Updated with Empeefree: Atlantic looks up, sees Orlando
Now with an Empeefree! We raved about Orlando rapper Wes Fif’s unique mismash of raver thump and street flow earlier this year [“Day-Glo Flow,” Apr. 5] and the music biz finally heard our top-of-the-lungs shouting. Atlantic sister label Slip ‘n’ Slide Records, who shepherded Rick Ross’ rotund ass and other Miami breakouts onto Billboard’s Top…
Book of Longing
Book of Longing Label: Orange Mountain Music Release Date: 2007-11-29 Media: CD Format: Album WorkNameSort: Book of Longing When Leonard Cohen released Book of Longing in 2006, his first collection of new poetry since 1984’s Book of Mercy, it read like an about-face – Mr. “I’m Your Man” softened and recast as Anthony Hopkins. The…
Somewhere in the Between
Somewhere in the Between Label: Victory Rated: NONE Release Date: 2007-11-29 Media: CD Format: Album WorkNameSort: Somewhere in the Between Streetlight Manifesto, a seven-piece ska creation made from bits of Jersey faves Catch 22 and One Cool Guy, picks up right where they left off with their 2006 rerecording of Catch 22’s ska classic Keasbey…
Walk on Water
Walk on Water Label: Self-released Rated: NONE Release Date: 2007-11-29 Media: CD Format: Album WorkNameSort: Walk on Water Everything there is to know about Winter Park’s Demic is laid out in the closing verse of “Requiem,” a jazzy cautionary tale. Borrowing a line from 50 Cent’s swagger classic, “Wanksta,” Demic chastises an underachieving friend, not…
WHOO TANG
Gallic flair enriches a wander down Bangkok’s eaten path
CAN’T HOLD IT BACK
Cuba retrospective’s bold and beautiful
This Is England
This Is England Studio: IFC Rated: NOT RATED Release Date: 2007-11-29 WorkNameSort: This Is England Set against the backdrop of the financially and emotionally drained England of the early ’80s, This Is England is a tale of sweet, humane, well-rounded and entirely believable characters. The main protagonist is 12-year-old Shaun, whose dad has died in…
Monsieur Hire
Monsieur Hire Studio: Kino International Rated: PG-13 Release Date: 2007-11-29 WorkNameSort: Monsieur Hire It seems like all of Patrice Leconte’s movies deal, in one way or another, with strangers colliding by fate, and his Monsieur Hire is no exception. Short on length (79 minutes) but not pathos, Leconte’s 1989 adaptation of the Georges Simenon crime…
In Between Days
In Between Days Studio: Kino International Rated: NOT RATED Release Date: 2007-11-29 WorkNameSort: In Between Days The first narrative feature from South Korean émigré So Yong Kim, In Between Days is an endearing movie about youth. Set in the Korean community of an unnamed North American city, the film quietly studies the relationship between two…
Pixar Short Films Collection
Pixar Short Films Collection Studio: Disney/Pixar Rated: G Release Date: 2007-11-29 WorkNameSort: Pixar Short Films Collection In many DVDs, the commentary tracks and bonus documentaries are of interest only to diehard fans of the film. In the case of the Pixar Short Films Collection, the commentary and appended feature “The Pixar Shorts: A Shorts History”…
The Joshua Tree: 20th Anniversary Remastered
The Joshua Tree: 20th Anniversary Remastered Label: Island/Universal Rated: NONE Release Date: 2007-11-29 Media: CD Format: Album WorkNameSort: Joshua Tree: 20th Anniversary Remastered, The Long since resigned to the coffee tables of khaki families or wedged on shelves next to the Bible and The Da Vinci Code, it’s easy to forget the widescreen impact of…
The Great Communication
The Great Communication Label: Get ‘Em Rated: NONE Release Date: 2007-11-29 Media: CD Format: Album WorkNameSort: Great Communication, The Bombs, the Taliban, vague “land collapse”; we need an indie rapper, stat! Social paranoia has bred rap’s own gallery of evangelicals, cloaking below-par upstarts in an impenetrable force field where no listener (or critic) can stain…
HAPPYTOWN
In an impressive display of political moxie, our very own ACLU Central Chapter voted 12-0 Nov. 20 to impeach President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. So what, you ask? A valid question. But here’s why it could be significant: The vote, says Central Chapter president George Crossley, was inspired by a Southern California…
POLICE BEAT
NOV. 13, 7:31 P.M.: Something doesn’t add up here. A guy gets shot in the leg in the 3300 block of West Colonial Drive by some gold-toothed, dreadlocked thug and decides not to press charges. To muck things up a little more, the victim knew his shooter, according to police reports. More weirdness: “Units also…
MAIL SACK
