Hip-hop

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
-
0

Stage listings are compiled by Guardian staff. Performance times may change; call venues to confirm. Reviewers are Robert Avila, Rita Felciano, and Nicole Gluckstern. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

THEATER

ONGOING

Absolutely San Francisco Alcove Theater, 414 Mason, Ste 502, SF; (415) 992-8168, www.thealcovetheater.com. $32-50. Schedule varies, through Dec 29. Not Quite Opera Productions presents Anne Nygren Doherty’s musical about San Francisco, with five characters all portrayed by Mary Gibboney.

Cinderella Buriel Clay Theater, African American Art and Culture Complex, 762 Fulton, SF; 1-800-838-3006, www.african-americanshakes.org. $10-35. Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat/10, 3pm); Sun, 3pm. Through Dec 18. African-American Shakespeare Company opens its season with a re-telling of the fairy tale set in the bayous of Louisiana.

Dr. Strangelove: LIVE Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF; www.darkroomsf.com. $20. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through Dec 17. Stage adaptation of Stanley Kubrick’s classic cold war comedy.

*Fela! Curran Theatre, 445 Geary, SF; www.shnsf.com. $31-200. Wed/7-Sat/10, 8pm (also Wed/7 and Sat/10, 2pm); Sun/11, 2pm. Director-choreographer Bill T. Jones’s highly successful Off-Broadway to Broadway musical (with book by Jones and Jim Lewis; additional lyrics by Lewis; and additional music by Aaron Johnson and Jordan McLean) proves worth the hype. With a prodigious performance at the center of it all by Sahr Ngaujah (rotating in the title role with Adesola Osakalumi), this is less a biography than euphoric and vehement musical party, sermon, and political rally at once. At the same time, enough of the career and times of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti (1938–1997) come through — amid a gorgeous video-enhanced street-art design scheme, and ecstatic live music and choreography deployed with contagious bravado — that there is no missing the contemporary relevance in the Nigerian Afrobeat legend and popular activist-outlaw who stood up for a devastated population against the Western imperialism and international corporate tyranny fronted by Nigeria’s oil-trading military regime. The only thing that would make this show better would be seeing it down at an Occupy encampment. (Avila)

The Golden Girls: The Christmas Episodes Victoria Theatre 2961 16th St, SF; www.trannyshack.com. $30. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through Dec 23. Despite the unseasonably warm weather last week, it was beginning to feel a lot like Christmas, circa 1987, thanks to the return of four luminous drag queens and a little TV-to-stage holiday special that, after six years, can safely be called a San Francisco tradition. Heklina (Dorothy), Pollo Del Mar (Rose), Matthew Martin (Blanche), and Cookie Dough (Sophia) are the older ladies of Miami, delivering verbatim two episodes of the famed sitcom, each with a special gay yuletide theme — fleshed out by special guests Laurie Bushman (as Blanche’s gay kid brother Clayton) and Manuel Caneri (as thinly disguised lesbian Jean). (Opening night also saw special appearances by morning-radio personalities and emcees Fernando Ventura and Greg Sherrell.) Of course, a Word for Word production this isn’t. Knowing drag mischief and unflappable performances allow a certain welcome latitude in attitude, not to mention costuming, which is wonderful in that Pasadena estate sale way: a veritable bazaar of ’80s bizarre. (Avila)

*The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through Dec 18. This new autobiographical solo show by Don Reed, writer-performer of the fine and long-running East 14th, is another slice of the artist’s journey from 1970s Oakland ghetto to comedy-circuit respectability — here via a partial debate-scholarship to UCLA. The titular Los Angeles residency hotel was where Reed lived and worked for a time in the 1980s while attending university. It’s also a rich mine of memory and material for this physically protean and charismatic comic actor, who sails through two acts of often hilarious, sometimes touching vignettes loosely structured around his time on the hotel’s young wait staff, which catered to the needs of elderly patrons who might need conversation as much as breakfast. On opening night, the episodic narrative seemed to pass through several endings before settling on one whose tidy moral was delivered with too heavy a hand, but if the piece runs a little long, it’s only the last 20 minutes that noticeably meanders. And even with some awkward bumps along the way, it’s never a dull thing watching Reed work. (Avila)

Ladies in Waiting Exit Stage Left, 156 Eddy, SF; www.horrorunspeakable.com. $20. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through Dec 17. No Nude Men Productions presents three one-acts by Alison Luterman, Claire Rice, and Hilde Susan Jaegtnes.

Language Rooms Thick House, 1695 18th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $20-28. Thurs/8-Sat/10, 8pm; Sun/11, 7pm. The immigrant experience has some familiar familial dynamics across the board. Parents, for instance, can easily discover their Americanized children becoming embarrassed by the older generation’s “foreign” ways. Allegiances potentially strain much further, however, when the immigrant story gets entwined with a little narrative called the “war on terror.” That’s the volatile mixture at the center of Yussef El Guindi’s Language Rooms, a somewhat uneven but ultimately worthwhile new play that leverages absurdist comedy to interrogate the perversion of basic human sympathies post-9/11. Seattle-based playwright El Guindi (whose other Bay Area productions include Back of the Throat and the hilarious Jihad Jones and the Kalashnikov Babes) well knows that the transformation of nightmare into bureaucratic routine is a reality sometimes best broached in a comic vein. (Avila)

The Last Five Years Boxcar Playhouse, 505 Natoma, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $20-35. Thurs-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through Dec 18. Poor Man’s Players performs Jason Robert Brown’s relationship drama as its inaugural production.

Mommy Queerest Bindlestiff Studio, 185 Sixth St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $15-25. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through Dec 17. Kat Evasco performs her autobiographical show about being the lesbian daughter of a lesbian mother.

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh San Francisco, Studio Theater, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Thurs-Fri, 8pm; Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 3pm. Extended through Dec 17. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. (Avila)

*On the Air Pier 29 on the Embarcadero (at Battery), SF; (415) 438-2668, love.zinzanni.org. $117 and up (includes dinner). Showtimes vary, through Dec 31. Teatro ZinZanni’s final production at its longtime nest on Pier 29 is a nostalgia-infused banquet of bits structured around an old-time radio variety show, featuring headliners Geoff Hoyle (Geezer) and blues singer Duffy Bishop. If you haven’t seen juggling on the radio, for instance, it’s pretty awesome, especially with a performer like Bernard Hazens, whose footing atop a precarious tower of tubes and cubes is already cringingly extraordinary. But all the performers are dependably first-rate, including Andrea Conway’s comic chandelier lunacy, aerialist and enchanting space alien Elena Gatilova’s gorgeous “circeaux” act, graceful hand-balancer Christopher Phi, class-act tapper Wayne Doba, and radio MC Mat Plendl’s raucously tweeny hula-hooping. Add some sultry blues numbers by raunchy belter Bishop, Hoyle’s masterful characterizations (including some wonderful shtick-within-a-shtick as one-liner maestro “Red Bottoms”), a few classic commercials, and a healthy dose of audience participation and you start to feel nicely satiated and ready for a good cigar. Smoothly helmed by ZinZanni creative director Norm Langill, On the Air signals off-the-air for the popular dinner circus — until it can secure a new patch of local real estate for its antique spiegeltent — so tune in while you may. (Avila)

*Period of Adjustment SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter, SF; (415) 677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org. $20-50. Tues-Thurs, 7pm (also Dec 21-22, 2pm); Fri-Sat, 9pm (also Sat, 3pm; no show Dec 24). Through Jan 14. A nervous young man with an unaccountable tremor, George Haverstick (a compellingly manic Patrick Alparone) has waited until his honeymoon to finally call on his old Korean War buddy, Ralph (a stout but tender Johnny Moreno) — only to drop his new bride, Isabel (the terrifically quick and sympathetic MacKenzie Meehan), at the doorstep and hurry away. As it happens, Ralph’s wife of five years, Dorothea (an appealing Maggie Mason), has just quit him and taken their young son with her, turning the family Christmas tree and its uncollected gifts into a forlorn monument to a broken home — which, incidentally, has a tremor of its own, having been built atop a vast cavern. Tennessee Williams calls his 1960 play “a serious comedy,” which is about right, since although things end on a warm and cozy note, the painful crises of two couples and the lost natures of two veterans — buried alive in two suburbs each called “High Point” — are the stuff of real distress. SF Playhouse artistic director Bill English gets moving but clear-eyed, unsentimental performances from his strong cast — bolstered by Jean Forsman and Joe Madero as Dorothea’s parents—whose principals do measured justice to the complex sexual and psychological tensions woven throughout. If not one of Williams’s great plays, this is an engaging and surprisingly memorable one just the same, with the playwright’s distinctive blend of the metaphorical and concrete. As a rare snowfall blankets this Memphis Christmas Eve, 1958, something dark and brooding lingers in the storybook cheer. (Avila)

A Tale of Two Genres SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter, SF; (415) 869-5384, www.un-scripted.com. $10-20. Thurs-Sat and Dec 20-21, 8pm (also Sat, 3pm). Through Dec 21. Un-Scripted Theater Company presents an improvised musical inspired by Charles Dickens.

