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Stacked Line Up for BottleRock

Music

Charlie Swanson

Jan 8, 2020

For many music lovers, the 1990s will be alive and well this Memorial Day weekend, May 22–24, 2020, at BottleRock Napa Valley, when the mega-sized music, food and wine festival returns for its eighth year with a musical lineup headed by the bygone decade’s biggest stars— the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Dave Matthews Band.

Two-time Rock & Roll Hall of Fame–inductee Stevie Nicks, who was recently instated as a solo artist after already being in the hall as a member of Fleetwood Mac, rounds out the final headlining spot for the three-day fest, which boasts over 75 bands and performers taking over the Napa Valley Expo in the heart of Napa.

In addition to the platinum-selling music veterans, BottleRock’s lineup includes younger pop stars, from Miley Cyrus to Brandi Carlile, and global superstars like Russian/German DJ and producer Zedd, Australian electronic duo Empire of the Sun and Grammy-winning R&B musician Khalid, recently named one of

Time’s Most Influential People of 2019.

“Our lineup once again features a wide variety of genres, combining legendary performers, up-and-coming bands and some of the most talked-about artists in the world,” said Dave Graham, CEO of BottleRock Napa Valley, in a statement. “Our goal each year is to book the best acts available that fit our audience profile, and we’re very happy that it resulted in such a deep lineup.”

Other notable performers coming to Napa Valley include sibling folk-pop groups the Avett Brothers and Tegan and Sara, multi-faceted singer-songwriters and performers Janelle Monáe and Maggie Rogers, the iconic Debbie Harry leading Blondie, fast-rising country star Maren Morris, indie-rockers Jimmy Eat World, local favorites Michael Franti & Spearhead and many more.

Alongside the chart-toppers and internationally-touring acts, BottleRock always features a handful of North Bay and Bay Area acts, and this year’s lineup includes regional artists such as San Francisco singer-songwriter Sam Johnson, Bay Area collective Full Moonalice—comprised of jam-band Moonalice, Oakland folk-group T Sisters and North Bay outfit the New Chambers Brothers—and Napa-based bands Obsidian Son and the Silverado Pickups, whose members each have winemaking history in their blood.

BottleRock also embraces the region’s winemaking and culinary history with an array of local food and wine, craft beer and spirits and the popular Williams Sonoma Culinary Stage, which hosts live cooking demonstrations that pair renowned chefs with celebrities, performers and rock stars.

BottleRock Napa Valley takes place Friday–Sunday, May 22–24, at Napa Valley Expo, 575 Third St., Napa. Three-day tickets start at $390. bottlerocknapavalley.com.

January madness

News & Features

Daedalus Howell

Jan 8, 2020

It’s January—the month named for the Roman god Janus who was simultaneously able to face both the past and future. This is impressive to me since I can’t face either without Lexapro. Janus had it easy, though; he had two faces, which makes him the only god suitable for a sideline in politics.

The beginning of the year hasn’t always been January. It’s bobbed around a bit thanks to Julius Caesar who changed the names of some months and added some mystery months for good measure. Ergo, the erstwhile month of Quintillis. You would think that Caesar’s invention was a newfangled fifth month (“quint” being a numerical prefix for five and all) but surprise, it was a new seventh month. Because—why not? When Caesar died they changed it to July in his honor, apparently having missed his “Ides of March” memo.

Later, Pope Gregory did a partial rebrand of the calendar. In the Gregorian calendar, Janus is more of a middle month and Martius (now March) was first. In the “Gregorian Brady” edition of this factoid, a jealous Janus would thus lament “Martius, Martius, Martius.” And, yes, in a past life, I was the warm-up act at the Coliseum.

