Metro Times Fall Arts Guide 092116 by Chava Communications

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Vol. 36 | Issue 50 | September 21-27, 2016

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Music............................................ 94 The return of the Magic Stick........ 94 Danny Brown’s almost homecoming................................. 98 Fred and Toody and the meaning of everything.............. 102 Livewire...................................... 108

Eat................................................ 82 Eat review: Detroit Grown & Made.......................................... 82 Bites.............................................. 86

Big Story

The Fall Arts Guide......................36 Free the Water............................. 36 Hinterlands Ensemble creates offbeat performance art.............. 40 Take Root uproots the norm....... 48 Detroit After Dark tells our city’s story though photos, architecture, music...................... 50 Biba Hustles Harder.................... 54 Ray Johnson’s Bob Boxes spill forth at CCS.................................. 56 Jim Crawford talks eggshells and big ideas................................ 60 Redford Theatre goes dark for the Noir Film Festival.................. 70 Bill Schwab takes us back to Where We Used to Live............... 76

What’s Going On........................ 30

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News & Views............................. 16 News Hits..................................... 16 Politics & Prejudices.................... 24

Project Editor - Michael Jackman Associate Editor - Alysa Offman Music Editor - Mike McGonigal Dining Editor - Serena Maria Daniels Contributing Editors - Larry Gabriel, Jack Lessenberry Copy Editor - Esther Gim Listings Editor - Jack Roskopp Editorial Interns - Selena Aguilera Photography Intern - Liv Martin Contributors - Taylor Bembery, Stephanie Brothers, Kahn Santori Davison, Aaron Egan, Cornelius Fortune, Cal Garrison, Curt Guyette, Charles L. Latimer, Noelle Lothamer, Jim McFarlin, Dan Savage, Jane Slaughter, Doug Coombe, Tanya Moutzalias, Dontae Rockymore, Brian Rozman, Steve Sergent, Sean Bieri, Rob Widdis, Adam Woodhead, Shelley Salant, Vaughn Gurganian, Mike Ferdinande, Mike Pfeiffer

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U p Front

In reply to last week’s cover story about Marvin Cotton, a reader named Denis Featherstone comments: This is a good story. I’m glad they are looking into his case. He’s a good man and he doesn’t deserve to be in there. There are too many other cases just like this one. He’s not the first and he damn sure won’t be the last. When will this stop? The “law” wants to take the easy way out instead of doing their jobs. How many more lives are they going to ruin before someone says enough is enough? One thing you can’t get back is time! Michael Jackman’s blog post about “Kid Rock, Colin Kaepernick, and the charmed life of Bob Ritchie” earned a lot of comments. For instance, Ed posted: Nice one, Jackman. The Detroit area still has a good track record for producing cool, quality artists, but it can’t help but fart out an occasional Nugent or Ritchie. It’s just gonna happen now and again. And TeacherPattiS commented: I don’t think I could love the Metro Times any more right now. In reply to Jack Lessenberry’s Politics & Prejudices column “Fighting to make it hard to vote,” nobsartist commented: These voting ID laws proposed by Republicans are funny because there are virtually no known cases of ID voting fraud committed by voters. By people running for office, yes, by people voting, no. The AWOL cokehead cheated his way into office and then duped millions of voters for eight years, many still clueless today. I voted for 40 years with only my voter registration card as ID. Today, when I am asked to show my ID, I simply demand to see their driver’s license

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and I hold up the line and make a scene until the person behind the table produces ID to prove who they are. Hypestyles commented: Absentee voting should be allowed nationwide. So many people are thrown by what shows up on the ballot when they arrive. Many people aren’t that well-versed in the down-ticket contests, knowing who is running, what their general background is, ideas, proposal details, etc. It would help a lot. And Just Sayin’ commented: Voting is a right, unlike an ID card, which is optional. No excuse is a good excuse when discussing U.S. citizens and their rights, if it will impede those rights. Michael Jackman’s blog “Is Troy the best city in Michigan for seniors?” also sparked some commentary. Allen commented: Troy has a very low property tax rate for homeowners, which is good from a fixed-income point of view. The property taxes for a comparable house in Farmington Hills are $1,500 a year more. The city library is an excellent resource. The city has some of the best roads in the state. There are many mega-churches (for getting a sense of community without having to get to know anybody). On the negative side you have to drive everywhere in this city and it is very pedestrian- and bicycleunfriendly. There is no downtown. (Somerset Mall is no downtown by any definition.) Politically, Troy is Tea Bag Central, with a former mayor who was a national disgrace — and anti-tax voters managed to close the library for a year.

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Weekend Warmup @ 3Fifty Terrace (D. Rockymore)

Armageddon Beach Party, DIY Fest @ downtown Ferndale (M. Pfeiffer)

Motor City Nightmares @ Novi Sheraton (M. Pfeiffer)

Michigan Burlesque Festival @ Tangent Gallery (M. Pfeiffer)

DIY Fest @ downtown Ferndale (M. Pfeiffer)

V Nightclub @ MGM Grand Detroit (D. Rockymore)

Michigan Burlesque Festival @ Tangent Gallery (M. Pfeiffer)

Elder Island premier @ Main Art Theatre (M. Pfeiffer)

Laith Al Saadi @ The Fillmore (Miss Shela)

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news hits

One year later, Flint’s water still unsafe to drink by Curt Guyette One year ago, on Sept. 15, 2015, a press conference was held on the lawn in front of Flint City Hall. Gathered before a small throng of reporters were members of Flint’s Coalition for Clean Water, scientists Marc Edwards and Siddhartha Roy of Virginia Tech, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan. Edwards and Roy were there to announce the results of a citizen-led study that had found lead levels in Flint’s water that were nearly double what the city and the state estimated. Members of the Coalition for Clean water — which included the Flint Democracy Defense League, Concerned Pastors for Social Action, CAUTION, Concerned Citizens, Water You Fighting For? and others — turned out in force to issue a number of demands, including a return to Detroit’s water system and the replacement of lead service lines. Meanwhile, the ACLU of Michigan announced the results of our own investigation — which found that the city and state could claim that Flint’s water met federal standards because the tests used to back those claims had been rigged in multiple ways to guarantee the results would skew low. As a result of these findings, we called for an independent outside investigation into way those tests were conducted. National media weren’t paying much heed that day. And those in power in Michigan had made their best efforts to keep the story from ever getting out. But the tragic tale of the Flint water crisis — wherein a cost-saving switch to the corrosive Flint River as the city’s mu-

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nicipal water source led to the leaching of lead into the water supply for nearly two years — eventually broke through and drew international attention. Because of the determined efforts of those standing in front of City Hall one year ago, the truth would not stay buried. Now, as we look back on the one-year anniversary of that gathering of media and activists, we’ve heard a lot of rhetoric and seen a lot of posturing in the months since. But the truth about what’s happened in Flint has emerged slowly, painstakingly and at the same glacial pace that change has arrived to Flint. Two months after that September 2015 press conference — and, after a string of adamant assurances from Gov. Rick Snyder’s administration that Flint’s water was safe — he finally conceded to the fact that river water untreated with corrosion control chemicals was causing the crisis. With the terrible reality of the crisis finally exposed, Snyder was forced to allow the city to return to the Detroit system. Replacement of service lines has begun. And numerous investigations have been launched. Snyder’s own task force laid much of the blame for the crisis on the state’s emergency manager law, which placed control of Flint entirely in the hands of a state appointee. That same task force also castigated the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality for expending its energy attacking the credibility of people proved to be telling the truth rather than doing its job of protecting the health and well-being of Flint’s residents. The U.S. Justice Department, the

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N ews criminal investigation unit of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Michigan Attorney General, and the Genesee County Prosecutor’s Office are all looking into what happened in Flint. So far eight state and one city employee have been charged with felonies, the result of an alleged conspiracy to cover up the fact that Flint’s 100,000 residents were needlessly exposed to a potent neurotoxin for 18 months and then falsely assured that the water was safe. More charges are likely to be filed. Numerous class-action lawsuits have also been launched. For instance, the ACLU of Michigan, along with the Natural Resources Defense Council, has filed a lawsuit calling for the courts to intervene in order to ensure the people of Flint are provided clean, safe water. On the day of the press conference, the ACLU of Michigan captured on-camera interviews with two of the key players in the crisis: Director of Public Works Howard Croft, who resigned soon afterward, and Utilities Director Mike Glasgow, who has pleaded no contest to charges brought against him and is now cooperating with law enforcement as the investigations continue. Those interviews can be seen in Thirst for Truth, a short documentary about the Flint water crisis the ACLU of Michigan released last year. Much has happened since that landmark gathering in front of Flint City Hall one year ago. The overarching problem, however, has not gone away: Flint’s water still remains out of compliance with federal safe drinking water standards. Despite returning to a regional system that draws water from Lake Huron, lead continues to be detected at unacceptable levels, forcing residents to either use bottled water or filters. The full truth about what happened in Flint is still finding its way to the light. The damage to infrastructure caused by using river water for 18 months was massive, with an equally massive amount of work to correct the problem still remaining. But slow as they may be to get to Flint, at least truth and change are emerging. Justice, however, has yet to be served. Curt Guyette is an investigative reporter for the ACLU of Michigan. Former 910 AM host says he was fired for backing Trump by Jennifer McDonell Conservative radio personality Wayne Bradley says he was fired from his selftitled radio show on 910 AM due to his support of Republican presidential

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news hits nominee Donald Trump. Bradley linked to an American Mirror post titled “Detroit: Black Trump supporter pulled from radio show gig” in a Facebook post on Friday. In the article, Bradley says he was put on hiatus ever since Trump visited Detroit and gave a speech at the Detroit Economic Club in August. In the description for his show, Bradley says he brings an urban conservative standpoint to his topics, and takes part in community dialogue that touches on both sides of the aisle. His tweets feature a lot of commentary on the upcoming election, including articles and memes touching on both Trump and Clinton. Bradley is the state director of African-American engagement for the Republican National Committee. The station’s owner, Kevin Adell, denied in an interview with The Detroit News that Bradley was fired because of his political leanings, and says Bradley was in fact hired for his controversial views. “When I hired Wayne, I knew his political views, I knew he was for Trump, it had nothing to do with that,” Adell said. “He violated corporate policy, that’s why he got fired. He was let go for insubordination.” Adell didn’t disclose to the News which corporate policy he was referring to. Bradley said on Facebook he will return to radio. “Though I am disappointed the show will end on that station, we will back. At least now there is clarification,” Bradley wrote. “Thank you to 910 AM Superstation for the opportunity. I will keep you updated on the next Wayne Bradley Show.” Southfield-based 910 AM launched a talk format geared toward AfricanAmerican listeners earlier this year and counts former Michigan Chronicle editor Bankole Thompson, former city attorney Krystal Crittendon, and former City of Detroit spokespeople Karen Dumas and Cliff Russell among its on-air talent. The station has also drawn attention with the addition of former public servants to its roster whose careers ended in disgrace, including former state representatives Cindy Gamrat and Todd Courser, ex-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s Chief of Staff Christine Beatty, and former Wayne County Circuit Judge Wade H. McRee.

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N ews

politics&prejudices

Detroit: Could it have been different? by Jack Lessenberry

I like to think that a lot of what we were forced to do we might have been able to gradually negotiate before the unfortunate circumstance of the bankruptcy. But we’ll never know. — Former Deputy Mayor Freman Hendrix

As most everyone knows, this year we face an election likely to be one of the most important in our history. Eleven years ago, Detroit had a mayoral election that was in many ways, very similar. Voters had a choice between a candidate who was skilled, proven, and competent — and a self-indulgent, utterly fascinating, criminal clown. And Detroit voters totally blew it. The parallels aren’t exact, but are uncanny, and there may be a lesson here for all of us. As I write this, a racist and sexist candidate who is profoundly — and proudly — ignorant about how government works is running almost even in the polls. This, even though he cheerfully lies with abandon, and appears to be a poster boy for narcissistic personality disorder. If anything, the choice was even clearer in Detroit in 2005, except for the fact that mayors don’t have nuclear missiles. Eleven years may not appear to be a long time. But think back, if you can, to what Detroit was like just a decade ago. Young hipsters were not flocking to Midtown. The streetlights were mostly off, and the city had no plans to get them back on. In fact, city workers told me they didn’t think there was any way to make the deteriorating, ancient equipment work. Detroit’s budget deficit was out of control. Most news was being made by the steadily growing excesses of Kwame Kilpatrick, the so-called “hip-hop mayor,” who, it was by then clear, regarded the city as his own personal candy store, piggy bank, and escort service. The residents knew how dreadful it was; they were voting with their feet. This wasn’t white flight; except for a few hardy or maybe foolhardy types, most of them had left years before. This was the departure of the black

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middle class. Detroit lost an astonishing average of 24,000 people a year throughout the decade. Most were smart to leave. Nobody knew yet about the extent of Kilpatrick’s corruption, but enough of it was known that voters should have known better. He’d already been caught leasing a Lincoln Navigator for his wife at city expense and lying about it. There was enough other evidence of his inappropriate lifestyle and flawed government to throw him out, and plenty of hints that much worse was to come. Early on, it seemed as if the voters would dump the Kwamster. Freman Hendrix, then 55, was exactly the type of mayor the city needed. He’d spent his career working for the city and the county, mainly on financial affairs. He was smart and tough when he needed to be; he had been the behindthe-scenes guy who put together the coalition to get taxpayers to support the building of Comerica Park. He then spent eight years as Dennis Archer’s chief of staff, and learned the city budgeting, inside and out. Additionally, he was a classy human

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being, devoted to his wife, Elaine Lewis, an executive with the Detroit Tigers, and their two teenage kids. His not-so-secret passion wasn’t high living and text messaging thugs, but Little League baseball; specifically, the Rosedale/Grandmont Red Sox. Hendrix beat hip-hop, 45 percent to 34 percent, in the September primary. Kilpatrick looked like a goner. But Kilpatrick was a more spellbinding speaker. There was a whispering campaign that said Hendrix wasn’t “black enough,” because his mother had been a European war bride. The corporate tycoons largely wanted Kilpatrick too; they didn’t live in Detroit; knew he was for sale, and felt he would do their bidding. On Election Night, in a stunning upset, he won. Hendrix conceded gracefully, and largely disappeared from view. Detroiters had made a terrible mistake. They paid for it soon enough, becoming a national laughingstock and financial basket case. Scandal was followed by resignation, trials, emergency management, and bankruptcy. Today, however, Detroit has emerged from all that. The city is once again on its feet and solvent. To the shock of the socalled experts, black Detroiters elected an energetic, can-do white mayor who indeed did get the lights back on. Nobody thinks much these days about federal inmate 44678-039, now in Oklahoma, who will be rotting in a cell until at least August 2037. Freman Hendrix isn’t often in the news either — but he is still out there doing good. He was a key member of the city charter revision commission. He took one last shot at being mayor, but lost a close, three-way race to Dave Bing in 2009. Today, he is anything but bitter; now almost 66, he looks closer to 55. The intervening years have been as good to Hendrix as they’ve been bad for Kilpatrick. Hendrix made enough in the private sector after government service that he no longer has to work full time. But he still does what he can for the city. Currently, he’s Detroit’s only representative on the new Regional Transit Authority, and one of two on the Great Lakes Water Authority. He didn’t support Mike Duggan for mayor; nothing personal, but he felt that backing a white mayor would be “an admission African-Americans can’t govern” the city. But after Duggan won, he asked Hendrix to serve on those vitally important boards. I wonder what Hendrix thought would

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have happened if he had won in 2005. The fact is that all Kwame’s corruption accounted for just a tiny fraction of the city’s massive debt. Had Hendrix won, there would not have been the searing scandals. But the deep problems were still there. Before that election, Joe Harris, the city’s independent auditor for a decade, told me it didn’t matter much who won; disaster and emergency management was on its way. “You’re right. It was inevitable,” Hendrix finally told me. “I like to think if I’d been there, a lot of what we were later forced to do we might have been able to do.” But he doesn’t really know. Or maybe, just maybe, it took the Kilpatrick scandals and a city council with creatures like Charles Pugh to shock Detroiters into deciding to be grown-ups. What Hendrix does know is this: His daughter Erin, a young attorney, recently took a $200,000 pay cut and left a Chicago law firm to come back to Detroit. “Will the city make it? How could it not make it?” he said. What I hope is that Duggan keeps putting Hendrix to work, or that the woman whose coordinated Detroit campaign he’s now heading gives him a job next year. Her name is Hillary Clinton. Bill Schuette, statesman Last week I talked about Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette’s latest move to waste taxpayer dollars by asking the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene and reinstate Michigan’s ban on straightticket voting. Any beginning law student knew this would never get anywhere; the nation’s highest court generally only intervenes when you have conflicting decisions from the lower courts, and twice the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had upheld Judge Gershwin Drain’s finding that this law was unconstitutional. Sure enough, the U.S. Supreme Court promptly gave the back of its hand to Schuette as well. But Schuette rose to the occasion. “Now the Supreme Court has spoken, and I will respect that decision,” his statement intoned. That’s pretty gracious of him — especially since he had no other choice if he didn’t want to secede from the union; the Supremes are the highest authority there is. Can’t you just imagine Schuette as governor?

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what’sgoingon

Art | Dance | Comedy | Eat | Theater

Friday, 9/23 Body Rhythm Dance: Black Bottom Paradise

n Body Rhythm Dance: Black Bottom Paradise. Courtesy photo.

@ Music Hall

The Body Rhythm Dance Theater, based out of Southfield, is presenting their show Black Bottom Paradise, funded by the John S. and James L. Knight FoundationKnight Arts Challenge grant. The musical, which is based on the famous Paradise Valley hub in Detroit, focuses on a family trying to make it in the Motor City during the peak years of the Valley, the 1920s through the 1950s.

Showtimes at 11 a.m. and 8 p.m.; 350 Madison St., Detroit; bodyrhythmdancetheater. com; Admission is $25-$55.

Thursday, 9/22

Friday, 9/23

Liberty’s Secret World Premier

Detroit Afrikan Funkestra

Jim Jeffries

@ Michigan Theater

@ Oakland Urban Farm

This 100 percent all-American musical is hitting the road this fall and it is starting off in its birthplace, Ann Arbor. The Michigan Theater will be premiering this film, written and directed by University of Michigan art and music school professor Andy Kirshner. The musical focuses on two girls falling in love on the campaign trail of a family values candidate. This exuberant, colorful musical will certainly be entertaining, especially since election fever is in the air.

