Metro Times 06/28/2023

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NEWS & VIEWS

Feedback

We received many response to last week’s music story about parking issues at Pine Knob for the recent concert by the Cure.

That was the longest its ever taken me to get in Pine Knob! —Sarah

Barnett, Facebook

We went. We thought arriving an hour before the show was enough time. Instead we missed the first hour after waiting 2 hours in line to park. Then it took another hour to get out of the parking lot to go home. I won’t be back there anytime soon.

—Cory Campbell, Facebook

I would have just left my car on the side of the road and walked there. Would’ve

been worth the cost of towing and tickets. Wouldn’t miss them. —Julie Clare, Facebook Happened at Stevie Nicks last year too. —Cin Kor, Facebook

The township that Pine Knob is in, needs to address the traffic situation. The surrounding roads are not at all designed to handle the amount of concert traffic that there is all summer. I live around the córner from PK and it’s a nightmare all summer.

Regina Rodriguez-Trevino, Facebook

When thousands of people are saying that something is wrong and one person is denying it, who is the problem here?

—Tonya Juhl, Facebook

Sound off: letters@metrotimes.com

NEWS & VIEWS

Nessel joins Hamtramck protest over city banning LGBTQ+ Pride flags

OVER 200 PRO-LGBTQ+

people gathered outside of Hamtramck City Hall at Winfield Park Saturday to express dissent towards Hamtramck City Council’s recent decision to remove the LGBTQ+ flag from flying on city property.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel was among those in attendance, and opened up on the microphone, lambasting Mayor Amer Ghalib. “I am not a stranger to you, I am not an agitator, I am your attorney general, and yes, I am also gay,” Nessel said. “ … I come here today to implore the government of the city of Hamtramck to repeal its resolution to ban the Pride flag. And to instead pledge to love, support and recognize the dignity and the value of all those who live, visit and do business with Hamtramck.”

Ghalib said last week that the city would not budge in the face of protesters after the all-Muslim City Council this month voted to ban the Pride flag from flying on city properties.

“In the coming days, you will notice strangers demonstrating in your city and disturbing the public peace by provoking you with their actions and behaviors,” Ghalib wrote on Facebook, claiming “they are trying to create chaos, division and disrupt security in the city.” Nessel noted that Ghalib has said that “banning the pride flag is meant to keep the city ‘neutral’ and ‘impartial’ towards its residents.

“Respectfully, I disagree,” she said. “Banning the pride flag is meant to send the very opposite message: a message of intolerance, hatred, and bigotry. … As it’s said, ‘In situations of injustice, neutrality always favors

the oppressor, never the oppressed.’ And as Martin Luther King Jr. so aptly observed: ‘The hottest place in hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict. Anyone who accepts evil, without protesting against it, is one who cooperates with it.’

“And make no mistake: homophobia, transphobia, are indeed forms of evil just as much as Islamophobia is,” Nessel continued.

Nessel ended with an appeal to Hamtramck officials.

“So I ask the city of Hamtramck to use its voice to speak up for all its people,” she said. “Take down the wall you have now built that has made this proud city into a national embarrassment, and raise the flag of equality.”

The crowd of mostly pro-LGBTQ+ people cheered, as more and more

speakers began to filter through. Between speakers, some local musicians performed, and other organizations took the mic to show their support. Adults and children chalked the park with various pro-LGBTQ+ drawings and slogans.

On the other side of Winfield Park, more than a dozen Hamtramck police officers stood in front of Hamtramck City Hall alongside Michigan State Police troopers.

After Planet Ant Theatre Director Darren Shelton’s speech, he sat down and spoke Metro Times. He noted that he had recently noticed an uptick in Hamtramck of hateful behavior, including multiple attempts to tear down the Pride flag that sits atop the Planet Ant marquee. Shelton said he had to bolt the Pride flag more securely to the marquee.

Attorney General Dana Nessel attended a pro-LGBTQ+ rally in Hamtramck.

VIOLA KLOCKO

Some patrons of Planet Ant also have reported anti-LGBTQ+ slurs being directed at them while standing outside while talking to friends or smoking a cigarette, he said.

“It’s been very disheartening to hear all of the terrible things being yelled from car windows passing by,” Shelton said. “... People will say, ‘It’s just a flag; it’s just a flag,’ but it’s about representation. … The big, scary thing is the number of bad players who really feel like it is their job to step up in a militant way to fight back [against LGBTQ+people] with hatred and violence.” Shelton said he’s happy that the mood of the rally has been one of love and peace.

“This rally is such a loving thing. You can’t come here and say that this is a hateful group that’s gonna corrupt the children or anything; it’s not,” Shelton said. “This is a gathering of scores of people who just want love and fair representation in a city that prides itself on diversity and ideals.”

As the event started to wind down, Gracie Cadieux, one of the organizers, grabbed the microphone and noted to the crowd that there’s plenty of art supplies and chalk lying around.

“We’re gonna ask you guys to make this place fucking beautiful,” Cadieux said. “There [is] chalk spread throughout this park. Please, leave it gay as fuck.”

—Viola Klocko

Warren councilman convicted of hawking Trump-related merchandise without a permit

WARREN CITY COUN-

CILMAN Eddie Kabacinski was convicted last week of a misdemeanor for selling Trump-related merchandise in Utica without a permit.

It’s the second time in less than a year that the conservative councilman was convicted of a crime related to his fervent support of former President Donald Trump.

In August 2022, Kabacinski was sentenced to one year of probation and anger management classes after he handcuffed a woman for posting Black Lives Matter stickers on a Trump yard sign in Eastpointe in October 2020.

Last Wednesday, a 41A District Court jury found him guilty of selling Trump-related merchandise at a rally in August 2021, in violation of city ordinances.

Judge Douglas P. Shepherd sentenced Kabacinski to one year of non-reporting probation and $500 in fines and costs. He also was ordered to pay $200 in attorney fees and $125 in probation fees.

During the trial, Kabacinski insisted he was giving the merchandise away in exchange for donations to Trump’s Save America Political Action Committee.

Kabacinski, a retired Army veteran, didn’t respond to Metro Times for com-

ment. He has vowed to appeal and to file a federal lawsuit against the city of Utica.

In September 2021, Kabacinski’s colleagues on the council called on state officials to consider disciplinary actions against him after his arrest for selling the merchandise.

In October 2021, Kabacinski was arrested for a third time in a little over a year for refusing to don a mask inside the former TCF Center in downtown Detroit. Kabacinski and a bushybearded cameraman wearing a Make America Great Again hat marched into the building without masks, en route to a public hearing on redistricting. Detroit police stopped Kabacinski and said he must wear a mask, pointing out the building was used as a vaccination site.

Kabacinski, who was wearing a “Conservative Values Matter” shirt, identified himself as a Warren councilman and called the officers “Gestapo” while demanding to enter the meeting maskless.

Kabacinski was back in the news last week when he launched into a homophobic and transphobic rant moments before his colleagues voted on an antidiscrimination ordinance.

Kabacinski voted “absolutely not” on the ordinance, falsely claiming that LG -

BTQ+ people are “preying on the youth of our society to change their gender.”

“For religious reasons, I cannot get on board with endorsing the behavior of the [LGBTQ+] community,” Kabacinski said.

He added, “This is about indoctrination, and I will not allow this to happen in this city. I’m not going to allow you to do this to the children of this community. It’s not going to happen.”

The council voted 6-1 in favor of the ordinance, which prohibits discrimination based on age, race, disability, education, familial status, gender identity, gender expression, height, weight, and ethnic origin.

Council President Patrick Green introduced the ordinance after Warren Mayor Jim Fouts’s administration was accused of telling a Bangladeshi group that it could not hold a festival on public space because it was “too ethnic.” Fouts later changed his mind and allowed the Bangladeshi American Festival to take place from July 22-23 at Warren City Square.

“It’s important that the city of Warren joins many other municipalities across the state who have anti-discrimination ordinances on their books,” Green said. When asked to comment, Kabacinski called this reporter a “demonic rat.”

—Steve Neavling

Mortgage demand by Black Detroiters soars, yet flight to suburbs continues IN A REMARKABLE DEVELOPMENT for metro

Detroit’s housing market, the demand for mortgages by Black homebuyers has increased 188% across the city and region over the past decade, according to a new study.

Between 2012 and 2021, the demand for mortgages among Black residents increased 443% for homes in Detroit and 159% for houses in the suburbs.

According to the analysis by Detroit Future City, a think tank that develops strategies for a more equitable city, significant concerns remain about Black residents continuing to leave Detroit. Since 2000, Detroit has lost about 295,000 Black residents, more than any other American city.

And despite the increase in demand for homes in Detroit, only one in five mortgage applications by Black homebuyers were made within the city. The largest increase in the suburbs came in the neighboring cities of Eastpointe and Warren and the outer-ring areas of Clinton Township and Romulus.

“Even though there has been a substantial increase in demand for homeownership in Detroit, this demand remains modest, especially relative to the size of the city,” the study states. “There is continued work needed to create desirable housing options for residents at all stages of life and price points.”

In Detroit, the neighborhoods with the biggest increase in demand for mortgages were East English Village, Grandmont Rosedale, and Bagley.

The analysis found that Detroit is the most popular city in the region for Black homebuyers to seek a mortgage, overtaking Southfield in 2017. The demand for mortgages spanned income levels, with the largest increase coming from Black residents who make less than $50,000 a year.

In Detroit, applications from middleand upper-class Black homebuyers increased by 382%, while the rate surged 477% for those making less than $50,000 a year.

What’s not clear from the study is the percentage of mortgages that were

approved. A previous study by Detroit Future City found that Black Detroiters, regardless of their income level, were twice as likely to be denied a mortgage as white applicants.

“Last fall, DFC announced an ambitious eight-year plan to increase the city’s Black middle class and other communities of color,” Anika Goss, president and CEO of Detroit Future City, said. “We have clearly gained some ground in the last decade, but even with the increase in middle class borrowers, disparities in mortgage originations continue to persist. African Americans make up 77% of the Detroit’s population and are denied home purchase loans at two times the rate as white applicants. It’s not until we solve for this issue, that we can equitably rebuild the homeownership in the city.”

Detroit Future City encouraged the city to invest in areas where the demand for mortgages is increasing to strengthen the city’s neighborhoods.

“These investments could include implementing strategies that support comprehensive community develop-

ment efforts, improving housing stock, increasing neighborhood amenities, and marketing neighborhoods to future homeowners,” the study states.

In the past two decades, Detroit has lost 37.4% of its African American population.

While Detroit’s white population declined by 44,300 between 2000 and 2010, it has since grown by more than 5,100. Its Hispanic and Asian populations have also grown.

Black people now account for 77.2% of the city’s overall population, compared to 82.2% in 2010, when Detroit had the highest percentage of Black residents in the country.

Gary, Indiana, and Jackson, Mississippi, now have larger shares of Black residents.

“Creating strong middle-class neighborhoods that can both retain existing residents and attract new ones is critical for putting Detroit on the path to returning to its status as a middle-class city,” the study concludes.

—Steve Neavling

Pro-DeSantis PAC hammers Trump for commuting Kwame Kilpatrick’s sentence

A GROUP SUPPORTING the presidential ambitions of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis unveiled a video Sunday taking aim at former President Donald Trump for commuting the prison sentence of former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick.

Never Back Down, a super PAC supporting DeSantis for president, rolled out the 52-second ad, titled “Welcome to Detroit,” which calls Kilpatrick a “stone-cold crook.”

The video suggests that Trump commuted the sentence after millionaire businessman Peter Karmanos Jr. approached Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner about releasing Kilpatrick.

“$100,000 later, Trump let Kwame out of jail 16 years early, commuting his sentence on his final day in the White House,” a narrator says. “For the elites in the swamp, that’s just business as usual.”

Kilpatrick was among more than 140 people who were either pardoned or had their sentences commuted in Trump’s final day in office.

Kilpatrick, who resigned from office in 2008, had been serving a 28-year federal prison sentence after his 2013 conviction on two dozen counts.

“He was a stone-cold crook who

assaulted police and stole millions of dollars from the people of Michigan, enriching himself through racketeering, bribery, extortion, and fraud,” the video says. “Not even President Obama

would give him clemency.”

