Cover Story
Jolly good fellows
A former General Motor line worker who writes of lives against a backdrop of industrial din. A jazz trumpeter who’s played behind the likes of Tony Bennett. An art historian who is exploring ways African-Americans have represented their culture and their struggles. A master of the kanun (a 76-string Middle Eastern harp) and a master…
Terrance Simien and the Zydeco Experience – 7.27.12 (PJ’s Lager House)
P.J. Ryder’s displayed a reverence for New Orleans’ Cajun and Creole culture through the aesthetic ambiance affected in his reboot of the hallowed rock club known as the Lager House, spiced with hosting Mardis Gras parties and showcasing zesty southern fare (blackened catfish and spicy chicken andouille gumbo) on the kitchen’s menu. With more than four years…
City Slang: Detroit Jazz Festival needs volunteers
Now that the Concert of Colors, along with Don Was’s Detroit Jazz Jam, is over for another year, jazz fans can look ahead to this year’s Jazz Festival, held Labor Day Weekend. “Now in its 33rd year, the festival takes place over several city blocks in downtown Detroit – from Hart Plaza to Campus Martius…
Xmas in July -tonight – with the Ashleys
More than halfway through the interview, Tom demands: “don’t make us look like asses ” Tom’s got a pipe dream of doing something Andy Kaufman-esque, here. Where he writes a letter to the editor demanding a retraction of the lies printed in this article suggesting that they are, in fact, asses, and then perhaps building…
City Slang: The Dirtbombs to play ATP
Detroit’s own Dirtbombs will perform at the All Tomorrow’s Parties Festival in New York on September 21-23. This year, the festival is curated by Afghan Whigs man Greg Dulli, and his band are the headliners at the Pier 36 venue in Manhattan. Besides the Dirtbombs and the Whigs, other bands set to perform include Philip…
City Slang: VetFest tonight
Saturday night sees the annual VetFest take place at the Timber Wolf Tavern in Redford. The action starts with the National Anthem courtesy of Jennifer Nasto at 4 p.m. Cover is $5 minimum, though you can decide what to pay. It’s all for the veterans. Other acts performing over the course of the afternoon and…
This weekend’s hit list
Friday Pig & Whiskey Downtown Ferndale, Free Download the 3-day entertainment schedule here Join Metro Times and The Woodward Avenue Brewers (WAB) for a weekend full of outdoor fun in downtown Ferndale July 13th-15th. Pig & Whiskey is free to attend and all ages are welcome! Attendees will enjoy the flavorful fare from SE Michigan’s…
City Slang: Damn Yankees in Bangor
Detroit fans of Ted Nugent, plus Chicago fans of Styx, have a right to feel slightly aggrieved, as the two bands waited until the final night of the Midwest Rock ‘n’ Roll Express tour in Bangor before getting onstage together to perform the Damn Yankees’ “Coming of Age”. I know that I was hoping for…
7.21.12 – Found Sound – Other Angels – BoG/JQ/SP/CwK – …it’s all happening
The road’s paved, foundation laid, the house has got a roof and the sound system’s boosted. The thing’s running itself, bands-everywhere – you can hear it. It’s gotten to where I can stumble with a whimsy of somewhat cocky sureness that wherever I crash will be hosting something of sonic interest at that particular moment,…
MT Drinks x Design with artist Carl Nielbock
This evening, metro Detroiters will have a rare opportunity to meet with and see the work of one of the city’s more interesting artists — and residents — Carl A. Nielbock, head honcho at C.A.N. Art Handworks, Inc. Nielbock’s story is so unusual, and dovetails so neatly with the history of his adopted hometown, it merits…
The Sights Tour Diary Entry No. 21: Mohegan Sun, Dude. Mohegan Sun.
