Girls Archives — Page 50 of 67 — San Francisco Bay Guardian Archive 1966

Renegade Rockers Hold Down 26 Years of SF Breakdancing

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June 18, 2009

By Michael Krimper

Renegade Rockers in action.

When a breakdance battle erupts — whether in a club or gym, or on the block or Youtube — heads heed and take note. In a swirling cypher, b-boys and b-girls display their skills on the floor in a back and forth rhythm, showcasing commando techniques and more daring, original styles to the appraisal of the crowd and their fellow crew members, and of course for themselves.

The electric dance style has come a long way since its formative years in the boroughs of 1970’s New York. The West Coast, and in particular the San Francisco Bay Area, has been at the center of many of the innovations contributing to the dynamic evolution of breakdancing. One of the legendary local crews still active, the Renegade Rockers, have been breaking boundaries since their founding at SF City College in 1983.

That longstanding history informs Renegades’ consistent dedication to the culture. In their upcoming 26th anniversary event, the crew plans to showcase the skills which keep them competitive with the top players of the worldwide breakdance community. “Organizing the Renegade Rockers anniversary events encourages the dance scene to keep pushing the limits and inspires new generations to come,” team captain Wicket tells me. Beyond the high energy battle competitions, the crew plans to spread the love by hosting a series of panel discussions on the history of street dance and workshops covering the basics, from foundational breaking to popping, locking, and rocking.

Dave Cummings: the oldest American in porn

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June 17, 2009

3

By Juliette Tang

69-year-old Dave Cummings, the oldest active porn star in America, has filmed over 500 movies and performed over 1,200 sex scenes in his 15-year career in the adult entertainment industry. He swears he doesn’t use Viagra, and when he’s not filming hardcore sex scenes in movies like Screw My Wife Please 32: And Make Her Sweat Like A Pig, Dave works as an educator and speaker, offering online classes on getting into the porn industry. Dave will be giving a seminar at the Cybernet Expo (1500 Van Ness) on June 27 called “Producing and Directing Adult Videos with Dave Cummings,” and spoke with the SFBG about sex, life, and his career in ‘old man porn’.

San Francisco Bay Guardian: First of all, congratulations on being 69! You are at arguably the most apropos numerical age for doing pornography and not many porn stars stay in the game long enough to get there.

DC: Thanks! I love my present life and age, and wouldn’t alter my past or present life at all!

SFBG: Nice name by the way! It can’t be your real name, right?

DC: No, it’s a stage name. Almost everyone in the porn industry uses a stage name.

SFBG: When did the idea of doing porn first occur to you?

DC: It happened as part of my swinging experience, specifically while Playboy Television was including me in a segment they were filming about swinging; that led me to a husband-wife team that filmed amateur porn, and my very first day as a crew member I was forced into doing a “stunt” money shot for the actor who was unable to do it that day. Subsequently, I performed in a few amateur movies, and then decided to try becoming a porn actor. I liked the fun of having sex with hot girls, AND getting paid for it. It was Heaven!

SFBG: What’s the market like for the kind of pornography you make?

DC: Aside from the present financial challenges foisted upon us by rampart piracy and copyright infringement, the market for my porn is unlimited. Although I’m a “niche”, people of both genders and of all ages seem to patronize my movies. The fantasy is that if an old, wrinkled, overweight, bald guy like Dave Cummings can have sex with such beautiful young actresses, then viewers can more easily envision that they themselves could indeed also have sex with the woman if they ever had an opportunity to meet her.

SFBG: Describe the sort of fan base you have.

DC: Mostly men looking for women to masturbate to while fantasizing that they are actually the one in the sex scene (not Dave Cummings!); couples looking for movies that show respect and caring for women; gays who appreciate older males (although I am heterosexual, I fully support their right to enjoy whatever sexual preference they want with other consenting adults); women who want to assert their right to get turned on sexually; and, women into the “daddy thing”.

SFBG: A lot of your titles have words like “Daddy” in them. “It’s a Daddy Thing,” “Sugar Daddy,” and “Dirty Dave’s Sugar Daddy”. You also have sex with much younger women in some of your movies, like “Barely Legal”. Your website talks about “teens getting drilled by Dave Cummings”. Yet the people you have sex with are, obviously, of legal age, and basically you’re just playing out a fantasy for viewers of an older man sleeping with younger women.

Designer Dish: Summer’s southwest splash

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June 17, 2009

1

SFBG’s Laura Peach chats up the cute and cheeky girls behind Mint Mall, Genevive Dodge and Corina Bilandzija, to see what they’re loving for summer and how the rent as an indie designer gets paid.

SFBG: What’s hot on your radar for summer?

Corina: I am so excited about these jumpsuits and rompers I’m making right now. Hand painted fabrics I’ve been into, too. I just got back from a trip to New Mexico and I’m obsessed with Aztec print patterns.

Genevive: There’s this slinky tank dress with a swingy skirt that’s so summer. We’re experimenting with it as a one-size-fits-all in different prints. And loving organic cotton, using it all over the place.

SFBG: Do tell, how did Mint Mall start?

Genevive: Well, Corina and I met working at a restaurant together five years ago. We sort of hit it off and then both took a sewing class together as a crafty, ’70s home-ec sort of thing, and started making simple designs and were easy to execute.

Corina: We were getting a lot of attention on the street and at work, people almost never failed to ask where we got our clothes. Then they would say “You have to make me one!”

Genevive: So we decided that we would. People were pretty skeptical of our partnership at first, they didn’t think that Corina and I would work well together.

SFBG: And the name?

Corina: Mint Mall actually began in the actual Mint Mall downtown at 5th and Mission. We rented our first studio there at a steal of a price. Initially we rented it as a sewing space without any business plans in mind.

Genevive: Mint Mall has been a lot of work, but we’re gaining momentum and starting to grow and evole. People like to know that they are wearing something that’s going to be made just once. That’s why they buy vintage—it’s as close as you can get.

When we grow up

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June 17, 2009

0

a&eletters@sfbg.com

In the 1960s and early ’70s there was great enthusiasm behind the idea of loosening up the public school system. You know, making things more participatory, sparking kids’ imaginations, encouraging those who might have be bored or neglected in traditional classroom models.

Suddenly grade-school veteran Mrs. McGregor was prodded — not that some sterner specimens didn’t resist — to read the hidden signs of each child’s psychological well-being as well as drill ye olde reading, writing, and ‘rithmetic. If the freshly arrived 20-something teacher (or teacher’s assistant) seemed more cool, accessible, and just plain interested, that’s because she or he was; universities had started moulding them that way.

Anyone who grew up in that era remembers the incongruity of old playground games alternating with teacher-led, noncompetitive new ones. Old instructional and filmstrips that seemed prehistoric because they came from the Eisenhower era, offering laughably corny behavioral (not to mention grooming) advice, were shown alongside hip new edutainments urging tolerance, getting in touch with one’s feelings, and treading gently on Mother Earth. (Most of the latter were produced by questionable corporate friends of the planet like Exxon and DuPont.) Where minority students had always had to accept their absence from textbooks and other media, now kids in the whitest small-town or suburb saw rainbow-coalition peers depicted in revised or brand-new materials.

This happened fastest on TV, where much children’s programming seemed to grow sophisticated and viewer-improving overnight. On the commercial networks, there were the likes of Schoolhouse Rock and Fat Albert. The bounty on PBS, then fatly funded and as yet undiminished by cable competition, included Sesame Street, The Electric Company, and ZOOM. All knocked themselves out painting learning as fun, group inclusion and individual differences as neat. The messages were subversive by prior standards: girls could grow up to be astronauts too; boys were encouraged to cry if they felt like it. (And we all know they sometimes do.)

Perhaps the era’s zenith was Free to Be … You and Me, a multimedia phenomenon that hasn’t died yet. (The original album is still in print.) Chosen this year for the annual Sunday kids’ matinee slot at Frameline, it has a special place in the memories of umpteen lesbian, gay, and trans adults — because while it didn’t directly address sexual identity, the emphasis on upending stereotypical gender roles echoed deep for kids who mostly didn’t know yet just how "different" they might turn out to be.

The story goes that Free first grew from liberated That Girl star Marlo Thomas’ desire to create something for her young niece. Something that didn’t reinforce traditional "See Dick! He’s building a mud fort! See Jane! She’s happy just watching him, keeping her dress clean!" sentiments in kid lit.

That idea became a half-million selling 1972 LP by Thomas and starry "friends" including one 6’5 NFL legend (and author of Rosey Grier’s Needlepoint for Men) singing sensitive boy anthem "It’s All Right to Cry." There were also tracks like "Parents Are People," "William’s Doll," and "Helping," performed by everyone from Dionne Warwick and Diana Ross to Tommy Smothers, Carol Channing, and Dick Cavett.

Many of them were back for the prime-time, hour-long special on ABC two years later, joined by Alan Alda, Cicely Tyson, Harry Belafonte, some Muppets, Kris Kristofferson and Rita Coolidge, Roberta Flack and Michael Jackson (still cosmetically intact), and the choral Voices of East Harlem.

A broadcast staple for some years, the show is still pretty great, reflecting the contributions of such brains as Carl Reiner, Shel Silverstein, Sheldon Harnick (Fiddler on the Roof), and Thomas’ major collaborator Christopher Cerf. Mixing sketches and songs, live action and cartoons, it humorously soft-pedals myriad corrective lessons: revising the Greek legend of suitor-outrunning Princess Atalanta so that the happy ending is feminist, not marital; clucking at the selfishness of a superfemme, pink-clad girl who brattily insists "Ladies First" (and gets eaten by tigers as a consequence).

The term "politically correct" hadn’t been invented yet, but it could certainly be levied against Free. As it duly was/is, in some quarters. "Make no mistake, this is propaganda aimed at children. The message is that girls will find happiness only if they mimic boys," harrumphs one current Amazon customer. (He also considers the running skits with wisecracking Muppet infants "disturbing" and "revolting.") Alert Rush Limbaugh, quick!

This dangerous brainwashing tool generated picture books, a belated TV sequel (1988’s Free to Be … A Family), and a 35th anniversary revised-form original print reissue for which Thomas made the publicity rounds last year. These days she may be lesser known in gay circles for public philanthropic expressions than her alleged private despotic ones (see scurrilous unauthorized biography That Girl and Phil: An Insider Tells What Life is Really Like in the Marlo Thomas-Phil Donahue Household, a camp tell-all classic right up there with Call Her Miss Ross.) All gossip aside, however, innumerable grown-up queers are still in Thomas’ debt. A self-Acceptance 101 dose as easy to swallow as Flintstone multivitamins, Free to Be … You and Me remains good for you, and baby too.

