King Artless
Behold what is, in theory, the thinking person’s ideal summer blockbuster. King Arthur features some of the planet’s most beautiful people, dressed way sexily, gallantly galloping and bashing each other with all manner of implements amid lush vistas and robustly appointed sets. Add an intriguing historical pedigree and apparently unprecedented narrative convention, which plunks this…
The Mooney Suzuki
New York City’s Mooney Suzuki has been at the forefront of the garage revival since the late ’90s, quickly building a rep for high-octane guitar that blends the swagger of the New York Dolls and ’70s Stones with the blue-collar muscle of Michigan legends such as the Stooges, MC5, and Grand Funk Railroad. (It’s probably…
Good News
Anchorman, co-written by its star Will Ferrell, plays like a series of outtakes. There’s a vague plot, about the fall and rise of a San Diego newsman whose polyester suits are brighter than he is, but this doesn’t propel the movie forward so much as keep it from spilling off the edges of the screen.…
Jazzanova
Jazzanova’s equatorial rhythms and tropical melodies tip a straw hat more toward São Paolo than to the group’s native Berlin. Those qualities endeared the band to tastemakers like BBC DJ Gilles Peterson, who gave the sextet its first exposure on his radio program in 1997. Jazzanova labored five years over its 2002 debut album, In…
The Ransom of Redford
It’s one of the oldest stories in cinema — and possibly in the history of storytelling: A man is kidnapped by a baddie wielding a deadly weapon. His family waits for word at home, while law-enforcement types try to figure out what’s going on. A plan is developed to deal with the situation, but then…
Eric Clapton
Forever, for Eric Clapton, is apparently a relative term. No doubt to the delight of his fans, Ol’ Slowhand’s 2001 “farewell” tour was really just his way of saying “See you later.” Clapton hit the road again last month, kicking things off with the three-day Crossroads Guitar Festival in Dallas. It was a megafeast of…
Serenade in the Sand
Fair warning: If the behavior of camels in the Gobi Desert during the spring birthing season is not high on your things-to-learn-about list, and you don’t hunger to know everything about southern Mongolian herdsmen, The Story of the Weeping Camel probably isn’t your kind of movie. Taking their inspiration from the pioneer documentarian Robert Flaherty…
Hot Rod Circuit
Pop quiz, everybody: How many emo kids does it take to screw in a light bulb? The correct answer is five — one to do it, one to form a band because of it, one to write a poem about his loss, one to cry to his girlfriend about it, and one to start a…
Kiickasssss!
The real Melvin Van Peebles shows up just once in Baadasssss!, a fictionalized account of his making of Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song in 1971, and it’s at the film’s end; he sits silent, grinning, clutching his ever-present cigar. But he’s all over this movie, in which his son, Mario, plays Melvin — and plays Melvin…
Ted Leo & the Pharmacists
Even if you’ve heard the LPs, 2001’s The Tyranny of Distance and last year’s Hearts of Oak, seeing Ted Leo & the Pharmacists live is a revelation. Dropping buckets of sweat on the stage, frontman Leo digs into his tunes with an abandon probably unseen since Iggy was hanging out with the Stooges. In Leo’s…
Activist Interrupted
The tall white priest hovers in the doorway of the basement at the Sagrada Familia church. “Stay for as long as you need,” he repeats in laborious Spanish. “Just get the lights when you go . . .” José Amin Cortes nods appreciatively. In the past year and a half, the labor lawyer has grown…
Tennessee’s Pride
If you didn’t know better, you’d think a play featuring a muscular, beer-swilling Polish mechanic on a bowling team would have to be set in Cleveland. Fortunately for the world of literature and theater, however, Tennessee Williams placed his immortal ode to the destructive persistence of illusion, A Streetcar Named Desire, in the seamy underbelly…
Gravy Train!!!!
