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Frameline33 review: “Cure for Love”

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By Laura Swanbeck

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For years cinematic satires such as Saved! (2004) and But I’m a Cheerleader (1999) have served as send-ups of extreme orthodoxy and have mined ex-gay therapy groups with names like “True Directions” and “Mercy House” for laughs. Francine Pelletier and Christina Willings’ Cure for Love (2008) also tackles these controversial subjects, but in a very earnest and even-handed way. Love opens with the wedding of Brian and Ana, two gay Evangelists who have no delusions when it comes to their sexuality, but who simply refuse to abandon their religious beliefs. The film juxtaposes their union with the relationships of their gay friends, Jonathan and Darren, who finally manage to accept their sexuality while retaining their faith after years spent struggling and journeying to Exodus, a retreat for “same-sex addiction.” From a liberal standpoint, it is extremely difficult to watch Brian and Ana’s wedding footage without thinking that this charade is what’s unnatural, not gay marriage, especially in light of the recent upholding of Prop 8. However,Love never preaches an agenda. Instead, it keeps both sets of couples clearly in focus, presenting an intimate portrait of the myriad kinds of love humanity possesses — love of family, love of God, love of a man or a woman (regardless of your gender) — and how individuals ultimately choose to reconcile them.

Cure for Love plays as part of the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival
Sat/20, 11 a.m., $8
Roxie Theater, 3117 16th St, SF
www.frameline.org

Renegade Rockers Hold Down 26 Years of SF Breakdancing

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By Michael Krimper


Renegade Rockers in action.

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

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

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

Film review: “American Artifact: The Rise of American Rock Poster Art”

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By Laura Swanbeck

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Synonymous with ‘60s counterculture, the plethora of rock posters adorning the walls of the Fillmore once served a more modest purpose. Concert promoter Bill Graham used to pass them out to the first 500 people out the door. If you love San Francisco’s role in rock and roll history or the very mention of Wolfgang’s Vault sends you scrambling for your collection of vintage vinyl, you will probably enjoy Merle Becker’s American Artifact: The Rise of American Rock Poster Art. Abandoning her corporate TV job, Becker traces rock poster art from its birth in the 1960s to its modern resurgence with burgeoning online communities such as gigposters.com. The subject matter might be inspiring, but the documentary’s execution is ultimately unsatisfying. While Becker reflects how Vietnam and the hippie era shaped the art form in the ‘60s, she lacks the conviction to dive headfirst into modern influences, glossing over the palpable imprint of pop culture, advanced technology, and the Iraq war. Although the film provides a few entertaining diversions with eccentric rock poster artists recalling how they gleefully flouted art school conventions to create their own psychedelic styles, Becker, providing the film’s monotonous voice over, fails to captivate. For a passion project, she sounds surprisingly dispassionate, not to mention disingenuous as she extols the virtues of nonconformity and independent art while ultimately returning to the corporate fold.

American Artifact: The Rise of American Rock Poster Art
Sat/20, 5 and 7 p.m., $6-9
Red Vic, 1727 Haight, SF
(415) 668-3994

Boxer wants to be shipyard clean-up’s “fair broker”

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Text by Sarah Phelan

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Sen. Barbara Boxer’s office forwarded me a letter yesterday that highlights Boxer’s concerns regarding the cleanup and redevelopment of Hunters Point Naval Shipyard.

“As Chair of the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works committee, I am focused on protecting the health and environment of the Bay Area, including the Bayview Hunters Point community,” Boxer stated in the May 18, 2009 letter that she sent to Power’s Alicia Schwartz, who, incidentally won a Guardian’s Local Hero award in 2008, for working to improve the future of San Francisco’s black and working class communities.

Boxer’s letter landed after my deadline for this week’s story about the Navy dissolving the main body for community involvement in the shipyard clean-up, as that effort enters its most critical phase.

