It Ain’t the Meat, It’s the Notion
by Ed Ward Smokestack Lightning: Adventures in the Heart of Barbecue Country by Lolis Eric Elie; photographs by Frank Stewart Farrar Straus Giroux, $35 hard Learning to control fire was, and is, a form of civilization,” says Dutch sociologist Johan Goudsblom in his book Fire and Civilization. “Because humans have tamed fire and incorporated it…
Walk a Mile, Save a Tire
In most cities, it probably wouldn’t have been much of a story, but then, this is Austin. Last month, when departing City Councilmember Max Nofziger pushed through a proposal to set up a coordinator to represent pedestrian interests in the Department of Public Works and Transportation (DPWT), it raised almost as big a storm in…
Liberation and Justice for All
by Malissa Williams Long Time Gone by William Lee Brent Random House, $25, hard “My actions in San Francisco on November 19, 1968, were a direct result of my awareness that I was a Black soldier at war in a white-dominated society where, in most cases, my people and I were denied our basic civil…
Double Happiness
D: Mina Shum; with Sandra Oh, Frances You, Stephen M.D. Chang, Alannah Ong, Callum Rennie, Donald Fong. VHS Home Video Vulcan Video, 609 W. 29th St. Writer-director Mina Shum makes terrific use of comedic actress Sandra Oh as Jade, the oldest daughter in a traditional Chinese family transplanted to the United States in Double Happiness.…
Up, Up and Away
Dear Suzy, I currently live in a cozy one-story house built in 1923. With the addition of family and years of not tossing anything away, the cozy feeling is disappearing fast. My fantasy (or nightmare depending on the point of view) is to add on another two bedrooms and a bath without covering over all…
The Cable Guise
Add to the long list of 20-year overnight successes in show business the name of Jim Carrey. Or James Carrey, as he is billed in some of the 20 film and television appearances he has made to this date. Twenty credits seems an unbelievable number for someone who burst upon the scene only a couple…
Making a Difference: Being There
Making a difference is the most human thing all are able to do. Every volunteer at AIDS Services of Austin (ASA) makes a significant difference in the lives of the individuals we serve by giving of themself. The willingness to grow, to just be there, be available, to learn, and to serve, can be the…
Coach’s Corner
Do you anticipate getting depressed? I do. Days of despair are fast approaching. The weeks following the NBA and NHL playoffs always send me plummeting. For two months, whistles, cross-checks, flagrant fouls, and evenings with Bill Walton and Marv Albert have substituted quite nicely for a life. Now, facing multiple four-game sweeps, I know I’ll…
Thu 13
Father’s Day Tool Trade-In to benefit Goodwill Industries, at Builders Square, Now through June 16. Trade in a tool for a 10 percent discount. 467-6224 x115. Adopt-a-Shelter Cat Month to benefit Williamson County Humane Society in Round Rock, Now through June 30. 244-9324 or 244-4532. Membership Drive to benefit Mothers & Others for a Livable…
Day Trips
The W.J. McDonald Observatory sits on Mount Locke like two bright, white eggs surrounded by the dark greens and browns of the Davis Mountains of West Texas. In fact, mountaineers in Mexico, a hundred miles away, use the buildings as a landmark and call the mountain “la mounta�a con dos huevos” — the mountain with…
Distributor Capped!
Followers of this column knew it was coming, but now it’s official; Antone’s Records has signed a distribution deal with Discovery Records and will be receiving marketing support and major distribution through the monstrous WEA (Warner/Elektra/Atlantic) network in North America and Warner Music International in Australia. This follows Arista/Texas as the second major distribution deal…
Page Two
The casual reader of this column might expect a post-election reflection, especially as I inadvertently became a minor issue in its closing hours because of my pre-election editorial. A regular reader would probably know better. The next few weeks will be exciting as the new city council’s personality emerges. All of this council ran on…
Accidents Will Happen
The Motards didn’t even start as a band,” laughs bassist Toby Marsh. “It was more like a party, really.” To hear Marsh talk, the ascent of Austin’s fave crash `n’ burn punkaholics to the top of the local slamheap has been a shopping list of one serendipitous event after another. “Everything has just happened by…
Bonus Tracks
THE SONGS OF ROUTE 66 (Lazy SOB) “It winds from Chicago to L.A.,” and this comp goes in reverse order, starting with the noir-sounding theme from the TV show and Bobby Troup’s cocktail-y original. Before Charles Brown’s R&B reprise of that song finishes things off, this tape winds through country and roots territory — there’s…
Also Playing
Friday: Motards, Buzzcrusher, Emo’s Saturday: Joan Armatrading, Backyard; Fishbone, Liberty Lunch; Coffee Sergeants, Cactus Cafe Sunday: Jazz PR, Cedar Street Monday: Richard Buckner, Gourds, Electric Lounge Tuesday: Seven Mary Three, Poe, Austin Music Hall Wednesday: Warden & Walser, Auditorium Shores Thursday: Brannen Temple, Ritz; Abra Moore, La Zona Rosa; The For Carnation, Emo’s
Food-O-File
What would life be without homegrown tomatoes? The next two weekends will be ripe with tomato events. This Sat., June 15, the Travis County Farmer’s Market, 6701 Burnet Rd., will host their Seventh Annual Tomato Festival. Tomatoes will be judged according to size, color, uniformity and taste; prizes will be awarded, and there’ll be plenty…
Sincola Adds Life
Two years ago, the Chronicle ran a piece on a certain Austin modern rock quintet. It was titled “Sincola Sells Out!,” and at that time, the still-young band was already considered fair game for potshots from former fans, scenesters, and of course, local music ‘zines, because they’d joined the list of bands who just weren’t…
Mr. Smarty Pants Knows
Kato Kaelin once made a living delivering singing telegrams. One of the principal deities of Ju-Ju, the central African animist religion that became known as “voodoo,” is “Ba-Ba-Lu Ai”, an entity similar to Satan. The entity is one and the same with “Babaloo,” made famous by Desi Arnaz’s character Ricky Ricardo. The average cost to…
On the Rails
Capital Metro just can’t seem to stay out of the negative headlines,” began a recent editorial in the Austin American-Statesman. Local transit advocate David Dobbs would change that to “The Statesman just can’t seem to stop laying negative headlines on Capital Metro.” Dobbs complains that editors of the local daily have been dogging the transit…
Public Notice
The Audience Is Listing Your Mission, if you choose to accept it, is classified. Examine the dossiers of the area organizations below, call one of the contacts and await further instructions. We are not authorized to Volunteer Information at this time. As always, should you or any member of your P.S. force be caught or…
Max for Cap Met Chief?
