The Homecoming.... Is Coming!

So, as many of you know, I have been away from the Shiver Cities for a few months, stretching my Midwestern wings out east in Pittsburgh, PA.

 

Pittsburgh, ain't it purty?

It has been a FABULOUS time out here, but in a few weeks, it will be time to come home - back to the Shiver Cities! Once I'm home, I'll be back in action blogging about listening, looking, learning, Eating, drinking, acting, living, and loving in the Twin Cities. I look forward to hearing from you all again and returning to somewhere where the snow actually collects on the ground!

Love to the Shiver Cities,

K

I'm Afraid of Virginia Woolf

Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf? Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf, early in the morning.....

This little ditty, which starts out as an attempt to remember funnier times, becomes, over the course of a few hours, the haunting theme song of some of the most despicable and tragic characters to ever grace the stage. In Edward Albee's seminal play, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, now going on at The Jungle theater in Uptown Minneapolis, the play's three-hour duration simply flies by. Who can think about time, or anything else outside the darkened theater for that matter, when the lives of four people are being eviscerated on the stage in front of you?

It is perhaps the most violent play I've ever seen, and yet there is never a drop of blood spilled. Daggers are thrown verbally between each character, hitting their mark each time, and every highball glass that is strewn around Bain Behlke's fitting set might as well have been one part gin, two parts arsenic, because with every drink the audience can see what is left of Albee's tragic characters slipping away.

It would not suffice to call The Jungle's production "astounding." The magnificent mounting of the play, spearheaded by Bain Behlke and starring Michelle Barber, Stephen Yoakum, Sean Michael Dooley (filling in for Sean Neely, who was sidelined due to a medical emergency), and Jane Froiland, was sickening, and also one of the BEST I've ever had the pleasure of seeing.

The play, written by Albee in 1962, takes place between 2 a.m. and dawn at the home of George (Yoakam) and Martha (Barber), a middle-aged married couple who have invited young newcomers Nick (Dooley) and Honey (Froiland) over for a drink after a faculty mixer put on by Martha's father, the president of the university the men teach at. Over the next few hours, George and Martha succeed in plunging to new lows in their own volatile relationship while pulling Honey and Nick down with them. This is not to say that the rift created between Honey and Nick is solely because of the older couple's actions: in the production, Behlke succeeds in showing the audience that although Nick and Honey seem naive, happy, and fresh-faced when they walk in George and Martha's door, there is almost as much bubbling under the surface of their relationship as there is with the other pair - who spend half the production verbally abusing one another.

The play is scathingly funny, and despite the relationship bloodbath that is in progress, the talented actors managed to draw a laugh out of the audience whenever Albee's intelligent dialogue called for it. Speaking of the talent of the play's cast, it would be wholly unfair not to recognize what REALLY had me on the edge of my seat for three hours: Stephen Yoakam and Michelle Barber. I have never had the pleasure of seeing either of these Twin Cities mainstays in action before, and after seeing their work in Virginia Woolf, I feel I have been cheating myself from the best of what our fair cities have to offer. Barber was both frail and vulnerable and a legitimate ball-crusher at many times throughout the play. Where many actors would have failed at their attempt to exude Martha's scathing wit and callousness, Barber was able to use her physical presence and vocal authority to bring each and every verbal bitch-slap to life. She was as believable as they come - which she was able to do in no small part because of the believability that Albee infused into the play's intense and never-ending dialogue. The characters speak as if they were having a real conversation - something that may seem obvious, but that few scripts or screenplays are able to actually accomplish.

As George, Stephen Yoakam was able to transition perfectly and timely through each and every phase his character visits throughout the night. It is difficult to play one character, much less several throughout a play - and although George remained George, Yoakam was sure to keep his portrayal of the washed-up historian in exactly the spot he needed to be at exactly the right time. If ever someone had a perfect voice for the stage, it is Yoakam. If at any point in the show I became distracted, it was because I was concentrating too hard on how Yoakam delivered his lines - to someone with a musical affinity like mine, it was a joy to listen to.

