Better late than never. A Twin Cities copywriter blogs his three-month visit to China. Go back and read though some of the funnier entries. I’m a big fan of My Apartment Was Designed to Kill Me.
Year: 2007
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Mental Contagion
A local online monthly arts and literature magazine, Mental Contagion features online exhibits, fiction, poetry, essays, profiles, interviews, podcasts, and more. See Wendy Lewis’s latest fiction.
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I Like to Watch
Salon writer Heather Havrilesky examines what upcoming televised features suggest about the American ego.
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Army of Dude
The Washington Note cues us in to Army of Dude, an American military guy’s blog that the Pentagon has not yet shut down. Washington Note writer Steven C. Clemons actually suggests that the guy is on the scale of The New Republic. That ought to tell you what to expect.
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Take Pride in What's Yours
MUSIC
Quirky and Hypnotic
Tonight the weird and wonderful Twin Cities jazz trio Hips Don’t Lie performs the first of a three-night gig at Rossi’s Blue Star. Though the group has the consistency of a traditional piano trio — Tasha Baron on keyboards, Liz Draper on upright bass, and Pete Henning on drums — their music is pointedly different from traditional jazz. Hips Don’t Lie’s songs (all of them originals, written by Draper and Baron) contain a good amount of the unexpected, with elements like sound effects and atonality; and the solos, though quirky and even challenging, can be downright hypnotic. –Danielle Kurtzleben 8 p.m., Rossi’s Blue Star, 80 South 9th St., Minneapolis; 612-312-2828.
Count on the Dakota for a Dinner Serenade
I used to think the Dakota was over-rated. It’s true. I missed the old location in Bandana Square. As inconvenient a location as it was, it was a beautifully intimate setting, which made for some fantastic shows. The first time I went to the new location, however, I went for dinner. I was seated upstairs, behind a wall, where we could not see the show. Stupid. Of course, I used to the think the Dakota was over-rated. I was stupid. I know better now. The Dakota is under-rated. The place is amazing — and in our own backyard. (My own back yard, literally, as I live downtown.) The food is solid. The space is solid. The service is solid (just don’t ask them to slice up your steak and serve it to you as an appetizer). And the acts they bring in — both local and from out of town — are truly outstanding. Tonight’s performance is no different. Grammy-nominated songstress Jane Monheit serves up her buttery pop-jazz vocals. This is a beautiful date night — both for old and new loves. Who isn’t impressed by a spontaneous Monday night offering?7 & 9 p.m., Dakota Jazz Club and Restaurant, 1010 Nicollet Ave., Minneapolis; 612-332-1010; $35 & $25.
MUSIC RADIO
Listen. Share. Learn.It seems sometimes that just about everyone in the Twin Cities is or has been a musician at some time. Come on — remember that band you were in? If you ever took it seriously, you probably know the frustration of trying to get radio play. While anyone with a band and a half-way decent computer has the potential to record and distribute their music nowadays, artists still suffer the frustration of trying to get their voice out there. Even on the Internet — a seemingly “democratic” space that demands user-shaped content and customized consumption — we suffer the consequences of corporate control. Yet, as big media desperately grapples for digital real estate — and our total dependence — the little guy keeps creeping up with more democratic ideas, more idealist ideas, ideas that require others to help build; and when we don’t step up to build them, the ideas get squashed under some warped interpretation of it — scooped up and controlled by the very entities we set out to defy.
Phew! What am I getting at here? There’s a new cat in town — a has-been musician is-now geek of sorts — and he has started an internet radio station, called Localtone Radio, to provide local artists of all kinds a platform where they can distribute their work, listen to other’s content, and learn about other Twin Cities artists. Any listener can add content to the system (anything from music, to poetry, to broadcast journalism), listen to samples of audio, and cast votes daily for the content that they like. And the votes determine the next audio to be played. It’s user contributed radio in its most open and free form — no big corporations dictating what media you can consume, just audio from your local artists and a community of listeners directly shaping the broadcast. The only problem — it’s takes us all to help build it. So build, my friends. Build. This is ours to be had.
