The Stranger back issues from June 2005:
LAST DAYS; THE WEEK IN REVIEW
Jun 02, 2005; ... MONDAY, MAY 23 The week kicks off with the hottest teenage trend since Christ and casual oral: death by self-inflicted gunshot wound, the personal offing technique recently employed by three Northwest teens. Today the Seattle Post-Intelligencer published its assessment of the "Eastside suicide ...
Counter Intel; Honor Deep Throat: Name Names
Jun 02, 2005; ... This week's bombshell revelation about Deep Throat couldn't be timelier. Just as a Federal Appeals Court in Washington, D.C. is threatening two big-name reporters with jail time unless they reveal their secret government sources, the Deep Throat news hit: Vanity Fair is reporting that W. Mark ...
Defying Wi-Fi; Capitol Hill Cafe Pulls the Plug on Free Internet Access
Jun 02, 2005; ... WHEN Victrola Coffee & Art, a popular cafe on 15th Avenue on Capitol Hill, decided to shut off its free wi-fi internet access on weekends, it didn't take long for the news to spread. Word broke on Seattle-based Wi-Fi Networking News (www.wifinetnews.com) last week, and by Tuesday, the news ...
SOUND AND FURY; Air America Fights For Liberals and Other Losers
Jun 02, 2005; ... The first thing I really heard on Air America Radio was the voice of Randi Rhodes. I'd been listening for days, but her voice made me turn up the volume. It's a voice coated with cigarette smoke, snarling and volatile. She sounds rude, like she has ruined countless dinner parties. I once heard ...
Lobster Alice
Jun 02, 2005; ... In the world of Salvador Dali, or, at least, the incarnation of Dali currently scandalizing ArtsWest in Lobster Alice, everything is interesting and everything is excrement. Or, wait. Is that nothing is everything and interesting is excrement? Is Alice Alice or is Alice not Alice? If a reviewer ...
The Ritz
Jun 02, 2005; ... June is gay season, and here, to celebrate, is a very shitty gay play set in the gayest of settings--a bathhouse. The central gag (I mean, premise) in this tedious production of Terrance McNally's tedious sex farce, The Ritz, is that a gangster checks into a bathhouse to hide from his ...
What You Don't See; Reading One Paragraph of Ian McEwan's 'Saturday'
Jun 02, 2005; ... IN THE BREAKNECK world of book reviewing, Ian McEwan's latest novel, Saturday, which was released in March, is already a hoary chestnut from publishing's yesteryear. Because of this sad fact, everyone else has already done a proper review. Instead, let us examine this paragraph--on page 128 in ...
In Arts News; Parting Glances
Jun 02, 2005; ... Maybe it's just the season that's instigating so much change, a kind of career spring-cleaning and self-evaluation, but there seems to be a lot of movement-as in departures and staff shufflings--in the art world right now, and a lot of grumbling about it. Is it coincidental or is something ...
Confusion Is Sex; The Spirit Takes Gang Gang Dance
Jun 02, 2005; ... "WHEN THE GOING gets tough, the weird turn pro," the late Hunter S. Thompson famously muttered. Which may explain why the troupe of bizarre New York bohos known as Gang Gang Dance are touring dozens of European and North American cities to crowds consisting of more than just cognoscenti squeezed ...
Border Radio; Roots & Americana
Jun 02, 2005; ... "I dedicate this song to you/For all the desperate things you made me do/I'd like to beat you black and blue/For all the agony you have put me through."--The Magnetic Fields, "The Desperate Things You Made Me Do" Desperation, not necessity, is the mother of invention. Witness John ...
Charming the Chaos; The National Contradict Themselves
Jun 02, 2005; ... "PEOPLE EXPECT ME to be much darker," smiles Matt Berninger, the National's gregarious and impressively tall singer/lyricist. "They're disappointed when I'm not morose." It's easy to see why folks might get the wrong impression. Here's a band who named their second album Sad Songs for ...
Catch a Ride; Amusement Parks On Fire Surf Walls of Sound
Jun 02, 2005; ... AROUND THE SAME time that Ecstasy pumped ravers full of illusions of forming deep bonds over deep-tissue massages, indie kids were also clouding their heads with the synthetic bliss. For shoegazer fans, what better illicit substance to amplify the rapturous, narcotic energy of bands like ...
THE NEIN; Wrath of Circuits
Jun 02, 2005; ... The Nein's Wrath of Circuits is the sound of a system perpetually on the verge of breakdown. Hypothetical influences might include: Beefheart's Doc at the Radar Station, Soul Coughing, and William Gibson. It's propulsive dance punk and angularized surf rock with dingy samples stumbling around ...