Not to call out the two lead actors specifically, because Sean Dooley and Jane Froiland did a fantastic job in their own right. Dooley played Nick as the curious youngster - attracted to Martha, nay, anything with breasts, while both physically shunning his own wife and being hyper-aware of anything that came out of her mouth at the same time. Dooley shone in the part, and his natural affinity with Albee's lines and their directed delivery (lines he had less than one week to learn, mind you) was impressive.  Although Froiland occasionally became cartoonish in her portrayal of Honey, she succeeded beautifully in following Honey through the many stages her character visits after she has a few glasses of brandy and the ugly side of her relationship with Nick. Although Albee only hints at it in his dialogue, Froiland also succeeds in bringing attention to a dimension of Honey that many Virginia Woolf audiences never get to see - her probable history of sexual abuse, when, wide-eyed and fear-stricken, Honey drunkenly believes she is somewhere else, in a memory where she screams "I don't want to anymore, get away."

The Jungle's production of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf is theater at its best, and the entire cast, crew, and the production staff deserve the credit they clearly worked very hard for. I encourage everyone to go see it for themselves - and to leave some time after the play for decompression and thought about this pivotal work in American theater, done, I believe, how Edward Albee would have wished.

For more information, and tickets, go to The Jungle's website.

-K

Yep.

My roommate just walked in, and what did Pandora start playing after an hour or so of nice normal classical concertos? The Russian Dance from the Nutcracker.

Courtesy of xkcd.com

A Mossbowl.

More good times from Sharing Machine:

The Single Greatest Succession of Photos Ever

Many of you already know that even before she came back into the America's consciousness after her 2010 Super Bowl Snickers commercial, I have always loved Betty White. She's spunky, graceful, and incredibly hilarious - from Golden Girls to appearances as senile elderly ladies on my all-time favorite show Scrubs, she's fabulous. Not only is she hosting Saturday Night Live on May 8th, but she's back stronger than ever in paparazzi-land as well, proving that showing her face can bring some serious publicity to wherever she happens to be.

This week, she showed up for the opening of a new hot dog joint in Universal City and chowed down on her namesake dog, the no-fixins "Naked" Betty White hotdog. What follows is possibly the greatest work of photojournalism I have ever seen. EVER. Happy Monday, all.

-K

When Local Music Made Love: GAYNGS

Ear-Candy Cocktail

This year is certainly turning out to be a bright one musically. The most recent addition to this spring's music goodness is a new project by, well, a s#*t ton of local and regional artists (and some out-staters), called GAYNGS. The project, which will be releasing their first album, Relayted, on May 11, includes members of Bon Iver, Megafaun, Lookbook, and Solid Gold, as well as P.O.S., Dessa, Michael Lewis (Andrew Bird's sax player), and many more. The hype alone could sell their record, but as happenstance would have it, the music always brings it home, and no matter how many pretty faces have shown up to be a part of Gayngs, the sound coming out of their first two released tracks, "The Gaudy Side of Town," and "Faded High," is what will have me lining up at the record store in a few weeks.

Additionally, they will be playing two shows at (surprise surprise) First Avenue on May 14, one at 5pm and one at 10. 

Here's a first listen of the two released tracks on Myspace.

-K

Head's Up!: Basilica Block Party

Summer is almost here! Well, sort of- it is certainly in sight, anyways. With summer comes a wealth of opportunity and, if you're lucky enough to live here in the Twin Cities, it means it is outdoor concert season.

Aside from The Current's Rock the Garden show (lineup not announced yet, sorry folks!), there are countless other gigs happening this summer that have been announced already, including the amazing Basilica Block Party over at the Basilica of St. Mary in Loring neighborhood.

The Block Party is heading into its 16th year, and they are doing it with a little help from some very talented friends, including Spoon, Weezer, The Avett Brothers, and Ingrid Michaelson, to name a few. I find it incredibly amusing that I rave about Spoon's show last weekend as First Ave and recommend that everyone try and see them if they get the chance because, well, here's your chance! The lineup isn't even finalized yet, but those are the headliners, with more band slots to be filled soon. I had a feeling Spoon would come back soon - we gave them a damn good showing last Friday and Saturday at First Ave, and they gave us some damn good concerts in return.

The block party spans over two days, July 9 and 10, and tickets go on sale this Saturday at 10am at Electric Fetus or on Ticketmaster. For more info, click this link.

Hope to see you there!

-K

A Love Rekindled: Spoon Plays MPLS at First Ave

Minneapolis is special. I've always known this deep down in my heart-of-hearts, but when the band that was literally once named "top overall artist of the decade" decides to play two back-to-back shows in our dear city, one on the 40th anniversary of First Avenue, we've really got something to smile about. Best yet, I was lucky enough to have snagged a pair of tickets to see Spoon in their 21+ performance at First Ave last night (tonight's gig is 18+, also sold out, sorry folks!).

