Radio

Summer Sounds: Exclusive bass-heavy tropical Surya Dub mix (and more)

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Summer Sounds: Exclusive bass-heavy tropical Surya Dub mix (and more)

Ahoy, sunshine! In this week’s Super Ego nightlife column, I get all hot an bothered about the upcoming re-appearance of the Surya Dub global dread bass DJ crew at the Non Stop Bhangra monthly party on Sat/14. This installment of this ever-awesome and refreshingly diverse shindig is billed as “Indian-Caribbean tropical summer madness.” Well, what the heck does that sound like? (Answers below.)

The super-productive producer and DJ Kush Arora is letting us drop this exclusive Surya Dub Summer Rewind mix — he had a hand in a few of the tunes himself — to let us hear where his crew is at lately, globalwise. It is a serious jam I highly recommend listening to somewhere you can bounce around. And below the Kush mix track list is a special “Asian dub bass mix” that Maneesh the Twister did for UK website NadaBrahama.co.uk that gets a little more ethereal. And below that? The sounds of Non Stop Bhangra itself, from DJ Jimmy Love. Great stuff, which will sound even better live. Also: catch Kush and Maneesh on the airwaves with their new radio show “The Surya Dub Takeover” Mon 7.23 10pm on KPFA 94.1FM.

TRACKLIST
1. Kush Arora and Mega Banton – Shake Sitten (China White Remix)
2. Violet – Black River
3. Solo Banton – Make you Groove
4. Bongo Chilli -Can’t Touch My Style
5. Dre Skull – Loudspeaker Riddim
6. Popcaan – The System
7. Natalie Storm – Rock The Runway
8. Ghislain Porier – Alert Riddim
9. Ghislain Porier Feat. Natalie Storm – Gal U Good
10. WILDLIFE feat. J Wow – DNO
11. Urban Knightz Feat. Blackout JA- Step On Dem
12. Dinherio Negro (Bumps Bailehall Mix)
13. Rishi Bass – Latin Futura

14. Mak and Pasteman – Jungle Juice ( Pale Remix)
15. LV feat. Okmalumkoolkat – Boomslang
16. Partysquad feat. Baskerville – Gunshot
17. Spoeke Mathambo and Cerebral Vortex – Drunk Like That
17. Mr. Vegas – Bruck it Down ( Kush Arora Remix)
18. Buraka Som Sistema – Rita O Pe (Rob Howle Remix)
19. Astronomar and Wick – WYWD
20. Busy Signal – Doggy Style ( So Shifty Remix)
21. Natalie Storm – Lick it Good
22. Cardopusher – Goldo
23. Maga Bo – Piloto de Fuga feat. Funkero and BNegaeo
24. Zuzuka Poderosa and Kush Arora – Pisicodelia
25. Nego Mozambique – SurfistadoPavaofinal

A Republican feminist

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A Republican feminist

caitlin@sfbg.com

LIT “Do you consider yourself sex-positive?”

If you have a chance to interview John McCain’s daughter, and she identifies as a feminist, and is demonstrably more comfortable in strip clubs than the “liberal comedian” with whom she has embarked on a tour with in promotion of their book America, You Sexy Bitch! (Da Capo Press, $26, 352pp), you have to seize your moment to ask the big questions.

The pause from the other end of the telephone line tells me Meghan McCain, however, does not know what this term refers to. “Do I consider myself sex-positive? I’m not sure what you mean.” See?

She and Michael Ian Black will be in conversation at the Castro Theatre on Tue/17 at an event sponsored by the Commonwealth Club, by the way.

“It’s a term that we use — keep in mind I’m calling from San Francisco,” I say. “To mean not ashamed of sex. Of the opinion that having sex with people is OK. Different kinds of sexualities?” Apparently I don’t know what sex-positive means either, or else I am awkward in explaining the term to Republicans.

McCain, having been raised in the belly of a well-oiled political machine, is wary of potentially loaded questions from reporters. But she has also built her adult career on being a fiscally conservative woman who delights in bucking the social mores of the Republican Party. As such, she is able to compose a categorical response that is still pretty charming to her commieweirdo interviewer.

“I’m a big supporter of the gay community, if that’s what you’re asking me. And when it comes to my personal life, I am not abstinent, if that’s what you’re asking me as well. I am straight, if that’s what you’re asking me. I only date men. But sex and sexuality, I’m not terribly prudish. I think it’s private in nature but as far as I’m concerned, everybody can do whatever they want as long as it’s legal. In the privacy of their own homes, that’s their business, literally. As long as they’re not hurting anybody, I don’t care. Do your thing.”

Despite the many pages McCain and Black spend casting themselves as a “real” conservative and liberal — McCain as a gun-loving war eagle, Black as a snarky priss — the secret-not-secret point made by America, You Sexy Bitch is: politics don’t make the person. To that end, readers are taken on a RV tour of the country with McCain and Black, a trip that threatens to reveal the real America. We learn that McCain is far more comfortable in strip clubs than Black and is happily single at 27, while the Ed veteran has been married since his early 20s, rarely gets drunk, and lives in the suburbs with the wife and kids.

One of my favorite aspects of McCain (and I have many), is the way she speaks out against the treatment of women in the media. Her fervor should come as no surprise: last year, she wrote a scathing open letter to Glenn Beck when he called her fat on his radio show. (“As a person known for his hot body, you must find it easy to judge the weight fluctuations of others, especially young women.”)

“I would have an entirely different career, an entirely different life if I were a man, which I think is just ridiculous,” she tells me. She laments the fact that women politicians have to deal with the “complete BS” that is appearance-driven mainstream media reportage.

She’s great! We’re best friends! Hang out with me, Meghan! But then, this, meant to be completely free of irony: “I hate this idea that the feminist movement has been caught up in the pro-choice movement and somehow the denial of femininity, which is something I don’t understand. For me being a feminist means giving women the choice to do whatever they want.”

Wa-wahhh. Still, I’ll take her over Beck any day.

MEGHAN MCCAIN AND MICHAEL IAN BLACK

Tue/17, 7pm, $15–$45

Castro Theatre

429 Castro, SF

www.commonwealthclub.org

 

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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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

Marat/Sade Brava Theatre, 2781 24th St, SF; (415) 863-0611, www.ticketfly.com. $20-38. Previews Wed/11-Thu/12, 8pm. Opens Fri/13, 8pm. Runs Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 7pm (also July 22, 1:30pm). Through July 29. Marc Huestis and Thrillpeddlers present Peter Weiss’ macabre Tony-winner.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; www.rayoflighttheatre.com. $25-36. Opens Thu/12, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through Aug 11. Ray of Light Theatre performs Stephen Sondheim’s sexy, sinister musical.

BAY AREA

Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom Sister Thea Bowman Memorial Theater, 920 Peralta, Oakl; www.lowerbottomplayaz.com. $10-25. Opens Fri/13, 7pm. Runs Fri-Sat, 7pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 22. Lower Bottom Playaz perform August Wilson’s music-industry expose.

The Marvelous Wonderettes Fox Theatre, 2215 Broadway, Redwood City; www.broadwaybythebay.org. $20-48. Opens Thu/12, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm (also July 21 and 28, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through July 29. Broadway By the Bay performs Roger Bean’s retro musical, featuring classic tunes of the 1950s and ’60s.

Roald Dahl’s Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory Julia Morgan Theatre, 2640 College, Berk; www.berkeleyplayhouse.org. $17-35. Previews Sat/14, 2pm. Opens Sat/14, 7pm. Runs Thu, Sat, and July 25, 7pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, noon and 5pm. Through Aug 19. Berkeley Playhouse performs a musical based on the candy-filled book, with songs from the 1971 movie adaptation.

Upright Grand TheatreWorks at Lucie Stern Theatre, 1305 Middlefield, Palo Alto; www.theatreworks.org. $24-73. Previews Wed/11-Fri/13, 8pm. Opens Sat/14, 8pm. Runs Tue-Wed, 7:30pm; Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 7pm. Through Aug 10. TheatreWorks launches its 43rd season with the world premiere of Laura Schellhardt’s play about a musical father and daughter.

ONGOING

Absolutely San Francisco Alcove Theater, 414 Mason, Ste 502, SF; www.thealcovetheater.com. $32-50. Thu-Sat, 8pm. Through Aug 18. A multi-character solo show about the characters of San Francisco.

Duck Lake The Jewish Theater, 470 Florida, SF; www.duck-lake.com. $17-35. Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through July 28. By terns gross and engrossing, PianoFight’s Duck Lake — written and produced by associated sketch comedy locals Mission Control — proves a gangling but irresistible flight, a ballet-horror-comedy-musical with fair helpings of each. By the shore of the eponymous watery resort with a mysterious past as an animal testing site, a perennially “up-and-coming” theater director named Barry Canteloupe (poised and sassy Raymond Hobbs) marshals a pair of prosthetic teats and other trust-building paraphernalia in a cultish effort to bring off yet another reimagining of Swan Lake. His cast and crew include a rebounding TV starlet (a sure and winsome Leah Shesky), a lazy leading man (delightfully dude-ish Duncan Wold), a supremely confident and just god-awful tragedian (a duly expansive Alex Boyd), and a gleeful misfit of a tech guy (an innocently inappropriate, very funny Joseph Scheppers). When the thespians come beak-to-beak with a handsome local gang leader (a nicely multifaceted Sean Conroy) and his rowdy band of sun-addled jet-skiers (the awesome posse of Daniel Burke, David Burke, and Meredith Terry), a star-crossed college reunion ensues between the tattooed tough and the hapless production’s white swan. Meanwhile, “scary fucked-up super ducks” go on a killing rampage under tutelage of some cave-bound weirdo (an imposing, web-footed Rob Ready), leading to love, mayhem, and shameless appropriation of timeless musical numbers. It’s all supported by four tutu’d mallards (the po-faced, limber ensemble of Christy Crowley, Caitlin Hafer, Anne Jones, and Emma Rose Shelton) and flocks of murderous fellow fowl (courtesy of Crowley’s fine puppet design). And don’t worry about the convoluted plot, all will be niftily explained by an old codger of a groundskeeper (a hilariously persuasive Evan Winchester). If the action gets attenuated at times across two-plus hours, a beguilingly agile cast and robust concept more than compensate for the loosey-goosey. (Avila)

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

Fwd: Life Gone Viral Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm (Sun/15, show at 7:30pm). Extended through July 22. The internet becomes comic fodder for creator-performers Charlie Varon and Jeri Lynn Cohen, and creator-director David Ford.

Jip: His Story Marsh San Francisco, MainStage, 1062 Valencia, SF; www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Thu/12-Fri/13, 7:30pm; Sat/14, 2pm; Sun/15, 3pm. Marsh Youth Theater remounts its 2005 musical production of Katherine Paterson’s historical novel.

Proof NOHspace, 2840 Mariposa, SF; www.proofsf.com. Wed/11-Sat/14, 8pm. $28. Expression Productions performs David Auburn’s Pulitzer-winning play about a mathematician and his daughter.

“Risk Is This…The Cutting Ball New Experimental Plays Festival” Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. Free ($20 donation for reserved seating; $50 donation for five-play reserved seating pass). Fri/13-Sat/14, 8pm. Cutting Ball’s annual fest of experimental plays features two new works and five new translations in staged readings.

The Scottsboro Boys American Conservatory Theater, 415 Geary, SF; www.act-sf.org. $20-95. Tue-Sat, 8pm (also Wed and Sat, 2pm). Extended through July 22. American Conservatory Theater presents the Kander and Ebb musical about nine African American men falsely accused of a crime they didn’t commit in the pre-civil rights movement South.

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

Waiting… Larkspur Hotel Union Square, 525 Sutter, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $49-75. Thu-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through Aug 5. Comedy set behind the scenes at a San Francisco restaurant.

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through August 4. Brian Copeland (comedian, TV and radio personality, and creator-performer of the long-running solo play Not a Genuine Black Man) returns to the Marsh with a new solo, this one based on more recent and messier events in Copeland’s life. The play concerns an episode of severe depression in which he considered suicide, going so far as to purchase a handgun — the title coming from the legally mandatory 10-day period between purchasing and picking up the weapon, which leaves time for reflections and circumstances that ultimately prevent Copeland from pulling the trigger. A grim subject, but Copeland (with co-developer and director David Ford) ensures there’s plenty of humor as well as frank sentiment along the way. The actor peoples the opening scene in the gun store with a comically if somewhat stereotypically rugged representative of the Second Amendment, for instance, as well as an equally familiar “doood” dude at the service counter. Afterward, we follow Copeland, a just barely coping dad, home to the house recently abandoned by his wife, and through the ordinary routines that become unbearable to the clinically depressed. Copeland also recreates interviews he’s made with other survivors of suicidal depression. Telling someone about such things is vital to preventing their worst outcomes, says Copeland, and telling his own story is meant to encourage others. It’s a worthy aim but only a fitfully engaging piece, since as drama it remains thin, standing at perhaps too respectful a distance from the convoluted torment and alienation at its center. (Avila)

BAY AREA

Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson The Stage, 490 S. First St, San Jose; www.thestage.org. $25-$50. Wed-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 29. An overrated president and rock musical at once, the 2010 Broadway hit by Alex Timbers (book) and Michael Friedman (music, lyrics) takes its first Bay Area bow in San Jose Stage’s ho-hum production, directed by Rick Singleton. In this proudly irreverent but rarely very witty take on mob-democracy and the pack of jackals that are our illustrious political forefathers, a vicious and ambitious cornpone Jackson (David Colston Corris, subbing for Jonathan Rhys Williams) takes his Indian-hating ways to the top of the political establishment on a wave of backwoods resentments and Tea Party-style populism. Present-day parallels should run deep here, but the play is so shallow in its humor that it feels one-note for the most part, while its South Park-like insouciance has an unintentional way of making jokes about the Trail of Tears feel “too soon.” This American Idiocy and the 13 accompanying musical numbers are gamely if not always smoothly essayed by cast and band alike (under musical direction by Allison F. Rich), but dumb satire lines up with a generally unappealing score, straining after saucy eloquence while sounding derivative of the emo fare served up by the likes of Spring Awakening and that lot. A tack away from sheer vulgarity and buffoonery toward moralizing history lesson comes late in the hour and its guilty pretention — along with earlier gratuitous, vaguely uncomprehending references to Susan Sontag and Michel Foucault — only makes matters worse. (Avila)

Emotional Creature Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2025 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Wed/11 and Sun/15, 7pm (also Sun/15, 2pm); Thu/12 and Sat/14, 8pm (also Sat/14, 2pm). It’s not easy being a girl, and Eve Ensler’s newest play Emotional Creature leaves no scenario unexplored: from high school shaming rituals to ritual clitorectomies. If that sounds like a jarring juxtaposition, you’d be right. It’s difficult theatrically to transition seamlessly from a deeply affecting monologue about being a teenage sex slave in the Democratic Republic of Congo to a cute song about wearing miniskirts, and it’s equally difficult for the audience to change emotional gears rapidly enough to be able to adequately absorb the impact of each individual segment. Instead, the play comes off as an earnest but awkward Girl Scout Jamboree variety show — attempting to address as wide a variety of social ills as possible (from teen suicide to industrial pollution) — despite the strong and savvy acting chops of the six performers. In contrast to Ensler’s most popular work, The Vagina Monologues, which effectively “humanized” a part of the body by giving it something highly personal to say, Emotional Creature weirdly depersonalizes its girls by putting lines in their mouths (“I’m not the life you never lived”) that clearly come from an adult perspective. And as for those girls who don’t particularly identify as “emotional creatures” at all? For them, there are no words. (Gluckstern)

For the Greater Good, Or The Last Election This week: Cedar Rose Park, 1300 Rose, Berk; www.sfmt.org. Free (donations accepted). Sat/14-Sun/15, 2pm. Various venues through Sept. 8. SF Mime Troupe launches its annual political musical (this year’s theme: one percenters behaving badly); the show travels around NorCal parks and other venues throughout the summer.

King John Forest Meadows Amphitheater, 890 Belle, Dominican University of California, San Rafael; www.marinshakespeare.org. $20-35. Opens Fri/13, 8pm. Runs Sun/15, July 21, 27, 29, Aug 4, 10-12, 8pm; July 22 and Aug 5, 4pm. Marin Shakespeare Company kicks off its 2012 outdoor summer festival season with this history play.

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/14, 8:30pm; Sun/15, 7pm. 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)

Salomania Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; www.auroratheatre.org. $30-55. Tue, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 22. The libel trial of a politically opportunistic newspaper publisher (Mark Andrew Phillips) and the private life of a famous dancer of the London stage — San Franciscan Maud Allan (a striking Madeline H.D. Brown) — become the scandalous headline-grabber of the day, as World War I rages on in some forgotten external world. In Aurora’s impressive world premiere by playwright-director Mark Jackson, the real-life story of Allan, celebrated for her risqué interpretation of Oscar Wilde’s Salomé, soon gets conflated with the infamous trial (20 years earlier) of Wilde himself (a shrewdly understated Kevin Clarke). But is this case just a media-stoked distraction, or is there a deeper connection between the disciplining of “sexual deviance” and the ordered disorder of the nation state? Jackson’s sharp if sprawling ensemble-driven exploration brings up plenty of tantalizing suggestions, while reveling in the complexly intermingling themes of sex, nationalism, militarism, women’s rights, and the webs spun by media and politics. A group of trench-bound soldiers (the admirable ensemble of Clarke, Alex Moggridge, Anthony Nemirovsky, Phillips, Marilee Talkington, and Liam Vincent) provide one comedy-lined avenue into a system whose own excesses are manifest in the insane carnage of war — yet an insanity only possible in a world policed by illusions, distractions and the fear of unsettled and unsettling “deviants” of all kinds. In its cracked-mirror portraiture of an era, the play echoes a social and political turmoil that has never really subsided. (Avila)

Truffaldino Says No Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby, Berk; www.shotgunplayers.org. $18-25. Wed-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 5pm. Through July 22. For centuries, stock characters have insidiously demonstrated to the working classes the futility of striving against type or station with broadly comedic pratfalls, doomed to play out their already-written destinies with no hope for a change in script. Truffaldino (William Thomas Hodges) is one such pitiable character. Longing for his airheaded mistress, Isabella (Ally Johnson), playing second fiddle to his father, the iconic Commedia dell’Arte fool Arlecchino (Stephen Buescher), Truffaldino becomes increasingly dissatisfied with the monotony of the “old world” and strikes out for the new one — eventually washing up in Venice Beach. Despite their dayglo California veneer and sitcom-appropriate shenanigans, the new world characters he meets quickly come to resemble the stock commedia characters Truffaldino has left behind, and he finds himself similarly trapped in their incessantly recurring cycle — pining predictably for valley girl waitress, Debbie (Johnson again). What thankfully cannot be predicted is how Truffaldino manages to rewrite his destiny after all while reconciling his two worlds in a raucous comedy of errors anchored by the solid physical comedy of its stellar cast, particularly that of Stephen Buescher as both Arlecchino and Hal, who bounces, prances, tumbles, and falls down the stairs with the kind of rubber-jointed dexterity that should come with a “kids, don’t try this at home” warning label. (Gluckstern)

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

“Ballroom With a Twist” Marines’ Memorial Theatre, 609 Sutter, Second Flr, SF; www.marinesmemorialtheatre.com. $49-79. Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2 and 6pm. Through July 29. Dancing With the Stars pros and contestants from American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance perform pumped-up ballroom dance and music.

