On Top of Spaghetti
The boss frowns upon heavy drinking at lunchtime, but there’s no rule against tying on a midday carbohydrate buzz. So we’re happy to report that at downtown’s new Bucatini’s (1228 Euclid Avenue, 216-696-1334), heaping helpings of pasta are the order of the day. Owner and chef Sergio Porcelli (former proprietor of Sergio’s Italian Restaurant, near…
Lucinda Williams
If Lucinda Williams is such a genius, then how come she keeps making the same album? Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, her 1998 breakthrough after years of obscurity, defined and perfected her earthy songwriting, filled with lust, longing, and exacting character detail. Its acclaim deserved, the record also painted her into a corner. No…
U.S.A. = A.O.K.
Radio consultant Mike McVay might think twice, the next time he’s in a giving mood. His Westlake-based McVay Media produced a manual on how stations should handle the war in Iraq. The four-page document was posted on the company’s website. In normal circumstances, only his client stations would have had access. But when the war…
Mood Swing
“We’re evil, we’re bad,” says the Creep, trying hard to keep a straight face. “No, no — we are evil!” he tries again, a grin emerging on his face. And with that, the Creep breaks into a loud, shrill laugh that nearly drowns out the jukebox at Lakewood’s pillbox-sized Mars Bar, which booms with Monster…
Crimson Rain
With songs like “All Your Love,” “Precious Love,” and “All I Want Is You,” Akron’s Crimson Rain packs the melodrama of an entire season of Days of Our Lives. And at its most maudlin, the band is just as overwrought as that daytime soap. “If I could stick you into my heart, I would bleed/I’d…
The Pervert’s Lament
“I’m no white Christian saint,” says Fred Sullivan, and he ain’t lying. The 53-year-old treats courtship like commerce: “How much?” is his way of connecting with an attractive woman. It’s a habit that gets him into trouble. Last April, Sullivan put that question to a woman who thought she was interviewing for a job as…
Chick Hunt
It’s been a month to forget for the Dixie Chicks — and for everyone else involved in country-music radio. Heading into March as the owners of a No. 1 country single, the Chicks now find themselves in a shit storm, thanks to that well-covered offhand comment about President Bush made at a concert in London.…
Spiritualized
The last several releases by Spiritualized, the psychedelic-gospel outfit of former Spacemen 3 guitarist Jason Pierce, have been as much about Pierce’s tendency toward staggering production costs as his desire to capture in song the sad, sweet ruination of recreational drug use. Pierce made no secret of the fact that he’d hired more than 100…
Defining Fellatio
Like flossing and mowing the lawn, fellatio would seem one of those acts that’s pretty easy to define. Except, apparently, in Ohio — which may be why the state Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case that could finally determine what qualifies as oral sex. Two years ago, a Medina County jury convicted John…
Hot and Bothered
On paper, Alison Mosshart and Jamie Hince — a.k.a. VV and Hotel, the co-conspirators behind the U.K. duo the Kills — appear to be heirs to garage-rock royalty. Thanks to a howling mix of seduction and stripped-down guitars, the Kills snagged an overseas opening slot for N.Y.C. bohemian kings Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and queens…
Heritage Drive
Guitarist-vocalist Tony Pulizzi has chops, attitude, and heart, but his music is dated, dogmatic, and dull. There’s some Steely Dan in “Swing Low,” some Kansas in “Be Gone,” even touches of Yngwie Malmsteen on “The Great Wall,” an instrumental that affirms Cleveland’s hunger for heavy metal. Pulizzi can play fast and complicated, and his voice…
Stonewall
Pity the Ohio Health Department. It’s a government agency, which means that its records are public, which means that when it screws up, people find out. ODH officials don’t particularly like this; nor do most government officials, for that matter. But it’s not wise to admit this: Under the doctrine of astute politics, one mustn’t…
The Law Won
Last fall, the RAVE Act looked as dead as the rave scene itself. The dubious bill, aimed at making owners and promoters of music venues responsible for drug activity at their events, went so far as to classify glowsticks, bottled water, and pacifiers as drug paraphernalia. The proposed RAVE Act (which stood for “Reducing Americans’…
Letters to the Editor
The Beacon slides toward irrelevance: Writing about the “raw deal” former editor Jan Leach got from the Akron Beacon Journal [“Homeward Bound,” February 12], Andrew Putz noted that the Beacon “had become the poster child of profit-margin journalism — a once great paper gutted to appease the demands of Wall Street.” Thirty-five staffers were shown…
Back With a Bang
It’s the best news for longhairs since Lemmy made bail in ’75: MTV’s Headbangers Ball is returning to the airwaves. Even better: The Ball will premiere May 1 on MTV2 with a show broadcast live from the Agora Theatre. The concert, featuring Godsmack and Anthrax, has yet to be confirmed, though Godsmack’s label, Universal/Republic, acknowledges…
Straight Outta Cleveland
The kids in Cleveland Public Theatre’s Student Theatre Enrichment Program found a way to get work experience without flipping burgers or folding pants. They wrote a play, designed and built its sets, and now — after nearly a year of development — they’re performing it in front of an audience. Bliss is a “social satire…
Dub Narcotic Sound System
Just as King Tubby was neither royalty nor fat, Calvin Johnson’s post-Beat Happening project is neither dub nor narcotic, and it’s a paltry excuse for a sound system. Regardless, the Olympia, Washington trio wants you to party hard, and it’ll come off the stage and shake your hips for you if necessary. It’s been five…
This Week’s Day-By-Day Picks
