Real Summer Lovin’
For starters, let’s crunch some numbers: 3 = number of lives saved by one pint of donated blood; 32,000 = pints of donated blood used every day in the US; 4.5 million = American lives saved each year by blood transfusions; 60 = percentage of eligible blood donors in US; 5 = the percentage of…
Film Clips: The Illusionist, Snakes on a Plane, more
New Releases THE ILLUSIONIST Set in Austria, The Illusionist stars Edward Norton as Eisenheim, an enigmatic stage magician so skilled at his profession that the locals suspect he might actually possess otherworldly powers. One of the few skeptics is Crown Prince Leopold (Rufus Sewell), a cruel ruler who sets out to prove that Eisenheim is…
Elemental Love
Earth Wind & Fire’s Serpentine Fire sparked 36 years ago, when Memphis-born bandleader Maurice White named his new jazz-rock outfit for his astrological sign, Sagittarius. Such was 1960s excess, but White had serious chops as a former Chess Records apprentice and member of the Ramsey Lewis Trio. So hallowed is Earth Wind & Fire’s position…
View From The Couch
AMARCORD (1973). La Dolce Vita and 8-1/2 are the acknowledged masterpieces in the Federico Fellini canon, but Amarcord will always hold a special place in my mind. Decades ago, it was one of the first films that introduced me to international cinema, in effect opening my eyes to a whole new world. In fashioning his…
So was Abu Musab Zarqawi’s death a turning point in the war in Iraq after all?
Nearly three months ago, on June 7, the US military managed to locate and kill Abu Musab Zarqawi. Zarqawi was the leader of Iraq’s al-Qaeda, a terrorist gang that is both associated with and a rival of Bin Laden’s al-Qaeda mothership. Zarqawi was responsible for numerous bombings, kidnappings, beheadings and, last spring, the only militant…
Letters to the editor
Rolling On The Table Somebody online beat me to telling John Grooms that his poll in his Boomer With Attitude column (“Poll Results Censored,” Aug. 23) is stupid. They didn’t bother to leave a name, so I’m sure I know into which bin their opinion will go. Actually, this is the funniest thing Grooms has…
Observations
Tour the world looking for discarded mattresses, play guessing games with candy, laugh at babies, be amazed at OCD time-telling antics, or watch Dean and Nigel try to blend in. Mattress Trash Authority www.streetmattress.com Name That Candybar www.smm.org/sln/tf/c/crosssection/namethatbar.html Discount Babies www.discountbabies.com Human Clock www.humanclock.com Dean and Nigel Blend In www.deanandnigel.co.uk
The Sommelier: A Labor Day Tribute
Corkscrew
Idlewild South
ATLien American hip-hop duo OutKast, alongside assorted Dungeon Family members such as once-and-future Goodie Mobsters Cee-Lo and Big Gipp (and the latter’s ex Joi), have become standard bearers for the Southeast’s avant-garde — if not the nation’s. All of their extraordinary Afrofuturistic foment since breakthrough bombshell Stankonia (2000) has enabled this cultural capital and the…
Afrofuture
These ain’t no Hollyweird Africans; these are Diaspora greats who burn to shine: What’s goin’ on was the late Marvin Gaye’s dark, complex sonic meditation on America’s turbulent 1960s, an era bookended primarily by Civil Rights struggle and the VietNam War. Now, the great Dirty Dozen Brass Band has re-contextualized Gaye’s song cycle to talk…
A Place you cannot Refuse
Imagine your parents had emigrated from America to another country back in the 1960s. What kinds of recipes would they have taken with them? Rumaki (bacon-wrapped water chestnuts with chicken livers), Quiche Lorraine or Chicken Divan? If they left anytime before 1975 — the year the Cuisinart food processor was introduced and revolutionized home cooking…
A Lazarus Taxon
The remarkable thing about Tortoise isn’t just that it’s synthesized music’s past 50 years into a sound all its own, but that it’s done it without conceding anything to traditional pop clichés or song structure. Still, it’s a mistake to think of these Chicago pioneers as a group of studio aesthetes and Pro-Tools dweebs churning…
Our Greatest Disaster
Book Review
Déjà Vu, Again
Since Marilyn Monroe, the reigning female paragons of beauty have become thinner and thinner. So, in a culture that celebrates skinny women — yet keeps a special place in its heart for the Rubenesque, “baby got back” quality that so many secretly admire — it took British actress Kate Winslet’s performance in Titanic and Nuyorican…
The Pesto Pinch
Kitchen Witch
Speaking the Same Language
Boomer With Attitude
Taking Pride in Stride
Don’t Panic 17Brother with a Pen 18Citizen Servatius 2317
Aug. 31 — Sept. 6, 2006
VIRGO The Virgin: (Aug. 22 — Sept. 22) You will be happier if you release the anger that has occupied your attention for a time. If you haven’t resolved it by now, you probably won’t. Rehashing isn’t useful. Give attention to your relationship and look for something to freshen the spark. For All Signs We…
Compelling Dwellings
See & Do 10Moodswing 1210Urban Explorer
Knock on Wood
Moddswing
Totally Awesome
It all started with a picture. Last August, friends Dorne Pentes and Jim McGuire, along with their wives and kids, were vacationing in the mountains of western North Carolina when Pentes saw it. “Wow, check this out,” he said, pointing to a picture in a real estate magazine. Pentes was often on the lookout for…
Karma Cleanser
Dear Karma Cleanser: My girlfriend and I have had a fairly open relationship. We’ve done a few threeways before, the rule being that we both have to be attracted to the person and that we agree never to see them again. The rule got tested when we ended up in a weird situation with our…
Give Bile a Chance
Burn Baby Burn 74Tortoise box 76Earth Wind & Fire 76Beyoncé 7777
Rap and the Middle East
Brother with a Pen
Anatomy of a Hate Crime
Citizen Servatius
Oh, Brothers
There are no doubt many tightly held secrets down at city hall. But Creative Loafing didn’t think the details surrounding the mayor’s decision to proclaim Aug. 27 “The Avett Brothers Day” would be among them. About three weeks ago, CL was amused to learn that the mayor planned to honor the alternative bluegrass band’s accomplishments…
Teens & Tunes in Crisis
Featuring teens at the center of stage musicals might seem to be a tried-and-true formula — until you try to take inventory. Grease, that summery paean to high school hiptitude, began life onscreen, and West Side Story borrowed its protagonists from an Elizabethan dude who had written about two passionate, star-crossed Veronese. Looking more closely…
Cheap Thrills
Elizabeth Billiards If you haven’t discovered the coolest watering hole south of the Square, it’s time for a trip to EB’s (hip, regional lingo). Voted best pool hall as well as best first date place, it’s also dirt cheap. Pool is free. Darts are free. Card tables can be set up to start a poker…
See & Do
Wednesday, August 30 Watch the Knights gear up for the playoffs as they take on Ohio’s pride and joy, the Toledo Mud Hens. It’s your last chance to see Charlotte’s best players before the major league roster expands on Sept. 1 and daddy club, the World Series Champion Chicago White Sox, pluck our best boys…
The Blotter
OH, ONE MORE THING: A man called the police to report the following threat was made against him: “I’m going to kill you for the ounce of cocaine you owe me.” The man received this call at his place of work four times, and the man’s boss has told the caller to stop calling. Hopefully…
