Rotation
Duke Ellington The Duke: The Essential Collection (1927-1961) Columbia Legacy Duke Ellington: The Reprise Studio Sessions Mosaic Records Miles Davis once told Down Beat magazine: “I think all the musicians should get together on one certain day and get down on their knees and thank Duke [Ellington].” Well, no one…
Bullets After Brunch
The headlights flashing in Marc Kajs’s rearview mirror were familiar. The light blue Honda Prelude had been following him for 20 miles that day. The 28-year-old waiter had worked the dinner shift at Urbana, and now he just wanted to go home and get to sleep — he had to…
Local Rotation
Raw Johnson Hard Lessons Raw Johnson As structural anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss most famously noted, there’s a significant difference between the raw and the cooked. And what’s true for food, or social systems, also applies to music. What to make of a five-member Houston rock band that dubs itself Raw Johnson?…
Duke Truong’s Freedom Ride
In 1978 Duke Truong and his family risked their lives to flee their native Vietnam and avoid persecution from a ruling government that was none too kind to American sympathizers. Their plan was simple: set a course for the United States in search of the political freedom and economic opportunity…
She Sings Hard for the Money
Texas is one of the few places where country music can evolve and even prosper outside Nashville’s evil influence. For proof positive of the artistic benefits of working outside the confines of Music Row, look no further than Kimmie Rhodes. In the simplest biographical sketch, one could say that Rhodes…
Farewell to a Killer
Settling himself into the witness stand in the Dallas County courtroom, burly and bearded Johnny Bonds makes no attempt to hide his ear-to-ear grin as he catches the blank gaze of defendant Michael Lee Davis. Technically Bonds was present only to provide a judge with his insights into a man…
Serious as Hell
There is a killing late in Gladiator, Ridley Scott’s new heroic epic, and it is one of those wonderfully cathartic extinguishings that make a wide-eyed audience rise and cheer. After several brutal battles, after much bloodshed, after considerable suffering both needless and entertaining, a blade finds its mark, and a…
Stepping on Some Toes
Rick Archer is not an Aggie, but he likes them an awful lot. A Texas A&M-trained veterinarian once saved Archer’s beloved Border collie from an inoperable tumor by getting her into an experimental treatment program in College Station. And back in the ’80s Archer dated a woman who had graduated…
(Stay) Out of Africa
Poor Kim Basinger! In her first role since bagging the 1998 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress (for L.A. Confidential, the film that should have won Best Picture and Best Director as well), the actress positively trembles with what seems to be fear. Notoriously insecure about appearing on camera, Basinger…
In For The Long Haul
Enron Field has brought downtown baseball to Houston; it has brought natural grass and sun back to the sport; it has brought sellout crowds to April games. It has also brought VeryŠLongŠGames. Games that are longer than Kevin Costner movies (it’s a fact; Costner movies just seem longer). Games where…
Literary Pretensions
The highfalutin soap operas in W. Somerset Maugham’s fiction earned him a huge reading public in his day and made him a favorite of movie producers on both sides of the Atlantic. Maugham’s stories and novels — every one stuffed full of romance, deceit and tragedy — have inspired nearly…
Payback Time
Bruce Tatro’s tenure in the northwest Houston District A Council seat has been marked by nonstop political feuds since he took office in 1998. Outwardly mild-mannered in a Clark Kent style, the bookish Tatro has a behind-closed-doors temper that has generated plenty of bad vibes and rapid staff turnover. He…
Damsels in Distress
Everybody’s a princess at one point or another. Rich girls work it from birth to final crack-up. Bourgeois girls play the precious-‘n’-misunderstood game through adolescence. As for boys, the princess bug can strike at any age, provoking anything from satin thongs to music industry mogulhood. Ultimately no one is immune…
Rewriting
Ten years ago Houston’s theater crowd — at least those who look forward to seeing Phantom of the Opera every other year — was all agog at the World Premiere of Jekyll & Hyde, a musical that was inevitably described as “Broadway-bound,” a musical that was opening Right Here in…
The Final Cut
