Swelter

It’s real life, getting out of the house and confronting a rich bounty of irritation wherever you go. What with the press of events lately, following the plots of mini-series is becoming problematic. Brain damaged, shattered, but in the perfect state of mind for metropolitan life. A blessedly nontaxing evening…

Program Notes

As mentioned last week, dead is the word for the Rock Box. A decade ago there were few higher compliments than being called a “punk.” We were white punks on dope, we were punk rockers, we were punked out and proud of it. But kids today, oh yeah, too many…

Letters

FIRST-CLASS POLITICAL JACKASS Urban League president T. Willard Fair is a first-class jackass to sit on his stupid political ass and say that the Pride campaign (“Germ City,” June 24) was not to empower community residents. No wonder the campaign was such a resounding failure. Empowering your citizens is not…

Program Notes

How does a song like the sweetly languorous “Make U Sweat” end up on the same album as the hip-hoppity, Gary Glitter-ized scratch-and-grab “Bad to the Bone” and an unlikely cover of Neil Young’s “Down by the River”? Yes, skank tops, Inner Circle is back with a new one, Bad…

Swelter

Summertime, and the living is hard. And in clubland, the range wars are terminally competitive and increasingly nasty. Messages sent between rival clubs through intermediaries. The insidious French/Eurofilth colonization of the Beach, the new Nice mafia, continuing apace. Warsaw and Paragon battling it out for the local gay market, all…

Swelter

Uptown, downtown, just one big amorphous herd lately, feeding on fame and cheap thrills, letting the old distinctions slide. It used to be that uptown people actually acted rich, did their drinking quietly at home, avoided ostentatiousness, devoted themselves to an arcane mythology of taste and class that outsiders could…

Letters

Stuart Tremain Miami Beach THAT’S SOME HEAVY-DUTY TOW JAM I just put down Jim DeFede’s article “Big Tow” (June 17) and want to relate my experience with the City of Miami meter maids (and the whole system). On January 2 my truck was being ticketed for expiring one minute. Never…

Program Notes

That nasty man Luther “Luke” Campbell has been working hard on behalf of the Liberty City Optimist Club. The effort includes a big celebrity golf tournament this weekend (see “The Calendar” listings). The other night I watched a Frontline documentary called A Kid Kills, which concerned hard life and quick…

Letters

PEROT-PAGANDA Raspberries to Peter Elkind’s editorial – no, contradictorial, his automatic everything-Perot-says-is-a-lie-because-I-say-so article (“The Bashful Candidate,” June 10). His list of “Perot’s Cons” had so many spins and exaggerations to make some events sound wrong, I have to wonder if he is a speechwriter for Clinton or Bush. And supporting…

Swelter

The evening hours, a battleground of opposing forces. Charity and faith vying against greed, desire, and degradation. It’s the clash of a dialectic, the struggle of good and evil, the ultimate seduction. And on a less exalted level, a constant fight for the inalienable human privileges: free food, drink, the…

Letters

THE PUDGY PONDER: A THREAT TO PUDGY IS A THREAT TO US ALL The link between cruelty to humans and cruelty to animals is known by experts and lay people. It is shameful that a writer from New Times is not aware of this connection (“Pudgy’s Revenge,” June 3). In…

Swelter

Deborah Harry, recycling the glamarama Seventies. Joe Walsh, spanning the decades. The new-era rat pack, desperately seeking fun and stretch limos. More clubs descending on an already overloaded landscape. The three graces of go-go. Hustling on the new Grub Street. Apollo, the magnificent muscleman. Politicians gone wacko. Drugs. A trip…

Program Notes

Remember Charlie Pickett? Ah, too easy. Remember the Flamin’ Groovies? Charlie always seemed to, and Melbourne’s magnificent Screaming Iguanas of Love certainly do. Formed in San Francisco in 1965, the Groovies went against the granola by ignoring the Brit Invasion and the mushrooming of psychedelia to instead perform nifty little…

Swelter

The Club Corps, looking for a few good men and women, tough, courageous, unflinching in the face of their own ugliness. The lame will be punished and the strong will flourish and grow fabulous, learning the greedy chill of parting velvet ropes as the non-fab wither in the wake. It’s…

Letters

BORN TO PUN… Just who do you think you are? Is this the same credible newspaper that promised us Parking Free in November? After reading Todd Anthony’s article about Bruce Springsteen, I get the impression that he knows nothing about the man, his music, or his songwriting style. Also, let…

Program Notes

The telephone has been ringing off the hook ever since we published Todd Anthony’s piece “Dead Men Make No Sales” in last week’s ish. For those of you who read nothing but “Program Notes” (Hi, Mom!), a brief recap: Anthony’s essay theorized that Springsteen died a few years ago and…

Letters

The Inmate Evening News is simply hilarious! Imagine the David Letterman show put on by a bunch of convicts. While ICTV is television at its finest, if you’ve never seen it, I hope you never do! Glenn Allen South Miami HE KNEW THE DANGER, HE PAID THE PRICE I was…

Swelter

Clubs everywhere, spreading like some kind of satanic slime across the landscape, feeding on mankind’s unholy hunger for drink tickets and fabulousness. Openings, disasters, concepts, and a week that belonged to the new Third Rail Company on Lincoln Road. A couple of one-nighter debuts – Kitty Meow and Jon Jon…

Program Notes

Sex sells but it’s illegal to sell sex. Go figure. Did you see that big blue and red ad in last week’s ish, the one with the blonde humping the Harley? The point is her point was covered with a red “censored” bar, where the nipple would be. New Times,…

Swelter

The lame parade, out every night with the lost boys, and nothing, nothing ever happens. One long steady stream of “hot-and-willing-to-submit-to-any-sexual-degradation-destiny-deems-necessary” theme parties. Tapped, over, the capacity for simple pleasures leeched right out. And then, a collection of shining moments, and it’s all brand-new again. Blues night at The Whiskey,…

Letters

As evidence of that effect, please see a comment in the article where Labbee says, “At least Pardillo’s credibility doesn’t bear the taint of any smutty allegations.” Here the author declares that smutty allegations, even without proof, taint the objects of the allegations. The best way to stop such unfounded…

Program Notes

“There’s a void of knowledge in the system.” Thus spaketh Frank “Rat Bastard” Falestra, rightfully bemoaning the top-secret appearance of My Dad Is Dead at Washington Square last night (the 19th). “This guy’s put out six albums in five years, every one of them has gone Top 20 in the…