The Temperamentals New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; (415) 861-8972, www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through Dec 18. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Jon Marans’ drama about gay rights during the McCarthy era.

Three Sisters Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; (415) 255-8207, www.42ndstmoon.org. $20-50. Wed, 7pm; Thurs-Fri, 8pm; Sat, 6pm (also Sat/10, 1pm); Sun, 3pm. Through Dec 18. 42nd Street Moon performs Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II’s World War I-set musical.

Totem Grand Chapiteau, AT&T Park, Parking Lot A, 74 Mission Rock, SF; cirquedusoleil.com/totem. $58-248.50. Tues-Sun, schedule varies. Extended through Dec 18. Cirque Du Soleil returns with its latest big-top production.

The Treasure of the Himawari Shrine: Another Mr. YooWho Adventure NOHspace, 2840 Mariposa, SF; 1-800-838-3006, www.brownpapertickets.com. $5-18. Fri-Sat, 7pm; Sun, 3pm. Through Dec 18. Master clown Moshe Cohen’s creation Mr. YooWho returns with a Japan-set adventure.

*Working for the Mouse Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $22. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through Dec 17. It might not come as a surprise to hear that even “the happiest place on earth” has a dark side, but hearing Trevor Allen describe it during this reprise of 2002’s Working for the Mouse will put a smile on your face as big as Mickey’s. With a burst of youthful energy, Allen bounds onto the tiny stage of Impact Theatre to confess his one-time aspiration to never grow up — a desire which made auditioning for the role of Peter Pan at Disneyland a sensible career move. But in order to break into the big time of “charactering,” one must pay some heavy, plush-covered dues. As Allen creeps up the costumed hierarchy one iconic cartoon figure at a time, he finds himself unwittingly enmeshed in a world full of backroom politics, union-busting, drug addled surfer dudes with peaches-and-cream complexions, sexual tension, showboating, job suspension, Make-A-Wish Foundation heartbreak, hash brownies, rabbit vomit, and accidental decapitation. Smoothly paced and astutely crafted, Mouse will either shatter your blissful ignorance or confirm your worst suspicions about the corporate Disney machine, but either way, it will probably make you treat any “Casual Seasonal Pageant Helpers” you see running around in their sweaty character suits with a whole lot more empathy. (Note: review from the show’s recent run at La Val’s Subterranean in Berkeley.) (Gluckstern)

Xanadu New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; (415) 861-8972, www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Previews Wed/7-Fri/9, 8pm. Opens Sat/10, 8pm. Runs Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through Jan 15. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs the retro roller-skating musical.

BAY AREA

*The Glass Menagerie Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller, Mill Valley; www.marintheatre.org. $34-55. Runs Tues, Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Dec 17, 2pm); Wed, 7:30pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through Dec 18. Marin Theatre Company performs the Tennessee Williams classic.

God’s Plot Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby, Berk; (510) 841-6500, www.shotgunplayers.org. $18-27. Thurs, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 5pm (starting Dec 15, also runs Wed, 7pm). Through Jan 15. Writer-director Mark Jackson’s historical drama, set in 1665 Virginia, closes out Shotgun Players’ 20th anniversary season.

Rambo: The Missing Years Cabaret at Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Thurs/8-Fri/9, 7pm; Sat/10, 8:30pm. Howard “Hanoi Howie” Petrick presents his solo show about being an anti-war demonstrator — while also serving in the Army.

The Secret Garden TheatreWorks at Lucie Stern Theatre, 1305 Middlefield, Palo Alto; (650) 463-1960, www.theatreworks.org. $19-72. Tues-Wed, 7:30pm; Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm; Dec 24, shows at 1 and 6pm); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through Dec 31. TheatreWorks performs the Tony Award-winning musical adaptaion of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s novel.

The Soldier’s Tale Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; (510) 843-4822, www.auroratheatre.org. $10-55. Tues, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through Dec 18. It has all the hallmarks of greatness: puppetry, finely-honed chamber music, a noteworthy composer, a fresh translation, a prima ballerina, a note-worthy cast and crew, and an enviable collaboration with one of the consistently pitch-perfect directors in the Bay Area. Even so “The Soldier’s Tale,” at the Aurora Theatre, doesn’t quite feel like a fully-realized theatrical production, but rather an highly-ambitious workshop. The relatively straightforward storyline, narrated by L. Peter Callender—a soldier strikes an ill-fated Faustian bargain with the smooth-talking Devil, a gleefully wicked Joan Mankin—becomes bogged down in its staging, principally between the soldier, a four-foot tall puppet, and his mostly-puppeteer Muriel Maffre, a six-foot tall dancer. Not only does it become quickly apparent that Maffre’s puppeting skills, while earnest, don’t impart the vital spark of life into her shuffling charge, but she then abandons him to the  stage crew halfway through the show in order to portray the ailing daughter of the king. Her short but sweet, balletic interpretation of the role is definitely the evening’s highlight, and while it is commendable for her to also choose to serve in the role of puppeteer, it doesn’t quite transport the imagination. However, the Stravinsky score, inventively performed by a quartet of Earplay ensemble players, directed by Mary Chun, does. (Gluckstern) The Wild Bride Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2015 Addison, Berk; (510) 647-2949, www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Opens Wed/7, 8pm. Runs Tues, Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Thurs and Sat, 2pm; no matinees Thurs/8 or Dec 15); Wed and Sun, 7pm (also Sun, 2pm; no matinee Jan 1). Through Jan 1. Britain’s Kneehigh Theatre Company returns to Berkeley Rep with the American premiere of Emma Rice’s grown-up fairy tale.

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Sun and Dec 26-30, 11am (no show Dec 25). Through Dec 31. Louis “The Amazing Bubble Man” Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

“Cut the Crap! With Semi-Motivational Guru, Clam Lynch” Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF; www.darkroomsf.com. Dec 16, Jan 6, Jan 13, 10:30pm. $15. Get motivated with self-help-guru-satirizing comedian Clam Lynch.

“Dance-Along Nutcracker: Clara’s Magical Mystery Tour” Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 701 Mission, SF; (415) 978-ARTS, www.dancealongnutcracker.org. Sat, 7pm; Sun, 11am and 3pm. $16-50. The annual tradition returns, as the San Francisco Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band presents a tribute to the Summer of Love.

“The Dog Show” Z Space, 450 Florida, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Thurs-Sun, 8pm. $20. New performance work by Laura Arrington and Jesse Hewit/Strong Behavior.

Kunst-Stoff Kunst-Stoff Arts, One Grove, SF; www.kunst-stoff.org. Thurs-Sat, 8:30pm. $15. The contemporary dance company performs its home season, divided into three programs featuring guests and multiple premieres.

Mark Foehringer Dance Project | SF Children’s Creativity Museum, 221 Fourth St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Sat-Sun, 11am, 2pm, 4pm; Dec 20-23, 11am and 2pm. Through Dec 23. $20-35. The contemporary ballet company performs Mark Foehringer’s Nutcracker Sweets.

“The Nutcracker” Palace of Fine Arts Theater, 3301 Lyon, SF; www.cityboxoffice.com. Sat-Sun, 2pm (also Sat, 7). $20-35. City Ballet School, featuring performers ages 6-19, presents the holiday classic.

ODC/Dance Novellus Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard, SF; (415) 978-2787, www.odcdance.org. Thurs-Fri, 11am; Sat, 1 and 4pm; Sun, 2pm. $15-45. The company presents the 25th

anniversary of KT Nelson’s The Velveteen Rabbit.

“Previously Secret Information” Stage Werx, 445 Valencia, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Sun, 7pm, $15. Joel Selvin, Will and Deb Durst, Sammy Obeid, and Joe Klocek tell true tales.

“The Revolutionary Nutcracker Sweetie: The Kidz Version” Brava Theater, 2781 24th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Sat, 2 and 6pm; Sun, 1 and 5pm. $15-17. The traditional ballet performed with a twist: Taiko drumming, hip-hop, trapeze artists, and more. Presented by Dance Brigade.