All I can say is "WOW." Spoon is a truly fantastic group. I've had an ongoing love affair with their music for many years, but there is really nothing to rekindle your devotion to a band's sound like seeing them live, hoping they play the songs you love, and screaming for them to come back for more once they have finally left the stage. I had to laugh because the girl standing near me at the show kept saying, dumbfounded over the music, "I can't believe it, they sound just like their recordings!" I wanted to tell her that unless a band sounds just as good as their album or better, they really aren't worth seeing, but I decided against it, figuring by her look of sheer delight, she already knew that she'd spent her money well, and so had I.

Despite running into the abysmal traffic situation that was the downtown area on the first night the Twins played at the new Target Field (cue me cursing loudly when we turned onto 1st Ave and right into traffic cops and road blockades), we managed to get to First Ave early enough to get a good spot in line. In another fortuitous turn of events, I also managed to snag a spot right up against the stage due to the people in front of me in line's inability to prioritize (standing spot first, then hit the bar) and I got to ogle Britt Daniel from two feet away and catch a glimpse of the set list at his feet (a set list that I later got to take home!)

It was an incredibly fulfilling show - the way concerts should be. The band's energy was high, the audience was involved but not invasive to the music, and between the show and the two encores of three songs each the band ended up playing (yeah, I screamed long and hard for those, even as others were giving up, damn straight) all of my favorite Spoon songs, even some of the more obscure, were played at peak performance. The sound was great, whoever did their lighting design was a genius, and Spoon held true to their tradition of creating a wholistic album by creating a nicely-planned concert in songs they chose to play, which spanned their entire career but seemed to all fit together perfectly. My personal favorite performance was "The Ghost of You Lingers" which had an almost eighties-esque Annie Lennox vibe that never would have come across on a recording, and it sounded great.

If any of you were at the show, give me a shout out, and for those of you who weren't, watch for another chance to see Spoon live, I promise it'll be worth it.

Britt, after it got too hot to wear leather anymore

More Britt, as I was right in front of him, it was

hard to get a good shot of many of the other band members!

The setlist, main show on the left, 

with encore options upside-down on the right.

-K

Shakespearean Women: You Need a Sassy Gay Friend

Hooray for perpetuating stereotypes. Well, some of the time - when they aren't harmful, and when they are funny, especially when they involve men saying "betch."

As an avid Shakespeare afficionado, well, at least as someone who is dating one, I've often wanted to slap some smarts into quite a few of the Bard's damsels. Now, my feministic concerns are voiced, only in a much funnier way: by members of Second City Theater Troupe, as they shake some sense into Shakespeare's women in their amazing "Sassy Gay Friend" shorts. So far, there are three, one for Hamlet, Othello, and Romeo and Juliet, enjoy!







-K

Half-Red and Half-Blue

You lookin' at me? I love Sharing Machine, happy Friday everyone.

-K

Fish-Water: Rites of Spring in Minneapolis

Well, Shiverers, it is that time of year again: Spring! While I'm sure most of you (myself definitely included) are shedding layers, opening windows, and generally finding it hard to get any work done, there is one thing about Spring in Minneapolis that is, decidedly, less than awesome: the nastiness that is our tap water this time of year.

As many of you know, Minneapolis gets its water straight from the mighty Mississippi River. It is actually pretty cool when you think about it - it means that the river running by our cities makes up over 75% of our bodies. However, with the copious amounts of snow we tend to get every year, and the rate at which that snow melts off, these few weeks in March leave the tap water with the unfortuante smell and taste of an uncleaned aquarium.

And so, it has become an annual rite of spring in Minneapolis (not for you St. Paul-ites who get your tap water from lakes and groundwater): turning on the tap, filling a water bottle, and then directly spitting it back out because well, your mouth now tastes like sturgeon.

It may taste and smell bad, but believe it or not, it IS still perfectly safe to drink, and still infinitely better that drinking bottled water, which, surprisingly, is less regulated than what comes out of the tap and produces a ton of waste. So, here are some tips for still getting your daily allotment of tap-found H20 without feeling like you're going to gag:

-Use a Brita filter on your tap, or have a Brita water purifying pitcher to fill and stick in your fridge, this tends to get rid of the bad smell, although it tastes a bit funny still.

