Art in the City
During the day, I have a limited amount of time to scan the internet for frivolous news items such as a story of Woody Allen’s favorite typeface or search through the Library of Congress’ flickr page. Of course, I lie… to an extent. I believe my editor has glanced over at my computer to find…
Tinseltown tell-all
Hi there, Curblog readers! Ash here. I’m out in Los Angeles for the NEA/USC theater-writing fellowship. The LA weather is perfect (I wish I could send you pictures and a jar of the unusually smog-free air!), the classes and lectures informative, and the hotel bed I’m writing from is essentially a queen-sized cloud. Things are…
Art in the City
During the day, I have a limited amount of time to scan the internet for frivolous news items such as a story of Woody Allen’s favorite typeface or search through the Library of Congress’ flickr page. Of course, I lie… to an extent. I believe my editor has glanced over at my computer to find…
Tinseltown tell-all
Hi there, Curblog readers! Ash here. I’m out in Los Angeles for the NEA/USC theater-writing fellowship. The LA weather is perfect (I wish I could send you pictures and a jar of the unusually smog-free air!), the classes and lectures informative, and the hotel bed I’m writing from is essentially a queen-sized cloud. Things are…
On the Street
Another Letter (Sent to the OTS Penthouse Suite) Hey Mark, one thing I like more than art in many forms is history (especially Asian history). When I was studying for my Associates Degree, my history classes would only catch my full attention when we would discuss Southeast Asia. What is interesting is that the further…
Available everywhere … except YouTube
Parts two and three of the TigerTV homelessness documentary that caused the City a YouTube panic attack will air on February 22 and March 14 at 3pm. Non Trinity University students can catch the show on cable channel 98, educational access (available with Basic Reception Service). Another update: TigerTV station manager Kaatie Cooper posted a…
On the Street
Another Letter (Sent to the OTS Penthouse Suite) Hey Mark, one thing I like more than art in many forms is history (especially Asian history). When I was studying for my Associates Degree, my history classes would only catch my full attention when we would discuss Southeast Asia. What is interesting is that the further back…
Available everywhere … except YouTube
Parts two and three of the TigerTV homelessness documentary that caused the City a YouTube panic attack will air on February 22 and March 14 at 3pm. Non Trinity University students can catch the show on cable channel 98, educational access (available with Basic Reception Service). Another update: TigerTV station manager Kaatie Cooper posted a…
Another one bites the dust
Cassandra’s Dream Release Date: 2008-02-06 Rated: NONE Genre: Crime Oh, Woody. You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. When critics began harping that you’d grown too old to be chasing nubile starlets a fraction of your age — especially in light of your unseemly tabloid past, natch! — you moved yourself off…
Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo 1992-2007
Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo 1992-2007 Composer: Rivers Cuomo Conductor: Rivers Cuomo Label: Geffen Release Date: 2008-02-06 Rated: NONE Media: CD Length: LP Format: Album Genre: Indie Rock From The Basement Tapes to Pete Townshend’s Scoop series, demo collections intrigue us because they provide a glimpse of artists with their guards down. Home…
Radio
Radio Composer: Ky-Mani Marley Conductor: Ky-Mani Marley Label: Artists Only Release Date: 2008-02-06 Rated: NONE Media: CD Length: LP Format: Album Genre: Hip Hop/Rap The question new convertees will obviously ask is: “Does it sound like Exodus?” Well, while you can definitely hear the Marley lineage here, this is more “gangsta Rasta” than anything you’ve…
Teenage Rehab, Middle Class Trash, Sewer Rats, Second to None, Gunship, & Side Effects
Release Date: 2008-02-06 Politics, mental illness, angst, and anger are only a few of the issues explored on Teenage Rehab’s new album Goodbye Sanity. The album retreats into the downward spiral, the tunes angry yet melodic old-school punk with some classic rock riffage thrown in. The Kentucky threesome has relentlessly toured with big names in…
On and Off Fredericksburg Road Studio Tour
Release Date: 2008-02-06 Kicked off by a Friday evening autograph party, this self-guided Studio Tour showcases the diverse work of 40 visual and cultural artists in five neighborhoods surrounding Fredericksburg Road. From ceramics and metal works to photography, this tour offers the rare opportunity to interact with artists in their workspaces while exemplifying the artistic…
Aly Tadros w. Douglas Jay Boyd
Critic’s Pick Release Date: 2008-02-06 Her last name is Greek but, once you speak to Aly Tadros, you always end up in Egypt or Pakistan. A natural world traveler, she’s a musical sponge who absorbs whatever she hears wherever she goes. And yes, because she’s an independent, idiosyncratic female singer-songwriter, there are the inevitable Cat…
Cesar E. Chavez Art Contest
