Local

Save our homes

Andrew Lam
-
9
Save our homes

yael@sfbg.com


This story has been edited


Bay Area activists, fueled in part by the Occupy movement, have recently taken stands against police brutality, for the rights of the homeless, against the corporate power of banks, and much more. But, arguably, nowhere has the movement been more successful than in the fight against foreclosures and evictions.


With the support of Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) and the Bayview Foreclosure Fighters, several Bayview residents whose homes had already been sold continue to occupy them, and in some cases sales have been rescinded. Occupy Bernal has used civil disobedience to postpone six housing auctions, keeping their neighbors in their homes that much longer. They secured a meeting with Diana Stauffer, Wells Fargo Home Mortgage senior vice president, and David Campos, District 9 supervisor, to delay foreclosure proceedings.


But the activists are pushing for a full moratorium on foreclosures and evictions in San Francisco. Such a moratorium is not without precedent. In recent years, sheriffs have stopped evictions and foreclosures in Wayne Country, Michigan; Cook County, Illinois; Butler County, Ohio; and Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania.


When Cook County Sheriff John Dart imposed his moratorium in 2010, he said, “I can’t possibly be expected to evict people from their homes when the banks themselves can’t say for sure everything was done properly. I need some kind of assurance that we aren’t evicting families based on fraudulent behavior by the banks.”


San Francisco seems ripe for a similar stance, as Assessor-Recorder Phil Ting recently released a report revealing widespread lawbreaking in foreclosure proceedings. The report found that 84 percent of foreclosures in San Francisco over the last three years involved faulty paperwork, some of it amounting to fraud.


Representatives from the District Attorney’s and the City Attorney’s offices told the Guardian that they are concerned about the report. These bodies may be starting the process of further investigating findings. Last week, Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi, whose office carries out the county’s evictions, said he has begun an initiative to collect and analyze the city’s foreclosure data.


But Mirkarimi’s hands may be tied. As he told Ann Garrison of KPFA radio Feb. 25, “I don’t have the latitude or discretion, much as I would like, because there would need to be a change in state law that empowers municipal sheriffs to be able to use that discretion.”


Occupy Bernal formed just a couple months ago, but it has emerged as a powerful advocate for homeowners facing foreclosure. The neighborhood-based branch of the Occupy movement chose to focus specifically on preventing the evictions of Bernal Heights residents, where over 100 homes face foreclosure.


They kept the pressure up Feb. 25, when a group of supporters convened at 1090 Chestnut Street, the residence of John Stumpf, the CEO of Wells Fargo. That bank owns the majority of mortgages on Bernal homes facing foreclosure.


The protest wasn’t meant to block the street and no one tried to enter the building where Stumpf owns three of the 14 floors. But police decided that the group of about 150 warranted blocking off the entire block to traffic, to the annoyance of many neighbors.


“You collected $43.7 billion in taxpayer money and have since made record profits at the expense of low-income communities, while repeatedly breaking your legal and moral obligations as a creditor. You have failed to comply with loan modification requirements under your own lending agreements,” said a blown-up “foreclosure notice” outside Stumpf’s home.


In the spirited street theater scene, activists dressed as an auctioneer and a larger-than-life John Stumpf played out a fake auction of Stumpf’s property.


Dexter Cato, a father of four whose wife was recently killed in a car crash in the midst of months-long loan modification proceedings, faces foreclosure from his Bayview home of 40 years.


“Stumpf, we want a new address for you,” said Archbishop Franzo King of the Western Additions’ John Coltrane church, “850 Bryant Street!”


The crowd then proceeded to chant this address: the San Francisco Hall of Jusice and County Jail.


“We understand that some of our customers are going through difficult times during this economic recovery,” said Jim Foley, president of Wells Fargo’s Greater Bay Area region, in a press release responding to the Feb. 25 protest. The company plans to hold “Home Preservation Workshops” in Richmond March 7 and 8 to help homeowners facing foreclosure.


Public officials may be a long way from locking up CEOs for foreclosure fraud, but some have taken notice of complaints against the banks. On Feb. 2, the Berkeley City Council voted not to extend its contract with Wells Fargo to manage $300 million in city assets, citing its foreclosures on city residents.


On a national level, activists have been successful in persuading people to transfer their money to local banks and credit unions in recent months. Javelin Strategy and Research came out with statistics that 5.6 million Americans have switched bank service providers in the past 90 days, three times the normal transfer rate. Bank Transfer Day in early October was specifically cited as the trigger by 610,000 of those people.


The recent $25 billion settlement between the five largest banks and attorneys general in California and other states over mortgage fraud made big headlines, but activists note that it allocates a measly $2,000 to some people who have lost their homes to foreclosure. Occupy Bernal’s Buck Bagot said people need more protection from powerful banks. “Banks suckered people into this stuff, and they have made billions,” Bagot said. “We’re not saying people shouldn’t have to pay off the money they borrowed, but it took two to tango.”

Image Comic Expo showcases new stars and the old guard

Tony Robles
-
1

Comic cons serve a variety of functions. They can be press junkets, costume parties, swap meets, social retreats, even museums. Comics writer Warren Ellis has a habit of referring to San Diego’s huge Comic Con as “nerd prom,” which perfectly captures the glow of excitement for mass socialization in funny costumes. By contrast, this year’s Image Comic Expo was more like a nerd Sadie Hawkins dance – a deliberate reversal of the standard hierarchy, where creator-owned books are championed over the widely beloved DC and Marvel franchises that sometimes seem to oversaturate the comics market. It was also a little less garish and hectic than some larger cons, but the sense of community and pride was still richly evident.

The event coincided with two historic peculiarities – the twentieth anniversary of Berkeley-based Image Comics and the migration of San Francisco’s WonderCon to Anaheim this year. And, fittingly, there was no shortage of Image worship over the con’s three days. In the center of the convention floor like a hub was the main Image vendor, which sold books, distributed tickets to panels and workshops, and hosted signings, all in the shadow of a massive edifice with Image book covers on one side and images from Robert Kirkman’s Skybound imprint on the other.

Local vendors were well-represented on the con floor, with Berkeley’s Fantastic Comics (shout-out to my hometown comic book guys and gals) and Escapist Comic Bookstore, and San Francisco’s Two Cats Comic Book Store, among others. The “artist alley” was rife with independent artists and creators selling their wares and producing sketches, while several Image creators, including Jonathan Hickman (Red Wing), Nick Spencer (Morning Glories), and the MAN OF ACTION gents, got their own booths around the con.

As for the sort of crowd the Image Expo attracted, based entirely on my casual observations, there was a notable diversity of age, gender, and ethnicity. There were strikingly few cosplayers, though I spotted one full-blown Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender, a group of ladies in anime-inspired dress (I made out one Sailor suit), and two young’uns dressed as Batgirl (or a female Batman) and Captain America. Among con guests, the Skybound booth featured an Atom Eve cosplayer, and the comedians of Dipstick Swagger sported a variety of disguises including their own mascot, Luchacat.

By virtue of the con’s Image-centric organization, the panels which ran through Saturday and Sunday were occasionally redundant, with guests like Kirkman, Joe Casey, and Brian K. Vaughan each appearing in multiple places. But breaking announcements and a sense of fan enthusiasm for these beloved creators’ upcoming work kept it all going. Among the exciting announcements at Friday night’s keynote speech by Image publisher Eric Stephenson: the long-awaited sequel to Howard Chaykin’s Black Kiss, a third volume of Phonogram from Gillen/McKelvie, a collaboration between Grant Morrison and Darick Robertson called Happy, and several other new titles.

The most enjoyable panels were the ones that featured folks with a less-established fanbase, who were in a position to introduce new readers to their ideas. The inaugural Saturday panel, moderated by G4’s Blair Butler, focused on the forthcoming Kickstarter-funded collection Womanthology, a showcase for comics by female creators. The panel featured Trina Robbins, Mariah Huehner, Nicole Sixx, Fiona Staples, and Bonnie Burton, all of who contributed in various capacities. The audience, though smallish, was enthusiastic about both the cause and the content, and discussions of such exasperating issues as the “brokeback pose” (slightly NSFW tumblr here) drew applause and thoughtful questions.

Also engrossing was Sunday’s “Image Introduces…” panel, with a slate of recently recognized creators whose series are still in their early issues, including Joe Keatinge (Glory, Hell Yeah), S. Steven Struble and Sina Grace (Li’l Depressed Boy), Daniel Corey (Moriarty), Jim Zub (Skullkickers), Brandon Seifert (Witch Doctor), and Kurtis J. Wiebe (Peter Panzerfaust). It was a joy to see their pride in their creations and their genuine pleasure at getting to share their work with potential new fans.

But let us not forget the old guard: at the “Twenty Years of Independence” panel, the founders of Image told their story and the audience got a chance to witness controversial icons like Todd McFarlane and Rob Liefeld; the “Stories and Scripts: Writing Comics” panel featured Image’s hottest properties, including Jonathan Hickman, Ed Brubaker, Nick Spencer, John Layman, Joe Casey, Steven T. Seagle, and Brian K. Vaughan, who basically all teased each other and had a grand old time.

Since it was an Image-minded convention, creators came first, which is always refreshing, especially for less iconic newcomers with a lot to offer, but the apotheosis of one publisher might wear thin if the convention continues in subsequent years. With a bit of expansion, though, an East Bay comics event might differ enough from WonderCon to hold an audience.

All photos by Taryn Erhardt

 

Guardian editorial: SF should go after mortgage criminals

-
16

EDITORIAL The mortgage crisis in San Francisco isn’t just devastating to homeowners and to the southeast neighborhoods where foreclosures are most common — it’s clear evidence that lenders and their affiliates are and have been acting illegally. This city ought to be taking the lead on pressing civil and criminal charges against the mortgage outfits.

City Assessor Phil Ting commissioned a report in February that showed that nearly every one of 382 foreclosures actions in the city between January 2009 and October 2011 had at least some irregularities. In more than 80 percent of the cases, the report identified direct violations of law.

It’s a stunning revelation: In nearly 100 percent of the cases studied, the mortgage companies did something wrong. Homeowners were not notified that they were in default. Properties were seized and sold by companies that didn’t have the proper title to them. Documents were backdated or signed by an entity that didn’t have the authority to sign. In some cases, it wasn’t clear who actually owned the mortgage, because the corporation that filed for foreclosure had never property taken title to the loan.

The report comes as Occupy protesters in San Francisco are moving aggressively to target banks that are tossing people out of their homes and at a time when county sheriffs in other parts of the country are refusing to execute foreclosure orders.

There may not be much San Francisco Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi can do — mortgage foreclosures in California can be done with almost no oversight and by the time the sheriff is called in there’s nothing left but an eviction. But the report makes clear that there were both violations of business regulations and crimes, in some cases felony crimes — and the San Francisco city attorney and district attorney should be moving as quickly as possible to take legal action.

Both City Attorney Dennis Herrera and District Attorney George Gascon have asked for more material from Ting’s office, although neither has announced a formal investigation. But every day that this goes on, more people lose their homes and more crimes are committed — and both offices should move as quickly as possible to take action.

There’s nothing in the federal settlement over fraudulent mortgage activity that prevents local officials from taking this sort of action. There’s nothing preventing Herrera from seeking an injunction against further foreclosures or preventing Gascon from indicting the lenders and their executives.

Meanwhile, Ting told us that he’s asking Attorney General Kamala Harris to investigate, because the pattern of violations almost certainly goes beyond San Francisco.

State Sen. Mark DeSaulnier has introduced a bill that would mandate transparency in foreclosures, so at least homeowners would know who to contact to seek a modification. That’s a good start. But holding these sleazy operators accountable would send a message that San Francisco isn’t going to let this sort of behavior continue.

—

Localized Appreesh: The Shants

Tony Robles
-
0

Localized Appreesh is our weekly thank-you column to the musicians that make the Bay. To be considered, contact emilysavage@sfbg.com.

The Shants have done something curiously rare these days: created an authentically Southern and categorically enjoyable stompy blues and folk record in the heart of garage punk and hip-hop obsessed Oakland. That authenticity come from real roots, as these sorts of things often do – the new record, Beautiful was the Night, is said to be a “haunted love letter” to singer Skip Allum’s youth in the South Louisiana delta pines.

The resulting record is a lively mix of Americana, twanged vocals, bluesy riffs, bits of piano and violin, and steel guitar, with guest appearances by the likes of multi-instrumentalist/horn player Ralph Carney, Blue Bone Express, and vocalist Quinn DeVeaux. I think singer Brianna Lea Pruett, who also guests on the record, describes the music best when she says in the short documentary on the making of the album, “Even in the dark parts, there’s a sweet treatment to it.”

With the long-awaited release of its debut full-length record finally here, the quartet will play Cafe Du Nord this Thursday.

You can watch the making of the new album here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaPdF3T8UZs

Year and location of origin: Oakland, 2009

Band name origin: Its a reference to the Gaelic word, shiant, meaning blessed or charmed… and the Shiant Isles of Scotland. Skip came across it while doing some research on his Scottish family origins, which can be traced to those islands. That’s the short version, anyway.

Band motto: “Is the pedal steel too loud? How ’bout now?”

Description of sound in 10 words or less: A dusty, slow blend of Southern folk, and country blues.

Instrumentation: 1954 Harmony archtop guitar, Emmons double-neck pedal steel guitar, 1970s Peavey bass guitar, drums. May soon have a new fella on many other instruments. Stay tuned!

Most recent release: Beautiful Was The Night, our first full-length! Available now at live shows, our website, iTunes, Bandcamp, Spotify, etc. and all Rasputin Records locations. It was recorded with all analog gear over at the Rec Center (formerly Bakesale Betty’s storage space) and at Tones on Tail Studios in Oakland, with Mr. Eliot Curtis.

Best part about life as a Bay Area band: The diverse musical community is pretty inspiring. We may not sound like a lot of other bands coming out of Oakland and the city… but we are all very DIY-focused & often looking to expand our sound with new textures.

Worst part about life as a Bay Area band: Tolls and parking tickets are a bitch, man. After shelling out this much money, we should get board seats with Caltrans and Alameda County.

First album ever purchased:
Skip: Matthew Sweet – Girlfriend
Carver: Nirvana – Nevermind
Adam: The Police – Synchronicity
Sam: Son Volt – Trace

Most recent album purchased/downloaded:
Skip: Samantha Crain – You (Understood)
Carver: Etta James – Etta James Rocks the House
Adam: Keith Jarret – Shostakovich 24 Preludes and Fugues
Sam: Calexico – Feast of Wire

Favorite local eatery and dish:
Skip: Aslam’s Rosoi on Valencia. I love their lamb Madras.
Adam: Lo Coco’s on Piedmont Ave in Oakland. Their Maria and Suzanne pizzas so good.
Carver: Brown Sugar Cafe in Emeryville. Get the chicken & waffles.
Sam: Bakesale Betty’s in Oakland. Fried chicken sandwich, of course.

