Crazy Tony Is Back
If you’ve seen one of the thousands of flyers around town the last couple of weeks, you know that “Crazy Tony Is Back!” Some of you have known all along who he was, but others of you had to wonder, “Who the hell is Crazy Tony, and where did he…
Capsule Reviews
The Barber of Seville Houston Grand Opera’s current production of The Barber of Seville is one of the funniest operas, short of a Bugs Bunny cartoon, that you will ever see. And Australian director Lindy Hume makes Gioacchino Rossini’s 1816 comic opera rip-roarin’ fun with an Elvis-impersonating Figaro, a blond,…
Micro Management
In 1982, Van Weldon, a young salesman adept at buying rounds and selling tractors in Abilene bars, dropped out of business school and set out to dig up some money. In those days in West Texas, plowing corn rows grew a few dollars, but digging deeper often uncorked a black…
William Hung
It was perfect — while killing time in Dallas I noticed a Tower Records up the street. I ambled in, flipped through the magazines, checked out the vinyl and nearly puked on some blue-light-special Limp Bizkit toys. Suddenly my peripheral vision drew my attention to what was not, in a…
Color Me Decadent
Gordon Terry’s art sure claims some eclectic influences. Among them are ’60s drug-fueled psychedelia and the hokey bohemian occultism and spiritualism popular during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He pays homage to the fin de siècle magic seekers by loosely lettering their names in glossy white acrylic on…
Well-Dressed Rebels
It may have lacked the lyrical strength of Martin Luther King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” but the burning scars of Injustice Endured still shone through. Kind of. Actually, the anonymous fax sent to Houston media, alleging police brutality on a Metro train, was pretty damn funny. On April 23,…
The Catheters
When the Catheters first came out of Seattle in 1999, they seemed destined for greatness. While there was nothing remarkable about their eponymous debut, it did hold promise, full as it was of bleak, energetic rock and roll songs capped off by the ferocious howl of Brian Standeford. Subsequent touring…
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…
Captive Market
Rockford Business Interiors, a Houston company that designs and installs office cubicles, was the low bidder for a $150,000 job with the Huntsville Police Department. The company’s celebration was short-lived, however. Despite what is set up to be a fair bidding process, one competitor — known as TCI — got…
Chingo Bling
El Mero Mero Ghetto Vaquero, the No. 1 freestylero, the southeast side’s foremost rapper/actor/comedian/damn fool is back, and he’s taking no prisoners with his overground official debut, The Tamale Kingpin. As he raps on one of the tracks, “When we do our nest tour we gonna need bigger venues /…
Meat and Tomatoes
5851 Westheimer, 713-266-0909. Hours: Mondays through Thursdays, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.; Fridays, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. to 11 p.m.; Saturdays, 3 p.m. to 11 p.m.; Sundays, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.
The End Game
Strangers are inside Rose Sanjakian’s A-frame house in West University, touching her belongings. They paw through boxes of scarves and hankies, examine the purses strewn across the bed and scavenge within the closets. Always a lady, Sanjakian owned more than two dozen pairs of prim white gloves, now available at…
Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings with Waxploitation DJs
What follows is a verbatim transcript of a stage introduction of 44-year-old Sharon Jones, the deep funk revivalist and former prison guard from James Brown’s hometown of Augusta G-A. Imagine hearing this delivered by her bandleader over a bacon-fat-greasy, bass-driven, sax-honkin’ J.B.’s-style track from about 1971… “Right now for your…
Letters
Thrill to Steele Laugh lines: Hilarious article [“How to Be Famous in Ten Easy Steps,” by Keith Plocek, April 29]! Well written and very well played! I have never been a fan of trendy clubs, nor am I impressed by anyone famous — their fame adds nothing to my quality…
The Dwarves with the Down and Dirties and the Delayed
Sadly, gone are the days when the infamous punk-rock kings of sleaze, the Dwarves, would burst on stage to play a chaotic 15-minute set in the nude. But that doesn’t mean the band isn’t still as dangerous as ever live. Guitarist HeWhoCannotBeNamed still gets vicious, but only when people aren’t…
Naughty Boy
For a man whose baritone booms out lyrics like “Shove it in my mouth / Pump it up my ass,” Houston Bernard is surprisingly soft-spoken on the phone. “The reason I decided to do a whole North American tour is to promote human rights and free speech,” says the Brooklyn-based…
Mary J. Blige with Musiq and Glenn Lewis
Since she debuted a dozen years ago, Mary J. Blige has come to be known as the Queen of Hip-hop Soul. Any number of pretenders to that throne have emerged in the interim, yet no one has wrested the crown away from the original, whose What’s the 411 created a…
This Week’s Day-by-Day Picks
Thursday, May 13 Thursday is always a good night to party. People are usually out in droves, but they don’t have the same expectations as they do on Friday or Saturday. And, as any good Buddhist drunk knows, the lack of expectation equals the lack of disappointment. We suggest you…
Houston Press Music Awards Sound Off ’04 with Blue October
Sunday, May 16, at the Meridian, 1503 Chartres, 713-225-1717.