Could outgoing City Councilmember Max Nofziger become the next General Manager of Capital Metro? Nofziger says that he is definitely interested in the job, and that while he may lack the technical expertise of former General Manager Michael Bolton, he has qualifications for which transit professionals are not usually trained, like local political capital and…
Live Shots
ADOLPH HOFNER& THE PEARL WRANGLERS Luckenbach, June 1 A lesson I’ve learned in recent years is that once a legendary performer gets up in years, you’d better not miss a chance to see them. This wisdom has come to me the hard way. I had tickets to Dizzy Gillespie’s last appearance here, but sold them…
Power Outage
It shouldn’t have been called a work session, because work is hardly a fitting description for what happened last Wednesday. For many, it was a parable for why the council shouldn’t manage the city’s flagship utility — the Electric Utility Department (EUD). To begin with, the council’s Wednesday session — devoted to EUD affairs –…
The Motards
Rock Kids (eMpTy) Eighteen songs, 27 minutes. That’s rock & roll, man! None of your epics or funk jams or weepy folk singers who don’t wanna be called folk singers here. This is pure, undiluted screech, crafted by advocates of on-the-job training and free-flowing beer. This is slices of life from pizza note carriers, librarians,…
The Brethren of Cisterns
King Mesha thought cisterns were a good idea. So good, in fact, that he had his servants record his edict on the matter in a text called the Moabite Stone. After conquering an area east of the Jordan River around 850BC, the king said, “I made two reservoirs in the midst of Qerkhah. Now there…
Geno Delafose
La Zona Rosa Friday, June 14 Currently in the world of zydeco music, there’s a definite changing of the guard taking place. Clifton Chenier, the famed “King of Zydeco,” has been dead for nearly 10 years now. In more recent years, Rockin’ Dopsie and John Delafose have also passed on, and other, older stars have…
ALO Lands Conductor
No, that isn’t a typo. We don’t mean ASO — Austin Symphony Orchestra — which is in the thick of a well-publicized search for a successor to conductor Sung Kwak. We mean ALO — Austin Lyric Opera — which has been holding a similar hunt, sotto voce. For two years, the Lyric Opera has been…
Off the Desk
The Austin Independent School District (AISD) will hold a public hearing on their $409 million budget, 7pm Thursday, June 20, at the auditorium in the Carruth Administration Building, 1111 W. Sixth St. People can sign up to speak at AISD headquarters at the same address any time before the hearing starts… — R.A. RECA Gets…
AISD Notebook
Will it be “Good- night, nurse” in AISD? As part of their budget deliberations, the AISD school board is poised to consider a partnership proposal, engineered by Superintendent Jim Fox, with Seton Hospital to put a licensed vocational nurse (LVN) at each AISD elementary campus during the 1996-97 school year. The program would be exanded…
Dance:
ENCANTO EN LA MISI�N, a program of traditional dances of Mexico and Spain performed in authentic costumes by dancers from DanzaHispana and Mariachi Festival, June 15-29, Sat, 8pm. By donation. Mission San Jos�, Roosevelt Ave., San Antonio.210/822-2453. HOUSTON BALLET presents artistic director Ben Stevenson’s staging of The Sleeping Beauty, with music by Tchaikovsky. The production…
Todd to Slusher: “Walk this Way”
Thinking about applying to become the city’s new pedestrian coordinator? Don’t bother. Mayor Bruce Todd is expected to repeal the measure the first meeting after the new council takes the helm on June 15. Todd’s got votes from Ronney Reynolds and Eric Mitchell, but we’ll bet the coordinator’s $45,000 annual salary that you can’t guess…
First Steps
Pilar Serrano recalls the terror and struggle of winning a place on stage. Everybody is awkward at age 12, and Serrano felt stiffer than the rest. She was born to perform, she had to perform, she would perform. She just had the rest of the world to convince. Serrano made her first nervous steps in…
New Tricks on South Congress
A twice-told anecdote: A friend and his young son were on South Congress around dusk, why I don’t remember, when they encountered a lady of ill fame stretched over the hood of a parked car, eating an orange. As they passed, she lifted her skirts to reveal a second orange wedged amidst the admirably supple…
