Little Village Eastern Iowa issue 317: April 2023

The State of Labor

From the stagehands union to Starbucks, LV spotlights wins (and setbacks) for Iowa workers.

24 let There Be light

The show can’t go on without the skillful members of Iowa’s stagehand union.

INDEPENDENT NEWS, CULTURE & EVENTS

Since 2001

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Extra Hot, No Foam

Baristas at the favorite Starbucks of University of Iowa students are organizing for a better workplace.

36 river’s Tributaries

Wrangling 150 Iowa musicians for one album is nothing compared to touring in a family band.

6 Top Stories

8 Ad Index

12 In Memoriam

14 Interactions

17 Time Capsule Dale

21 IC Speaks Winner

22 En Español

23 Fully Booked

24 Stagehands Union

28 State of Labor

32 Bread & Butter

36 Prairie Pop

38 A-List

40 Events Calendar

51 Dear Kiki

53 Astrology

55 Local Album Reviews

59 Local Book Reviews

63 Crossword

Little Village (ISSN 2328-3351) is an independent, community-supported news and culture publication based in Iowa City, published monthly by Little Village, LLC, 623 S Dubuque St., Iowa City, IA 52240. Through journalism, essays and events, we work to improve our community according to core values: environmental sustainability, affordability and access, economic and labor justice, racial justice, gender equity, quality healthcare, quality education and critical culture. Letters to the editor(s) are always welcome. We reserve the right to fact check and edit for length and clarity. Please send letters, comments or corrections to editor@littlevillagemag.com.

Subscriptions: lv@littlevillagemag.com. The US annual subscription price is $120. All rights reserved, reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. If you would like to reprint or collaborate on new content, reach us at lv@ littlevillagemag.com. To browse back issues, visit us online at issuu.com/littlevillage.

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Baird and Luis Aispuro work the morning shift. Jordan Sellergren / Little Village

INDEPENDENT NEWS, CULTURE & EVENTS

Since 2001

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EDITORIAL

Publisher

Genevieve Trainor genevieve@littlevillagemag.com

Editor-in-Chief

Emma McClatchey emma@littlevillagemag.com

Arts and Culture Editor

Isaac Hamlet isaac@littlevillagemag.com

News Director

Paul Brennan paul@littlevillagemag.com

Art and Production Director

Jordan Sellergren jordan@littlevillagemag.com

Multimedia Editor

Associate Publisher—DSM

Adria Carpenter adria@littlevillagemag.com

Photographer, Designer Sid Peterson sid@littlevillagemag.com

Multimedia Journalist

Courtney Guein courtney@littlevillagemag.com

Spanish Language Editor

Summer Santos

Calendar/Event Listings calendar@littlevillagemag.com

Corrections editor@littlevillagemag.com

April Contributors

Anne Mangano, Avery Gregurich, Becca Gorman, Christopher Burns, Claire Thoele, Don McLeese, Jay Goodvin, John Martinek, Kelsey Conrad, Kembrew McLeod, Lauren Haldeman, Michael Roeder, Mike Kuhlenbeck, Quiara Vasquez, Rob Cline, Sam Locke Ward, Sarah Elgatian, Tom Tomorrow

Digital Director Drew Bulman drewb@littlevillagemag.com

Marketing Analytics Coordinator

Malcolm MacDougall malcolm@littlevillagemag.com

SALES & ADMINISTRATION

President, Little Village, LLC Matthew Steele matt@littlevillagemag.com

Advertising

Genevieve Trainor, Joseph Servey, Malcolm MacDougall, Matthew Steele ads@littlevillagemag.com

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Website design, E-commerce, Publication design creative@littlevillagemag.com

CIRCULATION

Distribution Manager Joseph Servey joseph@littlevillagemag.com

Distribution

Bill Rogers, Ellen Keplinger, Ethan Christian Edvenson, Huxley Maxwell, Justin Comer, Sam Standish distro@littlevillagemag.com

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Little Village HQ, LV Creative Services 623 S Dubuque St Iowa City, IA 52240 319-855-1474

Little Village—Des Moines 900 Keosauqua Way, Ste 253 Des Moines, IA 50309

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PRODUCTION

Issue 317, Volume 2

April 2023

Cover by Claire Thoele

Workers behind counters, curtains and production lines are organizing across Iowa, but the state’s historically complicated relationship with labor looms large. Also in this issue: Iowa roots music, ’60s psychedelia and more!

Meet this month’s contributors:

Anne Mangano is the collection services coordinator at the Iowa City Public Library. She couldn’t imagine a life without books.

Avery Gregurich is a writer living and writing at the edge of the Iowa River in Marengo.

Christopher Burns lives in a state of uncertainty between Iowa City and the Quantum Realm. In between fluctuations he writes weird stories and plays music with the Shining Realm.

Claire Thoele is an illustrator, formerly of Iowa City, who now works and resides in the Wilds of Northwest Illinois.

Don McLeese teaches journalism at the University of Iowa. He has been writing about books and music, movies and TV, politics and popular culture, since the dawn of time.

Send

Kembrew McLeod is a founding Little Village columnist and the chair of Communications Studies at the University of Iowa.

Michael Roeder is a self-declared Music Savant. When he isn’t writing for Little Village he blogs at playbsides. com.

Mike Kuhlenbeck is a freelance journalist and National Writers Union member based in Des Moines.

Rob Cline is a writer and critic who would gleefully give the current state of things a negative review.

Sarah Elgatian is a writer, activist and educator living in Iowa. She likes dark coffee, bright colors and long sentences. She dislikes meanness.

Summer Santos earned her Ph.D. in Medieval English Literature and MFA in Literary Translation from the University of Iowa in 2019. She now works in immigration law as a paralegal.

Culture writers, food reviewers and columnists, email: editor@littlevillagemag.com

Illustrators, photographers and comic artists, email: jordan@littlevillagemag.com

From the Newsletter

Four of the top stories featured last month in the LV Daily, Little Village’s weekday afternoon email written by Paul Brennan. Subscribe at littlevillagemag.com/support

Iowa legislature passes bill restricting gender-affirming care for trans children, even if prescribed by doctors

Thursday, March 9

On Wednesday, Iowa House Republicans followed the example of their Senate counterparts and pushed through a bill banning gender-affirming care for any transgender person under 18 in the state, even if the person’s doctors and parents agree such care is necessary. Unlike the vote in the Senate, where every Republican voted for the ban, five Republicans joined all the House’s Democrats in opposing it.

Iowa governor says ‘it’s not easy for me either’ as she signs laws considered life-threatening by trans care providers

Wednesday, March 22

After not commenting on the bill to ban gender-affirming medical care for trans minors, Gov. Reynolds confirmed on Tuesday she will sign the bill. She compared the medical care to health- and safety-threatening behavior such as smoking and drinking alcohol, and said the ban “is in the best interest of the kids.” Reynolds also signed a ban on trans Iowans using school bathrooms or locker rooms that match their gender identity.

Iowa City Starbucks files to become first unionized store in the state

Tuesday, March 28

Workers at the Starbucks in downtown Iowa City have begun the formal process that will allow them to unionize. Unionization drives at the coffee chain have swept through locations around the country during the last two years, but the workers at the Starbucks at the corner of Burlington and Clinton Streets are the first in Iowa to file a petition for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

Set to close after 181 years, Iowa Wesleyan University is ‘disappointed in the lack of state support’

Wednesday, March 29

Iowa Wesleyan University announced on Monday it will permanently close at the end of the current semester. In a statement posted on its website, the private university in Mount Pleasant cited financial problems, including a decline in donor support and Gov. Kim Reynolds’ refusal to provide assistance using American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds.

80/35 (40)

Adamantine Spine Moving (45)

Arnott & Kirk (63)

City of Iowa City (20)

CommUnity Crisis Services (19)

Coralville Public Library (4)

FilmScene (41)

Firmstone Real Estate (29)

Floodwater Comedy Festival (39)

GDP Festival (31)

Grinnell College Museum of Art (29)

Hancher Auditorium (56)

Honeybee Hair Parlor and Hive Collective (16)

Independent Iowa Downtown Iowa City (10-11)

- The Green House

- Release Body Modification

- Merge

- Prairie Lights Bookstore & Cafe

- Hot Spot Tattoo

- Critical Hit

- Record Collector

- Yotopia

THANK YOU TO THIS ISSUE’S

PARTNERS

- Basic Goods

- Beadology

- Mailboxes

- Revival

- Fix!

Independent Iowa Northside Marketplace (26-27)

- Marco’s Island

- High Ground

- John’s Grocery

- Oasis Falafel

- Russ’s Northside Service, Inc.

- Pagliai’s Pizza

- R.S.V.P.

- George’s

- Artifacts

- Press Coffee

- Dodge St. Tire

Independent Iowa New Bohemia & Czech Village (33)

- Next Page Books

- SOKO Outfitters

- Goldfinch Cyclery

- NewBoCo

- The Daisy

- Cobble Hill

Indian Creek Nature Center (20)

Iowa City Area HBA (18)

Iowa City Burger Haul (29)

Iowa City Public Library (30)

Iowa City Zen Center (16)

Iowa Department of Public Health (62)

Iowa Metaphysical Fair (35)

Iowa Public Radio (9)

Johnson County Great Give Day (45)

Johnson County Public Health (58)

KRUI 89.7 FM (43)

Kim Schillig, REALTOR (50)

La Wine Bar (25)

Linn County Conservation (18)

Martin Construction (9)

Medical Reserve Corps (35)

Mesa 503 (7)

Mission Creek Festival (37)

Nearwood Winery (21)

New Pioneer Food Co-op (52)

Nodo (29)

Orchestra Iowa (46)

Phoebe Martin (60)

Public Space One (12)

Raygun (51)

ReFocus (21)

Riverside Theatre (45)

Shakespeare’s Pub & Grill (50)

Summer of the Arts (64)

Taxes Plus (35)

Theatre Cedar Rapids (61)

The Club Car (50)

The Englert Theatre (54)

The James Theatre (34)

The Wedge Pizzeria (53)

Theatre Cedar Rapids (61)

University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art (2)

University of Iowa Theatre Arts (43)

West Music (30)

Wig & Pen (53)

Willis Dady Homeless Services (34)

Willow & Stock (7)

World of Bikes (35)

Who reads little Village?

Magic the Warhammer.Gathering.Warmachine.

Board Games. X-Wing. HeroClix. Miniatures. L5R. Pokemon. Yu-Gi-Oh. Vinyl. Retro toys. Pop vinyl & plushies. Gaming & collectible supplies. Huge Magic singles inventory plus we buy/trade MtG cards. Weekly drafts, FNM, league play, and frequent tourneys.

Now buying/selling/trading games & toys! Bring in your Nintendo Gameboy, NES, SNES, N64, Gamecube, Sega, WiiU, Xbox 360, PS1-2-3, & other used games, consoles, action figures, and toys for cash or trade credit!

Fun atmosphere and great customer service!

115 S. Linn Street (by the Public Library), Iowa City Tel: 319-333-1260; Email: chg@criticalhitgames.net www.criticalhitgames.net @criticalhitgamesiowacity

Always buying & selling quality vinyl records, CDs & turntables.

Letters & Interactions

LV encourages community members, including candidates for office, to submit letters to Editor@LittleVillageMag.com. To be considered for print publication, letters should be under 500 words. Preference is given to letters that have not been published elsewhere.

Trevor lee Hopkins’ Small Stakes

This month Iowa City lost its Swiss Army knife, Trevor Hopkins. “Trigger,” “Sheriff,” sound guy, bartender, drummer, brother, dog dad, cook, uncle, tireless encourager, ray of social media sunshine, nickname artist, husband to wonderful Ashlee, and longtime Little Village distributor, Trevor’s big heart chose a quiet, cold, homebound Saint Patrick’s Day to finally give out overnight. He was 47, and I hope he was at peace.

Following his sudden passing, social media (and his memorial service) overflowed with remembrances from people who had ideas and aspirations that Trevor had put a nickel into at one time or another. Day after day, stories of these small stakes flooded my feed. They started to add up and, as

via the Hopkins family

is too often the case, I’m afraid they might have added up to more than he realized.

One of those endeavors that Trevor believed in was Little Village. Like anyone, we’ve had those days when it was hard to know if any of it was landing, or if we should even go on. As he was for so many others, there was a time or two when Trevor was that person for us—the one who was there, and wouldn’t hear it, and wasn’t going to let us leave until we looked each other in the eye and promised to keep going.

Trevor loved us (and, if you are reading this, that means you). I knew him for years and I still couldn’t tell his actual blood family from his chosen family, from new friends, from townies, or from musicians who had come through Iowa City only once or twice, or had one time promised/ indicated that they might. He was serious about all of it—serious about answering the call! And answer he did. Honestly whether you called or not, he was still around every corner, and always making a comeback—your comeback.