The video debuted on the same day Trump delivered a speech at the Oakland County Republican Party’s Lincoln Day Dinner, where he was honored as

the party’s “Man of the Decade.”

During the speech, Trump said DeSantis has “no personality” and claimed that his campaign is “falling like a rock.”

—Steve Neavling

Three charged in signature fraud scandal involving governor’s race

MICHIGAN ATTORNEY

GENERAL Dana Nessel filed charges Thursday against three people accused of submitting thousands of forged nominating signatures that ended the candidacies of five Republican gubernatorial candidates last year.

Willie Reed, 37; Shawn Wilmoth, 36; and Jamie Lynn Wilmoth, 36, were each charged with more than two dozen crimes, including conducting a criminal enterprise, forgery, and false pretenses.

They face up to 20 years in prison.

At a news conference, Nessel said the Wilmoths, who are married, and Reed were “the worst actors,” but additional signature collectors could be charged.

“The investigating is ongoing,” Nessel said.

Nessel said the three defendants “absolutely knew that they were submitting forgeries to these campaigns.”

“What we are alleging is they made no effort to warn the campaigns or eliminate the signatures they knew to be fraudulent before they passed them along to the campaigns,” Nessel said.

As of early Thursday afternoon, the Wilmoths were in custody, and Reed was being sought by the U.S. Marshals Service, Nessel said.

Shawn Wilmoth was charged as a habitual offender because he was convicted of election fraud in Virginia in 2011.

As a result of the signature forgery

ring, five of the 10 Republican gubernatorial candidates — former Detroit Police Chief James Craig, businessman Perry Johnson, financial adviser Michael Jay Markey, Michigan State Police Capt. Michael Brown, and entrepreneur Donna Brandenburg — were kicked off the ballot because they had failed to collect enough valid petitions.

Tens of thousands of the signatures were forgeries, according to the Michigan Bureau of Elections.

In a statement, Brown applauded Nessel’s office.

“The coming months will shed light on the alleged actions of this group that cause significant disruption of the electoral process in 2022,” Brown said.

The circulators were used almost

exclusively by conservative candidates. Democrats had been suspicious of the circulators for years and scoured the signatures last year for signs of fraud. The scope of the forgeries shocked them.

“I have never seen such evidence of forgery and fraud in a petition drive in the nearly 40 years I have been practicing election law in Michigan,” attorney Mark Brewer, who filed the challenge against Craig’s signatures, said at the time.

In total, six gubernatorial candidates and two judicial candidates paid companies associated with the Wilmoths and Reed more than $700,000 to collect the signatures.

—Steve Neavling

A group of DeSantis supporters called the former Detroit mayor a “stone-cold crook.”

SHUTTERSTOCK

Acclaimed Detroit-based mobile game is now an interactive play

DOT’S HOME, A relatable mobile game about housing insecurity and redlining developed in Detroit, is getting the stage treatment.

The game has been turned into an interactive play through a partnership with theater company A Host of People and community organization Detroit Action.

In the game, we meet Dot as a developer approaches her grandmother with an offer to buy her family home, which has fallen into disrepair. Dot then goes back in time to explore Detroit’s history of housing practices and policies that pushed Black residents out of the city, leaving Black families with little generational equity.

One of those moments shows Dot’s

parents deciding whether to move to the suburbs since the projects that they’re living in are going to be demolished.

During the play, the audience gets to vote on which choice they think Dot’s family should make, which will lead to one of three potential endings.

“All of these historical housing equity conversations, they’re still happening now with gentrification, with developers coming in, and with people holding on to property until property values go up while other people don’t have access to housing,” Sherrine Azab, co-director at A Host of People, says.

“The population of Detroiters that are leaving Detroit city proper the most are middle-class African American families

who want better schools for their kids.”

Dot’s Home Live! will have two productions at the Andy Arts Center on June 30 and July 1. Each show will be followed by a conversation with members of Detroit Action, who will share their stories of housing struggles in Detroit. Members of Detroit City Council will also be invited to the performances to hear residents’ concerns.

“Somebody described it as a live Rocky Horror [Picture Show] for social change,” Azab says. “We’re really excited to be able to do this in support of Detroit Action and all the work they’re doing around housing in the city. It shows how arts and culture can support community organizing and movement in regards to issues that we’re all facing.”

The Dot’s Home mobile game won the Cultural Impact award in Apple’s 2022 App Store Awards and Game of the Year at the Games for Change Festival. It was developed by the Rise-Home Stories Project and was influenced by the stories of several collaborators including Detroit producer and filmmaker Paige Wood who served as the game’s Supervising Producer.

Both performances of Dot’s Home Live! are free to attend, though organizers request that attendees sign up in advance.

For more information, or to reserve a seat to either performance, see mobilize.us/detroitaction.

—Randiah Camille Green

DJ Minx releases queer techno artist compilation

THIS YEAR DJ Minx is fully owning her queendom. Detroit’s “First Lady of Wax” is set to release a compilation of queer techno artists for Pride month.

Finally, we have something to look forward to after what seems like metro Detroit’s worst Pride month ever (we’re looking at you, Hamtramck).

The compilation, titled DJ Minx Presents: Queendom Vol. 1, includes new upbeat house tracks from Shaun J. Wright, Nita Aviance, Sydney Blu, DJ

Cent, Debbie Graham, and Minx herself. It will be released on Minx’s Women on Wax label on June 23.

Minx came out publicly as a lesbian on Instagram in 2021, writing, “People suffer from emotional anxiety at the mere thought of ‘coming out’, but the stress of not doing so is taking up WAY too much of my space and is shaking my energy to the core. So here I am. Minx, DJ, producer, Momma, partner, lesbian, friend.”

She released her latest EP The Throne on Higher Ground in May before playing

at Movement, where she curated her own stage of house music for the second year in a row. She’ll also play Detroit’s other techno festival, Charivari, on August 11. That festival is dedicated to the city’s contributions to techno and dance music.

Minx started Women on Wax in 1996 as a collective for women DJs and singers from Detroit and launched it as an official label in 2001 under the guidance of fellow Detroit artist Moodymann. While Women on Wax has been inactive in

recent years, Queendom marks the label’s relaunch to focus on underground artists and Detroit techno.

“Women On Wax Recordings has been dormant for a bit, but she’s baaaack!” Minx said in a statement. “We’ve sorted some music from a few of my dopest friends to present to you for Pride 2023.

‘Queendom, Volume One,’ is a compilation of tracks produced with love by 5 adorable LGBTQ+ artists. We’re so happy to be back!”

—Randiah Camille Green

In Dot’s Home Live! the audience collectively decides which path to take which will lead to one of three possible endings.

COURTESY PHOTO

NEWS & VIEWS

Lapointe

My friend Gregory Glenn and the vibrant African American parish that nurtured him

By Joe Lapointe

Shortly before he passed away, Gregory Glenn asked relatives to spread the ashes from his cremation in two specific places: Belle Isle and South Africa.

And that was just like him. He lived life both as a local kid still tied to Detroit and as a man of the world with vision beyond his city and his nation.

Glenn died of a heart attack at age 73 on June 10 in Cambridge, Mass. His memorial Mass was last Tuesday in the historic Sacred Heart Catholic Church, a 19th-century landmark building and Detroit’s most prominent parish for African American Catholics.

Greg was a dear friend, a school friend, my first close Black friend, a guy who enlightened me years ago and did it again last week, too, by drawing me into his church. Even in death, he helped acquaint me with Detroit’s African American culture. You might say he “woke” me again in death.

Yes, it is a common trope bordering on cliché to portray a white kid and a Black kid bonding over music and sports. But those true memories filled my mind in the pew at Sacred Heart, remembering the 1960s at St. Martin of Tours parish in the Jefferson-Chalmers neighborhood in Detroit’s southeast corner.

Our parish was about six miles east of downtown, next to Grosse Pointe Park but of a much different culture than our upscale neighbor. St. Martin’s — on one block — supported a church, a grade school, a high school, a convent and a rectory. The schools have long been torn down. The church still stands but has been vacant for decades.

Sacred Heart was Greg’s previous church. It was built by German immigrants in 1875 and is on the National Register of Historic Places.

It is also one of few structures remaining from the “Paradise Valley” era in the first half of the 20th century when many of Detroit’s African-Americans lived in Black Bottom and around the extended entertainment and commercial district north of it along Hastings Street.

After the Germans left the neighborhood, a Black congregation moved to this building from a smaller church nearby.

“On Sept. 1, 1938,” according to the church web site, “the parishioners moved in procession up Eliot, across Hastings to Rivard and became Sacred Heart Parish.”

Hastings Street, of course, got replaced by the Chrysler Freeway, but the church remains standing sturdily just south of Mack Ave., on the north end of Eastern Market, without homes and families around it anymore.

Before those buildings were torn down for “urban renewal,” several generations of Glenns lived in this neighborhood, Greg’s daughter, Janen Glenn, told me. Like many former parishioners, Gregory frequently returned.

His last visit, she said, came late last winter for the funeral of Father Norman Thomas, a legendary pastor of Lebanese descent who took over Sacred Heart shortly after the Riot/Rebellion of 1967 and turned it into something special.

“Sacred Heart is not a regular parish,” said John Thorne, a pastoral associate who sang beautifully at the memorial Mass. “Only 2 percent of our parishioners come from our ZIP code.”

Instead, he said, they come from places like Holly, Lansing or Canada.

“People come back,” Thorne said, “and they say, `Hey, it’s home.’”

Among them is Dr. Isaiah (Ike) McKinnon, the former Detroit police chief who holds a doctorate in educational administration among several degrees. He grew up nearby, he said, at 4125 St. Antoine, where most needs of life could be met in a short walk around Hastings.

“Countless businesses,” McKinnon said. “The Castle Theatre. Diggs Funeral Home. The Willis Theater. The New Bethel Church, where I first met Aretha Franklin. Brewster Center, where Joe Louis trained. Lincoln Elementary School. Joe’s Tap Room, a pool hall. Eastern Market. On Saturday mornings, a line of moms would walk there. And the Flame Show Bar! As kids, we’d walk by there and, from the sidewalk, you could hear James Brown.”

Greg Glenn also loved music, including James Brown. By most standards, he was a regular guy, an assembly-line worker who painted cars for GM for 25

years before retiring to Massachusetts, where he had attended college. He often came back home, sometimes for Detroit’s jazz festival.

At his Mass, along with traditional prayers, Thorne sang “Amazing Grace,” “I Won’t Complain,” “I Shall Wear a Crown,” “Psalm 23” and “God Has Smiled on Me.”

His tenor gave me goose bumps and flashed me back to the day in late 1967 when the soul singer Otis Redding died in a plane crash. Greg and I were in 11th grade. Greg cried that day and he was not a crier.

A tall, handsome, strong athlete, his nickname was “Glee-Glee” and his default setting was a smile. More than a year older than me, Greg was sort of a big brother figure.

His family had moved into our neighborhood as integration grudgingly spread across the East Side, and Greg was one of the few Black kids in our school. Greg possessed the self-confidence of the talented athlete and he showed me some of the ropes of downtown. We used to take the Jefferson bus to Cobo Arena to watch the Pistons in Dave Bing’s early years.

A natural-born hustler, he knew every usher at Cobo, including the ones guarding doors as well as those at the entrance to the season-ticket holder lounge with the free hot dogs. We never went hungry at Pistons games.

We rarely discussed race relations in any blunt way, but Greg knew I liked to read, so he would loan me books like Manchild in the Promised Land by Claude Brown and The Autobiography of Malcom X.

And, when I bought the Muhammad Speaks newspaper downtown and brought it to school, Glenn would patiently answer my ignorant questions about a different religion.

Less than four months after Redding died, Dr. Martin Luther King was murdered in Memphis.

This was spring of junior year, and it threatened musical plans I had made with Greg. Less than two weeks after Dr. King’s death, we were supposed to go to Cobo on Easter Monday to see a James

Brown concert. (The King of Soul had moved up in the world from the Flame Show Bar).

The Rebellion had occurred just nine months before. Some of my friends suggested that a James Brown show downtown at this time might not be a good idea for a guy who looked like me. As you might have predicted by now, Greg Glenn would not entertain that thought.

