Art

THURSDAY

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March 22

MUSIC

Places

Just when you thought there couldn’t possibly be another talented mystical voice on the modern songwriter scene, along comes Amy Annelle, a.k.a. the Places. In truth, she’s been living on the road for years now, from ancestral and actual homes in Portland, Ore., and Austin, and garnering nods in Billboard, which named her sixth album, Songs for Creeps (High Plains Sigh), one of the 10 best of 2006, along the way. (Nathan Baker)

8 p.m., $8
Rickshaw Stop
155 Fell, SF
(415) 861-2011
www.rickshawstop.com

VISUAL ART

“Myth by Method”

Katrina Lamb channels music- and art-school training into pieces that have inspired comparisons to Kiki and Herb and John Kelly — in other words, if and when she tortures an audience, she does so intentionally. Lamb also works in other media, and in the new show “Myth and Method,” she’ll focus equally on the humble work of line drawing as she trades off music and video explorations with the artist collective Lansing-Dreiden. (Johnny Ray Huston)

Through May 5
6 p.m. opening, 8–11 p.m. music performance, $3–$10
New Langton Arts
1246 Folsom, SF
(415) 626-5416
www.newlangtonarts.org

Pleased to meat you

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FILM I was a vegetarian for 18 years — more than half my life. But after quite a bit of soul-searching (and one incredibly triumphant taste of bacon), I recently realized that 18 years was plenty long enough. The honest truth is that meat is delicious, and I enjoy the hell out of eating it.

Coincidentally (or not), the Donner Party included several Eddys. I have no proof that I’m related to the ill-fated pioneers, but I feel a certain kinship nonetheless. They were the ultimate carnivores, after all. I’m not alone in my fascination with cannibalism — why else would there be five Hannibal Lecter movies? Soylent Green is made of people; the living dead will eat your brains at any time of dawn, day, or night; and the biggest blockbuster of 2006, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, featured droves of flesh-hungry islanders. For every highbrow take on cannibalism (Tennessee Williams’s Suddenly Last Summer; song-of-myself doc Keep the River on Your Right; Japanese war drama Fires on the Plain; art house fave Eating Raoul; plane-crash saga Alive), there are dozens more glorifying the ultimate taboo with sleazy glee. Put on your eatin’ dress and consider these tasty standouts.

(1) The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (Tobe Hooper, 1986). The first Chainsaw is a hands-down horror classic. The sequel, which stars Dennis Hopper and is far more of a comedy, includes a subplot about a chili cook-off: "No secret, it’s the meat. Don’t skimp on the meat."

(2) The Hills Have Eyes (Wes Craven, 1977). When Wes Craven met Eddie Murphy when they made Vampire in Brooklyn, the first thing Murphy did was quote The Hills Have Eyes: "Baby’s fat. You fat … fat and juicy."

(3–4) Ravenous (Antonia Bird, 1999). The American frontier circa 1847 provides the backdrop for this tale; well worth it just for the cast of twitchy character actors such as Robert Carlyle, Jeremy Davies, and David Arquette. A good double feature with Cannibal! The Musical (Trey Parker, 1996).

(4) Blood Diner (Jackie Kong, 1987). Guess what’s on the menu.

(5) Frightmare (Pete Walker, 1974). And you thought your family had issues.

(6) Dahmer (David Jacobson, 2002). One of the finer entries in the booming serial-killer biopic genre.

(8–10) The Cannibal gang: Cannibal Holocaust (Ruggero Deodato, 1980), Cannibal Ferox (Umberto Lenzi, 1981), and Cannibal Apocalypse (Antonio Margheriti, 1980). Nobody does human cruelty and bad-taste brutality like the Italians. (Cheryl Eddy)

CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST

Fri/23–Sat/14, midnight, $9.75

Clay, 2261 Fillmore, SF

www.landmarkafterdark.com

Sleepless fights

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› a&eletters@sfbg.com

In May 2002, El Producto issued the acidic collage Fantastic Damage on his label, Definitive Jux. Winning universal acclaim for its compendium of broken-home tales, hard-won insights, and teenage misadventures, the recording crystallized a moment when rap musicians could reject the corporate-approved pay formulas proliferating on MTV without losing a receptive and knowledgeable audience.

Five years later that promise has seemingly passed. Rhymesayers, once famous for selling hundreds of thousands of CDs without major-label support, is now distributed by Warner Bros. LA rap scion Busdriver likes to wear a T-shirt that reads, "Sorry, underground hip-hop happened ten years ago." The controversial Anticon collective, once renowned for its vision of rapping as avant-garde art, has turned its attention to experimental rock.

Meanwhile, critics have long since withdrawn their support. "Independent pop — not just hip-hop — has in many ways become a version of graduate school, a safe zone where artists can eke out a living, take their time doing specialized work," New Yorker critic Sasha Frere-Jones wrote in 2004. "In most cases, this is the last thing a popular musician should be doing." Unlike the participants of past movements — think early ’80s hardcore or mid-’90s indie rock — neither indie rap artists nor the popist critics who hate them can imagine an alternative, noncommercial universe that is profitable as well as artistically successful.

Some things haven’t changed, however. El-P, the man whose Definitive Jux imprint represents the best in underground hip-hop, remains a restlessly intelligent and caustically opinionated maverick. I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead, his just-released follow-up to 2002’s Fantastic Damage, is one of the year’s most remarkable albums, hip-hop or otherwise. I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead is hallucinatory and strange, but it ain’t a coke rap epic. It’s the equivalent of a distorted lens refracting El-P’s mind, bent during wartime, and he stays afloat through torrential word pours and samples collated into Sheetrock. "Why should I be sober when God is so clearly dusted out of his mind / With cherubs puffing a bundle tryna remember why he even tried / Down here it’s 30 percent every year to fund the world’s end / But I’m broke on Atlantic Ave. tryna to cop the bootleg instead," he raps on "Smithereens (Stop Cryin)." Despite the knotty slanguage, however, his lyrics are conceptually grounded, even when he musses with the details.

"I think the record has a political tinge to it, but it wasn’t me trying to feed you my crappy, base understanding of geopolitics," El-P says via phone from Planet New York. "I think the record is a snapshot of a mind state during a time that is highly politicized and strange…. I don’t think anyone needs to hear my perspective on why war is bad or what’s happening in the world. I just think that I’m very influenced by the tone of the times, and it comes through."

Deliberately twisted, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead isn’t, as El-P puts it, "constructs for the radio." Some of the tracks, such as "Everything Must Go" and "No Kings," are simple yet evocative b-boy rants with fresh rhymes. Others are stories. "Habeas Corpses" details a prison guard and firing-squad technician in a futuristic American prison camp — "This is incredibly nerdy," El-P says — who falls in love with one of the prisoners destined to be executed. He questions his feelings for her, but in the end he shoots her.

Eye-catching names such as Cat Power, Trent Reznor, members of the Mars Volta, and Daryl Palumbo from Head Automatica riddle I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead ‘s liner notes. El-P submerges the cameos — a rap by Slug from Atmosphere here, a vocal hook by Matt Sweeney there — into the maelstrom along with the X-Clan samples. With few exceptions, they’re barely noticed. El-P retains center stage.

"It’s been five years since he’s put out a record, so there’s people coming out of the woodwork to get behind him," Amaechi Uzoigwe, El-P’s longtime manager and business partner, says. He describes a postrelease schedule that includes appearances on late-night TV talk shows and international tours. "I think this record is what El-P has done every five years, going back to Funcrusher on Rawkus with Company Flow," Uzoigwe says. "He redefines what indie hip-hop is and can be every time he drops a record."

Throughout his career, El-P has consistently pushed the boundaries of hip-hop. As the leader of the trio Company Flow, in 1997 he issued the totemic Funcrusher Plus, a disc that eventually sold more than 100,000 copies with no radio or video support. (Vibe magazine recently called it "the defining document of ’90s hip-hop dissent.") Shortly before the group disbanded, El-P cofounded Definitive Jux with Uzoigwe. The label grew into an outpost for idiosyncratic visions from Aesop Rock, RJD2, and Mr. Lif. I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead continues that tradition as El-P reconfirms his status as a serious artist worthy of the same consideration as Nine Inch Nails and Cat Power. It’s his first since 2002, but he argues, "It seems like a long time, but for me it didn’t seem that long." Remixes for others (TV on the Radio, Hot Hot Heat, and Beck), beats for his Definitive Jux roster (Mr. Lif and Cage), exotic collaborations (High Water with jazz pianist Matthew Shipp’s Blue Series Continuum), and a soundtrack assignment (Bomb the System) helped the years pass by.

"Those things were me getting into the role of different characters. None of it was really me," El-P says. "The outside production that I do is about me trying to step into the role of furthering someone else’s vision and working within those confines. I seek those things out. I wanna know how to do it. I want to get better at it. I seek these experiences out because I know I’m going to go back and make my record, and hopefully there’ll be something I can pull from those experiences to enhance what I do for myself."

If all goes to plan, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead will anchor a busy year for Definitive Jux. New albums from Aesop Rock, Cage, Camu Tao and Rob Sonic and a 10th-anniversary reissue of Funcrusher Plus are in the offing. The label has been relatively quiet in recent years, only releasing one album (Mr. Lif’s Mo’ Mega), in 2006. In 2007, Definitive Jux hopes to reclaim its past and map out its future.

"We spent last year getting everything together internally so that we can go into these next couple of years as strong as possible," El-P says. He bristles at the notion that Definitive Jux is on the verge of a comeback. The label’s inactivity, he explains, was due to operational issues from launching a digital download store (the Pharmacy) to simply waiting for artists to finish their albums. "We’re very lucky, especially given a time where record labels are dropping like flies. It’s hard to maintain a business, and it’s hard to keep going. Somehow we’ve managed to be healthy and line up great projects. I’m very excited, to be honest."

In some ways, El-P has it easy. As a New York artist who came of age during the Wu-Tang era, the 32-year-old is a critic’s darling who isn’t as scrutinized and second-guessed as many of his peers, a group that ranges from the aforementioned Atmosphere and Busdriver to People under the Stairs and Sage Francis. But if mainstream audiences and critics continue to write off indie rap as a province for silly idealists and college nerds, then I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead indicates that the genre survives in spite of their disdain. At the very least, it sets an impressively high standard for a much-maligned and beleaguered art form.

"I think the genre is a little bit stagnant, musically and creatively. And I think we’ve seen the result of that, whether it’s show attendance, record sales, and just general complaints from the music community," Uzoigwe says. "I think [I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead] is a much-needed addition to the indie hip-hop canon." *

EL-P

Sun/25, 9 p.m., $15

Mezzanine

444 Jessie, SF

mezzaninesf.com

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State of the metal address

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If gnashing guitars, thundering drums, and growling vocals are suddenly silenced, will faces still find places to melt? It’s been five months since Pound-SF closed, after reportedly being evicted by the San Francisco Port Authority. (As early as May 2006, owner Tony Carracci spoke at a San Francisco Entertainment Commission meeting about his frustration at not being able to obtain a long-term lease for the space.) The all-ages club, tucked into San Francisco’s industrial bayside, hosted a large portion of the city’s metal shows during its five-year lifespan. The music may be thriving without the Pound, but what’s up with the local metal scene now that it has no sprawling, single venue at its hub, one that booked major metal touring acts and budding local bands, in addition to the occasional hip-hop or indie group?

Matt Shapiro, head booker at the Elbo Room and founder of metal club night Lucifer’s Hammer, has noticed a few changes. "Since the Pound closed, other people have had to step up. I was hoping that Slim’s would really pick up on it, and they’ve taken some of it," he says, adding that venues such as the Oakland Metro, Bottom of the Hill, and the Great American Music Hall have also begun booking more metal shows. However, he continues, "I’ve noticed that we’ve lost a lot of [metal shows], because a lot of the tours are skipping over the Bay Area now."

