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Free classes for all

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Free classes for all

Why should you need an expensive libereral arts education to ponder the question of realism, or pricey equipment to take a film making class? You don’t- the University of the Commons (UOTC) dove into its schedule of free, open to all classes a few weeks ago, and the effort is growing.

In a panel discussion at the summer session’s launch June 2, speakers placed the school in a radical context, mentioning other efforts such as D-Q University and Black Panther liberation schools like the Oakland Community School. 

The group’s mission statement says that the UOTC “aims to inspire participants to evolve more equitable and just societies and live more empowered and fulfilling lives.” The school isn’t accredited and students won’t get any formal acknowledgment of having taken classes there. 

It does, however, have some system-approved teachers. Dr. Barbara-Ann Lewis, who is teaching a class called Science Literacy to any and all who show up, is no newbie. She received her PhD in Soil Science from UC Berkeley in 1971, worked as a scientist at Argonne National Laboratory for seven years, and then taught environmental engineering at Northwestern for another 27. Since then she worked a stint as a violin-maker (“it’s good to have a trade,” she told me).

So what’s a pro like Lewis doing in a place like this? For her, its almost civic duty. “I want to teach the public,” she said. “The public votes, but has no idea about some of the real science behind the environmental issues.”

But in many of her university classes, “I had the standard students. They pay tuition, they come in, they don’t know too much about what’s going on in the world. They’ve lost their curiosity.”

She found students with that curiosity in her experience teaching with the Free University of San Francisco last year, Lewis says. “I had an 18-year-old and I had a 50-year-old in the class, lots of kinds of people, who all wanted to learn.”

Warren Lake of the San Francisco Free School, a similar effort that teaches free classes in the city, attended the launch in hopes of joining forces in some way with the UOTC. The Free School, Lake says, started with free yoga classes and has naturally offered movement, dance and other “right-brain pursuits,” compared to the UOTC’s heady academic offerings. Lake sees the Free School as “both a place to incubate teachers and for students to get together.” But when it comes to transferable skills and help along career paths, the picture is more complicated.

The Free School has been around for a few years now, and Lake says the accreditation issue is something he’s “thought about a lot.”

“There are different ways to show expertise,” said Lake. “Making a documentary or writing a book can often work as well as a college degree for showing you are interested of invested in something. There are different ways to market the experience.”

The University of the Commons is a great effort. But it brings up some questions. Who is it for? People who want an education but can’t afford one, now that the cost-free California community college system is a thing of the past? People who are already pretty well educated but always enjoy learning, not to mention generally fulfilling experiences? Students who want to supplement un-creative traditional schooling? People looking for friends and community who enjoy some learning on the side? Real change, liberation?

A Guardian article on a similar effort last year- the San Francisco Free University- pointed out that their effort was promising, admirable, and potentially very beneficial. It was also very white.

June 18, the pretty white- though, as members pointed out, also pretty female and queer- UOTC collective spent the majority of their meeting talking about “diversity and outreach.” They talked about teaching ethnic studies and women’s studies courses that are being cut out of public university curriculum. They talked about ideas for partnerships with organizations around the city that work with different groups, asking to see what kinds of free classes people there might want to participate in or teach. They talked about resources for classes in Mandarin and Spanish. They hope to plug in to existing efforts, and they hope to grow.

As of now, the classes range in the attendance. The students of Occupy U, a class discussing what worked and what didn’t in recent social justice efforts that focuses on Occupy, is about 11 mostly activist types, while From Mahler to the Music Video, a class tracing the history of music, has about 70 students that the instructor John Smalley says includes everyone from “professional musicians to homeless people.”

Next week will be the third week of classes, but you can still join in, although it might be a good idea to contact the instructor beforehand.

Science Literacy w/ Barbara-Ann Lewis

Tuesdays 5:30-7:30pm, Modern Times, 2919 24th St., SF

Responsive Cinema w/ Rand Crook

Tuesdays 7-9pm, the Emerald Tablet, 80 Fresno, SF

Intro to Western music: from Mahler to the music video w/ John Smalley

Saturdays 11am-1pm, Latino/Hispanic Community Meeting Room B, Main San Francisco Public Library, 100 Larkin, SF

History in digital culture w/ Molly Hankwitz

Sundays 6-8pm

Mutiny Radio Café, 2781 21st St

Occupy U w/ Stardust

Sundays 6-8pm, Modern Times, 2919 24th St., SF

www.uotc.org/wordpress

Mic Check: Everyone is listening at Sacred Grounds

Tony Robles
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Mic Check: Everyone is listening at Sacred Grounds

“It’s about writing. We should start the interview with that.” Todd Tholke leans forward across the greasy café table. “The whole reason I came all the way over here today to meet with you is to tell you about this thing that we do that has to do with free speech.”

Tholke emcees open mics, which is something he’s been doing in San Francisco for over 15 years to showcase the works of local artists in a free venue. At present, Tholke is hosting acoustic nights every Thursday at Sacred Grounds Café, which lies north of the Panhandle.

One of the city’s oldest coffee shops, Sacred Grounds has been hosting musicians almost every week since 1967. This pioneering open mic has a legacy that boasts artists such as Joan Baez and Tracey Chapman.

Tholke has been emceeing this event, which he refers to as the Songwriters’ Guild, for eight years, but he has no interest in discussing the event’s venerable past. He lays his ring-laden hands on the table. “I’m a person that’s into the present and the future,” he says with a smile.

In addition to his extensive history in the SF open mic scene, Todd works as a street musician on Haight and has a day job down at the docks. “I work on the docks and I’ve been living aboard my sailboat for fifteen years” says Tholke. “That’s how I supplement my lifestyle as a songwriter and musician in San Francisco. I live on a boat.”

As a known musician and vibrant personality in Upper Haight, Tholke was asked to emcee his first open mic at the now-defunct Coffee Zone. “The way that you become the host is by being asked to do it. I’ve been asked to do it at many different venues in Haight-Ashbury that I’ve been haunting for 25 years.” Tholke’s devotion to the district is emblazoned on his necklace, a metal disc that bears the image of the Haight and Ashbury street signs.

Though he doesn’t get paid to host the Songwriters’ Guild at Sacred Grounds, Tholke has been here once a week for nearly a decade because he believes that what happens there on Thursday night is important. “There’s an element of magic,” he says, “an element of the unknown and of possibility.”

He runs a tight ship in which no acts are favored, no one is barred, and politeness is key. “Sometimes people will come up and they’ll be vulgar or rude,” Tholke explains.

“We have something called clapping someone offstage. We’ll politely clap you right off the stage, and if you don’t get it we’ll give you a standing ovation.”

Unlike most open mics in the city, Sacred Grounds has no PA system. The unplugged aspect of the event forces people be to be quiet and listen, otherwise their chatter would drown out the musician in the small café.

“Everyone here is listening. At the end of the night there’s a camaraderie of people that don’t know each other. They shared two things: they shared their music and they shared the respect,” Tholke says. “At other open mics, everyone is like, ‘blah blah blah I don’t care who else plays and by the time I leave I’m going to be drunk.’” Tholke makes sure that the experience at Sacred Grounds is different.
 
“People come from all walks of life and it doesn’t matter how old you are, what your gender is, none of those things matter. All that matters is that you have your name on the list.”
 
It’s showtime

When I slip in to Sacred Grounds on a Thursday night mid-June, a man named Rainbow is just finishing his set. I count only 12 other people in the room, but it doesn’t feel like a small crowd with the dark paneling and low ceiling in the café.
Like the first time I met him, Todd is dressed in all black. This time his long hair is tied up under a beret. In between performers, he whispers to me, “You came on a really good night.”

After Rainbow, the next performer opens his set by asking the audience, “Anybody think they’re on Obama’s kill list?” Despite the eccentricities and left slant of most of the performers, the music is simple, never offensive, and some is just downright beautiful.

Featured musicians Maria Quiles and Rory Cloud play Nickel Creek-inspired folk lullabies that leave the Songwriters’ Guild literally begging for more. The audience is incredibly involved and tight-knit, addressing one another by name, borrowing instruments, and asking each other how they can buy their music and when their next gigs are.

As Quiles and Cloud leave the stage — more like a designated corner — Quiles calls out, “we met at an open mic! It could happen to you!” She smiles, “Maybe it already has.”
 
Reservations and revelations

After eight years at Sacred Grounds, Tholke isn’t sure he can keep it up. “Every single week I think it’s gonna be the last one and every single week I’m glad that I didn’t quit that week,” he says.  Tholke was paid to host open mics in San Francisco for many years, but the gig at Sacred Grounds is an act of charity. “My win is them winning, but I feel like a loser because I am poor,” says Tholke.  “I’m the most poor person I know. I don’t know anyone that has less than me because I’m not on any programs.”

Despite his reservations, Tholke keeps coming back every Thursday. The open mic got shut down in 2007 because of the musicians’ use of copyrighted materials, but Tholke brought it back.

He struggles with the time commitment, but ultimately he loves the Songwriters’ Guild. Tholke values very little above free speech, and the fact that the open mic is available to everyone for free is something that he thinks is immensely important for San Francisco’s culture.

 “Free speech and freedom and liberty. You can actually have it,” says Tholke, sipping his coffee. “That’s the thing that keeps me coming back.”

Glass on Glass: an extended interview with the composer

Sue Vaughan
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Glass on Glass: an extended interview with the composer

Few living composers can claim more influence over the landscape of modern classical music than Philip Glass. A glance at his expansive discography — comprised of symphonies, operas, ballets, film scores, and a broad range of collaborative efforts — reveals a restlessly creative artist, with little regard for categorization. Even after turning 75 earlier this year, Glass continues to work as prolifically as ever.

The latest installment in Glass’ storied career finds the composer joining forces with acclaimed singer-songwriter-harpist Joanna Newsom, for an exclusive, one-off performance Mon/25 to benefit Big Sur’s Henry Miller Memorial Library.

In a phone conversation with the Guardian last week, from his home in Manhattan, Glass detailed the evolution of his creative alliance with Newsom, his burning desire to work with Ornette Coleman and Wynton Marsalis, his likeness to Brian Eno, and his refusal to be labeled a “minimalist”, among a host of other topics.

Our interview was much too extensive for Wednesday’s feature to contain, so read on for more words of wisdom from Glass.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1C3FtvOZ4g

San Francisco Bay Guardian Are you working on any of your own material recently? Anything you can share with us, that you’re working on for your own purposes?

Philip Glass I finished an opera for Linz, Austria, based on a story about [Austrian novelist-playwright Peter Handke], and now I’m working on another opera, based on… well, that’s a Walt Disney. Besides that, I’m working with Godfrey Reggio on one of his new movies. He’s the one who made Koyaanisqatsi and Powaqqatsi. Besides that, I’m doing concerts. The one [in San Francisco] of course… and I have three in New York this week, and one in Chicago next weekend.

SFBG Solo piano performances?

PG They’re mostly ensemble concerts with my own group. There will be one in New York called the River to River Festival. That’s a group that’s been together for about 35 years or so, and we’re playing pieces that are retrospective of music from those years. Then, I will be doing some collaborative pieces. One concert I’m doing, I’m playing with Laurie Anderson. And I did one last night with Stephin Merritt. The concert in Chicago, which is next weekend, I’m doing with a wonderful violinist named Tim Fain [accompanying Glass and Newsom Mon/25], which is mostly chamber music of mine.

So, I tend to do a variety of things. It keeps everything very interesting for me. It means I’m always practicing and rehearsing [laughs], but it’s more fun to do that than to just play the same thing over and over again. I don’t do that very much.

SGBG Moving on to the show in San Francisco coming up: I spoke with [Magnus Toren, executive director of the Henry Miller Memorial Library] on the phone the other day, and said he’d heard that your rehearsals with Joanna Newsom and Tim Fain are going very well.

PG Yeah, we got along very well, and I’ve known Tim a long time. I knew Joanna from her records when we met for the first time. She spends a lot of time in New York. We met very recently, and we had two sessions here. We’re going to have another rehearsal out there.

What we’re doing, basically… it’s her music and my music. I’m playing one of her new songs, and then she and Tim are playing a number of songs together. Then, we’re playing some of my trios that I adapted for harp, piano, and violin. We’re also doing solo pieces. Violin, harp, and piano: it’s kind of a classic combination. They’re instruments that go very well together, and we found … she’s an excellent player, anyway, and a wonderful singer. But, we found that our music works very well together.

SFBG Are there any songs of [Newsom’s], or just elements of her music that you really connect to?

PG She has a unique way of approaching the harp. I’m not a harpist, so I can’t give you the technical details, but when you hear her play, she has her own style. The way that certain pianists have a certain way of playing the piano. You know, you hear them, you say, “Oh, that’s so-and-so.” You know right away who it is.

She has a bigger tonal range than harp players usually use, because she can change keys very easily, very rapidly. And so, that gives her a lot of flexibility in terms of the tonality. That’s the one thing that I noticed right away. She has a command of the whole range of the instrument, and she can adapt her voice to it very, very well.

SFBG In a recent interview, you said, “all the collaborations I’ve done, have been a way for me to put myself in a place where I haven’t been before.” Based on the time you’ve spent rehearsing with Joanna and Tim, where is this collaboration taking you, that you’ve never been before?

PG I’ve used the harp a lot in orchestral music, where it becomes part of the orchestra. It might not stand out that much. But now, with a harpist right in front of me, there were parts of the instrument that worked very well with parts of my music, and I was able to hear it. Although I knew the instrument, in terms of a large ensemble, I’ve never been in such an intimate relationship with it. It brings out a texture in the music I write, which I’m hearing almost for the first time.

SFBG Besides Newsom, are there any other new artists you’ve been listening to recently, or any currently working musicians who you admire, or take inspiration from?

PG I’m going back to working with a wonderful kora player named Foday Suso. He’s from the Gambia. We toured a lot in the late ’90s, and the early part of this decade, and we’re just trying to start touring again. We haven’t played in a few years. There will be a new percussion ensemble, and we’re going to be playing with them. But, we have concerts coming up in Seattle, and Mexico City, and actually one in Carmel.

I would guess, in terms of a new player, I think Joanna is the newest of the new, given the people I know. I just, last night, was doing a concert with, and played one piece with, Stephin Merritt. I liked playing with him. He’s a very good singer. Do you know his work?

SFBG Magnetic Fields, right?

PG Yeah, that’s right. So, he’s another person I’ve just worked with very recently, who I enjoyed working with.

SFBG So, you’re really known for your collaborations. You’ve done a lot of them. Is there any kind of consistent contribution that you feel you bring to collaborative projects?

PG One of the things that interests me the most is when I work with people who don’t have a background in Western music, as such. Wu Man, who is a wonderful pipa player (it’s like a Chinese mandolin, you could say), we’ve done work together. I’ve worked with Mark Atkins from Australia. He’s a didgeridoo player.

A percussion group from Brazil called Uakti. What I really like, is going outside of my home base. You know, my home base is basically central European art music, as it grew up in Europe and then took root in America. I find, when I’m playing with people from Africa, or Australia, or China, or Japan, or Korea, I find it very stimulating.

SFBG Are there any artists in particular who you’d love to collaborate with?

PG I did a very extensive piece with Leonard Cohen recently [The Book of Longing], and I liked that. I could go back to that collaboration again. But, it’s been four or five years since we did that piece. There are two people I’ve talked to, we’ve never had the time to do it: one is Ornette Coleman, and the other is Wynton Marsalis. We keep on talking about it, but you have to get in the same room long enough to do some work [laughs].

I’d love to go back and do some more pieces with Ravi Shankar, who is still alive, and still writing. I got to know his daughter, Anoushka. Wonderful sitar player. So, that’s a young person I would like to work with. But, she knows that. Ever since she was eight years old. She’s become a wonderful player, these days.

SFBG A few other questions about your music. You seem to reject the “minimalism” tag…

PG Well, here’s the problem: if you would like people to come to a concert of minimalism, and they come to the concert, you’re not going to hear it [laughs]. The reason I object to descriptions that are not going to be found [is that] instead of helping the audience, it creates a kind of obstacle.

The pieces I wrote in ’73, ’74, ’75, ’76: yeah, sure! But, I’m not playing any of those pieces in the concert in San Francisco. I can, and I have. I played Koyaanisqatsi with Godfrey Reggio’s film at the Hollywood Bowl last year. And, that’s close to that period. It was written in 1979. So, it wouldn’t be so outlandish to call it minimalist, but actually, the pieces I’m writing today … it’s misleading.

I don’t know what your situation is, but often, editors will try to find something to sum it up and make a headline of a piece: “Minimalist composer arrives with Joanna Newsom.” But, that’s not going to happen! [Laughs]. So, those are catchy lines, and they’re maybe good journalism, but they’re actually poor preparation.

Look: I’ve been writing music for 40 years. It’s not the same music. So, when people ask me about that, I say, “well, let’s talk about what the concert’s going to be.” Now, in this particular concert, I’m doing pieces with Joanna, and with Tim, that have been written in the last ten years. So, there’s no minimalism in it at all.

When people talk about [Einstein on the Beach]: of course. It resonates with reality. That was the heartland of minimalism in the mid-’70s, and Einstein was one of the apotheosis pieces of that time, that caught that spirit, caught that technique. But, we’re not doing Einstein. We will be doing Einstein at Berkeley, at the Zellerbach, in October.

SFBG Do you have a way, maybe a shorthand, to classify what you’re doing now?

PG You kind of brought it up, yourself. I work with musicians from many different areas, so I’ve become a collaborator. In a way, that informs more about what I do than almost anything else. I don’t care how I’m remembered, in a way, but how I might be remembered as someone who worked with a lot of different people, from Allen Ginsberg, to Twyla Tharp. [That’s the distinctive thing], and it’s definitely reflected in the form of the work.

SFBG A lot of people who were brought up on popular music, even jazz, see a certain exclusivity in classical music. But, looking at your body of work, in contrast, you’ve produced a wide range of work on commission, from operas…

PG Yeah, I got over that label right away! [Laughs].  I’m not even a new music composer anymore. I’m just a composer.

