Outta the funpark?
A glimpse into the ever-changing world of the Residents….
An ‘absolutely’ visual banquet
Her sentences seemed to have the cadence of irregular breathing, so I needed to adjust my reading process, prepare for either the random parenthetical thought or for a sudden stop, a caesura, in midclause. Once I became pleasurably lost in the narrative, though, I realized that first-time novelist Lynn Crawford’s syntax had less to do…
Nov. 6-12, 2002
WED • ART Milagros — Soothingly spiritual and eternal, the mysteries of the universe are represented at Detroit’s CPOP. The gallery will be displaying a trinity of exhibits as part of their new show, "Milagros." ("Miracles" in Spanish.) Old World masters, contemporary Latin artist, Daniel Martin Diaz and icons from Lithuania comprise this uniquely transcendent…
Eastern Terrace
What if Big Star hadn’t been Beatles buffs, but was instead a bunch of acid-gobblers making pan-fried tunage a la Spacemen 3? Or if Pavement had been young soul disciples enamored of classic Motown and Stax-Volt platters instead of lo-fi mavens operating under severe budgetary constraints? Or if nutjob Julian Cope had nurtured a serious…
This cold house
No furnace. No toilet. No hot water. The city seems powerless to stop problem landlords….
Tommy Rivers and the Raw Ramps
Coming from seemingly out of nowhere, Atlanta’s Tommy Rivers and the Raw Ramps blast forth with nearly an album’s worth of 3-minute, melancholy trash-pop gems which would fit nicely in your record collection were it filled with contemporary underground balladeers such as the Bounty Hunters, Dogs d’Amour, the Chamber Strings, as well as old Bowie,…
Stereotype shot down
I just knew the sniper was white. After all, black folks don’t make good serial killers. We’re not wired that way. At least that’s what I used to think. Oh, sure, we’re liable to go off the handle once in a while. That’s nothing new. The local news is full of violent black-on-black crime. But…
Hydraulic Groove
Despite the best efforts of blues purists (who sometimes tend to view musical evolution as a fate worse than death), the blues continues to shift its sonic shape. As with all other American musical art forms, it really doesn’t have much choice. Blues has achieved such a status and appeal (well-deserved, hard-fought, well-earned) that it…
And away we Go
They know the gig. It’s the secret ingredient in the old family recipe. Four years have passed — it’s time to lift the lid and take a peek. Since inception, the Go have been noticed. They’ve proudly sported boyishly handsome mugs, hip-swaying stage performances and primeval guitar riffs — but since the recording of their…
Steaking a claim
Diners will find steaks of one grade only — prime, the most expensive and fattiest — plus beef in other forms, like short ribs, veal chops and calf’s liver, and lots of lobster. Chicken with french fries is $18, and it goes up from there, to $39 for a porterhouse or $20 per pound for…
Science of pleasure
Painting in the last 100 years has opened the perceptual doors so wide that it’s hard to look at image-making today without feeling modernism’s pervasive spell. Cubism, futurism, surrealism, abstraction — each brought us a new kind of “reality,” a way of seeing that the conventional and habitual made us ignore. Veteran Detroit painter Allie…
Letters to the Editor
Disrespecting tha D I can’t believe the nerve of Metro Times selling out the image of Detroit by putting Eminem on the cover; of all things he’s pointing the finger at Eight Mile Road which he doesn’t even come from (Metro Times, Oct. 30-Nov. 5). How much did these people get paid to glorify that…
Gothic libidos
In her first woman’s story since the police thriller Blue Steel a decade ago, director Kathryn Bigelow pieces together two tragedies separated by centuries, telling their interlocking stories in pictures that are sometimes grim and frankly horrific — with Sarah Polley, Catherine McCormick and Sean Penn.
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): To get what you want in the coming week, you’ll have to be more generous and imaginative. These activities could help. 1) Send a letter expressing your admiration to a person whose good works fascinate you. 2) Dream up 20 new names for God, using ice cream flavors and DJ names…
Déclassé act
If News Hits were handing out grades, we’d have to give Detroit City Council member Sharon McPhail a B-minus for her political performance at Dominican High School and Academy last week. Students at the all-girl Catholic high school on Detroit’s east side were recently the focus of a WDIV-TV Channel 4 story about how appalled…
Roger Dodger
Roger is an asshole. His nephew Nick doesn’t know this when he unexpectedly shows up asking for help with women in this educational buddy flick. Roger’s theories on the obtainment of women and director Dylan Kidd’s script are both of the so-crazy-that-they-might-actually-work variety — with Isabella Rossellini.
‘Beautiful word’ power
Kaleema Hasan makes good on the meaning of her name….
