October 31, 1977: Tonight was extremely strange. Janette and I went to the Sombrero Theater (which is way down on Seventh Street and Camelback, kind of a scary part of town) to see Phantom of the Paradise. Janette has seen Phantom 37 times! I've never known anyone who has seen...
Provided you somehow fight off a T-Day invasion by the extended family with the usual gourmet gorge-fest, relieving your ravenous relatives (not to mention snuffing out the usual psychodrama), you've still got yet another dilemma: They're clamoring for some post-gluttony goings-on. Forestall a potential family feud with a good old-fashioned...
Bedazzling in your Uncle Sam novelty hat and puffy-paint flag shirt, with nowhere to go? At least it's the Fourth of July this time -- and not your cousin's bat mitzvah. (Don't worry -- we've made the same mistake.) No need to waste your ingenious ensemble on homemade barbecues and...
10/15-10/17 The ladies are packing lightly for Have Tassels Will Travel, a play following the life of burlesque dancer Satan's Angel, The Devil's Mistress. The play, which runs from Friday, October 15, through Sunday, October 17, at The Trunk Space, 1506 Grand Avenue, features performances by several burlesque dancers and...
Lenny Aviles and his girlfriend Lulu Saldana slipped away from his mother's west Phoenix home on the early evening of June 23, 1999. The longtime couple wanted to shop at Sam's Club before Lulu went home to Rio Grande, Texas, the next day. Lenny stepped outside to tell his mother,...
Blink while you're walking down Mill Avenue and you'll probably miss the new Swell Records. Just doors down from Fatburger, with only printed paper to mark its place, the latest incarnation of Swell sits a block north from Swell Clothing. Enter and you'll see a post-industrial space with a few...
Used to be that when the triple digits rolled around, everyone raced indoors and stayed there 'til Halloween. Then, sometime in the mid-'80s, as legend has it, a Scottsdale dishwasher hosing down some scarcely used outdoor furniture on a blistering June afternoon noted that the spray from his nozzle had...
There's light pop music piped in through the ceiling speakers at Paradise Valley Mall, but Donny Lang never really hears it. "This particular mall has no music -- or it's so quiet and the ceiling's so high that I can never hear it," says Lang, 25, a part-time musician and...
Looking like a cross between Jet Li and the Hives' Howlin' Pelle Almqvist, pimped out like his bandmates in a regal purple tux and a Green Hornet-style black mask, and twisting and shaking as if Benny Hinn had just laid hands on him and filled him with the Spirit, Russell...
Although some would have you believe our local music scene is deader than Tony Randall, consider that two new bands have migrated here: Tramps and Thieves (from Detroit and Minneapolis) and After Any Accident (from Blacksburg, Virginia), an intense power trio that blends the smarty muso sound of math rock...
D.R. Wilke, with gray hair, wire-rimmed glasses and an ASU alumni tee shirt, and Paul Taylor, with short curly locks and a white Izod polo, grab a balcony table at the Gordon Biersch brewery nestled atop the Mill Avenue Starbucks and are quickly greeted by a young waiter clutching four...
What's Selling Top 10 sellers at Swell Records (414 South Mill Avenue, Suite 120, Tempe) for April 30 through May 6: 1. Richard Humpty Vission, Big Floor Funk (System Recordings) 2. DJ Dan Mixed Live Ruby Skye, San Francisco (Moonshine Music) 3. Cut Throat Logic Mixed Tape (self-released) 4. Atllas...
Fri 10/1 You can get yourself clean and enjoy a good meal, but art at the YMCA? Sure enough, on Friday, October 1, the Lincoln Family Downtown YMCA, 350 North First Avenue, hosts its own First Friday event. Its Teen Center Art Gallery showcases paintings and murals by inner-city teenagers...
5/13-6/25 Being the hard-core culture warriors we are, we've considered joining the annual pilgrimage of peculiars to Burning Man in Nevada. But roasting in 127 degrees at the late-August mecca of eccentricity is daunting. We're down with the bohemian spirit, but not a killer case of heatstroke. We're more than...
As you may have gleaned from perusing this space previously, I take a dim view of conventional wisdom and the morons who spout it. Al Pacino's character Ricky Roma in the screen version of Glenglarry Glen Ross sums up my P.O.V. when he states that he subscribes to the law...
Charles Banaszewski -- Chuck B., for the phonetically challenged -- is about to embark on his grandest theatrical production yet. But for now, on a Tuesday night at Casey Moore's pub in Tempe, Banaszewski is preparing for his role as empathetic bartender. Banaszewski, a buff and bespectacled 32-year-old upstate New...
He has been, for the past 10 years, the mayor of Tempe -- a man who, like the best politicians, has been both respected and reviled. Neil Giuliano is a man who built a town lake, a man who helped revitalize a sagging downtown, a man who was reelected three...
5/21-5/22 Think "sand drags" mean a keg at the river bottom and a coupla converted Beetles? Meet Richard Holmes, a man who hasn't forgotten his raisin' -- or his racin'. The boy who launched his buggy over the dunes now kicks up a desert storm this Friday, May 21, and...
We've even found a great Fourth of July party. Read on . . . First Friday Reacting to the touristification of downtown Phoenix, artists have long begged people to get downtown and support the art scene there. They need beg no more, as thousands of people flock downtown every first...
CLUBS ACME Roadhouse: In its original Scottsdale location, ACME catered to Harley-Davidson weekend warriors. In its new Tempe incarnation, it entertains the college set with dancing and, on Sundays, local rock bands. Dance space is at a minimum, but there's plenty of room for other social rites. Sun: Live music...
From rappelling to resort pooling to ice blocking, here's a guide to finding the key ingredient for summer survival: water. Slip Sliding Away: Ice blocking is a cheap thrill. All you need is a few friends, a towel, an ice block (available at most Circle Ks) and a hilly park...
THU 2 We have a right to be crabby. We were born on the last day of Cancer, as was David Spade, and he got all the looks, all the talent and all the good scripts. Thank the heavens we hold no responsibility for our own success. So says "professional...