Calendar reform is a perennial topic in some circles (ironically, those circles never have dates). Among them is the Hanke-Henry Permanent Calendar, which has the peculiar feature of every date always falling on the same day of the week. Besides ruining the Friday the 13th film franchise, Hanke-Henry would also lock your birthday down to the same day for eternity. A whole new kind of astrology would emerge. Monday people would be the worst. Friday and Saturday people would be permanently cool. Wednesday people would suggestively drop “Hump Day” comments to gin up their sex appeal.

When it comes to calendars, the only thing worse than a Roman overlord is a corporate overlord. Consider Kodak founder George Eastman, who, in 1928, mandated the use of a 13-month company calendar just to let his employees know who was boss. Based on the International Fixed Calendar devised by Moses B. Cotsworth 26 years prior, Kodak divided his year into 13 months of 28 days apiece. This leaves a couple of days each year not belonging to any month (they’re probably in a vault somewhere). He also added a bonus month between June and July he called “Sol,” thus continuing a bizarre trend amongst powerful men to shoehorn in a new seventh month.

Kodak’s calendar surely went out with radium watch hands, right? Wrong. Kodak used it in-house until 1989. Fortunately, powerful men are less likely to exhibit such random and arbitrary behaviors these days. Then again, it’s only January. I’ll make a note in my calendar to check back on the Fourth of Trump.

Hollow Be Thy Name

Open Mic

Robert Eugene Rubino

Jan 8, 2020

Our grifter whose art of the Fox-spun spiel

loaded with ego overloaded with id

out of context without conscience

whose aggrieved entitlement whose flatulent fraudulence

became our American Tragedy

hollow be thy name hateful is thy kingdom

of racist misogynist xenophobic homophobic

ranting raving trumped-up anger

here & everywhere on earth where

your knee-jerk anti-science arrogant ignorance

as public policy shamefully mining misery & corruption

cruelty your credo confining children in cages

you give us each day our daily dread

of bullying bravado of denying or ignoring facts

of flaunting acts of mendacity high & low

oh forgive us for in the future near & far

you’ll be reduced to trivia in every bar:

who’s the “populist” who lost the popular vote?

who’s the subject of Commander-in-Cheat?

who’s the only prez in pro rasslin’s hall of fame?

Lead us no more after 2020 and deliver us

from your narcissism your pathology

go away retreat retire go back

under the rocks of unreality tv & steal estate deals

from which you floated bloated like a toxic beach ball

deceptively at first appearing harmless even perversely playful

cartoonish buffoonish idiotic patriotic pompous ass

your neck red with resentment your klan-white face your gas-flame
blue eyes

let’s not forget your swept-back combed-over orange-yellow mane

as lame as your qualifications such as they are

limited to your masterful mimicking of Il Duce gesticulation
manipulation

& your demonizing morally cracked compass

your compassion-clogged con

your junk fool mentality.

May our American Tragedy end

the sooner the better. Amen.

Robert Eugene Rubino worked 28 years in daily journalism in
Sonoma County. Since retiring in 2013 he has published prose and
poetry in various literary journals.

We the People

Letters to the Editor

Bohemian.com

Jan 8, 2020

Remember, the Constitution doesn’t begin with “I the President.” It begins with “We the People.”

Trump and Republicans: You can try to divide the country, but we will rise up and unify. All of us together. Women/men, black/white, gays/straight, disabled/young, old/Native American

We will not go quietly back to the 1950s. Love, not hate, makes America great. Are you listening white, anti-abortion, anti-gay, anti-immigrant Republicans? We the people: America is made great by immigrants, people of color, Muslims, women, gays. Real presidents pay their taxes.

Change the things that are unacceptable. We will not be silent. We will not play dead.

This is what patriotism looks like. Trump and Republicans: You work for all Americans, not white religious Republicans. This is what patriotism looks like.

—Ron Lowe

Nevada City

Uncensored

Bohemian editors,

Thank you for publishing Project Censored’s top 10 deliberate omissions of and by the corporate media (“Censored 2020,” Jan. 1). Indeed many of these were covered in alternative media and blogs, such as The Real News, Counterpunch, Dissident Voice, The Intercept, Shadowproof, Common Dreams, Washington’s Blog, Popular Resistance, Wrong Kind of Green, and many others. While none are perfect, and some more reliably reporting facts than others, citizens have myriad opportunities to inform themselves. Start reading, people!

