Cover Story
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Mighty Atom
Atomic City’s Jim ‘Prince’ Hughes is punk rock daikaiju at a whole different level
Show Us Some Luv: Free Women’s Dance Tickets!
Win FREE tickets to Friday night’s 2007 Pride Texas Women’s Dance.
So What’s Next for Ellison?
Acting police chief ponders her future
ACLU on Acevedo
“Hope is in the air; hard work in front of us.”
Dirty Days Ahead?
TCEQ approves permit for TXU Oak Grove coal power plant in Robertson County, about 100 miles from Austin
Las Manitas Had City Hall by the Huevos?
Did the Perez sisters have a trump card in their negotiation with the city?
Total Futrell Awareness
Blind eye sees all …
‘Texas Monthly’ Names Watson ‘Rookie of the Year’
Magazine says former Austin mayor was best of the newbies
Twangfest: Goes to 11
When it began in 1997, after a ‘let’s put on a show’ moment among Internet friends, Twangfest was at the heart of the then-burgeoning alt.country movement. At the time, few would have imagined it would continue for 11 years and provide some of the best underground talent in the country with an audience starved, and…
Bow Down to Yo
Yo Majesty returns, peon. Prepare to bow at the feet.
They Used to Call It Train Wreck
TCEQ lets Texas slide further into a coal-fired future.
City Manager IDs Top Cop at High Noon – Today!
Today we’ll know Toby Futrell’s pick for the next APD chief.
Let’s Get Ready to Rumble! Texas Title Fight
If you are one of the remaining humans who finds something appealing in the Sweet Science that is boxing – that is, if you’re not one of the converted, a follower of MMA (mixed martial arts) or UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) – then Saturday, June 16, will provide you with all you could hope for…
Make This Weekend an All-Soccer One
Okay, I’ve got your all-soccer weekend all planned out for you: Friday and Saturday it’s the Austin Lightning, who need to keep their unbeaten home record alive if they hope to climb back into the Premier Development League Mid-South race, after a tough two-loss road trip last weekend at Baton Rouge (3-2 on Friday, despite…
‘Think ESG meets the Geto Boys. Or something.’
Yo Majesty comes back to Ass-tin.
ACLU on Top Cop Finalists
ACLU gives the top two APD chief finalists good grades – others not weird enough.
More Pride Fest Pics
More pictures from 2007 Pride.
‘Chronicle’ Upsets BookPeople at Krieg, Sets Sights on Other Sixth & Lamar Businesses
Now it’s on to the rest of that intersection. What’s up, Whole Foods?
Texas Track & Field Teams Perform Well at Nationals
I’m embarrassed to admit that, as the Score’s resident track & field nut, I haven’t been making enough postings on the Texas Longhorns’ excellent programs this season (sorry, I have this “political journalist” job that actually pays the bills), so let me take a minute to note their performances in this past weekend’s NCAA Outdoor…
Oh, Elysium
Getty drowns her Sappho inna coldbeer.
Secretary of State Roger Williams Resigns
Weatherford car dealer and GOP superfundraiser may be eyeing elected office
Dobie Redux
Who else was expecting, you know, an actual mall the first time you went in the Dobie?
Love During Wartime
You! I want to bomb you with the Gay Bomb. Let’s start a war!
Take Your Slacker to Work Day
I would like to thank Mark Fagan and The Austin Chronicle for hooking me up with a press pass for the Memorial Day Texas Rangers vs. Boston Red Sox game. I would also like to thank all the incredibly nice and helpful people who work at the ballpark in Arlington, without whom I would have…
TYC: One Heads Out, Two Move Up
The clean sweep at Texas Youth Commission keeps a lot of the same names.
Don’t Spend That Budget Yet
Has the Lege really given out any more money in that megabudget? Even state agencies don’t know.
Proud as Peacocks
Is there really enough Austin Pride to stretch across an entire month?
Two Nice Listening Parties
Listen and remember 2 Nice Girls.
If Only She Were Gay
Getty loves Janeane. So much.
When the Circus Comes to Town
Bert Jansch’s first time in Texas gives us the vapors.
