International Accordion Festival
Release Date: 2007-10-10 The squeezebox extravaganza features performances, workshops, open mics, accordion jams, and dancing till you drop. This year’s moonlight concert and kick-off party focuses on Latino roots music, featuring world-music all-star Chango Spaziuk. He’s heralded as the guardian angel of chamamé, and an innovator of deep Argentinian swing. $5 Fri 6:30pm, Free Sat-Sun…
Chalk It Up!
Release Date: 2007-10-10 Chalk one up for Artpace and their colorful, urban, Houston St. festival. San Antonio’s premier artists turn the sidewalk into a gallery of temporary chalk masterpieces that includes a super-size public mural that all passersby are invited to work on. The beat of local DJs complements crafty street-side shopping and Kidzone creation…
John Peel Tribute Weekend
Release Date: 2007-10-10 KRTU’s Music for Listeners teams up with the Limelight in honor of BBC Radio 1 announcer John Peel, known for his eclectic taste in music and widely respected for his influence on British radio waves. Glorium and Brothers and Sisters headline the weekend, complemented by the famous Peel Sessions and documentaries on…
Gay Fiesta
Release Date: 2007-10-10 A best bet on the Current’s list, Gay Fiesta coincides perfectly with our Out in SA issue this week. Break it down at this annual bash for LGBT San Antonians and their friends, celebrating its 24th year with live entertainment, food, drinks, and more. Main attractions are the varied shows and merchandise…
Texas State Wakeboarding
Release Date: 2007-10-10 Texas State’s team gears up to impress judges at a Collegiate Wakeboard Qualifier this weekend with barrel rolls and mid-air spins, wake-skating moves largely inspired by skateboard techniques. The extreme water-sports competition features 29 collegiate teams from schools throughout the nation — winners advance to the National Finals. $5, All Day Sat-Sun,…
International Accordion Festival
Release Date: 2007-10-10 The squeezebox extravaganza features performances, workshops, open mics, accordion jams, and dancing till you drop. This year’s moonlight concert and kick-off party focuses on Latino roots music, featuring world-music all-star Chango Spaziuk. He’s heralded as the guardian angel of chamamé, and an innovator of deep Argentinian swing. $5 Fri 6:30pm, Free Sat-Sun…
Chalk It Up!
Release Date: 2007-10-10 Chalk one up for Artpace and their colorful, urban, Houston St. festival. San Antonio’s premier artists turn the sidewalk into a gallery of temporary chalk masterpieces that includes a super-size public mural that all passersby are invited to work on. The beat of local DJs complements crafty street-side shopping and Kidzone creation…
1st Annual International Burro Art Exhibit
Release Date: 2007-10-10 Calling all burros and burras! Stylin’ art scenester L.A. David, known for his funky, fusion paintings involving burros, guitars, spaceships, and classic cars, invites everyone out to paint the town red this Saturday. The 1st Annual International Burro Art Exhibit descends upon Gallista Gallery with enough UFOs and space burros to warrant…
USSA & Weedeater
Release Date: 2007-10-10 Steer clear of the “s” word when labeling U.S.S.A., and by that we mean “supergroup.” Formed about a year ago by bassist-producer Paul Barker of Ministry and Revolting Cocks fame and guitarist Duane Denison (The Jesus Lizard/Tomahawk), the band is the spawn of reputable sources but makes it clear that they’ve no…
Tilda Swinton fixes a staid ‘Michael Clayton’
About three-quarters of the way into Michael Clayton, as Tilda Swinton marches down a city street — the lone woman in a pack of well-dressed businessmen — my boyfriend turned to me and said, “What a gangsta.” (Indeed, “gang-stah.”) Thug, hooligan, or mobster her character, Karen Crowder, may not be, but that gangsta synonym hits…
Armchair Cinephile
PICK OF THE WEEK: Reign Over Me (Blu-Ray) (Sony) A 9/11 elegy starring Adam Sandler may sound like an awful idea, but (a few tiny missteps aside) it’s astoundingly effective. This is a touching, funny, finely balanced feature by Mike Binder, featuring a strong supporting role for Don Cheadle. Mala Noche (Criterion) Gus Van Sant’s…
Remotely Interesting (telly navigation)
Dexter (Showtime, Sundays, 9 p.m.) Toilet paper slowly soaks up blood from a shaving mishap. A knife hacks through flesh that turns out to be a ham steak. An egg is cooked over-easy, then gutted with knife and fork and splashed with Tabasco sauce. Filmed in slow motion with shots tight enough to show individual…
Spittin’ Game
Halo 3 Xbox 360 (Microsoft) $59.99 Halo 3 is going to make a lot of whiney geeks like me cry — but not because it disappoints. It’s awesome to the point of bringing tears to your eyes; it lives up to all those impossible expectations in the way that other hyped life events (your wedding,…
Home on the Range
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a mother in possession of two daughters must be in want of a son. At least that’s how it seems here in San Antonio, where complete strangers can’t help but ask, “So, are you going to try again?” after glancing meaningfully at my second baby daughter. Lovely as…
¡Ask a Mexican!