NOT TO BE FORGOTTEN
Laughter and PoetryWhile new forms and styles of entertainment greet us daily, we mustn’t take for granted the possibilities that are more constantly offered. How long has it been since you’ve had a good laugh? This city is so full of options: The Brave New Workshop (Is it still Dudley Riggs?), Comedy Sportz, Stevie Ray’s Improv Company. They have shows just about every week, and we so seldom go. Let’s get out there. And let’s start tonight with the open mic at Acme. Think you’re funny? Put yourself to the test. Sign up for a three minute act. Otherwise, sit back, relax, have yourself a from-the-gut roar. I guarantee at least two or three acts will provoke it. (Perhaps it will even be yours.)
8 p.m., Acme Comedy Company, 708 1st St. N., Historic Itasca Building, Minneapolis; 612-338-6393; free.
If laughter is not your thing tonight, explore your poetic side at the Artists’ Quarters open mic. What I love most about their poetry open mic night is the jam session that inevitably ensues after the words. Your poetry can be in any form — words or music, and the evening always ends with what I deem to be among the most genuine jazz jams around. (Or at least it used to be so — I confess, it has been a while since I have been there.) If you feel like getting out of the house early, be there at 7:30 p.m. for the “burning post-pop quartet” Green.
9 p.m., Artists’ Quarter, 408 St. Peter St., Hamm Building, St. Paul; 651-292-1359.
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A Prayer For Michael Vick
May you be forgiven.
May you be given a second chance:
May you come back as a dog.
May you be lost.
May you be found.
May you be loved.
May the whole world smell wonderful.
And may you know the touch
of gentle hands and the soft
voice of someone who sees
and knows and needs you,
to the end of your days.
Hence comes the four-legged friendships of so many of the better kind of men, for on what indeed should one refresh oneself from the endless deceit, falseness, and cunning of men if it were not for the dogs into whose faithful countenance one may look without distrust?
—Schopenhauer, Ethics
I have seen the sun break through
to illuminate a small field
for a while, and gone my way
and forgotten it. But that was the pearl
of great price, the one field that had
treasure in it. I realize now
that I must give all that I have
to possess it. Life is not hurrying
on to a receeding future, nor hankering after
an imagined past. It is the turning
aside like Moses to the miracle
of the lit bush, to a brightness
that seemed as transitory as your youth
once, but is the eternity that awaits you.
—R.S. Thomas, "The Bright Field" -
John Hock’s Playlist
Every year, sculptor John Hock invites a couple dozen fellow artists to come and do their thing at Franconia Sculpture Park, the road trip-worthy destination he co-founded near Taylor’s Falls. The sculptors, who range from established names based in far-flung metropolises to student interns from local art schools, sweat it out all summer; come September, there’s a huge day-long party to show off the fruits of their labor.
As the park’s artistic director, Hock attends to a host of duties besides making his own work, and music accompanies most all of them. Here are the songs that help him get the job, whatever it is, done:
1. “New York, New York,” Frank Sinatra
This makes the list for the obvious reasons: nostalgia and loneliness. Eight years in New York City, I was the shit magnet—people getting killed all around me. This was when Times Square was real! Before it became Dizzy World, middle class tourist Mecca. My first year out here (1993) I named my new dog after Frank. I also brought a copy of this song to my local pub, Romayne’s in Taylors Falls, for their jukebox. Frank helps me feel like my feet really grip the earth.2. “Is That All There Is?” Peggy Lee
She makes you want to drink and smoke (the latter I gave up after thirty-four years), and question art and life. Sometimes I play this song for the artist interns at the sculpture park. They don’t get it. Youth is wasted on the wrong people. I still have a vice or two and Peggy makes three.3. “Love Duet,” Madama Butterfly, Puccini
For me, this is (brain) yoga. It gets me all twisted up and sweaty with meditation and concentration (after all, I don’t smoke anymore); it helps me plan the day, make lists, see what will be truly unique today. Or say, “Is that all there is?”4. “Stranded in the Jungle,” New York Dolls