I mean, part of my agenda was to get out of the ghetto, get out of the new music ghetto, into a bigger musical world, where I could work with David Bowie, or Emmylou Harris, or Joanna Newsom. I could work with anybody, and it wouldn’t be a surprise. No one’s going to say “what is he doing now?” because I’ve done it so much that it’s more like, “there he goes again!” [laughs]

SFBG You’ve collaborated with Brian Eno in the past.

PG Yes, that was part of the collaboration with David Bowie, because during the days where they were doing pieces like Heroes and Low (I turned those into symphonies) Brian was a collaborator, for sure.

Also I had a record company at one time [Point Records], and we produced a new performance of Music for Airports [with Bang on a Can]. So, I’ve been involved with his music more than casually. I mean, I’ve actually been involved in recordings, and working on scores with his music. Very interesting composer. Very interesting guy.

SFBG Along those lines: he’s is another artist who’s really made a reputation on versatility, on working within a lot of musical settings. So, do you feel like you might have more in common with, perhaps, someone like Eno, than some of the more traditional figures in Western art music?

PG Well, I think that’s a very good point, because Eno crosses lines very casually, very easily. He wasn’t interested in being in any particular [genre]. I came up at Juilliard, and then [I had] a very high-end academic teacher in Paris called Nadia Boulanger. People who come from that background don’t usually do a lot.  [Pauses]. Trying to think. There was a great producer who produced some Michael Jackson [Quincy Jones]. He was a student of Nadia Boulanger as well. People turn up, but it’s not that common, to be truthful.

SFBG Another quotation from a recent interview, concerning your philosophy on music: you said, “music is a place, and is as real as Chicago, or Indianapolis, or the city you live in. It’s an absolute place, and once you know where that place is, you can go there.” Do you try to bring your audience, your listeners, to a certain place with your music?

PG Well, it’s not that I try to. I’m there already, so if they’re coming to my concerts, they’re going to be there, too. I think that it’s not so much the intention. It’s, more or less, a result of how I work, and who I am. If I tried to do it, I couldn’t do it any better than just, naturally doing what’s natural to me.

I think that’s not uncommon among musicians. We live in this world. It’s not a pastime. It amounts to, almost, an obsession for most musicians. They almost can’t think of anything else, to be truthful. They’re probably boring people to be around if you’re not a fellow musician [laughs]. But, the allure of the world of music is very powerful, and when you’re caught up in it, that’s what it is.

SFBG The place in music that you occupy: do you form any visual associations with it?

PG Not really, though in dreams, I can see things. The language of music is aural. It’s not about seeing; it’s about hearing.

SFBG Is there a piece, or even a section of a piece of yours, that you feel really succinctly encapsulates your approach to music, or what you strive for?

PG Einstein was the piece in the ’70s that captured that for me. But then, six years later, I was doing Koyaanisqatsi. Before Einstein, there was Music in Twelve Parts. Then, after that, there were three operas I did, to the work of Jean Cocteau. These are things that come up throughout my life. Certain pieces kind of sum up everything you’ve been thinking about, and you become aware of it afterwards. It’s hard to know it when it’s happening.

When I look back on certain pieces, [in the mid-’90s there was] Symphony No. 2, which, I didn’t think very much of when I wrote it. And the violin concertos from that time. They both became emblematic pieces of a certain kind.

I can see pieces that way: pieces that seem to sum up a period of search and work, and they seem to be the contestants of those ideas. And then, you move on to, then maybe three, four years of experimentation, of working through things. And then, another piece will pop up, that kind of sums it up. That happens to everybody.

A Benefit for Big Sur’s Henry Miller Memorial Library
Philip Glass and Joanna Newsom with Tim Fain
Mon/25, $62.50-$140
Warfield
982 Market, SF
(415) 345-0900
www.thewarfieldtheatre.com

The Grannies flaunt their finest digs for a good cause

Tony Robles
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The Grannies flaunt their finest digs for a good cause

The Grannies know how to have fun. After over a decade of raucous good times, including two European tours and years of stage antics, the six remaining members of the local punk band are back, playing in Oakland Fri/22 with Midnight Bombers and the Ardent Sons.

Yet this show extends past the chaotic atmospheres of a typical Grannies show. This show is a benefit for the son of founder and lead guitarist Sluggo Cawley.

Cawley’s four-year-old son Blixa was recently diagnosed with acute leukemia, and he’ll be undergoing treatment for the next four years. The Uptown is accepting donations above the door cover.

“My son is doing well,” says Cawley. “The initial shock is the most horrible. We went into the hospital for a regular checkup, and hearing that news was way out of our scope of reality. But there has been an outpouring of love and money; people offering help in any way that they can.”

Adding, “I used to be kind of a ‘people suck’ kind of person, but I have been proven wrong in the last couple months!”

He says total strangers having been sending in assistance. A punk band in Germany sent over a thousand Euros.

“We do have a lot of expenses, it will add up. I am not super religious, but if people offer us prayers and I appreciate it, every kind of good vibe or feeling helps.”

Usually, Cawley can turn to his bandmates for those good vibes — the Grannies is made up of Granimal, Granzig, Stagger G, Bjorn Toulouse and Drool Cup, who all rock out in full dresses and wigs, classic if outdated grandma-ware.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q78Rv9BeXlk

The group’s online persona is just as amusing. The San Francisco punk band, founded in 1999, notes in various online sites that its interests include knitting, reclining, drinking, burning, rocking, and sleeping. And the musicians’ cynical and ironic sense of humor comes across in songs such as “Denture Breath” and similarly silly album names like Taste the Walker.

Those musicians are excited to play the benefit tonight at the Uptown.

 “The Uptown is a really awesome club,” Cawley says. “[It was] the first venue to offer a benefit show, and for a Friday night, too!”

There’ll be an auction at the show as well, including the poster by well-known artist Gregg Gordon, who has worked on the graphics for Live 105 and its BFD show.

“After original horrible diagnosis, we feel really, really lucky that people have come to help,” Cawley says. “He is a beautiful blonde haired, blue-eyed kid. Right now he looks like a little old man, he has lost all his hair, but it doesn’t bother him. In 10 years it will all be behind him, he will be a normal teenager by then. Any adult in his situation would be worrying and complaining, I would be.”

“He is pretty awesome, I mean even when he had a bad fever for four days, he would still give you a smile.”

The Grannies
With Midnight Bombers, Ardent Sons
Fri/22, 9pm, $10
Uptown
1928 Telegraph, Oakl.
(510) 451-8100
www.uptownnightclub.com

Alerts

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Wednesday 20

Pack the court for Kali, Hayward Hall of Justice, 24405 Amador #108, Hayward; www.occupyoakland.org. 8-11am, free. Of all the outrageous and unjust arrests that have gone down at Occupy Oakland, Kali’s may be the worst. Kali was turning his life around at the Occupy Oakland camp when he was arrested in December for his “unpermitted” blanket. He was denied medication for a mental health issue for days in jail before getting in a conflict with a guard- which got him charged with assaulting a police officer. It was his third strike, and he may face life in prison. From organizers: “Wear red in support of Kali’s favorite color! Since he was an active member of the Kitchen Committee, there will be Coffee not Cops as well as a potluck afterwards.”

“Notes from a revolution,” Booksmith, 1644 Haight, SF; www.booksmith.com. 6:30pm, free. In the Haight’s heyday, the Diggers were a cultural and political force to be reckoned with. The “community anarchist” collective served food in the Panhandle, ran free medical clinics, and generally cared for the large amount of people who flocked to the neighborhood in the 60s. They set up free stores and crash pads, and were known for absurd theater that makes you think. Now their broadsides have become a new book, Notes from a Revolution. Some of those involved in this recent San Francisco history will speak at the Booksmith for the books release, and there might even be some Diggers-style people-feeding afoot.

Thursday 21

Emiliano Donis benefit concert, Brava Theater, 2781 24th St., SF; www.brava.org. 7:30pm, $15-20. Emiliano Donis had only been 18 for a few weeks when he was arrested for dating his underage partner. According to his mother, Denhi Donis, they had been together at ages 15 and 17 before his birthday last fall. He was arrested in November, and has been locked up since. His moher organized this benefit concert, featuring a pretty great lineup of local bands, to help raise money for his legal fees.

Friday 22

The Black Power Mixtape room 304, Redstone building, 2940 16th St., SF; www.norcalsocialism.org. 7pm, $5-10 suggested donation. The Black Power Mixtape, 1967-1975, contains rare and powerful footage. There are scenes of Angela Davis being interviewed in prison, Stokely Carmicheal with his mother, and too many unnamed leaders spreading the revolution. The footage, shot by Swedish filmmakers who lacked a certain tendency to demonize those in the black liberation movement, is unique in its honesty. This screening is a fundraiser for local folks to get to the Socialism 2012 conference in Chicago next week.

Sunday 24

Queer prisoner letter-writing Station 40, 3030B 16th St., SF; www.tinyurl.com/station40. 4-6pm, free. It’s the monthly prisoner letter-writing campaign- the “post-pride (or hide from pride)” edition. From hate crime victims who fight back to sex workers to people who just don’t “look right,” LGBTQ people make up a disproportionate number of people in the criminal justice system. Come write letters to show them they’re not forgotten.

Monday 25

“The sky did not fall” Commonwealth Club, 595 Market, SF; www.commonwealthclub.org. 5:30pm, $7-20.  Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was finally repealed last July. That hasn’t stopped people to argue for its reinstatement for reasons like“they’re in close quarters, they live with people, they obviously shower with people” (Rick Santorum in October.) Get the real story at this Commonwealth Club event, where soldiers will speak on the historic repeal’s effect on their lives. At least for these soldiers, the changes weren’t shower-related, but instead related to not fearing dishonorable discharge and hiding who they love while risking their lives in the military.

Maybe I should move to France

Zelda Bronstein
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57
Maybe I should move to France

I know that would make some of my happy trolls even happier. But then I’d have to learn French. And I don’t know if the bars in Paris have Bud Light.

But when you look at the agenda of the new French government, it’s pretty much what a lot of us, including a lot of non-Socialists, have been advocating for the United States: Tax the rich, end tax breaks for banks and oil companies, hire a lot of new teachers, invest in youth and the future, don’t get your pants in a wad about short-term deficits, legalize same-sex marriage … damn. They’ve got it all.

Or rather, Fichu. Ils l’ont obtenu tous.

Did I get that right?

Of course, the critics are terrified about the same things they all seem terrified about whenever anyone in San Francisco talks about local taxes on the wealthy: OMG! The rich will all leave town and go live in Fresno! See:

The pledges have prompted fears of an exodus of wealthy footballers and pop stars to lands beyond the French border.

I suppose. But I suspect a lot of wealthy Parisians will stay Parisians even if their taxes go up. They live there for a reason, as do San Franciscans, and Californians. What, you’re going to play football in France and live in Antwerp? That’s not going to go over too well.

So this will be a fine experiment here. If France doesn’t collapse and Paris doesn’t empty out and the world doesn’t end, maybe we’ll all learn a lesson. Oui?

 

 

 

Guardian voices: Outside the Bay Area Bubble

Zelda Bronstein
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7
Guardian voices: Outside the Bay Area Bubble

This week I’m back in the midwest, where my roots are strong and my mother is approaching her retirement years. I’m thinking about the vast geographic and cultural distance –both real and imagined — between the San Francisco, California where I now live, and the great state of Iowa, which made me so much of who I am.

Here I am, sweating through a ridiculously muggy midwest summer heatwave, thinking about how it is that I am black, a lifelong social justice activist and organizer, and a married, dyke mama who hails from a small, working-class Iowa town where sweet corn and tomatoes once grew in my own backyard.

When I tell people that I’m from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, there is a kind of shocked silence I’ve become accustomed to. I’m used to people’s confusion about how I – given my politics and identities — could possibly be from such a place. And, while I find it extremely problematic, I’ve also gotten used to a dismissive arrogance about Iowa, a comfortable ignorance about the heartland, and a total failure to comprehend why I long for my Nana’s lilac-lined house at 1339 10th Street and why I have so much hope for middle America.

I work, organize and am raising a family in the “Bay Area bubble” but being from Iowa has developed in me core values that are decidedly anti-bubble, and deeply pro-working America. My ancestors built the wealth of this nation, and I consider the whole place mine – to love and rage over, to listen to and understand, to organize and to challenge. I have not committed my life to social change just for a privileged few on the East and West Coasts. This is, fundamentally about all of us, the 99 percent in San Francisco, through the heartland, down South and all the way to upper tip of Maine.

My four-year-old son was born in San Francisco, and he is a proud Frisco kid through and through. We have a multi-racial community that dances and organizes for justice together, he considers Salvadoran pupusas a special treat, and he loves remembering the day the Giants won the World Series and it seemed like everyone in the city was a member of the same big family.

But today, I’m writing from a cramped apartment in a seven-story public housing building in Michigan where my mother now lives with her scores of books, photography equipment and cute dresses from QVC. She and I are from a clan of Gibsons, black folks from working-class Iowa where my great grandparents worked on the railroads, and where my grandfather slaughtered pigs and went on strike with his white coworkers to defend the gains of their union.

We’re from the Iowa, where my mother attended black churches as a child and found Islam as an adult, and where she, as a struggling single mother, read black feminist poetry and first fought battles with Ronald Reagan’s backwards welfare policies.

We’re from the Iowa that is a center of agribusiness and everything that’s bad about corporate food production in this country. We’re from the Iowa that rallied for Jesse Jackson’s run for president, voted for same-sex marriage, and where Obama won the caucuses back in 2008.

But Iowa has also gone from unionized, inter-racial meatpacking plants to non-union poultry factories that exploit undocumented Latino workers from as far away as El Salvador and Guatemela. We’re from the Iowa that is indeed mostly white, where my first best friend grew up – a sweet white working class red head – and our mothers shared survival stories of single, working-poor motherhood. And I’m from the Cedar Rapids, Iowa that, unlike San Francisco, is actually growing its black population and is home to a thriving center of African American community history.

For most of my adult life, as I’ve been marching against war and racism, I’ve also been defending this Iowa, fighting against the tendency toward self-righteous superiority I’ve found among too many activists in the Bay and on the East Coast. It’s the same arrogance that the Right exploits in its scandalous but effective pseudo-populist campaigns against so-called liberal elitism.

It’s my experience that people on the left think they know what it means to be Iowan. Iowans are used as stand-in for a stereotypical idea of backwards, irrationally racist white America that ‘doesn’t vote its class interests’; Iowa is a convenient marker for everything less cool, hip, cosmopolitan and liberal than, well, San Francisco.

This kind of dismissive arrogance leads to a refusal to develop, in any meaningful, long-term way, an organizing agenda for the majority of the country, and has been one of the errors of progressive politics for a long time.

We can change this. When we are thinking about the politics of immigration policy, Occupy Wall Street, gay marriage, the movement against corporate food policy, or the politics of race, poverty and labor unions, we have to think about Iowa. Think about the white working class Republicans. Think about my mom’s friend in Iowa, raised on an old fashioned farm and now leading an organic farming collective there. Think about the proud struggle for small farms, union work, and participatory democracy there.

And think about what it will really take to make the Bay, Iowa and the whole nation a place where we can all develop our full human potential, have true mutual respect for one another, and are able to struggle through our deep divisions without exclusionary moral superiority, top-down “we know what’s best for you” politics and where all of us who want to live out our old age on a quiet lilac-lined porch in Iowa, can do so in peace and dignity.
As we make our plan to build a new progressive majority, let’s stay open-minded and take our organizing to a whole new level.

Ethics Commission undercuts the main witness against Mirkarimi

Sasha Cuttler
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213
Ethics Commission undercuts the main witness against Mirkarimi

The testimony of the star witness in Mayor Ed Lee’s official misconduct case against suspended Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi came in for harsh criticism by the Ethics Commission last night, with that body striking most of it as prejudicial and unsupported hearsay evidence that should have never been introduced, something that even the city’s attorneys admitted and apologized for.

It was a serious blow to the city’s case that also undercuts the written testimony of the city’s domestic violence expert, attorney Nancy Lemon, who based much of her analysis and judgments on this discredited and disallowed testimony of Ivory Madison, the neighbor and confidante of Mirkarimi’s wife who reported the Dec. 31 domestic violence incident to police.

Meanwhile, Lee was confronted by a large pack of reporters following his monthly appearance before the Board of Supervisors earlier the day, which peppered him with pointed questions about his decision to bring what is evolving into an expensive, complicated, and nasty prosecution of Mirkarimi rather than simply allowing him to be recalled by voters. The exchange made news when Lee characterized Mirkarimi’s arm-grabbing incident as “the beating of his wife.”

Mirkarimi and his attorneys labeled that comment and much of the city’s case as simply a smear campaign that goes well beyond the narrow question of whether Mirkarimi committed official misconduct and should be removed from office, which the commission is still in the process of setting up procedures to answer.

Yesterday’s hearing dealt mostly with deciding whether to exclude or allow the written testimony of nearly two dozen witnesses. The only testimony that was stricken entirely was that of Paul Henderson, Lee’s criminal justice adviser, who testified that Mirkarimi’s guilty plea to misdemeanor false imprisonment for the grabbing incident would hurt his ability to function as the sheriff. The commission found the testimony to be irrelevant and prejudicial, clearly upsetting Deputy City Attorney Sherri Kaiser.

But the big news from last week’s hearing was the dim view that the commission took of Madison’s 22-page declaration, which painted Mirkarimi as domineering and oppressive, a bleak picture that she attributed to his wife, Eliana Lopez, as conveyed during repeated conversations between October and December as the couple was having marital problems. Madison is the main source supporting the city’s most serious allegations: that Mirkarimi abused his wife and then tried to thwart a police investigation

Commissioner Paul Renne – a career litigator appointed to the commission by the District Attorney’s Office – took the lead role in criticizing Madison’s testimony and the city for allowing it, ruing the fact that it was used by the Examiner and other media outlets to paint a defamatory “portrait of verbal abuse and child neglect inside Mirkarimi’s fear-ridden household,” as the Examiner put it on the cover of yesterday’s paper.