Dear Mexican: We were in a restaurant the other day eating some refried beans and green chili, when I overheard some gringos in the next booth making fun of Mexicans. One thing they said, which really made me mad was, “Why do Mexicans REFRY their beans? Stupid Mexicans! Don’t they know they already fried them…
ARTIFACTS
Art lovers be warned — this weekend will leave you exhausted. Three major events in the local arts community are taking place literally on top of each other. Beginning Saturday, the fourth annual Chalk it Up festival kicks off at 10 a.m. on Houston Street. Be prepared to get a little dirty at this family-friendly…
Clothes-Minded
Pumps are the shoes to pair with this fall’s feminine, tailored look. Take the retro feel even further and fill your closet with open- or “peep-” toe versions to maximize trends. Anything you may not be brave enough to try in a larger piece like a coat or skirt will set off the rest of…
Amuse-Bouche
Increase your hummingbird appeal and clear out those dusty, obsolete electronics this Saturday at the third annual Fall Wildlife Festival and Plant Sale, held at the Mitchell Lake Audubon Center from 9 a.m.-4 p.m. The first 800 people through the gate at the Southside nature preserve will get a free water-saving plant, courtesy of SAWS.…
Dear Uncle Mat
My boyfriend is driving me crazy! One day he tells me that he totally loves me, and the next day he doesn’t know if he wants to be with me. He says that we don’t spend enough time with each other and we only see each other at night and it’s getting old, but whenever…
Take care of your own business
Longtime San Antonio resident Frank Goodish, revered by wrestling fans (especially Japanese fans) as Bruiser Brody for his marauding-barbarian style, was murdered in a Puerto Rico dressing room in July 1988. The wrestler and booker who stabbed him was acquitted, but rumors persist to this day that Goodish was killed at the behest of a…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): I’m not necessarily recommending that you read Stanley Seigel’s book The Patient Who Cured His Therapist. But I do think you should regard the title as a suggestive metaphor for your immediate future. It’s possible that you’ll be helped by a person you’ve been helping, or be given gifts by person…
If we ruled Southtown, we would…
Before I even begin to delve into my artistic adventures from this past week I must share with you all an idea that came across my friend and I while at First Friday. We compiled a short list of items Southtown officials should ban: Children, not all children but newborns, we found it very odd…
Argentina, via the Ukraine
The accordion is like a rare flower that only grows in a very specific climate. Wherever the accordion thrives, you find the same conditions: an unlikely mix of wildly disparate cultures that somehow landed in the same spot, and restless, innovative musicians. You hear it when Argentinian accordion superstar Chango Spasiuk talks about Misiones, the…
THE QUE QUE
Let’s Active Ah, pitiable future. Such a load of hopes, cares, and fears are cast upon you it is a wonder you ever arrive at all. Casper Weinberger said that, we think, sometime after Iran-Contra. Not to be outdone, Wavy Gravy, suggested, “We are all the same person trying to shake hands with our self.”…
THE SOUND & THE FURY
One of the more intriguing performers at this year’s International Accordion Festival should sound highly familiar to SA listeners, even if the group’s trappings seem slightly exotic. That group, Southern Scratch, is the best-known exponent of a Native American musical form known as chicken scratch or waila (taken from baile, the Spanish word for “dance”).…
Remember the Esperanza (lawsuit)