I was very excited to play Sunday night’s club gig at Union Hall in Brooklyn. The promoter, Lee Greenfeld, is an honest man, and it is always nice to play for honest bookers. The room is tiny, and holds about 100. It was a perfect night after dealing with fools in Philly. We played for…
City Slang: Tesco Fest at the Stick
The first annual Tesco Fest, named after hardcore punks the Meatmen frontman Tesco Vee, will take place at the Magic Stick in Detroit on August 18. Tickets are $15/$17, it’s an all ages show, and the actions starts at 8 p.m. A killer bill has been put together featuring headliners the Meatmen, plus hardcore legends…
See Kresge fellows in action
The 24 winners of the 2012 Kresge Arts fellowships are a talented bunch: poets, playwrights, essayists, musicians in a variety of genres. They have earned their $25,000 each by proving to be innovative and creative. Some of that creativity has spilled over from our cover story (“Jolly Good Fellows”) into these clips. Enjoy! Xiao Dong…
City Slang: Nugent drummer drunk-drives a golf cart
Ted Nugent’s drummer Mick Brown is in trouble in Bangor, Maine, after police pulled him in for driving drunk on a golf cart stolen from a concert venue. According to Classic Rock magazine, Brown had grabbed the cart and was driving it recklessly on a footpath. When police tried to stop him, Brown sped up…
Insanity Fair
Former U.S. Rep. Thaddeus McCotter is a selfish, egocentric jackass. Want proof? Last week he abruptly quit, with six months left to go on his congressional term. True, the Livonia Republican had already managed to destroy his political future, all by himself, and without stealing any money or any sex scandals. Two months ago, everybody…
Hep on hemp
The United States government has cried wolf about cannabis so many times that its credibility on the subject must be at an all-time low. Nowhere is that more apparent than when it comes to hemp. Hemp is a strain of cannabis sativa, but is sort of the nerdish, boring, industrious cousin of the plants people…
Don’t stop believing
There’s a commonly held belief that the ’80s is the decade that doesn’t matter — the disposable years that gave us little more than consumerism. Reaganomics, big hair and unnatural neon clothing colors, as well as MTV and the growth of corporate culture in music that led to bland, radio-friendly dross. To be fair, the…
50 shades of obsession
Bunch of Amateurs: A Search for the American Character Jack Hitt Crown Publishers, $26, 288 pp. From Benjamin Franklin’s discovery of electricity with a children’s toy to biohackers trying to create new forms of life in their garages, America is and has always been a nation defined by the "self-invented crank wandering off to the…
Lebanese cool
Gemmayze 310 S. Main St., Royal Oak; 248-399-4900 gemmayzemichigan.com Handicap accessible Entrées: $17-$30 Gemmayze [je-MAY-zee] calls itself "a spirited restaurant," and it is. It serves wine, beer, house-made sangría and cocktails, thus distinguishing itself from most Lebanese places, and it has an assured, cool ambience that’s undeniably attractive. It’s named after Beirut’s old bohemian quarter,…
Beyond the prison gates
Life After Murder by Nancy Mullane Public Affairs, $26, 384 pp Settling in at an Emeryville, Calif., seafood restaurant for lunch, two friends consult their menus. For the person on one side of the table, the selection is typical, the dishes come as no surprise. For the person on the other side of the table,…
Don Was’ next challenge
Known as he is now for a couple of the best ears in the music business, it’s no surprise that that the teenage Don Was was a fan of Blue Note records in the 1960s. It was inarguably one of the best jazz labels, arguably the best. The label that had introduced Monk, Jimmy Smith’s…
10 x E6
Dick Valentine admits he was beginning to feel like a shark — that if he stopped moving he might die. After releasing eight albums in just nine years, each an elegantly agitated exploration of some nook or cranny in the craggy caves of "synth-rock," the Brooklyn-based (Detroit-bred) singer-songwriter and his band, the Electric Six, were…
Snyder says no
Last week, as this rag went to press before the Fourth of July holiday, it appeared that Gov. Rick Snyder was poised to sign three pieces of legislation that critics denounced as "voter suppression" bills. The fact that such legislation is part of the GOP’s national strategy to limit the turnout of left-leaning voters come…
Phantasmagoria
With their fresh, underage faces gracing the sun-splashed cover of MT’s 2011 Blowout issue, Phantasmagoria seemed to signal a new freshman class in Detroit’s music school. They set out to make "electro" sound "earthier," teasing warmer ambience with their synthesizers and tapping bongos and timbales across motherboards and oscillators. Their computers have "hearts of gold,"…
Powerslave!
The Drunk Diet: How I Lost 40 Pounds … Wasted by Lüc Carl St. Martin’s Press, $25.99, 244 pp. A quick word of warning: Female readers may have limited interest in The Drunk Diet, given author Lüc Carl’s penchant for a little locker room talk — as well as casual comparisons of women to…
Not how she rolls
Q: I’m a smart, professional woman in my mid-30s who dates the same. I also happen to use a wheelchair; I was diagnosed shortly after my first birthday with a motor neuron disease. I have about as much physical strength as a quadriplegic but I have full sensation. (Boy howdy, do I!) I am careful…
Letters to the Editor
Spill, Baby, Spill Curt Guyette’s well-done article on the tar sand spill two years ago near Kalamazoo ("Crude awakening," June 27) is only the middle part of the tar sand catastrophe. The Alberta tar sand deposits are considered the second largest in the world next to Saudi Arabia. The deposits underlay an area of the…
Food Stuff
A warm-up Founded in 1994, the Great Lakes Coffee Roasting Company celebrated the grand opening of its first location in Detroit last week. The mid-city location is at Woodward and Alexandrine, and serves organic, seasonal and fair-trade coffees; breakfast fare and outdoor seating are also available. Get your caffeine fix 7 a.m.-4 p.m Monday and…
City Slang: Weekly music review roundup
Remember – if you send it, it will get reviewed. That’s the City Slang promise. It doesn’t matter what genre the music is – as long as it has a Metro Detroit connection, it’ll get in. Preferably, we’d like to concentrate on new releases but, while we’re getting warmed up here, feel free to send…
To Rome With Love
>To Rome With Love C- There is something cosmically unjust about a universe that allows Woody Allen to attract a budget and endless parade of A-list actors to whatever half-baked idea he wants to throw at the screen — while Albert Brooks continues to scrape and scramble to launch his next project. It’s not that…