“I saw that and I thought maybe this idea of [taking initial testimony through written] declarations is not protective of the interests of everyone,” Renne said.

“I was disappointed by the content of Ivory Madison’s declaration. A first-year lawyer should know that much of it is inadmissible and it should not have been given to us,” Renne told Deputy City Attorney Peter Keith, calling it “clearly hearsay, clearly having the intention of poisoning the well of this hearing.”

Keith didn’t even try to defend most of the declaration, responding to Renne by saying, “We have an independent witness that is represented by [her own legal] counsel and we didn’t have control over everything that was submitted…I think the criticism is well-taken and we didn’t mean to put matters before the commission that are not relevant.”

“But you were the one who submitted the declaration,” Renne responded, telling Keith that the city must avoiding engaging in character assassination that goes beyond the scope of the commission’s inquiry, which will result in a formal recommendation going to the Board of Supervisors near the end of summer.

“My recommendation is we reject the declaration and you bring her in for live testimony,” Renne recommended. The rest of the commission seemed to agree with Renne’s criticism, but it opted to go through the declaration line-by-line, removing most of it from the proceedings. Madison is also expected to testify live and be subjected to a tough cross-examination by Mirkarimi’s attorneys, who say she has blown the incident out-of-proportion and broke the confidence of Lopez, who denies that Mirkarimi was ever abusive.

In arguing unsuccessfully for much of Madison’s written testimony to remain in the record, Keith told the commission that it was the basis for Lemon’s assessment of patterns of behavior by batterers, thus undercutting that testimony as well.

“If they’re untrue, they’re meaningless, right?” Renne asked Keith, referring to the sensational tales Madison told about Mirkarimi’s controlling behavior.

But Keith said that even if the stories Lopez told Madison were untrue or highly embellished – as Lopez’s attorney, Paula Canny, has implied as she characterized her client as building a child custody case in the event the couple divorced – they are still relevant to understanding why Madison reported Mirkarimi to the police.

“Whether or not these actions happened, it’s relevant to her concerns,” Keith said.

But Mirkarimi attorney Shepherd Kopp said that, like much of the city’s case, hearsay testimony based on flawed and prejudicial information should be irrelevant to these proceedings and shouldn’t be allowed as evidence against Mirkarimi.

“Their expert, Ms. Lemon, can believe what she wants, but that doesn’t mean it should come in as evidence,” Kopp said.

The hearing was continued to next week when Mirkarimi, Lee, and other key witnesses are expected to begin giving live testimony before the commission on June 28 and 29. Click here to read the various documents associated with the case.

Psychic Dream Astrology: June 20-26

Andrew Lam
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0

ARIES

March 21-April 19

It is the way that you respond to things that counts now, Aries. When you feel threatened or overwhelmed it’s easy to act defensively and engage in or start stupid fights. No matter how passionately you feel entitled to your feelings, slow down and consider the consequences before you act.

TAURUS

April 20-May 20

Keep your eyes on the prize. You are meant to thrive, and this week you need to stay focused on your goals so that you can do just that! Reach out to others for help, and learn the value of collaborating without diluting your vision or will. Flexibility and vitality will carry you through.

GEMINI

May 21-June 21

This week, clear, unequivocal communication will bring your game to the next level, Gemini. Be direct and compassionate as you assert your needs, or respond to the needs of those around you. Make the kind of deep changes that you need in your relationships by gently asserting your true wishes with others.

CANCER

June 22-July 22

Your gut feelings will guide you to where you need to go if you let them, Moonchild. Your instincts live in a place that requires some stillness to get to. Alone time may feel counter-intuitive this week, but you need to spend some time in a sweet little place called Me. Minimize activity and maximize your receptivity.

LEO

July 23-Aug. 22

When you feel bad, it’s hard to believe that you have any choice in the matter. Heartache and disappointments can be like a sieve for your good vibes, but you should remember that you have options. Look for possibility in even the crappiest of your circumstances and choose to put your energies into that, Leo.

VIRGO

Aug. 23-Sept. 22

Effort, hard work, and patience will bring you to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. The kind of success that awaits you this week is most gracefully achieved when you share with others. If you forget to include others in the good of your life, it has a way of eclipsing your abundance, so put yourself out there.

LIBRA

Sept. 23-Oct. 22

You’re looking for love in all the wrong places again, Libra. Until you start with yourself, you are unlikely to get off this carousel. Unplug everything and cancel plans! Quit it with the distractions until you get right with yourself. Only then will you be able to take care of things in a way that makes things good.

SCORPIO

Oct. 23-Nov. 21

When things get stuck you can try to unstick ’em, but what do you do when that isn’t working? There needs to be a point when you accept the limitations of your situation, Scorpio. Stop trying to get your square peg into that round hole, and put your energy where it can thrive instead. Move onwards and upwards, pal.

SAGITTARIUS

Nov. 22-Dec. 21

Where you focus your energies, they multiply! So simple, but easy to forget. This week, your challenge is to be real with yourself about your concerns while not letting them blossom into major fears. If you don’t know what will happen next, try imagining things turning a corner and improving, Sag.

CAPRICORN

Dec. 22-Jan. 19

You are engaged in a process in which you can better get to know yourself, and even let others get closer to you, too. Be patient this week! You can most certainly move through things quickly now, but if you do that, you are unlikely to stay emotionally present. Slow and steady yields the best results, Cap.

AQUARIUS

Jan. 20-Feb. 18

Be open to change, both the kind that you need to create and the stuff that happens out of your control. If you can be your own anchor, you don’t need to define your security or happiness through outside conditions. Bring the best you’ve got to the inevitable in your life this week.

PISCES

Feb. 19-March 20

Remain true to your ideals, even when your moods try to tear you away from them. When you’re freaking out it’s easy to convince yourself that you deserve to do whatever you want, but it isn’t so. Rise to the occasion and act with integrity this week, especially when the going gets rough.

Jessica Lanyadoo has been a Psychic Dreamer for 17 years. Check out her website at www.lovelanyadoo.com or contact her for an astrology or intuitive reading at (415) 336-8354 or dreamyastrology@gmail.com

 

Our Weekly Picks: June 20-26

Andrew Lam
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0

THURSDAY 21

SF Symphony Presents: Duke Bluebeard’s Castle

This’ll be dark and delicious. Young British filmmaker Nick Hillel’s innovative, sculptural projections have appeared in videos for the Beastie Boys, Baaba Maal, Cirque du Soleil, and Matthew Herbert. He’s set to direct and design the SF Symphony’s semi-staged performance of composer Bela Bartok’s wickedly gorgeous 1911 mini-opera setting of the Bluebeard legend: a young bride wanders through her older husband’s nightmarish castle, discovering seven rooms that include a torture chamber, a gleaming treasure, a lake of tears, and, finally, her own horrible fate. Somehow this is not a downer! Probably because the music’s so entrancing — here voiced by mezzo-soprano Michelle DeYoung and bass-baritone Alan Held — and the tale so engrossing. Plus you get awesome pianist Jeremy Denk performing Franz Liszt’s Piano Concerto #1 and a clubby afterparty on Fri/22 with John Vanderslice and Magik*Magik Orchestra. No lake of tears here. (Marke B.)

Thu/21-Sat/23, 8pm, $35–$145

Davies Symphony Hall

201 Van Ness, SF

www.sfsymphony.org

 

FRIDAY 22

“David Shrigley: Brain Activity”

Glasgow-based artist David Shrigley’s signature cartoons are hilariously deadpan: crude drawings and doodles; short stories filled with crossed-out corrections; a “Lost Pet” poster, taped to a tree, seeing a certain pigeon (“Normal size. A bit mangy looking.”) He’s also an animator, spoken-word performer, photographer, music-video director, occasional DJ, and taxidermist — witness the “I’m Dead” image, featuring a stiffly obedient Jack Russell, being used to promote “Brain Activity” at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (“Is this the sickest art show ever?” tut-tutted the Daily Mail). This is the only stateside stop for “Brain Activity,” so don’t miss the chance to witness, and chuckle at, the work of this offbeat art star. (Cheryl Eddy)

Through Sept. 23

Opening tonight with performance by Blasted Canyons, 8-10pm, $12–$15

Artist lecture Sat/23, 2pm, free with gallery admission ($8–$10)

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts

701 Mission, SF

www.ybca.org

 

“Mission in the Mix”

Talk to anybody who has ever sat through an evening of hip-hop, you are likely to hear: “It was so much fun.” Talk to somebody dancing in a hip-hop group, same thing: “so much fun.” In some ways the yearly “Mission in the Mix” is a kind of preview of the big hip-hop fiesta in November, to which dancers fly in from who knows where. But, Micaya, the soul force behind that event, has always stressed her love for the local dancers who might not necessarily be ready yet for the big tent. So this is her chance to make them shine in a more intimate but no less rollicking environment. (Rita Felciano)

Through June 30; Fri-Sat, 8pm, Sun, 7pm, $17

Dance Mission Theater

3316 24th St. SF

(415) 826-4441

www.dancemission.com

 

Royal Headache

Musical debates can give you a…total migraine. With the US release of the self-titled album from Australia’s Royal Headache earlier this year, finding out about the band now is like coming into an argument halfway. Having built up a reputation through its live performances, the band — whose members are named Law, Joe, Shorty, and Shogun — is at the center of Sydney’s burgeoning garage rock scene, combining additional powerpop and R&B. The key element, though, is the naturally soulful voice of singer Shogun, alternately hailed as either a rock’n’roll messiah or the unwelcome return of Rod Stewart. (Ryan Prendiville)

With Yi, Synthetic ID

7pm, $8

1-2-3-4 GO! Records

423 40th St., Oakl.

www.1234gorecords.com

 

Death to All

Seven members of the pioneering death metal band Death are uniting to embark on a seven-stop tour beginning in San Francisco. The band’s first album Scream Bloody Gore, released 25 years ago, is widely considered to be the first true death metal album. This tour comes 11 years after the death of founding member Chuck Schuldiner due to brain cancer, and is intended to celebrate his life as well as to raise awareness and money for Sweet Relief, a nonprofit organization that helps foot medical bills for musicians. Never before has shredding, head-banging brutality been so morally sound. (Haley Zaremba)

With Gorguts

9pm, $32

Regency Ballroom

1300 Van Ness, SF

(415) 673-5716

www.theregencyballroom.com

 

Horse Meat Disco

Honey Soundsystem has good reason to be proud. Its parties — focused more on quality music than marketing to a stereotype — have been an energizing force for and beyond the SF gay community. Now Honey is starting off a packed Pride weekend by bringing out London’s Horse Meat Disco. Boldly called “without a doubt the most important disco club night in the world” the collective shares Honey’s expansive take on the genre, releasing borderless mixes as likely to feature edits of Talking Heads and Mungolian Jetset as Sylvester. The night also features the return of DIY synth wiz Gavin Russom, not in a DJ set, but with his live ensemble, the Crystal Ark.(Prendiville)

With Poolside (live), Honey Soundsystem DJs

9pm Doors, $17 Advance

Mezzanine

444 Jessie, SF

(415) 625-8880

www.mezzaninesf.com


SATURDAY 23

Bicycle Music Festival

Though LovEvolution may have be out-Darwined by the War on Fun, we (gosh darn) still have Bicycle Music Festival providing ambulatory audio in our city streets. The fest, split between two free outdoor locations, is completely pedal-powered — attendees morph into volunteers when they grab saddles and lend their quad muscles to the generator cause. This year, festival co-founder Shake Your Peace! makes its triumphal return, attendance may hit 1,000, and Birds & Batteries, Rupa and the April Fishes, and Major Powers and the Lo-Fi Symphony will be among those taking the stage. Catch the thrilling cross-city processional at 5pm to see members of Jazz Mafia roll through intersections without missing a beat. (Caitlin Donohue)

Noon-11pm, free

Noon-5pm: Log Cabin Meadow, Golden Gate Park, SF

6-11pm: Showplace Triangle, Irwin and 8th St., SF

www.bicyclemusicfestival.com

 

Mark Gardener

A mainstay of Britain’s legendary early-’90s shoegaze scene, Ride embraced the Beatles-on-drugs songbook, turned its guitars up to 11, and filtered the result through a viscous, Phil Spectorian cloud of pink noise. Now, 15 years after Ride’s disbandment, the band’s vocalist and guitarist Mark Gardener is coming stateside to honor the 20th anniversary of its sophomore effort, Going Blank Again: an album equally indebted to the Stone Roses’ jangly pop, and Kevin Shields’ shapeshifting production dynamics. Those of you jonesing for another My Bloody Valentine reunion appearance, take note: this is the show of the weekend to seize upon. (Taylor Kaplan)

With Sky Parade, Silent Pictures, DJ Dennis the Menace

9:30pm, $15

Cafe du Nord

2170 Market, SF

(415) 861-5016

www.cafedunord.com


MONDAY 25

Friends

Friends will be friends. But only the best of them will house your ass after a bedbug infestation — or so the story of Bushwick, Brooklyn’s dynamo five-piece, Friends, goes. Frontperson Samantha Urbani opened her home to future bandmates Lesley Hann (bassist) and Oliver Duncan (drummer) after the two were hit with a bout of the six-legged bloodsuckers, and jamming ensued. Tapping Matthew Molnar and Nikki Shapiro to round out the lineup, Urbani and friends instantly honed in on a funky, tropical, soul-tinged, and totally danceable kind of pop music. Friends — formerly known as Perpetual Crush — hit the ground flying in 2011, releasing much buzzed about singles “Friend Crush” and “I’m His Girl.” Debut full-length album Manifest! is out now — just in time to have a summah. (Julia B. Chan)

With Splash!, Young Digerati

9pm, $12

Bottom of the Hill

1233 17th, SF

(415) 621-4455

www.bottomofthehill.com


TUESDAY 26

“Jurassic Live: Dino Action Show”

The T.rex is coming! The velociraptors are here! All the way from Austin, Tex., Old Murder House Theatre — producers of Aliens on Ice … I highly recommend YouTubing it — brings its latest blockbuster homage to the Children’s Fairyland Theatre. This venue usually excludes grown-ups without kids in tow, but this interpretation of 1993’s Jurassic Park is “intended for mature audiences,” which I hope means plenty of stage blood during the “clever girl” scene. Also in store: cardboard-and-duct-tape reptiles, DIY contraband-toting devices disguised as shaving-cream cans, a bewigged dude playing Laura Dern, and more. Eat your heart out, Spielberg! (Eddy)

8:30pm, $20

Children’s Fairyland Theatre

699 Bellevue, Oakl.

www.oldmurderhousetheatre.com

 

The Hundred in the Hands

This glammed-out electro duo from Brooklyn produces dreamy pop songs with a shimmery disco tinge. Vocalist Eleanore Everdell is classically trained, her background in opera leading not to overpowering vibrato but instead to lush vocal stylings that add a warm depth to their dance-friendly tracks. Keyboardist and programmer Jason Friedman brings his art school education to the band’s online publication THITH ZINE, which highlights their favorite music, art, and design. The zine’s DIY foundation compliments the raw feel of the duo’s catchy homemade beats. Named after the Lakota Nation term for a battle resulting in the slaying of 100 members of the opposing army, the Hundred in the Hands promise to deliver a powerful, take-no-prisoners performance. (Zaremba)

With Silver Swans, Teenage Sweater

8pm, $12

Rickshaw Stop

155 Fell, SF

(415) 861-2011

www.rickshawstop.com

 

KWJAZ

Often associated with the “hypnagogic pop” movement that’s put the blogosphere into overdrive (think chillwave, but artier/weirder/more “washed out”) SF’s own KWJAZ has taken the cassette-fetishist subculture by storm. Churning out a gloriously hazy brand of jam-based pop, mastermind Peter Berends specializes in a more drawn-out approach than most of his peers; KWJAZ’s self-titled debut, released this year on the hipper-than-thou Not Not Fun Records, consists solely of two extended tracks, jazzily oozing from one murky, spliffed-out groove to the next. Pink Floyd for Hype Williams fans? Ariel Pink for the Soft Machine crowd? Bear witness, and decide for yourself. (Kaplan)

With Aloonaluna, Aja

9pm, $5

Hemlock

1131 Polk, SF

(415) 923-0923

www.hemlocktavern.com

The Guardian listings deadline is two weeks prior to our Wednesday publication date. To submit an item for consideration, please include the title of the event, a brief description of the event, date and time, venue name, street address (listing cross streets only isn’t sufficient), city, telephone number readers can call for more information, telephone number for media, and admission costs. Send information to Listings, 71 Stevenson Street, Second Floor, SF, CA 94105 or email (paste press release into email body — no attachments, please) to listings@sfbg.com. Digital photos may be submitted in jpeg format; the image must be at least 240 dpi and four inches by six inches in size. We regret we cannot accept listings over the phone.

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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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

OPENING

The Scottsboro Boys American Conservatory Theater, 415 Geary, SF; www.act-sf.org. $20-95. Previews Thu/21-Sat/23 and Tues/26, 8pm (also Sat/23, 2pm); Sun/24, 7pm. Opens June 27, 8pm. Runs Tue-Sat, 8pm (July 3 performance at 7pm; also Wed and Sat, 2pm; no matinee July 4); July 1 and 8, 7pm. Through July 15. American Conservatory Theater presents the Kander and Ebb musical about nine African American men falsely accused of a crime they didn’t commit in the pre-civil rights movement South.

ONGOING

Aftermath Stagewerx, 446 Valencia, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $25. Thu-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. Theatre, Period presents Jessica Blank and Erik Jenson’s docu-drama, based on interviews with Iraqi civilians forced to flee after the US military’s arrival in 2003.