In San Antonio, 9/11 equals catastrophe in more ways than one: On September 11, 1997, then-Mayor Howard Peak presided over an official City Council vote disqualifying the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center from City arts funding on the grounds that the Center’s social-justice work was political and therefore not artistic. Throughout the loud public debate…
Sharp-dressed men
It’s Not Big It’s Large Lyle Lovett and His Large Band (Lost Highway) Lyle Lovett may tour plenty, but he is not the world’s most prolific songwriter. (His last new batch of songs was in 2003, the one before that way back in ’96.) So for those of us who admire his work, it’s hard…
Racial disparities condemn siblings
Troy Anthony Davis and his sister, Martina Correia, are fighting for their lives. Troy faces death by lethal injection at the hands of the state of Georgia, and Martina has breast cancer. Their parallel battles against insuperable odds will remain an inspiring story — provided they live. Time is running out. Troy Davis turned 39…
aural pleasure
White Chalk PJ Harvey (Island) It’s hard to think of a major rock artist who’s ever been as deep a mystery as Polly Jean Harvey. That’s partly because she has no use for celebrity, but it’s primarily because she uses her songs to disappear into character. She’s not about personal revelation (although any piece of…
Revealing briefs
MESQUITE — State Representative Thomas Latham, a Sunnyvale Republican, is an ardent foe of two measures on the November 6 ballot that would allow beer and wine to be sold in stores and alcohol to be sold by the drink without a club membership in the Dallas suburb of Mesquite. In fact, he’s even a…
Playback
With the exception of A&R people, just about everyone hates the old record-industry model and considers it an oppressive anachronism in the digital age. Unfortunately, while it’s easy enough for established artists to work around the industry, it’s much trickier for up-and-comers. Traditionally, labels have been most valuable on the front end: providing promotion and…
If we ruled Southtown, we would…
Before I even begin to delve into my artistic adventures from this past week I must share with you all an idea that came across my friend and I while at First Friday. We compiled a short list of items Southtown officials should ban: Children, not all children but newborns, we found it very odd…
CRITICAL DARLING
Critical Darling is willing to overlook her personal, perchance-a-smidge-exaggerated loathing of Robert Rodriguez just this once, as recent evidence suggests he may know a thing or two after all. (Though not necessarily about gracefully parting with his wife, Troublemaker producer Elizabeth Avellan, the mother of his FIVE children. Via The New York Times, since Desperado,…
Cuban swivel crisis
It’s been roughly six months since Maverick’s owner Mark Cuban blessed us with his verbal stylings to pronounce San Antonio’s distinctive landmark “that ugly-ass, muddy-watered thing they call a River Walk,” but I’m guessing the barb still stings as you read it. I wouldn’t want to as much as wiggle my toe over the side…
On the Street
Oh Marfa, Marfa, Marfa… (Aka The Free Carrot and Wine Chronicles, West Texas Style) We pulled into town at sunset and followed the mysterious lights to these two intriguing buildings. Luckily for me, I had been indirectly invited to stay for the night. These two homes are built by San Antonio architects Candid Rogers (on…
On the Street
Oh Marfa, Marfa, Marfa… (Aka The Free Carrot and Wine Chronicles, West Texas Style) We pulled into town at sunset and followed the mysterious lights to these two intriguing buildings. Luckily for me, I had been indirectly invited to stay for the night. These two homes are built by San Antonio architects Candid Rogers (on…