Peter Becker is the most important man in the movie business, even though you have no idea who he is. Becker himself would not cop to such a description; he, like few others in the business called show, does not put himself before the work. To describe what he does…
For Swingers Only
The scene: July 7, 1956, the Newport Jazz Festival in Rhode Island. Duke Ellington’s band is weathering a rare slump. With public interest waning, tenor saxophonist Paul Gonsalves starts to play the obligatory solo, when a woman in the front row starts dancing. That spontaneous act inspires Gonsalves to improvise…
Burning Down the House
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The Apolitical Blues
With the nabbing of Elian Gonzalez in the headlines, congressional hearings under way and the insinuation that Castro’s intelligence moles blackmailed President Clinton into the raid, emotions are running high among Cuban-Americans right now. So who could blame the Cuban members of Los Van Van if they’re a bit nervous…
Home Improvement
Curated by Project Row Houses founder Rick Lowe, Twelfth Round of Artist Installations gives free rein to seven artists who take these iconic shotgun houses and transform them with works that run the gamut from political and social statements to pure visual indulgence, hitting all points in between. The focus…
Get In Line
It seems everybody’s doing it. First, it was Robert Del Grande and his clan (Cafe Annie), then it was Michael Cordóa (Américas and Churrascos). Monica Pope (Boulevard Bistrot) soon followed, and now Bruce Molzan (Ruggles, Ruggles Bistro Latino, Uncle Ben’s Rice box) has got into the act. What these eminently…
Aida Who?
Two of Giuseppe Verdi’s masterworks draw from ancient eras: With intoxicating realism and detail, Aida re-creates a rift between Ethiopia and Egypt, and an Ethiopian slave princess who’s caught in the middle. In Nabucco, Verdi’s first hit, which premiered 30 years earlier in 1842, there’s a similar focus on captive…
Hot Plate
Crusted, When Crusted Wasn’t Cool: Show me a restaurant that doesn’t offer something encrusted, and I’ll show you a place that is yesterday’s news, maybe even tomorrow’s fish wrap. The upscale version of fried food began with simple bread crumbs, usually delicately dusting a sautéed chicken breast. But today’s chefs…
Letters to the Editor
Radical Unschooling The article on “unschooling” [“School’s Out Forever,” by Lauren Kern, April 20] was very interesting. The tone set by the reporter was sort of an admonishing bemusement, with the continual reminder that the Furgason children can do whatever they want, so they play Pokémon all day. Yet several…
Highway to Heck
Punk rock is a lot of things. Loud, always. Fast, mostly. Angry, sometimes. Uplifting? Well, yeah. Actually, if it’s done well, it can be downright inspirational — firing up the engines of self-empowerment that typically lie dormant, or creating a political sounding board (whether to the left, right or center),…
Irish By Design
“They always have a story to tell you,” observes P.J. Jamea, speaking of his Irish employees. Jamea, along with his brother Sean, is the co-owner of Houston’s newest Irish pub, Slainte [509 Main Street, (713)237-0000]. Thus, it is fitting that the two-month-old pub itself has a story to tell. “We…
Legacy of Gristle
When 62-year-old native Houstonian Clarence Hollimon died late last month, local blues and jazz culture lost more than just another gifted musician. It lost the player countless insiders considered to be the greatest all-around guitarist ever to emerge from the Fifth — or any other — Ward. And folks, given…
Love at First Bite
When I fall in love with a restaurant, I fall hard. I wake up thrilled like a kid on Christmas morning, only my first thought is, “Today I know I’m going to have a great meal.” I’m infatuated with the new menu, obsessed by every detail of its dishes. While…
Upcoming Concerts
Port Vale Rudyard’s Thursday, April 27 After swapping places on the marquee with San Francisco’s Timonium, Port Vale ended up headlining the night. Judging from the continuous hoots and whistles from the audience, it was perhaps rightfully so. Timonium’s Adam Hervey even found a place in front of the bandstand…
Ruff Rockers
On the back of Japanic’s new CD, Red Book, is in small typeface, “2000 Plethorazine. All Rights Reserved.” No logo. No bold lettering. Just a record label name with the necessary legal notice. Well, if Thomas Escalante gets his wish, that might change dramatically — or at least figuratively. The…