Chewing the Fat
Ken Hoffman’s February 27 column in the Houston Chronicle carried a report on a Ukrainian company that had begun selling a candy bar made of chocolate-covered pork fat. After describing the chocolate as “cheap” and declaring that it “does melt in your fingers,” he went on to state, “The manufacturer,…
House of the Rising Sun
The pretty people waiting for a table won’t step outside because it’s pouring rain, but they won’t back up to let us in, either. There is no lobby at Aries, the new restaurant on Montrose where 43 Brasserie used to be, so we have to decide between standing in the…
Whiskey a No-Go
Speaking off the toque: Jim McCray, proprietor and wine bar manager, divino Italian Restaurant and Wine Bar [1830 West Alabama, (713)807-1123]. Q. Do you think that drinking distilled spirits before a meal is detrimental to the dining experience? Is that why divino is a wine bar? A. Yes, whiskey just…
Stirred and Shaken
The jackpot was at $85 million, and we were feeling lucky. So we screeched into the parking lot and ran into the Stop-N-Go with minutes to spare. The convenience store was right next to the Roll-N Saloon [4200 San Felipe, (713)877-0187], where we immediately took ourselves and our lottery tickets…
Non-Orthodox
Don’t expect a straight answer from the Jewws — particularly when it comes to the inspiration for the band’s button-pushing, feather-ruffling name. “I hear it’s a religion,” joshes 23-year-old guitarist and lead singer Omari Yoshihiru. “That’s a good question, Omari,” seconds drummer Matt Murillo, who lists himself as “old.” “Where…
Pluck of the Irish
Every year it’s the same: People whose only tie to Ireland is a bottle of cream liqueur sport tiny shamrocks on their shirts, listen rapturously to music they ignore the rest of the year, and even take to throwing green dye into Buffalo Bayou. It’s as cliched as the quote…
A Crack Team
There’s a misconception among many of Clandestine’s fans. They seem to think the Houston-based Celtic band should be doing something more to spread the wealth of its music. That the quartet should hire a manager, sign with a major label, hook up with a production company, secure a publicity agent,…
Vanishing Act
The last rousing strains of the march from The Bridge on the River Kwai die out. All lights are trained on the ring. In the shadows of the big top there’s no hiding the sea of empty red seats on this February night at the Hermanos Vázquez circus in Mexico…
The Russians Are Coming
Starting this week, the Swank Lounge (910 Prairie) won’t be so swanky anymore. Swank, located above the tapas restaurant Solero, was one of the first trendy clubs to hit downtown, and since its opening in September 1997, it has been a snug fit for NoDo clubhoppers. That’s probably because the…
Elbow Greece
They call her Hitler. Eleni Fetokakis runs her Greek-American cafe, Niko Niko’s, with a German work ethic. She tells employees if they want to relax, go home. She says she isn’t running a school, she’s running a restaurant, and she doesn’t have time to teach everyone how to do everything…
Delbert McClinton
Delbert McClinton’s new album features a cast of wild honky-tonk women. There’s the nameless hell-raiser who lives it up while the narrator is “Livin’ It Down.” There’s Loretta, who plays with the narrator’s mind on “I Gotta Get It Worked On.” Then there’s the eponymous woman who leaves her man,…
A Loew(s) Blow
Two high-profile Houston movie theaters have closed, victims of the desperate battle between overspending movie-megaplex owners. The Loews River Oaks 12, which was hailed at its opening ten years ago as the first inside-the-Loop cinema in a decade, permanently shut its doors February 28. Two weeks earlier, Loews’ Cineplex Odeon…
Playbill
Lee Perry, the man known as “Scratch,” has always had a gift for manipulating rhythms and vocal harmonies and otherwise generating hypnotic arrangements. Through the art of dub, he elevated artists such as Bob Marley, Augustus Pablo and the Congos to previously unknown heights, and he even assisted with distinctly…
Prophet and Loss
He was no longer that Ricky Laine Gaspard, a 44-year-old high school grad and home remodeling contractor in the tank town of Texas City. Those blue-collar roots had blossomed into a new beginning of the great American dream. Sure, Gaspard remained the family man supporting a wife and three children…
Playbill