FREE TO BE … YOU AND ME

Sun/21, 11 a.m., Castro

Quickies

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June 17, 2009

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FRI/19

The Lollipop Generation (G.B. Jones, Canada, 2008) To truly appreciate G.B. Jones’ decades-in-the-making solo follow-up to her 1991 queer punk classic collaboration with Bruce LaBruce No Skin Off My Ass, you probably have to be a fan of Doris Wishman. Jones is on record as a major admirer of the woman behind Bad Girls Go to Hell (1965) and the Chesty Morgan vehicle Double Agent 73 (1974), whose singular directorial style had no need for dramatic momentum, synced-up dialogue, or sensible camera angles. (In a scene with dialogue, Wishman was more likely to lavish close-ups on nearby furniture than on the humans involved.) Lollipop Generation skewers the lust for youth at the rotten core of pop culture through its look at a loose gang of candy-licking teen and preteen trick-turners and the suckers who would like to prey on them. The cast includes writer Mark Ewert and Calvin Johnson, but Vaginal Davis steals a sizeable portion of the movie by throwing her all into a molester role in a sequence that shifts back and forth between Super 8 and video. My favorite aspect of Lollipop Generation is Jones’ eye for funny or dirty signs or landmarks, from giant smiling balls on the sides of freeways to sites with double entendres for names. By placing what story there is within this framework, she creates her own world with no need for special effects. (Johnny Ray Huston) 10:45 p.m., Roxie.

Making the Boys (Crayton Robey, USA, 2008) Whether you adore it as a nostalgic, pre-HIV throwback or despise it for its self-loathing and slew of gay stereotypes, The Boys in the Band was revolutionary for its time as the first play to revolve around a homosexual circle of friends and to present an honest examination of the gay community. In director Crayton Robey’s compelling and insightful new documentary, Mart Crowley, the playwright of Boys, recounts his days rubbing shoulders with the Hollywood elite as a burgeoning screenwriter only to be cast aside after a failed Bette Davis pilot and a film deal fell through. New York theater proved to be his salvation as he struggled with perceived personal and professional failure as well as alcoholism. With nothing to lose, he bravely penned Boys, secured the producer from Edward Albee’s equally controversial Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, and released it off-Broadway on April 14, 1968 to commercial acclaim. Robey interviews both Broadway and Hollywood mainstays such as Albee, Terrence McNally, Robert Wagner, and Dominick Dunne, who reflect on the impact of Boys, for better and for worse, and its role in challenging mainstream opinions of homosexuality as a mental illness and in jumpstarting the gay rights movement. In the middle of the film, I started wishing Robey had interviewed more of the cast of Boys. After all, they were the ones who experienced the highs of being in an exciting and subversive new play as well as the lows of later being essentially blacklisted from Hollywood. Then it dawned on me that five of the nine original cast members of Boys have since died from AIDS. Ultimately though, their cause to validate the gay community’s presence in society is forever immortalized with the legacy of Boys, the play that Vincent Canby hailed "a landslide of truths." (Laura Swanbeck) 7 p.m., Victoria. Also Mon/22, 1 p.m., Castro.

SAT/20

Greek Pete (Andrew Haigh, U.K., 2009) A deadpan serving of real-life drama, this night-and-day portrait is a 21st-century update of Andy Warhol’s Flesh, the 1968 movie that made Joe Dallesandro a star. In Flesh, Dallesandro is a hustler named Joe in New York. Here, Peter Pittaros is an escort named Pete in London. In Flesh, we see Joe school comparatively naïve and weak street corner boys on the tricks of rough trade. Here, Pete is a responsible breadwinner in comparison to his drug-spun chicken boyfriend. Both Flesh‘s Joe and the title character of Greek Pete hang with trannies, though Candy Darling and Jackie Curtis are more camera-ready than Pete’s goth gal pals. But whereas a strange optimism radiates from Flesh, which is understandably too smitten with its charismatic star to knock the hustle, Greek Pete has a strong undertow of melancholy. Its sadness doesn’t stem from a moral tut-tut stance about whoring but from a sense of modern emptiness that haunts Pete whether he’s with friends, alone in his apartment, or watching footage of himself winning a competition that’s the male escort equivalent of Miss America. Well-shot and anchored by a performance that’s just deep and ordinary enough to remain compelling, Greek Pete isn’t just easy meat. (Huston) 10 p.m., Victoria. Also Tues/23, 2:30 p.m., Castro.

SUN/21

Training Rules (Dee Mosbacher and Fawn Yacker, USA, 2009) Homophobia in sports is, depressingly, still an enormous issue. But compared to the macho world of the NBA, you’d think that women’s college basketball would be a comparatively safe realm for queer players. In the case of Penn State, you’d be dead wrong. For 27 years, coach Rene Portland intimidated and harassed players who were lesbians — and those she thought might be lesbians, or who had lesbian friends. As players from past teams recall (often through tears), Portland was an outspoken homophobe who revoked scholarships as she pleased and made basketball a joyless pursuit for those she targeted. In 2006, former player Jennifer Harris, a star athlete and standout student, sued the school for discrimination. Though Harris can’t speak at length due to the terms of her settlement (and of course Portland, who resigned in 2007, did not agree to an interview), Training Rules is an eye-opening document, exposing not just the ugly truth about one coach, but a systemwide crisis that those in power (athletic directors, the NCAA) have been painfully slow to address. (Cheryl Eddy) 3:30 p.m., Castro

TUES/23

City of Borders (Yun Suh, USA, 2009) Forty-five minutes away from Middle Eastern "gay mecca" Tel Aviv lies Jerusalem, ancient religious center and, unfortunately, bastion of equally time-tested attitudes toward homosexuality. Many Tel Aviv gays don’t even see the point of living, let alone fighting for rights, in Jerusalem. Yet Jerusalem’s sole gay bar, Shushan, was one place where Jews and Muslims, Israelis and Palestinians, mingled as equals. Yun Suh’s documentary focuses on a few diverse patrons, plus Shushan’s owner Sa’ar Netanel, who became Jerusalem’s first openly gay elected official (as a city councilman) on the same day it elected its first ultraright Orthodox mayor. He endures routine death threats, Gay Pride parades attract violent protest, and the other principals here have their problems and flaws too: lesbian couple Samira and Ravit try to stay together despite major cultural differences; Palestinian youth Boddy fears he’ll eventually have to leave for his own safety; Adam, an Israeli activist since being queer-bashed, doesn’t see any ethnical conflict in building a house on occupied territory with his boyfriend. Borders is a vivid snapshot of a gay rights struggle that is still very much an uphill slog. (Dennis Harvey) 7 p.m., Roxie

Patrick, Age 1.5 (Ella Lemhagen, Sweden, 2008) Freshly settled in suburbia, gay couple Goran (Gustaf Skarsgard) and Sven (Torkel Petersson) are eager to adopt a child — or at least Goran is, with Sven reluctantly caving in. But when against the odds they’re informed a native-born boy is available, a misplaced bit of bureaucratic punctuation means they get not the 18-month-old toddler expected but 15-year-old Patrik (Tom Ljungman). He’s a foul-tempered foster home veteran who makes it clear he’s no happier cohabiting with two "homos" than they are with him. Nevertheless, they’re stuck with each other at least through the weekend, allowing a predictable mutual warming trend to course through Ella Lemhagen’s agreeable seriocomedy. While formulaic in concept, the film’s low-key charm and conviction earn emotions that might easily have felt sitcomishly pre-programmed. (Harvey) 7 p.m., Castro

JUNE 24

Prodigal Sons (Kimberly Reed, USA, 2008) When Kimberly Reed (who studied film at UC Berkeley and San Francisco State University) set out to make Prodigal Sons, she was probably pretty certain the doc would be deliberately self-focused. The film’s first act takes place in Helena, Mont., at Reed’s 20-year high school reunion — amid former classmates who remember Kimberly Reed as Paul McKerrow, a football star who was voted "Most Likely to Succeed" (and, indeed, a success she has been; though she alludes to a difficult period during her transition, she’s clearly arrived at a happy and confident place in life). But Prodigal Sons is plural for a reason, and not because of brother Todd (who happens to be gay). Instead, it’s adopted brother Marc — who is given to terrifying rages as a result of a personality-altering brain injury; remains eternally resentful of Kimberly’s high school-era smarts and popularity; and (as is shockingly discovered) the grandchild of Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth — who becomes Prodigal Sons’ focus. He is the most heartbreaking figure in an intimately personal (sometimes uncomfortably so) film that’s ultimately about identities lost and found. (Eddy) 7:30 p.m., Castro

JUNE 27

Off and Running (Nicole Opper, USA, 2009) Teenager Avery, an African American, was adopted as an infant by a single white mom, who soon afterward meets another single white mom who had recently adopted an African American baby boy. Before long, a family (nicknamed "the United Nations," especially after a Korean child joins the mix) was formed. A track star who dreams of running in college, Avery loves her moms, but she’s curious about her biological parents. She knows she’s from Texas and was originally called Mycole Antwonisha, facts that hint at a cultural experience far removed from her upbringing as a Brooklyn Jew. After a few letters are exchanged with her birth mother, Avery is crushed when the woman mysteriously ends communication. A profound identity crisis ensues. "It’s like something really traumatic happened to her, and nothing did," Avery’s caring if clueless adoptive mother says. But Off and Running suggests otherwise. The doc may not speak for every adopted child’s experience, but it’s eye-opening nonetheless, and is blessed with a subject who is sensitive and articulate even in her darkest moments. (Eddy) 2:15 p.m., Roxie

Pop Star on Ice (David Barba and James Pellerito, USA, 2009) Yay, Johnny Weir! If you don’t share my sentiments about the sassy, sparkly, outspoken (but not on-the-record out) figure skater, then you might want to skip this documentary, which was filmed over a two-year period and offers an up-close-and-personal (like, you see him in a tanning bed) look at the three-time national champ. Or maybe not, actually — haters might come around after realizing how hard he’s worked to achieve his ice-rink dreams, born after watching Oksana Baiul win Olympic gold on TV and learning to skate (at the ancient age of 12) on the frozen-over cornfield in his Pennsylvania backyard. Competition footage backs up claims by longtime coach Priscilla Hill (with whom he breaks up over the course of the film) and others of Weir’s extraordinary talents; backstage clips and off-the-cuff interviews establish the fact that he’s one of the sport’s most fun personalities, probably ever. Weir pouts, jokes, struts in a fashion show, speaks in a Russian accent, discusses his collection of furs, and lands quadruple jumps with ease. Gay or (ahem) nay, he’s clearly 100 percent comfortable with who he is. (Eddy) 11 a.m., Castro

Rusty never sleeps

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June 17, 2009

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johnny@sfbg.com

I’ll be honest: interviewing Rusty Santos was a last-minute thing. I just found out that Santos’s group the Present is coming to SF. And let me tell you, I’m bummed. While Santos and bandmates Jesse Lee and Mina are making music here, I’m going to be across the country in their hometown of New York City. One listen to Santos’ production for Panda Bear’s sublime Person Pitch (Paw Tracks) is all it takes to recognize his special studio grace, and based on the spacious beauty of World I See (Lo Recordings, 2008) and the new Way We Are (Lo Recordings), the Present is one of the few contemporary bands I’m eager to see live. So if you check out one of the shows, tell me how good it was for you.

