Buzz Buzz

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Buzz Buzz

November 8-14, 2006

What is this thing called buzz? Is it strobing vision, caused by the slightly off-register photo of a celeb on a magazine cover? Is “buzz” the drone of a publicist’s voice, caught in the flytrap of my voicemail? (“Your readers will be interested in . . .”) Or is buzz really just the shriek of some telephone screamer in some far-off Manhattan or L.A. office–a shrill cry, distorted by distance, to the insistent whine of a dentist’s drill?

Imagine a world without buzz. Please think of the below not as adding to buzz, but as a mere schedule for informational purposes.

First, Christmas. Think of it: disorientation, panic, crowds, darkness–except for a discernable lack of heat, the holiday season boasts many of the most noteworthy features of Hell. The mold was not yet on the jack-o’-lantern before ‘The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause’ started its annual catastrophe. (In legalese, an “escape clause” means something that excuses a promisor from failure to meet the contract’s terms. Can’t say you weren’t warned by the title.)

‘The Nativity Story’ (Dec. 1) takes on holiday legends from a traditional angle. New Zealand actress Keisha Castle-Hughes (Whale Rider) plays, so to speak, the Virgin Maori. ‘Christmas at Maxwell’s’ (Nov. 10) is more a Seventh Heaven approach, with a languishing mother ruining the hols forever; ‘Deck the Halls’ (Nov. 22) and ‘Unsupervised Minors’ (Dec. 8) go for nigh-patricidal slapstick.

Meaner and doubtlessly more fun is ‘Bad Santa: The Director’s Cut’ at the Smith Rafael Film Center on Dec. 16, with director Terry Zwigoff in attendance. Also comes the remake of Bob Clark’s other famous Yuletide movie besides A Christmas Story, ‘Black Christmas’ (Dec. 25), which revisits the 1974 film’s time-honored approach of pitting a foaming maniac against a houseful of sorority sisters.

Winter cinema packs a flurry of emotional donkey-punches. The most furious seems to be ‘The Pursuit of Happyness’ (Dec. 15), with Will Smith as a homeless but honest dad in San Francisco, tending to his young son while living in a shelter. Tears of some sort–if not the ones proverbially shed for answered prayers–may be unleashed by ‘Rocky Balboa’ (Dec. 22). Even at his age, Rocky may live to fight another day.

But what’s sadder than athletes dying young, as in ‘We Are Marshall’ (Dec. 22)? Answer: the plight of our vets, as exemplified in ‘Home of the Brave’ (Dec. 15), in which Samuel L. Jackson, Jessica Biel and 50 Cent separately recover from Iraq-trauma. Disinterring ‘Bobby’ (Kennedy, that is) at Thanksgiving–well, that’s sad, certainly. But it takes a talking pig to make some of us really bawl. ‘Charlotte’s Web’ opens Dec 20. There were those who required intravenous fluids after seeing Babe, and this promises to be just as dehydrating. Julia Roberts voices a commonsensical Charlotte and Steve Buscemi is Templeton the rat, the salt on the film’s tale.

As Dickens describes him, the Ghost of Christmas Present is known for rich robes, smoking roasts and roaring fireplaces. Maybe he’s the spirit of the cinematic cataclysm, too, and movies about civilizations put to the torch are ever so popular at the butt end of the year. Thus we tremble before ‘Apocalypto’ (Dec. 8), Mel Gibson’s Mesoamerican twilight of the Gods; ‘Eragon’ (Dec. 15), which intends to take up where Lord of the Rings left off, replete with fireballs, swords and dragon-cam views of massed Dark Ages armies; and ‘Curse of the Yellow Flower’ (Dec. 22), Zhang Yimou’s latest ancient Chinese polychrome battle epic. ‘Children of Men’ (Dec. 25) is Alfonso Cuaron’s very well-produced science-fiction epic of societal breakdown in 2027, in which, at the behest of his ex-wife Julianne Moore, Clive Owen must escort earth’s last pregnant girl to safety.

The harder to classify films are perhaps even more interesting: ‘The Good German’ (Dec. 12) offers a love triangle of George Clooney, Tobey Maguire and Cate Blanchett, with our girl vamping Dietrich in Berlin, circa 1945. Shot in a particularly glorious-looking black and white, it’s a tribute to the Fritz Lang thriller. Bombed-out ruins, labyrinthine sewers and fog-shrouded but shiny Lockheed Elektras warming up on the runway–the ingredients are all there. More double-crossing and more Cate are found in ‘Notes on a Scandal’ (Dec. 25), based on Zoe Heller’s novel about a student/teacher romance, with Judi Dench getting to play a monster, Blanchett’s hard-faced, unwanted friend.

‘Dreamgirls’ (Dec. 25) is a musical about a girl-group awfully like the Supremes, with Beyoncé and Eddie Murphy singing through decades of music and fashion. ‘Little Children’ (out now and coming soon) is a witty but painful story of parenting in the Boston suburbs, with Kate Winslet as a mom who suddenly finds herself repeating the plot of Madame Bovary. It’s a huge improvement over Todd Field’s earlier film, the overpraised In the Bedroom. ‘The Painted Veil’ (Nov. 29) has Naomi Watts as the restless wife of a doctor (Edward Norton), who finds duty in the 1920s in the Far East during a cholera epidemic.

For those craving green fields and grazing sheep, ‘Miss Potter’ (Dec. 29) stars Renee Zellweger in the Beatrix Potter story. Scandalous times in Montmarte, opium and sexual experimentation will not be part of the bio-pic. (That would be Nov. 17’s ‘Fur,’ with Nicole Kidman as Diane Arbus in a fairy-tale version of the photographer’s life.) It turns out that Potter, when not water-coloring tender pictures of bunnies, fought the developers and polluters in her native and much beloved Lake District.

Since the next two months will be a fiesta of vainglorious acting and shameless Oscar-grub, ‘For Your Consideration’ (Nov. 17) will be a reprieve. Ensemble improviser Christopher Guest leads a cast of indie-film never-wases who are caught up in the awards machinery when their picture gets “buzz”–which in some cases, means a movie’s death rattle.