“We’re going,” he told me. We took the DSR bus (a quarter, then), and he talked us through the Cobo doors that night and into the balcony. This was the first concert I’d ever attended. Hundreds of shows 9later, it’s still among the best I’ve ever seen and heard. James Brown in his prime. Good God!

I vividly remember that night. In the style of the time, the men in the audience wore Easter suits in bright hues of blue, yellow, green and other colors so that Cobo that night looked like a giant basket of Easter eggs. And Brown outdressed everyone. For me, it was both eye- and ear-opening.

But that’s all in the past. Greg’s dead now and so is “Father Norm,” who made it to age 92, refusing to retire from Sacred Heart until his passing forced the issue. And what might the future hold for a still-living church shepherded for 54 years by a hockey-playing priest who skated with a group called “the Flying Fathers”?

His act will be tough to follow; not every house of worship has a pulpit adorned with “Black Lives Matter” banner, a Black Jesus on the crucifix above the altar and a Black Jesus pictured on the side walls in the Stations of the Cross.

Presently, the Archdiocese of Detroit operates Sacred Heart as one of the five parishes in the “Detroit Lower Eastside Family” under the supervision of Msgr. Dan Trapp. But the future is not clear.

“We’re waiting for a pastor to get assigned,” said Thorne, the singer. “That will give us more clarity.”

“It is the mecca,” said McKinnon, the ex-cop, “for African-American Catholics in Detroit.”

Columnist Joe Lapointe, left, with childhood friend Gregory Glenn in 2003. COURTESY PHOTO

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Product Validation Laboratory Manager, Plastic Omnium Auto Inergy, Troy, MI. Manage, lead, & mentor laboratory organization of Test/Val Engrs at various levels & Lab Techs to perform product validation for Plastic Omnium blow-molded, corrosion resistant plastic fuel tank syss incl. 6 co-extruded, multilayer structures such as Outer virgin HDPE layer; Regrind layer; Outer Adhesive (low density polyethylene) layer; EVOH layer; Inner Adhesive layer; & Inner virgin HDPE layer, “touching the fuel”; Lev3 Fuel Tank Syss; Twin Sheet Blow-Molding; INWIN Fuel Tank Syss for Hybrids. Schedule, coordinate & control testing for fuel tanks syss for OEM vehicle maker projects. Review & release final test reports for internal DVP& R. Dvlp test planning for design verification testing & process verification testing during dvlpmt both internally & at external test sites outsourced by customer/Plastic Omnium. Master, Chemical, Materials, Mechanical Engrg, or related. 12 mos exp as Engineer, engrg & dvlpg cmpts for blow-molded, corrosion resistant plastic fuel tank syss incl. 6 co-extruded, multilayer structures, or related. Mail resume to Ref#2425-423, POAI Human Resources, 2710 Bellingham Dr., Troy, MI 48083.

EMPLOYMENT

Controls Design Engineer, Milford, MI, General Motors. Design, develop, implement & validate math-based & physics-based algorithms for current & next generation conventional ICE psgr vehicle & Hybrid Electric Vehicle Exhaust Pressure & Temperature sys features incl temperature estimation & Post Oxidation in Engine Control Module & Battery Electric Vehicle torque estimation in embedded Vehicle Integration Control Module, in Embedded C, using MATLAB, Simulink & Stateflow models, & Git, Gerrit, Jenkins, IBM Rational Rhapsody, & Artifactory tools, following Scaled Agile Frame for future model year vehicle pgrms & global mkts. Define reqmts, & design & develop softwr for On Board Control Module to select optimal vehicle operation to meet driver demand & driver qlty using advanced control algorithms incl linear & nonlinear System Control, Optimal Control, Robust Control, Artificial Intelligence, steady state optimization & state estimation techniques, in C, using MATLAB, Simulink, Stateflow, ETAS INCA, Eclipse IDE, ETAS MDA & Artificial Neural Network tools. Master, Electrical Engrg, Mechanical Engrg, Automotive Engrg, or related. 12 mos exp as Engineer or Design Engineer, validating or calibrating control algorithms for engine electronic control unit or app, or related. Mail resume to Ref#31265-18208, GM Global Mobility, 300 Renaissance Center, MC:482-C32-C66, Detroit, MI 48265.

EMPLOYMENT

Feature Integration Engineer, Milford, MI, General Motors. Engineer, integrate, validate, & debug conventional ICE psgr vehicle & Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV) embedded Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) Compute Platforms & ADAS Software Defined Vehicle ECU features incl Super Cruise, Ultra Cruise, Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC), Enhanced Cruise Control, Lateral Impact Mitigation, Rear Impact Mitigation, Traffic Jam Assist, Ultrasonic Park Assist, Advance Park Assist, Side Blind Zone Area, Lane Change Assist, Rear Cross Traffic Area & Rear Virtual Braking, using ETAS INCA, Vehicle Spy, Vector CANalyzer & DPS tools, using neoVI FIRE2, RAD-Moon, & RAD- Galaxy hardwr. Perform root cause anlys of issues incl logging & analyzing Controller Area Network bus & Local Interconnect Network, & Automot Ethernet data using neoVI hardwr & Vehicle Spy tool. Identify issues related to integration between various modules & work w/ Electronic Control Unit (ECU) Design Release Engineers. Coordinate calibration work w/ Long Range & Short Range RADAR suppliers to coordinate ops softwr updates w/ suppliers. Bachelor, Electrical Engineering or related. 24 mos exp as Engineer, integrating & debugging BEV ADAS module & ECU features incl ACC, Rear Impact Mitigation, & Lane Keep Assist, or related. Mail resume to Ref#380-204, GM Global Mobility, 300 Renaissance Center, MC:482-C32-C66, Detroit, MI 48265.

WISHING YOU A SAFE & HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!

Wed 6/28

PATIO BAR OPEN @5pm

SANGRIA FUMINDOR PROMO!

Happy Birthday, Jimmy Doom!

Thurs 6/29

WDET 101.9 COMEDY SHOWCASE SERIES

“What’s So Funny About Detroit?”

Season 3

Hosted by Culture Shift’s Ryan Patrick Hooper Feat. 6 Detroit Stand-Up Comics!I INFO&TICKETS@ WDET.ORG/EVENTS

Doors@6:30pm/Show@7:30pm DEEP EDDY PROMO!

Fri 6/30

The DeCarlo Family/Elephant Den/ Switchblade Vengeance (pop/post-punk/rock)

Doors@9p/$5cover

Sat 7/01 DJ SKEEZ & DJ BET (hip-hop)

Doors@9p/$5cover HORNITOS PROMO!

Mon 7/03 FREE POOL ALL DAY Happy Birthday, Emily “DJ EM” Thornhill!

Tues 7/04

4TH OF JULY - OPEN ALL DAY B. Y. O. R. Bring Your Own Records (weekly) Open Decks@9PM NO COVER IG: @byor_tuesdays_old_miami

Coming Up: 7/07 Hidebehind/Bend/Small Stresses

7/08 BANGERZ & JAMZ (monthly DJ dance party)

7/11 DRINKING WITH DOGS w/ K9-5 @6pm

7/14 Carbon Decoy/Trash Fiasco/ Hourlies

7/15 The Good Time Gals/Amanda Standalone/Boblo Islanders

7/22 Funkwagon/Vig Arcadia

We Are Searching For A Permanent General Manager Contact us: theoldmiamibarjobs@gmail.com

Robert Bosch LLC seeks Sr. SW

(Mult Pos) (Plymouth, MI).

HOW DO YOU

YOUR BRAIN? REBOOT

By Randiah Camille Green

TRIGGER WARNING: This story includes themes of child sexual assault, trauma, and violence.

Ugly, robin-egg blue wallpaper with pink flowers covered the interior of the mystery house I found myself in. It looked like something an overly religious grandmother would use to decorate her home.

I didn’t recognize it. My grandmother, while overly religious for sure, never decorated her house like this, nor did anyone else I know.

I descended a dark staircase to the basement where a depressive and frightened energy clung to the walls, trapped. Far off in a corner, a man crouched on top of a bed with his pants at his knees. A young girl, no older than 10, lay frozen underneath him.

I didn’t need to see any more of that hideous wallpaper to know it was a sinister front to conceal the horrors happening within the house. It was repulsive, like a smile drawn on a pig’s face out of shit.

Approaching the overweight, hulking man from behind, I grabbed him and slit his throat. Blood sprayed the air as his heavy body slid to the ground and disintegrated into dust. The young girl looked at me with an expressionless

gaze before finding solace in my arms as I carried her out of the basement, leaving the nightmarish house behind.

The girl was me in a past life and this violent out-of-body experience from across lifetimes surfaced during a visit to a “mental health gym” called Inception.

I opened my eyes to a dim room where I lay in a reclining chair with sensors stuck to my scalp feeding into a laptop.

Inception is run by a family of Detroiters who use alternative healing modalities to help visitors address trauma and stress.

Located in Farmington Hills, Inception utilizes different techniques like floatation therapy, salt therapy, infrared saunas, and neurofeedback to reset the body and mind.

“When your computer freezes, what do you do? You reboot it,” Art McCullar, the father of owner David McCullar, says when I ask him in the gym’s lobby what I’m about to experience. “How do you reboot your brain? That’s what you’re about to do.”

During my visit, I did Inception’s “IINNER RESET” circuit which includes 30 minutes each of magnetic resonance therapy, neurofeedback or “brain training,” and floatation therapy. Since the

gym’s float tank was out of commission at the time, we substituted with red light therapy.

The 90-minute session addresses the impact of trauma by calming the nervous system and getting the body out of fight, flight, or freeze mode.

Most people can appreciate relaxing in a sauna, and float spas have been cropping up all over metro Detroit in recent years. Inception, however, takes it to the next level. While a visit may certainly leave you feeling recharged, you may also come face to face with traumatic events locked within your subconscious — past and present.

My apparent past life trauma surfaced during the brain training, where you lounge in a recliner wearing an eye mask and headphones. Sensors attached to your head monitor your brain activity while soft music plays, and when they find a blockage or thought pattern you need to address, the music skips.

It can be slightly annoying at first like listening to a scratched record with incessant skipping that makes its own remix, but murdering a child molester in an out-of-body experience was far more jarring.

David McCullar says the brain training technique is based on quantum theory — the idea that whatever is observed changes. He offers a metaphor to explain the purpose of the skipping music.

“Consider this, you’re driving down the road and you drift to the left and you start hearing this loud noise,” he says, mimicking the sound of a highway rumble strip. “What is that? That’s the feedback mechanism letting you know that if you keep going that way, you’re going to hit the median. That’s what neurofeedback is. It lets your brain know what it’s doing so the brain can self-correct … When you’re in that chair, the brain is observing those skips and pauses and it’s saying, ‘Why are we going to these states of danger when we are in a safe environment?’ The brain then begins to regulate the nervous system where you get into parasympathetic rest and digest, because at that moment there’s literally no threat in front of you.”

Fight, flight, or freeze

David tells me my experience confronting past trauma with violence is common during brain training.

“It sounds like you moved from [the freeze response], and typically when you come out of freeze there’s anger associated with it,” he explains. “Fight or flight is your first line of defense, but when you freeze there’s a sense of helplessness happening, so you shut down. It happens all the time … the trauma is in the body, so when you start to create these altered states within the system, it’s an opening that’s happening.”

He continues, “People come out

‘Mental health gym’ Inception says it can reset your mind, but gave me a terrifying past life regression

David McCullar owns Inception, a "mental health gym" in Farmington Hills that's supposed to be able to relax the nervous system.. COURTESY PHOTO

of brain training and have this moment where they realize they’ve been abused by their family or that they’re in bad workplaces or bad relationships. Inception is allowing you to get space between your thoughts and get out of the stimulus-response loop that we’re typically stuck in. When you have that space, all of a sudden you start to see things that were always present.”

“Brain training” therapy was the first offering David started his business with roughly 16 years ago. Back then he ran it with his father, it was called Neurofitness Center, and it didn’t include float therapy or any of the other modalities.

At the time, David had been suffering from severe anxiety, depression, and vomit-inducing panic attacks. Things had come to a head after a fallout with his church community left him feeling isolated.

“I went from being part of a community that I was in three or four days out of the week to nothing,” he remembers. “And that was a traumatic experience for me and my other friends who were part of that community and left due to … some character flaws. Now we’re talking about spiritual traumas, but it was really just lifelong stressors that broke the camel’s back in 2006. I became very reclusive and I would project about an event a week ahead and be so anxious … just my thoughts could have me go into a vomiting episode.”

