Dance of the Snow Lion
By Greg Harman gharman@sacurrent.com Alex Chilton once crooned, “High in the hills of the Him-a-layas; There lives a cool cat they call the Dalai Lama.” â??Course long before as he first penned this oddity, His Holiness the Dalai Lama was living in neighboring India, long since forced from his country by invading Chinese bullets and…
Fun Fun Fun Fest 2008, Day One
Fun Fun Fun Fest is ACL’s upstart little brother â?? and it should always stay that way, no matter how big the acts playing their stages get. And this year, they brought some pretty big acts. The National, Deerhoof, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Bad Brains, Dead Milkmen, Atmosphere, Octopus Project, Bishop Allen … this…
Live & Local Preview â?? Buttercup
Hey! You got a concert preview in my forced, unfunny joke! You got a labored reference to an old Reese’s candy commercial in my concert preview! Look for me at Limelight Saturday night, where I’ll be reviewing the show by local scene stalwart’s Buttercup. This power-pop quartet is, much like myself, an SA fan favorite…
Mistaken-Identity Department
I am proud to work for the San Antonio Current, not least of which because we provide la gente with the kind of intellectually-rigorous, investigative and/or politically-charged journalism that an intelligent and socially-conscious readership deserves–nay, requires. HOWEVER. Could we lighten it up a little, bitches? Or, more to the point, may I? We can’t all…
Obama and the Wall
Greg Harman gharman@sacurrent.com Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff is not welcome in South Texas. In fact, there will be celebrations when he leaves office with his Boss Bush. Still, Southwest Workers’ Union border coordinator Ruben Solis predicts it may still be difficult to work with institutional Democrats in Congress to stop the Border Wall now…
Cheers at UTSA carry Obama
Greg Harman gharman@sacurrent.com As the electoral votes start rolling down and Texas lilts towardMcCain while the nation veers (207-89) Obama’s way, the chips and salsa is being dished to hundreds of looselyassembled UTSA students out in northwest Bexar County are engaging inlap-sitting and celery-stalk munching. So what is Derek Trimm, chair of UTSA’s political action…
The A Team: where the rubber meets the crushed granite
While it’s might tempting to dig a big shovel into the latest pile of angry, accusatory, gettin-personal emails over the Park Reach Hike & Bike Trail, I’m going to force myself to stick to the comparatively dry facts here (read: you’ll find the dish in next week’s Queque). As the Queque reported a couple of…
On the Street: Oil and Vinegar, 55 Points, More Ink, and Other Important Discussions of Our Time
“The Paper Within the Paper Though Technically Without the Actual Paper” Letters (to the On the Street Penthouse Suite) #1 Change I Can Believe In Election night brought a flurry of ecstatic (drunken?) text messages signaling the changing of the guard. To recount (I knowâ?¦): From Jessica aka Lady G: “OBAMANOS!” From former Current scribe/rabble…
EPA updates Big Tex cleanup plan
“The greatest danger facing us is ourselves and our irrational fear of the unknown. But there is no such thing as the unknown. There are only things temporarily hidden, temporarily not understood.” — Capt. James T. Kirk This quote from the Star Trek poster in the cafeteria at Brackenridge High served as a symbolic reminder…
“President Elect Barack Obama” brings the civil-rights movement home
A deeply felt blog post from current Current intern Xavier Perez: My president is a minority. My president came from a single-parent home. My president worked hard and sacrificed for his education. My president looks like the America I really know. For the first time I am proud to be American, proud of my country,…
Good Time Charlie (Gonzalez)
In my search to find a good place to watch history unfold, I visited Congressman Charlie Gonzalez’s election party at Good Time Charlie’s on Broadway. The choice of venue was particularly apt, as Gonzalez and his supporters (as well as most Democrats everywhere) were indeed having a very good time. Gonzalez trounced Republican opponent Robert…
Secret Machines
Secret Machines Release Date: 2008-11-05 Rated: NONE Genre: Recording Don’t let the modern electronic whooshes fool you — Dallas noisemakers the Secret Machines were born 35 years too late. On their third album of synth-spiked psychedelia, the group (now down to a trio) goes into interstellar overdrive with a bunch of headphone-hugging cuts inspired by…
Jersey Shores