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The Byrne Report

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November 8-14, 2006

Last week, Indymedia journalist Brad Will was shot dead in the streets of Oaxaca, Mexico, during a demonstration against economic and political oppression. Will’s death was remarkable because he was an American and he cared enough about freedom and democracy to be present in Oaxaca.

His life and death remind me of Rachel Corrie, who was crushed to death in the Gaza Strip in 2003 by an occupier driving an American-made bulldozer. Corrie died because she chose to be present with Palestinian families who were being brutalized by American-subsidized Israeli forces.

And let us not forget Marla Ruzicka, killed last year by a roadside bomb in Baghdad, where she was advocating for Iraqi victims of our military industrial complex.

Many Americans are appalled by the violence we export to the Third World, yet are paralyzed into inaction by an incomprehensible demoralization. I often hear the lament, “What our country is doing is horrible, but there is nothing I can do about it.” Implicit in this despair is an acknowledgement that it will take more than voting for a Democrat to reverse the militarism and government-sanctioned thievery that befouls America.

But Will, Corrie and Ruzicka were not content to be limited by the disempowering electoral lesson preached in high school civics class. Witnessing the injustices wrought abroad by American foreign policy and market economics, they went forth in the spirit of “This I can do.”

These young Americans somehow escaped being programmed to hate the Other by the daily dose of television “news” that sculpts the collective brain of mainstream America. They used the Internet as a tool of political communication, not as a source of instant gratification. They were not pixilated by electronically delivered memes of fear, sex and gluttony engineered to transform survival instincts into commercial impulses. How did these activists manage to learn empathy for their fellow human beings?

Seeking answers, I visited Bonnie River, the director of education at the Live Oak Charter School in Petaluma, which uses the secular-style Waldorf method of teaching. River specializes in the neuropsychology of learning.

River says that empathy develops experientially as a link between antipathy (hot stove! Ouch!) and sympathy (let me kiss the hurt). Empathy allows us to feel what the Other feels. She says that the brains of empathetic people tend to have neural pathways in their prefrontal lobes that have been developed through direct physical interaction with reality. All information is physical. Ethical thinking is a bodily function.

On the other hand, research shows that the myelination, or wiring, of pathways channeling rational discernment is stunted when brains are bombarded by photons streaming out of television and computer screens. All images are taken as real at the lower brain levels. Thus, if you receive a violent image, you really do sense a life-threatening situation before you are able to rationalize that it’s “just television” or “just a video game.” Fear stimulates the release of stress hormones such as cortisol, which flood the midbrain, disrupting memory and the ability to link cause and effect.

The bottom line, River says, is that “reality does not happen inside of a box.” Watching screens is addictive and disembodies our engagement with reality. Our brains become disconnected from the real world; we become observers, not participants. We become incapable of experiencing and mirroring the pain and suffering inflicted upon the people of Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and Mexico, for example.

Unfortunately, many who do feel empathy can become frozen by depression, incapacitated by feelings of powerlessness. A lifetime of absorbing consumer and political advertising from electronic bursts etches mental patterns that reward passivity and detachment, not activism.

The good news, River says, is that the brain is adaptable, or “plastic.” Damaged and underdeveloped brains can be repaired through physical therapy and by the creation of neural pathways through contact with the real world. In other words, our passive-aggressive culture can be dehypnotized by turning away from the ubiquitous screens.

River envisions a positive role for television. “What if a program juxtaposed the fears and hopes of an Israeli family and a Palestinian family?” she asks. Caught between processing information about two cultures, an observing brain might create new neural pathways, enabling the emergence of empathy for the wounded in both societies.

“My life purpose,” River says, “is to educate children to discern, to think, so that we will not allow our society to become truly fascist.”

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Rice Dream

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Rice Dream

Heady stuff: A traditional drink for centuries, sake has been enormously refined in just the last 30 years.

By Molly Jackel

Many moons ago, I sat down to a Sunday afternoon sake tasting at the Ume Japanese Bistro in Windsor. The two things I remember most about that day are that (1) I’ve never been so plowed in broad daylight and (2) how shocked I was at the drastic difference in taste between one type of sake and another. C’mon, it’s just rice!

Seio Shimada of World Sake Imports hosted the event. (He was also involved in the giant “Joy of Sake” tasting at the Moscone Center this last August). Shimada presented a history of sake and explained the preparation and brewing processes while leading us graciously through a sake and food pairing.

We tasted selections from the three basic categories of premium sake, which are classified by the amount of polishing or milling of the rice grain. There are about 65 varieties of sake rice, some more valued than others. Like grapes, different rice strains grow best in particular regions. Premium sake is brewed with special rice in which the starch component is concentrated at the center of the grain, with proteins, fats and amino acids toward the outside. The polishing removes these “impurities” from the outer layers of the sake rice, which can affect fermentation and flavor. This also leaves just the starchy core, which is what eventually ferments. The more polishing, the purer the starch, and subsequently the cleaner, more refined the flavor. The three main types of premium sake, in descending order of refinement, are daiginjo, ginjo and junmai.

Premium sakes make up only 20 percent of all sake, the other 80 percent being something akin to table wine with much added alcohol and sometimes even sugars; this is the sake you might find served hot. In fact, serving piping hot sake is a holdover from times when brewing was not as refined as it is today. Even 30 years ago, sake was far rougher, fuller and sweeter, a profile more suited to warming than sipping cold. Heating sake is still common practice for making lower-grade sakes more palatable. However, most good sake tastes best slightly chilled. Ginjo sakes with a floral or fruity flavor are best lightly chilled, while earthier junmai and honjozu sakes with more rice flavor are good either warm or cold, but should never be served hot.

The history of sake is unclear. One historian believes that leftover cooked rice was left out long enough to get moldy; people noticed that moldy rice tasted sweet and smelled alcoholic. At some point before the third century B.C., these observations led to a technique for producing alcohol.

The first sake widely made was called kuchikami no sake, or “chewing in the mouth sake,” because people would chew the rice, spit it into a tub and the enzymes from the saliva would begin the fermentation process. Shimada claimed that in the early days, the finest sakes were spawned by a virgin in a white kimono with a cheekful of rice and a spittoon.