SFBG What are some of the first sounds you remember?

RUSTY SANTOS The sweet potato salesman’s song I heard as a kid in Japan. A lot of the vendors there sing these jingles that have probably been sung for generations and remind me of hymns. I lived in Nagoya for a few years when I was growing up, and my earliest sonic memories are from there.

SFBG What were some of your favorite musical experiences as a kid, in terms of listening to music and making it?

RS Playing in hardcore bands in high school was my most formative musical experience. Also singing in chorus in elementary school was important. My life was changed the first time I heard Michael Jackson.

SFBG You’re from Fresno and you’ve also lived in the Bay Area. What things did you love and not love about both?

RS I love how Fresno rests in the valley at the foot of an immense mountain range. Being at sea level but separated from the ocean felt pretty isolated, but there’s also this sense that the sky’s the limit. San Francisco has a lot more history, and is of course more worldly, so that was my introduction to the kinds of cultural activities I would pursue after moving to New York.

SFBG The Present is the Present, and as Rusty Santos you have songs or titles such as "Eternity Spans" and "Moving Time." What is it about time that interests or compels you?

RS Time has always fascinated me because I kind of feel like it doesn’t exist or at least doesn’t behave in exactly the same way recording equipment captures it. I feel that with music it’s possible to change the way people perceive time and help [them] appreciate it more.

SFBG Did you see that Alan McGee of Creation Records fame named the Present as one of his favorite groups?

RS Someone showed me that. I like a lot of Libertines and Babyshambles songs, and of course My Bloody Valentine. And Felt.

SFBG What’s the strangest or best description you’ve heard of your music?

RS That would have to be Alan McGee comparing it to [Wolfgang Voigt’s project] Gas. He’s wrong, but that’s a huge compliment.

SFBG Panda Bear’s Person Pitch is one of my favorite albums of recent years. You recorded it in Lisbon, and I’m wondering about your impressions of that place and how it might have influenced you.

RS Portugal is amazing. My last name is Portuguese and the first time I traveled there I felt like there was some lost family connection.

SFBG In an interview I did with him around the time of Tilt (Fontana, 1995), Scott Walker said he doesn’t like the compression of most modern recordings. Would you agree with his view?

RS Yes, I completely agree, except for when I disagree. Most of the time new music sounds flat and over-compressed, but in some cases it’s used to genius effect.

SFBG What are you looking forward to doing while you’re in the Bay Area?

RS I’m looking forward to checking out the bands we’re playing with and seeing old friends. It will also be nice to get some coffee and visit Golden Gate Park.

THE PRESENT

With Queens, Religious Girls, Our Brother the Native, New Future

Thurs/18, 9 p.m., $7 (21 and over)

The Knockout

3223 Mission, SF

(415) 550-6994

www.theknockoutsf.com

With Queens, Railcars, Egadz

Fri/19, 9 p.m., $8 (21 and over)

Thee Parkside

1600 17th St., SF

(415) 252-1330

www.theeparkside.com

PG&E attacks consumer choice

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June 17, 2009

0

rebeccab@sfbg.com

A ballot initiative backed by Pacific Gas and Electric Co. could amount to a death sentence for community choice aggregation (CCA) and expanded public power in California.

Dubbed the Taxpayers Right to Vote Act, the proposed initiative would require a two-thirds majority vote at the ballot before any local government could establish a CCA program, use public funding to implement a plan to become a CCA provider, or expand electric service to new territory or new customers.

The new hurdle would make it very difficult for a local government to move forward with a CCA, while at the same time making it much easier for a utility to defeat public power at the ballot.

Signed into state law in 2002, CCA allows local governments to buy up blocks of power to sell to residents, making it possible for cities and counties to set up alternatives to private utilities such as PG&E and, in many cases, to offer electricity generated by clean, renewable power sources.

The initiative is in its earliest stages, and it likely would not be placed on the state ballot until the June 2010 election. At this point, "it’s unclear how much of a campaign it’s going to be," according to Greg Larsen of the Sacramento public relations firm Larsen Cazanis, a spokesperson for the effort. "It’s a long way off."

That hasn’t stopped local CCA supporters from sounding alarm bells. "Urgent/Bad! PG&E State Ballot Measure To Kill Public Power & CCA," public power activist Eric Brooks wrote in the subject line of a widely disseminated e-mail last week. "It’s red alert time boys and girls," he wrote, saying the proposal "will kill all new Public Power and Community Choice Aggregation projects statewide."

Brooks isn’t alone: everyone the Guardian spoke with who is involved in the creation of San Francisco’s CCA voiced concern that the proposal could kill any future community choice efforts.

The proposed initiative was submitted to the California Attorney General’s office May 28 with the contact listed as the Sacramento law firm Nielsen, Merksamer, Parrinello, Mueller & Naylor, a powerful player with a long history of working with PG&E on ballot initiatives. Larsen confirmed that PG&E had provided the $200 filing fee, the only amount spent so far on the embryonic proposal.

The official proponent of the initiative is Robert Lee Pence, apparently the same person who was listed as an opponent of Proposition 80, a 2005 ballot measure that dealt with utility regulation. Opposition to Prop. 80 was heavily funded by PG&E and other utilities, and the initiative failed by a wide margin.

Pence’s group, Californians for Reliable Electricity, listed Steve Lucas as a contact on 2005 campaign documents. Lucas is also listed as the point person at Nielsen, Merksamer, Parrinello, Mueller & Naylor for questions regarding the Taxpayers Right to Vote Act.

The address listed for the organization is the same as that of Townsend, Raimundo, Besler and Usher — a Sacramento political consulting firm that also has a long history of working with PG&E on political campaigns. When asked about the PR firm’s role in the Taxpayer Right to Vote Act, Larsen acknowledged that they "may be involved as the campaign goes forward," but cautioned that any discussion so far has been preliminary.

The rationale behind the initiative is to protect taxpayers, Larsen said, because CCA programs "are major issues that communities undertake and require millions or billions of public dollars." The proposed initiative, he said, seeks to "ensure that voters — and frankly, their descendents — who will wind up being responsible for these programs have a say." If the measure passes, Larsen added, voters could still approve CCA programs — but with two-thirds of the vote, a supermajority that he contends is "staying in line with many other California requirements."

California Sen. Mark Leno, however, has a very different opinion. "I would hope that Californians would have come to understand that two-thirds vote thresholds are probably more responsible for damage to the state of California in the past 30 years than any other single factor," he said. "To hand a small minority controlling power is anti-democratic. This must be defeated." Leno also said he believes that the initiative would have drastic consequences for CCA programs if it passes.

Meanwhile, local CCA supporters say there is more to this than merely sticking up for taxpayers’ rights. If programs like Clean Power SF — the CCA initiative currently being developed in San Francisco — are fully implemented, then PG&E, which makes good money from its monopoly status, would face some actual competition. Naturally, the powerful utility would have an incentive to eliminate the alternative altogether.

Under the current system, PG&E "has to rely on the elected officials to kill CCA, and its much harder … to do that," says John Rizzo of the San Francisco Bay Chapter of the Sierra Club. But if the Taxpayers Right to Vote Act is enshrined in state law, "they could just pour in money and spread propaganda. Particularly the two-thirds requirement is just outrageous — it basically makes it impossible" to secure approval for any step toward CCA implementation.

"It’s a nasty ballot initiative," Mike Campbell, director of San Francisco’s CCA at the Public Utilities Commission, told us. "I think it’s clearly aimed at the heart of CCA." Campbell added that while he has been in discussion with SFPUC staff and others involved in hammering out Clean Power SF, he wasn’t at liberty to discuss a strategy for fighting the proposed initiative just yet.

Ross Mirkarimi, who chairs the city’s Local Agency Formation Commission — the body tasked with working in tandem with the SFPUC to implement San Francisco’s CCA — called the proposal "heinous — and yet I expect nothing less from PG&E.

"They can try to win by well-funded misinformation blitzkrieg," Mirkarimi noted. "If they’re able to spend $10 million without blinking here in San Francisco [on defeating a public power measure], they’re poised to spend tens of millions on this. As a state battleground, this elevates the fight that much more. We have to act in solidarity with other municipalities. We should be well-armed in repudiation of this effort."

There may be ways to attack the initiative in advance. The CCA legislation bars private utilities from seeking to undermine local CCA efforts. Assembly Member Tom Ammiano told us that the Legislature should look at how PG&E could be blocked from mounting a statewide effort to kill CCAs. "I think there’s some potential there," he said.

Julian Davis, who chaired the Prop. H campaign for public power last year, said he found the proposal very worrisome. "If you shut down community choice, you’re shutting down one of the major vehicles for clean energy," he said. To Davis, the initiative highlights "a disturbing trend of corporate America finding ever-more clever ways of tying the hand of local government in general. You know they’ll dump millions into this," he added. "The ultimate irony here is that none of us have the right to vote on anything PG&E does. None of us has a seat at the PG&E board table. It’s doublespeak."

Rachel Buhner contributed to this report.

Art listings

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June 16, 2009

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Art listings are compiled by Johnny Ray Huston. See Picks for information on how to submit items to the listings. For complete art listings go to sfbg.com.