So, I’ve included her letter here, so folks can see what Boxer’s main concerns are. And also because it suggests that things may improve, at least in terms of working with the US Environmental Protection Agency, now that Lisa Jackson has taken the helm.

As Boxer writes, “Under Administrator Lisa Jackson, the EPA is returning to its mission of protecting American families and communities from environmental threats.”

Boxer’s communications director Zachary Coile told me today that as chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, Boxer has oversight of the US EPA, and wants to play the role of “fair broker” at the shipyard.
That sounds like a worthy goal. So, here’s hoping that Boxer can pull it off in a way that’s truly equitable.

Designer Dish: Summer’s southwest splash

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

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

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

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

SFBG: Do tell, how did Mint Mall start?

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

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

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

SFBG: And the name?

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

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

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Weird Wine of the Week: Red wine in Austria?

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The Guardian’s Amy Monroe shares her favorite unusual, overlooked, and underappreciated wines every Tuesday. Check out her previous installment here.

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In a country that’s famous for Mozart, coffee, and birthing Gov. Schwarzenegger, what does it mean that Zweigelt is Austria’s most widely planted red grape? To most people, nothing really. While Austrian white wines made from Grüner Veltliner, the most widely planted grape in the country irrespective of color, enjoy some love from sommeliers and adventurous drinkers, Zweigelt remains relatively anonymous. It shouldn’t.

Meet Ecker Zweigelt, a recession-busting, screwcapped liter bottle that tastes like a lithe Pinot Noir spiced up with a generous shake of black pepper. It’ll take to your Tuesday night turkey burger like a natural, but there’s no need to pair it with food if you’re trying to cut back on the solid stuff. This is a wine that defines smooth, thanks to the one thing it lacks: tannin, a naturally occurring preservative that causes many reds to feel astringent on the palate. It’s the kind of wine you can crack (Thank god for screwcaps!) and knock back any day of the week — and why wouldn’t you? The price is right (around $13); the package is large (30 percent more juice than a standard size bottle); and the wine is good (I could drink a gallon of this stuff).

Of course, there’s a time and a place for fancy Napa Cabernet and vintage Champagne, but it’s probably not out of a paper bag on a lazy Sunday afternoon in Dolores Park. That’s what Ecker Zweigelt is for.

Available at Mollie Stone’s
635 Portola Drive, SF
(415) 664-1600
www.molliestones.com

Appetite: Wicked Emeralds, snail sliders, pindi chole, pickled Fresno chiles, and more

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Every week, Virginia Miller of personalized itinerary service and monthly food, drink, and travel newsletter, www.theperfectspotsf.com, shares foodie news, events, and deals. View the last installment here.

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Happy hour at Grand Cafe — delight on a stick. Photo by Virginia Miller

DEALS

Grand Cafe Happy Hour
Grand Cafe is one of those long time SF classics it’s easy for locals to forget is here, inside Hotel Monaco. Ideally located in the "theater district" for a little tete-a-tete or pre/post A.C.T. performance, Grand Cafe recently reopened with a new happy hour that lasts four hours each weekday with a cocktail list 23-deep, playfully employing current nearby theater plays (like one of three drinks as an ode to "Wicked": Elephaba’s Wicked Emerald-tini, a refreshing mix of Hendrick’s Gin, Ciroc Vodka with a sweet touch from St. Germain Elderflower and herbal notes of basil, cucumber and lemongrass syrup). During happy hour, drinks and appetizers, like gougere d’escargot (delicious escargot sliders!), salt cod beignets, salmon or duck rillette, are a mere $3-7, plus there’s $1 oysters and a 400-plus wine list. PS: the bar menu online notes the "secret" employee discount they give off bar food (50%!) on Monday nights if you mention the password, "Moulin Rouge". A truly happy "happy hour".
3pm – 7pm, Monday-Friday
501 Geary, SF
415-292-0101
www.GrandCafe-SF.com

Street Threads: Look of the Day

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SFBG photog Ariel Soto scoops SF street fashion. See the previous Look of the Day here.

