Cover Story
Charting Orion
The Many Derivations of punk will erupt this weekend as Orion Music + More descends onto Belle Isle. The Metallica-created music festival boasts a wide range of raucous acts, including The Red Hot Chili Peppers and the Detroit band Battlecross. Happenstance being what it is, Detroit will also witness dueling Black Flags: Flag, fronted by…
City Slang: Deadstring Brothers at Imperial
To promote the recently released album Cannery Row, outlaw country gents the Deadstring Brothers will be performing at Imperial (22828 Woodward, Ferndale) on Tuesday, June 25. They say, “On April 9, Deadstring Brothers released Cannery Row, their fifth Bloodshot Records album. The Nashville-by-way-of-Detroit group features current/former members of Whitey Morgan and the 78s, Ryan Adams’…
City Slang: From Hell and Heresy
Detroit hardcore crew From Hell releases its Heresy album via Paper+Plastick Records on June 25. According to a press release, the record is “Of the heaviest caliber blackened D-beat power violence using unique atmospheric valleys within songs that carry a somber, bleak feeling right to the next wave of vehement bludgeoning. Their sound captures the…
For Dinner Tonight: Veggie Mexican Lasagna
For Dinner Tonight: Veggie Mexican Lasagna A unique twist on the concept of lasagna, traditionally multiple layers of cheese, noodles and sauce is Mexican lasagna, which isn’t really lasagna at all, but the layering concept is the same. In place of noodles is tortilla; no ricotta or tomato sauce, either. This dish is quick, easily…
City Slang: Metallica talks Detroit
Rob Trujillo, bassist with Metallica, spoke to City Slang this week on the subject of this coming weekend’s Orion Fest. It seems the former Suicidal Tendencies man is a big fan of our glorious region. This is what he said: We’re so excited to have OrionFest in Detroit. What are your memories of playing in…
The Uncluded–Tonight in Detroit
This is my favorite song of the month! For what that’s worth, anyhow, by quantification in our era of Internet-wrung attention spans and our endemic wait, did you hear about this shit-yet?-culture-kaleidoscope of ever streaming songs and retweeted tunes. Formidably wordy rap over crisp, cordial lo-fi baroque-pop – Aesop Rock + Kimya Dawson (of Moldy Peaches…
The Hand In The Ocean – Tree/Forts – 6/15
Like buried circuits buzzing underneath the streets…. Hand In The Ocean release Tree/Forts – 6/15 on Timber Records with: Flint Eastwood / Gun Lake / Greater Alexander – at the Berkley Front (3087 W. 12 Mile rd.) Three men, one acoustic guitar, one banjo… It’s clear from the outset of Tree/Forts that the three musicians who have…
Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Text
Q: Yesterday when I came back from lunch, my emails were super tiny. Everything else was the same, but the text is so small I can barely read it. I tried to find a menu or button, but I couldn’t find anything. I’m using Outlook 2003 on Windows XP. Help! A: Most likely you accidently reduced the…
Films In the Cannes
Year in and year out, Cannes, a small city on the French Riviera, becomes the biggest tease on the film calendar. The stars and the parties are grand spectacles, sure, but it’s the movies that really matter. Despite the hype that immediately builds up around them as each screening happens, it’s months before we get…
Mai’s Authentic Thai Cuisine
Mai’s Authentic Thai Cuisine 6060 12 Mile Rd., Warren 586-751-1409 There once was a man with a dream. It wasn’t the kind of dream that would change the world, but it was a dream nonetheless — a dream that could only be realized at Mai’s Authentic Thai Cuisine in Warren, because that’s the only…
Letters to the Editor
Money Talks, Jack A reader from Detroit commented, via email, about Jack Lessenberry’s political fealty [“Unpleasant Truths, May 29-June 4, 2013; Vol. 33, Issue No. 33]. Dear Editor: If we all went by Jack Lessenberry’s logic [from] his most recent article, Ron Paul would be in the oval office today. We all…
DJ Coffee in the House
Next time you’re downtown walking along Griswold Street, and a hankering for coffee hits you, an establishment called the “Grind” might seem a fitting place to stop — if you want a lap dance with your latte; instead look across the street and find Urban Bean Co. Located on Griswold and Grand River — across…
For Detroit, For Valor