-Clean water bottles out with lemon juice to get rid of existing fishy smells, it kills the bacteria and makes your nalgene lemony-fresh!

-Don't drink it hot without purifying first! For God's sake, heating the water makes it worse, don't do it- I warned you!

No worries, in a week or so it will all be back to normal... until it snows again. I love you Minneapolis, I really really do.

-From the fishy-cities, K

Weekly Prank: Don't Actually Try This One At Home

A warning from the get-go: for all of you amateur pranksters out there looking for your big idea for April Fool's, THIS IS NOT IT. For this week's prank, I've decided to share a clip from what is, decidedly, an awful movie: Out Cold. However, despite the sub-par quality of the film itself, I have rarely even laughed as hard as I did when I saw this part of the movie. Zach Galifianakis, known now for being America's favorite facial-haired funnyman, plays Out Cold's often-drunk and frequently unconscious character, and his friends and brother frequently take advantage of his tendencies, with scenarios ending up like this. Enjoy, but again, I highly advise against causing anyone a potential heart-attack by actually doing this:



-K

America, You May Now Get Sick: The Top Ten Immediate Changes for Healthcare

 The Happy Healthcare Dance

Well, as most of you who do not live under a rock know by now, the historic new national healthcare bill passed last night. As one of millions who are either uninsured or who were about to be uninsured, I'm pretty pleased. For skeptics, the confused, people like me who have trouble sifting through it all, or if you're just curious, I've found a nice little list from HuffingtonPost of the top ten things the new bill will be doing immediately, and some of them are pretty cool:

The legislation will:

• Prohibit pre-existing condition exclusions for children in all new plans;
• Provide immediate access to insurance for uninsured Americans who are uninsured because of a pre-existing condition through a temporary high-risk pool;
• Prohibit dropping people from coverage when they get sick in all individual plans;
• Lower seniors' prescription drug prices by beginning to close the donut hole;
• Offer tax credits to small businesses to purchase coverage;
• Eliminate lifetime limits and restrictive annual limits on benefits in all plans;
• Require plans to cover an enrollee's dependent children until age 26;
• Require new plans to cover preventive services and immunizations without cost-sharing;
• Ensure consumers have access to an effective internal and external appeals process to appeal new insurance plan decisions;
• Require premium rebates to enrollees from insurers with high administrative expenditures and require public disclosure of the percent of premiums applied to overhead costs.

-K, the insured!

From MADATOMS: The Jim Henson Character Breakdown

Direct from MADATOMS, the Jim Henson Character Breakdown- every show/ movie and the more interesting aspects of their characters, which all fit into a few specific categories: http://www.madatoms.com/site/blog/the-muppets-character-flaw-breakdown

I'm a big fan of what is under "The Creepy One" for The Dark Crystal..

-K

Art for Language-Lovers: Wordle.net

In one of the best discoveries I've made since mixing garlic powder in with my tuna salad, I happened across an amazing website called Wordle.net. What exactly is it? Basically, you type in a block of text, a few words, or link to something on the internet, and it generates a very cool artistic word cloud, based on the frequency of individual words and phrases. IT IS SO COOL. I realize a lot of people might not be as excited about this as I am, but here are a few examples of the awesomeness:

My Brief Encounter piece from last week:

 

The lyrics to Dessa's song "551":

And finally, Emila's speech on the frailty of men, as said to Desdemona in Othello:

So seriously, check it out: Wordle.net, and try not to be amused!

-K

Everyman's Tale: A Brief Encounter

Nothing in life is easy. On any given day, a seemingly never-ending flow of junk makes the average person want to burrow down beneath the covers and call it quits. But to be truthful, most of us have it pretty good. Not to promulgate the proverbial parental lecture ("you don't know how good you actually have it, you're lucky"), but what if it was worse? What if a run-of-the-mill argument with your partner was coupled with the fact that you couldn't talk to anyone about it, what if no one could even know who your partner was? What if your heart was close to bursting with love and affection, but instead of yelling it from the rooftops, you had to swallow it down your throat so that even the tiniest shred of hope for that love wasn't ruined?

It is a timeless story- that of lovers simply being unable to love each other. Many of us have been there before, either experiencing it first or, if we’re lucky, secondhand. Although each story is different, the basic plot line stays the same. This familiar tale, with all its heartache and pain but also its simple joys, is explored in Noel Coward's classic film, Brief Encounter, which first appeared on screen in 1945, but was witnessed by yours truly last night at the Riverview Theater in south Minneapolis.