Part of the 2016 Detroit Design Festival, the Detroit Afrikan Music Institution presents the Funkestra. It will delve into the musical world of Afrofuturists and musical innovators. DAMI is located in Detroit’s North End, and is known for its ultra-shiny space-ship DJ booth, the Mothership. Which really sums up what these guys are about, bridging the gap between traditional African music and the emerging artists of today.

Starts at 8 p.m.; 603 E. Liberty St., Ann Arbor; michtheater.org; Admission runs from $8-$10.

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Event runs from 6-9 p.m.; 9227 Goodwin St., Detroit; damidetroit.org; Admission is free.

@ Cathedral Theatre, Masonic Temple

“Freedumb isn’t free” says controversial Australian comedian, Jim Jefferies. He recently made big news for his all-tooaccurate description of why Trump is just so terrifying a prospect; Jefferies points out that there is no better way to radicalize people than pointing out their exclusion from the majority. Whether it be comparing Donald Trump running for president of the United States to a kid running for class president, or shooting holes in the Second Amendment, Jefferies is spot on about U.S. politics in a way our presidential nominees could only aspire to be.

Starts at 6:30 p.m.; 500 Temple St., Detroit; themasonic.com; Admission runs from $39.50-$45.50.

Art | Dance | Comedy | Eat | Theater

n Hour’s Detroit’s Best Dressed Party. Photo by Andrea Stinson Oliver.

UpFront

what’sgoingon

News | Feature | What’s Going On | Eat | Drink

Thursday, 9/29

Hour’s Best Dressed @ The Fillmore

Fri-Sun, 9/23-25

SATURday, 9/24

Sunday, 9/25

Funky Ferndale Art Fair

Fleatroit Junk City

Wicked Finds at The Vintage Market

@ UFO Factory

@ Downtown Ferndale

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Culture

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Runs from 10 a.m.- 5 p.m.; 3775 Custer Rd., Monroe; thevintagemarketmi.com; Admission is free.

Arts

Event runs Sept. 23 from 3-7 p.m., Sept. 24 from 10 a.m.-7 p.m., Sept. 25 from 11 a.m.- 6 p.m.; funkyferndaleartfair.com; Nine Mile and Woodward, Ferndale; Admission is free.

11 a.m. to 4 p.m.; 2110 Trumbull St., Detroit; ufofactory.com; Admission is free.

The barn house chic look is an acquired taste, but it certainly has a huge following of decorators and collectors alike. If you are looking for a unique marketplace experience, Wicked Finds will have a variety of shabby chic tables, twinewrapped doo-dads and even stuff like flowers in a vintage thermajug container. If you are looking to scratch your shopping itch this weekend, this could be an interesting opportunity to do so.

If you are into ironic collages, iron jewelry, and cute stuffed animal owls, you might find yourself drawn to attending the Funky Ferndale Art Fair this Saturday. Thinking about getting a cool accessory to kick off your Halloween costume? They have some fancy, feathered witch hats. Maybe you wanted to get your boyfriend an awesome steampunk lamp for his birthday. If it is carnival food, shopping, and hanging in Ferndale you’re after — look no further than Nine Mile and Woodward.

@ Monroe County Fairgrounds

While enjoying the fabulous hot dogs at Laika Dog in the UFO Factory, you can also enjoy some serious fall shopping. The fall season is upon us, and so is the Fleatroit Junk City event, fall edition. Doodads, whatnots, whathaveyous, and sweaters will be available to peruse and purchase at this flea market extravaganza.

Watch

Event runs 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.; 2115 Woodward Ave., Detroit; 248-691-1800; Tickets are sold out.

Music

The quintessential fashion event for Detroiters, “Best Dressed” only comes along once a year, and it is an opportunity to see Detroit-style garb in a whole new way. This year, it is being held at the historic Fillmore theater in downtown Detroit, and guests can enjoy a mix of cocktails and treats before seeing a Neiman Marcus fashion show. Cash bar and after-party at the Whitney.

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F EATURE

feature

n Antonio Cosme, left, and William “Dale” Lucka. Courtesy photo.

Graffiti in the political theater As the city zeroes in on graffiti, two Detroit artists face possible prison time by Aaron Robertson When Antonio Cosme and William Lucka were arrested on Nov. 3, 2014, for allegedly painting “Free the Water” on a water tower in Detroit, few people would’ve guessed they wouldn’t be formally charged until 16 months later. On March 15, Cosme and Lucka were charged with the malicious destruction of property and trespass upon a key facility — both felonies. Their trial begins next month, and, if convicted, they face up to four years in prison, along with thousands of dollars in fines.

Lucka, 22, and Cosme, 27, are part of the Raiz Up, a hip-hop collective based in Southwest Detroit that pursues community-building through art, education, and direct action. They have vocally protested the Detroit water shutoffs and the injustices in Flint. Cosme and Lucka are immersed in a network that includes artists from the ONE Mile Project, activists from Black Lives Matter, the People’s Water Board, the Detroit Eviction Defense, and more. The wall of support that has formed

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around them since their arrest continues to grow. Led by members of the Raiz Up and the Detroit Eviction Defense, the Community Defense Committee started a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for the artists’ legal fees. Lucka has largely avoided talking to the media. Cosme, who agreed to speak to MT, was surprised by the amount of help they’ve received. “We’ve packed a courthouse, we’ve had fundraisers, we’ve gotten a lot of money online,” he says. “There are

people who want us to come speak at different events. I’ll be going to Austria to speak at the University of Applied Arts Vienna … There has been a lot of really amazing support that we’ve gotten in this short amount of time.” Cosme describes their case as “political theater.” “There are all these rape kits that go untested in the city of Detroit, yet there’s money to chase graffiti artists,” he says. Cosme’s view of political theater is fundamental to what he calls “the new urbanism movement.”

F He sees similarities among cities like Detroit, New Orleans, Washington D.C., and Baltimore. “They wouldn’t invest in Detroit and fix it up until black people lost control of it … Detroit was starved for capital very intentionally.” The fall of Kwame Kilpatrick, Cosme believes, was the climax of a political drama meant to highlight the failure of the black electorate and the black political body as a whole. It signaled victory for people like Mayor Mike Duggan and Dan Gilbert, who Cosme situates at the forefront of a kind of neo-colonial “takeover” of the city. “The consent agreement and the emergency manager is like a structural adjustment agreement,” Cosme says. “They want to privatize resources and take away sovereignty from the citizens.” Robert Mullen, the artists’ defense attorney, says the case of Cosme and Lucka is about more than just graffiti. “This is not about justice,” he says. “I’m not saying that tagging property that you don’t own isn’t criminal in some sense, but this water tower case is not about crime; it’s about politics.” Cosme and Lucka were charged with “specific-intent” crimes, meaning the prosecution must prove intent beyond a reasonable doubt. Mullen argues the prosecution will also be responsible for proving that they did not violate the defendants’ constitutional right to a speedy trial. One of the more interesting aspects of the case involves the water tower itself. The tower in question is located in Detroit, at 13512 Dequindre, but owned by Highland Park. The tower had been a part of Highland Park’s municipal water treatment system, but as a Detroit News article indicates, this system went offline about two years before the artists’ arrests, when Highland Park switched to the city of Detroit’s water system. The switch, Mullen notes, was intended to be temporary, but remained in effect as of September 2015, nearly one year after the arrests. During the trial, a number of questions will need to be addressed: Could the water tower be considered a working “reservoir” or “structure for the purpose of conveying water” at the time of defacement? If it was inactive, could it even be called a “key facility”? Did the artists injure the water tower “beyond repair”? That this last question can even be asked reflects a particular view of what

feature graffiti is capable of. In this instance, one might sensibly argue that the graffiti is a cosmetic concern, not an internal one. Even if the water tower were active at the time of the incident, the markings wouldn’t have disrupted any interior mechanism. When did defacement become synonymous with destruction, and why? Part of the answer may lie in how municipal governments understand and respond to the notion of blight. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, “blight” is a word first introduced in 17th-century literature and, although its origin isn’t certain, it may have been used by farmers or gardeners. Blight was defined as “any baleful influence of atmospheric or invisible origin, that suddenly blasts, nips, or destroys plants, affects them with disease, arrests their growth, or prevents their blossom from ‘setting.’” In contemporary usage, blight indicates any harmful influence that “withers hopes or prospects, or checks prosperity.” When the city of Detroit announced its plan of adjustment to exit bankruptcy in late 2014, blight became an important talking point. City of Detroit Corporation Counsel Melvin Hollowell tells MT that a court mandate called for “the eradication of blight and improving the overall quality of life for our neighborhoods.” Mayor Mike Duggan notably created a graffiti task force — a collaboration between Detroit administrators, prosecutors, and police forces — to make that happen. Since 2014, there have been dozens of successful prosecutions against graffiti artists, and thousands of unauthorized tags have been removed from properties. Last year, the high-profile felony case against artist Shepard Fairey, who was accused of leaving unauthorized work on several buildings, was dismissed by a Wayne County Circuit judge. Fairey was commissioned by Gilbert’s Bedrock Real Estate Services to create an 18-story mural on the side of One Campus Martius. “In the past,” Hollowell says, “blight was not contested. It takes on a number of areas in my office. For example, we will file and have filed cases on commercial blight, and that is when you have individual property owners who have kept their commercial properties in poor, deteriorating, and often dangerous conditions … The second part deals with graffiti and other kinds of blight

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feature

Ironically, the political significance of the tag Cosme and Lucka are accused of painting has been erased by the blindness of zero tolerance. cases, and these are cases that did not get prosecuted before. The task force put together a more coherent approach.” The city’s website explains that, if a property is found with graffiti on it, city inspectors will issue a notice to the manager or owner, who then must remove the graffiti within seven days. Those who fail to comply must pay a first offense fine of $130, and if the city ultimately removes the graffiti, an additional $200 cleaning fee must be paid. The rigid enforcement of antigraffiti law is not unique to Detroit. A study by professors at Portland State University entitled “Zero graffiti for a beautiful city: The cultural politics of urban space in San Francisco” revealed that municipalities in the United States spent an estimated $12 billion annually to get rid of graffiti circa 2009. In San Francisco alone, over $26 million in taxpayer money is used to support these initiatives every year. This amount doesn’t include private expenses or legal costs for prosecuting graffiti-related crimes. Zero-tolerance policies against blight were notorious in New York City in the ’80s, when the controversial “broken windows” theory was introduced. The theory states that the appearance of neglect encourages the spread of criminal activity. Minor crimes like vandalism may eventually lead to more destructive crimes like arson. And so it is best to stop the minor criminals in their tracks, at all costs. The ideology behind zero-tolerance elevates offensive or annoying crimes to grave ones. It interprets physical “disorder” as symptomatic of a disease whose hosts must be regulated and quarantined. When graffiti becomes a sickness that threatens the “quality of life,” official policies against it seem soothing and apolitical. Property owners are happy to aid the city in their efforts while the gradual dissolution of public and private space goes mostly unquestioned. Why is a city fresh out of bankruptcy

38 September 21-27, 2016 | | metrotimes.com metrotimes.com

paying its lawyers to prosecute two young artists who, according to their attorney, have no previous criminal records, who are accused of felonies and not misdemeanors, and possibly send them to prison for years? “We’ve entered into a memorandum of understanding with the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office to handle charges under state law,” Hollowell says. A significant amount of resources has been dedicated to cases related to graffiti and other crimes, including nine prosecutors at the 36th District Court led by the city’s Chief of Criminal Enforcement and Quality of Life Doug Baker and Deputy Chief Megan Moslimani. Ironically, the political significance of the tag Cosme and Lucka are accused of painting has been erased by the blindness of zero tolerance. While the city of Detroit prepares to prosecute the artists, the artists themselves have other things in mind. One of Cosme’s goals is to help Lucka launch his art career. He is also attending an organic farm school in Lansing so he can start a farm of his own next to his parents’ old home, which was foreclosed in 2009. Cosme says this is a moment not only to resist, but to generate. “We can spend all our time resisting the crazy bullshit that’s just gonna happen anyways,” he says, “or we can start to educate our community and build in our community, create more conscious people who will have a chance of upending the existing paradigm later. It’s just a change in strategy, in many ways.” The artists’ trial is set to begin on Oct. 24 in Wayne County Circuit Court. Aaron Robertson is a Detroit native and former Metro Times intern. He studies Italian literature as a senior at Princeton University, where he is editorin-chief of The Nassau Literary Review.

letters@metrotimes.com @metrotimes

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| September 21-27, 2016

F EATURE

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n Scene from “The Radicalization Process.” Courtesy photo.

Crowded house

The Hinterlands Ensemble may have created the oddest, most offbeat theatrical experience in Detroit by Michael Jackman

The Hinterlands Ensemble is anything but a typical theatrical group. This “performance company” is composed of Dave Sanders, Liza Bielby, and Richard Newman, and they bring to bear their various backgrounds in theater, dance, music, and other media. The material they stage is bizarre, dark, and quite funny. In the six years they’ve performed in Detroit, they’ve tried to push performance into uncharted territory, hence the group’s name, which ensemble member Bielby says implies the idea of a place just off the map. The show they performed this spring, and which they’re bringing back for the fall, is one that’s way off the charts. It takes place in an “art house” in the Banglatown neighborhood just north of Hamtramck, where several residences have been converted into offbeat artworks and living spaces. As if that weren’t already odd enough, they’ve taken a hodgepodge of 1960s radical politics, Greek drama, performance art, and convention-busting theater and created something truly out-there. In fact, the publicity for this show, contained in a press release, is by turns academic and self-lampooning, with references to “socialist pageantry” and gleeful obtuseness. It’s enough to leave you laughing and scratching your head

at the same time. There’s obviously a lot going on here. Their play is called The Radicalization Process, and it will invite small audiences into the house for a 90-minute experience intended to transport viewers outside the literal, rational world into a heady exploration of what it means to defy authority. After the doors open, audiences will be guided into a basement “archive,” were more than a dozen boxes of research will help prepare them for the play. “We just tell people the piece starts in the basement,” Bielby says. “That’s where you can go through the archives. There are 22 boxes of archived material. The idea isn’t to go through all the boxes, although somebody tried!” The boxes contain radical history, materials on method acting, and information about the play Antigone. Then the group will be led upstairs to watch a very physical piece of performance hung on the frame of that ancient play. It may be the only play we’ve heard of preceded by a research period. As those familiar with the play by Sophocles know, the drama hinges on King Creon’s wartime edict that corpse of the dead warrior Polynices remain unburied on the battlefield, and Antigone’s violation of that decree when she buries her brother’s body, for which she is buried alive. The themes of war and defiance of

40 September 21-27, 2016 | metrotimes.com

the state made Antigone a popular play after World War II. Brecht’s version was explicitly antiwar, and Puerto Rican playwright Luis Rafael Sanchez cast Creon as a Latin American dictator. The play was especially popular during the Vietnam War, when the Living Theatre, an anarchist theater collective, staged its famous adaptation in 1968. And then that play gets pulled into a somewhat new shape via the Hinterlands’ collaborative process. Bielby describes the ensemble’s pieces as centered around asking questions as opposed to driving home messages. In this case, the questions concerned the radicalization process. “We wanted to ask, ‘How far are we willing to go for our beliefs? And is that far enough?’” The group has performed the piece elsewhere in theaters and on stages, but it’s perhaps best appreciated when seen at the Play House. That’s because the trio actually helped transform the house, and came up with ideas for the play while doing so. “In a way, the play has become this love letter to that house,” Bielby says. “There are things that happened while we were renovating that came into the piece. We’ve done the play in theater spaces, but in a way it is really connected to that house.” The play, of course, is challenging work, but it’s designed to be funny as well as

thought-provoking; for some people, it will no doubt be bewildering. But that’s not a problem, as this group of radicals hopes to disrupt the status quo. Bielby tells us, “When you’re disrupted, you get disoriented. But if you lose your way, paths open up and new ways of thinking can be tried out.” “We try to create a new language,” she says, “to develop a language through the piece, and the sum of that language when put together at the end allows you to see something.” Despite the challenging nature of the show, Biebly says a surprisingly wide swath of people come to see it. Some, no doubt, appreciate the challenge the work presents, whereas others just enjoy the intimacy, the intensity, the dancing, and the joy. “Some of it was we just wanted to liberate ourselves,” Bielby says. As a boundary-pushing artist trying to ask questions about activism, she says some of the piece is a response to the current political climate: “It’s really hard times right now. Things are dark. But also hilarious and insane, the way we’re behaving as Americans right now. It’s hard, weird times.” Perhaps that best explains why this show is often so strange, from the unusual lighting design to Richard Newman’s sound design, which includes him playing live onstage on analog synthesizers and tuned glasses, along with sound loops and even turntables. But the Hinterlands Ensemble didn’t create this oddity alone. They had help with set design by Shoshanna Utchenik, writer and poet Casey Rocheteau helped with archives, and graphic designer Ben Gaydos helped prepare the actual print journal that figures in at the end of the piece. It’s something the group is proud enough of to offer a reprise of. When they were doing the show earlier this year, they attended a reading at MOCAD by poet Anne Carson, who Bielby says “did one of the best adaptations of Antigone.” The group invited Carson to see the piece, and she did. “When she walked out,” Bielby tells us, “she said, ‘That was very crazy.’” Bielby adds: “I take that as a compliment.” The Radicalization Process is performed at 8 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays and at 2 p.m. Sundays from Friday, Sept. 23 until Saturday, Oct. 1, at 12657 Moran St., Detroit; tickets are on a sliding scale from $10 to $30; for reservations call 313-454-1756 or email info@thehinterlandsensemble.org. Seating is limited.

mjackman@metrotimes.com @michaeljackman

metrotimes.com

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find it here

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taste

metrotimes.com

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F EATURE

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n The Take Root dance company in performance. Courtesy photo.

