Letters

McGreal should keep up her efforts to uncover the sleaze of the wildlife trade that even is able to penetrate governments. The animals have her voice, which is the voice of millions of people, too. Roger Fried Boca Raton IT JUST GOES TO SHOW WHAT A WARM SMILE WILL DO…

Swelter

It’s a visit to a nasty little place that makes you want to go somewhere else. Except that you already live there, it’s home, and there’s no way out anytime soon. It’s parties where you don’t know whether to be flattered or insulted by being included on the guest list…

Program Notes

What this town needs is some new trends, fads, something, anything, new. Oh, all right, we’ll take something borrowed, then. Rave, the British rage where thousands of people gather in fields to hear techno music, comes to South Florida tonight. DJ Pierre from London, DJ T4 from Jamaica, Freedom of…

Swelter

Fall in New York, the leaves turning color, the air crisp and almost clean, the prospect of a sort of Merry Christmas. And the fashionable life, back in full swing. Apocalypse, the new heavy-duty industrial night at The Building, put together by Gary James and Bobby Stark of Disco Inferno…

Letters

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO “IF YOU DON’T HAVE ANYTHING NICE TO SAY…”? How refreshing to read Manuel Pila’s bull’s-eye description of Doc Wiley and Washington Square (“Letters,” November 13)! The number of people who must feel the same way might be into the hundreds by now. Doc is a sick pup…

Program Notes

Ya know snowbound New York rock-industry hotshots have their calendars blocked out, and so should you, even if you aren’t escaping the big chill. You rock, right? Mark off December 9 for the South Florida Rock Awards at the Button South. (By the way, I think the battle between this…

Letters

Let’s get something perfectly clear; Planets bassist and Washington Square music director Doc Wiley is an asshole on a petty power trip, and a self-aggrandizing one, at that. I know people who’ve played at Washington Square. I’ve played there myself. And it’s not that musicians in South Florida are jealous…

Swelter

You go out often enough and the countless episodes of boredom, low-grade idiocy, and nausea get to you eventually. So many pointless conversations, so many brushes with the ignoble, so much trash to wade through. But then, once in a while, something interesting happens. The singular capacity of nightlife to…

Program Notes

Things are different now. Pee-wee Herman. Kathy Willets. Jimmy Swaggart. Willie Smith. Clarence Thomas. It seems like a 2 Live Crew album come to life. And, coincidentally enough, there is a new Crew album out, Sports Weekend, the group’s best work yet. And you know what that means. Up north…

Swelter

Until very recently, we had always prided ourselves on certain core values, a minimum set of operative social standards. No drinking straight from the bottle. No lying, cheating, or stealing. No using the word “fabulous” without irony. No hanging out with criminals, overextended homosexuals, possibly psychotic sex-act performance artists, party-hearty…

Letters

I’ve attended several citizens’ meetings at which Huber spoke, and my impression of him was similar to that of several people quoted in the article. He was full of energy, determination, and drive – at the same time, he strongly projected an attitude of “I have never made a mistake,…

Program Notes

Unlike a year ago, this autumn seems to be devoid of rampant censorship. Thank goodness, ’cause the F-Boyz are back in town. Long before there was a Marilyn Manson and the Spooky Kids, Methadone Actors, or Human Oddities, there was F-Boyz, the most musical dick waggers to ever rock a…

Swelter

So there’s Halloween, looming up on the horizon with all the sickening dear-God-please-fix-my-life-and-make-it-glamorous inevitability of New Year’s Eve. And as usual the members of the fun brigade are honing the necessary social skills of envy and malice, desperately pining to be invited to something truly spectacular, the ultimate party that…

Letters

Marilyn Manson is a wild treat live, and Bergasse 19 seems to be from another planet, bringing to Earth a unique psychedelic, industrial matrix of cosmic sound. I wish we had more bands like these two. Ana Romano Miami Springs DE NADA, FOR THIS YEAR AND ALL YEARS PREVIOUS I…

Program Notes

Since May 2, 1968, Miami has had a true radio alternative in the form of WVUM-FM. From reggae to rap to local bands, from the obscure to the ridiculous, WVUM, not constrained by commercial concerns, gives voice to so much music that otherwise wouldn’t receive airplay. What the station needs…

Swelter

It’s a small town, pal. A small ugly town. Full of rats. Area troublemakers. Unprovoked attacks. Misinterpreted declarations. Fabulous writers profiling fabulous club owners/boyfriends. Nebulous celebrity investors. Wire cover boy Abe Hirschfeld actually portrayed as a viable human being, let alone a viable political candidate. A politician in tune with…

Letters

T.J. Callahan is absolutely correct. Lesbian and gay persons do want equal opportunity for life insurance, health insurance, job security, benefits, and estate upon death – just like he and every other citizen already enjoys. That’s all we want – equal rights. We don’t understand why we are routinely deprived…

Program Notes

The choice had to be made: become a cop killer or go into rehab. Decisions, decisions. The traumatic turning point came September 28 at, naturally enough, Churchill’s Hideaway. A new “band” – actually a loose amalgam that is open to membership changes with each show – called the Volunteers debuted…

Letters

I am the local-music-show DJ at WUFI (the FIU radio station), and I was appalled to read that someone who “supports” local music could be so outright prejudiced toward some of Miami’s newest bands that are also on the cutting edge. Aside from their beliefs and promotional ideas, these are…

Swelter

The weather on the hot bottom of the earth begins to change, the cafard slowly lifts, and once again a parade of cultural/charitable gatherings gives a patina of meaning to an increasingly absurd social life. Having an uncanny instinct for doing the worst possible thing at any given moment, we…

Swelter

Over the course of too many long years in Miami, we have learned a vital survival skill: actually appreciating the disgusting as a local art form. Sometimes it’s fun digusting, and sometimes its just plain disgusting, but whatever the case, the ability to revel in the offensive has allowed us…

Letters

THAT’S POOP,ALL RIGHT I must say that after reading your feature article concerning “George & Jane & Steve & Ellis & Kathy” (October 2) I became incensed. What kind of journalism is this? Why have you wasted your time and space? When are you going to do your jobs right?…