Is this the tiny part of the year during which it's okay to be kind to people and generous? I always forget which week people give instead of take. Well if it is this week, here are three timely events:
If your wishes include some hard-as-Quayle's-head rock, nine bands deliver the decibels at Summers this Saturday. Aces Wild, Little Sister, Cadillac Bratz, Mad Margritt, Crystal Heart, Miami Riot, No One's Son, Hanky Panky, and 100 Proof flail and wail (and I mean that as a compliment), with proceeds pledged to the Make-a-Wish Foundation of South Florida, a supercool organization that helps terminally ill children enjoy the dreams of their lifetimes. You pay six bucks, which works out to, what, about 65 cents per band?
Over at Washington Square on Sunday, David and Goliath, along with Forget the Name, a reunited-for-this-show Utrec, and plenty of others, will play live to benefit Toys for Tots. You should be hearing David and Goliath's "I Don't Need Anything for Christmas" on radio soon; it's from the A David and Goliath Christmas compilation album, which you can buy at your fave record store.
Tomorrow (Thursday) millions will gather at the Hyatt Regency (400 SE Second Ave.) at 5:30 p.m. for the World's Largest Office Party, to benefit Ronald McDonald Children's Charities. There'll be live music and a variety of food, plus booze served up by celebrity bartenders who will hustle you for tips, which will go to the charity. Along with the celebs, I'll be there again, mixing the deadliest cocktails and chilling the coldest beer, so stop by and give me money. I'll wreck ya. Or look at it this way: Here's your chance to spit on me, kick, punch, and bite me for all the nasty stuff I write the other 51 weeks of the year. (By the way, if you can't get enough of me --
ha! -- dial up Stu Goldstein's show Friday at 5:00 p.m. on WVCG (1080 AM). We'll rock, we'll roll, we'll reminisce; the topic is the endurance of oldies.)
Local entertainment lawyer Allen Jacobi has been sneaking around in the biz, forming a record label, Pyramid, which released the most-recent Joe Walsh album with Epic distribution and has optioned a follow-up that is being recorded now. Jacobi's also involved in a second label, Great Pyramid, distributed through BMG. For that imprint he's signed the original Stray Cats, who are cutting with Dave Edmunds. He expects his next signing to be what he calls "the original Commitments" -- Average White Band, with four of the six original members. "I'm looking for something remarkably different," Jacobi says, "to sign out of Miami." The Next Big Thing, Jacobi predicts, will be salsa bands featuring rock guitarists.
Picasso Trigger and Trouble Boys have an in-store on Sunday at Yesterday & Today at 4:00 p.m. Call 665-3305.
Personal note to Broken Head: Thanks for the boots. Incredible stuff. No, I don't know what happened to them, either. But I'll find out.
Butthorn of the week: The "angry crowd" that savagely attacked Little Havana sidewalks to exorcise the demonic Mexican teevy star Veronica Castro. The brave warriors chopped her bronze star and her palm prints out of the cement at two locations. Cops said they couldn't ID the perpetrators even though the Miami Herald published photographs of many of the suspects, most of whom were proud of their accomplishment and readily admitted taking part. Certainly the vandals should be charged. Then they should be given their own comedy show on network TV. Who can't laugh at this kind of behavior? And bet your Lotto money Carl Hiaasen uses this one in his next novel.
The media circus: Jimmy Breslin, the famed New York columnist who believes the best research consists of getting very drunk and hanging out with fringe characters, was interviewed recently by Bob Costas. I was too drunk to catch most of what he said, but when asked if there were any decent reporters in American journalism, Breslin cited himself and a couple of Apple competitors, and added to that short list Chicago ballbuster Mike Royko and (drum roll, please) the Miami Herald's Carl Hiaasen. Also, Hiaasen was recently interviewed by Don Webb on WLRN-TV (Channel 17). Most of it was hype for Native Tongue, but Webb did elicit a few comments about Hiaasen's highly unusual situation. Thanks to the success of his novels, Webb noted, Hiaasen really doesn't need his Herald paycheck. But, the columnist responded, he does need a forum in which to examine the many foibles of South Florida. That sense
of conscience and responsibility is probably what makes Hiaasen an indispensable read.
Another media circus: If you really think about it, the freed American hostages deserve no more pity or sympathy than plenty of other people. Every minute some innocent and good person is having a heart attack or getting run over by a truck. Plenty of people are held captive unjustly. There's plenty of suffering to go around. In fact this is the land of plenty. I suppose the hostages are symbolic, and that's why they strike a collective chord. On the other, less cynical, hand, I couldn't avoid shedding a tear or two while watching Terry Anderson's amazing press conference Friday morning. I think the word is "indomitable.
