Grey hopes to launch a new project, which won't be all ages, at a new location, in a few months. You can't blame him, though you might feel bad for all the good kids, the ones that didn't screw it up, who've lost a cool place to hang and headbang. "They'd get intoxicated," Grey says of the loser cliques, adding that he had no liquor license, everything was BYOB. "Ruckuses, fights, I had nine people on security. They got tired of hitting on people. That gets old. Gangs came out, fifteen-year-old kids with nine millimeters, shotguns. In the year we were open, we had few visits from cops. No serious problems, not many police happenings. Things keep getting taken away because kids fuck it up. I don't want to be ultimately responsible for a life-and-death situation."
So what's been shining my shoelaces lately, tapewise? Brenda Lee. It took me a while to dial in, but I finally gave her Warner Bros. debut (I don't boycott Time Warner) a listen. A charming blend of country and pop, beautifully sung by the veteran star. With one killer exception: "Love Is Fair," a Jesse Winchester song with a deep R&B melody/hook that suggests Ms. Lee's soul came under the temporary possession of the late Billie Holiday during recording of the vocal tracks. Of course, I might have produced it a bit differently, dumped the cheese-o-rama synth foundation and maybe replaced the Forester Sisters and the other femme background vocalists with some "black" sounding -- oh, never mind, it's fine the way it is. More than fine. Deadly. Yes, Brenda, you make me laugh if you make me cry.
And another: Rebel Waltz's Rubber Walls. The Waltz is a too-obscure-for-music-this-good band that's been recording and performing and winning awards in their native Wisconsin since the mid-Eighties. I hate these comparison deals, but you might find it helpful to note that Rebel Waltz leavens heavy doses of the sound most associated with early Replacements by adding touches of Graham Parker and the Clash on better drugs than the Clash ever got hold of. Furious and fun. Some club or promoter around here should pursue the possibility of giving some local exposure to these Northerners. Inquiries, including from those who would like to try to obtain the tape -- which I received from a friend, not a hypester -- should be sent to 311 S. Patrick St., Kimberly, WI 54136.
Yes, that was Raul Malo's beaming mug peering out from the top corner of the front page of the nation's McNewspaper, USA Today. The peg on the piece, a package of short album reviews, is "cool country," and how the cited groups represent that concept. Okay, so it's a journalistic reach, but a sweet boost for the Mavericks. Being a South Floridian and a New Times peruser, you know more than anyone needs to know about the Mavs, so the rest is gravy, in this case very rich gravy with lots of juicy lumps. "The best new album of the year," writes David Zimmerman of From Hell to Paradise on page 4D of the June 30 edition. "This is a group that could help save '90s country...." No duh, dude.
Joe Imperato, of the Source and the public defender's office, leads, naturally enough considering his schizo occupations, an adventurous life. Anecdotal evidence: The other day, while assisting an upstart PD on a burglary case, Imperato noticed that one of the potential jurors happened to be Nil Lara. Being as ethical and professional as any attorney can be, Imperato alerted the prosecutors to the fact that they might want to ask Lara if he knew anyone in the courtroom. Even so, Imperato says with a chuckle, the judge said that since the two knew each other only professionally -- from appearing on the same bill at shows -- it was okay to leave Lara in the jury pool. The prosecutors got him out on some other grounds. The Source, meanwhile, is working on an album. Look all over for updates.
Natural Causes, which is how I want to go, has just completed a six-song cassette at Criteria, and begins this week a series of Saturday nights at Island Club. The dual-guitar-attack sextet hasn't announced a release date for the tape, but I bet you know where to find updates. If you should live so long.
The Baja Beach Club in Fort Lauderdale begins this week a series of twilight concerts on Sundays. Jim Dandy's Black Oak Arkansas is first up. Doors open early -- we're talking 5:00 p.m. -- and admission is free.
The Slang gang has shot (on film!) a "video" for "Rest Your Head" and intends to slab a vinyl single. The tune is already receiving airplay on 27 stations around the nation.
Some more hype behind Rock for Choice Weekend coming up July 24-26 at Uncle Sam's. Add to that list of bands from last week's "Program Notes" these acts: I Don't Know, Big Tall Wish, DV 8's, Beat Poets, Shotgun Wedding, Headway, Wet Flower, Falling Corpses, and Black Janet. And because we're on the hype tip anyway, I should mention that the guest hosts are, on Friday, Jeffrey Harrell, and, on the other two nights, Todd Anthony and some other goofball from NewTimes. Call 532-0973 to protest.
Butthorn of the week: Oliver "Above All Laws Made By Man or God" North. Sometimes I'm not quite sure whether to laugh, cry, or just go ahead and put the .45 to my temple and pull the trigger. I certainly know which of those options should be applied to the treasonous Ollie North. And unlike the band -- and newspapers should start getting this right -- Body Count, I'm not being symbolic. Take this scumsucker, who has betrayed his country too much already, out in the parking lot and shoot him. Put him out of our misery. North and his 120,000-member band of rebels, the ill-named Freedom Alliance, are now saying -- and I swear to the Ayatollah I ain't making this up -- that Time Warner, owner of Body Count's label, should be charged with sedition for releasing a song called "Cop Killer." Really! I swear! Talk about the white criminal calling the artist black. Not that I'm suggesting North and his goon squad, represented by censor-attorney Jack Thompson, are racist. Just really stupid and hypocritical. Mostly stupid.
The media circus: We heard last week that some loser went around emptying New Times boxes in South Miami and Miami Beach. That was the issue with the story explaining how George "What Will I Be Doing in 1993?" Bush and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen owe us some serious explaining about how they abuse our money, "our" meaning taxpayers. (Wow! Death and taxes, a two-theme "Program Notes"!) We hear this criminal didn't even bother to take the "Vote for Bushy Boy" bumpersticker off the getaway car. (Note to readers: When you see something like this, try to get a license plate number.) I guess it's not Bushy's fault, but it certainly reflects on him when his supporters, or at least one of them, is so childish, and a lawbreaker to boot.
Pet corner: Julia Allen Field said it: "We cannot glimpse the essential life of a caged animal, only the shadow of its former beauty."
Greg Brown lyric of the week: From "Who Woulda Thunk It" on 1985's In the Dark with You: "We used to say I could eat horse/And we could and we did/At fast food joints in the middle of someplace on the way to someplace else/Now we say I could eat a horse/It's not true/We can't eat a horse, no, 'cause we don't want to/We want something from the cookbook/That new one with the great graphics.