This ditty from the original glam rock band was on the first album, Too Much Too Soon, I ever bought. It was the early ’70s, I was fourteen. My mother thought the Halloween makeup I was wearing was “very interesting”—but it was Easter. This song makes me smile—always has, always will.5. “I’m Bored” (and “Tell Me a Story” and“Girls” and etc. etc.), Iggy Pop
I’m sick of kicks, stiffs, and dips. Load me into a cannon and shoot me into the butt of a rhino. Show me something new. Just don’t bore me.6. “Ride of the Valkyries,” Die Walküre, Wagner
This is music for installing very large sculpture. You’re in Chicago, you’re up at five a.m.; you’re meeting the 120-ton crane at six, three semi trucks are rolling in, you have seven sculptures to install by three p.m. The meter maids and rent-a-cops are all bent out of shape. You show them your permit and drop on this song: Da-da-da-daaa-da.7. “No Sleep Till Brooklyn,” Beastie Boys
The first raucous dance experience for my son Zane was when this number came on 89.3 while we were babysitting each other (he was two at the time). Upon Momma Tasha’s return, she inquired what we had been up to. I said, “Reading books.” Zane said: “Don’t beweeve the hype.”8. “Hot Rod,” Peaches
Really, almost that whole album, The Teaches of Peaches. That’s the way it’s supposed to be: not stuffy, locked up in some museum. Let it all hang out, play the trombone, challenge yourself, try something new.9. “Sex Bomb (Baby Yeah!),” Flipper
This is a lot like Wagner but is about installing (or deconstructing) something else altogether. Go ahead and upset your audience. This was the 1980s: Ronald Reagan, then George Bush. Who wasn’t pissed off? Gritty, aggressive angst. Nowadays I can only listen to it once or twice a year. Baby yeah!10. “Jesus Built My Hot Rod,” Ministry and Gibby Haynes (Butthole Surfers)
When my energy is running low, this masterpiece (sort of like a twenty-first-century rendition of “Hot Rod Lincoln”) is just what the doctor ordered. This song keeps a sculptor’s paradise running on high octane. If things are slowing down, you’re not sure of your newest idea—screw it. Jesus built my hot rod. Try it, you’ll like it.Franconia Sculpture Park’s fall arts and music festival takes place on September 15 with live music, dancing, bonfire, and tours of the new location. 29836 St. Croix Trail, Franconia; 651-257-6668.
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Small Plates, Big Egos
We all have to eat, but do we have to obsess about it? Hell’s Kitchen is a top-ten, prime-time show, Ratatouille is teaching our kids to rhapsodize over crème brûlée, and the Food Network force-feeds us celebrity chefs 24/7. There’s a story going around about a teacher who asked her class to list words describing food and one young boy wrote, “Bam!” Supermarket delis boast bars dedicated to olives soaking in various seasoned brines and ultra-virgin oils. Don’t even get me started on Whole Foods’ organic hand-harvested herbs, artisanal gelato, and heritage livestock breeds. How did we scrape by in the days before avocado slicers and rainbow-colored peppercorns?
This food frenzy is affecting even sane people like my husband. Although he is generous with others, he’s a skinflint with himself, refusing to accept anything but a card for birthdays and holidays. The only loophole in his anti-consumption policy is cooking gadgetry. My last few presents to him have been a diamond-edged professional sharpener, a mortar and pestle made of volcanic rock, and an Italian espresso machine covered with enough gauges and dials and switches to make it look like a little cartoon atom smasher. Our kitchen layout is more elaborate than some of the greasy spoons where I used to waitress, with a knife drawer that would be the envy of surgeons from any of the local hospitals.
Of course, like so many others who collect gastronomical gadgetry, we’re usually too exhausted to cook dinner. So we’ll toss a pizza in our little specialized pizzeria oven—one of those suckers from Lunds, a “Chef Crafted!” morsel maybe twice the diameter of a hockey puck, dotted with baby artichokes and “rich, nutty Asiago.” It makes me feel a little rich and nutty myself.
It’s all so precious. Kind of a new-fangled eating disorder, you know? If you had told me ten years ago that I would be eating like a deranged fashionista, I would have put down my kielbasa, wiped my greasy maw with the back of my hand and said you were nuts. Obviously, I’m still not comfortable with it. If some guy at a party tells me the pinot grigio is awfully fruity, it’s hard not to snap, “Same back at ya, Alice.”