The film is a cultural icon, and I first brushed up against it in another of my all-time favorite films, The History Boys, the screen adaptation of Alan Bennett’s successful London play. In it, two of the precocious sixth-form grammar school boys perform Brief Encounter’s final scene, in defiance of the more “useful” things their shrewd new instructor is hoping to teach them. After the performance, the instructor looks impressed but awash as to what to say, finally settling on “God knows why you’ve learned Brief Encounter…” which is met with raucous laughter by the other students. It seems a fitting enough question at the time: “why Brief Encounter?” and I’m sure most of the audience, regardless of how schooled in 1940’s cinema they are, might also ask the same thing of the cheeky students. I was one of those people, until I actually saw Coward’s work in action, and realized why it was they chose to perform this scene, or, more importantly, why it was chosen for them by their warm and yet personally unfulfilled closeted English teacher.

And so, sitting in the 1960’s style auditorium at the Riverview last night, this seemingly insignificant bit of humor in The History Boys finally made sense to me. It is not only the story of Brief Encounter: two lovers, both married, finally find what it is they have been missing in their respective relationships, share a shred of happiness, and then go on with their lives; but of Noel Coward himself, and my own speculation on what the play must have meant to him – a gay man unable to live life as what he actually was. Indeed, while certain insiders may have known, Coward’s sexuality, during his lifetime, was never discussed, but swept under the rug, as many were. He was a successful author, actor, director, singer, and playwright- lauded in society and well-loved among friends, and yet, Noel Coward the man was never the same person as Noel Coward the public face. Just as his Brief Encounter lovers Laura and Alec were, he was forced to turn something beautiful and real into a thing that must be spoken of only in hushed voices, or not at all.  Coward’s own love, like that of his main characters, was a love that had to be much more familiar with furtive glances, skulking in corners, and quick rendezvous than the leisurely hand-in-hand walks in the park an un-adulterous or heterosexual pair would have been allowed. 

Suddenly, it all makes sense. Who better to write the quintessential story of impossible ardor than a man who had spent his entire life facing true love as something that was, for him, outside the realm of possibility?

As if the story needed to be any more gut-wrenching, this extra layer of background knowledge on Coward’s own life takes it to an entirely new level of heartache. As a viewer, you feel the love, the second thoughts, the first kiss that - had circumstances been different - would have happened a long time ago. When Alec and Laura meet for a second time, you feel the intensity of the first time she holds his arm, and at the end of it all, you feel the overwhelming desire to run after him on the train platform, wanting to leave your own life behind to follow his, or simply not to live at all anymore. Coward’s script turns Alec and Laura’s story into what a great movie should be- something real, and something that, regardless of individual moral standards or auspices, causes every single person in the theater to understand, not just to feel for its characters, but to feel like its characters. Gay or straight, married or single, no one is exempt from being Alec or Laura, no matter how hard or softly their story may hit in their own lives.

Digging on Dessa: A Badly Broken Code

There is never enough time in the day to give the Minneapolis/St. Paul music scene the credit it deserves. As much as the Twin Cities may seem to be a little Midwestern-bubble, we export talent like cheese and wine from the south of France. So, it should be no surprise that once again, one of our own has outdone not only the local music scene, but in my humble opinion, pretty much everyone else too. Dessa, the first and  only female MC in the Doomtree collective (POS et al), released her debut full-length album, A Badly Broken Code, last month and let me tell you, after just one listen, it was worth the wait.

First off, Dessa is one smart cookie. While her spoken word background could lend her to being the female, Midwestern, wonder-bread version of Saul Williams, she stands alone. Her poetry, unlike his, is less likely to deliver a forceful blow with one line and more likely to make a lasting impression by the sheer weight of lyrical intrigue, woven throughout each and every line, all fitting together to make a warm bowl of literary oatmeal that sticks with you long after the actual meal is done. There are, of course, some serious stand-out tracks, such as the autobiographical opener: "Children's Work," "Dutch," a crafty piece that solidly shows her Minneapolis hip-hop roots, and the chilling song "Matches to Paper Dolls," which not only showcases her lyrical aptitude, but her amazing voice as well.

What really stands out in Dessa's favor is the thought that has clearly been put into what exactly she says. It may seem strange, but in the world of hip-hop, what is said too often becomes less important than how it comes out. For Dessa, there are no throw-away lyrics; everything has a point and purpose, and the metaphors, literary allusions, and profoundly complex yet incredibly familiar stories she tells are in a league of their own. Who else could write a heart-wrenching song about playing second-fiddle in a relationship to, well, an actual fiddle ("The Chaccone")?

