Rock Candy: May 2007 Archives

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Thursday, May 31, 2007 - 17:55:07

Cover girl

That's Kensett native Beth Ditto, lead singer of the Gossip. I haven't read the article yet. I'll report back after I pick it up, but it doesn't sound like she comes across too lucidly in the cover story.

Posted by Lindsey Millar at 05:55 PM | Permalink | Comments [0]

Weekend To-Dos

There's no time for post-Memorial Day Weekend fatigue. This is a short week. Buck up!

Thursday:

Silver Swirly (above) and Winter Furs play dreamy indie-pop at White Water at 9 p.m, $3.

Big Downtown Thursday goes from 5-8 p.m. at the River Market Pavillion with live music and food and booze. 5-8 p.m., $5

Those crazy Canadian acrobats in Cirque du Soleil bring Delirium to Alltel for one night only. There'll be lots of jumping and tossing and trapezing all to a "pulsating tribal beat." 8 p.m. $37.75-$108.75.

The 20th annual Eureka Blues Festival runs from Thursday through Saturday. Corey Harris, who's long been exploring the the blues through other genres, headlines with guitar hero Elvin Bishop, the North Mississippi Allstars and Roy Rogers. Go here for a complete schedule.

Friday:

Polka kings Brave Combo have played David Byrne's wedding, recorded with Tiny Tim and appeared on the Simpson's. Friday they'll play Sticky Fingerz, blending surf rock, zydeco, RnB—dozens of disparate genres together with polka for a blend of dance-y madness. Or something like that. Sticky Fingerz, 10 p.m. $7.

Pinnacle Mountain State Park plays host to a its 1st annual music festival on Friday and Saturday. Friday is gospel-themed; eight acts, including the Singing Reeds and Satisfied, will perform. Saturday turns a little closer to the devil with a day of blues featuring, N-2 Blues, the Billy Jones Band and Arkansas-native and contemporary blues star Michael Burks. Call 868-5806. Fri. 4-9 p.m. Sat. 1-9 p.m. $5 for parking.

There's roots rock with Charliehorse and The Munks at White Water Tavern. 10 pm, $5

First Friday jumps off at Revolution Room with local soul queen Tawanna Campbell and Ultimate Groove. White attire required. 10 pm, 21+,

Local pop-rockers Big Boots (featuring a lot of the dudes from Sugar and the Raw) headline at Juanita's with The Breakthrough and Michael Prysock. 10 p.m., $6.

Eighties nostalgia miners Molten Lava play the RiverTop party. Check their myspace page to see their influences and ready your requests. 8 p.m. The Peabody Hotel. $5.

Saturday:

The annual Arkansas AIDS foundation "Celebration of Life Walk" kicks off at 10 a.m. at the Clinton Library. Free.

Our A&E headliner this issue, the Boondogs, play a CD release show at Easy Street at 10 p.m. The Winter Furs open. This is the show of the weekend peoples. $10 gets you admission and a copy of the 'dogs fine, FINE new album.

Former members of Liars and Knife Skills make up These Are Powers. They do charmingly noisy avant-rock. Beeping Slag (TJD, Ettiem I.K.E.) offer up a DJ workout in support with a multimedia element, too, I'm told. ALSO: kings of the stage the Moving Front perform.

Starkz, along with new bassist Jerry Cordova, come to Juanita's with their latest single, “Fight Talk Stop,” now in regular rotation on local radio. 9:30 p.m., $10.

Sunday:

The third annual Little Rock Capital Pride Festival runs from 2 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Sunday, June 3 at the River Market Pavilions. It'll be an event to show support for members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community with loads of live entertainment and educational info. For more, go here.

Posted by Lindsey Millar at 12:15 PM | Permalink | Comments [0]

Wednesday, May 30, 2007 - 17:50:40

I have a man crush on Seth Rogen

Counting down the hours until "Knocked Up" opens, I've been reading up on up-coming Seth Rogen projects and have pretty much concluded that dude's the best thing to happen to cinematic comedy since Eddie Murphy (let's just pretend he died in the 80s). I mean Will Ferrell is riotous, but his movies are way uneven, and I'd be shocked if Sascha Baron Cohen can keep his schtick fresh. But with a huge assist from Jud Apatow, who first cast Rogen in the fine, under-seen TV show "Freaks and Geeks," Rogen's somehow been able to get big-budget funding for these Hollywood formula movies that he's tricking out with decidedly un-Hollywood hilarity. Ferinstance, see the 18+ trailer (vastly, VASTLY funnier than the regular one) for the high-school comedy "Superbad," which Rogen and his screenwriter partner Evan Goldberg wrote and in which Rogen and that funny kid from "Arrested Development," Michael Cerra, star. Maybe something to look forward to even more: "Pineapple Express," the action/comedy that stars Rogen and James Franco. Little Rock native David Gordon Green directs. It's a $100 million dollar buddy movie about weed that Rogen and Goldberg started writing when they were 13.