Today’s Look: Marina, Ferry Building

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Tell us about your look: “This is just what I threw on for work today.”

Interview: “Humpday” director Lynn Shelton

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By Mara Math

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In Humpday, two longtime straight male friends just reunited dare each other to have gay sex on camera for the amateur erotic film fest of the title, a dare that will test the boundaries of friendship, marriage, and self-definition. San Francisco Bay Guardian talked with director Lynn Shelton.

San Francisco Bay Guardian: What inspired the inventive plot?

Lynn Shelton: The starting point was actor Mark Duplass. I was looking for an idea for a film to center around him. And then when a straight filmmaker friend came back from Hump! (formerly Humpday), the real amateur porn festival in Seattle, and he was just fascinated by his first look at gay porn, and I thought it was really amusing and sweet. And I started thinking about the relationships between straight guys and gayness, and the tension inherent in super-passionate but platonic straight male friendships. There’s this low-grade homophobia — they don’t hate gay people but they still have residual anxiety about their own relationship to homosexuality. I find that very poignant, and I also loved the absurd deliciousness of taking two straight guys who are being so straight — it’s really about the extremities of straightness, in a way — that they can’t back down from this dare that neither of them wants to carry out … and that in fact is to be gay for a day.

‘Won’t You Stay?’: A peek behind the curtain

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By Rebecca Bowe

One of the first-ever showings of Adam Chanzit’s Won’t You Stay?, a work in progress, was held at the Ashby Stage on June 8 before a full audience.

The play poses questions about the consequences of extreme idealism by chronicling the lives of three college students as they transition to adulthood in New York City. Jacob, the protagonist, initially comes off as a workaholic entrepreneur who likens his ambition to a Jaguar speeding through the fast lane. He undergoes a transformation after having a profound experience in Siberia that is never fully articulated, but evoked bit by bit through monologues and original music. As time goes on, Jacob becomes increasingly obsessed with aiding people in need — but his frantic quest to end suffering is accompanied by his own descent into mental illness. His precarious path on the edge is contrasted with that of his girlfriend, Alice, and his best friend, Noel, whose own lives follow a more familiar progression from free-spirited college kids to conventional urban professionals.

Chanzit, whose plays have been produced in New York, Los Angeles, New Haven and Denver in addition to the Bay Area, says he felt it was important to solicit feedback not just from people involved with theater, but college and graduate students, people working in the mental-health sector and others. While many staged readings are closed to all but a few select colleagues, invitations to this event were targeted to reflect a much wider community.

After the 90-minute performance, Chanzit, director Mina Morita and producer Shane Boris opened up a dialogue with audience members, and an in-depth conversation ensued that touched on everything from interventions for people suffering from mental illness, to nostalgia for the idealism that was exhibited in the 1960s, to reflections on transformational experiences while traveling. “Having a larger and more diverse audience gives you more input into how the performance is working,” Chanzit says. And for the audience, events such as this offer a rare peek behind the curtain: “There’s something exciting about watching a play in development.”

Erykah Badu is out of her mind

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By Michael Krimper

LIVE REVIEW In anticipation of releasing her brilliant sound odyssey, New Amerykah Pt. 1: 4th World War (Universal Motown, 2008), Erykah Badu, a.k.a. “Analogue Girl in A Digital World,” a.k.a. “Fat Belly Bella,” a.k.a. “Low Down Loretta Brown,” clarified her artistic objectives on an Okayplayer form. Posting as analoguegirl, Badu affirmed, “As much as I would love to be just a recording artist, I am not. There’s a difference. I am a performance artist first; there’s a difference.” Having the chance to see Badu perform live at the Warfield June 6, I could not agree more with her distinction.