He began to look into self-development and alternative therapy techniques. That’s when he discovered brain training through physicist and author Lee Gerdes, who operates Cereset (formerly Brain State Technologies) out of Scottsdale, Arizona.

“When I saw it, I was like, this is something that can help me and that I can potentially bring back to Michigan if it works,” David says. “Me and my dad flew out to Scottsdale and my anxiety had decreased by 50% in one day. After that, I actually went out and ate for the first time in public since I started having these vomiting panic attacks, so I knew it was working.”

The McCullars expanded the business with other therapies and opened Inception in 2016.

Whether neurofeedback can actually treat things like stress, anxiety, post traumatic stress disorder, and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, however, depends on who you ask.

Neurofeedback has been studied as a potential clinical treatment since the 1970s when it was found to be effective in high-anxiety patients.

McCullar points us to several peerreviewed studies, including one by researchers at the University of Tehran and Iranian National Center for Addiction Studies where patients reported “a

significant reduction in anxiety-related symptoms” following 30 neurofeedback sessions over three-months. Another case study points to a veteran suffering from PTSD-induced depression and restless sleep whose symptoms “move(d) toward clinical insignificance” after four months.

Others aren’t so sure. A 2020 analysis of 17 neurofeedback studies suggests its impact on mood disorders is relatively low.

Still, David maintains the validity of neurofeedback for anxiety based on his own experience.

“It was always about me first,” he says. “I don’t have anything fluffy at Inception, because I have to experience it, and if it doesn’t really do anything for me, I don’t want to put it out there for my clients.”

The youngest person David has treated using Inception’s IINNER RESET was a two-year-old with delayed speech.

“Really the kid was just frozen,” David says. “As soon as we started training, next thing you know he started to formulate words. It goes back to your body’s resources. If your body is going to fight this imaginary thing in front of you and the system is using all its resources to do that, you’re not gonna have the ability to speak properly, or do math problems and things of that nature because your resources are being used for protection.”

He adds that it’s important to address imbalances as early as possible since trauma responses are often formed in childhood. To bring Inception to a younger generation, McCullar has partnered with the Detroit Hispanic Development Corporation to install a mini reset station in the nonprofit’s office. Here, kids from age six up to 25-yearold adults can experience a shortened 30-minute IINNER RESET circuit.

“We hope to continue to go forward and do that same model across other nonprofits,” David says. “We’ve already started to talk to a few high schools as well to get a reset station installed. It just comes down to getting the funding.”

Reframing “trauma”

The word “trauma” alone can be triggering. While images of a horrific experience surfaced during my Inception visit, McCullar says trauma isn’t just limited to extreme situations.

“When you hear the word trauma, people think it’s like the trauma wing of the hospital, but anything that’s overwhelming to the nervous system is trauma,” he says. “That could literally be winning the lottery, that could be being married, giving birth, falling off your bike as a kid. It just really depends on the nervous system and how it perceives danger and threat. I had a traumatic experience going into a hyperbaric chamber a few weeks ago and I felt my body going into freeze like I was

being trapped.”

While the IINNER RESET is one means of addressing trauma and enabling the body to cope with stress triggers, Inception also offers a specific “trauma release therapy.”

Scroll through Inception’s Instagram page and you’ll find videos of trauma release therapy participants convulsing and shaking uncontrollably on the floor.

“What you see the clients doing on the floor is all involuntary,” David says. The session includes a series of Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises (TRE) that McCullar says evokes a tremor mechanism in the body. He learned the TRE technique through Dr. David Berceli, a body worker who noticed how animals and children in war-torn countries would shake after violent experiences.

“When bombs were being dropped, he noticed all the kids were shaking, but none of the adults were,” David says. “And so he figured out that was a safety mechanism. He saw it in animals in the wild, too. After traumatic events, they shake. They discharge that energy out of their bodies, and they go on with the rest of their lives. They don’t end up with post-traumatic stress. So he figured out a way to re-engage the trauma response that our body has naturally and he created this series of exercises. I’ve been doing it for 15 years.”

David says experiencing trauma is a

Inception's "IINNER RESET" circuit includes things like brain training (aka neurofeedback), flotation therapy, and the magnesphere. COURTESY PHOTO

part of being human, but most people don’t have good coping methods to regulate their nervous system.

“We’re already dealing with our mental health, we just don’t know that we’re doing it, by going to drink and smoke, have sex, buy and consume, or whatever else,” he says. “Inception is just a safe, healthy environment that encourages the body to do its own healing, which it is capable of doing.”

David has plans to expand Inception far beyond its metro Detroit location with the help of radio personality Charlamagne tha God, who is working with the McCullars to open a reset station in South Carolina.

Charlamagne is a huge fan of Inception. The two became friends after David began tagging him on Inception’s Instagram posts back in 2019. Eventually, Charlamagne slid into Inception’s DMs and David invited him to come try it for himself.

“I was tagging Charlamagne, Big Sean, everybody in the space in my posts every day because everybody was talking about mental health, but nobody was really talking about solutions,” David remembers. “Or the only solution they were talking about was talk therapy, which is fine, but there are way more tools in the toolbox.”

After one visit, Charlamagne was hooked. David remembers the radio host saying he had “never experienced peace like that before.” He repeatedly visited Inception, quickly spreading the word on his show, and even appeared on Fox 2 promoting the mental health gym.

For now, the McCullars plan on opening reset stations with shortened circuits around the country and expanding them to full gyms with all the

EMPLOYMENT

EMPLOYMENT

healing modalities in the future.

During an appearance on The Breakfast Club, Icewear Vezzo said about Inception’s brain training, “That shit fucked me up, bro.” He meant it in a good way, as he expressed plans to return for another session.

Just before I head into the IINNER RESET chambers I meet one of McCullar’s aunts, Ann “Cookie” Jones, who’s just finished her session for the day. She’s been coming to Inception twice a week for the past three months.

“I have lost quite a few family members — my mom in 2019 [and] my aunt in 2021, who was like my second mom — so I was very depressed and sad,” she tells me calmly. “The first day that I came here, that was the first night I slept all the way through in about three years. I can’t tell you what it did, how it did it, but I have a smile on my face that I have not had in a long time.”

Six months before my visit to Inception, a tormented voice had cried out to me as I meditated in front of my altar, saying, “He raped me.” Petrified, I cut my meditation short and cleansed the space, fearing that an unwanted presence had come through the ether.

A psychic medium would later tell me the voice was me from a past life, screaming to be freed from the agony that had followed me into this timeline. I ignored it, but couldn’t overlook how that trauma had manifested itself in my relationships with men in my present life.

No matter what we believe, our time in this universe goes far beyond what we will experience in this lifetime. We carry the past experiences of our souls with us, and they shape us in ways we don’t realize.

Quality Manager, Brose North America, Auburn Hills, MI. Plan, control, supervise & assure timely execution & imprvmt of automated production lines, conveyors, checking fixtures, gauges, mfg processes, knowhow, & production practices at mfg plants in U.S., MEX & BRA to produce mechatronics drives syss incl brushless Cooling Fan Modules, Condenser Radiator Fan Modules, Heating Ventilation & Air Conditioning motors, oil pump motors, Electric Power Steering motors, actuator motors, related motor variants & plastic injection moldings. Supervise, lead, & mentor a team of 3. Generate customer qlty plans through project gates incl from Quotation (RFQ), prototype 0 (sample), soft tool prototype to prove design, tool test release, tooling kickoff, preproduction line (incl Measurement System Analysis & End of line (EOL) testing), start of production (serial production), & mass production & mfg handover, with OEM & Tier I customers, suppliers, Design & Engrg depts (Auburn Hills, MI & Queretaro, MEX) & plant production teams. Required travel to plants in U.S. & MEX to train personnel in new lines, review machine tryouts w/ customers, & ensure run at rate capacity capability, & to OEM/Tier I customer plants in U.S. & MEX to investigate qlty issues & implement containment strategies, up to 10 weeks per year. Master, Industrial Engrg, Mechanical Engrg, Automotive Systems Engrg, or related. 24 mos exp as Engineer, generating customer qlty plans through project gates incl from prototype (sample), soft tool prototype to prove design, preproduction line (incl EOL testing), start of production, & mass production & mfg handover, with OEM customers & suppliers, or related. Mail resume to Ref#4708, Brose, Human Resources, 3933 Automation Ave, Auburn Hills, MI 48326.

Safety Design System Architect, Milford, MI, General Motors. Identify & review key safety hazards & safety metrics such as unintended acceleration/deceleration, unintended vehicle propulsion/loss of propulsion, failure to reduce propulsion, unintended park disengagement/loss of parking engagement to develop within current & future vehicle safety architecture designs. Design, develop, & engineer (using IBM Rational Team Concert & Jira) ICE psgr vehicle & Battery Electric Vehicle current safety reqmts & safety architecture & future Software Defined Vehicle safety reqmts & safety architecture in embedded Electronic Control Units (ECU) incl Transmission Control Module (TCM), Powertrain Control Module, Vehicle Integration Control Module, &Engine Control Module in 2-speed, 6-speed, 8-speed, 9-speed, &10-speed transmissions & 2nd & 3rd generation, internal & external Electronic Transmission Range Select (ETRS), in MATLAB & Embedded C programming languages, using Git, Gerrit, Jenkins, & Artifactory tools. Collaborate with Sys Safety Engrg &develop reqmts & architecture safety solutions for GM transmission syss & ETRS to meet GM safety standards &ISO 26262 safety standards. Master, Mechanical, Automotive, Electrical Engineering, or related. 12 mos exp as Engineer, developing & engrg psgr vehicle safety reqmts & safety architecture in embedded ECU incl TCM in transmissions, in MATLAB & Embedded C programming languages, or related. Mail resume to Ref#40517, GM Global Mobility, 300 Renaissance Center, MC:482C32-C66, Detroit, MI 48265.

During "brain training" your brain activity is monitored as you listen to soothing music which skips when a blockage or uncomfortable thought pattern is observed.

COURTESY PHOTO

WHAT’S GOING ON

Select events happening in metro Detroit this week. Be sure to check all venue website before events for latest information. Add your event to our online calendar: metrotimes.com/ AddEvent.

MUSIC

Wednesday, June 28

Ann Arbor Civic Band 7:30-8:30 p.m.; Burns Park, 1414 Wells St., Ann Arbor; no cover.

Between The Buried And MeThe Parallax II Tour 7 p.m.; Magic Stick, 4120 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $25 advance, $30 door.

El Shaw Production, Foxxy Gwensday and The Craig Tyner Project Presents The 1st Annual Jazz & R&B Explosion ft. The Craig Tyner Project 7-10 p.m.; Aretha Franklin Jazz Cafe At Music Hall, 350 Madison Street, Detroit; $25.

Elvis Costello & the Imposters

7:30 p.m.; Meadow Brook Amphitheatre, 3554 Walton Blvd., Rochester Hills; $39.50-$125.

Maul, Primitive Rage, Jesus

Wept 7 p.m.; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $15.

Rebelution: Good Vibes Summer Tour 2023 7 p.m.; The Fillmore, 2115 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $29.50-$49.50.

Spyro Gyra 7:30 p.m.; The Aretha Franklin Amphitheatre, 2600 E. Atwater St., Detroit; $15-$65.

Thursday, June 29

Detroit Has Talent - hosted by J Cutz 9 p.m.-2 a.m.; The Compound, 14595 Stansbury St., Detroit; $15.

Loud Luxury 7:30 p.m.; Caesars Palace Windsor - Augustus Ballroom, 377 E. Riverside Dr., Windsor; $33-$68.

Morgan Wallen: One Night At A Time World Tour 5:30 p.m.; Ford Field, 2000 Brush St., Detroit; $189.75$269.75.

Teen Suicide 7 p.m.; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $18. The Whitney Garden Party: The Blueflowers 5 p.m.; The Whitney, 4421 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $5 individual or $15 VIP reserved tables for parties of 2, 4, or 6.

Pride Paint & Poetry ‘23 5-9 p.m.; Irwin House Gallery, 2351 Grand Blvd., Detroit; $5 donation.