The Shants
With Chadwick Stokes
Thurs/1, 8 p.m., $17
Cafe Du Nord
2170 Market, SF
(415) 861-5016
www.cafedunord.com

Cole Hardware pleads guilty in SFPUC scam

Sasha Cuttler
-
1
Cole Hardware pleads guilty in SFPUC scam

We at the Guardian have long celebrated small businesses as more beneficial to San Francisco than large corporations, which often extract wealth from the community and use it for competitive advantage or political corruption. But a recent criminal case shows that even a beloved local business – in this case, Cole Hardware – can get caught up in shady dealings.

The District Attorney’s Office yesterday announced the settlement of a procurement scam case involving the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) and employees of Cole Hardware. The company pled guilty to felony charges and has agreed to pay $51,545 in restitution to the SFPUC and $650 in court fines and fees.

“Our city will not tolerate city vendors who steal taxpayers’ money. We are pleased Cole Hardware has accepted responsibility for their role in this multi-level scheme to defraud the SFPUC,” District Attorney George Gascón said in a public statement.

Court records detail a scam that ran from April 2003 to October 2007 in which Cole Hardware and another city vendor worked with former SFPUC manager Donnie Alan Thomas – who pled guilty to his role in the scheme last year – to submit false invoices to the SFPUC for personal purchases.

Cole Hardware has issued a public statement explaining its role in the case and reasons for accepting the guilty plea: “For more than 50 years, Cole Hardware has stood for integrity, excellence and good citizenship in San Francisco. Unfortunately, a few years ago two trusted 20+ year employees submitted misleading invoices to the City, thereby facilitating a fraud by some of the City’s P.U.C. workers. At the time, Cole Hardware’s ownership was not aware of this misconduct. When we learned the details we terminated both employees, fully cooperated with the District Attorney’s investigation, adopted new internal policies to prevent future misconduct and offered to reimburse the City for any losses attributable to our employees. Sadly, after more than two years of huge expenses fighting the charges in court, Cole Hardware has reluctantly accepted a plea bargain. This is purely an economic decision. Cole remains committed to our mission of serving those living and working in San Francisco.”

SFPUC General Manager Ed Harrington noted in his public statement how important it is to take a hard line against this kind of fraud: “Today we have sent a strong message that the City will not tolerate public servants or vendors who attempt to fleece our hardworking taxpayers.”

There are six other co-defendants who have already pled guilty in this case: Donnie Thomas, Jean Quiroz, Centennial Distributors, Inc., John Rauch, Robert Mazariegos, and Vincent Padilla. There are three other co-defendants who have not yet pled guilty and who await their preliminary hearing: Miles Bonner, Tri-Delta Electric, and Elizabeth Bradford.

Noise Pop Roundup 2: Cursive, Budos Band, Emily Jane White, DRMS, Atlas Sound

Tony Robles
-
0
Noise Pop Roundup 2: Cursive, Budos Band, Emily Jane White, DRMS, Atlas Sound

My personal strategy for Noise Pop 2012 was to pack in as diverse a personal schedule as possible, taking into account old obsessions (Cursive, Bradford Cox) and favored newer acts (Allah-Las, DRMS), national and local bands and musicians, weird and precious live indie music.

I also wanted to spread my time over multiple venues, so this time around I hit up the Independent, Bimbo’s, Great American Music Hall, Swedish American, and Mezzanine. I walked the length of the city, racked up some high bus and cab bills, likely imbibed too frequently and caught some stellar live music. My head, feet, and note-scribbling hand are sore, but it was worth it.

WEDNESDAY: Cursive at Great American Music Hall

It was mid-song (“The Martyr,” 2000’s Domestica), mid-set (Noise Pop), of Cursive’s likely sold-out performance at Great American Music Hall. I opened my eyes, scanned the room, and saw we were all singing along breathlessly. Plaid-shirted forearms thrust towards stage, fringed heads bobbing, and everyone within earshot hollering towards the center. There in the middle stood grizzled singer-guitarist Tim Kasher, leader of the Omaha-bred longtime Saddle Creek Records fixture Cursive, as well as the Good Life. Parsing his words carefully, Kasher spoke for nearly the first time after a quick-fire opening shot of beloved Domestica and Ugly Organ tracks, interspersed with brand newer, understandably less-clapped-for I Am Gemini cuts. “Let’s get candid,” he understated. Full review here.

THURSDAY: Allah-Las and Budos Band at Independent

If you could handpick its most redeeming qualities and inhabitants from any time period in the past half century, Los Angeles could actually be a rather magical place. Pluck the psychedelic guitar strains reverberating through Laurel Canyon, scoop a fistful of bronzed sun-kissed surfers and sparkling waves from the coast, add two shakes of downtown weirdness, and you’d likely come up with something along the lines of Allah-Las, the quartet that opened for Budos Band during the Noise Pop lineup at the Independent Thursday. Full review here.

FRIDAY: Emily Jane White and DRMS at Swedish American Music Hall

The first time I saw dark folk songstress Emily Jane White live was at an ornate church on a hill (RIP EpiscoDisco) so this Noise Pop stop at the Swedish American Music Hall last Friday brought back some particular memories. Memories of an elegant, otherworldly setting and the singer-guitarist who encapsulates the venue’s charms.

With nary a smile, the black cloth-and-lace-swaddled White beautifully finger-picked and sang original tracks off 2009’s Victorian American and 2010’s Ode to Sentience, backed by a seated guitarist, a fellow on bass clarinet, and later, a violinist, who added even more depth to haunting closing song, “Victorian America” – a piece that showcases the bold yet breathy strength of White’s voice. Seated in folding chairs at the Swedish American, surrounded by dark wood trim, the audience clapped politely then grabbed between-act beers from guest bartender John Vanderslice.

Upon my return from Vanderslicing, I saw that DRMS (formerly known as Dreams) had splayed across the relatively small church-like stage, a clump of seven musicians with an interesting mixture of instruments and styles. Behind the retro 1920s blues vocals, the Afro-folk band incorporated more traditional instruments along with melodica, vibraphone, and some sort of bag of shimmering noise, all rainstick-like. Live, the intimate set felt like it could be happening anywhere in the world, a group of friends playing jumbly music with hints at a grab-bag variety of genres and cultures. This could work anywhere, yet still the venue felt the ideal setting.

SATURDAY: Atlas Sound at Bimbo’s

Three of the four acts Saturday night at Bimbo’s were solo dudes on guitar making sounds far beyond the basic limitations of the instrument. These were experiments in experimenting, Carnivores, Frankie Broyles, and of course, the man who likely influenced the others in some form or another, Atlas Sound (aka Bradford Cox, also of Deerhunter).

With a courteous “hello,” Cox picked up one of his magic vintage guitars – one attached to so many pedals and looping mechanisms that one pictures a jumble of chords slithering snake-like up his thigh – and opened up to a captive Bimbo’s crowd with his hypnotic near-soundscapes.

Not knowing quite what to expect live, I was, for whatever reason, somewhat surprised to see only Cox on stage at Bimbo’s (another grand San Francisco venue, for those keeping track of the prettiest music spots to visit) playing music so full it sounded like a full band. Perhaps a ghost band sat behind him, guiding the chord snakes.

Though it’s his solo project, it’s still mystifying to me that he can create such a beautiful noise alone. Cox’s swirling, pulsating loops of guitar and drum sounds picked up speed at times, revving up those in the audience as well, particularly during “Shelia” off 2009’s Logos and more so tracks off most recently released record Parallax: “Te Amo”  and “Terra Incognita.”

The front row of the ballroom was packed with youthful obsession (the excited youngsters sat up front on the dancefloor ground from the time the doors opened at 7 p.m. ’till Atlas Sound’s set at 11). Those kids provided fodder for Cox’s eccentric on-stage musings later in the evening, when he brought a boy on stage and said he looked like a younger version of him. I also heard later that young fans swarmed Cox after the set to gush and thank him for saving their lives, with his music.

Muralation: Swoon’s wheatepaste is reborn, in color this time

Andrew Lam
-
4

Swoon’s work has been haunting me. On a recent trip to DJ Rusty Lazer’s house in New Orleans it was there, bedecking a rundown Bywater neighborhood fence that concealed a village of homes that can be played as a symphony (she also designed a structure for the mini-city, a dream tree house atop stilts). As one strolls though the world one sees it here, there – fairy webs of delicate wheatpaste strands on city walls. 

So it’s no surprise that the Mission’s been eager to replace the wheatpaste Swoon (also known as Caledonia Curry) installed on Tony’s Market at 24th Street and Hampshire. Rejoice: after the original was defaced in August 2011, the female street artist’s new piece will finally adhere to Tony’s on Tue/28.

Goddess knows there are superlative female street artists based in San Francisco. Mona Caron, Juana Alicia — but here as in other places in the world women still (still!) haven’t gained the firmest of footholds in the street art world. Swoon is probably the best-known XX-chromosoned public artist out there, along with NYC’s Lady Pink.

So it was nice to have her around the city. Mission Local’s Molly Oleson penned a rather lovely little account of how Swoon’s piece — originally an image of a woman who had been kidnapped in Mexico’s spates of femicide — came to be on 24th Street and Hampshire. It has to do with Chicken John’s house, says Chicken John. 

The neighborhood liked it very much. But in one of the more bizarre cases of vandalism I’ve heard of, someone wrote the word ‘VOTE’ over it in big, artless red letters last August. Subsequent efforts to scrub off the letters half-obliterated Swoon’s work, so a team of concerned creative types including street art book editor Annice Jacoby, Lesley Freeman, and Chicken John contacted Swoon for a replacement, which she was reportedly happy to make. Oleson’s story includes a slightly humorous retelling of the moment when the team realized the replacement piece Swoon had sent wasn’t going to work out — happily for San Francisco, she was happy to create a second version of the replacement. 

This version, Swoon says in an artist’s statement, is a commentary on water issues surrounding the Gulf disaster in New Orleans. And the rendering that’s been done of the piece shows that its in color, not always the case in Swoon’s body of work. You’re welcome to go check out the piece getting put up tomorrow, and hear more about the inspiration behind the design in the video Swoon shot for Time Out New York below: 

Swoon mural re-installation

Tue/28 noon, free

Tony’s Market

24th Street and Hampshire, SF

 

Noise Pop Roundup 1: Shannon and the Clams, Die Antwoord, Glass Candy, last-minute parties

Andrew Lam
-
0

May I first say thanks to Noise Pop for bringing a sense of urgency to my concert-going behavior. I am nothing if not a festival junkie, and the sheer mass of shows that this particular festival coordinated was awe-inspiring and more than a little anxiety-provoking for those of us who feel the need to go to everything, always. Plus: badges. There is nothing like walking around feeling like you have special access to an entire city, at 24 venues in total from Bimbo’s up in North Beach to the Golden Gate Park-clad California Academy of Science.

Fresh off of a week in New Orleans for Mardi Gras, I couldn’t do it all. But here’s how I tried:

WEDNESDAY: Die Antwoord at Regency Ballroom 

This was the show I was most excited about seeing, and the South African hip-hop trio (emcees Ninja and Yolandi Vi$$er, and DJ Hi-Tek) were definitely worth their sold-out hype-age. Even if you can’t get down with their ultra-aggressive lyrics, you can’t quibble with Die Antwoord’s showmanship – even while spinning around like a demented, shaved head-top and bounding across the stage Vi$$er and Ninja managed to hit every lyric like wow. Sadly, the show opened with DJ Hi-Tek’s Mike Tyson-inspired homophobic rantings, and that was tough-impossible to get past. Is Hi-Tek gay? Who cares. Full review here. 

THURSDAY: Shannon and the Clams at Cafe Du Nord

One of the greatest things about Noise Pop is that the fest brings new audience to local favorites – and I found, conjures up concert experiences that are a lot different than if you saw your Bay-Bays in the same old venue with the same old crowd as always. Such was Thursday night’s lineup of the Soft Pack, Shannon and the Clams, Fidlar, and Surf Club. (Check Ryan Prendiville’s review of these last two acts here) It was actually my first time catching the Clams, but seeing the group slay it at Du Nord cast them in a different light than if my first time had been moshing in a room-capacity sweaty knot at, say, the Knockout. The Clams came across as a band that is expanding its reach beyond the dark rooms of the Bay Area. After the show lead singer Shannon Shaw told us that the group was in the process of recording its next album, so yay. 

FRIDAY: Glass Candy at Mezzanine

I wasn’t wearing neon, but Portland’s Glass Candy still moved my ass out of the upstairs VIP booth we’d somehow scammed and into the throngs for the middle and end of Ida No and Johnny Jewel’s set. The Chromatics are fine, but that group’s live set (which we tasted pre-Candy) was the teensiest bit slow, not compelling enough to leave the cold leather fishbowl that was the booth. Not so No and Jewel, who satisfied all the jumping grindsters with ecstatic chords and No’s prancing. 

SATURDAY: Big Queer Dance Party at Public Works

Headliner Big Freedia canceled in a medical emergency, but the crew behind this event decided to keep the ‘big’ and go along with it. Was it a Noise Pop event? Besides Freedia, the schedule, venue, and lineup had remained the same, but staff at the door told me that it was no longer part of the festival, so Noise Pop badge holders had to pay again to enter. Seemed like a boner move, but I was glad to be there once I was inside, if only to check out Double Dutchess’ beautiful boys getting hyped onstage. Their raybeams were reflected in the crowd for the rest of the night – DJ Bus Station John, Stay Gold’s DJ PinkLightning, and DJ Laydown (Hard French crewmember Timothy Strong in his debut on the decks) kept everything really sweaty – which was great because after that much Noise Pop I had some toxins to sweat out. 

Occupy and Castlewood Workers to join up for “perhaps the biggest and most vibrant march Pleasanton has ever seen”

-
10

Organizers hope for a big turnout Feb. 25 for the latest protest in a two-year saga to demand a better contract.

Food service workers at Castlewood Country Club were put on lockout on Feb. 25, 2010 when they refused the terms of a contract with the club. The contract stipulated that workers pay $849 per month for health care, a change from the free health care the contract had previously provided.

Lockouts, when employers refuse to let employees come back to work until they agree to contract terms, are a rare but powerful tool used against unions.

“A lockout is the opposite of a strike,” said Sarah Norr, organizer with UNITE HERE local 2850, which represents the Castlewood workers.

Since the lockout began, the club has hired non-union replacement workers and most of the union workers have taken other jobs. But, in order to end the lockout legally, the company must resolve the contract issues.

According to Norr, “It’s illegal to permanently replace locked out workers.”

Workers brought the case to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), which filed a complaint against Castlewood August 30, 2010. The complaint states that the club “has been interfering with, restraining, and coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in Section 7 of the [National Labor Relations] Act” and “has been failing and refusing to bargaining [sic] collectively and in good faith with the exclusive bargaining representative of its employees.”

