New street art marks the source
Whenever I hear someone say–again–that, “Art should be free!” my response is, “Yeah that’s great, but who’s buying the art supplies?” Last weekend off San Pedro, just south of the Nightrocker, dozens of local graf writers threw up some alley burners with help from Corpus Christi, Austin, Houston and New York artists. This time, the…
Interviews with ‘Falling Skies’ survivors Bloodgood, Gabriel
In the new Steven Spielberg-produced sci-fi TV series Falling Skies, actresses Moon Bloodgood (Terminator Salvation) and Seychelle Gabriel (The Last Airbender) play Anne and Lourdes, two survivors of an alien invasion who have taken on the responsibility of running a makeshift medical clinic as violent extraterrestrials run amok on Earth. During an interview with me,…
Ever thought of becoming a yoga teacher?
If so, you may want to attend this open house for Austin-based Yoga Yoga Teacher Training. When: Saturday, June 25 from 1-3 p.m. Where: Yoga Sanctuary, 23535 IH-10 West in San Antonio, TX This open house will provide information and answer questions about the fall 200-hour hatha yoga teacher training program, in partnership with Yoga Yoga Teacher Training…
Council vote clears the way for Pink Building demolition
One question still hangs over the debate surrounding Casa Maldonado, affectionately dubbed the “Pink Building” by those who would preserve it: Can it be salvaged? As Council unanimously voted Thursday to reject historic landmark status for the building, that question remained largely unanswered. The vote, which denied preservationists the one tool that could have halted…
“A Few Minutes of Hell” by Steven Botts
Introduction Jean-Paul Sartre famously wrote “L’enfer, c’est les autres” (Hell is other people) in the play No Exit. Steven Botts’ story is slightly longer than Sartre’s quote but suggests the same thing. Maybe it’s more of a “Hell is repetition.” Still there’s people in it. Your stories must be forthcoming: flashfiction@sacurrent.com. And don’t skimp on…
Infamous 2 ramps up the voltage and clears its predecessor
Cole McGrath didn’t want this — the powers, the control, the power to become worshiped or feared — he was a messenger-turned-savior as Empire City was overrun by militia controlled by a shadowy agency known as the First Sons. But this choice wasn’t his to make. In fact, it was never a choice at all;…
Green Lantern fails to light up the screen by sticking too close to formula
Dir. Martin Campbell, writ. Greg Berlanti, Michael Green, Marc Guggenheim, and Michael Goldenberg; feat. Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively, Peter Sarsgaard, Mark Strong, Temuera Morrison, Tim Robbins, Angela Bassett. (PG-13) This summer brings a slew of new superhero movies, and even though the big guns are sitting this one out (The Dark Knight Rises AND…
Quick take: Sondheim’s Company at the Bijou
Stephen Sondheim’s Company—filmed this past spring in a production by the New York Philharmonic—plays just three more screenings in San Antonio (at the Bijou, for instance), and judging by “opening night’s” performance on Wednesday, it’s a crowd-pleaser. With an all-star cast (including Neil Patrick Harris a.k.a “Doogie Howser,” Pattie LuPone, and, somewhat incredibly, Stephen Colbert),…
Rapture called off; Randy Savage holds End of Times in his hands
Every generation believes they’ll be the ones who will see the ‘end of times.’ Be it religious, cosmic, or human engineered, generations of people have obsessed over this singular idea and thought they’d be the lucky few alive to see the end of humanity. Such arrogance! Just what makes you so special to be chosen…
San Antonio Can! High School gives students a second chance
Another year of high school graduations has come and gone. But, in spite of the celebrations, there is a real problem with the high school completion rate in San Antonio and other Texas cities. Depending on which study you read, somewhere around 30% our city’s students who enter the ninth grade, do not go on…
Fast Foodie: Deco revival
Deco Pizzeria 1815 Fredericksburg Rd. (210) 732-3326 “Would you like a table in the sunroom? The light is good in there.” “Lead me to it.” “Do you want me to turn up the air conditioning?” “Sure, go for it.” The friendly folks at Deco Pizzeria in the heart of the Fredericksburg Rd. Deco District are…
To Grammy or not to Grammy
To Grammy or not to Grammy, that is the question. For some, the Grammy Awards are a waste of time, but most of the time, those who bitched about them had a sudden change of heart once they won one or got nominated. Let’s face it: The Grammys are still a powerhouse and even though…
San Antonio film festival spreads across the city
For the first time in its 17-year history, the San Antonio Film Festival will offer screenings in six different locations. It’s an 11-day festival with more to offer than ever, but — for reasons I will put forth in my next El Cine column — I was only able to obtain a few screeners ahead…
