De La Soul
If LL Cool J’s most recent album seemed to prove hip-hop wouldn’t allow its veteran stars to age gracefully, this is the rebuttal. Largely MIA since 2001, De La Soul still has seen growth to its reputation as patron saint of the burgeoning hip-hop underground. So get past the first…
This Week’s Day-by-Day Picks
Thursday, November 11 Robert Frank’s The Americans, a book of photographs from a 1955 road trip, is considered by many to be the most important photography publication in post-World War II America. But Frank abandoned photography for decades afterward, opting instead to dabble in film. Now, in celebration of Frank’s…
Dennis DeYoung
These facts are known: The year 1981 was the predawn of nerd chic, Styx was at the forefront, and Dennis DeYoung was the Elvis of the geeks. Back in these pomp-rockers’ heyday, virtually all of the band’s fans were geeky adolescent guys who knew FORTRAN and Pascal and how to…
Piercing Drama
Most folks’ exposure to the art and ritual of body suspension is limited to the 1970 film A Man Called Horse, in which the late Richard Harris endured the Sioux ceremony of o-kee-pa, being lifted off the ground through hooks lodged in the upper-chest pectoral muscles. The film elicits “Ow!…
Arcade Fire
Whether it inspires you or just leaves you pummeled, Funeral is a staggering debut. Over the course of just one album, the Arcade Fire bursts out of the rigid beats and chopping chords of its post-punk influences and straight into arena-rock territory; lead singer Win Butler’s raw-throated bombast has even…
Block Party
Bronzed breast implants, plastic totem poles and a dirt trampoline are taking center stage this weekend at “48 Hours,” the annual festival of the Third Ward’s venerable Project Row Houses. The off-kilter shindig celebrates the nongentrified charm of the Third Ward through quirky art installations by more than 30 local…
The Edge of Treason
A week after having seen Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, no memory of it remains save some scribblings in my notepad, such is the slight nature of this woeful, forgettable sequel. Squandering the goodwill that lingers from the original, now a beloved relic among the singletons and smug marrieds…
A Lobster’s Tale
Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar (2405 West Alabama, 713-520-5959) is one of only a few nationwide to test-market new menu items for the chain, and it’s offering some new, non-chop-house dishes. One that’s already clawed its way onto the printed menu and will soon be served across the country…
Redemption Thong
The witless inanity of After the Sunset is so numbing that the sole reason for any living creature to sit through it — man, woman or household pet — is to marvel at the speed and variety of actress Salma Hayek’s costume changes. After an opening sequence in Los Angeles,…
Sweet 17
In many ways, entering the Sam Houston Hotel’s new restaurant, 17, is like walking into Jurassic Park — you can tell they’ve “spared no expense.” The dark hardwood floors are spaced by thin, birch-colored stripes, giving the small room a much larger feel. The plush, stuffed white chairs trimmed in…
Swingin’ Party
SAT 11/13 At 160 miles per hour, a peregrine falcon can fly faster. At 852 mph, a bullet travels a lot faster. But young tennis hot shot Andy Roddick’s serve is still pretty damn intimidating, considering he set a professional tennis record of 155 mph at the Davis Cup in…
Enduring Creepiness
There is something important to know about Enduring Love that is not apparent from the title: It’s a thriller. More specifically, it’s a creepy, twisted, overproduced and often intelligent psychological thriller with an ending all too loyal to the genre. Director Roger Michell (most recently of The Mother, a nearly…
Style Council
WED 11/17 Have you sported the same look since Bush — the first Bush — became president? Do you think lip liner is great, especially when it matches your acrylic tips? Have you worn pleats, aviators and ponchos in and out and back into fashion again? Come on. Vogue’s André…
Reich-eous Dude
Guru or crackpot, scientist or visionary lunatic, martyr or holistic saint — none of these combos does justice to Austrian psychologist-philosopher Wilhelm Reich. For a time in his always varied life, he embodied them all. He is, perhaps, the only writer to have his works burned by both the Nazis…
The Joy of Cooking
FRI 11/12 In our fast-food world, few know anything about cooking anymore, especially not the daylong slow-bake kind of cooking practiced by grandmas around the world. San Antonio playwright Alicia Mena takes on this contemporary conundrum in what promises to be a sweetly kooky comedy, Las Nuevas Tamaleras. The story…
Capsule Reviews
Last Night at Orabella’s The wizards responsible for the nonstop hilarity at Radio Music Theatre are Steve Farrell, Vicki Farrell and Rich Mills, abetted behind the curtain by Mark Cain on lights and Pat Southard on sound effects and keyboard. Last Night at Orabella’s is the first in a 14-play…
Mussels In
New York’s culinary bad boy, Anthony Bourdain, will be in Houston soon promoting his latest release, Anthony Bourdain’s Les Halles Cookbook. The book is an interesting balancing act between Bourdain’s persona as a whistle-blower and his gig as a chef in New York’s French restaurant Les Halles. In his best-selling…
Should We Stay or Should We Go?
