Fighting the power
Thirty years ago, there was hope Detroit was poised for a comeback. The population had fallen, but at 1,203,339 people, we were still the nation’s sixth largest city. Times were tough, but there was hope. Chrysler had loan guarantees from the government and was about to introduce the K-car, the vehicle on which the corporation…
Things you learn here
In the spring of 1985, I had just returned to Detroit after a couple of months traveling in Mexico and Guatemala — with current Metro Times editor W. Kim Heron. I needed a job and checked out the want ads in Metro Times. The paper had been around a few years and some of my…
Motor City Rides
Downriver kids The HandGrenades are true children of rock ‘n’ roll. In fact, Nick Chevillet’s dad relaxes by taking leisurely 200 mph runs on a skull-emblazoned drag boat. Brothers Andrew and Tom Pawelski’s old man had a band, the Mastertones, that warmed up the Byrds, the Rolling Stones, and yes — Herman’s Hermits. And that’d…
Life after MT
Sometimes the question seems who hasn’t written for Metro Times. Former columnist Kenneth Cockrel Jr. serves on Detroit City Council (after serving as interim mayor). Pistons sideline reporter Eli Zaret had his "Sports with Eli" column in Metro Times’ maiden issue, and progressive talk radio host Peter Werbe shared his radio interviews with us for…
1,500 issues and counting
It seemed as if it would be easy, fun even: Flip through 30 years of Metro Times issues and come up with 30 stories to excerpt that tell the paper’s story. Not necessarily the 30 biggest prize winners. Not necessarily the 30 that had the most impact. Not necessarily the best written. Just 30 that…
Truth out
With an election less than two weeks away, the primary campaign season is hitting overdrive, which means that voters are going to be subjected to all manner of ads from politicians desperate to sway opinions and win votes. One of the inevitable consequences of that desperation will be attempts by candidates and their deep-pocketed allies…
Graveyard shifts
Four people with grim faces walk into the tombstone store. They’ve come here, to Otto Schemansky Sons Monuments on Van Dyke near McNichols, to get a marker for the gravesite of a 7-year-old girl shot and killed by Detroit police in a bungled raid several weeks back. These four, a mess of street manners and…
A doggie bag of wisdom
I wrote my first review for Metro Times in March 1982 during the Reagan recession, when I praised the Cook’s Shop in Windsor for its budget-balancing brochettes. I have been writing reviews on and off over three decades. During that period, legendary and not-so-legendary Detroit restaurants and culinary fads have come and gone, but it…
Couch Trip
A Million in the Morning Decon Inc. As someone who watches an unholy amount of movies, I can attest that all-night viewing marathons are a better idea than they are a reality. My butt numbs and my mind gets soggy after five or six flicks, so I can’t imagine the brain damage endured by the…
Night and Day
WEDNESDAY JULY 21 Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti TALES FROM THE BEDROOM The legend of Ariel Pink should be well known to anyone who flits in experimental indie circles and is familiar with "chillwave," a subgenre that Pink inadvertently spearheaded. For the uninitiated: Pink was a bedroom recording recluse, churning out tunes that reimagined cheesy ’70s…
Altered states
"… the smallest idea is a resilient virus, it can grow to define or destroy you." — Cobb from Christopher Nolan’s Inception Puzzle boxes and psychological defect are Christopher Nolan’s stock and trade. From Memento to The Prestige to The Dark Knight, the writer-director has cleverly constructed and explored an ongoing labyrinth of intellectual and thematic…
Food Stuff
GLOBAL VINES — MT readers’ best liquor and wine store in Macomb County for 2010 — Champane’s Wine Cellars — sets its sights on summertime vino at its Backyard Summer Wine Tasting on Thursday, July 22. The program runs from 6-7:30 p.m. and costs $10 for one or $15 for two. Wines such as Torrontes…
Upper crusty
Last February, the Tearoom at the Eleanor and Edsel Ford estate at Gaukler Point on Lake St. Clair in Grosse Pointe Shores became the Cotswold Café. In May, armed with a tavern license, the café began serving dinner on the weekends. Cotswold, however, applies more directly to the Albert Kahn-designed living quarters, outbuildings and dramatic…
Sweats, hugs, and rock ‘n’ roll
Laura: It is no secret that New Grenada are one of my favorite bands in Detroit. D’Anne: No, this isn’t a secret. You are totally gay for them. I attribute this to your love for 1990’s indie rock. Laura: No doubt about it. I readily accept the fact that I’ll always love the ’90s. Well,…
Unmarried with children
Director Lisa Cholodenko’s The Kids are All Right is an exceptional film that pulls off the trick of making the ordinary extraordinary by spinning a tale of a wholly nontraditional family into something utterly universal. Nic (Bening) and Jules (Moore) are a longtime L.A. couple in the midst of a midlife sweatpants malaise. They are…
No cover-ups
"I want to talk to someone about your cover" is a call we get from time to time. Sometimes it’s an inquiry about how to get a copy to frame. Sometimes it’s an earful of expletives. And sometimes we have both reactions to the same cover. Here’s a sampling of them — a testament to…
Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam
Life imitates art. Surely few know that better than author Michael Muhammed Knight. Raised Irish-Catholic, Knight was but a teen when he embarked on a soul-searching trip to Pakistan to make sense of his busted, abusive home life. He converted to Islam and, in 2003, wrote and published the book Taqwacore, whose title combines the…
Porn freak lies
Q: I was recently told that I am being puritanical and self-righteous because I can’t get over the fact that my partner spends a good deal of time seeking out pictures of very young girls to masturbate to. Nothing illegal, he says, but still … He admits to having a 20-year-plus addiction to porn, and…
P-Star Rising
Are you ready for an incisive, gritty and heartbreaking movie about the career of a pre-teen girl rapper? Didn’t think I was either, but P-Star Rising is as engrossing and inspiring as its kickass heroine, proving that big surprises can come in unassuming packages. The film follows the bumpy four-year ascendancy of young Priscilla "P-Star"…
Metro Retro
25 years ago in Metro Times: In May, the FBI and New Orleans Police Department foil an assassination plot by Sikh militants against two Indian government officials. They discover that the Sikhs hired some professional help: two mercenaries trained in Grosse Pointe by the Michigan branch of the Mercenary Association. The Mercenary Association, which also…
Sealed with a kick
Man, do we get mail. It sometimes peaks around 10,000 words of correspondence a week. It comes from all quarters, geographically, politically and demographically: outraged right-wingers, irritated greens, furious prudes, unhappy anarchists, appalled belly dancers, baffling weirdoes or simply people angry whenever we mention corn syrup! We get people writing us on the back of…
