Feel the burn
You’ll need a fire extinguisher for your palate at Thai Spice, but heat has never tasted so good.
BORDER ALLIANCE
Fuga: An El Paso band that artfully mixes elements of punk, jazz, ska, blues and vallento. (courtesy photo) Fuga and Bombasta epitomize the wildly eclectic Nuevo Chicano movement DJ Robotico, aka “the master selector, dub star reflector de Aztlan,” first introduced the concept of El Nuevo Chicano last year with a raw, stripped down…
SOUND AND THE FURY
a week on the scene Satan’s Helpers Nothing stuffs a stocking quite like a burning hunk of Boxcar Satan, so we’re all fortunate that the underground blues anarchists have blessed us with a new CD, called Upstanding and Indigent. As with previous BS noise orgies Days Before the Flood and Crooked Mile March, the new…
GOD’S OWN SINGER
Gram Parsons: a country-rock pioneer who altered the Byrds’ path (courtesy photo) Thirty years after his death, Gram Parsons’ imposing legacy is being resurrected O n the 35th anniversary of The Byrds’ seminal album, Sweetheart of the Rodeo, Columbia Legacy has issued a two-CD expanded version. For those unfamiliar with Sweetheart, it ushered country-rock…
DIVAS R 4EVER
San Antonio native Jimmy James returns home for the holidays From drag queen to diva impersonator, Jimmy James finds his voice T wenty years ago, Marilyn Monroe helped San Antonio’s Jimmy James run away from home. They have since gone their separate ways, though the parting was amicable. And now he’s coming home for…
MINOR KEYS
A licia Keys made her big splash a few months before the September 11 attacks, but she was the perfect artist to steer MTV into the post-9-11 world. A classically trained pianist and earnest songwriter young enough to be a classmate of Britney Spears or Christina Aguilera, she conveyed maturity without having to boast…
¡VÁMONOS NIÑOS!
Diana Gonzales Bertrand: Writing for children isn’t kids’ work “A good writing teacher needs to be a writer herself,” Diane Gonzales Bertrand says, smiling. And she knows of what she speaks. For more than a decade now, Gonzales Bertrand has taught writing at St. Mary’s University and, during the same span of time, authored…
GEORGIA PEACHES
Bow Wow (courtesy photo) A quick glance at 98.5 The Beat’s top 10 requested jams reveals that in the world of hip-pop, Atlanta is where it’s at. Subpar groups like Li’l Jon & the Eastside Boyz, Youngbloodz, and the Yin Yang Twinz are running the charts, with Ludacris and Chingy not far behind. The…
HAVE A HARDBOUND HOLIDAY
A nyone who has entered a bookstore this month and left with 17 impulse items knows the value of surgical-strike shopping. For those “in and out, nobody gets hurt” consumers, a few gift-giving suggestions: The very, very good: Surely the book gift that will generate the maximum “wow” effect from the widest range of…
ALL EARS
LAST MINUTE? THERE’S A WHOLE WEEK LEFT! Whether it’s because of industry-wide shrinking CD sales or the fact that everyone from Abba to Zeppelin already has a set or three out, 2003 is a slim year for music box sets. Nevertheless, there are a few choice things out there for the music lover on your…
SANTA GOES ON A GENDER-BENDER
Is he or isn’t he? Only Santa’s elves know for sure. T ired of the same old stuffed stockings? The Actors Theatre of San Antonio has teamed up with the newly created FMP Productions to stage the “ATSA XXX-Mas Special,” four shows full of outré, adult, alternative Christmas cheer. SantaLand Diaries, directed by Jerry Pilato,…
THE COMPLETION OF A MASTERPIECE
Frodo (Elijah Wood, left) and the lovable, loyal Sam (Sean Astin) in Return of the King (courtesy photo) The return of a king… T hose who have already seen the third installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy may rightly be tired of the question they’re hearing from their friends: “Is it great?”…
LIBERATING WELLESLEY
The women of Wellesley in Mona Lisa Smile (courtesy photo) An unsettling smile in the face of conservatism O ne of its graduates calls Wellesley “the most conservative college in the nation.” Visiting it during a snowy Christmas break, a California man describes the women’s school as an “elitist icebox.” Although she has always…
WRINKLE-B-GONE
Harry Langer (Jack Nicholson) and Erica Barry (Diane Keaton) in Something’s Gotta Give (courtesy photo) New comedy irons out all the creases and leaves a flat film A s the curtain rises on this new comedy about the politics of age and dating, we see a handful of slim young things strutting through city…
NEW REVIEWS
The Brothers Tenor: played by Matt Damon (left) and Greg Kinnear (Photo by Mark Greenberg) Stuck On You Dir. & writ. Peter & Bobby Farrelly; feat. Matt Damon, Greg Kinnear, Eva Mendes, Wen Yann Shih, Seymour Cassel, Griffin Dunne, Cher, Meryl Streep, Frankie Muniz (PG-13) Bob and Walt Tenor live a normal life in…
Armchair Cinephile
Ho, Ho, Home Video! W ithout unnecessary ado, a quick roundup of the gifts sure to elicit giddiness from your cinemaniac friends and family: Geek love: That’s what will wash over you, should your fanboy friends unwrap a package of The Alien Quadrilogy (Fox) with your name on it. This is an unprecedented level…
RECENT REVIEWS
Bad Santa Dir. Terry Zwigoff; writ. John Requa & Glenn Ficarra; feat. Billy Bob Thornton, Tony Cox, Bernie Mac, Brett Kelly, Lauren Graham, John Ritter (R) Bad Santa is vile. Snot-dripping and alley-pukey, pants-pissing and rotgut-swilling vile. It does not have redeeming social merit; it will not enrich your soul or teach you the meaning…
