Now this is a mission after my own heart…
Members of the New York-based performance group Improv Everywhere planned a “spontaneous” musical-style song-and-dance number to be held in a food court in a Los Angeles mall. (These are the same folks responsible for Frozen Grand Central and the annual No Pants event.)
Reporting by SFBG intern Emma Rae Lierley and SFBG reporter Sarah Phelan
Amid a backdrop of increased bloodshed in Tibet, and an early morning March 20 arson attack on the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco, Tibetan supporters gathered last Thursday outside City Hall for a candlelight vigil to protest San Francisco’s April 9 Olympic torch relay.
Inside City Hall, Mayor Gavin Newsom spoke to a semi-circle of news cameras, claiming that hosting the torch brings “pride” to many in the city, including San Francisco’s Chinese community, and stressing that the torch should be seen as a symbol of unity, both for the city and the world.
But during the Olympic Torch’s April 9 relay through San Francisco—its only North American touchdown as it travels from Greece to Beijing—the torch will be run along San Francisco’s waterfront, not through the narrow streets of the city’s Chinatown. And that Tibetan critics of China’s continuing human rights abuses would like to stamp out the torch’s relay through San Francisco entirely, claiming China has stained the flame’s original symbolism
“We, the Tibetans in San Francisco, see the torch as a tainted torch, a Chinese torch tainted in Tibetan blood,” said Tsering Gyurmey, an organizer of the March 20 vigil and an activist with SF TeamTibet, a collection of local organizations.
“The people of San Francisco don’t want the torch,” Gyurmey added. “It’s against the values of the city, against human rights and democracy. This torch comes from the communist Chinese government, where Tibetan people are being killed on their own land.”
A few hours earlier, Gyurmey was one of over a hundred speakers at a Board of Supervisors committee meeting, as Sups. Carmen Chu and Sean Elsbernd, Newsom’s closet allies on the Board, helped strike down a resolution, authored by Sup. Chris Daly, that took a critical stance of China and the Olympic torch.
Public comment lasted over two hours on the item, and was largely in favor of the resolution introduced by Supervisor Chris Daly. Calling for a solemn acceptance of the torch, the resolution asked for the city to receive it with “alarm and protest.”
Supervisor Daly also decried the city’s consideration of “free speech zones,” or special areas where anti-Chinese demonstrations would be limited to during the torch run.
“When our administration was asked to set up these zones, they should have said no,” Daly said during the meeting. “We can not be told to compromise our democracy as we ask others to expand theirs.”
Daly has pledged to try and reinsert his criticisms, when the resolution comes before the full Board on April 2, the week before the Olympic Torch relay is scheduled.
Meanwhile, China has lashed out at US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, calling her a “defender of arsonists, looters and killers” according to international news reports, after she visited the Dalai Lama and criticized Chinese oppression in Tibet.
“If freedom-loving people throughout the world do not speak out against China’s oppression in Tibet, we have lost our moral authority to speak on behalf of human rights anywhere in the world,” said Pelosi. who came out punching when evidence of China’s pre-Olympic crackdown on religious leaders, journalists and lawyers first emerged.
“The Olympic Games in Beijing this summer should provide an opportunity for more free expression, not less,” Pelosi said. MArch 12.
But now US Senator Dianne Feinstein is weighing in on the side of caution, telling the Board of Supervisors not to use the Olympic torch relay to condemn China, claiming that doing so, will make it harder to resolve the Tibet issue.
As for San Francisco’s plan to try to contain protesters in “free speech zones” – located at the start and end of the torch run – Feinstein reportedly doesn’t have a problem with it. That’s the way she handled demonstrations at Democratic National Convention in San Francisco back in 1984 when she was mayor.
We’ve invited fab local photog Darwin Bell to share some of his photos with us throughout the next month, and tell us what the heck he was thinking when he took them.
Study in Curves
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Darwin Bell: “This is probably my favorite building in San Francisco, located at First and Market. The curves and lines are just amazing and so fascinating to photograph. “
By Todd Lavoie
“Growing old, it’s hard to be the angry young man/ Turn away. Turn and walk away” – so observes the discernibly less-vexed Bob Mould on his recently released District Line (Anti-), and the line is as good as any in summing up the mood shift we’ve seen in the guitar-wielding singer-songwriter in recent years.
