Green Day: '¡Dos!'
There’s definitely some old school sound going on in ¡Dos!, the second of Green Day’s 2012 trilogy, but not the kind expected. Billie Joe Armstrong actively wanted garage rock rather than punk rock to define the album, and it works most fluidly on “Lazy Bones” and “Wild One” where, if not for Armstrong’s distinctive whine,…
Stay Current with the Pick of the Day: “Arte Chihuahua”
Curator Arturo Infante Almeida hopes to capture the spirit of El Estado Grande with “Arte Chihuahua,” a group show representing a collaboration between UTSA President Ricardo Romo and Mexican Consul Enrique Cortazar. Opening Monday at the Institute of Texan Cultures, the exhibition highlights 23 nationally and internationally recognized artists living and working in Ciudad Juárez,…
Actress Mae Whitman talks ‘Arrested Development,’ ‘ID43D,’ Tinker Bell
Actress Mae Whitman began her career in 1994’s “When a Man Loves a Woman” when she was only six years old. During an interview with me, actress Mae Whitman (Independence Day), best known for her role in the short-lived TV show Arrested Development, talked about what fans of the cult hit can expect when the…
Stay Current with the Pick of the Day: Have You Seen Marie?
A search for a lot pet becomes a “transformative quest” in Have You Seen Marie?, the latest from revered author Sandra Cisneros, who founded SA’s Macondo Foundation and is widely celebrated for the novel The House on Mango Street. Exploring grief, healing, and the power of love, the short story follows Sandra and her friend…
Stay Current with the Pick of the Day: Latino Music Festival
Coinciding with SA’s Veterans Day Parade, Main Plaza Conservancy’s 5th Annual Latino Music Festival gathers a wide-range of performers for a live music marathon encompassing flamenco, conjunto, Latin fusion, and rock en español. After a set by Flamenco Suspiro with Randy Cordero (12:30-1:30pm), the fest kicks into high gear with five-time Grammy-winning accordion hero Flaco…
Uruguay and ‘3 Millones’: In soccer we trust
(full disclosure: the author of this post contacted Tugg.com and the filmmakers about screening this movie in San Antonio, but is not receiving any part of the proceeds of the film nor is associated with the making of it) Uruguay, a tiny South American country with a population of 3.3 million, is perhaps the most…
Anthony Bourdain on pig guts and fellow star foodies
by Kimberly A. Suta I don’t know what I expected of Anthony Bourdain’s tour, The Guts and Glory, but by the look of his poster, which included a tattoo-like illustration of a bloody heart, kitchen knives, and talons gripping chicken bones, I thought we might just be in for a wild ride. I was wrong.…
Stay Current with the Pick of the Day: “Invited (Outside)”
Clamp Light Studios & Gallery — a multi-purpose space run by resident artists/co-directors Wesley Harvey, Zane Carroll, Mark Crutsinger, and Sarah Roberts — brings four nationally exhibiting artists to SA for “Invited (Outside).” Working in metals and jewelry design, Austin’s Jessica Jacobi creates work that challenges notions of “beauty and the grotesque” as they relates…
The Test Tube by Dan Timoskevich
Test tubes are wonderful things. So much possibility in such a small clear glass vial. But, as is the case here, so much disappointment too. What I find interesting — and this is the point — is the ending. Why does she say what she says? We can certainly understand her decision, though it is…
'Skyfall': Teaching an old dog new tricks
As it turns out, you can teach an old dog new tricks. When Jason Bourne hit the big screen in 2002, many heralded the other JB’s inevitable demise. After all, how could Bond’s graying, eager-to-please formulaic smarm compete with the real-world grittiness and innate humanity of Matt Damon’s tortured spy saga? Tragically, 2008’s ill-conceived Quantum…
Musical Bridges Around the World brings kids to concerts in outreach program
Musical Bridges Around the World (MBAW) is not just an organization’s name. It is a description of its musical gift to San Antonio. Board Member Suhail Arastu gives a great snapshot of Musical Bridges when he says, “In its 15 years, Musical Bridges Around the World has evolved from piano and chamber music to what…
Bourdain stops at Two Bros BBQ Market before Trinity talk
Right before dropping a whole lot of f-bombs at Laurie Auditorium, internationally renowned chef, author, and all-around bad ass Anthony Bourdain decided to drop in at Two Bros BBQ Market for a nice Texas-style BBQ lunch. If you weren’t lucky enough to catch him tearing meat right off of the bone at Chef Jason Dady…
Further proof that the Beatles live: AG, Mrs. Howl
I was reviewing AG’s The Beatles EP when I heard a beep coming out of my Facebook page. It was Mrs. Howl announcing the band’s December 8 full set of John Lennon and Beatles songs at Boneshakers, commemorating the 32nd anniversary of Lennon’s death. I don’t know, but perhaps one of the reasons Mrs. Howl…