The bleak morning after Election Night, I got on the Internet and Googled “Bush is the antichrist.” It pulled up 47,800 entries. Then I went to the Canadian government’s Web site and clicked on the “Emigrating to Canada” information page. I e-mailed it to friends and spent the rest of…
Shut Up and Drive
The Drive-By Truckers appear Sunday, November 14, at the Meridian, 1503 Chartres. The Heartless Bastards open. For more information, call 713-225-1717.
Capsule Reviews
“Al Souza” You may have seen Al Souza’s puzzle paintings. But if you haven’t, they’re pretty much what they sound like: paintings made out of puzzles. Souza hunts puzzles high and low, in thrift stores and on eBay, and has freelancers assemble them. Then he takes strategic sections of the…
Songs of Planet Krypton
How poignantly harmonic that Rodney Dangerfield and Christopher Reeve died the same week. Mr. No Respect vs. Superman, the ultimate underdog vs. the ultimate dynasty, Red Sox vs. Yankees. But with all overdue respect to Dangerfield, the iron grip of Reeve’s most famous role on popular culture — especially popular…
Escape Artists
Out here, it’s darker than you can imagine. There are tiki torches and Coleman lanterns in the camp, but outside of their range, you’re blind. Standing at the camp entrance, a figure beckons newly arrived Celtic Rogues toward him. Off in the distance, drums. The Rogues lug tents and coolers…
Feelings, Nothing But Feelings
The Sunday before last, above the fold in the Arts & Entertainment section of The New York Times, there was a lengthy piece by Kelefa Sanneh about “rockism,” which he defines as “idolizing the authentic old legend (or underground hero) while mocking the latest pop star; lionizing punk while barely…
Black and White
Debra Alston was a hard worker who didn’t believe in excuses, mostly because she didn’t need them. Born to an unwed teenager in a rural town near the Oklahoma state line, Alston worked her way through technical school, then earned a degree in nursing from the University of St. Thomas…
Playbill
The Delgados, with Crooked Fingers The latest Britpop invasion is tapering down to a trickle heard most often over the supermarket PA. But even though Coldplay’s warbly melancholy is a fine companion when deciding which frozen ham to buy, the Delgados’ sophisticated sound, marked by the trading-off vocals of Alun…
Cut and Run
Everyone wants to get into show business, but not everyone’s willing to go the John Wayne Bobbitt route. Houstonian Rene Aramando Nunez is not just anybody, however. Earlier this month Nunez followed the Bobbitt plan closely: Get involved with an (allegedly) kinda temperamental gal. Have love go sour. Get your…
Monday Night Fleshballs
“My 17-year-old son is in Iraq right now. I’m afraid he’s going to get killed.” It is a sad sentiment. But the words have less bite, somehow, coming from the mouth of a drunken stripper who appears to be in her mid-twenties. Her name is Carmen. On top of the…
Ready for a Rumbo?
Renato Castillo knows how to get the story fast. He marches into a southwest Houston health clinic, flashes a press card and quickly interviews patients in the dingy waiting room. Little girls wail and a pregnant teenager with twig legs rubs her boyfriend’s tattooed neck. By the time a health…
Jimmy Eat World
Futures often conjures the hookfests of the Goo Goo Dolls. This is hardly a pejorative comparison, emo elitists: Before vocalist Johnny Rzeznik morphed into a doppelgänger of Jon Bon Jovi, Goo had the heart of a brash bar band. Futures practically booms with such blackened sugar. Somersaulting riffs, mind-expanding choruses…
Letters
Rally Killer No-show ‘Stros: Praise the Lord! Someone else who thinks Roger Clemens is an arrogant — though talented — asshole! Enjoyed your take on the Astros season [“Curses Again,” by Richard Connelly, October 28]. The so-called Astros rally on October 25 confirmed my suspicions that they couldn’t give a…
Tom Waits
Over the past decade, Tom Waits has developed a tripartite personality: There’s the surrealist cabaret singer of The Black Rider, the sorrowful lounge act that has taken a “Downtown Train” to hell and back, and the high-octane caveman who emerged from Swordfishtrombones. If 2002’s simultaneous release of Alice and Blood…
Pryor Experience
If you’re half Jewish and half black, that probably qualifies you as somewhat “unique.” How about if your Jewish mother was a go-go-dancing activist and your black father was Richard Pryor? Dang, you deserve your own show. Hence Rain Pryor’s Fried Chicken and Latkas, a one-woman cabaret show about her…