Orion Music + More, a festival organized by Metallica — arguably the biggest heavy metal band in the world — is coming to Detroit this weekend; however, it’s not only a metal-fest. In addition to bands like the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Deftones, Infectious Grooves and, of course, the headliners, the bill also features the…
Keith Morris and his Black Flag band carry the punk banner high
There aren’t many people who can lay claim to having a front row seat at the birth of American hardcore, but Keith Morris is one of them. If there was a pantheon of early 1980s American punk, then Morris would surely be in it — along with Jello Biafra, Ian MacKaye and Glenn Danzig. Though…
Phantasmagoria
Critics get preoccupied with dissecting heavily electronic-based music albums. ( “What equipment are they using?” “What effects?” “How many overlaying tracks are on their laptop’s protocols?” “Or are they using Ableton?”) With that said, you’ll drive yourself crazy catching all the various tones, timbres, samples and sounds swarming throughout Phantasmagoria’s sublime (and sometimes dizzying) second…
Savage Love
Q: I love my husband of 20 years, but our sexual differences are putting a strain on our marriage. Ten years ago, he asked me to talk dirty to him about having sex with other men. It has progressed to him wanting to be a cuckold. I only want to be with him, but he…
Colombian Labor Pains
Looking for an answer to that question, News Hits has come to the home of Frank Hammer, a retired UAW international representative, former local president and longtime progressive activist. Hammer set up a three-way interview, via Skype, and one of the participants is Jorge Parra, a former assembly line worker at General Motors’ plant outside…
Former MT Culture Editor is Remembered Fondly
As news of Sarah Klein’s death spread last week, both divergence and convergence could be found in many of the responses from those touched by her loss. Klein, 36, was a passenger in a red Honda coupe driven by her husband, Raul “Bones” Padilla, 43, when the car was involved in a collision with a party…
Whole Foods Opens in Midtown
In the media, the notion that Detroit proper is a “food desert” has been — perhaps unfairly — a long-held view. There are no major grocery chains left inside the city limits, they say, and vast swaths of the city have limited access to nutritious food options. Even if the statistics support that belief —…
Mackinac Island Follies
MACKINAC ISLAND, Mich. – Rick Snyder is, without a doubt, the most thoroughly business-oriented governor in the modern history of this state. Without even trying, he talks like some sort of an executive trainer brought in to fire up the sales staff. “Government? What’s the role of government? Not to spend money. It’s to give…
DIA Fire Sale
The usually self-assured know-it-alls here at the Hits had a rare moment of self-doubt last week when we saw what turned out to be a bombshell of a statement from Detroit Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr’s office. “While there is no plan to sell any assets, it is possible that the city’s creditors could demand the…
Food Stuff
A-Square Deal — Have you wanted to dive into Ann Arbor’s plethora of restaurants but been intimidated by the check? Fear not, wary diner! June 9-14 is Ann Arbor Restaurant Week, when a bevy of Ann Arbor restaurants offer $15 lunch menus and fixed-price three-course dinners for $28. Some restaurants will even offer two-for-one deals.…
Bending the Rules Has Failed Detroit
Bending the Rules Has Failed Us ACCOUNTANT, MAYORAL CANDIDATE and seeming perennial loser Tom Barrow (he’s lost three mayoral bids and a couple of congressional primaries — not to mention having served 18 months for a federal tax evasion conviction) actually has a point in his effort to keep mayoral candidate Mike Duggan off…
Orion Music + More
ChadSmith, Red Hot Chili Peppers Smith spent most of his childhood in Bloomfield Hills, and he looks back on the time affectionately, telling us, “My fond memories are playing with Toby Redd in 1984-88 at all the bars and clubs. Three sets a night, six nights a week. I loved it so much. That’s how…
City Slang: Temple of Void rises
A new band called Temple of Void, featuring members of Hellmouth, Acid Witch, Knife, and Feisty Cadavers, has a Bandcamp page here. The band, which plays a kinda doomy death metal, plays Smalls on Thursday, July 18 with Beast in the Field, Writhing, and Konkeror. Click here to join the City Slang Turntable community!!! Follow…
