WE WANT THE AIRWAVES
The Tomorrow Show With Tom Snyder: Punk & New Wave Label: Shout Factory DVD Rated: NONE WorkNameSort: Tomorrow Show With Tom Snyder: Punk & New Wave, The Television has not been kind to rock & roll. Stifled by network censors, botched by tin-eared soundmen, left to sweat and die with an interviewer’s clueless questions, rock…
MY BIG FAT GREEK APPETIZER
I’ve never been to Greece, but I hear that eating at restaurants is mostly an outdoor affair. This fact bodes well for the Greek Corner on Orange Avenue, where the outside tables afford a picturesque view over Lake Ivanhoe. Formerly the home of Tiramisu Café, the new restaurant has a better grasp of Greek food…
Tales From Turnpike House
Tales From Turnpike House Label: Savoy Jazz Rated: NONE WorkNameSort: Tales From Turnpike House In the early 1990s, Saint Etienne’s innovative meshing of ’60s songwriter stylings and deep-house beats helped lay the framework for the formation of Britpop. This playful blend is still very much at work on Tales From Turnpike House. Baroque string arrangements…
Sunbomber
Sunbomber Label: 5 Rue Christine Rated: NONE WorkNameSort: Sunbomber As Excepter breaks in a new lineup – welcome aboard multi-instrumentalist Jon Nicholson – they come up with lackluster results on their first career stumble. A half-hour-long stumble, at that: all labored moans and aimless synth inversions, dribbling daubs and popcorn fluctuations, deliberately aimless and way…
The Mezzanine
The Mezzanine Label: Warm Rated: NONE WorkNameSort: Mezzanine, The Mostly minor-key guitar falls against breathy delivery on The Mezzanine, in verses that are lined with modest percussion, various background rumblings or faint synths, as provided by contributor/producer/her well-known uncle Vic Chesnutt. Dusty moments of sheer loveliness find their way into the title track’s striking vocal…
REFUSING TO SETTLE
The New World Studio: New Line Cinema Rated: PG-13 Website: http://www.thenewworldmovie.com/ Release Date: 2006-01-27 Cast: Colin Farrell, Christopher Plummer, Wes Studi, August Schellenberg, Raoul Trujillo Director: Terrence Malick Screenwriter: Terrence Malick WorkNameSort: New World, The Our Rating: 5.00 Public opinion of the mysteriously reclusive director Terrence Malick continues to be polarizing. His movies are difficult;…
HEAD OF THE CLASS
Loggerheads Studio: Strand Releasing Rated: PG-13 Website: http://www.loggerheadsmovie.com Release Date: 2006-01-26 Cast: Bonnie Hunt, Tess Harper, Kip Pardue, Michael Kelly, Michael Learned Director: Tim Kirkman, Savage Steve Holland Screenwriter: Tim Kirkman Music Score: Mark Geary WorkNameSort: Loggerheads Our Rating: 5.00 The deserving winner of the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature at last year’s Florida…
The Matador
The Matador Studio: The Weinstein Company Rated: R Website: http://www.matadorthemovie.com/ Release Date: 2006-01-27 Cast: Pierce Brosnan, Greg Kinnear, Hope Davis, Adam Scott, Philip Baker Hall Director: Richard Shepard Screenwriter: Richard Shepard Music Score: Rolfe Kent WorkNameSort: Matador, The Our Rating: 1.50 Every few years, Pierce Brosnan bankrolls himself an intended vanity project that instead lays…
Transamerica
Transamerica Studio: IFC Films Rated: R Website: http://www.transamerica-movie.com/ Release Date: 2006-01-27 Cast: Felicity Huffman, Kevin Zegers, Fionnula Flanagan, Graham Greene, Elizabeth Peña Director: Duncan Tucker Screenwriter: Duncan Tucker Music Score: David Mansfield WorkNameSort: Transamerica Our Rating: 3.00 There’s a reason Felicity Huffman’s lead performance is the only element of Transamerica that’s getting any awards play:…
Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World
Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World Studio: Warner Independent Pictures Rated: PG-13 Website: http://wip.warnerbros.com/lookingforcomedy/LFC_content.html Release Date: 2006-01-27 Cast: Albert Brooks, Sheetal Sheth, Jon Tenney, Fred Dalton Thompson, John Carroll Lynch Director: Albert Brooks Screenwriter: Albert Brooks WorkNameSort: Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World Our Rating: 1.50 Before you buy the PR line that…
Underworld: Evolution
Underworld: Evolution Studio: Screen Gems Rated: R Website: http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/underworldevolution/ Release Date: 2006-01-27 Cast: Kate Beckinsale, Scott Speedman, Bill Nighy, Derek Jacobi, Tony Curran Director: Len Wiseman Screenwriter: Len Wiseman, Danny McBride WorkNameSort: Underworld: Evolution Our Rating: 1.50 Underworld: Evolution H1/2 True to its title, Underworld: Evolution represents a modest learning curve for director Len Wiseman,…
I Love Television
OK, nothing new or interesting is coming on this week. BUT WAIT! Just because TV has once again let you down, that’s no reason to take your fury out on me. As you know, my success depends on your reading this column on a weekly basis – whether I have anything interesting to say or…
News of the Weird
Art history repeats itself In November, prominent performance artist Marina Abramovic, 59, performed “covers” of other performance artists’ seminal works (with their permission) in her Seven Easy Pieces show at New York City’s Guggenheim Museum. In one, according to a New York Times profile, she covered her head in honey and gold leaf, cradled a…