A Behanding in Spokane SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter, SF; www.sfplayhouse.org. $20-70. Tue-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 3pm). Through June 30. If Garth Ennis had been asked to write a comic book about a one-handed sociopath with a dark obsession, he might well have written something similar to Martin McDonagh’s A Behanding in Spokane. And admittedly, approached from that angle, a lot of the script’s dramatic flaws are more easily forgiven. There’s not a whole lot of subtle context or languid metaphor to be found in McDonagh’s criminal caper about the little-known “hand-dealing” trade, but as in Ennis’ best known work, Preacher, the pretty girl (Melissa Quine) is the smartest one in the room; the sociopath (Rod Gnapp) is interested in enacting as vicious a revenge on all humanity while spewing as many blatantly offensive invectives as possible; the boyfriend (Daveed Diggs) has some arrested development issues to work out; and the receptionist (Alex Hurt) takes the caricature of man-child to a whole new level. In fact, while all four actors deliver rock-solid performances of their mostly unsympathetic characters, it’s Hurt’s that impresses most. His spooky intensity and goofily tone-deaf determination plays like a combination of Adam Sandler and Arno Frisch, and if there’s a real sociopath in the room, the evidence suggests it’s probably him. Ultimately though the piece relies too heavily on hollow one-liners to remain interesting — a 20-minute farce stretched to 90 minutes — and quite unlike an Ennis comic, it does not leave one wanting more. (Gluckstern)

Bruja Magic Theatre, Fort Mason Center, Marina at Laguna, SF; www.magictheatre.org. $20-60. Wed/20-Sat/23, 8pm (also Sat/23, 2:30pm); Sun/24, 2:30pm. Although San Francisco’s Mission District is inexorably morphing into an empire of twee boutiques and haute cuisine, it’s still the first port of call for many Latin American migrants, and there are plenty of panaderias and botanicas tucked in between the sushi joints. In the Magic Theatre’s production of Bruja, playwright Luis Alfaro transplants the story of Medea to 24th Street by way of Michoacán, exploring the tension between retaining old-country values and staking out a future in a new world. Directed by artistic director Loretta Greco, the title role played by a stunning Sabina Zuniga Varela, this chamber version of the Greek tragedy hits hard, exposing each character’s darkest secrets to an unforgiving light. And every character, save the doomed brothers Acan and Acat (played the night I saw it by Daniel Castaneda and Gavilan Gordon-Chavez), has a secret to hide, even Medea, a curandera or healer by trade, whose powers run deeper and darker than her new world acquaintances, or even her old servant (Wilma Bonet) suspect. And when Jason (Sean San José) and his callous boss Creon (Carlos Aguirre), ruthlessly push Medea to her breaking point, her bloody vengeance proves, if little else, that she can play at ruthlessness better than anyone, whatever the consequences. (Gluckstern)

5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason, SF; www.tidestheatre.org. $20-38. Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 10pm). Through July 21. Tides Theatre performs Evan Linder and Andrew Hobgood’s comedy about five women forced into a bomb shelter during a mid-breakfast nuke attack.

The Full Monty Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; www.roltheatre.com. $25-36. Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through June 30. In desperate times, how far would you go to turn a buck? The central premise of the 1997 movie and its namesake musical comedy The Full Monty, the answer to this question is right in the title, which limits the suspense, but amps up the expectations. Set not in Sheffield, England as in the movie, but the similarly economically challenged climate of Buffalo, New York circa the late nineties, the comical romp follows a group of unemployed steel workers who decide, rather optimistically, that spending one night as exotic dancers will solve their immediate financial woes. Banish all notions of a Hot Chocolate sing-along; the soundtrack of the stage musical has little in common with its cinematic predecessor, but there are a couple of toe-tappers, particularly the songs writ for the ladies: a belter’s anthem for their spry but elderly accompanist Jeanette (Cami Thompson), a snarky commentary on male beauty, “The Goods,” for the ensemble. On opening night, Ray of Light’s production ran about 15 minutes long after a late start, and the tempo seemed sluggish in parts, but once it hits its stride, The Full Monty should provide a welcome antidote to the ongoing, we’re-still-in-a-recession blues, red leather g-strings and all. (Gluckstern) Fwd: Life Gone Viral Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm (Sun/24, show at 2pm; July 15, show at 7:30pm). Extended through July 22. The internet becomes comic fodder for creator-performers Charlie Varon and Jeri Lynn Cohen, and creator-director David Ford.

Lips Together, Teeth Apart New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Terrence McNally’s play about two straight couples spending July 4 amid Fire Island’s gay community.

100 Saints You Should Know Thick House, 1695 18th St, SF; www.therhino.org. $10-30. Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm. Extended through July 1. Homespun scenic design notwithstanding, Theatre Rhinoceros and artistic director John Fisher offer a fine, engrossing production of this 2007 play by Kate Fodor (Hannah and Martin, RX), a sturdy comedy-drama about two fractured families colliding awkwardly in a sort of spiritual vacuum. Matthew (an intriguingly restrained Wiley Herman) is a desolate but forbearing Catholic priest sent on a leave of absence after a venial transgression involving some artful nude male photographs. Returning home, he endures a pained relationship with his devout, passively domineering Irish mother (Tamar Cohn, channeling a nicely measured mixture of stony discipline and childlike vulnerability). Soon Matthew gets an unexpected visit from single mom Theresa (a bright but shrewdly self-possessed Ann Lawler), a former Deadhead who now cleans the rectory and finds herself overcome with an urge to ask the gentle priest about prayer — just at the moment his faith seems to have left him. Meanwhile, Theresa’s too-cool-for-school teenager, Abby (a deft and hilarious Kim Stephenson), waits outside and does some preying of her own on a slower-witted but game young man from the neighborhood (a charmingly quirky Michael Rosen), both of them roiling with confused yearnings. The appealing characters and unexpected storyline come supported by some excellent dialogue, developing a searching theme that ultimately has less to do with formal religion than the ordinary but ineffable need it promises (problematically) to meet. “I think I could be religious or whatever if it made any sense,” notes Abby, “but it doesn’t make any sense.” It’s easy to agree with the teenager on this one. 100 Saints is a genuinely funny and compassionate play discerning enough to avoid naming the depths it sounds. (Avila)

Reunion SF Playhouse, Stage Two, 533 Sutter, SF; (415) 677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org. $20. Wed-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. SF Playhouse presents a world premiere drama by local playwright Kenn Rabin.

“Risk Is This…The Cutting Ball New Experimental Plays Festival” Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. Free ($20 donation for reserved seating; $50 donation for five-play reserved seating pass). Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through July 14. Cutting Ball’s annual fest of experimental plays features two new works and five new translations in staged readings.

Slipping New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Daniel Talbott’s drama about a gay teen who finds new hope after a traumatic breakup.

Tenderloin Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. $10-50. Extended run: Thu/21, 7:30pm; Fri/22-Sat/23, 8pm (also Sat/23, 2pm); Sun/24, 5pm. Annie Elias and Cutting Ball Theater artists present a world premiere “documentary theater” piece looking at the people and places in the Cutting Ball Theater’s own ‘hood.

Vital Signs Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri/22, 8pm; Sat, 8:30pm. Through July 21. The Marsh San Francisco presents Alison Whittaker’s behind-the-scenes look at nursing in America.

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through July 7. Brian Copeland (comedian, TV and radio personality, and creator-performer of the long-running solo play Not a Genuine Black Man) returns to the Marsh with a new solo, this one based on more recent and messier events in Copeland’s life. The play concerns an episode of severe depression in which he considered suicide, going so far as to purchase a handgun — the title coming from the legally mandatory 10-day period between purchasing and picking up the weapon, which leaves time for reflections and circumstances that ultimately prevent Copeland from pulling the trigger. A grim subject, but Copeland (with co-developer and director David Ford) ensures there’s plenty of humor as well as frank sentiment along the way. The actor peoples the opening scene in the gun store with a comically if somewhat stereotypically rugged representative of the Second Amendment, for instance, as well as an equally familiar “doood” dude at the service counter. Afterward, we follow Copeland, a just barely coping dad, home to the house recently abandoned by his wife, and through the ordinary routines that become unbearable to the clinically depressed. Copeland also recreates interviews he’s made with other survivors of suicidal depression. Telling someone about such things is vital to preventing their worst outcomes, says Copeland, and telling his own story is meant to encourage others. It’s a worthy aim but only a fitfully engaging piece, since as drama it remains thin, standing at perhaps too respectful a distance from the convoluted torment and alienation at its center. (Avila)

BAY AREA

Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Wed/20 and Sun/24, 7pm (also Sun/24, 7pm); Thu/21-Sat/23, 8pm (also Sat/23, 2pm). Berkeley Rep presents a world premiere from writer-performer Dael Orlandersmith (a Pulitzer finalist for 2002’s Yellowman).

Emilie: La Marquise Du Chatelet Defends Her Life Tonight Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant, Berk; www.brownpapertickets.com. $18-25. Thu-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. Symmetry Theatre Company presents Bay Area playwright Lauren Gunderson’s romantic drama centering on the life of 18th-century French physicist and mathematician, Émilie du Châtelet (Danielle Levin) and her (here tempestuous) long-term romance with Voltaire (Robert Parsons). In a familiar conceit left accordingly vague, fate rematerializes Emilie from some hazy afterlife so that she may relive key moments in her life and account for herself. A Cartesian mind/body split rules the replay, with Emilie finding herself painfully attenuated from the world of the senses — her flashback self (played by an impressive Blythe Foster) alone able to enjoy sensual contact with her surroundings. Meanwhile, love and loyalty face the test as Emilie goes head-to-head with a male-dominated scientific establishment over a certain theorem she calls “force vivre” — a formula into which Gunderson cleverly folds theoretical physics and the irrational heart. There’s even a visual aid: a running tally is kept throughout on a screen at the back of the stage, where hash marks appear and disappear under the headings “philosophy” and “love” as the scenes wind their desultory way back toward the moment of her demise. Chloe Bronzan directs a cast of strong actors but their work is uneven. Foster alone is consistently commanding in a part that, while minor, suggests what a more muscular approach overall might have accomplished. The normally formidable Parsons seems uncommitted in the part of Voltaire, admittedly a character too simpering and watery as written to merit much credence. Instead of palpable relationships — whether with lovers or ideas — Emilie deploys self-conscious verbiage, strained repartee and heavy thematic underscoring to churn what amounts to thin drama. (Avila)

Emotional Creature Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2025 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Previews Wed/20-Thu/21, 8pm. Opens Fri/22, 8pm. Runs Tue and Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm; no show July 13); Wed, 7pm (no show July 4); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 15. Berkeley Rep presents Eve Ensler’s world premiere, based on her best-seller I Am an Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around the World.

The Great Divide Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby, Berk; www.shotgunplayers.org. $20-30. Wed/20-Thu/21, 7pm; Fri/22-Sat/23, 8pm; Sun/24, 5pm. Shotgun Players performs Adamn Chanzit’s drama about the hot topic of fracking, inspired by Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People.

The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s New venue: Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through July 15. 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)

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through June 30. 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. Note: review from the show’s 2011 run at the Marsh San Francisco. (Avila)

The Odyssey Angel Island; (415) 547-0189, www.weplayers.org. $40-76 (some tickets include ferry passage). Sat-Sun, 10:30am-4pm (does not include travel time to island). Through July 1. We Players present Ava Roy’s adaptation of Homer’s epic poem: an all-day adventure set throughout the nature and buildings of Angel Island State Park.

Salomania Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; www.auroratheatre.org. $30-55. Previews Wed/20, 8pm. Opens Thu/21, 8pm. Runs Tue, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Throgh July 22. Aurora Theatre Company closes its 20th season with writer-director Mark Jackson’s world premiere, commissioned especially for the company, about a San Francisco-born dancer notorious for her take on the “Dance of the Seven Veils.”

The Tempest Bruns Amphitheater, 100 California Shakespeare Theater Way, Orinda; (510) 809-3290, www.calshakes.org. $35-71. Wed/20-Thu/21, 7:30pm; Fri/22-Sat/23, 8pm (also Sat/23, 2pm); Sun/24, 4pm. California Shakespeare Theater opens its season with this dance-filled interpretation of the Bard’s classic tale.

Wheelhouse TheatreWorks at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro, Mtn View; (650) 463-1960, www.theatreworks.org. $19-69. Tue-Wed, 7:30pm; Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 1. TheatreWorks’ 60th world premiere is a musical created by and starring pop-rock trio GrooveLily.

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Fri, 6pm; Sun/24 and June 30, 11am. Through June 30. Louis “The Amazing Bubble Man” Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

“Bare Bones Butoh Presents: Showcase 24” Studio 210, 3435 Cesar Chavez, SF; deborahslater.org/studio210.php. Fri/22-Sat/23, 8pm. $5-20. New material and works-in-progress by both local and national cutting-edge artists.

Alicia Dattner Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.theexit.org. Fri/22, 8pm. $26. The comedian performs.

“DEEPER, Architectural Meditations at CounterPULSE” CounterPULSE, 1310 Mission, SF; www.counterpulse.org. Fri-Sun, 8pm. Through July 1. $25. Lizz Roman and Dancers perform a site-specific work.

“Elect to Laugh” Studio Theater, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. Tue, 8pm. Through Nov 6. $15-50. Will Durst and friends perform in this weekly political humor show that focuses on the upcoming presidential election.

“hOPPomage” Shotwell Studios, 3252-A 19th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/22-Sat/23, 8pm. $10-15. An evening of “mental dance” inspired by artist Dennis Oppenheim with Driveway Dancers.

“Jillarious Tuesdays” Tommy T’s Showroom, 1000 Van Ness, SF; www.jillarious.com. Tue, 7:30. Ongoing. $20. Weekly comedy show with Jill Bourque, Kevin Camia, Justin Lucas, and special guests.

“Majestic Musical Review Featuring Her Rebel Highness” Harlot, 46 Minna, SF

; www.herrebelhighness.com. Sun, 5pm. Through Aug 12. $25-65. Cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, performers in Baroque-chic gowns, music, and more.

“Mission in the Mix” Dance Mission Theatre, 3316 24th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 7pm. Through July 1. $17. SF Hip-Hop DanceFest producer Micaya presents new work by her SoulForce Dance Company, plus guest performances.

“Porch Light: California Dreaming” Contemporary Jewish Museum, 736 Mission, SF; www.thecjm.org. Thu/21, 7pm. $15. Storytelling with Janet Varney, John Law, Dayvid Figler, and more.

San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival Novellus Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard, SF; www.worldartswest.org. Sat/23-Sun/24, 3pm (also Sat/23, 3pm). $18-58. This weekend’s program includes dance Appalachia, Huntary, China, India, Mexico, the Middle East, Peru, Tahiti, and Zimbabwe.

Sex and the City: Live!” Rebel, 1760 Market, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Tue, 7 and 9pm. Through June 26. $25. Heklina, D’Arcy Drollinger, Lady Bear, Trixxie Carr play the fab four in this drag-tastic homage to the HBO series.

“Snob Theater” Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF; snobtheater.tumblr.com. Fri/22, 10pm. $10. With comedians Rick Overton, Drennon Davis, Chris Thayer, and Coree Spencer, and musicians Debbie Neigher, Laura Weinbach, and Anton Patzner.

“When We Fall Apart” Z Space, 450 Florida, SF; www.zspace.org. Wed/20-Thu/21 and June 27-28, 7pm; Fri/22-Sat/23 and June 29-30, 7 and 9pm. $25-35. Joe Goode Performance Group presents a world premiere, an exploration of “home” with a set designed by architect Cass Calder Smith. *

 

Music Listings

Andrew Lam
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Music listings are compiled by Emily Savage. Since club life is unpredictable, it’s a good idea to call ahead or check the venue’s website to confirm bookings and hours. Prices are listed when provided to us. Visit www.sfbg.com/venue-guide for venue information. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

WEDNESDAY 20

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Brian Bergeron Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Jonathan Coulton, John Roderick Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $29.

Dot Punto, Major Powers and the Lo-Fi Syphony, Greening, Tall Sheep Elbo Room. 9pm, $7.

Samantha Fish Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $15.

Graffiti6, Yuna Cafe Du Nord. 8:30pm, $15.

Indigo Girls, Shadowboxers Slim’s. 8pm, $31.

Jeff vs. JC Rockit Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

Amy La Vere Hotel Utah. 9pm, $10.

Parlotones, Ryan Star, Silent Comedy Independent. 8pm, $14.

Pins of Light, Hot Victory, Lozen Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Hélène Renaut, Bramble and Briar Lost Church, 65 Capp, SF; www.thelostchurch.com. 8pm.

Matt Skiba & the Sekrets, Case in Theory Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $20.

Stone in Love: A Tribute to Journey Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $25.

Tu Fawning Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $9-$12.

Vardensphere, W.A.S.T.E., E.S.A., End: The DJ DNA Lounge. 9pm, $14.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Cat’s Corner with Nathan Dias Savanna Jazz. 9pm, $10.

Cosmo AlleyCats Le Colonial, 20 Cosmo Place, SF; www.lecolonialsf.com. 7-10pm.

Dink Dink Dink, Gaucho, Michael Abraham Amnesia. 7pm, free.

Ricardo Scales Top of the Mark, 999 California, SF; www.topofthemark.com. 6:30pm, $5.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Carlos Aldama with Umi Vaughan City Lights Bookstore, 261 Columbus, SF; www.citylights.com. 7pm.

Amy LaVere Hotel Utah.

DANCE CLUBS

Booty Call Q-Bar, 456 Castro, SF; www.bootycallwednesdays.com. 9pm. Juanita MORE! and Joshua J host this dance party.

Coo-Yah! Som., 2925 16th St, SF; (415) 558-8521. 10pm, free. DJs Daneekah and Green B spin reggae and dancehall with weekly guests.

Mary Go Round Lookout, 3600 16th St, SF; www.lookoutsf.com. 10pm, $5. Drag with Suppositori Spelling, Mercedez Munro, and Ginger Snap.

Megatallica Fiddler’s Green, 1333 Columbus, SF; www.megatallica.com. 7pm, free. Heavy metal hangout.