With his latest, Mould still continues to stare down a demon or two, but he appears rather content to do so. Dare I say it? Oh, why not – there are moments on the disc in which he even could be described as sounding downright upbeat. Bully for him, I say, and double-bully for crafting such an engagingly diverse collection of songs. See the new Mould for yourselves Wednesday, March 26 – that’s when he and his band take to the Great American Music Hall stage, folks. Me, I’m already agog over the possibilities of the set-list, considering the breadth of his quarter-century-plus career.
Since the guy brought up the subject and all, it’s worth a little pondering. Ah, the angry young man thing: we music obsessives tend to really tighten our focus on this supposed issue, don’t we? Holding our heroes to high standards is one thing, but denying them the same inevitability that we all will eventually meet – growing older – has always struck me as absurd. Worse yet, we often insist on freezing them in time, keeping them bottled and bathed in piss ‘n’ vinegar and then carping away if they fail to deliver the same blister and bluster of their early to mid-20s.
Everyone’s getting rich off the NCAAs — except the players
By A.J. Hayes
Played, not paid
Last week, Boston Red Sox players staged what had to be the most ludicrous wildcat strike in the history of labor relations. The entire Bosox team(sters) threatened not to board a plane bound for Japan for a series of games vs. the Oakland A’s, unless club management, or major league baseball, or anyone else but the players themselves, forked over some serious cash.
Painting themselves as championing of the little guy, the Boston players said the trip was off unless each of the team’s coaches, trainers and clubhouse personnel received the same $40,000 bonus that each of the players was to pocket for enduring the hardship of an all-expenses paid, first-class jaunt to Japan.
And they say politicians are out of touch with the average American wage earner.
To drive home their point, the players refused to take their positions for an exhibition game against the Toronto Blue Jays until the matter was settled, making paying fans sit on their hands for 90 minutes at Ft. Myers, Florida.
The world champs finally decided to play ball when MLB and the club agreed to split the cost of paying the support staff. Considering that the bloated Red Sox staff contained nearly 30 coaches, trainers and others last season, that figure came in somewhere in excess of $1 million.
Meanwhile, most sports fans across the nation – even those who know the clubs are traveling to Japan – could hardly give a damn about a few early season baseball games in Tokyo. When Boston and Oakland are done, they’ll still have 160 more games to go.
Most sports fans across the nation are glued to their televisions watching athletes pour out their hearts and sweat in another sport – and receive not a penny. In fact, the players will be lucky to come away with a free t-shirt. It’ll probably be a 50/50 blend too.
In case you don’t own a television or haven’t picked up a newspaper in the past couple of weeks, we’re were in the midst of the NCAA basketball tournament, aka March Madness, aka the Big Cash Cow in Tube socks.
Every one remotely tied to the NCAAs, from the universities to CBS to the sports bars and the zillions of amateur bettors toting their cherished “brackets” will be racking in the dough this month.
Everyone is getting rich except for the one making it all possible – the players.
Oh you’re not so silent, Jens. Photo by Kimberly Chun.
If imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, then Swedish indie pop maestro Jens Lekman must be feeling pretty swell: by his own estimation, he’s accrued an army of faux MySpace and Facebook followers-poseurs since he took his own MySpace site down. The 27-year-old singer-songwriter – currently based in Melbourne, Australia, though not, he claims, for long – is embracing both the love and fictitious narratives being spun by his Jens puppets/impersonators, and likewise, he encouraged me to make up more outta-hand tales when I spoke to him at the eerily generic, brass ‘n’ business-class Omni Hotel in Austin, Texas, during South by Southwest.
We’ll see how wild it gets – and how crazy Lekman will be tonight, March 23, at Bottom of the Hill, when he plays solo, sans band, and full of, he promises, surprises.
SFBG: What have you seen at South by Southwest so far?
Jens Lekman: Tough Alliance – it’s really interesting because they’re such a Swedish phenomenon in one way. I think they’re the most influential band in Sweden right now. But it’s so hard – the crowd there at that place, I think, were a bunch of bloggers, who were like, “Hmm, what should I think about this,” you know. And they got so frustrated because they’re very much about energy. They play for 10 minutes and they just go offstage.
SFBG: Do you get that tough blogger crowd?
JL: No, when I play in New York, maybe. I think I’ve always had those people standing there smiling. That’s my favorite reaction.