“Why Is the Fat One Always Angry” Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF; www.kellidunham.com. Sat, 10pm, $10-20. The genderqueer Brooklynite performs her solo comedy show.

Art Basel frontlines: SCOPEing out Friday

Andrew Lam
-
1

Guardian photos by Paula Connelly

Art Basel is not the only show in Miami’s town this weekend. In addition to every gallery, boutique, and busy streetcorner hosting its own opening of varying degrees of importance, there are approximately 2,100 smaller art fairs going on (give or take). One of these is SCOPE, which I heard about first because urban art trendsetter SF gallery White Walls was trucking some canvases of ABOVE’s stenciled hip-hop dancers– and street artist ROA’s drawings of animals in capitivity, etched on wooden crates — down to show. (CORRECTION: ROA’s publicist has informed us that his installation is not wood etchings. His mediums are enamel, charcoal, China ink, aerosol and acrylic on found wood….no crates.) 

But to get into SCOPE, I first had to make it past the Alpine climber.

And I’m not talking Avery Lawrence’s “Moving a Tree,” though his real-life treadmilling amongst the artourists was a refreshing welcome to SCOPE’s cool white-tent embrace.

“Hi! I’m hear for press reg — ” I began, but didn’t take into account there was an older, wealthier European man with three likewise situated adults with him, behind me. 

“WELL WHAT IS THIS?” he bellowed, and the young woman at the front desk switched her attention like some money-seeking automaton. “Hello! This is SCOPE Festival!” 

“Is it mainly… emerging artists?” ventured the woman in tow with the man, who was now at my elbow at the front desk and had briefly given me a look of consolation when he realized he had asserted his importance over mine. Whatever, they paid first and then the other guy at the counter took pity on me and let me in. 

Everyone clucks when I tell them this story later in the wind of a South Beach hotel terrace. Were you trying to buy art? Well then. SCOPE, on its own, is responsible for $100 million in art sales each year. It concentrates on more edgy art — statement pieces, if you will. And there was some fantastically beautiful things on sales.

Here is the art fair to attend if you are interested in purchasing a life-size replica of a taco shack (Kenton Parker), multi-level traditional Iranian drawings wherein size-appropriate photographs of modern Iranians seamlessly collaged in (Soody Sharifi), Isabel Samaras‘ “Nuthatches With Attitude” (they’re wearing NWA hats and dookie gold and they’re adorable). But also, a rhinestone hamburger. 

This was the most serious buyer-seller discussion I heard, and yes I took photos of it with my Droid (above!) The couple were deciding between the basketball-sized hamburger, opened Lifesavers pack, or Chanel perfume bottle, all shiny and glorious. The Chanel bottle was beginning to rise above the hamburger, and the salewoman smoothly informed them “this one is $26,000. You see, the artist applies each stone individually. It really is amazing.” Reflecting on how little I wanted to see that puppy installed in someone’s home (or dressing room, e-blargh!) I moved on to eavesdrop on other, less trainwrecky people.

Later on the same day, a few blocks from SCOPE, we wandered into the Rubell Family Collection, currently hosting an exhibit featuring a room wallpapered in full Budweiser sixpacks (old label design) and sculptures of gravestones with putt-putt holes on the grass before them, human hands protruding from their flanks holding paper cups where their gravestone ears would be. It is called “American Exuberance,” but judging from my experience at SCOPE you could most likely have the same experience at any of the art fairs in Miami this weekend. Duh.  

How does it make you feel?

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
-
0
How does it make you feel?

arts@sfbg.com

MUSIC Africa Hitech makes intoxicating music. Programmed polyrhythms snake over punchy bass lines. Synthetic chord progressions crescendo and fall, disrupted by surges of 808 kicks, constellations of snares, outbursts of electric energy.

All the while, an offbeat rhythm assaults the interweaving drum patterns, unsettling any steady flow that might have taken shape. This tension pulls the music forward, destining outwards, while the bass anchors the body, whether on the dance floor or just mesmerized inwardly, a head in the groove.

The sound builds in momentum, in suspense, but with subtle patience, producing a great gathering of intensity — which if you happen to hear on the right sound system — exceeds its limit, and disorients, overwhelms, destructs, rejuvenates. It’s the Dionysian rave rewired for our times.

“We grew up in that whole bass line culture in the UK with dub, reggae, soul, and everything that’s come about after it and around it,” says Steve Spacek, who together with Mark Pritchard makes the duo Africa Hitech. “We try to tap into that amazing feeling of the frequency in the club when everyone’s getting down together on one vibe, one of the best feelings imaginable.”

Seasoned producers-vocalists Spacek and Pritchard have pursued this utopian vision of sound in their latest project. In the past couple years, Africa Hitech has released three EPs, including this month’s Do U Really Wanna Fight on Warp, and dropped a brilliant record earlier this spring, 93 Million Miles. The songs navigate two topological poles: the cosmic and the streets. While “The Sound of Tomorrow” and “Light the Way” evoke otherworldliness, the ecstatic openness of galactic space channeled by the likes of George Clinton’s Mothership and Sun Ra’s Arkestra, “Blen” and “Gangslap” gurgle in the enclosed terrain of frenetic polypercussion and dread inducing low end. Their vocals wreak both havoc and bliss on language: soulful croons give away to disembodied vocoder chants; or, Spacek unleashes a growling patois, and sample cuts dissipate in mutilated mantras, reconfigured on a stuttering trigger pad: “Out/ Out/ Out/ Out in the streets/ Out in the streets/ They call it murrderrrrr.”

“We’re trying to preserve the Jamaican sound system in the music we make,” says Spacek. “There’s all these so-called different genres, but we just see them as all just one family. In the end they’re just different tempos and sensibilities of the same rhythm.”

That rhythm, the swing, carries traces of its past. Its body has been dispersed across the Atlantic: marked by violence, labor, hybridization, creative upheavals and reversals, restless paths of migration and commerce, moments of resistance and dreams of redemption. In these diasporic unfoldings, the swing has evolved, adapted, mutated. Those struck by the rhythm have both reinvented its prosthetic origins and conjured alternative prophecies, sometimes in folkloric traditions, sometimes in the margins, on the limits of popular music or in the neglected underbellies of familiar acoustic space. Recall the recent ancestry. Mystic purveyors of dub armed the bass line in a highly weaponized electronic form; techno rebels programmed the soul of the machine with analog drum machines, keyboards, and sequencers; hip-hop and jungle collagists digitized the beat through cut and paste sample techniques, effect, and manipulation. Today, footwork, dubstep, funky, and all their kin tap into the same alchemy, spread spontaneously through the planetary dissolution wrought by cyberspace. Africa Hitech picks up here.

For Spacek and Pritchard, sonic oscillations between the cosmic and street, inner and outer, traces of the past and hyper-tech future, collapse in the simple and pure feeling of the intoxicating bass line. “We’re not trying to make music that’s deep and meaningful. We’re trying to make music that feels good … the kind of feeling that you can’t escape, and you don’t want to, you get lost in it,” says Spacek, the words now rushing out. “The bass becomes so immense that it’s literally rattling your ribcage. Some call it spiritual. It resonates. It makes sense, intuitively. But there’s some kind of emotion in there that we don’t quite understand. To some degree, we don’t want to understand it, maybe we can’t. We just want to feel it.”

AFRICA HITECH

With Jonwayne, Kush Arora, DJ Dials

Thurs/1, 10 p.m.

Public Works

161 Erie, SF (415) 932-0955

www.publicsf.com

Swing, shift

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
-
0
Swing, shift

arts@sfbg.com

DANCE Have you ever climbed a steep mountain but were unsure that your lungs or legs would hold up to get you to the top? Or felt a relationship slip through your fingers before you were barely aware of what happened? How about feeling your feet firmly planted, only to land suddenly on your behind? The performers in Stacey Printz’s new Hover Space, her most ambitious project yet, are finding out that their dance floor is putting the lie to such basic concepts as grounding, balance, gravity, or momentum. The space moves up and down and tilts at precarious angles, and yet the dancers appear to have the times of their lives.

At a late rehearsal in Z Space at Theater Artaud for the upcoming Hover Space, they giggle and struggle, accommodate and resist the demands of this unstable environment. The 75-minute work may be physically challenging, but thematically Printz believes that it rests on a solid, if volatile, base.

“How do long-term relationships sustain themselves?” the dancer, choreographer, wife, and mother asked herself. “What does it look like in a place of contentment when you have peace and support, though you have learned to listen and compromise?” For Printz it means being feeling grounded, and therefore being secure enough to take larger risks, “do crazier things” and expand into more new worlds. For some people that solidity comes through relationships, she says; others find it in themselves though “this space cannot be static because the moment you lose the ebb and flow, it’s dead.”