THURSDAY 21

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Baby and the Macks, Dresses, Phoebe Hunt, DAD Amnesia. 9pm, $5-$10.

Brad Wilson Blues Band Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $15.

Capital Cities, Gemini Club, popscene DJs Rickshaw Stop. 9:30pm, $13-$17.

Clamhawk Manor Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 8pm, $5-$8.

Fuckaroos, Pillars and Tongues, Joseph Childress, Grace Cooper Hemlock Tavern. 8pm, $10.

Gunshy Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Lisa Hannigan, Joe Henry Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $26.

HowellDevine, Aaron Leese & the Panhandlers Cafe Du Nord. 8:30pm, $10-$12.

Radio Noise, H is 4 Hector, Insecurities Grant & Green. 9pm, free.

Randy vs. Jeff Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

Rose Royce Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $30; 10pm, $20.

Scene of Action, Pavement Sea, Gold Medalists Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $8.

Spider Heart 50 Mason Social House, SF; www.50masonsocialhouse.com. 10pm, free.

Van Hunt, Ren the Vinyl Archaeologist Independent. 8pm, $20.

Younger Lovers, School Knights, Grandma’s Boyfriend Thee Parkside. 9pm, $7.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Stompy Jones Top of the Mark, 999 California, SF; www.topofthemark.com. 7:30pm, $10.

Ned Boynton Trio Bottle Cap, 1707 Powell, SF; www.bottlecapsf.com. 7-10pm.

Stephanie Mills Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $60.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

“Summer Solstice Soiree with Musica Delira” Bissap, 3372 19 St, SF; (415) 826-9287. 8pm.

Twang! Honky Tonk Fiddler’s Green, 1330 Columbus, SF; www.twanghonkytonk.com. 5pm. Live country music, dancing, and giveaways.

DANCE CLUBS

Afrolicious Elbo Room. 9:30pm, $5-$7. With DJ-host Pleasuremaker spins Afrobeat, Tropicália, electro, samba, and funk.

Base: Lee Burridge Vessel, 85 Campton, SF; www.vesselsf.com. $10-$15.

SF Riot Grrrl “Mine” Knockout. 9pm, $5. Benefit for Lyon-Martin.

Arcade Lookout. 9pm, free. Indie dance party.

Get Low Som., 2925 16th St, SF; (415) 558-8521. 10pm, free. Jerry Nice and Ant-1 spin Hip-Hop, ’80s and Soul with weekly guests.

SkisM DNA Lounge. 8pm, $15.

Thursdays at the Cat Club Cat Club. 9pm, $6 (free before 9:30pm). Two dance floors bumpin’ with the best of 80s mainstream and underground with DJ’s Damon, Steve Washington, Dangerous Dan, and guests.

Tropicana Madrone Art Bar. 9pm, free. Salsa, cumbia, reggaeton, and more with DJs Don Bustamante, Apocolypto, Sr. Saen, Santero, and Mr. E.

FRIDAY 22

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Cool Ghouls, Cigarette Burns, Courtney and the Crushers, Glitz Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Death to All, Gorguts Regency Ballroom. 9pm, $32.

Jenni & the Jerks 50 Mason Social House, SF; www.50masonsocialhouse.com. 10pm.

Joe Krown/Walter Wolfman/Russell Batiste Trio Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $15-$20.

Last Ambassadors, Cash Pony, 3 Ring Simian Cafe Du Nord. 9:30pm, $10.

Larry McCray Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $20.

Rahsaan Patterson Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $26; 10pm, $22.

Retroz, Funkery, Raya Zion Collective Slim’s. 8pm, $14-$16.

Sister Crayon, Sea of Bees, Jhameel Bottom of the Hill. 9:30pm, $12.

Sole Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Spyrals, Poor Sons, Wild Wild Wets, Arabs Thee Parkside. 9pm, $6.

THEESatisfaction Independent. 9pm, $14.

Rags Tuttle, Jeff, Jason Marion Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9pm.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Audium 1616 Bush, SF; www.audium.org. 8:30pm, $20. Theater of sound-sculptured space.

Black Market Jazz Orchestra Top of the Mark, 999 California, SF; www.topofthemark.com. 9pm, $10.

Terry Disely Bottle Cap, 1707 Powell, SF; www.bottlecapsf.com. 5:30-8:30pm, free.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

David Berkeley SFO Airport, Terminal Three. 10am-2pm, free.

Ozark Mountain Music Show Plough and Stars. 9:30pm, $8-$10. With Chapmans.

Taste Fridays 650 Indiana, SF; www.tastefridays.com. 8pm, $18. Salsa and bachata dance lessons, live music.

DANCE CLUBS

Baxtalo Drom Amnesia. 9pm, $7-$10. Live music, gypsy punk, belly dance.

Drag Yourself to Pride: Disney Prom Rickshaw Stop. 9:30pm, $5.

Joe Lookout, 3600 16th St.,SF; www.lookoutsf.com. 9pm. Eight rotating DJs, shirt-off drink specials.

Old School JAMZ El Rio. 9pm. Fruit Stand DJs spinning old school funk, hip-hop, and R&B.

Original Plumbing Elbo Room. 10pm, $7-$10. Trans March after-party with DJs Rapid Fire and Average Jo.

Paris to Dakar Little Baobab, 3388 19th St, SF; (415) 643-3558. 10pm, $5. Afro and world music with rotating DJs including Stepwise, Steve, Claude, Santero, and Elembe.

Pledge: Fraternal Lookout. 9pm, $3-$13. Benefiting LGBT and nonprofit organizations. Bottomless kegger cups and paddling booth with DJ Christopher B and DJ Brian Maier.

SATURDAY 23

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Curumin Slim’s. 9pm, $16-$18.

Dark Hollow Riptide, 3639 Taraval, SF; www.riptidesf.com. 9:30pm, free.

Fast Times Maggie McGarry’s, 1353 Grant, SF; www.maggiemcgarryscom. 10pm, free.

Foreverland, Planet Booty Bimbo’s. 9pm, $22.

Fusion Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Mark Gardener, Sky Parade, Silent Pictures Cafe Du Nord. 9:30pm, $12-$15.

“Go Van Gogh Celebrates the Sexual Revolution” Revolution, 3248 22 St, SF; www.revolutioncafesf.com. 9pm.

Hammers of Misfortune, Grayceon, Wild Hunt Elbo Room. 9pm, $10.

It Gets Indie, It Gets Better and the Trevor Project’s Princeton, Local Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $25.

Jeff, Randy, Jason Marion Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9pm.

Kicker, P.R.O.B.L.E.M.S., Modern Pets, Rock Bottom Thee Parkside. 9pm, $8.

Locos Por Juana, Bang Data Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $9-$12.

New Position, American Professionals Thee Parkside. 3pm, free.

Otis Heat, Quick & Easy Boys, Caldecott Bottom of the Hill. 9:30pm, $12.

Lavay Smith & Her Red Hot Skillet Lickers Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $20.

“Vans Warped Tour” McCovey Cove at AT&T Park, SF; warpedtoursf.eventbrite.com. Noon, $42. With Taking Back Sunday, All Time Low, Used, New Found Glory, and more.

Whirr, Lorelie, Moonbeams, Half String Hemlock Tavern. 8pm, $8.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Audium 1616 Bush, SF; www.audium.org. 8:30pm, $20. Theater of sound-sculptured space.

Citizen’s Jazz Red Poppy Art House. 8:30pm, $10-$15.

May’n Yoshi’s SF. 1:30pm, $50.

Pat Martino Organ Trio Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $25; 10pm, $20.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

“Fete de la musique” Alliance Francaise, 1345 Bush, SF; www.afsf.com.1pm. With Tod Hamilton and Jerry Kiernan, Zu Zed, Safe Under the Tree, Helene Renaut, Hot Six, and more.

Craig Ventresco & Meredith Axelrod Atlas Cafe, 3049 20th St, SF; www.atlascafe.net. 4-6pm, free.

DANCE CLUBS

Black Glitter 50 Mason Social House, SF; www.50masonsocialhouse.com. 9pm.

Bootie SF: Lady Gaga vs Madonna DJ DNA Lounge. 9pm, $10-$20. Resident DJs A Plus D, Smash-Up Derby, with Lindsay Slowhands, MJ Paul and La Femme.

Cockblock’s Dyke March After-Party Rickshaw Stop. 9pm, $10-$20. With DJs Natalie Nuxx, Chelsea Starr, and Kidd Sysko.

J Rocc, Shortkut, Beat Junkie Sound, Triple Threat DJs Mighty. 9pm.

Paris to Dakar Little Baobab, 3388 19th St, SF; (415) 643-3558. 10pm, $5. Afro and world music with rotating DJs including Stepwise, Steve, Claude, Santero, and Elembe.

SUNDAY 24

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Amaral Independent. 8pm, $20.

Anita Baker, Family Stone, Glide Ensemble Stern Grove Festival, Stern Grove, SF; www.sterngrove.org. 2pm, free.

Future Twin, Modrag, Cruel Summer Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $6.

J. Geils & Friends Yoshi’s SF. 6pm, $25; 8pm, $30.

John Lawton Trio Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Men, Wax Idols, Burnt Ones Bottom of the Hill. 9:30pm, $12.

Lisa Marie Presley Slim’s. 8pm, $22.

Shady Maples, Blind Willies Cafe Du Nord. 8:30pm, $10.

Viola Booth Group, Mike Bloom, Alan Semerdjian Amnesia. 9pm, $7-$10.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Linda Zulaica, Brad Buethe, Chris Amberger Bliss Bar, 4026 24 St, SF; www.blissbar.com. 4:30pm, $10.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Kata-vento Brazilian Ensemble Red Poppy Art House. 8pm, $10-$15.

Twang Sunday Thee Parkside. 4pm, free. With Famous.

DANCE CLUBS

Aesthetic Perfect, X-RX, BlakOpz DNA Lounge. 9pm, $19.

Dub Mission Elbo Room. 9pm, $6. Dub, roots, and classic dancehall with DJ Sep, Vinnie Esparza.

Jock Lookout, 3600 16th St, SF; www.lookoutsf.com. 3pm, $2. Raise money for LGBT sports teams while enjoying DJs and drink specials.

La Pachanga Blue Macaw, 2565 Mission, SF; www.thebluemacawsf.com. 6pm, $10. Salsa dance party with live Afro-Cuban salsa bands.

MONDAY 25

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

“An Evening with Philip Glass and Joanna Newsom and Tim Fain” Warfield. 8pm, $62.50-$150. Benefit for Big Sur’s Henry Miller Memorial Library.

“Blue Bear School of Music Showcases” Cafe Du Nord. 7:30pm.

Jimmy Cobb’s So What Band Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $30; 10pm, $18.

Damir Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Friends, Splash!, Young Digerati Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $12.

Scott Lucas & the Married Men Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $7-$10.

2:54, Widowspeak Independent. 8pm, $12.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Bossa Nova Tunnel Top, 601 Bush, SF; (415) 722-6620. 8-11:30pm, free. Live acoustic Bossa Nova.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Earl Brothers Amnesia. 6pm.

Anna Fermin Osteria, 3277 Sacramento, SF; www.osteriasf.com. 7pm.

DANCE CLUBS

Death Guild DNA Lounge. 9:30pm, $3-5. Gothic, industrial, and synthpop with Joe Radio, Decay, and Melting Girl.

Krazy Mondays Beauty Bar, 2299 Mission, SF; www.thebeautybar.com. 10pm, free. Hip-hop and other stuff.

M.O.M. Madrone Art Bar. 6pm, free. DJs Timoteo Gigante, Gordo Cabeza, and Chris Phlek playing all Motown every Monday.

Vibes’N’Stuff El Amigo Bar, 3355 Mission, SF; (415) 852-0092. 10pm, free. Conscious jazz and hip-hop from 1960s-early ’90s with DJs Luce Lucy, Vinnie Esparza, and more.

TUESDAY 26

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Arcadio Residency: Dedications, Brendan Thomas Amnesia. 9:15pm, $5.

“Blue Bear School of Music Showcases” Cafe Du Nord. 7:30pm.

Daniel Castro Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $15.

Jimmy Cobb’s So What Band Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $30; 10pm, $18.

Hundred in the Hands, Silver Swans, Teenage Sweater Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $10-$12.

K-Holes, Dirty Ghosts, Blasted Canyons Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $8-$10.

KWJAZ, Aloonaluna, Aja Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $6.

Queen Extravaganza Regency Ballroom. 8pm, $32-$45.

Stan Erhart Band Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Trini Lopez “Mr. La Bamba” Rrazz Room. 8pm, $40-$45.

DANCE CLUBS

Gumbo Lab Little Baobab, 3388 19 St, SF; (415) 643-3558. 7-10pm, free. Hip-hop, reggae, and improv open mic hosted by MSK.FM and Chris-B.

Eclectic Company Skylark, 9pm, free. DJs Tones and Jaybee spin old school hip hop, bass, dub, glitch, and electro.

Post-Dubstep Tuesdays Som., 2925 16th St, SF; (415) 558-8521.10pm, free. DJs Dnae Beats, Epcot, Footwerks spin UK Funky, Bass Music.

San FraNOLA Public Works. 7pm, free. With DJ Brice Nice, Lagniappe Brass Band, and Cook Me Somethin Mister jambalaya. Study Hall John Colins Lounge, 138 Minna, SF; www.johncolins.com. 9pm. Hip-hop, dancehall, and Bay slaps with DJ Left Lane.

Film Listings

Andrew Lam
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Frameline36, the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival, runs through Sun/24 at Castro Theatre, 429 Castro, SF; Roxie Theater, 3117 16th St., SF; Victoria Theatre, 2961 16th St., SF; and Rialto Cinemas Elmwood, 2966 College, Berk. For tickets (most shows $9-$11) and schedule, visit www.frameline.org.

OPENING

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter America’s 16th president jumps aboard the bloodsucker bandwagon. (1:45) Presidio.

Brave Kelly Macdonald, Emma Thompson, and Billy Connolly star in Pixar’s fantasy about a strong-willed girl who brings turmoil upon her Scottish kingdom when she defies a long-held tradition. (1:33) Balboa, Presidio, Shattuck.

5 Broken Cameras Palestinian Emad Burnat bought his first camcorder in 2005 with the intention of bottling family memories, but when Israeli forces began the construction of settlements in Bil’in (his home village in the West Bank) Burnat stumbled into activist-filmmaker territory. In documenting his community’s nonviolent resistance to the Israeli occupation, Burnat’s friends and family (much like his cameras) are shot at, injured, and even killed. His son Gabreel’s first words are “wall” and “cartridge,” epitomizing the psychological toll of the struggle. Israeli forces are depicted as an eerily faceless entity, with colonialist aspirations run amok. Burnat isn’t interested in highlighting the political delicacy of the situation, and frankly, he’s given us something far more powerful than your average piece of fair-and-balanced journalism on the Israel-Palestine conflict. Splitting the difference between home-video montage and war-zone nightmare, 5 Broken Cameras skillfully merges the political and the personal, profoundly humanizing the Palestinian movement for independence. (1:30) Embarcadero, Shattuck. (Taylor Kaplan)

Found Memories The literal Portuguese-to-English translation of this film’s title — “stories that exist only when remembered” — is clunky, but more poignantly accurate than Found Memories. At first, it’s not entirely clear if Brazilian Júlia Murat is making a narrative or a documentary. In an tiny, isolated community populated by elderly people, Madalena (Sonia Guedes) follows a schedule she’s kept for years, probably decades: making bread, attending church, doing chores, tending the cemetery gates, writing love letters to a long-absent partner (“Isn’t it strange that after all these years, I still find your things around the house?”), and grousing at the “annoying old man” who grinds the town’s coffee beans. One day, young photographer Rita (Lisa Fávero) drifts into the village, an exotic import from the outside, modern world. Slowly, despite their differences, the women become friends. That’s about it for plot, but as this deliberately-paced film reflects on aging, dying, and memories (particularly in the form of photographs), it offers atmospheric food for thought, and a few moments of droll humor. Note, however, that viewer patience is a requirement to reap its rewards. (1:38) SF Film Society Cinema. (Eddy)

The Invisible War Kirby Dick’s searing documentary takes a look at the prevalence of rape within U.S. military ranks, a problem whose unbelievably high levels of occurrence would long ago have caused huge public outcry and imposed reform in any other institutional context. Yet because it’s the military — where certain codes of loyalty, machismo, and insularity dominate from the grunt level to the highest ranks — the issue has not only been effectively kept secret, but perpetrators almost never suffer any disciplinary measures, let alone jail time or dishonorable discharges. Meanwhile the women — some studies estimate 20% of all female personnel (and 1% of the men) suffer sexual assault from colleagues — are further traumatized by an atmosphere that creates ideal conditions for stalking, rape, and “blame the victim” aftermaths from superiors. (Indeed, for many the superior to whom they would have reported an attack was the one who attacked them.) Most end up quitting promising service careers (often pursued because of generations of family enlistment), dealing with the serious mental health consequences on their own. The subjects who’ve come forward on the issue here are inspiring in their bravery, and dedication to a patriotic cause and vocation that ultimately, bitterly betrayed them. Their stories are so engrossing that The Invisible War is as compulsively watchable as its topic and statistics are inherently appalling. (1:39) Metreon. (Harvey) 

Oslo, August 31st Heroin movies are rarely much fun, and Oslo is no exception, though here the stress lies not in grisly realism but visceral emotional honesty. Following an abortive, Virginia Woolf-esque suicide attempt during evening leave from his rehab center, recovering addict Anders visits Oslo for a job interview. He reconnects bittersweetly with an old friend, tries and fails to meet up with his sister, and eventually submerges himself in the nightlife that once fueled his self-destruction. Expressionistic editing conveys Anders’ sense of detachment and urge for release, with scenes and sounds intercut achronologically and striking sound design which homes in on stray conversations. A late intellectual milieu is signified throughout, quite humorously, by serious discussions of popular television dramas, presumably an update of similar concerns addressed in Pierre Drieu La Rochelle’s 1931 novel Le Feu follet, on which the film is based. (1:35) Elmwood, Embarcadero, Smith Rafael. (Sam Stander)

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World See “Apocalypse Meh.” (1:41) Marina, Piedmont, Shattuck.