Whether “citizens” choose to inform themselves is a vital question for any hope for sustaining life on this Earth, as reliable information (not the kind the corporate media feeds you from the corporate-government-security state trough) merely represents a foundation for true resistance and effective actions to turn the tide against fascism, racism, militarism, imperialism, injustice, ecological annihilation, and other crimes against humanity and life. Every day, each of us should be writing letters, sending emails, making telephone calls, and then demonstrating your concerns in public as you choose. Sign petitions all you like, but they don’t amount to anything but cyberjunk, and are used by faux-progressive disaster profiteers to ensure their continued obeisance to illegitimate authority.

In my short lifetime, I’ve witnessed the complete submission of our rights and values to the sadistic, rapacious nature of capitalism and its minions, and without organized, widespread, and committed activism and civil disobedience, we’ve yet to see the ugliest from the psychopaths who’ve had their way for far too long. Start reading and watching from something other than corporate media outlets, and get involved as if your life depended on it. It does.

—’Saramago’s Truth’

via bohemian.com

More Rialto Love

Ky Boyd has been a leader in Sonoma County, bringing art to the attention of many plus helping nonprofits along with his excellent staff (“Screen the World,” Dec. 18)! To be in business in such a competitive market takes skill, dedication and love for the process and end goals.

—Marsha Vas Dupre

Via bohemian.com

Write to us at le*****@******an.com.

Cannabis Council

News & Features

Jonah Raskin

Jan 8, 2020

Though lawyering and judging rarely overlap, they do with Omar Figueroa—arguably the North Bay’s most flamboyant cannabis lawyer.

Last December, Figueroa served as a judge at the Emerald Cup. Is he worried about disbarment? Hell no!

“Judging was great fun,” he says.

It also added to the luster of his legend.

Born in Mexico and a graduate of Stanford and Yale, Figueroa initially made a name for himself as a criminal defense lawyer. Then, in 2018, after California began to regulate and tax cannabis, he reinvented himself as a business attorney. More recently, he focused his energy on the local hemp industry.

“Dairy farmers struggling financially, and even social conservatives, will cultivate hemp since it’s legal by federal law and because the local moratorium will be lifted,” Figueroa tells me over lunch at Fork Roadhouse on Bohemian Highway. He adds, “Judging cannabis at the Emerald Cup has to do with smelling, tasting and touching. Plus, you need stamina. It’s not for lightweights.”

For the annual competition, Figueroa traveled to a secret location in Mendocino County. There, he and a half-dozen other connoisseurs consumed and then debated the merits of the cannabis cartridges they sampled.

“The judges were like kids in a candy store,” Figueroa says. “They were also savvy smokers. After talking with them, I changed my mind and revised my ranking.”

After the New Year, Figueroa will join the board of the California Cannabis Tourism Association (CCTA) recently founded by Guerneville resident, Brian Applegarth. In 2020, CCTA will strive to legalize cannabis consumption at the same locations it’s sold. Right now that’s a no-no in Sonoma County.

Like a savvy judge before a hushed jury, Figueroa demolishes law-enforcement arguments against on-site consumption: there’s been no spike in cannabis-related DUIs and no “reefer madness” since legalization; because of easy access to Lyft or Uber, there’s no need for patrons to drive to dispensaries; and dispensaries can install air filters so no smoke escapes and inadvertently impacts innocent bystanders.

Lunch finished, Figueroa returns to the lessons he learned at the Emerald Cup.

“It was mind-expanding,” he says. “But I lost all enthusiasm for vape cartridges.”