BATS Improv Bayfront Theater, B350 Fort Mason Center, SF; www.improv.org. Fri, 8pm, through July 27: “Naked” Theatresports, $17. Sat, 8pm, through July 28: “Spontaneous Broadway,” $20.

“Elect to Laugh” Studio Theater, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. Tue, 8pm. Through Nov 6. $15-50. Veteran political comedian Will Durst emphasizes he’s watching the news and keeping track of the presidential race “so you don’t have to.” No kidding, it sounds like brutal work for anyone other than a professional comedian — for whom alone it must be Willy Wonka’s edible Eden of delicious material. Durst deserves thanks for ingesting this material and converting it into funny, but between the ingesting and out-jesting there’s the risk of turning too palatable what amounts to a deeply offensive excuse for a democratic process, as we once again hurtle and are herded toward another election-year November, with its attendant massive anticlimax and hangover already so close you can touch them. Durst knows his politics and comedy backwards and forwards, and the evolving show, which pops up at the Marsh every Tuesday in the run-up to election night, offers consistent laughs born on his breezy, infectious delivery. One just wishes there were some alternative political universe that also made itself known alongside the deft two-party sportscasting. (Avila)

“Expiration Date: Still Good” Jewish Theater, 470 Florida, SF; www.pianofight.com. Thu, 8pm. Through July 19. $20. PianoFight’s female-driven comedy group ForePlays performs fan-fave sketches.

“The Front Row: Live at the Dark Room!” Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF; www.thefrontrow4.com. Sat/14, 8:30pm. $8. The all-girl sketch comedy troupe performs.

Keith Lowell Jensen San Francisco Punch Line, 444 Battery, SF; www.punchlinecomedyclub.com. July 17-18, 8pm. $15. The comedian performs and tapes a new CD for Stand Up! Records.

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

“Majestic Musical Review Featuring Her Rebel Highness” Harlot, 46 Minna, SF; www.herrebelhighness.com. Sun, 5pm. Through Aug 12. $25-65. Cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, performers in Baroque-chic gowns, music, and more.

“Mediate presents Soundwave ((5)) Humanities: Human Bionic” Lab, 2948 16th St, SF; www.projectsoundwave.com. Sat/14, 8pm. $12-25. Multimedia and interactive performances by Joe Cantrell, Kadet Kuhne, and Les Struck + Sonsherée Giles.

“Mediate presents Soundwave ((5)) Humanities: Sonicplace Exhibition” Intersection for the Arts, SF Chronicle Building, 925 Mission, SF; www.projectsoundwave.com. Opening night event Fri/16, 6-10pm, free. Exhibit runs Tue-Sat, noon-6pm. Through Sept 28. Innovative sound installations and exhibits presented by UC Santa Cruz’s OpenLab/Mechatronics Group.

“Stripping Down to Story” Garage, 715 Bryant, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/13-Sat/14, 8pm. $10-20. Comedian and performance artist Jovelyn Richards performs her solo show.

 

9 ways to say oui to Bastille Day

Andrew Lam
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9 ways to say oui to Bastille Day

Unless the tech kings and queens need to start watching their backs, there’s no accounting for the voracity San Francisco consumes all things Bastille Day (Sat/14). Why do we celebrate the anniversary of the storming of a French clink so comprehensively, when Canada Day goes all but unnoticed? Perhaps the answers will be clearer after this weekend — movies, concerts, food cart explosions, and more will be taking place now through Sat/14 in honor of the Bay’s most illogically favorite holiday.

Farewell, My Queen 

Landmark Theatres picked an appropriate time to unveil French director Benoit Jacquot’s film Farewell, My Queen. The flick follows the last three days of Marie Antoinette (Diane Kruger) and her reader (Léa Seydoux, the pale beauty from Midnight in Paris) in the chaos just before the French Revolution.

Showing at Embarcadero Center Cinema, 1 Embarcadero Center, SF; Shattuck Cinemas, 2230 Shattuck Ave, Berk.

www.landmarktheatres.com

Pre-Bastille Musicale with Baguette Quartet and GAUCHO

Peacefully ring in this not-so-peaceful holiday with a musical performance in the UC Berkeley Botanical Garden. Local group Baguette Quartette performs tangos, foxtrots, and more tunes endemic to 1920s and ’30s Paris. It’ll be joined by Gaucho, a Euro-New Orleans-inspired jazz group that prides itself on its ability to inspire foot-tapping. 

Thu/12 5:30-7:30pm, $12

University of California Berkeley Botanical Gardens

200 Centennial, Berk. 

(510) 643-2755 

botanicalgarden.berkeley.edu

“From Geek to Chic: French Fashion and Technology”

SF Fashion + Tech has acquired a collection of Bay Area industry notables to speak at their Bastille Day commemoration “French Technique: From Geek to Chic.” Enrich your intellect and your closet with drinks, music, and fashion tech talk. 

Thu/12 5pm-9pm, $15-$25

Temple

540 Howard, SF. 

f1wfrenchtechnique.eventbrite.com

Mugsy’s Pop-Up Wine Bar

El Rio busts out its new socially-conscious wine bar in honor of Bastille Day, where Francophile — or just plain wine-chugging — Missionaries can celebrate French independence with a cuppa and some patio-side sunshine. Just as the French revolutionaries stormed the Bastille on this monumental day, Mugsy proposes to storm your olfactory senses with a velvety wine with hints of licorice, chocolate, and lavender (and, somehow, plum, olive, and pepper), a 2009 Le Clos du Caillou Côtes du Rhône Vieilles Vignes Cuvee Unique. Quite a way to class up your Friday night happy hour. 

Fri/13 5:30-8:30pm

El Rio

3158 Mission, SF.

mugsywinebar.tumblr.com

Off The Grid Au Francais 

Foodies can rejoice in a Off The Grid’s solution to affordable French cuisine. In honor of the holiday, many of the street truck fair’s vendors will be offering special French-inspired items. Regardless of one’s culinary orientation (cupcake, crepe, and bahn mi, or baguette?), French gypsy jazz will accompany this cart food frenzy throughout the evening. 

Fri/13 5pm-9pm, free entry

Fort Mason Center, SF

www.offthegridsf.com

Bardot-A-Go-Go 

Go-go to the Rickshaw’s no-pretension dance floor for this always-fun Bastille Day pre-party. DJs Brothers Grimm and Pink Frankenstein will be providing the tunes to guide the night, and you can count on some Gainsbourg screenins to provide an appropriately-hazy French ambiance. Go-go girls, drinks, videos — even 1960’s hair-styling for only $10. 

Fri/13 9pm-11pm, $10

Rickshaw Stop

155 Fell, SF 

www.rickshawstop.com

Belden Place Block Party 

Celebrating another nation’s independence day has never felt so authentic. Tucked away in a FiDi alleyway, Belden is a focal point for Francophiles in San Francisco due to its tasty restaurants. Bastille Day turns the nook into a communal fete, with music and other festivities to boot. The festival recently ran into some trouble due to “past insanity” — always a good sign — but it’s pledged to  

Sat/14, check restaurant websites for hours

Belden between Pine and Bush, SF.

www.belden-place.com

KZYX Bastille Day benefit

Holler your support of community radio through a mouthful of crawfish etouffee — today Mendocino indie radio station KZYZ is raising funds for its community tunes with a full spread of French Cajun fare. Live tunes from Americana rockabillies Contino and that band’s fave openers Shaky Jake Blues Band featuring Rag Time Rick will be the perfect side dish to heaping bowls of gumbo, jambalaya, and red beans and rice with sweet corn boiled in Tabasco mash for the vegetarians music fans. 

Sat/14 3pm, $10-$15

Mendocino County fairgrounds

Highway 128, Boonville

www.kzyx.org

Le P’tit Laurent 

What is normally a highfalutin French restaurant is also a fabulous fete for those who want to get their dinner, drinks, and dancing all in one. The restaurant will serve its normal menu a la carte, keep its bar open until 2am, and rumor has it DJs and dancing will enter the scene at around 10:30pm.

Sat/14 5:00pm-10:30pm dinner, 10:30pm-2am drinks and dancing, $23

699 Chenery, SF. 

 www.leptitlaurent.net

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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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

Duck Lake The Jewish Theater, 470 Florida, SF; www.duck-lake.com. $17-35. Opens Fri/6, 8pm. Runs Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through July 28. PianoFight’s resident sketch comedy group, Mission CTRL, performs its new "ballet-horror-comedy."

For the Greater Good, Or The Last Election This week: Dolores Park, 18th St at Dolores, SF; www.sfmt.org. Free (donations accepted). Opens Wed/4, 2pm. Runs Sat/7-Sun/8, 2pm. Various venues through Sept. 8. SF Mime Troupe launches its annual political musical (this year’s theme: one percenters behaving badly); the show travels around NorCal parks and other venues throughout the summer.

BAY AREA

King John Forest Meadows Amphitheater, 890 Belle, Dominican University of California, San Rafael; www.marinshakespeare.org. $20-35. Previews Fri/6-Sun/8, 8pm. Opens July 13, 8pm. Runs July 15, 21, 27, 29, Aug 4, 10-12, 8pm; July 22 and Aug 5, 4pm. Marin Shakespeare Company kicks off its 2012 outdoor summer festival season with this history play.

ONGOING

Absolutely San Francisco Alcove Theater, 414 Mason, Ste 502, SF; www.thealcovetheater.com. $32-50. Thu-Sat, 8pm (no show Fri/6). Through Aug 18. A multi-character solo show about the characters of San Francisco.

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

Fwd: Life Gone Viral Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm (July 15, show at 7:30pm). Extended through July 22. The internet becomes comic fodder for creator-performers Charlie Varon and Jeri Lynn Cohen, and creator-director David Ford.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch Boxcar Playhouse, 505 Natoma, SF; www.boxcartheatre.org. $25. Wed/4-Thu/5, 8pm; Fri/6-Sat/7, 7 and 9:30pm; Sun/8, 5pm. Boxcar Theatre performs John Cameron Mitchell’s musical about a transgendered glam rocker.

Jip: His Story Marsh San Francisco, MainStage, 1062 Valencia, SF; www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Thu-Fri, 7:30pm; Sat, 2pm; Sun, 3pm. Through July 15. Marsh Youth Theater remounts its 2005 musical production of Katherine Paterson’s historical novel.

The Magic Flute War Memorial Opera House, 301 Van Ness, SF; www.sfopera.com. $31-340. Fri/6, 8pm; Sun/8, 2pm. San Francisco Opera adds some unexpected vitality to its new star-studded production of one of the world’s most popular operas, Mozart’s whimsical but philosophical tale of a romance and (Mason-inspired) spiritual evolution. Prince Tamino (poised tenor Alek Shrader) and sidekick Papageno (fine baritone Nathan Gunn in a blithe comedic performance) are on a quest to rescue from sorcerer Sarastro (imposing bass Kristinn Sigmundsson) the lovely Pamina (appealing soprano Heidi Stober), daughter of the Queen of the Night (the rousingly virtuosic Russian soprano Albina Shagimuratova). The battle royal between the Queen and Sarastro is one between darkness and light, but the emphasis of this joyful production is rightly on the latter, even as Tamino and Papageno’s journey takes them through the ritual rite of passage in Sarastro’s order, the Temple of Light. Visual artist Jun Kaneko (responsible for the giant ceramic heads on view outside the War Memorial Opera House until November) marshals a brightly extensive color palette and some state-of-the-art 3D software to create a mise-en-scène out of parallel planes of patterned line and color. These enveloping and fascinating geometric flights of fancy — animated by a drawn, human touch and organic trickles and blushes of color throughout — come complimented by wildly playful costumes, including a host of wonderfully oddball brightly painted birds, that make for some pleasantly cackling entrances. David Gockley’s English-language translation of the libretto, meanwhile, adds a zesty colloquial freshness whose tinge of irony contributes to an intellectual roominess that matches the aesthetic one, both together offering some necessary reflective space to the contemporary audience vis-à-vis the certainties of this Enlightenment fairytale. (Avila)

Proof NOHspace, 2840 Mariposa, SF; www.proofsf.com. Wed-Sat, 8pm. Through July 14. $28. Expression Productions performs David Auburn’s Pulitzer-winning play about a mathematician and his daughter.

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

The Scottsboro Boys American Conservatory Theater, 415 Geary, SF; www.act-sf.org. $20-95. Tue-Sat, 8pm (also Wed and Sat, 2pm; no matinee Wed/4); Sun/8, 7pm. Extended through July 22. American Conservatory Theater presents the Kander and Ebb musical about nine African American men falsely accused of a crime they didn’t commit in the pre-civil rights movement South.

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

Waiting… Larkspur Hotel Union Square, 525 Sutter, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $69-75. Thu-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through Aug 5. Comedy set behind the scenes at a San Francisco restaurant.

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through August 4. Brian Copeland (comedian, TV and radio personality, and creator-performer of the long-running solo play Not a Genuine Black Man) returns to the Marsh with a new solo, this one based on more recent and messier events in Copeland’s life. The play concerns an episode of severe depression in which he considered suicide, going so far as to purchase a handgun — the title coming from the legally mandatory 10-day period between purchasing and picking up the weapon, which leaves time for reflections and circumstances that ultimately prevent Copeland from pulling the trigger. A grim subject, but Copeland (with co-developer and director David Ford) ensures there’s plenty of humor as well as frank sentiment along the way. The actor peoples the opening scene in the gun store with a comically if somewhat stereotypically rugged representative of the Second Amendment, for instance, as well as an equally familiar "doood" dude at the service counter. Afterward, we follow Copeland, a just barely coping dad, home to the house recently abandoned by his wife, and through the ordinary routines that become unbearable to the clinically depressed. Copeland also recreates interviews he’s made with other survivors of suicidal depression. Telling someone about such things is vital to preventing their worst outcomes, says Copeland, and telling his own story is meant to encourage others. It’s a worthy aim but only a fitfully engaging piece, since as drama it remains thin, standing at perhaps too respectful a distance from the convoluted torment and alienation at its center. (Avila)

BAY AREA

Emotional Creature Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2025 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Tue and Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm; no show July 13); Wed, 7pm (no show Wed/4); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 15. It’s not easy being a girl, and Eve Ensler’s newest play Emotional Creature leaves no scenario unexplored: from high school shaming rituals to ritual clitorectomies. If that sounds like a jarring juxtaposition, you’d be right. It’s difficult theatrically to transition seamlessly from a deeply affecting monologue about being a teenage sex slave in the Democratic Republic of Congo to a cute song about wearing miniskirts, and it’s equally difficult for the audience to change emotional gears rapidly enough to be able to adequately absorb the impact of each individual segment. Instead, the play comes off as an earnest but awkward Girl Scout Jamboree variety show — attempting to address as wide a variety of social ills as possible (from teen suicide to industrial pollution) — despite the strong and savvy acting chops of the six performers. In contrast to Ensler’s most popular work, The Vagina Monologues, which effectively "humanized" a part of the body by giving it something highly personal to say, Emotional Creature weirdly depersonalizes its girls by putting lines in their mouths ("I’m not the life you never lived") that clearly come from an adult perspective. And as for those girls who don’t particularly identify as "emotional creatures" at all? For them, there are no words. (Gluckstern)

The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s New venue: Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through July 15. This new autobiographical solo show by Don Reed, writer-performer of the fine and long-running East 14th, is another slice of the artist’s journey from 1970s Oakland ghetto to comedy-circuit respectability — here via a partial debate-scholarship to UCLA. The titular Los Angeles residency hotel was where Reed lived and worked for a time in the 1980s while attending university. It’s also a rich mine of memory and material for this physically protean and charismatic comic actor, who sails through two acts of often hilarious, sometimes touching vignettes loosely structured around his time on the hotel’s young wait staff, which catered to the needs of elderly patrons who might need conversation as much as breakfast. On opening night, the episodic narrative seemed to pass through several endings before settling on one whose tidy moral was delivered with too heavy a hand, but if the piece runs a little long, it’s only the last 20 minutes that noticeably meanders. And even with some awkward bumps along the way, it’s never a dull thing watching Reed work. (Avila)

Salomania Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; www.auroratheatre.org. $30-55. Tue, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 22. The libel trial of a politically opportunistic newspaper publisher (Mark Andrew Phillips) and the private life of a famous dancer of the London stage — San Franciscan Maud Allan (a striking Madeline H.D. Brown) — become the scandalous headline-grabber of the day, as World War I rages on in some forgotten external world. In Aurora’s impressive world premiere by playwright-director Mark Jackson, the real-life story of Allan, celebrated for her risqué interpretation of Oscar Wilde’s Salomé, soon gets conflated with the infamous trial (20 years earlier) of Wilde himself (a shrewdly understated Kevin Clarke). But is this case just a media-stoked distraction, or is there a deeper connection between the disciplining of "sexual deviance" and the ordered disorder of the nation state? Jackson’s sharp if sprawling ensemble-driven exploration brings up plenty of tantalizing suggestions, while reveling in the complexly intermingling themes of sex, nationalism, militarism, women’s rights, and the webs spun by media and politics. A group of trench-bound soldiers (the admirable ensemble of Clarke, Alex Moggridge, Anthony Nemirovsky, Phillips, Marilee Talkington, and Liam Vincent) provide one comedy-lined avenue into a system whose own excesses are manifest in the insane carnage of war — yet an insanity only possible in a world policed by illusions, distractions and the fear of unsettled and unsettling "deviants" of all kinds. In its cracked-mirror portraiture of an era, the play echoes a social and political turmoil that has never really subsided. (Avila)

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

"Channels: An Evening of Cross-Disciplinary Performance" Shotwell Studios, 3252-A 19th St, SF; www.ftloose.org. Fri/6-Sun/7, 8pm. $10-20. Dancers Daria Kaufman, Bianca Brzezinski, and musician-composer Richard Warp perform Arti Ulate, a dance-theater piece; Brzezinski also performs a solo, Non-self.