SFBG: Any superfans?
JL: I met this guy last night, this 45-year-old guy. Well, I dunno if he’s 45 but he’s in his 40s. He’s going to see eight shows, I think, on this tour, with his whole family, and they’re organizing this big barbecue party in Madison when we get there.
SFBG: So the last album, Night Falls Over Kortedala [Secretly Canadian, 2007], is a collection of older songs? What made you want to put them out in an album format?
JL: Yeah, I think all my albums have been like that. They’ve always been a collection of what I’ve been doing in the last three or four years. I just write songs – that’s all I do. I can’t put them together into an entity. So this time I had a bunch of friends pick them for me. I gave them about 30 songs, and they called me up and had a little bit of a Eurovision song contest. They’d say, “Song number eight – that’s definitely 10 points, yeah, and song number seven, that’s seven points.” I think I’ll do that in the future as well. It works so well. They saw the golden thread through the songs that I couldn’t see myself. I always had a problem with putting things together like that. I couldn’t see the connection myself.
Landland of Minneapolis, Minn.
South By Southwest ain’t nothing but loud, loud music; industry speakers; white-bread-bedecked barbecue; protein bar giveaways; soused UT students; and lil’ pools o’ puke if it weren’t for the American Poster Institute-sponsored Flatstock show, presented every year for the last five years alongside the music conference. I checked the state of the art – and came away with an eyeful of music posters that popped.
Leia Bell of Salt Lake City.
Status Serigraph of Knoxville, Tenn.
Simply Unique really is.
I’ve had a fantastic 24 hours: mani-pedis with my best friend from L.A. at Simply Unique on 14th Street (fab!) followed by a delicious Senagalese dinner at Bissap Baobab and a giggly slumber party – all to celebrate her engagement and my upcoming 30th birthday (I know.) The only thing that would’ve been better is if we’d somehow also been able to make it to the Buffy Reunion in L.A. and the National Conference for the Popular Culture and American Culture Association here in the Bay. Joss Whedon for dessert, lectures on Eating Disorders in US Weekly and the history of the coolness of motorcycles for breakfast, with my BF sandwiched between? Even more awesomeness.
By Ailene Sankur
Just in time for Easter…
I used to hate Pooh, Tigger, Roo, Eeyore and the rest of the Hundred Acre wood crew. Well, I don’t necessarily hate those characters. It’s more like those bumper stickers that say, “God, Save Me From Your Followers.” I hate the people who love Pooh: basically, people with severe arrested development issues, the kind of people who also like stuff from Disney. Not ironically. (My ex-boyfriend loves Tigger stuff — keychain, a full PJ set — and those things just reminded me of the indulgent females in his life who gave him the Tigger shit and who tended to encourage his Tigger-like behavior, i.e. Teenage guy hyperactive irresponsibility. I also had a high school friend who loved Eeyore, talking in baby voices, and sleeping with your boyfriend. Neither did much to change my original perspective on Pooh-lovers.)
So I didn’t have much room in my life for cartoon animals of the Pooh variety until a precocious eight-year-old (something else I normally hate…I’m growing soft in my advanced age) introduced me to the Peek-a-Pooh, a rubber keychain-like toy in which a hard plastic Pooh hides within various rubber costumes.
Under Da Sea: Peek-a-Pooh Aquatic Collection
Today’s Ammianoliner:
Mayor declares Olympic torch route to take wheelchair ramp. No bottles of water or anchor.
(From the home answering machine of Sup. Tom Ammiano on Friday March 21, 2008.) B3
Get an earful of what everyone at SXSW was yapping ’bout: longtime Oaklander Darondo performs, backed by Nino Moschella, at Shattuck Down Low tonight, March 21. Low-ridah soul – with vanity plates, sho – and R&B comes to town once more in the form of the Ubiquity artist who once opened for James Brown and hung with Fillmore Slim.
DARONDO
With Nino Moschella
Friday/21, 9:30 p.m., $12
Shattuck Down Low
2284 Shattuck, Berk.
By JB Powell
On Thursday, the full board of the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) voted to approve a record settlement agreement with State Sen. Carole Migden. As part of the deal, Migden had to pony up $100,000 of her own money as a down payment on the $350,000 in total penalties – the largest amount the FPPC has ever fined a public official in its 34 year history. The incumbent senator has one year to come up with the rest of the cash. Migden and two of her campaign aides admitted to 89 different campaign finance violations – including spending over $16 grand of campaign funds for “personal use.”