His ripples of encouragement spanned at least three generations, and it would be a very good

Think of your favorite meal from a restaurant. Is the restaurant still open?

thing in my opinion if they could span a couple more. He had such conviction and consistency, you have to at least consider the possibility that the truth was on his side: Maybe when he told us to keep going, that it was worth it, that we had to, that it mattered—maybe it really did. Maybe it still does. Maybe Trevor was right, but this will be a different place without him. Our family won’t ever be the same. Hold each other close, and keep checking your pockets for Trevor. If you find him, you’ll know what to do: Help him out by putting someone up on stage, at least one more time.

—Matt Steele

MOMBOY LAUREN HALDEMAN

PERSONALS

Pebbles could tell you stories. She can’t, but she could. She spent her first years as a stray before being fed and welcomed in by her soulmate. Sadly, her human died, leaving Pebbles alone. A neighbor rescued her, and Pebbles came into the Iowa City Animal Center shy and depressed. Gradually, she’s opening her heart again. Do you believe in life after love? Give the shelter a call: 319-356-5295

Send your personals for consideration to editor@littlevillagemag.com with subject line “Personals.”

LV Recommends: Blue Elephant Thai Restaurant in Coralville has all the marks of excellence (March 8)

I agree! Amazing food, great service, and the restaurant is beautiful! —Lisa

H.

My favorite takeout spot, hands down.

—Celine R.

Cristin Mitchell is an amazing food writer!!! Y’all are lucky to have her. —Bryn L.

UI Athletics will reimburse state the $2 million to settle football discrimination lawsuit (March 9)

Structural racism. —Ger

Take it out of Ferentz’s salary, then fire him. —David O.

Can we all just stop pretending that the marketing benefits of college football balance all of the many negatives?

—Stan C.

Thousand Island dressing for success: The Reuben review 2023 (March 15)

Great choices. I’m also partial to Bluebird Diner. —Matt S.

Back Berner Bar & Grill in Tiffin has one of the best Reubens in the area. Made from slow roasted and freshly shredded corned beef. Their Reuben pizza and Reuben mac and cheese are also amazing! —Lance G.

Hilltop Tavern has the best with amazing fries. —Lisa R.

I don’t like Reuben sandwiches but my wife spoke highly of the ones at Thoma’s Meat Market. —Normalice

I’ve found the one at Ox Yoke Inn in the Amanas to be one of the best. I think it’s the fresh kraut that makes the difference.

—Eric T.

If the rye is browned, it’s far too toasted. It should be a notch above warm bread at most. —Ben C.

May I propose the Trumpet Blossom Reuben as a dark horse candidate?

—Greg S.

Iowa governor says ‘it’s not easy for me either’ as she signs laws considered life-threatening by trans care providers (March 22)

*Ron Howard voice* It was actually very easy for her. —G.D.

Then…don’t do it????? This is not hard!

—Molly

Is Brenna Byrd handling the pending lawsuits?? Surely, we aren’t hiring extra outside lawyers to pay for this discrimination agenda by the GOP. Wasting taxpayer $$ to join the cult.

—Sara W.

Cue that scene from shrek: “Some of you may die, but that is the sacrifice I am willing to make.” —Oglesby F.

Isn’t her party also pushing to expand child labor in Iowa? If she cares about the best interests of kids so much maybe she’d like to explain that. —Anna K.

‘We have local acts that deserve to be on a stage of that size’: 100-year-old Hoyt Sherman Place theater to host GDP music festival on April 15 (March 22)

$30 tickets!?! Whoa. That’s a great inclusive price! Such an incredible venue. Be careful with the Slipknot show tho—

STRESS FRACTURES JOHN MARTINEK

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Jordan Sellergren / Little Village

Time Capsule Dale

Meet LV’s newest columnist—a Gen X townie who goes to bed in the ’90s and wakes up in modern day IC/CR.

It had everything a southeast side Iowa City resident would ever need: happy hour specials and the best damn scalloped potatoes and ham in Johnson County. I’m talking about Roxie’s on the corner of Muscatine and 1st Avenue. If I’d known I was going to hurtle nearly 30 years into the future after a random Cup Night at The Q, I wouldn’t have taken Roxie’s for granted. Or the 50 cent refills on Cup Night.

Hungry for some comfort food, I wander from my apartment past a stream of automobiles, not a single one a growling ’70s Chevelles or orange Ford Escort. There are “Help Wanted” signs on every window I pass, including the shiny Kum & Go that used to be the Gasby’s where I’d buy chew and 24-packs of Rolling Rock on paydays.

I peer across the street to where my beloved Roxie’s should be and see a quadrant of businesses. I pass on the pizza place that tells me I have to bake it at home, and I can’t afford a cellular phone (who am I, Zack Morris on Saved by the Bell?). An establishment called Mesa 503 looks promising, though.

Inside, a Salvadoran family cooks up pupusas. I order with little idea what I’m buying, but when the pupusas come out, they’re something to behold—like if a quesadilla and a pita had a baby! Hot, fluffy and cheesy. I nod to the family in the kitchen and salute them with my last bite, which I chew with some red cabbage slaw and rich salsa. Thirsty. I could use a marg. Maybe Senor Pablo’s has stood the test of time?

I walk out, and fall on my knees like Charlton Heston at the end of Planet of the Apes. 830 1st Avenue is sprawling concrete, the textbook definition of “pave paradise and put up a parking lot.” A giant Hy-Vee sits where the trailer park was.

Where were the Paulsons? Was little darling Corey all grow’ed up? Was the knight’s armor melted down to make ammunition during some war I missed—Y2K, maybe?

A young man wearing a red Hy-Vee shirt (something familiar, at least) helps calm me down, assuring me there are still plenty of softshell tacos and margaritas to be found in Iowa City.

“At least we still have La Casa and Gringos,” I manage to utter. He lets out a chuckle, then goes back to collecting carts.

—Jay Goodvin

INTERACTIONS

haha—I used to volunteer there & when They Might be Giants played, all the bouncing from the crowd felt like the balcony was going to give. Good work to all who are planning this show. —Genie M.

A great music festival with lots of thought and preparation behind it in one of DM’s best gems, Hoyt Sherman Place.

—Wendy H.

Letter to the editor: New traffic cameras around Iowa City spark concern (March 23)

Welcome to California. —Christine H.

New art project with black Krylon and a spray nozzle! —Josh C.

LV wants to know: What are some of your favorite dishes from bygone local restaurants?

The vegetable stack from Giovanni’s. Delicious. Also, the vegan miso soup dumplings from Dumpling Darling. They got me through the early days of the pandemic. I was crushed when they closed. —Anne A.

Tres Leches Cake from Banditos. Nearly anything from Augusta (I’m including their Oxford location). Augusta is my favorite overall restaurant in my adult life—burgers, tenderloin, fried chicken, gumbo, pecan pie, turducken...all amazing. —Charlie M.

I miss Hungry Hobo so much, as well as Gringo’s. I will never pass an opportunity to say how much I miss Paul’s, either, but that’s off topic here. —Jasmine E

The blackened catfish from Atlas. Anything from Mekong. The duck from the southside location of Yen Ching.

—Aprille C.

The tenderloin from Atlas w/the flash fried potato patties and chutney! I ate two at one sitting while pregnant! —Jill A.

Baby burrito with queso from La Casa! Blackened chicken, mashed potatoes and apple crumble dessert with ice cream from Ground Round! —Sandy T.H.

The Mill’s curried chicken salad sandwich

and the Iowa Waltz pizza, and the “on an island in Iowa” cocktail. Smoky Alvarez from Cheba Hut. Ancho rubbed chili pork tenderloin medallions from Atlas. Pita Pit. Lou Henri’s breakfast (all of it). Grandpa’s Coffin cocktail from Social Club. —Kyle

Bacon. Wrapped. Dates. from Devotay.

D.

—Dawn A.

Cheesecake from the Sheep’s Head. Fresh spinach pasta from The Kitchen. Fried mushrooms from the Mill. John’s had a veggie sandwich that I loved as an undergrad. Carrot cake from Bushnell’s Turtle. Croissants from Great Midwestern Ice Cream. Fruit pizza from the Green Pepper. Brandy Alexanders from Canterbury Inn. Loaded home fries from Salt Fork. Anything that David cooked at the Motley Cow. —Regenia

B.

Secret Pizza, lemon chicken from Givanni’s, Billy’s Favorite at Vito’s, smoked salmon eggs Benedict from The Wedge (downtown), Brad’s spicy tofuwich at New-Pi, “the pile w/eggs” at Rossi’s Cafe, margaritas from Gringo’s, any dish from Redhead in Solon, trout pate from Linn St. Cafe. The Chill and Grill gets an honorable mention, but to remember what we ordered I’d probably need to be hung over. —Heather H.

Ice cream from Great Midwestern and lunch specials at the Kitty Hawk! —Rod S.

All-American Deli at Old Capitol. For all I know, it was horrible, but as a college student in the late 1980s, I enjoyed it.

—Stephen C.

Thank you. I took over ownership of it in 1986 and operated it until 1996 when our lease expired and the mall would not renew our lease. I was told that they only wanted chain stores in the mall. Very disappointing. I cried when we had to auction off all of our equipment and belongings. —Mary

L.B.

I miss The Sub Shop at least 3 days per week. The Dagwood or The Veggie sandwiches were my top two favorites. Creamy Garlic dressing on those of course. —Donald

P.S.

Red Avocado veggie sandwiches and

cold cucumber soup. Devotay everything, but especially paella and polenta. Mouth watering thinking about it * sigh * . Oh, and Giovani’s seafood pasta. —Billie

J.B.

So many things from the Red Avocado but the chocolate chip cookie bars, the banana espresso smoothie, YUM. I still make that at home. —Susanna

R.

Wow! What a beautiful honor to be remembered fondly enough to a decade+ after for a meal, a dish, an experience that stuck in someone’s memory to be mentioned years after. Food & eating is so transient in nature, it’s sensoria’s and vanishes within seconds, but sometimes hits deeper and stays there as a highlight for the unsuspecting adventurer. As cofounder of the Red Avocado, a restaurant that was hardly recognized for how truly pioneering it was, especially in it’s time, this post means more than words can explain. Thank you for remembering and for sharing! —Joshua G.

Best Steak House on the corner of Iowa and Dubuque. Nearly paper-thin steaks, a baked potato, for a couple bucks. Favorite after school meal for me when I attended Central. —Jerry N.

The polenta with broccolini and mushrooms from Taste on Melrose, and the Angel hair pasta with Gorgonzola, spinach and pine nuts from Mondos. Oh, Electric Goat from Givannis, all of Salt Fork Kitchen (can I loop in the Lincoln Cafe in Mt Vernon?), and the pizza with Brussels sprouts and balsamic and whatever else was on it from Forbidden Planet. And I’m not even a vegetarian!

—Andrea S.B.

I literally dream about the wings at The Local Craft sometimes... Good stuff.

—Taylor F.

The twice baked potatoes at the original Bob’s Your Uncle. The Spin-Art (spinach & artichoke) Chicken at Okoboji Grill. Everything on the menu at Salt Fork Kitchen (and yes, I tried it all.) —Patty

K.

I miss Linn Street Cafe and the fantastic wine dinners. We also miss Frank Bowman and the delicious food that he made there.

—Joan A.

Devotay took over the location of my grandfather’s office. Took my sweetie for a first date there. —Carol C.

Banana cream pie from Bushnell’s Turtle. That’s what I chose for my reward after getting a vasectomy (and that’s saying something!) —Dickie C.

Read more reader recommendations at LittleVillageMag.com

Little Village is honored to present the winner of the IC Speaks’ 2023 Page Poetry Contest.

AN AUTOpSY

By Althea Downing-Sherer

Eyes drift over glazed glass, watching evergreen like motion pictures. New-moon rocks loosen their shadows into the windowsill and the floorboards consecrate my footprints in a layer of dust. This skeleton of a home holds hieroglyphics in its popcorn ceilings.

Shoulders are held at the same angle as the window frame before them, soft winter sun ghosting over half a face.

My papercut giver, My dog-eared page.

An arm is like that of my shriveled ivy plant, reaching out to meet me in a feeble attempt at life.

Features are arranged in asymmetrical monotony, a pair of blue false prophets pretending to be gray blink in synchrony. Voices unspool in unscraped cacophonies: Talk to me.

My sanctuary is ripped in half like a twoleaf clover, the only witness Sunday-morning light. And my hardwood skin and clothbound soul are finally affirmed as something impermanent.

Conocer tus derechos laborales

Con los intentos recientes en Iowa y otros estados vecinos para debilitar protecciones existentes para trabajadores, decidí a consultar a una autoridad en la ley laboral en Iowa. Hablé recientemente con César Rosado Marzán, el Edward L. Carmody Profesor de la Ley en la Universidad de Iowa, y le pregunté a él algunas preguntas para obtener una comprensión mejor de que los trabajadores en Iowa deben entender sobre sus derechos y como luchar por ellos.