Several centuries later, whole villages of folks chewing and spitting for the sake of sake became obsolete when the koji mold, which supplies the enzyme that converts the rice starch to sugar, was discovered. By the seventh century A.D., sake’s popularity warranted full-time brewers at the Imperial Palace, leading to further advances in technique. The 20th century brought great technological strides in brewing. The first sake tasting and competition was held in 1907; yeast strains specific to brewing were isolated, and the wooden barrels considered unhygienic were replaced with enamel-lined steel tanks.

The subtle flavors and aromas of premium sake complement so perfectly the delicate flavors of Japanese food, that it’s like they were made just for sushi. All the sakes that Shimada poured on that storied Sunday had a clean earthiness like the sweet smell after a rain or of a foggy morning–understated, clean and sweet–not so different from many things traditionally Japanese, the subtle beauty of which seems to call for a quieting of the mind and a honing of observations.

We started with the top of the line, a Daiginjo Hoyo Kura no Hana “Fair Maiden.” This one was fragrant and exceedingly light with just a hint of sweetness. It was paired with a super-fresh Fanny Bay oyster, which was also slightly sweet; neither eclipsed the other. This kind of sake works well served with shellfish or white fish sashimi.

Next came a Ginjo Dewazakura Dewasansan. This was fuller bodied and dried out the mouth somewhat; it tasted more alcoholic than the others and smelled incredibly of green apple but with the right acid balance to keep it from being too sweet. It was paired with a beautifully fresh sashimi plate. This sake goes well with rich, oily fish, like salmon, and with grilled fish.

Then a Junmai Masumi Okuden Kantsukuri “Mirror of Truth.” This one was stronger, edgier, more acidic and complex than the others. It was less sweet and tasted more of the earth, something like the Côtes du Rhône of sakes. It was paired with an intensely flavored soup-stew of tender beef braised with lotus root, snow peas and daikon.

A side-by-side tasting of two of the highest grade sakes was next, both paired with julienned squid tossed with citrus mayo and tobiko. The Daiginjo Masumi Yumedono comes from a 400-year-old brewery that exports only 800 bottles per year to the United States It had an intense fruity resonance that came on strong and then seemed to vanish just in time for a bite of squid. Shimada’s favorite, Daiginjo Akitabare Suirakuten, or “Heaven of Tipsy Delight,” had a much more subtle and fleeting flavor–almost like water. It was somewhat the opposite of the previous, with the flavor developing slowly in the mouth and lingering slightly, gentle and strong at the same time. This is one of the few aged sakes.

While we learned about the sakes, Shimada also instructed us on etiquette. Never pour your own sake and never let your friend’s cup go dry. It is a sign of disrespect to fill your cup when others are empty, or to allow your companion’s glass to go empty. If the cup is served in a larger saucer (or if the box cup is served on a small tray), it is customary to overfill your companion’s vessel as a sign of boundless friendship and generosity. Furthermore, contrary to popular fashion, I was surprised to learn that the wooden box cup, or masu, is a traditional serving vessel, but is not recommended, as the wood affects the aroma and flavor of the sake, especially the cedar boxes. Better are the little ceramic cups called ochoko.

For Your Own Sake

Japanese sake doesn’t have the same fruitiness or acidity as wine, nor the malty or hoppy flavor of beer, because it’s made from the pure starchy center of the rice grain (the shinpaku or “white heart”). Some say this makes sake the purest expression of the flavor of fermentation itself–surprisingly fruity and flowery, though no fruit or flower has touched it.

When purchasing sake from a shop, be sure to check the bottling date on the label. If the sake was brewed in Japan, note that this year (2006) is the year 18. So the date Nov. 8, 2006, would look like this: 18.11.8. Try to buy a sake bottled within the last year: the fresher, the better (except for koshu sakes, which are aged, and namazake or unpasteurized sake, which is a rich, fruity sake often served like a dessert wine. It is only released in springtime and should be consumed within six months of bottling). Look for purveyors who keep their sake refrigerated, as sake can spoil within days if kept at room temperature or exposed to sunlight. Never buy unrefrigerated namazake. Properly stored, it will last six months to a year. Once opened, sake should be consumed within one to two days.

If you want to have a try, see below for local restaurants with extensive sake menus. Kampai!

Ume Bistro 8710 Old Redwood Hwy., Windsor. 707.838.6700. Ume will be holding another sake tasting this winter. E-mail ke***@*******ro.com or call for more information.

You can also find some of the sakes we tasted at the following restaurants:
Hana Japanese Restaurant 101 Golf Course Drive, Rohnert Park. 707.586.0270.
Go Fish 641 Main St., St. Helena. 707.963.0700.
Ora Restaurant Bar & Lounge 24 Sunnyside Ave., Mill Valley. 415.381.7500.
Sushi Ran 107 Caledonia St., Sausalito. 415.332.3620.

For sakes from other importers try:
Hiro’s Japanese Restaurant 107 Petaluma Blvd. N., Petaluma. 707.763.2300.
Osake 2446 Patio Court, Santa Rosa. 707.542.8282.
Sushi Tozai 7531 Healdsburg Ave., Sebastopol. 707.824.9886.

–M. J.



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Molten Mood

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Molten Mood

November 8-14, 2006

It’s a great time for metal right now–depending on whom you talk to. A bunch of ogling fair-weather fans have crashed the funeral procession that devoted metal heads have kept going strong for years, without feature stories in Spin, thank you very much. The more metal, the better–but the world of metal is dark and unwelcoming by nature. Merely listening to metal does not make you hip. You have to get it, and not everyone does.

Once primarily the province of fringe deviants and long-in-the-jagged-tooth men and women with graying power mullets, metal is in the throes of a hearty underground renaissance. The best metal of now is vital and sincere, fueled by a potent mix of deft shredding, musical innovation and a fierce nostalgia for simpler times when men shamelessly wore leather pants and allowance money funded the purchase of cassingles at the drugstore.

But what do I know? I don’t listen to metal, and I never really have. Did that keep me from dressing up like a Viking on Halloween and attending a show by the Columbus, Ohio, band Teeth of the Hydra, whose new album, Greenland, wields an obvious Nordic slant? Oh no, it does not, and no one at the club gave me any grief for it.

There was a disappointing dearth of obvious metalheads in the crowd–probably not unusual, considering that this was a CMJ Music Marathon event–although a chain-belted example of what I’ve heard called a “heshbag woman” accosted the right horn of my Viking helmet with a Sharpie, inscribing, “Suck the left one.”