While the half-baked genre of electroclash cashed in its chips almost quicker than it could ante up, its echoes resound. One such reverberation is Oakland, California’s Gravy Train!!!! Although the coed quartet’s music is far removed from the contrived, plasticky kitsch of electroclash, it shares an affinity for the silly and the synthetic; band members…
Blind Man Squawking
Former Cleveland Mayor and Senator-for-Life George Voinovich recently had some tough words for John Kerry. In a press release, Voinovich accused Kerry of trying to eliminate coal as an energy resource, “causing a spike in electricity costs for Ohio businesses.” The reasoning was a tad circuitous. Kerry never said he wanted to eliminate coal, Voinovich…
Pop Machine
Imagine seeing an enormous wall of meringue advancing menacingly down the street. Just before panic sets in, you realize it’s just meringue. It won’t kill you — in fact, you might even enjoy a taste or two, then push aside the remainder of the sticky-sweet concoction and go on your way. That’s how it feels…
Kill Me Tomorrow
Alongside the recent explosion and quick implosion of electroclash has been an even larger ka-pow of cranky bands looking to mine the 45-degree angles and mysterio-bleeps of the early ’80s. And it’s easy to lump this San Diego-by-way-of-Portland combo of creepies into the bloated ranks of noisemakers. But instead of just another crew of Casio-carrying…
Forces of Nature
Lady Cerridwynn is running an hour late, an odd thing for a Wiccan elder. You’d think a devotee of a religion so attuned to the subtleties of nature would be mindful of seasonal time changes. But when clocks sprang forward earlier in the day, Lady Cerridwynn forgot to spring with them. “I guess we’ll be…
On Stage
Hot ‘N’ Throbbing — While Paula Vogel’s play serves as a direct commentary on the juncture of pornography, parenting, and domestic violence, the larger issue of how we all integrate our inner demons within a challenging external world is also illuminated in this thrilling production. Charlene appears to be a typical 38-year-old mom with two…
Angie Stone
Back when neo-soul still possessed its end-of-the-millennium novelty, a new artist could show up with a Fender Rhodes and a few warm bodies and win nearly instantaneous praise. In the nostalgic ’90s, everyone from D’Angelo to Maxwell to Macy Gray got a pass from plenty of writers, this one included, as much for what they…
Dumb and Dumber
Dumb and Dumber A contagion of bungles: Gregory Weinkauf makes two incredibly dumb statements in his review [“George of the Bungle,” June 23]. First, he writes that Michael Moore’s “biggest jeopardy” is potentially “alienating those outside the choir” he preaches to. Is Weinkauf joking? There is nobody in the world who will see Moore’s movie…
On View
Capturing Cleveland: Pages From a City Sketchbook — The 200-plus works in various media by 21 Cleveland Institute of Art students all portray Cleveland scenery. Although their subjects are easily recognizable, providing opportunities to reminisce, most of the works are mere surface studies, lacking tangible mood and depth. Among the exceptions are Sarah Laing’s digital…
The Dandy Warhols
After releasing their monumental 1995 debut, Dandy’s Rule OK?, the Dandy Warhols were quickly snapped up by Capitol, which just as quickly rejected the group’s second album, claiming it didn’t have any hits. In 1997, the group turned in The Dandy Warhols Come Down, which did provide alterna-hits in “Not if You Were the Last…
School of Bock
Can you pick a pilsner? Locate a lager? Eye an ale? John Staunton dreams of a day when everyone will know precisely what they’re drinking. And as the head accounts manager for Ohio City’s Great Lakes Brewing Company, he’s just the man to make that happen. He runs Great Lakes’ Beer School, a two-hour how-to…
Born to Be Wild
It’s all but impossible to ask the wrong questions when chatting with Cameron Muncey. “A lot of times, when you fuck up, it’s the best thing that happens,” the easy-going Jet guitarist says in a polite Australian accent that could be marketed as a muscle-relaxer. “You learn that sometimes it’s better to just chill the…
Sparta
When it comes to At the Drive-In offshoots, the members of Mars Volta have a lock on conceptualizing unexpected detours into weirdness. But Sparta gives the prog-freakers a run for their money on Porcelain, a second album that bends the boundaries of screamo, metal, and punk with a little experimental action of its own. Detached…
This Week’s Day-By-Day Picks
Thursday, July 8 Unlike wife Faith Hill, Tim McGraw has stuck pretty close to his country roots. His songs about modern-day cowboys and working-class heroes are sincere portraits in the often-artificial world of mainstream country. He pulls the heartstrings a little too shamelessly at times, but we still get weepy when we hear “Don’t Take…
World’s Fare
Even 10 years ago, paging through an ethnic cookbook was mostly an intellectual exercise for those of us on the North Coast, and not one that was likely to result in any actual cooking. After all, where was the average Clevelander going to cop such ingredients as paneer for palak paneer, say, or lily buds…
Polyphonic Spree
Touring in support of their first album, The Beginning Stages of . . . , the Polyphonic Spree seemed likely to fall into a novelty-act trap, what with all the people up onstage with their flowing white robes and sweeping Technicolor dreamsongs. If the Polyphonic Spree wasn’t a cult, then the band at least pushed…
Flash! It’s Gordon!