Leila Rauf, vocalist and guitarist for Saros, agrees that certain venues have increased their metal bookings to make up for the Pound’s demise. On the other hand, though, "places like Slim’s and the Great American aren’t going to book a band unless you draw at least 300 people," she says. "For smaller bands, that’s not really doable. There’s Balazo [18 Art Gallery] — we just played there are few weeks ago. But I definitely think we need another all-ages venue for smaller bands that’s organized and in a convenient location, because the Pound was kind of in the middle of nowhere."

Feo Berumen, vocalist from Arise, points out that other key metal venues — including the Maritime Hall and the Cocodrie — have shut down in the past and the scene has continued to flourish, though at a certain price. "It’s almost like the only people you’re cutting out is the underage crowd, which sucks," he offers. "The all-ages shows that Arise predominantly plays are up north, past Petaluma."

If the audience demands a Pound equivalent, it’s likely one will eventually emerge. Pete Ponitkoff, formerly of Benumb and now the vocalist for Agenda of Swine, has a suggestion: "I’m surprised somebody doesn’t take Broadway Studios and start having [metal] shows there again. That place would be an awesome replacement for the Pound."

No matter what happens, local metal hardly seems in danger of dying out. Rob Cavestany, lead guitarist of the influential Bay Area thrash band Death Angel — and a former Pound employee — has seen the scene change a lot over the past 25 years, with one proud constant. "The Bay Area metal scene is legendary in the metal world. Any metal fan, all over the world that we go, knows straight up, ‘Bay Area! You guys are from the Bay Area!’ They know it’s the scene that spawned Metallica, Exodus, Testament — some of the hardest-hitting thrash bands."

PLAY AT HIGH VOLUME: A SELECTED GUIDE TO BAY METAL


Agenda of Swine "The new big shit," Berumen declares.

Arise "As of recently, I’ve seen an influx of new, Bay Area thrash," Shapiro says, and Arise is one of his favorites.

Asunder From Oakland, this band got props from Shapiro, Ponitkoff, and Saros drummer Blood Eagle.

Dekapitator Witness the truth of their MySpace headline: "Head-splitting metal!!!!!"

Hatchet On Ponitkoff’s list of new favorites; bands like this make him say of the Bay Area, "We’re the thrash capital of the frickin’ world."

Ludicra Hammers of Misfortune’s John Cobbett plays guitar in this black metal band, guided by Laurie Shanaman’s eerie vocals.

Saros In an interview with Thrasher magazine, Rauf described her band’s music as "simultaneously complex and cyclical." And it rocks.

Saviours "Saviours are really making a name for themselves and touring constantly," Blood Eagle says. See their killer live show, and you’ll see why.

Watch Them Die "The band," Berumen says. "By far one of the best bands out of the Bay Area."

Wayward Son "Young kids who play some of the best goddamn thrash on the face of the planet," according to Berumen. (Cheryl Eddy)

Tale of two Valley Girls

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THE ORIGINAL It starts as a joke, but it rarely ends well. You pick up a piece of slang to make fun of it and then, at some point far too late down the line, realize you are physically incapable of putting it down. Who knew — I didn’t in seventh grade, when I first started using the word “like” as an irritating placeholder for nothing in particular — that Moon Unit Zappa and her dad’s joke, a song mimicking a youthful subculture’s garbled tongue, was also on me and my friends, 3,000 miles distant from Sherman Oaks, or that 24 years later I would still sound vaguely like a character from Martha Coolidge’s film Valley Girl?

My community of incoherents is a large one. The syntax has stuck around, and so has the film at least partly responsible for it — not to mention the threads sported on both sides of the film’s Hollyweird-Valley divide, which have now cycled back into fashion at least twice in the past decade. The streets of San Francisco are filled with stripy-shirted hipsters, Valley Girl is still being paid tribute at events such as Midnites for Maniacs at the Castro, and now the admirers who packed that house can even troop down to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art for a screening that pairs OG VG with a low-budget homage directed by Michele O’Marah.

If you’ve seen the original, and I’m so sure you have, you know exactly why a crazed fan would undertake such an endeavor. Starring Deborah Foreman as Julie, the titular Valley girl, and Nicolas Cage as Randy, her tubular, dreamy-eyed swain from the wrong side of the Hollywood Hills, Valley Girl managed to gently send up a vapid ’80s mall culture while at the same time treating its viewers to a torrid new-romantic love story fueled by worlds colliding, the Plimsouls, and a song about getting it on mid–nuclear holocaust (Modern English’s “I Melt with You”).

Building on the can’t-fail tale of R+J, the film cruises the Hollywood club scene and sneaks into the tract homes of Tarzana and Van Nuys, coolly siding against a brand of teen robotics and materialism epitomized by middle-class girls running loose in the Galleria with their parents’ credit cards — yet admitting that they look “truly dazzling” in their string bikinis at the beach. Fittingly, or fitting-roomly, a shopping montage supplies the footage for the opening credits. But if shopping’s not your bag, try the “I Melt with You” montage, or the Randy-stalking-Julie montage, or lines like Randy’s “Well, fuck you! No, fuck off, for sure! Like, totally!” — an utterance whose consummate blend of anguish and hilarity never fails to secure viewer forgiveness for the admittedly shocking sight, early on, of Cage’s saltwater-slicked V-shaped chest hair. (Lynn Rapoport)

THE REMAKE When she was a teenager, Michele O’Marah’s favorite movie was Valley Girl — reason enough, as an adult, to mount a remake of what’s probably the most popular teen love story of the 1980s (non–John Hughes division). Or was affection the only reason? According to an August 2006 interview O’Marah did with the Web site Austinist, she created her homage as “a serious piece of artwork to be viewed in a gallery” addressing the film’s “serious issues — how a teenage girl thinks about herself, and how she thinks about men and how they should treat her.”

Whether or not this intention comes through is debatable. Fact is, the audience that goes to see a Valley Girl remake (even when it’s showing in a museum) is going to be largely composed of Valley Girl fans, who might let things like O’Marah’s charmingly homemade sets slide but will mutter among themselves when key details are altered. Why didn’t O’Marah direct the guy playing Tommy to make that crazy arm gesture after he knocks back a drink at Suzi’s party? Why are certain crucial lines jumbled beyond recognition?

The disconnects are all the more puzzling when you consider all that O’Marah gets exactly right. Her tweaks can be incredibly winning: Julie’s dad’s broken sandals — the “Water Buffalos” — are made of cardboard; a bewigged Plimsouls cover band offers excellent coverage during the Hollywood bar scenes.

O’Marah was clearly operating with a budget one-zillionth the size of the original’s, itself a cheap film by Hollywood standards. But if her lo-fi Valley Girl is to be taken as serious artwork, it raises a serious question: why remake something you love only to emphasize subtext over joy? In the 1980s a group of junior high kids devoted endless summers to a shot-for-shot remake of Raiders of the Lost Ark. They had the same flagrant disregard for copyright laws as O’Marah but no pretensions whatsoever. Their product may have been technically rough, but it was also energetic and enjoyable. Thing is, when you start putting quote marks around quote marks, fun becomes work. To the max. (Cheryl Eddy)

FIDELITY AND BETRAYAL: VARIATIONS ON THE REMAKE — VALLEY GIRL

Thurs/22, 6:30 p.m. Valley Girl (Michele O’Marah) and 8:30 p.m. Valley Girl (Martha Coolidge)

Sun/25, 2 p.m. Valley Girl (O’Marah) and 4 p.m. Valley Girl (Coolidge)

$5–$7

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Phyllis Wattis Theater

151 Third St., SF

(415) 357-4000

www.sfmoma.org

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A half-century of lies

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View pictures of Leola King’s legendary Blue Mirror club here.

Leola King has lived your life, the lives of three friends and then some.

She’s traveled to Africa with the legendary entertainer, Josephine Baker. She’s featured jazz great Louis Armstrong at a popular Fillmore nightclub she helmed in the 1950s called the Blue Mirror, where she also once convinced a roomful of patrons to drink sweet champagne from the heel of her shoe.

She’s played host to the crusading television journalist Edward R. Murrow.

She’s even had a fling with championship boxer Joe Louis. From the ring at Madison Square Garden, he glanced toward her front-row seat, which she’d secured by chance during her first trip to New York, and had his lackeys retrieve her for a date afterward. Their rendezvous appeared as a gossip item in an Ohio paper and remains in its archives today.

Most of all, Leola King has come as close as anyone possibly can to experiencing bureaucratic hell on earth. For half a century, she’s been fighting with the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency, which has taken four pieces of her property, wiped out a restaurant and two nightclubs she owned, and left her with a string of broken promises.

Her story is evidence that the ugly local chapter of Western Addition redevelopment history still isn’t over – and it’s a demonstration of why so many African Americans in this town will never trust the Redevelopment Agency.

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Beginning in the 1940s, King successfully operated a series of restaurants and nightclubs in the city, remarkable enough in an era that imposed a double-paned glass ceiling on black, female entrepreneurs.

“Back when I first moved onto Fillmore, it was very popular,” King told the Guardian. “Market Street didn’t have shit. They didn’t have traffic. They didn’t have nothing on Market Street.”

During the height of King’s accomplishments, the Redevelopment Agency infamously launched an ambitious project to clear out “blight” in the neighborhood. It was part of a nationwide urban-renewal trend, and while the project here still won’t be finished until 2009, it’s widely regarded as one of America’s worst urban-planning disasters.

In theory, Western Addition residents who were forced to give up their homes or businesses were given a “certificate of preference,” a promise that when the sometimes decaying buildings were turned to kindling and new ones built, the former occupants could return.

In practice, it didn’t work out that way. An estimated 5,500 certificates were issued to families and business owners shortly before the second phase of Western Addition redevelopment began in 1964. Some 5,000 families were dislodged and many of them fled to other sectors of the city (including Bayview-Hunter’s Point, which is today slated for its own redevelopment), or outside of the Bay Area completely.

Only a fraction of the certificates have benefited anyone. The agency has lost contact information for more than half of the holders, and redevelopment commissioners now openly admit the program is a joke.

“If we’re going to boast about being this diverse community in San Francisco, and we’re going to allow our African American population to become extinct, then how can we show our faces in government if we’re not really doing anything about it?” asked London Breed, a redevelopment commissioner appointed by Gavin Newsom in 2005. “And not just putting black people in low-income housing. There [are] a lot of middle-class African Americans all across America, specifically in the East Bay and in other places. Why do they choose to live in the East Bay over San Francisco?”

A renewed interest in the certificates by City Hall led to hearings this month, and District 5 Sup. Ross Mirkarimi has planned another for April.

King obtained two certificates, and attempts to later redeem them both devolved into costly legal wrangling with the agency that lasted more than two decades. She has never regained what she lost.

Leola King’s story is about more than certificates of preference. It’s a story about the troubling legacy of urban renewal.

King welcomes guests into her home on Eddy Street near Fillmore with ease. The living room in what is little more than a two-bedroom converted garage apartment swells unimaginably with antiques – three stuffed chairs with vinyl slips, crystal chandeliers, an ornate dining-room table, lamps, a fur throw.

She insists that she’s just 39 years old, but public records put her closer to 84.

When the Guardian first visited with her in person, she was dressed in black cotton leisure attire. Two chestnut braids cascaded from a gray Kangol-style cap, which she smoothed with her hands as they hugged a pair of light-skinned cherub cheeks.

King made her way west after spending her earliest years behind the barbed wire of a Cherokee reservation in Haskell, Ok. Her mother died when King was young, and her restless father had meandered off to Los Angeles. Her grandparents oversaw her adolescence before she trailed after her father to California, where he was establishing a chain of barbecue restaurants. She married a man at just 14, and a year later, she was a mother. Tony Tyler, her son, is a San Francisco tour guide today and remains a close confidant and business partner.