Nostalgia alert: reminiscences on How It Used To Be forthcoming. When I was a kid, growing up in a working-class neighborhood on St. Paul’s East Side, having a spice rack with more than four little McCormick tins was hoity-toity. Gourmets lived in France. They ate crêpes, which was funny to say, and brie, a cheese that echoed their national character by being soft, pale, and runny. Here in America, if you wanted to get creative you’d find interesting things to do with a packet of onion soup mix. The East Side word for a guy who thought a lot about food was chowhound.
Mancini’s, on West Seventh Street in St. Paul, was the place to go for a fancy meal. It was a sprawling, bustling supper club that billed itself as a Char House and cooked your meal on giant, open charcoal grills. Anything other than beef or lobster on the menu was a misprint. This was the ’80s, but the food was unchanged from the days of tailfins and V-8 Oldsmobiles. Every neighborhood had its version of Mancini’s: Nye’s Polonaise Room, Jax Cafe, Little Jack’s, Murray’s, Caspers’ Cherokee Sirloin Rooms (“Steaks the Size of Idaho”), Lindey’s, the Manor, Kozlak’s, Jensen’s, the Hopkins House, the Carpenter’s Steak House. You’d go there for a big, burned piece of meat, demolish it, down a fishbowl of Johnny Walker, burp, and go home stuffed and content. These places were as honest and Midwestern as the Chicago stockyards.
The restaurants that get all the attention now are image-conscious temples of hipness, frequently raided by glamour vigilantes and given makeovers to keep them up-to-date. Which leads me to wonder if today a lot of us are using food to satisfy complicated emotional cravings. Plagued by economic insecurity and status anxiety? You could take a Prozac for that, but how about a twelve-dollar duck-breast spring roll instead? As you bite into it, your mouth tells your brain, “If we can afford to eat like this, we must have no money problems whatsoever.” It’s kind of like how wearing a Ralph Lauren shirt indicates you own polo ponies. Worried about your health and the ecosystem? You can save both with organic heirloom tomatoes.
But this behavior is placing demands on food that it can’t fulfill. Expecting a meal to cure alienation and boredom leads to mental malnutrition. Gourmets must be unhappy. They’re always on a quest for the next thrill. I’m content to remember the Embers.
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Dans Paris
This French comedy opens with two brothers in bed with a girl. One looks at the camera, apologizes for speaking directly to the audience, and then asks, “How would someone throw themselves off a bridge for love?” Rest assured, we’ll find out. Dans Paris (Inside Paris, not to be confused with One Night in Paris) unfolds over the course of a single day, when the would-be jumper, utterly despondent over the collapse of his marriage, returns home to live with his divorced father and hyperactive, sexed-up younger brother. .
It is already being acclaimed as a brilliant character study, a love letter to Paris, and one of the sultriest, most complex comedies to hit our shores in many a year. 612-825-6006; www.landmarktheatres.com
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Bridge Collapse Media Source
Congratulations on your coverage of the tragic bridge collapse. Getting individual stories from local media was insightful.
However, you missed one of the public’s most important media sources for information on that day. Jazz 88, KBEM, broke this story at 6:10 that night…just a few minutes after the bridge fell and provided vital traffic reports directly from the Minnesota Department of Transportation.
That day, Susan Spongberg sat in for our regular Afternoon Cruise host Kevin O’Connor and at 6:07 she took a phone call from a panicked driver on the scene who called KBEM with the news.
At the same time, Don Zenanko, reporting from the Regional Transportation Management Center, watched as the MNDOT camera on the bridge went dark. At 6:10, KBEM went into continuous coverage of the collapse and the traffic affected by it, immediately giving people alternatives to their normal route.
We stayed with continuous coverage until 8, pre-empting our regular music programming with only two short breaks for weather, news and for Don to catch his breath. Don and Susan handled the situation with calm and common sense, providing virtual on-the-scene coverage. One listener told me: “After listening to KBEM, CNN’s coverage sounded like a joke.”
The next day, and the rest of the week, we continued to provide our audience with detour routes and valuable information straight from MNDOT.
Your coverage of the media’s response to the bridge collapse was excellent but incomplete when you failed to acknowledge the role KBEM played in providing the public with the most comprehensive coverage. Thank you for this opportunity to congratulate Susan and Don on their great work on KBEM that day.