Ultrasonic Is it madness to imagine a stylish new twist on the claustrophobic conspiracy thriller? Multi-hyphenate director, co-writer, and cinematographer (and musician and software engineer) Rohit Colin Rao manages just that with this head-turning indie feature film debut, while managing to translate a stark indie aesthetic encapsulated by Dischord and Touch and Go bands, lovers of Rust Belt warehouses and waffle houses, culture vultures who revere both Don DeLillo and Wisconsin Death Trip, and critics who lean too hard on the descriptor “angular.” Musician Simon York (Silas Gordon Brigham) is one denizen firmly placed in that cultural landscape, but the pressures of funding his combo’s album, coping with the diminishing returns of his music teacher livelihood, and anticipating the arrival of a baby with his wife, Ruth (Cate Buscher), seem to be piling on his murky brow. Simon begins to hear a hard-to-pin-down sound that no one else can detect, though Ruth’s eccentric and possibly certified conspiracy-theorist brother Jonas (Sam Repshas) is quick to affirm — and build on — his fears. Painting his handsome, stylized mise-en-scène in noiry blacks and wintry whites, Rohit positively revels in this post-punk jewel of a world he’s assembled, and it’s a compelling one even if it’s far from perfect and ultimately shies away from the deepest shadows. (1:30) Roxie. (Chun)

Ongoing 

Bel Ami Judging from recent attempts to shake off the gloomy atmosphere and undead company of the Twilight franchise, Robert Pattinson enjoys a good period piece, but hasn’t quite worked out how to help make one. Last year’s Depression-era Water for Elephants was a tepid romance, and Declan Donnellan and Nick Ormerod’s belle epoque–set Bel Ami is an ungainly, oddly paced adaptation of the Guy de Maupassant novel of the same name. A down-and-out former soldier of peasant stock, Georges Duroy (Pattinson) — or “Bel Ami,” as his female admirers call him — gains a brief entrée into the upper echelons of France’s fourth estate and parlays it into a more permanent set of social footholds, campaigning for the affections of a triumvirate of Parisian power wives (Christina Ricci, Uma Thurman, and Kristin Scott Thomas) as he makes his ascent. His route is confusing, though; the film pitches forward at an alarming pace, its scenes clumsily stacked together with little character development or context to smooth the way, and Pattinson’s performance doesn’t clarify much. Duroy shifts perplexingly between rapacious and soulful modes, eyeing the ladies with a vaguely carnivorous expression as he enters drawing rooms, dining rooms, and bedrooms, but leaving us with little sense of his true appetites or other motivations. (1:42) Lumiere, Smith Rafael. (Rapoport) 

Bernie Jack Black plays the titular new assistant funeral director liked by everybody in small-town Carthage, Tex. He works especially hard to ingratiate himself with shrewish local widow Marjorie (Shirley MacLaine), but there are benefits — estranged from her own family, she not only accepts him as a friend (then companion, then servant, then as virtual “property”), but makes him her sole heir. Richard Linklater’s latest is based on a true-crime story, although in execution it’s as much a cheerful social satire as I Love You Philip Morris and The Informant! (both 2009), two other recent fact-based movies about likable felons. Black gets to sing (his character being a musical theater queen, among other things), while Linklater gets to affectionately mock a very different stratum of Lone Star State culture from the one he started out with in 1991’s Slacker. There’s a rich gallery of supporting characters, most played by little-known local actors or actual townspeople, with Matthew McConaughey’s vainglorious county prosecutor one delectable exception. Bernie is its director’s best in some time, not to mention a whole lot of fun. (1:39) Embarcadero, Four Star, Presidio, Shattuck, Smith Rafael. (Harvey)

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (1:42) Albany, Four Star, Piedmont, SF Center, Sundance Kabuki.

A Cat in Paris This year’s Best Animated Film nominees: big-budget entries Kung Fu Panda 2, Puss in Boots, and eventual winner Rango, plus Chico and Rita, which opened just before Oscar night, and French mega-dark-horse A Cat in Paris. Sure, Jean-Loup Felicioli and Alain Gagnol’s film failed to cash in on 2011’s Paris craze, but it’s still a charming if featherweight noir caper, being released stateside in an English version that features the voices of Marcia Gay Harden and Anjelica Huston. A streetwise kitty named Dino spends his days hanging with Zoey, a little girl who’s gone mute since the death of her father — a cop killed in the line of duty. Zoey’s mother (Harden), also a cop, is hellbent on catching the murderer, a notorious crook named Costa who runs his criminal empire with Reservoir Dogs-style imprecision. At night, Dino sneaks out and accompanies an affable burglar on his prowlings. When Zoey falls into Costa’s clutches, her mom, the thief, and (natch) the feisty feline join forces to rescue her, in a series of rooftop chase scenes that climax atop Notre Dame. At just over an hour, A Cat in Paris is sweetly old-fashioned and suitable for audiences of all ages, though staunch dog lovers may raise an objection or two. (1:07) Opera Plaza. (Eddy) 

Dark Shadows Conceptually, there’s nothing wrong with attempting to turn a now semi-obscure supernaturally themed soap opera with a five-year run in the late 1960s and early ’70s into a feature film. Particularly if the film brings together the sweetly creepy triumvirate of Tim Burton, Johnny Depp, and Helena Bonham Carter and emerges during an ongoing moment for vampires, werewolves, and other things that go hump in the night. Depp plays long-enduring vampire Barnabas Collins, the undead scion of a once-powerful 18th-century New England family that by the 1970s — the groovy decade in which the bulk of the story is set — has suffered a shabby deterioration. Barnabas forms a pact with present-day Collins matriarch Elizabeth (Michelle Pfeiffer) to raise the household — currently comprising her disaffected daughter, Carolyn (Chloë Grace Moretz), her derelict brother, Roger (Jonny Lee Miller), his mournful young son, David (Gulliver McGrath), David’s live-in lush of a psychiatrist, Dr. Hoffman (Carter), and the family’s overtaxed manservant, Willie (Jackie Earle Haley) — to its former stature, while taking down a lunatic, love-struck, and rather vindictive witch named Angelique (Eva Green). The latter, a victim of unrequited love, is the cause of all Barnabas’s woes and, by extension, the entire clan’s, but Angelique can only be blamed for so much. Beyond her hocus-pocus jurisdiction is the film’s manic pileup of plot twists, tonal shifts, and campy scenery-chewing by Depp, a startling onslaught that no lava lamp joke, no pallid reaction shot, no room-demolishing act of paranormal carnality set to Barry White, and no cameo by Alice Cooper can temper. (2:00) SF Center. (Rapoport)

The Dictator As expected, The Dictator is, yet again, Sacha Baron Cohen doing his bumbling-foreigner shtick. Said character (here, a ruthless, spoiled North African dictator) travels to America and learns a heaping teaspoon of valuable lessons, which are then flung upon the audience — an audience which, by film’s end, has spent 80 minutes squealing at a no-holds-barred mix of disgusting gags, tasteless jokes, and schadenfreude. If you can’t forgive Cohen for carbon-copying his Borat (2006) formula, at least you can muster admiration for his ability to be an equal-opportunity offender (dinged: Arabs, Jews, African Americans, white Americans, women of all ethnicities, and green activists) — and for that last-act zinger of a speech. If The Dictator doesn’t quite reach Borat‘s hilarious heights, it’s still proudly repulsive, smart in spite of itself, and guaranteed to get a rise out of anyone who watches it. (1:23) 1000 Van Ness, SF Center, Shattuck. (Eddy)

Double Trouble When crooks nab a priceless painting from a Taipei museum, two security guards — wannabe hero Jay (Jaycee “Son of Jackie” Chan) and Chinese-tourist-on-vacation Ocean (Xia Yu) — reluctantly team up to recover the piece. A road trip of sorts ensues, laden with petty bickering, wacky melees, bonding moments, mistaken identity, gangsters both comical and sinister, and other buddy-comedy trappings. As expected, there are a few high-flying fight scenes; in the film’s production notes, director David Hsun-Wei Chang reveals he was inspired by the Rush Hour movies. Alas, Chan is neither as charismatic nor as breathtakingly nimble as his father (and, obvi, Xia is no Chris Tucker). It should be noted, however, that one of the slithery art thieves is played by underwear model Jessica C., famed in Hong Kong for her “police siren boobs.” So there’s that. (1:29) Metreon. (Eddy)

Elena The opening, almost still image of breaking dawn amid bare trees — the twigs in the foreground almost imperceptibly developing definition and the sky gradually growing ever lighter and pinker in the corners of the frame — beautifully exemplifies the crux of this well-wrought, refined noir, which spins slowly on the streams of dog-eat-dog survival that rush beneath even the most moneyed echelons of Moscow. Sixtyish former nurse Elena (Nadezhda Markina) is still little more than a live-in caretaker for Vladimir (Andrey Smirnov), her affluent husband of almost 10 years. She sleeps in a separate bed in their modernist-chic condo and dutifully funnels money to her beloved layabout son and his family. Vladimir has less of a relationship with his rebellious bad-seed daughter (Yelena Lyadova), who may be too smart and hedonistic for her own good. When a certain unlikely reunion threatens Elena’s survival — and what she perceives as the survival of her own spawn — a kind of deadly dawn breaks over the seemingly obedient hausfrau, and she’s driven to desperate ends. Bathing his scenes in chilled blue light and velvety dark shadows, filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev (2003’s The Return) keeps a detached but close eye on the proceedings while displaying an uncanny talent for plucking the telling detail out of the wash of daily routine and coaxing magnetic performances from his cast. (1:49) Lumiere. (Chun)

Headhunters Despite being the most sought-after corporate headhunter in Oslo, Roger (Aksel Hennie) still doesn’t make enough money to placate his gorgeous wife; his raging Napoleon complex certainly doesn’t help matters. Crime is, as always, the only solution, so Roger’s been supplementing his income by stealthily relieving his rich, status-conscious clients of their most expensive artworks (with help from his slightly unhinged partner, who works for a home-security company). When Roger meets the dashing Clas Greve (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau of Game of Thrones) — a Danish exec with a sinister, mysterious military past, now looking to take over a top job in Norway — he’s more interested in a near-priceless painting rumored to be stashed in Greve’s apartment. The heist is on, but faster than you can say “MacGuffin,” all hell breaks loose (in startlingly gory fashion), and the very charming Roger is using his considerable wits to stay alive. Based on a best-selling “Scandi-noir” novel, Headhunters is just as clever as it is suspenseful. See this version before Hollywood swoops in for the inevitable (rumored) remake. (1:40) Lumiere. (Eddy)

The Hunger Games Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) is a teenager living in a totalitarian state whose 12 impoverished districts, as retribution for an earlier uprising, must pay tribute to the so-called Capitol every year, sacrificing one boy and one girl each to the Hunger Games. A battle royal set in a perilous arena and broadcast live to the Capitol as gripping diversion and to the districts as sadistic propaganda, the Hunger Games are, depending on your viewpoint, a “pageant of honor, courage, and sacrifice” or a brutal, pointless bloodbath involving children as young as 12. When her little sister’s name comes up in the ann­ual lottery, Katniss volunteers to take her place and is joined by a boy named Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson), with whom she shares an old, unspoken bond. Tasked with translating to the screen the first installment of Suzanne Collins’s rabidly admired trilogy, writer-director Gary Ross (2003’s Seabiscuit, 1998’s Pleasantville) telescopes the book’s drawn-out, dread-filled tale into a manageable two-plus-hour entertainment, making great (and horrifying) use of the original work’s action, but losing a good deal of the narrative detail and emotional force. Elizabeth Banks is comic and unrecognizable as Effie Trinket, the two tributes’ chaperone; Lenny Kravitz gives a blank, flattened reading as their stylist, Cinna; and Donald Sutherland is sufficiently creepy and bloodless as the country’s leader, President Snow. More exceptionally cast are Woody Harrelson as Katniss and Peeta’s surly, alcoholic mentor, Haymitch Abernathy, and Stanley Tucci as games emcee Caesar Flickerman, flashing a bank of gleaming teeth at each contestant as he probes their dire circumstances with the oily superficiality of a talk show host. (2:22) 1000 Van Ness. (Rapoport)

Hysteria Tanya Wexler’s period romantic comedy gleefully depicts the genesis of the world’s most popular sex toy out of the inchoate murk of Victorian quackishness. In this dulcet version of events, real-life vibrator inventor Mortimer Granville (Hugh Dancy) is a handsome young London doctor with such progressive convictions as a belief in the existence of germs. He is, however, a man of his times and thus swallows unblinking the umbrella diagnosis of women with symptoms like anxiety, frustration, and restlessness as victims of a plague-like uterine disorder known as hysteria. Landing a job in the high-end practice of Dr. Robert Dalrymple (Jonathan Pryce), whose clientele consists entirely of dissatisfied housewives seeking treatments of “medicinal massage” and subsequent “parosysm,” Granville becomes acquainted with Dalrymple’s two daughters, the decorous Emily (Felicity Jones) and the first-wave feminist Charlotte (Maggie Gyllenhaal). A subsequent bout of RSI offers empirical evidence for the adage about necessity being the mother of invention, with the ever-underused Rupert Everett playing Edmund St. John-Smythe, Granville’s aristocratic friend and partner in electrical engineering. (1:35) Opera Plaza. (Rapoport)

The Intouchables Cries of “racism” seem a bit out of hand when it comes to this likable albeit far-from-challenging French comedy loosely based on a real-life relationship between a wealthy white quadriplegic and his caretaker of color. The term “cliché” is more accurate. And where were these critics when 1989’s Driving Miss Daisy and 2011’s The Help — movies that seem designed to make nostalgic honkies feel good about those fraught relationships skewed to their advantage—were coming down the pike? (It also might be more interesting to look at how these films about race always hinge on economies in which whites must pay blacks to interact with/educate/enlighten them.) In any case, Omar Sy, portraying Senegalese immigrant Driss, threatens to upset all those pundits’ apple carts with his sheer life force, even when he’s shaking solo on the dance floor to sounds as effortlessly unprovocative, and old-school, as Earth, Wind, and Fire. In fact, everything about The Intouchables is as old school as 1982’s 48 Hrs., spinning off the still laugh-grabbing humor that comes with juxtaposing a hipper, more streetwise black guy with a hapless, moneyed chalky. The wheelchair-bound Philippe (Francois Cluzet) is more vulnerable than most, and he has a hard time getting along with any of his nurses, until he meets Driss, who only wants his signature for his social services papers. It’s not long before the cultured, classical music-loving Philippe’s defenses are broken down by Driss’ flip, somewhat honest take on the follies and pretensions of high culture — a bigger deal in France than in the new world, no doubt. Director-writer Olivier Nakache and Eric Toledano aren’t trying to innovate —they seem more set on crafting an effervescent blockbuster that out-blockbusters Hollywood — and the biggest compliment might be that the stateside remake is already rumored to be in the works. (1:52) Embarcadero. (Chun)

Jiro Dreams of Sushi Celebrity-chef culture has surely reached some kind of zeitgeist, what with the omnipresence of Top Chef and other cooking-themed shows, and the headlines-making power of people like Paula Deen (diabetes) and Mario Batali (sued for ripping off his wait staff). Unconcerned with the trappings of fame — you’ll never see him driving a Guy Fieri-style garish sports car — is Jiro Ono, 85-year-old proprietor of Sukiyabashi Jiro, a tiny, world-renowned sushi restaurant tucked into Tokyo’s Ginza station. Jiro, a highly-disciplined perfectionist who believes in simple, yet flavorful food, has devoted his entire life to the pursuit of “deliciousness” — to the point of sushi invading his dreams, as the title of David Gelb’s reverential documentary suggests. But Jiro Dreams of Sushi goes deeper than food-prep porn (though, indeed, there’s plenty of that); it also examines the existential conflicts faced by Jiro’s two middle-aged sons. Both were strongly encouraged to enter the family business — and in the intervening years, have had to accept the soul-crushing fact that no matter how good their sushi is, it’ll never be seen as exceeding the creations of their legendary father. (1:21) Bridge. (Eddy)

Lola Versus Greta Gerwig’s embattled late-twentysomething, the titular Lola, apologetically invokes the Saturn return to explain the chaos that enters her life when her emotionally underdeveloped boyfriend proposes, panics, and dumps her. Workaday elements of the industry-standard romantic comedy surface, lightly revised: a crass, loopy BFF (co-writer Zoe Lister Jones) who can’t find true love and says things like “I have to go wash my vagina”; a vaguely soulful male friend (Hamish Linklater, 2011’s The Future) who’s secretly harboring nonplatonic feelings (or maybe just an opportunistic streak); wacky yet vaguely successful Age of Aquarius parents (a somewhat toneless Debra Winger and a nicely gone-to-seed Bill Pullman). One can see why it would be tempting to blame a planet’s galactic travels for the solipsistic meandering that Lola engages in, bemusedly lurching, often under chemical influences, from one bout of poor decision-making to the next. She claims to be searching for a path out of the chaos into some calmer place (fittingly, she’s a comp lit Ph.D. candidate who’s writing her dissertation on silence), but as the movie transports us mercilessly from one scene of turmoil to the next, we have little reason to believe her. The script has funny moments, and Gerwig sometimes succeeds in making Lola feel like a charming disaster, but her personal discoveries, while certainly valuable, feel false and forced. (1:26) Metreon. (Rapoport)

Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted (1:33) Balboa, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness, Presidio.