In a separate matter – covered this week in the Guardian (“Migden sues the FPPC”) – Migden is hauling the FPPC into federal court to save about a million dollars they say she can’t have. In a statement released after the vote yesterday, commission chair Ross Johnson didn’t mince words in voicing his displeasure with the San Francisco Democrat: “Senator Migden’s track record has shown her complete disdain for [campaign finance laws] … We will now focus our attention on [her] lawsuit and Senator Migden’s numerous other serious and deceitful violations of California law. We will fight her all the way.”
It’s all Santogold. All photos by Kimberly Chun.
South By – why, a week later, the wrap-up keeps coming. Here’s what was on the plate Friday night, March 14 – in addition to the beef rib barbecue and banana pudding with Nilla wafers at Iron Works.
Soft sweat: Kim Hiorthoy.
I was glad to catch a few songs by Kim Hiorthoy in the SXSW day stage at the convention center’s cafeteria. The Oslo, Norway, knob-twirler headed up the Smalltown Supersound showcase Wednesday night – here he performed with a percussionist pal, making more meditative, ambient sounds than the house-tinged music he ended up delivering at the Boredoms SF show on March 18.
Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful – hate me because of my bad band name: the Ting Tings.
The evening started out at Stubb’s for the Ting Tings, art-pop duo from Salford, UK – the twosome has been surprising listeners with their infectious, dancey sass. Spunky, model-esque Katie White managed to hold the stage on her lonesome, thrashing away at her guitar.
by Bryan Cohen
We hope. We really hope. After nearly two years of collaboration from a variety of homeless service providers, city officials, and activists, the standards of care legislation for city-funded homeless shelters was finally passed in a quick roll call vote by the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, March 18.
The legislation is considered a major victory for homeless rights advocates and groundbreaking for homeless programs across the country. The legislation, sponsored by Supervisor Tom Ammiano and co-signed by Supervisors Ross Mirkarimi and Gerardo Sandoval, was initiated after investigations by the city’s Shelter Monitoring Committee found many shelters lacking in basic hygiene products. Over half of shelter residents reported some form of abuse during their stays. Key components of the legislation require shelters to provide toilet paper, clean sheets and towels, sanitary bathrooms, and eight hours of sleep a night.
Over the past few weeks the legislation has caused some tension between Supervisors and supporters of the bill and the Mayors office. One of the biggest points of contention was the pricetag of the legislation, initially ballparked at $6 million by the Budget Analyst’s office. However, members of the Standards of Care work group, which wrote much of the legislation, argued the estimates were far too high. In fact, the final bill passed with an estimated $165,000 per year cost to the city.
The legislation also includes a mandate for a 24-hour drop-in center, another departure from Mayor Gavin Newsom’s fiscal priorities. In his recent mid-year de-funding spree, the Mayor pulled Buster’s Place, the city’s only centrally located 24-hour drop-in center. Read this if you want to know why Buster’s is often the only places to go if you’re looking for a shelter bed. While the legislation requires a 24-hour center, it is not clear who will run the center and where.
Supervisors Carmen Chu (District 4) and Sean Elsbernd (District 7) were the only supervisors present who voted against the legislation. Both were appointed to the Board by the Mayor.
Field Music, surely the best group to come out of Sunderland, UK, is no more – sort of. One of the group’s central songwriter’s David Brewis, 27, said as much while tooling around the country with his new project, School of Language. No fear, students of rock, the musical complexities of SOL’s new Thrill Jockey album, Sea from Shore, will impress those already missing Field Music. Catch Brewis at Hemlock Tavern Friday, March 21.
SFBG: Why make this album under the name School of Language rather than Field Music?
David Brewis: Because I didn’t let Pete or Andy play on it! So it would be a little bit of stress. We talked about doing a bunch of records separately and maybe putting them all out as Field Music records. I thought…we’re not splitting up, but we’re not going to be a band anymore. People really haven’t taken to that idea. Why, I’m not sure. Maybe it sounded like a complicated situation.