An ongoing NLRB hearing on the case is expected to conclude on March 1.

Meanwhile, workers have been picketing daily since the lockout began two years ago. This has sometimes resulted in dramatic clashes with the club members.

One of the workers’ protests last June. Golfers’ reponses, complete with property desctruction, begin around 1:35

“Members of the club harass them on a daily basis. Hitting golf balls at them, throwing racial slurs at them. Some of them are really supportive but some are not so nice,” said Norr.

But workers persevere, and tomorrow they hope for a larch march on the club, joined by OccupySF and Occupy Oakland.

Said Norr, “It’s going to be a big, vibrant march, perhaps biggest and most vibrant march Pleasanton has ever seen. There will be a babies’ and children’s brigade.”

For Occupy organizers, joining up with the protest makes perfect sense.

“Many of Castlewood’s member-owners spent $25,000 for their memberships,” said Ann Worth, a longtime union member and participant in Occupy Oakland, in a press release. “They can justify spending that kind of money to play golf, but they still think it’s okay to squeeze more out of the people who work for them for $10 or $12 an hour. They expect workers to subsidize their expensive game by giving up affordable health care for their kids. It’s a perfect example of what’s been going wrong in this country: the rich are getting richer by denying everyone else their share in the American Dream.”

What’s wrong with the America’s Cup deal? A lot

Zelda Bronstein
-
21
What’s wrong with the America’s Cup deal? A lot

Let’s start out with a premise that even Larry Ellison’s minions have come to accept: The race is happening here. Too late now to move it to another city. Worst-case scenario, according to Stephen Barclay, the point person for the world’s sixth-richest man: “If we don’t meet those dates, the teams will be forced to relocate to other places around the bay.”

That’s right — the teams will relocate to other places around the bay. The host city will still, for all practical purposes, be San Francisco; the races will happen off SF’s waterfront (where the Coast Guard is willing to allow them and the conditions are right) and the rich tourists will stay here, not in Burlingame or Fremont.

If Ellison decides the city’s not giving him enough, he won’t put up $55 million to fix up some of the waterfront piers. The city may decide that a development deal of some sort with him makes economic sense. But it’s a real-estate deal at this point, not a deal for the race. At least, that’s what the Ellison team seems to be confirming.

And I fear that the real-estate deal that the Board of Supervisors Finance Committee sent forward yesterday, 2-1, is a bad deal for the city.

The terms are really complicated, and it makes my head hurt just trying to figure it all out — and still, the supes are expected to vote on the 120-plus-page document Feb. 28. Here’s what we do know, though:

The supervisors originally came to a deal with the America’s Cup Event Authority back in December. The concept was — and is — pretty straightforward, the same sort of deal the city has done (or, certainly, the Redevelopment Agency has done) many times in the past. In exchange for putting cash into renovating several piers, Ellison’s group would get long-term leases and development rights on the property. The idea: The city can’t afford to fix the piers. Ellison’s organization can. And once the property is renovated, the developer can make back that initial investment, and a profit, by building commercial space, condos and whatever else the Port decides to allow.

In a perfect world, San Francisco (and the state and the feds) would tax the hell out of people like Ellison, and there’d be public money to rebuild the waterfront as public open space, recreational facilities and the like. And wouldn’t that be utterly cool? Wouldn’t this city have the most awesome waterfront in the world?

But no: The only way the piers are going to anything but a place to park cars until they fall into the bay is if some private developer gets the rights to build something that I won’t like.

Supervisors Jane Kim and Mark Farrell, who don’t agree on a lot of things, both agreed with my basic analysis of the politics here: We shouldn’t let the excitement over the prospect of a boat race get in the way of analyzing this for what it is: A financing tool for the Port to get its infrastructure fixed up. Without a private investor, “they just don’t have the capacity to do that,” Kim told me.

So let’s just stipulate for a moment that this is the best, maybe the only way the city can restore the Port. Then it comes down to the real issue: Has the Mayor’s Office negotiated a good enough deal? Is San Francisco getting enough out of this? Or is everyone so hyper-buzzed about fancy carbon-fiber boats in the water (and I admit, they’re pretty cool) and free-spending tourists in the hotels and restaurants that we’re letting Mr. Ellison — who didn’t get so stinky rich by being a weak negotiator — walk away with most of the cookies?

Remember: Ellison’s not doing the city any favors. He’s only fixing up the piers that he will effectively own (as least for most of the rest of this century).

Back in December, the rough outlines looked like this: A corporation set up by Oracle, called the America’s Cup Event Authority, would put $55 million into repairing and renovating piers, then would get  66-year leases and development rights on piers 30-32, 26 and 28, as well as seawall lot 330, across the Embarcadero, which Ellison’s team wants to turn into more condos for rich people. If that’s not enough to pay for Ellison’s investment, Ellison’s heirs or successors get half the rent for the piers for another 15 years. That’s 81 years.

The original deal mandated that the city would collect a 1 percent fee on the re-sale of the new condos. It also had a requirement that Ellison share with the city any profits he made by flipping the long-term leases.

That’s a big deal, because almost nobody in the city actually holds onto development entitlements anymore. A developer wins the right to build an office building — and next week, he or she sells that right to somebody else. It’s almost certain that at some point, Ellison — whose sole goal here is going to be making a profit off city land — will decide that the best way to make money is to cash out. He’ll keep his 66-year leases for a few years, maybe lobby his way to approvals for office, condos, time-shares (gasp! yeah, they’ll do that if it’s legal) restaurants or whatever — then sell the remaining time on the leases, plus the development rights, to somebody else. And because he’s Larry Ellison, he’ll wind up making a nice tidy profit.

That used to be what happened with Port property (see: Pier 39) but lately, the Port’s gotten a bit wiser and has, in some cases, insisted that part of the profit from flipping a lease goes back to the city. In the original discussions, Ellison was going to have to pay the Port 15 percent of any net gains he made from the almost inevitable sale of the valuable leases.

But that’s gone now. After the board approved Newsom’s deal, the former mayor — who was always terrible at negotiation with the rich and powerful and always gave away the store — went back and monkeyed around with it. He and Sup. David Chiu insisted that the changes were just technical, not substantive enough to require a new board vote — but the current deal has no 15 percent cut for the Port, and the 1 percent levy on condo sales only applies after the second owner sells — which will be years down the road.

Then there’s the part where the city has to reimburse Ellison if the cost of renovating the piers exceeds what’s expected (oh, and we have to pay him 11 percent interest, which is about ten times what I get on my bank account; how about you?) There’s no cap on what the city might have to pay. And Ellison gets to develop a new marina.

And while Pier 29 is no longer a part of the deal, the city has to give Ellison $12 million — or rights to a pier to be named later. (Maybe Ellison figures that in a few years the people who opposed Pier 29 development will be out of office and he can convince the new mayor and supervisors to give Pier 29 back. It’s not legally excluded.)

Kim told me she’s going to insist that the final deal include a local-hire provision, which the rest of the board would be crazy not to support (and which Ellison, despite his company’s problems with local labor laws in the past, would be crazy not to accept).

But overall, Kim — who with Sup. Carmen Chu was part of the 2-1 majority sending the package to the full board — told me she thought the city got a good deal. “It took me a while,” she said. “But [Port Director] Monique Moyer convinced me that this was good for them.”

Sup. John Avalos, the dissenting vote on the Finance Committee, isn’t convinced. He’s got a long list of concerns, starting with the fact that he thinks the projected attendance and economic benefits are a bit delusional. “The figures seem farfetched,” he told me. “I’m seeing a lot of pumped up numbers. And those numbers drive whether this is a good deal for the city or not.”

He’d like to see the 1 percent rule apply to the second condo sale, not the third. He’d like to see the Port get 15 percent of the profits from any sale. And he’d like a cap on the reimbursements the city has to give to Ellison.

But here’s the problem: When the development agreement comes before the board, sitting as a Committee of the Whole Feb. 28, it will be hard to put any of that back in the agreement. This is a contract, and while the board can pass a resolution asking for more, in the end, it’s a matter of voting it up or down.

Vote yes and it’s done — more or less as is — although Kim says there will be another chance to make changes down the road, since the board and the Planning Commission will have to sign off on whatever type of development Ellison wants to do. The problem with that scenario? Ellison’s lawyers will wave this development agreement around like a Giants victory towel and proclaim that it binds the city and limits any ability to demand any more changes later. That’s how these people operate.)

Vote no and the ball goes back to Larry’s Court: His group can sit down with the Mayor’s Office and make some changes, or they can walk away (and build their boat sheds in …. where? Oakland? Foster City? Who’s got waterfront that can handle this?)

When the Finance Committee send the package to the full board, Avalos said, “we pretty much lost our ability to influence the agreement. Now we have to decide if we want to call [Ellison’s] bluff.”

PS: One of the lingering issues is whether the America’s Cup Organizing Committee can raise the $30 million-odd that is needed to make the numbers pencil out. If I were a rich person and Mark Buell, the ACOC point person, called me for money, here’s what I’d say:

How much is Larry Ellison contributing?

See, Ellison’s improvements on the waterfront aren’t charity. He’s looking to make a buck off everything he does. In past eras, the great robber baron capitalists would donate civic monuments — libraries and museums and stuff — and by any traditional standard of great wealth, Ellison ought to be writing a personal check for that $30 million. Or at least for some of it.

But so far, he hasn’t given a penny. The sixth richest man in the world isn’t actually donating anything to San Francisco. Yeah, he’s gracing us with his lordly presence, but cash? Nada.

Good luck with that one, Mark.

PPS: This whole concept that the city needs to fix the “crumbling” piers ought to be examined. First of all, nobody’s ever said that Pier 29 was in anything but fine shape. But beyond that, the Bay Conservation and Development Commission considers piers to be bay fill, and in the long term, wants San Francisco to get rid of some of them. “Maybe it’s a good thing if some of the piers fall into the bay,” former Sup. Aaron Peskin told me. “Then we’ll have more leeway with BCDC when we want to fix up some of the others.”

Research assistance by Royce Kurmelovs

Bounce to this: Rusty Lazer does Mardi Gras

Andrew Lam
-
1

Due to health problems, Big Freedia had to cancel her and Rusty Lazer’s Noise Pop gig at Public Works Sat/25. The event been transmutated into a big gay dance party with Double Duchess, DJ Bus Station John, and more. You should still read this interview, though.

With all its technicolor thrift flair, Mardi Gras costumes in state of midway-preparedness, and sleepy passels of breakfast-cooking houseguests, Jay Pennington’s New Orleans clapboard house is pretty hallucinatory on the Saturday afternoon of Carnaval weekend. Staring out the window waiting for the bounce DJ to call me up for our interview, I was to be excused for imagining that the shed in the side lot was producing actual chords while the New Orleans monsoon that raged outside hit it.

When I come across him in his bedroom, Pennington – who is also known as Rusty Lazer, and is the now-famous transgender NOLA bounce artist Big Freedia’s DJ and informal manager – is threading colored paper onto a string. He was going to be Hanuman the monkey god at the Mardi Gras parades on Sunday, his day off from work over Mardi Gras weekend. Around him, the city has ballooned with tourists and locals chucking beads at targets, high-stepping through brass numbers, eating frosted king cake, and peeing in inappropriate places.

I braved the rain that afternoon to talk about bounce music and Mardi Gras with Pennington, so it was kind of a surprise when our conversation swerved into the intricacies of 501(c)3 registration. It shouldn’t have been. He is a lot like New Orleans itself, a town that counts as a centuries-old melting pot, where the frat boys hang at the same bars as the career jazz musicians hang at the same bars as the pretty queer kids who sometimes party at dark gay leather bars (I was privy to this last comingling within six hours of landing in the Big Easy, at Daddy Aki’s Peacock party at the Phoenix Eagle Leather Bar where Pennington and his new managee Nicky Da B spun). [Correction: An earlier version of this article identified Peacock as Jay Pennington’s party. It is actually organized by Daddy Aki. Our bad.]

If you are a NOLA entertainer, Mardi Gras weekend counts among the most hectic of the year. Pennington had evenly informed me that my suggested meet-up time of noon was at least two hours too early considering the aftermath of the night shift on the decks he’d pulled before and that he would surely pull again that evening. But it’s two thirty now and for the moment, he’s able to focus on Hanuman, and attempt to tell me what’s so special about his city.

Hands-on Hanuman: Rusty Lazer in mid-Mardi Gras repose. Guardian photo by Caitlin Donohue

Though the DJ is playing less and less a role in Big Freedia’s career as she blows up and sells out shows around the country, Pennington continues to be a driving force in bounce’s dispersal outside NOLA. He signed his first official managerial contract with Nicky Da B, an adorable local whose track with Diplo hit Soundcloud last week. Bounce is indigenous to New Orleans — like Chicago’s juke and Detroit’s jit — a Caribbean-inflected dance music that is well known for the way its dancers pop their hips at machine gun rates.

Pennington is also is the co-founder along with Delaney Martin of New Orleans Air Lift, an international program he made to support local artists post-Katrina. This loosely-incorporated organization (it’s not 501(c)3 and relies instead on private donations, like the sales of the work of Swoon, one of the few females in the upper echelons of the street art world – her intricate, delicate wheatpastes blanket the fence next to Pennington’s house.) The Airlift Project has sponsored trips by New Orleanian artists to Berlin, even the import of Siberian breakdancer Ivan Stepanov to New Orleans.

This last story illustrates one of Pennington’s biggest turn-ons — fostering the artistic combustion that happens when a bunch of different energies get together. As illustration, he shows me a high fashion video shoot made by Lady Gaga’s stylist Nick Knight featuring the 19-year-old local bounce dancer Quack. 

After seeing a video of the improbably Barbie-bodied dancer, Knight contacted Pennington to ask if she’d care to do the same dance wearing Alexander McQueen for a fashion film series. Quack didn’t have a passport, but she went and got one with Pennington. The next day they went to London, found themselves “sitting in a room with nothing but Amazonian models.” Quack danced for eight hours to make the video, which turned out to be a testament to not just the extreme sexuality of bounce music, but also its athleticism, and emotional panacea. 

“This is the music that makes people forget that they’re hungry,” Pennington tells me, excitedly clicking through videos of schoolkids bouncing in rec centers, and endless YouTube clips of home bounce practice, done against a wall, ass to the camera. “It’s finally tuned to helping you forget your problems.” He wants to “take a New Orleans plane full of people all over the world,” to teach bounce to the masses. “In case anybody around here has forgotten how to have fun.”

The music lends itself to teaching — singers often give specific commands in songs, a popular request being for everbody to bend over and keep their ass popping. “Bounce is all instructions,” Pennington says.

The ability to move among social groups is one of the reasons why Pennington fell in love with New Orleans. 

