AltWeeklies Wire
Baltimore's Sustainability Commission Holds First Meetingnew
The goal of the commission, which was created last year by a City Council bill, is not just to work for a cleaner, greener footprint for the city but also to create a blueprint for meeting the economic and social needs of city residents.
Baltimore City Paper |
Joe Tropea |
06-24-2008 |
Environment
'The James Brown Reader' Shares a Warts-and-all View of the Godfather of Soulnew
Co-editors Nelson George and Alan Leeds both contribute fine overtures to the volume, but it's hard not to wish they'd included a note about their compiling methodology, though it doesn't take long to figure out the pair elected to leave in original typos, misspellings, falsities, and myths.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michaelangelo Matos |
06-24-2008 |
Nonfiction
Where Hip-hop Wentnew
Gold: New Jack Swing, a genre overview, and and What Does It All Mean?, the collected works of cut-up pioneer Steinski, tell the story of rap going beyond itself.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michaelangelo Matos |
06-24-2008 |
Reviews
Legendary Avant-Garde Musician and Philosopher Henry Flynt Performs Again After 25 Yearsnew
Before he called it quits in 1984, he recorded long drone pieces and shorter country jams, collaborated with Tony Conrad, Pandit Pran Nath, and Yoko Ono, and even replaced John Cale in the Velvet Underground for two weeks in 1966. He also pursued mathematics at Harvard and New York University and economics at the New School.
Baltimore City Paper |
Marc Masters |
06-24-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
'Mongol' Desperately Wants to be 'Braveheart'new
You can see these aspirations in every shot, but its meandering, anti-climactic story arcs and an unrealized main character handicap the movie from early on.
Baltimore City Paper |
Cole Haddon |
06-24-2008 |
Reviews
Digital Video Has Become as Unreliable a Narrator as Celluloidnew
Hollywood has finally started to respond to the success of YouTube and other online video sites. Cloverfield, Redacted, and Diary of the Dead purported to be "found" videos, made by someone who didn't plan for their footage to wind up in a movie theater. But video looks too good to be "real."
Baltimore City Paper |
Martin L. Johnson |
06-24-2008 |
Movies
Since When Does the President Have the Power to Silence People Who Want to Talk?new
It's fascinating to see the various uses George W. Bush's administration has made of the phrase "executive privilege." Most recently, Karl Rove has ignored a subpoena from the House Judiciary Committee to testify about the prosecution of Don Siegelman, the former governor of Alabama, a Democrat who also happened to be that party's best chance to regain the governor's mansion. (Rove has already brushed off a subpoena from the Senate.)
Baltimore City Paper |
Brian Morton |
06-10-2008 |
Commentary
Hip-Hop is My Crazy Girlfriendnew
Like many young passionate relationships, as we got older, hip-hop and I drifted apart. My sensibilities remained progressive, my humor became more biting, and my patience for ignorance became shorter than ever. And hip-hop? Well, we all know what happened to hip-hop.
Baltimore City Paper |
Vincent Williams |
06-10-2008 |
Music
Ponytail Taps Into Something Deeper and More Adaptable Than Moon/Junenew
Molly Siegel's vocals are almost certainly the strangest and most refreshing in indie music since Xiu Xiu's Jamie Stewart taught his throat to cry. It's like listening to a child learn its first word in accelerated form, only it's a twentysomething art-school graduate backed by an epic, even more clamorous version of Deerhoof.
Baltimore City Paper |
Michael Byrne |
06-03-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
Tags: Ice Cream Spiritual, Ponytail
African-American Male Exotic Dancers Protect Their Rights in 'Don't Hate'new
The documentary patiently deconstructs the myth of adult entertainment as the last refuge of the unemployed and anti-social through the story of Jim Bell's fight against one Maryland county legislature's attempts to outlaw the traditional etiquette for tipping an exotic dancer.
Baltimore City Paper |
Violet Glaze |
06-03-2008 |
Profiles & Interviews
What McCain and the GOP Really Mean When They Say They 'Support the Troops'new
One of these days, the American public is going to wake up and see that just because a candidate like John McCain can talk a good game about the military, and show off his pictures from the Vietnam days, it doesn't mean life will get any better for troops serving now.
Baltimore City Paper |
Brian Morton |
05-20-2008 |
Politics
Obama on My Mindnew
I almost wrote a whole column on Willie Tyler and Lester because, like a great many of us, my entire life has been consumed by Barack Obama, and what I really want to do is write yet another column about the presumptive Democratic nominee. But I'm trying to pace myself with the Obama stuff for a few reasons.
Baltimore City Paper |
Vincent Williams |
05-20-2008 |
Commentary
Comparing Tap Water to Bottled Waternew
At a recent meeting of the Mount Washington Green Club, members held a blind water tasting to figure out once and for all: Do tap and bottled waters taste differently? The point was to illustrate that buying bottled water is not only costly and environmentally unsound but also pointless, since there's not much difference in flavor.
Baltimore City Paper |
Laura Laing |
05-20-2008 |
Food+Drink
The Catonsville Nine and Baltimore Four Revisitednew
Forty years ago, nine Catholic peace activists took a draft office in Maryland -- and the nation -- by surprise. Together they took the draft files to a grassy patch behind the building where tipped-off reporters were waiting for them. They then set the files ablaze with homemade napalm, recited a prayer, made statements to the press, and waited peacefully to be arrested.
Baltimore City Paper |
Joe Tropea |
05-20-2008 |
History
Tags: protest, military, activism, peace, FBI, history, 1960s, Vietnam War, The Baltimore Four, The Catonsville Nine
Mr. Wrong: Sometimes No Great Notionnew
Wow, I just got back from vacation, and boy is my brain empty! Hiyo! Emptier than ever! Arrooo! An infinitely paradoxical increase of post-vacation vacancy in my room to let! Whoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-ooo!!!
Baltimore City Paper |
Joe MacLeod |
05-13-2008 |
Comedy
Tags: humor & satire
