SAT 4/9 While most consider rolling off the couch to manually change TV channels a severe hardship, a unique subculture that thrives on brutally pushing their bodies to the verge of collapse visits Tempe this weekend. They’ll compete hoping to break the tape — or simply finish — in Arizona’s…
SAT 4/9 Wanna be in gay porn pronto, Tonto? Better show ’em your “Oh!” face on Saturday, April 9, at the Bunkhouse, 4428 North Seventh Avenue, where Will Clark, a gay porn “star” — none of the men at the Bunkhouse during a recent happy hour would admit to knowing…
Sorry, retro rock fans, but Rush: The Musical won’t have a Geddy Lee cameo, nor will there be any chorus-line cancans to “Tom Sawyer.” ASU senior Lauren Henschen came up with something even cheekier: a “goofy pop-rock romp” about five college girls trying to survive sorority rush week. Henschen’s participated…
Moby sold millions of copies of his 1999 sample-savvy dance mosaic record Play, with virtually no radio airplay. “The Iggy Pop of electronica,” as Penthouse dubbed the eccentric artist, licensed all of the songs off the album for television advertising. And people were actually going, “Wow! Who does that Bailey’s…
FRI 4/1 Get your ears spanked when the thick whip of verbal science comes crashing down Friday, April 1, at the PHiX gallery, 1113 Grand Avenue. A group of 15 Valley poets congregate to stir your minds and souls while laying down their collective abilities of articulation for the first…
TUE 4/5 To all the wanna-bes who love sushi and Bruce Lee, but whose best kung fu moves are limited to wax on and wax off, Tokyo Tuesdays are for you. Leave the coveted Enter the Dragon box set at home and karate-chop your way to Ra Sushi Bar Restaurant,…
SUN 4/3 Break out the gloves and fly your uncle down from Saskatchewan: Hockey is back. Witness some serious slap shots as the Phoenix Adult Hockey Association plays every Sunday night at the Arcadia Ice Arena, 3853 East Thomas Road. Old pros, wanna-be stars and enthusiasts take to the ice…
4/1-4/10 A souvenir shop in Dearborn, Michigan, once sold a rubber stamp that read, “People are more violently opposed to fur than leather because it’s safer to harass rich women than motorcycle gangs.” Obviously, the quotation predates the modern motorcycle frenzy of the middle-aged. In the 1960s, riding a motorcycle…
At last year’s Arizona Central Pride Festival, the guy in the hemp shorts and the hot-pink feather boa didn’t get to finish his fantastically ludicrous karaoke cover of “Like a Virgin.” A big rainstorm cut his performance short, just as he was simulating butt-flossing with said boa. It’s rained on…
3/22-3/26 Mark Lundholm refers to himself as “a professional mistake-maker.” In 1988, he found himself in a halfway house after carjacking for fixes. The divorced father of two had gone from being a Catholic altar boy to a homeless addict and mental patient. He found some humor in it all,…
SAT 3/19 Grandpa’s been acting kookier than normal lately, whistling “Pennsylvania 6-5000” to himself, and doing a solo Charleston in the mirror. But don’t up his dosage of Xanax just yet, as the old coot’s probably just aching to skedaddle to “A Night in the 40’s” Big Band Dance and…
SAT 3/19 Slash and Scott Weiland (formerly of Guns n’ Roses and Stone Temple Pilots, respectively) might have mellowed a bit — a tad bit — since the days of their reckless youth. But the Speed Jam at Phoenix International Raceway, 7602 South 115th Avenue in Avondale, on Saturday, March…
FRI 3/18 “The Moog,” as it’s known among musical types, is the indispensable electronic synthesizer that has pioneered both mainstream and independent music movements over the past 40 years. It also happens to be one of the most criminally mispronounced names in the history of popular culture (correct pronunciation rhymes…
You’d think your own brother wouldn’t bust your watermelon. Produce-pulverizing comedian Gallagher didn’t have a problem with his younger brother, Ron, touring as a Gallagher impersonator, as long as Ron didn’t perform Gallagher’s signature move: smashing watermelons with a sledgehammer at the end of the show. But things got messy…
3/10-3/26 You know how it is: Your lover is a gay porn star, you’re the owner of a gay porno film company, and your lover wants to break into the “mainstream,” so you contribute $100,000 to the California Repertory Theatre so your lover can get the leading role in Christopher…
SAT 3/12 Muscle cars and band geeks don’t typically mesh — unless the former is running over the latter. But the Cruisin’ to the Tunes Car Show at Deer Valley High School, 18424 North 51st Avenue in Glendale, turns the odd pairing into the perfect duo for a day. The…
3/14-3/20 We may be saucy spectators at the FBR Open, but LPGA golfer and Phoenix resident Carin Koch says she’s never had any hecklers here. If she did, she says she would “probably tell them to go away or stop it.” Well, that beats a golf club to the head…
3/10-1/1 In the late 19th century, the U.S. government implemented a policy of assimilation to deal with what it termed the country’s “Indian problem.” The goal was nothing less than erasing all outward traces of Indian culture, and the means was forcibly removing Native American children from their homes and…
With the amount of breakables among the more than 185 booths at the Scottsdale Arts Festival this year — including jewelry, ceramic, drawing, glass, metal, mixed media, painting, photography, printmaking and sculpture — you’d be best off shopping with your eyes. But while you may not be able to touch…
Al Singer, one of the Valley’s most prominent jazz promoters, died on March 3. He was 77 years old. Singer’s passion for jazz started in the 1930s, when movie Westerns exposed him to the sounds of swing. For Singer, it was an early stimulus for jazz, and by the 1940s,…
FRI 3/4 Last fall, renowned African-American choreographer Alonzo King took up residence at the White Oak Plantation in Yulee, Florida, where Mikhail Baryshnikov’s Dance Studio hosts artists for the development of new works. Apparently, the stay did King some good. His San Francisco-based LINES Ballet, founded in 1982, shows off…
SAT 3/5 If your pooch’s flabby paunch is starting to rival your beer gut, it’s time to get that mutt some exercise. Take a hike with your canine companion on Saturday, March 5, when local no-kill animal organizations Paw Placement and For the Luv of Dogz, along with the Canine…