Uprooting the norm

Take Root Dance Company finds inspiration in unconventional places by Jack Roskopp We tend to have a one-sided perception when it comes to dance and dancers: We think the art is created in one space and then immediately transferred to the stage, the space where most dancers perform their art. While other mediums of art can be transported into various locations, the performing arts tend to be associated with a stage, lights, sound, and watching from your chair in the audience. Performing on a stage with all the bells and whistles is exhilarating and fantastic, but becoming a true artist means that you can be adaptable to any situation. A dance company that made its way out of Oakland University’s dance department, Take Root, is challenging the norms of what it means to be performers and how one performs in a space. We spoke to Ali Woerner, who cofounded and co-directs the company, along with her dance partner Thayer Jonutz, about what Take Root is about, dance’s impact on the art world of Detroit, and their upcoming performance at the Red Bull House of Art on Oct. 1. “We started [dancing together] about eight years ago, and Thayer Jonutz and

I knew each other from grad school. We both loved partnering so we just gravitated toward each other,” Woerner says. The dance company’s beginnings can be traced back to when Jonutz and Woerner began performing together, but it took a little while before things became official. “People started asking us to perform together and we always said ‘yes’ to everything. I had my own dance company and he had his at the time, and we thought this would be kind of cool to just do this together,” Woerner says. “Our first concert together was called ‘Take Root,’ and we just continued on from there.” That was back in 2013. Take Root has evolved since then into a company of six dancers, plus a music director/composer who plays live music at every show, and they’re about to perform for the fourth time at the Red Bull House of Art in Eastern Market. If you’re familiar with the Red Bull House of Art, it is normally not known for hosting dance concerts. The space is mostly used to showcase hanging art to the masses, but Woerner and her team

48 September 21-27, 2016 | metrotimes.com

love the challenge of setting up shop in an art gallery opposed to an auditorium. “We have nothing against going to a theater and watching a show,” Woerner says with a chuckle. “I love going to theaters as much as the next person, but we really want to create an experience, and we think that it’s possible when you do that in an alternative space.” The company has drawn inspiration from performing at the Detroit Institute of Arts and rooftop spaces in the city. “The audience is very immersed with art when they come to these shows,” Woerner says. “You’re surrounded by actual art and then you’re watching live art being performed. We like that it brings attention to our company, but also deserving attention to the Red Bull House of Art because they are so great. It’s turned into this annual event now and we love it.” Since Take Root is allowed to break the fourth wall, they have a unique opportunity to engage with the audience at the performance space and in the community. “We’re really passionate about bringing dance to people who normally don’t dance with outreach,”

Woerner says. “We’ll go into schools where the arts are not funded, and we’ll do outreach with dance and music along with our music director Jon Anderson, who teaches composition and music theory at Wayne State.” In addition to outreach at schools, Take Root hosts a free dance class once a month at Oakland University for people with Parkinson’s disease. Woerner only hopes the company can continue to grow and create while the city of Detroit is growing too. “We have an amazing opportunity as artists to showcase Detroit and all that it has to offer for people who want to consume art.” Take Root’s season-opening concert is Saturday, Oct. 1 at the Red Bull House of Art, 1551 Winder St. in Detroit. A VIP reception starts at 6:30 p.m. followed by a live performance at 7:30 p.m. that is open to public. General admission tickets are $35, student tickets are $20, and VIP tickets are $100. Visit takerootdance.com for more information.

jroskopp@metrotimes.com @jackroskopp

metrotimes.com

| September 21-27, 2016

F EATURE

feature

City of night

Photo exhibit tells Detroit’s story through music, architecture

n “Jack White, The White Stripes, Gold Dollar, 3129 Cass Ave, Detroit, November 27, 1999” by Doug Coombe. Photo courtesy of the Detroit Institute of Arts.

by Aidan Wayne

n “Gotham, Detroit” by Jon DeBoer. Photo courtesy of the Detroit Institute of Arts.

Detroit After Dark, an exhibit coming to the Detroit Institute of Arts on Friday, Oct. 21 and on view until April 23, 2017, showcases the wonders of Detroit with nightlife photography that includes everything from pictures of musicians to the varied venues they played — no matter how large or small. Pictures of concert halls stand side-byside with others of bars and clubs. There are also photographs that showcase some of the changes that have come to Detroit in the form of gentrification, that may well affect the future of some of the places that have otherwise withstood the test of time, as well as architectural studies of the city. The exhibit also includes a small gallery featuring photographs of Paris and New York, a way to further showcase Detroit’s place in the history and evolution of night photography and nightlife. The idea for the exhibit originally came from DIA curator of photography Nancy Barr. “I had done a lot of work by Detroitbased photographers, and there seemed to be some work coming out that was related to night photography and subjects on nightlife,” she says. Barr was also influenced by HungarianFrench photographer Brassaï. Working in the 1930s, Brassaï was one of the first to make in-depth night photography of Paris. Barr says she wanted an exhibit of how photography narratives had influenced surrounding cities and urban photography, and bring it into the current Detroit artistic practice. The exhibition expanded to a section on music, architectural studies, and graffiti, all representing the city of Detroit. Jenny Risher, one of the photographers featured in the exhibit, completed a series on Detroit before with Heart Soul Detroit, a photobook featuring the city. “It was during the time where there was a lot of negative

press on Detroit,” Risher says, “So I wanted to interview all these famous people on Detroit and their experiences and how great it was ... in doing the research of the book, I came to learn a lot about the hip-hop community in Detroit.” Risher felt the hip-hop community in Detroit wasn’t receiving the visual attention that rock ‘n’ roll or Motown was, and so she wanted to create a photo series of that scene. In doing so, she worked closely with Barr, selecting artists and taking those subjects around Detroit to highlight the landmarks around the city. And why night photography? “Night photography is really great, because you can really focus on the person and the personality of the person in the portrait,” Risher says. “You only have your light source or whatever it is you’re highlighting on the person. It’s more technical in the sense that you really have to adjust your lights properly, your ambient, your exposure, your aperture — all of those things must be perfectly tuned in. And you’re also enlarging your photographs, so they have to be perfect; you’re going to see any imperfection, any outstanding grain or noise.” In short, night photography requires a higher level of concentration, Risher says — but that’s the beauty of it. Four of Risher’s pieces are now part of the DIA’s permanent archives and will be featured in Detroit After Dark. One such image was photographed in the Eastern Market, and features Nick Speed and Seven the General. “For that one, I really wanted to incorporate graffiti. Graffiti is one of the elements of hip-hop, and I really wanted to incorporate that element in a photograph.” The keyboard Speed holds in the photograph was given to him by 50 Cent. Doug Coombe, another photographer

50 September 21-27, 2016 | metrotimes.com

n “Nick Speed and Seven the General” by Jenny Risher. Photo courtesy of the Detroit Institute of Arts. featured in the exhibit, got his start by taking a camera to shows to document bands he thought were underappreciated. “Greg Baise introduced me to then-Metro Times music editor Chris Handyside, which led to me photographing the first Blowout, which Chris and Brian Boyle organized. It was literally at the event I realized what an amazing and diverse music scene Detroit has. I ended up photographing every Blowout since.” Coombe photographs a lot of concerts, but has the most fun photographing “an amazing band in a small club. There’s a lot more intimacy and a lot more interaction between the artist and the fans. I love to document that interaction as well — not just the musicians,” he says. Other photographers featured in Detroit After Dark include Russ Marshall, Scott Hocking, and Jon DeBoer. Marshall’s photographs feature architectural studies, street scenes, and labor centering around

the night shift, as well as Baker’s Keyboard Lounge. Hocking is an installation-based artist and photographer, and focuses on pictures of empty streets and images of Detroit at night — a somewhat surrealistic, otherworldly vision of the city. DeBoer loves atmospheric shots: fog, snow, rain, and mist. He’s one of the few black-and whitephotographers in the show. Barr says Detroit After Dark is important because it shows a mysterious, romantic side of Detroit, while also telling different stories about the city, from jazz legends to hip-hop to famous rock ‘n’ roll personalities. “I think the exhibition just scratches the tip of the iceberg regarding Detroit photography,” Barr says. “There are so many photographers working, and it’s just the jumping-off point for photography and conversations about Detroit.”

letters@metrotimes.com @metrotimes

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| September 21-27, 2016

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metrotimes.com

| September 21-27, 2016

F EATURE

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n Jordan Holland and Biba Bell. Photo by Noah Elliott Morrison.

Biba hustles harder Local dancer examines the art of the hustle by Alysa Offman The last time we spoke with Biba Bell, she was working on a project that interlaced dance and architecture — talk about high concept art. Before that, she and her dance trio had spent time performing in avant garde spaces like backyards, alleys, and even the packing shed of a farm. In short, when we talk about a dancer like Bell, we aren’t talking about a run-of-the-mill performer who’ll be showcased at a local theater — there’s a lot more to Bell than that. Bell, who is an adjunct professor at Wayne State, has a doctorate from New York University in performance studies. So, whenever the writer, dancer, and choreographer is creating a new project, you can expect it to incorporate elements you wouldn’t typically expect in a dance show. Bell studies her subject matter first, and then creates something of a performance installation around her findings. With her solo, architecture-inspired dance project behind her, Bell is working on something more social. And by something more social, we mean the Hustle. Yes, that Hustle. The Hustle that’s played at every school dance, wedding reception, bar/bat mitzvah, and podunk nightclub in America. Of course, we don’t mean just the Hustle — although that’s the way Biba describes her project — what we mean is any sort of modern line dance like the Cupid Shuffle, the Wobble, the Electric Slide, the Cha Cha Slide — you get where we’re going with this.

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Bell says she’s particularly interested in the social elements of line dance: the way it gets everyone out on the dance floor at the same time, and that rush of unified excitement we feel while we’re all stepping together in unison. “It becomes almost a living thing,” says Bell. “You have that shared experience of joy when you’re all doing it together. When you go out to a club, that’s what you’re after.” Bell wants to explore what happens to a singluar dancer when they disappear into that group experience. She’s hoping to do some research during a group event she’s putting together later this season. “I’m really interested in that group experience,” she says. “It’s a feeling where you can forget what you’re doing, but the group is there to support you.” The group event is tenatively planned for sometime this fall, before the weather gets cold, but nothing is set in stone quite yet. Bell says there will also be a theater element, and she already has dates booked for a New York premier next June. Of course, the Motor City can expect to get an eyeful of Bell’s hustle too. For now, we just have to wait and see what this dancer lines up. And it probably wouldn’t hurt to go out and do the Hustle.

alysa@metrotimes.com @Oh_Miss_Alysa

February 18 • 7:30 PM Resident Artist Rodney Whitaker: Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite February 22 • 10:00 AM Jazz @ Lincoln Center: Jazz in Detroit February 24 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: Falstaff February 25 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: Falstaff March 10 • 6:00:00-9:00 PM Muse to Muse: Michael Kelly Williams & Larry Gabriel March 18 • 7:30 PM The music of Conrad Hering with MSU Jazz Orchestra March 30 • 7:30 PM Brother Size: a presentation from BMA March 31 • 7:30 PM Brother Size: a presentation from BMA April 1 • 7:30 PM Brother Size: a presentation from BMA April 7 • 10:00 AM Writers @ the Carr April 8 • 6:00 PM Writers @ the Carr: Gustavo Adolfo Aybar April 13 • 7:30 PM U of M Student Ensembles Big Band April 14 • 10:00 AM A Day @ The Carr: U of M Dance Day April 28 • 6:00:00-9:00 PM Between the Lines: African Symbols in Fabric and Textiles Apr 29 • 7:30 PM Destination Forever Project: Tribute to J Dilla and A Tribe Called Quest May 10 • 10:00 AM Jazz @ Lincoln Center: Jazz and the Civil Rights Movement May 13 • 7:30 PM Resident Artist Rodney Whitaker: Annual Carr Center Legacy Concert May 19 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: Don Giovanni May 20 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: Don Giovanni

September 23 • 7:30 PM Light Up Livernois Residency September 24 • 10:30 AM-10PM Light Up Livernois Residency October 7 • 10:00 AM Writers @ the Carr October 8 • 6:00 PM Writers @ the Carr October 13 • 7:30 PM The music of Russell Malone with the MSU Jazz Orchestra October 21 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: The Medium October 22 • 7:30 PM When the Street Lights Come On October 23 • 7:30 PM When the Street Lights Come On October 17 – Oct 27 • 7:30 PM Saxophonist and Composer: Steve Coleman October 29 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: The Medium November 2 • 10:00 AM Jazz @ Lincoln Center: Jazz and Democracy November 3 • 7:00-11PM You Are Here November 4 • 7:30 PM Resident Artist Rodney Whitaker: The Vocal Jazz Summit November 5 • 6:00 PM Writers @ the Carr: Aquarius Press Tribute November 11 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: The Old Maid and the Thief November 12 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: The Old Maid and the Thief November 16 • 7:30 PM Polyfold: The Music of Jon Taylor November 26 • 7:30 AM Polyfold: The Music of Alex Levine December 2 • 7:30 PM Grammy and Tony-Award Winner Dee Dee Bridgewater with Geri Allen December 10 • 7:30 PM The music of Rufus Reid with the MSU Jazz Orchestra December 16 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: Three Decembers December 17 • 7:30 PM Opera Modo Presents: Three Decembers December 23 • 6 PM-9:00PM Alumni Exhibition January 27 • 6:00:00-11:00 PM Black Identity: Redefining the Black Body February 11 • 7:30 PM The music of Anat Cohen with the MSU Jazz Octets

A new chapter begins: Join us in welcoming our new artistic director, Geri Allen Native Detroiter, and one of America’s greatest Jazz musicians and music educators, Geri Allen returns to her hometown to provide artistic leadership for Carr Center programming, to oversee the development of a multi-year artistic plan, and to guide the Carr Center arts education program. Come experience the start of this exciting partnership.

“I am thrilled to have this opportunity to partner with the Carr Center, a very key institution that has maintained an important role in accessing our cultural history in Detroit It is the only institution of its kind in the city and it has made a difference.” —Geri Allen, Carr Center Artistic Director

Get a full season of Dance, Art, Opera and More for just $99 with the Carr Center MulitPass: order by October 13 and save big! It’s your house-pass for Carr Center events. Learn more at thecarrcenter.org. For a complete listing of events visit thecarrcenter.org.

/carrcenter www.TheCarrCenter.org

3111 East Grand River Ave. | Detroit, MI 48226

metrotimes.com

| September 21-27, 2016

F EATURE

feature

n Installation view of “Ray Johnson: The Bob Boxes.” Photo by Liv Martin.

The sublime art of a known unknown ‘Ray Johnson: The Bob Boxes’ spills forth at CCS by Mike McGonigal Of all the artistic children of Detroit, Ray Johnson (1927-1995) is among the greatest and most influential, yet he might also be the least understood. His work was often given away for free, through the mail — generally without the recipient asking for it. His graphic, ephemeral, and nuanced Xeroxes would often be drawn upon with a marker. They were frequently obscene, regularly hilarious, and always-playful works that mixed his own stylized cartoon iconography with found images and objects, including images of celebrities and the names of art world insiders. Johnson grew up in a working-class neighborhood and attended Cass Tech, where he enrolled in an advertising art program. His dad worked the line at the Ford plant. Johnson studied art as early as junior high school and spent a summer in a drawing program at Ox-Bow in Saugatuck. Leaving Detroit in the summer of 1945, he attended the fascinating experimental program at Black Mountain in Asheville, N.C., where he worked with artist-teachers like Josef Albers, Lyonel Feininger, and Robert Motherwell. He even collaborated with visiting musician John Cage on a performance piece and befriended Buckminister Fuller. The experience of being mugged at knife point (on the same day in 1968

when his friend Andy Warhol was shot by Valerie Solanas) prompted a relocation to the safe remove of Glen Cove, Long Island, where Johnson remained until his death. He committed suicide by drowning off the coast of Sag Harbour on Friday, Jan. 13, 1995, in a deliberate and staged act that most consider his “last performance.” In his lifetime, Johnson was frequently referred to as the “best known unknown artist” and was an early practitioner of conceptual art, a founder of the mail art movement, and a prolific and very hard to pin down practitioner of Pop Art. The critically acclaimed 2002 documentary How to Draw a Bunny did a bit to realign Johnson’s place in the art world — a world he consistently mocked, right to its face, with his collages and drawings. On display now at CCS, Ray Johnson: The Bob Boxes is the largest show of Ray Johnson’s work in his hometown since an exhibition at Gertrude Kasle in 1975. “Innumerable people here were connected to Ray Johnson and have been sharing stories in the gallery,” Jonathan Rajewski, the CCS gallery’s coordinator and curator of the exhibition, says via email. “Ray continued to visit Detroit after leaving for Black Mountain College, and it seems clear in the Nick Maravell films on display in the exhibition — the countless storied references to Detroit;

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people, places — that Detroit was something he thought about regularly.” The expertly laid-out exhibition includes the contents of boxes that Johnson crammed with found objects and artwork, which he gave to the New York City-based artist Bob Warner during their eight-year correspondence. Warner had contacted Johnson in 1988 by sending him a collage on paper. Johnson was curious where to get more of the same paper. After Warner sent along his remaining paper stash, the two became fast friends, talking on the phone daily while mailing hundreds of works back and forth to each other. On the phone from the South Street Seaport Museum where Warner today works as the master letterpress printer, he is warm and eager to discuss his friend’s work. “Ray would always direct me,” Warner says. “I was kept busy with the things Ray had in mind. He would ask me to go to galleries on my lunch hour and ask where his work was, what was on the left and what was on the right, and what were they selling for. Once he sent me a newspaper with the drawing of a sock on it that has text which reads, ‘My sock please return to [artist] Bob Rauschenberg.’ He asked me to send it over to Rauschenberg, but I liked it so much, I didn’t. I kept it, and never told him.”

