Nik Turner’s Hawkwind
Why is it being promoted as Nik Turner’s Hawkwind, you ask? Well, like a depressingly large number of rock ’n’ roll survivors, Turner is feuding with the other members of his old outfit over who owns the name, so it’s Nik Turner’s Hawkwind, and not Dave Brock’s or Tim Blake’s or Lemmy’s Hawkwind. All that ugliness aside, though, it’s a good time to be a grand old man of space-rock, the genre being invigorated by a whole new generation of stoned youngsters into its heavy, wandering sounds, and Turner has assembled a pretty cracking band (including members of veteran punk crews like Chelsea, Die Krupps and UK Subs) to play on and tour behind his new epic, Space Gypsy. Give Turner a shot: his sax still brings the noise, and it doesn’t look like he and the rest of the boys will be burying the hatchet anytime soon. $10, 8pm Monday, The Ten Eleven, 1011 Avenue B, (210) 320-9080, theteneleven.com. —Leonard Pierce
Mon, Oct 11 – Tue, Oct 12
“Between Peril and Promise: Reporting Mexico in the Age of the Narco War”
The UTSA Honors College Non-Fiction Seminar presents a screening of Guanajuato, Mexico-born filmmaker Bernardo Ruiz’s documentary Reportero, following a reporter and his colleagues at a Tijuana-based newsweekly as they ply their trade in one of the deadliest places in the world for members of the media (reception at 6:15pm, screening at 7pm Monday at UTSA’s Buena Vista Theater). The program continues the following night with Dallas Morning News Mexico City Correspondent Alfredo Corchado reading from his book Midnight in Mexico, A Reporter’s Journey Through a Country’s Descent into Darkness (reception at 6:15pm, reading at 7pm Tuesday at UTSA’s Aula Canaria). Free, 7pm Monday-Tuesday; UTSA Downtown Campus, 500 Buena Vista, San Antonio, (210) 458-4011, utsa.edu/mexicocenter. —Bryan Rindfuss
Tue, Nov 12
Drake
Drake may be credited with (or blamed for) making YOLO (You Only Live Once) the hash tag of choice for twenty-somethings posting pics of Jello shots and bacon cheeseburgers on social media sites, but in the universe of Canadian teen soap operas, he exists twice: Once as Jimmy Brooks, the wheelchair-bound former athlete he portrayed for the first seven seasons of Degrassi: The Next Generation and once as the wildly successful rapper briefly referenced in the made-for-TV movie Degrassi Takes Manhattan. The apparent paradox has not, as of this writing, caused the Degrassi-verse to collapse in on itself like a dying star, but maybe that’s because Drake is just the unlucky-in-love Brooks’ alter-ego. He kicked off his critical and commercial breakthrough So Far Gone by declaring his love for a stripper, and this year’s Nothing Was the Same finds him pining for the Hooters waitress who got away. Make eyes at him on his characteristically politely named “Would You Like a Tour?” tour, and you too might be the subject of a hit song. The dude claims to catch feelings the way other rappers claim to catch bodies. $62.37-$117.94, 7pm Tuesday, AT&T Center, One AT&T Center, (210) 444-5000, attcenter.com. —Jeremy Martin
Wed, Oct 13
William Control
William Control makes the kind of music that will probably still get you a serious talking to from authority figures if you look him up on the computers in the school library, especially if your outfit involves a dog collar. Control's slick modern rock takes major cues from Ian Curtis and Trent Reznor and explores the dark obsessions that have been making Concerned Adults take rock way too seriously since Screamin' Jay Hawkins first climbed out of the coffin. Lyrics about death, depression, and suicide (so much suicide) are accompanied by hummable synthesizer hooks and call-and-response choruses in songs that have soundtracked scenes in the Saw and Underworld films. Post-Twilight teens seem to be the target audience, and parental hand-wringing could practically be credited as an instrument in the liner notes. But Control, joined by Davey Suicide and the Fearless Vampire Killers on the aptly named Revel Without a Cause tour, is really just soundtracking the party in the U.S.A. where everybody's wearing pancake makeup and leather. Death-dancing the angst away has always been one of the healthiest alternatives. $13, 6:30pm Wednesday, The Korova, 107 E Martin, twinproductionstexas.com/william-control. —JM
Wed, Oct 13
The Book of Matt: Hidden Truths about the Murder of Matthew Shepard
Intending to write a screenplay, award-winning journalist, writer and producer Stephen Jimenez traveled to Laramie, Wyo., to research the story of Matthew Shepard's murder. According to a press release for The Book of Matt: Hidden Truths About the Murder of Matthew Shepard, "As a gay man, he felt an added moral imperative to tell Matthew's story. But what Jimenez eventually found in Wyoming was a tangled web of secrets. His exhaustive investigation also plunged him deep into the deadly underworld of drug trafficking. Over the course of a thirteen-year investigation, Jimenez traveled to twenty states and Washington DC, and interviewed more than a hundred sources." Likened to Truman Capote's In Cold Blood, The Book of Matt promises to "stir passions and inspire dialogue as it re-frames this misconstrued crime and its cast of characters, proving irrefutably that Matthew Shepard was not killed for being gay but for reasons far more complicated—and daunting." Free, 7-9pm Wednesday; The Twig Book Shop, 306 Pearl Pkwy, Ste 106, (210) 826-6411, thetwig.indiebound.com. —BR
