More from Indian Jewelry
Here’s a little extra from our conversation with Tex Kerschen of Indian Jewelry in our feature Smoke Signals, Indian Jewelry comes home by Olivia Flores Alvarez in the November 30 issue of the Houston Press. Houston Press: It’s been about a year since you played in Houston, let’s see what’s…
Pornstars, Nymphos and Karaoke…Oh My!
Texas native Jessica Drake is in town and may show up for karaoke tonight. Five bucks says she’ll do “My Humps.” If you’re looking for something decadent for your evening’s entertainment, check out Pornstar Karaoke at Encounters (5718 Fairdale). The event promises cameos by “hot” porn stars, so it should…
It’s Time to Get Rogered
Courtesy of Roger Creager The Aggie accountant croons today. We’re not ones to tell you what to do with your personal time. Actually, yeah, we are. And here’s why: Show up at the Houston Press Concert Series today at Pub Fiction, and you’ll be entertained by one Roger Creager —…
When Saul Williams Preaches, We Listen
Courtesy of Saul Williams We enjoy reading from the Book of Saul. The annual B-Boy Hodown is doing more than just bringing windmills and back flips to Houston. The five-day event includes panel discussions, a film festival, musical happenings and big hip-hop names such as Kool Herc and poet/musician Saul…
Coogs Fans, Get Your Conference USA Game Tix Now! (No, really, now…)
Courtesy of UH Sports Information Better stand in line now if you want to see Kevin Kolb. There are 120 teams in the NCAA’s Division 1-A, but only two of them get to play for the Conference USA championship. We’re sure Ohio State and USC, on the outside looking in,…
Coogs Fans, Get Your Conference USA Game Tix Now! (No, really, now…)
Courtesy of UH Sports Information Better stand in line now if you want to see Kevin Kolb. There are 120 teams in the NCAA’s Division 1-A, but only two of them get to play for the Conference USA championship. We’re sure Ohio State and USC, on the outside looking in,…
HISD: A Good Call on the Westbury Tragedy
There are myriad lessons from today’s tragic shooting outside Westbury High School. One of them: Parents, when you see “Houston Independent School District” on your caller ID, you may want to check your voicemail. High schools have been calling parents and leaving automated messages for ages. But they tend to…
Vote for Your Favorite Band
Okay Houston, here’s your chance to help your favorite band get some attention. You tell us what local band or artist you would like to see profiled in the Houston Press and we’ll do it! Vote in the comment section of this post between now and December 15 and the…
Make the Cut: We Have a Winner!
Monica Fuentes for HouStoned Images Ltd., Unlmtd. Picture it: “Hey janitors, since you aren’t really doing anything, you think you can pick up that pile right behind me?” That’s good stuff. We’ve had to delay the awards ceremony (brief form letter e-mail) for You Make the Cut because of the…
Taco Truck Art: A Coke and a Smile
Photo by Robb Walsh It’s refreshing and snazzy… Only taco truck gourmands are aware of an otherwise little-known phenomenon: taco truck art. In a new series, Robb shares his favorite objects d’ (taco) art. This coke bottle was painted on a pop-out panel under the driver’s side window on El…
Taco Truck Art: A Coke and a Smile
Photo by Robb Walsh It’s refreshing and snazzy… Only taco truck gourmands are aware of an otherwise little-known phenomenon: taco truck art. In a new series, Robb shares his favorite objects d’ (taco) art. This coke bottle was painted on a pop-out panel under the driver’s side window on El…
Slightly Stoopid
Slightly Stoopid’s dual frontmen Miles Doughty and Kyle McDonald have been friends since they were one and two years old and have been playing music since their midteens. In 1995, they caught the ear of late Sublime vocalist Bradley Nowell, who signed them to his own Skunk Records label. Joined…
Be The Bachelor(ette)
Copyright 00A9 2006 ABC, Inc. / Bob D’Amico You can audition for The Bachelor and maybe have Erica talk down to you? Score! We had fun watching the two local ladies on ABC’s The Bachelor: Rome . Jami and Erica are off the show, but if you’re an Erica fan,…