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Dressed in a mystical mauve kimono, golden skull cap, and gem encrusted space goggles, Badu strutted onstage in profile, tracing her steps forward like a celestial, hieroglyph narrative. A cinematic whirling rainstorm of bleeps and lasers and synth bubbling keys reverberated in the background, aspiring to transport the audience to the far reaches. This intergalactic resonance would remain the most consistent frequency throughout the performance; each transition of song and style marked by its cosmic joy of noise. Badu’s enigmatic presence recalled Sun Ra’s theatrical myth making, framed by an open ended aesthetic in Egyptology and a surreal space age, radicalized belief in the power of music to free the soul from its rusty, earthly shackles.

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Erykah Badu performs at L.A.’s Club Nokia June 5, 2009, the night before her San Francisco gig. Photo by Beth Stirnaman.

But this outlandish and historically rooted ethos did not restrain Badu’s emphasis on the contemporary. The high priestess of hip-hop soul incorporated the gods of our musical past into the urgency of the now. The tensions of old and new styles and sounds continuously pressed against each other throughout the remarkable performance.

Street Threads: Look of the Day

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SFBG photog Ariel Soto scoops SF street fashion. See the previous Look of the Day here.

Today’s Look: Nagisa, Dolores Park

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Tell us about your look: “I like the color and the fabric of my jacket.”

Beaching youthful shyness with the Lemonheads

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By Max Goldberg

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Just Dando

For a brief time in the early 1990s, Evan Dando was an It boy. He wore great jeans and hid behind his hair — the shaggy pop songs didn’t hurt either. His band, the Lemonheads, coasted to success with an easy cover of "Mrs. Robinson," and then Atlantic took a bath on Come On Feel the Lemonheads (Atlantic, 1993), an album that’s likely still haunting remainder bins. These are the facts, but the melodies that snag your adolescence are destined to boggle any attempt at objectivity.

I still remember picking It’s a Shame About the Ray (Atlantic, 1992) off the rack after spotting it in an older friend’s collection — I must have been 11 or 12. Soon, I went the extra mile for a couple of bootleg cassettes I then listened to in ritualistic isolation. In Dando, I heard the sympathetic reticence of a dropout. I beached my shyness on his languid refrains; he was good company. I wouldn’t say I wanted to trade places (Ben Lee took up this mantle on "I Wish I Was Him"), but the Lemonheads furnished my imagination with yearning and ennui — sensing those things without knowing them was sublime. I loved the band for coming from Boston; their stoned melodies padded the lonely stretches of Memorial Drive and sandy dunes of Cape Cod where I moved into my feelings. Nearly all Lemonheads songs are letters, and I imagined I too would come to know a "you."

Trying to sort out how memory imprints my continued weakness for these melodies would require a novel rather than a capsule review, but I like to think the Lemonheads albums still hold up because I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I don’t put them on very often, but I can easily lose a whole afternoon when I do.

THE LEMONHEADS With Kim Vermillion. Wed/10, 8 p.m., $21. Slim’s, 333 11th St, SF (415) 255-0333. www.slims-sf.com

Hot sex events this week: June 10-16

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Compiled by Molly Freedenberg

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Dottie Lux will shake and shimmy at Spookshow A-Go-Go’s first all-gay show on Sunday. Photo by M. Ulto and Tigger.

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>> Night of Mayhem
Viriginia Suicide hosts this weekly burlesque revue by Barbary Coast, featuring Pin Key Lee, Flame Cynders, sASSy Hotbuns, Flying Fox, and more.

Wed/10, 8-11pm. $5.
Annie’s Social Club
917 Folsom, SF
www.anniessocialclub.com

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>> MythFits
Writers, filmmakers, and performance artists queerify classic myths and seek out the deviant threads in tales of yore in this three-week series, this time featuring gigi Otalvaro-Hormillosa, Robin Coste Lewis, and Sadie Lune.