¿Cómo describirías el estado presente de los derechos laborales en Iowa? Como la mayoría de los EEUU, los derechos laborales en Iowa están en disminución empinada. Como la mayoría de los estados ‘rojos’ ellos están en gran peligro en Iowa. Dado que el gobierno quiere restaurar la labor de niños en Iowa, la evidencia de la degradación de los derechos laborales es muy alta.

la gobernadora reynolds soporta el derecho al trabajo – ¿Qué significa esta frase, en realidad? Se significa que, si los trabajadores eligen democráticamente un sindicato para representarlos a su empleador, uno, el sindicato estará obligada a representar legalmente cada trabajador a pesar de su afiliación o falta de afiliación con el sindicato, y, dos, cualquier trabajador en esa compañía puede rechazar legalmente a pagar la cuota por servicios del sindicato, aun si el sindicato esta requerido a representarlos. Es decir, derecho al trabajo significa que el sindicato debe representar cualquier persona en una compañía donde el sindicato representa trabajadores, gratis. Los economistas se refieren a este fenómeno como polizones. Mi abuelo se referiría como gorronear y quizás cosas más desfavorables.

¿Que son los efectos verdaderos de derecho al trabajo? Los estudios han demostrado que derecho al trabajo tiene impacto negative en afiliación en sindicatos y representación por sindicatos. Debilita a las uniones y por eso hace menos atractivas los sindicatos a la mayoría de los trabajadores.

¿Cuáles derechos son los más importantes de entender para los trabajadores de Iowa? Es una pregunta muy compleja y merece conversación más amplia. Si tengo que escoger un derecho, creo que el derecho de unirse a un

sindicato y la negociación del convenio es lo más importante. La democracia se depende de este derecho, y sin la democracia todos los trabajadores salen perdiendo.

¿Qué pueden hacer los trabajadores de Iowa para mejorar sus derechos en el lugar de trabajo? Pueden hacer muchas cosas. Pueden unirse a sindicatos. O soportar a los trabajadores en huelga o con ganas de unirse a un sindicato. O convencer a sus iglesias para soportar los trabajadores necesitados, tal como cuando los trabajadores con salario bajo dicen que su empleador no les pagaba justamente de acuerdo con la ley.

Knowing Your rights as a Worker

WrITTEN AND TrANSlATED BY SUMMEr SANTOS

With recent efforts in Iowa and neighboring states to weaken existing protections for workers, I decided to consult an authority on labor law in Iowa. I recently spoke with César Rosado Marzán, the Edward L. Carmody Professor of Law at the University of Iowa, and asked him some questions to help get a better picture of what Iowan workers should understand about their rights and how to fight for them.

How would you characterize the current state of labor rights in Iowa? Labor rights in Iowa, like in most of the United States, are in deep decline. Like in most “red” states, they’re even in bigger trouble in Iowa. The fact that the government wants to restore child labor in Iowa is perhaps more than good evidence of how degraded workers’ rights are in Iowa.

Gov. reynolds supports “right to work”— what does that mean, really? It means that if workers democratically choose to have a union represent them at work, that, one, the union has to legally represent all the workers in that workplace, whether they want to be union members or not, and, two, any worker in that workplace can legally opt out from paying the union service charge even when the union must represent them. In other words, right to work means that the union must represent for free anyone in a workplace where a union must represent employees. Economists call this “free riding.” My grandpa would have called it “freeloading,” and perhaps worse things.

Tres verdades sobre los sindicatos, según de profesor Rosado Marzán

1. Los sindicatos protegen tu derecho de negociar y obtienen resultados mejores que la negociación individual.

2. Los trabajadores en sindicatos reciben más dinero y beneficios mejores que los trabajadores no sindicados. La cuota vale la pena.

3. Un sindicato no es un forastero. Un sindicato es elegido y compuesto de los trabajadores y debe representar justamente todos los trabajadores de la unidad/departamento de negociación. Mas frecuentemente, los forasteros son los empleadores y los dueños de la compañía, no los sindicatos.

Three truths about unions, according to Professor Rosado Marzán

1. Unions protect your right to negotiate and obtain better outcomes than individual negotiation.

2. Unionized workers make more money and better benefits than non-union workers. The dues are worth it.

3. A union is not an outsider, but is elected by and composed of workers who must fairly represent all workers in their bargaining unit. More often, the outsiders are the bosses and company owners, not the unions.

What are the actual effects of “right to work”? Studies have shown that right to work negatively impacts union membership and union representation. It weakens unions and, because of that, unions become less attractive to most workers.

What rights are most important for Iowan workers to understand? This is a complicated question better left for a wider discussion. But if I had to choose one right, I think that the right to join a union and bargain collectively is the most important labor right of all. Democracy depends on this right. Without democracy, all workers lose.

How can Iowans best improve their workplace rights? They can do many things, from joining unions to supporting workers who want to join unions or who are on strike, to getting their churches to support any group of workers who seek help, such as when low-wage workers claim their employer failed to pay them adequately under the law.

MEGA STORE

Unflinching U.S. History

By Anne Mangano

Hilary Mantel once wrote that reading history and historical fiction allows us to measure up our own lifetimes. “Are these good times, bad times, interesting times? We rely on history to tell us,” she explained in a 2017 Guardian op-ed. I find myself turning to the pages of books to find context to today’s news and experiences. Historians are happy to oblige.

Take our current political divide. Adam Hochschild’s American Midnight: The Great War, a Violent Peace, and Democracy’s Forgotten Crisis chronicles an America on the political brink: 1917-1921. The government infiltrated labor unions, political parties and immigrant associations. The Post Office used broad power to take down journalists. Libraries removed books seen as anti-American.

In 1920, the Battle of Matewan raged in West Virginia. White workers murdered scores of African-American workers in the East St. Louis Riots in 1917, and the Tulsa Race Massacre followed four years after. The U.S. government used the new 1918 Sedition Act to jail Eugene Debs, a prominent and vocal opponent of President Wilson. Americans were fighting a war that Wilson argued would make “the world safe for democracy,” but so much happening in the U.S. didn’t resemble a free country.

Hochschild tells the stories of courageous individuals working to end government and societal violence and injustice, including W.E.B. Du Bois, Kate Richards O’Hare and Louis Post. He provides a layered narrative of the time, providing a good understanding of what people experienced.

But the tumultuous period of World War I was not the first time Americans found themselves divided. In The Ruin of All Witches: Life and Death in the New World, Malcolm Gaskill brings us back to the white colonial settlement of Springfield, Massachusetts, 50 years before the Salem Witch Trials. Hugh Parsons, a brickmaker, was bad tempered and didn’t attend church services. His wife Mary had a hard time coping with the demands of living in a frontier community and having a young family.

As the English Civil War ended, everyone was on edge, expecting large political changes. When livestock began to die, the Puritan community had one explanation: witchcraft. As public nuisances, the Parsons were prime suspects for being in league with the devil.

Gaskill shows us that Salem wasn’t a one-off—it was part of a larger story of colonial New England. Many towns experienced divided communities and witchcraft hysteria. Their stories follow a pattern. A community faces change. Fear breeds suspicion. Whole communities became caught up in persecuting their neighbors. It is a thread woven into the fabric of U.S. history from Salem to the Red Scare to fear of immigrant groups.

History is a way to explain the present or predict the future. As the old adage says, those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.

Anne Mangano is the collection services coordinator at the Iowa City Public Library. She couldn’t imagine a life without books.

Bat Babies Shirt (White): $23

Show Business

Workers behind some of Iowa’s biggest productions are joining hands for more “voice, power and protection” on the job.

BY ISAAC HAMlET

Hancher Auditorium’s relationship with the local stagehand union dates back to when the University of Iowa first created the venue.

“Hancher opened the same fall that CAMBUS started [1972],” recalled Mark Falk. “That was my freshman fall. [I thought] ‘Look at all this new stuff, that’s cool.’ As long as there’s been a Hancher, IATSE’s been involved with it.”

IATSE is the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, which has five locals in Iowa including Local 690 based out of Iowa City. Falk, who often works behind the scenes at Hancher and remains involved with IATSE, is the union’s former vice president. Falk stepped out of the role roughly around the time current Local 690 president Greg Wicklund assumed his own current title.

Though Wicklund’s presidency is just over a year old, he’s been involved with IATSE for about a decade. According to Wicklund, Local 690 covers “Iowa City, Coralville and anything south of North Liberty, down to the bottom of the state.”

Local 690 was charted in June of 1930. As Wicklund explained, Local 690 started its life as a projectionists’ union. As time went on, however, the location’s jurisdiction broadened.

“If there’s lights [or] there’s sound, we’re gonna be there,” Wicklund said. “On a national level there’s thousands of contracts; on the local level we maintain about five and, in addition to that, there’s so many single events that come in and they only need a contract for a day or a week.”

A noteworthy single event is Fox Sport’s Big Noon Kickoff, which has been hosted in Iowa City the past two years. In terms of established contracts, the most significant in the area include the Xtream Arena in Coralville, which opened in 2020, and Hancher Auditorium, which reopened in September of 2016 eight years after flooding forced the venue to close.

Last fall, Iowa City’s 110-year-old theater added its name to the list of venues whose stage hands have unionized.

“I’m so proud of those employees,” Wicklund said. “You put your job on the line with things

like that. They came out and they voted.”

Following a unanimous vote of 13 in favor, The Englert Theatre’s stagehands are in the process of joining IATSE.

“We started making a concerted effort a year ago; we signed authorization cards in the summer and the union approached the theater at the end of August to let them know that we were seeking representation,” said Justin Comer, a production technician at the Englert who also delivers copies of Little Village.

One of the reasons he favored joining IATSE, Comer said, is a desire for more standardized work hours. He pointed out the hours stagehands might work on a given day can vary wildly, which Wicklund and Falk further attested to.

It’s work that typically has to be done the day of the performance, and can vary in scope depending on the performer.

For example, Comer tends to focus on sound at his job. When a touring band arrives for sound check, he needs to make multiple mixes. Speakers must be arranged to project sound toward the singer, so they can get a sense of the full balance of sound and, particularly, hear themselves. That balance will be different from what the drummer needs to hear, which is different from what the bass player needs to be hear, and all of those are different from what the audience is hearing.

By Comer’s estimation, he’s had to work on as many as eight different mixes for a performance.

“Some days we’ll work a small production and we’ll be there for two hours. Other days it’ll be a huge touring act and we’re working a 14- or 16-hour day,” Comer said. “Some weeks, those’ll be the only two shows that we work, so our pay for that week is a straight 18-hour week.”

Comer’s hope is that, by joining IATSE, he

Above: Alex Body mixes sound offstage for an event at Hancher Auditorium. Below: Scott Wiley works “on the tubes” at Carver Hawkeye Arena to rig chain motors for a concert in 2018. Opposite: Chuck Ping prepares to give the big wheel a test spin during the setup for Wheel of Fortune LIVE! at Hancher Auditorium. Chuck celebrates 40 years as a member of IATSE this year. Courtesy Greg Wicklund

and his fellow Englert workers can have work conditions more in-line with industry standards, including a minimum wage and time-and-a-half for going over an eight hour shift.

“We have certain industry standards that we stand by in terms of minimums number of hours, fair working conditions and equitable working conditions for everyone that’s covered under union contracts,” Wicklund said. “That’s one of the principal tenets of unionism, is that workers feel safe and comfortable and happy in their jobs.”

Safety and comfort are especially important given the impact of the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic on the entertainment industry. The Bureau of Economics reported that Iowa’s Gross Domestic Product fell by 3.5 percent in the first quarter of 2020, with the art and entertainment industry bearing the brunt of that fall.

While COVID-19 may not have led directly to stagehands at the Englert unionizing, Comer did muse that the pandemic caused a lot of people to reassess their situations.

Meanwhile, in central Iowa, a different kind of backstage worker has also made moves to

join a union. It was announced last year that the stage managers of the Des Moines Metro Opera (DMMO) will unionize and join the American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA).

“The stage managers of Des Moines Metro Opera thank DMMO management for voluntarily recognizing our Union with AGMA,” read a statement from DMMO stage managers. “We believe this collaborative partnership will continue to flourish as we bargain our first AGMA contract.”

According to James Odom, the Midwest business representative with AGMA, “DMMO is the first shop AGMA has organized in Iowa,” and will represent both stage managers and assistant stage managers at the opera.

AGMA was founded in 1936 as an independent organization and was chartered a year later to cover grand opera, concert and recital. That same year it was granted a charter, AGMA negotiated and signed a deal with the Southern California Symphony Association, and began negotiations with the Chicago Opera Company and the Philadelphia Civic Grand Opera Company.

In an email with Little Village, Odom went on to explain that AGMA largely represents

“IF THErE’S lIGHTS [Or] THErE’S SOUND, WE’rE GONNA BE THErE. ON A NATIONAl lEVEl THErE’S THOUSANDS OF CONTrACTS; ON THE lOCAl lEVEl WE MAINTAIN ABOUT FIVE AND, IN ADDITION TO THAT, THErE’S SO MANY SINGlE EVENTS THAT COME IN AND THEY ONlY NEED A CONTrACT FOr A DAY Or A WEEK.” —GREG WICKLUND, PRESIDENT LOCAL 690

singers, dancers and production staff (like choreographers and stage managers) while IATSE represents crew members (such as carpenters, electricians and make-up artists).

