What Am I Gonna Tell Your Mom?
Back in March, local music video mavens Single Barrel Detroit decided that they really wanted to get your attention. And give it to local indie-rock quintet Prussia. With a Kickstarter campaign aimed at financing the best possible cinematic production (to acquire stellar equipment and an ideal location), SBD set out to produce an epic “media kit”…
City Slang: Stewart Francke to play Trinity House
Detroit singer / songwriter Stewart Francke has announced that he is to play the Trinity House in Livonia on October 21. A press release said that, “Stewart Francke’s intrepid band of Detroit rocking soul men and women will invade the intimate confines of the Trinity House on Friday, October 21, 2011. TH is located at…
City Slang: Head On in Hamtown
Hell of a night in Hamtramck last night. Hell of a night. For those that attended and, therefore, played a part in launching The Stooges: Head On, I am eternally grateful. To the bands that played, thanks for bringing your A-game. Sharky & the Habit kicked the whole thing off in style and with a…
City Slang: Open house at the School of Rock
Of course, today is the launch of my Stooges book, Head On from 9 p.m. at the New Dodge in Hamtramck. I know you’ll all be there. Before that though, get over to the School of Rock in St. Clair Shores from 1 until 5 p.m. for an open house. There will be food and…
Fucked Up, Wavves hit the Magic Stick
There’s just some things that will never make sense in life. For example, just how in the world Nathan Williams and his surf-rock band Wavves have managed to sustain themselves playing what had to be the sickest joke of a music set brought upon my ears in a long time. It’s fucked up – pun…
City Slang: Stooges book release in Hamtramck
On Saturday night, the New Dodge in Hamtramck will host the book release party for The Stooges: Head On by, umm, me. No apologies for the shameless self-promotion. It should be a great night. I’ll be there with books, for those with an interest in the Stooges or the MC5 (the latter the subject of…
Ypsi Fest 2011
Anthony Anonymous calls himself out. “I know it sounds like bull shit when I say that I am excited for all of the bands playing YpsiFest this year,” the shaggy, bearded, wild-eyed, guitar gutting singer of demolition-punk-duo Jehovah’s Witness Protection Program says, “but it’s true.” The incorrigibly enthusiastic Ypsilanti-advocate with a “rock and roll heart” dreamed…
Greider: U.S. political system destabilized, deformed, deteriorating
As of Thursday, journalist William Greider didn’t know for certain exactly what it is he will be saying when he comes to Dearborn on Saturday to speak at a fundraiser for the local branch of the Democratic Socialists of America. He did know two things though: He didn’t want the speech, which will focus on…
50/50
50/50 B+ No one ever said, "What Hollywood needs to do is make more movies about people with cancer." But after watching Jonathan Levine’s (The Wackness) thoughtful, funny and sensitive film, I can say with easy confidence that Hollywood needs to make more cancer movies like 50/50. Loosely based on screenwriter Will Reiser’s own…
Dream House
Dream House C With a topnotch cast and a well-respected pro at the helm, Dream House is a good-looking thriller — and yet the cast refused to promote it, and Universal did just about everything to hide this thing but sweep it under a rug in an attic, screening it only at the very…
City Slang: High Strung bassist writes documentary score
Chad Stocker, bassist with the High Strung, has written the music for a documentary that airs at the Michigan Theater in Ann Arbor this Saturday. The film, Where Soldiers Come From, is from the mind of Heather Courtney. According to the press release, the story is as follows. “Enticed by a $20,000 signing bonus and…
Machine Gun Preacher
Machine Gun Preacher C Yes, even Rambo can find Jesus. Which is convenient when you need to blow away dark-skinned baddies in the name of the Lord. In the final moments of Marc Forster’s Machine Gun Preacher, as the last credits roll, there’s documentary footage of the real-life Sam Childers asking: "If you had…
Life, Above All
Life, Above All B A happy childhood, at least as we imagine it in the West, is a luxury in some corners of the world, where too many children are forced out of the bubble of innocence too soon. This is a point hammered home in this noble but unremittingly bleak South African melodrama…
Indian delights
Krishna Catering & Restaurant 28636 Ford Rd., Garden City 734-513-FOOD (3663) Handicap accessible Entrées: $6.50-$8.50 One of many unpretentious restaurants catering to the west side’s Indian population, Krishna caught my attention because of its Groupon. It’s a bare-bones operation with plasticware, serve-yourself water from a cooler, just eight back-to-back tables and lots of carryout. What’s…
City Slang: “Paradise” revisited
Back in ’89 when Inner City put out the debut Paradise album, barriers were being broken. Techno and, to be honest, all forms of electronic music was still new, and those that did listen to it were part of an underground secret movement that regular people weren’t privy too. And then Inner City came along.…