Jersey Shores Composer: Akimbo Label: Neurot Recordings Release Date: 2008-11-05 Rated: NONE Genre: Recording On their latest album, Seattle’s sludgy noise-core veterans Akimbo stay true to the color of ’90s stoner metal while incorporating D.C. post-hardcore’s finest shining moments. Sweeping instrumentations lash out at you and quickly retract, only to attack again on a different…
Madagascar : Escape 2 Africa
Critic’s Pick Madagascar : Escape 2 Africa Director: Eric Darnell, Tom McGrath Screenwriter: Eric Darnell, Tom McGrath Cast: Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, Jada Pinkett-Smith, David Schwimmer, Sacha Baron Cohen and Cedric The Entertainer Release Date: 2008-11-05 Rated: PG Genre: Film Disregarding the intelligent-design theorem — which I believe postulates we were all extracted from our…
Kottonmouth Kings w. Hed PE
Release Date: 2008-11-05 California rip-hop heavyweights Kottonmouth Kings roll through San Antonio once again with Hed PE. No stranger to selling out a venue, the cannabis connoisseurs are still one of the biggest success stories in independent music. Despite the struggles found in today’s music industry the Kings have thrived, maintaining their successful independent record…
Saliva, Drowning Pool, Tantric, & Jet Black Stare
Release Date: 2008-11-05 Saliva and Drowning Pool hit the road together for a co-headlining tour, as Tantric and Jet Black Stare round out the hard-rocking lineup. Gold-selling Memphis turbo-rockers Saliva are anticipating the mid-December release of their fifth album, Cinco Diablo, while Texas favorites Drowning Pool are touring in support of their current release, Full…
The Red Elvises w. King Pelican
Release Date: 2008-11-05 The Red Elvises have managed to surpass one-trick-pony gimmickry, inventing a hybridized sound that accesses both their ethnic Russian roots and American ’50s and ’60s surf and pop influences along the way — Siberian surf-a-billy, if you will. Their onstage exuberance keeps them on the road. Live performances, peppered with frequent costume…
Ian McFeron Band
Release Date: 2008-11-05 The Seattle-based Ian McFeron Band shifts smoothly through a variety of roots-Americana styles, ranging from acoustic folk rock to gritty alt-country blues, from soulful ballads to driving, danceable backbeat grooves. The foursome makes its way through the Alamo City in support of its latest release, Let It Ride, a 14-track narrative spanning…
Ron Wilkins “4tet”
Release Date: 2008-11-05 Roosevelt High School grad and San Antonio legend Ron Wilkins showcases some of his best work during the Ron Wilkins “4tet” at the Little Carver. A jazz trombonist and vocalist, Wilkins is a giant on the scene in both San Antonio and Austin and is currently playing the tuba and bass trombone…
Letters to Sala: A Young Woman’s Life in Nazi Labor Camps
Release Date: 2008-11-05 For nearly 50 years, Sala Kirschner’s struggle for freedom during the Holocaust was kept a secret. After surviving five years of Nazi work camps, she came to America and never spoke of her wartime experiences until 1991, when she revealed a collection of about 350 letters, photographs, postcards, and a diary from…
“Bud” means big
Release Date: 2008-11-05 The folks at Bud Jones restaurant have been feeding South-siders for 50 years. Longtime San Antonians still remember the “Yo, Bud!” commercials blaring from late-night TV. I would say that if you haven’t visited since 1958 you’d find not much has changed. The same family still owns and runs the place. Most…
Lordi
Release Date: 2008-11-05 Finnish monster-rockers Lordi brings their over-the-top horror-movie theatrics and pyrotechnic-fueled rock ’n’ roll to the White Rabbit in support of their newest album, Deadache. National treasures in their native country, Lordi have conquered numerous European charts and are making their mark in the U.S. since winning the 2006 Eurovision Award. Books and…
Strange brews
Release Date: 2008-11-05 A combination of details makes you feel like you’re in Seattle or Portland or some other wonderful Northwestern city when you have a pint at the San Antonio Homebrew Supply. It’s the owner-bartender’s laid-back and friendly attitude. It’s the even light, diffused as it comes through the skylight, which recreates, no matter…
A Flock of Seagulls w. Missing Persons & Tommy Tutone
Release Date: 2008-11-05 Back in 1988, when South by Southwest was still in its infancy, the confab’s organizers invited English band Flock of Seagulls to play a showcase. By all accounts, the gig was a distaster. The band members proved to be unprofessional egomaniacs who showed up late and made outrageous demands. To make matters…
In Ear Park