Thursday, April 25 “I want the audience to laugh with them, not at them,” says Flip Orley, the self-proclaimed comic/hypnotist, in reference to his onstage hypnotees. “The volunteers are my partners, not my victims. Each is treated with respect and gentility.” Who wouldn’t want to be put under by this guy? Orley also shrewdly promotes…
Pearl Jam
Pearl Jam Once upon a time, Pearl Jam seemed to live for a reaction — a trait that catapulted the band to the forefront of grunge. They blazed their brand of arena rock for the sole purpose of shoving it in listeners’ faces, and their faithful hung on every power chord and Eddie Vedder wail.…
Bodies of Work
Unless you’re a character in one of Thomas Harris’s grody Hannibal Lecter books, or really into tattoos, skin isn’t a canvas for exorcising creative impulses. But the 10 artists participating in the Body Ball will put their brushes to human hides, all in the name of art. “My paintings are done with makeup, so this…
Martin Sexton
Martin Sexton is rare, not so much for his musicianship — good musicians are a dime a dozen — but because he’s an old-fashioned performer: Sexton sells the audience not only on his music, but the passion and energy behind it. Perhaps it can be attributed to his naturally impetuous and rebellious nature, which landed…
Identity Crisis
You can’t be sure what to make of Identity for its first hour: Director James Mangold’s first foray into the horror genre plays so much like a joke, it’s almost impossible to tell whether he’s making you laugh on purpose or because, well, he’s director James Mangold, maker of the dopey Kate & Leopold and…
Insane Clown Posse
Forget Maggots, Deadheads, and the Kiss Army — Juggalos are music’s most devoted fans. Sporting Shakes the Clown face paint and postmodern hairdos, the devotees of Insane Clown Posse certainly know how to make an impression on concert night. You’ve gotta admire an audience that rocks with serial-killing, Faygo-drenching, breast-flashing abandon, yet adheres to a…
Sexual Healing
When you see a glamorous movie star like Kate Beckinsale tying her hair back and wearing glasses, it’s surefire shorthand that she’s an uptight soul. Writer-director Lisa Cholodenko gives a couple of even more obvious clues in her second feature film, Laurel Canyon. Kate, as medical grad student Alex, also gets huffy when someone translates…
Metal Gods 2003 Tour
Metal Gods Tour Other than the headliners, this tour doesn’t really live up to its title, if only because none of the bands supporting Rob Halford are popular enough to qualify as “gods.” But man, do they ever bring the metal. Halford is, of course, Halford. Rob’s voice is as strong as ever, as his…
Vig’s Eleven
In Confidence, Edward Burns plays Jake Vig, a con artist whose body temperature runs a few degrees below normal. Even when things seem to go bad, when a would-be partner betrays him with a phone call or a seedy-greedy Dustin Hoffman lays maybe-gay and grubby paws all over him, Burns never breaks a sweat or…
Ministry
Very much like an ambush, critics never saw Ministry’s latest coming. Off the radar for four years, Al Jourgensen and Paul Barker stunned skeptics in March by delivering Animositisomina, an album replete with renewed drive and hostile intent (in Jourgensen’s own words: “I got pissed off again!”). In a genre mired in clichés indistinguishable from…
Hallway Gangstas
Better Luck Tomorrow, about Asian-American high schoolers who are making good grades but are up to no good, arrives with the furor (albeit minor — a rumpus, perhaps?) attendant upon a Sundance Film Fest fave. In this case, Internet movie-gossip hounds bark among themselves about changes made to the movie after MTV Films and Paramount…
2 Skinnee J’s
Even the most amazing live acts seldom capture their in-concert spectacle on wax — which is just one of the reasons 2 Skinnee J’s haven’t supplanted the Red Hot Chili Peppers as the era’s laureate freaky stylists. Before rap-rock became synonymous with nü metal, the J’s built a grass-roots following based on their live show,…
Flat Pop
There once was a Gary Larson cartoon showing a tuxedoed orchestra conductor, baton in hand, being led to his eternal chamber in Hades by Satan himself. Through the slightly open door, you see rows of musicians waiting for him, sitting in front of their sheet music and each holding . . . a banjo. If…
Cex
Cex — 21-year-old Baltimore baller Rjyan Kidwell — dubs himself “the white Eminem.” The claim, though witty, is inaccurate; he’s the goyish Paul Barman. While Cex’s live shows possess a Tenacious D air of ridiculousness, with a compulsive need to hassle chin-stroking IDM fans, on disc he comes off as an earnest overachiever who flaunts…
Break Like the Wind
They were loud once, deafeningly so–and dumbingly so, if such a thing is possible. They wore skins of leather stuffed with cucumbers of foil, towered over dwarves who danced around a Stonehenge made of pebbles, sang about women who fit like flesh tuxedos and explored the majesty of rock and the mystery of roll. These…
Daniel Lanois
On his first solo album in 10 years, our Canadian of the Sorrows pulls off a ton of ambiance, calls in some prestigious cameos, and ultimately delivers too few real songs. This is a collection of moods more than melodies, and even though Emmylou Harris and Bono help out on some tracks, there are too…
Tagine, With Love
All due apologies to the Clash, but it’s Crosby, Stills & Nash who are responsible for my obsession with Morocco. If I climbed aboard the “Marrakesh Express” once, I swear I did it a thousand times during the long, hazy nights of my misspent youth; and today, all I have to show for it is…
The Haunted
To get an idea of what the latest from Swedish thrashards the Haunted sounds like, think about AC/DC. Remember how they used to put the fear of God into televangelists? And how, when you listened to them, you could see where the televangelists were coming from: how there was something sweet and seductive and real…
