Give a Little

Buncha benefits happening around D-D-FW this week and next. First up is a shindig for the Denton Humane Society at Rubber Gloves Rehearsal Studios on April 27, featuring performances by Will Johnson and Scott Danbom of Centro-matic, The Baptist Generals, Failure Plus and Southpaw Preachers, with all proceeds going to the DHS' spay/neuter program. Doors open at 10 p.m., and the cover is six bucks, though it wouldn't hurt to give a little more. (And then go adopt a dog or cat, you uncaring sumbitches.) There's also a hat-passer for Care for Kids (a nonprofit start-up formed by two Southern Methodist University students) on April 30 at Gypsy Tea Room, with sets by Chomsky, Sorta, Sparrows and Tall. Not sure about the door charge, but all the cash goes to Heart House and Bryan's House, an after-school program for at-risk and low-income kids and a 24-hour home serving more than 250 families affected by HIV and AIDS. (So, basically, we're saying it doesn't matter how much it costs, just show up and open your wallets.) And on May 5, Sons of Hermann Hall will host a concert by Ed Burleson, Tommy Alverson, Kevin Deal, Clay Farmer, Jack Ingram, T-Roy Miller and more, benefiting Texas country legend Don Walser and his ongoing battle with diabetes, as well as the American Diabetes Association. There will also be a food drive for North Texas Food Bank; $16 and two cans of food get you in, or $18 without the food. Give a little, give a lot, just give something. That's right, kids: We found our heart. It was in our other pants...

At long last, The Dooms U.K. return to a local stage on April 28, when they headline a bill that includes Baboon, The Banes and Corn Mo at Gypsy Tea Room. In recent years, John Freeman and John "Corn Mo" Cunningham have migrated to NYC, while the other members of the band have busied themselves in other local outfits such as Legendary Crystal Chandelier and Mission Giant, among others. But none of that matters now that the gang's all here, albeit briefly. "Art rock is like a beautiful cancer growing in the hearts and minds of the youth of the world," Freeman says. "We were forced into remission for a few desperate years, but now the world can feel our disease. The art-rock tumor is growing once again--and it's malignant as a motherfucker!" Well played, sir...

Got a message last week from Mark Griffin, better known to most of you as MC 900 Ft. Jesus, apologizing for his absence from the 2002 Dallas Observer Music Awards on April 16 at Gypsy Tea Room, where he took home the Industrial/Dance hunk of metal. Or he would have, anyway, if he'd been there. "If I had thought there was even a remote chance I was going to win an award, I wouldn't have been a no-show at the shindig," Griffin explains. "Damn, sorry I missed out. I moved a couple of weeks ago and I'm still pretty frazzled, so I kind of forgot about it until the last minute. Then the tired old geezer in me won out and I wound up sitting around the house watching TV. Aargh! Anyway would you mind relaying my thanks to those who voted for me, and mention how amazed and flattered I am?" You get all that? Because we don't mind typing it again...

Hand stamps: Mandarin and Failure Plus play Club Clearview on April 25, with El Gato and Groceries the next night; Slow Roosevelt performs April 28 at Trees as part of KEGL-FM's Local Show; Final Friday Hip-Hop celebrates its two-year anniversary on April 26 at Curtain Club; Sparrows, Vibrolux and Tweed are at Liquid Lounge on April 25, followed by Macavity and The Chemistry Set (check 'em out) the next night; OHNO plays Gypsy Tea Room on April 26, with Stickfigure (featuring major-league chucker Jack McDowell) opening, and Astrogin and Spyche open for Patrice Pike & the Black Box Rebellion the following night...

This week in Sack of Kittens, because when we say a band that you like sucks, we're apparently saying that your opinion sucks: Spoonfed Tribe. Looks like? Slipknot in the Summer of Love, with masks, body paint, tribal tats and, for some reason, a bowl of grapes. Sounds like? Slipknot giving Dave Matthews Band a grudge fuck with a flute and/or the worst acid trip in recorded history. How they see themselves? Hard to tell: "To describe the Spoonfed Tribe, one needs to speak a language of color, feeling and sound. To try to pinpoint or label their style would be like caging a butterfly." (This is how they actually describe themselves and their music on their Web site, www.spoonfedtribe.com.) Sample lyrics? "And Aphrodite's mighty and her love holds tightly to our dreams that still remind me of immortality/On Mount Olympus the gods did send us to fly Pegasus through the sky," from "Pickin' Weeds." (Getting stoned and watching too much Clash of the Titans is a bad combo, friends.) Just who are these jokers, anyway? ShoNuff, Egg Nebula, Katsuk, Gouffahtts, Jerome57, P. Green36, Kaboom, U.V., SpaceCase and BigTow. (Fellas, you're not even making us work here. Come on.) Where can you find them? Playing anywhere and everywhere, from the Curtain Club and Ridglea Theater to various Bob Marley festivals around the state to opening for jam-friendly Medeski Martin and Wood in Lubbock. Number of kittens in the sack they're currently standing on? About a dozen, and their names are almost as ridiculous as the ones sported by the members of Spoonfed. Don't cry for them; they deserve the torture...

Confidential to Doug S.: We don't buy your "We Are the World" bullshit for a minute. Kiss it.