Warner worked closely with Rajewski to lay out the contents of the boxes. This is the fifth time the “Bob boxes” have been exhibited, and the first where pedestals were used, which means that they can’t be called “Tables of Content” (get it?) as they have been before, but it makes them float in place as obsessive pack-rat artworks in and of themselves. The walls teem with his playful and largely black-and-white works, while these other colorful bits bob in your line of vision at the heart of the space. “This is my archive, the ‘Bob Box’ archive, and it’s stored at the estate,” Warner says. There’s book spines, ties, elastic underwear waist bands, belts, art world ephemera, drawnon coffee cups, twine, can lids, inflatable birthday cakes, wigs, water bottles, tennis balls, baby shoes, cans of toy food, paint stirrers, and some stuff you’re not sure what it is. The decaying cardboard box that holds coiled belts is marked “snakes” on its side, in red felt tip marker. “When the estate went through his house after he died, there was one package left with my name on it and no address so they gave it to me. Ray Johnson had written inside a book these words: ‘There are some Tibetan monks who choose the day that they die.’ And I realized that his death was his choosing; he didn’t seem to be in any pain at the time. He didn’t seem ill; it was just his choice. It was an event that he chose. Ray always had a wicked sense of humor, and that seems the last prank he played on the world. Later I learned there was an envelope in his safety deposit box with the word ‘will’ written on it. But there was nothing in it.” The show also includes artwork, objects and materials that reference Ray Johnson’s childhood in the Detroit area. CCS’ Rajewski says he wanted to include material that provides direct links to Johnson’s life in Detroit. “I took a trip to New York City in July to visit the Ray Johnson Estate, where Maria Ilario and Frances Beatty had brought out notebooks, sketches, homework, and yearbooks from his Cass Tech days, collages from later in life that reference Detroit, much of which had not been previously exhibited.” Ray Johnson: The Bob Boxes runs until Oct. 8 at the Valade Family Gallery inside the first floor of the A. Alfred Taubman Center for Design Education; Gallery hours are noon-5 p.m., WednesdaySaturday; 460 W. Baltimore, Detroit; collegeforcreativestudies.edu; free.

mmcgonigal@metrotimes.com @mikemcgonigal

F EATURE

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n Heidelbergology: A 30-year photo retrospective. Archive photo.

ART EXHIBITS Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center; 248-644-0866; bbartcenter.org 1516 S. Cranbrook, Birmingham • INfolding/Unfolding-Susan Aaron Taylor. Sept. 9-Oct. 14 • Jewelry and Objects 2016 - Michigan Silversmiths Guild. Sept. 9 - Oct. 14 • Tommy Wilson and Cara DeGalan Oct. 21 - Nov. 18 • Birmingham Society of Women Painters- Oct. 21 - Nov. 18 • Linda Beeman- Oct. 21 - Nov. 18 The Carr Center; 313-965-8430; thecarrcenter.org 311 E. Grand River Ave., Detroit • Beautiful Skin II: The Art of Body Adornment in the African Diaspora. Every Saturday, Sept. 10 - Oct. 8 • Artist 2 Artist, Detroit’s Fav Exhibition: New Horizons at the Carr Center. 7 p.m. Oct. 7 • [You Are Here] Exhibition at The Carr Center. Nov. 3 - Dec. 17 • Alumni Exhibition. Dec. 23 - Jan. 20 • Black Identity: Redefining the Black Body. Jan. 27- March 3 College for Creative Studies; 313-6647400; collegeforcreativestudies.edu 201 E. Kirby St., Detroit • Ray Johnson: The Bob Boxes. Sept. 10 - Oct. 8 • De facto Detroit- Selections from the N’Namdi Family Collection. Sept. 17 - Oct. 22 • We See: Salwan Georges I David Jordano I Vanessa Miller I Rashaun Ruckner. Oct. 15 - Nov. 12 • Earth Sky Bed Table: Kate Daughdrill & Mira Burack. Nov. 12 - Dec. 17 • Focus on Faculty: Sabbatical Exhibition. Nov. 19 - Dec. 17 Cranbrook Museum of Art; 248-645-3320, 39221 Woodward Ave., Bloomfield Hills • Hippie Modernism: The Struggle for Utopia. June 18 - Oct. 9 • John Glick: A Legacy in Clay. June 18 - March 12 • Unsettled: The Work of Edward Gorey. Sept. 18 - March 12

• The Truth Is I Hear You. Nov. 19 - March 12 • Cranbrook Time Machine: Twentieth Century Rooms. Nov. 19 - March 19 • From the Vault: Recent Gifts to the Collection: Nov. 19 - March 19 • 2017 Graduate Degree Exhibition of Cranbrook Academy of Art. April 22- May 14 David Klein Gallery; 313-818-3416; dkgallery.com 1520 Washington Blvd., Detroit • Lester Johnson: Paintings and Works on Paper 1960-1985. Sep. 10 - Oct. 29 • Kelly Reemsten: Over It. Sept. 17 - Oct. 22 • Emmy Bright: Why Don’t You Want This? Sept. 17 - Oct. 22 • Derrick Melander: Window Installation. Sept. 17 - Oct. 22 • Brittany Nelson: Alternative Process. Nov. 5 - Dec. 17 • Susan Goethel Campbell. Nov. 2016 • Corktown Studios; 517-304-0734; corktownstudios.com • Haunted Wood Review. Sept. 17 • Strange Territory by Paulo Pedini. Sept. 24 • New Works by Jaye Thomas. Oct. 29 • 5th Anniversary Show. March 12 Detroit Artists Market; 313-832-8450; detroitartistsmarket.org 4719 Woodward Ave., Detroit • Tree of Life: Zubel Kachadoorian. Sept. 9 - Oct. 15 • Legendary Firehorses of Detroit Gala at Eastern Market. Oct. 14; 7 p.m. • Art for the Holidays. Nov. 9 - January Detroit Institute of Arts; 313-833-7900; dia.org 5200 Woodward Ave., Detroit • Guest of Honor: Gallery of the Louvre. June 16 - Sept. 18 • Detroit After Dark: Photographs from the DIA Collection. Oct. 21- April 23 • Bitter I Sweet: Coffee, Tea, and Chocolate. Nov. 20 - March 5 Ellen Kayrod Gallery; 313-833-1300; kayrodgallery.org

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Seeing there

n Selections from the Pile Series, Jim Crawford, 1972

How artist Jim Crawford rolled with the Cass Corridor scene, disappeared from Detroit, only to return next month to talk eggshells and big ideas by Michael Jackman How does an artist who left town 24 years ago get a one-person exhibition in one of the newer hip art galleries in town? It’s quite a tale, especially if you like detective stories. It begins late last year, in the back storeroom of Xavier’s 20th Century Furniture, a high-end design and furnishings store on Michigan Avenue. That’s where Rebecca Mazzei, the curator of Trinosophes, a performance space and art gallery on Gratiot Avenue near Eastern Market, was digging around in owner Xavier Slade’s art and design library with co-curator Megan Stockton, looking for ideas for the space’s Material for Living show. Mazzei tells us, “I’ve always adored what Xavier has in there. He has a background in art, and so I’ve often gone in and gotten stuff and visited. He just has a great eye.” Mazzei then made a startling discovery. “I saw this huge stack of posters, like, broadsides, and these glassine envelopes

with prints. I pulled one out and said, ‘This is amazing.’ I immediately saw the Willis Gallery stencil. The prints were of these really beautiful, kind of industrial settings in photographs. I was like, ‘What is this? And who is Jim Crawford?’ Because they were all signed and numbered.” Xavier told Mazzei that Crawford was a Cass Corridor artist, and that he bought his shop from Crawford, who had used the building as his studio. “Jim Crawford is not a name you often hear associated with Cass Corridor,” Mazzei says, “and yet he had this show at Willis. That intrigued me, because that space has such a legacy, you know? And so I asked Xavier, ‘Can I show these?’” Slade agreed, adding that he wasn’t even sure what to price them at, as he’d held onto them forever. The work aroused the interest of Sandra Schemske and Daniel Sperry of Wayne State University. “Sandra runs the University Art Collection at Wayne State,” Mazzei says. “And

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they have a significant Cass Corridor collection. They hold some of the greatest work from that movement. And they were immediately interested. And she knew who he was, because she said, ‘We have a piece from his Pile Series. We have a piece or two because he was in Kick Out the Jams.’” Mazzei says that show, the DIA’s 1980 retrospective of Cass Corridor artists, was “really influential.” While Schemske and Sperry wanted to purchase the work for the university, they cautioned that they couldn’t take it in front of their committee unless they were certain that Xavier rightfully owned the works. It fell to Mazzei to figure out where Jim was, find out if he was still alive, and establish that, yes, he had abandoned the works. “They happened to have an old phone number for him with an Indianapolis area code, and I called it. And it was him.” Mazzei handled the unusual errand of calling a stranger out of the blue more than two decades after his departure with

her usual grace. “I just kind of introduced myself,” Mazzei says. “He was a little confused. I was like, ‘Did you sell your building in Detroit to Xavier Slade?’ And he said yes. And I said, ‘Xavier’s still there. I’m good friends with him. I have an art space in Detroit, and I happened upon a series of works that we think are yours that you perhaps left there. He remembered the series and he said, ‘Yes I left them there.’ “Of course it became a little tricky to discuss, because now the institutions wanted them. The more we spoke, he was willing to sign off that he had left them there. We created a contract and he signed off on it. “But the more I talked to him, there was something about him I really connected to. … We started having these really deep conversations. I could tell this was somebody I wanted to work with.” We speak with Crawford by phone on a late summer weekend, the same day the Dally in the Alley is taking place in his old stomping grounds. He audibly brightens up when discussing Mazzei’s first call. “It was a surprise,” he says, adding, “It was a delight. And we’ve just gone from there. And I think we have a really good working relationship.” That relationship culminates next month in a show featuring several different bodies of work by the artist who was perhaps the most striking outlier of the gritty Cass Corridor artists of the 1960s and 1970s. It’s not often you see a oneperson show with such a variety of work, from a period spanning decades. Crawford agrees. He tells us, “People don’t do exhibitions like this. They might do it in a retrospective in a museum, but they don’t normally do it in a gallery. Rebecca is the only one that thinks these things through enough to put the integrity back historically and she’s put this together in a really wonderful way.” ‘Heightened seeing’ Today, when we talk about Cass Corridor artists, we mostly think of the rugged assemblages of found objects. Detroit artist and educator John Egner said much of the art “evoked and echoed the real physical reality of Cass Corridor lofts, alleys, and apartments: woodwork that had been painted a hundred times; cracked or broken glass.” While not all the work traded in such ramshackle excesses, at the very least, Crawford’s work tended to be more conceptual. The difference went deeper than the art. Crawford was born just a bit earlier than the rest of the Corridor baby boomers, in rural Hillsdale, where his mom stayed with her mother during the war. He grew up on Grand River Avenue, and after the

F EATURE 4750 Woodward Ave., Detroit • The Turbulent Years. Oct. 14 - Dec. 9 • Sight Fest Open Exhibition Dec. 13 - Jan. 16 • Painters Invitational. Jan. 20 - March 3 • College Invitational. March 10 - April 21 Inner State Gallery; 313-744-6505; innerstategallery.com 1410 Gratiot Ave., Detroit Library Street Collective; 313-600-7443; lscgallery.com 1260 Library St., Detroit • Jordan Nickel (POSE): Frankly. Sept. 17 - Oct. 11 Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit; 313-832-6622 4454 Woodward Ave., Detroit • Sanford Biggers’ Subjective Cosmology. Sept. 9 - Jan. 1 • Detroit City/Detroit Affinities: Matthew Angelo Harrison. Sept. 9 Jan. 1 • DEPE Space Exhibition: The Spirit of the Animals Is in the Wheels. Nov. 4 - Jan. 1 • MobileHomestead: Art as a Social Force Exhibition: It’s Your Party. Sept. 9-Jan. 1 Motor City Brewing Works; 313-8322700; motorcitybeer.com 470 W. Canfield, Detroit • This Week in Art. Wednesdays, year-round. N’Namdi Center for Contemporary Art; 313-831-8700; nnamdicenter.org 66 E. Forest Ave., Detroit Paul Kotula Project; 248-544-3020; paulkotula.com 23255 Woodward Ave., Ferndale Post-Hab Gallery; 313-974-6896; heidelberg.org 3632 Heidelberg, Detroit • Heidelbergology: A 30-year photo retrospective. Sept. 14 - Oct. 21 Public Pool Artspace; 313-405-7665; apublicpool.com 3309 Caniff Ave., Hamtramck • On Which Side, The Barbarians? Sept. 10 - Oct. 22 Simone DeSousa Gallery; 313-833-9000; simonedesousagallery.com 444 W. Willis St., Detroit • Addie Langford: A Timeless Elsewhere. Sept. 9 - Oct. 9 • Tom Phardel: Inner Core. Oct. 15 - Nov. 13 • Edition 16: PRINT. Nov. 26 - Dec. 24

feature River’s Edge Gallery; 734-246-9880; artattheedge.com 3024 Biddle Ave., Wyandotte • The Paint is Real. Sept. 16 - Oct. 22 Scarab Club; 313-831-1250; scarabclub.org 217 Farnsworth St., Detroit • John Peters - Look. Aug. 31 - Oct. 15 • Feather J. Chiaverini - Feather Skins. Aug. 31 - Oct. 15 • Drawn Together. Aug. 31 - Oct. 15 Start Gallery; 313-909-2845; startgallery.net 206 E. Grand River Ave., Detroit • Stressed. Sept. 21 - Oct. 5 Trinosophes; 313-707-6606; trinosophes.com 1464 Gratiot Ave., Detroit • Jim Crawford: Recent Work. Oct. 21 - Dec. 23 • Self Titled #2. Feb. 22 - April University of Michigan Museum of Art; 734-764-0395; umma.umich.edu 525 S. State Street, Ann Arbor • Mira Henry: The View Inside. July 12 Oct. 16 • Mark Bradford: Spiderman. July 27 Nov. 27 • Manuel Alvarez Bravo: Mexico’s Poet of Light. May 13 - Oct. 23 • In Focus: Modern Japanese Fold Ceramics. Aug. 8 - Oct. 30 • Catie Newell: Overnight. June 10 - Nov. 6 • The Connoisseurs’ Legacy: The Collection of Nesta and Walter Spink. June 17 - Sept. 25 Wasserman Projects; 313-818-3550; wassermanprojects.com 3434 Russell St., Detroit • Koen Vanmechelen- Energy/Mass. Sept. 22 - Dec. 17 • After Industry. Feb. 3 - April 7 Art Gallery of Windsor; 519-977-0013; agw.ca • 1920s Modernism in Montreal: The Beaver Hall Group. June 25 - Oct. 2 THEATER/MUSIC Detroit Symphony Orchestra; 313-576-5100; dso.org 3711 Woodward Ave, Detroit • Hilary Hahn Plays Beethoven. Sept. 29- Sept. 30 • DSO Presents: Lang Lang! Oct. 1 • Rhapsody in Blue. Oct. 7 - Oct. 9 • Romance of Rachmaninoff. Oct. 20 - Oct. 22 • Sibelius 2. Oct. 29 - Oct. 30 • Beethoven 4 & Mahler’s “Das Lied” Nov.

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F EATURE 11 - Nov. 12 • Tchaikovsky’s First Concerto. Nov. 17 - Nov. 19 • Seven Deadly Sins. Dec. 2 - Dec. 4 • Emanuel Ax Plays Beethoven. Dec. 9 - Dec. 11 • Virtuosic Cho-Liang Lin. Jan. 14 • 2017 Mozart Festival. Jan. 19 - Feb. 4 • Gershwin Rarities. Feb. 17 - Feb.18 • 38th Annual Classic Roots. March 3 - March 4 • Romeo & Juliet, Plus Branford Marsalis. March 24 - March 25 • Guitar Genius Sharon Isbin & Mahler’s Tenth. April 6 - April 9 • Symphonic Jazz. April 21 - April 22 • Classical Mystery Tour. Oct. 14 - Oct. 16 • Great American Songbook. Nov. 4 - Nov. 6 • Music of the Journey. Nov. 26 - Nov. 27 • Home for the Holidays. Dec. 16 - Dec. 18 • Love is All You Need: A Celebration of the Sixties. Jan. 6 - Jan. 8 • A Night at the Academy Awards. Feb. 24 - Feb. 26 • Under the Streetlamp. March 27 • Cirque De La Symphonie. March 31 - April 2 • Chick Corea Trio. Oct. 7 • Diane Reeves. Dec. 1 • Joe Lavano I Brian Blade. Feb. 17 • James Carter Organ Trio. April 7 • Rock O’Ween with Miss Paula and the Candy Bandits. Oct. 29 • Halloween at Hogwarts. Oct. 29 • World Winter Holiday. Nov. 26 • Tubby the Tuba. Nov. 26 • Earth Day is Everyday. March 25 • Tchaikovsky Discovers America. March 25 Michigan Opera Theatre; 313-237-7464; michiganopera.org 1526 Broadway, Detroit • Carmen. Oct. 13 - Oct. 23 • Incognito with Maysa. Oct. 14 • Silent Night. Nov. 12 - Nov. 20 • Too Hot To Handel. Dec. 10 • Little Women. March 11 - March 12 • The Girl of the Golden West. April 1 - April 9 Stagecrafters; 248-541-6430; stagecrafters.org 415 S. Lafayette Ave, Royal Oak • Disney’s The Little Mermaid. Sept. 9 - Oct. 2 • Trevor. Oct. 13 - Oct. 22 • The Best Man. Nov. 4 - Nov. 19 • Fantastic Mr. Fox. Dec. 9 - Dec. 11 • In the Heights. Jan. 20 - Feb. 12 • Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill. Feb. 24 - March 12 • The Red Velvet Cake War. March. 24 - April. 9

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feature

n Eggshell Series, Jim Crawford, 2015-16 war lived just inside the city near Redford. Also, trauma struck him relatively young, providing the impetus for his art. “This artistic thing was a healing effort that came primarily from the fact that my mother had committed suicide,” Crawford says. “The way I healed myself was through a long process of creativity. I’ve had a really strange adventure after sort of jumping outside myself.” Crawford’s grandmother stepped in to care for him as a boy, and introduced him to what he calls “heightened seeing.” “When I was a child, my grandmother used to sit at the kitchen table and interpret tea leaves for people that would come over to the house,” he recalls. “It was kind of magical for me as a child, and it just opened up a kind of wonder in the world.” Or as Mazzei says, “He describes that experience as a child as the first time he was interpreting meaning from what he was looking at, which is what you do with art.” As a student at Cooley High School, Crawford’s ability was nurtured and rewarded. “I had all these scholastic art awards, and I got scholarships,” he says. “I was really rewarded as a young person as an artist.” As a result, by the time Crawford moved into a rooming house on Forest in the late 1960s, he was in a different place than many Detroit artists. “By the time I was in college, I was well aware that that’s who I was: an artist. And it was an unusual situation, because a lot of the people I was around had decided to become artists in college.” He adds with a laugh, “I had decided to become an artist when I was, like, 5.” Another difference was that Crawford had a stable day job. In 1970, he took a position as visual arts coordinator for the Michigan Council for the Arts, and began a long career as an arts administrator. The

gig meant a steady income, and gave Crawford the opportunity to support individual artists, and pursue his own work somewhat more leisurely. From that time, his work hinged on looking at things in new ways, which is one of the things he explored in the 1972 Piles Series Mazzei discovered more than 40 years later. Mazzei says, “In the original press release from Willis Gallery, he called them ‘found forms.’ So basically he was going around the industrial landscape and seeing stacks of concrete, stacks of pipes, stacks of tires, and basically experiencing them as if they were sculptures.” “That may sound like it’s something we do all the time now: Scott Hocking and other people like that use found materials to create piles and stacks of things,” Mazzei points out. “But at the time, that was not happening in the art world at large.” “Once you get turned onto it, you can’t stop seeing this stuff all around you,” Crawford explains. “It’s just the way that things are casually stacked. Usually building materials, but you’ll also find it in the department store. My stuff was different from the eclectic assemblages made from things other people didn’t want, materials you could pick up in the alley because they were free. I see their work as very visceral. And I see my work at the other end of the spectrum more conceptual, an entirely different approach.” Putting it another way, Crawford has said: “Portions may have been added or subtracted, but it is not contrived sculpture.” As for photographing the materials on construction sites, Crawford says, “I thought there was more sculptural integrity in them. They seemed free-flowing, casual. … The way that those materials are put together, delivered, just set down on the ground, from my point of view, it