Release Date: 2008-02-06 Celebrate the Year of the Rat and San Antonio’s cultural diversity at the 21st Annual Asian Festival. In addition to the wide variety of foods — Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, and more — the festival performances include cultural dances, music, and martial arts. Other activities include Ikebana floral-arrangement seminars, Asian games, craft…
Peachcake, Foxy Shazam, Karate High School, Sworn to Secrecy, & Prom Night Fist Fight
Release Date: 2008-02-06 Meet Peachcake, the vigilante duo who uses their mutant-based powers to protect the world from audio-terrorism. Their quest to do something positive and eliminate crime has taken them to many states, and they were featured on Jones Soda Co. bottles nationwide in 2005 for their efforts. Studio musicians Stefan Pruett and Johnny…
Go Red for Women Fashiontini
Release Date: 2008-02-06 Strap on your red-patent stilettos and enjoy this fun and funky runway show while promoting women’s health awareness. The $10 ticket comes with a complimentary Go Red Martini and free valet parking, with a portion of the proceeds benefiting the American Heart Association’s Go Red campaign. Fashions by Gabriela Boutique and jewelry…
Trail of Tears, Cellador, Echoes of Eternity, & Unexpect
Release Date: 2008-02-06 Trail of Tears is a Norwegian black metal band whose music contrasts male death growls with female soprano vocals and is accompanied by keyboard melodies. 2006 saw the departure of several members, but the band returned to the live scene last year with new blood for vocalists Cathrine Paulsen and Ronny Thorsen…
Second Saturday PEAK Program
Release Date: 2008-02-06 San Antonio Natural Areas sponsors PEAK, Promoting Environmental Awareness in Kids, a program designed to educate children about the outdoors and responsible enjoyment of our shared public lands. It follows Leave No Trace principles, and teaches children 8-12 years old proper hiking skills, day-hike packing, and how to respect wildlife and fellow…
21st Annual Asian Festival
Release Date: 2008-02-06 Celebrate the Year of the Rat and San Antonio’s cultural diversity at the 21st Annual Asian Festival. In addition to the wide variety of foods — Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, and more — the festival performances include cultural dances, music, and martial arts. Other activities include Ikebana floral-arrangement seminars, Asian games, craft…
‘Fool’s’ for lovers
Fool’s Gold Director: Andy Tennant Screenwriter: Andy Tennant Cast: Matthew McConaughey, Kate Hudson, Donald Sutherland Release Date: 2008-02-06 Website: http://foolsgoldmovie.warnerbros.com/ Rated: PG-13 Genre: Romantic Comedy Add a generous dose of slapstick to 2005’s Into the Blue and you have Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey’s latest venture, Fool’s Gold. Director Andy Tennant (whose résumé includes Hitch…
Second time’s the charm
Release Date: 2008-02-06 I’ve been scouring the city for the perfect dulce-de-leche latté — sadly, the cup I ordered at Lazarus Coffee didn’t fit the bill. Yes, for die-hard latté fans a dulce de leche may be a cop-out coffee selection but the sugary cup is one of my faves. The latté I ordered was…
The talking cure
Mark Wahlberg’s shrink drama may drive you back to real life
Clothes-minded
Continuing our series on fair-trade ethnic accessories, Mad Imports is the place to get a head start on that perfect spring handbag. Mad Imports, based in Brooklyn, imports eclectic, handmade, and quite effortlessly chic items from Madagascar and Kenya. Their totes, clutches, and shoulder bags come in popping candy colors and are made from renewable…
CRITICAL Darling
John Rambo. Rocky Balboa. John McClane. Indiana Jones: All beefy action stars portrayed by actors now over 50 whose franchises have been dusted off uncannily at once. (Come to think of it, Schwarzenegger slipped back into his cyborg shoes in his mid-50s for Terminator 3 in 2003 …) Imagination? Innovation, anyone? But here’s my real…
Annals of Internet Dating, Part II
For those of you just tuning in, this is part two in a series about how to date on the World Wide Web. Last week I discussed choosing appropriate sites and the all-important profile pictures. If you are playing along at home, you have already researched and picked out a site or two and gathered…
Postcards on a scandal from the edge of reason
Distinguished Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences It is with great privilege that I compel you to disband, motherfuckers. You seriously decided, in your awesome collective wisdom, to nominate Lars and the Real Girl — a 1.5-hour-long television episode — for Best Original Screenplay, and not Margot at the Wedding from national-fucking-treasure Noah Baumbach?…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): “Men should be barred from holding public office for 100 years,” says billionaire Ted Turner. “Men have been running the world for too long and they’ve made a mess of it.” If women were in charge, he adds, “It would be a much more peaceful, prosperous, equitable world in a very…
Armchair Cinephile
PICK OF THE WEEK: Jean-Luc Godard (Box Set) (Lionsgate) One out-of-print JLG favorite (First Name: Carmen) joins first-time DVD editions of assorted ’80s/’90s highlights in this three-discer that draws on everything from film noir to Greek myths for subject matter. Great World of Sound (Magnolia) A “small” movie in the best sense, this indie played…
The year of “Rats!”