“Here, you’re part of a community, not just part of a scene,” he reflects. “The difference is that the communities include all the people in your community. I don’t feel that in Portland or Austin.” He says the young arrivals in other artsy, liberal towns “hang out in mirrored social groups. I don’t know if that means anything, but it makes sense to me.” Pennington considers the neighborhood connections he’s made through participating in NOLA’s famous informal second line parades as, if not more, crucial than the ones he’s made with fellow travelers who have alit upon New Orleans as a haven for weirdos and music freaks. “New Orleans black community is nothing if not family-oriented,” he says.

Those mirrored social groups are a concept that should make sense to those beyond DJ Rusty Lazer. Part of what makes gentrification such a bummer is that when young bohos move into low-rent, family-oriented neighborhoods, they don’t form connections with the existing culture, imposing their own wacky adventures on top of the landscape as though they’re the first to really enjoy it. 

This missed connection leads newcomers away from frequenting established neighborhood businesses, and doesn’t provide for enough interconnectedness to get any kind of organizing come when rents start to rise and the condos come in. So good for New Orleans, and especially the rapidly changing Bywater neighborhood if they can avoid the typical storyline of minority community attracting broke artists attracting yuppies who can pay first, last, second, and third months’ rent in cash. 

Not the town doesn’t have other defense mechanisms. “The heat, the bugs, that lack of industry, the violence — that keeps it from growing out of control,” says Pennington. “It keeps the excessively ambitious away. When this place piles it on, it really piles it on. You can’t just casually live in New Orleans.” Wise words to the San Franciscan exodus that will surely come in the next months after tech boom 2.0. 

And for the record, I wasn’t hallucinating the house making music. The Ninth Ward’s musician mad scientist Quintron installed a rain organ into the Music Box, a small village of structures built in Pennington’s sideyard by 70 people to be played like a symphony, complete with Quintron playing conductor and a capacity crowd crammed into bleacher seating and crouching amid the structures themselves. At recent performances during last fall, 750 people showed up to watch the show. There was space for 250 in the sidelot. 

Buy local: yoga edition

-
1
Buy local: yoga edition

YOGA Walking into Bay Area yoga studios can sometimes feel like being subsumed into a cult of Lululemon, Yogitoes, and Gaiam. Yoga means big bucks these days, and most everyone seems to be sporting the same few brands while getting their warrior on. Yogic ideology espouses non-materialism and self-acceptance, yet it’s hard not want to fit in. Fortunately, there are lots of options that can get you out of big brand conformity and into stylie yoga gear that supports local vendors and designers. Follow these tips and in no time flat your yoga-related footprint won’t extend much farther than the four corners of your mat!

 

BLUE CANOE

Inspired by a homemade canoe that once sat on the shores of Humboldt County’s Benbow Lake, Blue Canoe’s name highlights its dedication to homegrown, yet stylish organic clothing. All its clothes are made in San Francisco and most use organic cotton in comfy blends. The company has been in business for more that 16 years and is known for its decidedly “un-granola” pieces that make as much sense in a yoga class as they do on Valencia Street.  

Hot item: boot cut pant

www.bluecanoe.com

 

LEOM DESIGNS

Born of designer Margaret Leom’s own need for good yoga and dance wear, Leom Designs has been operating out of Santa Cruz for six years. The clothes have a uniquely organic feel to them, taking inspiration from the environment and employing a deliberative creative process. Though initially Leom just made clothes for herself, she was always asked where she got her outfits. So she jumped at the chance to create designs in her vision and hasn’t looked back.  

Hot item: elfarrow men’s yoga top

www.leomdesigns.com

 

SWIRL SPACE

Since 2000 Swirl Space has been producing movement friendly, hemp-based clothes in San Francisco. As a business that’s committed to fair local labor, sustainable business practices, and educating the public about the benefits of Hemp, Swirl Space’s lofty ideals are an integral part of its goods.

Hot item: hemp hottie short

www.swirlspace.com

 

ZOBHA

Headquartered in Mill Valley, Zobha produces dreamy, high-end yoga wear that rivals Lululemon in fit and durability — yet the two companies’ trajectories couldn’t be more different. While Vancouver-based Lululemon seems to court controversy at every turn, Zobha directly supports Bay Area community initiatives like Headstand, which teaches yoga to at-risk youth. Bottom line, Zobha makes your butt look good while hitting the sweet spot between transcendent and trendy.

Hot item: Paige tank

www.zobha.com

 

KLEAN KANTEEN

Hydration is key while practicing yoga, but not every water bottle is created equal. It goes without saying that conscious yogis should eschew disposable plastic bottles in favor of refillables, and since 2004 Chico-based Klean Kanteen has been preaching the benefits of BPA-free, stainless steel bottles.  

Hot item: Klean Kanteen Reflect

www.kleankanteen.com

 

YOGA PROPS

Operating out of a warehouse in the Mission District, Yoga Props has been in business for 32 years. It sells a very wide range of items including blocks fashioned in the Props woodshop and locally made bolsters. In addition to online orders, Yoga Props welcomes walk-in customers who call ahead to its Mission HQ.  

Hot item: cylindrical bolster

www.yogaprops.net

 

YOGA MATS

Yoga Mats is another SF-based prop purveyor that’s been in town for decades, nearly three to be exact. While it participates in occasional Dogpatch neighborhood trunk sales, the bulk of Yoga Mats’ business is done online.

Hot item: kapok-filled zafu crescent

www.yogamats.com

 

TADASANA FESTIVAL

No need to fly to remote spots like Tulum or Bali to get your OM on en masse. Taking place on the beach in Santa Monica, the Tadasana Festival will pair classes by master teachers like Seane Corne and Elena Brower with performances by global music luminaries like Karsh Kale, Cheb i Sabbah, and Vieux Farka Touré. No passport necessary, just gather your yogi posse and carpool to LaLa Land come late-April.  

Can’t miss: Mandala vinyasa with Shiva Rea and the Touré-Raichel Collective

www.tadasanafestival.com 

 

Die Antwoord’s athletic use of the F-word

Andrew Lam
-
4

When South African hip-hop duo Die Antwoord played “Fok Juule Naaiers,” the first single off latest album Ten$ion — the track that opened the group’s Noise Pop gig last night at the Regency Ballroom — for its LA manager, they were told it had some problems. The problem’s name was homophobia, their manager ventured. US audiences, he said, don’t take kindly to the F-word (I wish that were consistently true).

In response, Die Antwoord released this video. It is entitled “F-word,” the version of that term that lacks my lavish commitment to political correctness

Ninja, a.k.a. Watkin Tudor Jones, says the usage is all good because he has good homo friends, and that one of them is Hi-Tek, the group’s DJ, who opened up last night’s show with his charming “Fok Juule Naaiers” verse. Assorted lyrics below:

DJ Hi-Tek will fuck you in the ass, punk ass white boy

Look at you scared/Scared of a real man

Fuck it ’til you love me, [F-word]

So, was this song Hi-Tek’s coming out party? What a bummer party.

Of course, the crowd (sold out to the gills — I had press credentials and still had to beg, borrow, and perform mild thievery to get in) ate it all up. Die Antwood’s stage show is less weird than its videos, because matching them would entail wearing coats made of live rats, which would be hard to get through customs.

Emcee Yolandi Vi$$er without her album cover blood-soaked visage is massively sexy on stage (the whole group looks like they hit the gym hard together). By the end of the show, she had stripped down to running shoes, spandex shorts, and a midriff-bearing pink tee with “zef” printed inside a heart. She always looks like her clothes are about to fall off. Next to Ninja in his orange running shoes and signature Dark Side of the Moon underwear (infamous jiggling penis beneath), they looked like they were hosting a really agressive workout video. Ninja crowdsurfed, constantly. Let no one say that Die Antwoord doesn’t work it out on stage.

Yolandi Vi$$er at the Regency last night.

And, Ninja. Guardian photos by Caitlin Donohue

And it is a good show. Yolandi hype-chirps after Ninja’s every line. She spins around five times and picks up her verse right on cue, and the two reverse roles with Ninja cooing after her lines end. New single “I Think You’re Freaky” was a huge hit, particularly, one imagines, with the guy in a rubber pig mask sweating balls in the front row, a couple in the middle of the crowd wearing the hooded plushie onesies that Die Antwoord rocked — weirdly, always weirdly — in its “Umshini Wam” video. The front lighting blacks out after songs, silhouetting Ninja and Yolandi’s distinctive haircuts. They are unapologetic in their stage presence, crowd love.

Earlier that day, afraid of not getting on the list for the show, I lurked outside Upper Playground’s Fifty24SF gallery, where Ninja had spent the day painting the walls with the black chicken scratches and Evil Boy engorged penis characters that now adorn Die Antwoord merch, stage sets, and his own body. At 4 p.m., there was a line of Die Antwoord fans lined up to greet Yolandi and Ninja. You could cut the line if you bought a $200 Evil Boy latex toy.

Few people did. First-in-liner Stephanie Farrell, who came straight from school for the signing didn’t. But she got what she wanted out of her wait: a really awkward experience with her idols. 

“What was your interaction with them like?” I asked her while looking at the Die Antwoord’s signatures, written in her wire-bound, lined notebook. 

“They didn’t say anything, it was really awkward. I was like ‘hey,’ and they were like ‘hey.'”

“But are you still a fan?”

“Absolutely. I didn’t expect it to be a normal experience whatsoever.”

In the “[F-word]” video, Ninja says that people from the United States who are upset by the way they use that and other (N-word) offensive bullshit should quit being a little less PC and learn from “your brothers and sisters here in the dark depths of Africa,” where a local saying is translated into “we are one.” He then grabs his Evil Boy dolls, a black one and a white one, and knocks their monster toy dicks together while repeating the “we are one” phrase in a high-pitched voice. “That’s why they say South Africa is a rainbow nation.”

Weird. 

Photos of Die Antwoord’s Ninja painting the inside of the Fifty24SF gallery are by John Orvis

Whither indie?

-
4
Whither indie?

MUSIC How does one trace the warp and woof of Bay Area indie rock’s silky, sick, multihued tapestry — with ticket stubs to long-ago shows, holey concert T’s, or grainy snapshots of sweat-swathed guitar players, red eyes gleaming in a haze of smoke machine emissions? Perhaps one way is to chart SF indie’s course from the first Noise Pop to the latest 20th anniversary edition, teasing out the tenuous connections between the first fest’s headliner Overwhelming Colorfast, reunited this year, and newish local poobah Young Prisms.

The pinging, ringing unifier might be found in the cascades of distortion, the buzzsaw guitars, used to drastically different ends. Fighting it out, too, beneath Overwhelming Colorfast’s fleet-footed crunch and Young Prisms’ smoggy overhang of echo-chamber shoegaze are clearly discernible, sensitive hearts, pulsing through the dulcet vocal lines and delivered with perfectly imperfect, threadbare falsettos. You can hear the ties that bind the two bands in the tide of romanticism and even sentimentality running under OC’s onslaught, YP’s haze.

Back in their 1991 to ’96 day, I confess I lost track of Overwhelming Colorfast: I don’t think I even saw them during their brief lifetime, although the music-snob friends respectfully granted that OC were kind of OK. So it feels thoroughly weird to play catch up with the most praised recording, Moonlight and Castanets (Headhunter/Cargo, 1996), by Antioch’s finest. Just as Overwhelming Colorfast was breaking up (only to reassemble, in time, as Oranger), Moonlight came along. Sprawling and ambitious with a bit of everything, it evokes the exploding mind of a particularly imaginative punk/rock fan, stuck in the suburbs and succored on chicken-fried ’70s and ’80s FM rock and moshpit-ready Amerindie hardcore bands that could be your life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7xH5axRHM4

Of course, much like Young Prisms, accusations of derivativeness dogged Overwhelming Colorfast, whose inspiration and albatross was Hüsker Dü. Founding vocalist-guitarist Bob Reed couldn’t help it — he had clearly ingested far too much SST, with a very special emphasis on 1984’s Zen Arcade and Double Nickels on a Dime and 1985’s I Don’t Want to Grow Up. But listening to Moonlight now —particularly its forward-thrust first side — those snap dismissals and facile comparisons seem unfair.

The side starts “Starcrunch” with its heavy-outta-the-gate guitars that match Bob Mould and J. Mascis lick for lick, moves through “Mickey’s Lament,” which goes Weezer one better with its smart-kid, enjambed vocal delivery, rhythm guitar chug, and Stooges-y impaired piano drone, and closes the tender, breathy “Last Song” with a back-and-forth guitar line that captures the indecision as Reed sings, “Got a stupid note here / It’s from me to you. It’s all I could do / Thought I might just toss it / But it took so long. Tell me if it’s wrong.” Eventually a way-too-exuberant fusillade of guitars busts in, attempting to obliterate uncertainty: it’s as if Reed peered into the overwhelming darkness— wondering whether he should hold this awkward note and whether Colorfast could last—then decided, “Fuck it.”

The precarious, ground-shifting nature of SF indie — so often fielding copy-cat accusations, so far from the so-called music industry centers — also touches Young Prisms, also reared in SF’s bedroom communities yet looking to influences further afield, across the Atlantic, in the form of My Bloody Valentine and the Jesus and Mary Chain. Like Colorfast, the outfit has also coped with its share of membership switcheroos: the title of debut Friends For Now might have foretold the departure of guitarist Jason Hendardy and the arrival of vocalist-guitarist Ashley Thomas, whose vocals along with vocalist-keyboardist Stephanie Hodapp’s, pushes Prisms further toward the vaguely feminized, sonically diffuse space of the Cocteau Twins.

Songs like “Gone,” off YP’s upcoming second LP, In Between (Kanine), hinge on nursery rhyme-like vocal lines and a fluid wall of rhythm guitars against which a singular New Order-like guitar line dances. Guitars are used as pretty, pointillistic devices, seamlessly incorporated with washes of synth. People come and go, but here, sonic elements coexist in a more generalized, less personalized harmony, where lyrics are obscured and vocals are used as effects, rejecting the jolts — and listen-to-me force — of Reed’s more intimate, ungainly urgency. Do the Prisms reflect a kind of indie progressiveness — an evolution from the punky and individualistic to the ambient and collective? For answers, revisit In Between in 15 years.

 

YOUNG PRISMS

With Melted Toys, Tambo Rays, Preteen

Weds/22, 7 p.m., $14

Cafe Du Nord

2170 Market, SF

(415) 861-5016

2012.noisepop.com

OVERWHELMING COLORFAST

With Oranger, Slouching Stars, Peppercorn

Sat/25, 8 p.m., $12

Bottom of the Hill

1233 17th St., SF

(415) 621-4455

2012.noisepop.com

Krushin’ on

-
0
Krushin’ on

SUPER EGO I’ve only a wee bit of space this week before I rush off back into the Mardi Gras of my mind, but I’ve got to three times diagonal-snap for local fashion designer Jeanette Au (jeanetteau.carbonmade.com) who tore it up for SF on the NY Fashion Week runways last week with her debut collection of 3-D knit fantasias. Ruling!