It was 1946 when she first landed in San Francisco and eventually started her own barbecue pit at 1601 Geary St., near Buchanan, historic building inspection records show. She called it Oklahoma King’s, and hungry San Franciscans were lured to the smell of exotic buffalo, deer and quail meats.

“That end of Fillmore was very popular all the way down until you got almost to Pacific [Avenue],” she said. “Heavily populated. There was at one time in that area of Fillmore over 100 bars alone. Lots of hamburger places. That’s where I had the barbecue pit.”

By 1949, however, Congress had made urban renewal federal law with the goal of leveling slums and deleting general “blight,” still the most popular and awkwardly defined threshold for determining where the government can clear homes and businesses using eminent domain.

The first redevelopment zone in the Western Addition, known as A-1, included Oklahoma King’s. She was paid approximately $25,000 for the property, but offered no relocation assistance or other compensation for the revenue she lost as a result of ceasing her day-to-day business.

Forging ahead, she opened in 1953 what became a hub of jazz and blues entertainment in the Fillmore, the Blue Mirror, at 935 Fillmore Street. The place was decorated with brass Greek figurines on the walls, a circular bar and velvet festoons. King spent a year hopping onto buses full of tourists and begging the driver to drop them by her nightclub for a drink. Before long, her brassy personality had attracted world-class performers, each of them adding electricity to the club’s reputation.

“She was the type of woman who knew how to handle people,” a Blue Mirror regular later said in the 2006 collection of Fillmore jazz-era photography, Harlem of the West. “She could talk to the pimps and hustlers. She didn’t play around, and they knew how to conduct themselves in her club.”

A musician who formerly worked there told the Guardian the Blue Mirror was one of the few places on Fillmore that actually provided live entertainment at that time. Bobbie Webb backed up B.B. King, Little Willie John, T-Bone Walker and others as a young saxophonist at the Blue Mirror with his band the Rhythm Rockers. He said the other establishments nearby on Fillmore were mostly bars except for headlining auditoriums where mainstream acts like James Brown and the Temptations performed. Smaller venues abounded up the street on Divisadero, he said, save mostly for King’s Blue Mirror and the Booker T. Washington Hotel.

“[King] didn’t only have a personality” said Webb, who now airs a show Tuesdays on 89.5 KPOO, “she was a beautiful lady. Personality just spoke for itself. All she had to do was stand there.”

But like virtually everyone in the neighborhood at that time, King rented the place where the Blue Mirror operated. Redevelopment again reached her business in the early 1960s. State booze enforcers, she says, claimed to have witnessed a bartender serving alcohol to a minor and her liquor license was taken away. When the Redevelopment Agency showed up shortly thereafter to sweep the block away, she was ejected without compensation because she wasn’t at that time technically in business.

Two more commercial and residential properties she owned on Post and Webster streets respectively were also eventually taken under redevelopment.

She pressed on, encouraged by Jewish business owners in the area she’d befriended, including liquor wholesaler Max Sobel and Fairmont Hotel operator Benjamin Swig.

“Whenever I’d lose something, they’d say, ‘Keep on moving. Don’t stop, because you’ll lose your customers. When you open back up, they won’t know who you are.’ They’re the ones who told me, ‘Go get another spot.'”

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By the time King began work on her third business in the Fillmore, urban renewal projects had wreaked havoc on minority communities across the nation, including neighborhoods in west-side Boston, downtown Atlanta, the celebrated 18th & Vine District of Kansas City and elsewhere.

King opened the Bird Cage Tavern at 1505 Fillmore St. in 1964 near O’Farrell complete with a jukebox, 30-foot mahogany bar, a piano and a gilded birdcage. Then-police chief Thomas J. Cahill tried to block her liquor-license renewal by complaining to the state about “winos” and “prostitutes” in the neighborhood, records show, but regulators dismissed the claims.

“We had viable businesses all around us,” King said. “I had one fellow I worked with a lot named Willie Jones. He was a blues singer. The interesting thing was, I had music in the daytime at the Bird Cage. I specialized in afternoon jazz.”

Despite a triumphant resettlement, nonetheless, the redevelopment agency arrived yet again and bought her building during the expansion of it’s A-2 redevelopment phase and served as landlord for the Bird Cage, a barber shop and a liquor store as it waited for another two years deciding what to do with the building.

On the agency’s watch, a fire broke out next door to the Bird Cage that led to water damage in her space. Federal Housing and Urban Development records show that no insurance claim was ever filed by the Redevelopment Agency. King says the agency removed some of the bar’s contents, mostly kitchen supplies, and made only stopgap repairs to the building anticipating that she would later be ousted anyway. The items they took, she says, were never returned.

The agency then evicted all of the building’s tenants in 1974. This time, King stood fast and had to be forced out by the sheriff. The agency promised relocation assistance, but those empty assurances became her biggest headache yet. In fact, she would spend the next 25 years quarreling with the agency over relocation terms.

King and the agency searched fruitlessly until 1977 for a suitable replacement building before King purchased her own out of desperation at 1081 Post St. She was then forced to begin another endurance test of working to actually extract money from the agency owed to her for properly outfitting the new building.

Meanwhile, the Bird Cage’s leftover furnishings – from oil paintings, rugs and curtains to an ice maker, wood shelving and an antique porcelain lamp – were destroyed when the agency amazingly chose to store them on an outdoor lot off Third Street during her move, a fact later confirmed by an agency employee in an affidavit.

“They moved it all out,” King said, “all these antiques and stuff, into this field where the weather ate it up.”

The agency’s initial response was to determine how it could best avoid legal liability. Redevelopment officials finally offered her about $100,000, which she needed desperately to keep things moving with the Bird Cage’s new location, but King insists today the materials were worth closer to $1 million.

As she was fighting to reopen her bar business, she attempted to redeem an earlier certificate of preference given to her when she’d lost a residential property on Webster Street to redevelopment. In 1983, she bought a condemned, 12-unit apartment building on Eddy Street hoping to rehabilitate it using a federally backed loan.

The deal only led to more trouble. The agency paid for its own roving security to patrol Western Addition properties it had purchased, and before 1431 Eddy St. was ever officially conveyed to King (as well as two other neighboring developers), thieves gutted the building of windows, doors, plumbing, light fixtures and other hardware. (Two buildings belonging to neighboring developers were also hit, and the agency addressed their losses the same way.)

Almost immediately, the agency told her she’d purchased the building “as is” and that they weren’t responsible for the break-in. But according to an internal 1983 memo marked “confidential,” later unearthed when friends of King submitted a records request to the agency, staffers clearly were concerned about the legal implications of offering one building for sale “as is” and actually providing another one on the date of delivery that had been thoroughly burglarized.

The memo shows that the possibility of a lawsuit was of greater concern to the agency than any obligation to compensate King for the lost hardware, regardless of whether proper security was the agency’s responsibility. Records show they did discuss a settlement of little more than $2,000, but King considered the stolen goods to be worth thousands of dollars more.

She managed to eventually finish the rehabilitation of her Eddy Street property after several years of work, and while she lives there today, time and angst took their toll. Each step of the transition to what she hoped would someday become her new bar, Goldie’s on Post Street, involved a seemingly endless round of yet more negotiations, letters, legal threats and bureaucratic backbiting before the agency would lift a finger and allocate money for contractors, necessary seismic upgrades, architects and equipment.

In 1997, then-Rep. Ron Dellums (now Oakland mayor) wrote a letter to top local HUD official Art Agnos (later a San Francisco mayor) on King’s behalf.

“On August 26, Ms. King met with a member of my staff and detailed issues surrounding a 25-year dispute she has attempted to resolve with HUD and the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency,” Dellums wrote. “Your expeditious attention to this matter is [a] request, as Ms. King is elderly and experiencing health problems. The resolution to this issue would allow her to live the remainder of her life with some piece of mind.”

It was too late. The federally backed loans she’d received from HUD to rehab her Eddy Street property, from which the Redevelopment Agency strictly enforced repayment, fell into default. Loans leveraged against her other remaining properties began to slip, too, all while she fought with the forces of redevelopment to recreate what she had once proudly possessed.

King’s story may seem like an unfathomable streak of bad luck, but there’s a paper trail for all of it. And her battle, laid out in hundreds of pages of documents saved by King over several decades and reviewed by the Guardian, was ultimately unsuccessful..

By 1997, King was submerged in bankruptcy proceedings and would lose pretty much everything that she owned, including an Edwardian landmark home on Scott Street near Alamo Square where she’d lived for years (partially burned in a 1986 fire, believe it or not) and a residential building on Sutter Street.

Goldie’s was to be her final resting place, a roost from which she hoped to feature cabaret dancing, fresh crab at happy hour, a refined art deco aesthetic and live music performances. She lost that, too. Today, it’s Diva’s just off Polk Street.

Urban renewal won.

———————-

Hopeful press accounts lately foretell a jazz revival in the Fillmore District fueled by enterprising developers deft at financing lucrative redevelopment projects through tax incentives and low-interest loans half a century after the promise of “renewal,” now described euphemistically as “historic preservation.”

But with such a sordid history behind them, it’s no wonder residents of Bayview-Hunter’s Point, many of whom escaped Western Addition “renewal” in the first place, are leery of a pending years-long plan to redevelop nearly 1,500 acres in the southeast neighborhoods.

Bayview newspaper publisher Willie Ratcliff led a petition drive last year in an effort to put the plan before voters. Over 20,000 petition signatures were certified by elections officials, but City Attorney Dennis Herrera ruled the petitions were technically invalid because circulators hadn’t presented the full text of the redevelopment plan to signers. Redevelopment foes have since sued to have Herrera’s decision tossed.

“The misuse by these people is just unbelievable,” King said. “They were fighting me every inch.”

Thanks to Susan Bryan for joining the Guardian in reviewing hundreds of pages of public and personal records preserved in Leola King’s estate. Bryan is currently working with Monkey Paw Productions on a documentary about King’s life

NOISE: Yeehaw, rounding up those SXSW doggies!

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Ah, SXSW, time to wrap up all the kookiness. So here are a few last lists, a few last pics, though look out for a few scattered weather reports on interviewees in the not-so-distant future. Here’s to the mammaries…

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We get hearts; they get guitars – which breed of public art do you prefer? All photos by Kimberly Chun

Glad I caught: Psychedelic Horseshit’s exhilarating, smart-ass Fall-isms; Gilberto Gil’s sweet revelations; Pete Townshend’s on-point reminiscences (“Isn’t the Internet something of an option – we don’t need to burn gas in order to be together, though we ultimately want to be together,” the man who predicted the Net with Lifehouse said); the Stooges’ blunt bludgeons, onstage and in conversation (“What passes for intelligence generally isn’t,” Iggy Pop said on getting slapped with a “dumb” sticker by Rolling Stone); Isaac Hayes in the smiling flesh at a Stax press conference; Jandek getting a standing O at Central Presbyterian Church; Load show with NOXAGT; Silver Daggers and “Monotract” show consisting of Monotract’s Nancy Garcia, Thurston Moore, Burning Star Core’s C. Spencer Yeh, and Magik Marker’s Pete Nolan; Oxford Collapse; Oh No! Oh My!; Entrance; Slaraffenland; Rob Crow; Charlie Louvin; Panda Band; Foreign Islands; Jay Reatard; the Good, the Bad, and the Queen with top hat and strings at Stubb’s; Nina Nastasia and Jim White; Vashti Bunyan live and with Gabrielle Drake at the “Nick Drake Remembered” panel; and JESU.

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Blues dudes jam outside Victory Grill and a nearby Vice day party.