Indeed, doctors urge medical marijuana patients and recreational users to avoid cartridges until scientists figure out the cause of Vaping-Associated Pulmonary Illness (VAPI). Last year, vaping harmed more than 1,000 people. Fifty people died.

No wonder Figueroa says, “I’ve switched to using flower in my Volcano.” That’s a sound judgment.

Jonah Raskin is the author of “Dark Day, Dark Night: A Marijuana Murder Mystery.”

Top Torn Tickets Take 2

Theater

Harry Duke

Jan 8, 2020

Comedies and dramas occupied North Bay stages for the bulk of 2019. Here, in alphabetical order, are my Top Torn Tickets, the best and/or most interesting comedic and dramatic stage work done in Sonoma and Napa counties in the past year:

After Miss Julie (Main Stage West) One of several outstanding productions at this little theater dynamo, this tale of a love triangle set during political upheaval was brutal in its portrayal of what people are willing to do to get what they want.

Eureka Day (Spreckels
Theatre Company) This dark comedy about a charter school and the issue of vaccinations was hysterically funny but may have hit too close to home for some.

Faceless (6th Street Playhouse) Expatriate Craig Miller returned to direct this crackling courtroom drama whose combination of religious, political, personal and legal conflicts made for a gripping evening of theater.

Hamlet (Spreckels Theatre Company) Most theater companies try to contemporize Shakespeare to appeal to a modern audience. Director Sheri Lee Miller and company proved it works just fine as-is.

The Laramie Project (Raven Players) This beautifully staged documentation of a community’s reaction to a horrendous crime was a stern and too-oft-needed reminder to those who think “it can’t happen here” that it can.

Luna Gale (Cinnabar Theater)Liz Jahren’s towering performance as a social worker at the end of her rope and great ensemble work allowed this show to get past its directorial idiosyncrasies.

Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley

(Spreckels Theatre Company) Who knew that an extension of Jane Austin’s Pride and Prejudice would turn out to be the best Christmas show of the season?

Of Mice and Men (Cloverdale Performing Arts Center) An American classic presented in a stripped-down version that retained all the power of Steinbeck’s original takedown of the American Dream.

Rapture, Blister, Burn (Lucky Penny Productions) Venturing out of their usual comfort zone of family-friendly musicals and boisterous comedies, this Napa company scored a hat trick with this contemporary look at gender roles—terrific script, strong direction and superb acting. They should produce more like this and audiences should go see it.

This Random World (Left Edge Theatre) This collection of vignettes about the randomness of human connections had everything from laugh-out-loud comedy to touching drama. Everything, that is, but an ending.

Congratulations to the entire North Bay theatre community for a great year on-stage and Happy New Year to all!

BottleRock 2020 Lineup Is Here

BohoBlog

Charlie Swanson

Jan 6, 2020

The 1990’s will be alive and well this Memorial Day weekend, May 22-24, 2020, at BottleRock Napa Valley, as the mega-sized music, food and wine festival returns for its eighth year with a musical lineup headed by the bygone decade’s biggest stars; the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Dave Matthews Band.
Fleetwood Mac vocalist and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee Stevie Nicks rounds out the headlining spot for the three-day fest, which boasts over 75 bands and performers taking over the Napa Valley Expo in the heart of Napa.
The rest of the lineup, to date, includes Miley Cyrus, Khalid, Anderson .Paak & The Free Nationals, Zedd, Brandi Carlile, The Avett Brothers, Janelle Monáe, Maggie Rogers, Blondie, Of Monsters and Men, Maren Morris, Empire of the Sun, Foals, Tegan and Sara, Jimmy Eat World, Michael Franti & Spearhead, Local Natives, Finneas, Iration, Milky Chance, Jon Bellion, Matt Nathanson, Amos Lee, Trampled By Turtles, CAAMP, The Band CAMINO, Turkuaz w/ Jerry Harrison & Adrian Belew, Mandolin Orange, Grace VanderWaal, Village People, Eric B. & Rakim, MUNA, Hobo Johnson & the Lovemakers, Hamilton Leithauser, Ra Ra Riot, The Frights, MAX, Jack Harlow, Digable Planets, Big Freedia, Absofacto, Ripe, DJ Z-Trip, Meg Myers, TWIN XL, Atlas Genius, Oliver Riot, White Reaper, DeVotchKa, Reignwolf, slenderbodies, Eliza & The Delusionals, Tessa Violet, Evie Irie, KOTA The Friend, Uncle Blazer + DJ Ango from Workaholics, 99 Neighbors, Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears, In The Valley Below, Madison Ryann Ward, JJ Wilde, Lily Meola, Full Moonalice: The THC Revue, The Alive, Smith and Thell, Hembree, Buffalo Gospel, Ryland James, almost monday, Chris Pierce, Peter Harper, Pacific Radio, The Haden Triplets, Obsidian Son, Grass Child, Sam Johnson, Silverado Pickups and the Napa Valley Youth Symphony.
Three-day festival passes go on sale at 10am tomorrow, Tuesday, Jan 7, at BottleRockNapaValley.com.