In Ear Park Composer: Department of Eagles Label: 4AD Release Date: 2008-11-05 Rated: NONE Media: CD Length: LP Format: Album Genre: Recording Department of Eagles features Grizzly Bear’s Daniel Rossen, and their latest album is lousy with ursine contribution (Chris Bear played drums on several tracks and Chris Taylor produced the album and played bass…
Tuna Does Vegas
Critic’s Pick Release Date: 2008-11-05 The eccentric characters from the third-smallest town in Texas make their way back to the Majestic stage for the newest installment from the “Greater Tuna” creative team, Tuna Does Vegas. Starring the unrivaled duo of Jaston Williams and Joe Sears, the pair changes scenery for a romp in Sin City…
Mediterranean paradise
Southtown’s Oloroso excels at house-made charcuterie, seasonal cuisine
Subtle change
Changeling Director: Clint Eastwood Screenwriter: Clint Eastwood Cast: Angelina Jolie, Amy Ryan, John Malkovich, Jeffrey Donovan, Riki Lindhome Release Date: 2008-11-05 Rated: R Genre: Film While plumbing the true-life mystery of a missing boy in ’20s-era LA, director Clint Eastwood’s Changeling brings another curious fact to the surface. Somehow, the man who once wrapped his…
Super ‘Models’
Role Models Director: David Wain Screenwriter: David Wain Cast: Paul Rudd, Sean William Scott, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Bobbâ??e J. Thompson, Elizabeth Banks, Jane Lynch Release Date: 2008-11-05 Rated: R Genre: Film When you look back at some of the roles actor Seann William Scott has played over the years, the term “role model” isn’t one of…
Microcastle
Microcastle Composer: Deerhunter Label: Kranky Release Date: 2008-11-05 Rated: NONE Genre: Recording Deerhunter sounds exactly like frontman Bradford Cox looks: Ghostly and spindly, yet possessed of a wiry, mischievous intelligence that makes up for a lack of muscle. On Microcastle, Cox pumps up his gauzy compositions by summoning the spirits of ’60s pop and garage…
Alamobama bash
By Gilbert Garcia Here’s a chronological recap of my election night: 6:42 p.m. — I arrive at Sunset Station for the Term Limits Extension party. Things are a bit dreary. Only 11 people are here, but among them is former Councilwoman Bonnie Conner, who chats with friends. Elisa Chan, already campaigning for the District 9…
S’Nuff film
Slab Cinema (slabcinema.com) will extend its free outdoor screenings into the month of November. Last month, the films were all Halloween-y fright fests, but this month the non-theme seems to be “movies selected randomly from some dude’s DVD rack.” John Wayne’s terrifying performance in Native American slasher flick The Searchers eases the transition 7:30 p.m.…
Secret Agency Man
Not long after U.S. Air Force Major General* Michael Hayden learned he was going to be named the director of the National Security Agency in 1998, he and his wife went out on a date. The Haydens lived in Seoul, South Korea, where he was stationed with the United Nations Command, and they decided to…
That ’70s show
TV land is well acquainted with time travel. You got your Quantum Leap, your Do Over, your Futurama, your Journeyman, your Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. You got that increasingly inscrutable ancient-Japan subplot in Heroes … The list goes on. And, with three of those examples debuting in the last three years and another (Futurama)…
Dear Uncle Mat
I am a 45-year-old lady working for one of the biggest media houses in Kenya. There is this man I met in Nairobi some years back, and I have two kids from him. I have money and do not have other kids. We are legally married. This man had another wife from whom he was separated when…
Cinema Obscura
With a suggested sale price of $69.99 (or even at the amazon.com discounted rate of $48.99), this collection of four previously unreleased MST3K episodes probably only qualifies as “bargain-bin” on the same scale that categorizes people making $250,000 a year “working class.” But as a dream assassin (aka, a critic) I feel a giant debt…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Uranus is on the opposite side of the sun from Saturn right now. To traditional astrologers, that’s a stressful aspect. It bespeaks a titanic clash between the forces of progress and the inertia of the past. But there are mitigating factors. The expansive planet Jupiter is trine to Saturn and sextile…
Zombie Movies: The Ultimate Guide
Pitching your book as the “ultimate guide” to anything is a risky move, especially when there are nerds involved, and there’s not much nerdier than a good zombie film. For that reason, I’m guessing movie reviewer Glenn Kay’s claim to an authoritative zombie-film text has already earned him more hate mail and snotty error-spotting than…
¡Ask a Mexican!