Indian drumming, believe it or not, has become fashionable on the dance floor. Remixers are fusing Indian classical music with cool, Euro-American drum ‘n’ bass. Tablas, dhols and duggis are being augmented with kit drumming and synthetic percussion loops; the result is mesmerizing, sophisticated 21st-century dance music. Zakir Hussain doesn’t…
Getting Wrecked
Act 1, Scene 1: It’s late at night in Woodlake Square, a small strip shopping center at Westheimer and Gessner. J. Michael Douglas, the mild-mannered owner of Houston-based Bristol Motors Car Corp., comes out of a restaurant beaming like a glowworm after food and drinks with a friend. On top…
All Systems Go
Computer science hardly seems the stuff of riveting drama, but Hugh Whitemore’s Breaking the Code finds a way to turn the geekdom of mathematics and logic into truly fascinating theater. The proof is in the production; for though the show is riddled with problems, the engrossing story of Alan Turing…
Some Very Special Friends
When Harris County Commissioners appointed first assistant county attorney Michael Stafford to replace his resigning boss, Mike Fleming, last week, they picked an up-and-coming politico with cozy ties to county special interests. So cozy that he received $100,000 in campaign loans last year that he never had to repay. Why?…
Grave Commentary
Somewhere between the broad comedy of Monty Python and the morbid humor of The Addams Family you’ll find Spymonkey, a tiny European troupe that has landed at Theater LaB to bring us one of the funniest and most engagingly goofy shows to leap onto any stage this season. And leap…
Latino Loss
There was some happy reaction when Channel 13 announced that former morning anchor Gina Gaston was returning to the station after almost two years. But not in all corners. Nothing against Gaston, who comes back to Houston after working for the MSNBC cable network. But she’ll be replacing longtime KTRK…
Coping with Coppélia
The dancers of the Houston Ballet must still be a bit shaken by artistic director Ben Stevenson’s near-resignation late last month (see The Insider, “Politics of the Dance,” by Tim Fleck, March 8). Opening night of Stevenson’s staging of the classic Coppélia was marred by more than a few missteps:…
Up the Academy
Gil Cates takes a long, deep breath before answering the question: Is producing the Academy Awards show the ultimate no-win situation? Cates has produced nine of the past 11 Oscar telecasts, and he returns March 25 after a year’s layoff; for those scoring at home, Cates is not to blame…
Kiss of Death
To keep it simple, Enemy at the Gates plays like a cross between the PlayStation game Medal of Honor, a World War II Nazi shoot-’em-up viewed through a sniper’s scope, and a Harlequin Romance novel. It’s history lesson as video game, video game as soap opera, soap opera as highbrow…
Letters
Spinning Out Politics in public works: This is a prime example of the Brown administration [“Devil in the Details,” by Bob Burtman, March 1]. The fact that the contractor screwed over his “very dear friends and great people” should tell you something about his character. Dear friends? I don’t think…
Feminist Farm Fantasy
The heroine of Andrucha Waddington’s Me, You, Them is a force of nature who holds men in her thrall and deftly reshapes them to suit her life. Without knowing it, they fall prey to her charms, her spirit, her very scent. But she’s no Cleopatra dripping with jewels, no Lucrezia…
Give This Piece a Chance
In the ’70s a New York gallery finally expressed interest in some of John Lennon’s drawings. Until then, art spaces had refused even to look at the work of the man they condescendingly called a “pop star,” albeit one of the best known in the world. Lennon jumped at the…
Marzi
Marzi is a three-piece metal band that’s pretty much cut with nothing but Texas boogie and the classic rock purveyed by yesteryear’s guitar heroes. Marzi (a.k.a. Maziar Montazeri) is also a guitarist, hailing from Houston, who apparently once played with Philip Anselmo in Superjoint Ritual. The Need is Marzi’s debut…
Trading Places
The state of Texas has always had its defenders. William Travis. Sam Houston. “Stone Cold” Steve Austin. You can add Edgar Award-winning mystery novelist Jan Burke, creator of the hugely popular Irene Kelly series, to the list. “I was infamous in grade school for my defense of the Lone Star…
Smells Fishy
It’s easy to call the bacalao ($8.95), or salt cod, served at Tex Chick [712 1/2 Fairview, (713)528-4708] the best in town, because it’s the only one in town. Tex Chick is also the only Puerto Rican restaurant in Houston — at least the only one we know of. Labeling…