“The overlap is that both unions almost invariably have bargaining units with the same employers,” Odom said in his email, speaking on a national level. “While the members represented by each union work closely together, they are separate groups with separate priorities, but similar interests. AGMA and IATSE have a good working relationship.”

Though not as old as the Englert, DMMO is a longstanding company in central Iowa. Based out of Indianola, the organization has been operating for more than 50 years. Over the course of its existence, the opera has brought established works to Iowa for the first time and even created new operas, such as last year’s adaptation of the Jane Smiley novel A Thousand Acres

Just as with the contract between the Englert and the unionizing stagehands there, the contract between DMMO and its unionizing managers is still being worked out.

“Forming a union with AGMA creates a collective voice, power and protection for artists,” Odom said, speaking broadly about AGMA members. “As union workers, AGMA artists have the right to bargain over the terms and conditions of their employment, including wages, benefits, health and safety, and more, as well as the right to request and receive information from employers, including financial information. As union workers, artists have the backing of AGMA and its professional staff in enforcing their contractual guarantees and their legal rights, and when reporting incidents of harassment or discrimination.”

Back in eastern Iowa, Falk is just thrilled to see more workers unionizing.

“I’m a real pro-union guy, have been all my life, so I’m real pleased to see workers get representation,” he said, regarding Englert workers unionizing. “I’m pleased as punch that we got that organized. We’ve got [roughly] a dozen new members in, it brings a new perspective.”

That new perspective goes two ways. Though it’s not entirely clear at this point how much the Englert members will intermingle with the other stagehands, the newly unionized workers will have access to the experience of their IATSE peers.

“We can give them more training,” said Falk, “which will only help their profession when they go back to Englert.”

Isaac Hamlet is Little Village’s arts and culture editor.

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How Did We Get Here?

BY pAUl BrENNAN

When lawmakers in Des Moines are seriously discussing rolling back laws against child labor, it can be hard to believe there’s anything positive about the state of labor in Iowa. But despite years of Republicans raging against unions, union membership in Iowa slightly increased last year. In 2021, 6.5 percent of the state’s workers were in unions. In 2022, it grew to 7 percent.

If that number seems low, it’s worth remembering that in 1947—70 years before Republicans in the 2017 Iowa Legislature gutted collective bargaining rights for public sector unions, except police and other public safety unions—Iowa became the first state outside the deep south to pass a rightto-work law, undermining the ability of unions to organize workplaces.

Beyond that small uptick in union membership, there were a few other bright spots recently.

John Deere workers succeeded in getting a decent contract after a 34-day-long strike last year. In January, workers at Ingredion in Cedar Rapids brought a 175-day strike to a successful conclusion. A few days later, Case-New Holland workers in Burlington ratified a new contract after eight months on the picket line. And at the end of March, it was announced that workers at the downtown Starbucks in Iowa City were joining the fast-moving labor organizing effort in the country, and had taken the first steps required to form a union, the first at a Starbucks in Iowa.

It’s not surprising those bright spots are hard to see. Every big newspaper in the country has a Business section; none have a Labor section. The gyrations of the stock market, even when clearly irrational, are treated like a reliable sign of the national economy’s health, while decades of wage stagnation and the yawning wealth gap between the working class and those living off investment income aren’t.

Labor history is scantily covered in American history textbooks, and any discussion in Iowa schools of class conflict in the country’s labor disputes, current or historical, might run afoul of the ban on teaching “divisive concepts” that Gov. Kim Reynolds signed into law in 2021.

The political climate in America for the last 40 years has been unhealthy for the labor movement. Republicans have done almost everything possible to oppose unions (except police unions), while the Democratic Party has been a half-hearted ally for unions since the ’80s (except for police unions).

The “erasure of workers from our collective sense of ourselves as Americans is a political act,” labor historian Erik Loomis wrote in his 2018 book Strike! “Americans’ shared memory,” shaped by school textbooks, the media and the stories we celebrate in public settings “too often erases or downplays critical stories of workplace struggle.”

Even Labor Day contributes to this erasure. Congress made it a holiday in 1894 to discourage Americans from participating in the annual international celebrations of labor unions on May 1. It worked.

May Day, which grew out of commemorations of the brutal repression of an 1886 strike in Chicago, is celebrated worldwide, but it’s largely ignored in America. And Labor Day has little meaning to most people beyond a nice, long weekend in late summer.

Most Americans regard the eight-hour workday, the 40-hour workweek and basic health and safety laws in the workplace as if they were naturally occuring phenomena, instead of victories won by unions after long and bitter struggles with employers and politicians.

Given all this, it’s no wonder so few Iowans know that 112 years ago, Muscatine was briefly the

most important city in America for labor organizers.

Muscatine owes its place in labor history to clams. It was the plentiful supply of freshwater claims along the Mississippi River at Muscatine that convinced John Boepple, an immigrant from Germany, to settle there in 1891. Boepple used the mother of pearl lining in clam shells to make buttons he sold as “pearl buttons.” He opened a small factory in Muscatine shortly after moving there, where he and his assistants made the buttons using hand tools. Pearl buttons quickly became fashionable.

As the buttons became more profitable, the work was mechanized and factories proliferated. By 1901, there were 27 pearl button factories in Muscatine. Ten years later, there were 43. Only New York produced more pearl buttons than Iowa, and Muscatine was the state’s button capital.

The button factories were by far the city’s largest employers. Everyone in Muscatine either worked in a factory or knew someone who did.

Working conditions appalled and horrified observers who visited the factories. Before being cut, the shells had to be softened by soaking them in water. Cutting rooms had barrels of standing water filled with shells that turned the water rancid. In addition to the stench, the water was also toxic, causing cuts on hands to become infected. And there were plenty of cuts on workers’ hands. A complete lack of safety guards on the machinery made mangled hands and missing fingers common.

Work in the factories was segregated by sex. Men cut the button blanks from shells, a process

A massive uprising by pearl button makers in Muscatine more than a century ago may shed some light on Iowa’s current labor woes.

Interior of Schreurs Pearl Button Factory, showing workers on assembly line. Muscatine, Iowa, circa 1912. Special Collections, State Historical Society of Iowa, Des Moines

APRIL 21 - MAY 22, 2023

BAX: BACHELOR OF ARTS EXHIBITION

This exhibition presents work in the creative arts by third- and fourth-year Grinnell College students.

CLOSING MAY 6

FRAGMENTARY VISIONS: GRINNELL COLLEGE’S KELEKIAN COLLECTION

For updated information about events visit Grinnell.edu/museum

Left: McKenna Doherty. Colorized, 2022. Polymer clay, family photos, mixed media.

Right: McKenna Doherty and Hannah Agpoon. Panes, 2022. Vinyl and plexiglass.

that filled the air in the poorly ventilated factories with dust that caused breathing problems. Women operated the machines that drilled holes into the buttons and embossed patterns on them. But most women worked sorting buttons by size and sewing them onto cards.

Workers were paid by the piece. For sewing 168 buttons onto cards, women were paid oneand-a-half cents. What few laws existed to protect workers were routinely ignored, including those prohibiting child labor.

There were failed attempts to unionize Muscatine button workers in 1897 and 1903. But in 1910, things began to change.

That year, there was a major strike by garment factory workers in Chicago. Its effects were felt in Muscatine in two ways. First, the example of workers standing up for better treatment was inspiring. Second, with fewer garments being produced, demand for buttons decreased. Production was cut in the Muscatine factories, and so were wages.

In November 1910, nine men and 29 women formed the Muscatine Button Workers Protective Union (BWPU). Factory owners and managers derided the organizing effort, but membership grew quickly. By February, the BWPU had almost 2,500 members. It was the largest union in Iowa. The attitudes of owners and managers changed.

On Feb. 25, 1911, almost all of Muscatine’s button factories, including all of the largest ones, suddenly shut down. Owners claimed the closings weren’t coordinated and had nothing to do with the new union. They cited national economic conditions as the cause. But two weeks later, the factories reopened with only nonunion workers. BWPU members were locked out. The union declared a strike, and called for a boycott.

The BWPU was affiliated with the American Federation of Labor (AFL), which had started by organizing craft labor and had only relatively recently, and somewhat reluctantly, begun to organize factory workers. But the strike in Muscatine was different from other industrial labor actions.

A large percentage of factory workers in early 20th century America were immigrants for whom English was a second, often difficult, language. Xenophobic and racist imagery colored how other Americans viewed those workers, and since Jewish workers were often prominent among union organizers, antisemitism joined the other fears and prejudices. Major newspapers and national political leaders portrayed unions as the work of dangerous subversives determined to

undermine American business and society.

Muscatine broke that mold. The striking workers were unambiguously white, overwhelmingly American-born and from the sort of rural communities Americans romanticized as repositories of wholesome values. National labor leaders saw a chance to change the public image of industrial unions.

The AFL sent a top official to negotiate on behalf of the BWPU. Factory owners remained united in rejecting any deal that recognized the union. Leaders from the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), the AFL’s biggest rival for organizing workers, also came to Muscatine to observe the strike. Newspapers around the country carried stories on the strike when it began.

Women in the BWPU took the lead on relief efforts to make sure striking workers and their families had food and other basic necessities. That work was made easier by support from the broader community, with many people recognizing the strikers as their friends and neighbors.

Community support, however, faded as the strike dragged on for 15 months.

In retrospect, it’s remarkable the strike in Muscatine lasted into 1912. As Loomis documents in his book, “There is simply no evidence from American history that unions can succeed if the government and employers combine to crush them.”

A month into the Muscatine strike, as fights between strikers and scabs became common, factory owners hired professional strike-breakers from Chicago and St. Louis. Known as “sluggers,” because they attacked strikers with baseball bats, the goons were sworn in as “special deputies” by the sheriff.

In April, the sluggers’ actions sparked a riot in the city. The special deputies left town, but the governor sent in three companies of state militia, who occupied Muscatine for three days.

Gov. Beryl Carroll also tried to impose a settlement in the strike, drafting his own proposed contract. But the BWPU rejected it, saying the terms of the contract were too vague to be effective. In the autumn of 1911, Carroll sent in the militia again.

In her study of the strike published in Annals of Iowa, Kate Rousamaniere explains it’s hard to reconstruct exactly what went on in the strike, because the “Muscatine News-Tribune, which was sympathetic to the union in the first three months of the strike, abruptly stopped coverage of the labor situation in mid-May.” After May, there were only sporadic stories in the News-Tribune and

THE ENVY CORPS PERFORMS DWELL (with strings)

Full Steam Ahead

Iowa City baristas become the first in the state to subvert Starbucks Corporate’s anti-union culture.

BY MIKE KUHLENBECK

Baristas and supervisors at the Iowa City Burlington and Clinton Starbucks store made history on March 27, filing a petition to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to form a union. They join the ranks of thousands of workers demanding their voices be heard by executives of the Seattlebased coffee chain. If they succeed, they will become the first unionized Starbucks store in Iowa.

Affectionately known in labor circles as “The Wobblies,” the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) attempted to unionize Starbucks stores as early as 2004. While those efforts did not result in unionization, it highlighted the struggles of Starbucks workers which continue nearly 20 years later.

“I think a lot of people wonder why Starbucks workers need a union, and the answer is that I see how hard my coworkers work every day, and they still aren’t able to cover rent or pay their bills,” Abi Scheppman, shift supervisor and member of the organizing committee for filing for a union, told Little Village in an email. “I see these people every day. I know how amazing they are, I know that they deserve to be valued as people and not just cogs in a machine for Starbucks to make more profit.”

The troubles with Starbucks as an international franchise have been brewing for decades, along with the discontent of their workers (referred to as “partners” by the company) during increasingly unstable economic times.

Based on interviews with the BurlingtonClinton store partners conducted by Little Village, workers share similar concerns as their partners at other stores around the country: worker and customer safety, understaffing, low wages and lack of communication with management and the company.

“We are really just looking for more equitable treatments as a store,” Everlynn Roberts, a member of the organizing committee, said in an email. “We make a lot of money for Starbucks and our hard work isn’t always reflected in our pay, our benefits, and how higher-ups respond to us as baristas.”

has worked for Starbucks since May 2020, joining the staff of the Burlington-Clinton location in June 2021 before becoming a shift supervisor in November that same year. She says partners want more recognition for the work they do, and proper responses to problems within the store.

“There have been a few situations in the past few months where us as a store have tried to take safety precautions due to biohazard exposure or active shooters on campus, but management had instead instructed us to remain open despite our concerns,” Roberts said. “Basically, we’re just looking for more of a voice within the company, especially where our store is concerned. We are the ones that work here, and we know what is best for us and what our needs are.”