SPECIAL CANADIAN EDITION Dear Readers: So your presidential candidate lost (congratulations, McBama! Our condolences, O’Cain. Damn early deadlines …), and you can’t bear the thought of living under his reign for the next cuatro years. Fear not: the other side of America’s bullshit sandwich will save you! The Mexican hereby turns this column over to…
The QueQue
Puss in booths The Express-News is shaping up to be the paper of former District 1 Councilman Julian Castro come City election time (no less a moral watchdog than Jaime Castillo called District 8 Councilwoman and mayoral hopeful Diane Cibrian “radioactive,” and many a column inch has been devoted to her undisclosed vacation in the…
Amuse-BOUCHE
That noise? Ah, that’s just the Current’s main-squeeze food critic, Ron Bechtol, pushing tiny cocktail forks into an effigy of me, your faithful A-B scribe, who unwisely promised to try to publish his epic Canary Islands culinary adventure ahead of the New World Wine & Food Festival, taking place this week at venues around town…
Green fire
I’m making a sweep of the exhibition floor at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center, trying not to trip over the chemical-protection suits and feeling like a freak-out-of-bongland. I’ve got my hair piled in a topknot and “oil-hatin’ puke” written all over my face. Upstairs in the banquet rooms, presenters at the 18th Annual Clean…
Rent! (and salaries, and programming)
This story was sparked by a quiet moment in a well-lighted downtown park — a park that has benefited some from the recent years of prosperity our city has experienced along with the rest of the nation. The much-needed lamps ringing the small walking path are so new they still look tacked on and naked,…
Practical advice for sailing an arts org in rough financial waters
“I don’t think `the economic situation is` going to get that tough,” Kronkosky Managing Director Palmer Moe told the Current during an interview for this week’s story about local arts funding during the recession. “I don’t envision any arts organizations failing.” Especially if they think and plan strategically, he and our other interview subjects stressed.…
ARTIFACTS
If you’re anything like the Current, you hate airports. Noisy and boring in equal measure, uncomfortable, bad-smelling, and full of the kind of ghoulish décor and lack of refinement that sugests we are, in fact, the unfeeling cattle that airlines believe us to be, the modern airport has sucked most of the fun out of…
The Serence Dominic Show
His King Buzzo wig never arrived on time, forcing Serene to interview Dale Crower and Coady WIllis of the Melvins with his ratty regular Ralph Nader mane. The dual drummers talk about their mutual telepathy. play the Lightning Round, get hyper critical of what’s on Serene’s ipod and what should be immediately removed. After taking…
Open wounds
Celebrity philanthropic efforts often center around a few photo opportunities showcased to further a career. These usually well-meaning events generally turn a fleeting spotlight on the truly needy, such as the numerous Africa plights, conquered Tibet, or the disaster relief du jour. With I Live Here, Mia Kirshner (The L Word) shines an unwavering, informative light…
Fable 2
Microsoft and Lionhead Studios’ Fable II is adventure/RPG gaming at its finest. You play as Sparrow, a homeless child (you choose your sex) raised by your older sister, Rose. After Rose dies, Theresa, the mysterious leader of the Hero’s Guild of Albion, takes you in and raises you to fulfill your destiny as a hero.…
A separate peace