Stay Current with the Pick of the Day: Guts and Glory
After seven years of exploring exotic, isolated, and war-torn locales for his four-time Emmy-winning Travel Channel series No Reservations, chef, author, and television personality Anthony Bourdain announced he’d be leaving the network to launch two new primetime shows: a food and travel series for CNN and the ABC cooking competition The Taste. No Reservations’ final…
Stay Current with the Pick of the Day: Vicky and the Vengents
Comprised of lead singer Vicky Tafoya, guitarist Matt Beld, bassist Vinny Malachi, and drummer Dusty Watson, Southern California’s Vicky and the Vengents is a “psychedelic maltshop punk rock group” influenced by The Shangri-Las, The Ronettes, Phil Spector, Joan Jett, and “all thangs dramatic and loud.” “The girl groups, guitars, grease, and garage are all in…
Motivated Texas Greens secure a spot on 2014 ballot
“I’m losing but that’s Okay,” said Greg Fox, Green Party candidate for State House District 120. The trade unionist’s attitude seemed to sum up the mood at the Bexar County Green Party’s election night shin dig. Forget the presidency. On Tuesday evening, most of the Greens gathered at Tycoon Flats were focused on far less…
Voters approve Castro’s Pre-K initiative
Mayor Julian Castro had one hell of a night Tuesday. Early in the night, damn near everyone had called the race for his man Barack Obama. Castro’s twin, Joaquin, was elected to Congress by a wide margin (no surprise there). And voters approved the Mayor’s historic city-wide pre-kindergarten initiative, upon which Castro’s staked his entire mayoral…
Plant-based Vegeria delivers Tex-Mex everyone can enjoy
Typically, San Antonio’s meaty, gravy-laden, and cheese-smothered offerings send vegans running. Cue Vegeria Vegan Restaurant, a mostly Tex-Mex vegan joint that also caters to gluten-free and raw diets. Located in the Viva Bookstore Complex on Broadway, Vegeria’s décor is reminiscent of a festive Mexican home, with festive lights strung across the ceiling and photos of…
Stock up on kitchen supplies
The San Antonio Restaurant Association is helping restaurants and home cooks alike by having a massive garage sale. Restauranteurs have been donating all kinds of kitchen equipment for the sale on Saturday, November 10. While you might not be in the market for an industrial flat top, you also might find great kitchen utensils at…
Everclear rediscovers its spark
"I am not the king of self-destruction," challenges Everclear frontman Art Alexakis before relenting a smidge. "I may be a crown prince." Now 50 and celebrating his first new music in six years, Invisible Stars, Alexakis is in good spirits. If there was ever any truth to the suggestion that Alexakis was "difficult," that time’s…
Gadgets bigger than culinary fads
Local culinary expert and food historian Melissa Guerra isn’t easily impressed with high-tech gadgets for the kitchen. As the owner of the green-friendly Latin Market Kitchen at the Pearl Brewery (FYI: it just moved locations, but is still in the complex), Guerra is not interested in selling something in her store that is "just going…
Vincent Valdez brings Veterans Day to the McNay
Bronze statues of warriors have gone out of fashion and it’s a rare day that Big Art acknowledges those who serve in the military and that after a decade of conflict our country is still at war. In America’s Finest: Recent Works by Vincent Valdez, Valdez adjusts that view by paying tribute to his close friend…
Newsmonger: DPS under fire, Woman nabbed in murder-for-hire plot, Millions spent on school punishment in TX
DPS under fire Civil liberties groups, immigrant advocates and a group of Texas elected officials are outraged over a DPS helicopter sniper who fatally shot two Guatemalan men during a high speed chase on a rural border road late last month. An audio recording of the chase obtained last week by KRGV-TV reveals troopers did…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): The data that’s stored and disseminated on the Internet is unimaginably voluminous. And yet the 540 billion trillion electrons that carry all this information weigh about the same as a strawberry. I’d like to use this fun fact as a metaphor for the work you’re doing these days — and the…
Pop Pistol: 'Animal Prisms'
Animal Prisms — Pop Pistol’s sophomore LP — manages to transcend influences, technical roadblocks, and the contemporary music milieu to find its own cosmic sonic niche. On this record, the band perfects an eerily comfortable chaos — a full to bursting sound that rewardingly blends brooding electronic moods, sturdily mechanical drum and bass, wandering prog-rock…
¡ASK A MEXICAN!
