Live Review: High Dials w/Oblisk and Sisters of Your Sunshine Vapor. Friday, Jan. 14 at the Magic Stick Lounge
Montreal’s road-wearied alt-rockers the High Dials dropped by the Magic Stick Lounge last night, their first gig in Detroit since 2006. Supporting them were two of Detroit’s own psyche acts, Sisters of Sunshine Vapor and Oblisk. In an event they dubbed the “Psychedelic Supper,” alongside the wild sounds were a plethora of free Indian food…
Liberal think tank sees state’s green prospects
What? A progressive, activist organization lauding a Republican? And over green policy? What’s happened? Gov. Rick Snyder and Michigan’s path toward and potential in the green economy caught the attention of the liberal think tank the Center for American Progress, that’s what. An article posted on the group’s website Friday at americanprogress.org, “Maintaining Michigan’s Clean…
Ro Spit on a Billboard for New Detroit Initiative
This is clearly starting off to be a good month for Michigan rapper Ro Spit. Just last week, we blogged about his new music video, and as of yesterday, there’s a massive billboard with his face plastered on it downtown. I actually snapped the photo above this morning on Woodward Avenue just north of the…
The Dilemma
The Dilemma GRADE: C Though it’s his strongest film, Apollo 13 ruined Ron Howard as a director. An Oscar contender, it’s critical and box office success transformed Howard from a modestly talented studio craftsman into a "serious" A-list filmmaker, inflating both his budgets and reputation. His Best Director Oscar win for A Beautiful Mind was…
The Dilemma
The Dilemma GRADE: C Though it’s his strongest film, Apollo 13 ruined Ron Howard as a director. An Oscar contender, it’s critical and box office success transformed Howard from a modestly talented studio craftsman into a "serious" A-list filmmaker, inflating both his budgets and reputation. His Best Director Oscar win for A Beautiful Mind was…
Green Hornet
Green Hornet GRADE: B- The Green Hornet is rowdy, discordant, subversive and thoroughly modern, exactly what you’d expect when a stoner and a visual genius team up to make a blockbuster movie. Kicking around Hollywood for decades, the property has had more names attached to it than a kindergarten bulletin board, with the likes of…
Eminem signs Slaughterhouse and Yelawolf to Shady Records. Detroit Cheers.
Today, in a business maneuver that has been brewing behind the scenes for quite some time, Eminem finally announced that he’s growing his Shady Records roster. In a not so surprising move, he’s bringing Slaughterhouse — the four rapper supergroup consisting of Joell Ortiz, Joe Budden, Crooked I, and Detroit emcee Royce Da 5’9″ –…
Bettye LaVette does Zeppelin on Leno last night. Watch.
From ace intern Patrick Higgins … We absolutely love Detroit-raised R & B singer Bettye LaVette around here. In fact, Ms. LaVette generated her signature voltage on Jay Leno’s stage last night. The roughly four-minute performance, which was Led Zeppelin’s 1979 nugget “All My Love,” proved that her stage style has only gotten feistier with…
Bridge company twofer? Riverside Park case back in court
Now that Judge Prentis Edwards has dropped the hammer on the Detroit International Bridge Co., will fellow Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Kathleen Macdonald follow his lead and send a strong message of her own to the company owned by Manuel “Matty” Moroun? On Monday, as we all now know, Edwards sent bridge company president…
Lemmy! Motörhead! Ferndale!
Lemmy in Ferndale Storied speedfreak, rock ’n’ roll torchbearer, death-defier and Motörhead bassist-shouter Lemmy Kilmister is finally the beast upon whom a film is based. Tho we’ve not seen the doc yet, we can imagine the rock ’n’ roll holy hell to be had, even if by-the-numbers. We’ve also heard the film’s a lovefest to the…
Quentin Tarantino’s First Film
This 30 minute black and white flick has surfaced on the net, showing us Tarantino’s first effort. On display is the auteur’s motormouth, pop culture obsessions. When he was first starting out, QT thought of himself as an actor first… and he’s clearly the best performer in his no budget cast. And even though the…
Arizona and the deadliest gun states: Michigan isn’t top 10!