Lonestar Rollergirls Playoffs: Putas del Fuego vs. Hellcats
I stepped into the Austin Convention Center, Saturday, June 9, and inhaled the sticky, boozy aroma. With only two matches left on the TXRD Lonestar Rollergirls’s 2006-2007 calendar, I could taste the estrogen-laced sweat gliding beneath fishnet pantyhose. How does a rollergirl cope with the demands of the amateur-sport arena? As I pondered these matters…
No Such Thing as Free Parking
When did the city plan on charging for parking at City Hall? And when did emo get so dorkus-malorkus?
Teen Witch
Teen Witch 1989, PG-13, 90 min. Directed by Dorian Walker, Starring Robyn Lively, Dan Gauthier, Joshua John Miller, Caren Kaye, Dick Sargent, Zelda Rubenstein. The film’s songwriters, Tom and Larry Weir, will be present at this special screening. The film is a supernatural comedy about a teenager who realizes that she’s descended from a long…
The Great Muppet Caper
The Great Muppet Caper 1981, G, 95 min. Directed by Jim Henson, Voices by Jim Henson, Frank Oz, Dave Goelz, Starring Charles Grodin, Diana Rigg, John Cleese. The gang gets back together for a London-based heist comedy.
GP Exclusive: Extended ‘love conjure/blues’ Preview Clip
Do not miss Sharon Bridgforth’s “love conjure/blues” coming this weekend to the Off Center.
Quin Snyder Named New Toros Coach
This past Wednesday, the Austin Toros named Quin Snyder to be their new head coach. Snyder will take over for interim coach Dale Osbourne, who took the reins last February after the untimely death of Dennis Johnson. Snyder is a former college basketball player and coach who helped lead Duke University to the Final Four…
The Sharp, Pointy Dude: Or, the Heinousness of Anusness
Bush nominee Holsinger sure knows from anuses.
Behind the Lisa Story
Behind the scenes on the Lisa Cameron photo shoot.
Looking for Technical Training?
Try the Gary Job Corps Center
Come Pride It Up With Us
Come join K8 & Kate at Pride 2007.
Akins High’s New Boss Departing Current School Amid Tension
Teachers at El Paso high school have filed grievances against Daniel Girard, Akins High School’s incoming principal
AISD Considering All-Boys School
District asking for input from community on plans to open a school for young men
Clandestino: Manu Chao
Against a sonic backwash of beach life – waves, children laughing – a strummed acoustic guitar begins its metronomic time keeping. The tropical climate has thickened the instrument’s strings, but the rusted steel just deepens in richness. Manu Chao’s pinched, double-tracked Spanish transmits a police bulletin in reverse: confession. Solo voy con mi pena Sola…
City Outlaws Dog-Chaining
Thanks to new ordinance enacted Thursday by City Council, Dog-chaining – or tying up a pooch with rope, cord, or similar type of tether while unattended – will be illegal in Austin as of Oct. 1
Provoked
What should have turned out as a terrific movie about the crime of spousal abuse has instead received the equivalent of a ham-handed molestation by director Jag Mundhra.
Arts Review
For his exhibit ‘Thickly Settled,’ artist Jeff Williams has blanketed an array of everyday objects in an electrostatic flocking fiber that looks a lot like dust from an AC window unit
Yummer Reading
Chef’s Story: 27 Chefs Talk About What Got Them into the Kitchenedited by Dorothy Hamilton and Patric Kuh Ecco, 344 pp. $27.95 It’s been a long time since PBS didn’t have to think about fundraising with regard to its programming, and while this companion book to the PBS series is clearly a moneymaking endeavor, it’s…
Texas Platters
Tia CarreraHeaven/Hell EP (Arclight) Tia CarreraVous Êtes la Guerre (Arclight) The gothic, Gustave Doré-inspired tri-fold artwork by Rachel Kolar that houses the Heaven and Hell EP is the key to Tia Carrera’s latest improvised and metaphysical journey into the unknown. Depicted as a baby in utero floating in the stars, “Heaven,” the pinnacle of this…
Happenings
June 7-14
Arts Review
Tom Molloy’s exhibition at Lora Reynolds Gallery may be critical of current U.S. leadership, but it also wisely opens queries instead of plugging in answers
Yummer Reading
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life by Barbara Kingsolver, with Camille Kingsolver and Steven L. Hopp HarperCollins, 384 pp., $26.95 In Barbara Kingsolver’s first work of narrative nonfiction, she passionately records a year lived in complete harmony with the seasons and their products and the trials and tribulations that her family endured in…