Marvel’s The Avengers The conflict — a mystical blue cube containing earth-shattering (literally) powers is stolen, with evil intent — isn’t the reason to see this long-hyped culmination of numerous prequels spotlighting its heroic characters. Nay, the joy here is the whole “getting’ the band back together!” vibe; director and co-writer Joss Whedon knows you’re just dying to see Captain America (Chris Evans) bicker with Iron Man (a scene-stealing Robert Downey Jr.); Thor (Chris Hemsworth) clash with bad-boy brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston); and the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) get angry as often as possible. (Also part of the crew, but kinda mostly just there to look good in their tight outfits: Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye and Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow.) Then, of course, there’s Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) running the whole Marvel-ous show, with one good eye and almost as many wry quips as Downey’s Tony Stark. Basically, The Avengers gives you everything you want (characters delivering trademark lines and traits), everything you expect (shit blowing up, humanity being saved, etc.), and even makes room for a few surprises. It doesn’t transcend the comic-book genre (like 2008’s The Dark Knight did), but honestly, it ain’t trying to. The Avengers wants only to entertain, and entertain it does. (2:23) Metreon, 1000 Van Ness, Sundance Kabuki. (Eddy)

Men in Black III Why not? It’s been ten years since Men in Black II (the one where Lara Flynn Boyle and Johnny Knoxville — remember them? — played the villains), Will Smith has barely aged, and he hasn’t made a full-on comedy since, what, 2005’s Hitch? Here, he does a variation on his always-agreeable exasperated-guy routine, clashing with his grim, gimlet-eyed partner Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones, and in a younger incarnation, a spot-on Josh Brolin) in a plot that involves a vicious alien named Boris (Flight of the Conchords’ Jermaine Clement), time travel, Andy Warhol, the moon (as both space-exploration destination and modern-day space-jail location), and lines that only Smith’s delivery can make funny (“This looks like it comes from planet damn.“) It’s cheerful (save a bit of melodrama at the end), crisply paced, and is neither a must-see masterpiece nor something you should mindfully sleep through if it pops up among your in-flight selections. Oh, and it’s in 3D. Well, why not? (1:42) 1000 Van Ness, SF Center, Shattuck. (Eddy)

Moonrise Kingdom Does Wes Anderson’s new film mark a live-action return to form after 2007’s disappointingly wan Darjeeling Limited? More or less. Does it tick all the Andersonian style and content boxes? Indubitably. In the most obvious deviation Anderson has taken with Moonrise, he gives us his first period piece, a romance set in 1965 on a fictional island off the New England coast. After a chance encounter at a church play, pre-teen Khaki Scout Sam (newcomer Jared Gilman) instantly falls for the raven-suited, sable-haired Suzy Bishop (Kara Hayward, ditto). The two become pen pals, and quickly bond over the shared misery of being misunderstood by both authority figures and fellow kids. The bespectacled Sam is an orphan, ostracized by his foster parents and scout troop (much to the dismay of its straight-arrow leader Edward Norton). Suzy despises her clueless attorney parents, played with gusto by Bill Murray and Frances McDormand in some of the film’s funniest and best scenes. When the two kids run off together, the whole thing begins to resemble a kind of tween version of Godard’s 1965 lovers-on the-lam fantasia Pierrot le Fou. But like most of Anderson’s stuff, it has a gauzy sentimentality more akin to Truffaut than Godard. Imagine if the sequence in 2001’s The Royal Tenenbaums where Margot and Richie run away to the Museum of Natural History had been given the feature treatment: it’s a simple yet inspired idea, and it becomes a charming little tale of the perils of growing up and selling out the fantasy. But it doesn’t feel remotely risky. It’s simply too damn tame. (1:37) California, Metreon, Piedmont, Sundance Kabuki. (Michelle Devereaux)

Music From the Big House See review at sfbg.com/pixel_vision. (1:27) Sundance Kabuki.

Peace, Love and Misunderstanding How is that even as a bona fide senior, Jane Fonda continues to embody this country’s ambivalence toward women? I suspect it’s a testament to her actorly prowess and sheer charisma that she’s played such a part in defining several eras’ archetypes — from sex kitten to counterculture-heavy Hanoi Jane to dressed-for-success feminist icon to aerobics queen to trophy wife. Here, among the talents in Bruce Beresford’s intergenerational chick-flick-gone-indie as a loud, proud, and larger-than-life hippie earth mama, she threatens to eclipse her paler, less colorful offspring, women like Catherine Keener and Elizabeth Olsen, who ordinarily shine brighter than those that surround them. It’s ostensibly the tale of high-powered lawyer Diane (Keener): her husband (Kyle MacLachlan) has asked for a divorce, so in a not-quite-explicable tailspin, she packs her kids, Zoe (Olsen) and Jake (Nat Wolff), into the car and heads to Woodstock to see her artist mom Grace (Fonda) for the first time in two decades. Grace is beyond overjoyed — dying to introduce the grandchildren to her protests, outdoor concerts, and own personal growhouse — while urbanite Diane and her kids find attractive, natch, diversions in the country, in the form of Jude (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), Cole (Chace Crawford), and Tara (Marissa O’Donnell). Yet there’s a lot of troubled water for the mother and daughter to cross, in order to truly come together. Despite some strong characterization and dialogue, Peace doesn’t quite fly — or make much sense at its close — due to the some patchy storytelling: the schematic rom-com arch fails to provide adequate scaffolding to support the required leaps of faith. But that’s not to deny the charm of the highly identifiable, generous-spirited Grace, a familiar Bay Area archetype if there ever was one, who Fonda charges with the joy and sadness of fallible parent who was making up the rules as she went along. (1:36) Opera Plaza, Shattuck, Smith Rafael. (Chun)

Prometheus Ridley Scott’s return to outer space — after an extended stay in Russell Crowe-landia — is most welcome. Some may complain Prometheus too closely resembles Scott’s Alien (1979), for which it serves as a prequel of sorts. Prometheus also resembles, among others, The Thing (1982), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), and Event Horizon (1997). But I love those movies (yes, even Event Horizon), and I am totally fine with the guy who made Alien borrowing from all of them and making the classiest, most gorgeous sci-fi B-movie in years. Sure, some of the science is wonky, and the themes of faith and creation can get a bit woo-woo, but Prometheus is deep-space discombobulation at its finest, with only a miscast Logan Marshall-Green (apparently, cocky dude-bros are still in effect at the turn of the next millennium) marring an otherwise killer cast: Noomi Rapace as a dreamy (yet awesomely tough) scientist; Idris Elba as Prometheus‘ wisecracking captain; Charlize Theron as the Weyland Corportation’s icy overseer; and Michael Fassbender, giving his finest performance to date as the ship’s Lawrence of Arabia-obsessed android. (2:03) Metreon, 1000 Van Ness, Sundance Kabuki. (Eddy)

Rock of Ages (2:03) California, Four Star, Marina, 1000 Van Ness, SF Center, Sundance Kabuki.

Safety Not Guaranteed San Francisco-born director Colin Trevorrow’s narrative debut feature Safety Not Guaranteed, written by Derek Connolly, has an improbable setup: not that rural loner Kenneth (Mark Duplass) would place a personal ad for a time travel partner (“Must bring own weapons”), but that a Seattle alt-weekly magazine would pay expenses for a vainglorious staff reporter (Jake Johnson, hilarious) and two interns (Aubrey Plaza, Karan Soni) to stalk him for a fluff feature over the course of several days. The publishing budget allowing that today is true science-fiction. But never mind. Inserting herself “undercover” when a direct approach fails, Plaza’s slightly goth college grad finds she actually likes obsessive, paranoid weirdo Kenneth, and is intrigued by his seemingly insane but dead serious mission. For most of its length Safety falls safely into the category of off-center indie comedics, delivering various loopy and crass behavior with a practiced deadpan, providing just enough character depth to achieve eventual poignancy. Then it takes a major leap — one it would be criminal to spoil, but which turns an admirable little movie into something conceptually surprising, reckless, and rather exhilarating. (1:34) Metreon, Shattuck. (Harvey)

Snow White and the Huntsman It’s unclear why the zeitgeist has blessed us this year with two warring iterations of the Snow White fairy tale, one broadly comedic (April’s Mirror Mirror), one starkly emo. But it was only natural that Kristen Stewart would land in the latter rendering, breaking open the hearts of swamp beasts and swordsmen alike with the chaste glory of her mien. As Snow White flees the henchmen and hired killers dispatched by her seriously evil stepmother, Queen Ravenna (Charlize Theron), and traverses a blasted, virulent forest populated with hallucinogenic vapors and other life-threatening obstacles, Stewart need not act so much as radiate a dazzling benignity, weeping the tears of a martyr rather than a frightened young girl. (Unfortunately, when required to deliver a rallying declaration of war, she sounds as if she’s speaking in tongues after a heavy hit on the crack pipe.) It’s slightly uncomfortable to be asked, alongside a grieving, drunken huntsman (The Avengers’ Chris Hemsworth), a handful of dwarfs (including Ian McShane and Toby Jones), and the kingdom’s other suffering citizenry, to fall worshipfully in line behind such a creature. But first-time director Rupert Sanders’s film keeps pace with its lovely heroine visually, constructing a gorgeous world in which armies of black glass shatter on battlefields, white stags dissolve into hosts of butterflies, and a fairy sanctuary within the blighted kingdom is an eye-popping fantasia verging on the hysterical. Theron’s Ravenna, equipped in modernist fashion with a backstory for her sociopathic tendencies, is credible and captivating as an unhinged slayer of men, thief of youth, destroyer of kingdoms, and consumer of the hearts of tiny birds. (2:07) Metreon, 1000 Van Ness, Shattuck. (Rapoport)

That’s My Boy (1:55) Metreon, SF Center.

Turn Me On, Dammit! The 15-year-old heroine of writer-director Jannicke Systad Jacobsen’s Turn Me On, Dammit! is first heard in voice-over, flatly cataloging the over familiar elements of the small town in rural Norway where she lives — and first seen lying on the kitchen floor of her house sharing an intimate moment with a phone sex operator named Stig (Per Kjerstad). Largely ruled by her hormones and longing to get it on with someone other than herself and the disembodied Stig, Alma (Helene Bergsholm) spends large segments of her life unspooling sexual fantasies starring Artur (Matias Myren), the boy she has a crush on, and Sebjorn (Jon Bleiklie Devik), who runs the grocery store where she works and is the father of her two closest friends: burgeoning political activist Sara (Malin Bjorhovde) and full-fledged mean girl Ingrid (Beate Stofring). Back in real life, a strange and awkward physical interaction with Artur leads Alma, excited and confused, to describe the experience to her friends, a mistake that precipitously leads to total social ostracism among her peers. With the possible exception of some unnecessary dog reaction shots during the aforementioned opening scene, documentary maker Jacobsen’s first narrative feature film is an engaging and impressive debut, presenting a sympathetic and uncoy depiction of a young girl’s sexuality and exploiting the rich contrast between Alma’s gauzier fantasies and the realities of her waking world to poignantly comic effect. (1:16) Opera Plaza. (Rapoport)

The Woman in the Fifth A rumpled American writer with a hinted-at dark past (Ethan Hawke) shows up in Paris, to the horror of his French ex-wife and confused delight of his six-year-old daughter. An ill-advised nap on public transportation results in all of his bags being stolen; broke and out of sorts, he takes a grimy room above a café and a gig monitoring the surveillance-cam feed at what’s obviously some kind of illegal enterprise. During the day he stalks his daughter and romances both sophisticated Margit (Kristen Scott Thomas) and nubile Ania (Joanna Kulig); he also dodges his hostile neighbor (Mamadou Minte) and shady boss (Samir Guesmi). Based on Douglas Kennedy’s novel, the latest from Pawel Pawlikowski (2004’s My Summer of Love), offers some third-act twists (gory, distressing ones) that suggest Hawke’s character (and, by extension, the viewer) may not be perceiving reality with 100 percent accuracy. Moody, melancholy, not-entirely-satisfying stuff. (1:23) SF Film Society Cinema. (Eddy)

Your Sister’s Sister The new movie from Lynn Shelton — who directed star and (fellow mumblecore director) Mark Duplass in her shaggily amusing Humpday (2009) — opens somberly, at a Seattle wake where his Jack makes his deceased brother’s friends uncomfortable by pointing out that the do-gooder guy they’d loved just the last couple years was a bully and jerk for many years before his reformation. This outburst prompts an offer from friend-slash-mutual-crush Iris (Emily Blunt) that he get his head together for a few days at her family’s empty vacation house on a nearby island. Arriving via ferry and bike, he is disconcerted to find someone already in residence — Iris’ sister Hannah (Rosemarie DeWitt), who’s grieving a loss of her own (she’s split with her girlfriend). Several tequila shots later, two Kinsey-scale opposites meet, which creates complications when Iris turns up the next day. A bit slight in immediate retrospect and contrived in its wrap-up, Shelton’s film is nonetheless insinuating, likable, and a little touching while you’re watching it. That’s largely thanks to the actors’ appeal — especially Duplass, who fills in a blunderingly lucky (and unlucky) character’s many blanks with lived-in understatement. (1:30) Albany, Embarcadero, Sundance Kabuki. (Harvey)

 

Make it better now

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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1
Make it better now

yael@sfbg.com

Noted queer writer and speaker Dan Savage sent a hopeful message to LGBT youth with his 2010 YouTube video, “It Gets Better.” But many queer youth in the Bay Area say they aren’t willing to wait.

“If my adult self could talk to my 14 year old self and tell him anything, I would tell him to really believe the lyrics from “Somewhere,” from West Side Story. There really is a place for us. There really is a place for you. And that one day you will have friends that love and support you, you will find love, you will find a community. And that life gets better,” Savage said.

Savage and his partner Terry Miller’s message went viral. It inspired hundreds of similar videos and eventually led to the creation of the It Gets Better Project, headquartered in Los Angeles. The videos were a response to a tragic cluster of suicides by children bullied for seeming gay, a trend that was only unusual in that the media picked up on it. And for many teens across the country, the “It Gets Better” videos provided crucial hope and support.

But last week, I was talking to Stephanie, Lolo, Ose, and Mia Tu Mutch, four Bay Area teens, about what its like to be a queer youth today. We were talking at the Lavender Youth Recreation and Information Center (LYRIC), a center for queer youth in the heart of the Castro.

When I asked about the “It Gets Better” videos, they all had the same reaction: “Ugh. I don’t like those videos. I don’t like those at all.”

“Those videos are depressing,” Lolo said.

“Yeah. ‘Just wait ’til you’re an adult?'” Stephanie asked.

“Just wait ’til you’re an adult, and your problems will go away,” Mia said, shaking her head.

“And it’s celebrities, too,” Ose noted. “‘I got thousands of dollars, and it gets better!'”

The four of them are facilitators at LYRIC, leading weekly community-building workshops that deal with issues queer kids face. Between 17 and 21 years old, these youth are not waiting for it to get better. They’re doing it for themselves.

 

LYRIC’S OUTREACH

LYRIC definitely promotes pride and empowerment. Founded in 1988, LYRIC organizers worked to secure funding for a physical space a few years later. Since then, this purple house on Collingwood has functioned as a crucial center for Bay Area queer youth. It offers counseling, food, clothing, community building workshops that kids teach, and a safe place to hang out.

But LYRIC, like many nonprofits, has felt the impact of the severe government cuts to health and human services. As a result, its budget has suffered steady declines from approximately $1.2 million in 2008 to $954,000 this, year primarily due to shrinking government funding.

But LYRIC refuses to give up offering paid internships, a rarity in the nonprofit world.

“The City has made it clear that they no longer intend to invest significant funding into subsidized employment model programs — they want to serve greater numbers of youth at a much lower unit cost — even if we all understand that some of the most marginalized youth will no longer be getting the intensive level of support they need to make it to a successful adulthood” LYRIC’s Executive Director Jodi Schwartz told me, explaining that the organization is now growing support by more grassroots funding networks.

“We used to hire 60-70 young people per year, now it’s more like 20,” Schwartz says.

The organization still serves about 400 young people per year.

“I would guess we have 6,000 queer youth living in the city,” Schwartz said. “So we’re not reaching everyone. Not to say that all those 6,000 queer youth need a LYRIC, but they need community. We all need community.”

Youth from across the country come to San Francisco seeking that community. Often they have escaped intolerant, abusive, or dangerous situations in their families or hometowns. But when they arrive in this storied city, these youth are often disappointed.

“I was that kid who left a small town in Texas and who got to San Francisco as fast as I could,” Mia told me. “And I was like, you know, I’ll figure it out, I’ll find a job, and I’ll do this and that. And it was really hard.”

” I think that the difference is that there are more LGBT specific languages and policies, and organizations that are affirming. All of that is the best in the US, probably,” Mia said. “And there are all these cultural groups and all of that. But queerphobia and transphobia exist here just like it exists everywhere else.”

“So my big thing is how we have all these systems in place that make us a little more queer friendly,” she said. “But how do we actually get the public to stop hating people, to stop doing hate crimes, to stop bullying?”

Ose, who now lives in the Bayview, grew up closer to the city. But coming from a religious family in Modesto, he says, “I had heard things about the Castro itself. I always thought the Castro was the devil…I was a church boy.”

He remembers fear that someone he knew would recognize him in the forbidden neighborhood, that “my mom would find out and be like, what are you doing in the Castro? So I was scared to death my parents would find out I was coming to the Castro.”

That was two years ago. Now, Ose works in the Castro, and he was dressed in cut-off shorts and a slicked back Mohawk, long painted nails clicking on the table. “I’m hella gayed out,” he happily reports.

When Mia made it to San Francisco, she initially settled into the Tenderloin, rather than the gentrifying Castro.

“As a trans person, a lot of trans history is in the Tenderloin and there’s a lot of trans women who live in the Tenderloin and who work in the Tenderloin,” she explained. “So I feel more at home there. Even though it isn’t technically the gay neighborhood, it’s always been the queer ghetto and that’s where the low income and queer people of color live a lot.”

The Tenderloin is also the site of many of the services that queer youth use. Mia made some of her first local connections at Trans: Thrive, a program of the Asian Pacific Islander Center. And many of the kids at LYRIC, as well as the city’s other queer teens, benefit from Larkin Street Youth Services.