"Comedy Bodega" Esta Noche Nightclub, 3079 16th St, SF; www.comedybodega.com. Thu/5, 8pm. Free (one drink minimum). Weekly free stand-up show. This week: Yayne Abeba, David Hawkins, Anna Seregina, Veronica Porras, Baruch P. Hernandez, and George Chen.

"Comedy Returns to El Rio" El Rio, 3158 Mission, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Mon/9, 8pm. $7-20. With Joe Klocek, Josh Healey, Regina Stoops, Johan Miranda, Shanti Charan, and Lisa Geduldig.

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

"The Eric Andre Show" Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell, SF; www.rickshawstop.com. Mon/9, 8pm. $10. Adult Swim-spawned, SF Sketchfest-presented faux-cable access variety show with musical guests and "real and fake celebrity appearances," hosted by actor Eric André.

"The Fag Hag Comedy Show" Deco Lounge, 510 Larkin, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Sun/8, 8pm. $10. Charlie Ballard hosts this stand-up comedy extravaganza, with headliner Glamis Rory and more.

"A Funny Night for Comedy" Actors Theatre of San Francisco, 855 Bush, SF; www.natashamuse.com. Sun/8, 7pm. $10. Natasha Muse and Ryan Cronin host stand-up comedians, including headliner Jason Wheeler, at their monthly talk show.

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

Carolina Lugo and Carolé Acuña’s Café Flamenco Peña Pachamama, 1630 Powell, SF; www.carolinalugo.com. Sun/8, 6:15pm. $15-19. Mother-daughter flamenco dance and music company.

"Majestic Musical Review Featuring Her Rebel Highness" Harlot, 46 Minna, SF; www.herrebelhighness.com. Sun, 5pm. Through Aug 12. $25-65. Cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, performers in Baroque-chic gowns, music, and more.

"Schwabacher Summer Concert" Herbst Theatre, 401 Van Ness, SF; www.sfopera.com. Thu/5, 7:30pm. $25-40. The young talent of the Merola Opera Program performs scenes from works by Bizet, Stravinsky, and more.

How they do it in New York: ‘Brooklyn Boheme’ premieres, SFNY goes out with a bang

Andrew Lam
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How they do it in New York: ‘Brooklyn Boheme’ premieres, SFNY goes out with a bang

Do people within a “scene” ever recognize it at the time? Does that self-awareness kill the vibe, or is it essential in forming a group identity? Perhaps the answers can be gleaned at the Thu/12 Bay Area premiere of hip-hop writer Nelson George’s latest flick Brooklyn Boheme — a documentary filled with glimpses of baby Rosie Perez, Erykah Badu, and Talib Kweli in the thick of their Fort Greene, Brooklyn heyday. The show’s being thrown down by SFNY,  the three-year event series concluding this week that has connected SF and NYC with promises of slick DJs in fancy hotels and bicoastal culture swap. 

Hip-hop historian Jeff Chang interviewed George about the period he explores in Boheme. In that exchange, George’s top five moments from Fort Greene circa mid-’80s to ’90s make it sound like a dream: 

“1. I had a book party for The Death of Rhythm & Blues at my place at 19 Willoughby Avenue in 1988 that attracted a very eclectic group of folks, from Russell Simmons to Melba Moore to supermodels. It was a very fun, memorable party.

2. Chris Rock coming over to that same apartment to pitch me the film that eventually became CB4.

3. Sneaking around one night to the apartments of two women who lived around the corner from each other for booty calls. A very risky, but exciting night.”

Judging from the trailer, Brooklyn Boheme is an insider’s look at the kids everyone wanted to be like in the ’90s. Yeah, that’s Michael Jordan hanging with Spike Lee, what? Mos Def — sorry, Yasiin Bey — pre-Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, visual artist Lorna Simpson reminiscing on the productivity that came from hanging out around densely-packed, extravagantly brilliant people (Lorna, I’m down for tips on how to do this if you’re offering.) The snapshot of the temporary community is made even more poignant with the knowledge of what came about in the neighborhood later on. The trailer acknowledges that Fort Greene has become synonymous with gentrification. Blame it on the artists… 

After the flick, head to the Clift Hotel for sets by KM/FM (King Most, FA, and Marky), Wonway Posibul (Latin Soul Brothers-Thinkbeat Radio), Haylow (Roy Ayers Project-70/30), and Jerry Nice (Groove Merchant Records). 

Brooklyn Boheme premiere

Thu/12 8pm; $5 movie only, $15-$45 movie and afterparty

Clay Theater 

2261 Fillmore, SF


SFNY wrap party-Brooklyn Boheme afterparty

Thu/12 10pm-2am

Clift Hotel 

495 Geary, SF

sfny6.eventbrite.com

The good old days in Rock Rapids, Iowa, the Fourth of July, 1940-1953

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(Note: In July of 1972, when the Guardian was short a Fourth of July story, I sat down and cranked out this one for the front page on my trusty Royal Typewriter. I now reprint it each year on the Bruce blog, with some San Francisco updates and postscripts.)

Back where I come from, a small town beneath a tall standpipe in northwestern Iowa, the Fourth of July was the best day of a long, hot summer.

The Fourth came after YMCA camp and Scout camp and church camp, but before the older boys had to worry about getting into shape for football. It was welcome relief from the scalding, 100-degree heat in a town without a swimming pool and whose swimming holes at Scout Island were usually dried up by early July. But best of all, it had the kind of excitement that began building weeks in advance.

The calm of the summer dawn and the cooing of the mourning doves on the telephone wires would be broken early on July Fourth: The Creglow boys would be up by 7 a.m. and out on the lawn shooting off their arsenal of firecrackers. They were older and had somehow sent their agents by car across the state line and into South Dakota where, not far above the highway curves of Larchwood, you could legally buy fireworks at roadside stands.

Ted Fisch, Jim Ramsey, Wiener Winters, the Cook boys, Hermie Casjens, Jerry Prahl, Elmer Menage, and the rest of the neighborhood gang would race out of  their houses to catch the action. Some had cajoled firecrackers from their parents or bartered from the older boys in the neighborhood: some torpedoes (the kind you smashed against the sidewalk); lots of 2 and 3-inchers, occasionally the granddaddy of them all, the cherry bomb (the really explosive firecracker, stubby, cherry red, with a wick sticking up menacingly from its middle; the kind of firecracker you’d gladly trade away your best set of Submariner comics for).

Ah, the cherry bomb. It was a microcosm of excitement and mischief and good fun. Bob Creglow, the most resourceful of the Creglow boys, would take a cherry bomb, set it beneath a tin can on a porch, light the fuse, then head for the lilac bushes behind the barn.

“The trick,” he would say, imparting wisdom of the highest order, “is to place the can on a wood porch with a wood roof. Then it will hit the top of the porch, bang, then the bottom of the porch, bang. That’s how you get the biggest clatter.”

So I trudged off to the Linkenheil house, the nearest front porch suitable for cherry bombing, to try my hand at small-town demolition. Bang went the firecracker. Bang went the can on the roof. Bang went the can on the floor. Bang went the screen door as Karl Linkenheil roared out in a sweat, and I lit out for the lilacs behind the barn with my dog, Oscar.

It was glorious stuff – not to be outdone for years, I found out later, until the Halloween eve in high school when Dave Dietz, Ted Fisch, Ken Roach, Bob Babl, and rest of the Hermie Casjens gang and I made the big time and twice pushed a boxcar loaded with lumber across Main Street and blocked it for hours. But that’s another story for my coming Halloween blog.

Shooting off fireworks was, of course, illegal in Rock Rapids, but Chief of Police Del Woodburn and later Elmer “Shinny” Sheneberger used to lay low on the Fourth. I don’t recall ever seeing them about in our neighborhood and I don’t think they ever arrested anybody, although each year the Rock Rapids Reporter would carry vague warnings about everybody cooperating to have “a safe and sane Fourth of July.”

Perhaps it was just too dangerous for them to start making firecracker arrests on the Fourth – on the same principle, I guess, that it was dangerous to do too much about the swashbuckling on Halloween or start running down dogs without leashes (Mayor Earl Fisher used to run on the platform that, as long as he was in office, no dog in town would have to be leashed. The neighborhood consensus was that Fisher’s dog, a big, boisterous boxer, was one of the few that ought to be leashed).

We handled the cherry bombs and other fireworks in our possession with extreme care and cultivation; I can’t remember a single mishap. Yet, even then, the handwriting was on the wall. There was talk of cutting off the fireworks supply in South Dakota because it was dangerous for young boys. Pretty soon, they did cut off the cherry bomb traffic and about all that was left, when I came back from college and the Roger boys had replaced the Creglow boys next door, was little stuff appropriately called ladyfingers.

Fireworks are dangerous, our parents would say, and each year they would dust off the old chestnut about the drugstore in Spencer that had a big stock of fireworks and they caught fire one night and much of the downtown went up in a spectacular shower of roman candles and sparkling fountains.

The story was hard to pin down, and seemed to get more gruesome every year – but, we were told, this was why Iowa banned fireworks years before, why they were so dangerous and why little boys shouldn’t be setting them off. The story, of course, never made quite the intended impression; we just wished we’d been on the scene My grandfather was the town druggist (Brugmann’s Drugstore, “Where drugs and gold are fairly sold, since 1902″) and he said he knew the Spencer druggist personally. Fireworks put him out of business and into the poorhouse, he’d say, and walk away shaking his head.

In any event, firecrackers weren’t much of an issue past noon – the Fourth celebration at the fairgrounds was getting underway and there was too much else to do. Appropriately, the celebration was sponsored by the Rex Strait post of the American Legion (Strait, so the story went, was the first boy from Rock Rapids to die on foreign soil during World War I); the legionnaires were a bunch of good guys from the cleaners and the feed store and the bank who sponsored the American Legion baseball team each summer.

There was always a big carnival, with a ferris wheel somewhere in the center for the kids, a bingo stand for the elders, a booth where the ladies from the Methodist Church sold homemade baked goods, sometimes a hootchy dancer or two, and a couple of dank watering holes beneath the grandstand where the VFW and the Legion sold Grainbelt and Hamms at 30¢ a bottle to anybody who looked of age.

Later on, when the farmboys came in from George and Alvord, there was lots of pushing and shoving, and a fist fight or two.

In front of the grandstand, out in the dust and the sun, would come a succession of shows that made the summer rounds of the little towns. One year it would be Joey Chitwood and his daredevil drivers. (The announcer always fascinated me: “Here he comes, folks, rounding the far turn…he is doing a great job out there tonight…let’s give him a big, big hand as he pulls up in front on the grandstand…”)

Another year it would be harness racing and Mr. Hardy, our local trainer from Doon, would be in his moment of glory. Another year it was tag team wrestling and a couple of barrel-chested goons from Omaha, playing the mean heavies and rabbit-punching their opponents from the back, would provoke roars of disgust from the grandstand. ( The biggest barrel-chest would lean back on the ropes, looking menacingly at the crowd and yell, “ Aw, you dumb farmers. What the hell do you know anyway? I can beat the hell out of any of you.”   And the crowd  would roar back in glee.)

One year, Cedric Adams, the Herb Caen of Minneapolis and the Star-Tribune, would tour the provinces as the emcee of a variety show. “It’s great to be in Rock Rapids,” he would say expansively, “because it’s always been known as the ‘Gateway to Magnolia.” (Magnolia, he didn’t need to say, was a little town just over the state line in Minnesota which was known throughout the territory for its liquor-by-the-drink roadhouses. It was also Cedric Adams’ hometown: his “Sackamenna.”) Adams kissed each girl (soundly) who came on the platform to perform and, at the end, hushed the crowd for his radio broadcast to the big city “direct from the stage of the Lyon County Fairgrounds in Rock Rapids, Iowa.”

For a couple of years, when Rock Rapids had a “town team,” and a couple of imported left-handed pitchers named Peewee Wenger and Karl Kletschke, we would have some rousing baseball games with the best semi-pro team around, Larchwood and its gang of Snyder brothers: Barney the eldest at shortstop, Jimmy the youngest at third base, John in center field, Paul in left field, another Snyder behind the plate and a couple on the bench. They were as tough as they came in Iowa baseball.

I can remember it as if it were yesterday at Candlestick, the 1948 game with the Snyders of Larchwood. Peewee Wenger, a gawky, 17-year-old kid right off a high school team, was pitching for Rock Rapids and holding down the Snyder artillery in splendid fashion. Inning after inning he went on, nursing a small lead, mastering one tough Larchwood batter after another, with a blistering fastball and a curve that sliced wickedly into the bat handles of the right-handed Larchwood line-up.

Then the cagey Barney Snyder laid a slow bunt down the third base line. Wenger stumbled, lurched, almost fell getting to the ball, then toppled off balance again, stood helplessly holding the ball. He couldn’t make the throw to first. Barney was safe, cocky and firing insults like machine gun bullets at Peewee from first base.

Peewee, visibly shaken, went back to the mound. He pitched, the next Larchwood batter bunted, this time down the first base line. Peewee lurched for the ball, but couldn’t come up with it. A couple more bunts, a shot through the pitcher’s mound, more bunts and Peewee was out. He could pitch, but, alas, he was too clumsy to field. In came Bill Jammer, now in his late 30’s, but in his day the man who beat the University of Iowa while pitching at a small college called Simpson.

Now he was pitching on guts and beer, a combination good enough for many teams and on good days even to take on the Snyders. Jammer did well for a couple of innings, then he let two men on base, then came a close call at the plate. Jammer got mad. Both teams were off the bench and onto the field and, as Fred Roach wrote in the Rock Rapids Reporter, “fisticuffs erupted at home plate.” When the dust cleared, Jammer has a broken jaw, and for the next two weeks had to drink his soup through a straw at the Joy Lunch. John Snyder, it was said later, came all the way in from center field to throw the punch, but nobody knew for sure and he stayed in the game. I can’t remember the score or who won the game, but I remember it as the best Fourth ever.

At dusk, the people moved out on their porches or put up folding chairs on the lawn. Those who didn’t have a good view drove out to the New Addition or parked out near Mark Curtis’ place or along the river roads that snaked out to the five-mile bridge and Virgil Hasche’s place.

A hush came over the town. Fireflies started flickering in the river bottom and, along about 8:30, the first puff of smoke rose above the fairgrounds and an aerial bomb whistled into the heavens. BOOM! And the town shook as if hit by a clap of thunder.

Then the three-tiered sky bombs – pink, yellow, white, puff, puff, puff. The Niagara Falls and a gush of white sparks.

Then, in sudden fury, a dazzling display of sizzling comets and aerial bombs and star clusters that arched high, hung for a full breath and descended in a cascade of sparks that floated harmlessly over the meadows and cornfields. At the end, the flag – red, white and blue – would burst forth on the ground as the All-American finale in the darkest of the dark summer nights. On cue, the cheers rolled out from the grandstand and the cars honked from the high ground and the people trundled up their lawn chairs and everybody headed for home.

Well, I live in San Francisco now, and I drive to Daly City with my son, Danny, to buy some anemic stuff in gaudy yellow and blue wrapping and I try unsuccessfully each year to get through the fog or the traffic to see the fireworks at Candlestick. But I feel better knowing that, back where I come from, everybody in town will be on their porches and on the backroads on the evening of the Fourth to watch the fireworks and that, somewhere in town, a little boy will put a big firecracker under a tin can on a wood porch, then light out for the lilacs behind the barn.

P.S. Our family moved in l965 from Daly City to a house in the West Portal area of San Francisco. There are, I assure you, few visible fireworks in that neighborhood. However, down at the bottom of Potrero Hill, the professional and amateur action is spectacular.

 From any Potrero Hill height, you can see the fireworks in several directions: the waterfront fireworks in the city, fireworks on the Marin side of the Golden Gate bridge, fireworks at several points in the East Bay, fireworks along the Peninsula coast line.

And for the amateur action, parents with kids, kids of all ages, spectators in cars and on foot, congregate after dusk along Terry Francois Boulevard in San Francisco along the shoreline between the Giants ballpark and Kellys Mission Rock restaurant.

The action is informal but fiery, fast,  and furious: cherry bombs, clusters, spinning wheels, high flying arcs, whizzers of all shapes and sizes. The cops are quite civilized and patrol the perimeter but don’t bother anybody. I go every year. I think it’s the best show in town. B3.

Garage Days re-revisited

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Garage Days re-revisited

MUSIC In 2003, at Moses Music in East Oakland, I stumbled across a CD labeled “Numskull of the Luniz Presents…Hittaz on tha Payroll, Ghetto Storm” (Hitta Records). I bought it and was blown away, not simply by the rappers — one of whom, Eddi Projex, has gone on to be a Bay hitmaker — but also by the cinematic expressiveness of the music, with its moody, minor-key atmospheres and rapid counterpunctual basslines, courtesy of the Mekanix: Dotrix 4000 and Kenny Tweed.

Who were they? I found out in ’04, when I met Dot at a Digital Underground show. Turned out, he’d been the group’s late ’90s tour DJ, but left to pursue production, forming the Mekanix with Tweed in 2001. They invited me to their High Street studio, the Garage, to meet J-Stalin, a rapper they were developing who’d debuted as a teen on Richie Rich’s Nixon Pryor Roundtree (Ten-Six, 2002).

Soon after, the yet-unnamed hyphy movement began to foment and I got a gig covering rap for a great metropolitan alt-weekly….

I’d say the rest is history but nothing in Bay Area rap is ever that simple. On the one hand, the prolific Stalin is among the most popular local rappers — currently second biggest seller after E-40, according to Rasputin rap buyer Saeed Crumpler — with Dot and Tweed producing his entire solo debut, On Behalf of the Streets (Zoo Ent., 2006) and a chunk of his sophomore effort, The Pre-Nuptial Agreement (SMC, 2010).