BURN THE PRIEST; Burn the Priest
Jun 02, 2005; ... Way before Lamb of God slammed their hairy Virginian tits up against the Ozzfest stage (and Epic's checkbook), they were flash-frying the underground under the apparently "controversial" moniker of Burn the Priest--so "controversial" in fact, that the über-Christian waterheads who run the L.A ....
MY PHILOSOPHY; Hiphop Ya Don't Stop
Jun 02, 2005; ... So hate hate on/My momma always told Tre to keep a straight face on/That's why I stay strong knowin' nothing is fair/And have you ever been so hungry you be rushin' your prayers?/Like, "Jesus my heavenly, amen" I done walked around hungry for days like cavemen. You haven't heard of Tre ...
all ages action; AND READY TO PARTY
Jun 02, 2005; ... It's hot. In fact, as I type this, the temperature outside has passed 80 degrees. Phew. When the weather gets like this, of course, that means two things: It's the beginning of summer and the end of school! To celebrate the close of another academic year, the kids at Nova High School ...
DATE PLACE TIME
Jun 02, 2005; ... I hadn't set foot in Kincora in a good five years or so-and even back then, I was only there to buy the insanely good coffee they'd sell from an espresso stand tucked just inside the front door. Clearly I've been missing out, because the first thing I notice when I walk in on this sweltering ...
BAR EXAM; Forgiveness
Jun 02, 2005; ... I won the bet. After languishing at a table at Kaspar's wine bar, my friend and I squeaked in an order for an obscene quantity of schmancy happy hour food just before the 6:30 p.m. cutoff. The waiter was of the lovable, myopic, bumbling variety. The bar was as full of upscale cheapskates ...
The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
Jun 02, 2005; ... Based on a popular young adult novel, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is built on a truly ridiculous conceit. A group of four best-friends-forever (their moms met in a prenatal aerobics class) collectively purchases a pair of Levi's. Two of the actors are skinny, one is tall and athletic, ...
Rock School
Jun 02, 2005; ... Odious reality show offshoots aside, this may well be the golden age of the audience-friendly documentary, with such wildly disparate films as The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill and the upcoming Murderball proving the advantages of increasingly mobile cameras and endearingly oddball subject ...
DVD; Late, Great
Jun 02, 2005; ... Though he lives on in the infinite rerun universe of The Simpsons, and the home video demimonde of Saturday Night Live best-of collections, it's easy to forget that Phil Hartman was one of the greatest comic actors of the last century. When Hartman was murdered by his wife at the age of 49, he ...
The Red Colored Grey Truck
Jun 02, 2005; ... As either die-hard festival watchers or unwary stumblers across late night Telemundo can tell you, comedy can be one of the toughest concepts to survive the translation process. All too often, one nation's collective chuckle is another country's thumb-twiddling befuddlement. Thankfully, debuting ...
Celebrity I SAW U; Cross, Thinly Veiled
Jun 02, 2005; ... It's like 10 minutes to Memorial Day weekend or Labor Day weekend or the weekend Lincoln Logged or whatever (I loathe utilitarian, government-invented holidays in general and refuse to get them straight--including the Fourth of July. Fuck patriots! FUCK THEM!) and all my deadlines are early and ...
Blow Up; Keeping It Local
Jun 02, 2005; ... For a while in the '90s, Seattle was a film town above and beyond its ravenous audiences. Perhaps it was the grunge phenomenon that got us the attention, but our film community was able to lure Hollywood money and productions here. Well, movies are still being made in our city, but now it's ...
Zoning For Dollars; When activists complain about density, Nickels slaps them down. When developers complain, Nickels backs down
Jun 02, 2005; ... WHILE PUSHING HIS pro-density agenda, Mayor Greg Nickels usually makes a point of standing up to the knee-jerk NIMBY temper tantrums that inevitably erupt in opposition to increased development. For example, over the last two years, the mayor has--in sequence--successfully beat back resistance ...
Bike Messengers; Anonymous Bikers Raise Awareness of Seattle's Danger Zones
Jun 02, 2005; ... LAST FRIDAY AFTERNOON, May 27, dozens of bicyclists gathered near the cool mist of Westlake Center's water fountain, defying the summer's first heat wave. They were waiting for the start of the Critical Mass ride--a monthly, meandering group cruise through Seattle's streets. A couple of cyclists ...
