Rainer Maria completes about one new song a month. On the surface, this sounds a bit slow, especially considering that the Madison, Wisconsin, trio has relocated to rural Connecticut where their daily chores include feeding dogs, going to the library, and spending a few hours each day just working on…
Making movies seems like a dream job. Sure, there’s that pesky loss-of-privacy thing, but it’s got to be better than database entry or bookkeeping, or, well, anything else. But for David Chappelle, making movies is almost like a nine-to-five job. It simply allows him the funds and the time to…
Dallas artist Arthur James is obsessed. Artman, as he prefers to be known, loves the blues, its history, its legends, and its connections to his hometown. His interest exploded when he moved into the Boyd Hotel building on Elm Street. Almost as though possessed, James began researching the blues history…
Most among us don’t love or hate The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Rather, it’s a matter of how much you love it — a little, or a-rice-throwing, Windex-bottle-spraying-lot. Maybe you’re just a Brad if you don’t dig a schlock-and-roll musical that lampoons ’50s uptightness and old sci-fi movies, dolled up…
The skeptics among us might be tempted to dismiss an archaeological find making its premiere at Dallas’ suspicious-phenomena clearinghouse The Eclectic Viewpoint; it’s just too easy to think of it as the doings of the far-out, the paranoid, or the just plain crazy. But it’s too hard to resist a…
Matthew Sweet “Girlfriend” was one of those out-of-nowhere singles that could have — should have — turned its author, Matthew Sweet, into just another one-hit wonder, especially since he chose to follow the album it appeared on (also called Girlfriend) with Altered Beast, a more experimental, less straightforward disc. Beast…
Janet Weiss might have been better off if she had just left Quasi when she joined Sleater-Kinney in 1996. She could have said goodbye to her ex-husband and Quasi partner Sam Coomes, his Roxichord, and his honestly caustic lyrics, and run off to be the star drummer in the much…
There are plenty of legends about journeys and locations of historical objects. The History Channel dissects the tales from George Washington’s wooden teeth to Marilyn Monroe’s dress from The Seven Year Itch. Then there’s how the “Cowardly Lion” costume from The Wizard of Oz was found in a studio’s trash…
Ken Nelson, a regular at the “Branson-on-the-Brazos” show in Waco, was destined to have a career in music. His mother sang with a big band, his father was a trumpeter, and their home was filled with the music of Frank Sinatra. Nelson’s own calling began with his cabaret show of…
There’s a certain rush of anticipation when entering the TI Founders IMAX Theater at The Science Place and seeing the 79-foot domed screen come into view — in front, above, and around. It’s like waiting in line at the roller coaster. The next train is coming down the tracks, and…
We’ve all seen them — the black velvet canvases with garish paint slathered thickly like margarine on sandwich bread, sold from a beat-up truck on a street corner, banished to the back of thrift stores, or stacked in booths at the many festivals this city spawns during the spring and…
The old vaudeville stripper motto in Gypsy was “you gotta get a gimmick.” It works just as well nowadays, and not just for strippers. It’s also perfect for comedians. Drew Carey talks about his weight, Jeffrey Ross reads poetry, and Bobcat Goldthwait has that voice — the trademark multi-octave, avalanche-of-emotions-at-once…
Police officers don’t get much respect from adults. No news flash there. After all, cops stop us and issue speeding tickets when we don’t deserve them. (And we never do.) Seriously — 73 in a 70? State trooper, dude, I’m late to school already; going three miles per hour over…
This is the story of an incredible journey — not the Disney story about two dogs and a cat, but the history of a 72-year-old theater organ. (Yes, theater organ, but don’t stop reading.) This isn’t the kind of organ used by churches or for classical music. It was designed…
In 1924, a tall-hatted, big-mustached, slow-limping, long-gazing cowboy rides into the oil-boom town of Cromwell, Oklahoma, to help keep good folks safe from bootlegging gangsters armed with machine guns. Guess the ending. It’s not hard. After all, there are only two types of Westerns: the kind that end with the…
Take a message to Murry As they continue to recuperate from a hectic recent touring schedule, Rhett Miller and Murry Hammond of The Old 97’s — also known as The Ranchero Brothers — will perform at Sons of Hermann Hall on August 18. The all-ages show was announced by Hammond…
In an episode of The Monkees, the boys try to help an old toy inventor named Harper, who can’t get his creations produced because the toy company’s manager, named only Daggart, manufactures toys designed by computers. Daggart says that when the children break or get bored with the shoddy computer-designed…
I had the idea that when I graduated from college, I would tour the country, hanging out at truck stops while listening to the adventures and wisdom of truckers. This would also involve eating a lot of pie at roadside diners. When I had enough of the road, I’d stop…
It’s not very hip for a grown man to say things like “happy little trees” and “pretty little mountains” — that is, if he wants to keep his street cred. Bob Ross — with his big ‘fro, unbuttoned shirt, and virtually narcotic voice — probably never even knew what street…
The standard for bands these days seems to be release an album and tour, then record and release another album as quickly as possible to cash in before the craze winds down and the band becomes one more in a holding pattern on the VH1 Where Are They Now? runway…
The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey’s circus is coming to town, and for the first time in more than 70 years, there’s going to be a grand circus parade. All the clowns, the acrobats, the gymnasts, and the sideshow stars will wind their way from Reunion Arena through downtown,…
There are misnomers, and there is false advertising. There seems to be a fine line between the two, and dancing that line is the Summer Arts Explosion, downtown’s daily lunchtime “in progress” arts exhibit. Public relations people just love to use words such as “explosion” and “extravaganza,” even when (especially…