But does one need to look metal in order to be metal? A lot of the press devoted to the current coolness of metal alludes to the disingenuousness of it, as if metal were a bandwagon for bored thirty-something musicians to hop onto for wink-wink kicks. Metal is not a curio to be collected and displayed on a shelf of ironic delights, and fed-up critics roll their eyes at poseurs who maybe have a few Yngwie Malmsteen tracks on their mp3 player and call it a day. Metal, the music of outsiders, does not welcome day-trippers.

And yet the cerebral side of metal has never been so accessible. Bands like Mastodon, Pelican, Priestess and High on Fire value melody over hypermasculine showmanship, and for those who don’t respond to growling vocals and constant lyrical nods to the pain, suffering and the Grim Reaper, it’s a great time to check out up-and-coming, metal-lovin’ bands.

Metal has survived because of its adaptability. Its purity of intention–be loud, be angry, be drunk, get laid–remains the same. But its means of expression are elastic enough to encompass the most disparate subgenres: black metal, adventure metal, speed metal, hair metal, butt-rock and nu metal. Your average Hatebreed fan does not have much in common with the typical Whitesnake fan other than steadfastness–lovers of metal are faithful for life.

That’s why diehards clung tighter and tighter during the lean years after metal’s height of popularity in the mid-1980s. Though not particularly visible, they continued to gather at clubs and amphitheaters across the country to worship under the flowing tresses of their gods. In his 2004 book Too Fast for Love: Heavy Metal Portraits, photographer David Yellen presented these fans as an endangered species, his eager groupies and heavily tattooed, frizzy-haired men confronting the camera in a dare: Go ahead, make fun of me–I don’t give a shit. But some of his subjects betrayed a melancholy resignation in their eyes, as if they knew their glory days had passed, leaving them with nothing but the bizarre ritual of pilgrimages to Poison package tours to bring back to life the days captured in Heavy Metal Parking Lot.

The grandest thing about metal is its permanence. Its presence on the developed world’s cultural radar might ebb and flow, but as long as the sun rises and sets, you will find disaffected, pimply longhaired kids skulking around in ripped-up Levis and AC/DC T-shirts. Fashions change, but just like hippies, goth kids and punk rockers, the stalwart metal archetype soldiers on. Metal is for anyone who needs it and means it, and that includes slick urban dwellers in $300 jeans, awkward teens growing up on a farm in rural Iowa and 45-year-olds with office jobs, growing kids and beautiful metal memories of yore.


Morsels

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November 1-7, 2006

‘I think some people come out just to say they’ve had rattlesnake,” says Jeffrey Madura. “Others come out because they really enjoy having things like the grilled buffalo loin or the wild boar spareribs,” he adds. As executive chef of John Ash & Co., Madura is preparing for Wild Game Week, a tradition that started some 15 years ago after the restaurant’s founder wrote a critically acclaimed cookbook, American Game Cooking. Ever since, the restaurant has hosted a Wild Game Week on-and-off. And we’re in luck, because this is one of the on years.

The menu speaks for itself: Panko-crusted frog legs with watercress, caper and pine nut sauces; wild boar sausage pizza with goat cheese, sage and mushrooms; braised rabbit pot pie with fall vegetables; roasted breast of pheasant stuffed with pistachios, roasted grapes and porcini mushrooms with an orange ginger cream . . . Oh yeah, and Madura’s planning to serve alligator skewers with tropical fruit on several of the nights, as well as rattlesnake, which he prepares kind of like a Japanese restaurant might server eel (unagi), with miso broth, soba noodles and shiitake mushrooms.

Madura tries to use as much free range, sustainable meat as is humanly possible, and he says game tends to have less fat and cholesterol than other meats and it’s more sustainable than raising cattle. So basically, it’s perfect–just make sure your date’s an omnivore. Keep the rifle locked up, and head to Wild Game Week from Monday, Nov. 6, through Saturday, Nov. 11, at John Ash & Co. restaurant at the Vintners Inn. Barnes Road, River Road exit, just west of Highway 101, Santa Rosa. Dinner, 5:30pm-9pm daily; Saturdays, 5pm-9pm. 707.527.7687. www.vintnersinn.com. . . .

Foodies plus groupies equals–foopies? Like any respectable rock band, Outstanding in the Field just finished a North American tour, gathering fans in hotbeds from Athens to Austin to New Orleans. Except that OF doesn’t play any music. Instead, OF is more of a touring supper program, stopping at various farms throughout the country. There, they set up white-tablecloth dinners right in their host’s field or community garden (as was the case in NYC). This way, diners get to eat with food growers. Chefs change according to the location, and this time around, farmer Deborah Walton of Canvas Ranch in Petaluma will host guest chef Duskie Estes (Zazu Restaurant & Farm, Restaurant Bovolo). After participants get a tour of the farm, Estes will cook up a five-course Tuscan dinner, paired with wines from Chateau St. Jean. Proceeds benefit North Coast Grown, which brings locally grown produce into schools. The Outstanding in the Field tour bus sets up shop on Sunday, Nov. 5, at Canvas Ranch in the Two Rock Valley west of Petaluma. 2:30pm. $150 per person (includes tour, wine and food). To make reservations, call 831.247.1041 or visit www.outstandinginthefield.com.

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The Byrne Report

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November 1-7, 2006

During election season, I wait by the mailbox in anticipation of chuckling through colorful mailers filled with outrageous lies. Some people amuse themselves by snorting meth or sipping wine or watching television. When I am not pulling the wings off of flies, I recreate by watching self-serving plutocrats scramble after votes while pretending that normal people have a real say in how we are governed. I relish the glossy hit pieces published by paid political assassins.

In the end, does it really matter which corporate-branded narcissist gets to lord it over us for an unproductive term or two? The $74 billion (including interest) worth of bonds on the ballot is designed to serve Wall Street underwriters and politically savvy contractors who build public works with planned obsolescence and cost overruns in mind. The biggest laugh in this year’s bond bundle are the “disaster prevention” projects. National, regional and local governments in America have seldom, if ever, been truly prepared for coping with natural and man-made disasters, because the “prevention” money usually gets sucked off into baggage X-ray machines that do not work, or flood-control systems built with substandard sand, or Predator drone planes spying on political demonstrations.