Sure, they’re cute. But some of Sesame Street’s Muppets are difficult to work with, admits Roscoe Orman, who ought to know. He’s played Gordon on the PBS kids’ show for more than 30 years. But it’s not the usual suspects (hello, camera-hogging Elmo! We’re talking to you, super-freakin’-huge Big Bird!) that give Orman trouble. “Oscar’s…
Getting Away With McKay
On the phone, the first thing that stands out about Nellie McKay is her sonorous speaking voice, which is a mixture of the sweetheart lilt of Judy Garland’s Oz-bound Dorothy and the regal mannerisms of Tori Amos. The next thing you notice about the singer-songwriter-pianist is her genteel demeanor. She apologizes for a delay, is…
Kid606
This Kid is more than alright; he’s in robust health. Even his archival detritus packs more excitement than most artists’ slaved-over magnum opuses. Oakland PowerBook gadfly and Tigerbeat6 honcho Kid606 (Miguel Depedro) hasn’t met a style he can’t warp to his own impish designs, with no qualms about copyright or cultural imperialism — all is…
Monster House Party
SAT 7/10 Patrick Shepherd is known as the political dynamo of the gay Stonewall Democrats. But once a year, he lets loose as one of the four hosts of the Tremonsters Ball (one of more than 40 parties in the TaDa! dinner series for the Lesbian-Gay Community Center of Greater Cleveland). At host Brooke Willis’s…
Remake Yourself
At a time when survivors of the faded funk-rock movement need to pull out all the stops to hold onto their share of a dwindling audience, Incubus is plugging its new album with controversial political messages and stylized images of Hitler and humanoid cats. The biting “Megalomaniac” was the first single from the Southern California…
Sappy Bell
Sappy Bell doesn’t have a huge buzz about it, though it probably deserves more than it gets. The band managed to land an amusing-but-rough track on the DRI tribute We Don’t Need Society, but lead guitarist Mel Hardy is more Slash than Spike. The quintet, which has been making moves in Cleveland since 1995, also…
The Hooves Are on Fire
7/11-7/18 Hunter Jumper Classic participants don’t horse around in their spare time. “I ride six days a week, eight horses a day,” boasts Meg Udelson, who will compete, along with her horses, at the weeklong contests — which judge style, pace, and form during jumps. Man’s best friend is allowed to get in on the…
Queen of the Beats
For nearly 10 years, Lolita Swain shot, directed, and edited footage for a combat camera unit in the U.S. Navy. The skirmishes prepared her well for battles she now faces as a burgeoning producer and label owner in the hip-hop world, which is about as masculine as a groin pull. “I’ve walked into studios and…
Stepsister
So much alcohol was consumed at Stepsister’s shows that it can be hard to recall just how commanding this bunch was. Thankfully, this new collection of live and rare tracks is a reminder of Stepsister’s vigor, blackouts be damned. Formed by brothers Tom Dark and Scott Eakin in the late ’90s, Stepsister came into its…
Hal, Yeah!
TUE 7/13 Hal Lebovitz has been writing about sports in Cleveland for more than 60 years. But unlike most of his peers, he’s always shunned the idea of gathering his work for a book. “I’ve turned down lots of opportunities to collect my stuff,” he says. Finally, his daughter broke him down. “She begged me…
Launching Rikets
Rikets, a new metal supergroup made up of former members of Switched, the Bedroom All-Stars, and Erase the Grey, has recorded an EP and plans to play its debut concert in late summer or early fall. “We’ve been practicing and writing for eight months,” says singer Scott Rose, Erase the Grey’s deep-voiced background vocalist, programmer,…
Clear as Folk
SAT 7/10 Singer-songwriter Patty Larkin never fancied herself a political activist. But in 2000, as she worked on her 10th album, she found herself worrying about the state of the world. Her concerns informed the songs on Red=Luck, which she describes as a “meditation on hope” that we could return to a simpler time. Then…
Medeski, Martin & Wood
Countless jam bands owe their careers to Medeski, Martin & Wood, the avant-jazz trio who made it cool to groove again with 1996’s Shack Man, a Hammond-hammered Phish-lot mainstay that opened the door for instrumental improv groups like Soulive and Particle. In the years since, the threesome has plugged up other holes with a free-jazz…