It’s good reasoning from a dancer-choreographer who has always refused to be pinned down. Still an awesomely strong performer, Printz draws on jazz, modern, some ethnic forms, and hip-hop, disciplines in which she has both trained and performed. If the term “fusion” didn’t suggest borrowing, perhaps even an essential lack of artistic independence, she wouldn’t mind the description. “But this is who I am,” she says. “This is how I push myself the most.”

Having a foot in several worlds has given Printz access to a creative freedom that informs the choreography for her own company but which is most strongly seen in her own dancing. For instance, last October’s WestWave Dance Festival piece If You Knew — a duet with beatboxer-musician Tommy Shepherd — was a fulminating explosion of rhythm and motion, with the two of them challenging each other to an ever-higher degree of virtuosity. But she has also challenged her own (and other) dancers to step beyond their own comfort levels. In the 2009 spitfire Cross Talk, the members of the National Folk Theatre of Ireland loosened up their torsos while Printz’s barefoot dancers shone in pristinely precise footwork.

In addition to choreographing for her own 11-year old company, Printz regularly collaborates with Marc Bamuthi Joseph on his multi-genre theater pieces. “I have known him for a long time, and I know how his body moves, so I can give him what he needs within a specific context,” she explains. But working with Bamuthi gives Printz what few choreographers working on someone else’s show get: time and respect. “He is brilliant and has the resources and a big umbrella under which we all can work together for months,” she says.

She also learned that “if you bring in collaborators, let them do what they do best.” Bamuthi lets her make her own gifts to his projects.

Printz’s primary collaborators for Hover Space are her 12 dancers, the largest group she has ever worked with locally. The choreography of a dozen or so distinct episodes includes looks at the relationships of three very different couples. While she often uses pre-recorded music, for her first evening-length piece Printz has invited DJ-composer Kraddy (a.k.a. Matthew Kratz) to join the team. Designer Sean Riley suspended the 12×15 movable platform from Z Space’s ceiling. David Szlaza created the lights; Catherine Myre signed on for the costumes.

HOVER SPACE

Wed/30-Sat/3, 8 p.m., $22–<\d>$25

Z Space at Theater Artaud

450 Florida, SF www.brownpapertickets.com

Madlib’s Medicine Show returns to SF

Tony Robles
-
0
Madlib’s Medicine Show returns to SF

The final album to Madlib’s 13-part Medicine Show is scheduled to be released this month, capping a series that may prove to be the producer’s magnum opus. Through 12 albums, already he has journeyed through genres – hip-hop, dub, soundtrack music, free jazz, soul, psychedelic rock. He sampled music from around the world – Brazil, Africa,
Jamaica. He culled work from different eras – records from the 1970s, his own unreleased tracks from the ’90s, new productions from today.

When not delving into his massive record collection and producing mixtapes as the Beat Konducta, Madlib goes by a variety of different production aliases, ranging from the
warped-voice lyricism of Lord Quasimoto to the jazz-themed stylings of Yesterday’s New Quintet. He gained new fans in 2004 when he collaborated with rapper MF Doom to form Madvillain and combined blunted beats with heavy, slurred rhymes on album Madvillainy (Stones Throw). Rumors are circulating that the duo is working on an eagerly awaited sequel. Meanwhile, Madlib still remains tapped into the hip-hop scene, recently teaming with Black Star (emcees Talib Kweli and Yassim Bey, formerly known as Mos Def) to produce new track “Fix Up.”

So what does Madlib have in mind for the Mighty crowd on Fri/19? The flyer for Mighty says it’s Madlib’s Medicine Show with Stone Throw mate J-Rocc. Maybe we’ll get to hear
snippets of Medicine Show 13. Maybe Lord Quas launches into a helium-noted harangue on the police. Maybe Madlib spins Krautrock. Really, it could be anything.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tf_YoG9M6Mk&feature=list_related&playnext=1&list=SPA1483AB92DEEA9EE

Madlib
With J-Rocc
Fri/19, 9 p.m., $25
Mighty
119 Utah, SF
(415) 762-0151
www.mighty119.com

Our Weekly Picks: November 16-22

Andrew Lam
-
0

WEDNESDAY 16

Kiran Ahluwalia

Tuareg rock band Tinariwen continues to hit it out of the park this year, releasing a hypnotically raw new album, collaborating with TV on the Radio’s Kyp Malone and Tunde Adebimpe — and now working with Indo-Canadian singer Kiran Awluwali on her engrossing new disc Aam Zameen: Common Ground. Not that Awluwali needed the help, exactly: her enticing voice holds its own in both her own Punjabi-inflected compositions and the throaty tribal blues of the Sahara. She has also seamlessly incorporated Celtic fiddling, Persian gazals, Portuguese fado, Sufi qawwali, and Afghan rhubab into her previous releases — her eclecticism comes without preciousness. Emblematic is her version, with Tinariwen, of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s “Mustt Mustt”: “a song from the South Asian Islamic tradition performed with Muslims from Mali, Tinariwen.” And a gorgeous Canadian! (Marke B.)

8 p.m., $20

Yoshi’s Oakland

510 Embarcadero West, Oakl.

www.yoshis.com


ChameleonsVox

Unlike some other bands that emerged out of Manchester, England in the 1980s (Joy Division, The Fall), The Chameleons have remained relatively obscure. Formed in 1981, the band’s exotic strain of post-punk was perfected on its breathtaking debut, Script of the Bridge (1983). Script was an atmospheric album that featured some of the most interesting guitar work of the post-punk era thanks to Reg Smithies and Dave Fielding. “Second Skin” and “View from a Hill” were two swirling, heavily delayed tracks that remain astonishing feats. Since the band separated in 2003, lead singer and bass player Mark Burgess has started ChamelonsVox, a run off band (and a blessing) that stays true to the original. (James H. Miller)

With Black Swan Lane, James Oakes

9 p.m., $20

Cafe Du Nord

2170 Market, SF

(415)861 5016

www.cafedunord.com

 

“Block by Block”

Forget hushed indoor voices and audio tours. At the de Young Museum this weekend, Campo Santo and Sean San José will activate the space with the work of artists including hip-hop theater collective Felonious, and writer Junot Díaz. The roving performance adventure composed of dance, mixed-media, live music-mixing, beatboxing, spoken word movement, and projected visuals by Favianna Rodriguez and Evan Bissell brings a San Francisco block party inside the museum. Drawing from recent short stories and other original writings rooted in the New Jersey Dominican family life of Junot Díaz, Block by Block: The Pura Principle is the third Camp Santo work created with the writer. (Julie Potter)

Through Sat/19, 8 p.m., $15–$30

de Young Museum

50 Hagiwara Tea Garden, SF

(415) 750-3600

www.deyoung.famsf.org

 

“Love Streams”

Yerba Buena screened John Cassavetes’s smoldering swan song four years ago, but it’s not likely you’ve seen it since. Love Streams remains unavailable on DVD, though it inspires strong allegiances: French impresario agnès b. named her production company after it, while Yerba Buena curator Joel Shepard simply calls it his favorite film. Cassavetes and his wife Gena Rowlands play brother and sister experiencing crises in different emotional registers. Their moment-by-moment performances earn every bit of wisdom and tenderness the hard way. (Max Goldberg)

7:30 p.m., $8

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts

701 Mission, SF

(415) 978-2787

www.ybca.org


FRIDAY 18

International Motorcycle Show

Have you a loved one who insists on riding their motorcycle in ill-advised conditions? Through light rain showers, perhaps, or after a solid Whiskey Wednesday at Bender’s? Make light of their foolhardy shenanigans with a trip to the International Motorcycle Show, where the two of you will drool over custom choppers — built-in gaping maws, anyone? — but also the tally-ho swaggadacio of “Around the World Doug” Wothke, who has ridden a 1948 Indian Chief around the world, and a Harley Sportster for completely unrecommended distances (the width of continents). Clutch post-ride Wothke quote: “I’m wore out like a two dollar whore on nickel night!”(Caitlin Donohue)

Fri/18, 4-9 p.m.; Sat/19, 9:30 a.m.-8 p.m.; Sun/20, 9:30 a.m.- 5 p.m., $10 one day/$24 three day pass San Mateo County Event Center 2495 South Delaware, San Mateo (650) 638-0745 www.motorcycleshows.com

 

Trey McIntyre Project

In the ballet world, Trey McIntyre is something of a phenomenon: a popularizer of an art that in some people’s eyes is weighted down by the cobwebs of history. But for this choreographer of over 80 works, ballet is just a language that can be augmented with anything from hip-hop to salsa, gymnastics to modern dance. Out of this twenty-first century lingo McIntyre very skillfully fashions dances that communicate with an easy physicality; quite simply, it’s lots of fun to watch, even when they tackle serious subjects. TMP is bringing three works: the ebulliently theatrical “Gravity Heroes,” “The Sweeter End,” which is dedicated to the people of New Orleans, and “Dreams” — set to the music of and as a tribute to Roy Orbison. (Rita Felciano)

8 p.m. $30-$68

Cal Performances

Zellerbach Hall, Berk.