Raised in Clive, UI student Molly Belvo started as a Starbucks barista in May 2021 at a store in West Des Moines, where she returns to work during long school breaks. She started at the Burlington-Clinton Starbucks in August 2021.

“The main things we want to be addressed are our wages, safety of ourselves and customers, a functioning and efficient work space, and

guaranteeing our benefits, among other things,” Belvo explained. “Each partner has their own reasons for supporting this effort, but we all just want to be heard when we voice concern and support for the things that happen while we’re at work.”

In order to file for unionization, only 30 percent of workers need to sign union cards. The Burlington-Clinton workers made sure at least 70 percent of partners signed cards to better their chances winning a union election and recognition by the company.

The news was greeted with “excitement, and support from members of the Iowa, Iowa City, and University of Iowa communities,” according to Belvo.

“So far we haven’t really seen any retaliation,” Roberts said. “But it is still early and we will probably have a lot of waiting before we see an election.”

Almost a week before Burlington-Clinton workers made the announcement, Starbucks workers in over a hundred cities participated in a one-day strike on March 22, including a march outside the company’s headquarters. The strike

Jordan Sellergren / Little Village

was scheduled to coincide with “Founders’ Day,” a kind of corporate hero’s send-off for the outgoing Starbucks CEO, Howard Schultz, one day before the annual shareholder meeting—which reportedly ended with union filings from seven stores.

Despite retiring from the company in 2018, Schultz rejoined Starbucks as interim chief executive officer and a member of the company’s Board of Directors on April 4, 2022. He stepped down from this position on March 20 and has been replaced by Laxman Narasimhan as CEO.

“I think with how many Starbucks have been unionizing recently, people are becoming less scared of what it could mean for the workplace, becoming more informed about what a union is and why businesses will try to union-bust,” Roberts said. “I think a lot of us here at Starbucks have really learned a lot for ourselves and are informed, and so I really believe that my coworkers will make the right choice when we vote.”

Since the Starbucks Workers United (SWU) national union drive was launched as a grassroots effort by rank and file workers in the summer of 2021, there are now nearly 300 unionized Starbucks stores in at least 42 states and the District of Columbia.

The company has been merciless in crushing past union efforts, using high-pressured threats and other scare tactics. SWU reports at least 200 Starbucks union leaders have been fired and several stores shuttered due to pro-union activity.

The Economic Policy Institute reports that large employers such as Starbucks collectively spend roughly $433 million a year on anti-union consulting firms, a large sum considering the same employers claim that raising workers’ pay will somehow endanger their business.

NLRB judge Michael A. Rosas ruled that Starbucks engaged in “egregious widespread conduct demonstrating a general disregard for the employees’ fundamental rights,” citing hundreds of federal labor law violations at one Buffalo, New York store alone. The NLRB has issued 80 official complaints against Starbucks, citing over 1,400 violations of federal labor law across the U.S.

Under subpoena by Congress, Schultz testified before the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on March 29, initiated by Sen. Bernie Sanders. Schultz downplayed his role in shaping the company’s anti-union policies.

As this magazine goes to print, Scheppmann said some partners have already reported an increased presence from management in the Iowa City store. However, Belvo said she and her partners have been trained on what to expect when

the company reaches out to the unionizing workers, and how to respond.

“There have been conversations about unionizing with every partner in the store, and the vast majority of us support the effort and no one opposed,” Belvo said. “I have no doubt that our effort will be successful. I hope that Starbucks will start doing better about recognizing union efforts, especially with the Senate hearings.”

The Iowa Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO and other organizations are part of the pro-labor coalition urging Congress to pass the Richard L. Trumka Protecting the Right to Organize Act and the No Tax Breaks for Union-Busting Act to better protect workers’ rights and help squash union-busting campaigns.

“I’m really excited, and I hope this inspires other baristas and supervisors to reach out about unionizing their stores too,” Roberts said. “The power belongs in the hands of the workers, the people who are putting in the hours and know the day to day of the job. These are the people who should be making decisions.”

Mike Kuhlenbeck is a freelance journalist and National Writers Union member based in Des Moines.

prairie pop

Born into Music

He started on a tiny violin. Now, River Glen’s releasing the most ambitious Iowa music collab in recent memory.

BY KEMBREW MCLEOD

“Iwas born into music,” River Glen Breitbach said. “I’m my parents’ fourth child, and by the time I came to be, they already had an existing family band with my older siblings called The One Hat Band.”

Less than a year after the Dubuque native began attending his siblings’ Suzuki method lessons around the age of 3, he was given a 1/32size violin and was taught to pluck the high E string to create the “pop” in the song “Pop Goes the Weasel.” The rest is (family) history.

“My parents wasted no time incorporating this undeniably cute effort by such a tiny human into their act with The One Hat Band,” Breitbach recalled. “I clearly remember loving that when my part came, I received everyone’s attention and was, for just a few moments, a ‘star’—and thus began my career as a performer.”

Before long, Breitbach was regularly playing bluegrass and other styles of roots music at the local farmers’ market, where his parents also had a vendor booth. The One Hat Band was led by his mother, who played upright bass, and his father, who played guitar and was joined by Breitbach’s siblings on violins, mandolin and other stringed instruments. If the group managed to draw a standing crowd, they’d do their best couple of songs and pass a hat for tips, which is how the family band got its name.

Soon enough, the One Hat Band was traveling to Galena, Illinois on weekends and holidays and, for several years, they made a handful of street corners their home, along with the downtown park where they busked. Breitbach and his siblings were homeschooled, which gave them the freedom to travel to big camping festivals in Wisconsin, Ohio and New York, and they also took the Amtrak train to Seattle a few times to play at the Northwest Folklife Festival, along with other street fairs around the country.

“We were a string band flirting with being a family circus,” Breitbach recalled. “I can remember failed attempts to incorporate things like juggling and walking on stilts. I think the lasting effect of this musical upbringing is that I am open to the humor and silliness that can be found in this life. I’ve grown into a prolific lyricist who writes about belonging and cherishing loss and

death as a natural part of life, along with your standard love songs and all that, but I know not to take myself too seriously.”

After being homeschooled through primary school, Breitbach’s parents decided that the kids needed the socialization of high school, where he and his brother Jackson formed a band with other students. The band was called River and the Tributaries. They were essentially a folkrock group, though with an eclectic style and a broad pallet of sound that incorporated four-part harmony, percussion, guitars, violin, mandolin,

river Glen & Band album release show, The James Theater, Iowa City, 7:30 p.m., Friday, May 5, $15-$17

observes in the introductory track, this record is a “patchwork quilt woven lovingly with voices and instruments of over 150 people.” Yes, you read that right: more than 150 musicians!

“I played the part of curator by demonstrating the depth of my understanding of the sound and style of each artist in how I grouped them with other guests,” Breitbach said. “I sought out ‘road dogs,’ the ‘weekend warriors,’ many of the working musicians who have been working their circuit in Iowa for years.”

A small sampling of artists include Kevin B.F. Burt, Bo Ramsey, Denny Garcia, Alyx Rush, Annie Savage, Courtney Krause, Ginny Luke, Penny Peach, Bob Black and Dave Zollo, along with members of Bridges 2 Harmony Gospel Choir, Flash in a Pan, The Host Country, Jack Lion, The Maytags, NOLA Jazz Band and the Uniphonics, to name a few.

keys, bass, drums, flute, trumpet, cello and other instrumental odds and sods. The group created two albums, toured the Midwest and ventured out to Colorado before going their separate ways in college.

These combined life experiences have fed into River Glen & Band’s ambitious new album, As Above, So Below, which incorporates a kaleidoscopic array of musicians who call Iowa home.

As longtime Iowa Public Radio DJ Bob Dorr

Breitbach recorded As Above, So Below in Lone Tree at Flat Black Studios, where the recording engineers remained patient and supportive as he experimented and sometimes failed during the process of executing “this crazy endeavor.” The Iowa Arts Council also played a key role in bringing this project to life after Breitbach was awarded an Artist Fellowship in 2017.

“It was from this encouragement that I thought up the idea to create an album featuring as many Iowa artists as I could,” he said. “I saw it as a way

“WE WErE A STrING BAND FlIrTING WITH BEING A FAMIlY CIrCUS. I CAN rEMEMBEr FAIlED ATTEMpTS TO INCOrpOrATE THINGS lIKE JUGGlING AND WAlKING ON STIlTS.”

River Glen & Band (Justin Leduc, Dan Padley, River Glen, Blake Shaw and Megan Roeth) pose on the Flat Black Studios stage in Lone Tree. Michael Weber / Shadow Fox Photography

to think of more than just myself, to show appreciation for the larger community that brought me up, to help all ships rise with the coming tide. So, I pitched the idea to the Iowa Arts Council and they were willing to work with me in terms of funding, which got the project started.”

He explained that the arc of As Above, So Below loosely mirrors the cycle of a life. One is born, one grows, leaves home, moves away from the familiar, finds love, loses love, hopefully finds more love and then reflects on where they’re from as the curtain draws to a close.

Referring to the album’s second-to-last song, “In Another World,” Breitbach said, “Death makes its presence known, in this case as the sound of a bagpipe, and after all the living and loving and reflecting, just like everyone who came before, just so naturally, one dies.”

The title track, “As Above, So Below,” was Breitbach’s attempt to connect the “personal” to something more “universal”—a plea for people to establish a shared understanding so that we might learn to appreciate, celebrate and respect our differences.

“I come from a very Catholic town, but my parents raised me without any specific religion or religious practice,” he explained. “As a songwriter, I see it as my duty to metabolize my culture and the world around me and to reflect it back to my listeners. On one hand I’m saying, ‘this is us,’ and on the other hand I’m asking, ‘this is us?’ or ‘is this us?’ There is a common saying among Catholics, ‘... thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven,’ and I found myself comparing that to the hermetic saying, ‘as above, so below,’ and just generally thinking about the sacred geometry of the world, or life itself.”

As Above, So Below closes with “Live Right, Love, Give, Die and Then… ,” which features dozens of singers trading off lyrics—creating an aural patchwork of vocal tones, timbres and singing styles from around the state of Iowa. This is the end of the album, and it feels like everyone has shown up to say goodbye.

“When I die don’t you go bury me in no grave / don’t have me hanging ’round taking up space / When I’m gone, when I regain my innocence, please pass around my instruments and coalesce… I fight the good fight knowing it don’t guarantee a good life / I’m just trying to live right, love, give, die and then … ”

As Above, So Below releases officially on May 1

Kembrew McLeod is currently surfing the astral plane.

A Blast from the past

If there’s any band that epitomizes ‘60s psychedelic, it’s Acid Mothers Temple.

BY CHRIS BURNS

If you ask a random stranger on the street about psychedelic music, they might name Jimi Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane, or mumble something about sitars, samplers and LSD. “Psychedelic” is often regarded as a trippy, hippie, countercultural vibe—a phase music went through in the ’60s before arena rock.

But fans know psychedelic has its own place among musical genres and, like any genre, it means a lot of different things. It could be the culty art collectives of Amon Düül II, or maybe the math-driven beats of Can. Maybe you like the spaced-out sci-fi stylings of British band Hawkwind, or the electric jug of Austin garage rock groups The Golden Dawn and 13th Floor Elevators. Psychedelic music intersects with early proto-metal, not to mention its influence on pop, hip hop and R&B.

Maybe it is trite to reminisce, but I, like many kids, dreamed of getting out of my small town, of finding other worlds and experiences beyond the tradition of marrying the high school sweetheart and starting a nuclear family. It took effort in the early ’90s to search for things outside of classic rock radio or the manufactured twang of country music stations.

When finally, I did move away, my like-minded friends and I couldn’t get enough of all the music and art we had only suspected existed. Thankfully, the ’90s were full of comps and re-releases of all sorts. Suddenly, the music landscape was flooded with “forgotten” bands and records. Every newfound release was a small revelation, like discovering a knowledge that had been suppressed.

This was when I found myself gravitating towards psychedelic sounds. My tastes were, and in large part still are, vast, but those were the records I returned to most often. This led me to the sounds coming out of Japan. There was White Heaven, High Rise, Ghost (for Google purposes, “Japan Ghost band”) or the bootlegged reissue of Flower Travellin’ Band, among many others.

One band, however, became kind of legendary. One with an audacious name; one that, unlike many hailing from Japan, toured the U.S. frequently; one that played Iowa City a decade ago, and will return on May 2 for a show at Gabe’s—Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O.

The term “psychedelic” was coined by psychiatrist Humphry Osmond while researching hallucinogens in the 1950s. The meaning in Greek equates to “mind manifesting.”

The band’s name alone is psychedelic, in that it’s enough to conjure the sound and imagery associated with the band. But it’s hard to describe the Acid Mothers Temple’s otherworldly sound as anything other than psychedelic.