 

RED BARAAT

The Non Stop Bhangra (www.nonstopbhangra.com) monthly party’s return two weeks ago was beautiful-insane — if you missed it, or must fulfill your yearning for incredible Indian-inspired dance music sounds before the next installment, check out this live act featuring irrepressible bandleader Sunny Jain on the dhol drum, backed by a high-stepping nine-piece brass band. Bollywood meets Mardi Gras is the shorthand, but the ringing grooves transcend categorization.

Thu/23, 7:30 p.m., $12–$15, all ages. Slim’s, 333 11th St., www.slimspresents.com

 

ROLLER DISCO

Oh man, David Miles Jr., our patron saint of skate — “The Godfather of Skate,” actually, who founded the essential Black Rock Roller Disco and keeps peeps rollin’ from the Embarcadero to Golden Gate Park — lost everything in a tragic fire. He and his family are OK, but here’s a great event to help get them back on their (wheeled) feet. Skate rental available: Lots of good DJs.

Thu/23, 9 p.m., donations at the door. Mighty, 119 Utah, SF. www.mighty119.com

 

CUTE FANGS 4EVER!

It’s no secret that hyper-productive tech-breaks player and Cute Fang label owner Forest Green is one of my favorite people. It’s hard not to leave her parties with a smile plastered on your face — partly from the room-wobbling beats, partly from her pure positivity transmission. This is her two-room blowout birthday party, with a slew of bonkers local guests like DJ Denise, Dragn’fly, Raydeus, Tek 9, and Base Hed. And it will be cute!

Fri/24, 9 p.m.-4 a.m., $5 before 10 p.m., $10 after. Icon, 1192 Folsom, SF. www.forestgreen.org

 

SITUATION

Part of the reason door fees have risen so much in San Francisco is our insistence on relying on foreign or guest DJs to bring something interesting to the table. Flights are expensive, cover rises. Well here comes Situation, a free party deliberately designed to showcase local talent and some snappy grooves: “the new disco sound of New York, bangin’ house joints, 12-inch dance versions, and more than a few non-sequitors to keep things interesting,” quoth host DJ (along with Eug and Ash Williams) Derek Opperman, my nightlife critic counterpart at the Weekly, who’s basically an adorable human Shazam. Move out, yazoo.

Fri/24, 10 p.m., free. 222 Hyde, SF. www.222hyde.com

 

DJ KRUSH

Let’s just admit that future bass was the trip-hop revival, OK? And while Flying Lotus et al. took the sound to unfathomable new highs/lows (and old hands like Amon Tobin sizzled retinae with his ISAM stage-show comeback), there’s sometimes no beating the originals. After 20 years, Tokyoite chill-wizard DJ Krush can still gently ride those intelli-stoned waves into the stratosphere: a three-hour set should do you quite solid.

Sat/25, 9 p.m., $17.50 advance. Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. www.blasthaus.com

Campaign cash roundup and questions about our sleeping watchdog

Sasha Cuttler
-
3
Campaign cash roundup and questions about our sleeping watchdog

Oliver Luby – the last true public-spirited employee at the Ethics Commission (a campaign lapdog when it should be a watchdog) before being forced out in 2010 – has written an insightful and comprehensive analysis of spending by candidates and outside groups during last year’s election. It’s published by CitiReport.

Among his findings are that the largely unregulated spending by supposedly independent third-party groups totaled $3.6 million, with $1.4 million of that going to support Mayor Ed Lee, and much of it coming so late in the race that voters weren’t able to factor its sources into their decisions.

Those outside groups spent almost as much to elect Lee as the campaign itself raised, which was almost $1.6 million. When those two figures are combined, and one subtracts the $419,891 in independent expenditure (IE) spending in opposition to Lee, the appointed mayor and his supporters spent $33.87 for each first place vote he received, or about 2.5-times that of second-place finisher John Avalos, whose $757,327 in “supportive financing” works out to $13.25 per vote.

Luby has long called for Ethics to get tougher on violators of campaign finance law, playing whistleblower at several key points in his career, starting in 2004 when he and then-staffer Kevin DeLiban exposed notorious campaign attorney Jim Sutton’s alleged scheme to illegally launder unregulated funds being collected for then-Mayor Gavin Newsom’s inauguration into paying off some of his $550,000 campaign debt.

In his latest piece, Luby again calls out his old bosses at Ethics for ignoring local laws against maxing out donations to many candidates in order to buy influence at City Hall. Donors are limited to an “overall contribution limit” that equals the maximum individual donation of $500 times the number of offices open, which was three in this election. It allows the city recoup from the campaigns money collected in excess of that, which Luby said totals $29,111 in this election.

“The SF Ethics Commission does not enforce this law. Supervisor Scott Wiener wants to help them get rid of it,” Luby wrote. Ethics Commission Executive Director John St. Croix was out of the office and hasn’t returned a Guardian call for comment.

Among those whose excessive contributions would be diverted to city coffers are Planning Commissioner Michael Antonini (perhaps the city’s most powerful Republican), PR powerhouse Sam Singer, medical marijuana activist Kevin Reed, political fundraiser Wade Randlett, city staffer-turned-developer Michael Cohen, moderate Democrat Mary Jung, and Coalition for Responsible Growth (a pro-development group) President Rodrigo Santo. Not surprisingly, they all contributed to Lee, whose campaign would be on the hook for the most in givebacks, $7,725, followed by David Chiu’s mayoral campaign at $4,700.

Finally, for all their talk about fiscal responsibility, Lee and his supporters couldn’t seem to live within their means in this election. Lee’s campaign finished about $275,000 in debt, while two of the pro-Lee IEs also finished in the red: SF Neighbor Alliance ($11,338) and Progress for All ($35,890), the ethically challenged creators of the “Run Ed Run” campaign that purported to talk Lee out of his pledge not to run for a full term in the office he’d been appointed to.

These are just some of the findings in Luby’s voluminous reporting, so check it.

Compressing the press

-
6
Compressing the press

Journalism in the Bay Area has been in decline for many years, with corporate consolidations, shrinking newsrooms, declining print readership, and struggles with how to pay full-time reporters when content is offered free-of-charge on the Internet. And with its waning institutional strength, the Fourth Estate has lost some of its ability to watchdog the powerful, creating a dangerous situation in a country founded on the belief that a free press is an essential safeguard of liberty and fairness.

One countervailing trend during this time was the creation of robust nonprofit newsrooms, with the two largest ones in the Bay Area being the Berkeley-based Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR) and the Bay Citizen in San Francisco. But now those two entities have announced that they’re in merger talks — and that the combined newsrooms would be led by Phil Bronstein, who presided over the decline of San Francisco’s two major daily newspapers.

Whether this merger bodes well or ill for a journalistic resurgence remains unclear. Both entities have their strengths and flaws, and both of their boards are in the middle of a 30-day review period to determine whether the merger makes sense and what the combined operations would look like.

As the exclusive Bay Area content provider for The New York Times, Bay Citizen made a big splash when it was launched with $5 million in seed money from billionaire financier Warren Hellman in late 2009. As Hellman (who died in December) told me at the time, he was seeking to create an independent, local, public interest alternative to the San Francisco Chronicle, which was being gutted by its New York-based owners, Hearst Corp., and even threatened with closure if its unions hindered the downsizing.

Many were skeptical that a newsroom funded and overseen by Hellman and other uber-wealthy San Franciscans would deliver the kind of public interest journalism that the city needed, but under the leadership of veteran Editor Jonathan Weber, it produced many strong stories, starting on launch day with an investigation of how the richest home owners in the city avoid paying property taxes the city once relied on. And last year, Bay Citizen broke some important stories and created valuable databases on campaign contributions and danger spots for bicyclists, for which it recently won a Society of Professional Journalists award for computer-assisted reporting.

Acting CEO Brian Kelley told us the Bay Citizen has succeeded in creating a strong “three-legged stool” balancing solid journalism, a sustainable business model, and technological innovation. After raising about $17 million in three years, ranging from small donations to the $6 million Hellman contributed, “we’re in a very healthy state from a financial standpoint.”

But sources say the operation has had some tough internal divisions, some of it propagated by an out-of-touch board and an overpaid CEO, Lisa Frazier, who took a reported $457,000 salary to run an operation that she had served as Hellman’s consultant in launching. They say Frazier clashed with Weber and the reporting staff, particularly after it voted to unionize last year, and then with Weber’s successor, Steve Fainaru. Both Weber and Fainaru resigned in the last month, creating a leadership vacuum that was one of the factors that triggered the merger talks.

Meanwhile, CIR has experienced the most dynamic growth period in its 30-year history since 2008, when veteran editor Robert Rosenthal took over as executive director after leaving the Chronicle, where he served directly under Bronstein, who also later left the Chronicle and now serves as president of CIR’s board.

CIR has traditionally had a small staff working on a shoestring budget to produce a handful of big investigative journalism projects per year, including award-winning broadcast segments for “Frontline” and “60 Minutes.” But Rosenthal focused on securing millions of dollars in foundation funding and creating collaborations with media outlets around the state (such as KQED), launching California Watch to beef up coverage of statewide issues, as he describes in his 24-page essay “Reinventing Journalism: An unexpected journey from journalist to publisher” (www.californiawatch.org/project/reinventing-journalism).

“I was deeply frustrated by a lack of vision, ambition, and passion on the business side that was throttling creativity and undermining the crucial role that journalism, and especially investigative reporting, play in our democracy,” Rosenthal wrote in the report that was requested by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, one of three foundations that provided more than $1.2 million each to launch California Watch (the others are Irvine and Hewlett foundations).

The Guardian has long raised questions about the trend of foundations increasingly stepping in to fill journalism’s funding voids, arguing that it can compromise journalistic independence and allow wealthy interests to determine what issues get investigative scrutiny (see “Buying the news: How private foundations are quietly underwriting — and shaping — local news coverage of major issues,” 10/8/97).

But in an era when most California newspapers are clinging to life, Rosenthal had used the funding to augment CIR’s investigative reporting staff and get impactful, award-winning stories to run simultaneously in outlets around the state, challenging old journalistic norms about competition and exclusivity.

Rosenthal admits the model has its shortcomings, including the unreliability and often-narrow focus of foundation funding and how CIR’s successes have done little to backfill the loss of local beat reporting (such as covering City Hall or keeping the cops and local power brokers in check), but he thinks the merger might help in those areas.

“It’s exciting for us to be able to address what has been a vacuum in San Francisco for a long time,” Rosenthal told us about reviving local coverage. And on the funding model, he said, “If we can do this right, it’s about creating a local base of people who believe in accountability journalism to give small donations.”

Bronstein told us that many of the shortcomings at his old newspapers were the result of business decisions Hearst made and general trends in the industry. But he acknowledged people’s concerns about whether someone with such a long local history is the best person to turn things around: “I don’t know that I’m the best person to take it over. That’s something other people should determine, not me.”

Both admit that the Chronicle under their tenure could have better covered the consolidation of wealth and power and other economic justice issues, long a Guardian focus and one that the Occupy movement helped highlight. “The Bay Area media could have been a lot more effective on those issues,” Rosenthal said.

But Bronstein said he’s committed to supporting more accountability journalism in the Bay Area, supporting the work of the Bay Citizen, and supplementing work done at papers like the Guardian: “The weeklies do a fine job of writing some in-depth stories and we need more of that, providing context.”

Both said that even if the merger takes place, Bay Citizen would continue to provide local coverage under the brand and model it’s developed, although the New York Times has not yet determined whether it would continue to run its content if it’s not exclusive. The two newsrooms wouldn’t initially be merged, although Bronstein has said that achieving savings of up to $1.9 million is one of his goals, something he’d try to accomplish without reducing journalistic content or quality.

The two entities have slightly different cultures and areas of focus, so the question now is whether they’re compatible. Bay Citizen’s Kelley said he thinks they are: “I personally feel they are very complimentary.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Guardian editorial: The DA and mayoral corruption

-
8

EDITORIAL The indictments of two executives of an airport shuttle company on charges of laundering campaign money are, in themselves, a rarity and something to celebrate: the district attorney of San Francisco is actually attempting to enforce the laws against political corruption. That’s unusual in this city, and worthy of note.

But at this point, the entire sum total of prosecutions involving the scandal-ridden campaign of Mayor Ed Lee amounts to a pair of cases against people who made what appear to be illegal contributions. As of today, the message that’s being sent is that nobody in the Lee campaign did anything wrong. And that seems a little bit curious.

Lee’s late entry into the race — after he’d promised for months not to run — and his refusal to abide by the rules of public financing forced his supporters to raise a large amount of money very quickly. There were so-called independent expenditure committees collecting donations and running parallel campaigns that, by law, should have been entirely distinct from Lee and his official effort. We’ve always been dubious about the supposed lack of coordination.

Then there were the well-documented instances of irregularities serious enough that every other candidate in the race asked for state and federal monitors to watch the election. Several eyewitnesses told local reporters that they saw volunteers for one of the supposedly independent groups filling out absentee ballots for voters, using a special template that ensured the votes would go for Lee. Some said they saw ballots being collected at a makeshift voting booth. In a video provided by the campaign of State Sen. Leland Yee, it appears that volunteers were both filling out ballots and placing them in bags — both clear violations of law.

Gascon’s announced investigations of all the allegations — but more than three months later, nothing has come of it. His office won’t confirm or deny whether investigations are ongoing or whether any further indictments may be forthcoming. But at the Chinese New Year Parade, Chinatown powerbroker and Lee ally Rose Pak announced that she had heard Gascon was investigating her.

There’s been plenty of time to collect evidence, and Gascon has a responsibility to let the public know, as quickly as possible, what’s happened to the rest of the allegations. If everyone in the Lee campaign is really innocent, and none of the independent groups supporting the mayor did anything wrong, he should say that, and present the evidence.

It doesn’t help Lee, the city, or the integrity of the voting process to have these cases drag out. Gascon needs to conclude them, expeditiously.