Best on Screen

Movies

Richard von Busack

Jan 1, 2020

The top 10 films of 2019, in alphabetical order: The Big Hack, Captive State, The Irishman, Jojo Rabbit, Joker, The Lighthouse, 1917, Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood, Parasite and Us.

“We’re Americans. Get the rope.”—Us

“You’re Americans. Just barge on in.”—Midsommar

Such is my country these days. We seem to be Rotvalla-pissers one and all, like the chump in Midsommar who wees on the sacred, dead ancestral tree of the Swedes.

This year’s cinema was heavy on stories of the immured (Parasite) and the entrenched (1917). In 2019, even Captain America said, “To hell with this, I’m heading for the past.”

In Jordan Peele’s eerie parable Us, America isn’t filled with just the rich and the poor, but with the influencers and the influenced. His story of the hordes in their government-funded Plato’s Cave isn’t easily picked apart. Yet it does merit space next to the business of the grateful, kowtowing subterranean lodger in Bong Joon-ho’s uproarious Parasite, a movie composed with Hitchcock-ian perfection.

Captive State demonstrates what a real occupation and a real resistance looks like, with alien overlords dwelling in their own cellars. The Great Hack was another type of horror story of rats in the walls, a terrifying documentary about the kind of manipulation of social media that overthrows governments.

An escape from the present, Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood is, on this list, not like the others. It’s not just edgeless nostalgia, but an irreplaceable vision of L.A. as a mecca that distingerates under people’s feet. It’s the glittery version of Scorsese’s masterful vision of the blandness and crookedness of mid-century America, The Irishman.

Jojo Rabbit took its own liberties with history, even with its own Anne Frank concealed in the attic—maybe it’s a measure of the shocks we’re enduring that the funniest movie of the year had the gallows in it.

By contrast, Robert Eggers’ glorious black-and-white The Lighthouse is lighter, in a dark and horrible way. It’s based on the lovely old Down East joke with the punchline, “Oh, don’t dress up. There’s only going to be the two of us.” Whether we like it or not, in the lighthouse America, there’s no “them or us,” there’s just “us.”

Top Torn Tickets

Theater

Bohemian.com

Jan 1, 2020

After attending over 100 Bay Area theatrical productions in 2019, it’s time to clear the theater programs out of the file cabinet and select my Top Torn Tickets. Here, in alphabetical order, is my list of the best and/or most interesting work done in the musical genre by Wine Country–theater artists in the past year:

Cinderella (Spreckels Theatre Company) I had a problem with the storyline (a bit too much Prince Charming for my taste), but this production had great voices and clever stagecraft.

Forever Plaid (Lucky Penny Productions) Get past the hokey pretense and you’ll find that as jukebox musicals go, this was a pretty darn entertaining one.