MUSEUMS

Asian Art Museum 200 Larkin; 581-3500, www.asianart.org. Tues-Wed, Fri-Sun, 10am-5pm; Thurs, 10am-9pm. $10 ($5 Thurs after 5pm), $7 seniors, $6 for ages 12 to 17, free for 11 and under. "In a New Light: The Asian Art Museum Collection." Ongoing.

California Palace of the Legion of Honor Lincoln Park (near 34th Ave and Clement); 750-3600. Tues-Sun, 9:30am-5pm. $8, $6 seniors, $5 for ages 12 to 17, free for 10 and under (free Tues). "Surrealism: Selections from the Reva and David Logan Collection of Illustrated Books." Work by surrealist poets and artists. Ongoing.

Cartoon Art Museum 655 Mission; CAR-TOON. Tues-Sun, 11am-5pm. $6, $4 students and seniors, $2 for ages 6 to 12, free for five and under and members. "The Art of Stan Sakai: Celebrating 25 Years of Usagi Yojimbo." Through July 5. "Watchmen." Illustrations, sketches, and comic book pages by Dave Gibbons. Through July 19. "The Brinkley Girls." Retrospective devoted to early 20th century illustrator Nell Brinkley. Through August 23.

Contemporary Jewish Museum 736 Mission; www.thecjm.org. Mon-Tues, Fri-Sun, 11am-5:30pm; Thurs, 1-8pm. $10, $8 seniors and students, free for 12 and under and members. "Chagall and the Artists of the Russian Jewish Theater." An exhibition of 200 works of art and ephemera. Through Sept 7. "Being Jewish: A Bay Area Portrait." Ongoing.

De Young Museum Golden Gate Park, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive (near Fulton and 10th Ave); 750-3600. Tues-Sun, 9:30am-5:15pm (Fri, 9:30am-8:45pm). $10, $7 seniors, $6 for ages 13 to 17 and college students with ID (free first Tues). "Signs: Wordplay in Photography." Thematic survey. Through Sun/14. "The Fauna and Flora of the Pacific." Mural by Miguel Covarrubias. Ongoing.

Legion of Honor Lincoln Park, 34th Ave and Clement; 750-3600. Tues-Sun, 9:30am-5:15pm. $20 adults, $7 seniors, $6 youths and students, free 12 and under. "Waking Dreams: Max Klinger and the Symbolist Print." Retrospective of the German Symbolist artist. Through July 4.

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art 151 Third St; 357-4000. Mon-Tues, Fri-Sun, 11am-5:45pm; Thurs, 10am-8:45pm. $12.50, $8 seniors, $7 students, free for members and 12 and under (free first Tues; half price Thurs, 6-8:45pm). "Austere: Selections From the SFMOMA Collection." Photography and architecture and design. Through July 7. "Otl Aicher: Munchen 1972." Graphic design. Through July 7. "Patterns of Speculation: J. Mayer H." German architectural studio. Through July 7. "Looking In: Robert Frank’s ‘The Americans’." Exhibition devoted to the photographic classic. Through August 23. "Georgia O’Keefe and Ansel Adams: Natural Affinities." Show dedicated to the two popular American artists. Through Sept 7. "Art in the Atrium: Kerry James Marshall." Monumental murals. Ongoing.

San Francisco Museum of Performance and Design War Memorial Veterans Bldg, 401 Van Ness, fourth floor; 255-4800, www.sfpalm.org. Tues-Fri, 11am-5pm; Sat, 1-5pm. Free. "Star Quality: The World of Noel Coward." Exhibition dedicated to the icon. Through August 29. "Maestro: Photographic Portraits of Tom Zimberoff." Portraits of national and international conductors. Ongoing. "150 Years of Dance in California." Ongoing. "San Francisco in Song." Ongoing. "San Francisco 1900: On Stage." Ongoing.

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts 701 Mission; 978-ARTS. Tues-Wed, Fri-Sun, noon-5pm; Thurs, noon-8pm. $6, $3 seniors, students, and youths, free for members (free first Tues). "Under a Full Moon: 30 Years of Perpetual Indulgence." Show devoted to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. Through June 28. "Nick Cave: Meet Me at the Center of the Earth." Mixed media sculptural "soundsuits" by the Chicago dancer-turned-artist. Through July 5. "Through Future Eyes: The Endurance of Humanity." Contemporary work by ten artists, incuding six Young Artists at Work curators. Through July 5.

BAY AREA

Cantor Arts Center Lomita and Museum, Stanford University, Stanford; (650) 723-4177. Wed, Fri-Sun, 11am-5pm; Thurs, 11am-8pm. "Appellations to Antiquity." 19th and 20th century works from the museum collection. Through July 26. "Pop to Present." Survey from the 1960s to the present. Through August 16. "Contemporary Glass." Modern glass works. Ongoing. "Rodin! The Complete Stanford Collection." Ongoing.

Judah L. Magnes Museum 2911 Russell, Berk; (510) 549-6950. Mon-Wed, Sun, 11am-4pm. $4, $3 students and seniors. "Memory Lab." Interactive installation allowing visitors to make family albums from their documents, photographs, and memories. Ongoing. "Projections." Multimedia works from the museums archival, documentary, and experimental films. Ongoing.

Oakland Museum of California 1000 Oak, Oakl; (510) 238-2200. Wed-Sat, 10am-5pm (first Fri, 10am-9pm); Sun, noon-5pm. $8, $5 seniors and students (free second Sun). "Future of Sequoias: Sustaining Parklands in the 21st Century." Panoramic photos with commentary. Through August 23. "Squeak Carnwath: Painting is No Ordinary Object." A solo exhibition dedicated to the Oakland artist. Through August 23. "The Art and History of Early California." The story of California from the first inhabitants through the Gold Rush. Ongoing.

Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology UC Berkeley, 103 Kroeber Hall, room 3712, Bancroft and Bowditch, Berk; (510) 643-1193. Wed-Sat, 10am-4:30pm; Sun, noon-4pm. $4, $3 seniors, $1 students, free for 12 and under. "From the Maker’s Hand: Selections from the Permanent Collection." An exploration of human ingenuity found in living and historic cultures around the world. Ongoing.

San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art 560 S First St, San Jose; (408) 283-8155, www.sjica.org. Tues-Wed, Fri, 10am-5pm; Thurs, 10am-8pm; Sat, noon-5pm. Free. "It’s Not Us, It’s You." Rejection-themed art. Through Sat/20.

UC Berkeley Art Museum 2626 Bancroft Way, Berk; (510) 642-0808. Wed-Sun, 11am-5pm. $8 adults, $5 seniors and young adults, free for members and 12 and under. "Galaxy: A Hundred or So Stars Visible to the Naked Eye." Museum survey curated by Lawrence Rinder. Through August 30. "Human Nature: Artists Respond to a Changing Planet." Collaborative exhibition. Through Sept. 27.

GALLERIES

ONGOING

Brian Gross Fine Art 49 Geary, fifth floor; 788-1050; Tues-Fri, 10:30am-5:30pm; Sat, 11am-5pm. "More Than Meets the Eye," metal collages by Tony Berlant. Through June 27.

Dolby Chadwick Gallery 210 Post, suite 5; 956-3560. "Suburban Birthday Party," new paintings by Douglas Schneider. Through June 27.

*Electric Works 130 8th St; 626-5496. Mon-Fri, 11am-6pm; Sat, 11am-5pm. "2012," slot machine by Enrique Chagoya. Through July 3.

Fraenkel Gallery 49 Geary, fourth floor; 981-2661. Call for hours. "A Survey: 1972-2006," photography by Bernd and Hilla Becher. Through July 3.

Gregory Lind Gallery 49 Geary; 296-9661. Call for hours. "Garden Ruin," new work by Bob Matthews. Through June 27.

Hosfelt Gallery 430 Clementina; 495-5454. Tues-Sat, 11am-5:30pm. "Cubic Drops," drawings and installation by Marco Maggi. Through June 27.

Italian Cultural Institute 425 Washington; 788-7142. Mon-Fri, 9am-5pm. "Giorgio Morandi: Works from the Estorick Collection," etchings and drawings. Through June 30.

Luggage Store 1007 Market; 255-5971. Call for hours. "Cultural Geometry," public art project by Rigo 23 and Fernando Cardoso. Ongoing.

Mark Wolfe Contemporary Art 49 Geary, second floor; 369-9404. Call for hours. Site-specific installation by James Sansing and paintings by Jared Walker. Through June 27.

Micaëla 49 Geary; 551-8118. Tues-Sat, 10:30am-5pm. "In Camera," photography by Douglass freed, Joshua Hershman, and Taliaferro Jones. Through June 27.

Modernism 685 Market; 541-0641. Tues-Sat, 10am-5:30pm. "The Murmur of the Innocents," work by Gottfried Helnwein. Through June 27.

*Oxenrose 448 Grove; 816-9530. Call for hours. "Nature’s Ladders," work by Tahiti Pehrson, sponsored by Arthur magazine. Through June 30.

Robert Koch Gallery 49 Geary, fifth floor; 421-0122. Tues-Sat, 10:30am-5:30pm. Photographs by Kenneth Josephson. Through June 27.

*Steven Wolf Fine Arts 49 Geary, suite 411; 263-3677. Tues-Sat, 11:30am-5:30pm. "You Feel Me?," work by Tim Sullivan. Through June 20.

*SFAC Gallery 401 Van Ness; 554-6080. Call for hours. "Trace Elements," group show curated by Meg Shiffler. Through July 3. *

It’s Cougartown, Jake

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June 10, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I’m 19 and still a virgin. I’ve never been on a date, kissed a girl, held hands, hugged … you get the picture. I’ve never really had the time to take interest in girls, or the courage to ask one out. I’m now starting to feel pretty lonely, and tired of my lack of "experience." However, after talking with several different girls my age on different occasions, my question has come to this: are virgin guys really worthless for experienced women?

Most women I talk to say that’s the answer to the question. If this is true, I think I’m going to have serious nervous breakdown. Since this is apparently the case, and such a bad thing, I was wondering what I should do — if anything at all — to fix the problem?