—

Our Weekly Picks: February 22-27

-
0

WEDNESDAY 22

Way Behind the Music

Famous rockers may have a way with riffs, but their grammar and syntax can often prove cringe-worthy. And yet, their inflated egos and turmoil-filled musings within literary efforts provide insight into worlds otherwise unknown. This, my friends, is the perfect set-up for an evening of music obsessed over-sharing. At the return of Litquake and Noise Pop’s collaborative event, Way Behind the Music, a collection of esteemed local musicians and writers will read from the autobiographies of Ozzy Osbourne, Sammy Hagar, Jewel, Slash, Ted Nugent, Marianne Faithfull, Angela Bowie, Jim Hutton (boyfriend of Freddie Mercury), and Christopher Ciccone (brother of Madonna). The group on stage — which includes Penelope Houston, Carletta Sue Kay, Jennifer Maerz, and more — will extract tales of Olympic-level drug use, epic bands fights, and rock star trials and tribulations, giving the audience just a taste of that wild ride to infamy. (Emily Savage)

7 p.m., $15

Make-Out Room

3225 22nd St., SF

(415) 647-2888

www.makeoutroom.com

 

THURSDAY 23

Big Black Delta

Big Black Delta is the solo project of Los Angeles maestro Jonathan Bates, lead singer of lo-fi rock band Mellowdrone. Legend has it Bates launched BBD after buying a used laptop off frequent Nine Inch Nails collaborator Alessandro Cortini and using it to create electronic soundscapes. Good thing too, because BBDLP1 is a crafty compilation made up of equal parts power and panache. “Huggin & Kissin” sounds so aggressive, it’s as if Depeche Mode’s synths decided to take steroids and beat up little kids. On the flip side, “Dreary Moon” with Morgan Kibby (the Romanovs, M83) has all the ethereal, vocal playfulness of an Air track. Bates brings in dueling drummers Mahsa Zargaran and Amy Wood for the live show. (Kevin Lee)

With New Diplomat, Aaron Axelsen & Nako 9 p.m., $10–<\d>$12 Rickshaw Stop 155 Fell, SF (415) 861-2011 www.rickshawstop.com

 

FRIDAY 24

“More Light”

If you’re up for a dose of reifying pessimism, check out “More Light” —a joint exhibition featuring new works by Francesco Deiana and Lafe Harley Eaves. In an effort to explore how society diverts humans from primordial joys, Deiana creates ballpoint pen drawings and images on photographic paper that juxtapose society’s adulterating tendencies with natural beauty (e.g. a drawing of an impenetrable brick wall flushed with a photograph of the ocean). Eaves, who’s said he views the world as “one dark joke after another,” makes line and pattern narratives that delve into the occult, religion, and the psychedelic. He also focuses on illustrating human duality and the uncertainty of relationships. (Mia Sullivan)

7 p.m. opening reception, free

Park Life

220 Clement, SF

(415) 386-7275

www.parklifestore.com

 

Image Comic Expo

With San Francisco’s WonderCon moving to Anaheim while Moscone Center South undergoes renovation, Image Comic Expo in Oakland is the primary destination for Bay Area comic book nerdery this season. Instead of focusing on Marvel and DC — the comics industry’s “Big Two” — the Expo bills itself as a “celebration of creator-owned comics.” Exhibitors include a number of independent publishers besides Berkeley-based Image Comics. Guests include Image luminaries Rob Liefeld, Todd McFarlane, and Robert Kirkman (The Walking Dead), plus fan favorites Jonathan Hickman (FF, Pax Romana), Joe Casey (Gødland), Brian K. Vaughan (Y: The Last Man, ABC’s Lost) and Blair Butler. (Sam Stander)

Fri/24, 3-8 p.m.; Sat/25, 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; Sun/26, 10 a.m.-5 p.m., $20–$150

Oakland Convention Center 550 10th St., Oakl.

www.imagecomicexpo.com

 

Dave Holland Overtone Quartet

English bassist Dave Holland came to the United States at the request of the legendary Miles Davis and became part of music lore as part of the quartet that birthed jazz fusion and its opus, Bitches Brew (Columbia). Holland has since worked with a number of jazz masters including Herbie Hancock, Stan Getz, Thelonious Monk and Chick Corea. When Holland was coming into his own as a musician in the 1970s, the rest of the Overtone Quartet were just entering into the world. But saxophonist Chris Potter (a frequent Holland collaborator), drummer Eric Harland (a SFJazz Collective performer) and pianist Jason Moran (a MacArthur Fellowship “Genius”) have established themselves as potent forces in their own right. (Lee)

8 p.m., $25–$65

Palace of Fine Arts

3301 Lyon, SF

(415) 567-6642

www.sfjazz.org

 

“Oracle and Enigma”

For a while, thanks to a series of festivals organized by producer Brechin Flournoy, San Francisco was the place in the country to see Butoh. The excitement and puzzlement surrounding the art has died down as it has simply become another form of international dance. So it should be good to again see one of its original practitioners, the Kyoto-born Katsura Kan who in 1997 moved to Thailand and has since become one of those peripatetic choreographer-dancers who takes inspiration from wherever he alights. As part of his winter residency at CounterPULSE, Kan and Shoshana Green will present “Oracle and Enigma” which they describe as “a journey towards the celestial horizon”. Sounds like Butoh . (Rita Felciano)

Fri/24-Sat/25, 8 p.m., $18–<\d>$20

CounterPULSE

1310 Mission, SF

(800) 350-8850

www.counterpulse.org

 

SATURDAY 25

Monster Jam

A stampede of horsepower comes thundering into the Bay Area today with the Monster Jam series of monster truck races and events, featuring 16 ground-shaking custom creations such as the long-running fan favorite “Grave Digger,” which is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. Fans can get up close and personal with the burly behemoths during the afternoon “Party In The Pits” before the night’s main events, where the 10,000 pound muscle machines will fly through the air at distances up to 130 feet, reach heights up to 35 feet in the air, and of course, gloriously smash a series a puny regular cars. (Sean McCourt)

3-6 p.m. pit party, 7 p.m. main event; $12.50–<\d>$32, $125 for total access pass

O.co Coliseum

7000 Coliseum Way, Oakl.

(800) 745-3000

www.monsterjam.com

 

“Cum and Glitter: A Live Sex Show”

Perhaps you’re one of those people — that yes, do exist — left nonplussed by your standard strip club experience. Let’s face it, fried chicken buffets and atrocious choreography amplified by glitter platform heels don’t do it for us all. For you, then, queer pornographer Maxine Holloway’s new monthly sex show. Holloway, a vintage-loving local coquette, has bolstered her sex industry chops heading Madison Young’s women’s only POV website and used her connections to line up a crack cast for Cum and Glitter’s opening night: Kitty Stryker, Courtney Trouble, and Annika Amour among other superlative sex workers. Live cello music. Specialty cocktails named after the performers. Class. (Caitlin Donohue)

9 p.m., $30–$55 individuals, $50 couples

RSVP for location

www.cumandglitter.com

 

SUNDAY 26

“Up the Oscars!”

For a particular breed of movie fiend, the Academy Awards are more like a sporting event than a glamorous celebration of Hollywood. You know the type: catcalling the screen like they’re giving a blind ref the business (2006 flashback: “Crash? Are you fucking kidding me? Brokeback Mountain forever!”) This year’s ceremony will no doubt evoke its own array of passionate responses to awkward presenters and awkward gowns, omissions from the Tribute to the Dead, faux-surprised winners who unfurl pre-scripted lists of people to thank (“My agent! My masseuse!”), etc. The Roxie’s annual “Up the Oscars!” bash is aimed squarely at those who enjoy cheering and jeering the gold man in equal measure. D.I.Y. drinking games optional. (Cheryl Eddy)

3:45 p.m., $15

Roxie Theater

3117 16th St., SF

www.roxie.com

 

Stardust Sunday

Cover band? Try cover cult. The First Church of the Sacred Silversexual takes all the Christ allusions David Bowie made with The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars and The Man Who Fell to Earth, exorcising one little bit — Jesus. The resulting mass is a blasphemous celebration of the 65-year-young rock God’s music. With as many members as Bowie has personas, all fully embracing their deity’s love of costume, the Church’s service has the campy theatricality of The Rocky Horror Picture Show and all the sparkle of a Ken Russell movie. (Ryan Prendiville)

With Space Cowboys DJs Mancub and 8Ball

8 p.m., $5

Public Works

161 Erie, SF

(415) 932-0955

www.publicsf.com

 

The Dodos

Listening to the Dodos kind of makes you feel like you’re part of a drum march that’s heading down a sunny country road via Brooklyn. Logan Kroeber, who’s been known to play a drum kit sans bass and to tape a tambourine to his foot, creates catchy rhythms that compel you to dance frenetically (really, it’s unavoidable), while lead vocalist Meric Long finger-picks an acoustic guitar and traverses the octaves with deep, introspective lyrics you can’t help Googling. This San Francisco-based indie folk duo most recently released fourth album, No Color (Frenchkiss) last year, and is closing out Noise Pop this year with what will likely be a memorable performance. (Sullivan)

With Au, Cannons and Clouds, Here Here

7 p.m., $20

Great American Music Hall

859 O’Farrell, SF

(415) 885-0750

www.gamh.com

 

MONDAY 27

Leslie and the LY’s

Long known for her 1980s-esque minimal dance-pop numbers encased in stretchy gold lame (referred to in “Gold Pants”), and even longer for her extensive bejeweled sweater collection (ahem, “Gem Sweater”), Leslie of Leslie and the LY’s boasts a newish additional talent to add to the mix: wedding officiant. The Ames, IA-based confetti-puke performance artist began officiating weddings when Iowa voted yes on gay marriage in 2009. The weddings she oversees are said to twinkle with her typical megawatt star quality — there’s even a documentary about one affair called Married in Spandex — and Mother Gem performs a personalized dance number for each lucky couple. While she may not be hosting any impromptu weddings during her appearance at Rickshaw this week, the world just feels more glamorous knowing that she could (for this, we listen to “Power Cuddle”). (Savage)

With Pennyhawk, Ramona & the Swimsuits

8 p.m., $13

Rickshaw Stop

(415) 861-2011

155 Fell, SF

www.rickshawstop.com

 

TUESDAY 28

Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks

Following 2010’s high profile Pavement reunion tour — which gave fans of the ’90s alternative rockers a chance to see the group live for the first or last time (as well as reportedly giving some of the members funds to pay off some financial debts) — leader Stephen Malkmus returned to the studio with his band the Jicks to record an album with Beck on board as producer. The result, Mirror Traffic, carries over the tour’s energy, and is the closest thing to a Terror Twilight follow-up to date. And as showcased by the Jicks’s all-too-short performance at the last Treasure Island Music Festival, Malkmus remains the slacker king of the nonchalant guitar solo. (Prendiville)

With Nurses

8 p.m., $20

Slim’s

333 11th St., SF

(415) 255-0333

www.slimspresents.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, the Guardian Building, 135 Mississippi St., SF, CA 94107; fax to (415) 487-2506; or e-mail (paste press release into e-mail body — no text 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.

On the Cheap

-
0

On the Cheap listings are compiled by Soojin Chang. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

WEDNESDAY 22

“An Edward Gorey Birthday Party” Cartoon Art Museum, 655 Mission, SF; (415) 227-8666, www.cartoonart.org. 6 p.m.-8 p.m., free. Edward Gorey: a cool guy who not only made pop-up matchbox-sized books by hand, but also redefined the macabre nonsense that makes up children’s literature. Come celebrate the world-renowned author’s birthday with an evening of readings, interpretations, and cake.

BAY AREA

“Path to Prison Reform: Freeing Jails from Racism Berkeley-East Baby Gray Panthers” North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst, Berk; (510) 548-9696, berkeleygraypathers.mysite.com. 1:30 p.m., free. Plenty of things go down in jails that are neither documented nor resolved. Join ACLU members and former prisoners in a discussion of how racism may be the culprit behind prison brutality.

THURSDAY 23

“A Mnemosyne Slumber Party” Mechanic’s Institute, 57 Post, SF; (415) 393-0101, www.mililibrary.org. 6 p.m., $12. Mnemosyne is a free online journal that features art, fiction, and nonfiction work dedicated to the science of memory and the mind. Come to the premiere of their newest “Sleep and Dreams” issue, stay for a night of live readings and artist appearances.

FRIDAY 24

“Diversity and Evolution of Hummingbirds” City College of San Francisco Ocean Campus, 50 Phelan, SF; (415) 239-3475, ccsf.edu/upcomingevents. Noon-1 p.m., free. Hitchcock ruined birds for some of us, but for those who still find these flying feathered creatures non-terrifying, this is a chance to join ornithology instructor Joe Morlan as he discusses the many birds he saw in his adventures in California, Arizona, Belize, Costa Rica, Trinidad, and Ecuador.

BAY AREA

Oakland Food Not Bombs benefit show Revolution Cafe, 1612 Seventh St., Oakl; (510) 625-0149, www.revcafeoak.com. 7 p.m., $4-$13. Food Not Bombs is all about non-violence, consensus decision-making, and tasty vegetarian meals, distributed for free to the community. What’s not to love? Support the group’s efforts this weekend in a benefit show featuring local bands Nate Porter and Wagon Boat.

SATURDAY 25

“Noise Pop Culture Club” Public Works, 161 Erie, SF; (415) 932-0955, www.publicsf.com. 11:30 a.m.-6:30 p.m., $10. Noise Pop would not be possible without the visionary artists in the music, film, art, design, technology, and food communities. This event features a discussion by Johnny Jewel of Glass Candy, artwork by Grimes, an Ableton Live workshop with Thavius Beck, a talk on animation by Aaron Rose and Syd Garon – plus a bounce lesson taught by New Orleans bounce belle, Big Freedia.

Punk Swap Meet Speakeasy Ales and Lagers, 1195 Evans, SF; (415) 642-3371, www.goodbeer.com. 1

p.m.-6 p.m., free. If you thought flea markets were just for old knitting ladies, you have never been more wrong. Punk Swap Meet has tables selling records, zines, tapes, DIY crafts, clothing, and is open to all ages. There will be food by Eagle Dog, with vegetarian and vegan options available, and brew on tap for $3.

San Francisco Crystal Fair Fort Mason Center Building A, 99 Marina, SF; (415) 383-7837, www.crystalfair.com. 10 a.m.-6 p.m. (also Sun/26, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.), $6 for two-day admission. Is your chakra out of sync? Not to worry. Pacific Crystal Guild is coming with over 40 exhibitors carrying crystals from Nepal, Bali, Afghanistan, and China.

SF Flea Herbst Pavilion at Fort Mason Center, One Buchanan, SF; (415) 990-0600, www.sf-flea.com. Sat., 11 am.1-6 p.m. (also Sun/26, 11 a.m.-5 p.m.), $5. SF Flea is a modern public market that brings together local design, style, food, art, and entertainment.

BAY AREA

Miss and Mister Oakland Punk Rock Pageant East Bay Rats Club House, 3025 San Pablo, Oakl; (510) 830-6466, www.eastbayrats.com. 8:30 p.m., $5 (free for contestants). Who says you have to be a six-year-old from Georgia or proclaim world peace in a bikini to be in a pageant? Have your long-awaited tiara moment by showcasing how swiftly you can open a beer bottle with your teeth at Oakland’s very own punk rock pageant.

Stories of Old San Francisco Chinatown reading Eastwind Books of Berkeley, 2066 University, Berk; (510) 548-2350, www.asiabookcenter.com. 3 p.m., free. A long walk through Chinatown conjures ghosts – one can’t help cogitating on these streets’ secrets and history. Join Lyle Jan, a San Francisco native, for a journey through his youth spent growing up in Chinatown.