Besides Stalin and Eddi, the duo helped launch former Delinquent G-Stack’s solo career, as well as newer artists like Shady Nate, DB the General, and Philthy Rich. Last year, they even landed a track on the deluxe version of E-40’s Revenue Retrievin (Heavy on Da Grind), and 40 declares his intention to continue working with them.

“The Mekanix are pure talent,” 40 enthuses over the phone. “Even though they make mob music, you can tell they grew up listening to soul music from the R&B days; they could make a killer cry!”

On the other hand, in the digital age, when anyone can slap a beat together, the question is, how do you get paid for production in a region like the Bay, whose rap suffers the twin neglect of corporate radio and major labels? With the decline in album sales, rappers out here derive their music income chiefly from live performances, an option unavailable to producers.

Despite their undeniable artistic impact, the Mekanix today find themselves in a tiny East Oakland studio not far from the Garage where it all began.

“We can’t go outside without somebody playing our music,” Dot says. “That’s cool, but it’s not that fly if your rent ain’t paid.”

“We sell beats but it’s never consistent enough to feed our families and pay our bills,” Tweed admits. “That’s why we’re putting out albums now.”

Thus the duo have made 2012 the year of the Mekanix, beginning with February’s The Chop Shop (Zoo Ent.), a digitally-released compilation of Youtube and street hits they’ve produced for various artists, with a handful of new cuts like the Yukmouth-driven title song.

They followed in April with the Go Boyz, Everything Must Go (Zoo Ent.), a “lost” supergroup project from the hyphy era (ca. ’05), featuring Kaz Kyzah (the Team), Stalin and Shady (Livewire), and Dot himself on vocals in addition to producing with Tweed. Almost released half-a-dozen times, in deals that collapsed at the last minute, the darkly comedic, Ecstasy-themed Everything destroys most Bay albums of that period and remains fresh, even if Shady especially is a far greater beast on the mic today.

Both releases, however, are merely set-up for an album “coming all the way new,” according to Tweed: The Chop Shop 2 (Zoo Ent.), due late July. With a pair of monster lead singles — “Bay Area Perspective” teaming 40, Stalin, Keak Da Sneak, and Turf Talk, and “Money” featuring a vintage verse by Mac Dre recorded at the Garage, alongside fresh contributions from Stalin, Keak, and Bay R&B phenom R.O.D. — Chop 2 is the most ambitious Mekanix project to date, its judiciously matched voices sewn together by the gradual emergence of Dot’s rapping alter ego, 4rax.

Oddly enough, 4rax has had airplay outside the Bay, largely from DJ Premier, who’s spun several tracks on his SiriusXM show, Live from Headqcourterz, over the past two years. But Dot’s only begun sprinkling the conscious thug persona into the mix locally, dropping a very Oakland video, “Kerosene,” in January.

“4rax always been there,” Dot says. “I just ain’t focused on him. But it’s at the point where, shit, we done focused on everyone in the Bay, so either I do it now or not at all.”

“We’ve laid the groundwork, but people gotta pay for it this time,” he laughs. “But we made it; we’re still here.”

Our Weekly Picks: June 27-July 3

Andrew Lam
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WEDNESDAY 27

“Turbulence (a dance about the economy)”

Breaking down the proscenium is one thing. Favoring installations over stage presentation is another. But messing with the distinction of representation and participation is something else entirely. No one I know of so radically questions the very essence of performance as does Keith Hennessy. What do you call it when in the process of creation, the viewer disappears into the action? For Hennessy it’s a political act. “Turbulence, (a dance about the economy),” which he describes as a “collaborative failure,” was already in the making when Occupy Wall Street exploded. Just as in life, during the “Turbulence” presence at CounterPULSE last December, some people stepped up, others left, the majority sat and waited. (Rita Felciano)

8pm, free

CounterPULSE

1310 Mission, SF

(415) 626-2060

www.counterpulse.org


THURSDAY 28

Andy Rourke of the Smiths (DJ set)

Your inner disco dancer better not be dead, because Smiths bassist Andy Rourke is coming to town, with a crate of records in tow. Ever since he moved to NYC from across the pond, Rourke has become a fixture in the city’s DJ circuit. Instead of aiming for a unified sound with his sets, he jumps impulsively between pop, funk, and electronica, compiling a vibrantly erratic patchwork quilt of his musical influences. Will Rourke tip his hat to the Mozfather with a few beloved Smiths numbers when we least expect it? Only one way to find out, so, clubgoers of the world unite! (Taylor Kaplan)

With Aaron Axelsen and Omar

10pm, $12

Rickshaw Stop

155 Fell, SF

(415) 861-2011

www.rickshawstop.com

 

Russian Circles

These dudes produce a lot of noise for just three people. The Chicago-based Russian Circles employ heavy use of effects pedals to layer their instrumental, wallowing metal, creating a deep pitß of sound. Their songs seamlessly transition from chugging, mathematical guitar riffs to soft, melodic interludes. In concert, the band is impressively able to replicate and expand upon their complex recorded work, which features enough tempo, time signature, and key shifts to awe anyone with a basic understanding of music theory. It’s metal for the thinking (wo)man, but not to worry, it still shreds. (Haley Zaremba)

With Deafheaven, And So I Watch You From Afar

8pm, $14

Great American Music Hall

859 O’Farrell, SF

(415) 885-0750

www.gamh.com


FRIDAY 29

“The Official Blues Brothers Revue”

With an all-star musical cast and the comedic genius of John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, the beloved 1980 film The Blues Brothers paired one of the best soundtracks of all time with an action packed storyline that continues to thrill. The movie — which screens at the Paramount Theatre in Oakland on Friday night — has also inspired a top notch musical tribute show, “The Official Blues Brothers Revue,” featuring the talents of Wayne Catania and Kieron Lafferty as Jake and Elwood, all with the approval of Belushi’s estate and Aykroyd. So put on your suits, shades, and fedoras and get ready to join the boys this weekend on their “mission from God!” (Sean McCourt)

Fri/29-Sat/30, 8 and 10pm, $25–$35

Yoshi’s

1330 Fillmore, SF

(415) 655-5600

www.yoshis.com

 

Pepper 19-Year Anniversary

It’s been 19 years since a gaggle of scruffy dance-and-drink fanatics took over Monday nights at Don’s Different Ducks bar in the Lower Haight, spun some funky house records, and imbibed with abandon, often using the plywood-covered pool table as a dance floor. Pepper, they called it, and although it’s moved around a lot since the Don’s days (it was one of the Guardian’s favorite roving parties of the 1990s), it’s still held strong, retaining its ragtag aura even as its players have become lionized. For this installment, at 222 Hyde in the Tenderloin, DJ Charlotte the Baroness returns from her new home in Chicago to join originator Toph One, fresh out of the hospital after a tragic hit-and-run, on the decks with the Pepper family. Good friends, good fortune, new faces, no-holds-barred dancing. (Marke B.)

9pm, $5

222 Hyde, SF

(415) 345-8222

www.222hyde.com

 

Dent May

She visits from Brooklyn, he attempts to show her a fun time. “You Can’t Force a Dance Party,” from 2009’s The Good Feeling Music of Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele, wryly introduced May as an affective personality to rival Jonathan Richman and Jens Lekman. It’s not hard to see the autobiographical elements in his music when he sings of his native state, “For you I’ll try so hard to make you see, it ain’t so bad in Mississippi.” Dropping out of NYU, May returned home to work on music and helped found the Cats Purring arts collective/”infotainment cult.” With his new release, Do Things — a slice of sun that sounds like the product of playing with a drum machine after listening to “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” on repeat/acid — May proves that the party is wherever he goes. (Prendiville)

With Quintron and Miss Pussycat

9pm, $9–$12

New Parish

579 18th St., Oakl.

www.thenewparish.com

 

Sat/30 9:30pm, $10–$12

With Quintron and Miss Pussycat, Shannon and the Clams

Elbo Room

647 Valencia, SF (415) 552-7788

www.elbo.com

 

Sandwell District

The SF techno scene blossomed nicely in spring, a kaleidoscope of pixellated textures, live experiments, and visiting representatives of a global scene unburdened from any anti-intellectual strains by the rise of pop EDM. There was also some damn good dancing to be had, no lie. Perhaps auguring a summer full of even deeper, and, perhaps, harder sounds, a showcase from Berlin’s Sandwell District label kicks the season off with some sophisticated boom-boom from Function, Rrose, and Silent Servant at Public Works, presented by the As You Like It party crew. Entrancing UK slow-burn disco king Mark E gives something to swing our skirts to upstairs, and the whole shebang kicks off with the debut of Amélie Ravalec’s documentary Paris/Berlin: 20 Years of Underground Techno. (Marke B.)

9pm, $15–$20

Public Works

161 Erie, SF

(415) 932-0955

www.ayli-sf.com


SATURDAY 30

The Slow Motion Cowboys

The music of the Slow Motion Cowboys has a subtle summery ease — it makes you want to pick up a banjo and play along, perhaps while sipping some lemonade out on the porch. You’d close your eyes and strum along to the sounds of upright bass, gentle guitar picking, baritone ukulele, and fiddle. The group’s original songwriting style and arrangements capture that wistful feeling of yearning that so characterizes classic folk and bluegrass music. While contemporary enough to strike interest in a city audience, their sound is country enough to provide you with much needed peace of mind on a Saturday night out on the town. (Shauna C. Keddy)

6pm, $8–$10

Amnesia

835 Valencia, SF

(415) 970- 0012

www.amnesiathebar.com

 

Kafana Balkan

Admit it: you could use a lot more woozy oompah-pah in your life, a splash of wheeling fiddle-dee-dee, soaring hurrah, and bouncey bass arpeggio. Forget the automated four-four march of your quotidian existence, and whirl away from the rat race like a romanticized gypsy, a musical nomad free of the cubicle, the log-in, the comments section, the endless update. Kafana Balkan, one of our best Romani-inspired parties, mixes gypsy tunes and strong drink with a wee bit of playa dust to conjure non-stop ecstatic dancing: this blowout with live powerhouses Brass Menazeri and Fishtank Ensemble (and fantastic DJ Zeljko) is just the ticket to chase away any reality blues. (Marke B.)

9pm, $15

Great American Music Hall

859 O’Farrell, SF.

www.slimspresents.com


SUNDAY 1

Party Hard(ing)

When it comes to the high stakes game of gentrification, the Divisadero Corridor — lovingly dubbed DivCo by the passels of farmers market-minded individuals that have repopulated the once-African American, once-Western Addition — is betting high. The neighborhood has the critical mass of sustainability activists needed to launch high profile wars against big bank incursion, and drive the conversation on what kinds of new businesses belong on their street. The Harding Theater at 616 Divisadero is a new battle site. Neighborhood groups hope to thwart the efforts of condo developers and make it a community space. Today, come party and fundraise to that end with local vendors, barbers, musicians, and chefs in a gorgeous Alamo Square mansion. (Caitlin Donohue)

7-10pm, $20

Westerfield Mansion

1988 Fulton, SF

Facebook: Party Hard(ing)

www.nddivis.org

 

Lower Dens

Ever since Lower Dens made some year-end lists with 2010’s Twin Hand Movement, bandleader Jana Hunter has kept Kraftwerk’s Radio-Activity in heavy rotation. And, it shows. The Baltimore outfit’s breakthrough follow-up record, Nootropics, doubles down on thick, Krautrockabilly grooves, with the Zen-like propulsion of Lou Reed cruising the Autobahn. The production aesthetic is fascinating in its ability to sound both dry and soaked in reverb, and the album’s second half reveals a newfound interest in Musique concrète, giving the material an artier edge. Sure, they’ve upped their studio game, but the question remains: how will the band rock these songs in a live setting? (Kaplan)

With No Joy, Alan Resnick

8pm, $15

Independent

628 Divisadero, SF

(415) 771-1421

www.theindependentsf.com


MONDAY 2

The Casualties

Punk’s not dead! The Casualties made sure of it when they formed in New York in 1990 with the purpose of bringing punk back to its roots, in the style of the Exploited and pre-Rollins Black Flag. More than 20 years and eight studio albums later, they’re following through on their proclamation “The punx are fucking here/ You know who we are/ We’re here til the end/ Die hards! Die hards!” With over two decades to perfect their stage dives and liberty spikes, the Casualties are guaranteed to deliver a killer show. Expect some brutal circle pits. (Zaremba)

With Nekromantix, Down By Law, Lower Class Brats, the Sheds

7pm, $16

Oakland Metro Opera House

630 Third St, Oakl.

(510) 763-1146

www.oaklandmetro.org

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.

Music Listings

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

WEDNESDAY 27

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Adios Amigo, Dreamdate, Garrett Pierce Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $10.

Civil War Rust, Air Show Disaster, Why I Hate Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $8.

Keith Crossan Invitational Pro Blues Jam Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $15.

Trini Lopez Rrazz Room. 8pm, $40-$45.

Jason Marion vs. Lee Huff Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

Terry Savastano Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Symbolick Jews, Konichiwa Baby, Impersonations Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $6.

Tanlines, Aaron Axelsen, Miles the DJ Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $10.53.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

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

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Nachito Herrera Trio Yoshi’s. 8pm, $20.

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

Full-Step! Tunnel Top. 10pm, free. Hip-hop, reggae, soul, and funk with DJs Kung Fu Chris and Bizzi Wonda.

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

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

Shutter Elbo Room. 10pm, $5. With DJs Nako, Omar, and Justin.

Southern Fried Soul Knockout. 9:30pm, $3. With Selectors Medium Rare, Psychy Mikey spinning barbecue greasy soul.

THURSDAY 28

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Anthem Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

AVICII, Chuckle, Cazzette Bill Graham Civic Auditorium. 8pm, $49.50.

Harper Blynn, Madi Diaz Cafe Du Nord. 8pm, $10.

Butch Whacks & the Glass Packs Bimbo’s. 8pm, $45.

Shane Dwight Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $16.

Fake Your Own Death, Glass Trains, Le Panique Hemlock Tavern. 8:30pm, $6.

High and Tight, Flexx Bronco, Lonely Kings, Parachute on Fire Thee Parkside. 9pm, $7.

Lee Huff vs. Jason Marion Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

Japonize Elephants Amnesia. 9pm, $7-$10.

J Boog, Katchafire, Irie Dole, Hot Rain Mezzanine. 9pm $35.

Trini Lopez Rrazz Room. 8pm, $40-$45.

Magic Trick California Academy of Sciences, 55 Music Concourse, SF; www.calacademy.org. 6pm, $10-$12.

Russian Circles, An So I Watch You From Afar, Deafheaven Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $14.

Sister Sparrow & the Dirty Birds Boom Boom Room. 8pm, $15.

Terry Malts, Rat Columns, Synthetic ID Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $10.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Chuchito Valdes Latin Jazz Band Yoshi’s. 8pm, $18; 10pm, $12.

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

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

DANCE CLUBS

Afrolicious Elbo Room. 9:30pm, $5-$7. With DJ/host Senor Oz and guests DJ Oneman, B Sears & Coolhands.

Andy Rourke (DJ set) Rickshaw Stop. 10pm, $12. Popscene vs the Smiths.

Afrolicious Elbo Room. 9:30pm, $5. DJs Pleasuremaker and Señor Oz spin Afrobeat, Tropicália, electro, samba, and funk.

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

Ritual Dubstep Thursdays Temple Nightclub, 540 Howard, SF; www.templesf.com. 10pm, $5. Dubstep with alternating DJs.

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

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

FRIDAY 29

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Baby Dee, Carletta Sue Kay Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 8pm, $12-$15.

Back Pages Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Blues Brothers Review Yoshi’s. 8pm, $30; 10pm, $25.

Bpos Showdown, 10 Sixth St, SF; www.showdownsf.com. 9pm, free.

Butch Whacks & the Glass Packs Bimbo’s. 8pm, $50.

Delta Rae, Victoria George, Helena Independent. 9pm, $12.

El-P, Killer Mike, Mr. Muthafuckin’ eXquire, Despot Regency Ballroom. 8pm, $25.

Ian Franklin & Infinite Frequency Rockit Room. 9:30pm, $5.

Noah Griffin Union Room at Biscuits and Blues. 7:30pm, $10.

Growlers, Extra Classic, Cosmonauts Rickshaw Stop. 8:30pm, $13-$15.

Guido, Jason Marion, Lee Huff Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9pm.

Paula Harris Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $20.

Austin Hastings, Stellar J, Mischa Pollack Brainwash Cafe, 1122 Folsom, SF; www.brainwash.com. 8pm.

Trini Lopez Rrazz Room. 8pm, $40-$45.

Laura Marling Grace Cathedral, 1100 California, SF; www.lauramarling.com. 9pm, $39.50.

Moggs, Sons of Huns, Porch Hemlock Tavern. 9:30pm, $7.

Mrs. Magician, Mantles, Kids on a Crime Spree Bottom of the Hill. 10pm, $12.

Rad Cloud, Assateague, Sean Flinn and the Royal We, Sparrow’s Gate Amnesia. 9pm, $7-$10.

Chris Sprague & His 18 Wheelers, Mitch Polzak and 10-4, Kit & the Branded Men Cafe Du Nord. 9pm, $10-$12.

Justin Townes Earle, Tristen Great American Music Hall. 9pm, $21.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

El Sonido Callejero, Santos De Los Angeles Slim’s. 8pm, $13-$15.

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

DANCE CLUBS

Bloke Salutes Roxy Music Truck. 8pm, free. With DJ Bobby Please.

DJ What’s His Fuck Riptide Tavern, 3639 Taraval, SF; www.riptidesf.com. 9pm, free.

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

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

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

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

Sandwell District Showcase Public Works. 9pm, $15. With Function, Silent Servant, RRose, and more.

Sweater Funk Elbo Room. 10pm, $10. With DJs Jon Guillermo, Selecter DJKirk, Sabrina, Chun-Tech, special guests Mark Grusane and Mike Cole, and more.

Teenage Dance Craze Knockout. 10pm, $5. DJs Russell Quan, Okie Oran, and dX the Funky Granpaw spin surf, soul, garage, and more.

SATURDAY 30

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Alaric, La Corde, Crimson Scarlet, DJ Brown Amy El Rio. 10pm, $7.