510-642-9988

www.calperformances.org

 

DJ Harvey and Mike Simonetti

Have you heard DJ Harvey before? He’s been around for more than two decades now, and released the LP Locussolus earlier this year, but his sound does have special requirements: “You can’t understand the blues until you’ve had your heart broken by a woman or whatever, and you can’t understand my music until you’ve had group sex on Ecstasy.” At least that’s what he told his 19-year-old son (and later a CMJ interviewer.) Well, a quasi-Luddite (spinning vinyl and sometimes analog tape edits) with tastes at the crossroads of disco, house, and punk, Harvey’s music is almost as provocative (and unsubtly sexual) as his bold statements. He’ll be joined by Mike Simonetti, the tastemaker behind Italians Do It Better, home of Glass Candy and Chromatics. (Ryan Prendiville)

With Eug (Face)

9:30 p.m., $10-15

Public Works

161 Erie, SF

(415) 932-0955

www.publicsf.com


SATURDAY 19

Lucinda Williams

Proving that some things only get better with time, Lucinda Williams’ intoxicating blend of introspective songwriting and impassioned performing skills makes her one of the best musical acts out there. The 50-something singer continues to weave her twangy, soulful voice with a background of country, rock, folk and blues on her latest album, this year’s Blessed (Lost Highway), featuring standout tracks “Copenhagen,” “Convince Me,” and “Seeing Black.” While her records are excellent, live on stage is really the place to hear Williams—her shows are pure musical marathons; somehow raucous, soothing, cathartic, and celebratory all at the same time. (Sean McCourt)

With Blake Mills (Sat.) and Buick 6 (Sun.)

Through Sun/20, 8 p.m., $40

Fillmore

1805 Geary, SF

(415) 346-6000

www.thefillmore.com

 

“Fall 2011 San Francisco Underground Short Film Festival”

Sometimes, a killer title is your best weapon. Peaches Christ’s alter ego, Joshua Grannell, knows this (see: 2010’s All About Evil). Together with partner-in-crime and fellow local weird-movie champion Sam Sharkey (he’s pals with Tommy Wiseau!), Peaches returns to the scene of Evil (the Victoria) to roll out the Fall 2011 San Francisco Underground Film Festival. The fest features 33 films from every genre imaginable crammed into two programs, including the later “After Dark” segment featuring my personal favorite killer title of the group: Wizard Heist, from filmmaker Max Sylvester. And Peaches wouldn’t steer you wrong: the nine-minute film, about a quartet of sorcerers reuniting for one last score, is all that and a 12-sided die. “I need to know: are you going to get back on that unicorn with us, or are you going to let your beard fall off?” (Cheryl Eddy)

7:30 and 10:30 p.m., $15 ($20 for both programs)

Victoria Theatre

2961 16th St., SF

store.peacheschrist.com

 

Kyuss

Back in its early 1990s heyday, Kyuss found success without the help of traditional venues. Instead, the band would rock the arid wilderness near its Palm Desert, Calif. home, turning on a gas-powered generator and playing its distinctive brand of swirling, down-tuned stoner rock until the juice ran out. Founding guitarist Josh Homme eventually departed to form Queens of the Stone Age, rubbishing talk of a reunion, but Kyuss has recently been resurrected without him. Rounded out by new guitarist Bruno Fevery, the four-piece embarked on a worldwide headlining tour, playing (mostly) indoor venues and delighting fans who thought their opportunity to see the influential band had gone for good. After languishing in stasis for more than a decade, Kyuss Lives! (Ben Richardson)

With the Sword, Black Cobra, Papa Wheelie

8 p.m., $30

Regency Ballroom

1300 Van Ness, SF

(415) 673-5716

www.theregencyballroom.com

 

Dirty Ghosts

Dirty Ghosts is a grimy quartet rising up from the gutters of San Francisco. Allyson Baker provides vocals, gnarly guitar riffs, and a bad attitude. Erin McDermott handles the bass, Jason Slota’s on drums and Nick Andre tackles the keyboard and sampler. Originally an in-apartment recording project, the band formerly included Carson Binks (who’s now in the Saviours) and Baker’s husband Aesop Rock, but when the Dirty Ghosts decided to get serious in 2010 and start playing live shows, Baker enlisted McDermott and Andre — Slota joined this year. A link to the band’s website recently popped up in my inbox with a direct warning — “They’re gonna be huge.” After listening to Dirty Ghosts’ single, “Shout It In,” I believe it. Heed the warning. Don’t sleep on this act. (Frances Capell)

With Dante Vs. Zombies and Phil Manley’s Life Coach

9 p.m., $8

El Rio

3158 Mission, SF

(415) 282-3325

www.elriosf.com


SUNDAY 20

Kimya Dawson

Kimya Dawson is much too candid of a songwriter to even think of separating her life as a new mother from her music. In 2008, the ex-Moldy Peach released an album of children’s songs, called Alphabutt. On her latest album, Thunder Thighs (released on her label, Great Crap Factory), Dawson returns in anti-folk mode to sing about the humbling experience of having a baby daughter, and looks back on her muddled past. “I walked with the sweats/I walked with the chills,” she sings on the 10 minute epic about recovering from addiction, “Walk Like Thunder.” Thunder Thighs even has some children’s songs, too. (Miller)

With Your Heart Breaks, Dave End

8 p.m., $15

Rickshaw Stop

155 Fell, SF

(415) 861-2011

www.rickshawstop.com


TUESDAY 22

Laura Johnston Kohl

In her self-published book Jonestown Survivor: An Insider’s Look, Laura Johnston Kohl documents how, in 1970, she became a follower of Jim Jones, leader of the religious cult the Peoples Temple split between San Francisco and the South American country of Guyana. Jones became infamous in ’78 when he ordered more than 900 of his Peoples Temple followers to commit suicide by ingesting cyanide-laced Kool Aid. Kohl was away from Jonestown when the suicide order came. She spent the next 20 years recovering from the deaths of her family and friends and her so-called survivors’ guilt. Now, Kohl is an avid public speaker willing to share her tragic, life-altering experience with the world. (Kevin Lee)

7 p.m., free

Books Inc.

601 Van Ness

(415)776-1111

www.jonestownsurvivor.com

Maximum Consumption: Justin Bua finds the vegan in hip-hop

Andrew Lam
-
4

Hip-hop and jazz visual artist Justin Bua is reeling off the pillars of vegan hip-hop.

“Mr. Wiggles, DJ Qbert, Russell Simmons, Dead Prez, KRS-One, Mear One – I think GZA from Wu Tang? But I’d doublecheck that.” (It turns out he’s at least vegetarian, as are four members of the Wu) “I think being vegan is the ultimate expression of hip-hop,” says the B-boy cum bestselling poster artist. 

It was a novel twist to our conversation, which took place over a table at Gracias Madre, Cafe Gratitude’s vegan Mexican restaurant in the Mission. Bua’s new coffeetable portrait book, The Legends of Hip-Hop (Harper Collins, 160 pp, $34.99) came out earlier this month, and he had just performed at the Independent the night before in a show that he hopes to take around the country in 2012. The Bay’s DJ Qbert – one of Bua’s subject for Legends, who was just finishing up his plate of food at the table when I walked into the restaurant – and others had spun while Bua hosted and supplied visuals. The show had sold out, the painter told me. He said tickets were going for “$60, $70” from scalpers. 

But back to veganism. 

“It’s irreverant, subversive, truth,” Bua mused over a creamy, vegan coconut pie when I asked him about the connection between hip-hop and eschewing dairy. “It’s about having a clean head and mind.”

C’mon, even Tupac was on this level. “Let’s change the way we eat, change the way we live, change the way we treat each other,” Bua quotes. “Let’s change the way we eat? He was talking about going vegan.” 

