BEST OF ORLANDO® NOMINATION BALLOT IS OPEN THROUGH MAY 6!

Feb 25 – Mar 3, 1998

Feb 25 - Mar 3, 1998 / Vol. 14 / No. 8

Slamming with Ammerman

Dack Cole knew he would be fighting an uphill battle as the lone challenger facing Orlando’s incumbent District 1 Commissioner Don Ammerman. What he was unprepared for were Ammerman’s tactics. First, Ammerman showed up for homeowners’ association meetings with a uniformed police officer who explained Ammerman’s role in beefing up neighborhood patrols. Then, Cole says,…

Lawrence Budd

Messing with Mother Nature

The question is no longer “What’s for dinner?” but “What’s in dinner?” You don’t have to be Oprah Winfrey to be revolted by Mad Cow Disease, E.coli and other exotic contaminants creeping into our food supply, courtesy of the industrialized practices of today’s corporate cowboys. But if you find this worrisome, wait ’til you bite…

Jim Hightower

Lady and the Tramp

Charlie Chaplin’s daughter joins a new generation that finds his flms aimed for more than laughs It’s hard for modern film audiences to think of Charlie Chaplin as anything more than the “Little Tramp” persona he created at the dawn of his film career. Even in silhouette, the figure in baggy pants, oversized shoes, tight…

Matt Kelemen

A true collaboration of words and music

Maya Angelou, with Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson, Disney-MGM studios, February 27, 1998 When the city’s awful voice, a wall of noise, crowds me up against myself, I grab a freighter fantasy, settle down in Pullman memory, and I’m back safe and sound … back … where we come from… Maya Angelou’s words fall among…

Dee Rivers

Big Bang theory spawns Salmon

Leftover Salmon, House of Blues, February 27, 1998 The birth of Leftover Salmon can be blamed on the Big Bang theory, according to the band’s rambunctious front-man, Vince Herman. The Boulder, Colo., quintet formed in 1991 when Herman’s Cajun-calypso outfit, Salmon Heads, joined forces onstage with mandolin, electric guitar and fiddle player Drew Emmitt’s progressive…

Philip Booth

Street-corner synergy

Jonny Lang, with Robert Bradley and Blackwater Surprise, House of Blues, February 28, 1998 MTV blues newbies will be groovin’ that Johnny Lang is coming to the ‘hood, but the blond wunderkind with the outsized, ballsy vocal chords has an opening act that will turn more than a few heads. People need to be aware…

Garaud McTaggart

Coming clean

According to Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler, who should know something about this, “Forgiveness is like giving your soul a blow job.” It’s the same as saying, “Confession is good for the soul,” but why say that when you can say blow job? And given President Clinton’s current affair of state, who isn’t? Tyler’s point is…

Liz Langley

The politics of Parramore

As star football players at Jones High School, Nap Ford and Edward “Zip” Clark battled opponents side-by-side on the defensive line. And after Clark’s death in 1991, Ford stood with Clark’s wife, Mercerdese, as she took charge of Orlando’s ill-fated campaign to “revitalize Parramore ” the blighted African-American neighborhood a short stroll, but a world…

Lawrence Budd

Piercing politics

Once again, health authorities are slicing up the proposed legislation that would regulate body piercing in Florida. Body-art studios continue to pop up around downtown and across the state. Yet virtually no guidelines protect those pierced — or those doing the piercing — from unsafe conditions and the potential spread of diseases. House Bill 69,…

Lawrence Budd

Observations on a growing problem

From hip-hop to cyberpunk, from The Weather Channel to fashion, Andrew Ross has been in the vanguard of emergent cultural studies. Currently the director of American Studies at New York University, Ross is spending this year living at Disney’s Celebration, researching an upcoming book. An ongoing interest in his research and writings has been the…

Michael Hoover and Lisa Stokes

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