Michael Burks
As Muddy Waters might have put it, Michael Burks is one grown-ass man. A smoldering fire on the often bleak contemporary blues scene, what sets the third-generation bluesman apart is a deep, earthy tone in both his singing and his guitar playing. Equal parts Teddy Pendergrass and Freddie King, Burks…
Love: Anna
At the north end of River Oaks Boulevard is a bastion of elitism: the River Oaks Country Club. As you enter through the guard gate (in your Benz, of course), you’ll find the pristine facilities where rich people gather. Oh, and this week, you’ll also find Anna Kournikova, the hottest…
Porn Again
It’s a measure of continual cultural desensitization that The Girl Next Door plays like a remake of 1983’s Risky Business, yet very little of it feels risky in the slightest. Twenty years on, the notion of a high school student getting involved in the sex-for-pay business seems almost cute, rather…
He’s Got Skillz
FRI 4/9 V Zilla has been making sonic waves in the H-town hip-hop scene for some time. “I get really aggressive when I’m putting on a show,” he says. “It makes it easy for me to see what moves the crowd.” Zilla (formerly known as VG Skillz) will lend his…
Messin’ with Texas
It is, to those of us born and raised in Texas, the Greatest Story Ever Told and Retold; who can forget the Alamo when it’s on every Texas history class final exam? At 5 a.m. on March 6, 1836, some 189 Texian soldiers and volunteers were slaughtered while trying to…
Salad Barre
There won’t be any frilly frocks at Dance Salad. “No tutu pieces,” says Nancy Henderek, the show’s founder and director. “It’s contemporary in that all the pieces are done now, in the current moment.” Henderek has pliéd in Brussels, Sweden and Hong Kong and befriended dancers at barres across the…
Boys to Men
I first encountered America’s Army two years ago when I was hanging out, jobless and drunk, at a buddy’s house. Addiction was instant. America’s Army is an online shoot-’em-up game created by the U.S. Army. It was designed, according to its Web site, as “an entertaining way for young adults…
Burrito Wrap-Up
Nobody behind the counter at Chipotle Mexican Grill on Kirby speaks English. A friend and I order a carnitas burrito and a barbacoa burrito, and I chat with the three women in Spanish as they assemble them. “Do you eat carnitas and barbacoa on the weekends?” I ask. They all…
Capsule Reviews
“The Centaur’s Smile: The Human Animal in Early Greek Art” Centaurs, satyrs, sphinxes, the Minotaur, gorgons and the like are part of the ancient Greek panoply of half-human, half-animal creatures depicted in this exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts. The artifacts provide a stroll back through the stories of…
Embrace the Darkness
Music wo camps are forming in America. These factions are vehemently opposed to each other. Both are convinced they’re in sole possession of the truth. But the funny thing is, we’re not talking here about the gay marriage debate or the Iraq-war hawks-versus-doves dispute. No, this discussion is about something…
Triple Time
The first thing anyone’s likely to love about the Alley’s production of Yasima Reza’s Life (x) 3 is Kevin Rigdon’s stunning set. The back wall of the gorgeous room is lined with enormous curving windows covered in powdery vellum; they cradle a large living room that looks like something straight…
Higher Ground
Brothers and sisters, let’s talk about the Lord — yes, that capital L dude. Like many of us, perhaps your faith in the higher power(s) is lapsed, questionable, agnostic or even nonexistent. My fellow wanderers in the wilderness, welcome to the flock of those who might believe but haven’t found…
Capsule Reviews
Birthday from Hell What has six arms, six legs and three heads — and is one of the greatest comedy shows on earth? If you correctly guessed Radio Music Theatre and its three loony creators (Steve Farrell, Vicki Farrell and Rich Mills), then you’re probably still laughing about the latest…
A Century of Progress
There’s a Xeroxed black-and-white picture on the wall in Huey Long’s Heights retirement-home apartment that is simply astounding. On stage in the photo, there’s a big band — and what a big band it was. There’s Long on guitar, seated in the back row. Standing in the front row at…
Lindsey’s Loss
Excerpts from Steven Long’s new book, Out of Control, on the Clara Harris murder case (St. Martin’s Press, $6.99) Lindsey Harris and her father were at home alone when Clara Harris arrived that night. David was playing the new $90,000 grand piano that had been installed in the music room…
Cee-Lo
Cee-Lo’s inclusion of a few guest collaborators — most notably Blues Traveler’s John Popper — on his 2002 solo debut, Cee-Lo Green and His Perfect Imperfections, was adventurous. But while the album was critically praised, its wide stylistic range confused urban audiences, for whom the central messages of hope and…
Oral Argument
U.S. District Judge Vanessa Gilmore is having a heavy, heavy time these days, with the tedious procedural sparring of the Enron broadband suit and the looming death penalty case against a heartless human smuggler. So she might be forgiven for laughingly telling attorneys, “I want this one!” when pretrial discussions…
Randall Bramblett