Sorry I missed: Mrs. B’s house parties (including one with the Pack rapping atop booker Todd P’s car), Pink Reason, Swishahouse showcase, Bonde do Role, My Brightest Diamond, Deerhunter, the Big Sleep, Galactic with Lyrics Born and Boots Riley, Yip-Yip, Strange Boys, Fuck by Fuck You, Horrors, the A-bones, Reigning Sound, Cody Chestnutt, the M’s, Oohlas, the Ponderosa Stomp party, Miko Miko, Daniel Johnston and the Nightmares, David Garza, Clockcleaner, Gown, Michael Pitt’s Pagoda, Broken West, Rosebuds, Cyann and Ben, Cortney Tidwell, Langhorne Slim, Finally Punk, Sammies, Golden Bear, Devin the Dude, the Presets, Kings of Leon, Turzi, David Karsten Daniels, Midnight Movies, Watson Twins, Malajube, Gods and Monsters, Plan B, Lee “Scratch” Perry, Swamp Dogg, Beats of Bourbon, the Saints, Andrew Bird, and Andrew WK.

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Jay Reatard and co. bust up Longbranch Inn at a Vice Saves Texas shindig.

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The Hylozoists send out good vibes.

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Psychedelic Horseshit talks back. “This song is about Deerhunter and their samplers.”

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Oh, no, it’s Iono, Norway’s NOXAGT

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Rusted Shut opens up the Load showcase.

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Remembering This Moment in Black History.

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Jesus, it’s loud. It’s JESU.

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Vashti Bunyan kills us softly with her song at Central Presbyterian Church.

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Here’s what a capacity SXSW crowd looks like – peering in from outside the Beauty Bar Patio at Foreign Islands.

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This is the end, my semi-naked friend.

By the way, anyone notice that the old-school girl-group sound is back (i.e., Amy Winehouse, the Pipettes, Mary Weiss)?

NOISE: Pinned at SXSW’s Flatstock

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Flatstock, the American Poster Institute’s poster show at SXSW, is always a must-catch at the fest: everyone I ran into had to get the free silkscreened-as-you-wait Turbonegro poster or buy new art for their walls back home. Trends in cleaner, more Scandinavian moderne-like design were visible. So much to see and drool over.

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Animal Rummy of Austin

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Zachary Hobbs Design of Chattanooga, TN

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Pedini of Austin

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Serigraphie Cinqunquatre from Montreal.

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Largemammal Print of Collingswood, NJ

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Ron Liberti of Carrboro, NC

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Standard Deluxe of Waverly, Ala.

Mission: fresh-air beer

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› a&eletters@sfbg.com

Listen up, troops: Spring is here and decent weather may be on the radar. It’s time to escape from the barracks and attack life with a blitzkrieg of beer and BBQ. Below is a list of checkpoints that are reported to condone and encourage the outdoor consumption of alcohol.

Good luck, soldier. Now get out there and knock ’em back!

Big guns

ZEITGEIST


The HQ of patio bars — the grand pooh-bah, the big cheese. Hands down the biggest, baddest patio west of the bay. Although owing to the line of porta-potties, it’s probably one of the stinkiest. This is your safe station, no matter what company you’re signed up with. Zeitgeist’s commissary will stock you up on burgers and fries, and its Bloody Marys will keep you flying.

199 Valencia, SF. (415) 255-7505, myspace.com/zeitgeistsf

EL RIO


Outer Mission hideaway El Rio is big enough for large outfits but romantic enough for a date while on leave. A portion of the yard is sheltered by a tent for rainy-day ops — and there’s nothing to stop you from lighting up. Mmmm — gotta love the smell of cigarettes in the midafternoon.

3158 Mission, SF. (415) 282-3325 www.elriosf.com

PILSNER INN


Few cantinas can muster as many features as the Pilsner Inn. Twenty-four beers on tap, two pool leagues, and a lush, landscaped garden patio with two koi ponds should be enough to make anyone stand at attention. A strong contingent here flies the rainbow flag, but the Pilsner welcomes troops from all outfits to its relaxed environs.

225 Church, SF. (415) 621-7058, www.pilsnerinn.com

Smaller outposts

PAPA TOBY’S REVOLUTION CAFÉ


This little Mission spot will flash you back to life as a guerrilla fighter in Cuba or Guatemala. A beer and wine café with a secluded backwoods feel and a heated streetside patio, Papa Toby’s Revolution Café offers a variety of troop entertainment, from free trade to tango lessons. With enough alcohol here, you may be able to brainwash your copilot into believing he or she is the reincarnation of Che Guevara.

3248 22nd St., SF. (415) 642-0474

FINNEGAN’S WAKE


An enclave of Cole Valley regulars is keeping Finnegan’s Wake top secret. The back patio is a mini-Zeitgeist, equipped with a grill and picnic tables. Surrounded by apartments, this little retreat goes on lockdown after 21:00 hours, making this site good for daytime expeditions only.

937 Cole, SF. (415) 731-6119

GOLD CANE COCKTAIL LOUNGE


The patio of this Haight Street joint has a nicely elevated rear portion — high ground, easy to defend from marauding tourists and the like. And if you can’t successfully pilot your hand-rolled smokable through the crowd, you’ve no business flying so high, soldier.

1569 Haight, SF. (415) 626-1112

MAD DOG IN THE FOG


Bright red and green paint often makes the Mad Dog in the Fog’s vibrant little patio hard to handle without a pint or two. Local hostiles have managed to shut down maneuvers here after 22:00, so your best bet is to set up a happy-hour camp during the soccer off-season — around World Cup time, soccer insurgents outfitted in reversible jerseys and knee-high socks seize the position.

530 Haight, SF. (415) 626-7279

THE AXIS OF BURGERS


Taken together, Flippers restaurant and Marlena’s bar in Hayes Valley can provide a prime afternoon drinking and lounging target. Flippers serves burgers, beer, and wine. Its patio is outfitted with a variety of flora: lilies, trees, and lawn. Right next door, with a full bar, Marlena’s has a minimal cagelike smoking facility with just three benches gated off from the street.

Flippers Gourmet Burgers, 482 Hayes, SF. (415) 552-8880

Marlena’s, 488 Hayes, SF. (415) 864-6672

MARS BAR AND RESTAURANT


A secluded SoMa bar and restaurant often overrun by hordes of concertgoers and workers from the neighboring Concourse Exhibition Center in the evening, Mars Bar and Restaurant makes for an excellent outdoor lunch break. Late at night you’ll often locate barkeeps from other watering holes gathered here to blow their tips.

798 Brannan, SF. (415) 621-6277, www.marsbarsf.com

Coast Guard

PIER 23 CAFE


This waterfront bar and restaurant features live music most nights of the week. Its outdoor area is an expansive field of patio furniture flanked by the bay. A popular evening destination for locals, Pier 23 Cafe just underwent a complete remodel, now ready for inspection.

Pier 23, SF. (415) 362-5125 www.pier23cafe.com

RED’S JAVA HOUSE


Little more than a kitchen shed up front and a tent with bar in back, Red’s Java House is nestled beneath the Bay Bridge on Pier 30. The only thing that might obstruct your skyward reconnaissance is the occasional SUV parked next to the fenced-off, bare-bones patio. There’s a widescreen TV for sports fans in the tent and a menu of burgers, dogs, and fish and chips.

Pier 30, SF. (415) 777-5626

MOMO’S


Right next to PhoneCompany Park, Momo’s has a limited view — the baseball stadium and a massive apartment complex obstruct most of the horizon. The bar is incredibly well equipped, but Momo’s is a restaurant, which may impair smoking operations. While there, enrich yourself with the art installation in the front garden box: a giant heart-shaped olive. Enriching!

760 Second St., SF. (415) 227-8660, www.sfmomos.com

Eastern Theater

JUPITER


Just a short flight east of San Francisco, Jupiter is the majordomo outdoor operation of the East Bay. This two-story brewpub and pizza restaurant in downtown Berkeley is attached to a giant compound replete with heating lamps and ivy. You’ll have to stow those stogies, though: this place is a restaurant and doesn’t take kindly to smoking.

2181 Shattuck, Berk. (510) 843-8277, www.jupiterbeer.com

BECKETT’S


The two-story Irish pub is equipped with two fireplaces and two functional bars. Its patio is a small balcony above a cobblestone alleyway — the perfect size for an elite task force to secure a position and commence a-blazing.

2271 Shattuck, Berk. (510) 647-1790, www.beckettsirishpub.com

OASIS RESTAURANT AND BAR


Deep into East Bay territory is the Oasis Restaurant and Bar. By day this Oakland position operates as a Nigerian restaurant; at night it becomes a grooving outdoor lounge with DJs and two dance floors. A staggering canyon of cement surrounds the small rear patio. The heated paradise has multiple tables and chairs, a stage, a massive sound system, and a wraparound grass-covered overhang.

135 12th St., Oakland.

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MORE OUTDOOR DESTINATIONS

Carmen’s, Pier 40, SF. (415) 495-5140

Cinch, 1723 Polk, SF. (415) 776-4162, www.thecinch.com

Connecticut Yankee, 100 Connecticut, SF. (415) 552-4440, www.theyankee.com

Eagle Tavern, 398 12th St., SF. (415) 626-0880, www.sfeagle.com

Jay ‘n Bee Club, 2736 20th St., SF. (415) 824-4190

Kennedy’s Irish Pub and Curry House, 1040 Columbus, SF. (415) 441-8855, www.kennedyscurry.com

Lone Star Saloon, 1354 Harrison, SF. (415) 863-9999, www.lonestarsaloon.com

Lucky 13, 2140 Market, SF. (415) 487-1313

Medjool, 2522 Mission, SF. (415) 550-9055, www.medjoolsf.com

Mix, 4086 18th St., SF. (415) 431-8616

Parkside, 1600 17th St., SF. (415) 503-0393, www.theeparkside.com

Il Pirata, 2007 16th St., SF. (415) 626-2626

Ramp, 885 Terry Francois, SF. (415) 621-2378

Red Jack Saloon, 131 Bay, SF. (415) 989-0700

Rosewood, 732 Broadway, SF. (415) 951-4886, www.rosewoodbar.com

Wild Side West, 424 Cortland, SF. (415) 647-3099

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Dance dance revolution

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"If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be in your revolution" is a club-friendly sentiment traditionally attributed to estimable anarchist Emma Goldman. But even if she didn’t put it in quite those words, the message is clear: changing the world doesn’t have to be a grim slog. Why struggle at all if it doesn’t result in a world we can actually enjoy? That’s where these benefit-hosting, rabble-rousing, community-oriented bars, clubs, cultural centers, and performance spaces come in. Like the spoonful of sugar that masks the medicine, a nice pour and a few choice tunes can turn earnest liberation into ecstatic celebration.

DANCING QUEENS


Billing itself as "your dive," El Rio defines "you" as a crowd of anarchists, trannies, feminists, retro-cool kids, and heat-seeking salseros as diverse as you’re likely to find congregating around one shuffleboard table. Whether featuring a rawkin’ Gender Pirates benefit show or a rare screening of The Fall of the I-Hotel as part of radical film series Televising the Revolution, El Rio encourages an intimacy and camaraderie among its dance floor–loving patrons less frequently found these days in an increasingly class-divided Mission.

3158 Mission, SF. (415) 282-3325, www.elriosf.com

THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE SANITIZED


Although it’s really an aboveground Mission storefront, Balazo 18 has a great "in the basement" underground vibe, and within its gritty labyrinth, upstart idealists lurk like scruffy Minotaurs. The low overhead and inclusive ambience has proven fertile ground for local activist functions such as the recent Clarion Alley Mural Project fundraiser and December 2006’s Free Josh Wolf event (freedom still pending). The dance floor’s generous size attracts top-notch local bands and sweaty, freedom-seeking legions who love to dance till they drop.