They ask, have you split up? I see my brother every day and Pete every week. I was certainly feeling like, after we finished the last Field Music record what I didn’t want to do immediatley was have the three of us tour and try to go back in the studio again. I didn’t feel like it would be much fun. I felt like what Field Music was supposed to be had solidified in people’s minds and in ways it shouldn’t. The idea with Field Music was me and Pete pool our resources in terms of songs and the three of us pool our resources in terms of skills as players, and always do whatever is best for the song regardless of what that entails.
Winnetka? Why-not-ka? Apologies to lovely Del Tha’s underground East Bay, but if there’s gotta be a new epicenter of nouveau-Cali alternative hip-hop (cue the searing lazer bass and sympho-poetic glitches) then you could do no better than the Outer-LA hometown of mixmaster amazo Flying Lotus, who’s currently stealing hearts and heartbeats on his WARP Records tour. And yeah, he’s this cute:
If you’re in the mood for some woozy bottom-blasting with a high-hat twinkle, Lotus will be numbing Dr. Scholl’s at dread bass mecca night Surya Dub at Club Six this Saturday night, March 22. Lotus’s own releases get us where DJ Shadow hurts, and his remix of Mia Doi Todd’s 2006 soulful torcher “My Room Is White” has brightened our rhythmic footfalls to work for the past month. So yeah, come get zigzagged in a headtrip melancholy way this weekend …
Flying Lotus, “Tea Leaf Dancers”
Flying Lotus
at Surya Dub
Sat/22, 10pm-4am, $10
Club Six
60 Sixth St, SF
www.suryadub.com
www.clubsix1.com
By Vanessa Carr
“Egg”
If you’ve ever seen the strange monsters and fantasies of the bizarre 16th Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch and thought, “Man! I wish that guy could have given me a tattoo” — well, you might still have your chance with San Francisco tattoo artist and painter Mike Davis.
In addition to owning San Francisco’s Everlasting Tattoo, Davis is a self-taught painter whose oil painting seem plucked from another time. The inhabitants of the fantastical world he’s created are insects, crustaceans, snakes, birds, scorpions, eggs, fruit-bearing trees, trumpets, birdhouses on fire, the classic dripping ear, and draped figures.
“We show Mike not only because he is a phenomenal painter, but because no one else is doing what he is doing,” says White Walls Gallery owner Justin Giarla.
Davis’ first solo show, “Solo Flight,” opened this past weekend runs through April 12 at the White Walls Gallery, featuring 24 paintings and drawings from his upcoming book, Blind Man’s Journey.
White Walls Gallery, 835 Larkin, SF. 415-931-1500, www.whitewallssf.com
By Justin Juul
You never know what kind of crazy shit your brain’s going to tell you to do when Saturn comes back into the picture and starts demanding attention. Some of us start thinking about babies and tract homes while others spin off in the opposite direction and become workaholics or barflys.
My friend, Jason Lewis of Lollyphile, did something even stranger. On the dawn of his 29th year, he suddenly decided to become a confectioner. He spent hours and days mixing flavors in his basement and self-promoting on the Internet until finally, success! His first run of Absinthe flavored lollipops was met with critical acclaim, eventually reaching full-blown awesomeness when the people over at Penthouse Magazine decided to run a review. A less ambitious man may have stopped there, but my friend is “very special” so he immediately started planning a slow takeover of the gourmet candy industry. He’s gonna be the next Willy Wonka. I can feel it.
I tried to get Lewis on the phone to discuss his outlook on candy, life, and world affairs, but he was too busy boiling lard or something. I did manage to squeeze this little e-interview out of him though. Enjoy.
SFBG: What’s your stance on candy from Japan? How can you ever hope to compete with brands like Pocky, Black Black, and Cubyrop?
So, while Japan’s candies have awesome names, brand recognition, and the loyalty of several billion people, I’ve got deity cred.
SFBG: What do you do when you’re not turning meat and controlled substances into candy?
Lewis: I reverse the process. Candy into meat and liquor. I transubstantiate stuff all the time.
“Bacon lollipops? Why not!”
Baby wants to wear their White Shoes.
Too tuckered out by South By Southwest? Hey, I saw you at the Boredoms the other night! Surely you’re not too pooped to pop for these indie-rockers.
WHITE SHOES AND THE COUPLES COMPANY
Brimming with silky retro charm, this ultra-cute Indonesian combo on Minty Fresh scored a spot as one of Billboard‘s “12 Acts to Watch at SXSW.” Do they remind you of UK space-pop revivalists of the past ala Stereolab and High Llamas? Find out for yourself before the band hoofs it back to their homeland: these are their only other North American shows besides SXSW.