Sound Bite; Outsourcing Education
Jun 02, 2005; ... With all the concerns about outsourcing, I was curious to learn we're now outsourcing education to Mexico, which ranks last among major nations in educational achievement. In a recent teleconference with Mexican President Vicente Fox, Governor Christine Gregoire announced a high school ...
Epitaph
Jun 02, 2005; ... I'm glad to see the techniques of sketch comedy incorporated into plays. The dark surrealism and hilariously callous hallmarks of sketch are sorely needed in the theatrical family, which takes too much pride in liberal enlightenment and not enough in anarchist shock. Epitaph, a two-man ...
SKATE MOM
Jun 02, 2005; ... Navigating the walkway to Kate Martin's front door is an exercise in agility. Unless it's pouring rain, you'll need to dodge Martin's two sons and half a dozen of their friends, some of whom will be skateboarding on the sloping footpath and its adjacent ramps, while other kids stand on the ...
Nightstand; Explainittomeistan
Jun 02, 2005; ... The crowd last Thursday at the D'Adamo/Woltz Gallery looked like the crowd in Charles Saxon's 1966 New Yorker cover depiction of an art gallery opening: colorfully dressed, tipsy, slightly vacant. Everyone also looked rich, except for a pair of guys who were holding hands and a few sweaty, ...
Theater News; Brandy and Ice Cream
Jun 02, 2005; ... In the few hours during my adolescent years when I wasn't listening to rock bands or using up all the Kleenex, I loved to play the villains in our school productions, loudly and publicly flipping off the world without risking any of the consequences that normally follow bad behavior. The tissue ...
Viral Migration; Gretchen Bennett's Moving Landscapes
Jun 02, 2005; ... "I'M ALWAYS KIND of longing for whichever landscape I'm not in," Gretchen Bennett says of her bicoastal life between Seattle and Brooklyn. Last year she returned to Seattle to live in an artist loft at the Tashiro Kaplan building after residing in Brooklyn for five years. Her apartment in New ...
Loose Joints; Tussle's Infinite Chug
Jun 02, 2005; ... YOU CAN'T FLING a Pigbag 12-inch without hitting a band copping those fabulous, scabrous sounds of the '80s. Have you yawned yourself stupid yet? Okay, now snap to it, because there's one band mining '80s moves who won't make your eyes roll with more Gang of Four/Cure biting. Meet San Francisco ...
Siren Songs; The Emergency Keep It Urgent
Jun 02, 2005; ... YOU CAN SAY that rock 'n' roll hasn't changed in years, and in many cases you may be right. Take away the fancy prefixes and effects pedals, and the bands that came straight down the pike from the Stones and the Stooges don't seem to care much for taking off on many adventurous tributaries. But ...
Romeo Voided; Infomatik Build Drama, Lose Guitars
Jun 02, 2005; ... "WE'D GET ONSTAGE and the sound guy would be like, 'Okay, where's the guitar player in this band?' I could almost liken it to homophobia for sound guys-if there's no guitar player, it messes with their minds!" says Ben Larson, bass player for Infomatik. In the 18 months since their inception, ...
SMOG; A River Ain't Too Much Love
Jun 02, 2005; ... Bill Callahan has been cranking out albums under his indie moniker Smog since 1990, and over the course of a dozen albums he has expanded and contracted around the core of his forlorn voice, morose and cutting lyrics, and guitar. In other words, he's a troubadour with the emphasis on dour. But ...
GORILLAZ; Demon Days
Jun 02, 2005; ... Most of the cartoon bands in history have been pandering novelties for which the idea of a sophomore album seems ridiculous. (The Archies, anyone?) Not so for Gorillaz, who have proven to be compelling both aurally and visually. As in the band's 2001 debut, the animation is a wonderful--but not ...
LIVE WIRE; Motherly Love
Jun 02, 2005; ... ROCK SCHOOL, the documentary about the East Coast's School of Rock Music, showed at SIFF last week, presenting the story of how one insane teacher (Paul Green) uses classic rock--from Sabbath to Zappa--to give youngsters the confidence to jam the fuck out. In support of the film, Green and some ...
data breaker; ELECTRONIC MUSIC REVIEWS
Jun 02, 2005; ... A stack of outstanding electronic-music CDs precariously teeters on my desk, so it's time again to sling some words about 'em. Herewith, a portion of the mother lode ... ARMANDO, Trax Classix: Armando; JOEY BELTRAM, Trax Classix: Joey Beltram (Trax; traxhouse.com). The late Armando's a ...
the score; KURT ELLING ET AL.