Love,

Another Lonely Boy

Dear Boy:

In light of recent discussions of sexual opportunities found on craigslist, among the (barely) used fitness equipment and the remarkably ugly couches, I’m suddenly seeing your problem in a whole new light. In your usual fictional treatments of the "desperate male virgin seeks state-change" trope, you see the hapless hero attempt, unsuccessfully, to get age-mates interested, or to trick them with false-bottomed popcorn buckets or what-have-you. Then you have your prostitute scene, which never goes well. I have no compunctions about suggesting seeing a pro, actually — it may not be legal, but as far as I know I can recommend what I like as long as I don’t recommend whom I like, as in "See my friend Lavinia, she’ll fix you right up."*

In fact,I AM going to suggest you see a pro, since this has been going on way too long and I’m afraid you’re going to get what they used to call "a complex." But I do realize it’s not a solution that fits everyone’s tastes, morals, or pocketbook, and it isn’t much help if what you’re seeking is a boon companion and a chance to get your blank-blank-ed (I hate all those phrases and can’t even bring myself to type the one about cherries. Ick.

We’ll get back to craigslist, but first, no, I don’t think inexperienced men are "worthless" to women. I think very few people can truly be considered worthless (even the worst can be repurposed as mulch, for instance), and I’d hate for you to judge your own worth by what some chicks at a party said. Your "worth" is irreducible and inborn.

How useful you can be to other people may depend on things like skills and history, but probably not as much as you think. I think we’re having some confusion here about what question those girls thought they were answering. Would they really, at the advanced age of 19 or so, reject a serious and otherwise appealing suitor on the grounds of sexual inexperience? Or was it more a case of "I’d rather do it with guys who know what they’re doing"? The latter is understandable, the former a bit sad.

I really think young women of a slightly less hardened persuasion are your best bet, for many reasons, but there is that craigslist option (craigslist is in some senses sui generis, but it could also be considered to stand in here for any online meeting place where "casual encounters" ads are acceptable). I’m thinking that your chances of a cute 19-year-old picking up on your ad in a place like that and thinking, "Sweet! He doesn’t know a thing!" are virtually nil. But if there really is such a thing as a "cougar," then … mrowr.

I am personally still unconvinced that any such widespread social phenomenon of older, slightly stringy but glossily well-preserved ladies prowling for young man-meat yet exists, or ever will. You couldn’t prove it by the presence of the stereotype, though. Not only is there the SNL sketch and a number of ad campaigns featuring "cougars," there’s even an upcoming series staring the ancient and wizened Courteney Cox (I believe she’s 45) in something called Cougar Town. This is not good.

Reservations about the designation and the ugly light it casts on women over, say, 35 who still like sex aside, this could all be good news for you. Try running an ad that says "19-year-old virgin seeks cougar for important life lessons" and see how that works out for you. While it’s true that most female grown-ups are not seeking utterly inexperienced partners half their age, there are certainly some who would find you an interesting experiment.

All this nonsense about pros and ladies on the prowl aside, I do have two other suggestions, both of which seem to have escaped you. One, you can talk to girls and even ask them out without revealing a certain embarrassing biographical fact upfront and, two, you could date virgins.

Love,

Andrea

* No, I don’t know anyone named Lavinia.

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Tears of a thug

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June 10, 2009

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a&eletters@sfbg.com

The first time I interviewed Shaheed Akbar, a.k.a. the Jacka — in December of 2007, during a midnight session for Tear Gas (Artist Records/SMC), due June 16 — he was rolling purple and green weeds plus two types of hash into a Sharpie-sized blunt. I felt like Paul Bowles interviewing Bob Marley. Having known him three years, I can assure you that even in the Bay’s smoky atmosphere, Jacka blazes like a forest fire.

I dwell on this because it’s one facet of the Tear Gas concept, beyond the title’s literal meaning. The perpetual cloud enveloping Jacka is as much a part of his persona as his mobbed out tales of street life, based on experience. Like many artists, the MC enlists his favorite plant in the service of music.

"Weed helps you concentrate on certain things," Jacka observes, during a follow-up interview last month. "Nothing that contains too much multitasking. But if you don’t rap, try writing one; it’s hard as fuck. Weed gets you outside your normal realm so you coming up with crazy shit."

ARE YOU EXPERIENCED?

Yet, considering his consumption, Jacka barely raps about weed, or at least no more than most rappers; he has other things on his mind. When I e-mail Paul Wall, one of several big-name features on Tear Gas, to ask why he wanted to work with Jacka, he emphasizes the authenticity of his collaborator’s verses.

"He speaks from experience when he rhymes," Wall writes. "Like he’s rapping from a hustler’s perspective for other hustlers."

The experience Wall cites consists of details which, in the aggregate, might make for improbable fiction. Jacka’s rise to local notoriety at age 18 as a member of C-Bo’s Mob Figaz — whose eponymous debut (Git Paid, 1999) moved something like 140,000 units — is fairly well documented. But the story begins much earlier. Born of 14-year-old parents, young Jacka saw his mother get addicted to crack, and his father go to prison for a decade only to be murdered shortly after release. The result was an impoverished childhood in various hoods in Oakland, Richmond, and finally Pittsburg, where the Mob Figaz began.

"As a kid, everywhere I lived was in the projects," he says. "A nigga’s whole thing is to get out of there." Such ambition led Jacka to start dealing crack as early as age 11.

"Say you’re in school," Jacka continues. "Moms ain’t working. Pops ain’t around. The other kids at school have everything you don’t, as far as clothes and packing they own lunch. All that matters when you’re a kid. You go to junior high and you eating free lunch, people are like, ‘What kind of nigga is you?’ So when you’re from the hood and can hustle, that’s definitely helping your self-esteem. You pulling out wads of cash and motherfuckers who used to laugh at you ain’t got shit. That made me feel hella good."

"Things I had to do to survive is one thing," he says. "But how I feel about it now is another."

BLUNT (OR DEEP) EMOTION

Jacka’s willingness to probe psychological wounds reveals another implication of Tear Gas. Paradoxically or not, in a genre where emotions are usually limited to elation and anger, a large part of Jacka’s appeal is his emphasis on the melancholy ambivalence of street life. It’s subtle, of course, sprinkled into stories of coke-dealing and cap-busting. But contrary to his assertion on the Traxamillion-produced "Girls," an infectious thug-pop remake of the 1986 Beastie Boys classic, Jacka doesn’t just "knock hoes and live it up."

"You can only shoot the breeze so much; you gotta drop a jewel on people," says Jacka, citing 2Pac, to whom he pays homage in "Hope Is for Real." "He had to be a sheep in wolf’s clothing because he had to reach me, the niggas in the hood, but look what you learn from him. So I have to study and get wiser to even make a song."

To be sure, Tear Gas isn’t a sociological treatise; like the blues, it voices the despair of a culture rather than proposing solutions. But such articulation is exactly what makes the music of both Pac and Jacka so powerful.

"Listen to Marvin Gaye," Jacka continues. "I guarantee he’s going to grab your soul. He knows something and could put it together with the music. And what he talked about was the struggle, the pain. I try to make shit that’ll stick to your soul. Like the music my parents used to listen to."

Besides his social consciousness, Jacka’s success rests squarely on quality. Last year, his single "All Over Me" — included on Tear Gas — hit No. 7 on KMEL’s playlist and No. 15 on Billboard’s "Bubbling Under" singles chart. Yet he refused to rush his album to capitalize on this exposure. Instead, he released 11 side projects. Two of them debuted on Billboard’s R&B/Hip-Hop chart: Drought Season (Bern One), a collaboration with rapper Berner, at No. 55, and The Street Album (Artist Records), a "mixtape album" with KMEL DJ Big Von, at No. 91.

"Motherfuckers like shit that make them think," Jacka says, when asked about his appeal. They also like real albums and, taken as whole, Tear Gas is among the best rap discs in recent history, major or indie. Despite its array of producers and perhaps a few too many guests, Jacka has fashioned a tight, coherent album where every track is vital — an extreme rarity in contemporary hip hop. With its minor-key, exotic flute and harp textures, the new single "Glamorous Lifestyle," also produced by Traxamillion and featuring André Nickatina, epitomizes the overall feel.

"It’s not an easy process unless you really listen to music, and follow all kinds of genres," says Jacka. "Some people just listen to rap, but other music helps you grow as an artist."

THE VOICE

Being a rapper, Jacka’s voice is ultimately his most important asset, an instantly recognizable, rounded, mellow drawl — even when he raps fast — that is never raspy, despite the steady diet of blunts. His melodic, half-sung delivery, moreover, perfectly fits his vocal texture and mournful themes.

"My style really comes from the struggle," he says. "I’m not trying to make you like what I’m saying — I’m trying to get into your soul." This spiritual goal reflects what he credits as his primary influence: chanting the Koran. Surprising or not, given his gangsta themes, smoking, and even drinking, Jacka is a devout Sunni Muslim. It’s the result of a spiritual quest he began at age 9, when he joined the Nation of Islam.

"They showed me how to be black, because I really didn’t know," he explains. "I just knew we were in America, we used to be slaves, but I didn’t know why it was so tough for us. They made me read books that taught me to be proud of who I am. They can be a little strict sometimes, but they have to be; there was so much taken away from us."

When Jacka began intensively reading the Koran, however, he began to question some of the Nation’s teachings. "I realized that what it said in the Koran is what I should do," he says. "Not that plus something else."

The development of Jacka’s faith toward more orthodox Islam accelerated circa 2000. The Mob Figaz’ momentum slowed when C-Bo went to prison and Jacka caught a robbery case that landed him in county jail for a year.

"In jail, I was reading the Koran and realized the Sunni Muslim way is for me," Jacka remembers. "It’s the way I can pray directly to God." Following his release, Jacka took his shahada, declaring his formal adherence to Islam. But as rap money dried up in the Bay during its leanest years (2000-04), he returned to crime at a whole new level, even while beginning his solo career with The Jacka (Akbr Records, 2001).

"When I started working on my album, things changed for me — I really got into the streets," Jacka says. Rap celebrity gave him connections he otherwise would have lacked. "Whatever rap niggas was talking about, we were living," he says with some pride, although he feels he’ll one day have to answer to Allah for his misdeeds. Details of his criminal past are necessarily vague, though if you consider that fellow Mob Figa Husalah was arrested for transporting "over five kilos" of cocaine, a case culminating in his 2006 sentence to 53 months in federal prison, you get the picture.

"The streets are dried up for me," says Jacka. "Once the feds knock your boy, you can’t fuck around for the rest of your life. I’m hot. So I stay with the music now."