The Best Hit Piece Award for this year goes to Mike Healy, who is running for mayor of Petaluma. Healy sent out a vomit-colored mailer portraying his “nice” opponent, Pam Torliatt, as pro-traffic jam. It was sexist and dumb. When I telephoned Healy, he declined to talk to me because, he said, I had once called him a “nitwit” in print. He must have been referring to the column of Sept. 21, 2005, in which I described how he and other members of the Petaluma City Council tried to stall a garbage contract for transparently political reasons. But I did not call him a nitwit or any other name; the column was mostly a recitation of facts. (OK, I called him a lawyer. Apologies.) It is unfortunate for attorney Healy that he remembers himself as a nitwit.

Second place goes to Phil Angelides, whose union supporters mailed out multiple mug shots of scowling sexual offenders. Their ridiculous message is that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is soft on registered sex predators.

(While we are on the subject of Angelides: Why did the Democratic Party nominate for governor the only piece of protoplasm in California who could not beat Arnold? Answer: Feinstein, Boxer, Kerry, both Clintons and the party establishment are beholden to the man who created this wetlands-paving politician. Angelides’ sugar-pop is Angelo Tsakopoulos, the super-rich developer of the Sacramento flood plain, and a Democratic Party money pump.)

Schwarzenegger, on the other hand, deserves to be thrown out of office simply for vetoing dozens of reasonable bills such as protecting public health in prisons by distributing condoms; protecting farmworkers from being cheated out of their wages; and providing court interpreters to Californians who need language translation in civil cases. Not to mention vetoing same-sex marriage and universal health care! Both gubernatorial candidates moan endlessly about prison overcrowding while continuing to support the vicious “three strikes” law that has incarcerated tens of thousands of people who should not be doing hard time.

With the exception of supporting our antiwar congressperson Lynn Woolsey, I am voting Peace and Freedom Party down the line as a protest against the sock puppets. But I see no reason not to vote yes on general principle for the Sonoma Marin Area Rail Transit (SMART) project (Measure R), or the water project (Measure F). And, yes! Sane Petalumans must oppose the Nevada Gold & Casino-controlled Indian tribe that would bring yet another life-destroying casino to the North Bay.

And that brings us to Proposition 90, the ban on state governments using the power of eminent domain to seize property for redevelopment and private purposes. This badly-written proposition is designed to undermine the common good and exempt developers from being responsive to environmental concerns. I was poised to vote no. But then I talked to Mary Ratcliff, who publishes the Bay View newspaper in San Francisco’s Bayview-Hunters Point district, which is targeted for gentrification by eminent domain.

After 30,000 city residents recently signed a petition to force the Bayview-Hunters Point redevelopment plan to a popular vote, the city attorney voided the people’s will, ludicrously arguing that petition signers had not been given copies of the voluminous redevelopment plan. Ratcliff is supporting Proposition 90, hoping that squelching the power of eminent domain will thwart the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency’s plan to tear out the heart of yet another black community and replace it with expensive condos, boutiques and 20-bucks-a-shot sake bars. Her message is that saving California’s inner-urban communities from redevelopment’s bulldozer should be a higher priority than protecting the pretty beaches, open spaces and low skylines cherished by rich NIMBYs and the bed-and-breakfast set. Ouch.

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Ask Sydney

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November 1-7, 2006

Sydney, most Americans don’t remember (not taught in school) that it was illegal and almost an act of treason to sell, give, barter or trade certain guns–repeating rifles, to be exact–with American Indians. This was during the 1800s, due to the fact we were at war with them (’cause they wouldn’t give us what we wanted or do what we told them to do). History repeats itself. North Korea has a weapon we have. So here is my question: If our country and people were founded on a strong belief in God and equality, why not arm everyone (countries) with the same weapons?–Rant ‘n’ Rave

Dear R&R: This seems like a hypothetical question, and one that you are only posing because you are upset–nay, enraged and distraught–by the current state of humanity. And who can blame you? These are frightening times. It seems that ever since the collapse of the Twin Towers and the invasion of Iraq, many have not been sleeping well at night. And well we shouldn’t. With so much blood on our hands, how can we rest without a nagging sense of fear and sorrow?

But here’s the thing: Humans are a bloody lot. We’ve been killing each other ever since we figured out how to wield a club, and as much as I would like to say, “Hey, if we had a different president . . . ,” or “If we only got rid of nuclear weapons . . . ,” or any of a million “if onlys,” this wouldn’t change the fact that we continue to perform desperate atrocities against each other and the earth, always have and–always will? Probably. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but I just don’t see that we have the collective intelligence, and overwhelming selfless love of others, to make peace a worldwide and never-ending reality. This is one of the tragedies of our existence. We would be fools not to weep.

Dear Sydney, are we a nation founded on Christian beliefs or Darwinism? I mean, our money has “In God We Trust” printed on every piece, and even though “justice for all” has been removed for some time from our Pledge of Allegiance, we fought over “under God” being erased from same. So why are the American Christians so fearful of other nations having the same powerful weapons as U.S. Unless of course we deep down know we are just as unchristian as the others and fear that they will respond the way we do with vengeance. Does might make right?–Easy Sleeping Wiccan

Dear Sleepy: Are we a country founded on Christian or Darwin beliefs? Of course the answer is the former. After all, this is country founded on the belief systems of a group of religious zealots who massacred the native people, burned witches at the stake, condemned anything even moderately enjoyable as a sin, and who felt no compunction whatsoever when it came to oppressing anyone who did not live up to their definition of godliness. I would like to think that things have gotten better, and I suppose for a select few, things have, but you are absolutely correct in your assertion that we have a hell of a long way to go. Of course might does not make right–whoever said that it did? And why would anyone listen to such a foolish assertion?