I've included links to some YouTube versions of a few tracks below, but if you enjoy A Badly Broken Code's intelligent ear-candy, I encourage you to go grab the album and help support one of the Shiver Cities' best.

-K

Comic-Book Superheroes in the Twin Cities: Would It Work?

Many of you may not know this, and some might, but I am an absolutely HUGE comic book fan. Anything superhero related, and you can pretty much count on me being on board. Yes, I have spent an entire evening creating the superhero personas of myself and my roommates with Marvel's super hero generator, and it was great, I'm not ashamed.

So imagine, much to my surprise, when I was tipped off to a recent McSweeney's article that discusses, albeit brifly, the potential success of America's most beloved superheroes, if they had been located in the Twin Cities.

The real TC superfolk: the delivery guys from Galactic Pizza

Arguably, the biggest problem for many of the superheroes is the Shiver Cities' lack of consolidated tall buildings: Batman could not stand atop a skyscraper in downtown Minneapolis and brood, and Spiderman would have a tough time web-slinging his way between Minneapolis and St. Paul, so he would have to settle for sticking to the side of a truck going down I-94, far less dramatic and incredibly inefficient during rush hour if you ask me. Here's the entire piece, enjoy:

By Keith Pille, courtesy of McSweeney's:

"On the Utility of Minneapolis-St. Paul as a Base of Operations for Various Well-Known Superheroes or Super Teams."

Spider-Man: Poor. The lack of a single, concentrated downtown area would greatly hinder Spider-Man's preferred method of transportation. Given that there's not much higher than three stories after you get out of the two downtowns, swinging from building to building isn't going to work. It's not difficult to imagine Spider-Man standing on Nicollet Mall in downtown Minneapolis, hearing that thugs have taken over the Xcel Center over in St. Paul, and cursing under his breath as he runs to I-94, forced to affix a web to the top of a bus and ride it across town.
The X-Men: So-so. Their initial problem would be that no one around here seems to have much of a problem with mutants. With no one trying to wipe them out, the X-Men would lose some of their edge. They would run the risk of turning into hypersensitive college kids who go around looking for the slightest excuse to be outraged.
They'd have more of a reason to stick around, though, after the inevitable burst of mutant jokes on the local classic-rock morning show. Those guys can be very cruel.
Batman: Also so-so. No real deal-breakers to Batman setting up shop here, but lots of annoying obstacles: lack of dramatic places to stand and brood over the cityscape; difficulty of driving the Batmobile at high speeds through some of the St. Paul street vortices (watch the ice on the road!); necessity of getting cozy with two police chiefs instead of one commissioner; and lack of a paralyzing, all-pervading criminal culture (although he'd be welcome to come to my neighborhood, starting with the three middle-aged fat guys who think riding little putt-putt scooters three abreast at 20 mph down Minnehaha Parkway is AWESOME).
Superman: No problem.
The Incredible Hulk: No problem. Hulk's in the Superman club. When your main thing is smashing things, location is less of a factor. Hulk could smash very effectively in Falcon Heights, for example.
Wonder Woman: Poor. People around here just wouldn't cotton to a woman dressed like that, especially one carrying a magic lasso. Well, some folks would like that quite a bit, but some would make a stink about it.
Aquaman: Most people seem to like him, but Garrison doesn't, so it's a no-go.


-K

- - - -

The Best Michael Jackson Tribute Ever: Senior Citizens

In the last year there have certainly been no shortage of tributes to the late great Michael jackson. The King of Pop has had concerts, a movie, countless dopplegangers, and many a photo-montage dedicated to him. Needless to say, it is surprising that so long after his death, I've come across possibly the best tribute to his legacy EVER: old men dancing to Billie Jean. Yes, you read that right, Billie Jean, senior citizen style. Happy Wednesday everyone, enjoy:

The Hole-iest Season of All...

This could be you...