Ben Benkert, Caldecott, Lifted Roots, Speed Goat Slim’s. 9pm, $14.

Big Tree, City Tribe, Yesway Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $10.

Blisses B, Green Door Hemlock Tavern. 6pm, $5.

Blues Brothers Review Yoshi’s. 8pm, $35; 10pm, $30.

Butch Whacks & the Glass Packs Bimbo’s. 8pm, $50.

Glitter Wizard, Shrine, Hot Lunch Hemlock Tavern. 9:30pm, $8.

Growlers, Extra Classic, Summer Twins Independent. 9pm, $15.

He’s My Brother She’s My Sister, Assemble Head in Sunburst Sound, Strange Vine Cafe Du Nord. 9:30pm, $10.

Kafana Balkan, Brass Menazeri, Fishtank Ensemble Great American Music Hall. 9pm, $15.

Trini Lopez Rrazz Room. 8pm, $40-$45.

Major Powers & the Lo-Fi Symphony, Billy Cramer & Share the Land, Prairiedog Amnesia. 9pm, $8-$10.

New Monsoon, Tim Carbone Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $12-$15.

Northerlies, Raven Marcus, Slow Motion Cowboys Amnesia. 5:30pm, $8-$10.

Quintron & Miss Pussycat, Dent May, Shannon and the Clams Elbo Room. 9:30pm, $12.

Royal Deuces, Jinx Jones & the King Tones, Miss Lonely Hearts Knockout. 10pm, $6.

Earl Thomas & the Blues Ambassadors Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $22.

Thundercult, Vir, Lotus Moons Thee Parkside. 9pm, $5.

Top Secret Band Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Trainwreck Riders Riptide Tavern, 3639 Taraval, SF; www.riptidesf.com. 9:30pm, free.

Via Coma, I The Mighty, Atlas Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $10.

Voco, Minot Thee Parkside. 3pm, free.

Greg Zema, Lee Huff, Jason Marion Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

Elliot Simpson Unitarian Universalist Society of San Francisco, 1187 Franklin, SF; www.tangentguitarseries.com. 7:30pm, $15.

Two Grands One Heart: Lynn Yew Evers and Margie Balter Salle Pianos, 1632 C Market, SF; www.lynnyewevers.com. 7-9pm.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

DANCE CLUBS

Icee Hot: Robert Hood Public Works Loft. 10pm, $10.

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

Woogie Nights with Alex Rose, Alexi Delano, Sammy Bliss, Sex Pixels Public Works. 9pm.

SUNDAY 1

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Apparitions, Rat Columns, Bad Backs Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $6.

Con Brio, Dia, Steer the Stars Cafe Du Nord. 9pm, $10.

Delicate Steve, Yalls, Al Lover Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 8:30pm, $8-$10.

Dream Theater, Crimson Projekct Warfield. 8pm, $52-$65.

Kally Price Old Blues and Jazz Band Amnesia. 8pm, $5.

Trini Lopez Rrazz Room. 5pm, $40-$45.

Lower Dens, No Joy, Ellie Beziat Independent. 8pm, $15.

Terry Savastano Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Vastum, Whitehorse, Laudanum Elbo Room. 4pm, $6.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Dwaine Spurlin Band Bliss Bar, 4026 24 St, SF; www.blissbar.com. 4:30-7:30pm, $10.

Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Stone Foxes Sigmund Stern Grove, 19th Avenue and Sloat Boulevard, SF; www.sterngrove.com. 2pm, free.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Twang Sunday Thee Parkside. 4pm, free. With Lone Star Retrobates.

DANCE CLUBS

Dub Mission Elbo Room. 9pm, $6. Dub, roots, and classic dancehall with DJ Sep, Maneesh the Twister, DJ Shockman.

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

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

MONDAY 2

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Bass Drum of Death, DZ Deathrays, Warm Soda Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $10.

Damir Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

French Cassettes, Butcher Brown, West Wingz Elbo Room. 9pm, $5.

Theo Katzman, Joey Dosik Cafe Du Nord. 8pm, $10.

Mates of State, Stepkids Independent. 8pm, $18.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Vieux Farka Toure Yoshi’s. 8pm, $22.

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

TUESDAY 3

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Driftless Pony Club Cafe Du Nord. 8pm, $10.

Family Folk Expolision Amnesia. 9:15pm, free.

Colleen Green, White Fang, Pamela Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, free.

“Hip Hop, Hope, and Harmony” Elbo Room. 9pm, $10. SF AIDS Walk benefit with Junior Toots, Zamico, DJ Lady Ryan.

Libyans, Adults, Face the Rail Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Sad Ladders El Rio. 8pm, $5.

Valient Thorr, Holy Grail, Royal Thunder, Kickass Bottom of the Hill. 8:30pm, $12.

Young Empire, Humans, Rio Rio Thee Parkside. 8pm, $10.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Gaucho Bottle Cap, 1707 Powell, SF; www.bottlecapsf.com. 7-10pm.

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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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

Absolutely San Francisco Alcove Theater, 414 Mason, Ste 502, SF; www.thealcovetheater.com. $32-50. Opens Thu/28, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm (no show Fri/29 or July 6). Through Aug 18. A multi-character solo show about the characters of San Francisco.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch Boxcar Playhouse, 505 Natoma, SF; www.boxcartheatre.org. $25. Opens Wed/27, 8pm. Runs Wed-Thu, 8pm; Fri-Sat, 7 and 9:30pm; July 8, 5pm. Through July 8. Boxcar Theatre performs John Cameron Mitchell’s musical about a transgendered glam rocker.

Jip: His Story Marsh San Francisco, MainStage, 1062 Valencia, SF; www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Previews Fri/29, 7:30pm. Opens Sat/30, 5pm. Runs Sun/1, 4:30; Thu-Fri, 7:30pm; Sat, 2pm; Sun, 3pm. Through July 15. Marsh Youth Theater remounts its 2005 musical production of Katherine Paterson’s historical novel.

Waiting… Larkspur Hotel Union Square, 525 Sutter, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $69-75. Opens Fri/29, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through Aug 5. Comedy set behind the scenes at a San Francisco restaurant.

ONGOING

Aftermath Stagewerx, 446 Valencia, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $25. Thu/28-Sat/30, 8pm. Theatre, Period presents Jessica Blank and Erik Jenson’s docu-drama, based on interviews with Iraqi civilians forced to flee after the US military’s arrival in 2003.

A Behanding in Spokane SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter, SF; www.sfplayhouse.org. $20-70. Wed/27-Thu/28, 7pm; Fri/29-Sat/30, 8pm (also Sat/30, 3pm). If Garth Ennis had been asked to write a comic book about a one-handed sociopath with a dark obsession, he might well have written something similar to Martin McDonagh’s A Behanding in Spokane. And admittedly, approached from that angle, a lot of the script’s dramatic flaws are more easily forgiven. There’s not a whole lot of subtle context or languid metaphor to be found in McDonagh’s criminal caper about the little-known “hand-dealing” trade, but as in Ennis’ best known work, Preacher, the pretty girl (Melissa Quine) is the smartest one in the room; the sociopath (Rod Gnapp) is interested in enacting as vicious a revenge on all humanity while spewing as many blatantly offensive invectives as possible; the boyfriend (Daveed Diggs) has some arrested development issues to work out; and the receptionist (Alex Hurt) takes the caricature of man-child to a whole new level. In fact, while all four actors deliver rock-solid performances of their mostly unsympathetic characters, it’s Hurt’s that impresses most. His spooky intensity and goofily tone-deaf determination plays like a combination of Adam Sandler and Arno Frisch, and if there’s a real sociopath in the room, the evidence suggests it’s probably him. Ultimately though the piece relies too heavily on hollow one-liners to remain interesting — a 20-minute farce stretched to 90 minutes — and quite unlike an Ennis comic, it does not leave one wanting more. (Gluckstern)

Bruja Magic Theatre, Fort Mason Center, Marina at Laguna, SF; www.magictheatre.org. $20-60. Extended run: Wed/27-Fri/29, 8pm; Sun/1, 2:30pm and 7pm. Although San Francisco’s Mission District is inexorably morphing into an empire of twee boutiques and haute cuisine, it’s still the first port of call for many Latin American migrants, and there are plenty of panaderias and botanicas tucked in between the sushi joints. In the Magic Theatre’s production of Bruja, playwright Luis Alfaro transplants the story of Medea to 24th Street by way of Michoacán, exploring the tension between retaining old-country values and staking out a future in a new world. Directed by artistic director Loretta Greco, the title role played by a stunning Sabina Zuniga Varela, this chamber version of the Greek tragedy hits hard, exposing each character’s darkest secrets to an unforgiving light. And every character, save the doomed brothers Acan and Acat (played the night I saw it by Daniel Castaneda and Gavilan Gordon-Chavez), has a secret to hide, even Medea, a curandera or healer by trade, whose powers run deeper and darker than her new world acquaintances, or even her old servant (Wilma Bonet) suspect. And when Jason (Sean San José) and his callous boss Creon (Carlos Aguirre), ruthlessly push Medea to her breaking point, her bloody vengeance proves, if little else, that she can play at ruthlessness better than anyone, whatever the consequences. (Gluckstern)

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

The Full Monty Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; www.roltheatre.com. $25-36. Thu/28-Sat/30, 8pm (also Sat/30, 2pm). In desperate times, how far would you go to turn a buck? The central premise of the 1997 movie and its namesake musical comedy The Full Monty, the answer to this question is right in the title, which limits the suspense, but amps up the expectations. Set not in Sheffield, England as in the movie, but the similarly economically challenged climate of Buffalo, New York circa the late nineties, the comical romp follows a group of unemployed steel workers who decide, rather optimistically, that spending one night as exotic dancers will solve their immediate financial woes. Banish all notions of a Hot Chocolate sing-along; the soundtrack of the stage musical has little in common with its cinematic predecessor, but there are a couple of toe-tappers, particularly the songs writ for the ladies: a belter’s anthem for their spry but elderly accompanist Jeanette (Cami Thompson), a snarky commentary on male beauty, “The Goods,” for the ensemble. On opening night, Ray of Light’s production ran about 15 minutes long after a late start, and the tempo seemed sluggish in parts, but once it hits its stride, The Full Monty should provide a welcome antidote to the ongoing, we’re-still-in-a-recession blues, red leather g-strings and all. (Gluckstern) Fwd: Life Gone Viral Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm (July 15, show at 7:30pm). Extended through July 22. The internet becomes comic fodder for creator-performers Charlie Varon and Jeri Lynn Cohen, and creator-director David Ford.

Lips Together, Teeth Apart New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed/27-Sat/30, 8pm; Sun/1, 2pm. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Terrence McNally’s play about two straight couples spending July 4 amid Fire Island’s gay community.

100 Saints You Should Know Thick House, 1695 18th St, SF; www.therhino.org. $10-30. Fri/29-Sat/30, 8pm; Sun/1, 3pm. Homespun scenic design notwithstanding, Theatre Rhinoceros and artistic director John Fisher offer a fine, engrossing production of this 2007 play by Kate Fodor (Hannah and Martin, RX), a sturdy comedy-drama about two fractured families colliding awkwardly in a sort of spiritual vacuum. Matthew (an intriguingly restrained Wiley Herman) is a desolate but forbearing Catholic priest sent on a leave of absence after a venial transgression involving some artful nude male photographs. Returning home, he endures a pained relationship with his devout, passively domineering Irish mother (Tamar Cohn, channeling a nicely measured mixture of stony discipline and childlike vulnerability). Soon Matthew gets an unexpected visit from single mom Theresa (a bright but shrewdly self-possessed Ann Lawler), a former Deadhead who now cleans the rectory and finds herself overcome with an urge to ask the gentle priest about prayer — just at the moment his faith seems to have left him. Meanwhile, Theresa’s too-cool-for-school teenager, Abby (a deft and hilarious Kim Stephenson), waits outside and does some preying of her own on a slower-witted but game young man from the neighborhood (a charmingly quirky Michael Rosen), both of them roiling with confused yearnings. The appealing characters and unexpected storyline come supported by some excellent dialogue, developing a searching theme that ultimately has less to do with formal religion than the ordinary but ineffable need it promises (problematically) to meet. “I think I could be religious or whatever if it made any sense,” notes Abby, “but it doesn’t make any sense.” It’s easy to agree with the teenager on this one. 100 Saints is a genuinely funny and compassionate play discerning enough to avoid naming the depths it sounds. (Avila)

Proof NOHspace, 2840 Mariposa, SF; www.proofsf.com. Wed-Sat, 8pm. Through July 14. $28. Expression Productions performs David Auburn’s Pulitzer-winning play about a mathematician and his daughter.

Reunion SF Playhouse, Stage Two, 533 Sutter, SF; (415) 677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org. $20. Wed/27-Thu/28, 7pm; Fri/29-Sat/30, 8pm. SF Playhouse presents a world premiere drama by local playwright Kenn Rabin.

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

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

Slipping New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed/27-Sat/30, 8pm; Sun/1, 2pm. Midwestern high-school senior Eli (Evan Johnson), a recent transfer from San Francisco, is a rebellious gay teen with issues — what American teen doesn’t have issues? But then Eli’s, which include the loss of a beloved father and a Hamlet-like resentment for his recently widowed, sexually liberated academic of a mom (a subtle Stacy Thunes), have already driven him over the ledge. Eli’s “slip” into a state of deep grief is further accelerated by the complicated, violently closeted love he left back in San Francisco. In flashbacks, Eli relives this punishing, irresistible relationship with Chris (a coiled, forceful Fernando Navales) as meanwhile new best friend Jake (Benjamin T. Ismail) gradually expresses more than platonic interest and life with mother builds toward a showdown, in New Conservatory’s Bay Area premiere of Bay Area–born playwright Daniel Talbott’s thoughtfully drawn if dramatically underdeveloped play. In contrast to Ron Gasparinetti’s purposefully vague “anywhere” of a monochrome set (consisting of several low or sloped stone slabs), director Andrew Nance’s cast are engagingly precise in their clear-eyed take on adolescent anguish. Johnson proves gracefully multifaceted as Eli, at turns unbearable in his loose, simmering rage and disarming in his helplessness and heartbreak. And a charmingly awkward and earnest Ismail makes wholly convincing Jake’s innocent moth-to-flame attraction. Indeed, the play’s weaknesses — including a dizzying amount of hopping around the time-space continuum and, more critically, a dramatic arc that’s too neat and shallow to be really satisfying — do not completely detract from a worthwhile subject that often feels drawn from life. (Avila)

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

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

BAY AREA

Emilie: La Marquise Du Chatelet Defends Her Life Tonight Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant, Berk; www.brownpapertickets.com. $18-25. Thu/28-Sat/30, 8pm; Sun/1, 2pm. Symmetry Theatre Company presents Bay Area playwright Lauren Gunderson’s romantic drama centering on the life of 18th-century French physicist and mathematician, Émilie du Châtelet (Danielle Levin) and her (here tempestuous) long-term romance with Voltaire (Robert Parsons). In a familiar conceit left accordingly vague, fate rematerializes Emilie from some hazy afterlife so that she may relive key moments in her life and account for herself. A Cartesian mind/body split rules the replay, with Emilie finding herself painfully attenuated from the world of the senses — her flashback self (played by an impressive Blythe Foster) alone able to enjoy sensual contact with her surroundings. Meanwhile, love and loyalty face the test as Emilie goes head-to-head with a male-dominated scientific establishment over a certain theorem she calls “force vivre” — a formula into which Gunderson cleverly folds theoretical physics and the irrational heart. There’s even a visual aid: a running tally is kept throughout on a screen at the back of the stage, where hash marks appear and disappear under the headings “philosophy” and “love” as the scenes wind their desultory way back toward the moment of her demise. Chloe Bronzan directs a cast of strong actors but their work is uneven. Foster alone is consistently commanding in a part that, while minor, suggests what a more muscular approach overall might have accomplished. The normally formidable Parsons seems uncommitted in the part of Voltaire, admittedly a character too simpering and watery as written to merit much credence. Instead of palpable relationships — whether with lovers or ideas — Emilie deploys self-conscious verbiage, strained repartee and heavy thematic underscoring to churn what amounts to thin drama. (Avila)

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

The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s New venue: Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through July 15. This new autobiographical solo show by Don Reed, writer-performer of the fine and long-running East 14th, is another slice of the artist’s journey from 1970s Oakland ghetto to comedy-circuit respectability — here via a partial debate-scholarship to UCLA. The titular Los Angeles residency hotel was where Reed lived and worked for a time in the 1980s while attending university. It’s also a rich mine of memory and material for this physically protean and charismatic comic actor, who sails through two acts of often hilarious, sometimes touching vignettes loosely structured around his time on the hotel’s young wait staff, which catered to the needs of elderly patrons who might need conversation as much as breakfast. On opening night, the episodic narrative seemed to pass through several endings before settling on one whose tidy moral was delivered with too heavy a hand, but if the piece runs a little long, it’s only the last 20 minutes that noticeably meanders. And even with some awkward bumps along the way, it’s never a dull thing watching Reed work. (Avila)

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri/29, 8pm; Sat/30, 5pm. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. Note: review from the show’s 2011 run at the Marsh San Francisco. (Avila)

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

Salomania Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; www.auroratheatre.org. $30-55. Previews Wed/20, 8pm. Tue, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Throgh July 22. The libel trial of a politically opportunistic newspaper publisher (Mark Andrew Phillips) and the private life of a famous dancer of the London stage — San Franciscan Maud Allan (a striking Madeline H.D. Brown) — become the scandalous headline-grabber of the day, as World War I rages on in some forgotten external world. In Aurora’s impressive world premiere by playwright-director Mark Jackson, the real-life story of Allan, celebrated for her risqué interpretation of Oscar Wilde’s Salomé, soon gets conflated with the infamous trial (20 years earlier) of Wilde himself (a shrewdly understated Kevin Clarke). But is this case just a media-stoked distraction, or is there a deeper connection between the disciplining of “sexual deviance” and the ordered disorder of the nation state? Jackson’s sharp if sprawling ensemble-driven exploration brings up plenty of tantalizing suggestions, while reveling in the complexly intermingling themes of sex, nationalism, militarism, women’s rights, and the webs spun by media and politics. A group of trench-bound soldiers (the admirable ensemble of Clarke, Alex Moggridge, Anthony Nemirovsky, Phillips, Marilee Talkington, and Liam Vincent) provide one comedy-lined avenue into a system whose own excesses are manifest in the insane carnage of war — yet an insanity only possible in a world policed by illusions, distractions and the fear of unsettled and unsettling “deviants” of all kinds. In its cracked-mirror portraiture of an era, the play echoes a social and political turmoil that has never really subsided. (Avila)

Wheelhouse TheatreWorks at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro, Mtn View; (650) 463-1960, www.theatreworks.org. $19-69. Wed/27, 7:30pm; Thu/28-Sat/30, 8pm (also Sat/30, 2); Sun/1, 2 and 7pm. TheatreWorks’ 60th world premiere is a musical created by and starring pop-rock trio GrooveLily.