According to an industry magazine, the U.S. is facing a shortage of Chinese chefs. Apparently, China’s newfound prosperity is keeping them at home. While New York and Los Angeles may still be able to attract top Sino chefs to their shores, in San Antonio that means only one thing: more buffets. Yes, I realize buffets…
A polite message from the Surveillance State
Say what you want about Google being an evil corporate overlord who steals all your private data, turns it into info-mulch, and then injects it into the technoslaves to keep them drugged up and helpless. There are still some good things about the company despite all that. For example, Google’s IM program, gtalk, sends you…
Amuse-BOUCHE
Dear Andrew: Congratulations on your newest baby! We are all very happy for you and Maureen. The purpose of this letter, however, is to talk to you about another of your children, who we’re concerned is not getting due attention. I’m speaking, of course, of Sandbar, your downtown fresh-fish joint that was briefly the darling…
Spiderwick Chronicles
Spiderwick Chronicles Wednesday, February 13th 7:30pm at Santikos Palladium Imax 17703 w. IH-10 We are out of tickets for this screening
Easy E and Tyree
Everyone thinks that athletes are audaciously bold when they guarantee or predict a victory by their team. I think the opposite is true. As an investment in self-made mythology, it’s a lower risk than diving into the office betting pool. Whenever a player goes out on a limb and talks pre-game smack, they have immortality…
Jumper
Jumper Wednesday, February 13th 7:30pm at Santikos Silverado 11505 W. Loop 1604@Bandera Rd We are out of passes for this screening
Tulsa time
It’s not every day that you get a call asking you to move to Tulsa, Oklahoma to join one of the most ambitious, adventurous musical acts nobody has ever heard of, but that’s what happened to Tim Convy in 2003. Almost five years later, the St. Louis native’s band, Ludo – named after a giant…
Homeless programming
TigerTV homelessness A Trinity University television program documenting the state of homelessness in San Antonio was pulled from YouTube at midnight February 6. The segment’s producer, Trinity student Josh Nowitz, voluntarily removed the program, part one in a three-part series, after a City employee who appeared in the documentary said she had consented to appear…
THE SOUND & THE FURY
Buttercup’s latest release, The Head Sits Upside Down on the Top of the Head, is the third and finest installment in the group’s trilogy of EP releases over the last year. The nine-track CD delights in its many eccentricities, which include abrasive, distorted vocals on “Blackwater”; a Japanese recitation on “Sleep With Me”; Erik Sanden’s…
Bay City Trollers
Streams and rivers move past us to the Gulf, mixing into the countless brackish bays and reed-chocked estuaries where millions upon millions of crusted and scaly aquatic infants spill into the greater coastal system each year. We follow the watershed’s coastward slump from San Antonio for nearly 200 miles. Against us is the Gulf’s returning…
Molotov cocktail party
“Don’t call me ‘gringo’/you fucking beaner/stay on your side/of the goddamn river/don’t call me ‘gringo’/you beaner” “No me digas ‘beaner’ Mr. Puñetero/te sacaré un susto por racista y culero/No me llames ‘frijolero’/pinche gringo puñetero” — Molotov’s “Frijolero” In an old conversation with Guillermo Gómez Peña published on pochanostra.com, Josh Kun nearly hits the nail on…
Spiderwick Chronicles Official Books Package
The Spiderwick Official Book Package Contains 7 books: 1. Make Your-Own Field Guide 2. Hogsqual;s Activity Book 3. Beware the Boggart 4. Thimbletack’s Mission 5. The Movie Storybook 6. Official Movie Companion 7. Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around You To qualify, please send an email to: freebies@sacurrent.com Winners will be picked at random…
CDs Nuts
On Disappearing Harpeth Trace (Rockets Red Glare) How does an album manage to be both minimalist and psychedelic? Honestly, I have no idea. It’s hard to say exactly how the Harpeth Trace manages to pull this off. With three-minute songs constructed of sparse, lingering musical notes and Josh Kasselman’s pretty but sorta-spooky vocals, the Harpeth…
The bloodhounds of war
Charlie Morris’s work, much like the artist who creates it, doesn’t talk loudly or wave its arms, but it would, in its quiet way, like you to notice it. Notice, and engage in a meaningful conversation, not some shallow chitchat about its pretty colors or that hilarious faux pas at last night’s reception. Admittedly it’s…
Race for the curious
By the time the primaries make their way to Texas March 4, the presidential-ticket leaders will be all but decided (or will they?), but Texans still have the opportunity to weigh in on a number of important races — from local contests for sheriff, district attorney, and tax assessor-collector to United States Senator. The March…
ARTIFACTS