"I didn’t take the business as seriously as I should have," he admits. "So I had to start from ground zero." Fortunately, by the time Jacka’s second "official" solo album The Jack Artist (Artist Records, 2005) was ready to drop, the Bay began to heat up again. Even in the heyday of hyphy, the conspicuously non-hyphy Jack Artist sold some 20,000 copies, or "more than all those niggas put together," in the words of the man behind it. Yet despite this success, Tear Gas sounds little like its predecessor. Instead, it reflects Jacka’s artistic growth now that he’s settled down to music full time.

"I wouldn’t trade this for those times again — never," Jacka says, when asked to weigh yesterday and today. "This is something legit we’re doing that’s real. My dream as a child was to do this."

www.myspace.com/thejackamobfigaz

Sexy, scary surfers tonight at Zombie Beach Party

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June 5, 2009

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By Molly Freedenberg

The Living Dead Girls were sexy and scary at Hubba Hubba’s Creepshow Peepshow last year. Photo by Patrick McCarthy.

Here’s the setting: If Annette came back from the dead and ate Frankie’s brains. If Gidget gorged on Moon Dog’s entrails before catching a sweet wave. If Brian Wilson were not just King of the Beach Boys but King of the Undead. If the Australian altrock band were called Dead Can Surf. If all you needed for a day at Baker was a big towel, a good book, and a large giblet smoothie…

Yup. It’s Zombie Beach Party. And it’s gonna be awesome.

I don’t only say that because I’m going to be in it. In fact, the new dance my Richard Cheese-inspired troupe, the Cheese Puffs, will debut on Friday has plenty of potential to go horribly wrong – in the form of 7 bounce-able, lose-able, unpredictable beach balls (though, to be fair, they’ll be bounced or lost or — gasp! — even kept by 7 adorable showgirls).

No, it’s because so much of the evening has the potential to go horribly, grotesquely, disgustingly right.

The event at DNA is co-hosted by Hubba Hubba Revue — the wacky variety/burlesque production team that brings vaudeville-style antics to Oakland’s Uptown every Monday, to DNA Lounge at least every month, and, increasingly, to other events around town (if it’s bawdy, sexy, well-organized, and funny, it’s probably Hubba Hubba’s doing) — and the Living Dead Girlz — the troupe of sexy undead dancers whose (actual dance) choreography is matched only by their zombie-licious costumery and storylines.

Between Kingfish and Eddie’s banter and the LDG’s guaranteed sexiness, you might not even need another reason to go. But just in case, keep in mind the rest of the show will feature burlesque favorites like Sparkly Devil (who performed at last year’s Best of the Bay party), Honey Lawless, and Dottie Lux, all doing their nearly-naked best to honor surf and zombie movies of yore.

Zombie Beach Party
Friday, June 5
9pm-late
$7 with costume, $10 without
DNA Lounge
375 11th St., SF
www.dnalounge.com

ZBP_b500[2].jpg

Products: Well Hello, Kitty

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June 4, 2009

4

By Molly Freedenberg

One little two little three little kitten toys…

I’ll be the first to admit that I could’ve given the G-Twist more of a chance. I was lazy. Stuck in my ways. And, in the words of the poet Sir Mix-A-Lot, it was so big…so black.

And then came Hello Kitty [ed note: available at Good Vibrations]. The slender pink vibrator with the rounded kitty-cat head and big, big eyes, packaged in a cute rectangular box covered in Japanese writing. Intimidating it was certainly not. But there was something else in the way… oh yeah!… it’s a sex toy based on a character popular with 10-year-old girls (and, to be fair, the adults they grow up to be).

Not that I wasn’t charmed. I was. And a little relieved. The small vibe, in all its smooth pastel adorable-ness, could’ve passed as an oversized pen – and, in fact, it sat on my desk – next to my Post-Its and concert stubs and Sharpies and empty coffee cups – for a few days before I took it to my bedroom. This vibe was much more my speed – no pun intended.

But still. I wondered if I’d be able to use such a thing on my lady parts. Could I get past the associations with kids? The images it conjured of Japanese vending machines dispensing young girls’ used panties?

Turns out, I could. I could get past it. And under it. And off on it.

Glittering prize

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May 27, 2009

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johnny@sfbg.com

One shorthand description of Ramona Gonzalez’s recording project Nite Jewel is that it’s disco on quaaludes. I don’t know if I like Nite Jewel quite as much as Glass Candy’s underrated B/E/A/T/B/O/X (Italians Do It Better, 2007) — c’mon, they’re funnier than they are given credit for, and they made "Computer Love" melancholic, what’s not to love? — or if I love it more.

Throughout Good Evening (Gloriette, 2008) and Nite Jewel (Human Ear, 2008) Gonzalez’s singing is both high-pitched and kinda dazed. On "Weak 4 Me," she reminds me of Mr. Bill, which can never be a bad thing. "What Did He Say" is the best Nite Jewel song so far. It sounds like a radio playing "I Can’t Wait" by Nu Shooz slowly sinking to the bottom of a pool. I recently caught up with Gonzalez on the phone.

SFBG I hadn’t realized you’re from the Bay Area. How was Berkeley High? What did you like about the Bay Area and not like about it?

Ramona Gonzalez Berkeley High when I went there was transitioning between being out of hand and horrible and pretty much a normal school. Now it’s nice. Back when I went, it was not like that. There were 23 arson attempts when I was a sophomore.

Certain teachers I had there were some of the best ones I’ve ever had. As for the school itself — fuck, it’s hard for a kid to get along in a 2300 person student body. Lots of aggro annoying kids, popularity contests and danger, everyday. But overall it was rewarding.

SFBG How were your experiences in the Oakland Interfaith Youth Choir and the Berkeley Jazz School Music Ensemble?

RG Oakland Interfaith Youth Choir was pretty awesome. My friend Emily introduced me to it, because her dad was singing in the adult choir. The songs are incredible and really difficult — the girls in that choir were unbelievably talented. I wasn’t as good as them. Singing soprano in a chest voice — that’s crazy.

I did that for 2 years and then joined the Berkeley Jazz school, just taking piano. I ran into one of the girls from the Youth Choir there.

SFBG You’ve said Kevin Shields would be a dream artists to work with.

RG I got into my shoegaze period in college and started listening to Lilys whenever possible. Me and my friend Shane tried to start a fan club.

One of my favorite bands is Woo. Their It’s Cozy Inside (Independent Record Publishing, 1989) and Whichever Way You’re Going, You’re Going Wrong (no info available) might be the two albums I’ve listened to the most in my entire life. They’re these two brothers who are Hare Krishna who live in the UK. I recently found out where they are, and they wrote me back and we’re totally going to hang out when I go to England.

SFBG We have to talk Bruce Haack. What do you love about him?

RG Bruce Haack to me is psychedelic electronic music. It also has a playfulness, because he’s making music for kids. His music has this relaxing quality and aggressive quality at the same time. There’s a simplicity I like. I like his fervor and bitterness towards the music industry, especially on Haackula (Omni Recording, 2008). But the one I listen to most is Electric Luficer (Omni Recording, 2007). His music doesn’t have a direct correlation with Nite Jewel in terms of textures and sounds, but more in terms of what it means to be a punk electronic musician.

NITE JEWEL

With Telepathe, Hawnay Troof

June 12, 10 p.m., $10

Bottom of the Hill

133 17th St, SF

(415) 621-4455

www.bottomofthehill.com

Higgamus hoggamus

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May 27, 2009

0

andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I wonder if you’ve been living in San Francisco too long? Most prostitutes are not happy grad students! Most have been abused, are addicts, or both, and it’s not a "career choice." I think the woman in your last column is a sex addict and needs therapy, not someone to be cheered on by people like you who think promiscuity is cool. I would worry that kind of behavior says something pretty bad about the emotional state of anyone who’s doing it. I usually like your column, but I do think you can get warped by living too long where being weird is cool.

Love,

I Used To Live There Too

Dear Used:

I worry about her, too! What do you think I am? The question for last week, though, was not "Is promiscuity healthy for women?" (a very complicated question indeed, and one we will get back to), but the far simpler and more specific, "Is meeting men online for sex likely to get you killed?" No matter how you feel about female promiscuity, the answer to the latter is going to have to be no. It is simply not likely, although we have seen, tragically, that it is possible.

Expensive, boutique-y prostitution practiced by sane, smart women who can afford to screen clients carefully is surprisingly unlikely to lead to ax-murder. Neither does either activity put its female practitioners at any great risk for STDs or accidental pregnancy, since these are women who own condoms and know how to use them. It’s young (and not so young) people in the fuzzy-headed throes of romantic love or lust (sure, there’s such a thing as "romantic lust") who fall prey to the "spontaneity" fallacy or simply cannot force themselves to hold back until someone has gone out and procured the necessary protective gear. Call girls don’t go "oops," and last week’s "friend" probably doesn’t either. Certainly my own friends who use the sexier personals sites (say, Nerve rather than Chemistry.com) don’t make amateur’s mistakes. They can’t afford to.

Now, "Female promiscuity — hobby or symptom?" Contemporary understanding points to neither, or both, or to questioning the entire category, since the word itself implies deviation from an assumed non-promiscuous norm. For the last 60 years or so, the basic sociobiological story has gone something like this: Men are naturally promiscuous (and interested in nubile young women) because sperm is cheap and the best route to reproductive success is to shoot (and shoot, and shoot) and run. Women, meanwhile, are naturally (if serially) monogamous because pregnancy and infancy are expensive and they will need the help of a well-to-do, physically strong male to help them achieve reproductive success. More recent research has served to completely bollux-up our tidy story, though.

"Chimpanzee males trade meat for sex!" announced pretty much every media outlet in April. No surprise there, really, but it also turned out that … female chimpanzees trade sex for meat. Lots of sex, although not on the first date, since they are not always in estrus at time of trade. Are they making bets on future help (and sperm donations) from males they are merely flirting with now? And are the males keeping a database of females who will later say yes? If they can carry on such complex sociosexual calculations, what else are they up to?

Meanwhile, our premier expert on the sociobiology of motherhood, Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, posits a revolutionary difference between ape societies and early (and modern) human ones, so big that it renders ape models even more useless than they already were as revisitable reservoirs of human history. Looking at modern hunter-gatherer societies, she sees cooperative parenting, a human invention, still in operation. It takes a village, in other words, men and women both, to raise a helpless human baby. And, looking back, the more we helped each other, the better our social and communication skills grew. Group responsibility for the children, she says, made us human.