Formed in 1995 by Japanese guitarist Kawabata Makoto (alongside Koizumi Hajime, Suhara Keizo and Cotton Casino) Acid Mothers Temple began touring outside of Japan in 1998. Soon after the group added synth/theremin player Higashi Hiroshi, whose distinct frequency whistles and squeaks have become synonymous with the Acid Mothers Temple sound. Since then, members have come and gone, most leaving to pursue their own bands, but Kawabata and Higashi remain.

The current lineup features two members that have been around since 2018. First is drummer Satoshima Nani, formerly of Zuinoshin and Bogulta, as well as having played with Kawabata in an improvisational duo called Human Shower. The other is vocalist/bouzouki player Jysonon Tsu. Tsu, whose solo work is a progressive mix of medieval balladeer and theatrics, plays both guitar and bouzouki (a member of the lute family popular in Greece), and sings in an ethereal made-up language I can only describe as evocative of Elven or Fae.

To listen to the band on vinyl or streaming is one thing, but where Acid Mothers Temple really thrives is on stage. This year marks the band’s 25th year of touring and is also the first time in four years that Acid Mothers Temple has been able to play in the U.S.

Like many bands, 2020 was a tough year for Kawabata and company. Their North American

Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting paraiso U.F.O. w/ My Education and Shining realm, Gabe’s, Iowa City, 7 p.m., Tuesday, May 2, $16-20

tour was interrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Mandates and precautions that forced music venues to close in the early days of the pandemic lasted long enough to make it impossible to schedule a tour in 2021. In 2022 the threat of a COVID resurgence also meant there was no U.S. tour that year.

Despite those setbacks, the band was anything but inactive. They hosted and played a Tokyo Olympics parody festival, and performed a blistering set for the online version of 2021’s Levitation Festival (formerly Austin Psych Fest).

An Acid Mothers Temple show is as eclectic as its members. They may start with doomy riffs (“Dark Star Blues”) that transform into a disco bounce (a la “Pink Lady Lemonade”), before changing again into a thunderstorm of feedback and synth squeals.

It’s more about the journey than the where and why. Kawabata has previously said that, more than being influenced by any particular band, he is influenced by the static on the radio, or the chants of Buddhist monks or even trying to imitate the sounds in nature. He wants to create music that is truly psychedelic, of and for the mind. It’s a definition that seems to align with Osmond’s original intention, and one that Acid Mothers Temple lives up to.

Christopher Burns lives in a state of uncertainty between Iowa City and the Quantum Realm. In between fluctuations he writes weird stories and plays music with the Shining Realm.

courtesy of the artists

July 7-8

• Downtown Des Moines, Iowa

LITTLEVILLAGEMAG.COM/CALENDAR

EVENTS: APrIl

APRIL 2023

Planning an event? Submit event info to calendar@littlevillagemag. com. Include event name, date, time, venue, street address, admission price and a brief description (no all-caps, exclamation points or advertising verbiage, please). To find more events, visit littlevillagemag.com/calendar. Please check venue listing in case details have changed.

Cautious Clay · Blu DeTiger · Thumpasaurus ·

Etran de L’Aïr · Disq · McKinley Dixon · Ax and the Hatchetmen · Lipstick Homicide · Kiss the Tiger · Ancient Posse · Annie Kemble · Us Vs Them · Emma Butterworth · Penny Peach · Hurry Up, Brothers · Allegra Hernandez · Lady Revel · Flash in a Pan · Chill Mac· Surf Zombies ·

FEED ME WEIRD THINGS PRESENTS

Lake Mary with Emily Berregaard

Sat, Apr 15 at 9 p.m. at Trumpet Blossom Cafe, $10-15

Xiu Xiu with ghOstMiSt

Fri, Apr 28 at 8 p.m. at Trumpet Blossom Cafe, $25

Eli Winter with TBA

Thu, May 4 at 9 p.m. at Trumpet Blossom Cafe $10-15

Derek Monypeny // Ak'chamel

Fri, Jun 9 at 9 p.m. at Trumpet Blossom Cafe, $10-15

Justice Yeldham with Maul of America

Thu, Jun 29 at 9 p.m. at Trumpet Blossom Cafe, $10-15

Build Johnson County Investor Council on New Development

Fri, Apr 21, 3:30 p.m., Johnson County Extension & Outreach, free

ARE YOU AN EVENT ORGANIZER?

START SELLING TICKETS TODAY: IT’S FREE! CONNECT WITH LV TO SELL TICKETS TO YOUR EVENTS.

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An Evening with Rainn

Wilson, Englert Theatre, Iowa

City, Monday, May 1 at 7:30 p.m.,

$38

Rainn Wilson is a comedian, actor, producer and writer most recognized for his role as Dwight Schrute in NBC’s The Office. In Wilson’s upcoming appearance at Iowa City’s Englert Theatre, he’ll be touting his latest book, Soul Bloom: Why We Need a Spiritual Revolution, which calls for a spiritual revolution following the boiling social tension of recent years. The text also promises its share of Star Trek references in its call to action. Wilson recently made headlines for reportedly changing his name to Rainnfall Heat Wave Extreme Winter Wilson to raise awareness of climate change. Each ticket for the one-hour event includes a a pre-signed copy of Soul Bloom.

Literary Luxuries

Wednesdays, April 5, 12, 19, 26 at 9:30 a.m. Spring Storytime, Sidekick Coffee & Books, Iowa City, Free

MCF: Thursday, April 6 at 5:45 p.m.

Michelle Zauner, Hancher, Iowa City, $50-110

Thursday, April 6 at 7:15 p.m. Raquel Gutiérrez, Prairie Lights, Iowa City, Free

William Elliott Whitmore

Basketball Divorce Court · Zap Tura · Glass Ox · Salt Fox · Belin Quartet · The Crust Band · Lost Souls Found · Girls Rock! Des Moines

Sudan Archives · Deerhoof · Ric Wilson · Gustaf

House of Large Sizes · Elizabeth Moen · Maxilla Blue · Pictoria Vark · Tayls · Ramona and the Sometimes · Neil Anders and the Brothers Merritt · Monstrophe · Des Moines Music Coalition Summer Camps

Courtesy of Englert Theatre

AROUND THE CRANDIC

MCF: Friday, April 7 at 5 p.m. Lit Walk, Various Venues, Iowa City, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 11 a.m. Small Press & Literary Magazine Fair, The Chauncey, Iowa City, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 11 a.m. Industry Talk, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Iowa City, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 11 a.m. I.C.E C.R.E.A.M Zine Fair, Public Space One Close House, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 12:30 p.m. The Sun, Readers Write Workshop, The Tuesday Agency, Iowa City, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 2 p.m.

Literary Conversation, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 3:30 p.m

Podcast Recording, The Tuesday Agency, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 7 p.m. Capstone Reading & Afterparty, The James Theater, Iowa City, Free

Tuesday, April 11 at 7 p.m. Mary L. Cohen, Prairie Lights, Free

Wednesday, April 12 at 7 p.m. Clancy Martin w/Tyler Fyotek, Prairie Lights, Free

Thursday, April 13 at 7 p.m. Esmé Weijun Wang, Iowa City Public Library, Online, Free

Friday, April 14 at 10 a.m. April Book Club, Sidekick Coffee & Books, Free

Friday, April 14 at 7 p.m. Jane Roper, Prairie Lights, Free

Monday, April 17 at 7 p.m. Dina Nayeri & Jeff Sharlet w/ John Kenyon, Prairie Lights, Online, Free

Saturday, April 29 at 11 a.m. Independent Bookstore Day, Swamp Fox Bookstore, Marion, Free

SPONSORED BY

EVENTS!

Community Connections

Wednesday, April 5 at 12:15 p.m. Art Bites: Mauricio Lasansky: A New Installation, Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, Free

Thursday, April 6 at 7 p.m. Grant Wood Fellow Talk: Kieron Dwayne Sargeant, Stanley Museum of Art, Iowa City, Free

Saturday, April 8 at 1 p.m. Houseplant Swap & Prairie Seed Giveaway, Iowa City Public Library, Free

Pots, Plants and Prints Artist Market, The Iowa Ceramics Center and Glass Studio,

Cedar Rapids, Saturday, April 22 at 11 a.m., Free

Spend a day in the heart of Cedar Rapids with the Iowa Ceramics Center and Glass Studio (ICCGS). They’re hosting an art market in their studio in conjunction with Cedar Rapids EcoFest, an Earth Day celebration that’ll be taking place nearby at NewBo City Market. Eastern Iowa artists will be selling handmade works centered around plants and Earth Day at the market. Additionally, ICCGS will be hosting activities such as seed bomb making, wheel throwing demonstrations, and drop in workshops throughout the day.

Saturday, April 15 at 8 a.m. Zazenkai and Dharma Talk, Iowa City Zen Center, Free, donations accepted

Friday, April 14 at 1 p.m. Japanese Papermaking Festival, UI North Hall Lawn, Iowa City, Free

Saturday, April 15 at 12:30 p.m. UI’s Annual Powwow, Johnson County Fairgrounds, Iowa City, Free

Sunday, April 16 and 30 at 11 a.m. Johnson Co Market, Johnson County Fairgrounds, Free

Thursday, April 20 at 6:30 p.m Hervé Youmbi and Willie Cole, Stanley Museum of Art, Free

Saturday, April 22 at 10 a.m. Art Education Community and Family Day, Stanley Museum of Art, Free

Saturday, April 22 at 10 a.m. EcoFest, NewBo City Market, Cedar Rapids, Free

Saturday, April 22 at 6:30 p.m. Excellence in the Arts, CSPS Hall, $10-20

Sunday, April 23 at 1 p.m. Public Space One Art Market, Big Grove, Iowa City, Free

Friday and Saturday, April 28 and 29 Library Book Sale, Coralville Public Library, Free

Dos Santos and Ratboys, Hancher–

Strauss Hall, Iowa City, Saturday, April 22 at 7:30 p.m., $10-20 Two Chicago based groups, Dos Santos and Ratboys, are making their way to Iowa City this month to play at Hancher’s Strauss Hall for an intimate, standing-room-only show. The concert is a collaboration between Hancher and UI’s Scope Productions. Ratboys, an American indie rock band formed in 2010, will be performing first. They’ve been on tour with bands like Soccer Mommy and PUP and have a discography consisting of four albums. Stay for Dos Santos, a quintet that honors traditional Latinx music with contemporary composition and production techniques. Tickets are $10 for students and $20 for the general public.

Musical Marvels

MCF: Thursday, April 6 at 7:15 p.m. Black Belt Eagle Scout, Cat Power, Hancher Auditorium, Iowa City, $50-110

MCF: Friday, April 7 at 7 p.m. Extravision, Mr. Softheart, Yasmin Williams, Riverside Theatre, Iowa City, $60-110

MCF: Friday, April 7 at 7:30 p.m. FlyLife, Water From Your Eyes, Divino Niño, Gabe’s, Iowa City, $60-110

MCF: Friday, April 7 at 8 p.m. Sudan Archives, Snail Mail, Englert Theatre, $60-110

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 3 p.m. Pictoria Vark, The Uniphonics, The Heavy Heavy, Big Grove Brewery, Iowa City, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 3:30 p.m. mars hojilla, Karen Meat, Friko, Trumpet Blossom Cafe, Free

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 7 p.m. BCJSPS, Ebony Tusks, Natural Information Society, Riverside Theatre, $60-110

Courtesy of SCOPE

Friese

LITTLEVILLAGEMAG.COM/CALENDAR

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 7:30 p.m. Greg Wheeler & the Poly Mall Cops, McKinley Dixon, TEKE::TEKE, Gabe’s, $60-110

MCF: Saturday, April 8 at 7:45 p.m. Courtney Marie Andrews, Kevin Morby, Englert Theatre, $60-110

Saturday, April 8 at 8 p.m. Logan Springer & the Wonderfully Wild, Ideal Theater & Bar, Cedar Rapids, $10

Wednesday, April 12 at 5 p.m.