2183 Mission, SF. (415) 255-7227, www.balazogallery.com

STARRY-EYED IDEALISM


Applause for the Make-Out Room‘s green-minded stance against unnecessary plastic drink straws (it doesn’t serve ’em), its championing of literary causes (Steven Elliott’s "Progressive Reading" series, Charlie Anders’s "Writers with Drinks"), and its calendar of benefit shows for agendas as diverse as animal sanctuary, tenants rights, and free speech. Plus, not only are the (strawless) drinks reasonably priced, but the wacked-out every–day–is–New Year’s Eve disco ball and silver star decor hastens their effect.

3225 22nd St., SF. (415) 647-2888, www.makeoutroom.com

STOP IN THE NAME OF ART


The Rickshaw Stop hosts progressive literary luminaries by the library-load, raising the roof and the funds for programs such as the 61-year-old San Francisco Writer’s Workshop and the reading series "Inside Storytelling." Other beneficiaries of the Rickshaw’s pro-arts programming include SF Indiefest and Bitch magazine, and the club calendar is filled with queer dance parties, record release shows, and even an upcoming "Pipsqueak a Go Go" dance party for l’il kiddies with the Devilettes and the Time Outs. If teaching a roomful of preschoolers the Monkey isn’t an act of die-hard, give-something-back merrymaking martyrdom, well …

155 Fell, SF. (415) 861-2011, www.rickshawstop.com

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS


A dancer- and activist-run performance incubator, CounterPULSE hosts a diverse collection of cutting-edge artistes ranging from queer Butoh dancers to crusading sexologists to mobility-impaired aerialists. It’s also home to the interactive history project Shaping San Francisco and a lively weekly contact jam. But it’s the plucky, DIY joie de vivre that pervades its fundraising events — featuring such entertainment as queer cabaret, big burlesque, and an abundance of booty-shaking — that keeps our toes tapping and our progressive groove moving. Best of all, the "no one turned away for lack of funds" policy ensures that even the most broke-ass idealist can get down.

1310 Mission, SF. (415) 626-2060, www.counterpulse.org

MORE THAN THE SUM OF ITS PARTS


Sometimes a dance club, sometimes an art gallery — and sometimes not quite either — 111 Minna Gallery is pretty much guaranteed to always be a good time. Funds have been raised here on behalf of groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the West Memphis Three, and Hurricane Relief as a plethora of local and big-name artists and music makers — from Hey Willpower to Henry Rollins — have shown their stuff on the charmingly makeshift stage and the well-worn walls.

111 Minna, SF. (415) 974-1719, www.111minnagallery.com

THE HUMAN LAUGH-IN


It’s true — the revolutionary life can’t just be one big dance party. Sometimes it’s an uptown comedy club adventure instead. Cobb’s Comedy Club consistently books the big names on the comedy circuit — and it also showcases some side-splitting altruism, such as last month’s THC Comedy Medical Marijuana benefit tour and the annual "Stand Up for Justice" events sponsored by Death Penalty Focus. Even selfless philanthropy can be a laughing matter.

915 Columbus, SF. (415) 928-4320, www.cobbscomedyclub.com

OLD FAITHFUL


The headless guardian angel of cavernous, city-funded cultural center SomArts has been a silent witness to countless community-involved installations and festivals, such as the "Radical Performance" series, a Day of the Dead art exhibit, the annual "Open Studios Exhibition," and the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival. And plenty of fundraising celebrations have been hosted beneath its soaring rafters on behalf of organizations such as the Coalition on Homelessness, Survival Research Labs, and the Center for Sex and Culture. We’ve got to admit — nothing cries "community" like a space where you can drink absinthe and build misfit toys one night, dance to live salsa the next, and attend a sober seminar on pirate radio the following afternoon.

934 Brannan, SF. (415) 552-2131, www.somarts.org

STORMING THE CASTLE


Even if the Edinburgh Castle were run by community-hating misanthropes, we’d come here for the craic and perhaps a wistful fondle of the Ballantine caber mounted on the wall. But general manager Alan Black has helped foster a scene of emerging and established writers, unsigned bands, and Robbie Burns lovers in the lively heart of the upper TL. The unpretentious, unflappable venue also hosts benefits for causes such as breast cancer research and refugee relocation. And the Tuesday night pub quiz, twice-monthly mod-Mersybeat dance nights, and annual swearing competition keep us coming back for more (except maybe the haggis).

950 Geary, SF. (415) 885-4074, www.castlenews.com

SHAKE IT TILL YOU MAKE IT


Turning martini shaking into charitable moneymaking, Elixir has been the go-to drinks dispensary for fundraisers of all varieties since it launched its unique Charity Guest Bartending program. The concept is simple: the organizers of a fundraising effort sign up in advance, beg or bully a hundred of their best buddies to show up early and stay late, get a crash course in mixology, and raise bucks behind the bar of this green-certified Mission District saloon (the second-oldest operating bar in San Francisco). Did we mention it’s green certified? Just checking. Barkeep, another round.

3200 16th St., SF. (415) 552-1633, www.elixirsf.com

SPACE IS THE PLACE


A 2006 Best of the Bay winner, CELLspace has weathered the usual warehouse-space storms of permit woes and facility upgrading, and yet it continues to expand its programming and fan base into some very far-flung realms. From roller disco to b-boy battling, hip-hop to punk rock, art classes to aerial performances, the CELL has been providing an urban refuge for at-risk youth, aging hipsters, and community builders since 1996. Though we mourn the loss of the Bike Kitchen, which moved to its new SoMa digs, we’re glad to see the return of the Sunday-morning Mission Village Market — now indoors!

2050 Bryant, SF. (415) 648-7562, www.cellspace.org

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Attack of the killer Ts

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› kimberly@sfbg.com

"Ironic T-shirts — where the lameness of my T-shirt is in inverse proportion to my hipness!" comedian Patton Oswalt shouted at a recent sold-out Noise Pop show, pointing out in particular one special Salinas lass in a skull-and-hearts T. "I’m so cool I can defeat my own T-shirt!"

You know T-shirts have arrived — and by now may even be taking the last BART train to Fremont — when they’ve crept into the routines of comics desperate to warm up a 6 p.m. crowd. Is there anything more appropriate for every occasion, barring the most obscenely uptight cotillion? Be it basic formal and fiendish black, all-purpose "what are you rebelling against?" white, or any hue in the spectrum between. Be it worn on the chest, sleeve, or belly. Be it decorated with words and pictures so promo, pomo, and porno, with bands and teams, mugs and slugs of the sheer truth, alliances and affiliations, affirmations or fighting words — there’s no place like the homely T-shirt. Provided you have the right cut, cult, or message, you can throw it on and rock that bod with just jeans and trendoid footwear — consider yourself done.

Ts are our wearable tabula rasa, once underwear suitable only for soldier boys circa World War II, later campus and business iron-on throwaways in the ’50s, and even later rock band promos ready to be gracefully defaced with pins and zippers during the punk years (and now we’re back to white Ts for gangstas dodging crippling colors). Remember when the only T-shirt sizes available were L and XL? Remember when the sole women’s Ts around were toddler ready, fit for showing off every chub roll acquired from here to the nearest bakery? Whether you break them down between screen prints and iron-ons or between skate-beach-BMX, rock–metal–punk–pop–hip-hop, and TV-film-cartoon-advertising specimens, as Lisa Kidner and Sam Knee do in their 2006 book, Vintage T-Shirts (Collins Design, $19.95) — there’s an unsnooty, democratic beauty to a T.

Long after those faux–feed store and John Deere–logoed T-shirts have evaporated and aeons after the not-so-ironically offensive faux-Asian biz T-shirts have been yanked from Abercrombie and Fitch, we can still fall for a few artfully decorated scraps of tissue-thin jersey — and not just those by newbie local hotshot T designers such as Turk+Taylor (www.turkandtaylor.com) or My Trick Pony (www.mytrickpony.com). Only a few months ago I was bewitched into purchasing a $9 Flying V–bedecked shirt with a factory-frayed neck and sleeves at Le Target, of all places — the ideal block-rockin’ New Year’s Eve outfit with a black chiffon tiered skirt and boots. Why did I fall? It never fails to get compliments and fits like a teenage dream, and I can always make room for another music T in my collection, which encompasses an ’80s Sex Pistols reproduction purchased from the back pages of Creem, a boxy Poison pachyderm rewarded after a gig loading out for the hair metal combo, and a Scottish-slurred "Where am I and what the fuck’s going on?" Arab Strap T.

Lucky us, living at ground zero of the rock-T explosion: in 1968, the late Bill Graham began printing shirts regularly for the first time, an effort that distinguished him from fan club and individual band merchandising designs, according to Erica Easley, who cowrote Rock Tease: The Golden Years of Rock T-Shirts (Abrams Image, $19.95). Bill Graham Presents still sells vintage articles and reproductions on its Wolfgang’s Vault site (www.wolfgangsvault.com), though if you want the real thing, you might have to settle for the Doobie Brothers and Exodus rather than the Stones and Hendrix.

A buyer for one of the largest buy-sell-trade clothing stores on the West Coast, Red Light Clothing Exchange in Portland, Ore., Easley can pinpoint the beginning of the recent rock-T trend to the late ’90s when designers began buying vintage shirts and modifying them with grommets, trim, and patchwork. "They were able to do that because they were so cheap," she explains, citing Lara Flynn Boyle as one of the first celebs to sport a T (Bob Seger) on the red carpet, and attributes the longevity and cultural relevance of the rock-T trend to the resurgence of new bands such as the White Stripes.

American Apparel’s sexy softcore ads and no-logo trendy styling haven’t hurt either, while street artists have taken to embellishing Ts as they might a skateboard, and fashionistas continue to layer short-sleeve with long-sleeve Ts in what Easley calls the "Spicoli surfer look." To her eye, the urban art trend "raises all sorts of sociological questions. It’s from the street and supposedly authentic and tends to be pricey — it’s not what a street rat can really afford. There’s the price of a shirt and who’s wearing it and who’s supposed to be wearing it — you’re buying into a lifestyle." Personally, she’d "love to see a resurgence of do-it-yourself T-shirts, writing on T-shirts making personal statements."

Easley confesses the overall rock-T trend is waning. "It was such a fashion fad and so oversaturated. The sense of exclusivity that made it really hard at any other part of this decade to find T-shirts is gone," says the writer, who got into collecting by way of a Mötley Crüe obsession. "But I think long term it has been great for rock T-shirts and put them into the collectible realm."

Steven Scott, the manager of Aardvark’s Odd Ark (1501 Haight, SF; 415-621-3141), agrees that the trend for music Ts seems to be ebbing, while morphing from a ’70s to an ’80s focus. The store’s personal best: a Michael Jackson "Thriller" T, which sold for $125. "You can’t get that for it now," Scott says. "But [the appeal] is like San Francisco rents — they never go down, and landlords keep hoping people will come back."

T-SHIRTS, WEAR EVER

When shopping for a vintage T — or really any T — Rock Tease coauthor Erica Easley says, "It’s all about the image. I don’t care about the band, even though I’m always excited about a good Alice Cooper T. It’s all about a strong image, colors, and, personally, a shirt where I don’t have a sense of computer-generated graphics."

When looking for oldies, do, however, beware of fakes. "The colors won’t be correct, the green is too bright, or the cut wasn’t being produced at that point," Easley warns.

AARDVARK’S ODD ARK


Ringers, jerseys, worn-soft garb adorned with Firesign radios and corny sayings: Aardvark’s re-creates the thrifter’s thrill of discovery with a jam-packed rack of oldies.

1501 Haight, SF. (415) 621-3141

AMERICAN APPAREL


The most fashion-conscious print-free Ts around, regardless of how you feel about the jailbaity marketing campaigns. Gotta love me some blouson and dress-length styles.