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Fri/29, 6pm; Sat/30, 11am. Louis “The Amazing Bubble Man” Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

Alicia Dattner Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.theexit.org. Thu/28-Sat/30, 8pm. $26. The comedian performs.

“DEEPER, Architectural Meditations at CounterPULSE” CounterPULSE, 1310 Mission, SF; www.counterpulse.org. Fri/29-Sun/1, 8pm. $25. Lizz Roman and Dancers perform a site-specific work.

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

“I Heart Hamas: And Other Things I’m Afraid to Tell You” Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/29-Sat/30, 8pm. $20. Jennifer Jajeh performs her solo show, soon to be presented at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

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

“Majestic Musical Review Featuring Her Rebel Highness” Harlot, 46 Minna, SF; www.herrebelhighness.com. Sun, 5pm. Through Aug 12. $25-65. Cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, performers in Baroque-chic gowns, music, and more.

“Mission in the Mix” Dance Mission Theatre, 3316 24th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/29-Sat/30, 8pm; Sun/1, 7pm. $17. SF Hip-Hop DanceFest producer Micaya presents new work by her SoulForce Dance Company, plus guest performances.

“Nerdgasm” Garage, 715 Bryant, SF; wonderdave.wordpress.com. Thu/28, 8pm. $12. Poetry, storytelling, and more, for nerds and by nerds. Part of the National Queer Arts Festival.

“One Night Only Benefit Cabaret” Marines Memorial Theater, 609 Sutter, SF; www.richmondermet.org. Mon/2, 7:30pm. $25-65. Cast members from the American Idiot tour perform original music and comedy to raise money for the Richmond/Ermet AIDS Foundation and Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

“Picklewater Clown Cabaret: Robot’s Revenge!” Stage Werx Theatre, 446 Valencia, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Mon/2, 8pm. $15. Picklewater and guests perform physical comedy and other circus acts.

“Same Amor” Shotwell Studios, 3252-A 19th St, SF; www.ftloose.org. Fri/29-Sat/30, 8pm; Sun/1, 3pm. $10-20. Flamenco and contemporary dance, comedy, and live music, featuring Acuña Danza Teatro.

San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival Novellus Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard, SF; www.worldartswest.org. Sat/30-Sun/1, 3pm (also Sat/30, 8pm). $18-58. This final weekend of programming includes dance from Hawaii, India, Indonesia, Japan, Liberia, Mexico, the Philippines, Spain, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.

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

“This Is What I Want Performance Festival” SOMArts Cultural Center, 934 Brannan, SF; thisiswhatiwant.eventbrite.com. Wed/27-Fri/29, 8pm. $20. Part of the National Queer Arts Festival, this event features different bills each night of new, multidisciplinary performances from San Francisco and Los Angeles-based artists.

“Walking Distance Dance Festival” ODC Theater, 3153 17th St, SF; www.odctheater.org. Fri/29-Sat/30, 6:30pm; Sun/1, 2pm. $20-75. LEVYdance, inkBoat, Kunst-Stoff, and more participate in this new festival, featuring dance artists performing throughout ODC’s two-building campus.

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

Poverty Scholars Unite

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This post has been updated. RYME orientation is July 3, not June 27.

July 3 will begin another session of Poor Magazine’s revolutionary youth media education program, or RYME.

Poor Magazine was founded in 1996 as a way to bring together poor people to produce media, teach and learn, and create community. From their space in the Mission, they have launched the printed Poor Magazine, Poor News Network TV and Poor Radio, published dozens of books at Poor Press, and hold programming throughout the year.

One such program is People Skool, sessions for and by the people. Poor rejects status indicators like degrees and job titles in favor of expertise based on experience. People are esteemed as Indigenous Scholars, Poverty Scholars, Youth Scholars, and Mama Scholars share their knowledge at People Skool.

The RYME session is “a multi-generational , mutli-lingual skool,” according to Tiny Gray-Garcia, Poor Magazine’s co-founder.

The program will “teach our children and families back their stolen indigenous languages through art and project based learning– this summer we will be teaching media, radio, music, art and journalism with a focus on eldership, indigenous herstories and histories ” Gray-Garcia said in an email.

Tuition for the program is based on ability to pay, and can range from $90 – 500. There are full scholarships and stipends provided for youth in poverty.

At tomorrow’s orientation, youth can learn about the program, which runs through July 31, and a “healthy homemade lunch” with “vegan and meat options provided” will be served, Gray-Garcia said.

Revolutionary Youth Media Education orientation/registration

July 3, 4pm, free

Poor Magazine

2940 16th St., #301, SF

www.racepovertymediajustice.org

Youth scholars from last summer’s RYME program conduct interviews outside City Hall

Free classes for all

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Free classes for all

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Science Literacy w/ Barbara-Ann Lewis

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

Responsive Cinema w/ Rand Crook

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

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

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

History in digital culture w/ Molly Hankwitz

Sundays 6-8pm

Mutiny Radio Café, 2781 21st St

Occupy U w/ Stardust

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

www.uotc.org/wordpress

Don’t funk with THEESatisfaction’s groove

Tony Robles
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Cat Harris-White and bandmate Stasia Irons know how to write a memorable lyric. “Queens of the Stoned Age/and princess of time/feel our energy/floating through your mind.”

The totally DIY hip-hop duo, which makes up THEESatisfaction, earlier this year released groundbreaking, 30-minute debut LP awE NaturalE. But they’ve long been a part of the emerging Seattle art scene. In it, they’ve been creating a nearly incomparable sound, at least, galaxies away from swag, with roots in soul and jazz overlaid by spacey electronic beats, cosmic funk zaps, and unexpected twists, along with eloquent sing-rapped verses.

Each track on the record holds a mini story, another sound exploration. The chopped, wordless R&B opener “awE” blends easily into funky beat-poetry style “Bitch,” on which the duo sings, “I’m always finding a time/when I feel I need to please you/but why do I even give a fuck/A fuck about/how the world trails off/off.” Fade out.

There’s floaty, twinkling “Juiced” and powerful closer “Naturale”. Synthy, whistle-dropping, hand-clapping jam “QueenS” should, in a perfect world, be the summer anthem of 2012. On it, their mission statement: “Leave your face at the door/turn off your swag /check your bag.”

I talked with both Harris-White and Irons about all this – musical origins, the nature of DIY creation, being sci-fi Trekkies, Seattle’s current hip-hop surge, harmonizing with Drake, and memorable personal anthems (hint: Montell Jordan) –  prior to their SF show this weekend:

SFBG How was the Europe tour?

Cat Harris-White It was really good, we did 12 shows out there in two weeks so it was kind of intense, but the crowds were really cool. We got to see a lot of cool people and go to different places we’ve never been – we went to the Netherlands, where we’ve never been before, and Brussels.

Stasia Irons This time we got to go up to Sweden and Belgium, we even dipped into Germany, we didn’t have a show there but we passed through Dusseldorf, Germany, so that was awesome. We went out in Scotland to a nightclub and [laughs] we had a lot of fun. We were out pretty late, but that’s how they party.

SFBG It must be much easier to get around on tour with just the two of you, as opposed to a larger backing band, or with roadies?

SI Yeah, it’s much easier, you can take the train.

SFBG [THEESatisfaction] comes from a pretty DIY sensibility, a scene where you’re making your own handmade CDs and tapes?

CHW Definitely, we were doing our own thing. We’re self-managed. It’s just a totally different experience, because we get to make the decisions and decide what we’re doing.

SFBG Does that also influence the style of music you’re making?

SI Yeah, when we first started off we just made music for ourselves, just to enjoy at home and play around. We kind of developed the way we sound over time just listening to a lot of different kinds of music and figuring out what we wanted.

We really like gospel and jazz. We both come from those genres. I was more heavily in gospel and Cat was well-versed in jazz. So we started there. And then since we’re doing it ourselves, we can go anywhere we want with it.

SFBG I’ve seen a lot of comparisons, to acts like Shabazz Palaces or even ESG, but beyond that I feel like it does have a very different sound, and it probably comes from that DIY sensibility – how do you feel about comparisons to other acts?

CHW I accept them, and it’s cool that people can draw those lines. I’m never really offended. I like when they’re able to pick out people who I really like. Someone told us that we reminded them of TLC and SWV and Digable Planets.

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

SFBG On the album, there are such interesting turns of phrases, and wordplay, I was wondering where that came from – are you voracious readers, students of hip-hop?

SI We read a lot, especially now more than ever. When we first started out we were just listening to a lot of music, and not really reading a lot. But now, since we did the album, we were heavily in to black sci-fi authors. I went to school for English, and Cat went to school for vocal jazz, so that’s the reason too.

SFBG There are some sci-fi sounds, outer-space atmospheres on the album — was that sort of spacey vibe intentional?

CHW Yeah, we’ve always been into sci-fi too, I’m totally a Trekkie and everything like that. We’ve always been into outer-space and exploring beyond what’s here on earth, and exploring deeper into what is here on Earth. Where we come from, where we’re going. We’re researchers and historians. We’re always interested in finding out different information, I guess that comes out in our sound.

SFBG Who are some of the authors you’re reading currently?

CHW Right now we’re reading a lot of Octavia Butler.

SI Toni Morrison. Oh, Shakespeare.

CHW Shakespeare definitely. Alice Walker as well.

SFBG I feel like “Queens” is a really anthemic song – a song that people want to shout out the lyrics to – what were the anthems of your youth?

CHW Growing up I listened to a lot of George Clinton and P-Funk and Parliment. “We Want the Funk” and just all their songs. You know what I’m saying? Those songs go on for like 10 minutes and they’re just chanting and harmonizing and blending things, so those kind of songs were anthemic, but also songs from Chic and SOS Band and other songs like that that have the same kind of vibe.

SI My mom listened to R&B a lot — so “This Is How We Do It” comes on, obviously I’m going to be reciting all the lyrics. Party jams like that. A lot of New jack swing and shit too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hiUuL5uTKc

SFBG What’s your music scene like in Seattle?

CHW Yes, Seattle is poppin’ right now, as far as music. A lot of friends are involved in it, not necessarily only music, but arts, authors. A lot of artsy people. But hip-hop is what’s really going on right now. It used to be a lot of grunge and indie bands and they’re still there, but I see like a lot of different kinds of hip-hop coming out of Seattle right now.

As you said Shabazz, and then there’s Champagne Champagne, a lot of great hip-hop DJs – Chocolate Chuck. There’s punk hip-hip, party hip-hop, sad hip-hop [laughs], Christian hip-hip.

SFBG Christian hip-hop?

CHW [Laughs] there’s a lot of that going on. That’s actually how I started getting involved [with music]. When I was kid, going to church, there was a group called Cave and I didn’t know they were Christian hip-hop, they never cursed or anything but their songs were just really good and usually gospel hip-hop isn’t all that good, but they were pretty dope.

SFBG Any thoughts on the current state of mainstream hip-hop? I guess “mainstream” is kind of a fast and loose description, but radio-popular hip-hop in 2012?

CHW I don’t have a problem with it essentially in a big way, because there’s always a certain place for it, on the radio and TV. There’s always been a popular format of music, music that’s highly promoted to the world. The music you’ll hear when you go places – you’ll hear Flo Rida or Odd Future or Nicki Minaj, or maybe LMFAO. There’s music that will always be promoted because there’s a certain force behind it and that’s fine. It’s been around as long as radio’s been around.

SFBG Do you have any dream collaborators?

CHW Fantasy-wise, Prince or Stevie Wonder. Missy Elliot, Timbaland too. Esperanza Spalding. Drake [laughs], we can harmonize with Drake.

 

THEESatisfaction
WIth Le Vice
Fri/22, 9pm, $14
Independent
628 Divisadero, SF
(415) 771-1421
www.theindependentsf.com

Stage Listings

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

THEATER

OPENING

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

ONGOING

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

BAY AREA

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

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

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

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

The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s New venue: Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through July 15. This new autobiographical solo show by Don Reed, writer-performer of the fine and long-running East 14th, is another slice of the artist’s journey from 1970s Oakland ghetto to comedy-circuit respectability — here via a partial debate-scholarship to UCLA. The titular Los Angeles residency hotel was where Reed lived and worked for a time in the 1980s while attending university. It’s also a rich mine of memory and material for this physically protean and charismatic comic actor, who sails through two acts of often hilarious, sometimes touching vignettes loosely structured around his time on the hotel’s young wait staff, which catered to the needs of elderly patrons who might need conversation as much as breakfast. On opening night, the episodic narrative seemed to pass through several endings before settling on one whose tidy moral was delivered with too heavy a hand, but if the piece runs a little long, it’s only the last 20 minutes that noticeably meanders. And even with some awkward bumps along the way, it’s never a dull thing watching Reed work. (Avila)

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through June 30. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. Note: review from the show’s 2011 run at the Marsh San Francisco. (Avila)

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

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

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

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

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

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

 

Music Listings

Andrew Lam
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0

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

WEDNESDAY 20

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

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

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

Amy LaVere Hotel Utah.

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

THURSDAY 21

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

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

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

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

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

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

Gunshy Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

Stephanie Mills Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $60.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

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

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

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

SkisM DNA Lounge. 8pm, $15.

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

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

FRIDAY 22

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Sole Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

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

THEESatisfaction Independent. 9pm, $14.

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

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

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

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

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

SATURDAY 23

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Curumin Slim’s. 9pm, $16-$18.

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

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

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

Fusion Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

May’n Yoshi’s SF. 1:30pm, $50.

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

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

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

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

SUNDAY 24

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Amaral Independent. 8pm, $20.

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

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

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

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

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

Lisa Marie Presley Slim’s. 8pm, $22.

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

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

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

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

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

MONDAY 25

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

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

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

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

Damir Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

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

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

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

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Earl Brothers Amnesia. 6pm.

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

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

TUESDAY 26

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

‘Block Reportin’ 101′ and more at the San Francisco Black Film Festival

Sue Vaughan
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0
‘Block Reportin’ 101′ and more at the San Francisco Black Film Festival

Frameline is hitting screens tomorrow (our coverage here, here, and here), but this weekend also unspools another local festival worth your filmgoing time: the San Francisco Black Film Festival, which kicks off Fri/15 with Robert Townsend’s latest, based-on-a-true-story drama In the Hive. It’s about a group of at-risk teens struggling to continue their educations (with the help of tough-love administrators played by Loretta Devine and Michael Clarke Duncan).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFARWl3Q92A

The rest of the fest includes a “Focus on Fathers Family Day” featuring a new short doc by Kevin Epps; a games and animation-focused program topped off by a panel with Leo Sullivan (Fat Albert) and Morrie Turner (Wee Pals); and, of course, a huge slate of features and shorts, on a wide-cast net of subjects: pick-up basketball, hip-hop in Ghana, “good hair,” and more. Don’t miss mockumentary Thugs, The Musical — SF comedian Kevin Avery’s show biz satire in the vein of Townsend’s 1987 Hollywood Shuffle.

Of particular local interest is the Sat/16 screening of Block Reportin’ 101, S. “C-ya” Samura’s documentary about community activist and journalist J.R. Valray, “People’s Minister of Information,” and his work at the Bay Area’s own Block Report Radio. Check out the trailer below, and Valray’s own radio report on the SFBFF here.

Fri/15-Sun/17, $5-$50
Various venues, SF
www.sfbff.org

Music Listings

Andrew Lam
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0

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

WEDNESDAY 13

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Action Bronson Independent. 9pm, $17.

Buffalo Tooth, Uzi Rash, Poor Sons, Parmesans Elbo Room. 9pm, $5.

Keith Crossan Invitational Pro Blues Jam with Sista Monica Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $15.

Lee Huff vs. Rome Balestrieri Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

Iron Maidens; All-Female Iron Maiden Tribute Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $22.

Jail Weddings, Twin Steps, Better Maker Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Life and Times, Ume, Kitten Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $10.

Rin Tin Tiger, Bonnie & the BANG BANG, Roosevelt Radio Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 7:30pm, free with RSVP. The Lineup.

Terry Savastano Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

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

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

Ben Vereen Rrazz Room. 8pm, $45-$50.

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

Mod v Rockers: Beatles vs. Buzzcocks Make Out Room. 9pm. DJs spin mod, pop, R&B, Northern Soul, punk, and new wave.

“Tupac Birthday Celebration” Mezzanine. 8pm, $25. With Rappin’ 4Tay, Mac Mall, Ray Luv, Spice 1.

THURSDAY 14

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Aceyalone with live band Yoshi’s SF. 10pm, $20.

Rome Balestrieri vs. Lee Huff Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

Beat Connection, White Arrows, Mmoths, popscene DJs Rickshaw Stop. 9pm, $12.

Big Freedia Public Works. 9pm, $16.

Erin Brazil and the Brazillionaires, Yawpers, Tidelands Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Craig Horton Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $15.

Japandroids, Cadence Weapons Independent. 8pm, $15.

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

“Moshi Sound Studio” with Loquat, Halsted Monarch, 101 Sixth St, SF; www.do415.com. 8pm, free with RSVP.

Owl Paws, Sugar Candy Mountain, Hoot Hoots, Upstairs Downstairs Thee Parkside. 9pm, $6.

Real Nasty, Grand Nationals, Guella Cafe Du Nord. 9pm, $10.

Slippery Slope, Bodice Rippers, Go Van Gough Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $10.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

Stephanie Mills Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $60.

Ben Vereen Rrazz Room. 8pm, $45-$50.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

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

DANCE CLUBS

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

Darling Nikki SOM. Bar. 9pm. DJ Rapid Fire and residents Dr. Sleep and Justin Credible spin ’80s, top 40, and hip-hop.