Texas Platters
Doctors’ Mob, WannabesHole in the Wall, June 1 There’s nothing like a reunion show to make Austin feel half its size. Especially at a venerable spot like the Hole in the Wall, where the warm guitars and beer light pop songs of bands like Doctors’ Mob and the Wannabes. Like their Minneapolis cousins in the…
Local Lawyer Plans to Run for Council
Robin Cravey throws his hat in ring
Readings
An unimaginative Murakami makes for a middling piece of work
Yummer Reading
Build Your Own Earth Oven: a low-cost, wood-fired, mud oven, simple sourdough bread, perfect loavesby Kiko Denzer, with Hannah Field Hand Print Press, 129 pp., $17.95 (paper) It used to be the case that only alternative-lifestyle, off-the-grid hippies were interested in such subjects as How to Build an Oven out of Mud in Your Back…
Texas Platters
Golden Arm TrioThe Tick-Tock Club (Shamrock) Part movie soundtrack, part crime jazz, part classical tribute, part boisterous rock & roll, The Tick-Tock Club is easily the most ambitious of the Golden Arm Trio’s three releases and its first in six years. It might initially sound like a hodgepodge, but GAT ringmaster Graham Reynolds and his…
Johnston’s Backup Plan
In light of latest Johnston High test scores, district draws up contingency plan in anticipation of decision from state on underperforming school’s future
Readings
An autobiography of injustice leads to a career in crime writing
Yummer Reading
Lobel’s Prime Time Grilling: Recipes and Tips From America’s #1 Butchersby Stanley, Leon, Evan, Mark, and David Lobel Wiley Publishing, 290 pp., $27.95 A few months ago, I reviewed another great Lobel book, Lobel’s Meat and Wine. The review was sparked by an opportunity I had to try several cuts of beef from Lobel’s. They…
Texas Platters
Bee vs. MothSoundhorn (Aggraveire) If Danny Elfman hadn’t scored Forbidden Zone, Austin’s Bee vs. Moth could have done a pretty good job. The horn-heavy quartet comes equipped with trumpet and vibraphone, supplanted on debut Soundhorn with Holland Hopson on soprano sax and Jerome Smith on trombone. Opener “Doom Equity” sounds as impish as anything the…
Point Austin: Congress’ War
The Texas congressmen look for a way out
Page Two: Free Means Free
Knee-jerk support of Chavez’s TV-station shutdown legitimates all censorship
Yummer Reading
Alice Waters and Chez Panisse: The Romantic, Impractical, Often Eccentric, Ultimately Brilliant Making of a Food Revolutionby Thomas McNamee Penguin, 400 pp., $27.95 If you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette, you can imagine what the path to a revolution is littered with. In his biography of the “mother of American…
Texas Platters
The Golden BoysWhiskey Flower (Emperor Jones) Fed on moonshine and mushrooms, Canyon Lake quintet the Golden Boys set the summer on fire with their sophomore LP. Picking up where 2005 debut Scorpion Stomp #2 (Hook or Crook) left off, Whiskey Flower tightens the knot while letting loose a psychedelic Last Waltz Roky Erickson would be…
Beside the Point
With only one meeting to go until summer break, City Council should be mob scene
Letters @ 3AM
Excerpts from Cassavetes Directs, Ventura’s forthcoming book about the making of the film Love Streams
Yummer Reading
The Simple & Savvy Wine Guide: Buying, Pairing & Sharing For Allby Leslie Sbrocco William Morrow, 339 pp., $14.95 Leslie Sbrocco was one of the big hits of the 2006 Texas Hill Country Wine & Food Festival. Seventy-five women and one man (me) watched as she delivered the goods on how to pick wines for…
Texas Platters
Mandible(Here Come the) Mandible (Almost There) A significant sphere in the Grand Champeen/Gourds/Prescott Curlywolf social orbit, Phillip McEachern’s Mandible seesaws between simple (but not simplistic) melodies and spirited (but not spiteful) pound-it-out rock. Plus bong-friendly studio goofs that titles like “Stupid Happy Clown” and “Beelzebub Telephone” suggest. Opener “Gone Out” pairs Springsteen with Tears for…
The Hightower Report
Corporate Creeps Bilk the Elderly; and Al Qaeda Banks on Bush
After a Fashion
Stephen drowned his sorrows in Houston after not being invited to that exclusive shindig at the Belmont. Perhaps they would have let him in if he donned one of those notorious Britney Spears hat-and-wig combos?