White Shoes and the Couples Company perform tonight, March 20, 6 p.m., at Amoeba Music, 1855 Haight, SF. Free. (415) 831-1200. They perform with Foxtail Somersault tonight, May 20, 9 p.m., at Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St., SF. $12. (415) 647-2888.
HEADLIGHTS
The Champaign, Ill., indie-pop fivesome have played more than 300 shows a year since their 2004 inception. So you know they gotta have it down at this point: winsome is as winsome does on their new full-length, Some Racing, Some Stopping (Polyvinyl), which shows off Headlights‘ love o’ ’60s pop hooks.
Headlights appear with School of Language and the Evangelicals Friday, March 21, 9:30 p.m., Hemlock Tavern, 1131 Polk, SF. $10. (415) 923-0923.
Okay, I didn’t hear the speech live. And I didn’t have a chance until tonight to watch the clip and read the entire text..
But wow. I must say, I agree with the NY Times — its was a a profile in courage. Obama broke through a huge barrier — he actually talked about race in an intelligent way and gave white Americans a reason to understand that he shares their pain, but that he expects them to share his. Yes, it was historic.
I don’t know if it’s over now; I was just watching the idiots on the O’Reilly factor talk about how the polls in Pennsylvania are favoring Hillary Clinton and that one of the great moments in political oratory of our generation might actually cost Obama votes. Still, for the superdelegates, this will be tough to ignore.
And I think that femlaw at kos is right: This was Obama’s swift-boat test, and he did far better than John Kerry could dream of in showing how he will deal with vicious attacks from the GOP.
God, it would be nice to have a president who can demand that Americans rise to their best instincts. I don’t agree with Obama on everything, and I’m the world’s worst cynic when it comes to national politics, but tonight I’m thinking that his candidacy is truly something special. He got me.
Today’s Ammianoliner:
Obama’s minister-to-be defrocked. It’s a shame. It’s such a pretty frock.
A whole new meaning to cross-dressing. Think about it.
(From the home answering machine of Sup. Tom Ammiano on Wednesday, March 19, 2008.
The good news is that Ammiano is back, after complaining about his answering machine and threatening to take a hiatus from the celebrated Ammianoliner. The better news is that his voice is much clearer and the Ammianoliner comes through in good form. Keep going, Tom, there is too much rich material out there for you to miss.)
B3
Thanks to Bob Brigham, I have some video of the Market Street protests this afternoon.
The Chron describes the scene this way: ” As officers encircled the group, they briefly pushed other protesters onto the sidewalk and confiscated at least one bicycle and a sign.”
But the video suggests a lot less restraint on the part of the cops.
By Jason Shamai
In conjunction with my review of his new graphic novel and Repo Man sequel Waldo’s Hawaiian Holiday (Gestalt Publishing, 164 pages, $19.95) in this week’s Guardian, I set down a few questions for writer/director Alex Cox to answer via email.
Clearly he doesn’t find me as clever, or as informed, as I do.
Alex Cox, not looking surly. Photo by Sam Jones, from www.alexcox.com .
SFBG: What was your initial reaction to Chris Bones’s proposal to turn the screenplay into a graphic novel?
ALEX COX: I thought it was a great idea.
Polish me off, Chrome. All photos by Joshua Rotter.
By Joshua Rotter
Chrome makes me think of those metallic-plated bicycles that kids ride around on. It also reminds me of the same-name rock band that formed in San Francisco in the late ’70s. Promoter Bill Picture (Trans Am) managed to meld both elements together at monthly rock night Chrome at the Gangway.
Showcasing DJ Dirty Knees (Trans Am, Charlie Horse) and special guest DJs including March’s Metal Patricia, this metal night gets gear heads banging with heavy favorites like Bad Company’s “Feel Like Makin’ Love” and Motley Crue’s “Too Fast for Love.” It’s like a metal hall of fame with something old and something newer.
Headbanging purists might divide the genre into two phases: the early years with bands like Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath and the later, new wave of British metal (NWOBHM), led by tougher, harder acts like Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, and Motorhead. But I chronologize it differently: BRHCO and ARHCO, before Rob Halford Came Out and After Rob Halford Came Out, which finally brought the genre out of the closet.