Deadly enchiladas Jessica Bryce Young: Hear, hear, concerning Trader Joe’s `“Chains of love,” Nov. 15`. In a pinch, World Market can produce a nostalgic moment when looking at the wines (limited to Florida’s dubious distributors), and some international foodstuffs (alas, no fresh or frozen, mostly dry and boxed). God, I may even consider some sort…
PUSH COMES TO JUMP
“It’s like a deadly game of cat and mouse up here,” ad-libbed David Lee Roth during Van Halen’s sold-out performance at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Roth’s campy melodrama was entirely appropriate, given that a few weeks on the reunion circuit have put the group through all the cheeseball intrigue of an episode…
BILL MCCOLLUM’S REEFER MADNESS
If you believe Florida attorney general Bill McCollum, weed is stronger than ever. It’s so expensive that you could trade hydroponic pot ounce-for-ounce for cocaine. It “is no Woodstock rerun.” In other words, the pot your parents inhaled a few decades ago pales in comparison to the potent, expensive and dangerous marijuana your kids are…
DON’T GET BUSTED
Say you’re cruising down I-4, music blaring, perhaps moving a bit too fast, when you notice red and blue lights flagging you from behind. Problem: You’ve got a dime bag in your glove compartment, and you figure a trip to the Orange County jail is in your future. Or maybe not. We spoke briefly with…
THE COMING ATTACK
It seems that with each passing week there are more stories raising the specter of George Bush turning Iraq and Afghanistan into a bloody trifecta by attacking Iran. Look beyond the mainstream -– from Seymour Hersh’s reporting in The New Yorker to articles in The Nation – and the picture emerges of an administration that…
THE CUBAN ENIGMA
Here are three books that plot a trajectory in the tormented life of Cuba, the island at our back door and one of the great enigmas of the American political imagination. This slender strip of land, not quite the size of Pennsylvania, defied American interests by nationalizing its sugar and fruit industries, switched alliances to…
A RIGHTEOUS BLEND
Austin’s Coffee and Film may very well be the coolest café in town, but Cup O’ Soul may very well be the coziest. Situated right across the street from Austin’s, the café is a labor of love for husband-and-wife tandem Bob and Dawn Frauman, who converted the former real-estate office into a homey little perk…
BLISTER
I am not having sex tonight, but I am doing it. The long and the short (but mostly the short) of this lyrical conundrum involves a public foray into exhibitionism that I probably should have avoided, because last year I made the same mistake and ended up with a scrotum on my forehead. Tammy Kopko…
SAVAGE LOVE
I’m a single gay male in my late 20s. I’ve met a guy I really like. We haven’t yet been sexually active with each other, but we’re planning to get naked and sweaty (and break out the ropes and blindfolds) over Christmas break. But here’s the “problem” – he happens to be HIV-positive. Before you…
ROB BREZSNY’S FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
ARIES (March 21-April 19) How much more can you hold? How much further are you willing to reach? How much bigger of a big picture can you open your mind to see? We will soon discover the answers to those questions, as well as others that have to do with the themes of unbinding, emancipation…
THIS LITTLE UNDERGROUND
Man, are things FUBAR in the world today. To wit: the crisis in Darfur. Not that you should need prodding to donate desperately needed humanitarian aid, but this week the folks at Waxploitation have made it easier to help with the release of Causes 1: Darfur. No mere charity case, this album’s a quality compilation…
I LOVE TELEVISION
Logic dictates there are certain things you should never trust a 98-year-old man to do: 1) Be left alone with your girlfriend. I’m telling you, at that age, he has nothing to lose. 2) Operate heavy machinery – and remember, anything larger than a roller skate is heavy to a 98-year-old. 3) Keep you in…
COUNCIL WATCH
There was a bare Christmas tree outside, and not many present inside at this week’s perfunctory jabbering of the official jaws. No awards, no presentations, no controversy … well, almost no controversy (see last item). The mayor offered love to the fire department, to the University of Central Florida Knights football team (conference-bound!) and the…
How to fix global warming
Pee in the ocean. A LOT. Really. Below is an excerpt from the London Telegraph: Proposal to fix Pacific with ‘urea’ dump By Charles Clover, Environment Editor Last Updated: 6:01pm GMT 05/11/2007 Proposals to dump large quantities of nitrogen-rich chemical in the Pacific as a quick fix for climate change have emerged at a UN…