SUNDAY 26

San Francisco Bookstore and Chocolate Crawl Meet at Green Apple Books, 506 Clement, SF. (415) 387-2272, www.greenapplebooks.com. Noon-6 p.m., free. Go on a walking tour of some of San Francisco’s finest bookstores, buy some books, and eat a lot of chocolate.

The Fairy Dogfather signing Books Inc., 3515 California, SF; (415) 221-3666, booksinc.net/SFLaurel. 3 p.m., free. In Alexandra Day’s new book, a dyslexic boy asks for a fairy dogfather instead of a fairy godfather. And we’re so glad he did, because the combination of a fedora-wearing dog-friend and a confused child makes for one adorable picture book.

MONDAY 27

Guitar Zero: The New Musician and the Science of Learning reading Booksmith, 1644 Haight, SF; (415) 863-8688, www.booksmith.com. 7:30 p.m., free. Is it really true that an old dog can never learn a new trick? In his book Guitar Zero, NYU professor Gary Marcus chronicles his own experience learning to play the guitar at age 38, and finds that there isn’t necessarily a cut-off age for mastering a new skill.

TUESDAY 28

“Pritzker Family Lecture” with Claude Lanzmann and Regina Longo Jewish Community Center of San Francisco, 3200 California, SF. (415) 292-1200, www.jccsf.org. 7 p.m., free with reservation. Lanzmann not only lived through the German occupation of France and fought with the French Resistance, but helped document the whole thing as the editor of Les Temps Modernes, Jean Paul Sartre’s political-literary journal. Come pick his brain as he discusses his new memoir, The Patagonian Hare, and his film, Shoah.

Stage Listings

-
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 Pirates of Penzance Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College, Berk; (510) 845-8542, www.juliamorgan.org. $17-35. Opens Sat/25, 2 and 7pm. Runs Fri-Sat, 7pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, noon and 5pm. Through April 1. Berkeley Playhouse performs the Gilbert and Sullivan classic, with the setting shifted to a futuristic city.

Titus Andronicus La Val’s Subterranean, 1834 Euclid, Berk; www.impacttheatre.com. $10-20. Previews Thurs/23-Fri/24, 8pm. Opens Sat/25, 8pm. Runs Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through March 31. Impact Theatre takes on the Bard’s bloodiest tragedy.

ONGOING

*Blue/Orange Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, 450 Post, SF; (415) 474-8800, www.lhtsf.org. $43-53. Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm). Through March 18. Lorraine Hansberry Theater offers an uneven but worthwhile production of British playwright Joe Penhall’s sardonic comedy of ideas and institutional racism, an intriguingly frustrating three-hander about a young doctor (a bright Dan Clegg) at a psychiatric teaching hospital who begins a battle royal with his suave and pompous supervising physician (a comically nimble Julian Lopez-Morillas) over the release of a questionably-sane black patient. Originally brought in by police for creating a disturbance, Christopher (the excellent Carl Lumbly) still exhibits signs of psychosis and his ability to care for himself seems doubtful to the young doctor treating him. The older physician appeals to the patient’s general competence, hospital procedures, the shortage of beds, and the exigencies of career advancement in countering the younger doctor’s insistence on keeping the patient beyond the mandatory 28-day period required by law. For his part, Christopher, nervous and rather manic, is at first desperately eager to be released back to his poor London neighborhood. Competing interviews with the two doctors complicate his perspective and ours repeatedly, however, as a heated debate about medicine, institutionalization, cultural antecedents to mental “illness,” career arcs, and a “cure for black psychosis,” leave everyone’s sanity in doubt. Although our attention can be distracted by a too-pervading sound design and less than perfect British accents, Edris Cooper-Anifowoshe directs a strong and engaging cast in a politically resonant not to say increasingly maddening play. (Avila)

52 Man Pick Up Brava Theater, 2781 24th St, SF; (415) 647-2822, www.brava.org. $10-25. Thurs-Sat and Mon/27, 8pm. Through March 3. Desiree Butch performs her solo show about a deck of cards’ worth of sexual encounters.

Geezer Marsh San Francisco, MainStage, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $25-100. Thurs and Sat, 8pm; Sun, 5pm. Through March 18. Geoff Hoyle’s hit solo show returns.

Glengarry Glen Ross Actors Theatre of San Francisco, 855 Bush, SF; (415) 345-1287, www.brownpapertickets.com. $26-40. Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through March 24. David Mamet’s cutthroat comedy, courtesy of the Actors Theatre of San Francisco.

Higher Theater at Children’s Creativity Museum, 221 Howard, SF; (415) 749-2228, www.act-sf.org. $10-65. Extended run: Wed/22, 2pm; Thurs/23-Sat/25, 8pm (also Sat/25, 2pm). American Conservatory Theater premieres artistic director Carey Perloff’s ambitious but choppy play about renowned architect Michael Friedman (an affably egotistical Andrew Polk) and brilliant but still up-and-coming Elena Constantine (a restlessly clever yet vulnerable René Augesen), lovers who find themselves competing for the same commission to design a memorial at the site of a bus bombing on the Sea of Galilee. The spunky widow (Concetta Tomei) of a wealthy American Jewish businessman is funding the memorial, and supervising the competition with the help of a handsome young Israeli, Jacob (Alexander Crowther), grieving for his father. The jet-set lovers only gradually realize they’re competitors (Michael very late in the game, which seems a bit too clueless). Meanwhile, Michael attends to the strained relationship with his grown-up but too-long-neglected gay son (Ben Kahre), a convert to “born-again Judaism” in contrast to his father’s attenuated affiliations; and shiksa Elena finds inspiration for a radical design in the grief-stricken (but soon smitten) Jacob, kneading the burnt sand at the shore of a lake “filled with Jewish tears.” In a play dealing with land and memory, reconciliation, chauvinism, and short-sightedness, the absence of any mention of Palestinian “tears” in the same water (or Palestinians at all) seems a conspicuous absence. The dialogue, meanwhile, while often witty, can be labored in its mingling of airy architectural notions with earthier matters. Mark Rucker’s direction gives scope to an admirably tailored performance from Augesen (the small stage offers a rewarding chance to watch the ACT veteran work up close) but not enough attention goes to the supposed sexual tension between Elena and Michael, which, despite sporadically randy dialogue and some awkward blocking on a mattress, is effectively nil. (Avila)

*Little Brother Gough Street Playhouse, 1620 Gough, SF; www.custommade.org. $25-32. Thurs/23-Sat/25, 8pm. Custom Made Theatre Co. performs Josh Costello’s adaptation of Cory Doctorow’s San Francisco-set thriller.

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh San Francisco, Studio Theater, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Extended run: Fri/24, 8pm; Sat/25, 5 and 8:30pm. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. (Avila)

Private Parts SF Playhouse, Stage 2, 533 Sutter, SF; www.sfplayhouse.org. $20. Thurs, 7pm; Fri/24-Sat/25, 8pm. Graham Gremore performs his autobiographical solo comedy.

The Real Americans Marsh Studio Theater, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $25-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm; Sun, 2pm. Through March 18. Dan Hoyle revives his hit solo show about small-town America.

Scorched American Conservatory Theater, 415 Geary, SF; (415) 749-2228, www.act-sf.org. $10-85. Opens Wed/22, 7pm. Runs Tues-Sat, 8pm (Tues/28, show at 7pm); Wed, Sat-Sun, 2pm (no matinee Wed/22). Through March 11. Oscar nominee David Strathairn stars in ACT’s performance of Wajdi Mouawad’s haunting drama.

Three’s Company Live! Finn’s Funhouse, 814 Grove, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $20. Fri-Sat, 7 and 9pm. Through March 3. Cat Fights and Shoulder Pads Productions (best production company name ever?) brings the classic sitcom to the stage.

Tontlawald Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. $10-50. Thurs, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 5pm. Through March 11. Cutting Ball Theater presents this world premiere ensemble piece, using text by resident playwright Eugenie Chan, a capella harmonies, and movement to re-tell an ancient Estonian tale.

*True West Boxcar Studios, 125A Hyde, SF; (415) 967-2227, www.boxcartheatre.org. $25. Thurs-Sat, 8pm. Through April 7. The first installment of Boxcar Theatre’s four-play Sam Shepard repertory project, True West ushers in the ambitious run with a bang. This tale of two brothers who gradually assume the role of the other is one of Shepard’s most enduring plays, rich with humorous interludes, veering sharply into dangerous terrain at the drop of a toaster. In time-honored, True West tradition, the lead roles of Austin, the unassuming younger brother, and Lee, his violent older sibling, are being alternated between Nick A. Olivero and Brian Trybom, and in a new twist, the role of the mother is being played by two different actresses as well (Adrienne Krug and Katya Rivera). The evening I saw it, Olivero was playing Austin, a writer banging away at his first screenplay, and Trybom was Lee, a troubled, alcoholic drifter who usurps his brother’s Hollywood shot, and trashes their mother’s home while trying to honor his as yet unwritten “contract”. The chemistry between the two actors was a perfect blend of menace and fraternity, and the extreme wreckage they make of both the set (designed by both actors), and their ever-tenuous relationship, was truly inspired. (Gluckstern)

*Vice Palace: The Last Cockettes Musical Thrillpeddlers’ Hypnodrome, 575 10th St, SF; (415) 377-4202, www.thrillpeddlers.com. $30-35. Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through March 3. Hot on the high heels of a 22-month run of Pearls Over Shanghai, the Thrillpeddlers are continuing their Theatre of the Ridiculous revival with a tits-up, balls-out production of the Cockettes’ last musical, Vice Palace. Loosely based on the terrifyingly grim “Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe, part of the thrill of Palace is the way that it weds the campy drag-glamour of Pearls Over Shanghai with the Thrillpeddlers’ signature Grand Guignol aesthetic. From an opening number set on a plague-stricken street (“There’s Blood on Your Face”) to a charming little cabaret about Caligula, staged with live assassinations, an undercurrent of darkness runs like blood beneath the shameless slapstick of the thinly-plotted revue. As plague-obsessed hostess Divina (Leigh Crow) and her right-hand “gal” Bella (Eric Tyson Wertz) try to distract a group of stir-crazy socialites from the dangers outside the villa walls, the entertainments range from silly to salacious: a suggestively-sung song about camel’s humps, the wistful ballad “Just a Lonely Little Turd,” a truly unexpected Rite of Spring-style dance number entitled “Flesh Ballet.” Sumptuously costumed by Kara Emry, cleverly lit by Nicholas Torre, accompanied by songwriter/lyricist (and original Cockette) Scrumbly Koldewyn, and anchored by a core of Thrillpeddler regulars, Palace is one nice vice. (Gluckstern)

*Vigilance Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason, SF; (415) 335-6087, secondwind.8m.com. $20-25. Thurs/23-Sat/25, 8pm. Ian Walker (The Tender King) directs a sharp revival of his own lucid, involving 2000 domestic drama about three households brought to the brink by the arrival of a menacing working-class loner. Seamlessly staged in a single pair of rooms (designed by Fred Sharkey) representing all three suburban middle-class homes — as well as downstage on the street where dream-home lottery winner Duncan (an imposing Steven Westdahl) throws his beer cans and leers at the wives and children — Vigilance begins with three friends meeting under the pretext of a poker game. Host Virgil (played with gruff charm by a commanding Mike Newman) is a 30-something husband, father, and guy’s guy whose Montana-grown libertarian machismo compensates for the agro of a stormy marriage and rocky finances. He talks the suggestible, nebbishy Bert (a slyly humorous Ben Ortega) and the equally nerdy but independent-minded Dick (a nicely layered Stephen Muterspaugh) into forming a “committee” to deal with the troublesome Duncan. Walker’s well-honed dialogue brings out the false notes in the supposed pre-Duncan harmony right away, and the play strikes best at the buried politics of marriage and friendship. (Avila)

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Through March 24. Brian Copeland returns with a new solo show about his struggles with depression.

BAY AREA

Arms and the Man Lesher Center for the Arts, Margaret Lesher Theater, 1601 Civic, Walnut Creek; (925) 943-7469, www.centerrep.org. $38-43. Wed/22, 7:30pm; Thurs/23-Sat/25, 8pm. Center REPertory Company presents George Bernard Shaw’s classic romantic comedy.

*Body Awareness Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; (510) 843-4822, www.auroratheatre.org. $30-48. Tues, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through March 11. In Annie Baker’s new comedy, receiving a top-notch Bay Area premiere at Aurora Theatre, peppy psychology prof Phyllis (Amy Resnick) hosts “Body Awareness Week” at her small Vermont college, while back home partner Joyce (Jeri Lynn Cohen) talks to her 21-year-old son Jared (Patrick Russell) about the porn pay-per-view bill he’s racked up. Phyllis contends that Joyce’s introverted, somewhat explosive virgin son (who in addition to bouts of violent anger soothes himself compulsively with an electric security toothbrush) has Asperger’s Syndrome — a diagnosis that Jared, a budding not too say obsessive lexicographer, hotly contests. That same week, the couple hosts a guest artist, Frank (Howard Swain), a breezy man’s man whose career stands squarely on a series of photographs of nude women and girls. The young man seeks sexual advice from the older one, much to Phyllis’s disgust and Joyce’s relief, while also tempting Joyce with the notion of posing for a nude portrait and “reclaiming her body image,” in a well-used phrase. An already delicate balance thus goes right off kilter as, between the poles of Phyllis and Frank, Joyce and Jared chase competing notions and definitions of themselves and the world. In the volatile tension between perspectives, power trips, and extreme personalities, playwright Baker initially pushes a comic form toward an unsettling edge, only to retreat in the end for safer ground and a family-friendly resolution. While that feels like a lost opportunity, Body Awareness is still a stimulating and solidly entertaining evening, brought to life by a warm and dexterous ensemble under fine, lively direction by Joy Carlin. (Avila)

Counter Attack! Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby, Berk; (510) 444-4755, ext. 114, www.stagebridge.org. $18-25. Wed-Thurs, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through March 4. Stagebridge presents the world premiere of Joan Holden’s waitress-centric play.

A Doctor in Spire of Himself Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2015 Addison, Berk; (510) 647-2949, www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Tues and Thurs-Sat, 8pm (also Thurs and Sat, 2pm; no matinees Sat/25, March 1, 8, and 15; no show March 23); Wed and Sun, 7pm (also Sun, 2pm). Through March 25. Berkeley Rep performs a contemporary update of the Molière comedy.

*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 March 25. 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)

Mesmeric Revelation Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant, Berk; (510) 558-1381, www.centralworks.org. Thurs-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 5pm. Through March 18. Central Works opens its season of world premieres with Aaron Henne’s Edgar Allen Poe-inspired drama.