This is Bua’s jam – changing the world through personal actions. He sees his own work to document hip-hop’s legendary emcees, DJs, graffiti artists, producers, and B-boys as a entry in the historical record. Of his swirling, regally distorted works he says “they’re really in the tradition of the Grecos, the Raphaels, the Rubins” – artists which once documented the elite and created some of the few lasting visuals of the times in which we live. 

“I’d like people to take away from The Legends of Hip-Hop that these people are as historically revelant as the kings and the queens, those are the important people of the time.”

He says that given the hip-hop generation’s spending power, that the music has the capacity to change the world. And that it could do it through veganism, the rejection of industrial farming and that invasive act of consuming a fellow earth-dweller. “The ultimate form of respect is to not eat each other. That’s fucking weird.” 

To that end, Bua is considering launching a hip-hop-oriented eco-festival, featuring presentations by the food scientists whose findings have helped change his own lifestyle. So taken is he, in fact, by the power of food, that he and girlfriend Ruby Roth started a cooking blog called We Be Vegan, and he has an affordable super food drink in the works with nutritionist David Wolfe. He calls Wolfe “the most knowledgable person I’ve ever met in my life – and I’ve met Cornell West and Bill Clinton.” He hopes to drop the product in the next few months, insisting “you have an experience when you drink it.”

Ultimately, he’d like to see the people that take strength like he does in hip-hop’s powerful figures translate their message into taking control over their diets. Corporations, he said, can be toppled by what’s in your kitchen cabinet and lower intestine. Big companies should never be trusted to care for the health of the people.

“They know that they’re putting garbage on your plate, but they don’t care because the want that money. We gotta eat simple. Seven billion people on this planet is unstable. You can’t feed the world meat.”

 

Justin Bua brings his hip-hop legends to the Bay

Andrew Lam
-
0

Justin Bua‘s new book Legends of Hip-Hop would look nice in your living room, but if you get a chance to snag the renowned portratist on his promotional swoop through the Bay Area this weekend (Thu/10-Sat/12) don’t feel like you have to call it a coffeetable book. This thing’s got wisdom to impart to the Beyonce feat. J. Cole generation.

You’ve probably seen Bua’s work before. He’s that “new urban realist” whose iconic DJ print hangs in just about every hip-hop gearhead’s hallway. He did the cityscapes for Slum Village’s “Tainted” video – a sober East Coast version of Sirron Norris’ Mission District send-ups. 

In Legends of Hip-Hop readers get to find out exactly why Bua has dedicated his lifework to exploring hip-hop culture. The man feels it deeply. He chose 50 artists for the pages of the book, each honored with a luminous image and page-long reflection on their importance in history, in music, in Bua’s own life. He’s picked old school classics like Sha-Rock, B-boy Mr. Wiggles, and pioneering tagger Lady Pink, and goes up straight through today’s greats that even the MTV generation can recognize as legendary: Jay-Z, Jay Dilla, Missy Elliott. 

And it’s not just rote explanations, either. Like any great hip-hop artist (he is one) Bua is unafraid to put some weird blanket statements out there, like his unexplicably tender profile of Snoop Dogg, subtitled “The Beloved,” no less.

“Snoop transcends definition, and everyone – from soccer moms to gang bangers – loves him.” [emphasis author’s own] Well…

Legends makes a good read for anyone stuck in that hip-hop-is-Auto-tuned miasma, and instructs also on the music’s greater influence on our culture as a whole. The book’s first profile is Muhammed Ali, progenitor of hip-hop’s swagger and patter. It ends with Obama, who Bua says quietly signaled hip-hop lovers when he gave daps to Michelle onstage and brushed his shoulders off during speeches. Perhaps those movements weren’t quite as under-the-radar as he thinks, but there’s no doubt that Obama is the first president to successfully use hip-hop’s power to organize his own campaign. 

 

Legends of Hip-Hop concert

Thu/10 9 p.m., $25

Feat. DJs Qbert, Shortkut, and Apollo

The Independent

628 Divisadero, SF

(415) 771-1421

www.theindependentsf.com

 

Legends of Hip-Hop book signing

Fri/11 6 p.m., free

The Booksmith

1644 Haight, SF

(415) 863-8688

www.booksmith.com

 

GOLDIES 2011: San Francisco Hip Hop DanceFest

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
-
1
GOLDIES 2011: San Francisco Hip Hop DanceFest

GOLDIES “Five, six, seven, eight!” Micaya — teacher, choreographer, and unstoppable producer of the San Francisco Hip Hop DanceFest (the 2011 edition is coming up Nov. 18-20 at the Palace of Fine Arts) — is counting off for her beginners’ class at ODC. Some of these Saturday-morning devotees are skinny; others are not. One has gray hair, most do not; some are dancers, while some … “They are all dancers. We are all dancers,” Micaya (who often calls herself “Mama”) insists after class.

There is something, perhaps not exactly maternal, but definitely loving and encompassing about the way she talks about dance in general and the Hip Hop DanceFest in particular. No matter whether she is, as now, in worn pedal pushers and thick-bottom sneakers or, as emcee at the Palace, in five-inch heels and a tight skirt barely longer than the heels are high — one way or the other, you get a sense that she feels a personal responsibility for the dancers in her life.

As a producer Micaya is a phenomenon. She has single-handedly moved hip-hop from the studio and community hall to a proscenium theater, giving it widespread recognition and enthusiastic audiences. Uniquely, she has done so by honoring the art as a social activity and in its more theatrically evolved expressions. On Micaya’s stage there is room for the recreational dancer and the professional. Significantly, she refers to all of them as “companies,” preferring that term to “crews” or “troupes.” “It’s a matter of respect,” she insists.

Yet the Hip Hop DanceFest, now in its 13th year, started on a hunch. In the late 1980s, Micaya had just arrived from the South, a dirt poor single mom with her small son in tow. “I know what it means to live on food stamps,” she remembers. But she had two kinds of wealth: love for dance (ballet, Latin, modern, jazz, African, hip-hop) and an embracing attitude towards difference, something to which she credits her upbringing. Teaching hip-hop in San Francisco, she offered yearly recitals at Dance Mission. “They always sold out,” she remembers. So she started a festival, and “that’s when I found out how big and rich Bay Area hip-hop is.”

This year the festival had over 100 applicants, from as far away as Kenya and Uganda. Seventeen of them — local, national and international — made the cut. Yet Micaya is a still frustrated producer: so much good art, so little money. No matter, she’ll soon be back on the Palace of Fine Arts stage, pointing to the dancers and exhorting audiences to “give ’em love!”

Rep Clock

Andrew Lam
-
0

Schedules are for Wed/9-Tues/15 except where noted. Director and year are given when available. Double and triple features are marked with a •. All times p.m. unless otherwise specified.

ARTISTS’ TELEVISION ACCESS 992 Valencia, SF; www.atasite.org. $6-10. “Brazil on Screen:” Bandido de Luz Vermelha (Sganzerla, 1968), with “O Vermelha Luz do Bandido” (Jorge, 2009), Fri, 8. “Other Cinema:” works by archival compilation master Bill Morrison, Sat, 8:30.

CASTRO 429 Castro, SF; (415) 621-6120, www.castrotheatre.com. $7.50-10. “Woody Wednesdays:” •Annie Hall (Allen, 1977), Wed, 3, 7, and Hannah and Her Sisters (Allen, 1986), Wed, 4:50, 8:50. The Man Who Fell to Earth (Roeg, 1976), Thurs, 2:30, 5:15, 8. “Midnites for Maniacs: Lost in No Man’s Land:” •FernGully: The Last Rainforest (Kroyer, 1991), Fri, 7:30; Romancing the Stone (Zemeckis, 1984), Fri, 9:30, and Ishtar (May, 1987), Fri, 11:45. $12 for all three films. “3rd I International South Asian Film Festival:” Gamperaliya (Peries, 1964), Sat, noon; I Am Sindhutai Sapkal (Mahadevan, 2010), Sat, 2:30; A Letter of Fire (Handagama, 2005), Sat, 5:10; Delhi Belly (Deo, 2011), Sat, 9:15. More info at thirdi.org/festival. •Flash Gordon (Hodges, 1980), Sun, 2, 4, and Dune (Lynch, 1984), Sun, 4:10, 9:15.

CHRISTOPHER B. SMITH RAFAEL FILM CENTER 1118 Fourth St, San Rafael; (415) 454-1222, www.cafilm.org. $6.75-10.25. Le Havre (Kaurismäki, 2011), Nov 11-17, call for times. Crimebuster: A Son’s Search for His Father (Dematteis, 2011), Sun, 2. Between Two Worlds (Kaufman and Snitow, 2011), Mon, 7.