Awright, Carl Lewis, Break It Up
Now that you’re back at the office, the last thing we’d want to do is distract you from your Cyber Monday surfing. But if you find that Amazon is loading a little slow, we offer this little diversion. It’s a classic ditty from H-town track phenom Carl Lewis that’s been…
Turkey: The Day After
Your turkey could look like this, thanks to Kapoor. We’re certainly not trying to get all Good Housekeeping on you. Hell, we all love the venerable day-after-Thanksgiving turkey sandwich. But if you’re looking for something more than white meat on mayo, try a few of these recipes that some local…
Turkey: The Day After
Your turkey could look like this, thanks to Kapoor. We’re certainly not trying to get all Good Housekeeping on you. Hell, we all love the venerable day-after-Thanksgiving turkey sandwich. But if you’re looking for something more than white meat on mayo, try a few of these recipes that some local…
Rotation: My Chemical Romance
Reaching for bigger and better, The Black Parade still disappoints. My Chemical Romance The Black Parade Reprise Ever get the feeling that modern rock is now all about one-upmanship? The Killers are reaching for Springsteen’s lofty heights. Panic! at the Disco is augmenting its stage show with a veritable burlesque…
The Earth Slips, A&M Wins
It’s a rare day, Aggie fan: You win, and Lomax salutes you. Given that Texas A&M has upset UT 12-7 on national TV, I had to call Press music editor/college pigskin pundit/bleedin’-orange-UT-fan John Nova Lomax and offer my condolences. “Stick it up A&M’s ass,” he growled, spitting about the bogus…
Here Comes the Boom!
MLB.com Lee will be a big (literally) addition to the ‘Stros. Good news from your Houston Astros. The team has called a 4 p.m. press conference to announce the signing of hotly pursued free agent outfielder Carlos Lee. The deal is reported to be for six years, $100 million. Actually,…
Re: We’re Not Buying It
Well, shoot, does lunch count? That didn’t last long. Sorry, Adbusters. — Keith Plocek…
We’re Not Buying It
Adbusters.org “Patchouli on aisle four!” The term “Black Friday” actually refers to many Fridays. There was the financial panic of 1869. The day in 1881 when 189 Scottish fishermen lost their lives. The 1919 riot in Glasgow. The fires that devastated Victoria in 1939. The 1978 massacre of Iranian protestors…
Shooting Up the Bird
Photos by Julia Walsh To go Cajun, you gotta shoot up. Injecting a turkey with a great big hypodermic needle full of pepper sauce and spices had to be the weirdest Thanksgiving activity at my house this year. “Gather round children, we’re going to shoot up the turkey now!” Only…
Shooting Up the Bird
Photos by Julia Walsh To go Cajun, you gotta shoot up. Injecting a turkey with a great big hypodermic needle full of pepper sauce and spices had to be the weirdest Thanksgiving activity at my house this year. “Gather round children, we’re going to shoot up the turkey now!” Only…
Double Trouble
Q& A with Lady Sovereign Just in case you didn’t get enough of rapper Lady Sovereign in this week’s print edition of the Houston Press (Sovereign Ruler, Is the U.S. Ready for the S-O-V? by Geoff Cannon), here’s a Q&A with her that covers a few more things. It took…
Through Thicke and Tim
Robin Thicke and Justin Timberlake need to stop meeting like this. People are starting to get suspicious. Ever since in-demand pop songwriter Robin Thicke and former ‘N Syncer Justin Timberlake began their respective solo careers, their albums can’t stop bumping into each other. Thicke saw his debut album A Beautiful…
Capsule Reviews
“Andy Moses: Vuelta” Andy Moses’s work looks like interstellar plein-air paintings — sunrises and sunsets from some other planet. Using pearlescent pigments, Moses creates luminous bands of color by what appears to be a combination of pouring and squeegee-ing; the lines of color, which lean toward deep cobalt blues and…
When Mixtapes Attack!