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F EATURE • Seascape. April 21 - April 30 Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra; 734994-4801; a2so.org 35 Research Dr., Ann Arbor • Romeo & Juliet. Oct. 8 • Tchaikovsky & Friends. Nov. 11 • Holiday Pops. Dec. 9 • Mozart Birthday Bash. Jan. 14 • Firebird. March 18 • The Music of Harry Potter. Nov. 12 • Peter and the Wolf. April 9 • Chamber Orchestra at the Ann Arbor Jewish Community Center. Oct. 31 - May 1 PuppetART; 313-961-7777; puppetart.org • Sleeping Beauty. Sept. 10 - Sept. 22 • Firebird. Oct. 1 - Oct. 30 • Turtle Island. Nov. 5 - Nov. 27 • Snow Queen. Dec. 3 - Jan. 29 • Oh, Ananse. Feb. 4 - Feb. 26 Michigan Theater; 734-668-8397; michtheater.org 603 E. Liberty St., Ann Arbor • Max Rose. Sept. 16 • Lewis Black. Sept. 16 • Glen Hansard. Sept. 17 • Eva Hesse. Sept. 18 • Almeida Theater Live in HD: Richard III. Sept. 18 • Alex Schweder. Sept. 22 • Liberty’s Secret Premier Screening. Sept. 22 • Mila Madre. Sept. 23 • The Hollars. Sept. 23 • Mental with Director Q&A. Sept. 23 • Danny Says. Sept. 24 • Time Bandits. Sept. 24 • Phantasm. Sept. 24 • A Town Called Panic: The Specials. Sept. 24 • Dark Star Orchestra. Sept. 24 • Zip & Zap and the Marble Gang. Sept. 25 • Electric Shadows Contemporary Chinese Film Series: The Mermaid. Sept. 27 • Mark Mothersbaugh. Sept. 29 • Manhattan Short Film Festival. Sept. 29 • Author: The JT LeRoy Story. Sept. 30 • Kamasi Washington and the Next Step. Sept. 30 • NJFK: Mosaic Youth Theater. Oct. 2 • Little Stones Test Screening. Oct. 5 • Miwa Matreyek. Oct. 6 • NT Live: The Deep Blue Sea. Oct. 9 • Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Oct. 10 • The Breakfast Club. Oct. 10 • Loreena McKennitt. Oct. 12 • Not an Alternative. Oct. 13 • Songs from the North. Oct. 13 • Sixteen Candles. Oct. 17 • Wynwood Walls. Oct. 20

feature • The Blues Brothers. Oct 20 • Nick Offerman. Oct. 21 • Love, Life, & Loss. Oct. 24 • Pretty in Pink. Oct. 24 • Being Mortal presented by Arbor Hospice. Oct. 26 • Philip Beesley & Iris Van Herpen. Oct. 27 • Elvis Costello and the Imposters. Oct. 30 • Adventures in Babysitting. Oct. 31 • Fred Gelli. Nov. 3 • Stop Making Sense. Nov. 3 • Say Anything. Nov. 7 • MAthi-Patra Ruga. Nov. 10 • Back to the Future. Nov. 14 • Jane Fulton Suri. Nov. 17 • Top Gun. Nov. 17 • Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Nov. 21 • WarGames. Nov. 28 • Roland Graf. Dec. 1 • NJFK: Frosty. Dec. 3 • RSC Live: King Lear. Dec. 4 • Gremlins. Dec. 8 • NT Live: The Audience. Jan. 22 • NJFK: Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood LIVE! Feb. 4 • Jelly & George: Aaron Diehl & Cecile McLorin Salvant • NJFK: Pete the Cat • DakhaBrakha. Mar. 29 • King Sunny Ade’. April 21

n Cat Can Series, Jim Crawford, 2015-16

had the highest level of integrity and the smoothest process in which it all happened.” Of course, Crawford is frank that he could afford to be an outlier. He credits his unusual place in the Cass Corridor art scene to the fact that he had a day job. “I had an income,” he says. “So I didn’t have to make a life in the marketplace. Consequently, I was able to remain pretty pure. I showed in all of those venues, but there was no great pressure to sell work.” For instance, one series of his work was created at his desk: Crawford would make The Fisher Theatre; 313-872-1000; broad- his morning tea and take the teabags and wayindetroit.com set them on 3-by-5 cards and stain them. 3011 W. Grand Blvd., Detroit He created a set of more than 300 tea• Beautiful - The Carol King Musical. Dec. stained cards, each of them with the sort 13 - Jan. 8 of smooth, carefree, nearly unconscious process guiding them. When you consider DANCE how it meshes with his respect for ritual Michigan Opera Theatre; (and the way his grandmother read tea 313-237-7464; michiganopera.org leaves), the meaning goes even deeper. 1526 Broadway, Detroit “They keep calling me a conceptualist,” • The Nutcracker. Nov. 25 - Nov. 27 he says. “And concepts and ideas are very • Common Ground. March 4 important in my work, but I don’t neces• A Cinderella Story. March 18 - March 19 sarily want them to get in the way.” • Alvin Ailey. April 21 - April 23 Crawford’s efforts to confront the public and ask it to engage in a bit of “heightened Music Hall Center for the seeing” was behind an impermanent Performing Arts artwork he did in downtown Detroit in 350 Madison St., Detroit the 1975. He used 50,000 pounds of ice • The Osiris Legend. Oct. 8 - Oct. 9 to create four 8-foot-tall ice walls on the • Lizt Alfonsoso presents: walkways of the Kern Block. Dance Cuba! Nov. 9 “These were gigantic walls of ice that • Dallas Black Dance Theater. Nov. 12 were a story tall that obstructed the traf• For colored girls who have considered fic,” Crawford explains, “and people had to suicide/when the rainbow is enuf. Nov. walk around them. You would never have 17 - Nov. 20 been able to do something like that today.” • Wayne State Winter Dance Concert. Asked if perhaps it was futile to try to get Dec. 9 - Dec. 10 harried, get-the-job-done Detroiters to try • Ballet BC. Feb. 5 to take a liking to challenging conceptual • Cuisine & Confessions. art, he replies with much laughter, “SomeMarch 18 - March 19 body came with a truck and just knocked them down. … They were not receptive to FASHION it. They obliterated it!” Fashion Speak; 248-722-8407; But art in Detroit at the time was all

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about pushing boundaries, whether it meant dragging a large granite stone across the DIA’s lawn or putting up walls of ice to surprise office workers. And that sort of weird work wouldn’t have happened without the challenging art community in town, which reached from the rooming houses of the Corridor up to the offices of the museum and the university art departments, and beyond to Lansing, where state arts funding was relatively lavish. Crawford credits such educators as Aris Koutroulis, who taught painting at what’s now the College for Creative Studies, and John Egner, who taught at Wayne State. “They were the mother hens of a lot of the stuff that was happening,” Crawford says. Add in all the working artists, a few edgy galleries, and you have a core that can make things happen. “See what you have there is a community,” Crawford says. “That doesn’t happen very often. And that’s why Detroit is so significant. That it did have a community that was vital enough to have a presence on a national scene. And it was because of a lot of different people, such as [DIA contemporary art curator] Sam Wagstaff, who gave it credibility. But it happened. There were enough people, and the community was tight enough.” Over time, however, that scene began to disperse. Many of the risk-taking administrators and academics moved on to New York. The Cass Corridor scene was already a proper subject for a backward-looking restrospective by 1980. And by the early 1990s, when Crawford was working out of his Michigan Avenue space, the crack cocaine epidemic was reaching its peak in Detroit. Crawford’s day-to-day life was miles apart from the commune-like interracial community that sought out the Cass Corridor in the late 1960s. Crawford was hit by a string of burglaries in which even his bronze artworks were stolen, to be melted down for scrap, he guesses. At

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F EATURE the time, even the manholes in the avenue would disappear. To make matters worse, Michigan’s new right-wing governor was slashing arts funding. Crawford says, “The Michigan Council for the Arts was being completely annihilated by Gov. Engler at the time. We went from 50 employees to 10. I quit the Michigan council for arts the very day I could get my retirement. I retired after 22 years.” Crawford sold the studio to Xavier Slade and left town, he says, due to “a very willful woman as much as anything else.” Rituals old and new Indianapolis has been good to Crawford. He’s an avid gardener who has spent 18 years in the same spot by the Indiana State Fairgrounds. Arts curator Mazzei traveled there to meet with him, and says, “He has an incredible studio and living space, and a beautiful garden around it. It’s almost a compound.” It also seems that getting away from Detroit hasn’t made him less productive as an artist. He’s says he’s been working on the same body of work for 15 years, since his last show in metro Detroit, but that he’s had a “rush of creativity” that involves two newer series he’s done over the last two years. One of them is called the Eggshell Series, and it’s a series of eggshells placed into egg cartons with some staining. It recalls the teabag series that came out of him starting his days at the MCFA, as well as referencing his grandmother’s readings. “When I would do my eggs in the morning over the frying pan,” Crawford says, “I would open them up and then I’d put them back in the container. Eventually I stained them all with walnut stain from a walnut tree. There’s probably about 40 of these pieces.” He says the artworks involve several factors: The point where vision becomes a meditation, the recording of gesture, a conscious sort of ritual. And that’s not touching the eggs as symbols of rebirth, or the way ancient diviners saw the future in the entrails of slaughtered sacrificial animals. There’s much for those into “heightened seeing” to witness there. Crawford’s other newer work is the Cat Can Series, consisting of artworks in which used cans of cat food are placed inside painted boxes. The fortune-teller’s grandson says the project began with a vision of the future he had: “I had a dream,” he says, “I saw this woman with long black hair facing away from me. And immediately, I thought, ‘I’m going to meet a woman with long black hair.’” Soon afterward, he had a cat with black hair and emerald eyes come into

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feature his garden. “She got pregnant,” Crawford says, “and became insatiably hungry. And I found an unlimited supply of cans of cat food.” Those works and more will be part of his upcoming exhibition, including older pieces juxtaposed with enough new pieces to flesh his career out. It will be Crawford’s first show in Detroit since his last one in Ferndale, 15 years ago. Mazzei is thrilled to be able to show the new work. “I think what attracts me to them is that there’s something ritualistic and mystical about them,” she says. “Because his process is one of doing something with such attention and focus, but then not just doing that one thing and leaving it, but doing it over and over again. And I think there’s a kind of meditative state in that for him.” She adds that it’s the sort of art that’s more than at first meets the eye, possessing a formal compositional quality that forces people to “really think about what he’s doing with objects.” If that sounds a little high-toned to connect with, Mazzei helps break it down further: “It’s a ritual. It has meaning. I guess the reason I connect to it is that so much art these days is post-internet culture. People are just using the reference points of pop culture and visual culture, and it seems to be kind of avoidance of any kind of relationship to the human experience. I think it’s an intentional avoidance. But I don’t connect to that kind of work. I like the kind of work that makes me feel as if I’m connecting to some little point of humanity. “He was on the very early end of stuff that early minimalists were thinking of. And he was in our back yard. My sense is had he been more willing to participate in that world of schmoozing with collectors, he could have made it big. But he’s a little more serious than that.” True to form, Crawford seems completely content being his own person and making his deeply personal art. It is ritual and ideas that are at the center of his world more than any specific place and time. Perhaps that’s why he’s reluctant to embrace a “homecoming” narrative for this show. He says, “I don’t want people to get distracted. There are no fancy stories about me. I want it to be about the art.” Jim Crawford opens 6-10 p.m. Friday, Oct. 21, with a talk from Crawford at 3 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 22, at Trinosophes, 1464 Gratiot Ave., Detroit; 313-737-6606; both events are free and open to the public; exhibition runs through Dec. 23.

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detroitgarmentgroup.org Oct. 13 1 Woodward Ave., Detroit LECTURES Arab American National Museum 31624 Michigan Ave., Detroit; 313-5822266; arabamericanmuseum.org College for Creative Studies 201 E. Kirby St., Detroit; 313-664-7400; collegeforcreativestudies.edu • Toyota Lecture Series in Design presents, Hugh Dubberly, Software and Service Designer. Sept. 26, 6 p.m. • Woodward Lecture Series Presents Holland Carter. Oct. 5, 3 p.m. • Toyota Lecture Series in Design presents, Reiko Sudo. Oct. 19, 6 p.m. • Toyota Lecture Series in Design presents, Makram El Kadi. Feb. 2, 6 p.m. • Toyota Lecture Series in Design presents, Joe Baratelli. April 5, 6 p.m. • Woodward Lecture Series Presents Leslie Dill. April 6, 3 p.m. Detroit Institute of Arts 5200 Woodward Ave., Detroit; 313-883-7900; dia.org • Homegrown in Detroit and Beyond: Art of Mario Moore. Sep. 25, 2 p.m. • Rembrandt Peale’s Court of Death: Exhibition Picture and Family Portrait. Oct. 5, 6:30 p.m. • Friends of Art & Flowers 2016 Betsy Campbell Lecture. Oct. 15, 2 p.m. • FAAAA 2016 African Art Recognition Award: Matching African Elegance with Substance. Oct. 16, 2 p.m. • Horst at Home and Abroad. Oct 28, 7 p.m. • Moving Mountains: The Construction of Sacrality in the Himalayas. Oct. 29, 2 p.m. • Wonder Drugs: Coffee, Tea, and Chocolate. Nov. 20, 2 p.m. • Silent Windblown Shrines: Abbott Thayer and the American Landscape. Nov. 30, 6:30 p.m. MOCAD 4454 Woodward Ave., Detroit; 313-832-6622; mocadetroit.org • Huey Copeland Sun Ra Lecture. Sept. 23, 7 p.m. MISC. • Hamtramck Neighborhood Arts Festival. Oct. 8 • Eastern Market After Dark. Sept. 22, 7 p.m. • Signal - Return; 313-567-8970; signalreturnpress.org 1345 Division St., Detroit • Type-Oh!-Rama! Oct. 7 • Power of the Press Fest. April 6 - April 9

n Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth in The Lady from Shanghai, 1948.

‘It’s not just a little niche anymore’

See film noir classics at the Redford Theatre the way they were meant to be seen by Dave Phillips Moviegoers can take a step back in time Sept. 23-25 as the Noir City Film Festival makes its way to the Redford Theatre. The festival, dedicated to showing rare 35mm prints of crime and detective films of the 1940s and 1950s, will feature at least two films on each of its three nights. Saturday will showcase a triple feature, with Double Indemnity and The Prowler preceding a special screening of Blue Velvet to commemorate the film’s 30th anniversary. Other options include The Killers and 99 River Street on Friday, and The Lady From Shanghai and Woman on the Run on Sunday. “I couldn’t be more excited about it,” says John Monaghan, curator at the theater and Detroit Free Press film critic. “I’m passionate about the films because they hold up so well. They’re gritty and they’re funny and they’re dark, and they’re super wellconstructed in terms of film technique and lighting.” Watching the films in 35mm is an added treat, Monaghan says. The Redford is the only theater in Michigan and one of just a few in the country that regularly shows 35mm prints.

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“The black-and-white is going to look stunning in the 35mm prints we’ve obtained,” he says. “One of the goals for the Redford, for me, is to keep showing 35mm rather than digital, especially for the film noir, because it does make a difference. It’s tactile. It’s light shining through film, the way it was when it was released.” Even the projectors that will be showing the films are from the 1950s. “It’s a pretty authentic presentation of the films as they would have been (shown) in the theater,” Monaghan says. Film noir turns 75 this year — an anniversary that was featured in a recent edition of Time magazine. “It’s not just a little niche anymore,” Monaghan says. Eddie Muller, founder and president of the Film Noir Foundation, has built a following through the format, appearing on Turner Classic Movies each Friday during its summer 2015 series Summer of Darkness. Muller — dubbed the “Czar of Noir” — will introduce each film during the festival. “He’s a walking encyclopedia,” Monaghan says. “He’s not just academic. He has a lot of passion. He helps people understand

why these films panned out.” Each night features a more wellknown film paired with an obscure film — two of which are so obscure that Monaghan has yet to see them. “I’m saving that experience for seeing it with the audience,” he says. “Personally, I’m excited about what he’s bringing.” Monaghan’s hopeful the festival — already an annual occurrence in San Francisco, Chicago, and New York — becomes a regular event in Detroit. “We’ve made it really reasonable for people to come to everything,” he says. “This is really something we’d like to keep going.” Tickets are $10 for each double feature, $7 for the Blue Velvet screening or $25 for an all-access pass, which will include a coffee session with Eddie Muller prior to the Sunday program. Films begin at 7 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 23 and Saturday, Sept. 24 and 3 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 25 For more information, visit RedfordTheatre.com or Facebook.com/ NoirCityDetroit.