So much art news to report, so little space — so I’ll just jump right in. In my hand, I have the On and Off Fredericksburg Road tour catalogue for this weekend’s self-guided tour of over 20 art studios and galleries (showcasing — brace yourself now — more than 40 local artists including David Rubin,…
THE QUEQUE
Rebel rebel There’ll be a bed for you, protestor. The Legislative Budget Board made sure of that. As gaggles of distraught, disenfranchised Texans plot on the eve of rampant public hearing mania over Goodfella Perry’s NAFTA highway plans, the state’s fiscal manager has found that thanks to recent judiciary diversion programs, the state prison population…
‘Love’ is all you need
The Cameo Theater’s I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change! is a lighthearted, unpretentious bit of musical theater whose primary purpose is to entertain, and that it does. I can’t say the set design, with its swirly-tailed hearts on a purple background, was my favorite, but then I’ve never been a fan of hearts not…
The Craddick D list
If Aunt Ginny in Austin and Uncle Roberto in Palmview are thinking of sulking at home this year because they may not get a say in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary (what else is new?), pick up the phone (or send them an IM or email) and tell them they have a reason to vote…
Home is where the art is
Local husband-wife artists Nate Cassie and Ethel Shipton tap into the community for their first joint show, currently on display at Palo Alto College’s new Gallery 100. The inspiration for What Are You Doing? says Cassie, is place and community. As for the offbeat title, it refers to the couple’s separate workplaces, office spaces, and…
I Tried to Vote
I think my ex-boyfriend stole my voter registration card, but I know it’s current. You can still vote at your precinct polling place using one of several acceptable forms of ID, including a driver’s license or a U.S. passport. See sos.state.tx.us/ for more info. I’m not sure if I’m registered, or maybe I moved since…
Homeless programming
TigerTV homelessness A Trinity University television program documenting the state of homelessness in San Antonio was pulled from YouTube at midnight February 6. The segment’s producer, Trinity student Josh Nowitz, voluntarily removed the program, part one in a three-part series, after a City employee who appeared in the documentary said she had consented to appear…
Check those divas!
Sunday! Sunday! Sunday! Rollergirls fans wait no longer — the darlings of the Alamo City have dusted the cobwebs off their skates for the first down ’n’ derby action of the regular season, pitting the Prim Reapers against the Missyfits. As the girls eagerly await new bruises, bloody noses, and sprained knees, their insurance companies…
Your rep can’t do it alone: A spectator sport that brings home the bacon
Aside from football, there is no better contact sport in America than electoral politics in Texas, and just in time to cure your post-Super Bowl blues come the March 4 Texas primaries (don’t forget, in-person early voting begins February 19; see page 9 for more info). Tammany Hall and the Chicago Machines ain’t got nothin’…
Bay City Trollers
Streams and rivers move past us to the Gulf, mixing into the countless brackish bays and reed-chocked estuaries where millions upon millions of crusted and scaly aquatic infants spill into the greater coastal system each year. We follow the watershed’s coastward slump from San Antonio for nearly 200 miles. Against us is the Gulf’s returning…
¡Ask a Mexican!
Dear Mexican: After working with Mexicans for years, I have noticed that Mexican men have a double standard when it comes to homosexuality. Why is it that the “giver” is not regarded as being just as equally gay as the “receiver”? — El Vaquero Dear Cowboy Gabacho: I think all heterosexual societies condemn the catcher…
Climate change: Panic in the trenches
It’s an old joke: Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it. The same, unfortunately, is true for the climate. They ARE talking about it. They were at it again in Honolulu last week, discussing mandatory, internationally binding commitments on greenhouse-gas emissions (although Russia and India refused to allow any mention of…
Council gets personal
It felt like Ex-Mayors Day at the San Antonio City Council’s January 31 meeting, with Nelson Wolff detailing the planned consolidation of city and county health systems (a measure unanimously passed by the council) and Lila Cockrell updating councilmembers on renovations to the historic Japanese Tea Garden. Cockrell quickly ceded the floor to…
Council gets personal
It felt like Ex-Mayors Day at the San Antonio City Council’s January 31 meeting, with Nelson Wolff detailing the planned consolidation of city and county health systems (a measure unanimously passed by the council) and Lila Cockrell updating councilmembers on renovations to the historic Japanese Tea Garden. Cockrell quickly ceded the floor to another face…