Mushroom nation
The battle over records of Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy powwows has grabbed the largest headlines, but it’s only one in a series of depressing skirmishes where the Bush administration is strangling the public’s right to learn exactly what our government is up to (or, more accurately, down to). Examples are cataloged on the Web…
Red Beard
This amazing last collaboration (1965) between director Akira Kurosawa and actor Toshiro Mifune is a three-hour super-soap opera about the emotional education of a callow young doctor under the tutelage of a gruff older one, set in a slum clinic in 19th century Japan. There’s enough tragedy here – some of it devastating — for…
The ring’s the thing
Q: I was wondering if there is any advice you can give for wearing wedding bands. My boyfriend and I are bisexual, masculine, and not ready to publicly display our sexual orientation. A few months ago we decided to bind our commitment to one another by purchasing a set of wedding bands. The rings are…
Notes from the underground
News Hits recently came upon a new publication that we fully expect will soon be putting a serious dent in circulation over at the Freep and Snews, not to mention the rag being held in your own sweaty paws this very moment. All it needs to hit the big time are some advertisers and a…
Merci Pour le Chocolat
This typical Claude Chabrol film is a suspense story with the suspense de-emphasized, an elegantly dark look at evil intruding into a world of bourgeois manners and mannerisms, less a whodunnit than a why-did-they-do-it, with the answer ultimately withheld — with Isabelle Huppert.
The King and I
Sometimes, when conducting creative writing workshops, I get to have conversations with young people about hip-hop. Depending on their age, they often have a difficult time remembering legendary rap groups like Run-D.M.C. At that point, in my mind, they demote themselves from hip-hop fans to rap fans because they lack the history of hip-hop culture.…
Run free
News Hits has been putting on a few pounds lately. We kid ourselves about going on a diet. But that is as likely to happen as it is for George Dubya to give Saddam Hussein a wet kiss. It’s not going to get any easier shedding the blubber with Thanksgiving and other stuff-your-face holidays around…
The Santa Clause Two
Is it the perfectly rounded snowballs, or maybe the way the flakes don’t melt when they hit the skin? Whatever the reasons, SC2 is an autopilot Hollywood concoction lacking in imagination and authentic Christmas spirit, yet it’s geared towards an audience full of masters of both — with Tim Allen.
Brother sin, sister loon
Tom Walmsley’s Blood is a lost highway of incest and drugs….
Brush with decay
The Brush Park district is getting a second chance thanks to organizations that have spent millions of dollars on renovation and new construction in the area. In the mid-1800s, Brush Park was considered très chic, with such Detroit notables as J.L. Hudson and David Whitney calling this area along Woodward Avenue home. Decline began occurring…
I Spy
This film is overloaded with self-destruct modes, override codes and cocky Eddie Murphyisms discharged with machine-gun relentlessness. It’s too bad Owen Wilson’s refreshing, soft-spoken charm finds itself smothered by lame dialogue and Murphy’s in-your-face whining.
Pssst, they still want a war
Well, the elections are over and, as always, everything came out exactly as I thought it would, with the exception of a couple seats in the Oklahoma Legislature. Actually, Metro Times goes to press on Monday night, so I don’t know any of the election results as I write this. In any event, once we’re…
Beyond basketball and diaries
Hipster legend Jim Carroll comes clean with a new novel….
Myopic Americans
We have met the enemy … and he is us….
I want to be your dog
At first glance, it seems we might be witnessing the pages of some couture magazine sprung to life — or, rather, larger-than-life. But instead of the usual cadre of long-limbed, smoky-eyed women lounging in decadently furnished rooms, we encounter images of male power, vanity and eroticism. Using amplified detail, Dog, by Swedish video artist Annika…
Abandoned Shelter of the Week
The Brush Park district is getting a second chance thanks to organizations that have spent millions of dollars on renovation and new construction in the area. In the mid-1800s, Brush Park was considered très chic, with such Detroit notables as J.L. Hudson and David Whitney calling this area along Woodward Avenue home. Decline began occurring…
Skin deep
It’s a chilly October evening in 1983 at Ferndale High School. Students crowd into the auditorium. Some are curious. Others don’t have anything better to do. At the front of the stage in floor-length gowns stand five nervous seniors, each hoping to be crowned homecoming queen. The first three runners-up are announced. It’s down to…
Burnt orange heresy
In NME this week, (not the Detroit issue, I might add): A half-page article, “White Stripes Appear on Right-Winger’s Talk Show” referring to their “SNL” appearance with John McCain, Republican senator from somewhere; a review of the Electroclash tour at the Majestic in Detroit, celebrating Peaches’ cry of “Detroit Fuck City” — as it should…
Oh, Christ
Future Bible Hero Stephin Merritt talks clown suits and Magnetic Fields….
The Complete Savoy Recordings
Charlie Parker The Complete Live Performances on Savoy Savoy In jazz, “cool” as a full-fledged style starts with tenor saxophonist Lester Young. Young was a natural contrarian, constitutionally incapable of playing the obvious lick in the obvious manner, a natural innovator whose personal style plugged into the music’s historical continuum. Sliding over bar lines, extending…