UPDATE: Vulture has an outtake from "Knocked Up" with Michael Cerra in the Seth Rogen role. Comic gold.

Read an R-rated plot synopsis after the jump.

Posted by Lindsey Millar at 05:50 PM | Permalink | Comments [0]

Blood and guts and Oprah

Early TV alert: I don't think I've ever watched Oprah before, but I'm going home at lunch to set my TiVo to record her interview with Cormac McCarthy, which'll air next Tuesday, June 5. McCarthy, the author of "Blood Meridian," "All the Pretty Horses" and "The Road," which Oprah recently selected for her book club, hasn't given any kind of substantive interview since this 1992 profile in The New York Times. This'll be his first TV interview. Even aside from the momentousness, this is like Gene Simmons going on Dr. Phil to talk about relationships. I mean, is there any legitimate writer today who's grimmer than McCarthy? "The Road," for instance, is set in a post-apocalyptic world where baby-eating "blood-cults" roam. Other plots center around a mass-murdering necrophiliac, a marauding band of Indian killers and the search for a baby that's the product of incest between a brother and sister. So lots of laughs for sure.

ALSO: Check out these really promising clips from "No Country for Old Men," McCarthy's take-the-money-and-run noir that the Coen brothers have adapted. The film just screened at Cannes and got lots of props.

ALSO, ALSO: A Coen brothers short, from the shorts collection "Paris, je t'aime."

Posted by Lindsey Millar at 11:35 AM | Permalink | Comments [1]

Puzzling

Crossword puzzle master Will Shortz is at the Clinton School all day today. Here's the schedule:

1:30 p.m. - 3:00 p.m. – FREE Crossword and Sudoku Puzzle Tournament with Will Shortz (See registration info below)

3:00 p.m - 3:30 p.m. – Awarding of Prizes for tournament winners.

4:00 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. – Screening of Wordplay, with producer Christine O’Malley and director Patrick Creadon

6:00 p.m. - 7:15 p.m. – Lecture and Discussion with Will Shortz
-- Shortz will discuss the history, cultural fascination and methodology of crossword puzzles and will conduct audience-participation word games.

7:15 p.m. - 7:45 p.m. – DVD and Book Signing with Shortz, O'Malley and Creadon.

-- Wordplay books and DVDs will be sold on site along with other titles by Will Shortz.

*These events are FREE and open to all puzzle enthusiasts. To register for any of the Puzzle Day events, email publicprograms@clintonschool.uasys.edu, or call Nikolai DiPippa at 501-683-5239. Please indicate which events you'd like to participate in.

Posted by Lindsey Millar at 11:07 AM | Permalink | Comments [0]

Tuesday, May 29, 2007 - 16:34:51

Riverfest photo recap

While I was watching people do weird watersport tricks and Nicole was celebrating her birthday, Brian Chilson was sweating it out at Riverfest. He got dozens of great shots. Max posted several; here's a bigger helping after the jump.

Posted by Lindsey Millar at 04:34 PM | Permalink | Comments [0]

Lake surfing

Over the weekend, during the long race rain delay, I rode around in this fancy ski boat with my future in-laws and their friends. My soon-to-be brother-in-law is a former champion wind surfer and a huge gearhead. Last Christmas, his wife bought him a wake surfboard and it'd just gotten warm enough for him to try it out.

It was one of the damnest things I've ever seen. There are scores of other wake surfing videos out there. For all its graininess, I chose this one because it captures how terrifyingly close surfers have to stay to the boat. Course this is something people only do with inboard motors, and you'd have to defy physics (or the boat would have to run aground) to crash into the back, but still. Shew. Not for me. But really cool to watch.

Anyone seen anyone wake surfing in Arkansas?

Posted by Lindsey Millar at 03:01 PM | Permalink | Comments [0]