A coworker quit the other day. Justin. He was a cool guy, a little off, maybe, but cool. At least I thought he was. Then I found something in the office after he left. A mixtape CD. A bad, horrible, “Say it isn’t so!” mixtape. I felt lied to, I…
SPECIAL ONE-QUESTION EDICIN
Note to readers: The following is a serious, stat-saturated Mexican. I promise more dwarf- and Dirty Sanchez-related questions next week! Dear Mexican, A recent study by the Pew Hispanic Center reveals the following: Hispanics are four times more likely than non-Hispanics to receive welfare Hispanics account for three-quarters of the…
McKay Brothers
In 2003, these real-life brothers from the Hill Country of Bandera, Noel (vocals, guitar) and Hollin (vocals, bass), released their self-titled debut. A superb effort, it boasted memorable, impressive songs filled with wistfulness, humor, party-fueled joy and even the occasional Spanish number sung with surprisingly convincing ease for a gringo…
Bad News With Al
An Inconvenient Truth (Paramount) This isn’t exactly the kind of DVD you buy to watch again and again; the ending doesn’t get happier, and there are no twists to decipher with repeated viewings. The producers hope instead that you buy it and share it; it’s less movie, after all, than…
Isis
The “thinking-man’s metal” tag that hangs on Isis seems bad for business, but guitarist/vocalist Aaron Turner and his comrades don’t appear to mind. After all, the jacket of their new CD includes the quote “Nothing is true, everything is permitted” that inspired the album’s title, as well as a quasi-footnote…
Encore Performance
Publisher: Red Octane
Platform: PlayStation 2
Price: $49.99 (game only), $79.99 (with controller)
ESRB Rating: T (for Teen)
Score: 8.5 (out of 10)
The Residents
Though the Residents are among the most recognizable figures in the world of avant-garde pop music, they rarely push compositional or sonic envelopes, except superficially (their landmark Eskimo being a notable exception). Rather, their experiments are more commonly conceptual or theatrical pieces that pose forceful challenges to listeners’ appetites for…
Our top DVD picks for the week of November 23
American Slapstick (Image) Alias: The Complete Fifth Season (Buena Vista) Boston Legal: Season Two (Fox) The Cry Baby Killer (Buena Vista) Devil Times Five (Code Red) Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist: Season Two (Paramount) Fall Out Boy: Solid Gold Uncertainty (Music Video Dist.) A Fish Called Wanda: Collector’s Edition (MGM) Freedom…
Nirvana
You know the story by now: After Nevermind, Kurt Cobain and company became far more popular than they’d ever dreamt or wanted — and man, that totally sucked — so the band hooked up with underground producer Steve Albini for In Utero, an album meant to be so goddamn authentic…
Straylight Run
Straylight Run is one of those Internet-success fairy tales all unsigned bands dream about. The band started in May 2003 when friends John Nolan (guitar/piano/vocals) and Shaun Cooper (bass) decided to leave the band Taking Back Sunday to form their own group. They recruited Will Noon (drums) and John’s sister…
THE FISH
“When you kill someone, you get a tattoo,” the guy sitting next to me at The Fish (309 Gray, 713-526-5294) explains to his friend as he points to his arm. Given that we’re at the epicenter of the yuppie universe, the intersection of Gray and Brazos, this seems like an…
Wolfmother
Wolfmother, the bombastic trio of Andrew Stockdale (guitar/vocals), Chris Ross (bass/keyboards) and Myles Heskett (drums), have been performing together since 2004. Then in 2006 their self-titled full-length debut landed the native Australians on the music scene with all the subtlety of Conan the Barbarian leaping on Thulsa Doom in a…
Muck a Duck
The guitar player on stage has impossibly long legs. And he’s entirely too calm to be playing those licks. Other guitarists would be making all sorts of faces, grimacing and scowling, contorting their bodies, showing us how hard what they’re doing really is. This guy’s just standing there, blazing away,…
Jim Lauderdale
Jim Lauderdale has been one of the most prolific artists on the Americana scene during the past decade. The guy puts out records almost on pace with Ryan Adams, recently releasing two new sets simultaneously, Bluegrass and Country Hits Vol. 1. Lauderdale’s special gift is that he writes and performs…
Thai Hot Hubris
After one bite of Thai Gourmet’s stir-fried crystal noodles, I started to cough. A chile pepper must have gotten wedged in my throat or something. I took a gulp of beer and tried it again. The thin bean thread noodles, which were tossed with garlic, carrots, mushrooms and scrambled eggs,…