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Journey to the end of the night Bill Schwab’s new work captures a city’s twilight

n SS Ste. Claire.

by Michael Jackman By now, almost everybody in metro Detroit has heard of “ruin porn.” Underneath that “ruin porn” criticism lies the allegation that Detroit’s decaying Beaux Arts skyscrapers and empty industrial hulks are being exploited for leering audiences that revel in just how far Detroit’s fortunes have fallen. The term all but accuses photographers of taking the hard realities of disinvestment and turning them into an unwholesome peep show. While the term has come in handy for blasting photographic work that mines the city’s dilapidation for a bit of shock value, it might have been better if pornography hadn’t entered into the discussion. After all, even Supreme Court justices have questioned just where pornography ends and art begins. Certainly, some of those who have shot photos of inner-city abandonment have created high art or dispassionate documentation, such as Bruce Giffin or Camilo José Vergara. Their work stands out because it’s done with affection, even love, of the places prosperity left behind. In some photographers’ able hands, what some might call “ruin porn” becomes something magical, something moving. For instance, a new exhibition of

photos by landscape photographer Bill Schwab is visually arresting, even beautiful, while presenting the hard realities of Detroit’s descent. It’s something that’s hard to do right, and Schwab spent months scouting out locations for his new body of work. It’s quite an accomplishment, and it offers a haunting photographic record of the city’s twilight between what it was and what it will become. Schwab is no stranger to Detroit.

n Melville and Yale.

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His great-grandfather had a studio in Detroit a century ago. While he’s done his share of globe-trotting, leading groups of photographers everywhere from Northern Michigan to Iceland to the Faroe Islands, his body of work includes imagery of Detroit: In the past, Schwab created images of Detroit with a noirish style. He did a photo book showcasing the beauty of Belle Isle. And yet the subject matter of a ruined city was almost too charged for him to

try to take on. “A lot of people over the years have been saying, ‘Hey, why don’t you get back to your Detroit stuff?’ … And it’s been a real struggle of mine to come to terms with the way that I was going to actually do this.” The proper impetus finally arrived in November of last year, when what remained of the SS Ste. Claire, better known as the boat that ferried Detroiters to the amusement park on Boblo Island, was docked somewhere in Detroit. Schwab saw the story of the vessel’s return, figured out where it was docked, and took a camera to photograph it at night. “I hadn’t been out in Detroit shooting at night in a long time,” Schwab says of the shoot. “We went there and I came over the bridge and there it was, exactly where I thought it would be. It was kind of a foggy, misty night. It was overwhelming. As a photographer, when I’m photographing a landscape, a lot of times, it’s a physical energy that you get when you start feeling it. It’s almost like something passes through you or is given to you. It gives it up. That night I had that feeling in this extreme way. It was amazing. I went back

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F EATURE and waited for that one night of snow. I pulled back a bit, and framed it in that way with the trees, and before I’d even pushed the shutter it had become this iconic thing for me.” Obviously a time exposure, given a bit of a blur in some of the branches, the photo looks much like the photos of 100 years ago, when the ship was new. You can almost imagine it as a vintage shot of a ship being refitted after wartime service. The shoot left a deep impression on Schwab. “I thought, ‘I grew up in Detroit. I have great memories of that boat. And I have so many friends who have memories of that boat,” he says. “And I started thinking: This is where we all were. At some point, everybody of a certain age had been on that boat … It just got me thinking about the neighborhoods.” It turned into a project that lasted many months, with him stealing night shots of the streets. “There’s something about it at night,” he says, “because it’s stripped of people and you’re alone and you’re seeing it. And it just starts to do a lot more things to you.” This new body of work represents

feature a break from Schwab’s earlier photography. He was exclusively a blackand-white photographer who worked in film, and he describes suddenly shooting digital and in color as “a bit of a jump for me.” “I just decided that, for the type of work I wanted to do, film would put too many limitations on that. With digital, I can make it look more like your naked eye would see it than a piece of film would.” He decided not to do the shoot as a “gadget guy” — no filters, one lens, one camera, one tripod, and no extra battery. As Schwab puts it: “One view the whole time.” The sole concession to analog is that the prints are made old-school, by running the digital files through chemistry. While his images do show some urban decay, they often show signs of the people who still live there: Windows are illuminated, tire treads are crunched into the snow, porch lights still beckon callers, old walls are adorned with street art. Even when the subject is a vacant street, there are undeniable details showing that somebody loved a place enough to decorate it with architectural grace

n Michigan and Wesson.

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notes, now fading. It gives the work an ice-cold whisper of melancholy breezing through it. “I didn’t want to show just this desolation,” Schwab says. “Detroit had this thing that’s palpable, I just can’t describe it. It’s all about the history. There’s just something about Detroit. We all have our roots here. These are all neighborhoods I’ve known all my life. We all have our grandparents who worked at the car factories … I was looking at it in a romantic way, and I would dare to say I still am looking at it in that romantic way, with a love. It’s an amazing place.” That indescribable quality came through loud and clear to those who viewed Schwab’s work as he posted it online while shooting. “It was the first time I had ever done that,” he says. “And I started getting this incredible outpouring from people who were from here. That’s where Where We Used to Live came from, because it seemed like everybody who was talking to me had been here, even though they and their family no longer were here … This woman picked me up off Instagram, told me there was this

great little gallery in Toronto.” The project seems to have left him feeling more passionate than ever about the city, as well as a way to pose that question to a larger, international audience. “What are we going to do?” he asks. “We are watching the ruralization of Detroit. There’s 4 to 7 square miles of Detroit that’s being really worked on. From what I’m seeing so far, it’s helping a few people who’ve got some money and are able to invest — and God love them for doing it — but … none of that seems to be coming back into the neighborhoods.” “That tends to be an old argument around here,” he adds, “but it’s no less valid, I think.” The opening of Detroit: Where We Used to Live runs 6:30-9:30 p.m. Sept. 24, at Charlotte Hale Gallery, 588 Markham, Toronto, Ontario. The show exhibits until Oct. 8. For more information, see billschwab.com.

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n Pollo Sambuca with oven-roasted Herb tomato quinoa pilaf. Photo by Scott Spellman.

A taste of urban paradise

Detroit Grown & Made dinner series shines light on black chefs and farmers by Serena Maria Daniels The scene could have been that of a rustic farm in upstate New York or a quiet vineyard in Napa Valley. Amid bountiful plots of dinosaur kale, collard greens, Asian squash, and heirloom tomatoes, was a long wooden table beautifully accented with wildflowers, elegant place settings, and a menu that rivaled any high-end pop-up dinner. A gleaming Bentley was parked nearby. Well-to-do Detroiters — black, white, young, and old — were smartly dressed in summer linen and flowing dresses. Youths in crisp white T-shirts with towels folded over their arms carried out dish after exquisitely plated dish — all sourced from gardens just a few feet away. Never mind the burnt-out building across the street or the fact that most of the dinner guests until then had never stepped foot in the city’s North End. Until that cool summer Sunday, few had even heard of the Oakland Avenue Urban Farm where the dinner was held. “It’s like Hudson Valley, but way cooler,” says one of the event’s organizers, Devita Davison. Davison’s voice rises in volume and urgency when talking about the food scene in Detroit, but it’s more than ticking off the names of new trendy

eateries that gets her excited. She runs communications for FoodLab Detroit, a group of socially conscious entrepreneurs with the shared goal of building the city’s food economy, not just for wealthy foodies, but to provide an ecosystem that everyone can enjoy. “Food is a place where you will bring all types of people together,” she tells us. It’s that communal experience that breaks down barriers. How farmers, chefs, and activists of color are addressing poverty, racial disparity, and food insecurity, and how just by sitting at the same table and eating together, decades of racial tension can begin to heal. That’s what the Detroit Grown & Made dinner series is all about. The idea for the dinner series was born from seemingly opposite ends of the spectrum. Davison had been brunching in New York City with chef Maxcel Hardy, a Detroit native, who was trying to find his path back to his hometown after 16 years away. He had also been a featured cook in the Black Chefs Series in Harlem at Blujeen restaurant. Every other week, a different African-American chef had a

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platform to show off his or her culinary skills. He suggested bringing the series to Detroit, to which Davison suggested making it a Detroit-specific event that not only highlighted Hardy’s talents but also shone a light on black farmers. Meanwhile, Peter Dalinowski, proprietor of the pop-up venue (revolver) in Hamtramck, was searching for his own ways to integrate more black chefs and growers with his venture. (revolver) got its start in 2013 when Dalinowski partnered with Nigerian-born chef Tunde Wey. The sleek space attracts a well-heeled, mostly white clientele, who were willing to pay upward of $100 per ticket to test out the creations of some of the area’s most promising chefs (including Hardy). The two connected after a chance Google search led Dalinowski to Davison’s Pinterest page. With Davison’s deep connections with local farmers, the culinary wizardry of Hardy, and Dalinowski’s vast rolodex of (revolver) followers, the trio had just the recipe to get Grown & Made off the ground. “It just happened serendipitously,” Davison tells us. We were among the first guests to be seated at the inaugural Grown & Made

dinner at the North End farm. On the menu: grilled heirloom tomato salad with an Avocado Champagne dressing; brook trout with wilted greens and vegetable gratin; followed by a chicken Sambuca with an oven roasted herb tomato quinoa pilaf with pine nuts and dried cranberries; and a rhubarb and strawberry crumble to finish — its sweet aroma wafting through the breeze. We delighted in each course, impressed not just with the freshness of the ingredients, but with the complexity of each dish, noting that aside from the avocado from the dressing and the proteins, pretty much everything came from the farm. Hardy punctuated that point: “The rhubarb you’re about to eat was harvested maybe 45 minutes ago.” Happily, full dinner guests marveled at the level at which the hosts executed the dinner, and toward the end of the meal we heard the types of whispering the hosts were banking on: Once my friends hear about this, they’ll have to be convinced to come back to check out the city.

E sdaniels@metrotimes.com L@serenamaria36

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E at Join the Taco Truck Party The “Taco Truck Party” is continuing to gain momentum across the nation in this historic presidential election. Following the delicious threat by a Donald Trump supporter who predicts #TacoTrucksOnEveryCorner should Hillary Clinton become president, taco trucks are now increasingly adding voter registration sites and vehicles for political discourse to their savory menus. In Southwest Detroit, eight mobile taquerias joined in on Sept. 16. Organizers galvanized several spots: all El Parian locations, Tacos El Rodeo, El Taquito, El Imperial, Tacos El Toro, and Tacos El Caballo. Volunteers were on hand to make sure customers got a side of democracy along with their tacos de pollo. The local drive came after a tasty protest Sept. 3, when the Tacos El Caballo truck proprietors parked outside the Great Faith Ministries Church during Trump’s visit — both to sling tacos and show detractors the contributions of immigrants. Similar forms of activism are taking shape elsewhere across the United States. The U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, in its so-called “Guac the Vote” effort, is encouraging taco truck vendors to park outside of polling places on Election Day. Meanwhile, OC Weekly editor Gustavo Arellano, syndicated Latino cartoonist Lalo Alcaraz, and cohort Bill Esparza have taken the movement a step further with the creation of the “Taco Truck Party” at facebook.com/ TacoTruckParty. A description of the party says it’s a “pro-immigration political movement to unite Americans through tacos to combat racism, pendejadas, and nativism” and urges voters to “Make America Asada Again.” Uniting Americans through tacos? That’s one campaign we can vote for.

A new restaurant week emerges The very dining scene that the Detroit Restaurant Week helped develop has become so big it seems to have outgrown the event itself. When the 10-day celebration of Detroit restaurants got its start six years ago, the city was in a very different place. Aside from going downtown for the

Bites

n Taco Truck Party. Photo via Facebook. occasional sports game, theater, or to the Detroit Institute of Arts, organizers say metro Detroiters were still hesitant about venturing into the city — let alone eating there. That’s when the idea of organizing a handful of restaurants to provide a prix fixe dinner at a discounted rate made sense. It promoted local businesses, while showing suburbanites that, yes, Detroit can be a fun place to visit. As each year passed, the event grew larger and larger, with last year’s featuring more than 25 restaurants. A lot has changed since those first days. City dwellers, suburbanites, and tourists are now making it a point to dine in Detroit, drawn to eateries that are capturing national interest. Add to that with a growing number of similar events like Dine Drink Detroit (another dayslong promotional week that also features special menus and pricing and takes place in the fall) and a variety of pop-ups, and the flagship restaurant week appears to have lost its edge. The changing dynamics have forced organizers to take pause and halt programming until they can figure out a new approach. The springtime festivities were postponed earlier this year, and it’s now becoming doubtful to past

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participants that there will be a fall program either. “As the city’s restaurant scene continues to grow, we are looking at some new ideas and [a] structure [that] will highlight some of the newer spots as well as the longtime establishments,” says Morin Yousif, one of the event organizers. Yousif stopped short of saying the event will be canceled altogether. Still, a number of restaurants that have participated in years past aren’t waiting around for an update. Come Sept. 23-Oct. 2, seven eateries mostly in downtown and Midtown will host their own event, to be dubbed Motor City Restaurant Week. Restaurants include several stalwarts: 24Grille, Andiamo’s Riverfront, Cliff Bells, Mario’s, Traffic Jam & Snug, and the Whitney; along with a relative newcomer, Chartreuse Kitchen & Cocktails. The more scaled-down, independent spinoff (Detroit Restaurant Week had been hosted by the Downtown Detroit Partnership, Opportunity Detroit, and Open Table) came about when the eateries — which have come to depend on the increased traffic the event has provided — began getting phone calls from customers, eager for details about the next restaurant week.

Without an answer, the restaurateurs decided to go forward with their own plans. Each spot will offer three-course dinners for $35 or less.

Night owl Sundays Hamtramck late night haunt Campau Tower is saying goodbye to lunch service, but in doing so will now be open late night seven days a week. Jessica Imbronone Sanches, who coowns the greasy spoon with husband Nikita Sanches, tells us the move is to focus primarily on catering to the city’s late-night crowd. Earlier this month, the Sancheses relaunched Rock City Eatery in its new Midtown location after shuttering its smaller, original spot in Hamtramck. The two had previously said they would continue operations at Campau Tower after the move. The couple have remained tightlipped about the Hamtramck diner’s future, though we have seen unconfirmed comments on their Facebook page that a number of “surprises” are in the works. The couple resuscitated Campau Tower (adding “the Americana Eatery” to the title) two years ago after its previous iteration abruptly closed. Prior to

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the takeover, the spot was open 24/7 and offered super cheap sliders and coffee. Before that, the location was a White Tower (a competitor to White Castle). Under the new ownership, bigger burgers with interesting toppings, plus hot dogs, tots, and other, more chef-inspired fare replaced the old menu — though at higher prices. The spot also got rid of 24-hour service, instead opening during lunch and again after Rock City closed its kitchen. While the higher tickets have meant losing some of its blue-collar clientele, Campau Tower has maintained a loyal following among night owls, many of whom keep late hours working in the food and bar scene or performing in bands. We’ll be sure to keep you posted if/ when any “surprises” come to fruition. Campau Tower is at 10337 Joseph Campau Ave.

Chick-fil-A hits Michigan If you’ve ever put together a list of all the fast-food spots that you’d love to come to Michigan, Chick-fil-A has most likely made the rankings. This comes with a huge caveat: The Atlanta-based chain’s former stance against gay marriage. Chick-fil-A has two low-key outposts in the Mitten State already — one at Oakland University and the other at Detroit Metropolitan Airport’s McNamara Terminal. But unless you manage to catch the limited hours at the university location (not to mention, find a reason to be on campus) or have booked your travel specifically around flying out of the right terminal, chances are slim you’ve been able to enjoy this Southern classic. That will change come Oct. 13, when Michigan welcomes not one but two new locations. Metro Detroit will get one inside the mall at Somerset Collection in Troy, while the state’s first stand-alone store will be located at 5617 W. Saginaw Hwy. in Lansing. Both locations are owned by franchisees Blake Dennard and Kate McNerney. The first to open that October day will be the Lansing branch, at 6 a.m., with Somerset following four hours later. The chain will host an overnight “First 100” party ahead of each store’s opening. As is tradition, the first 100 customers to make it into either location will win free food for a year (52 meals consisting of a Chick-fil-A

n Dakota Inn Rathskeller. Photo by Jim Renaud via Creative Commons. chicken sandwich, waffle fries, and a medium drink). Guests will have to live within specific zip codes surrounding the restaurants to participate (sorry, you can’t road trip from too far away). The openings mark the first in Chick-fil-A’s expansion into Michigan. The company plans to open 15-20 restaurants in the state in the next five years and hire 150 full- and part-time employees combined.

A fall food and drink roundup Fall is in the air and it means so much more than pumpkin spice anything. You get the cool of an evening breeze, the punch of a hoppy brew, and revisiting some of the comfort foods that you’ve been laying off all summer. With that in mind, here are a number of food and drink options to get you started this season: Oktoberfest, Dakota Inn Rathskeller: 8 p.m.-midnight. Sept. 16-17, Sept. 23-24, Sept. 30-Oct. 1, Oct. 7-8, Oct. 14-15 Oct. 21-22, Oct. 28-29; 17324 John R St.

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Squeeze into your Lederhosen and Dirndl and swing by this oldschool Bavarian watering hole for its Oktoberfest festivities, which lasts over a month. Featuring the sounds of the Dick Wagner & Die Rhinelander band, Immigrant Sons, Harry Lutz & Die Fahrenden Musikanten, and Tommy Schober & Sorgenbrecher Band. Admission is $3. Don’t forget your chicken hat. German Beer Dinner, Bastone Brewery: 7 p.m. Sept. 21; 419 S. Main St., Royal Oak Beer lovers can dig into a five-course German beer dinner, which pairs traditional fare like sausage and potato soup, beet salad, and black forest cake with plenty of suds. $50 per person, includes a complimentary Oktoberfest glass. Also at Bastone Brewery, an Oktoberfest celebration Oct. 3-16, with a special menu and beers. “Seasoned Chef’s Dinner Series,” C.A.Y.A. Smokehouse Grill: 6:30 p.m. Sept. 21; 1403 S. Commerce Rd., Wolverine Lake; 248-438-6741

This suburban spot will also have a multichef takeover. This time, it’s for a seven-course meal, featuring Aaron Solley of Craft Work, Alan Merhar of Strada, Jay Gundy from Cork Wine Pub, Eric Voigt from Big Rock Chophouse and the Reserve, along with C.A.Y.A.’s Jeff Rose. $120 includes dinner and wine pairing. Reservations required. AleSmith Beer Dinner, the Stand Gastro Bistro 6 p.m. Friday, Sept. 23; 34977 Woodward Ave., Birmingham; 248-220-4237 San Diego brewery AleSmith will offer five of its best offerings to go along with dinner prepared from chef Paul Grosz’s kitchen. $60 includes pairings for five beers (excluding tax and tip). Reservations required. Ste. Anne Annual Sausage Festival, 5 p.m.-10 p.m. Sept. 23-25; 5920 Arden Ave., Warren No, no, not that kind of sausage fest. This is of the traditional Polish variety. Be treated to a mix of beers, Polish dance performances, live bands, games, rides, and of course plenty of Polish cuisine.