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

Lions, Tigers, and Queers Underground SF. 10pm-2am, $3. Indie, Electro, and House dance party with resident DJ Becky Knox and special guests.

Matthew Dear DJ set Vessel, 85 Campton, SF; www.vesselsf.com. 10pm, $10-$15.

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

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

FRIDAY 15

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Stu Allen & Mars Hotel, Jugtown Pirates Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $12-$15.

Animal Games, French Cassettes RKRL, 52 Sixth St, SF; www.rkrlsf.com. 9pm, $10.

Attracted, Mad River 50 Mason Social House, SF; www.50masonsocialhouse.com. 7pm.

Bay Area Heat Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

How to Dress Well, Babe Rainbow, Finally Boys Rickshaw Stop. 9pm, $12-$14.

Locura, La Gente Boom Boom Room. 8pm, $12.

Steve Lucky & the Rhumba Bums Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $20.

Monophonics Great American Music Hall. 9pm, $15-$17.

Mother Hips Independent. 9pm, $25.

Mustache Harbor, Sean Tabor Band Bimbo’s. 9pm, $20.

KG Omulo, Afromassive Elbo Room. 10pm, $12.

Soko, Rob Solinski, Vandella, Slow Moving Lions of the Vegetable World Bottom of the Hill. 9:30pm, $12.

Thralls, Rubedo, Excited States Hemlock Tavern. 9:30pm, $7.

Rags Tuttle, Rome Balestrieri, Lee Huff Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9pm.

Walk Off the Earth, Mowgli’s Slim’s. 10:30pm, $16.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

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

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

Stephanie Mills Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $60.

Ben Vereen Rrazz Room. 8pm, $45-$50.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

“Bluegrass Bonanza” Plough & Stars. 9pm, $6-$10. With Creak, New Thoreaus.

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

“Urban Hillbilly Show” Cafe Du Nord. 9pm, $10-$12. With T.V. Mike and the Scarecrows, Eight Belles, Megan Keely.

DANCE CLUBS

DJ What’s His Fuck Riptide Tavern, 3639 Taraval, SF; www.riptidesf.com. 9pm, free. Spinning old school punk and more.

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

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

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

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

Second Annual Fire Ball Public Works. 9pm, $15. With R/D, J Phlip, Christian Martin, Mr. Projectile, AntAcid, and more.

Womp SF: Summer Party DNA Lounge. 9pm. With Frank Nitty vs Ross Fm, St. John, John Beaver, Adam Ant vs Sychosis, and more.

SATURDAY 16

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Casy & Brian, Batwings Catwings, Pang, Feelings Thee Parkside. 9pm, $6.

Chris Cain Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $20.

Cosmonauts, Burnt Ones, the Mallard, DJ Al Lover Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $7-$10.

Cribs, Devin Great American Music Hall. 9pm, $21.

Detroyer (Kiss tribute), Minks (Kinks tribute), Madam and the Ants Cafe Du Nord. 9:30pm, $12.

Digital Underground: Tupac’s Birthday Celebration Yoshi’s SF Lounge. 10:30pm, $30.

Drowning Men, River City Extension, Bonnie & the Bang Bang, Ben Henderson Bottom of the Hill. 8:15pm, $12.

Guverment, Stalking Distance Thee Parkside. 3pm, free.

Hooray for Everything, Awesome Hemlock Tavern. 9:30pm, $6.

Lee Huff, Guido, Rome Balestrieri Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9pm.

Lyrics Born, Bayonics, Adam Mansbach Independent. 9pm, $25.

Mayer Hawthorne (DJ set) Public Works. 9pm, $10.

Motion City Soundtrack, Henry Clay People, Front Bottoms Slim’s. 8pm, $20.

Tall Shadows Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Temper Trap, Crocodiles Warfield. 8pm, $30.

Western Justice Riptide Tavern, 3639 Taraval, SF; www.riptidesf.com. 9:30pm, free.

Zombie Nation, Whitlock, Harrison Hayward, Manzinita Rickshaw Stop. 10pm, $13-$16.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

Alex Keitel presents Heart of Viol Conservatory of Music, 50 Oak, SF; www.alexplayscello. 8pm, $10-$15.

Jacqui Naylor Legion of Honor, 100 34th Ave, SF; www.jacquinaylor.com. 7pm, $35.

Rob Reich accordion trio Red Poppy Art House. 9pm, $15.

Ben Vereen Rrazz Room. 8pm, $45-$50.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Roem Baur Beach Chalet Brewery & Restaurant, 1000 Great Hwy, SF; www.beachchalet.com. 2pm, free.

Jackstraw, Misisipi Mike Cyperian’s, 2097 Turk, SF; www.noevalleymusicseries.com. 8pm, $18.

Stephanie Mills Yoshi’s SF. 8pm, $60.

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

DANCE CLUBS

Bootie SF: The Monster Show DNA Lounge. 9pm, $10-$20. With Cookie Dough’s “”DO Ask DO Tell: A Salute To Our Gays In Uniform” and more.

Fringe Madrone Art Bar. DJs Blondie K and subOctave spin indie music videos.

O.K. Hole Amnesia. 9pm. With live music and visuals.

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

Radio Franco Bissap, 3372 19th St, SF; (415) 826 9287. 6 pm. Rock, Chanson Francaise, Blues. Senegalese food and live music.

Saturday Night Soul Party Elbo Room. 10pm, $5-$10. DJs Lucky, Paul Paul, and Phengren Oswald spinning ’60s soul 45s.

Smiths Night SF Rock-It Room. 9pm, free. Revel in 80s music from the Smiths, Joy Division, New Order, and more.

Wild Nights Kok BarSF, 1225 Folsom, SF; www.kokbarsf.com. 9pm, $3. With DJ Frank Wild.

SUNDAY 17

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Boogaloo Bahia Jane Warner Plaza, Market and Castro, SF; www.castrocbd.org.1-2pm, free.

Japanther, Pharmacy Hemlock Tavern. 10pm, $7.

Kate Miller-Heidke, Sylvie Lewis Cafe Du Nord. 9pm, $12-$15.

Celso Pina Independent. 8pm, $22.

Lee Huff vs. Rome Balestrieri Johnny Foley’s Dueling Pianos. 9:30pm.

Lemonade, LE1F, Water Borders Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $10-$12.

Marduk, 1349, Withered, Weapon DNA Lounge. 6:30pm, $25.

Meat Sluts & Friends Thee Parkside. 2pm, free. Tribute to Spot 1019.

Ben Runnels & Friends 50 Mason Social House, SF; www.50masonsocialhouse.com. 7pm, free.

“San Francisco Rock Project” Bottom of the Hill. 2pm, $10. British Invasion Season Show with Best of Rockapocalypse.

Ann Marie Santos and Dio Palacio Bliss Bar, 4026 24 St, SF; www.blissbarsf.com. 4:30pm, $10.

Terry Savastano Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Skabbs, Songs for Snakes, Pirate Radio Hemlock Tavern. 6pm, 6.

Stray Cat Lee Rocker Yoshi’s SF. 7pm, $25; 9pm, $20.

Violet Lights, Young Digerati, Dogcatcher Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $5-$8.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Stephanie Mills Yoshi’s SF. 3pm, $60.

Ben Vereen Rrazz Room.4pm, $45-$50.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Sandeep Das, Matt Small and the Crushing Spiral Ensemble Studio B, ODC, 351 Shotwell, SF; www.odcdance.org. 7pm, $20.

DANCE CLUBS

Dub Mission Elbo Room. 9pm, $6. Dub, dubstep, roots, and dancehall with DJ Sep, Ludichris, and Roger Mas.

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

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

MONDAY 18

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Damir Johnny Foley’s. 9pm, free.

Hides, Don Peyote Hemlock Tavern. 6pm, $5.

Threads, Liar Script, Man in the Planet Elbo Room. 9pm, $5.

Wildlife Control, Coast Jumper Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $10-$13.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

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

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Buck Wild and the Boss Hossers, Escalator Hill, Magnolia Keys Cafe Du Nord. 8pm, $10.

DANCE CLUBS

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

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

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

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

TUESDAY 19

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Arcadio Amnesia. 9:15pm.

Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers, Arann Harris & the Farm Band Rickshaw Stop. 7:30pm, $10.

Buster Blue, Brother Pacific, Beggars Who Give, Disposition Brick and Mortar Music Hall. 9pm, $7-$10.

Comodo Complex, Inq, Strangers, God’s Hotel Sub-Mission. 8pm.

Fat Tuesday Band Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $15.

Midtown Social, Anadel, Trebuchet Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $8.

Rhett Miller & the Serial Lady Killers, Spring Standards Independent. 8pm, $20.

Neal Morgan, Sad Horse, 3 Leafs Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $6.

Needles, Frustration, Kontrasekt, Caged Animal, DJ Agitator Knockout. 9:30pm, $6.

Solwave, Dangermaker, Hello Monster Cafe Du Nord. 8pm, $10.

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

Vanaprasta, Rocketboys, From Indian Lakes Hotel Utah. 8:30pm.

Wooster Boom Boom Room. 8pm, $5.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Gaucho Bottle Cap, 1707 Powell, SF; www.bottlecapsf.com. 7-10pm, free.

Sharon McKnight Rrazz Room. 8pm, $30.

DANCE CLUBS

Brazilian Wax Elbo Room. 9pm, $7.

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

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

Sonnymoon, Jonti, Devonwho, MndDsgn, B. Lewis Public Works Loft. 9pm, $10. *

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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0

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

THEATER

OPENING

5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason, SF; www.tidestheatre.org. $20-38. Opens Fri/15, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 10pm). Through July 21. Tides Theatre performs Evan Linder and Andrew Hobgood’s comedy about five women forced into a bomb shelter during a mid-breakfast nuke attack.

BAY AREA

Emotional Creature Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2015 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Previews Thu/14-Sat/16 and June 19-21, 8pm; Sun/17, 7pm. Opens June 22, 8pm. Runs Tue and Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm; no show July 13); Wed, 7pm (no show July 4); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 15. Berkeley Rep presents Eve Ensler’s world premiere, based on her best-seller I Am an Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around the World.

Salomania Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; www.auroratheatre.org. $30-55. Previews Fri/15-Sat/16 and June 20, 8pm; Sun/17, 2pm; June 19, 7pm. Opens June 21, 8pm. Runs Tue, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Throgh July 22. Aurora Theatre Company closes its 20th season with writer-director Mark Jackson’s world premiere, commissioned especially for the company, about a San Francisco-born dancer notorious for her take on the "Dance of the Seven Veils."

ONGOING

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

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

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

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

100 Saints You Should Know Thick House, 1695 18th St, SF; www.therhino.org. $10-30. Wed-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm; starting June 22, runs Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm. Extended through July 1. Homespun scenic design notwithstanding, Theatre Rhinoceros and artistic director John Fisher offer a fine, engrossing production of this 2007 play by Kate Fodor (Hannah and Martin, RX), a sturdy comedy-drama about two fractured families colliding awkwardly in a sort of spiritual vacuum. Matthew (an intriguingly restrained Wiley Herman) is a desolate but forbearing Catholic priest sent on a leave of absence after a venial transgression involving some artful nude male photographs. Returning home, he endures a pained relationship with his devout, passively domineering Irish mother (Tamar Cohn, channeling a nicely measured mixture of stony discipline and childlike vulnerability). Soon Matthew gets an unexpected visit from single mom Theresa (a bright but shrewdly self-possessed Ann Lawler), a former Deadhead who now cleans the rectory and finds herself overcome with an urge to ask the gentle priest about prayer — just at the moment his faith seems to have left him. Meanwhile, Theresa’s too-cool-for-school teenager, Abby (a deft and hilarious Kim Stephenson), waits outside and does some preying of her own on a slower-witted but game young man from the neighborhood (a charmingly quirky Michael Rosen), both of them roiling with confused yearnings. The appealing characters and unexpected storyline come supported by some excellent dialogue, developing a searching theme that ultimately has less to do with formal religion than the ordinary but ineffable need it promises (problematically) to meet. "I think I could be religious or whatever if it made any sense," notes Abby, "but it doesn’t make any sense." It’s easy to agree with the teenager on this one. 100 Saints is a genuinely funny and compassionate play discerning enough to avoid naming the depths it sounds. (Avila)

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

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

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

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

Vital Signs Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Previews Fri/15, 8pm. Opens Sat/16, 8:30pm. Runs Sat, 8:30pm; June 22, 8pm. Through July 21. The Marsh San Francisco presents Alison Whittaker’s behind-the-scenes look at nursing in America.

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

BAY AREA

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

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

God of Carnage Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller, Mill Valley; www.marintheatre.org. $34-55. Wed/13, 7:30pm; Thu/14-Sat/16, 8pm (also Sat/16, 2pm); Sun/17, 2 and 7pm. Marin Theatre Company performs Yasmina Reza’s Tony-winning comedy about two sets of parents who meet after their children get into a schoolyard fight.

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

The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s New venue: Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through July 15. This new autobiographical solo show by Don Reed, writer-performer of the fine and long-running East 14th, is another slice of the artist’s journey from 1970s Oakland ghetto to comedy-circuit respectability — here via a partial debate-scholarship to UCLA. The titular Los Angeles residency hotel was where Reed lived and worked for a time in the 1980s while attending university. It’s also a rich mine of memory and material for this physically protean and charismatic comic actor, who sails through two acts of often hilarious, sometimes touching vignettes loosely structured around his time on the hotel’s young wait staff, which catered to the needs of elderly patrons who might need conversation as much as breakfast. On opening night, the episodic narrative seemed to pass through several endings before settling on one whose tidy moral was delivered with too heavy a hand, but if the piece runs a little long, it’s only the last 20 minutes that noticeably meanders. And even with some awkward bumps along the way, it’s never a dull thing watching Reed work. (Avila)

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through June 30. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. Note: review from the show’s 2011 run at the Marsh San Francisco. (Avila)

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

The Tempest Bruns Amphitheater, 100 California Shakespeare Theater Way, Orinda; (510) 809-3290, www.calshakes.org. $35-71. Tue-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also June 23, 2pm); Sun, 4pm. Through June 25. California Shakespeare Theater opens its season with this dance-filled interpretation of the Bard’s classic tale.

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

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Fri, 6pm; Sat/16, June 24, and 30, 11am. Through June 30. Louis "The Amazing Bubble Man" Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

"The Amen Corner" Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, 450 Post, SF; www.lhtsf.org. Mon/18, 7pm. $25. Project1Voice presents this benefit staged reading of James Baldwin’s play, part of a simultaneous staged-reading event with 25 other African American theaters across the country.

"Branded Funny" Purple Onion, 140 Columbus, SF; www.eventbrite.com. Thu/14, 8pm. $15. Stand-up with Melanie Bega, Seth Hardiman, and Justin Lucas.

"The BY Series" ODC Theater, 3153 17th St, SF; www.odcdance.org. Thu/14-Sat/16, 8pm; Sun/17, 2pm. $25. Robert Moses’ Kin Dance Company presents work by guest choreographers Molissa Fenley, Ramon Ramos Alayo, and Sidra Bell, plus the world premiere of Moses’ Scrubbing the Dog.

Alicia Dattner Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.theexit.org. Fri/15-Sat/16, 8pm. $26. The comedian performs.

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

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

"Fresh Meat Festival" Brava Theater, 2781 24th St, SF; www.freshmeatproductions.org. $15-20. Fri/15-Sat/16, 8pm; Sun/17, 7pm. $15-25. The transgender and queer performance festival celebrates its 11th year with members of Vogue Evolution (America’s Best Dance Crew), Emily Vasquez (American Idol), drag star Miss Barbie-Q, same-sex ballroom champs William DeVries and Kumi Keali’I, and Sean Dorsey Dance.

"hOPPomage" Shotwell Studios, 3252-A 19th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun/17, 3pm. Through June 23. $10-15. An evening of "mental dance" inspired by artist Dennis Oppenheim with Driveway Dancers.

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

"Kunst-Stoff Arts/Fest 2012" Kunst-Stoff Arts, One Grove, SF; kunststoffartsfest2012.eventbrite.com. Thu/14-Sat/16, 8:30pm. $15. Bruno Augusto and Meisha Bosma perform.

"Porch Light: I Do: The Wedding Show" Verdi Club, 2424 Mariposa, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Mon/18, 8pm. $15. Wedding-themed storytelling with Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez, Barbara Berman, Clint Catalyst, and more.

"Previously Secret Information" Stage Werx Theater, 446 Valencia, SF; www.eventbrite.com. Sun/17, 7pm. $15. Comic storytelling with C.W. Nevius, Jack Boulware, and more.

"Qcomedy Showcase" Stage Werx Theater, 446 Valencia, SF; www.qcomedy.com. Mon/18, 8pm. $8-20. Special Pride edition with stand-up comedians Julia Jackson, Scott Backman, Enzo Lombard, Justin Simpson, Karen Ripley, and drag performers House of Glitter.

"Queeriosity" San Francisco LGBT Community Center, 1800 Market, SF; www.youthspeaks.org. Fri/15, 7pm. Free. Youth Speaks hosts this literary arts and performance showcase for LGBTQ youth.

San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival Novellus Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard, SF; www.worldartswest.org. Sat/16-Sun/17, 3pm (also Sat/16, 3pm). $18-58. This weekend’s program includes dance from China, Cuba, Hawaii, Hungary, India, and more.

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

"Two by 24: Love on Loop" UN Plaza, Market between Hyde and Seventh St, SF; www.rawdance.org. Tue/19, 11am-7pm. Free. RAWdance performs an eight-hour contemporary dance installation.

"Voca People" Marines’ Memorial Theatre, 609 Sutter, Second Flr, SF; www.marinesmemorialtheatre.com. Wed/13-Fri/15, 8pm; Sat/16, 6:30 and 9:30pm; Sun/17, 3 and 6pm. $49-75. A capella from outer space.

"When We Fall Apart" Z Space, 450 Florida, SF; www.zspace.org. Thu/14-Sat/16, June 20-21, and 27-28, 7pm; June 22-23 and 29-30, 7 and 9pm. $20-35. Joe Goode Performance Group presents a world premiere, an exploration of "home" with a set designed by architect Cass Calder Smith.