Dear Sydney, I have a daughter just over one, who’s perfect, of course. I have some friends who have a daughter who’s just over four, who’s a monster–of course. I swear that my perfect angel is influenced by the monster. After they have been hanging out together, my daughter throws herself on the ground and pitches fits when she doesn’t get her way, and she hits more and yells (she didn’t get any of this from me, of course). I live far from family and other friends right now, and these folks are two of the four friends we have and I like them a whole lot. They babysit a lot and, well, do I just turn a blind eye? Should I mention it to them? Do I try to keep my kid away? Am I overreacting?–Mom

Dear Mom: OK, just take a deep breath and relax. First of all, this monstrous four-year-old you’re talking about? Get used to it. She is no doubt the first in a long line of unsuitable or otherwise “bad influence” friends that your daughter is sure to have throughout her childhood and adolescence. My kids have them too–the ones that always try to get them to steal the ice cream out of the freezer as soon as I leave the room; the ones that say, “Hey, let’s go outside and play with matches!”

This is what adults call peer pressure, though in your situation, it’s still only bad examples. You may not like it, but it’s important for your daughter to learn early on that just because she sees her friends behave badly, doesn’t mean that she can behave badly, too. This is a skill kids need to learn. But most importantly, you must remember not to make too much of a pain in the ass of yourself.

My belief has always been that if kids misbehave at my house, I will deal with it. I tell them, “Your behavior may be cool at your house, but it isn’t at mine, and if you don’t like it or can’t be respectful of my rules, then you can go home, no hard feelings.” I never, ever complain to the parents. And when people call me to complain about my kids, this is the only indicator I need to know that they are so inept at caring for children that they deserve pity not apologies.

Now, if the bad behavior goes on at the other kid’s house, then don’t let your kid go over anymore, but never call up the other parent and say, “You aren’t taking good enough care of my kid.” Take charge, and next time they offer to babysit, politely decline. As your daughter gets older, I’m sure you’ll find that she is very good at monitoring whose house she likes and whose she does not. I find this is always a direct reflection on which house a kid feels safe at, and that is all you need to worry about. What matters is that she’s safe, not that she might pick up a bad habit or two. Bad habits can easily be nipped in the bud. Rest assured that she won’t be smoking cigarettes by age two. Her general safety and well-being should be your only concern. Outside of that, it’s all part of growing up.

No question too big, too small or too off-the-wall.


Necessary Darkness

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the arts | stage |

By David Templeton

‘I don’t believe grief is grief unless it kills you.”

So says the guilt-ridden lawyer Quentin in the opening moments of Arthur Miller’s After the Fall, and those 10 words sum up the weight being carried by a man who cannot forgive himself for having survived and even thrived in a world where others have failed and died.

Wait. You’ve never heard of Arthur Miller’s After the Fall? Well, don’t fret about it. You’re not alone. After the Fall is hardly Arthur Miller’s best-known or most frequently performed play. That would be Death of a Salesman. If it is known by casual theatergoers at all, After the Fall is usually spoken of as “the Marilyn Monroe play.”

Arguably Miller’s most autobiographical stage piece, Fall does indeed include a tragic dim-bulb sex symbol character based on his second wife, Marilyn Monroe, but there is much more to the piece than that. First staged in 1964, the play is Miller’s anguished (and perhaps a little too personal) attempt to explain and wrestle with the guilt of his own past. After the Fall has been accused of being too trivial, a play about a man who feels bad about having divorced two difficult women, who feels responsible for the deaths of friends during the McCarthy Blacklist era, and who even feels regret for going to college and becoming a success instead of joining his father’s failing manufacturing business. Miller’s experimental use of memory, with characters from different time periods colliding into one another and randomly barking out significant remarks from the past, has been perceived as a playwright’s whining self-indulgence.

While certainly flawed, After the Fall is a fascinating and powerful play, containing some of Miller’s most beautifully written language, and it’s a pity that it isn’t performed more often, quirks and all. Ironically, there are about to be two separate productions of the play running at the same time in the North Bay: director Carl Hamilton (whose oft-stated goal is to direct every play ever written by Miller) opens Fall this weekend at the Raven Theater in Healdsburg, while Marin County’s gutsy AlterTheater ensemble–the edgy professional company that performs its plays exclusively in nontheatrical, store-front settings located somewhere along San Rafael’s Fourth Street–opened its own three-week-long production last Friday.

Having not seen Hamilton’s production, I cannot comment on it, but the AlterTheater production, superbly directed by Jessica Heidt, is the most satisfying theatrical experience I’ve had this year. Staged on the large, carpeted floor of a vacant Victorian storefront, the spare and elegant production makes wonderful use of every inch of the unusual performance space (designed by Stanley E. Gibbs), and does so with confident technical support by Norman Kern and Tahzay Mikkael on sound and lights. The cast, pared down to eight actors playing 13 roles, is exceptional across the board.

As the emotionally conflicted Quentin, Nick Sholley is convincingly tied in knots, stepping in and out of his own life as he attempts to catch us up on the events of the last several years. He has fallen in love with a beautiful German intellectual, Holga (played with luminous complexity by Jeanette Harrison), and wonders if he has what it takes to make a third marriage work.

“Life is evidence,” he says, “and I have two divorces in my safety deposit box.”

His memories of his first marriage to the brittle Louise (heartbreakingly done by Ayla Yarkut) collide with those of his mother (Patricia Silver), father (Dennis Yen) and brother (Eric Fraisher Hayes), whose actions, judgments and sacrifices pile up like rocks at the bottom of an avalanche, setting the stage for Quentin’s marriage to the switchboard operator-turned-singer Maggie, a stunningly committed Karen Aldridge, who tackles the role with bravura, courage and raw emotional honesty. Other roles are well-filled by the mutifaceted Dawn Scott.

In the end, After the Fall is more than just a play about a man ridding himself of bad memories; it’s a play about living with shame. Miller talks to the audience, to history and to God, when, pleading with Louise at the end of his first marriage, he wrenchingly demands, “How much shame do you want me to feel?”

AlterTheater’s production of ‘After the Fall’ runs Thursday-Sunday through Nov. 12. Thursday at 7pm; Friday-Saturday at 8pm; Sunday at 5pm. Discussion follows Nov. 5 and 10 performances. $20; Nov. 2, pay- what-you-can admission available 30 minutes prior to curtain. AlterTheater Ensemble, 1557 Fourth St, San Rafael, 415.454.2787. The Raven Players production of ‘After the Fall’ runs Friday-Saturday Nov. 3-18 at 8pm. Raven Performing Arts Center, at the Raven Theater, 115 North St., Healdsburg. $11-$18; $5 tickets on preview night, Thursday, Nov. 2. 707.433.6335, ext. 11.