A scorching odyssey of death and rebirth
Incendies Dir. & writ. Denis Villeneuve; feat, Lubna Azabal, Mélissa Désormeaux-Poulin, Maxim Gaudette and Rémy Girard. The opening sequence in Incendies is a stunning piece of poetic filmmaking: A desert in the Middle East framed in the window of a barracks where a dozen young Muslim conscripts readied for combat are having their heads…
Two-fisted miche puts Triple J’s on our drink map
Triple J’s Pub 3400 S Flores (210) 532-3335 Vibe A labor of love that speaks to the neighborhood setting. Best Use Giant, spicy micheladas are puro pinche Southside. Prices Domestic beer $2, Imports $2.75 Triple J’s Pub is tucked down on South Flores on a corner with a car repair shop. It’s a small…
The Apoca-List
AKA The “We’re Fucked” Index
Mental health rollback : Community program one of few options for many
The lines between staff and members at Our House, a local nonprofit for those with a history of mental illness, often blur. Inside the welcoming two-story house, program staff and community members — not patients — work side-by-side answering phones, cleaning, and cooking meals. Our House isn’t a treatment center but is designed to give…
Tre Trattoria at the Fairmount Hotel coming into its own
Tre Trattoria at the Fairmount Hotel 401 S Alamo (210) 223-0401 tretrattoria.com The Skinny: Tuscan classics and house-cured specialties, served family-style. BEST BETS: Chef’s Market Salad, changes weekly. Our rendition included baby arugula, Fredericksburg peaches, and pork torchon served with a pomegranete molasses dressing. Hours: 11am-10pm Mon-Fri 10am-10pm Sat & Sun, brunch offered PRICES: Small…
SMOD: SMOD
While he was producing Amadou & Mariam’s brilliant Dimanche à Bamakoem> (2005), Manu Chao got to meet Sam, the son of the legendary Malian couple. He was part of an up-and-coming hip-hop quartet named after the members’ initials (Sam, Mouzy, Ousco, and Donsky). After Mouzy left for France in 2001, the band retained its name…
Apple joining Google, Amazon in the Cloud
Last week Apple Inc.’s Steve Jobs made news again, announcing the dawn of iCloud at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference. By outsourcing storage to remote servers, cloud computing eliminates the need to save data on a hard drive or other storage device and allows users to more easily share files with others across the internet. Imagine…
Working Man Special from Burger Boy
A bite of what we’re eating here at the Current
No Te Va Gustar: Por lo menos hoy
For their sixth studio album, Uruguayan nine-piece rock combo No Te Va Gustar almost got rid of all the horns and any native candombe/murga fusion. Instead, they hired the services of Argentina’s Juanchi Baleirón (from los Pericos, arguably the best Spanish-language reggae band ever) and opted for a simpler, more direct sound. The result is…
J.J. Abrams aims high with Super 8, and nearly arrives
Super 8 Dir. and writ. J.J. Abrams; feat. Joel Courtney, Elle Fanning, Kyle Chandler, Noah Emmerich, Riley Griffiths, Ryan Lee, Zach Mills. (PG-13) As much as filmmaker J.J. Abrams (Star Trek) would have liked for his nostalgic sci-fi Super 8 to convey as much enchantment as a Steven Spielberg-directed masterpiece like E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial or Close Encounters of the…
Chilly Gonzales: The Unspeakable Chilly Gonzales
After setting a world record for the longest performance by a solo artist and starring in a quirky feature film, Canadian emcee Jason Charles Beck, aka Chilly Gonzales, returns from the laboratory with what his PR team calls “the planet’s first all-orchestral rap album.” With apologies to Los Angeles’ amazing Dakah Hip Hop Orchestra, Beck’s…
Live & Local: Evil Mothers at Nightrocker Live (w/video)
When it comes to reunion shows, there’s no escaping the disconnect between a band’s image and the change that comes with years. But as Evil Mothers closed a surprise three-city reunion tour June 11 at Nightrocker, something greater than the spectre of pounds gained and images tamed loomed over the show. “Thank your lucky stars…
Of trees and slackers
With the imminent release of Terrence Malick’s much anticipated The Tree of Life, now is a good time to revisit one of his earlier films, The Thin Red Line. His work has always been considered poetic and visually stunning, not to mention critically acclaimed, but the films rarely appeal to mass audiences, even though Malick…
Kimberly Cotton: Shine
On her debut release Shine, Kimberly Cotton is easy to label a folk songbird with an occasional Ani DiFranco edge. But her subjects — love, humanity, and Krishna consciousness — give her more in common with spiritual players like Ben Harper. All of this combines into a skeletal and emotive debut that at times comes…
Suzanna Choffel: Steady Eye, Shaky Bow
What if Nelly Furtado recorded jazzy pop instead of club music, Adele learned how to write more than three types of songs, and Zero 7 weren’t so damn boring? Suzanna Choffel, an Austin-based guitar and voice teacher, takes the potential of other artists rooted in R&B, pop, and moody electronica, and actually fulfills it. Her…