Friday, June 30

Detroit Symphony Orchestra

And The Henry Ford Present Salute To America At Greenfield Village 5-10 p.m.; 20900 Oakwood Blvd., Dearborn, 5-10 pm; $42.

Morgan Wallen: One Night At A Time World Tour 5:30 p.m.; Ford Field, 2000 Brush St., Detroit; $189.75$269.75.

Cynic, Atheist 6 p.m.; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $25.

The Ghouls, Chase Down and Elixir 9-11:59 p.m.; New Dodge Lounge, 8850 Joseph Campau Ave., Hamtramck; $10 pre sale $15 door.

Half Way There, Slowfoot 7:30 p.m.; Pike Room, 1 S. Saginaw, Pontiac; $12.

Kool & the Gang 8 p.m.; The Aretha Franklin Amphitheatre, 2600 E. Atwater St., Detroit; $39.50-$125.

The Pandys, Dreamjacket, Jack Oats, Wally Dogger 7-10 p.m.; Trixie’s Bar, 2656 Carpenter Ave., Hamtramck; $10.

Shop, Rock N’ Stroll Downtown

Port Huron 6-10 p.m.; Downtown Port Huron, Huron Avenue, Port Huron; no cover.

Sun-Dried Vibes with Leaving

Lifted 8 p.m.; Magic Bag, 22920 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $15.

The Rocket Summer, The Juliana Theory 7 p.m.; The Loving Touch, 22634 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $20.

The Zotz, Cocktail Shake, DJ Zak Frieling 9 p.m.-12:30 a.m.;

Bowlero Lanes & Lounge, 4209 Coolidge Hwy., Royal Oak; no cover.

Thay & Friends on the Alley

Deck 9 p.m.; Garden Bowl, 4120 Woodward, Detroit; no cover before 10:30 p.m., $10 after.

Saturday, July 1

Detroit Symphony Orchestra

And The Henry Ford Present Salute To America At Greenfield Village 5-10 p.m.; 20900 Oakwood Blvd., Dearborn, 5-10 pm; $42.

Cat•chella Music Festival and block party 4-10 p.m.; Lawrence Street Project, 31 North Saginaw St., Pontiac; $15.

DUENDE + DJ Tony Drake 8 p.m.12:30 a.m.; Bowlero Lanes & Lounge, 4209 Coolidge Hwy., Royal Oak; no cover. House of Cheer: The Level Up

Tour 2023 8 p.m.; Fox Theatre, 2211 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $29.50-$85.

Rise Up Detroit: Gwenyth Hayes

8 p.m.; Cornerstone Village Bar & Grille, 17315 Mack Ave., Detroit; $15.

Sammy Kershaw 8 p.m.; District 142, 142 Maple St., Wyandotte; $30-$50.

Sterling Freedom Festival 7 p.m.; Michigan Lottery Amphitheatre at Freedom Hill, 14900 Metropolitan Pkwy., Sterling Heights; $75-$200.

Sunlight Ascending, Man Mountain, Normal, Doubt It! 6 p.m.; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $13.

The Aretha Celebrates Hip Hop 8 p.m.; The Aretha Franklin Amphitheatre, 2600 E. Atwater St., Detroit; $40-$125.

The Budos Band 7 p.m.; Magic Bag, 22920 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $30.

Versace James & Friends on the Alley Deck July 1, 9 pm; Garden Bowl, 4120 Woodward, Detroit; no cover before 10:30 p.m., $10 after.

Sunday, July 2

Detroit Symphony Orchestra

And The Henry Ford Present Salute To America At Greenfield Village 5-10 p.m.; 20900 Oakwood Blvd., Dearborn, 5-10 pm; $42.

Choke Artist Records Presents: Invalids Summer Tour 2023 with special guests Sincerely + Panda House 8-11:59 p.m.; New Dodge Lounge, 8850 Joseph Campau Ave., Hamtramck; $10 advance, $15 door.

Erykah Badu: Unfollow Me Tour with Yasiin Bey 7:30 p.m.; Little Caesars Arena, 2645 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $39.95-$129.95.

Loma Prieta, Frail Body 7 p.m.; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $15.

Post Sex Nachos, Fox Royale 8 p.m.; The Loving Touch, 22634 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $20.

Monday, July 3

Detroit Symphony Orchestra

And The Henry Ford Present Salute To America At Greenfield Village 5-10 p.m.; 20900 Oakwood Blvd., Dearborn, 5-10 pm; $42.

Tuesday, July 4

“Not Our Independence Day” Concert and Reading of Frederick Douglass’ Speech 12-4 p.m.; Shrine Of The Black Madonna Church, 7625 Linwood St., Detroit; $10.

B.Y.O.R Bring Your Own Records Night 9 p.m.-midnight; The Old Miami, 3930 Cass Ave., Detroit; no cover.

THEATER

Musical

The Great American Trailer Park Musical Sundays, 3-5 p.m. and Thursdays-Saturdays, 7:30-9:30 p.m.; Riverbank Theatre, 358 S. Water St., Marine City; $35.

COMEDY

Improv Go Comedy! Improv Theater Pandemonia $20. Saturdays, 10-11:30 p.m.; $10 Sundays, 7 p.m.; $20 Every other Friday, 8 & 10 p.m.

Mark Ridley’s Comedy Castle

Brad Wenzel with Diego Attanasio and Timothy Locke. $20. Thursday, 7:30-9 p.m., Friday, 7:15-8:45 p.m. and Saturday July 1, 7-8:30 & 9:30-11 p.m.

Trixie’s Bar Diva Cup 5 “Backyard Beach Party.” Sign up for comedians is 7:30 p.m. $9 advance, $15 door.

FILM

Michigan Theater The Cat Returns at Michigan Theater Thursday, 7:30 p.m.; Saturday July 1, 3:30 p.m.

ARTS

detroit contemporary Jeanne Bieri: Hide and Seek reception July 8 6 p.m.-10 p.m.

Motor City Brewing Works Flesh n Bones: Wednesday night art series with Stacey Macleod and Michelle Thibodeau. Wednesday, 7-10 p.m.

David Klein Gallery Birmingham Al Held. 163 Townsend St., Birmingham. Through July 1.

Detroit Shipping Company Disco Walls Presents: The Art of Gary Horton Through Aug. 1.

I.M. Weiss Gallery Play-Ability Through July 8.

Irwin House Gallery LIVING HUES: Quadre Curry solo exhibiiton. Through Sunday, July 9.

Janice Charach Epstein Gallery Stop Making Sense Plus One. Through July 12.

Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD) Gina Osterloh: Her Demilitarized Zone: Image Without Weapon. Through Sept. 3. Liz Cohen: Café Pan-Soviético Americano. Through

Sep.t 4. Sydney James: Girl Raised in Detroit. Through Sept. 3. Jennifer Harge + Devin Drake: A Clearing. Through Sept. 3. Free Your Mind: Art and Incarceration in Michigan. Through Sept. 3. New Dodge Lounge Summer Art Installation at New Dodge Lounge: Kate Dodson. Through Aug. 1.

The Secret Garden Gallery

Detroit Outdoor Art Market. No cover. Saturdays, 11 a.m.-6 p.m.

Block party

Beacon Park Family Fun Days. The events will include live stage performances, lawn games, arts and crafts, food trucks, and more. Family Fun Days are free and open to community members of all ages. Sundays.

MISC.

80s VIDEO NITE - OPEN BOWLING & PINBALL Thursdays, 8 p.m.midnight; Bowlero Lanes & Lounge, 4209 Coolidge Hwy., Royal Oak; no cover.

FOOD

Food & Fun at The Village of Rochester Hills Every Friday this summer, from 5:-9 p.m., NE corner of Walton and Adams, Rochester Hills; thevorh.com/events.

Royal Oak Taco Week June 23-29. Downtown Royal Oak, Main & S. Troy; royaloaktacofest.com/taco-week.

Detroit Princess Riverboat See website cruise schedule for daily entertainment. $38-59 Saturdays, Sundays.

SHOPPING

Marketplace

Night Market Each Night Market will host live bands, food trucks and DJs. Saturdays.; Beacon Park, 1901 Grand River Ave., Detroit; empoweringmichigan. com/beacon-park.

SPORTS

Baseball

Comerica Park Detroit Tigers vs. Oakland Athletics Tuesday July 4, 7:10 p.m.

Golf

Cranbrook Art Museum Artistdesigned Mini-Golf. Through Sep. 3.

PXG Detroit Summer Golf Community Day at PXG Detroit. Thursday, June 29. 2830 W. Maple Rd., Troy, Thursday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m.

Local buzz

By Broccoli and Joe Zimmer

Got a Detroit music tip? Send it it music@metrotimes.com.

The electric sounds of West Africa: Bands like Mdou Moctar and Bombino have popularized the so-called “desert blues” in the U.S. over the past decade — electric guitar compositions pioneered from the Tuareg musicians throughout the Sahara region. The first time I heard this music was when I attended a live performance by Mdou Moctar at Trinosophes in 2018, which was (I believe) their first live performance in Michigan. Something must’ve stuck, as the band then went on to record their 2019 breakthrough album Ilana (The Creator) with Chris Koltay in Detroit, and has returned to the city on every tour since then. Due in large part to Mdou Moctar’s success and acclaim in the West, more Saharan musical exports have been making their way to the U.S. According to their label, “Etran de L’Aïr translates to ‘the Stars of the Aïr,’ the mountainous region of Northern Niger. [The band is] based in the town of Agadez, an urban center of the desert, and a city renowned for the production of music — in particular the electric guitar … In the circuit of wedding bands of Agadez, Etran de L’Aïr is one of the best known and longest playing groups. Yet they are also a band that has remained on the fringes, stars of the Agadez working class.” Their latest

album, also called Agadez, is out now via Sahel Sounds, and you can catch them live at Trinosophes this Monday, July 3. You can get tickets ahead of time via the Trinosophes website, or available at the door.

—Joe

Party-starting heavy hitters at Heavy Meta: Heavy Meta is a new series hosted by resident DJs Gallons and Auntie Chanel. It also happens to have the best event flyers I’ve seen in quite some time, and I suggest you head over to the @heavymeta.zip on Instagram to peep these stock-image collage fever dreams for yourself. In keeping with that theme, you can expect a maddening mix of electro, footwork, acid, jungle, vogue, and any other club-adjacent genre you can think of. Basically, this is booty-shakin music. The next Heavy Meta iteration is happening on Saturday, July 1, at UFO Factory, with guests (and Local Buzz faves) Father Dukes and Dream Beach. So, you’ll also have the opportunity to see two of the best Detroit selectors at the top of their game, playing fast and loose to keep the dance floor packed. Tickets available via Resident Advisor, or also at the door the night of.

—Joe

Your dreams of being a dive-bar DJ are about to come true: Have you always dreamed of commanding the playlist at your favorite local watering hole, soundtracking a night

of boozing and pool games as if they were scenes in a movie? Do you have your own record collection, or at least enough music to play for roughly 20 minutes? Then invite your friends and head on over to The Old Miami on Tuesdays for Bring Your Own Records Night, where staff have record players set up for folks to sign-up to play short sets of whatever music they’d like, and word on the street is that they’ll even teach you how to use the decks if you’re not familiar. We can’t promise that you’ll love the music all night long, and by extension we can’t promise that anyone will like the music that you play (hence why we suggest you bring your own personal fanbase with you), but what we can promise is a nice opportunity to test the waters and have a humbling experience of how thankless it can be to spin music that you love for people that may or may not care. You’ll also probably realize how annoying it is to request songs from a DJ once you have the chance to try DJing yourself, so consider that a learning experience as well. Sign starts at 8 p.m., 21 and over, and cover is free!

—Broccoli

If you haven’t seen Dez Andrés play a live set yet, here is your chance: For those of you that aren’t familiar, Dez Andrés is truly a legend in Detroit music. The son of Detroit jazz icon Humberto “Nengue” Hernandez, Andrés has made a name for himself in a multitude of genres through his work with the likes of Amp Fiddler, J Dilla, Slum Village, Kenny Dixon Jr./Mahogani Music, and many more. He has graced some of the biggest stages in the city, including Hart Plaza for Movement this year, and yet you can still find him tucked away in the corners of smaller establishments from time to time, playing his heart out for whoever is there to listen. This Thursday, June 29, Spot Lite Records is presenting a special live set by Dez Andrés at Spot Lite Detroit, with resident DJs Vince Patricola and Jesse Cory holding it down before, after, and between sets. Dez is extremely connected within the local music scene, so while we don’t currently know the lineup for the band he’ll be performing with on Thursday, history tells us that it will likely be a star-studded cast of live musicians that might just casually blow your mind. Cover is free, music will be happening both inside and outside starting at 9 p.m., and did we mention that it’s free?