The Right Stuff
The “boy band” phenomenon is often reflexively dismissed as being just the most recent flash in a very lame pan. However, there are heretics who argue that boy-band-osity is, rather, a long and hallowed tradition. They would have us travel back through time and space, bypassing ‘N Sync, detouring around…
Need New Bodywith Make Believe and Hella
Numerous scribes anointed Toronto musical collective Broken Social Scene as this year’s cool trend after a gig at Stubb’s during South By Southwest in March. Lucky for them Need New Body wasn’t on the bill that night. Indeed, an appearance by the Philly band, whose instrumental collages sound at times…
Walking Tall
They were good enough for Jaohn Travolta, KISS and Elton John, and if the Art Guys have anything to say about it, platform shoes just might be making a comeback. Short — or, in the politically correct vernacular, vertically challenged — men, take note. Jack Massing of the Art Guys…
Bernie Leadon
Mojo Nixon was right: Don Henley must die. But at least one former Eagle deserves to be spared. Listening to Bernie Leadon, one wonders how he ever fit in with the glitz and glamour and Hollywood posing of the Eagles. Mirror, Leadon’s first album in 26 years, is damned smart,…
Heavy Heaving
Let us be thankful for Scotland. Land of bagpipes, kilts and golf. Land of attitude, accent and Sean Connery. And land of some unique forms of sport, almost all of which involve throwing something heavy. (Dwarf-tossing is allegedly an Australian invention, but don’t forget that many an Aussie has Scottish…
Melissa Etheridge
It’s best to peel off the celebrity skin when considering Melissa Etheridge. Sure, she became tabloid fodder when former lover Julie Cypher bore two children thanks to David Crosby’s seed, not to mention when she got engaged last year to current companion Tammy Lynn Michaels. And yes, she’s a fervent…
Don’t Choke
THU 5/13 In the world of ska, the quick drum beats and the happily blazing horns make life seem just peachy keen. Same thing with most ’80s music — fun, fun, dance, dance, don’t worry, be happy. In the world of Fishbone, though, the merry-go-round ’80s ska sound meets a…
The Dirtbombs
Detroit’s Dirtbombs often go out of their way to suggest they’re not a garage band. Sorry to nit-pick, but they need to get their story straight. After all, when your lineup includes two drummers and sometimes two bass players, the results can be both magnificent and maddening, which sounds just…
A Funny Thing
FRI 5/14The smarty-pants world of legitimate theater is about to get turned inside out. The Alley Theatre and all its la-di-da Shakespeare-spouting, Tom Stoppard-loving actors are putting on a musical. Of course, this is no ordinary, run-of-the-mill silly festival of songs. The Alley is mounting a full-scale production of Stephen…
Pat McGee Band, Michael Tolcher and Pilot Radio
On Save Me, the Virginians in the Pat McGee Band serve up earnest VH1-ready pop-rock balladry that seldom offends. And because it chances so little, it wins nothing — it’s just sort of there, a platter of generic frat-bar rock and humdrum love songs gussied up with expensive production and…
Transcultural Tuna
Ragazza’s signature dish, the tuna Ragazza ($16.95, 920 Studemont, 713-864-3700), is an elegant blend of Japanese and Italian cuisines. You’d expect its brown grill marks and overall beige color to impart a strong grill flavor. But the fish’s characteristic pink interior, reminiscent of pickled ginger slices, shows that it’s barely…
Big Fat Greek Bloodletting
In the mood to launch a thousand ships? Fine, but it’s gonna cost you. Feel like sacking the Temple of Apollo? Okay, but bring drachmas. Depending on who’s counting, Warner Bros.’ pre-summer blockbuster Troy budgeted out at anywhere between $175 million and $250 million, including the big wooden horse, assorted…
Mouse Rap
Whether we’re talking about the funky-fresh breakin’, gold-chain hip-hop fans of the 1980s or the glowstick, lollypopped PLUR set, music has always been as much about the community and culture surrounding it as it has the scales and octaves within it. Adapting to the times and new technology, the Web…
McRibbing
What becomes of Morgan Spurlock’s body after a month of eating and drinking nothing but McDonald’s assembly-line foodstuffs is not surprising. He bloats up, gaining nearly 30 pounds in 30 days. His sex drive peters out, among the myriad disappointments visited upon Spurlock’s vegan-chef girlfriend, who’s only too happy to…
Rock and Roll Never Forgets
This year’s Arrowfest, the crown jewel of Houston’s live classic rock calendar, has easily the best lineup ever: Styx, Peter Frampton, Kansas, Blue Öyster Cult, America, Grand Funk Railroad and, um, Nelson (don’t ask). Among them, these acts are responsible for about a gazillion hits, from “Come Sail Away,” “Do…
At the Hotel
Wallace Shawn has one of Hollywood’s most recognizable faces. Since he shuffled onto the scene in the late ’70s as Diane Keaton’s “homunculus” of an ex-husband in Woody Allen’s Manhattan, he’s made countless big-budget films, playing everything from a balding nebbish schoolteacher (Clueless) to a balding evil mastermind (The Princess…