Brian Eno’s (first) golden years
Brian Eno 1971-1977: The Man Who Fell To Earth Dir. Tom O’Dell 154 minutes Never did a man with so little have so much influence in the history of music. The man born in 1948 as Brian Peter George St. John le Baptiste de la Salle Eno (!) doesn’t read or write music. Heck, he…
Day Trippin’ for Beer
San Antonio beer enthusiasts and new brew hunters will go to great lengths to take breweries outside the city for a test drive. And with the buzz around Austin’s exploding brewery scene, it’s even tempting to brave the inexcusable traffic morass of the Capitol City to get a taste. But don’t be so fast to…
The QueQue, June 15, 2011
IRS bites LULAC More than 17,000 Texas nonprofits had their tax-exempt status yanked recently in a sweeping federal action intended to purge the rolls of defunct organizations. San Antonio orgs like the Nimrod Rifle Club, Ethical Breeders Association, and the Koi and Fancy Goldfish Society will now have to file applications for reinstatement — if…
Dirty South examines impact of Southern Rap
Dirty South: Outkast, Lil Wayne, Soulja Boy, and the Southern Rappers Who Reinvented Hip-Hop By Ben Westhoff Chicago Review Press $14.95 (trade paper), 272 pages In scores of interviews with key players — some requiring classic shoe-leather man-hunting — Westhoff pins the genre’s roots to 2 Live Crew, profiles the renegade boom-bust fortunes of No…
Smith’s ‘Kick Ass” Wines
When a big-haired rock band impresario with a self-declared “kick ass” attitude decides to start making wines it’s only reasonable that motives might be, if not exactly impugned, at least politely questioned. A lot of people with more money than sense — retired attorneys, airline pilots, and even firemen among them — have had an…
Claims of sexual abuse by former Southside priest results in calls to stay execution
The church of St. Clare’s, a symbol of faith and piety for some in this small Southside community, has become an icon of the fear and shame others here have kept buried for decades. In recent weeks, nearly half a dozen current and former parishioners have come forward claiming they were sexually abused by former…
Critic’s Pick: Rear Window
Texas Public Radio Cinema Tuesdays series $10 for TPR members, $12 for non-members 7:30pm Tuesday, June 21 Santikos Bijou 4522 Fredericksburg Rd (210) 614-8977 tpr.org/cinema The temperature is 97 degrees Fahrenheit as Rear Window opens on the kind of torrid New York morning that causes characters in Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing to go…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): The film Tuck Everlasting tells the story of a family that becomes immortal after drinking from a magical spring. The two parents and their two sons hide their gift from the world, but eventually a mysterious man in a yellow suit finds out about their secret and stalks them. At one…
The Apoca-List
AKA The “We’re Fucked” Index
San Antonio teachers, administrators watch the budget ax fall
This has been a year colored by activism in the Texas public education community, as school district superintendents, teachers, and other advocates for the children of Texas rushed to Austin to demand that the Legislature continue funding school districts at current levels. It didn’t happen. On May 31, Governor Rick Perry called the Texas State…
Accordion Babes will demand your complete surrender at La Tuna
Accordion Babes (Amber Lee Baker and Renée de la Prade) Call for prices, 7pm Saturday, June 18 La Tuna 419 E Cevallos (210) 224-8862 amberleeandtheanomalies.com squeezeboxgoddess.com Since 2008, a group of international female accordion players has been publishing a photo calendar of themselves in pin-up style and touring on the strength of a CD…
Pretentiousness the true leading role in The Art of Getting By
The Art of Getting By Dir. and writ. Gavin Wiesen; feat. Freddie Highmore, Emma Roberts, Michael Angarano, Blair Underwood, Rita Wilson, Alicia Silverstone, Sam Robards, Elizabeth Reaser. (PG-13) While one could argue about where the line between brilliance and bullshit starts to blur with films like Richard Linklater’s 2001 mindbender Waking Life, Darren Aronofsky’s 2006…
Artifacts
The Kronsky Charitable Trust Foundation has issued a challenge grant to encourage new support for ARTS San Antonio. Each dollar donated by new supporters of ARTS San Antonio before August 11 will be matched one-to-one: Give a buck, deliver two. The challenge will match donations up to $25,000, and extends to those who have not…
Twisted Taco Truck Throwdown
Aided by the opening of Boardwalk on Bulverde, the lot for in-town food trucks, mobile dining continues to trend positive in San Antonio. Cruising Kitchens, the team behind Boardwalk on Bulverde, is aiming to keep the tires turning with special events. They’ve started screening family movies at night to add a cinematic aspect to…
