Better grooming through technology
Adult. converts neat-freak style into modern-danceable grooves….
Abandoned Shelter of the Week
The debate over Detroit’s abandoned housing may rage (or simmer someplace on a back burner), but for places like this, the renovation-vs.-demolition conundrum is a no-brainer. Located in the 300 block of Dragoon in a southwest Detroit neighborhood that’s as much industrial as residential, the only thing worth saving about this dump is, well, absolutely…
Dealing with picky eaters
Dan gets nasty with guys who deny their mates pleasure … Finding love by looking beyond your “type” … & Hints for seriously advanced sexplay.
Theatrical Italian
With this premier location, across from Comerica Park in the same gloriously restored building as the Fox Theatre, it’s a natural destination for theatergoers. Most menu offerings are simple and grilled, including three steaks, lamb chops, veal chops or char-grilled tuna, as well as three other seafood choices and seven pastas. The rustica pizza and…
Letters to the Editor
As the stomach turns As I was reading "Waste knot," (Metro Times, Feb. 20-26), I literally got sick to my stomach. Nobody should live like the people in your article. I cannot believe that this continues to occur and nothing is done. I do not for one second believe that money is not a factor;…
Earthtones
Funktelligence, or “Funktell” if you’re down, is what the Roots would call “organic hip-hop jazz.” That’s pretty close to where Funktell’s at, but there’s also the occasional dose of R&B and arena rock (if you can imagine). This Ann Arbor group’s essence, however, is already captured by the jaunty name they’ve picked to grace future…
A hijacking at the airport
Northwest’s new airport terminal seems worthy of the hype. But if we truly want a change, we’d better fight against Engler and McNamara’s plan to keep control of it all.
Big Bad Love — Music from the Motion Picture Soundtrack
In the interest of putting the consumer first, you need to know that this record contains two new Tom Waits songs. Yup, brand-new. So there’s that. But the most important thing you should know about this sound track (to a film I have not yet seen) is that cover-to-cover, it creates an atmosphere that’s so…
Tomorrow never knows
Power-pop godhead Brendon Benson overcomes delusions of failure….
Forever
The last time we heard from Cracker, on 1998’s tedious Gentleman’s Blues, the band was in the midst of what the Detroit Lions call a “rebuilding period.” The folksy blues (or bluesy folk) of that album announced that Cracker was leaving behind the stoner alt-rock of its previous hits like “Low” and “Teen Angst (What…
Not an end
Folks crowd BoMac’s mega-jam in honor of the ever-generous, legendary Motown musician Rudy Robinson…
Celebrity
Last year, Mariah Carey suffered a very public emotional breakdown, then trundled off to a clinic for some psychic decompression. Now, to add insult to injury, her record company has given her the kiss-off, albeit with a $28 million parachute. Should we laugh or cry? Neither, suggests Chris Rojek in this smart compendium of celebrity…
Fix in the mix
Mixworks’ Thursday-night parties at Porter Street includes an extra-special event on March 7 … The Kooky Scientist shows off his new gear … & D and Paxahau rock the rooms at Motor.
Nightmare at high noon
Unabashedly an exposé, a condemnation of the Taliban from a Muslim’s point of view, the latest film from Iranian director Moshen Makhmalbaf is roughly hewn. Yet it’s also a film of visual surprises and an abiding strangeness that lingers long after one’s initial viewing.
Living on the edge
A homeless family makes do in a church warming shelter while its members hope and plan for better days.
Queen of the Damned
The latest film based on the writings of popular horror concoctor Anne Rice isn’t so much a sequel as a troubled animal unto itself. It’s as if late Detroit vocalist Aaliyah, the intoxicating highlight of the movie, knew this was her last chance to steal the show. But there isn’t much to steal.
Martians, artists & Hourly types
American Mars enthralls the WAB crowd (including a few other talented local musicians) … A real artists’ colony in the works for downtown Detroit … & Hour Detroit’s founder attempts to mine printed gold in San Francisco.
Beijing Bicycle
Here’s a modern Chinese variation on De Sica’s The Bicycle Thief, uncertain in tone but enlightening in what it shows us of contemporary Beijing. Overall the impression is that director Wang Xiaoshuai doesn’t want to upset us too greatly, and the film suffers a little from this kindness.
Detroit confessional
Why in the hell would somebody move to Detroit from sunny Arizona? Because this is Motown, baby — there’s a palpable energy here, creative and defiant.
Vengo
Director Tony Gatlif’s homage to flamenco music is thinly disguised as an old-fashioned revenge drama. The music is powerful and passionate and entrancing and endless, but as an attempt to offer a dramatic corollary to the music, this is a badly bobbled job.
Death on the range
Part journalism and part theater, The Laramie Project is an unforgettable documentary drama centered on Matthew Shepard’s terrible murder.
Dragonfly
A supernatural thriller with Kevin Costner? As Dragonfly unfolds its lackluster wings, its mystery fades into New Age sentimentality spiked with a few scattered horror-show shocks. Despite its airy-fairy, feel-good ending, it never soars.
No go, Canflow?
Residents rejoice when a Canadian firm’s wastewater dumping permit is postponed pending a reexamination of its practices.
Two grande dames
They could be sisters. Joan Didion and Susan Sontag share so much, it’s hard to believe they have no common genetic ancestry. The two do share a tight relationship on the time line, however: both coming of age artistically during the tumult and excitement of the ’60s, waging parallel battles against empty orthodoxies in anti-intellectual…
Council shout-out
Detroit City Council argues over whether to allow police moonlighting at special events.
Two grande dames
They could be sisters. Joan Didion and Susan Sontag share so much, it’s hard to believe they have no common genetic ancestry. The two do share a tight relationship on the time line, however: both coming of age artistically during the tumult and excitement of the ’60s, waging parallel battles against empty orthodoxies in anti-intellectual…
Dallying with dildos
Q: My husband and I have a good sexual relationship and have wonderful sex in many positions. I get turned on by licking and fingering his anus. He enjoys it; I love it so much I get orgasmic by doing this. We also play with dildos. I have tried to insert one in him; he…
Aborted logic
Michigan lawmaker attempts to sneak in anti-abortion bill; Planned Parenthood funding seems to be targeted.
Free will astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): It’s not a good time to inject Cheez Whiz into Twinkies and serve them as hors d’oeuvres. It’s neither a favorable moment to recite dirty limericks to pillars of the community nor the right time to launch a vision quest in the weedy, glass-littered field behind a shopping mall. While I…
State of the fair
Fairground officials think they’ll profit without Joe Nederlander (and they’ve got their own accounting to prove it)….
The endless education of Ishmael Reed
Author, critic, free-thinker and deconstructionist Ishmael Reed speaks to absorbing minds at Wayne State…
Surreal estate
The debate over Detroit’s abandoned housing may rage (or simmer someplace on a back burner), but for places like this, the renovation-vs.-demolition conundrum is a no-brainer. Located in the 300 block of Dragoon in a southwest Detroit neighborhood that’s as much industrial as residential, the only thing worth saving about this dump is, well, absolutely…