Jun 02, 2005; ... In his 1961 essay "Style and 'Styles' in Music," composer Roger Sessions (1896--1985) wrote "Properly understood, style is a living process, in every case a process of development and of boldness; and I often think that the most fitting motto for the young artist should be that of [French ...
Most Unwanted; Declaring War on Seattle's Mushy Muffins, Sorry Scones, and Bran Briquettes
Jun 02, 2005; ... THERE IS NO EXCUSE for a pastry case filled with shitty pastries. I am vulnerable in the morning, as I'm not only hooked on coffee, but also on the promise of a little something sweet. Sometimes the thought of an indulgent little coffeehouse breakfast is all that gets me out of bed in ...
Lords of Dogtown
Jun 02, 2005; ... The success of the entertaining, if awfully egocentric, skater documentary Dogtown and Z-Boys has apparently given director/star Stacy Peralta the green light for an entire cottage industry about what a cool guy he was/is. The Peralta-scripted Lords of Dogtown absolutely nails the hazy, stoned ...
Cinderella Man
Jun 02, 2005; ... If a gnarled creature were grown in a lab, bred and designed by unfeeling scientists to spend its soulless existence craving and consuming only Oscars ... well, it would still come up short to Ron Howard's latest film. Cinderella Man, the much-ballyhooed reuniting of the team behind A Beautiful ...
Mondovino
Jun 02, 2005; ... More a religion than a business, and liable to cause massive rifts between nations, the wine industry appears at first glance to be prime documentary material. But beneath all the controversy and intrigue is an unfortunate fact: As a movie subject, wine--like the blowhards who extol its ...
Malfunkshun: The Andrew Wood Story
Jun 02, 2005; ... SIFF isn't lacking in music documentaries this year, but the festival is especially kind to our local scene, showcasing movies about everyone from the Gits to Death Cab for Cutie. Like any great documentary, though, Malfunkshun transcends its genre (and locale) so even if you know nothing about ...
Police Beat
Jun 02, 2005; ... Some people strive their whole lives to see something of theirs in print, so when The Stranger asked me to provide this review, I figured, "What the heck, why not?" "What the heck?" was much the same reaction I was having five minutes into Police Beat; it was nothing like I'd expected ....
I LOVE TELEVISION; Humiliation, Yay!
Jun 02, 2005; ... NOTHING, AND I mean NOTHING spells hilarity like a good dose of humiliation--especially when it happens to someone other than me! Like, this one time? I was working as a department store bra fitter--which should be a dream job, right? Except my boss was French and a total gasbag! He was always, ...
Dino Lossi; Wenatchee Judge Thumps Republicans
Jun 09, 2005; ... ON MONDAY MORNING, after six months of Republican posturing that an evil liberal cabal in King County had stolen the gubernatorial election, stubborn GOP candidate Dino Rossi got his comeuppance. Let's not mince words: Chelan County Superior Court Judge John Bridges methodically destroyed the ...
Sound Bite; Gregoire Didn't Win Either
Jun 09, 2005; ... Even though liberal Seattle is celebrating the dismissal of Dino Rossi's election-contest lawsuit, it shouldn't be seen as a victory for Christine Gregoire, or for that matter, the voters of the state. The expensive failure to set aside this tainted election will only be a disincentive to ...
Counter Intel; Blue Balls
Jun 09, 2005; ... During Mayor Nickels's state of the city speech last February, I laughed out loud in council chambers when he announced his initiative to honor the Kyoto Protocol by "meeting the threat of global warming." It struck me, and I wrote this at the time, as one of those chimerical slaps at the Bush ...
The New Deal; Monorail Agency Completes Negotiations With Cascadia
Jun 09, 2005; ... SITTING BEHIND a low conference table in a nondescript meeting room in the basement of the Seattle Monorail Project's downtown headquarters, SMP director Joel Horn looked, of all things, nervous as he announced the most positive news to come out of the agency in months: The SMP had finally ...
lessons learned; Red States May Be Outbreeding Blue States, but Blue Cities -- Particularly Blue College Towns -- Can Help Turn the Tide
Jun 09, 2005; ... One of the best things about university life is the rhythm it gives to a year. For university professors like me, breaks for summer, which are just beginning, and breaks between terms allow for a bit of breathing room, time to reflect on the year past and plan for the year ahead. But not all ...