—Broccoli

Etran de L’Aïr.

ABDOULMOUMOUNI HAMID

FOOD

‘Michigan-style’ barbecue has Ypsi cheering

Ypsilanti’s Regal Beagle is at once the sort of place that you would and would not expect to find excellent barbecue. It’s a dive bar where on a recent early Saturday evening some regulars from the neighborhood played chess out front, while inside a small number of punk rock types and young people hung out in the bar and set up drums on the stage for a show later that night.

A guy who calls himself “Dirti Kurt” on CashApp runs the barbecue component of Regal Beagle, but don’t be fooled by his moniker — there’s a level of sophistication to his approach and dishes, and it doesn’t include grime. Chef Kurt Prowell is a student of Matteo Malosi, the chef-owner behind Ann Arbor’s West Side BBQ, which was a pandemic victim.

Prowell and Malosi forged a mentor relationship while the former did catering jobs for West Side. Malosi opened the kitchen at Regal Beagle when new owners bought it in mid-2021, and Prowell took over shortly after.

Prowell bills his fare as “Michigan barbecue,” which isn’t really a thing, but he is trying to make one, and a key element to the nascent style is smok-

By Tom Perkins

ing with Michigan woods. As Prowell puts it, mesquite doesn’t grow around here, so why would anyone smoke with it? Instead, he smokes with Michigan cherry wood grown in the Upper Peninsula.

The sweet element shines through best in the pork shoulder, which sits in the smoker for up to 16 hours. I guessed it had been smoked above applewood, as the meat had strong apple notes, but Prowell corrected me. He sprays the shoulder with an apple juice-vinegar mix as it smokes, which imparts the apple elements while keeping the shoulder moist, and that and a brown sugar-based rub are responsible for the sweetness and caramelized bark.

The brisket spends about 20 hours above the cherry wood, and has the right amount of fat — it isn’t overly rich brisket, but balanced and tender with a sweet element. Prowell employs an apple-pineapple juice mix that provides depth even as the acidic pineapple juice breaks down the meat to make it extra tender.

The smoked chicken drumstick meal came with four pieces of falloff-the-bone bird with crisp exteriors. Prowell peels back the skin on the

chicken before smoking and rubs on a mix of brown sugar, garlic, cracked Madagascar pepper, paprika and smoked sea salt. He says he smokes lower and longer than most pitmasters, and that produces more flavor and keeps the bird moister. He achieved success in three out four drumsticks — one was incredibly dry, but it was an anomaly.

The dirty rice dish has a bit of a New Orleans feel to it, but Prowell goes further south, adding a smoked tomatillo puree and nopalitos in with the mix of bell peppers, onions, and garlic.

Each of the dinners come with two sides. The vinegary greens were excellent, as were the baked beans, which spend a couple hours in the smoker. Even the vinegar is smoked — Prowell says if there’s room on the smoker for an ingredient, then it takes a spin. The crisp, vinegary slaw was almost saladlike, but the best side of the bunch is the cheesy potatoes, which reminded me of my mom’s twice-baked potatoes. They come with cheddar mixed with sour cream, and are cooked low and slow for several hours to avoid emulsifying the cheese and leaving the dish soupy.

Regal Beagle

817 E. Michigan Ave., Ypsilanti

regalbeagleypsi.com

Dinners $15-$20

Barbecue served 4 p.m.-midnight Wed.-Sat. Wheelchair accessible

The menu changes each week depending on what’s available seasonally, and Prowell cooks in small batches, so if he runs out, he’s out, which helps him maintain quality control. Prowell says he likes his menus to reflect his customer base, which is diverse. Oxtails are an African-American favorite, while it’s white folks who are typically ordering brisket. If people start asking for a certain dish, he’ll make it.

It’s worth noting that the vibe in Regal Beagle has changed with the new owners. Folks from the neighborhood say they appreciate having a small bar where they can go hang out instead of a “a place you avoid because you’re scared of it,” Prowell said.

Regardless of what it was before, you can definitely now call Regal Beagle a barbecue spot.

Pulled pork and beef brisket dinners from the Regal Beagle. TOM PERKINS

FOOD

listened to, he spoke to what he finds so rewarding about his work.

“My music life’s like a movie,” he says. “I play. People start to sway and smile and sing along. That I’m able to make connections like that without saying a word can feel very sobering, especially when someone approaches you afterward to tell you how you’ve touched them and why.”

I’m sure there’s a story behind every song request, Joel. Play me Johnny Cash’s “Sunday Morning Coming Down” next time, then I’ll tell you mine.

Dangling another pianist story:

Mary Elaine’s at the Scottsdale Phoenician Resort was a five-star, five-diamond, fine-dining destination where I worked as a captain some 20 years ago. It, too, featured a live pianist who played in our luxe lounge, adjacent to the dining room. One evening, our general manager, Frank, noticed an elegant, elderly woman goose-necking around the room from her table.

Chowhound

What it’s like to try to find restaurant workers right now

By Robert Stempkowski

Editor’s note: Due to popular demand, we are increasing the frequency of Chowhound, our column about what’s trending in Detroit food culture, from bi-weekly to weekly. Tips: eat@metrotimes.com.

Surviving an extinction event: COVID-19 brought meteoric change to the restaurant world. The landscape’s permanently altered. Buffets and salad bars have disappeared. Full-service concepts still evolving on the run struggle to survive with skeleton crews, bare-bones service, and pared-down menus. Years into this murky mess, yes, some dust is clearing, but wholesale food prices never really settled back down, and what feels like an entire workforce has been wiped out. Capable, reliable restaurant staff have gone the way of the dinosaur. Missing are countless many who once worked monster kitchen hours or braved the bad-behavior slings and arrows of troglodyte customers, whose dining room manners might have devolved during the apocalypse. Now, hiring managers concede: they’ve lowered the bar from polished and professional to borderline literate and bipedal. Savvy staff who once knew food and wine have given way to warm bodies who can barely bring themselves to serve bread and water. Blame the ignorance and apathy at work now on whatever you will. May-

be food service alpha-talent in all its conscientious virtue was raptured up to greater rewards elsewhere. Perhaps the manpower hit still hobbling hospitality businesses will prove temporary. Perish the thought that people who once filled their rosters (hard-working, social, personable, paying their way through life and/or school) don’t exist much anymore.

Chef “X” of the Joe Vicari Restaurant Group (anonymity requested), whom I met recently over such conversation, says it’s gotten rough enough that he’s considering throwing in the career towel early. Chef cited some persistent problems.

“Work ethic is dying. Everyone wants part time. And short shifts on the few days they’re available. And if you can’t meet every request, that’s it. They quit. I’ve done this job all my life. I’m no crazy disciplinarian. There’s no want to work, and I’m tired of covering for it.”

Preach on. This is gospel.

Here’s how hiring goes in food service these days: First, one spends a fortune on an indeed.com ad, which triggers a flood of responses but only a trickle of applicants whose resumes warrant an attempt to contact for conversation or an interview. Of those few, half prove unreachable by call or text. And almost always, one or more scheduled interviewees don’t show. Even if you do ultimately tender a job offer, the

odds are even that the new hire isn’t nearly all they claimed to be on paper and won’t stick with the job past the first time-off request you can’t approve. By and large, they’re short-term problem children: Socially stunted, mentally immature, emotionally fragile, umbilically tethered to their phone, and constant attendance truants. Can I get an Amen?

Sing us your song, piano man: Reviewing some fancy-schmancy restaurants recently gave me two opportunities to appreciate the talents of Joel Seah, a pianist I heard playing at both The Whitney and Joe Muer downtown a few nights apart. Over seafood, I enjoyed Seah’s cheeky rearrangement of Disney’s The Little Mermaid score into something sounding more like Tchaikovsky. Sipping a cocktail at Whitney’s Ghost Bar, his stirring rendition of a West Side Story love song left me nearly crying in my tequila. After introducing myself to Seah, I asked to hear more of his story.

“I’m the audible ambience,” Seah, a piano prodigy born in Singapore, chimed right in. “I size up the crowd and then tailor a musical backdrop around it. I’m not there to play over the pleasures of a lobster dinner, but to make the experience as a whole taste better.”

Complimenting Seah over the sets I

“May I be of service, Madam?” Frank inquired, just so. It was that kind of place. We waiters wore custom-tailored Armani suits, sold $7,400 bottles of wine, and shaved white truffles tableside over other ridiculously-priced delectables on Wedgewood China. It was a great gig, but formal to a fault.

“I can’t for the life of me see a pianist,” the bejeweled and bewildered lady let Frank know. “Where’s the pianist?” As fate would have it, Madam’s view of the lounge was blocked by an impressive horse sculpture. Ever obliging, Frank positioned himself just over the lady’s shoulder and pointed.

“Look underneath the horse,” he said. From a line of sight perspective, Frank was correct. Beneath and beyond the belly of that sculpture one could clearly see the lounge’s pianist, but hanging also in the air there, the masculine appendage carved onto the undercarriage of the anatomically correct, stone stallion.

“How dare you!” The woman gasped. “I said pianist!” No one ever stewed for as long a second or two in such uncomfortable silence as Frank. Then, the woman’s husband and I saved his ass as he and then I both broke into helpless horse laughter. It took Madam another moment or two to see the humor in it but she did, which started Frank breathing again, and apologizing profusely until all he could do was laugh, too.

Moral of this story? I’ll borrow a line from an old TV episode of M*A*S*H that speaks to not taking things too seriously:

“Ladies and gentlemen, take my advice: Pull down your pants and slide on the ice.”

The food service industry needs help.

SHUTTERSTOCK

FOOD

Bites

New fast-food Big Boy spin-off coming to metro Detroit

THE BIG BOY restaurant chain’s iconic overalls-wearing mascot used to be an ubiquitous sight across the U.S. — especially here in the Detroit area, where the nearly 90-year-old company is headquartered. At its height there were nearly 1,000 Big Boys across the country, but their number has declined precipitously over the years as dining tastes and trends change. Today the chain has only 60 restaurants in the U.S., mostly in Michigan.

But now, the company is trying to inject new life into the brand with a fast-food spin-off called Bob’s Big Boy. The new store is readying to open at 32704 Grand River Ave. in Farmington.

Franchisee owner Ali Baydoun says the new format is an experiment to bring down costs.

“This is actually the first one,” he says. “So I’m the guinea pig.”

The site was formerly home to a Burger King and later, a short-lived restaurant called Detroit Eatz, which pitched a “drive-thru deli” concept. Bob’s Big Boy will retain the drive-thru, as well as an indoor dining area that seats about 60.

Unlike other Big Boy locations, there will be no table service, nor breakfast and salad buffets; instead, customers order at a counter.

The menu is also scaled down from typical Big Boy restaurants, but Baydoun says it will feature the company’s signature items like the Classic Big Boy double-decker burger, Slim Jim Sandwiches, fish and chips, shakes, and hot fudge cake, among others.

Baydoun says he’s aiming to open in July, and is hiring.

It’s not the first time the company has tried out different formats. It has had a number of incarnations over the years, evolving from drive-ins to coffee shops and eventually family restaurants. In the ’90s, an Upper Midwest franchise called Marc’s Big Boy opened two drive-thru only Big Boy Express stores. And in 2019, Big Boy opened a fast-casual location at 26400 Telegraph Rd. in Southfield where it

experimented with new menu items like a chicken kabob, a Greek salad, and plant-based Impossible Burgers. It was also the chain’s first fast-casual location to offer breakfast in addition to lunch and dinner.

Baydoun, who also owns a traditional Big Boy restaurant in Garden City, says that the COVID-19 pandemic dealt a major blow to his business.

“My sales went from $40,000 down to $500, $600 a week,” he adds. “It was devastating.”

Baydoun says the new format can be staffed with fewer workers. “This is kind of a small version of it,” he says. “We can actually compete now.”