Filling the hole
Metro Times: You were a kind of a kleptomaniac as a kid. What’s the first thing you’d say to a young sufferer now? Terrence Shulman: I first shoplifted at about age 10 — a piece of candy — around the time my parents were separating. I stumbled into shoplifting a few years later as a…
Recommended recent spins: John Maus; Washed Out
Two scholarly types craft pop throwbacks; it’s not rock ‘n’ roll, but we like it John Maus We Must Become the Pitiless Censors of Ourselves (Ribbon Music) You could be forgiven for not wanting to enjoy John Maus’ music after some particularly eyebrow-raising comments he made about the decline of record shops in America; it’s…
Where Soldiers Come From
Where Soldiers Come From B+ Best friends Cole, Dom and "Bodi" are fairly typical northern Michigan high school seniors, busy indulging in the glories of adolescent summers: bonfires, dances and golden Lake Superior sunsets. The only difference is that these guys aren’t heading for college in the fall, but to combat duty in Afghanistan.…
Quick-Pickin’ ‘N Fun-Strummin’ Home Guitar Course (1973)
Years ago, before he shape-shifted from groggy, over-30 hippie to the king of slowpoke storysingin’, "The Gambler" was a TV pitchman for this two-record gee-tar primer. "Hi, this is Kenny Rogers, and I feel like singing a sad song for those old guitars collecting dust in the closet," his cranky spiel began. It’s only fitting…
Living in the moment
The men of Bear Lake are laid-back, easy-to-talk-to dudes who happen to be extremely musically driven, which makes for an interesting little dichotomy. The quartet is an indie rock band, to be sure, but describing them isn’t easy, mostly because they’ve pushed themselves forward with each of their three albums. Mellow, but able to kick…
Fall without fail
Every fall without fail, TV gives us a handful of what I like to call "mystery" series. It’s a mystery how they ever claimed a spot on the new prime-time schedule over other pilots and some very good series that got canceled the previous season. It’s a mystery how they can be expected to attract…
Wilco – The Whole Love (Anti)
Wilco couldn’t have crafted a stronger refutation to nine years of agreeably fat-and-happy records than the crazed salvo that opens The Whole Love, "Art of Almost." In this instantly disorienting successor to Yankee Hotel Foxtrot’s "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart," Jeff Tweedy sneers with drunken desperation over an ominous wall of sound somewhere…
7-inches of Pleasure
Here are four new singles chipped off the block of Detroit’s Cass Records, run by drummer and current Nashvillian Ben Blackwell. Renowned for scooping up picks of the local litter in garage and psych-rock — the label this year went techno! Moon Pool and Dead Band "Patsy b/w Patsy (Jack Ruby Version)" — Take a…
Great meals off Grand River
$=$5-$10; $$=$10-$25; $$$=$25-$50; $$$$=$50+ FARMINGTON, FARMINGTON HILLS 2Booli Fresh Mediterranean Eats 37610 W. 12 Mile Rd., Farmington Hills; 248-994-0614; 2booli.com; $$: For many diners, the lack of a liquor license is a deal-breaker. Farmington Hills’ 2Booli addresses the problem with not only a full bar but a happy hour that…
Panics, then & now
I’d like to start by saying what a pleasure and a privilege it is to have been alternating in this space for almost a full year with one of my favorite writers, Larry Gabriel, whose column last week was particularly informative and told me everything I wanted to know about what’s been happening in Michigan…
A split in the seam*
Recall this Metro Times cover? Yeah, it’s still haute shit. Inside those pages, we gawked at the work from Detroit’s Femilia Couture. When it came to ready-to-wear fashions, the Femilia label was undoubtedly the freshest thing on the city scene. And the women behind the label, Emily Thornhill and Fotoula Lambros, were an inseparable two-woman…
Cluttered Lives, Empty Souls: Compulsive Stealing, Spending & Hoarding
Cluttered Lives, Empty Souls: Compulsive Stealing, Spending & Hoarding by Terrence Daryl Shulman Infinity Publishing, $24.95, 247 pp Ever been caught stealin’ and wonder why? Ever speculate why you can’t stop blowing every dime you get your hands on? Ever wonder if because you can no longer navigate inside your cluttered home that you…
MT talks to Fotoula Lambros of Fotoula Lambros Design
metrotimes: What’s your fashion influence? lambros: For his presentation I always admired McQueen, and, for her draping, Donna Karan. I’m influenced by the flow of fabric and the possibilities in design. mt; Tell us about Fotoula Lambros Design. lambros: It’s an ecologically conscious, fashion-forward label that focuses on multifunctional garments. Tops and dresses…
The End of Everything
The End of Everything Megan Abbott Reagan Arthur Books, $23.99, 256 pp. It’s summer. 1980s. It’s a middle-class Detroit suburb, perhaps the very same neighborhood where author Megan Abbott grew up. Evie and Lizzie are inseparable, soul twins, the best of friends. They share knowing looks and strawberry lip gloss. They spend muggy nights…