Yummer Reading
Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook: Recipes from Hunan Province by Fuchsia Dunlop W.W. Norton, 256 pp., $29.95 Fushsia Dunlop’s first book, Land of Plenty (see “Someone’s in the Kitchen With Santa,” December 12, 2003), had a huge impact with Sichuan cuisine fans, and the glowing advance word on this, her new Hunan-centric effort, prompted many of her…
Texas Platters
The Jesus LizardLive (MVD Visual) It’s a damn shame this is the first proper Jesus Lizard live DVD. Boston’s Venus de Milo club, 1994, is the scene of the crime, and naturally it’s easy to focus on David Yow’s feral gyrations, but here we also get to see Duane Denison and David Wm. Sims trade…
A City in Fits and Starts
AFS Documentary Tour: Austin Time Tours
Day Trips
DeZavala Vineyards, between Franklin and New Baden, grows the sweetest blueberries in Texas
Yummer Reading
Moonshine!: Recipes, Tall Tales, Drinking Songs, Historical Stuff, Knee-Slappers, How to Make It, How to Drink It, Pleasin’ the Law, Recoverin’ the Next Day by Matthew B. Rowley Lark Books, 175 pp., $14.95 “The history of moonshine,” Matthew Rowley writes, “is as much about human spirits as it is about alcoholic spirits; it is about…
How Not to Pick a Police Chief
As the search reaches full speed, so do complaints about the process
Brutal Youth
Eli Roth on Hostel: Part II
Soccer Watch
Lightning on the road, U.S. defeat China, and more
Yummer Reading
The Taste of Country Cooking: The 30th Anniversary Edition of a Great Southern Classicby Edna Lewis Knopf, 268 pp., $22.95 If there were ever a cookbook worth buying for the sheer pleasure of simply reading it, this is it. Ever since its publication in 1976, The Taste of Country Cooking has been beloved for its…
APD Shooting: What went down
Officer shoots and kills 25-year-old after scuffle early Sunday in East Austin, Department of Justice to investigate APD’s use-of-force tactics
In Print
Digital Filmmaking
Mr. Smarty Pants Knows
Einstein’s slippers, and playing six degrees of alcoholism
Yummer Reading
Backstage with Julia: My Years With Julia Childby Nancy Verde Barr Wiley & Sons, 285 pp., $22.95 Julia Child is an American icon who delighted and inspired two generations of home and professional cooks in her 40-year career. For the better half of her 92 years, Child was a bona fide celebrity, beloved for her…
Homeless Funding Struggle
Agency overseeing Austin’s most comprehensive web of homeless services scrambles for funding
And the Award Goes to …
The 2006-2007 Austin Critics Table Awards
Severance
This British horror comedy ricochets from violence to vengeance to outright survivalism, with comedy – some brilliant, some less so – underlying it all.
The Common Law
Protesting high property taxes
Hill Country Flourish
The third annual Blanco Lavender Festival
Sally Shipman, Good Samaritan
Community says farewell to former City Council member
Junk: When you’re jonesing for the good stuff
The four improvisers who constitute the Austin troupe Junk prefer to work in long-form, and long-form certainly seems their forte
Hostel: Part II
Roth has accomplished the near impossible: He’s crafted a vastly superior sequel to Hostel, one that supersedes the original’s sadistic quotient, gore effects, and narrative subversiveness.
Yummer Reading
From How to Pick a Peach to going Backstage With Julia Child
Food-o-File
Barbecue, wine, sushi, and crepes, that sort of thing
On the Lege
Looking back at the Lege through local eyes
DVD Watch
The Murder of Fred Hampton Facets, $24.95 “Before you go to bed tonight, say ‘I am a revolutionary.’ Make that your last words, in case you don’t wake up. Then somebody might believe it if you end up in the – what do you call it? The revolutionary happy hunting ground. Say that, ‘I am…
Surf’s Up
This animated avian surf epic is most alive when its radio-friendly pop hits accompany beautiful CGI waves.