A Steady Rain Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller, SF; (415) 388-5208, www.marintheatre.org. $34-55. Wed/22, 7:30pm; Thurs/23-Sat/25, 8pm (also Sat/25, 2pm); Sun/26, 2 and 7pm. Marin Theatre Company performs Keith Huff’s neo-noir drama.

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Extended run: Sun/26, March 11, and 18, 11am. Louis “The Amazing Bubble Man” Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

“Accentuate the PAWSitive!” DNA Lounge, 365 11th St, SF; www.dnalounge.com. Tues/28, 7pm. $20. Cabaret star Carly Ozard and friends perform to raise money for Pets Are Wonderful Support.

“The Auction” Kanbar Hall, Jewish Community Center of San Francisco, 3200 California, SF; (415) 292-1233, www.jccsf.org. Sat/25, 8pm. $10-40. Miranda July performs a piece based on her book It Chooses You.

Batsheva Dance Company Novellus Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard, SF; (415) 398-6449, www.sfperformances.org. Thurs/23-Sat/25, 8pm. $35-60. The Tel Aviv-based company performs Max.

“Black Choreographers Festival: Here and Now 2012” Dance Mission Theater, 3316 24th St, SF; www.bcfhereandnow.com. Fri/24-Sat/25, 8pm; Sun/26, 7pm. $10-25. Celebrate African and African American dance and culture at this multi-part festival, with works by Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Kendra Kimbrough Barnes, and more.

“Club Chuckles” Hemlock Tavern, 1131 Polk, SF; www.hemlocktavern.com. Thurs/23, 9pm. $8. Comedians Rob Cantrell, W. Kamau Bell, John Hoogasian, and Caitlin Gill perform.

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

“The Eric Show” Milk Bar, 1840 Haight, SF; www.milksf.com. Tues, 8pm (ongoing). $5. Local comedians perform with host Eric Barry.

“No Exit” and “Dead/Alive” Garage, 975 Howard, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/24-Sat/25, 8 p.m., $15. Christine Bonansea and Minna Harri Experience Set perform new works.

“Oracle and Enigma” CounterPULSE, 1310 Mission, SF; 1-800-838-3006, www.counterpulse.org. Fri/24-Sat/25, 8pm. $20. Master Katsura Kan directs this Butoh dance theater work.

Alerts

-
0

WEDNESDAY, FEB. 22

 

Police graft

This event, part of the Shaping SF Public Talk series, will focus on the 1937 Atherton Report that blew the lid off San Francisco police corruption in that era. Speakers Hank Chapot and Chris Agee will address their research, on the report and on SF policing and crime in the 1950s, respectively.

7:30pm, free

CounterPULSE

1310 Mission, SF

www.counterpulse.org/?tribe_events=shaping-sf-public-talk-police-graft-in-san-francisco/

THURSDAY, FEB. 23

Eviction community forum

A panel discussion and chance to access resources for those affected by and interested in the epidemic of foreclosures and evictions in our neighborhoods. Hear from community organizers, foreclosure lawyers, and affected homeowners and tenants. This is organized by Occupy Bernal and will feature Spanish translation and childcare.

7pm, free

Bernal Heights Community Center

515 Cortland, SF

415-821-7617

 

Garden for the environment

Enjoy live music, food from Haight Street Market, a raffle, and a celebration of urban permaculture at the fundraiser. The Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Center celebrates the achievements of Garden for the Environment, a group that maintains a one-acre garden in the Sunset demonstrating the educational, environmental and food-security possibilities of permaculture.

6pm, $5

111 Minna, SF

www.hanc-sf.org/urban-farming-fundraiser-and-party.html

FRIDAY, FEB. 24

 

History of porn

Join author Sam Benjamin and golden age porn star Richard Pacheco for a lively presentation chronicling how porn emerged in its present form by looking back over past decades. The presentation will use non-explicit clips but promises to be funny and informative. Benjamin is the author of American Gangbang: A Love Story.

8pm, $10-30 suggested donation

Center for Sex and Culture

1349 Mission, SF

www.sexandculture.org/

SATURDAY, FEB. 25

Foreclose on Wells Fargo CEO

A demonstration, complete with street theater and education, as activists attempt to foreclose on and evict Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf. According to Occupy Bernal, this fun community event will feature “street theater to foreclose, auction home, and evict the CEO, music, Pride at Work dance mob, and special surprise bidders.”

1pm, free

1090 Chestnut, SF

www.occupybernal.org/wordpress

 

Deep Green Resistance

Have you ever felt that to continue to live on the planet, people must actively dismantle industrial systems which are destroying the earth, perhaps by any means necessary? If so, you should hear author Aric McBay speak about his book Deep Green Resistance: Strategy to Save the Planet. In the book, also by Derrick Jensen and Lierre Keith, the authors discuss the philosophies, tactics and implications of this brand of radical environmental activism.

7:30pm, free

Unite HERE Local 2

209 Golden Gate, SF

www.occupysf.org/calendar-2/

Down Dog break down

-
29

culture@sfbg.com

YOGA For a sizeable sector of our population, yoga is as much a part of the culture as burritos and biking to work. With more than 50 studios in San Francisco’s 49 square miles alone — and even a brand-new yoga room in SFO, which claims to be an airport first — the Bay Area isn’t short on options for a Saturday morning sweat sesh or Sunday night candlelight.

But which teacher is best for you? For three exhaustive weeks I pretzeled it up from Berkeley to Bernal, sampling classes with some of our most famous and intriguing yogis. Below are my experiences with each, along with a one-to-five “sweat factor” intensity rating . Hopefully, this will help you choose the right teacher to help you lighten up, ground down, or just plain bliss out. (Perhaps you might be inspired to follow one of our dozens of other local yogis’ paths.)

Me? I’ll be soaking in a hot bath. Can you hand me that ice pack?

 

PETE GUINOSSO: GOOFY AND LOOSE

If you’re the kind of person who thinks the Black Eyed Peas and Beyoncé — let alone House of Pain — don’t belong in the yoga studio, then Pete’s Friday night Happy Hour Yoga at Yoga Tree on Valencia (www.yogatreesf.com) isn’t for you.

Guinosso breaks it down, both musically and with frequent stops to explain a new inversion or variation on an arm balance. With plenty of “play time” to work at your own pace, plus friendly gossip and occasionally flirty energy in the female-heavy room, the class can sometimes feel more like a very sweaty cocktail party. But it’s a great way to stay loose, learn new tricks, and cultivate what Pete calls the “inner teacher.” The smiley, Forrest-trained yogi also guides more traditional vinyasa and candlelight flow classes — no Top 40 here — but his liberating sense of humor remains.

Sweat Factor: 3 

The Takeaway: Fun and funky, but probably not best if verses from “Afternoon Delight” aren’t among your favored mantras.

www.petegyoga.com

 

LES LEVENTHAL: FRESH AND AFFIRMING

Imagine taking a rubber band ball and chucking it down some hard wooden stairs: that’s what Les was like, bouncing around during Saturday morning vinyasa while his students were still waking up.

But that’s all right. As my neighbor one mat over put it, Les is “really good at letting you know that where you are is fine, while at the same time pushing you to move forward.”

Leventhal’s quirky style, coupled with live beats by Sac-town sacred sound messenger Nate Spross (Les has also brought the likes of Buddha Bar’s Daniel Masson from Paris to spin), kept class sparkling; even when he got down among the mats to demonstrate a Foot-Behind-Head pose which morphed into a series of arm balances that had students’ eyes bulging, his sense of humor soothed the spirits of those of us who were in pain just watching — let alone trying to replicate the seamless flow.

“Why do we let our heads tell us what’s good enough?” he asked, putting a hand at neck level to show a separation between head and body. “Even if you’re in the simplest expression of this pose, it feels good from here down!”

Sweat Factor: 4 

The Takeaway: Down-to-earth, despite chanting in a reverberating baritone that brings me shuddering back to the rabbis of my Sunday school days.

www.yogawithles.com

 

JANET STONE: FAST AND UNFETTERED

With barely two inches between mats on a Saturday morning, it’s easy to see that Janet is a Bay Area favorite. She’s no slave to typical maneuvers like the Sun Salutation, though, and while her fast flows kept class interesting, all the unfamiliar iterations seemed a bit frantic — and made the class more about momentum (and not getting lost) than about muscle and alignment.

But of course, that’s the yoga. And though her students may love her because they come to learn her style, she might say the real work is in getting better at not knowing what’s next. Or, in Janet’s wording: “In this practice we pause and disarm our myriad of defenses, and experience the pure luminous light that is there.”

Sweat Factor: 3

The Takeaway: Good if you like spontaneous Hare Krishna-themed dance fevers and Lulu-clad students eager to show off their handstands — even when that means toppling onto others’ mats.

www.janetstoneyoga.com

 

RUSTY WELLS: DEVOTED AND UNDONE

Only a few years after beginning his journey as a yogi in early 1990s Atlanta, Rusty started to sense something missing.

“A teacher of mine told me after class one day, ‘it looks like you’re praying when you practice,'” Rusty says, “and my reply was, ‘What, am I not supposed to be?'”

Now he knows that something is bhakti, Sanskrit for “devotion to the wonder of life,” and it’s for sale (well, actually, for donation) at Rusty’s vinyasa-inspired studio near the Mission, Urban Flow (www.urbanflowyoga.com).

Taking class with Rusty is a bit like having your own personal cheerleader, albeit an extremely calm one, urging you to “undo a lifetime of doing.” His classes reflect the intention to be a beginner each time you return to the mat. But despite a slightly slower pace and emphasis on fundamentals, Bhakti Flow is by no means a soft option. In fact, everyone I saw there (including a smattering of other Bay Area teachers) was pretty much a hardbody.

Not that I should have noticed, my teacher told me.

“When I first started practicing,” Rusty said, “I used to look around and admire the people who were really strong, really stretchy.”

“After a while, I learned to look around and admire the people who were finding great joy in their practice. And a while after that,” the yogi concluded “I learned to just stop looking.”

Sweat Factor: 3

The Takeaway: Like Chicken Soup for the Ass(ana). Part workout, part therapy.

www.rustywells.com

 

STEPH SNYDER: COMFY AND UNASSUMING

I was a little intimidated, walking into the crowd assembled for Steph’s class on Super Bowl Sunday — my first with her, and her first upon returning to teaching after having a healthy baby boy. Excitement was as thick as the steam wafting through the air, streaking the windows with condensation. Friends squealed and greeted each other, mats moved over and over again to make more space, and shouts that had nothing to do with pigskin could be heard all around.

But once we started, it was like slipping into a favorite pair of old jeans. Her flows have great rhythm and plenty of variety. Plus something intuitive, as though my body knew what to do even before her cue. She’s humble, and you can tell that she honestly loves what she’s doing.

Part of her appeal is her belief in the practice, one she says has gotten her through dark times, and her commitment to making the same hold true for others.

“Whatever you need, the practice is there for you. If you need to be saved, it will literally save you,” she promises. Add to that a great workout, beautiful chanting, and some awesome harmonium playing (Steph says she accompanies herself every day) and you can’t go wrong.

Sweat Factor: 4

The Takeaway: Delicious in every way.

www.stephaniesnyder.com

 

PRADEEP TEOTI: SONGFUL AND BOLD

Born in a small village outside of New Delhi, Pradeep brings with him an international yoga certification in the Sivananda tradition, a deep personal practice that stretches way beyond asana, and an amazing unique voice that pitches and rolls all throughout class with nary an audible breath, making him sound something like a spiritual auctioneer trying to sell peace of mind and six-pack abs; the only pause in singsong accompaniment raising warrior ones to warrior twos is his distinctive intonation of exhaaayle, inhaaayle.

Pradeep’s classes, including this one at Oakland’s Flying Yoga Shala (www.flyingyogashala.com) are fast and packed with plenty of push-ups and core work, definitely best when you’re feeling bold. But his compassion is also undeniable.

“Yoga is not saying you put your leg behind your head,” he told me when I was feeling sick in class. “Yoga is just putting yourself in the moment, paying attention to right now. Maybe someone wants to come to my class and just do child pose for one whole hour. Then my job is to create that space for them.”

Sweat Factor: 5

The Takeaway:Though he said I taught him yoga that day, it’s better to leave the instruction up to Pradeep: he’s one of the best.

www.pradeepyoga.com

 

DARREN MAIN: SPIRITUAL AND SINCERE

Though he’s definitely made a student or two sweat, Darren truly shines when teaching restorative sessions — especially his donation-based Tuesday night practices in the cavernous Grace Cathedral, coupled with live music like Sam Jackson’s exquisite chorus of a dozen Tibetan singing bowls.

The temptation may be not to take Darren seriously: sometimes he slips into that same ethereal quality of voice he uses to introduce his “Inquire Within” podcasts, and the flowing blond hair and bright blue eyes staring out from the back of his most popular book, Yoga and the Path of the Urban Mystic, are a bit Cherub-cum-movie-star, come to that.

But his teachings — in the studio and as an author, essayist, and international speaker on spirituality — come from a sincere place: a struggle with issues of sexuality, religion, and identity. Who couldn’t use a teacher with that kind of experience on their quest for personal growth? Plus, his hair’s short now.

Sweat Factor: 1 

The Takeaway: Unique restorative classes with a dose of mysticism — and sometimes hot stones.

www.darrenmain.com

 

MARK MORFORD: CALM AND FOCUSED

Straight up: I have to respect a guy who starts class, no apologies, with core work. Mark is that guy. His classes are serious and to-the-point, but without the rush and ego I sometimes associate with other hardcore workout-focused yogis. Of course, he does teach, rather noticeably, with his shirt off. But we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and chalk that up to inspiration. Perhaps because his classes don’t tend toward the super-crowded, they feel both peaceful and purposeful.

And — unlike his columns for the Chronicle, which are all over the place and over-the-top funny — his yoga, both the asana and the anecdotes, have a simple, quiet intensity and calm focus that make them rewarding and accessible for all levels.

Sweat Factor: 4 stars

The Takeaway: Strong, steady yoga with the occasional conversational foray.

www.markmorford.com

 

JANE AUSTIN: CANDID AND EARTHY

In classes filled with as much laughter and candid advice as yoga, Jane prepares new moms and moms-to-be for the best and worst of mothering. And she does it as much through understanding and open conversation as through asana (poses to strengthen the arms for holding a newborn, to rotate wee ones while they’re still inside, and to stretch, err, whatever might need stretching in preparation for delivery).

A midwife, doula, and mother of two, Jane is funny and warm, and able to come up with plenty for pregnant or healing women to do other than “go sit against the wall and squat.”

Plus, for ladies looking to speed things up, her classes have a history of hastening delivery — as in, right then and there. Pssst, the “water breaking spot” is just one mat to the right of the door at Yoga Tree on Valencia.

Sweat Factor: 2 

The Takeaway: Be prepared to discuss everything from the nipples on down. And imagine your cervix melting like butter.

www.janeaustinyoga.com

1...103104105...294Page 104 of 294

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