More immediately apropos, perhaps, is the research (www.scientificblogging.com/news_articles/human_sex_roles_male_promiscuity_debunked_and_women_arent_all_picky_either) by Gillian Brown and associates, widely reported this spring, which examined mating behavior and reproductive success in 18 human societies and found that what people do depends on what else is going on: population density, differing life expectancies between the sexes, sex ratios, and a bunch of other variables made a huge difference in who was doing more or less of what with whom. Why this demonstration that humans are complex and adaptable should have come as much of a surprise to anyone, I couldn’t tell you. I admit, though, that I likewise couldn’t tell you that sociobiological research supports the innate wholesomeness of picking up men on Craigslist, and I doubt it ever will. I tend to be a worrier too, and I have certainly seen people, especially women, do a fair amount of psychic damage to themselves with ill-considered sex. But it would be pretty presumptuous to assume that last weeks "friend" is broken on the basis of, well, not knowing anything.

Love,

Andrea

P.S. Readers, what about you? Care to share your adventures in promiscuity, soul-deadening, life-affirming, or just plain OK? They would make a great column.

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Madcap laughs

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May 19, 2009

0

a&eletters@sfbg.com

SONIC REDUCER "I told you so" are the sweetest, shortest words in the lexicon of raving visionaries and maligned prophets, but Sir Richard Bishop is far too gentlemanly to resort to such snack-sized snarkery. Still, I’m thinking the world’s attentions and the brothers Bishop and their many projects might finally be harmonically, magically converging as I park myself on a thrift-store coach beside the charming Bishop in the airy, uncannily tidy West Oakland flat he shares with Mark Gergis (Porest, Neung Phak, Mono Pause).

After the 2007 death of Sun City Girl Charles Gocher, attentive underground music fans — who’ve revered the band for its determinedly DIY, cassette-culture cussedness — collectively blinked, rubbed their eyes, and wondered why they hadn’t paid closer attention to the endlessly productive Girls (even now issuing rarities via the new Napoleon and Josephine: Singles Volume 2 [Abduction]). Attention from figures like Bonnie "Prince" Billy (who told me that the Bishop Brothers’ Brothers Unconnected show at Slim’s was the best he saw last year) and labels such as Sub Pop, which talked to the Bishops about doing a best-of, soon followed.

Likewise Sublime Frequencies — the label Richard and Alan Bishop toiled on for years amid accusations that they were ripping off artists, failing to follow academic protocol, and simply not applying enough polish to their rough aesthetic — began to get its due as a groundbreaking disseminator of obscure sonic gems from such far-flung, seldom documented sites as Burma, Laos, and Western Sahara. Richard, who is less involved with the imprint these days, says they’ve become adept at tracking down and paying the performers. Today, the label gets the kind of praise it richly deserves, including a hefty feature by onetime naysayer Clive Bell in Wire. Sublime Frequencies is also producing the first European, non-Mideast tour by breathtaking Syrian folk-pop legend Omar Souleyman, whose Highway to Hassake (Sublime Frequencies, 2006) positively shreds with phase-shifted Arabic keyboard lines and frenetic beats.

Meanwhile Sir Richard is concentrating on his new Oakland life, bathed in the soft light and BART train roar streaming in from the ‘hood. "It seems like it’s alive here — whereas in Seattle it’s kind of dying and not just musically," he says happily. "This is not the best neighborhood, but when I go out the door, I’m alive, and I’m totally aware of what’s going on, and there’s just some cool creative energy to grasp onto."

Guitars and instruments are neatly clustered in an alcove across from a massive TV rigged to catch Mideast channels — perfectly tuned into Bishop’s current obsession with and studies into the music the half-Lebanese musician first heard his grandfather play on old cassettes. Here in Oakland — aided and abetted by the half-Iraqi Gergis and his collection of Middle Eastern MP3s, cassettes, VCDs, and vinyl — he’s been digging deeply into the music of Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt, a homecoming of sorts since Bishop started out studying Egyptology around the time of Sun City Girls’ early ’80s inception.

When Bishop started tracking his fine, even sublime new The Freak of Araby (Drag City) in Seattle, the switch from making a poppy electric-guitar album to one centered on Middle Eastern-related originals and covers was a natural one — a tribute to his latest fave, Egyptian guitarist Omar Khorshid. Bishop scrambled to learn new songs in six days, but he’s pleased with the result, which he’ll fill out live with tour mate Oaxacan as his backing combo. The disc "was very rushed, and I didn’t have time to hash out a lot of the ideas," he says. "There are people who are not going to like it, but that’s okay, it never bothered me before!" And with that, the jolly Sir Richard laughs. *

SIR RICHARD BISHOP AND HIS FREAK OF ARABY ENSEMBLE

Fri/22, 9:30 p.m., $10

Stork Club

2330 Telegraph, Oakl.

www.storkcluboakland.com

FITS AND WIGGLES

OBITS

Drive Like Jehu and Hot Snakes are in the Brooklyn post-punkers’ past, now gathering steam with Sub Pop singles and SXSW blather lather. Wed/20, 9 p.m., $10–$12. Bottom of the Hill, 1233 17th St., SF. www.bottomofthehill.com.

BLK JKS

Don’t fear the guitar solo, all ye Johannesburg black-rockers. Fri/22, 9 p.m., $12. Independent, 628 Divisadero, SF. www.theindependentsf.com

NOMO

Out now with Invisible Cities (Ubiquity), the polyrhythmic Midwestern mind-blowers destroyed all reservations at their last BOH show. Fri/22, 10 p.m., $10–$12. Bottom of the Hill, 1233 17th St., SF. www.bottomofthehill.com.

LADY SOVEREIGN

The pint-sized electro-grime poobabe finds a Cure with "So Human." Sun/24, 9 p.m., $18. Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell, SF. rickshawstop.com

Don’t change a Thing

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May 13, 2009

0

andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I found this on Craigslist. Please, please stop this poor girl before it’s too late! She should hear from a professional that she’d be sacrificing nerve endings to a bunch of dickweeds who are suckers for media standards. And they won’t even like her more. God help us.

advice please re labia — w4m

so im hearing mixed reviews from guys about a female’s labia. do guys prefer the labia minora to be big or small? because tons of my friends are seeking to have them made smaller (like by a lot) so they look like playboy types etc. is that what guys want? what turns men on? and why? any advice on what to do here for me??

‘Nuff said. Thank you.

Love,

A Concerned Citizen

(Seriously.)

Dear Concerned:

Oh, okay. Maybe she’ll see this and maybe she won’t, but obviously this is a thing, or a Thing, that affects a lot of young women, just as she says. "Tons" of her friends, though? I realize she’s posting from L.A., where you have to expect this sort of thing, but the image of busloads of girls she went to high school with or worked with at Hot Topic after school lining up for surgical "correction" is unsettling even me.

So, what is going on here? I’ve long assumed (this has been going on a while now) that women used to go a lifetime without seeing their own (it takes a mirror and the will to look) or anyone else’s labia in great detail unless they had chosen to be midwives or something, in which case they were busy.

Men used to see a few sets, all too different from each other to even form much of a preconceived notion of what they "ought" to look like. Hardly anybody used to view an endless parade of stunt labia, chosen or surgically altered to conform to a (sub)cultural standard. But since the 1990s or so, that is exactly what we are doing. The porn industry standard is tiny, close-to-the-body, and unusually symmetrical, and if that is what young men are seeing before they even get a peek at the real thing, I suppose it’s to be expected that some may be shocked or dismayed by reality’s asymmetry and wild diversity of form, and in some cases indignant that they did not get exactly what they were in the mood for. It works with YouTube and iPods!

At least with pubic hair (a similar issue with young men being shocked on first encounter), one can go with the fashion flow and change with it as it (inevitably) changes. The same cannot be said for surgical rearrangements.

Now, how do I feel about young women permanently altering themselves to suit male fancy? I think it might be a trick question, actually, since I’m not entirely sure that that many guys care that much. What if they do, though — ought a young woman scramble to put herself through a painful, expensive, dangerous (all surgery is dangerous) procedure to please guys who probably still won’t be that into her if they’re not already? Of course not. Nothing is ever that simple, though.

Most of the Web sites put up by surgeons who do these procedures talk a great deal about painful horseback-riding or bicycling or inability to wear pants, all very real if somewhat rare complications of very long or loose labia. Then they give a little nod to being displeased with the size, period, and that’s the population we’re worrying about here. A reputable surgeon is going to accept or reject patients based not only on physical factors but emotional ones as well, especially patient expectations ("this surgery will make my labia smaller" versus "this surgery will make me stop hating myself"). And I hate to say this, Concerned Dude, but there are plenty of women (and men too, of course) whose self-esteem problems really can be cleared right up with the proper application of surgical instruments. I hate to see people who undergo surgery, itself morally neutral and a personal choice, treated like brainwashed sheeple who could not possibly have had a good enough reason to go under the knife.

As for the nerve endings, while I was appalled to see this statement — There is no physiological association for sensory pleasure with the labia — that function is served by the clitoris. The only sensation elicited from labia is pain upon tearing or stretching. — on one of the surgeon’s sites, since it is obviously wrong and very condescending in that surgeon-y way as well, I think we have to concede that the labia are not the major, or even a major, route to sexual ecstasy for most women. A half-inch or so less here or there is not going to make much difference. Not that that’s any reason to go chopping them off, though, sheesh! L.A. Girl, don’t listen to your girlfriends. You’re fine. None of you knows enough yet about what men want, or, much more important, about what you want yourselves. Don’t change a thing!

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Bicycle Art: Bike dance with the Derailleurs

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May 13, 2009

2

In honor of Bike to Work week, we’re featuring one aspect of bicycle art per day. Check back regularly for homages to Cyclecide, Bicycle Porn, the Bicycle Film Festival, and more. By Molly Freedenberg

de rail leur [di-rey-ler]. noun:

1. a gear shifting mechanism on a bicycle that shifts the drive chain from one sprocket wheel to another

2. a Bay Area-based group of badass girls who dance on, with, and about bikes

The Derailleurs. Clockwise from left: Agents Contrary, Flux, Chaos (Eliza Strack), Joke Star, Agitator, Verve (Hollis Hawthorne), Take the Lane, DoubleOO, and Edge. Photo by Alicia Sangiuliano.