Wed/10, 6pm, free.
San Francisco Public Library
100 Larkin, SF
www.queerculturalcenter.org

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>> Cocktails and Burlesque Aerial Arts
Back by popular demand, Kate Law and Alayna Stroud’s Bow and Arrow present Cirque Noir (yes, the lovely ladies we recently saw at the Gold Club Anniversary Party), in their lower Pac Heights/upper NoPa dance studio. Expect cocktails as delicious as the burlesque is sensuous.

Fri/12-Sat/13, 8pm. $20.
DanceGround Keriac
1805 Divisadero, SF
(336) 391-6610
www.alaynastroud.com

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>> Lusty Lady Pride Float Benefit Party

Come support SF’s Lusty Lady Theater, the one and only unionized worker-owned peep-show co-op, and their saucy presence in SF Pride 2009! Strippers, dancers, performance, DJ Durt, dykes, debauchery, raffle, panty and date auction, lapdances, bodyshots, and you….

Sat/13, 9pm. Free.
Lexington Club
3464 19th St, SF
www.lexingtonclub.com

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>> Spookshow A-Go-Go: Lezbo-A-Go-Go
In honor of Pride Month, Lux-Killmore Entertainment presents their first ever all-gay show: an evening of chicks, dicks, and flicks. Performers for this unprecendented Spookshow A-Go-Go include Ruby Vixen, Dottie Lux, Ophelia Cour de Noir, Kitty Von Quimm, Steven Satyricon, and many more, all hosted by Virginia Suicide (yes, she’s busy this week).

Sun/14, 7pm. $7.
The Stud
399 9th St, SF
www.myspace.com/spookshoagogo

Weird Wine of the Week: Everything’s coming up rosés

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The Guardian‘s Amy Monroe shares her favorite unusual, overlooked, and underappreciated wines every Tuesday.

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Too many people are afraid of pink wine. I blame white Zinfandel. Despite the fact that the majority of rosés made around the world are dry, American drinkers cling hard to the misguided notion that pink equals sweet, thanks in no small part to the fact that Sutter Home cranks out more than 4 million cases of cloying white Zin annually. But, there’s a lot more to rosé than the potential of a sugar spiked hangover. In fact, rosé pretty much rocks my world and it should yours, too.

Need some convincing? Try Ameztoi Rubentis Txakolina, a crazy delicious, bone dry wine from the Basque region of Spain made from two obscure grapes named Hondarribi Zuri and Hondarribi Beltza. As pink and feather light as a ballerina’s tutu, it’s made even more charming by the fact that there’s a lively bit of spritz in the bottle. Drinking this wine is like dating someone who’s really hot, actually gets along with your friends, and is great in bed. It’s nice to look at, fun at a party, and surprisingly flexible.

QSM offers BDSM adventure of a different sort

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By Juliette Tang

It started as I was digging around for an old Janus magazine for a friend of mine (sigh, I swear).

Janus — the classiest and cheesiest British spanking magazine from the 1970s, and still being campily produced to this day — reads like the Vice Magazine of softcore spanking. There’s something that is, strangely and inconceivably, almost high-brow about this periodical, with its modestly made-up and un-enhanced models who look like they stepped out of a Richard Kern photo. The lo-fi, soft-focused, 35mm photos and the intentionally retro design of the layout and typeface — plus the fact that the magazine’s design philosophy has not changed in the last three decades — imbue the publication with a toothsome genuineness noticeably absent in its more explicit modern day counterparts.

The publication also makes no secret of its aspirations toward a “higher standard.” Janus also runs a popular sex shop in Soho, London, that boasts a storefront more fitting of a Prada boutique than a sex shop, and which in the past has participated in an homage to Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine, two French poets who had a famously violent affair in the 1870s.

It was by pure accident that, through searching for Janus magazine, I discovered QSM, an online BDSM bookstore, its warehouse located here in San Francisco, woman-owned and -run since 1989.

If Manheimer is SF’s next top cop, will Newsom push Villa-Lobos in D6?