Potholes. You've gotta love 'em. Well, you've certainly got to something them, because like it or not, they're here to stay. From November through April, metropolitan Minnesota becomes infested with the treacherous horse-sized holes, and so we drive on: hitting bump after bump after coffee-spilling divot. A friend of mine told me yesterday that the potholes outside her Cedar-Riverside apartment are so bad, if anything bigger than a pickup truck drives over them, it wakes her up at night. Ridiculous. With all the freezing and thawing that has been going on lately, they're worse than ever. So what is to be done? Sure, you can call the Minneapolis 311 line and report a pothole, and they, more often than not, will come and fix it. However, fixes last anywhere from a day to a few weeks typically, and they cost the city money in the interim (they'll get re-paved come spring anyways) and then poof! they're back again!

Sooo what to do, what to do, what to do... my suggestion? Public transportation. Chances are, if you're in a bus or on the light-rail you're not as concerned with the alignment-shattering abysses. Then again, that suggestion may not be approved by my good friend in her pothole-adjacent apartment at night, because MAN does a bus make a racket when it drives over one of those puppies.

My other suggestion? Let them get so bad that they soon become a corporation's advertisement platform. Take Chicago, for example: last year, their potholes got so bad that KFC began filling them in to generate some goodwill and free PR. Brilliant? I think yes. By all means, let KFC fill in potholes as they simultaneously clog America's arteries with fried chicken, the metaphor is too awesome to pass up. Who knows, maybe 3M, Target, or Best Buy could follow Colonel Sanders' lead.... and also give me a new stereo system for giving them the idea. Until then, check out metrotransit.org. to find a bus/train near you.

-K

The Weekly Prank: The "Sarkozy"/ Palin Phone Call

Hey Shiverers, another frigid Tuesday, and I've gotten a lot of suggestions for favorite pranks, but one has risen to the top this week. Although it is over a year old, I, as well as most of you I'm sure, had forgotten about one of the best prank phone calls ever: the Sarkozy call to Sarah Palin. The illustrious former-governor of Alaska was prank called by two notorious Canadian comedians who pretended to be French President Nicholas Sarkozy and guess what? She believed them! No matter what your politics, this is some downright funny s**t, enjoy the memories.

A Tribute to the Calvin and Hobbes Snowmen

Hello shiverers, to get you over the Thursday slum, I've compiled a collection of what I belive are the greatest winter-inspired cartoons ever created: the Calvin and Hobbes snowman series. Clearly, Calvin is a precocious child, but freaking your parents and the neighbors out is never so much fun as when it is done with the help of snowmen, observe and enjoy:

My personal favorite is the snow-giant looking over the hill.

-K

The Weekly Prank: The Water Bowl Ceiling Trick

Happy Tuesday, everyone. Isn't it great to be in the weather-worn Twin Cities while everyone else in the country freaks out because of all the snow we're getting nationally? Just to prove my point, I saw someone in downtown St. Paul wearing shorts while bicycling the other day... we're a hearty lot...

Although April Fool's Day is a ways off, I thought I'd start a new series where I pull some of the best footage of pranks I could find on YouTube and share it with you lovely people. My first entry, a video of the infamous water bowl on the ceiling prank. The only issue I can see with implementing this is that once they have been humiliated, the "prankee" now has a large stick with which to hit the prankster, which I forsee as causing some serious problems:



See what I mean? That girl now has a broom handle, and she's probably pretty pissed.

Have a good prank to share? Comment!

-K

Happy Birthday Current!

The Crowd from above

Q: So what does spending almost an entire Friday in front of a computer hitting the "refresh" button get you?

A: Four member pre-sale tickets to 89.3 The Current's 5th Birthday Party at First Avenue.

WIN.

After being one of the hundreds of MPR members who helped crash First Ave's ticket-buying server during the member pre-sale, I persevered and basically sat by the computer all day to finally get my four glorious ($6 a piece) tickets to the local-music studded party that happened last week at First Avenue, celebrating five years of truly great music for the Twin Cities.

The lineup was The Twilight Hours, Lookbook, Mason Jennings, POS, and Solid Gold, all local acts that have been able, much in part because of the Current, to make it big outside the Cities. My favorites initially were Mason Jennings and POS, but I also really enjoyed Lookbook's synth-pop airyness and their singer's visceral wails, which I'm sure reminded most people there, myself included, of Karen O's signature sound-offs in the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. 

Here are some pics of the shindig, which also featured free catered food from Red Stag Supper Club (free oysters, I kid you not), Solera, and other TC foodie staples.

Nick and Jane with their "Mason Jennings is on stage!" faces on

Mason!

POS

    

Mayors RT Rybak and Chris Coleman showed up

Here's to you, Current!  -K