You probably won’t see Randall Bramblett at that hotbed of inbreeding and self-promotion known as the Grammys. Unfortunately, that says damn near all we need to know about the prestigious awards ceremony, because his not being nominated for music’s highest honor is like Pete Rose not being in the Gambling…
You Ain’t Punk 2004
Like hundreds of other kids, Christian Arnheiter saw the Sex Pistols on their ill-fated 1978 U.S. tour and immediately formed a punk band. Though overshadowed by the mewling pop-punkers on MTV, 26 years later, true punk still lives, fuck you very much. And so does Arnheiter’s band the Hates, which…
A Dog’s Life
A pack of dogs roams the premises. Nearly all are large, many of them pit bulls and chows. Watching them are the caged dogs, housed in an oddly configured assortment of regular kennels and miniature hutlike structures cobbled together from the plastic board used to build walls along highways. There…
Alpha
Stargazing, the third album from Corin Dingley and Andy Jenks, a Bristol, England-based duo who initially debuted on Massive Attack’s Melankolic label, sees them delving into their classic songwriter roots. Less of a trip-hop affair than their previous records, Stargazing (Special Edition) — a revamped U.S. version of the original…
Eliza Gilkyson
It should come as no surprise that Eliza Gilkyson has become an elder stateswoman of Southwestern folk as well as a paragon of quality in a field littered with mediocre mush. Her father, Terry, was an original folk revivalist who wrote the classic “Greenfields,” and her guitar-playing brother distinguished himself…
Married to the Job
To some in attendance, the scene at City Council was so sweet it was almost cloying. Accepting her appointment as Houston’s new parks director in August 2002, Roksan Okan-Vick emotionally thanked her husband, James Vick, for his faith and support. Not to mention his selflessness. As a memo to councilmembers…
Freezer Burned
Moore’s Double Horn Grill
Rod Stewart
Today, it’s hard to believe that Rod Stewart was once the epitome of rock-and-roll cool and street-level cred. But some 30 years ago, his first two solo albums as well as his discs with the Jeff Beck Group and the Faces showcased a rootsy soul rebel and swaggering rock rooster…
Letters
Bank Shots Proof enough: I have to feel sorry for these people, as their lawyer says it should not be your responsibility to prove what the bank did with your stocks [“Taking Stock,” by Sarah Fenske, March 25]. If I were to make a deposit at the bank and realize…
Pretty Enough to Eat
Pretty enough to eat: The miso bass ($18.95) at Rickshaw Far East Bistro (2810 Westheimer, 713-942-7272) is eye-catching. The curled cut of fish, seared to a golden-brown and topped with a dollop of orange masago (smelt roe), resembles a sunburst. It comes with purple mashed Peruvian potatoes that look like…
Every Time I Die, with As I Lay Dying, Black Dahlia Murder and Scarlet
Nearly a year after the Summer of Screamo, there still isn’t a good term for bands like Every Time I Die — “post-hardcore” and “melodic hardcore” don’t say enough, and most of them are about half metal. “Ferretcore” might be good; the group’s Jersey-based label, Ferret Music, has plenty of…
Edging In
Back in the day, storytelling was a way of preserving history and culture. Today, it’s somewhat of a lost art. “It’s really unfamiliar to people today,” says local storyteller Brian Herod. “I want to get people curious.” Herod hopes to bring storytelling back with “Stories from the Edge.” “This event…
Iron & Wine, with Holopaw
Remember that scene in Animal House where Bluto is at the toga party and this bearded guy in a turtleneck — listed in the credits as “Charming Guy With Guitar” — is singing “I Gave My Love a Cherry,” and Bluto grabs the guy’s acoustic and smashes it to smithereens…
This Week’s Day-by-Day Picks
Thursday, April 8 You might know of Jim Norton from his regular gig on Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn, that asinine show that comes on right after The Daily Show on Comedy Central. You know the one we’re talking about: A group of comics sits around making jokes about world…
Chaka Khan
In her recently published autobiography, Chaka! Through the Fire, Chaka Khan (born Yvette Marie Stevens) reveals her tough road to sobriety — turns out Whitney Houston emulated more than Khan’s voice in an odd mirroring of two careers. This goes a long way to explaining Khan’s relative absence from the…
Beating Around the Bush
Are you fed up with your government? Are you sick and tired of your president’s Matrix-style dodging of war and economic issues? Do you want change, and do you want it now? Comics Against Evil hears you, brothers and sisters. In fact, team member Brian Malow can’t wait to dish…
Liars, with Young People
Aptly named band, ’cause that’s what you’ll call anyone who tells you their new album, They Were Wrong, So We Drowned, is worth a shit. It’s a piece of crap. Unlistenable is still unlistenable, high concept about medieval witchcraft and beleaguered German peasants be damned. Their 2001 album, They Threw…
Unearthing Kitsch
We all remember that exhilarating sense of anticipation whenever the teacher hauled in a clunky film projector. “A movie? We’re going to see a movie!” was followed by a chorus of hallelujahs. The films’ messages were usually forced, with awkward writing and horrid acting. But dammit, they broke up the…