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Is this the face of San Francisco’s next top cop?

Text by Sarah Phelan

Back in February, I asked mayoral spokesperson Nathan Ballard if San Mateo police chief Susan Manheimer was Newsom’s top pick to replace SFPD Chief Heather Fong.

I asked because the Community Leadership Alliance was promoting Manheimer hard and seems to have the insider edge within Camp Newsom.
(CLA lists the Chamber of Commerce’s Rob Black—Newsom’s unsuccessful pick to replace D6 Sup. Chris Daly in 2006—as honorary Chair, Scott Caroen as Chair, Troy Hammer, David Muhammad, Christopher Rosas and Joseph Alioto Veronese and Angela Alioto as advisers, and David James Villa-Lobos as director.)

Ballard’s reply, which I included in the Guardian’s story about San Francisco’s dysfunctional public safety system, was that, “It would be wildly premature to comment on the Mayor’s preference for police chief at this time. “

This was of course before Fong demoted veteran police office Greg Suhr to captain, before the domestic violence victim whose case was used to demote Suhr claimed that Suhr’s actions saved her life, various other candidates had their names leaked to the press, and before the Examiner’s Ken Garcia accused Fong of trying to burn down the whole department.

But now the Chronicle is claiming that Manheimer could very well be SF’s next top cop, because she spent 16 years in the SFPD before heading to San Mateo, the powerful SF Police Officers Association feels it can work with her, and the choice will allow Newsom to appear to be choosing a department outsider.

Suhr, Deputy Chief Kevin Cashman, and Pasadena Police Chief Bernard Melekian, are reportedly still in the running.

Meanwhile, I’m left wondering if Newsom is going to back CLA director Villa-Lobos for D6 in 2010, becausethe two are photographed posing together on CLA’s website and the group seems to have its finger on Newsom’s pulse.
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David James Villa-Lobos poses with MGN

Appetite: Hot pastrami, Little Feat, Omnivore books, Mizuna salad, and more

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Every week, Virginia Miller of personalized itinerary service and monthly food, drink, and travel newsletter, www.theperfectspotsf.com, shares foodie news, events, and deals. View the last installment here.

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Nice pastrami! Katz comes to the Great American Food Fest

EVENTS

6/13 – Great American Food & Music Fest at Shoreline (Bobby Flay, Guy Fieri, Little Feat and food from around the country)
I’m already saving room in my stomach for a rare chance to roam the country in one day of eating! Sure, it’s down at Shoreline Amphitheatre, but this is a fun one, y’all: The Great American Food and Music Fest is a gorge and feed feast featuring sentimental, all-American food favorites, with performances from the likes of Little Feat, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy and Marshall Crenshaw.

Yes, on the food front, we have some of our best in the mix:
– Incanto’s (one of my top restaurants anywhere) chef and offal master, Chris Consentino, prepares homemade hot dogs
– Chuck Siegel, founder of Charles Chocolates, creates chocolate truffles
– June Taylor, of June Taylor Jams, makes her signature strawberry jam
– Boulevard’s Nancy Oakes gives us crab cakes
– Bruce Aidells, of Aidells’ Sausages, brings on the pork
– A16’s Nate Appleman cooks up a surprise
– Burger Meister and Bouchon Bakery serve their treats
– A “Best of Bay Area” showcase features local cheeses, meats, breads, chocolates, cherries, peaches, tomatoes
– West Coast wine tastings are curated by Best Cellars’ Josh Wesson and Gary Vaynerchuck, host of Wine Library TV

Take a deep breath. That’s just the Bay Area contingency.

Street Threads: Look of the Day

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SFBG photog Ariel Soto scoops SF street fashion. See the previous Look of the Day here.

Today’s Look: Butch, Dolores Park

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Tell us about your look: “I wear what’s comfy and anything that looks pretty cool.”