The homeless shelter oversees the only beds reserved for queer youth in the city, all 22 of them, a number Schwartz believes in inadequate. A report from Larkin Street in 2010 found that 30 percent of the homeless youth they serve identify as LGBTQQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or questioning).

LYRIC is part of the Community Partnership for LGBTQQ Youth and the Dimensions Clinic Collaborative, which includes service organizations like the queer-specific health clinic Dimensions, the nearby LGBT Center, the Bay Area Young Positives HIV health and support nonprofit, and the city’s Department of Public Health. But LYRIC is one of only a few organizations that focuses on fun, informative community-building workshops.

 

ACCEPTANCE NOW

Savage promised queer kids that, in the distant future, they would “have friends that love and support you, you will find love, you will find a community.” But LYRIC’s workshops, largely envisioned and run by the youth themselves, show kids that they don’t need to wait: they can create those supportive networks for themselves, in the here and now.

Another such community-building effort was on display at the LGBT Center on June 15: Youth Speaks’ queer poetry slam Queeriosity. The show, which was preceded by five weeks of free poetry workshops for and by queer youth, brought together young queer people from across the Bay Area, and one could feel the love and support in the air.

“Queeriosity is important because, in the poetry scene, we have so many people with so many different backgrounds,” Milani Pelley, one of the show’s hosts and a poet who works with youth in the workshops, told me. “A lot of times people who get identified in the LGBT category, they don’t have that space where they’re front and center and it’s a space for them. It’s very important that we celebrate everyone.”

Pelley, 24, has been working with Youth Speaks since she was 16. She said the message of the It Gets Better videos might be too simple.

“Thinking about being an adult versus a teenager, adults go through the same things,” she said. “The only difference is it’s not encouraged to speak out about it, you’re supposed to act like you have it together and it’s okay.”

Mia said youthful teasing and bullying are precursors to hate crimes: “Bullying and hate crimes are related because it’s all about people not accepting you, and then violently reacting to who are. So either throwing insults or beating you up.”

On April 29, Brandy Martell, an African American trans woman, was murdered in Oakland in a likely hate crime. CeCe McDonald’s recent case has also exhibited the dangers and injustice trans women of color face. The young Chicago woman defended herself against a bigoted attacker who she ended up killing, only to spend time in solitary confinement while awaiting trial, get convicted on manslaughter, and, last week, be placed in a men’s prison to serve her sentence.

I asked the four LYRIC teachers about the campaigns of national organizations like the Human Rights Committee — such as marriage equity or LGBT soldiers — and they all shook their heads.

“There’s a huge disconnect between the national platforms of the major gay organizations and the actual realities of queer youth,” Mia said. “Like they don’t even have queer youth in the majority of their meetings, but then they act like they’re the ones fighting for our rights, you know.”

For example, she said “marriage equality wouldn’t affect me at all. Yeah, it would be okay, it would be better if it was equal across the board. But when you have people dying because of hate crimes, and dying because of bullying, and dying because they don’t have a place to stay and they’re on the streets, it’s like, I just feel like those are a lot more pressing than getting a piece of paper from the government.”

 

SETTING THE AGENDA

Mia serves on the city’s Youth Commission, where she’s designing training programs for service providers to work with LGBT youth. Ose is working with Schwartz to create programming for LGBTQ youth who don’t want to take the common path of rejecting religion and spirituality as they come to terms with other parts of their identity.

“I go to church a lot,” Ose explained. “I grew up as a Christian. And I wanted to touch base on that because a lot of times, the youth that I come across, the majority of them are being silenced…I’m still going through some issues with my own church, especially with my pastor because just recently I’ve heard that he dislikes me over the fact of the way I dress, the way I act, my feminine gestures.”

Stephanie sighed and said, “I wish there were more LYRICS around the city. One in Bayview, one in every district. And Oakland too.”

“People who provide counseling, food, clothes, water if you need it,” Lola added. “A safe space to go to, a place where you can make friends, and make connections. There need to be more places like that specifically for queer youth.”

Even in San Francisco, harassment is a reality in youth programs and schools. In 2009, the SFUSD studied Youth Risk Behavior in San Francisco’s elementary through high school public schools, and found that more than 80 percent of students reported hearing anti-gay remarks at school, and more than 40 percent said they had never heard school staff stop others from making those remarks. The survey also found that students who identified as LGBT were significantly more likely than their peers to report skipping school out of concern for their safety.

Queer youth will never stop finding informal networks of support. But structured settings like LYRIC can be vital. At places like LYRIC, youth find the community, the love, and the friends that Savage promised would appear with time — before they turn 18.

“It’s easier to build relationships and to build community when its structured, when it has a little bit of structure like, hey, this is a queer specified setting, we’re going to talk to each other, we’re going to hang out, we’re gonna do this, and then you kind of build community off of that. And because it’s based on identity, you feel more comfortable to talk about that,” Mia explained. “You have to change your reality. And you have to be the one to change it for yourself. Because ain’t nobody gonna make it better for you.”

Win a pair of tickets to Laura Marling, presented by Live Nation

Maria Poblet
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Win a pair of tickets to Laura Marling, presented by Live Nation

Win two free tickets to see Laura Marling on June 29 at the legendary Grace Cathedral.  Laura’s music has been prominent within the London folk scene since she won the award for Best Female Artist in 2011 and the New Musical Express award for Best Solo Artist in 2011 as well.  Besides her dominant presence in London, she has also toured with a number of well-known indie artists around the UK.  She started her tour in the US at the Bonnaroo music festival in Tennessee, then took off and started touring all around the states throughout the month of June.  At the young age of 21, this girl is sure to preform a memorable show you won’t want to miss out on!

Tickets are on sale now To enter to win a pair of tickets, email sfbgpromos@sfbg.com with “Laura Marling” as the subject and provide your name and email address in the message. Two winners will be announced Wednesday, June 27 at noon!

Friday, June 29 at 9pm @ Grace Cathedral, 1100 California, SF

For a sneak peak at her music, which Pitchfork calls “timeless”, check out this video footage:

 

 

Live Shots: The Temper Trap at Warfield

Tony Robles
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0

Australian indie rock band the Temper Trap played to a nearly-full Warfield theater on Saturday night, where devoted fans screamed every word along with singer Dougy Mandagi.

The sparsely decorated stage — the flashiest set piece was a boomerang taped to the mic stand — left all the attention on the band, giving a feeling of stripped-down intimacy usually reserved for smaller shows.

Guardian voices: The zombie condo converters

Zelda Bronstein
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28
Guardian voices: The zombie condo converters

What is the shelf life of  a really bad public policy concerning housing in  San Francisco?

When it comes to condo conversions of existing rent controlled apartments, the answer is that there is no limit on how many times this bad idea is taken off the shelf. Like a bad summer zombie movie, this undead keeps  walking, no matter what San Franciscans say.

A little history.  In 1982 Supervisor Willie Kennedy, not a bomb-throwing tenant advocate by any stretch, sponsored legislation that limited the  conversion of existing apartments to condos to no more than 200 a year. The measure did not touch new constriction, allowing unlimited condominium construction. Indeed, from 1983 to 2000, some 12,200 new condos were built, an average of some 680 units a year. Since 2000, nearly 100 percent of all new residential constriction is built as condos; there is no limit on renting a condo, but an annual limit in converting an existing apartment. Clearly, condos are a tenure type of housing that is dramatically expanding.

The reason Kennedy and the at-large elected Board of Supervisors voted for the annual limit was to protect rent-controlled apartments, a type of housingthat can’t be expanded. San Francisco’s 1978  rent control ordinance exempted all new construction from being under rent control. So rent-controlled apartments were a fixed number — all apartments built before 1978 — banned by law from ever being expanded. 

Yet those apartments are the largest number of affordable housing units available to moderate and middle income households. Thus, there’s a rational desire to preserve them by a public policy that limits their conversion to condos because they are declining in numbers.

And San Francisco voters understand and support this very rational policy.

In 1989, realtors and speculators tried to overturn the annual limit, proposing a measure that said if 51 percent of a building’s existing tenants voted for a conversion, then the building could be converted with no annual limit. This proposal laid out a future of a Hobbesian society here in San Francisco with one set of well-to-do tenants fighting another set of less-well-off tenants, building by building. San Francisco voters defeated the measure 63-37.

But in the land of the living dead condo converters, no is never the answer.
 
In 2002, Gavin Newsom, Tony Hall and Leland Yee, Plan C, and the Chamber of Commerce placed another measure on the ballot to repeal the annual limit. It too, was  rejected: 60 percent voted no, and 40 percent yes. The measure was defeated in all of the supervisorial districts except  Newsom’s D2, Tony Hall’s D7, and Leland Yee’s D4.

Tenant and affordable housing advocates were not unmoved by the desire of tenants, especially in privately owner rental housing facing Ellis Act and TIC evictions, to seek the protection of home ownership. In 2008 they supported an amendment to the Subdivision Code carving out from the annual limit conversions of apartments by nonprofit, limited equity housing
co-ops.

Now were are confronted again by a desire to allow more conversions of rent controlled units by private buyers who bought into the TIC dodge around the annual condo conversion limit.

Since TIC’s do not require a sub-division map, creating legally recognized separate units, they became “grey market” condos. With hot mortgage money flowing during the bubble, TIC owners could get financing. Now, banks are actually following some laws and will not lend to buy a legally grey TIC.  Thus the move to get them converted to legal condos.
 
This is, in its most basic form, yet another bailout caused by speculative capitalism. We seem to no longer believe in the market as an economic system, in which bad economic decisions result in economic loss for the folks involved. We now seem to believe in the “market society” — in which those with money get to keep it no matter what bad decisions they make.

What this is all about is not really homeownership but about home sales. After all, if you have a TIC you already have a home. You want to convert it to a condo not to live in, but to sell. To make it easier to sell TICs would make it harder to sell the thousands of already approved but stalled new condos.

Mayor Lee administration want to stimulate these stalled condo developments, claiming they will create constriction jobs. The Farrell and Wiener condo conversion plan undercuts these efforts and, of course, will create no jobs for anyone but realtors and moving companies.

This is called a “contradiction of capitalism,” when one set of capitalists seek, to the disadvantage of another group of capitalists, to get the government to intervene on their behalf.  But it does prove once again that Lenin was right when he said that one could count on one set of capitalists to compete with each other to sell rope to hang another set.

It’s really bad economic policy, and even worse housing policy.

Local jazz, blues behind bars, and backing-band memories: new music docs

Sue Vaughan
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Local jazz, blues behind bars, and backing-band memories: new music docs

Jazz singer Jacqui Naylor — Buddhist, Hayes Valley resident, mash-up innovator — premieres her new doc, Lucky Girl: A Portrait of Jacqui Naylor, with a live concert at the Palace of Fine Arts Sat/16 (the DVD will be available in stores Tue/19).

The film, produced by the Bay Area’s ARTiDOCs, is about as far from Behind the Music-style tell-all as you could get; Naylor seems blissfully happy with her life, being completely creatively and personally fulfilled (see also: the film’s title, named for her 2011 CD). No scandals or dark secrets revealed here; this is a straightforward look at a working artist, briefly touching on her career beginnings (at the suggestion of teachers at American Conservatory Theater, she chose music over acting) and including mini-profiles on the artists she collaborates with, including husband Art Khu.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiBY1U4b8oI&feature=player_embedded

Fans (whom she prizes highly — and takes their suggestions seriously) will enjoy the film’s many musical interludes, which showcase snippets and entire songs of Naylor performing and rehearsing in the Bay Area, Seattle, and Istanbul. Her repertoire includes original songs, pop and jazz standards, and standards freshened up with her signature “acoustic smashing” — singing the lyrics to “My Funny Valentine” over the instrumentation for AC/DC’s “Back in Black,” for example. Will this versatile performer dust off more heavy-metal flair for Saturday’s show? It could totally happen. She’s taking requests: jacqui@jacquinaylor.com.

Lucky Girl: A Portrait of Jacqui Naylor (with reception and concert)
Sat/16, 7pm, $35
Florence Gould Theater
Legion of Honor
100 34th Ave., SF
www.jacquinaylor.com

**

Coming to the Kabuki and Smith Rafael this weekend is Music from the Big House, a soulful doc from filmmaker Bruce McDonald (2008’s Pontypool) about fellow Canadian Rita Chiarelli‘s experiences working with musician-inmates at Louisiana’s Angola Prison.

Angola Prison — earlier the subject of an acclaimed short documentary about its famous rodeo — has a well-known, rich musical history; in the 30s, John and Alan Lomax recorded Leadbelly while he was serving time there. Chiarelli, a blues superstar in her native country, says she initially traveled to the American South a decade ago to “visit the birthplace of the blues” — a journey that included a stop at America’s largest maximum security prison (5,000 inmates), where she discovered a thriving musical culture. Inspired (“the trueness totally moved me”), a planned concert for the prisoners became a concert with the men, including groups playing good ol’ boy country, gospel, Stevie Wonder jams, and Chiarelli’s own brand of raw, rootsy blues.

Gorgeously filmed in black and white, and crisply edited, McDonald’s film emphasizes the joy and feelings of freedom the men have achieved through their musical pursuits. But it also acknowledges its inescapable setting, filming the dorm-style cell blocks, a visiting day filled with seldom-seen wives and children, the barbed wire encircling the years. “When you’re playing music it’s easy to forget where you are,” the husky-voiced Chiarelli reflects. “But they’re still in prison and that’s rough.”

Though most of the featured men don’t directly address their crimes (their various offenses, including rape and murder, are addressed in the film’s sobering end credits), themes of deep regret and redemption run throughout the film. Kind of like the blues.

Music From the Big House
June 15-21, 2:15, 4:10, 7, and 9:20pm (with live performance by Rita Chiarelli Sat/16, 7pm)
Sundance Kabuki Cinema
1881 Post, SF
www.sundancecinemas.com

Also Sun/17, 7pm, $12 (with live performance by Chiarelli)
Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center
1118 Fourth St., San Rafael
(415) 454-1222
www.cafilm.org

**

And next weekend, get a sneak peek at an as-yet-unreleased (and not on DVD) documentary about acclaimed session musicians the Wrecking Crew, presented by the San Francisco Chapter of the Audio Engineering Society.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xs2kJn6PBE&feature=plcp

The film sounds kind of similar to the excellent 2002 doc Standing in the Shadows of Motown, about Motown’s legendary Funk Brothers: the Wrecking Crew was hugely active in 1960s Los Angeles, adding their musicianship to hits by the Beach Boys, Frank and Nancy Sinatra, the Monkees, the Mamas and the Papas, and more. (The film contains so many songs that its release has been held up over music-rights issues).

Producer-director Danny Tedesco — son of Wrecking Crew guitarist Tommy Tedesco — will be on hand to discuss the film, which he’s been working on for over 15 years, after each screening.

The Wrecking Crew
June 23, 2:30 and 7pm, $20
Auctions By the Bay Theater
2700 Saratoga, Alameda
www.brownpapertickets.com

Beach daze with buzzing brother act Wildlife Control

Tony Robles
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What would it be like if a day of your life was filmed then released into the wilds of the web? Better yet, what if you and your brother were musicians, and you produced, directed, and released your first big, innovative music video – shot over a full day at Ocean Beach in San Francisco – and it ended up going viral on Youtube, before the release of a full-length album?

Well, your band Wildlife Control would be a rather buzzed about act. And it would leave the people wanting even more (debut EP Spin was released this March). Brothers Neil and Sumul Shah, hailing from a rural Pennsylvania town – now based in Brooklyn and San Francisco respectively – spent a day in early February filming said music video for their new single “Analog or Digital” on a windswept beach, using a unique combination of time-lapse and stop-motion techniques.

In the video, it appears that the background is moving faster than real time, while the band’s movements are stagnant, choppy, like a slow-moving slideshow; it creates an effect that looks their feet are closely hovering over the sand.

This effect was created by a series of more than 3,000 individual photographs. The process was tiring for the brothers, holding the poses for such a long stretch of time, “We got really stiff” laughed Sumul during a conversation at Cafe Mediterranean in Berkeley.

Wildlife Control’s sound is far from rigid, it’s based in breezy pop – poppy enough to appeal to mainstream audiences – and layered with rock’n’roll riffs, and some jazz influences. There are layers to peel back with each listen, more depth than initially meets the ear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boGyFAYomBo

“We grew up in a whole family of musicians, Sumul reflected. “Our parents both imparted the importance of music from an early age. They wanted us to dive deep into it. Our dad is a trained classical Indian musician.” In fact, he plays Tabla on their future full-length release. “Music was all around, all the time; from an early age we always heard good music.”

Sumul added that – along with that family of musicians – he was also inspired by teachers, other artists, and inspirational folk with a clarity of vision, ticking off a list that included Steve Jobs, the Beatles, and Johann Sebastian Bach.

“When we would go with our friends in their parents’ minivan, I didn’t get what they listened to. The cheesy kids’ music was just not what we were exposed to in our family,” he laughed. “There is a necessity to some extent to have music appropriate for kids, but I don’t believe they should need their own weird kids’ music. A child can appreciate music like the Beatles.”

While the brothers grew up surrounded by music and have been playing together for some time, they’ve just barely dipped their toes in the modern world of viral music videos. With the “Analog or Digital” video, they made a concerted effort to capture their personalities.

“We thought, what better way to do it then to film an entire day to ourselves, and then compress that down into the three minutes of the song,” Sumul said. “Certain aspects of it were very planned out, but otherwise we just wanted to have fun and be ourselves.”

The song is anchored by a steady drum line, and the story-telling of the lyrics instantly create a potential for nostalgia; the musical bridge adds a dramatic flair that makes the song all the more memorable.

“It’s interesting that it went viral; all we really want is to make music for anyone who wants to hear it and be exposed to it.”  Sumul said. “To live in an age where we can get so much fan response amazes us,” adding, “we totally live in the future and we love that.”

Wildlife Control
With Coast Jumper
Mon/18, 8pm, $13
Brick and Mortar Music Hall
1710 Mission, SF
(415) 800-8782
www.brickandmortarmusic.com

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