Year of the Coma
It’s been nearly three years since Pedro Almodóvar’s All About My Mother won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. Perhaps it’s in the spirit of spreading things around that Spain has not nominated Almodóvar’s latest, Talk to Her, as their entry this year. It’s hard to imagine any other reason to pass over this…
The Delgados
Glasgow’s Delgados write songs like Grimm Brothers fairy tales. From first album Domestiques onward, band co-founders Emma Pollock and Alun Woodward have played the innocents abroad, their sweet vocal melodies a breadcrumb trail through Sonic Youth-inspired guitar pyrotechnics and an enchanted forest of shimmering dream-pop orchestration. But there has always been a menacing darkness at…
Dread Crumbs
Imagine a play set in the present day, featuring an American woman who is an operative of al-Qaida. Now imagine that this play never addresses any issues raised by her membership in that terrorist group. It would be absolutely nonsensical, given the anxiety and fear engendered by the specter of al-Qaida these days. The rule…
The Young Gods
Swiss sampledelic outfit the Young Gods have survived for more than 15 years in an industry that treats innovators like lepers. But it hasn’t been easy. Led by composer- vocalist Franz Treichler, the Young Gods take qualities that typically torpedo bands — bombast, camp, and long-windedness — and turn them into virtues. Before anyone else,…
The Bleeding Edge
It was supposed to be make-believe, a disturbing but ultimately uplifting work of science-fiction from a celebrated author of grim futurama and glorious fantasy. The subject matter of Orbiter, a hardback graphic novel about a spaceship that disappears for years and returns sheathed in skin after visits to faraway places in the final frontier, has…
Paul Van Dyk
Hey, have you heard? They listen to dance music outside of England now. What, you don’t believe us? Well then, check out this DVD. It’s about this German guy, Paul Van Dyk. He tours the world, DJing in places like Tokyo, Hong Kong, Mexico City, Ibiza, and even Miami. Isn’t that great? In this scene,…
Noble Pursuit
If, way back in 1799, old David Hudson had had the wherewithal to picture a Chinese restaurant in his namesake village, his mental image might have looked a lot like today’s Noble House, Arthur Yuan’s pretty little restaurant in the heart of the Western Reserve. Tucked into a clapboard house nestled behind a white picket…
Ry Cooder and Manuel Galbán
Ry Cooder, who helped shepherd the Buena Vista Social Club toward international stardom, steps out in far more modern style on this stunning collaboration with guitarist Manuel Galbán, arranger for Los Zafiros, an idiosyncratic Cuban doo-wop group of such prowess that they wowed the Beatles. Backed by Jim Keltner and Ry’s son Joachim on drums,…
Heart’s Delights
Voluptuous pillows of naughty pleasure, plump chocolate truffles are the candy case’s X-rated cuties. And with physical benefits of chocolate consumption allegedly the same as a brisk horizontal hula, it’s no wonder that these little hotties are emblematic of Valentine’s Day passions. Luckily for lovers, top-quality truffles are easy to come by in our stretch…
California Speedbag
Gary Lupico’s heart is the biggest truck stop in the world. This we learn of the California Speedbag singer- guitarist on his band’s wounded, wonderful new album. “You don’t have to drink alone/I’ll be right there by your side,” Lupico wails on “Don’t Drink That Whiskey.” “I’ve got a pint, let’s take a ride.” And…
Panhandler Paydirt
Mike Vorhees isn’t known for his good luck. He spent much of the late ’90s homeless, sleeping under the West Third Street bridge, with addictions that included heroin, alcohol, and the Cleveland Indians. Vorhees has since kicked heroin, he’s moderated his drinking, and he shares a small Fairview Park apartment with his buddy, Bob Kasarcik.…
Sore Subject
“If you get any four guys into a room, it doesn’t matter if they do market research or accounting or whatever — they fuck around all the time,” contends Sum 41 drummer Steve Jocz (pronounce it yatch). “That’s what guys do. That’s what we do, and people tape it and put it on TV. And…
Deuce Dirty
If Nelly spent as much time in lockdown as he has on top of the charts, he might sound something like Deuce Dirty. Like St. Louis’s finest, Deuce knows his way around a harmony, and he can sing like a ghetto Soulchild. Unlike Nelly, though, Deuce brings a real thug presence to the mic. “Fuck…
Homeward Bound
A lot of people like Jan Leach, and it isn’t hard to figure why. She’s smart. She’s quick with a laugh. She treats her employees well. That sunny bearing wouldn’t be noteworthy if Leach were the boss at a bakery, a junior high, or even a muffler shop. But she’s the editor of a prominent…
Blues Remedy
Johnny Walker, singer-guitarist of Toledo’s Soledad Brothers, was born with his umbilical cord wrapped seven times around his neck. Talk about bona fide. After all, even Bo Diddley didn’t really have a “cobra snake for a necktie.” And wouldn’t you know, Walker grew up to be a bluesman. But having a built-in mythology — a…
The Suing Machine
Anne Master was an uncommon woman. In 1938, while most ladies of the day had their arms full of babies, she was learning obstetrics and gynecology at Women’s General Hospital in Cleveland. After completing her residency and postgraduate work, she opened a practice and married an ear, nose, and throat man named John Master. The…
Something Wild