Evolution and the missing ‘o’
I am a 23-year-old female, sexually active for seven years, and I can’t reach climax. I am extremely frustrated. I have a wonderfully patient and helpful partner. He has tried hard to no avail. I can’t even get myself there. I feel like I am broken. My partner and I talk out anything that is…
Rusty Hearts
Rusty Hearts Perfect World Entertainment PC, Mac OS Those who play PC games these days are for the most part easily categorized. In most cases you’re either, A) a die-hard Blizzard junkie whose diet consists of World of Warcraft, Starcraft and, my personal fave, the Diablo franchise; or you’re B) a first-person shooter Call of…
MT talks to Emily Thornhill of Homeslice
Emily Thornhill’s homeslice metrotimes: What’s your fashion influence? EMILY thornhill: Growing up, Calvin Klein. His classic cuts and provocative marketing got me thinking about self-expression through fashion. Today, I look to stylish people on the streets. I study trends around the world and I’m continually inspired by what people are wearing in Detroit.…
Mad as Hell: The Crisis of the 1970s and the Rise of the Populist Right
Mad as Hell: The Crisis of the 1970s and the Rise of the Populist Right by Dominic Sandbrook Knopf, $35; 529 pp. The 1970s are perhaps the most Rodney Dangerfield of recent decades. Many who lived through them hardly remember a thing; others don’t want to. British historian-journalist Dominic Sandbrook takes on the ’70s…
Mastodon – The Hunter (Reprise)
Atlanta metal band Mastodon made its name on sprawling thematic albums that take on subjects that are literary (2004’s breakthrough, Leviathan, retold Moby-Dick with 13-minute prog epics), spacious (wormholes, souls and suicide were all covered in 2009’s Crack the Skye) and perplexing (what was Blood Mountain about again?). Their terrific fifth album, The Hunter, scales…
Lies before your eyes
If you live in Michigan and watch television at all, you have undoubtedly seen the commercial being run by the Detroit International Bridge Co. You know the DIBC — the Manuel "Matty" Moroun-controlled outfit that owns the Ambassador Bridge. It is the same company that illegally took control of a piece of Detroit parkland and…
Crank
Anthrax Worship Music Megaforce 1 star Riffing: Yup. Like ugly meth slams in a singlewide alongside sweaty dudes old enough to know better. Reference points: Anthrax welcomes back poodle-headed (and Dio fetishist) singer Joey Belladonna, who sounds exactly like 1988. The hairy "Revolution Screams" is best and could scare anyone right off…
Letters to the Editor
Double your Dubya Jack Lessenberry has it right ("Lansing’s closet reds," Sept. 6) — almost. The Republicans are Republicans qua Marxist-Leninists: They are functioning in the capacity of Marxist-Leninists, even though that is not, of course, their conscious intent. This has been going on for a long time. Dubya did more to raise consciousness, radicalize…
Tucker and Dale vs. Evil
Tucker and Dale vs. Evil B This probably sounds odd, but it’s refreshing to see some real thought and wit go into a gore-drenched hillbilly slasher film. Of course, to suggest that Tucker and Dale vs. Evil is your run-of-the-mill hillbilly slasher film is to completely misrepresent what director Eli Craig and his savvy…
To hell with the poor
We have reason to celebrate this weekend: Michigan is cutting off welfare payments forever to nearly 30,000 poor children! Good thing. Little bastards are eating too much, and if their growth isn’t properly stunted and they are allowed to survive, they’ll eventually start breeding too. Yes, I know we should castrate them. Back in the…
Undercover brothers
Reggie Carter is tall, and his lanky body cuts a commanding figure walking down the street. He was something of a ladies’ man back in the day, and the black eye patch he wore back then gave him a swashbuckling air. That patch was no tool of seduction. Carter lost his right eye at 4…
Nirvana – Nevermind: Deluxe Edition (UMe)
The most influential album of the past quarter century celebrates its 20th anniversary with several new reissues. The priciest is a four-CD, one-DVD box that includes a different mix of the record plus a complete concert. But most fans will be happy with the two-disc set that tags on B-sides, radio sessions, and some rehearsal…
Food Stuff
Our kind of garden New-fooder Suzanne Vier, owner of her homegrown Simply Suzanne granola company, has helped found a new Detroit institution: a beer garden. They’ve taken a vacant parcel of land in Detroit’s West Village and, for the next four Sundays, will turn it into a European-style venue for enjoying Michigan craft beer. It’s…
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…
MSM slow to pick up on Occupy Wall Street
If you’ve been watching mainstream TV news or reading mainstream newspapers, chances are you’re not aware that protesters in New York have been marching, speaking and waving signs against Wall Street. Dubbed “Occupy Wall Street,” the action has drawn about 1,000 people, who are occupying a park in lower Manhattan. But if you’ve been using…