You’re five times more likely to die from a gun in Arizona than you are in Hawaii, the Daily Beast reports. I can believe it, mister. I’ve lived in Arizona and it can be a frightening place to call home, especially Phoenix, a city teeming with pistol-wielding felons, meth heads, hillbillys, and NRA, Joe-Arpaio-adoring mooks.…
Trash rock
From Bantam Rooster to the White Stripes and, more recently, the Jehovah’s Witness Protection Program, even Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr., or the Thornbills, the rock ‘n’ roll two-piece has become less a novelty and more an acceptable band format in these parts. Whether it be the simplistic garage-blues attack of the Stripes or the Rooster,…
When science goes to pot
Welcome to the world of science. I didn’t do well in high school science and have pretty much avoided addressing scientific subjects formally until now. That’s because I’ve been delving into the science of marijuana to try to figure out some of the hows and whys of medical marijuana’s workings. There are some 20,000 published…
Letters to the Editor
Blood on their hands The assassination attempt of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), the death of U.S. District Judge John Roll, the death of 9-year-old Christina Taylor Green, the three other dead and 12 wounded — the blood is on the hands of those Republican Party, Tea Party and Sarah Palin, whose anti-Obama, birther, anti-health…
Lowering the boom
News Hits has a new hero. His name is Prentis Edwards. Edwards, a Wayne County Circuit Court judge, earned his way into our pantheon on Monday by giving the Detroit International Bridge Co. the kind of public spanking it has long deserved. Fed up with its steadfast refusal to abide by a court order issued…
Go downtown!
24 Grille inside the Book-Cadillac Hotel, 204 Michigan Ave.; 313-964-3821; spa1924grille.com; $$: Dark and sexy, with cushioned stools, Swarovski crystal and more create a sumptuous interior. Various nods to industrial design, right down to an exposed 1920s I-beam. Outdoor patio. Anchor Bar 450 W. Fort St.; 313-964-9127; anchorbardetroit.com; $: Enjoy waxed-paper-wrapped burgers, sandwiches and bar…
Motor City Five
It’s funny how the music industry in 2011 both mirrors and totally diverges from the biz circa 1961, a time when a band could garner radio play and tour the country with only a single. Brooklyn trio Brahms finds itself in this very position with a synthy single dubbed "Subtext is Deadly" and only, like,…
When innocence is pink
From a deep sleep, Julie Rea Harper awoke to screams. They were coming from her 10-year-old son in his bed in the next room as he was being fatally stabbed with a knife from her kitchen. Rushing to her child, Harper surprised the intruder, who dragged her into the backyard, struck her in the face…
Third parties
Q: Any time I have relationship questions, I always ask my inner Dan Savage, and he never leads me astray! My boyfriend and I have had a wonderful relationship for six years. We have had "girlfriends" in the past who were involved with both of us simultaneously. But he recently met a girl and they…
Wire – Red Barked Tree
Wire – Red Barked Tree Pink Flag If your favorite Wire is the one that recorded searing, innovative punk and new wave in the 1970s, the outfit’s 11th album, Red Barked Tree, holds a few magic moments: "Two Minutes" is a melodramatic thud that runs the titular length before cutting off in the midst of…
Mesrine: Killer Instinct and Public Enemy
Mesrine: Killer Instinct and Public Enemy GRADE: B- American cinema has produced two distinct film genres — the western and the gangster film. Though few European directors have been attracted to the first (Sergio Leone being the obvious exception), the French can’t seem to get enough of the second. Their love affair with American-style criminal…
Oprah, please
Oprah has her own network. I would like my own network too, please. The Jimmy Network. Emphasis on the "my." Is it my imagination, or does every show on this new cable vehicle have to have "Oprah" in its title? As significant as it is — and as cheesed-off as her loyal fan base is…
Blue Valentine
Blue Valentine GRADE: A- There’s inescapable attraction in peeking through slightly cracked doors, but the intensely personal Blue Valentine invites you in and demands that you rifle through the underwear drawer while no one’s looking. The film’s stock-in-trade is squirmy, uncomfortable intimacy, as we watch a young romance flare up, burn and then slowly extinguish.…
Causes of action
Allison Leotta was raised in the suburbs of Detroit and attended one of the state’s best public high schools. Her father was a respected federal prosecutor in Detroit and her home life was supportive. Undergrad studies at Michigan State University led her to Harvard Law School. She speaks of all of this with a refreshing…
Somewhere
Somewhere GRADE: C- Sophia Coppola’s detractors have long labeled her a dilettante, a lightweight and an unworthy heir to her father’s genius, with a smidgen of raw talent but nothing much of importance to say. And if you were to view the callow, navel-gazing Somewhere as the only evidence, you might be inclined to agree…