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n The Jolly Pumpkin. Photo via Facebook.

21-27,2016 2016 | metrotimes.com 90 September 21-27,

Detroit Wine Stroll: 1 p.m.-5 p.m. Sept. 24 Get a chance to peruse several historic properties while sampling wine and snacks. You’ll get a unique history lesson on some of the most significant structures downtown and also delicious libations. Walking tour starts at Angelina’s Italian Bistro. For more information, go to the Facebook page by searching “Detroit Wine Stroll” on Facebook.

est in Birmingham with John Somerville of Steven Lelli’s Inn on the Green in Farmington Hills; Marc Bogoff of the Stockyard Detroit food truck with Eve Aronoff of Eve in Ann Arbor; Wright & Co.’s Marc Djozlija with Michigan native Ed Sura of NoMI Kitchen in Chicago; and Brad Greenhill of Katoi in Detroit with Slurping Turtle’s Takashi Yagihashi. Tickets are $125 per person per night. More info at hourdetroit.com or savordetroit.com.

Zwanzie Day, Jolly Pumpkin: 2:15-7 p.m. Oct. 1, 2319 Bishop Circle East, Dexter Special release of the Cantillon brewery from Brussels usually takes place in London or New York, so this Michigan event is something different (perhaps speaking of our rise in beer-making prominence). So it’s pretty cool they’re hosting one in Michigan this year. The event first opens to VIP ticket holders ($125), who will have a first taste of the Zwanze beer. Then general admission guests will be permitted to enter and have at whatever is left. More details at jollypumpkin.com. Savor Detroit, Great Lakes Culinary Center: 6 p.m.-9 p.m. Oct. 3-7; Southfield Hour Detroit magazine presents its semiannual culinary showcase in which prominent local chefs team up with high-profile cooks from across the country. This year, Michael Barrera of Townhouse in Detroit pairs up with Marjorie Meek-Bradley of Ripple in Washington D.C.; Nick Jauntol of For-

Detroit Cocktail Classic, Shed 3, 7 p.m.-11 p.m. Oct. 14; Eastern Market This “gala celebration” event will highlight local and national spirits and will give some of your favorite barkeeps at popular bars a chance to show off their craft cocktail making skills. Participating spots include: Gold Cash Gold, Grey Ghost, the Last Word, La Rondinella, and more. Advanced tickets go for $45 online and $50 at the door. Each ticket purchase includes 12 drink samples. More information at app.gopassage.com/events/detroitcocktail-classic-2016. Detroit Fall Beer Festival, Eastern Market: 5 p.m.-9 p.m. (Friday), 1 p.m.6 p.m. (Saturday) Oct. 21-22 This beer-heavy season is punctuated by this fest. More than 700 Michigan brews will be on hand, plus lots of food. Admission is $40 in advance, $45 at the door and includes beer samples. Information at mibeer.com.

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n Dave Zainea, left, and Dan McGowan outside the Majestic complex. Photo by Jarrett Koral.

The return of the Magic Stick After Populux scandal, the rock ‘n’ roll resumes by Jarrett Koral

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Traversing up the stairs to the Magic Stick now, inside the Majestic complex on Woodward, seemingly little has changed from when the venue was in full operation. At the top of the stairs, the familiar bar is still there, but the ambiance of the place feels different. Less grungy and more refined, the new incarnation of the Magic Stick offers patrons the chance to experience one of Detroit’s legendary music venues while also being involved in something new and exciting for the Detroit music scene. The venue has been in the hands of the Zainea family since 1946, but in 1994, Dave Zainea convinced his dad to let him introduce a nightclub in the complex that already contained a large bowling alley, theater, and bar. While the theater offers space for larger touring acts, the Stick offersa decent-sized room for

local and smaller touring bands. Both Zainea and business partner Dan McGowan, of Crofoot Presents, seem ecstatic about the reopening. Walking with McGowan through the new Magic Stick, Zainea is quick to divert attention to a flyer on top of the bar advertising the White Stripes as third billing, which seems to only solidify the venue’s standing in Detroit’s storied garage-rock past. While other venues like the Gold Dollar and Zoot’s Coffee House offered positive reinforcement for local musicians, the Magic Stick was able to offer a larger room and a more inclusive setting. Playing the Magic Stick was like making it big for many musicians in the local scene. This is a tradition Zainea hopes will continue, saying he knows that the Magic Stick became a “cornerstone to the music community.”

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Both local and worldwide artists took the stage for more than 20 years before the venue closed its doors in 2015, when the Magic Stick changed from a garage-rock haven to a dance nightclub in the middle of that year. The new venue, Populux, replaced the Magic Stick’s classic pool tables with DJ equipment and high-tech lights. The conversion to Populux left many in the local scene disillusioned, including Lee Rosenbloom, a frequent concertgoer and local promoter. “I understand why they tried Populux. The crowds for the shows at the Magic Stick weren’t as big as they used to be. You’d sometimes have touring bands play there to a half-empty room when the same band would pack people in when they played Chicago or Cleveland the next night,” Rosenbloom says.

Knowing that the Majestic complex was so closely associated with the Magic Stick, Rosenbloom never believed Populux had a chance. “In all the time it was open, a Populux sign was never even made for the outside or inside. In all that time, the Magic Stick signs were still up all over the place.” One challenge the reopening of the Magic Stick poses for management is competing with clubs that opened in Detroit while the Magic Stick name laid dormant. Speaking as a promoter, Rosenbloom says now that the Magic Stick is back, they’ll have to be more aggressive in booking good shows, as clubs like El Club and the Marble Bar have opened since the Stick closed, giving bands more options than they did a year or so ago when the Stick was still in operation. Rosenbloom fondly remembers

M usic downing shots with Jack White before White Stripes shows in the Majestic Cafe — just one example of what the venue means to those who were there in the early days of Detroit garage rock. Populux closed its doors in July after an anti-Black Lives Matter rant was posted on the club’s Twitter account following a mass shooting in Dallas. The tweets were attributed by the club’s owners to hacking. Rather than trying to salvage the Populux venue, Zainea figured it best to return to the reliable Magic Stick name and brand, something that he says offers an “opportunity to pivot” for both the Stick and Detroit’s music scene. “I don’t regret the partnership with Amir Daiza [the local promoter who leased Populux from Zainea and ran the venue], but the only thing I regret is the changing of the name,” Zainea says. “The Magic Stick name has credibility in Detroit, so we wanted to return to that.” It only seems fitting the Magic Stick makes its return in the same time frame as White’s opening of a Third Man Records location in Detroit. With its intense roots from the forefront of Detroit’s garage rock scene in the late ’90s and early aughts, the Stick could make a full return to form. It was Zainea’s idea to change the upstairs area from a multilane bowling alley to a nightclub, realizing that the Majestic complex could be an all-inclusive entertainment center, while also noticing the steadily rising local music scene in the surrounding Cass Corridor and Midtown areas. Now that the Magic Stick is returning to its beloved and recognizable name, a pool table has been reinstalled to its rightful place by the rear bar, surrounded by posters on the walls offering shows for bands like the Melvins and Queens of the Stone Age. The Stick is nicer than before too. The small stage has been updated with a large centered stage, surrounded by state-of-the-art sound equipment that was once used as part of Metallica’s touring rig. A brand-new floor has been installed along with brilliantly clean new bathrooms, something anyone familiar with the old venue should be ecstatic about. While Populux is gone, the only things left behind are the light posts, and even then in limited capacity, as Zainea says the lights won’t be on at rock shows. Zainea says he’s proud of the direc-

feature tion the venue is heading. “We’re having local employees who live in Detroit in Corktown [work] here, a diverse staff.” Patrons are free to roam during shows: If someone wants a slice of pizza, they can walk downstairs, buy it, and return to the show. The shows at the Magic Stick will reflect “diverse and eclectic booking,” according to Zainea and McGowan — something Populux was unable to offer, although the dance club was often packed on show nights. The energy in Detroit’s music scene, and the Zainea’s family longtime involvement in it, are reasons to reboot the Magic Stick name, Zainea says. He’s not worried about new venues that have opened, either. “In places like Austin, the live scene thrives,” Zainea says. “It shouldn’t be a problem for all these venues in the city to be running at the same time; we all work with each other.” While live music events were infrequently held in the Populux space under the Magic Stick name, the venue is completely returning with a Sept. 23 show by the Buzzcocks, who last performed in Detroit at Saint Andrew’s Hall. The Stick now offers increased lines of sight and multiple viewing platforms for those wanting to be away from the crowd action, but still wanting to see the band perform. For musicians, a brand-new green room has been built. The old Magic Stick is still there in spirit through the posters of the legendary shows held there, but the new incarnation of the Stick offers something new for those interested in both the venue’s history and future. “We’re proud to be involved with the Stick again, and we’re looking forward to its bright future,” Zainea says. The Buzzcocks headline the official Magic Stick kickoff party with special guests Residuels and Devious Ones at 8 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 23. All ages; tickets are $25 in advance and $28 on the day of the show. 4120 Woodward Ave., Detroit. Visit majesticdetroit.com for more information. Jarrett Koral is the founder of the record label Jett Plastic Recordings.

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feature n Danny Brown at Bruiser Thanksgiving 2015. Photos by Dontae Rockymore.

Danny Brown almost comes home Experience the Exhibition tour in Grand Rapids by John Akers Danny Brown’s new album title of his fourth LP, Atrocity Exhibition (Warp Records; out Sept. 30), shares the name with a controversial work of literature, an experimental post-punk song, and a thrash metal album — you can’t make that shit up. It’s like what we’ve previously said of Brown: He is both “certified hood and a full-on hipster.” Lately, Brown has been full of paradoxes, which only make him a more complex and interesting artist. Maybe that’s why he’s returning to Grand Rapids for the first time since the 2013 2 High 2 Die tour with Action Bronson,

instead of playing a show in his native Detroit. But ultimately, he’s gotta spread the love, or in this case, the “Pneumonia.” This looks to be a killer album. We’ve already gotten two singles, “Pneumonia” and “When it Rain,” and a snippet of another track that hints at Brown rapping in his softer tone, usually reserved for his more introspective and thoughtful moments. The contents also predict some killer features (“Really Doe” featuring Kendrick Lamar, Ab-Soul, Earl Sweatshirt), and possible qualifiers for both molly-fueled bangers (“Goldust,” “White Lines,” “Dance in the Water,” “Get Hi”)

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and Brown’s softer side on Old (“Downward Spiral,” “Lost”). The entire track list has the potential to show us what Brown has been up to the last three years, and there’s no doubt he has some surprises. Hopefully he’ll debut some of the new material at this de facto homecoming show, because we’ve been having a hard time dealing with all of the album teases for so long now. The surreal and trance-inducing “Pneumonia” has us sick with anticipation for his newer material, yet “When It Rain” is the real standout single and a rather paradoxical song, much like Brown’s reputable persona. The beat sounds like it came straight off XXX, and Brown’s relentless flow can’t help but make you bop your head — yet when you consider the lyrics, you might think twice about the way the song makes you feel. The title is of course an allusion to the saying we all reiterate when we’re having a shitty day: “When it rains, it pours.” I’m sure Brown had a lot of those days growing up in Detroit at the time he did, which he describes as “the city

where them goons be lurking, get caught slippin, yo ass will be hurtin” and later in the track, “doomed from the time we emerged from the womb, so to cope, drugs we consume.” Perhaps Brown feels surprised he was able to make it out at all, especially when we look at the way he describes Detroit; “Ain’t no water, how a flower gon’ grow? ... No sunshine and them showers be lead.” Brown is merciless with his honest depictions of what it was like to grow up when he did, and of the atrocities he was bound to experience. These paradoxes begin to make sense once we consider the album title once more, and most likely give us a hint of what to expect at his concert: an exhibition of atrocities. Danny Brown performs on Friday, Sept. 23 with Maxo Kream and ZelooperZ at the Intersection; 133 Grandville Ave. SW Grand Rapids; Doors at 7 p.m., sectionlive.com; $25.50 advance, $28 day of show, all ages.

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n Fred and Toody. Courtesy photo.

Fred and Toody and the true meaning of everything Oregon’s punk rock godparents play El Club by Ana Gavrilovska Rugged, ragged, always real — you couldn’t find two people that embody DIY ethos with more palpable sincerity than punk rock heroes Fred and Toody Cole from Portland, Ore. You probably know them slightly better as two-thirds of Dead Moon, one of those scarily influential bands that, for one reason or another, the larger world still doesn’t quite seem to know, despite how well-loved they are by musicians and rabid fans alike. Fred’s musical start came in the early ’60s; one of his first groups was the Weeds, but you might know them better as the Lollipop Shoppe. Their single “You Must Be a Witch” is now an underground psychedelic garage classic, but at the time it didn’t chart, and neither did their album. The group

disbanded within a few years. At this point, in 1967, Fred had already met and married Toody. The story goes that the Weeds’ van ran out of gas in Portland on the way to Canada. The band got a gig at local venue the Folk Singer, which had a certain Toody Conner under their employ. A year later, the two were married, and they’ve been together ever since. Fred has played in numerous bands, but his first group with Toody was the Rats, raw punk with just a dash of the country influence that winds its way throughout all their output in some form or another. Sick of being unable to keep a stable lineup, Fred taught Toody how to play bass. Once the Rats had disbanded, the Coles’ next band together was more deeply country: the

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Range Rats. Andrew Loomis tried out for this band, but it didn’t quite work out; the Coles ended up using a drum machine instead. At this point, it was 1987, and they wanted to return to a darker rock ‘n’ roll sound; Loomis auditioned for a new group on drums, and this time it was just right. Thus arrived Dead Moon, with 10 studio albums, five live albums, and three compilations released over the course of their prolific existence. In 2006, Dead Moon disbanded, but that didn’t spell the end of Fred and Toody’s music. Almost immediately afterward, they started another garage rock band, Pierced Arrows, with Kelly Halliburton on drums. Two albums, five singles — including one split with the Black Lips — and numerous shows

followed, spreading their powerful, lovelorn spirit to fresh ears and veteran fans alike. It’s not just in the approach to their own music, though — the Coles are DIY, and have been their entire lives. In the ’70s, Fred ran his own equipment store — Captain Whizeagle’s, which lent its name to a label they started at the time to release their own music. In 1988, they started another label to release Dead Moon albums, Tombstone Records; this would eventually lend its name to their own Western-themed DIY miniworld that included not only a music store, but a general store as well, all on their own property in Clackamas, about 25 miles southeast of Portland. The Coles built everything from the ground up, all the businesses and their

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M usic own music-paraphernalia-filled home, where they still live (although they’ve since retired from retail). Even the mastering of the majority of their work has all been done in their own home, employing a mono lathe from the ’50s that had been used for the Kingsmen’s “Louie Louie.” (The lathe was actually a birthday gift to Fred from Toody.) Dead Moon reunited for a string of shows in 2014, but the death of original drummer Andrew Loomis earlier this year brought an official end to the beloved band. Fred’s own health issues have also put a stop to the unruly rock ‘n’ rollness of their shows. (In 2014, he successfully underwent emergency openheart surgery, but the following year, they had to cut short a festival performance when Fred collapsed on stage.) As Toody told the Willamette Week in March, “At this point, Fred’s rock ‘n’ roll days are over. He knows it and he’s happy with it.” But in true dogged Cole fashion, they are continuing to perform as a duo, playing songs from throughout their musical career, and that’s what we’ll be treated to at El Club on Sept. 26. These days, they play seated, with an intimacy between one another wise and touching, the real stalwart kind that can

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feature only be born of a 40-plus-year romance and an over 30-year musical partnership. The thing about Fred and Toody is that they were never trying to make a point. They needed to release their music, so they created a label. They needed to make a home for themselves and their children (they have three, and now at least seven grandkids), so they built it. They needed to make sure everyone was taken care of, so they ran their own businesses for years. Today, DIY is a buzzword. But for Fred and Toody, it’s simply life — and we’re extremely grateful for the chance to see them living it, side by side onstage, proof that even though the shape may need adjustments, you really never have to stop doing what you’ve always loved, on your own terms, in your own way. Fred and Toody perform with Power at El Club on Monday, Sept. 26; Starts at 8 p.m.; 4114 W. Vernor Hwy., Detroit; elclubdetroit.com; $13.50 in advance/$15.50 day of.

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Livewire

This week’s suggested musical events by MT Staff

Friday, Sept. 23 Ra Ra Riot, Young the Giant @ The Fillmore

When it comes to f lat-out joyous and literate indie-pop, it’s hard to go wrong with these mainstays who record for Seattle’s beloved Barsuk label. Their sound may have morphed from orchestral Belle and Sebastian-esque sounds to heady electro-pop, but their current synth-rock sound is consistently excellent and always delivers. Entertainment Weekly has said that their new album “might be their most artful and catchiest set yet.” While Harper’s Bazaar says that their current songs do not “stray from the band’s fun indie vibe.” Bring your friends from your old dorm room days, and dance around like all of your worries are based on term papers and whether what you scored was actually MDMA like the guy said it was, all over again.

Doors at 7 p.m.; 2115 Woodward Ave., Detroit; thefillmore.com; $25-$45.

n Ra Ra Riot. Photo by Shervin Lainez.

Thursday, 9/22

Thursday 9/22

Friday, Sept. 23

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Mint Condition, Bel Ami

@ the Fillmore

@ Motor City Sound Board

Seth Bogart, Rebel Kind, Duane the Jet Black Eel

California-based ambient chillwave act Tycho combines electronic and live instrumentation to create an original sound experience. Scott Hansen, Tycho’s front man and mastermind, has been active in the scene since 2002, and composes an intimate and honest atmosphere through his music. Tycho’s live band is a five-piece, with Hansen in charge of all of the electronic sounds, along with guitar and bass guitar. While the sound heavily relies on the seamless blending of analog and electronic elements, Tycho also incorporates unique sound clips that add to the mood of the piece. With this combination of elements, the group’s shows achieve a refreshing uniqueness.

R&B band Mint Condition, known for jams like “Breakin’ My Heart (Pretty Brown Eyes)” and “What Kind of Man Would I Be” has been bringing the funk since the mid’80s. The group has toured with Prince and has been nominated for three Soul Train Music Awards. Amir Bellamy (Bel Ami), a Houston native, was inspired by a serious car accident to take up music. Bellamy settled in Brooklyn and began creating his signature blend of rock, soul, jazz, and gospel. Bellamy prides himself on his classical music background which plays a large role in the foundation of his music.