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They Came in Robes

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They Came in Robes

November 1-7, 2006

I was talking to someone last week about bands I’d recently seen, and when I mentioned that I’d been to a show featuring four metal bands, he was dumbfounded.

“Metal?” he asked with the kind of bewildered surprise that ordinarily accompanies references to all things ancient. “You mean, metal is still cool?”

Briefly, I toyed with attempting to explain to him the path that metal has taken since its 1980s heyday, from its theatrical beginnings through its recent flowering into a teeming musical river rife with countless creative tributaries, but I opted, instead, for the succinct. “As long as kids still ask for electric guitars for Christmas,” I told him, citing a tradition that shows no apparent sign of waning, “metal will always be cool.”

But lately, it’s gotten even cooler than usual, with bands like 3 Inches of Blood and Sonata Arctica keeping the fantasy/adventure flame alive, or with Mastodon and Isis pushing the genre into hitherto unexplored territories. In the last 20 years, metal has grown up with its fans, and a once-adolescent genre is now more interesting than ever. In fact, I’d venture to say that almost anyone could find at least one band located in a record store’s metal section that is downright listenable, if not thoroughly enjoyable.

As an example of this sheer variety, the band I had recently seen was Sunn o))), a drummerless concept troupe whose specialty is conjuring a lengthy, formless, trancelike drone, thinly distinguished from New Age music only by its use of distortion and absolute volume. At once progressive and primitive, the band’s music is so out of the ordinary, so much an obviously aberrant strain, that it acts as a mirror to magnify the genre, blemishes and all.

In concert, Sunn o))) exaggerate the first basic tenet of metal; i.e., to extract all doom from life and enshrine it in song. Even before the band’s first note, fog machines blanketed San Francisco’s famed Fillmore Ballroom stage with enough smoke to truly resemble the seventh level of Hades. Eight full-stack Sunn amplifiers, the source of the noises that make up the band’s “music,” as well as its name and logo, spanned the view, and when the ensemble’s five members took the stage, they appeared clad in hooded robes, brandishing devil signs.

Then it began–a deep, thundering onslaught, an extended exercise in amplifier misuse. On three guitars, the same low, evil chord was played over and over on three guitars and a Moog, very slowly, for five long minutes. This chord then eerily changed to an even lower chord, followed some time afterward by what sounded and felt like the Lowest and Craziest Chord in the World, fierce and rumbling, the clash of its wavering sound waves locked in a churning oscillation, dizzying to the system.

I thought for sure that I was going to throw up.

The movement of the music, the lights and the band members themselves all progressed at a glacial pace, and after 15 minutes, Sunn o)))’s singer began whispering unintelligibly nightmarish admonitions into the microphone. By that point, I was convinced that I was communing, in some way, with Lucifer himself. My rattled stomach’s nausea had given way to a hypnotic, full-body experience, and I submitted willingly to a long interruption in my own space-time continuum.

Of course, not everyone experienced the same transfixion, and near the end of the 35-minute set the crowd was visibly angry. Numerous hands thrust aloft with thumbs pointed downward–or, more popularly, middle fingers hoisted upward. The stage crew handed out earplugs to people in the front row, many of whom pleaded an end to the band’s barrage with the universal throat-cutting sign, and in the brief crack of silence between the band’s final note and the crowd’s tepid applause, a long-haired metalhead in a Metallica jersey barely squeezed in his shouted disgust: “You fuckin’ suuuck!”

Which proves that anyone, given a thorough listening, could find at least one band located in a record store’s metal section downright unlistenable, as well.

Sunn o))) release ‘Altar,’ a collaboration album with the Japanese trio Boris, on Southern Lord recordings this week. For a very good album to listen to while reading existential detective novelist Paul Auster, check out Sunn o)))’s ‘Black One,’ released last year.


The Horror, the Horror

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November 1-7, 2006

While taking in a recent viewing of Ravenous, the 1999 pioneer-era splatterfest most of us were fortunate enough to miss in theaters, I was unexpectedly hit with a profound example of what horror is. Guy Pearce’s world-weary soldier has returned to his fort after a harrowing ordeal with Robert Carlyle’s cannibalistic mountain man, Colqhoun–who has eaten every single one of Pearce’s companions in a bid to become a superbeing.

Who should now show up to take over the fort but Colqhoun dressed as a captain, his command sanctioned by a number of higher ranking officers. Pearce has one chance to prove to his superiors that Colqhoun is a monster. In his last encounter with Colqhoun, Pearce’s Capt. Boyd had shot Colqhoun in the shoulder, presumably leaving him with a scar. As Colqhoun unbuttons his shirt, Pearce waits with bated breath. He knows, and we know, that there isn’t going to be a scar–and so his helplessness becomes our own.

Helplessness is at the root of horror, and horror, by and large, is an infinitely sympathetic genre. Its tried-and-true conventions (knowing–duh!–that Colqhoun’s consumption of human flesh will have resulted in fast-acting healing powers, leaving his wounded shoulder without so much as a blemish) have given fans common ground and no small amount of security.

Many of us can’t agree on who should run the country or whether The Sopranos or Deadwood is the most bad-ass television series of all time, but all of us can feel scared, and seeing that co-ed run down an unlit hall with an axe-toting maniac at her heels speaks to a certain vulnerability in all of us. There’s a weird sense of safety in being able to predict the scares–and if anyone disagrees with me, may I calmly direct your attention to the fact that The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning was actually green-lighted.

We like our scares, thank you very much. We are all quite happy to shell out our 10 bucks to the predictable maw of commercialized bloodshed, because we all know exactly what we’re going to get.

Which brings me to politics.

Yes, politics. That same 10 bucks could have paid for gas–a lot more gas, now that prices have conveniently dropped in time for the election–but it was spent instead on a comfy level of gore. Why? Well, because when it comes to being an American these days, watching people get chainsawed to death is far preferable to wading in the mire of what Rolling Stone magazine has just declared “the worst congress ever.” Halloween has passed, but the real horrors are just around the corner: voter-machine tampering, threatened terrorist attacks, Joe Lieberman!

