Howard’s End
The day after the April shootings in Littleton, Colorado, radio personality Howard Stern asked on air if the perpetrators “[tried] to have sex with any of the good-looking girls?” His remarks created an outrage. His affiliate in Denver apologized for what was said. Stern never did, even though some of…
Girls to Women
When a musical performer or a musical group does an “in-store appearance,” the result can be hectic, unnerving, sometimes a little monotonous. Now, that may be the way some performers describe it, but for the reporters and journalists who are there to cover the event and interview the talent afterward,…
New Wave Good-bye
Santa Fe, Texas, is not the most picturesque or bustling town in the Lone Star State. Petrochemical refineries and front yards decorated with rusted metal machinery line the hot asphalt of Highway 6 in an area where one local notes that “bingo, Lotto and canned beer are king.” There was…
Return to Metal
Heavy metal has undergone a significant transformation during the ’90s. Gone are the denim and leather and the open-E power chords of yesterday. Even throwing the “sign of the devil” — index finger, pinky and thumb held aloft — has become somewhat passé. Instead, what exists are baggy, pastel-colored outfits…
New Releases Reviewed
Geri Halliwell Schizophonic Capitol Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott Da Real World The Gold Mind, Inc./Eastwest Geri Halliwell and Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott are two gals with some serious identity problems. As the jiggly portion of the platinum-selling girl quintet Spice Girls, Geri Halliwell was the one most guilty of being excessively extravagant…
Romantic Revolution
Nothing’s more dramatic than war. No one knows that better than Frank Wildhorn (his Tony-nominated Civil War premiered at the Alley last fall) and Nan Knighton, creators of The Scarlet Pimpernel. Romantic, gilded, gaudy and drop-dead sexy, this old-fashioned tale about the intrigues and dirty rotten bastards of the French…
Local Music Reviewed
Chlorine Primer Time Bomb There isn’t a thing in the world wrong with wanting to make it big in rock and roll. On the contrary, it sounds like a lot of fun. So “good for you” to all those “art” bands that hole up in crappy little clubs and play…
Soul-searching
There is something fairy-talelike, but also deeply human, about Twin Falls Idaho, a gentle, beautifully realized tale of love and intimacy that marks the feature film debut of Mark Polish and Michael Polish, identical twin brothers. Mark wrote the script, Michael directed it, and both of them star. It is…
Coming This Week
There are visionaries and then there are eccentric visionaries. Neil Young, visionary. John Lennon, eccentric visionary. Kurt Cobain, visionary. Brian Wilson, lunatic visionary. Chuck D., visionary. Kool Keith, eccentric visionary. The difference? Cobain et al. see things how they are and eloquently describe them. Keith et al. see whole different…
Mickey Mouse
Lo and behold the plight of the American gangster. John Gotti, the Dapper Don, has been sent down the river. His big-time heavy, Sammy “The Bull” Gravano, is famous and face-lifted for being a no-good dirty-rat stool pigeon. And Robert De Niro, the reigning deity of hoodlum heavies in films…
Local Music News
Saw something funny the other day. At Half Price Books, Records, Magazines out on Highway 6 in Sugar Land, a teenager was checking out the “rap” section. This is unusual because the kid was white and the music he was looking to purchase is made predominantly for and by black…
Tingle Hell
If Kevin Williamson has anything to say about it, the good works of noble movie schoolteachers like Mr. Chips, Miss Dove and Mr. Holland will be wiped out in one fell swoop. In their place, the creator of TV’s hormonal Dawson’s Creek series proposes an unmitigated horror: a high school…
Johnnie B. Bad
Until recently, Linda Tripp was the biggest blabbermouth to serve up a national scoop for Newsweek investigative reporter Mike “Spikey” Isikoff. The now-indicted Pentagon staffer fed him details of the White House assignations of Monica and Bill. But that was before Isikoff met Johnnie B. Rogers three weeks ago in…
Ross Tossed
Jack Gargan sought to raise a ruckus, if not spawn a revolution. The retired financial consultant from Florida started a campaign in 1990 against corrupt politicians who he believed had wrested government away from its rightful owner, the people. Gargan founded THRO — Throw the Hypocritical Rascals Out! — to…
DeLay’s Way
Carmencita Abad says six years in the brutal conditions of a Saipan sweatshop still left her unprepared for the reception she got in another place: Representative Tom DeLay’s Stafford office. Abad, a garment worker-turned-human rights activist, arrived at the office on August 9 with Bob Buzzanco, a University of Houston…
Approaching Death At The County Morgue
When the Harris County Commissioners Court offered Dr. Joye Maureen Carter the job as the area’s chief medical examiner just over three years ago, she didn’t hesitate to accept. According to Carter, the morgue facilities in Washington, D.C., where she had become the first black female chief medical examiner in…
Diving To The Bottom Of The Media Barrel Each Week
We know it’s mean to say anything about Maxine Mesinger, the Houston Chronicle’s longtime gossip columnist. She is bravely fighting a debilitating disease, after all. But we can’t let her August 9 effort go by. It was a rousing call to arms for reporters everywhere. Mesinger was mightily annoyed by…
Dangerous Deficits
Last week state budget officials revealed that, somehow, $30 million has evaporated from the $1.9 billion earmarked by the Legislature for Texas mental health organizations during the next fiscal year. Groups such as the Mental Health and Mental Retardation Association of Harris County were forced to put their budgets on…
News of the Weird
Lead Stories In April, Citizens Bank, the holder of the mortgage on Edward J. Brown’s $90,000 Dartmouth, Massachusetts, home, sold it at auction for $60,000 because Brown had dallied over paying the final $324 last year. He had made 299 of the 300 payments but held off on the last…
Get The Goods On All The Bads
Brenda Flynn Flores, 46, sometimes goes by the Spanish nickname Juera, or Blondie. The short, spunky Spring Branch activist and divorced mother of ten is well known at City Hall, particularly in the offices of Councilman Bruce Tatro. She has been both a paid and volunteer worker on his campaign…
Brilliant Korea
You hardly ever hear anyone say, “Honey, I feel like Korean food tonight!” Ask most people what they know about Korean, and you’re likely to get a blank stare, or, at best, “Kimchi, right?” Well, yes, kimchi, a spicy pickled cabbage dish, is part of nearly every Korean meal, but…
Safety Zone
Bull riding is dangerous business. Just ask Troy Dunn, last year’s Professional Bull Riders Bud Light Cup World Champion, whose title cost him a dislocated hip. Or ask Jerome Davis, the 27-year-old rider who was paralyzed from the chest down in last March’s Fort Worth PBR event. Or ask Lane…
Olivette
Rx for heat relief: Why steam over a bowl of soup when you can chill? Refreshingly, Olivette [inside the Houstonian Hotel and Spa, 111 North Post Oak Lane, (713)685-6713, nonmembers welcome] offers cold seasonal soups du jour. For the dazzling orange-strawberry number ($4.50), fresh OJ and strawberries are pureed to…
Twice in a Lifetime
In the mid-’80s high school and college students flocked to the Rocky Horror Picture Show-esque midnight screenings of Jonathan Demme’s Stop Making Sense at the River Oaks Theatre. The now-famous director’s filmic chronicle of a series of Talking Heads shows in Hollywood was a cult classic, a perfect concert experience…
Jazzed
Good Cajun and creole food is about as rare in Houston as a mild day in August. So it’s not surprising that when Mary Hodge and her husband, William, moved here from New Orleans, they found all the local Louisiana-style restaurants lacking. So they decided to open one of their…