TCB
TCB shakes a maraca in Spoon�s new video, stakes out the Belmont for a supersecret Prince show, and talks street with Krum Bums singer Dave Tejas.
Yummer Reading
Rosa’s New Mexican Tableby Roberto Santibañez Artisan, 278 pp., $35 When Le Cordon Bleu-trained chef Roberto Santibañez took over the kitchen at Austin’s landmark Fonda San Miguel restaurant several years back, the established clientele was initially wary of the innovative dishes he created to supplement the traditional Interior Mexican menu. Before long, however, both the…
Event Menu
June 8-15
Rodeo 80
The 2007 Legislature in a quick-step roundup
TV Eye
Network Failure
Offside
Deeply immersive, thought-provoking, and quite often funny, Offside depicts the resourcefulness women in Iran must rely on in order to enter a stadium to watch, no less play, soccer.
Salvage Vanguard Theater: The rebel sets down roots
After 13 years of staging shows in bars and other companies’ theatres, Salvage Vanguard Theater is opening its own all-purpose arts space in a 9,600-square-foot warehouse on Manor Road
Yummer Reading
What’s a Cook to Do? An Illustrated Guide to 484 Essential Tools, Tips, Techniques, & Tricksby James Peterson Artisan, 422 pp., $16.95 In this season of graduations, weddings, and showers, have I got a great gift book for you to bestow upon loved ones who are leaving the nest, setting up housekeeping, or just plain…
Deprogramming Dave
Drummer Lisa Cameron talks with ex-bandmate Kathy McCarty about her transition into self
Developing Stories: Counting Cars and Fears
Officials say their hands are tied at Northcross – but is that true?
Developing Stories
1) It may be a tiny taco joint, but as an economic development engine for Austin, it packs an outsized wallop. 2) The loan program is self-financing. 3) The use of standard development fees, while innovative, is consistent with established City Council policy and historical precedents. 4) The loan isn’t favoritism, and it’s supported by…
I’m Reed Fish
The ultimate indie self-indulgence, this film (with a script by Reed Fish) is weighed down in its own coming-of-age angst.
Sharir + Bustamante Danceworks: Save the last dance for me
When the curtain falls on the final performance of its 24th season, Sharir + Bustamante Danceworks will dance away into history and an era of dance in Austin will end
Yummer Reading
How to Pick a Peach: The Search for Flavor from Farm to Tableby Russ Parsons Houghton Mifflin, 432 pp., $27 Russ Parsons’ new title is a fascinating combination of agricultural history, fruit and vegetable buying guide, cookbook, and discourse on the marketing of produce and the impact of agribusiness on taste. It is the perfect…
Naked City
Quote of the Week “There’s a movie, a little-known movie called Bring It On, and that’s basically what we’re saying [to the DOJ]: Bring it on.”– Acting Police Chief Cathy Ellison, responding to news that the civil rights division of the U.S. Department of Justice will investigate Austin Police Department’s use of force by comparing…
Cheeni Kum
A chef falls for a woman 30 years his junior in this new Bollywood comedy romance set in London.
Arts Review
Naughty Austin’s production of the musical The Full Monty gets off to a clunky start, but once it hits its stride, it generously delivers a fun night for its audience
Yummer Reading
Lidia’s Italy: 140 Simple and Delicious Recipes From the Ten Places in Italy Lidia Loves Most by Lidia Matticchio Bastianich and Tanya Bastianich Manuali Knopf, 384 pp., $35 I have long been a fan of Lidia Bastianich’s many public television series and companion books. Her latest is quickly becoming one of my favorite cookbooks. Lidia’s…
‘Princely Ambitions’
Jim “Prince” Hughes’ Top 5 “permanent distractions”
Higher Ed Funding: Congress comes to ACC
Looking at new methods to distribute federal education funds earmarked for historically black- and Hispanic-serving colleges and universities, U.S. Rep. Rubén Hinojosa hosts hearing on ACC Eastview campus
Luv Doc Recommends: The Miracle Bash
It’s probably safe to say that since you’re trolling these pages you’ve given up on the idea of becoming a priest or a nun. You don’t need a personal ad to marry Jesus. Even still, there could be occasions when you wake up on the floor of your hotel room with coke crust on your…
