Best place to find arcane videos 2000 | Forbidden Books | Best of Dallas® 2020 | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Dallas | Dallas Observer
Navigation
Support Us
Search

Best place to find arcane videos

Forbidden Books

Forbidden doesn't claim it has Dallas' largest collection of cult video for nothin'. Though it changed hands earlier this year from founder Jason Cohen (who leaves the store to run a same-monikered gallery around the corner) to Ben Moore (who's in his early '20s), the collection of 2,000 videos in genres ranging from Japanimation and cult to blacksploitation and fetishist stays intact, though some of the music and books have been pulled. We hope it's to make room for more video, though we can't imagine what else they might need.

Best Radio DJ

Barry Switzer, "Football All the Way," Thursday at 6 p.m., KTCK-AM 1310

OK, so the ex-Sooners and Cowboys coach isn't really a DJ--he's no Kidd Kraddick or Carter, no computer jockey playing the latest by Britney or Sting or some other disposable pop icon (hey, we love Sting as much as the next straight man, but we stopped caring around the time of "Russians"). And he's not necessarily the host of "Football All the Way," which airs during The Hardline's 3 p.m.-7 p.m. time slot on The Ticket, the domain of Greg "The Hammer" Williams and Mike "The Old Grey Wolf" Rhyner. And, OK, it's a 10-minute show. Got it. But it's the best damned 10 minutes of radio this town's heard in a very long time, at least since Gordon "Microphone Johnson" Keith asked Stars coach Ken Hitchcock which part of his last name was popular with the gay community. For 10 minutes every week, Switzer talks Cowboys and OU, stumbling down Memory Lane (and, on occasion, Amnesia Lane) like a pissed-off drunk at closing time; the man uses "damn" and "hell" and "crap" the way other people say "and" and "the" and "but." Now that he's no longer on the payroll, he's free to dish on his old boss, Jerry "Crazy Sumbitch" Jones (that's our appellation, by the way, not his), and his old team. And you can damned sure bet your ass he'll say whatever the hell he wants about them damned good old days when the University of freakin' Oklahoma used to beat the crap out of Nebraska. Want to get Barry going? Ask him why he's not in the College Football Hall of Fame. Damned politics, that's why, helldamncrap. Come back, Barry, all is forgiven. We miss you so damned much.

Best gadfly Web Site

Sharon Boyd's "It's a Bad Deal," www.dallasarena.com

She whines. She carps. She's half-wrong. Sometimes she's almost impossible to read. But at least she gives a small hoot about what's going on downtown, and with a little publicity blast this year, she's even being noticed for it. Boyd, whose hit-counter reads more than 52,000 lately, is not the force she aspires to be in Dallas. She's just not electable, and she's too doctrinaire to make enough friends to attain any sort of power, but she is almost a perfect match for the Internet, that great democratizer and spreader of faint voices and long-shot causes.

Best Local TV News Show

Weeknight broadcasts on KTVT-TV Channel 11

Whether it's vengeance on his former colleagues at WFAA Channel 8 or just being free of them, Channel 11 News anchor Tracy Rowlett has helped give his fellow teammates an edge the other locals sorely lack. Covering the school district, the cops, the controversy over sexually oriented businesses, the folks at KTVT clearly don't have to worry about all the sacred cows and family-unfriendly troubles that keep News 8 in a constant state of flinch. They've come up with a heads-up, straight-on format that's worth watching.

Best Reason for An Appointed Judiciary

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals

You say you believe in the Democratic process, in the right of an informed electorate selecting the most viable judicial candidates from the marketplace of lawyers who have distinguished themselves in their careers. You say voters are intelligent enough to make good choices, to select the most qualified candidate, unswayed by the politics of the moment or popular sentiment. Then you look at the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, gasp, and decide to rethink the whole thing. Yes, we are a law-and-order state that doesn't cotton to coddling criminals. But our current crop of judges who man (and woman) the state's highest court of criminal jurisdiction have little regard for legal precedent; they seem to be making up the law as they go along. They have little intellectual candlepower since they are notorious for affirming guilty verdicts even in cases where DNA evidence suggests innocence. Some of them even have questionable integrity: Witness new presiding Judge Sharon Keller, who rails against pornography at the same time she is the landlord of a titty bar in Dallas. These guys are the state's court of last resort for our booming death penalty business. Even George W. deserves a better backstop.

Best Director

Preston Lane

Best Band Comeback

Union Camp

We had no idea how much difference a name makes until Check changed its moniker to Union Camp. To be honest, we probably wouldn't have given Check another chance, after 1998's All Time Low proved to be a tease, featuring guest appearances by Slobberbone's Brent Best, Legendary Crystal Chandelier's Peter Schmidt, and Centro-matic's Will Johnson, and, well, that's about it. But as Union Camp, the band got another shot to win us over, and this year's Fever and Pain (as well as its contribution to the Band-kits compilation) did just that, sounding like Brian Wilson sitting in with Creedence Clearwater Revival, or something like that. Southern rock that's not embarrassing or offensive? That's gotta be worth something.

Best proof that Texas Monthly might be right

The Nixons, Hellafied Funk Crew, Pimpadelic, and every band that plays at The Rock. Unfortunately, there's even more where these came from.

Best threat to Sam Paulos' empire

ACME CD Manufacturing Co.,

The compact-disc manufacturing outfit run by former Leaning House Records honcho Mark Elliott and The New Year's Bubba Kadane out of a storefront in Exposition Park will one day pry loose Sam Paulos and Crystal Clear Sound's stranglehold on the local music scene. Count on it: Everyone involved with the company is too smart and talented for that not to happen. The only question is when. Already, the company has handled projects for the late, great Trance Syndicate Records, Two Ohm Hop, Quality Park Records, Last Beat Records, and the Butthole Surfers, as well as putting together CD-ROMs for numerous corporate and government clients. That sound you hear is Crystal Clear trying to come up with a counterattack. It might be too late.

Best threat to Sam Paulos' empire (Part II)

Last Beat music complex

A place where bands can rehearse and record, combined with a fully functioning record label, the Last Beat compound on Commerce Street has undergone major changes in the past few years, with outstanding results. The Toadies, Legendary Crystal Chandelier, The Deathray Davies, Chomsky, Captain Audio, Pinkston, and others all use the rehearsal facilities, and Baboon, The Polyphonic Spree, and many more have recorded in the studio, designed by renowned producer (Pink Floyd, etc.) Nick Griffiths. The label is one of the few in town that thinks like a major, with a roster (Pleasant Grove and Baboon, for starters) to match. You can bet Sam Paulos has driven by the Last Beat complex a few nights with Molotov cocktail in hand, just itching to put an end to it.

Best Of Dallas®

Best Of

Use of this website constitutes acceptance of our terms of use, our cookies policy, and our privacy policy The Dallas Observer may earn a portion of sales from products & services purchased through links on our site from our affiliate partners. ©2024 Dallas Observer, LP. All rights reserved.
Do Not Sell or Share My Information
Powered By Foundation