Show Review: TFDI with Riley Etheridge & Michael Kang at Cafe du Nord, 8/21/2011

A little over two years ago, some friends and I went to see Tony Lucca at the Hotel Utah. He was playing with two dudes we’d never heard of before: Jay Nash and Matt Duke. Matt opened, and before he’d finished the first song all three of us were staring at him, transfixed (and okay, maybe a little surprised as well). Our reactions to Jay were similar, and of course we already knew we loved Tony’s music too. As the tour progressed, it didn’t take them long to realize that their fantastic chemistry shouldn’t go to waste. By the time they reached SPACE in Chicago, they were harmonizing their way through each other’s set lists, two of them flanking the third songwriter as he took center stage. They decided to record a 4-song EP, and somehow the whole project was dubbed “TFDI.” (More on that later.)

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Theatre Review: Stuffed and Unstrung by Henson Alternative at Curran Theater, 8/18/11


Stuffed and Unstrung is an improv show put on by the Henson Alternative using 80 Henson puppets and six performers.  This sentence makes it sound good and intriguing, but actually watching it is like an explosion of joy in your brain.  When I left the theater Thursday night, with tears in my eyes from laughter and an added spring in my step, I said to my friend “We should watch it again!” Continue reading “Theatre Review: Stuffed and Unstrung by Henson Alternative at Curran Theater, 8/18/11”

Film Review: “Fright Night”

Anton Yelchin and Colin Farrell in FRIGHT NIGHT

starring: Colin Farrell, Anton Yelchin, Toni Collette, David Tennant, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Imogen Poots, Dave Franco, Reid Ewing

written by: Marti Noxon

directed by: Craig Gillespie

MPAA: Rated R for bloody horror violence and language including some sexual references

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Film Review: “Conan the Barbarian”

Rose McGowan blows in CONAN THE BARBARIAN

starring: Jason Momoa, Stephen Lang, Rose McGowan, Rachel Nichols, Ron Perlman, Leo Howard

written by: Thomas Dean Donnelly, Joshua Oppenheimer and Sean Hood

directed by: Marcus Nispel

MPAA: Rated R for strong bloody violence, some sexuality and nudity

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San Francisco’s 2011 Outside Lands Festival, Day 3

The crowd in unified fist-pumping for Major Lazer
The crowd in unified fist-pumping for Major Lazer

60,000 is an extremely large number, especially when you’re speaking in terms of human beings. The largest amphitheater in the Bay Area, the Shoreline in Mountain View, holds around 30,000 with its lawn fully filled, and most shows that can completely fill it to the brim are multi-platinum megastars, or great music festivals that last all day. It therefore isn’t too surprising that nearly all 3 days of the 2011 Outside Lands Festival were sold out, both with single-day and three-day tickets; still, 60,000 people per day is a pretty staggering number. By the time Sunday rolled around, and the denizens of the festival had been dragged through cold, fog, heat, sun, and likely several hundred thousand watts of amplified music, it was stunning to see that the park was still packed to the gills; while most people didn’t trickle in until the mid-afternoon hours, there was enough sunlight out to see Golden Gate Park filled from end to end with a flood of musicgoers.

But what about the people who made it in the morning?

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Spinning Platters Interview: Miranda July on “The Future”

Miranda July in THE FUTURE

Miranda July is an anomaly in the film industry. Perhaps this is because, although she has experienced success within it, she understands there is much more to the creative world outside of it. A multimedia artist in the truest sense of the term, July has been celebrated as much for her performance art as for her filmmaking. Her multimedia pieces have been shown and performed in galleries around the world. Her debut collection of short stories, No One Belongs Here More Than You (2007), won the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. And her debut film, Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005), which July wrote and directed as well as starred in, won four prizes at the Cannes Film Festival, in addition to numerous critics awards and a Special Jury Prize at Sundance.

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San Francisco’s 2011 Outside Lands Festival, Day 2

Can you tell that you're in San Francisco yet?
Can you tell that you're in San Francisco yet?

(For our coverage of Day 1, here’s a link! Or maybe Day 3?)

It makes sense that for a weekend, Saturday is the most popular day. It’s the middle point; you had a night off before and a day off afterwards, so there’s no reason not to go wild and throw a big party. It therefore makes perfect sense, for a weekend-long musical, to host some of your biggest acts on the second day. The fine folks at Outside Lands rose to this challenge magnificently, and in addition to the heavyweights on the Land’s End stage that kept the Polo Field occupied for most of the day, some excellent surprises were thrown in for those who decided to venture out into the smaller and SLIGHTLY less-packed areas of Golden Gate Park.

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San Francisco’s 2011 Outside Lands Festival, Day 1

60,000 people per day!
60,000 people per day!

(Want to skip to Day 2? Or maybe Day 3?)

Let’s get one thing straight, right off the bat: There’s always going to be rivalry between Northern California’s concert scene and Southern California’s concert scene. We’re always looking for reasons to stay up here and not go down there. Never mind any of the usual excuses people give for not going to Coachella in April: it’s far away, it’s hot, it’s got a different crowd, the scene is too (insert choice phrase here); it’s just not “us”. So, while we’re happy for things like Fauxchella to keep us from having to go down to Indio around the cusp of summertime, there’s always that infectious festival vibe that pulls us in somehow. However, mere moments after remarks begrudging the Coachella 2011 lineup — which looked remarkably like our 2010 Outside Lands and Treasure Island lineups — the 2011 Outside Lands lineup popped up, and this time, it was clear that we had gotten things right. Back to 3 days, back with some of the biggest acts in music to date, and loaded with a bunch of new treasures to discover, Outside Lands was going to be bigger this year than ever.

That being said: This is a long entry, because it was a long weekend. We’ve got a collection of highlights that we wanted to share with our readers, because it’s impossible to fit everything in. Hope you can keep up!

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Spinning Platters Interview: Lone Scherfig on “One Day”

Lone Scherfig on the set of ONE DAY

“Look at this city!” Lone Scherfig is staring out at the San Francisco skyline from a conference room at the Ritz Carlton, perched high atop Nob Hill. Despite being a celebrated international director with a penchant for filming in the world’s loveliest locations, the 52-year old Danish director is in San Francisco for the first time (the closest she’d come previously was an appearance at the Mill Valley Film Festival). “You have so much good architecture here,” she exclaimed, eyes scanning the cityscape before us.

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