The name is a reference to the chain’s first restaurant, Bob’s Pantry, which opened in 1936 in Glendale, California. Over the years the chain’s restaurants have been branded as Bob’s, Bob’s Big Boy, and Bob’s — Home of the Big Boy Hamburger, among others, and it has regional chains like Michigan’s Elias Brothers and Ohio-based Frisch’s.

In 1987, the Elias Brothers purchased the chain and moved its headquarters to Warren, later declaring bankruptcy in 2000, when it was sold to an investor. In 2018, the chain was sold to another group of Michigan investors and is now based in Southfield. (Oddly, Big Boy remains big in Japan, with more than 270 restaurants there, although the menu is quite different.)

After immigrating from Lebanon to the Detroit area in the 1970s, Baydoun says he got his first job at age 13 washing dishes at a long-shuttered Big Boy at Michigan and Telegraph.

“I started working for Big Boy when I was a baby,” he says.

He began learning other aspects of the business, like helping flipping

burgers in the kitchen. He says by age 17, he moved up to manager.

“Land of opportunity,” he says.

“One of the goals that I set up in my early days as a man was to own my own Big Boy, because I worked for them through high school, through college,” he adds. “I always wanted to own my own Big Boy. … I worked hard and saved money.”

After careers working on a Chrysler assembly line and as a medical equipment buyer, Baydoun acquired a closed-down Big Boy in Garden City in 2018.

He says he had his eye on purchasing the Grand River location when he heard members of the corporate office mention an idea for a fast-food spin-off and volunteered to run it.

The company has fallen on hard times in recent years. Last month, The Detroit News reported that Big Boy is

once again at risk of bankruptcy, with its bank accounts frozen as the federal government investigates its role in an alleged $11 million money laundering scheme.

Baydoun says the franchisees are not involved in the matter and could not comment on it. Big Boy’s corporate office could not be reached for comment.

Baydoun is hopeful that the fast-food concept will help the company. “If this goes well, watch out — everybody will be jumping in because you don’t need the labor cost and the overhead of the regular stores,” he says. “If it’s successful, there’ll probably be hundreds of them popping up.”

He adds that he has six daughters who will help him.

“If other fast food restaurants can do it, we can,” he says. “We have the brand. I think anybody that’s over 50, 60 grew up on Big Boy. On every corner, there

Star Bakery is closing up shop

A JEWISH DELI staple in Oak Park that’s been around for generations is shutting its doors in July.

Star Bakery at 26031 Coolidge Highway will serve its last loaf of rye on July 2. Owners Daniel Buckfire, David Schechter, and Stacy Fox cite rising costs of ingredients and labor for the closure, noting lingering difficulties from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Star Bakery was founded in 1915 and Buckfire, Schechter, and Fox purchased it in July of 2021.

“It was a very hard decision to close, and we did everything we could to try to save Star Bakery and make it profitable,” Buckfire said in a statement. “Wholesale was always a

significant part of the business at Star Bakery, and we determined that we were no longer competitive on this side of the business.”

Some of the bakery’s fresh-baked Jewish goods like challah, rugelach, seven-layer cake, and mandel bread will still be produced at West Bloomfield’s Diamond Bakery, which is under the same ownership.

“We felt that Diamond Bakery, with its location in West Bloomfield and its strong retail business and brand name, gives us the best chance to operate a neighborhood Jewishstyle bakery successfully,” Buckfire said.

—Randiah Camille Green

A new fast-food spin-off called Bob’s is readying to open in Farmington.

LEE DEVITO

CULTURE

Artist of the Week

Tony Whlgn makes being a hooligan fashionable — and fun

By Randiah Camille Green

Tony Whlgn is leading with love. He also, apparently, doesn’t like vowels. Whlgn is pronounced “hooligan,” a title the Detroit-bred artist wears like a badge of honor.

“I do what I love and love what I do… it’s as simple as that,” he tells us.

Earlier this month, Whlgn completed a mural, “All I See Is You & I,” inside Neiman Marcus at Troy’s Somerset Collection. His exuberant and playful characters permanently fill the walls above an escalator with the message “leading with love.” Along with the mural, Whlgn has several paintings that are on display as part of Neiman Marcus’ private art collection.

The three-sided mural tells the story of two couples falling in love in and around the mall, with imagery that represents Detroit, including cars and a beaver for Big Beaver Road where the mall is located.

“I pulled from not only my past but the past of just Detroiters or Black people, in general, growing up in the mall,” he says. “You know, when you’re young you may have a crush and you may be going to the mall just because of a crush or interest and because of that you take the opportunity to meet in this space and find love.”

The artist describes his work as Afro-futuristic “street contemporary.” The adolescent cartoon-like images of a grinning Black girl with an afro and hoop earrings and his silly animal characters make our inner child smile.

“When I grew up, a lot of my cousins and friends noticed that I watched cartoons a lot, and I like to pull it through my artwork because I got this mantra about life, that you got to have a sense of humor about it,” he says. “As difficult as things may get, or as challenging as things may always seem, I’ve always been grateful. I’ve always looked to have some sense of, don’t be so serious.”

Early on in his art career, Whlgn wasn’t taken seriously, anyway. He has

been drawing and taking art classes since he was a child but dropped out of the College for Creative Studies after his first year because he couldn’t afford it. During his short time there, he says, several teachers told him his work wasn’t “real art,” whatever that means.

“I will say the College of Creative Studies allowed me to know what I was capable of, but still choose to do things my own way, like a hooligan for real, and you could kind of say that’s where the name came from,” he says. “I take my own approach to art... I don’t see how you can tell me that this isn’t a form of expressing myself, and that’s when I guess I kind of took it to the streets.”

Whlgn started off designing mixtape covers for Detroit musicians and went on to be a graphic designer for Marc Ecko in New York. He’s done work for artists such as Joey Badass, Dej Loaf, Big K.R.I.T., and fashion brand Kith N.Y.C. He’s since moved back to Detroit and has participated in Murals in the Market and done murals in partnership with 1xRun, Rocket Mortgage, and the Detroit Pistons.

He leaves us with, “I’m just being myself, for real.”

Where to see his work: “All I See Is You & I” is on permanent display inside the Neiman Marcus at the Somerset Collection at 2800 W Big Beaver Rd, Troy. You can keep up with Whlgn on Instagram @tonywhlgn.

Tony Whlgn’s Neiman Marcus mural is titled All I See Is You & I

UNCLE

TAE WHLGN ®

“I’ve always looked to have some sense of, don’t be so serious,” says Tony Whlgn says.

Somebody that you used to know

By Andrew Wyatt

Past Lives

Rated: PG-13

Run-time: 106 minutes

Writer-director Celine Song’s melancholic romantic drama Past Lives opens with a heck of a shot. The camera slowly zooms in on an Asian woman and two men — one Asian, one white — chatting at a bar. Their conversation is muffled by ambient sound, but a pair of offscreen observers can be heard, attempting to untangle the relationship dynamic of this trio from across the room, based solely on their body language. Husband and wife plus brother? Girlfriend and boyfriend plus co-worker? Race and gender play an implicit role in the unseen voyeurs’ suppositions, but the truth of the matter is both simpler and more poignant than they suspect. Eventually Song will return to this moment, giving the viewer the proverbial reverse shot from the trio’s perspective, with the addition of 24 years of heart-wrenching context.

The story proper begins in Seoul, South Korea, in the late 1990s, as the friendship between elementary school students Na Young (Seung Ah Moon) and Hae Sung (Seung Min Yim) is just starting to develop into a mutual crush. Unfortunately, Na Young’s par-

ents have recently decided to relocate their family to Canada, though not before Na Young and Hae Sung have their first and only chaperoned playground “date.”

Twelve years later, the twentysomething Na Young (now going by Nora, and played by Greta Lee) is an aspiring playwright in New York City when she hears through the family grapevine that Hae Sung (Teo Yoo) has been looking for her on social media. They eventually reconnect via a video call, and she learns that he’s still living in Seoul and studying for an engineering degree following his compulsory military service. Nora’s Korean might be a little rusty, but they’re both visibly beaming at this digital reunion.

For a time, the pair maintain a regular correspondence of texts, emails, and video calls, the 13-hour time zone difference between the be damned. However, the initial elation of their reignited crush soon cools, their nascent careers take priority, and Nora pulls the plug on their long-distance maybe-relationship. Fast-forward another 12 years: Nora is now married to novelist Arthur (First Cow’s John Magaro) and living in Brooklyn, where they are both eking out modest artistic success.

Then Hae Sung abruptly breaks over a decade of silence: He’s going to be in New York for a couple of nights.

Would Nora want to meet up? Arthur is understandably anxious at the reappearance of this childhood sweetheart, but Nora’s interests in reuniting with Hae Sung are more contemplative than romantic (mostly). In Hae Sung, she sees a window to the life that she left behind and the little girl she once was. A different kind of feature would use this meeting between old friends as a catalyst for a relationship crisis, but Past Lives’ gentle, introspective mood makes it clear that the story is not headed for melodramatic upheaval. Indeed, Song achieves something remarkable with her feature debut, a deeply romantic film that isn’t really about romance per se. As the title suggests, Past Lives is concerned with regret, longing, and the relentless, unpredictable churn of life. Song and her performers do a fantastic job of maintaining a tricky balance, as the chemistry between Nora and Hae Sung needs to feel potent and authentic but not calamitously destabilizing. Nora and Hae Sung’s adult interactions — first over video calls, then in person — are full of nervous giggles and long, meaningful pauses. These are two people with a deep connection, but what that connection means after nearly a quarter-century apart is compellingly uncertain.

Like Nora, Song is a Korean-Canadian playwright living in the U.S., and

Past Lives reportedly has a semi-autobiographical dimension. It’s the sort of screenplay that can only come from lived experience and keen observation. Her writing and direction are unfussy yet astute, gracefully conveying the complex psychology of relationships, immigration, and the process of growing into one’s settled adulthood. Despite the Seoul and New York settings, there’s also something distinctly Canadian about the film. Maybe it’s the soft natural lighting, the general pensive vibes, or the indie folk-rock score by Grizzly Bear members Christopher Bear and Daniel Rossen.

All three of the central performances are strong, but Lee is a revelation in the lead role. Best known for supporting parts on The Morning Show and Russian Doll, she provides phenomenal shading to a strong-willed but sensitive woman who is grappling with the person she’s become. The Korean Buddhist concept of inyeon — an interpersonal connection that spans multiple lifetimes — is central to the film’s thematic heart, but for poetic rather than literal reasons. Nora deflates the mystique of the idea by conceding that Koreans use it as a pickup line, and Song is less interested in ethereal notions of destiny than in conveying aching, universal emotions. Despite (or because of) the specificity of Nora’s story, even the most cold-

Nora (Greta Lee) embraces childhood sweetheart Hae Sung (Teo Yoo). COURTESY A24 FILMS

CULTURE

Savage Love Topside

By Dan Savage

: Q I’m a 41-year-old cis female and have experienced a significant amount of physical and emotional abuse in my relationships. I recently started dating again and met a really great guy who told me that he was interested in having a Dom/sub relationship. I thought that would be it and told him so — given my experiences, I wasn’t interested in being his sub — but it turns out he wants me to be his dom. The thought of being the one in control kind of fascinates me and it feels very sexy to think about. But I am so used to worrying about the very scary and very real repercussions of even having an opinion after everything I have experienced in the past that I’m finding it difficult to navigate this. His interests aren’t in the whips-and-chains wheelhouse; it’s more like wanting to please someone who is demanding and bossy. Do you have any tips, suggestions, or resources you would recommend for me to learn more and be the best Dom Goddess I can possibly be?

—Woman Having Extreme Excitement

A: “Take it slow,” said Midori. “That’s always my first piece of advice: Take it slow. Then take small steps while remembering to center yourself and your joy first.”

An author, artist, educator, and public speaker on sexuality and kink for more than two decades, Midori created the ForteFemme Women’s Dominance Intensive (fortefemme.com) to help women to explore domination thoughtfully and authentically.