EMBARCADERP CENTER CINEMA One Embarcadero Center, SF; www.sffs.org. $12-20. “New Italian Cinema:” A Quiet Life (Cupellini, 2010), Sun, 1; The First Assignment (Cecere, 2010), Sun, 3:45; Our Life (Luchetti, 2010), Sun, 6:30, 9:30; It’s Happening Tomorrow (Luchetti, 1988), Mon, 6:30; Ginger and Cinnamon (Luchetti, 2003), Mon, 9; 20 Cigarettes (Amadei, 2010), Tues, 6:30; One Life, Maybe Two (Aronadio, 2010), Tues, 9:15.

EXPLORATORIUM McBean Theater, 3601 Lyon, SF; www.exploratorium.edu. $5. “The Last Kodachrome Movie: Recent Works in Obsolete Color,” Wed, 7:30.

NINTH STREET INDEPENDENT FILM CENTER 145 Ninth St, SF; www.artwithimpact.org. Free. Slingshot Hip-Hop (Salloum, 2008), Thurs, 6.

PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE 2575 Bancroft, Berk; (510) 642-5249, bampfa.berkeley.edu. $5.50-9.50. “Alternative Visions:” El Valley Centro (Benning, 1999), Wed, 7:30. “Romani Culture:” The Shutka Book of Records (Manic, 2005), Thurs, 7:30. “Southern (Dis)Comfort: The American South in Film:” House by the River (Lang, 1950), Fri, 7; The Fugutive Kind (Lumet, 1960), Fri, 8:50. “Abbas Kiarostami: The Fragility of Life:” And Life Goes On… (1992), Sat, 6 and Sun, 3. “Jeanne Moreau: Enduring Allure:” Jules and Jim (Truffaut, 1961), Sat, 8; Touchez pas au grisbi (Becker, 1953), Sun, 4:50. “Kino-Eye: The Revolutionary Cinema of Dziga Vertov:” Stride, Soviet! (The Moscow Soviet in the Present, Past, and Future) (1926), Tues, 7.

PALACE OF FINE ARTS 3301 Lyon, SF; (415) 554-0525, www.americanindianfilminstitute.com. Free-$20. “36th Annual American Indian Film Festival,” Thurs-Sat.

ROXIE 3117 and 3125 16th St, SF; (415) 863-1087, www.roxie.com. $5-9.75. “3rd I International South Asian Film Festival:” Big in Bollywood (Bowles and Meehan, 2011), Wed, 7:20; “The Family Circus: Local Short Films,” Thurs, 7:20; Ashes (Naidu, 2010), Thurs, 9:30; Patang (Bhargava, 2010), Fri, 7:20; Semshook (Kumar, 2010), Fri, 9:45; Flying Fish (Pushpakumara, 2011), Sun, noon; Way of Life (Driver, 2011), Sun, 12:20; The Boxing Ladies (Nandakumar, 2011), plus shorts, Sun, 2:30; The Image Threads (Vijay, 2010), Sun, 2:40; Play Like a Lion: The Legacy of Maestro Ali Akbar Khan (Mellars, 2011), Sun, 4:30; What Is Time? (Pasha, 2009), Sun, 6; Pudhupettai (Selvaraghavan, 2006), Sun, 7:20. More info at thirdi.org/festival. Gainsbourg: The Man Who Loved Women (Forneri, 2011), Wed-Thurs, 7, 9. “International BowWow Doggy Film Festival,” Sat, 12:30. This event, $10-90. Public Speaking (Scorsese, 2010), Mon-Tues, 7, 8:45.

SAN FRANCISCO PUBLIC LIBRARY Koret Auditorium, 100 Larkin, SF; www.sfpl.org. Free. “Bay Area Community Cinema Series:” We Still Live Here (Makepeace, 2011), Tues, 5:45.

VORTEX ROOM 1082 Howard, SF; www.myspace.com/thevortexroom. $5 donation. “The Vortex Incarnate:” •Bedazzled (Donen, 1967), Thurs, 9, and The Car (Silverstein, 1977), Thurs, 11.

WALT DISNEY FAMILY MUSEUM 104 Montgomery, the Presidio, SF; www.waltdisney.org. $12-20. “The 11th Hour: A Sampling of Shorts from World War II,” Fri, repeats throughout the day starting at 11am.

YERBA BUENA CENTER FOR THE ARTS 701 Mission, SF; (415) 978-2787, www.ybca.org. $6-8. Urbanized (Hustwit, 2011), Wed-Thurs, 4, 6, 8. “Manila! Manila!”, reading and screening with author R. Zamora Linmark, Fri, 7 (free event). The Dream of Eleuteria (Zuasola, 2010), Sat, 7:30; Sun, 2.

On the Cheap Listings

Andrew Lam
-
0

Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

WEDNESDAY 9

Food For Thought Dine-Out Various locations, SF. www.missiongraduates.org. 9 a.m. – 11 p.m., prices vary (check website for participating restaurants). Mission Graduates, a nonprofit working to boost the numbers of college-bound Mission youngsters, receives a sizeable chunk of participating diners’ bills tonight at eateries across town. Depending on your budget, today’s the day to either go all-out at Foreign Cinema or reignite your love affair with the humble Papalote burrito.

“Trading Ideas: Emerging Discourses on Asian Contemporary Art” Galley One, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 701 Mission, SF. www.ybca.org. 6:30 – 8:30 p.m., $7, free for members. YBCA and the Asian Art Museum team up to explore Asia’s role within the contemporary art picture.

“Unwrapped and Regifted: Stories about the Holidays” 111 Minna gallery, SF. (415) 974-1719, www.111minnagallery.com, free. The story-sharers at LitUp Writers know that it’s not even Thanksgiving, and on shopping center time that means the hour is nigh for Christmas and Chanukah tales. If you think you can take the heat, don your worst holiday sweater to compete for a cash prize.

THURSDAY 10

One and Only: the Untold Story of On the Road book reading Booksmith, 1644 Haight, SF. www.booksmith.com. 7:30 p.m., free. LuAnne Henderson rambled with Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady for the entire length of that well-known Road. Her daughter, Anne Marie Santos, joins Kerouac expert Gerald Nicosia to discuss the journey’s underside.

Love Cake Reading Modern Times, 2919 24th St., SF. www.mtbs.com. 7 p.m., free. Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha may not be the easiest name to type into Google, but it merits a cramped finger or two. The activist and spoken-word poet reads from recent work addressing how queer people of color combat violence with compassion and sexuality.

Footloose Forays Talk Randall Museum, 199 Museum Way, SF. www.randallmuseum.org. 7:30 – 9 p.m., free. Michael Ellis’s bio photo shows the man in a backwards pink baseball cap, matching shirt, and dangling binoculars. This may aptly sum him up. Join the freewheeling botanist, Burner, world traveler, and radio host for a recounting of his best adventures.

FRIDAY 11

Legends of Hip-Hop book signing Booksmith, 1644 Haight, SF. www.booksmith.com. 6:30 p.m., free. With a lovingly-penned forward by Chuck D of Public Enemy, Justin Bua’s compilation of art honoring hip-hop’s greats breathes new life into the traditional coffee table book.

Celebration of Craftswomen Festival Pavilion, Fort Mason, SF. Also Sat/12 and Sun/13. www.celebrationofcraftswomen.org. 10 a.m. – 5 p.m., $9. The 33rd annual fair and celebration brings SF’s craftiest females and their wares out on display, accompanied by live music and dance. Proceeds benefit the Mission’s eye-poppingly beautiful Women’s Building.

SATURDAY 12

Green Festival Concourse Exhibition Center, 635 8th St., SF. Also Sun/13. www.greenfestivals.org. 10 a.m. – 7 p.m., free (see conditions below). Maybe the 12 pounds of organic garbanzo beans you just bought do have an immediate use, after all. Bring a Rainbow Grocery receipt (for a purchase of more than ten dollars), four cans of food, your bike, your Sierra Club card or a union card and get free admission to the green equivalent of a state fair. Food court, beer garden, yoga classes, business seminars, speakers, and exhibits await.

Paul Madonna book signing Museum Store, SFMOMA, 151 Third St., SF. www.sfmoma.org. 2 p.m., free. If this well-known SF cartoonist has luminously sketched your cupola, gable, or neighborhood pothole you know you have bragging rights. Everything Is Its Own Reward, Madonna’s latest compilation of SF streetscapes, roams from mundane telephone wires to noble turrets, all in pen and ink.