GOING, GOING, GONE
Four more days, five more nights. That’s how long staff sergeant Danny Campos, 35, has until he is deployed to Iraq. Right now at 11 a.m. on a Thursday, he’s at his home, a new duplex in a new development in MetroWest, playing Madden NFL 2006 on his PlayStation Portable, a Christmas gift, while his…
Police Beat
Jan. 17, 10:52 p.m.: Police Beat takes its mission to educate and inform seriously. And so today we present a parable called “How not to file a police report.” The story begins with police responding to a robbery call at a park in the 4600 block of Oliva Street. There they found the victim, a…
AUTO TRAITOR
Judas Iscariot, the disciple who betrayed Jesus with a kiss, is to be given a makeover by Vatican scholars. The proposed "rehabilitation” of the man who was paid 30 pieces of silver to identify Jesus to Roman soldiers in the Garden of Gethsemane, comes on the ground that he was not deliberately evil, but was…
Blister
And now for something completely different, yet somehow exactly the same. “Ready to see how much fun we won’t be having tonight?” I fizz as Tony plop-plops into the passenger seat. “Totally.” OK, so down to business then. In a frightening (or fabulous) trend rooted somewhere between Brokeback and boredom, Tuesdays are the new gay…
Notable Noise
I rant a lot about how publicly owned companies are destroying our creative culture by placing short-term stockholder value over the long-term “greater good.” Usually these rants involve some sort of invective about slow decision-making, out-of-touch technophobes and lack of vision/loyalty/free thought. That said, I think that Universal Music Group could be exempt from damnation.…
Rob Brezsny’s Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19) I don’t take drugs or alcohol, but I love to get high. So how do I crack open the doors of perception? Engaging in extreme horseplay is one way. Recently, for instance, three friends and I radically altered our consciousness in the middle of the night on a New York City…
New Mexican Disaster Squad, The Black Crowes, Orlando Guitar Expo, Stomp and more
Thursday • 26 ZORA NEALE HURSTON FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS AND HUMANITIES Better known at this annual celebration of African-American culture is the food and music-laden street festival Friday through Sunday in Eatonville. Also of note at this year’s tribute to writer Zora Neale Hurston is the ZORA! Celebration of New Black Cinema Film Festival…
Savage Love
My girlfriend of three years is a smoker. In the beginning her smoking didn’t bother me, but now it’s a huge turn-off. I’ve started a new job where I work with cancer patients and I see the deadly effects of smoking every day. I’ve tried everything under the sun to get her to stop. She…
Letters
Right about radio Jason Ferguson: I relocated to the border of Polk and Highlands counties from San Jose eight years ago, and the location provides antenna pick-up of the majority of FM radio stations; the affordability factor being a plus, the negative is lack of modern-rock program format. As reported `Notable Noise, Jan. 5`, the…
BEEN THERE, DUNIT
It was a dark and stormy night. A shot rang out. The butler did it. That’s about all the genre expertise you need going into Deathtrap, Ira Levin’s low-key but convoluted murder mystery. Playwright Sidney “Four Flops” Bruhl (David Bass) wrote a hit years ago, but he’s lost his mojo and now lives off wife…
COUNTER CULTURE
Outside the doors of Memphis Lee’s run-down diner, in a once-thriving black section of Pittsburgh, the world is changing. It’s 1969, and America is witnessing both the emergence of black power and the catastrophic dislocation caused by massive urban-renewal projects that are sweeping away neighborhoods and uprooting lives. Inside the diner (with its declining clientele…
BEARABLE LIGHTNESS
If you recognize Isamu Noguchi’s name, it’s probably as the designer of the curvy glass-and-wood coffee table he created for Herman Miller, an iconic symbol of the midcentury interior. Or perhaps you’ve seen one of his akari lamps, those undulating paper lanterns that lend a comforting glow to the severest of modern rooms. I owned…
WONDER BOY
When he took on a simple writing and drawing assignment six and a half decades ago, Jerry Robinson had no idea he’d be carving a permanent, wicked grin on the face of popular fiction. He merely thought he’d earn a few extra dollars and some course credit. Not yet out of his teens, Robinson had…
BATTLE READY
Editor’s note: This is the second installment of a three-part series that explores the city’s homelessness dilemma. (Part One: [“Stalemate,” Jan. 19], Part Three: [“Dear Buddy,” Feb. 2]) Every day, the Christian Service Center’s Daily Bread kitchen feeds lunch to 325 homeless men. The center also provides emergency assistance to low-income families (for instance, money…
Happytown
It’s no secret that Orange County Sheriff Kevin Beary dislikes strip clubs; his department is a big part of the Metropolitan Bureau of Investigation, an agency that spends a lot of its time undercover trying to bust titty bars for any infraction they can make stick. But the latest allegations of chicanery even took us…