CommUnity Fundraiser Benefit Concert: Kevin Burt, Dave Zollo, Wildwood Saloon, Iowa City, $20-25

Friday, April 14 at 7:30 p.m. Conor Hanick, Hancher Auditorium, $10-30

Friday, April 14 at 7:30 p.m. Chicago Farmer & the Fieldnotes w/Brian Johannesen, The James Theater, Iowa City, $12-25

Friday, April 14 at 8:30 p.m. Katy Guillen & The Drive w/Two Canes, Gabe’s, $10

Friday, April 14 at 8:30 p.m. Chaircrusher, Rachel Saint, Blossoms At Night, PS1 Close House, free will donation

Saturday, April 15 at 7:30 p.m. Orchestra Iowa: Percussive Fire, Paramount Theatre, Cedar Rapids, $17-58

Saturday, April 15 at 7:30 p.m. One World: Brazil, The James Theater, $17-20

Saturday, April 15 at 8 p.m. Fruit Bats w/VV Lightbody, Codfish Hollow Barnstormers, Maquoketa, $30-35

Saturday, April 15 at 9 p.m. FMWT: Lake Mary w/Emily Berregaard, Trumpet Blossom Cafe, Iowa City, $10-15

Sunday, April 16 at 2 p.m. Orchestra Iowa: Percussive Fire, Hancher Auditorium, $17-58

Sunday, April 16 at 7 p.m. Weeping Wound w/By The Thousands, Wildwood Saloon, $12

Wednesday, April 19 at 8 p.m. The Cactus Blossoms, The James Theater, $15-22

Thursday, April 20 at 8 p.m. Sophie Mitchell, Allegra Hernandez, Miss Christine, Death Kill Overdrive, The James Theater, $10

Friday, April 21 at 7 p.m. Sweetie & The Toothaches, Wildwood Saloon, $15

Friday, April 21 at 8 p.m. The Talbott Brothers, CSPS Hall, Cedar Rapids, $20-25

Friday, April 21 at 9 p.m. Early Girl, mars hojilla, Die Mad, The James Theater, $10-15

Saturday, April 22 at 8 p.m. Good Morning Midnight, MAAAZE, Haploid, Gabe’s, $10

Saturday, April 22 at 1 p.m. 11th Anniversary Party, Trumpet Blossom Cafe, Free

Sunday, April 23 at 3 p.m. Physics, Art & Music, CSPS Hall, $30

Thursday, April 27 at 6:30 p.m. Immersive Opera, Stanley Museum of Art, Iowa City, Free

Friday, April 28 at 7:30 p.m. Buddy Guy, Hancher Auditorium, $25-85

Friday, April 28 at 8 p.m. John Primer and The Real Deal Blues Band, CSPS Hall, $25-30

Friday, April 28 at 8 p.m. FMWT: Xiu Xiu, Trumpet Blossom Cafe, $25

Saturday, April 29 at 8 p.m. Dickie, CSPS Hall, $17-22

Saturday, April 29 at 8:30 p.m. Halfloves w/Jim Swim, Bella Moss, Gabe’s, $10

Sunday, April 30 at 7 p.m. Kyshona, CSPS Hall, $18-20

UGLY LIES THE BONE

by Lindsey Ferrentino

Directed by Mary Beth Easley

IOWA NEW PLAY FESTIVAL

Floodwater Comedy Festival (FCF):

Sarah Perry & Jamie Shriner, Joystick

Comedy & Arcade, Iowa City, Saturday, April 29 at

9 p.m., $5-65 More than 70 comedians are said to be pouring into Iowa City as part of this year’s Floodwater Comedy Festival, a three-day affair that fills downtown venues. While there are plenty of shows to pick from, one to keep any eye on is a dual appearance from Sarah Perry & Jamie Shriner at Joystick on Saturday, April 29, starting at 9 p.m. Both Perry and Shriner are Chicago-based comedians with their own individual events over the course of Floodwater – the Saturday night show, however, gives audiences a chance to see both over the course of one hour. As Floodwater attaches a cause to its comedy, proceeds from this year’s festival will be directed towards CommUnity and the Johnson County chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Health.

More Floodwater!

Thursday, April 27 at 5 p.m. Improv Incubator Kickoff Jam, Deep Sea Jesters Improv, Willow Creek Theatre, Iowa City, $5-65

Thursday, April 27 at 6 p.m. Red Room Showcase, Sanctuary Pub, Iowa City, $5-65

Thursday, April 27 at 7:30 p.m. Comedy Tsunami, The Green House, Iowa City, $5-65

Thursday, April 27 at 9:30 p.m. Joke-oke Showcase, Joystick, Iowa City, $5-65

Thursday-Saturday, April 27-29 at 10:45 p.m. Drag Show, Studio 13, Iowa City, $5-65

Theatrical Thrills

Friday and Saturday April 7 and 8. Matt Banwart, Lucky Cat Comedy, Cedar Rapids, $15

Closing Saturday, April 8. The Play That Goes Wrong, Theatre Cedar Rapids, $25-48

Thursday, April 13 at 7:30 p.m. Justin Willman, Englert Theatre, Iowa City, $15-75

Opening April 13 Eddie and Dave, Mirrorbox Theatre, Cedar Rapids, $20

Friday, April 28 at 6 p.m. Deep Sea Dive Bar, Gabe’s, Iowa City, $5-65

Friday, April 28 at 7:30 p.m. Improv Typhoon, Willow Creek Theatre, $5-65

Friday, April 28 at 7:45 p.m. Jamie Shriner, Reunion Brewery, Iowa City $5-65

Friday, April 28 at 9:30 p.m. Sarah Perry, Joystick, $5-65

Friday, April 28 at 10:30 p.m. Late Night Bits, Deadwood, Iowa City $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 12 p.m. Study Floodies, Joystick, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 1:30 p.m. Lunchtime Bits, Eden Lounge, Iowa City, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 4 p.m. Flooded Yacht Comedy Show, Joystick, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 5 p.m. Captain Gabe’s Showcase, Gabe’s, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 6 p.m ReUnion’s Best of the Midwest, ReUnion Brewery, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 6:30 p.m. Splash-Zone Improv, Willow Creek Theatre, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 7:30 p.m. Heather Land, Englert Theatre, $1565

Saturday, April 29 at 7:30 p.m

Homegrown Comedy, The Green House, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 9 p.m. Devil’s Daughter, Willow Creek Theatre, $5-65

Saturday, April 29 at 10:30 p.m. FCF: Late Night Showcase, Deadwood, $5-65

Opening Friday, April 14. Angel Street, Dreamwell Theatre, The ArtiFactory, Iowa City, $10-15

Opening Friday, April 14. And the Winner is, Giving Tree Theater, Marion, $25

Saturday, April 15 at 6 p.m. RHCR Theatre’s 24 Hour Play Festival & Silent Auction, St. Andrew Lutheran Church, Cedar Rapids, $12

Saturday, April 15 at 9:30 p.m. Stand-Up Science, Joystick Comedy & Arcade, Iowa City, $5-10

Tuesday, April 18 at 7 p.m. World Ballet Series: Cinderella, Paramount Theatre, Cedar Rapids, $35-89

Saturday, April 22 at 7:30 p.m. David Sedaris, Englert Theatre, $58

Sunday, April 23 at 3 p.m. Hits! The Musical, Paramount Theatre, $29-99

Monday, April 24 at 7 p.m. Neil Hamburger, Trumpet Blossom Cafe, Iowa City, $15-25

Opening Friday, April 28. Follies, Iowa City Community Theatre, $14-22

Opening Friday, April 28. The Roommate, Riverside Theatre, Iowa City, $15-35

Opening Friday, April 28. Run of the Mill One Act Showcase, ArtiFactory, Iowa City, $16

Sarah Perry via Floodwater

Out of the Archive: 70s/80s Shorts,

FilmScene–The Chauncey, Iowa City, Tuesday, April 11 at 7 p.m., Pay-What-YouCan, $10 Throughout April, FilmScene will present Out of the Archive: Black Women Behind the Lens, a new three week series that celebrates the work of Black women filmmakers from the 1970s to present. Five important directors’ films will be shown at this screening. Attendees will see work directed by Monica Freeman, Julie Dash, Iman Uqdah Hameen, Camille Billops and Fronza Woods. The screening will be followed by a Q/A with Monica Freeman in person. Freeman, a filmmaker and film programmer, co-organized the 1976 Sojourner Truth Festival of the Arts.

Films In Focus

Wednesday, April 5 at 7 p.m. Out of the Archive: Literary Shorts, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Pay-What-You-Can, $10

Thursday, April 6 at 7 p.m. Othello, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Pay-What-You-Can, $10

Thursday-Saturday, April 6-8. Mammal Hall / Hyperdistanced, Public Space One Cloud House, Iowa City, Free

Saturday, April 8 at 10 p.m. Just Another Girl on the I.R.T., FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$8

still from Diary of an African Nun

AROUND

EDITORS’ PICKS: APRIL 2023 PRESENTED BY WILLIS DADY HOMELESS SERVICES AROUND THE CRANDIC

Monday, April 10 at 7 p.m. Compensation + Cycles, FilmScene–The Chauncey, PayWhat-You-Can, $10

Wednesday, April 12 at 6:30 p.m. Tiktok, Boom, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Pay-What-You-Can, $10

Friday, April 14 at 6 p.m. Love and Rockets: The Great American Comic Book, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Pay-What-You-Can, $10

Saturday and Sunday, April 15 and 16 at 11 a.m. The Picture Show: The Land Before Time, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$5

Saturday and Sunday, April 15 and 16 at 1 p.m. Standing Strong: Elizabeth Catlett, FilmScene–The Chauncey, $17.70

Saturday, April 15 at 10 p.m The Holy Mountain, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$8

Tuesday, April 18 at 7 p.m. Ghost in The Shell, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$8

Wednesday, April 19 at 7 p.m. Losing Ground, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Pay-What-You-Can, $10

Thursday, April 20 at 3:30 p.m. The Picture Show: The Land Before Time, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$5

Thursday, April 20 at 7 p.m. Pride at FilmScene: The Watermelon Woman, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Pay-What-You-Can, $10

Saturday, April 22 at 7 p.m. Alma’s Rainbow & Hair Piece: A Film for Nappyheaded People, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Pay-What-You-Can, $10

Saturday, April 22 at 10 p.m. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$8

Monday, April 24 at 6:30 p.m We, FilmScene–The Chauncey, PayWhat-You-Can, $10

Tuesday, April 25 at 7 p.m Blue, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$8

Wednesday, April 26 at 7 p.m. Science on Screen: After Yang, FilmScene–The Chauncey, $10-13

Friday, April 28 at 7 p.m. Bijou Open Screen Spring, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free

Saturday, April 29 at 10 p.m. After Hours, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free-$8

Sunday, April 30 at 1 p.m Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, FilmScene–The Chauncey, PayWhat-You-Can

Monday, May 1 at 6:30 p.m. Matewan, FilmScene–The Chauncey, Free

EDITORS’ PICKS: APRIL 2023 PRESENTED BY WILLIS DADY HOMELESS SERVICES DES MOINES

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) Festival, Hoyt Sherman

Place, Des Moines, Saturday, April 15

at 5:30 p.m., $20-35 The annual all-Iowa music festival, GDP (co-presented by Des Moines Music Coalition and Little Village), is taking over Hoyt Sherman Place this year and features several local musicians. The Envy Corps, a Des Moines indie rock band that’s been playing since the early 2000s, headlines. Don’t miss them as they play their debut album, Dwell, in full with a string section, to celebrate the recording’s 15th anniversary. B.Well, Annalibera, Geneviève Salamone, James Tutson, EleanorGrace and Lani are also on the lineup. Also catch the pre-party at Big Grove (4 p.m.) and the after-party at Carl’s Place.

Dynamic DSM

Thursday-Saturday, April 6-8

Poetry Palooza, Franklin Jr. High School & Mainframe Studios, Des Moines, Free

Thursday, April 13 at 7 p.m. AViD: R.F. Kuang, Central Library, Des Moines, Free

Friday-Sunday, April 14-15. Middle of the Map Tattoo Convention, Iowa Events Center, Des Moines, $20-39

Saturday, April 15 and 30 at 1:30 p.m. Firat Erdim: Field Harp Soundings & Q/A, Des Moines Art Center, Free

Wednesday, April 19 at 7 p.m. Bendigo Fletcher, Gas Lamp, Des Moines, $15-18

Thursday-Monday, April 20-24. Planned Parenthood Book Sale, Iowa State Fairgrounds, Des Moines, Free-$20

Friday, April 21 at 12 p.m. Queer Hikers: Earth Day Trash Bash, Fort Des Moines Park, Free

Saturday, April 22 at 7 p.m. All Things Considered, Wooly’s, Des Moines, $25

Saturday, April 22 at 7 p.m Twen w/Mr. Softheart, xBk Live, $12

Saturday, April 22 at 10 p.m N0Ne (CH)iLLeR! Album Release, Teehee’s Comedy Club, Des Moines, $15

Tuesday, April 25 at 7 p.m. Mustard Service w/Treesreach, xBk Live, $15

Friday, April 28 at 7 p.m. Joyland, Varsity Cinema, Des Moines, $12

Friday, April 28 at 7 p.m. Tenci w/Annalibera, xBk Live, $12-15

Saturday, April 29 at 10:30 a.m. Lemon Trail Ride, Exile Brewing Co., Des Moines, $30

Annalibera, Sid Peterson

First Friday Art Walk and Community Celebration,

Fairfield, Friday, April 7 at 6 p.m., Free

It’s officially spring! This First Friday in April will be celebrating film and photography. It’s a great time to see numerous displays throughout Fairfield of our best local photographers. Red-Tailed Hawk by Werner Elmker is an excellent example of the level of photography here in Fairfield. First Friday celebrates creativity, culture and community, while bringing diverse groups together to express their passion for the arts.