Turkeys of the Year
A Houston Thanksgiving conjures up many time-honored traditions. These include: 1) Throwing a football around and saying, “Kinda hot out for November, isn’t it?”; 2) Seeing how far down the D-list the sponsors of the Thanksgiving parade have to go to find a celebrity (This year’s report: Pretty damn low,…
El Vez
Want some well-done, socially relevant music? Well, you better skip the El Vez show at the Continental. On the other hand, if what you want is a laugh-till-you-pee-type musical entertainment, get your butt in the front row at El Vez’s show. Don’t know El Vez? He’s a Mexican Elvis impersonator…
NICE NARANJA
The small portion of pasta naranja ($14.99/$19.99) at Bayou City Seafood & Pasta (4730 Richmond, 713-621-6602) is enough to feed two people, so you can imagine just how big the “large” is. The menu claims it’s healthy, but before some of you stop reading, you need to know that it’s…
Spank This
Ed Stumpf IV had $7,500 and a good name. He got the $7,500 from a novice investor in Atlanta and the name from his father, Edward Stumpf III. The elder Stumpf was one of the first owners of the Houston Rockets, a founder and two-time chairman of the Greater Houston…
L.A. Story
For Your Consideration pulls off the neat trick of skewering the movie industry while remaking it in its own image. The latest ensemble comedy by Christopher Guest and company may take place in Los Angeles, but its imaginative provenance lies somewhere between the La La Lands of Entourage and Mulholland…
Online Fun
Finally, the state of Texas has done something to alleviate the shocking lack of finding entertaining things to do online. This month saw the launch of the long-anticipated Web site where dedicated patriots can watch the view from cameras placed along the Mexican-Texas border and e-mail authorities if they see…
Fountain of Shame
Solemn, flashy and flabbergasting, The Fountain — adapted by Darren Aronofsky from his own graphic novel — should really be called The Shpritz. The premise is lachrymose, the sets are clammy and the metaphysics all wet. The screen is awash in spiraling nebulae and misty points of light, with the…
Midnight in the Garden of PS3
Jose Martinez can barely keep his eyes open as the chill of an evening wind hits him again. It’s 11:57 p.m., and he’s been standing, sitting and lying outside the Galleria Best Buy since late Monday night. The 16-year-old, a home schooler, has skipped this week’s classes and spent four…
One Toke Wonder
The first few minutes of Tenacious D in ‘The Pick of Destiny’ are something to behold: a four-minute rock opera cranked to 11. A doughy young boy with dirty-mop locks (Nacho Libre’s Troy Gentile, once more playing lil’ Jack Black) laments his tragic plight: He’s stuck in Kickapoo with “a…
Risky Business
Ten and injured: The story on youth football was insightful and informative, but it forgot to mention the most damaging effects on children [“Tough Guys,” by Daniel Kramer, November 9]. My son, who is ten years old, received a mild concussion on September 16. Two months later, he still suffers…
Hats Off
Dark and lonely, a cobblestone road glimmers under the gloomy glow of Victorian gaslights, which hang like fallen stars. Steam hisses up from the grating in the street. This is a lost world, glistening in the damp night with all the romance and danger of history. We are in London…
Sovereign Ruler
Are you writing with an Etch-A-Sketch over there, mate?” Lady Sovereign asks me with perfectly honed boredom as I scribble down her last few words between questions, letting the line go dead during our brief phone interview. Oh, this is going well. I tell her sorry, no, just a sec,…
Capsule Reviews
Barbra’s Wedding Anyone who’s seen Home Alone will recognize Daniel Stern, who’s best known as an actor. But now the thin, curly-haired Stern has ventured into scriptwriting, and his first play is a lot like the comedies he’s known for. The mildly amusing Barbra’s Wedding imagines what it must have…
H-Town Mixtape Part II
Back in 2001, before Tropical Storm Allison, before Enron, before the Great H-Town Rap Boom of 2005, one of the very first columns I wrote was a piece about Houston’s lack of a quasi-official city anthem. (You can find it here: http://houstonpress.com/Issues/2001-06-14/music/racket_full.html.) Songs put forth in that piece as being…
Light Fantastic
If you’re near a computer, search YouTube for a video of Brigitte Bardot singing “Contact.” The 1960s Serge Gainsbourg song sounds like early French electronica, and the video’s got a goofy Barbarella thing going on. Bardot sports a sexy silver alien micro-mini dress by Paco Rabanne, and she’s surrounded by…