2174 Union, SF. (415) 440-3220; 1615 Haight, SF. (415) 431-4028; 2301 Telegraph, Berk. (510) 981-1641. www.americanapparel.net

BANG-ON


Customize your own cool: this international chain provides the iron-ons, puffy wood-panel lettering, and brightly fierce ’80s accessories. Where else can you get spanking new-old "Cheer up, emo kid," Mr. Snuffleupagus, Roxy Music, and Johnny Wadd Ts in one fell, freshly ironed swoop?

1603 Haight, SF. (415) 255-8446, www.bang-on.ca

FTC URBAN LIFESTYLE STORE


Get your Ipath Bigfoot and Western Edition Mingus shirts right here, along with oodles of other contenders.

1632 Haight, SF. (415) 626-0663, www.ftcskate.com

GIANT ROBOT


The large-livin’ API groundbreakers still peddle locals Barry McGee and Mark Gonzales as well as Daniel Johnston shirts and the ever-popular Geoff McFetridge 2K "I’m Rocking on Your Dime" T.

618 Shrader, SF. (415) 876-4773. www.gr-sf.com

HELD OVER


A rail of vintage Ts beckons, from a ’70s-era "Natural Gas" number to a Morrissey You Are the Quarry lovely.

1542 Haight, SF. (415) 864-0818

PARK LIFE


Marcel Dzama’s frail ye olde comic critters, Ferris Plock’s sketchy characters, Neckface’s doom metal demons, and Clare Rojas’s folkloric scenes populate Park Life.

220 Clement, SF. (415) 386-7275, www.parklifestore.com

STATIC


Joining the Gucci knockoffs, denim, and ’70s leather are soft-as-my-55-year-old-uncle’s-midriff surfer shirts.

1764 Haight, SF. (415) 422-0046

SUPER7 STORE


Poppy yet pretty in-house screens by, for instance, store co-owner Dora Drimalas coexist with Bawana Spoons, Spicy Brown, Hedorah, and Gama-Go Ts.

1628 Post, SF. (415) 409-4700, super7store.com

TRUE


Urban outfits cry "Brother, please" for a Zoo York T sporting a Ruthless Records’ NWA single, Parish’s pop art Popsicles, Akomplice abstractions, or Free Gold Watches’ splashy ’80s evocations. Ladies, check Ts by Tens, Palis, Heavy Rotation, and Blood Is the New Black, as well as Mama T’s pseudo-airbrushed ghetto sweetness.

True Men, 1415 Haight, SF. (415) 626-2882; True Women, 1427 Haight, SF. (415) 626-2331; True, 1335 S. Main, Walnut Creek. (925) 280-6747. www.trueclothing.net

UPPER PLAYGROUND


The hella loyal cult that follows this pioneer of urban styles can stock up on all the Muni and Miles UP and Fifty24SF Ts it can stand now that the shop has split in two for men and women — with fresh Jeremy Fish, Sam Flores, and Estevan Oriol for all.

220 Fillmore, SF. (415) 252-0144, www.upperplayground.com

>

SCENE: Nightlife During Wartime

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Last Wednesday we unleashed the first issue of our new quarterly glossy supplement SCENE: The Guardian Guide to Nightlife and Glamour to thunderous approval and only a few (disappointing) howls of protest. I want more protest dammit! Where’s freakin’ Fox News when you want ’em! My nails are too long to dial the right-wing media up. Lord, I need a special dialing wand .

SCENECover.jpg

With fashion and photography contributed by House of Herrera and art direction by Mirissa Neff, SCENE took on Nightlife During Wartime. Go ahead and read my intro essay Emergence exits: Getting crazy in a time of crisis — if you dare.

More pics and articles after the jump!

SATURDAY

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March 17

VISUAL ART

Jim Campbell, “Home Movies”

When I think about SF artist Jim Campbell, I also think about the Icelandic musician Jóhann Jóhannson and his recent album IBM 1401, a User’s Manual (4AD). In particular I think of the final song, “The Sun’s Gone Dim and the Sky’s Turned Black,” in which Jóhannson creates a final aria for the extinct computer for which his father once served as chief maintenance engineer. The uncanny mix of emotion and inhuman chill in that composition takes on more effective forms in some of Campbell’s pieces. In fact, a few of his early works perform similar variations on paternal and maternal ties manifested through technology. (Johnny Ray Huston)

Through April 28
4-6 p.m. reception, free
Hosfelt Gallery
430 Clementina, SF
(415) 495-5454
www.hosfeltgallery.com

MUSIC

G3

On the shoulder of every guitar player, there resides a small elf who whispers into the guitarist’s ear, “Shred! Shred as hard and as fast as you can every second of every day until the combination of your fingers and a fret board results in an explosion of rock so epic and grandiose that it would wake Jimi Hendrix from his heavenly slumber.” Most guitarists ignore the elf and end up writing songs about their feelings. Not the gentlemen of G3 (Joe Satriani, John Petrucci, and Paul Gilbert), a rotating tour of guys whose elves were so big that the rockers strapped sequined white leather saddles on them and rode off into the sunset. (Aaron Sankin)

8 p.m.
$45-$85
Berkeley Community Theatre
1900 Allston Way, Berk.
(510) 664-8593
www.satriani.com/G3

On white planes

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By Johnny Ray Huston


› johnny@sfbg.com

Life on tour isn’t just about partying. It’s partly about crafty use of time and space. In that sense, the German electronic duo Booka Shade are expert pragmatists. Walter Merziger and Arno Kammermeier don’t just attempt to write songs while they’re on planes or in hotel rooms — they’ll record them as well. "In a traditional studio you always have the same atmosphere. Day and night changes, of course, yet it’s basically the same," Kammermeier explains over the phone from Berlin. "But if you travel and have a laptop with you, you can look out the window and see a new, completely different thing while recording."

Such flexibility is at the core of Booka Shade’s second album, on their self-run label, Get Physical. Its very title, Movements, reflects a recording process propelled by the touring connected with flagship club hits such as "Body Language" and the irresistible dance floor stormer "Mandarine Girl," which boasts a melody that sounds like it was made with a gargantuan electronic woodwind. "We had a good time meeting people internationally, and all that energy went into Movements," Kammermeier says, discussing the record, which like most of the group’s releases sports Hannah Hoch–like cut-with-a-kitchen-knife body parts on its sleeve art. "That’s probably why it’s a lot less dark than Memento [the duo’s 2004 debut] and has more drive."

It would be hard for Movements to be darker than Memento, considering Booka Shade’s first album, complete with a name that might have been borrowed from Christopher Nolan, repeatedly digs into the realm of film ("16MM") and especially film noir ("Vertigo"). "It’s not like we have a library of 10,000 DVDs, but we like the combination of pictures and music," says Kammermeier, who also scores commercials with Merziger. "One thing we did for [Memento] was put a film on with the sound off and watch the pictures while we were working — that atmosphere gave us a lot of inspiration."

GET A REP


Booka Shade’s inspiration and reputation stem from their label as much as their music. In recent years Get Physical has garnered a critical rep that calls to mind canonical imprints such as Warp and the still thriving house-inflected Kompakt. This praise is due to Booka Shade’s constant collaborations with mix-oriented labelmates such as DJ T and M.A.N.D.Y. and to their production work on tracks such as a pair of classic early singles by Chelonis R. Jones, "One and One" and "I Don’t Know?" Those tracks are peerless in both a pop and a club sense, with "I Don’t Know?" suggesting what would happen if a male diva from the heyday of Chicago house who possessed encyclopedic brilliance hooked up with "Blue Monday"–era New Order. "The chorus of ‘One and One’ wasn’t originally a chorus as Chelonis had sung it," Kammermeier says while discussing the collaborations. "We placed it there, like part of a puzzle."

Working with a talent as singular as Jones is a far cry from the duo’s early days in the music business, when they created Europop for Spice Girls–esque major-label prefab acts such as No Angels, a girl group for whom they designed a cover of Alison Moyet’s "All Cried Out." The dead-end results of those efforts and of Merziger and Kammermeier’s first venture as a group, called Planet Claire, led them to start Get Physical. That, and a desire to broaden the formulaic boundaries of techno in particular and electronic music in general — a desire further sparked on hearing well-arranged ’70s- and ’80s-tinged tracks by the likes of Metro Area.

"Walter and I were both kids of the ’80s," says Kammermeier, who grew up with a jazz musician father and guitar- and piano-playing siblings, while Merziger was raised by a Richard Wagner–loving father. "Anything that came out of England — Soft Cell, the Smiths, Depeche Mode — was very influential to us." Last year the duo’s ’80s influences came full circle when Booka Shade remixed and shared concert bills with the last group. And it turns out Kammermeier is listening to Soft Cell again, having recently downloaded both their underrated aggro 1984 finale, This Last Night in Sodom, which includes early studio work by the influential producer Flood, and their 1983 sophomore effort, The Art of Falling Apart. "I just listened to [Art] again," Kammermeier admits. "There’s so much frustration and darkness in those songs."

THE ART OF COMING TOGETHER


There’s so much frustration that it might seep into Booka Shade’s sound, if song titles are worthwhile clues. One single from The Art of Falling Apart was the club ho litany "Numbers," and it turns out the first single from Booka Shade’s next full-length recording will bear the same name. "We want to introduce a vocal side on the next album," Kammermeier says when describing "Numbers" and some of the group’s other songs, including a track created by Merziger in a Rio hotel room. "We’ll introduce it in a different way — not verse-chorus vocal but little parts that we perform. We’re not great fans of these ‘featured artist’ albums, where people just get a handful of star vocalists to perform on different tracks. Also, we can’t bring a bunch of vocalists or a session vocalist on the road."

That said, Booka Shade do aim to put their show on the road in the old-school sense — an ambitious plan at a time when many of the best electronic music makers are still better off DJing than pulling rock star poses on a stage. "People always ask what instrument I play, and I say, ‘I’m one of those guys who hangs out with musicians — I’m a drummer,’ " Kammermeier jokes. He’ll have to put that joke into practice as he and Merziger embark on their second US tour — and maybe he’ll write and record some songs while in flight as well. *

BOOKA SHADE

With Future Force and Hours of Worship

March 23, 9 p.m., $14 advance

Mezzanine

444 Jessie, SF

(415) 625-8880

www.getphysical.com

For a top 10 list from Booka Shade’s Get Physical labelmate Chelonis R. Jones, go to www.sfbg.com/blogs/music.

SFIAAFF: Got fangs?

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› kimberly@sfbg.com

What a difference an indie blockbuster makes. The last time I spoke to Better Luck Tomorrow writer and director Justin Lin, he was energetically doing the grassroots festival rounds, beating the shrubbery on the importance of Asian Americans making Asian Pacific Islander films with empowered, complex characters. Yet judging from the craft, ideas, humor, and humanity that went into Lin’s compelling final product, luck was only one part of it. Rather, it was a game of wit, tenacity, and persuasion that archetypal overachiever Lin excelled at (he’d already made one indie, 1997’s Shopping for Fangs). It probably seemed like gravy, with rice noodles on the side, when the MTV Films–released Better Luck Tomorrow broke new ground during its 2003 opening weekend, earning almost $400,000 in 13 theaters, averaging $30,650 per screen and thus beating the averages of other MTV releases such as Jackass: The Movie.

Now, five years after I first talked to Lin, he has paid off the quarter-mil credit card debt he’d accrued in financing Better Luck Tomorrow and parlayed his success into studio work: 2006’s Annapolis and The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, a sequel that attempted to correct the damage done by the first film’s rewrite of Asian car culture. Lin is still one of the only API faces behind the camera in Hollywood ("At directors guild meetings you definitely stick out," he confesses with a chuckle), but in the process of gaming the studio system, he’s been able to return to what he calls "passion projects." In fact, earlier in the day of our interview, he’d just completed Finishing the Game — his imagined retelling of the making of Bruce Lee’s posthumous cash-in deathsploitation flick, Game of Death — a comic take on Asian American masculinity, Hollywood, and the stories we tell ourselves to make it through the next scene.

