…
Loose Lips
MISSING MUSIC When we were kids, snow had to reach our thighs before school was called off. It seems that these days, citywide panic of apocalyptic proportions accompanies forecasts of just a few inches. Must be snowplow anxiety. While sensationalistic newscasts seem a likely cause for our Chicken Little behavior, it can’t be denied that…