Mark Medoff’s Children of a Lesser God is a surprisingly cerebral play, less a sentimental romance than a sustained rumination about the place — and struggles — of the deaf in a hearing-dependent society. Centered on the courtship of an idealistic speech therapist and his strong-willed (and deeply troubled) deaf client, the play mostly avoids…
Dig out your soul
If music’s faithful — the Killers’ Brandon Flowers, Flyleaf’s Lacey Mosley, Prince, Sufjan Stevens, Daniel Smith, etc. — have converted us to anything, it’s the idea that religion and rock stardom can, in fact, coexist. Enter McAllen indie quintet Dignan, which came to fruition five years ago in the confines of a, gulp, church. Bassist…
THE SOUND & THE FURY
It might seem strange to say this, given all the municipal hype that accompanied the redevelopment of Main Plaza, but the downtown site’s free weekend concerts remain one of the better-kept secrets in SA. That thought hit home last Saturday when Los Texmaniacs played one of their usual ebullient shows (abetted by a beautiful Día…
All Ears
Alegranza! El Guincho (Young Turks/XL) Music lovers who headed out in search of Roma bands after the Accordion Fest’s recent spotlight may have been surprised at the bounty of new names in their favorite store’s international section. It’s true that Roma music continues to be hot, with accessible entry points ranging from anthologies (like Princes…
Blowing Trees
Drummer Drew Pierce is dressed for trick-or-treating in a Luke Skywalker robe, and afroed lead guitarist Edwin Jered Stephens looks so kick-ass in an old-timey vest and bowtie it shouldn’t even be a costume. Marcus Rubio, sitting in on violin and synth as part of his ongoing quest to play in every band in SA,…
“Pop Rock” — Commercial Free Project
“Pop Rock” would be pop rock only in some alternate universe where Thurston Moore and Leonard Cohen top the charts. Neither the horseshit stench of Nickelback-esque radio fodder nor the sweet candy fizz that allegedly exploded that cereal commercial kid’s head is anywhere to be heard. Instead CFP plays like unplugged grunge on a Nyquil…
Mother cutters
Think you haven’t seen all that many movies made by women? Think again. The “invisible” art of film editing — of selecting from masses of raw footage (generally shot out of sequence) of landscapes, character close-ups, dialogue, establishing shots, unfurling ropes, crossed swords, galloping horses, cars screeching to a halt, shark fins emerging from dark…
Dead love for election fears…
Greg Harman gharman@sacurrent.com You’ve got your RSS feeds streaming in news from Kentucky and Vermont and Twitter action piping from polling locations you’re never heard of. Monster fears and bad conjecture creep with every click of the remote. The screens start to mist over. Or are those tears of anxiety piling up? We’ll be popping…
Slow Ba-rocking to the music
Xavier Perez xavier.perez.007@gmail.com A slow voter turnout on Election Day, is that possible? Well I guess if you factor in high early-voter turnout, plus my tour of polling sites went from 12 p.m. to 4 p.m. Could explain the low volume of voters at the polls I visited. (I am going back at 5 p.m.)…
Barnes & ignoble?
By Gilbert Garcia Fred Barnes is either a genius or a delusional homer for the Republican cause. Having observed Barnes, the editor of the Weekly Standard, in action for the last several years, I’ve got my own hunch, but we’ll let voters make the call. Today’s Huffington Post features a list of 27 political pundits,…
Clean Gulf & messes that could have been
Nice habitat. Leak much? An abandoned oil well off the Texas coast. Greg Harman gharman@gmail.com Gathered at last week’s Clean Gulf conference in San Antonio were the heroes of our oil dependence. Ben Benson, worked the largest oil catastrophe (Kuwait) and the most ecologically egregious to date (Exxon’s Valdez). While the true cost of either…