Perhaps my favorite development in the world of bicycle art is bike dance, the strange and beautiful hybrid between high school drill team and BMX bike crew.

It all started – in its current form, at least – with the Sprockettes, who formed almost six years ago in Portland. A group of bold, fun-loving ladies donned pink and black outfits and performed synchronized dance and bike tricks at the Multnomah Bike Fair, a one-time show that was so popular, it not only grew into a regularly-performing dance troupe, but spawned a bona fide movement.

Inspired by the Sprockettes, bike enthusiasts in other cities began to form their own troupes, each choosing their own “power colors” and establishing unique identities with their own combination of synchronized moves, bike tricks, acrobatics, and fire. (Check out a full description of the history of bike dance here.)

Film review: “Treeless Mountain”

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May 13, 2009

0

By Natalie Gregory

So Yong Kim’s Treeless Mountain follows two young Korean sisters, Jin and Bin, and their transient lifestyle. Their mother leaves them with their aunt to search for their father, whose absence is unexplained. What’s remarkable is how Kim captures the independence experienced by these young girls (Jin, the elder sister, is six). The film is told mainly from Jin’s perspective, following her as she mourns the absence of her mother and ponders how to protect her sister. As they are passed to their aunt, the girls’ are told that their mother will return when their piggy bank is full. They sell grasshoppers to quicken the process and begin to fill the bank in hopes of their mother’s return. Jin’s realizations of her and her sister’s reality are heartbreaking. In the end, the pair ends up in a happier home, but have grown up all too quickly. Evoking emotions without the benefit of an overbearing musical score, it is a thoughtful, melancholy picture.

Treeless Mountain opens Fri/15 in Bay Area theaters.

alt.sex.column: Don’t change a Thing

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May 13, 2009

0

By Andrea Nemerson. View more alt.sex columns here. Email your questions to Andrea: andrea@altsexcolumn.com.

Dear Andrea:

I found this on Craigslist. Please, please stop this poor girl before it’s too late! She should hear from a professional that she’d be sacrificing nerve endings to a bunch of dickweeds who are suckers for media standards. And they won’t even like her more. God help us.

advice please re labia — w4m

so im hearing mixed reviews from guys about a female’s labia. do guys prefer the labia minora to be big or small? because tons of my friends are seeking to have them made smaller (like by a lot) so they look like playboy types etc. is that what guys want? what turns men on? and why? any advice on what to do here for me??

‘Nuff said. Thank you.

Love,

A Concerned Citizen

(Seriously.)

Dear Concerned:

Oh, okay. Maybe she’ll see this and maybe she won’t, but obviously this is a thing, or a Thing, that affects a lot of young women, just as she says. "Tons" of her friends, though? I realize she’s posting from L.A., where you have to expect this sort of thing, but the image of busloads of girls she went to high school with or worked with at Hot Topic after school lining up for surgical "correction" is unsettling even me.

So, what is going on here? I’ve long assumed (this has been going on a while now) that women used to go a lifetime without seeing their own (it takes a mirror and the will to look) or anyone else’s labia in great detail unless they had chosen to be midwives or something, in which case they were busy.

Velo-mutations

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May 13, 2009

0

P>I’ve been aware of the intersection between alternative culture and bicycles since 1996, when I saw my first tall bike at Reed College in Portland, Ore. Since then, I’ve seen bikes at Burning Man tricked out with paint, fun fur, and EL wire. Bikes at Critical Mass made to look like animals or disco balls. Bike-powered carnival rides at Coachella. And punk girls, dressed in pink, dancing on minibikes at Tour de Fat.

But it wasn’t until "The Art of the Bicycle," an underground multimedia art show and party held in a warehouse in the Mission District last May, that I came to understand how these were each parts of a greater whole — spokes in the wheel of a bicycle culture that centers around creativity, empowerment, and, above all, fun. It also became clear, as I sipped cheap beer and listened to live punk rock in an unpermitted space, that this culture was very different from the road bike culture my dad (and his Spandex shorts) was a part of in the 1980s — or even the activist culture my friends in the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition are in now.

No, this bike culture is something else. Rooted in DIY principles, punk and anarchist values, a good dose of geekiness, and rejection of the mainstream, the alternative bike culture that exists in San Francisco and beyond is an entirely different animal — and it’s growing up fast.

In the Bay Area alone, there’s Cyclecide, a bicycle club known for mutating found and rejected bikes into new forms and pedal-powered rides, as well as for their carnie aesthetic and rodeo-inspired antics; the Derailleurs, a group of women who dance on, with, and about bicycles; and the Trunk Boiz, an Oakland-based community of kids who pimp out their bicycles the way their older brothers might’ve pimped out their low-riders; and many others — all of whom operate outside the realm of traditional bike culture or politics.

And each of these are connected to a greater network of bicycle artists across the country and the world. The past decade has seen the birth of the Portland-based Bicycle Porn festival, which screened films showing the sexiness of (or near) bikes at Victoria Theater last November; as well as the New York City-based Bicycle Film Festival, which had its first West Coast showing in San Francisco several years ago and now visits 39 cities per year. There are now more than 120 bicycle clubs all over the world, with originals like Black Label growing so big it has 40 chapters of its own. And only five years after the first bicycle dance troupe, the Sprockettes, was formed in Portland, there are 11 bicycle dance troupes worldwide.

But who are these people? Why are they so inspired by bikes? And why make art with or about them, rather than just ride them? The answer is complex. For some, the bike is simply a beautiful machine, an engineering problem whose solution hasn’t changed much since the 1600s but whose application is infinite. For others, it’s the bike’s democracy that’s so appealing: cheap, accessible, and available to all kinds of riders. Some see the bike as a vehicle for change, undermining car culture and the politics involved in non-people-powered transportation.

But what seems to tie all these people together is a counterculture instinct. These are artists, musicians, and math geeks. They’re the same people who may have been drawn to skateboarding or surfing (before both became commercial and mainstream), punk shows, Dumpster diving, or even Stitch ‘n’ Bitch parties. It’s a community of people dissatisfied with the status quo and filled with the imagination and ambition to work outside it — if not against it.

"We wanted to have fun," said Jarico Reesce, about founding Cyclecide in 1997. "And we wanted to break every rule we could." (Molly Freedenberg)

Welcome to Jersey: Checking the latest Real Housewives

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May 12, 2009

0

By Kimberly Chun

Real Housewives of New Jersey: down-to-earth, grown-up Jersey girls – or The Sopranos with big hair, McMansions, and surgically enhanced “bubbies”? I was dying to know after getting sucked into the show’s sneak-preview special – now being aired nonstop on Bravo – so I took a peek into a conference call arranged by NBC Universal-Bravo. On the line: the tough-talking, red-headed matriarch Caroline Manzo, who comes off as softer and much less malevolent sans dramatic edits, and her dark-eyed, down-low sister-in-law Jacqueline Laurita. The Real Housewives of New Jersey premieres tonight, May 12, with a new episode every Tuesday night on Bravo.

Q: Caroline, my first question’s for you. I was just wondering if you could tell us a little bit about the early years leading up to the life you have now.

Caroline Manzo: Sure. I met my husband actually 28 years ago. We will be celebrating our 25th anniversary this July. And when we first started the Brownstone was a very, very young business in its infancy, at least for the Manzo family, and we struggled. My husband, at that time, made less than $200 a week, and we lived in a small apartment above the Brownstone, and we lived there for a couple of years, and then we had our first son, Albie.

Ask a Porn Star: “Porns stars are over!”

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May 4, 2009

1

In Which Super Sexy Porn People Answer Questions –each week– From Bay Area Locals. View the last installment here.

By Justin Juul

Fielding your questions this month is AVN’s current “Transsexual Performer of The Year,” Wendy Williams. Check out some of her stuff and then send some questions here.

Trent B: What is the best place for a transsexual to live?
Williams: Um….the most progressive place in the U.S. is probably New York. Last year’s “AVN Transsexual Performer of The Year,” Allanah Starr, started a huge huge party trend there and so there’s a lot to do now…just parties and clubs where girls like us can go out and meet guys. Los Angeles is also a great place to be. I spend tons of time there. And then San Francisco, obviously. But that’s just America. There are plenty of great spots overseas too. London, for example. There’s a huge circuit there, mostly cross dressers and transvestites, but it’s still fun. There’s a spot called The Way Out Club in London that caters to girls like us. I love it there.

Lisa N: Do you feel more comfortable with other transsexuals?

Film review: ‘American Violet’

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May 4, 2009

0

By Natalie Gregory

Lawyer movies can be really entertaining. Tim Disney’s American Violet certainly is. I was sucked in from minute one. Based on true events, it’s the story of Dee Roberts (an awesome performance by Nicole Beharie), a single mother with four little girls living in the projects of a small Texas town. In these particular projects, there are frequent drug raids. The law states that a single informant’s testimony justifies an indictment — and Dee is wrongfully accused. ACLU lawyer David Cohen (a brilliant Tim Blake Nelson), believes Dee’s community is being harassed because residents are black, although the theory is very difficult to prove. The district attorney Calvin Beckett (a sadistic Michael O’Keefe) is tough, and he likes plea bargains. David, Dee, and do-the-right-thing local lawyer Sam Conroy (the great Will Patton) challenge Beckett. American Violet is not only an interesting story, it’s based on a true one. You can’t help rooting for Dee and hoping that justice will prevail.

American Violet Trailer

AMERICAN VIOLET opens Fri/1 in Bay Area theaters.

Sex sells…coffee?

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May 1, 2009

3

By Molly Freedenberg

Wow, this coffee is hot. And I’m not talking about when it’s brewed. SV Holdings, the parent company that operates Stella and Victoria pastry companies, has launched its own line of organic roasts – and the packaging is downright sizzling.

The central theme is vintage pin-up girls whose poses and phrases are meant to embody the characteristics of the coffee inside the bag. A va-va-va-voom hourglass in a Jessica Rabbit dress nearly commands you to drink the bold, intense Espresso Roast by saying, “come taste how strong I am.” A smoky-eyed brunette kneeling on the cover of the Full Body Roast wants you to know “I’m known to be full bodied and rich in flavor” — and also seems to want you to come to bed with her. And your incentive for drinking the Breakfast Blend? The playful, lingerie-clad reminds you to “wake up with me every morning!”