Shell and Chevron: a tale of two oil companies

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Text by Sarah Phelan

Shell has decided to pay $15.5 million to settle with the family of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the relations of other activists killed in Nigeria.

Brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights on behalf of Saro-Wiwa’s family and others in 1996, the New York-based lawsuit accused Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary of complicity in the writer’s 1995 hanging and the killings or persecution of other environmental activists in the Niger Delta.

Shell was fighting the lawsuit until last week, when a federal appellate court ruled that the plaintiffs could see the company’s Nigerian subsidiary in American courts. That ruling overturned a March decision in the company’s favor.

According to CNN, Shell said it had “no part in the violence that took place,” and called the $15.5 million settlement, “a humanitarian gesture to set up a trust fund to benefit the Ogoni people.”

Saro-Wiwa’s son, Ken Saro-Wiwa Jr. told CNN that, “It enables us to draw a line under the past and actually face the future with something tangible, some hope that this is the beginning of a better engagement between all the stakeholders in this issue.”

Shell’s settlement coincides with a California judge’s decision to throw out a key environmental report on Chevron Corp.’s contentious renovation of its Richmond refinery.

Judge Barbara Zuniga of the Contra Costa County Superior Court ruled that the report was too vague on the question of whether the project will allow the 107-year-old refinery to process heavier grades of crude oil than it currently does. Zuniga also faulted the report for not analyzing the project’s new hydrogen pipelines, and criticized Richmond for giving Chevron a permit before the company submitted a plan for limiting greenhouse gases after the upgrade.The judge’s ruling did not say whether work on the project, which Chevron began in September, after winning the City Council’s approval in July, must stop.

Will Shell’s decision to settle save it from the “Chevwrong” subvertisement campaign that Chevron has been bombarded with this summer—and the need to hire ex-reporters to make itself look good? Only time will tell.

Handjobs: Are we having them?

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By Juliette Tang

Hand jobs. Are people still giving, getting, or even thinking about them? I’m not talking about a few jerks during foreplay either. I’m asking if anyone out there habitually engages in hot and heavy hand love… and goes all the way. Because it seems, in many peoples’ sex lives, that the hand job is to a CD Walkman what the blow job is to an iPod. It was great when you were in junior high, but then something new came around and you sort of forgot about it. I occasionally see used latex gloves discarded on the sidewalk, and we regularly hear about San Francisco law enforcement cracking down on local massage parlors (so obviously someone out there is paying for it) but – like secret societies, group sex, and crack – hand jobs are something you know is out there, though you’re hard pressed to know anyone who regularly participates. I awkwardly asked some of my male friends, both straight and gay, “When was the last time you got a hand job?” and then quickly added, “And not from yourself.” The most common response was, “And… um, came?”

What once seemed so sexy and thrilling in 9th grade has now, in adulthood, become prosaic. But why? Have we really graduated from the hand job? Is it that because those who can simply jerk themselves off would rather engage in other activities when with a partner? Do hand jobs seem dispassionate and sterile? Or is it simply that, for most, no one else really gives a hand job quite as good as one can give oneself?

Street Threads: Look of the Day

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SFBG photog Ariel Soto scoops SF street fashion. See the previous Look of the Day here.

Today’s Look: Andrea, 24th Street and Guerrero

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Tell us about your look: “These are Moo Shoes.”

Nite Trax: The Glass

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By Marke B.

You may be worn out by indie dance acts that have “glass” in their name — as well as those with “crystal,” “soundsystem,” and any kind of cute furry animal — but the UK’s The Glass have just released a summer anthem, about dancing outside in summer, that deserves to be as big as I hope it will be. The video is bananas good as well.

The Glass, “Wanna Be Dancin'”

Could that buried “It Takes Two” sample in the chorus be any more delicious? There’s a killer mix of this track by one of my favorite, unfortunately overlooked, bands of 2k8, Clubfeet — available at Beatport. I recommend downloading it and blissing out in the park, toute suite

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