Is it any wonder that in our blighted political landscape, the most attractive oases are George Romero remakes (Night of the Living Dead 3D, out Nov. 10!) and yet another version of a (much scarier) Japanese thriller starring Sarah Michelle Gellar? (The Return, Nov. 17.) However, this year, when looking at our coming attractions, the gore they don’t splatter tells us more about ourselves than the gore they do.

We’ve already seen TC: The Beginning, Saw III: The Blessed End and Sarah Michelle paying her rent with Grudge 2 (the scariest feature of which is poor Buffy’s utter need of a cheeseburger). In the works, we have a number of sci-fi thrillers: the aptly named Déjà Vu (Denzel Washington plays yet another “agent” character; opens Nov. 22), The Fountain (Hugh Jackman searches for love and the Fountain of Youth, also Nov. 22) and the promising dark fantasy Pan’s Labyrinth (Dec. 29).

There is also, of course, the remake of 1974’s sorority slasher flick Black Christmas. Gas prices, Foley, Iraq–it’s anyone’s guess what to self-medicate about next. However . . . Black Christmas?

Luckily, there are glimmerings that we actually care about our societal woes, reluctant as we are to face them. Perhaps with our children lucky enough to return from Iraq minus only a limb, it is simply too hard to stare into the dark blatant blood-and-guts horror reveals to us.

When the final movies of 2006 aren’t safely gratuitous blood-and-co-ed fare, they are usually gritty spy wars. Last month’s release of The Departed features Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Damon playing a pair of moles in a deadly identity game. Blood Diamond, also with Leo (Dec. 15), is a politically themed downright thrill-ride à la The Constant Gardener. George Clooney uncovers conspiracies in post-WW II Berlin in The Good German (Dec. 8) and Matt Damon is yet another two-faced type, a secret agent, in the Robert De Niro-directed Good Shepherd (Dec. 22).

I find it interesting that in Bush’s America it has taken us this long to come to terms with our national identity crisis. Films like The Good Shepherd or The Good German, with their tantalizingly ambiguous protagonists, could not have arrived at a more poignant time for an America busily reassessing who we are and what side we wish to take in an increasingly polarized political climate.

This holiday season’s crop of film heroes show characters in the midst of political, as well as personal, chaos, and their default bogeyman–whether it be Hitler’s Berlin or Kennedy’s Bay of Pigs–is government. Where our national psyche used to run helplessly down the hall, pursued by monsters (hello, Democrats), we are now menaced by uncertain political terrain, murky motives and an overwhelming crisis regarding who to turn to in our hour of need.

Noted cultural analyst David J. Skal, author of The Monster Show, has written eloquently of the abortion-scare horror movies of the Reagan and pre-Reagan eras–Rosemary’s Baby and Alien being among the most influential. Likewise, in an era marked by shifting loyalties and less-than-honest political leaders, we are experiencing our own particular attack of horrors.

On Thanksgiving, when we shell out our $10 to see Matt Damon navigate his way through the Cold War, it will be, in part, because we wish to make ourselves feel better about the last four years. Because no matter which party has taken the House and Senate by then, we will still have a government of uncertain standing, a government whose officials are either guilty of corruption or inaction–a government that must now, somehow, balance its powers and rebuild. Whatever has happened, whoever is in power, we’re in for a long haul. And we sure are going to need Matt and Leo. Because we all know the word to describe the sort of Guy Pearce-like helplessness a broken government inspires, don’t we?

That’s right: scary.


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Buzz Buzz

November 8-14, 2006What is this thing called buzz? Is it strobing vision, caused by the slightly off-register photo of a celeb on a magazine cover? Is "buzz" the drone of a publicist's voice, caught in the flytrap of my voicemail? ("Your readers will be interested in . . .") Or is buzz really just the shriek of some telephone...
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The Byrne Report

November 8-14, 2006Last week, Indymedia journalist Brad Will was shot dead in the streets of Oaxaca, Mexico, during a demonstration against economic and political oppression. Will's death was remarkable because he was an American and he cared enough about freedom and democracy to be present in Oaxaca. His life and death remind me of Rachel Corrie, who was crushed...
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Rice Dream

Heady stuff: A traditional drink for centuries, sake has been enormously refined in...
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Molten Mood

November 8-14, 2006It's a great time for metal right now--depending on whom you talk to. A bunch of ogling fair-weather fans have crashed the funeral procession that devoted metal heads have kept going strong for years, without feature stories in Spin, thank you very much. The more metal, the better--but the world of metal is dark and unwelcoming by...
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Morsels

November 1-7, 2006 'I think some people come out just to say they've had rattlesnake," says Jeffrey Madura. "Others come out because they really enjoy having things like the grilled buffalo loin or the wild boar spareribs," he adds. As executive chef of John Ash & Co., Madura is preparing for Wild Game Week, a tradition that started some 15...
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The Byrne Report

November 1-7, 2006During election season, I wait by the mailbox in anticipation of chuckling through colorful mailers filled with outrageous lies. Some people amuse themselves by snorting meth or sipping wine or watching television. When I am not pulling the wings off of flies, I recreate by watching self-serving plutocrats scramble after votes while pretending that normal people have...
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Ask Sydney

November 1-7, 2006 Sydney, most Americans don't remember (not taught in school) that it was illegal and almost an act of treason to sell, give, barter or trade certain guns--repeating rifles, to be exact--with American Indians. This was during the 1800s, due to the fact we were at war with them ('cause they wouldn't give us what we wanted or...
Read more

Necessary Darkness

the arts | stage | By David Templeton ...
Read more

They Came in Robes

November 1-7, 2006I was talking to someone last week about bands I'd recently seen, and when I mentioned that I'd been to a show featuring four metal bands, he was dumbfounded."Metal?" he asked with the kind of bewildered surprise that ordinarily accompanies references to all things ancient. "You mean, metal is still cool?" Briefly, I toyed with attempting to...
Read more

The Horror, the Horror

November 1-7, 2006 While taking in a recent viewing of Ravenous, the 1999 pioneer-era splatterfest most of us were fortunate enough to miss in theaters, I was unexpectedly hit with a profound example of what horror is. Guy Pearce's world-weary soldier has returned to his fort after a harrowing ordeal with Robert Carlyle's cannibalistic mountain man, Colqhoun--who has eaten every...
Read more
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