"Wonderland" Circus Center, 755 Frederick, SF; wonderlandatcircuscenter.eventbrite.com. Fri/15-Sat/16, 7pm; Sun/17, 2pm. Free (advance registration recommended). Family-friendly show of aerialists, acrobats, and other circus-style performers. *

Who to drink

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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virginia@sfbg.com

SUMMER DRINKS Incas at Heaven’s Dog with a side of Stax? A Cherry Bounce at Comstock Saloon with some Booker T and the M.G.’s? How about just a nice, perfectly made sazerac? Whether through years of bartending or expertise in classic cocktails and spot-on service, the five respected mixers below have long encapsulated what has made San Francisco a leader in the cocktail renaissance of the past decade-plus. To get a (summer) taste of their different styles and recommendations, we asked them to fill out a questionnaire delving into their personalities and cocktail prowess. The responses showed that the past is more present than ever as a delicious, tipsy inspiration in finer Bay bars.

 

ERIK ELLESTAD

Savoy Stomp, Heaven’s Dog

Erik Ellestad first landed on the cocktail map in 2006 with his blog, Savoy Stomp (www.savoystomp.com) — during his off hours as a tech engineer he began working his way through the classic Savoy Cocktail Book, one recipe at a time. This led to monthly gathering and demonstration Savoy Cocktail Book Nights at revered Upper Haight cocktail hotspot the Alembic since 2008, and bartending at chic SoMa Chinese restaurant Heaven’s Dog since its opening in January 2009. He’s an expert on classic recipes; his technically-minded side informs his precision and sense of balance.

SFBG Where did you grow up, and how did that influence your bartending style and taste?

Erik Ellestad I’m from a small town near Madison, WI. Other than developing my taste for beer, cheese, and Old Fashioned cocktails, I don’t think growing up in Wisconsin particularly affected my bartending. However, the 10 years I spent as a line and prep cook while living in Madison definitely affected both the way I approach cocktails and how I prioritize tasks while bartending.

SFBG What’s your area of expertise or obsession?

EE Pre-Prohibition American beverages. Almost all my real favorite cocktails go back to the 19th and early 20th centuries, or before.

SFBG What do you drink most during off hours?

EE To be honest, now that I’ve nearly finished the Savoy Cocktail Book Project, I’ve been taking a bit of a break from drinking cocktails. You’ll most often find me drinking esoteric beers or interesting wines.

SFBG What cocktail is exciting you lately?

EE I try to learn a new cocktail or perfect an old one every week just so I can have an answer to the inevitable cocktail nerd question, “What have you been working on lately?” This week I was inspired by Leopold’s Navy Strength Gin to perfect the Inca cocktail:

3/4 oz Leopold’s Navy Strength Gin

3/4 oz Dolin Dry Vermouth

3/4 oz Carpano Antica Italian Vermouth

3/4 oz Manzanilla Sherry

1 tsp Small Hand Foods Orgeat

1 dash Orange Bitters

Add ice and stir until well chilled. Strain into a small cocktail glass and garnish with an orange twist.

SFBG Favorite off-hours food or drink hangouts? 

EE I live in Bernal Heights, so the places I get to most often are in the neighborhood: Gialina for pizza, Papalote for burritos, Front Porch for soulful American food, and Ichi Sushi, for, well, awesome sushi. If my wife and I are splurging, we’ll go out to Bar Tartine, Bar Jules, or Commonwealth. Other than the bars I work in, Rock Bar, Royal Cuckoo, Glen Park Station, St. Mary’s Pub, and Wild Side West are the bars I’m most likely to be found in.

SFBG Your bartending playlist? 

EE The core of my playlist at Heaven’s Dog is the box set of Stax-Volt Soul singles from 1959 through 1968.

 

JEFF LYON

Range

Jeff Lyon has been tending for about 16 years, the last five being at Range in the Mission, where he’s currently the restaurant’s bar manager. Besides a keen love and knowledge of whiskey and tequila, he’s well-versed in music and sets an utterly comfortable tone at his bar with his dry, sly sense of humor.

SFBG Where did you grow up, and how did that influence your bartending style and taste? 

Jeff Lyon I was born in Long Beach, CA, but bumped around CA until I was 20, then moved to Minneapolis to become a rock star with my brother. In order to fund our impending international success (ahem), we waited tables, but I noticed bartenders had way more fun than waiters. So I watched what they did and asked a lot of questions. Eventually I lied and told my boss I knew what I was doing, and they let me behind the bar. Minneapolis influenced my bartending style in that I picked up a strong work ethic. It wasn’t about “mixology” — it was about being nice, working clean and fast, having fun.

SFBG What’s your area of expertise or obsession?

JL I’m a whiskey guy and Bourbon is my favorite, but right now I’m really excited about the wine-based world of vermouth, sherry, and Madeira. I wouldn’t call it an area of expertise, but I find the variety and subtlety of this stuff endlessly fascinating. Who needs crazy tinctures, bitters, and infusions when you can simply pour a Barolo Chinato over a big chunk of ice? Done!

SFBG What do you drink most during off hours?

JL I drink more beer and wine than anything else.

SFBG What cocktail is exciting you lately?

JL I’m proud of a cocktail I do called Dante that’s inspired by the sazerac’s “whiskey, sugar, bitters and a rinse” structure. I stir up Angel’s Envy bourbon, Perucchi Blanc vermouth, and Rothman and Winters Pear Orchard liqueur to provide sweetness, and Peychaud’s to balance it out. Standing in for the absinthe is a generous rinse of St. George Spirits pear eau de vie.

SFBG Current favorite off-hours hangouts for food or drink?

JL More often than not, I go to dive bars. I do my share of cocktail R&D right in my neighborhood — Wo Hing and Locanda are rockin’ it. Beretta is always great. Outside the neighborhood I love the usual suspects: 15 Romolo, Alembic, Bar Agricole, Comstock. The great thing is that there are so many bars raising the standards, even dive-y bars are making better drinks.

SFBG Your bartending playlist?

JL If I could have a night full of Bill Withers, Django Reinhardt, and Thelonious Monk, balanced with Nirvana, The Beatles, and Led Zeppelin, I could smile through just about anything.

 

AURORA SIEGEL

Hotsy Totsy, Dogwood

A true veteran of cocktailia, Aurora Siegel has been tending bar for the better part of 17 years. Having worked as a GM and beyond, she deeply understands service and the full restaurant-bar experience. Years at North Beach classic Rose Pistola honed her skills in numerous aspects of management and bar service, and she’s quite the cook herself (she makes a mean kimchi). You’ll currently find her rocking the East Bay at Albany’s Hotsy Totsy and Oakland’s Dogwood.

SFBG Where did you grow up, and how did that influence your bartending style and taste?

Aurora Siegel I grew up in Hawaii where hospitality is key and a cold refreshing drink while caressed by a light breeze makes all feel right with the world. That background influenced my style on many levels, hospitality being the most important. I believe if you don’t truly like serving people you shouldn’t because it always shows. I happen to love it. The drinks I tend to create are often light and refreshing: four dimensional, not eight; balanced but not too complicated; drinks you can make in under a minute — with a smile, of course. So you can sit back and say all is right with the world, even without the tropical breeze!

SFBG What’s your area of expertise or obsession?

AS My obsession is balance. Balance of sight, smell and of course taste. I’m often making ingredients to help me meld balance with speed such as my own home-brewed ginger beer, tonic base, and falernum.

SFBG What do you drink most during off hours? 

AS Pisco sours: I just love ’em! Or a good sazerac, negroni, or Old Fashioned. I like trying new drinks but a well-made classic will almost always win out in the end.

SFBG What cocktail is exciting you lately?

AS Robert Hess’ Trident [with sherry, Cynar, aquavit, peach bitters]! I think it’s one of those drinks that will go down in history.

SFBG Current favorite off-hours hangouts for food or drink?

AS Three of my favorite spots are Comstock for the whole package: good late night bites, great drinks, and real bartenders! Madrone on Divisadero: nice staff, good drinks, and unique music. Or Tony Nik’s in North Beach, where the staff are true pros and drinks are good, too.

SFBG Your bartending playlist?

AS Anything from the ’80s just gets my hips shaking, but I must say we have one of the most diverse and fun playlist at the Totsy. I’m almost always feeling the groove there!

 

JONNY RAGLIN

Comstock Saloon

A bartender for the past 16 years, Jonny Raglin is an English lit major with a sense of style that includes several evolutions of mustache. He started tending in SF over a decade ago at Stars, then B44, then the early days at Absinthe with Jeff Hollinger, with whom he eventually opened Comstock Saloon in 2010, a haven for classic cocktails in a historic Barbary Coast space with live jazz (and the occasional Gold Rush tune) and honky tonk and classic country vinyl Sundays.

SFBG Where did you grow up, and how did that influence your bartending style and taste?

Jonny Raglin I’m from Oklahoma. It certainly does influence my style of bartending. I’m cavalier, self-taught, hard-working, hard-headed, whiskey-slinging, whiskey-drinking, a lover not a fighter — except when fighting — and the fastest hand in the West!

SFBG What’s your area of expertise or obsession?

JR My obsession is the 9/10ths of bartending that has nothing to do with “mixology.” That is what I try every day to improve upon. Not to say I’ve given up on the drink itself, but I am certainly concerned with what Leary called “set and setting,” i.e. a perfect cocktail can only be had in perfect company.

SFBG What do you drink most during off hours?

JR Margaritas with my wife. I typically order dry martinis at any given bar since its REALLY hard to fuck up cold gin.

SFBG What cocktail is exciting you lately?

JR I’m really digging making cocktails from who I consider to be the two queens of the cocktail in New York: Julie Reiner and Audrey Saunders. I feel like they have a firm grasp of not only the classic cocktail but also the modern palate. I find myself in the Savoy Cocktail Book for inspiration as I have for the past five years or so. And people sure like the Cherry Bounce at Comstock which is a recipe I came up with (made from the juice of house-made brandied cherries).

SFBG Favorite off-hours food or drink hangouts?

JR To me the best place to eat and drink in SF is Cotogna. God bless the Tusks [Michael and Lindsay] for their little trattoria a block from us at Comstock!

SFBG Your bartending playlist?

JR When Booker T. and the M.G.’s comes on, I’m the fastest bartender on the planet. On Friday lunch at Comstock, we play Buddy Holly radio on Pandora. It’s a bit of a sock hop with bow ties and suspenders, giving away lunch, selling booze… and fun!

 

STEVEN LILES

Smugglers Cove

Tending bar since 1997, Steven Liles dons a Hawaiian shirt and mixes it up tiki-style to exotica tunes at the Cove, after having spent years crafting cocktails at fine dining spots like Boulevard and Fifth Floor. Besides his stylin’ wardrobe and hats, Liles has his own 1930s home bar, an extensive music collection (start asking him about ’60s soul), and is well-versed on classic recipes and spirits distillation.

SFBG Where did you grow up, and how did that influence your bartending style and taste?

Steven Liles I was born in Compton, California, but mainly grew up in Lancaster, in the Mojave Desert. So my style is dry, like my humor. Growing up in California with all of its diversity has developed a sense that I should explore the different facets of my career as much as possible. I am defined by the desire to expand the definition of myself.

SFBG What’s your area of expertise or obsession?

SL I’ve never been the type to focus on one particular thing as a bartender. I prefer a more rounded approach. Working at a rum-centric bar is fun and fascinating, but I also pay attention to other spirits and styles of tending bar. I love pisco, gin, Calvados, and so many other amazing spirits with amazing stories.

SFBG What do you drink most during off hours?

SL It varies. My go-to cocktails are the martini and negroni. I love a glass of champagne — or a bottle. With so many great cocktail bars, I always try out new ideas that bartenders are creating. It’s a lot of fun.

SFBG What cocktail is exciting you lately?

SL With 75 drinks on the menu at The Cove, I can’t help but be excited: it is a great challenge. I love making new drinks but that’s not really a big focus of mine. I have a regular, Paul Cramer, that I make original creations for all the time. I don’t bother writing anything down. I find that fun, to just go off he cuff, in a care-free way.

SFBG Favorite off-hours food or drink hangouts?

SL I love Maven, Comstock Saloon, AQ, Heaven’s Dog, Jasper’s, Wo Hing, Bar Agricole. There are so many more.

SFBG Your bartending playlist?

SL Sam Cooke’s “Good Times” is a great bar song to me: “We are going to stay here ’til we soothe our souls, if it takes all night long.” That’s perfect.

Subscribe to Virgina’s twice-monthly newsletter the Perfect Spot, www.theperfectspotsf.com

 

Lusty for the Ladies? Worker-owned strip club still open, but needs your help

Andrew Lam
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Lusty for the Ladies? Worker-owned strip club still open, but needs your help

I have to apologize for not frothing up the waters with my own account of everyone’s favorite (and only) worker-owned strip club the Lusty Lady being in peril of having to shut its doors. I was gallivanting about on a world tour — find my list of illegal places in Berlin to trespass on here — and re-emerged on this side of the bridge to hysterical accounts that the classic, unionized titty joint was going under.

It’s no secret that the Guardian has a tawdry, longstanding affair with the Lusty — so I made a quick call to long-time Lusty Lorelei. Upshot: the club is kind-of safe for the moment, but it’s ready to grind it out for your singles.

“We would like to keep going, we would like to improve the business,” Lorelei told me. “We are looking for investors, but if that doesn’t work we’ll have to look for buyers.” Anyone willing to support their local, female-empowering, size-positive, all-inclusive adult club?

Here’s what happened: the Lusty has been struggling with finances for awhile. “It’s been funky and we just weren’t doing that great,” said Lorelei. The club has struggled, she continued, with perceptions that the private peep show booths were unclean, staff was unfriendly, and that dancers just weren’t working it out enough. “You can’t just go up there in your Payless heels and no makeup. Customers would come in and it would be like, sad trombone.” 

So when a company called Millenium Group offered $25,000 for the beleagured club, some staffers thought their ship had come in. Not Lorelei. “$25,000? That’s insulting. Really? We could come up with that!”

Nonetheless, a hasty employee vote was convened over email one weekend, side-stepping (Lorelei says) the informal co-op protocol that such matters necessitate a couple weeks for employee-owners to think them over. The Lusties decided against selling, and in the decisive moment many of the staff members who had been in favor of the sale split. 

Previous press accounts that reported that the employee-owners would be held financially liable if the club went bankrupt are erroneous, says Lorelei, who actually sees this moment of high drama as an opportunity. The mediocre service and hygiene reflected a complacency that a passel of new hires, she hopes the club has left behind. “The girls are hot, the theater is clean,” she laughs. 

The club is looking into starting up webcam shows, and has already started offering lapdances at specified times. Some of the dancers have started up a radio show Wednesdays from 9pm to midnight on 107.7 The Bone called Ask a Hot Chick, a great customer interaction tactic. Check out the Lusty Lady’s Indie Go Go page (side note: Kickstarter is not down with “adult” causes) to donate towards the club’s continued existence — the campaign will be active for the next day or so.

Or here’s a better plan: head down to the club this weekend for the club’s brand-new lapdance parties. You know the drill — see you a sex-positive, well-proportioned hottie and let her take you for a spin in a booth. 

Lusty Lady lapdance parties

Fridays and Saturdays, 9pm-2am

The Lusty Lady

1033 Kearny, SF

(415) 391-3991

www.lustyladysf.com

 

A range of rage at Obama visit

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A range of rage at Obama visit

Hundreds gathered in the financial district today as President Obama came through San Francisco for a brief visit, consisting of a high-priced fundraising lunch and no public events. A mostly silent crowd waited patiently to watch the president’s motorcade drive by this afternoon, first at 1 Market St and then at 456 California, before he went off to SFO. On the crowd’s sidelines, handfuls of dissenters from various groups held signs and spoke up with a diverse range of reasons for protesting the president.

On Market, the motorcade went past the Occupy SF campsite at 101 Market St, where a dozen protesters had gathered. Their signs and chants focused on the National Defense Authorization Act. Sections 1021 and 1022 of the act, which the president signed Dec. 31 2011, have been interpreted as allowing for indefinite detention of terrorism suspects in the United States without charge or trial.

National groups Code Pink and World Can’t Wait brought attention to what they called Obama’s war crimes. 

“Code Pink is asking Obama to kill the kill list,” said Nancy Mancias, an organizer with the womens’ peace organization, referring to a list of terror suspects targeted for US attacks that Obama personally oversees. “We want more transparency in the CIA drone program, and victim compensation to the families of those who have been killed in drone strikes.”

World Can’t Wait demonstrators emphasized that Guantanamo Bay detention facility is still open and housing almost 200 prisoners, despite President Obama signing an executive order to close it days after taking office.

For demonstrators from the Center for Biological Diversity and Greenpeace, it’s imperative that the president stop oil drilling in the Arctic.

“There are a couple small permits they still need to get, but Shell is ready to drill in the Arctic in July,” said Miyoko Sakashita, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. 

Sakashita said that drilling there could be dangerous for residents of the region, as well as polar bears, walruses and seals. 

“The conditions are terrible for drilling,” said Sakashita, citing low visibility and icy terrain. “If they can’t stop an oil spill in the gulf of Mexico, how will they stop it in the Arctic?” 

If these conditons do indeed lead to a disastrous oil spill, Greenpeace volunteers will be there first hand to witness it, as the group plans to send vessels of their own to monitor the operations.

Tea party protesters and Ron Paul supporters also came out to see the president. 

“It’s an issue of competence,” said Charles Cagnon, a protester who held a sign calling President Obama a “bad hire.”

“A president is our employee, not a king.”

But Cognan wasn’t too pleased with the competition either. 

“I was a Ron Paul kind of guy,” he said, “but I’ll take Romney. He’s level-headed and competent, and he likes arithmetic.”

“Obama doesn’t like arithmetic,” he continued, as evidenced, according to Cagnon, by the senate rejection of Obama’s budget May 16.

“Bush was terrible,” Cagnon added. “Romney is uninspiring.”

Cagnon and his group sported “Nobama” gear, Code Pink protesters came with signature pink clothing and signs, and a Greenpeace volunteer was dressed as “Frostpaw the polar bear.” Focused for the day on a common enemy of sorts, no conflicts arose between the divergent protest groups. For his part, Cagnon added that despite his right leanings, he loves KPFA radio, and that he believes the tea party has a distrust of government in common with Occupy.

“I’m just glad there’s people out there dissenting,” he said. “We need people like that.”

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