Dear Mexican: When are the racial minorities going to give up la causa? We have a black man for el presidente, and as a white middle-aged male, I couldn’t be happier. I have been hearing all of my life about how oppressed the racial minorities have been and what needs to be done with society…
Indian celebration fills HemisFair with lights, dancing
Enticing aromas of dosas and tandoori flavors, a rainbow of Indian jewelry and clothing, an array of mesmerizing performances suitable for anyone’s taste: this is how San Antonio commemorated the city’s fourth annual Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, which represents the welcoming of good by dispelling the bad. It was my fortune to attend…
Jackson Albracht takes Cartographers off the the map. For now
For the last five years, Cartographers have been one of the most creative, engaging, irreverent, and technically talented forces in San Antonio music. If you frequent live music events in this town, chances are you’ve enjoyed/been harassed by their heartfelt and scatterbrained brand of experimental indie rock with a poppy sheen and a grunge heart.…
Martinis and freebies at Bin 555
On the basis of its happy hour, Bin 555 isn’t in danger of becoming a Mixology Mecca any time soon — those who have cloyed of the craft cocktail juggernaut may now exhale. Monday through Friday from 5-7, $5 will get you a basic drink made from Absolut Vodka, Tanqueray Gin, Bacardi Silver Rum, Dewar’s…
Killer Kill: 'Act Your Age' EP
Killer Kill’s sound is hard to put a pin in — and its unpredictability is a good thing. Its strengths are in a shifty, dynamic sound, especially when the rhythm section of John Guest and Mason Macías play around with tricky time signatures (as on the opening track, "Actress"), or when frontman Cameron Taylor lets…
Diana Vreeland, her life and enduring impact on the fashion world
"Why don’t you rinse your blond child’s hair in dead champagne to keep its gold, as they do in France?" "Why don’t you go serenely out in the snow in a court jester’s hood of cherry red cotton velvet?" "Why don’t you look up the new deep mauvish-pink rose which came out in Paris at…
URBAN-15 moves to the beat of its own drums
On the corner of South Presa and Dunning Avenue sits a brick building. Nothing to see here, save for a few faded blocks of stained glass. Crickets chirp at a darkening sky as the body shop attendant across the street yawns and rolls down the door for the day. Then, as the sun dips behind…
Q&A with Lisa Immordino Vreeland
First published as a book chronicling Diana Vreeland’s life through 350 photographs, Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel is the first film endeavor from Lisa Immordino Vreeland, who is married to Alexander Vreeland, grandson of the late "High Priestess of Fashion." She spoke to the Current about her documentary and the woman behind such…
Alejandro Jodorowsky: 'El Topo' (original motion picture soundtrack)
If you have never seen the epic cult classic El Topo, stop reading and correct this immediately. Go ahead, I’ll wait. … Finished? OK. Welcome back. Do you feel like you’ve dropped a tab of fun stuff, traveled through a handful of sinister allegorical dimensions and no longer know your purpose in this world? Good.…
'Wedding Band' finds laughs in the gap between swagger and sad reality
Wedding Band (9pm Sat, TBS) This wonderful new comedy series combines Spinal Tap and School of Rock in a satire of the wedding-band biz. The band in question is made up of four aging musicians with day jobs and, in one case, a family, but the wedding circuit allows them to keep their rock ’n’…
Stay Current with the Pick of the Day: “Arthur Dove’s Meteorology”
Rachael Z. DeLue, associate professor of art and archaeology at Princeton University and author of George Inness and the Science of Landscape, is completing a book about Arthur Dove (1880-1946), an early modernist who is often considered the first American abstract painter. In “Arthur Dove’s Meteorology,” DeLue discusses the artist’s preoccupation with the nature and…
Silver Streak
The San Antonio Spurs opened up the first week of their young NBA campaign by making history. After solid wins against the New Orleans Hornets, Oklahoma City Thunder, Utah Jazz, and Indiana Pacers, Tim Duncan and company stand atop the Western Conference at 4-0, the first time they have accomplished that feat in the franchise’s…