The Awakening
Jun 09, 2005; ... Some 19th-century novels can handle having a shrieky, clappy gospel interlude inserted into their middles. (I quite liked the seaside choir in the pseudo-Bollywood movie Bride & Prejudice.) Others, like Kate Chopin's wispy, mystical novella The Awakening, fall to pieces at the first hint of ...
Occidental Blindness; Theroux Goes Down South
Jun 09, 2005; ... PAUL THEROUX'S latest novel, Blinding Light, is, like all novels, about many things. To begin with, the structure of its story is built on the story of Eden, the myth of how the first woman, Eve, tempted the first man, Adam, with the fruit of knowledge. The Bible's interpretation of the birth of ...
Hook the Holy Hollow
Jun 09, 2005; ... Hook the Holy Hollow is a cautionary tale of sorts. It's the story of Penny, a Mormon maiden torn between the burning in her loins (her words, not mine) and the religious doublespeak that her parents dispense as sex advice. In her confusion, Penny (or Penelope, if you're into heavily loaded ...
In Arts News; The Envelope Please
Jun 09, 2005; ... A constant renewable resource for art world gossip and speculation is the awarding of grants and fellowships. But three recent award recipients seem to have garnered unanimous praise from their peers and gotten people talking not just about money and prestige but the importance of grants and ...
Chameleon Chemistry; Electrelane Rock with the Changes
Jun 09, 2005; ... ELECTRELANE'S 2001 debut disc, Rock It to the Moon, was almost entirely instrumental, a maze of atmospheric tangents and swirling guitar countermelodies. Too focused for free jazz but not groove-oriented enough for new wave, it fused wordless genres. Strikingly cinematic (they aptly titled an ...
Jack of All Trades; Synthesizing Meat Beat Manifesto
Jun 09, 2005; ... YOU CAN BOIL down Jack Dangers's musical stance to the title of an old Kinks song: "I'm Not Like Everybody Else." For 17 years, his band Meat Beat Manifesto have been adding galvanizing facets to electronic music's arsenal, and inspiring hordes of producers along the way. The only constant in ...
Negativeland; Headphones Keeps with Bazan's Dark Side
Jun 09, 2005; ... PEDRO THE LION frontman David Bazan is a master of morose, dejected tunes about hopelessness, decay, and paralysis. For his latest project, Headphones, Bazan's slow moaning delivery, relentlessly downbeat subject matter, and invariable morbidity remain the same--but he's ditched the soaring ...
Jesus Loves You; But Deicide Want You to Keep It to Yourself
Jun 09, 2005; ... IF SATAN GAVE a flying fuck about death metal, Deicide would probably be his favorite band of all time. As if having songs called "Mad at God," "Fuck Your God," and "Blame It on God" weren't enough to score anyone a backstage pass to some kind of secret Luciferian security bunker, Deicide ...
THE CATCH; Get Cool
Jun 09, 2005; ... You know the group of women chatting intimately over cocktails in a crowded bar--the ones you can't help but eavesdrop on, because their animated gossip session makes it clear they're talking about broken hearts? The Catch capture the mood of that clique, but they take the dishing a step ...
NEED NEW BODY; Where's Black Ben?
Jun 09, 2005; ... With the word "funny" recurring like a mantra over the course of Need New Body's latest release, Where's Black Ben?, it's no surprise to find the album thoroughly subscribing to the school of psychedelic as code for just being plain goofy. What would otherwise be a solid pop album full of ...
!!! Take Ecstasy with Me/Get Up
Jun 09, 2005; ... This EP testifies to Cali/NY septet !!!'s diverse tastes and ability to transform other people's music into customized vehicles for their own dance-floor purposes. According to vocalist Nic Offer, these cover versions also helped the band learn new things about writing pop songs. !!! transform ...
DAVIE ALLAN & THE ARROWS; Cycle-Delic; Blues Theme; Apache '65
Jun 09, 2005; ... I know I've said it before but, DAMN, Davie Allan and the Arrows seem like such a bunch of MENACING mofos! Dig the cover of their Blues Theme LP! By the looks of 'em, all them bad asses have for you is a sucker punch in the kisser and pointed kick to the giblets! OUCH! However, rather than ...
LIVE WIRE; Lost, Found, and Lost Again
Jun 09, 2005; ... OKAY, SO FIRST it was weird enough that Linda Perry--she of that drill-a-screw-through-my-ear-so-I-forget-it-please song, "What's Up"--went from being a member of one-hit wonders 4 Non Blondes to hit-a-week producer for such pop divas as Christina Aguilera, Gwen Stefani, Pink, and Courtney Love ....