Cheat Code
Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood Ubisoft PlayStation 3 Assassin’s Creed has become a household name amongst all console gamers — love it or hate it, the franchise had a great launch. But AC Brotherhood reveals disappointing changes. After choppy, substandard cinematics, we get to play the exact same thing for hours — you’ll hit the same two…
Feel sad, don’t be sad
Laurie Anderson’s Delusions premiered a year ago at the Vancouver Olympics and is winding down with its last North American shows in Ann Arbor and a short European tour in May (although there may be South American or Asian performances later). It’s a work described by The New York Times as "more theatrical than musical,…
Downtown heat
Orchid Thai 115 Monroe St., Detroit 313-962-0225 Orchid Thai has one surprise in store: spice levels higher than you might expect at a mostly lunch restaurant for downtown workers (it’s near Compuware, hard by the Hard Rock Café and Jimmy Johns). Though the menu goes to great pains to describe five fire levels, from "First-Timer,…
Hometown heroics
When Detroiters last caught native daughter Alex Winston, it was likely as trombonist and singer for the sprawling, eclectic band the JSB Squad. (Or as a teenager fronting a band with Ann Arborites Chris and Drew Peters supporting Ted Nugent!) But funny things happened on the way to hometown heroics for this classically trained 23-year-old:…
Crazy tolerance for guns
… nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places … or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms. —U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, June…
Friday night lights
This past Friday night, the Wonder Twins braved the snow and headed out to the Detroit Institute of Arts to check out the Juliets as part of the museum’s "Friday Night Live!" music series. An outstanding local band in the DIA’s breathtaking Rivera Court? Yes, please. Laura: The last time I was at the DIA,…
Spun
FRIGHT FROM THE BINS Glenn Lewis It’s Not Fair (2002) It’s Not Fair: Let’s list the reasons for Glenn Lewis’ feelings of unhappiness and inequity posed by us but unfairly attributed to Glenn himself: 1) "According to Wikipedia, Stevie Wonder is my biggest influence and yet I’m cursed with sounding exactly like him. If I…
Encore for Encore!
It’s simple: If you’re into music and you’ve stepped foot in southeast Michigan, you know about Encore Recordings. The Ann Arbor store’s selection is one of the biggest and best in the state, er, country. Hell, Rolling Stone even rated it recently as the seventh best used-record store in the United States. Its cramped, floor-to-ceiling…
Lubec – Nothing is Enough
Lubec – Nothing is Enough Crash Avenue The debut EP from this Richmond quartet is one of the more distinctive shoegaze retreads heard lately. At times, it could be a transmission from the late ’80s; the giveaway is the gleefully amateurish sound quality, with enough blown-out hiss for three Loveless sequels. An abandoned silo did…
Food Stuff
Car talk — The Auto Show is on again, which puts downtown Detroit’s restaurants in the global spotlight for a week. (See our generous listings in our Short Order section.) Though it’s not really located downtown, the Whitney wants you to motor by. They’ll have a special event on the night of the Auto Show…
Up for auction: Historic Baker’s Keyboard; asking $450,000
Long in the news for its financial woes*, Baker’s Keyboard Lounge faces a bankruptcy sale at the end of the month. Here are some details from Friedman Real Estate Group, Inc., based in Farmington Hills, which is handling the sale: World’s oldest jazz club. Well known establishment. Possible expansion. Owner retiring. Building, business, inventory, liquor…
The secret equation: 33+45=78 rpm
We set it aside when it first came in, but we just got around to reading in its entirety a six-page letter (five pages on 11-inch-by-17-inch sheets, a sixth on 8 1/2-by-11, all front and back, annotated and illustrated, no less) from one Dennis A. Lambiris, written in response to our November Music Issue with…
Call to laughter: The guys behind ‘The Ed & Moe Show’
A SAMPLE OF ED & MOE’S ANTICS There’s a new comedy web series starring two Dearborn twentysomethings — one a Muslim Arab-American and the other an Irish Catholic — who while away their days playing video games, shopping at the mall, and driving up and down Warren Avenue. If this seems to be an unusual…
Mike Posner Hosts DJ GQ’s Juice Mixtape
Perhaps Southfield, Michigan’s most popular music export of all time, Mike Posner, had a banner 2010. He not only became a household name among listeners of pop radio all across the country (a huge accomplishment) but he also closed out the year by performing on Dick Clark’s annual New Year’s Eve show live. Now that…
Danny Brown Interview on FADER TV
Here’s an interview that Detroit rapper Danny Brown did with the folks at FADER magazine during CMJ in New York this past October. The interview should’ve come out awhile ago but publications are on tight budgets and when you’ve only got one person handling video, things take awhile. Nonetheless, Danny was completely himself chatting about…