A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder (Spreckels Theatre Company) This macabre musical ended up a casualty of the Kincade fire and PG&E Public Safety Power Shutoffs with its run cut short. A true shame that more folks didn’t get a chance to see it and Tim Setzer’s tour-de-force performance.

Jesus Christ Superstar (Santa Rosa Junior College) Thank God Andrew Lloyd Webber’s first musical was the last musical that the SRJC theater folk had to perform in a high school auditorium.

Little Shop of Horrors (Cinnabar Theater) One of the most entertaining musicals of the last half-century got a terrific staging in Petaluma and had audiences clamoring to see more Seymour, proving that you can’t keep a bad plant down.

Matilda the Musical (Napa Valley College) This delightful production showed that the youth-talent pool in Napa is deep.

Merman’s Apprentice (Sonoma Arts Live) This original musical featuring Dani Beem and Emma Sutherland as the title characters got its first full staging in Sonoma and, with a few rewrites, just might have legs.

Million Dollar Quartet (6th Street Playhouse) This fictional look at the gathering of four musical giants with an impressive set and imported talent was the closest thing to a touring production this area has seen in a while. And oh, that music.

My Fair Lady (Sonoma Arts Live) A charming lead performance from Sarah Wintermeyer anchored a luverly show with some stellar supporting work by Chad Yarish and the ubiquitous Tim Setzer.

The Sound of Music (Santa Rosa Junior College/Sonoma State University) The hills of Rohnert Park came alive with the sounds of this musical, a harbinger of good things to come when SRJC’s Burbank Auditorium reopens in the spring.

Next week: Top Torn Tickets: The Plays!

Meter Matters

Letters to the Editor

Bohemian.com

Jan 1, 2020

Smart Meters and 5G towers—they may be smart at increasing the speed on computers and other devices, but at what cost? How smart is it to expose people, animals and the environment to strong, harmful radiation that makes us sick and can even kill?

According to many scientists, because of soft body tissue, infants and children—the most vulnerable among us—are absorbing the dangerous radiation at much deeper and faster rates than adults. The elderly are also more susceptible.

The poisonous radiation has no odor, color or sound. It is a sneak attack on humanity. The Smart Meters and 5G towers are being installed in communities around the world that have not been tested for safety. We, humans, are the guinea pigs.

The utility companies claim that they are perfectly safe but they are not tested for safety as it is too expensive. What is too expensive is the loss of health and life of humans. Where is the concern for humanity? The complete lack of concern for the citizens of the world is criminal. Fortunately, there are many courageous citizens and officials who have said no to the installation of Smart Meters and 5G towers in their homes, businesses and neighborhoods. There is much information on the internet regarding these positions. Check out “Smart Meter and 5G tower harm” in a search engine.

Citizens of the world need to awaken and become united against this devastating disaster. This is a holocaust of even more enormous proportions than we have seen before. It involves the whole world.

Please remember our children and grandchildren, who need a safe and healthy environment. Maybe some of you remember a brave, young schoolgirl, Kennedy Irwin, who spoke at a City of St. Helena meeting and pleaded with her elders to leave the earth in as healthy a place for her generation and those who come after as they had found it. Perhaps you read the Napa Valley Register recently where our same Kennedy Irwin spoke on behalf of the environment at the Youth March Worldwide.

Hurrah and many thanks to our courageous youth—steadfast stewards of our planet!

—Ester Akersloot

St. Helena

Perpetually Slanted

The only reason I bother with this New Age pander-rag is Daedalus Howell. Anyone who can write without a 40-pound cliche monkey hanging off his back has my attention. I got a bet with the Fates that the Bohemian will knee-jerk the “homelessness is about homes” meme. Let me smack you into the Age of Info—homelessness is an issue defined by drugs and mental health. Bridle your perpetual left-turn signal, or your Johannes Gutenberg certificate of authenticity will be revoked by the Union of Better Angels Local 777. 🙂

—Walter Alter

Santa Rosa

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