“Everyone talks about new relationship energy, and NRE is real,” said Midori, “but new relationship dynamic energy — NRDE — is just as real. NRDE feels just like NRE in important ways. In both cases, enthusiasm can get the better of us. We find ourselves wanting to do-all-the-things-all-atonce. In our excitement we can bite off more than we can chew, and then wind up feeling queasy and upset after. Right now WHEE should allow the sweet spiciness of all the new and exciting things she’s thinking about to continue to percolate while building confidence in herself.”

Once you’re ready to get started

once you’re ready to experiment — take small steps.

“There’s a giant difference between Dominance and submissive play scenes and D/s relationships, even if the names imply they’re the same thing,” said Midori. “I always refer to the latter as Consented Hierarchical Opted-In Relationships, or CHOIR for short — I know, too cute by half — but it’s helpful to make this distinction between saying yes to a small scene and entering into a D/s relationship.”

Even if you ultimately want a D/s relationship, you should start with some simple play.

“Play is about your fun for tonight,” said Midori, “CHOIR is about structures of decision-making that can encompass ordinary daily life stuff as well as play time. It’s common for folks to mix these up, which can lead to unnecessary pressure, confusion about boundaries, expectation conflict, and other decidedly un-fun feelings. This confusion is so common that I have an online class called “So You Want D/s? Now What?” to help people figure out which is which and how to enjoy them both.”

And your first small step that first playful scene — doesn’t have to look like BDSM porn. You don’t need gear, outfits, or a dedicated play space.

“WHEE should experiment with adding a power dynamic to her already existing sex life,” said Midori. “It’s an exercise I call ‘Will You to ‘You Will.’ Take all the hot vanilla sex stuff you’re already enjoying — the things you’re probably already asking for — and turn the ask into a directive. ‘Will you kiss me?’ becomes ‘You will kiss me.’ ‘Will you lick me?” becomes “You will lick me.’ ‘Do you want to fuck me?’ becomes ‘We are going to fuck.’”

It’s about what you want.

“Think about what would please you,” said Midori. “That’s what centering yourself and your joy is about. Many of us have been conditioned to,

in the course of our daily lives, to think of others first and not check in on our own wants. A consensual, collaborative D/s play scene can be a lovely way to break down these self-erasing, destabilizing habits. But to do that — to go there — you have to honestly ask yourself, ‘What would please me right now?’ It might not be something thought of as kinky or sexual. Do you want your hair brushed? You can tell him to brush your hair. Do you want a story read to you? You can tell him to read to you. Do you want dinner cooked and served with him dressed or undressed in a pleasing manner? And then for him to do the dishes? As Westley says to Buttercup, ‘As you wish.’”

To learn more about Midori, to check out her art, and to buy her books, go to planetmidori.com. The next ForteFemme Women’s Dominance Intensive takes place July 7-9, and dates for the fall will be announced soon. To learn more or register, go to fortefemme.com.

: Q Fourteen years ago, I fell for a woman who was into watching guyon-guy oral sex. I indulged her fetish on multiple occasions at play parties and during pre-arranged hotel encounters with bisexual guys. While I only did this to please her, I enjoyed these MMF encounters because I got off on her getting off. At the time I thought maybe I was bisexual and had been in denial. But after we broke up, and after becoming more thoroughly educated on D/s dynamics, I’ve come to believe I am in fact not bi and instead straight. I can just be really subby for the right woman. Most people to whom I disclose my history insist that I’m not straight because of what I did for that one woman. I even encounter this in the kink community, where the D/s perspective should be better understood. My argument that I am straight and not bi is that I’ve never been romantically attracted to a man. I’ve never gone down on a man without a woman telling me to — and it’s not as if there aren’t any opportunities for me to do so, as I live on the north side of Chicago. (You might be familiar with this neighborhood?) All that being said, do you think I’m straight?

—Sucker For Dom Women

A: Sure.

: Q How do furries happen? The kink just seems so random. And why are there so many furries now but no furries in ancient history?

—Fathoming Unusual Roles

A: Cartoons. Disney. Mascots. While not everyone who gets off on dressing up in fursuits and/or animal mascot costumes has the same origin story, FUR, many furries trace their kink to — many credit their kink to the anthropomorphized animal characters they were exposed to in childhood. Now, most kids who watch Disney movies don’t grow up to be furries, just as most kids who take a swim class don’t grow up to have speedo fetishes or rubber swim cap fetishes. But a certain tiny percentage of all three groups do. Since we can’t predict which random environmental stimuli a kid might fixate on — and therefore can’t predict whose childhood fixations will become adult sexual obsessions — there’s no controlling for kinks. Some people are gonna be kinky when they grow up, no one’s kinks are consciously chosen, and if they seem random, it’s because they kindasorta are random.

As for the ancients…

Anthropomorphized animal characters didn’t come to dominate childhood (mass media, imaginations) until the 20th century — Disney was founded in 1923, Looney Tunes was founded in 1930 — but there were adults running around out there with marionette fetishes acquired at puppet shows before Mickey and Bugs took over. (There are still marionette fetishists out there.) As for the actual ancients, the Roman emperor Nero (37-68 AD) used to dress up in animal skins and pretend to be a wild boar at orgies — according to historians who may have been biased against him — and there are lots of examples of ancient people dressing up as animals for religious festivals and holidays; some of festivals included sacred sexual rites, but some of them were just fuck fests because people are — and have always been — kinky freaks.

Send your burning questions to mailbox@savage.love. Podcasts, columns, merch, and more at Savage. Love!

CULTURE Free Will Astrology

ARIES: March 21 – April 19

Visionary author Peter McWilliams wrote, “One of the most enjoyable aspects of solitude is doing what you want when you want to do it, with the absolute freedom to change what you’re doing at will. Solitude removes all the ‘negotiating’ we need to do when we’re with others.” I’ll add a caveat: Some of us have more to learn about enjoying solitude. We may experience it as a loss or deprivation. But here’s the good news, Aries: In the coming weeks, you will be extra inspired to cultivate the benefits that come from being alone.

TAURUS: April 20 – May 20

The 18th-century French engineer Étienne Bottineau invented nauscopy, the art of detecting sailing ships at a great distance, well beyond the horizon. This was before the invention of radar. Bottineau said his skill was not rooted in sorcery or luck, but from his careful study of changes in the atmosphere, wind, and sea. Did you guess that Bottineau was a Taurus? Your tribe has a special capacity for arriving at seemingly magical understandings by harnessing your sensitivity to natural signals. Your intuition

thrives as you closely observe the practical details of how the world works. This superpower will be at a peak in the coming weeks.

GEMINI: May 21 – June 20

According to a Welsh proverb, “Three fears weaken the heart: fear of the truth; fear of the devil; fear of poverty.” I suspect the first of those three is most likely to worm its way into your awareness during the coming weeks. So let’s see what we can do to diminish its power over you. Here’s one possibility: Believe me when I tell you that even if the truth’s arrival is initially disturbing or disruptive, it will ultimately be healing and liberating. It should be welcomed, not feared.

CANCER: June 21 – July 22

Hexes nullified! Jinxes abolished! Demons banished! Adversaries outwitted! Liabilities diminished! Bad habits replaced with good habits! These are some of the glorious developments possible for you in the coming months, Cancerian. Am I exaggerating? Maybe a little. But if so, not much. In my vision of your future, you will be the embodiment of a lucky charm and a repository of blessed mojo. You are embarking on a phase when it will make logical sense to be an optimist. Can you sweep all the dross and mess out of your sphere? No, but I bet you can do at least 80%.

LEO: July 23 – August 22

In the book Curious Facts in the History of Insects, Frank Cowan tells a perhaps legendary story about how mayors were selected in the medieval Swedish town of Hurdenburg. The candidates would set their chins on a table with their long beards spread out in front of them. A louse, a tiny parasitic insect, would be put in the middle of the table. Whichever beard the creature crawled to and chose as its new landing spot would reveal the man who would become the town’s new leader. I beg you not to do anything like this, Leo. The decisions you and your allies make should be grounded in good evidence and sound reason, not blind chance. And please avoid parasitical influences completely.

VIRGO: August 23 – Sept. 22

I rebel against the gurus and teachers who tell us our stories are delusional indulgences that interfere with our enlightenment. I reject their insistence that our personal tales are distractions from our spiritual work. Virgo author A. S. Byatt speaks for me: “Narration is as much a part of human nature as breath and the circulation of the blood.” I love and honor the stories of my own destiny, and I encourage you

JAMES NOELLERT

to love and honor yours. Having said that, I will let you know that now is an excellent time to jettison the stories that feel demoralizing and draining — even as you celebrate the stories that embody your genuine beauty. For extra credit: Tell the soulful stories of your life to anyone who is receptive.

LIBRA: Sept. 23 – Oct. 22

In the Mayan calendar, each of the 20 day names is associated with a natural phenomenon. The day called Kawak is paired with rainstorms. Ik’ is connected with wind and breath. Kab’an is earth, Manik’ is deer, and Chikchan is the snake. Now would be a great time for you to engage in an imaginative exercise inspired by the Mayans. Why? Because this is an ideal phase of your cycle to break up your routine, to reinvent the regular rhythm, to introduce innovations in how you experience the flow of the time. Just for fun, why not give each of the next 14 days a playful nickname or descriptor? This Friday could be Crescent Moon, for example. Saturday might be Wonderment, Sunday can be Dazzle Sweet, and Monday Good Darkness.

SCORPIO: Oct. 23 – Nov. 21:

From 998 till 1030, Scorpioborn leader Mahmud Ghaznavi ruled the vast Ghaznavid empire, which stretched from current-day Iran to central Asia and northwestern India. Like so many of history’s strong men, he was obsessed with military conquest. Unlike many others, though, he treasured culture and learning. You’ve heard of poet laureates? He had 400 of them. According to some tales, he rewarded one wordsmith with a mouthful of pearls. In accordance with astrological omens, I encourage you to be more like the Mahmud who loved beauty and art and less like the Mahmud who enjoyed fighting. The coming weeks will be a favorable time to fill your world with grace and elegance and magnificence.

SAGITTARIUS: Nov. 22 – Dec. 21

About 1,740 years ago, before she became a Catholic saint, Margaret of Antioch got swallowed whole by Satan, who was disguised as a dragon.

By Rob Brezsny

Or so the old story goes. But Margaret was undaunted. There in the beast’s innards, Margaret calmly made the sign of the cross over and over with her right hand. Meanwhile, the wooden cross in her left hand magically swelled to an enormous size that ruptured the beast, enabling her to escape. After that, because of her triumph, expectant mothers and women in labor regarded Margaret as their patron saint. Your upcoming test won’t be anywhere near as demanding as hers, Sagittarius, but I bet you will ace it — and ultimately garner sweet rewards.

CAPRICORN: Dec. 22 – Jan. 19

Capricorn-born Johannes Kepler (1571–1630) was an astronomer and mathematician who was an instrumental innovator in the Scientific Revolution. Among his many breakthrough accomplishments were his insights about the laws of planetary motion. Books he wrote were crucial forerunners of Isaac Newton’s theories about gravitation. But here’s an unexpected twist: Kepler was also a practicing astrologer who interpreted the charts of many people, including three emperors of the Holy Roman Empire. In the spirit of Kepler’s ability to bridge seemingly opposing perspectives, Capricorn, I invite you to be a paragon of mediation and conciliation in the coming weeks. Always be looking for ways to heal splits and forge connections. Assume you have an extraordinary power to blend elements that no one can else can.

AQUARIUS: Jan. 20 – Feb. 18

Dear Restless Runaway: During the next 10 months, life will offer you these invitations: 1. Identify the land that excites you and stabilizes you. 2. Spend lots of relaxing time on that land. 3. Define the exact nature of the niche or situation where your talents and desires will be most gracefully expressed. 4. Take steps to create or gather the family you want. 5. Take steps to create or gather the community you want.

PISCES: Feb.19 – March 20

I’d love you to be a deep-feeling, free-thinker in the coming weeks. I will cheer you on if you nurture your emotional intelligence as you liberate yourself from outmoded beliefs and opinions. Celebrate your precious sensitivity, dear Pisces, even as you use your fine mind to reevaluate your vision of what the future holds. It’s a perfect time to glory in rich sentiments and exult in creative ideas.

Homework: Find a way to sing as loudly and passionately as possible sometime soon.

Happy Independence Day my fellow Americans, have a blast! Let’s try to keep all our digits and most of our hearing intact come the 5th.

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