SFBG How did Finishing the Game come to pass?

JUSTIN LIN The idea has been with me since I was a kid. It’s funny because as a filmmaker, there’s the journey you kind of dream up, and there’s the reality that hits you. You take out 10 credit cards and are in six-figure debt — it does affect your choices. I was fortunate. Better Luck Tomorrow opened up avenues, and one of those was to make studio movies. In reality, not many people get those opportunities, and it’s a whole different set of challenges and rules. It’s insane. Walking on set on a big Hollywood action movie, I would think, "$250,000 was the budget of Better Luck Tomorrow — here you spend that buying lunch."

SFBG Is it harder to get films with Asian American narratives and Asian American characters made?

JL Yeah, even for a $250,000 budget movie — that’s still tons of money, as far as Asian American film goes, and it’s all about gross profits and getting the films out, distribution and exhibition.

It’s funny — when I get into the studio world, I go to marketing meetings and meetings that most people don’t get into, and I’ve learned it’s all about numbers. Better Luck Tomorrow proved there was an audience, and it crossed over. But with Finishing the Game, the conversation always went back to Better Luck Tomorrow, because as far as Asian American films go, that’s the only thing they have to refer to, and it’s a challenge to prove it’s a valid business model for investors. I hope to conquer that with Finishing the Game — you can’t be treating these films as if they’re big-event blockbusters. Hopefully we are building our community with shared experiences.

SFBG You made Finishing the Game independently?

JL I approached studios early on. But I could see them wanting to develop it into a kung fu movie. Right now, the Asians on film have to exist for Asian reasons. Usually when you see Asian faces they’re Asian for a reason, whether they’re tourists or kung fu masters.

I don’t think it’s racism. That’s just the mind-set that exists in these rooms — the reality of it is, when you go in these casting offices and when they cast, it’s usually black and white. I think it’s going to take filmmakers to go in and say, "I want the casting to be color-blind." Even getting Asian American actors in to meet heads of casting is important — you may not get the job, but they can see your work. These are little baby steps. No one talks about it or knows about it.

SFBG How do you feel about Bruce Lee?

JL As a kid, I had a push-pull relationship with Bruce Lee, who was empowered, sexy, and cool and everything wrapped into one. At the same time, you’re walking down the street, and they’re expecting you to know kung fu and doing his yell at you.

But his screen presence and fearlessness made him so great. At the time I was totally confused — I saw Game of Death and didn’t know the backstory that 80 percent of it was made with a fake stand-in. As the idea evolved, all these other issues came up. There’s a made-up scenario of a casting process to replace him and, especially in the last five years, issues of identity and what it means to be in the film industry and society as a whole and the politics and agendas that go into it. In Asian American cinema too, I think it’s time for us to laugh — at ourselves, even.

FINISHING THE GAME

Thurs/15, 7 p.m., $40 opening night gala screening, $60 screening and Asian Art Museum reception

Castro Theatre

429 Castro, SF

(415) 865-1588

www.asianamericanmedia.org

>

TUESDAY

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March 13

MUSIC/DANCE

Queen Anne’s Revenge and Black Cactus Choir

Since pirates are all the rage, you may have already guessed that local trio Queen Anne’s Revenge is named for Blackbeard’s notorious frigate, surely the setting for many a bloody and brutal act. However, these guys keep the peg leg count on the low end, favoring instead a garage-pop sensibility heightened with curious synth glissandi and warm vocals floating somewhere between Love and Rockets and Zombies territory. Also performing is the Black Cactus Choir, an experimental dance troupe pushing the boundaries of physical expression with brain wave–nourishing choreography. (Todd Lavoie)

With Brittany Shane
9 p.m., $7
Hotel Utah Saloon
500 Fourth St., SF
(415) 385-2100
www.thehotelutahsaloon.com

VISUAL ART

“Moby Dick: Chapter 44 or 78,744 times”

Justin Quinn is transcribing Herman Melville’s Moby Dick into the letter e. So obsessive-compulsive they might wear out that nautical chart maker Captain Ahab, Quinn’s graphite drawings and prints have graduated from boxlike and crosslike maze formations to large and elaborate jellyfish shapes? The e in Quinn’s SF show “Moby Dick: Chapter 44 or 78,744 times” could stand for exile. Quinn tries to turn it into poetry. (Johnny Ray Huston)

Through April 12
MMGalleries
101 Townsend, suite 207, SF
(415) 543-1550
www.mmgalleries.com

MONDAY

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March 12

MUSIC

Youth Group

It’s no small feat that Aussie gossamer popsters Youth Group were able to rescue Alphaville’s overwrought new wave flashback-grenade “Forever Young” and miraculously twirl it around into a glistening, gently unfolding four-minute pageant. Better yet, their latest release, Casino Twilight Dogs (Anti-), gushes with 11 other exquisitely crafted charmers destined to draw inevitable, but understandable, Shins comparisons, while elements of that glorious synergy achieved by English pop-anthem geniuses James with producer extraordinaire Brian Eno bubble up. (Todd Lavoie)

8:30 p.m., $13
Slim’s
333 11th St., SF
(415) 255-0333
www.slims-sf.com

VISUAL ART

“Seeing Memory”

If we live in an age of cynicism, one in which an existential leap of faith, to borrow from Søren Kierkegaard, is necessary to imbue with meaning this unbright rock we call earth, then Creativity Explored is a safe house in our land of dread. This inspirational Mission gallery and studio provides a venue for people with disabilities, many of whom are nonverbal, to create and express themselves. “Seeing Memory” — curated by Larry Rinder, California College of the Arts dean — is an exhibit of recent work by member artists exploring the images and mechanisms of memory. (Nathan Baker)

Through April 6, free.
Creativity Explored Gallery
3245 16th St., SF
(415) 863-2108
www.creativityexplored.org

SUNDAY

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March 11

EVENT

Dr. Sketchy’s Anti Art School

Luckily for artistically challenged people like me, Dr. Sketchy’s Anti Art School encourages such behavior. I’m sure my figures won’t look much better while I’m listening to the event’s promised “slutty jazz music” and participating in drinking and drawing contests, but who cares? (Elaine Santore)
4–7 p.m., $10
Stud
399 Ninth St., SF
(415) 637-8657
www.skidroche.com

MUSIC

SFJAZZ Collective

Listening to SFJAZZ Collective’s suave Live 2006: 3rd Annual Concert Tour: Original Compositions and Works by Herbie Hancock (SFJAZZ), you’ll know that this “Monk and Beyond” performance, launching SFJAZZ’s spring season, is gonna be a hot one. New trumpeter Dave Douglas joins SFJAZZ artistic director and tenor and soprano sax machine Joshua Redman for a deep look at the wonderfully madcap music culled from the brilliant corners of Thelonious Monk’s mind. (Kimberly Chun)

3 and 7 p.m., $20–$65
Herbst Theatre
401 Van Ness, SF
1-800-225-2277
www.sfjazz.org

SATURDAY

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March 10

MUSIC

Chanticleer

If you’re not a fan of contemporary choral ensembles, then you’ve probably never heard of Chanticleer, but scrupulous classical music fans know that this San Francisco choir operate at the pinnacle of their trade. Next month they will premiere And on Earth, Peace: A Chanticleer Mass (Warner Classics) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Here’s your chance to catch them on the home field. (Nathan Baker)

8 p.m., $25–$44
Also Sun/11, 7 p.m.
First Unitarian Church
1187 Franklin, SF
(415) 392-4400
www.cityboxoffice.com

MUSIC

Qui

Since the mighty Jesus Lizard had a brief flirtation with overproduced nu metal and broke up, live music has been missing a certain je ne sais quoi, to the tune of a whiskey-drunk Texan in shitkicker cowboy boots with his balls in his hand by the name of David Yow. While they might not be Jesus Lizard Mach 2, Yow’s new band, Qui, have that stripped-down, broken-glass noise rock edge that’s guaranteed to scare the kids. (Duncan Scott Davidson)

With Replicator
10 p.m., $7
Hemlock Tavern
1131 Polk, SF
(415) 923-0923
www.hemlocktavern.com

THURSDAY

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March 8

MUSIC

Hiss Golden Messenger

The most remarkable thing about Hiss Golden Messenger is not its personnel — members of the Court and Spark, Oranger, and the Mother Hips — but that the sum of its parts sounds much different than one might imagine given their respective histories, none of which hint at the reverbed, spliff-friendly jams born of this incarnation. While it’s true that, between them, these guys have played every gin joint from Willits to Escondido, this is just their second show together. (Nathan Baker)

With Citay
9 p.m., $7
Make-Out Room
3225 22nd St., SF
(415) 647-2888
www.makeoutroom.com

FILM

Night of the Lepus

If the words “giant killer rabbits” aren’t enough to convince you to travel to the East Bay to see a movie, then you are truly beyond hope. Night of the Lepus, perhaps the glorious nadir of all monster movies, has bunnies in spades. An experiment in bunny population control in the Southwest goes horribly awry, resulting in a radiated breed of hopping Godzillas that terrorize model train sets and devour poorly blue-screened actors. (Matt Sussman)

9:15 p.m., $8
Parkway Speakeasy Theater
1834 Park, Oakl.
(510) 814-2400
www.parkway-speakeasy.com

MUSIC

Born/Dead

There is an old adage: if you can talk, you can sing; if you can walk, you can dance. Add that if you have an ax to grind, you can wield a guitar. It’s a philosophy, and Oakland anarcho-punks Born/Dead are its champions. Don’t look to them for brainless entertainment. Born/Dead have a message to their madness: no one gets out alive. They’ll be challenging the status quo with Pittsburgh, Pa.’s Behind Enemy Lines, among others. (Nicole Gluckstern)

With Behind Enemy Lines, Peligro Social, Nightstick Justice, and War Trash
7 p.m., $6
Balazo18 Art Gallery
2183 Mission, SF
(415) 255-7227
www.balazogallery.com

God chillin’

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› kimberly@sfbg.com

SONIC REDUCER O brother, where art thou, blog-worthy, buzz-besieged bands? Whither the classes of 2004 and ’05? As memory fades and fads pass, the Klaxons and Beirut had best look to the respective fates of Arcade Fire and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, both of which have spawned second albums at a time when Britney Spears’s postpartum-postbreakup cue-ball cutes (uh, was she actually a musician, mommy?) score almost twice as many hits as Beyoncé or any ole artist who has actually issued fresh tracks in the last four years. How has blogosphere-borne hypey held up? Can the viral gospel survive, with or without fast-buck comps with the word "Hitz" in their titles? (Was I dozing through Now That’s What I Call Indie! Vol. 23?) Was there any substance to the sound of the mid-’00s when it comes to Arcade Fire and CYHSY — two indie taste sensations that musically mimed Talking Heads and, in their number, resembled villages more than singular villains? Can they bring sexy back sonically, even though they never bumped billiard balls with the naked-noggined queen of pop?

From the sound of the last CYHSY show I caught at the Warfield, the Philly–New York sprawl seemed well on its way to sell-out-by staleness. Out were the frothy, Afropop-derived David Byrne–ing campfire rhythms. Enter monotonous, monochromatic indie rock.