Writers with Drinks The Make Out Room, 3225 22nd St., SF. www.makeoutroom.com. 7:30 – 9:30 p.m., $5 sliding scale. Authors swig and shoot the breeze with their audience at this recurrent event, which benefits the Center for Sex and Culture this month. Befitting of the cause of the evening, tonight’s lineup includes writers responsible for an erotic novella, a transsexual showbiz memoir, and a treatise on dating as a feminist.

SUNDAY 13

“Man as Object” Peep Show Drawing Circle SOMArts Cultural Center, 934 Brannan, SF. www.somarts.org. Noon – 3 p.m., $8 suggested donation. All our welcome to take up their artistic tools and depict a live male model as part of SOMArts’ ongoing exhibit turning traditional gender roles upside down — although we tend to question the innovation of having a man treated like a piece of meat in this town.

MONDAY 14

Mere Future Reading and Signing Pegasus Books, 2349 Shattuck, Berk. www.pegasusbookstore.com. 7:30 p.m., free. To an audience familiar with paying astronomical rents, Sarah Schulman’s dystopian satire of a future New York will strike a chord. Schulman slyly invents a world where apartments go for forty bucks a month and the only possible jobs are in marketing.

TUESDAY 15

Ether Reading and Signing City Lights, 261 Columbus, SF. www.citylights.com. 7 p.m., free. Ben Ehrenreich once reimagined The Odyssey to critical acclaim, and his latest undertaking – the chronicle of an unnamed protagonist wandering through a city’s violent apocalypse – is no less involved of a literary feat.

The X Factor: It’s all Paula

Zelda Bronstein
-
0
The X Factor: It’s all Paula

After an embarassing selection episode,  the Simon Cowell Show (excuse me, the X Factor) is actually allowing the contestants to sing. And while Simon is strutting around trying to steal the limelight and show how incredibly cool and smart he is (at one point telling one of the contestants to kiss him because he knew what kind of music was best for her) the real star was … Paula Abdul.

Not because she’s appears perfectly sober (amazing) and looks great in purple — but because she’s taken the people with by far the least talent and turned them into winners.

See, each judge gets to mentor one category. Simon, of course, has the girls (more on that later). L.A. Reid has the boys. Nichole Sherzinger has the over-30s … and Paula has the groups.

Frankly, the groups were the weakest entries. In the early rounds, some of them were train wrecks and none of them were terribly good. But somehow, Paula has turned three of them into real contenstants; she’s picked good music, helped with good dance moves, given them confidence … even Simon admits she’s done well. Not that any of her folks are going to win (first prize — you get to make a Pepsi ad!); they aren’t that good. But while the other judges, particularly Simon the Great, have made some awful mistakes, the spaced-out daffy Paula has kept it together.

So onto the show.

What’s up with the interplanetary opener? Like the folks on Saturn are really zipping through the Solar System at warp nine just to see the X Factor? If this is the random picture of life on Earth that reaches the Vulcans, they’re going to continue to believe that the third rock from the sun is still far too primitive for First Contact.

The host, Steve Jones (no, not THAT Steve Jones) is as dull as dishwater, and needs a personality implant.

Stereo Hogzz open the show; I wasn’t impressed last time, and the red vests gotta go — but man, Paula worked a miracle with these guys. They’re actually ready for prime time. Chris Rene tries to do a hip-hop version of Karen Carpenter, complete with flames shooting out of what looks like a giant barbecue. Ack. Leroy Bell is 59, does a decent job with a bad song.

Rachel Crow is Viv’s favorite, of course, since she’s 14. She does a tolerable “Walking on Sunshine,” except that Simon has changed the lyrics to “You are my Sunshine” and the rythm is all wrong. Oh, and the bad psychedelic graphics in the background made the whole thing hard to follow.

Lakoda Rayne. Paula’s girls. They’re all dressed up like colored crayons, and they all look exactly the same. They have very little talent among them. But they managed to make a Fleetwood Mac song sound okay. A little less sexy than Stevie Nicks, but what are you going to do.

I hope Joch Krajcik wins, if only because he looks so much like Jack Black in School of Rock, complete with a girlfriend who clearly has been supporting him all these years while he makes an occasional burrito and sings in unsuccessful bands. I like the girlfriend; she better get half the money. And the guy can sing, he really can.

Melanie Amaro does “Desperado.” Jean hates the Eagles and always has, but not me, and that’s a great song for the right singer, and Melanie is the right singer. Something Simon did right. She’s got as much vocal talent as anyone in the show.

Astro — man, you have to love Astro. He’s 14, he writes his own raps, and even when he’s a little shaky, he’s awesome. He just is.

Marcus Canty is L.A. Reid’s guy, and Reid has him sing a song by … L.A. Reid. But it’s good, and he’s good, and L.A. gets a good one on Sir Simon, to wit:

Simon: It’s a little bit narcissistic to have your artist sing one of your own songs, but …

L.A.: Well, Simon, we were going to do one of yours, but …

Stacy Francis. Girl has pipes. Not my kind of singer. Amazing voice, though.

InTENsity. Some shit about America. Drew: Cute but predictable.

Tonight someone goes home. I predict weeping.

 

 

Rhythm nations

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
-
0
Rhythm nations

DANCE Watched over by two pink carousel horses, a rainbow. and a big lotus flower, they sway, stomp, and slide even as they chant, clap, and body slap in increasingly complex rhythms. They are SlamDance, Keith Terry’s sextet of musician-dancers, and they are rehearsing their upcoming performance at the fourth International Body Music Festival, held this year at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.

Last year, the (free) festival took place in São Paulo, Brazil; next October it will happen (also free) in Istanbul, Turkey. “Free performances [are] something we could never do in this country,” Terry ruefully observes. Still, the plan is to have a local festival (2011 tickets start at $25) every other year.

Terry, who organized the first festival in 2008, started out as a percussionist. He was the first drummer for the Jazz Tap Ensemble, and he is a founding member of Berkeley’s Gamelan Sekar Jaya. So the beat has been in his body for a very long time — yet early in his career he changed from “a seated musician to a moving musician,” as he calls himself. Using one’s body as a musical instrument, he says, sometimes is called “body percussion” or “body drumming.” Terry prefers the term “body music” because it includes melodic and harmonic aspects as well as its rhythmic components. SlamDance performers, for instance, use their voices to percussive effect as well as in simple part-singing.

Using your body to make music is pretty basic. We all do it, perhaps starting as toddlers with patty-cake, progressing into clapping games at recess, and ending up as oldsters who play the spoons. Much of these practices go back to folkways rooted in ritualistic endeavors. But there are also innovations: the gumboot dance, for instance, was developed by South African miners early in the 20th century, while African American fraternities popularized a particular form of step-dancing.

Body music is both a communal practice with a sense of freedom even as it demands great discipline and precision. “That’s what makes it fun,” Terry explains. Often it integrates improvisation and fixed passages, not unlike what happens in both hip-hop and jazz.

Noticeable from a dance perspective is the SlamDancers’ slight sway in the torso. “It helps with the breathing,” Terry notes, though he was surprised to see how practices change from culture to culture.

“One of the things that fascinates me about these festivals is how differently these musicians, who come from all over the world, carry themselves. It was one of the most profound experiences with my first body music festival because we are, basically, all just clapping and stepping. It’s definitely a cultural thing. You put a French group next to a Brazilian one and you can immediately see the difference.”

One of the first groups Terry identified with as kindred spirits was Çudamani, an astounding troupe of male dancer-musicians from Bali. They perform kecak, a rhythmic, chanting-and-swaying “monkey dance” that originated in trance rituals. Six of its dancers bring new choreography as part of this year’s International Body Music Festival line-up, which features a total of eleven companies.

Others include the theatrical Cambuyón, from the Canary Islands, which integrates tap and hip-hop into other percussive forms, and Kantu Korpu, which draws on flamenco and tap to translate regional Greek music into motion. Both of these groups are making their US debut. KeKeÇa’s five performers interpret Turkish songs within Near Eastern movement traditions. Fernando Barba from Brazil draws from samba and maracatu; Danny “Slapjazz” Barber is a hambone virtuoso; the Las Vegas-based group Molodi pulls in theater and just about everything with a beat. A gentler soul is Quebec’s Éric Beaudry, who will also team up with a trio of Oakland step dancers.

 

INTERNATIONAL BODY MUSIC FESTIVAL

Fri/4-Sat/5, 8 p.m.; Sun/6, 2 p.m., $25–$50

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts

701 Mission, SF.

www.internationalbodymusicfestival.com

1...212223...55Page 22 of 55

48hills.org is the official publication of the non-profit San Francisco Progressive Media Center.
Contact us: info@48hills.org