About the only thing the members of Finless Brown have in common is the grin they all seem to sport. Downing Budweiser and passing blunts one recent Tuesday evening in the basement of the East Side home that serves as the band’s practice spot, the members of Finless Brown look as different as they sound.…
The Next LeBron
Whenever super-scout Bob Gibbons is in St. Louis, he makes a point of picking the brain of longtime Savvis Center security guard Jesse Whitaker, a 64-year-old hoop junkie regarded by insiders as a living tote board when it comes to spotting talent on St. Louis playgrounds. Whitaker, after all, was among the first to recognize…
CD Returns
There are many things folks are reluctant to accept — wooden nickels, a good ass-whuppin,’ Don Ho albums — but few people ever pass up the opportunity to score some free cash. Yet that’s just what many music fans are doing these days, since anyone who bought a CD between January 1, 1995, and December…
Cash Diet
The volcano inside Lawrence Smith’s chest erupted on June 8, 1999. The LTV shipping supervisor crumpled to the plant’s floor, dead of a heart attack. But as abruptly as his life ended, it’s surprising he lived to age 54. At 6 feet 2 and 260 pounds, the beefy Smith treated his body less like a…
Broken Bone
Looks like Bone Thugs-N-Harmony rhymer Bizzy Bone may no longer be able to live up to his name, now that the MC has reportedly been dismissed from the group for good. After being kicked out of Bone last fall, following a drunken performance in New York City, the embattled MC was brought back into the…
Letters to the Editor
225,000 bottles can’t be wrong: As my bloodshot eyes devoured the unveiling of the real truth about PBR [“Cool in a Can,” December 25], it was a breath of fresh air for my soul. I’ve known for most of my adult life that PBR is like manna from heaven. I calculate my lifetime beer consumption…
Malevolent Creation
Malevolent Creation was by no means the most interesting band to roar out of Florida in the early 1990s. The group was technically accomplished and appropriately nihilistic, but it didn’t offer the balls-out stoopidity of Deicide, the lunacy of Morbid Angel, or the avant-garde underpinnings of Obituary. Malevolent Creation had to get by on technical…
Star Geezer
Sometimes it takes a while to realize what you want to do in life. Just ask Howard Johnson. After 58 years as an engineer, he embraced a long-simmering passion for writing. A college teacher advised Johnson to abandon engineering and pursue a writing career. But he didn’t listen. Until now. At age 75, Johnson has…
Finch
It may be painful, but you gotta give Fred Durst credit for one thing: If you haven’t seen the video for Limp Bizkit’s breakout cover of “Faith” by George Michael, you might find it hard to believe that screaming — the throat-shredding, nerve-grating kind that’s typical of most underground hardcore music — would ever be…
Off to See the Cheez Wizard
Joey Green is a wacky guy. He puts Reddi-wip on his head. He cleans his clothes in Cheez Whiz. And he shaves with peanut butter (creamy, not chunky). And it all started with an advertising campaign for Nestea nearly 20 years ago. “I got into all of this by accident,” admits Green, who was working…
Koko Taylor
Only a handful of the truly great blues performers are still around, and fewer still have as much left in the tank as Cora Walton “Koko” Taylor. Averaging about 100 concerts a year, the internationally celebrated Queen of the Blues comes to town this weekend, placing the crowning touch on Fat Fish Blue’s fifth-anniversary celebration.…
This Week’s Day-by-Day Picks
Thursday, February 6 For those of you who’ve been jonesing for an interactive theater fix since the closing of Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding a couple of months ago, there’s good news! Late Nite Catechism, Vicki Quade and Maripat Donovan’s comedy about a nun who gives a class (i.e., the audience) some adult education, has replaced…
David Thomas and the Two Pale Boys
It kind of stands to reason that someone like Lou Reed is still shadowed by his Velvet Underground stint, owing to the massive influence of that legendary band. At least Lou can console himself for the often unfair dismissal of his three decades of solo work with the residuals from the umpteen V.U. repackages. David…
Bearly Necessary
Anybody who’s cracked open a recent Disney G-rated DVD has probably witnessed the ultimate in sequelmania: On Lilo & Stitch, for instance, the feature was preceded (skippably, thank God) by trailers for The Jungle Book 2, Atlantis 2: Milo’s Return, 101 Dalmatians II: Patch’s London Adventure, Inspector Gadget 2, and a Lilo & Stitch follow-up.…
Alex Skolnick Trio
On paper, the difference between jazz and heavy metal is similar to the gap between Chianti and Coors, Chicago and Joe Dirt. On wax, it’s a whole different story. Goodbye to Romance, the debut from the Alex Skolnick Trio, attests to as much. Not since Pat Boone threw on the leather and belted out “You’ve…
Hard Luck
Intacto, the first feature film by 34-year-old Spanish director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, is a complex meditation on luck, fate, and the torments of memory. Remarkable for its inventive visual style and its bold imaginative leaps, Intacto demands the close attention of an alert audience. But it’s also so entertainingly quirky and full of such unexpected…
Various Artists
The soundtrack to the big-screen adaptation of Chicago may not sound better than the trio of cast recordings that have come before it, but it sure does sound bigger. Catherine Zeta-Jones, a hoofer from way back, can render any song a showstopper; her “All That Jazz” is all that and more, the kind of opening…