Yet although CYHSY’s new (and still bravely self-released) ‘un, Some Loud Thunder, peters to a dull roar by the time "Five Easy Pieces" rolls around, the full-length still impresses with its sense of aural experimentation. Flaming Lips producer Dave Fridmann throws fuzz, shmutz, and the noise equivalent of cat fur and tumbleweed over the proceedings, futzing the opening, title track into a cunning combo of foregrounded murk and tambourine-shimmy clarity. CYHSY cut through the fog of pop with the dissonance-laced sweetness of a cockeyed, choral "Emily Jean Stock" and the Dylanishly titilutf8g manifesto tease of "Mama, Won’t You Keep Them Castles in the Air and Burning?" Some Loud Thunder is a freakin’ busy record — with the emphasis happily on the freak — and it’s almost as if CYHSY were trying to reach beyond the easy, cumbersome cool of their name (always suspected to be a major part of their appeal) and toward, hoo-boy, depth. Too bad the lyrics aren’t often up to the musical intrigue on such songs as "Satan Said Dance" and "Goodbye to Mother and the Cove," making CYHSY sound like the E.E. Cummingses of indie, for whatever that’s worth. "Gravity’s one thing and / Gravity’s something but / How about coming down …," Alec Ounsworth whinnies. "Weird but you’re back talking." Wonderfully weird, yes, though is it unfair to ask if you have anything to say?

Back also, in priestly black, are Arcade Fire, who have plenty to tell in the three years since Funeral was unveiled. Amid the majestic choral sheen, synth pop flock, and Tijuana brass of their new album, Neon Bible (Merge), Win Butler and party have unearthed and dusted off the lost threads of connection between the teary tough-guy sentimentality of Gene Pitney and Roy Orbison, the jittery junked-up teardrops of "Little Johnny Jewel" and Suicide, and the quavering, coaguutf8g pop syrup of the Cure and OMD. Arcade Fire have crawled through a creaky, darkened looking glass and found a lost, perhaps losing world populated with forlorn soldiers, urban paranoiacs, rough water, guiding lights, lions and lambs, and idling vehicles.

Cloaked in increasingly trad folk and ’80s pop-song structures, engineering by Markus Dravs (Björk) and Scott Colburn (Sun City Girls), and contributions by members of Calexico, Wolf Parade, and Final Fantasy, Arcade Fire thankfully put lyrical clichés to work during Neon Bible‘s clamorous service, to the end of genuine storytelling. They’re preaching the gospel of transcendence through music and art — something that now seems unique to rock, in contrast to rap — questioning a holy war in "Intervention" ("Working for the church while my family died / Your little sister is going to lose her mind / Every spark of friendship and love will die without a home / Hear the soldier groan / He’ll go it alone") and the god-fearing hysteria of "(Antichrist Television Blues)" ("Don’t want to work in a building downtown / I don’t know what I’m going to do / Because the planes keep crashing, two by two"). Arcade Fire are far from the first to fire artful shots in response to wartime, but Neon Bible — as bold and beautiful, as hysterical and hopeful, as corny and acute as a rockin’ soap opera or Jesus Christ Superstar — feels like the best album of 2007 so far. *

ARCADE FIRE

June 1–2, 8 p.m., $31.50

Greek Theatre

UC Berkeley, Gayley Road, Berk.

www.ticketmaster.com

GET OUT

NICE BOYS


The Portland, Ore., upstarts with mighty fine shaggy rooster cuts step up with ’70s-style glitter pop. With Time Flys and Apache. Wed/7, 9:30 p.m., $7. Hemlock Tavern, 1131 Polk, SF. www.hemlocktavern.com

OLD TIME RELIJUN


K Records’ wrecking crew just might find a deity at the bottom of a beer stein. With Tussle and the Weasel Walter Quartet. Wed/7, 10 p.m., $5. Knockout, 3223 Mission, SF. (415) 550-6994

BUNNY RABBIT


CocoRosie’s girly rapper protégé freestyles with a thumb-sucking bounce. Is her Lovers and Crypts (Voodoo-Eros) for reals? With Tha Pumpsta and Bruno and the Dreamies. Thurs/8, 8 p.m., $6. 21 Grand, 416 25th St., Oakl. (510) 444-7263. Tues/13, 9:30 p.m., $7. Hemlock Tavern, 1131 Polk, SF. www.hemlocktavern.com

EMPTY ROOMS


A new self-titled EP finds the Bay Area moodniks waxing gothily. With Worship of Silence and This Isn’t It. Sun/11, 9 p.m., $6. Hotel Utah, 500 Fourth St., SF. (415) 546-6300

Pop goes Panther

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Prince may have his devoted popites canonizing those purple-clad jewels once again after his recent Super Bowl halftime performance, but in Portland, Ore., there’s an equally crude one-man dance-aster who could soon take the crown from His Royal Badass. This beat blaster and master, however, comes in the form of a scrawny gyrator whose elasticlike body rapidly contorts, recoils, and slams against walls during his pop-flushed freak-outs.

Since 2002, Panther, a.k.a. Charlie Salas-Humara, has administered a hip-spasming dose of what his press literature describes as "damaged soul," fusing pulsating drum machines and bassy hooks with disheveled synths and glass-cracking falsettos. MTV2 has even taken a liking to the 32-year-old, nominating "You Don’t Want Your Nails Done," the single from his debut, Secret Lawns (Fryk Beat), for Video of the Year. During the video a brown-suited Salas-Humara rocks the microphone in a room cluttered with cardboard furniture, cell phones, and iPods. The fidgety performer busts into the Robot like a Tourette’s-afflicted Michael Jackson and beatboxes, "When you’re making these fists / You don’t want your hair / When you’re making these fists / You don’t want your nails done." Watching the video makes you want to grab the sweat-drenched vocalist by his shoulders and yell, "Go, white boy, go!"

But according to Salas-Humara, Panther’s intoxicating bite hasn’t taken that much effort. "It’s a great project because I don’t have to think about it, and there’s no concept besides whatever shit I pull together in my basement," he says on the phone from Portland. "It’s just me, and I don’t have to be a Gang of Four cover band or try and be some pop thing."

And Salas-Humara doesn’t always sound like he’s in pursuit of pop. Songs such as "Rely on Scent" and "Take Us Out" evoke a free jazz and R&B artiness and rely heavily on organ to keep them afloat. Others, such as "How Does It Feel?" and "Tennis Lesson," recall the mechanized keyboard bluster of early-’80s Herbie Hancock and the Art of Noise while integrating densely arranged hip-hop beats as their driving force.

Born in Florida but raised in Chicago’s suburbs, Salas-Humara moved to Portland in 1995 with his band, the Planet The. The trio stuck it out for 11 years, though Panther had already sprung to life before the group’s demise.

"I started doing Panther because somebody asked me to do one of those solo performance nights where people from different bands get together and play acoustic songs," he says with a laugh. "I thought it would be funny to terrorize it with prerecorded drum machines."

Salas-Humara claims that he thought he would never perform as Panther again, but he continued producing new music because his friends kept egging him on.

"It was really fun to try and fill up a lot of space on a stage with one person, so I started experimenting with dancing and doing different things with the stuff I would choreograph," Salas-Humara explains. "Basically, I just get weird."

In addition to the MTV2 nomination, 2006 saw Panther embark on tours with the Gossip and Ratatat, and Fryk Beat released the lauded 12-inch Yourself.

Gearing up for his first national tour, Salas-Humara confirms he’s a bit nervous about the jaunt.

"You never really know where your fans are," he says. "I’m sure it’ll be pretty awesome in some places and dismal in others. I guess that’s the way that it goes." (Chris Sabbath)

PANTHER

With Yip Yip, Lemonade, and Like Nurse

Thurs/8, 9:30 p.m., $7

Hemlock Tavern

1131 Polk, SF

(415) 923-0923

www.hemlocktavern.com

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Scruff trade

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› a&eletters@sfbg.com

Forty years ago Bruce Nauman made a squat, unpainted block of plaster sculpture titled A Cast of the Space under My Chair. This single work, one of dozens in the Berkeley Art Museum’s absorbing exhibition "A Rose Has No Teeth: Bruce Nauman in the 1960s," is said to have provided enough inspiration to fuel the career of British artist Rachel Whiteread, who famously cast the interior of a condemned Victorian house. Nauman’s sculpture, here seen as cast exhibition copy, could easily be overlooked. It’s modest in scale and, like much of this show, constructed with the most basic materials. The piece points, as do others, to Nauman’s uncanny and influential ability (Matthew Barney’s use of physical endurance and film are connected to Nauman) to activate negative space, be it a physical zone or the creative void artists face in the studio. As is evidenced here, he exalts, questions, liberates, and gibes the anxiety-ridden act of making art, irrespective of material form. He quite often relies on the one thing always at hand: his body.

The show, curated by BAM’s Constance Lewallen, is limited to works made during five prolific years while Nauman lived in Northern California. There are an impressive number of classics here, including Self-Portrait as a Fountain, a 1966–67 photograph of the artist squirting an arc of water from his mouth, and Wax Impressions of the Knees of Five Famous Artists, a 1966 phlegm-colored, rectangular wall sculpture that subverts the promise of its title (it’s fiberglass, and all the knees are Nauman’s). But the exhibition is less about masterpieces than it is about the spirit of experimentation that’s always been a hallmark of Bay Area art making. In four galleries fitted with drawings, sculpture, photography, film, video, and neon, text, and sound works, the show easily proves its thesis: Nauman established his artistic vocabulary — using whatever means necessary to focus on the physical, playful use of language and that sense of void — while living here. "Rose" also communicates the thrill of seeing the vision, propelled by a sustained, successful run of art production, of an artist who became one of the most important of his generation.

It’s rare to see static and projected works installed together so handsomely, and the spare yet lively exhibition design is a key to the show’s success. Nauman’s promiscuous use of media is in glorious effect throughout. In the first gallery, fiberglass sculptures cast from architecture and forming homely objects sit next to videos that find the artist slowly and sometimes suggestively interacting with a corner of a room or a glowing fluorescent light tube. Nearby, small ceramic works from 1965 depict imploding cups and saucers. Drawings and neon present Nauman’s interest in text and wordplay. Later the exhibition adds Nauman’s quasi-how-to 16mm films, pieces that illustrate his interest in the notion of making. Andy Warhol made dry, deadpan films concurrently, but Nauman’s are more boyishly wry and reveal the artist getting his hands dirty, literally. Challenging the hegemony of minimalism, Nauman channeled the 1960s spirit of political and lifestyle fomentation. His classic studio videos, in which he engaged in repetitive, sometimes strenuous physical acts for the camera (Bouncing in the Corner, No.1 and Stamping in the Studio, both 1968, among them), directly link the artist to his work.

Lewallen’s decision to focus on pieces made in a specific region, one outside the art world mainstream, introduces elements of Bay Area art history and the contested notion of regionalism and place in a contemporary art scene ruled by international biennials and art fairs. Here we see pieces made while Nauman was in the nascent graduate art program at secluded UC Davis, where he studied with William Wiley and Robert Arneson and TA’d for Wayne Thiebaud. That backdrop indirectly surveys the role of graduate schools when they were affordable — and in this case, laid-back and apart from the limelight and marketplace.

Nauman has always seemed to operate as a lone cowboy and has long resided in New Mexico, far from art world centers. He’s notoriously reticent about attending openings, though he surprised everyone by showing up in Berkeley for this one. The exhibit’s catalog pinpoints Nauman’s onetime studio at 144 27th St. in the Mission District, a neighborhood still attractive to artists. But "Rose" doesn’t so much suggest a Bay Area aesthetic as use location as a framing device.

In a 1970 interview Nauman said that his work was initially confused with funk art, a 1950s-born movement that had a strong Bay Area presence in the early work of Bruce Conner and others. "It looked like it in a way," he said, "but really I was just trying to present things in a straightforward way without bothering to shine them and clean them up." Scruffy still works around here, and in that spirit the show generates a frisson of hometown pride that feels anything but sentimental. It’s heartening to see what amazing things emerge from under the radar. *

A ROSE HAS NO TEETH: BRUCE NAUMAN IN THE 1960S

Through April 15

Wed. and Fri.–Sun., 11 a.m.–5 p.m.; Thurs., 11 a.m.–7 p.m., $4–$8 (free first Thurs.)

Berkeley Art Museum

2626 Bancroft Way, Berk.

(510) 642-0808

www.bampfa.berkeley.edu

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