@ UFO Factory

Doors open at 7 p.m.; 2115 Woodward Ave., Detroit; fillmoredetroit.com; tickets are $30-$40.

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Starts at 8 p.m.; 2901 Grand River Ave., Detroit; soundboarddetroit. com; Tickets are $35, $37, or $47; 21 and older only.

If this show doesn’t get you out of your house, what will? A rare set by local garage-pop geniuses Rebel Kind plus the debut of Duane’s newly gentrified persona Duane the Jet Black Eel, and a visit from the modern king of queer punk Seth Bogart? Be still, dear heart. Bogart is best known for leading the genre-melting Hunx and his Punx, but let’s not forget he got his start in the fabulous party crasher Gravy Train, and that he seems to have infinite capacity for reinvention, and for finding new idioms within old languages. His new sound was called “electro bubblegum” by none other than Fred Thomas.

Doors at 8 p.m.; 2110 Trumbull St., Detroit; $10.

Wednesday, 9/28 Kanye West @ Joe Louis Arena

What could we possibly say about Kanye West at this point that might convince you to attend this show? Conversely, if you weren’t aware this show is happening, and you now are, what are the chances you might be able to score tickets for anything approaching a reasonable amount of dough? Certainly the amazingly talented and perpetually scowling reality television star will deliver theatrics and bombast in this stop on his “Kanye West: The Saint Pablo Tour.” He’s erected a special stage that actually f loats in the air 15 feet above the audience. You have to attend, at least to tell your grandkids that you were there.

Starts at 8 p.m.; 19 Steve Yzerman Dr., Detroit; 313-4717000; Tickets $44-$214.

n Kanye West on stage in Chile. Photo from Wikipedia.

Saturday, 9/24

Sunday, Sept. 25

Sunday, 9/25

Nada Surf

‘Uncle Jessie White’

Chance the Rapper

@ Loving Touch

@ Hastings Street Ballroom

@ Fox Theatre

Believe it or not, Nada Surf does have more than just the ’90s angstfilled, “cool kids suck” anthem, “Popular” and 2002’s hopeful, longing-filled “Inside of Love.” Thrust into fame by Ric Ocasek (the Cars) in 1992, Nada Surf has never ceased to provide music dripping with the discontented passion of adolescence. With eight studio albums under their belts, the indierock band of disheveled guys has grown-up, but has not lost their f lare for agonizingly relatable lyrics and melodies.

How can we not be excited about this documentary, Uncle Jessie White: Portrait of a Delta Blues Man in Detroit, about a local musician and the crew of assembly line workers who’d play at his house all weekend long during Detroit’s 1967 rebellion? The film details such important blues musicians as the Butler Twins, Johnnie ‘Yard Dog’ Jones, Eddie Burns, Robert Jones, and Mississippi Al. Uncle Jessie White and his racially diverse jam sessions demonstrated how music and culture could keep the community together.

Chance the Rapper, a Chicagoan creating a lot of buzz in the mainstream hip-hop scene since 2013, has shot into fame, now hanging out with the likes of Beyonce, Jay-Z, and Kanye West. He co-wrote and was featured on The Life of Pablo, and has brought home three BET Awards and one MTV Video Music Award. He’s still working to get his music on the radio, but he’s already a name that’s taking the scene by storm.

Doors at 8 p.m.; 22634 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; thelovingtouchferndale.com; Tickets are $20 in advance and $22 at the door.

Starts at 2 p.m.; 715 E. Milwaukee Ave., Detroit; admission includes live band and appetizers; $20.

metrotimes.com

Starts at 8 p.m.; 2211 Woodward Ave., Detroit; olympiaentertainment.com; 800745-3000; Tickets are $35, $55, and $75.

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N ews

stiritup

How the community saved Palmer Park by Larry Gabriel I’ve always been a walker. Whether I’m walking to get somewhere or just walking for the enjoyment, I consider walking to be one of the keys to health. If you can put one foot in front of the other you still have a firm hold on this world. One of my favorite places to walk simply for the enjoyment of it is Palmer Park. Taking a stroll through the woods and around Lake Francis (yes, that’s what the old ice skating pond is called) has pleasured me for years. While I have used the park off and on over time, there have been three periods of intense activity for me there. In the late 1960s, when I was a kid, I would go there with my friends and have cookouts at the casting pond back in the woods. Then we would ride our bikes around on the trails. In the late 1990s, I would take my dog for walks in the park. And over the past couple of years my wife and I have been taking walks there — with our new dog. Not to mention taking in the art fair and some other events in the park. Each of those periods has presented a distinctly different Palmer Park experience for me. When I was a kid, it was still what many who can still remember consider the heyday of Palmer Park. Sports leagues used the baseball fields and tennis courts. There was ice skating and hockey playing on the pond in the winter, and a pavilion where you could get hot chocolate and snacks. In the late ’90s, there weren’t a lot of positive things going on there. The casting pond had disappeared, and a walk through the woods revealed liquor bottles and condom wrappers strewn about. I would sometimes run into a police cruiser hidden in little clearings. I guess they were looking out for whoever was leaving the bottles and wrappers. A woman who I would guess was a prostitute once approached me. I did see people actually fishing in the lake, catching overgrown goldfish that had been dumped there. The

city had put a swimming pool in, and there was a Halloween event when you could take a scary walk through an area festooned with witches and ghosts. But most of the activities were things of the past. The pavilion had been torn down and goose poop surrounded the lake. The tennis courts were in disrepair, as was the fountain and just about everything else. Dope dealers hung out in the parking lots waiting for customers. I could still enjoy a walk there, but it wasn’t exactly a family atmosphere. When we started walking there again a couple of years back, we saw a wonderful transformation in progress. The place is cleaner — condom wrappers were no longer strewn about although more can be done. Police cars no longer lurk in the woods. The pool has changed into a water park. There’s a community garden near the golf course. The log cabin overlooking the lake is secured and being fixed up. There are Little League baseball games there. People are walking around enjoying the place. I love it, but how did it happen? Well the first thing that happened was that in 2010, then-Mayor Dave Bing threatened to shut the place down as part of cost-cutting measures that included 77 parks across the city. Locals organized protests, and the Detroit City Council came to an agreement with the mayor’s office that would keep some parks open. Then some of those who organized

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N ews protests decided to organize with the objective of revitalizing the park. “It was a grassroots movement that mainly started through a lot of the tennis players,” says Clinton Griffin, a People for Palmer Park (PFPP) board member and chair of the Preservation and Beautification committee. “They realized marching and protest wasn’t going to be enough for the vitality of the park.” They created People for Palmer Park, and started things off through the city adopt-a-park program; then received 501(c)3 nonprofit status in late 2011. Since then, it’s been a slow process of project-by-project development. The most recently completed development is a butterf ly garden near the water park area. Griffin and PFPP member Dan Scarsella spearheaded the project, which features plants native to Wayne County: swamp milkweed, black-eyed susan, horsemint, and others. In order to save money, the plants were grown by Wildtype Native Plant Nursery in lieu of purchasing mature plants. Griffin says as

stiritup the plants propagate and need to be thinned out, they will be transplanted to other areas of the park. They’re not only attracting butterf lies. “We’re trying to create spaces that attract people to the park,” Griffin says, “spaces that people enjoy coming to so they adopt a stakeholder attitude.” PFPP sponsored major cleanups in the park, planted an apple orchard and pruned trees to improve sightlines so police didn’t have to hide in the woods — although Detroit’s mounted police are headquartered there, and they sometimes patrol the woods. When I took my dog to walk at Palmer Park the other day, I noticed a couple of people throwing netting over the vegetable beds of the PFPP urban garden. I was wondering if they were expecting a mid-September frost and went over to chat. No, they weren’t girding up for a frost, says Lindsay Page, the farm and community engagement manager, told me. They were covering up the vegetables to protect them from getting eaten

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by deer. Deer in Palmer Park? That’s a new one for me. I’ve never seen one there, but they apparently come out when they’re hungry. Page told me she saw a red fox there this summer. I’ve seen raccoons and possum there, but deer and foxes just add a new layer of interest for me. Page’s part-time position makes her the one paid employee of PFPP. Much of the work is done by volunteers who meet on Saturday mornings. The volunteers get to take fresh produce home. Lots of folks meet at the park. There’s a walking group that meets there three days a week. A bicycling group meets every Thursday. During the warm months, there’s tai chi on Tuesday evenings and yoga on Saturday mornings. There’s a tennis academy, and new chess tables were recently installed in the Lake Francis parking lot. The PFPP has plenty of plans. They’re hoping to restore the fountain, but the $1.5 million price tag makes it a distant dream. A more

tangible goal is the restoration of the log cabin. PFPP has a patronocity. com/palmerparkcabin crowdfunding effort going on right now. If they can reach $25,000, then the Michigan Economic Development Corp. will match the donations so the cabin can be restored inside and out. There is plenty more in the hopper, including a sculpture park at the Seven Mile and Pontchartrain entrance to the park. There’s already one there, donated by artist John Rizzo from the College for Creative Studies. The next big event planned at Palmer Park is an Oct. 1 Harvest Festival near the garden. “What we’ve been trying to do over past five years is transform the park to become family friendly, beautiful, clean, and welcoming,” says Barbara Barefield, a board member and chair for events and marketing. “Recreational programs that haven’t been in the park for years, or haven’t ever been in the park are going on now.”

N letters@metrotimes.com L@gumbogabe

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savagelove by Dan Savage

Quickies Q

I’m a 27-year-old straight male and a high school teacher held to a strict code. I left my fiancée in June and haven’t had sex since. Needless to say, I’m really horny. I’m also in that weird in-between age where I’m not comfortable hanging out at college bars but I’m also a bit younger than most of the women in other bars. But when I scour dating apps, I see profiles of women ages 18 to 22 — women who, for all I know, could have been students at my school. I would never fuck a former student, of course, but I’m worried that I could get my license revoked if my supervisors discovered I was online trolling for sex. So what am I supposed to do? My cock is making sad faces at me right now. —Teacher Evidently Needs Sexual Encounter

If you live in a college town, TENSE, there’s at least one bar where grad students hang out — look for the bar where women are grading papers, not pounding shots, and hang out there. And with more than one in three new marriages beginning with an online meeting these days, and with Pew Research telling us that 60 percent of Americans approve of online dating, I don’t see how your supervisors could possibly object to staffers scouring dating apps and the interwebs for age-appropriate partners. Unless we’re talking about a Catholic school staffed entirely by nuns, which isn’t what we’re talking about.

I’m female, 26, and in an open marriage with a wonderful man. I am having a recurring fear that he’ll get some other woman pregnant and she will refuse to abort. I trust him, but condoms break (or get holes poked in them). He inherited serious money from his father, and his father got “oops’d” into having three kids. I would immediately divorce my husband if this happened. (Yes, I’m an asshole, but my life plans have NEVER included children, step or otherwise.) My solution is for him to get a vasectomy. He says he’s for it, but it’s been a YEAR and he hasn’t made an appointment. I’m seriously considering yanking “open” until he’s sterile. Maybe he really wants children and he’s not telling me, but I keep asking and he keeps saying no. Am I being

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unreasonable asking for the snip? —Seriously Not Into Pregnancy

Maybe your husband wants children, SNIP, maybe he doesn’t. Or maybe he’s one of those guys invested in/aroused by the power of spunk to make babies they don’t want; these guys would rather see their shots intercepted than go unattempted. So while a vasectomy is an eminently reasonable way for a married man who wishes to remain childless to prevent himself from impregnating someone who isn’t his wife, SNIP, arousal often defies reason. And ultimately this is his decision to make— his body, his choice.

I’m a single gay male in my 40s. I have a good life and do good work. I’m not worried about finding the right guy to settle down with. I’m worried about what happens next. I’ve had three serious long-term relationships and several friends-with-benefits relationships. In every single one, a time has come, generally sooner rather than later, when I completely lose interest in my partner sexually. It’s not a matter of him being less attractive to me. It’s not a matter of us not being on good terms — often we become very close friends. It’s not a matter of my sex drive shutting down — I’m all kinds of turned on by other guys, just not the one I’m with. It’s reached a point where I’m deliberately holding myself back from getting into relationships because I’m tired of ruining good things. —Confirmed Bachelor

You could get your ass into therapy, CB, and churn through several relationships while you work on this — relationships that could fail for this or some other reason—and not have anything to show for your effort 10 years from now. Or you could find a guy who has the same problem you do — your predicament is not uncommon — and instead of breaking up when you lose interest in each other sexually, you stay together, you love each other, you take care of each other, and you both fuck other guys.

C mail@savagelove.net L@fakedansavage

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C ulture ARIES (March 21- April 20):

This could be your moment. Figuring out how to bottle whatever it is that you’re using to bring your dreams to life is where it’s at. Up until now it’s been a lot like feeling your way through the dark. In the last year the ability to remain true to the heart’s instructions has shown you that it’s the only thing you can trust. With enough evidence to suggest that you’re on the right track, it’s safe to leave the nest and test your skills in a wider circle of experience. At the moment when the dream becomes real, the need to be careful what you wish for is the only thing that keeps it alive. TAURUS (April 21 -May 20):

Balanced on the blade of a double edged sword, you are poised between life and death, in a situation that is testing all of your limits. It’s been intense, at the very least. With all of your beliefs being tested, and every ounce of energy needed to hold it together, what’s left of you is solid as a rock. Believe it or not, within this crisis the seeds of a new beginning are coming to life. You will remain in the dark until the seasons change. Hang in there. At that point it may be useful to look outside of the box for answers to things that can’t be found elsewhere. GEMINI (May 21-June 20):

Things are looking up. If the sense of pressure is intense for some of you, and/ or the feelings of fear and isolation make you wonder what lies ahead, put your attention on the idea that your higher self has this covered. Your nearest and dearest are there for you too — up to a point. You can’t expect more from people when their issues are just as overwhelming to them as yours are to you. Keep your focus clear. The tendency to think too much, along with the tendency to scatter your energy won’t help at a time when all of your resources are needed for deeper forms of healing. CANCER (June 21-July 20):

The frustration that comes from having to wait has many of you tearing your hair out. Work issues, red tape with the people in charge, delays that rely heavily on the actions of other people — these things keep driving you nuts. The question of what to do while you wait comes down to doing whatever it takes to keep yourself happy in the meantime. Seen in that light, instead of tearing your hair out, take a ride, or spend a day or three out in the middle of nowhere, or give yourself a chance to remember that life is what’s important, not the stuff that we fill it with.

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horoscopes by Cal Garrison LEO (July 21-Aug. 20):

You need to be clear about why things are taking so long. Don’t be impatient with yourself or with anything else. It takes time to turn your life around. As the next few weeks unfold, good aspects from Venus to Mars will frame your plans in a beautiful light. If adjustments need to be made, try to understand that what doesn’t come out exactly the way you planned it may turn out way better than you ever dreamed it would. You’ve got too many things working in your favor to be ready to give up and run back to square one. The long haul will be well worth it when it’s over.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 21-Dec. 20):

Being caught in the middle of a soap opera that has been going on all of your life, you’re beginning to see how history repeats itself. Time, experience, and repetition are the only teachers here in 3-D. Your nearest and dearest are part of it. As you beam in on the back story the part of you that is always totally hip to what’s going on knows exactly what to do. Getting everyone else to see things your way is another story. Whoever you’re pleading your case to has balls bigger than China. If you stand in your truth they will have no problem acquiescing to your demands.

VIRGo (Aug. 21-Sept. 20):

You know you were made for more than this. It’s got less to do with ambition and ego than it does with satisfaction. You’re at a point where it’s the deeper stuff that you need to connect with. Your relationships have gotten stuck in a place that could use a transfusion. One or both of you could consider coming to terms with what you need as individuals, and figure out how to remain loyal to that. If the relationship is worth its salt there will be plenty of room for both of you to get out of this rut and get on with the show. Great leaps are in store for you. Anything is possible.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 21-Jan. 20):

How you’re going to find your way through this one is a good question. It’s not like you haven’t been here before. Knowing where to place your trust has gotten to be a major concern; it could even be the crux of the issue. The saying goes that those who can’t trust, can’t be trusted. Give that some thought and ask yourself how it applies to what’s confusing things right now. Others have no point of reference for where you’re coming from. Seeing eye to eye? I have a feeling you will have to agree to disagree until you cut to the chase and realize that you want the same thing.

LIBRA (Sept. 21-Oct. 20):

It’s the things that money can’t buy that matter more than anything. I don’t need to tell you this; if anyone has a sense of what matters, of late, you have been through enough to know what the score is. With more than one obstacle throwing stones in the road, the fears that arise when we are fresh out of faith could be nipping at your heels. What others have done in response to your plight hasn’t been reassuring. Sitting here in limbo, waiting for the dice to roll, this is less about knowing what to do about it than it is about knowing how to be when life turns us inside out.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 21-Feb. 20):

Give this a day or three and keep breathing; things are about to let up. You have finally reached a point of no return with people and/or situations that have tested your sanity and your patience. The ones who keep throwing rocks in your path have adopted a self righteous pose. If they are using the spiritual bypass to justify their behavior, good luck. When it comes to that, the sooner you call people on whatever they’re pretending to be, the better. You’re totally in the right, as far as I can see. If things don’t get aired out in a couple of days, little hard ball might be in order.

SCORPIO (Oct. 21-Nov. 20):

What started out on an easy track has gotten three times more complicated than you thought it would. Now that you’re here, knowing how to deal with people who keep hatching one crisis after another has you wondering why you didn’t see it coming. And the idea that everyone else’s problems are suddenly your responsibility is another thing; who made it your job to handle this? As you sift through the answers to these and other questions you will begin to wonder why you’re here. It’s time to review your position and realize that you can’t let yourself get used like this.

PISCES (Feb. 21-March 20):

The inner workings of your life are more alive than whatever your surface reality is dishing up. This is a multi-level thing. Layers of old issues are rising to the surface. If you thought you had it all under control, the truth is, you are more like a volcano, ready to erupt. Those closest to you are either clueless, or they’re just too self absorbed to see where you’re at. It all comes down to realizing that you’re totally on your own regardless of who’s in the room. The ones who think they know you haven’t seen anything yet. Be mindful of the need to hold your cards close to your chest.

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