Finest Fairfield

Wednesdays, April 5, 12, 19, 26 at 8 p.m. Open Mic, Café Paradiso, Free

Tuesday, April 7 at 8 a.m. Spring Bird Hike, Lamson Woods State Preserve, Free

Saturday, April 8, 15, 22, 29 at 8 am. Farmers Market, Golden Magnolia, Free

Saturday, April 8 at 7 p.m. TRU REV MMA, Sondheim Center for the Performing Arts, Fairfield, $35

Tuesday, April 11 at 7 p.m. Science Café, Fairfield Public Library, Free

Friday-Sunday, April 14-16 at 10 a.m. Fairfield Renaissance Fair, Free

Saturday, April 15 at 6 p.m. Jake McVey, Cider House, Free

Friday, April 21 at 7:30 p.m. Karen Black, Heavenly Hymns, Sondheim Center, Free

Saturday, April 22 at 7:30 am. April Legislative Forum: Shipley, Hayes, and Dickey, Fairfield Arts & Convention Center, Free

Saturday, April 29 at 7:30 p.m The Bicho Brothers, Sondheim Center for the Performing Arts, $20-$45.

For more events and specific details on each of the above events, visit: fairfieldjournal.org

Events compiled by Fairfield Journal

EDITORS’ PICKS: APRIL 2023 PRESENTED BY WILLIS DADY HOMELESS SERVICES WATERLOO/CEDAR

Film

Screening:

JeanMichel Basquiat:

Africa

at

the Heart, Waterloo Center for the Arts, Friday, April 14 at 5:30 p.m.,

Free Art enthusiasts, head to Waterloo Center for the Arts for a free film screening centered on Jean-Michel Basquiat, an iconic neo-Expressionist artist from New York. The documentary showcases Basquiat’s rise to fame in the 1980s, while also explaining his great influence on the contemporary art world. Doors open at 5:30 p.m., and the screening will begin at 6 p.m.

Wildest W’loo + more!

Thursday, April 6 at 5:30 p.m. Hops: Craft Beer Tasting Event, Cedar Falls Downtown District, $30-150

Thursday, April 13 at 7 p.m. The Reminders, Hawkeye Community College, Waterloo, $11-16

Saturday, April 15 at 2 p.m. Orchesis Dance Company Annual Gala, Oster Regent Theatre, Cedar Falls, $5-10

Saturday, April 15 at 8 p.m. Back Pocket, Octopus College Hill, Cedar Falls, $10

Friday, April 21 at 8 p.m. Allegra Hernandez and Salt Fox, Octopus College Hill, $10

Friday-Sunday, April 21-23. The Book of Mormon, Gallagher Bluedorn Performing Arts Center, Cedar Falls, $45.75-110.75

Thursday, April 27 at 8 p.m. Goth Night w/Mr. Softheart, Stranger Gallery, DJ Pals, Octopus College Hill, $5

Friday, April 28 at 8:30 a.m. Cedar Valley Arts Summit, Waterloo Center for the Arts, $20-60

Opening Friday, April 28. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, Waterloo Community Playhouse, $10-15

Saturday, April 29 at 9:30 a.m. Dino Egg Hunt, Waterloo Center for the Arts, $4-8

Saturday, April 29 at 7 p.m. Evolution of African American Music, Gallagher Bluedorn Performing Arts Center, $6.7565.75

FALLS

Werner Elmker still from Jean-Michel Basquiat: Africa at the Heart

If You Can’t Beat It, Eat It: Foraging for Invasive &

Noxious Edible Plants, Wapsi River Environmental Education Center, Dixon, Saturday, April 22 at 1 p.m., Free

Naturalist Becky at the Wapsi River Environmental Education Center will teach an interactive program in which attendees will learn about foraging safety, plant identification, which invasive and noxious plants are edible and how to prepare them. The program will include a hike and hands-on practice foraging and identifying edible plants. This event is hosted by Scott County, Iowa Conservation. Register via phone at 563-328-3286.

Quintessential QC

Wednesday, April 5 at 6:30 p.m. Quad Cities Trauma Healing Course, Quad Cities Veteran Outreach Center, Davenport, Free (registration required)

Thursday, April 6, 6:30pm.

Muscatine Newcomers & Friends Dining Adventures, Sal Vitale’s, Muscatine, Free (must pay for meal)

Saturday, April 8 at 1 p.m. Bikes Swap and Outdoor Gear Sale, The Village Theater, Davenport, Free

Saturday, April 8 at 7 p.m. Cinephile Cinema: Mind & Body Night, Rozz-Tox, Rock Island, Free

Tuesday, April 11 at 6 p.m

Creative Session Mixed-Media Story Collage, Gilda’s Club QC, Davenport, Free

Thursday, April 13 at 6:30 p.m Ballet Quad Cities: Art Comes to Life at the Figge, Figge Art Museum, Davenport, Free

Friday, April 14 at 8 p.m. DESSA, Raccoon Motel, Davenport, $20

Sunday, April 16 at 1:30 p.m. Red Barn Studio: Iceland Poppy, Muscatine Art Center, Muscatine, $13-15

Sunday, April 16 at 7 p.m. Nature Writing Performance with Nahant Marsh and Midwest Writing Center, Rozz-Tox, Rock Island, Free (donations accepted)

Monday, April 16 at 6 p.m. Songwriters Roundtable, Common Chord, Davenport, Free

Saturday, April 22 at 9 a.m. Record Story Day, Ragged Records & Trash Can Annie, Davenport, free

Saturday, April 22 at 6 p.m. Quad City Rollers vs Skunk River, Eldridge Community Center, Eldridge, $12

Sunday, April 30 at 2:30 p.m. If These Walls Could Talk - Behind the Scenes Tour of Butterworth Center, Deere-Wiman House, Moline, $25

other Iowa papers.

No explanation was given for these editorial decisions, but it’s worth considering that striking workers weren’t the ones buying the ads that newspapers relied on for revenue.

Whatever national impression the BWPU strike in Muscatine made was quickly eclipsed when workers at textile mills in Lawrence, Massachusetts began to walk out of their factories in January 1912.

The walkout was sparked by a pay cut, but the reasons it grew into a strike of 20,000 men, women and child laborers went beyond just meager pay. They wanted better working conditions, and they demanded to be treated with respect.

Conditions in the factories were horrific, but that didn’t engender much public sympathy. The strikers were mostly immigrants, almost half had been in the country for less than five years. These were exactly the workers that made the AFL and the WTUL uncomfortable.

The IWW quickly assumed a leadership role. The Wobblies, as they were known, believed in “one big union” of all workers, no matter where they were born or the color of their skin. The Wobblies were political radicals who wanted workers to take power in the workplace and replace the rich as the people who set the rules for society.

The strike met with fierce resistance, but in late February, police working on behalf of the factory owners went too far. They attacked a group of women strikers and their children. Public outrage exploded across the country. President William Howard Taft condemned the brutality. Congress launched an investigation. Normally anti-union newspapers turned sympathetic. Within weeks, the factory owners agreed to most of the strikers’ demands.

As workers were celebrating in Lawrence, the strike in Muscatine was sputtering to a close. Workers couldn’t hold any longer, and went back to the factories. The BWPU continued to exist, but only on paper.

It would take 20 years and the election of the union-friendly Franklin Roosevelt for union sentiment to stir again in Muscatine, but by then it was too late. Plastic buttons became the standard in the 1930s, demand for pearl buttons nosedived. All the factories in Muscatine closed.

All that remained from the city’s industrial heyday were clams and the quickly fading public memory of one of Iowa’s biggest strikes.

Paul Brennan is Little Village’s news director.

Dear Kiki, I’m a sexual obsessive. I think about sex constantly, am pretty constantly horny, and have obsessive thoughts about having sex with most people I come in contact with. It can be scary sometimes when I have intrusive thoughts that are illegal or harmful, but I’m dealing with that bit in therapy. The question, though, is this: I feel like I can come across as off-putting to people because I’m thinking about them sexually as I interact with them. I know they’re intrusive thoughts and aren’t real manifestations of desire, but it feels like it can warp my ability to communicate, despite that. I’m in a happy relationship and I don’t think I want to open it up or anything, but what’s the best way to be sure I’m not creeping people out without having to explain my condition?

Dear Obsessive, The good news is this: People, by and large, think far more about themselves

morning, the coworker who grabs coffee the same time you do every day. Those encounters are trickier, aren’t they?

Although the same principles are in play as before (really! no one cares!), repeated exposure can make you feel more, well, exposed. Even with that, though, your perception is probably out of whack with reality. You can never be “sure” that you’re “not creeping people out,” because you can’t get inside their heads. But the more you worry about it, the less organic and natural your interactions will be.

Easier said than done, of course. But if you’re working with your therapist to draw boundaries, maintain a sense of right and wrong, and develop techniques to mitigate your intrusive thoughts, that’s really the best anyone can ask. You say you’re in a happy relationship; maybe you can ask your partner to offer an exterior view of how you behave socially.

The question of whether people find you

than about others. Unless you’re inserting an inordinate amount of Freudian slips into these casual conversations—or, of course, engaging in sexual harassment, for which there’s no excuse—it’s unlikely that most people will care or even notice that you’re struggling with this while you chat.

We’re all awkward in one way or another, so chances are others are far more concerned with how they’re coming across to you than vice versa. Or, if they’re like me, they’ll feel relieved when you seem a little “off-putting,” because it takes away the pressure for the social interaction to go perfectly on their end.

It’s easy to look around and assume everyone’s got their shit together except you. But in reality, we’re all just isolated balls of weird bouncing into and off of one another, trying to make it through each day without a story embarrassing enough that it becomes an anecdote.

The less-good news is, not every social interaction is superficial. For every bank teller and grocery store clerk, chances are there’s a different swathe of people who you’re slightly more familiar with: the neighbor you wave to every

“off-putting” is ultimately on them, not you. It’s not our job as humans to achieve or even aspire to perfection in our interactions. We can only be kind, patient and respectful.

You certainly have no obligation to reveal your personal mental health history. Ever.

—xoxo, Kiki

IT’S EASY TO lOOK ArOUND AND ASSUME EVErYONE’S GOT THEIr SHIT TOGETHEr EXCEpT YOU. BUT IN rEAlITY, WE’rE All JUST ISOlATED BAllS OF WEIrD BOUNCING INTO AND OFF OF ONE ANOTHEr, TrYING TO MAKE IT THrOUGH EACH DAY WITHOUT A STOrY EMBArrASSING ENOUGH THAT IT BECOMES AN ANECDOTE.

ASTROLOGY

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Aries-born René Descartes (1596–1650) was instrumental in the development of modern science and philosophy. His famous motto, “I think, therefore I am” is an assertion that the analytical component of intelligence is primary and foremost. And yet, few history books mention the supernatural intervention that was pivotal in his evolution as a supreme rationalist. On the night of Nov. 10, 1619, he had three mystical dreams that changed his life, revealing the contours of the quest to discern the “miraculous science” that would occupy him for the next 30 years. I suspect you are in store for a comparable experience or two, Aries. Brilliant ideas and marvelous solutions to your dilemmas will visit you as you bask in unusual and magical states of awareness.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): The dirty work is becoming milder and easier. It’s still a bit dirty, but is growing progressively less grungy and more rewarding. The command to “adjust, adjust, and adjust some more, you beast of burden” is giving way to “refine, refine, and refine some more, you beautiful animal.” At this pivotal moment, it’s crucial to remain consummately conscientious. If you stay in close touch with your shadowy side, it will never commandeer more than 10 percent of your total personality. In other words, a bit of healthy distrust for your own motives will keep you trustworthy. (PS: Groaning and grousing, if done in righteous and constructive causes, will continue to be good therapy for now.)

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): “‘Tis the good reader that makes the good book,” wrote Gemini philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson. “In every book he finds passages which seem confidences or asides hidden from all else and unmistakably meant for his ear.” In the coming weeks, a similar principle will apply to everything you encounter, Gemini—not just books. You will find rich meaning and entertainment wherever you go. From seemingly ordinary experiences, you’ll notice and pluck clues that will be wildly useful for you personally. For inspiration, read this quote from author Sam Keen: “Enter each day with the expectation that the happenings of the day may contain a clandestine message addressed to you personally. Expect omens, epiphanies, casual blessings, and teachers who unknowingly speak to your condition.”

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Traditional astrologers don’t regard the planet Mars as being a natural ally of you Crabs. But I suspect you will enjoy an invigorating relationship with the red planet during the next six weeks. For best results, tap into its rigorous vigor in the following ways: 1. Gather new wisdom about how to fight tenderly and fiercely for what’s yours. 2. Refine and energize your ambitions so they become more ingenious and beautiful.

3. Find out more about how to provide your physical body with exactly what it needs to be strong and lively on an ongoing basis.

4. Mediate on how to activate a boost in your willpower.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): I won’t ask you to start heading back toward your comfort zone yet, Leo. I’d love to see you keep wandering out in the frontiers for a while longer. It’s healthy and wise to be extra fanciful, improvisatory, and imaginative. The more rigorous and daring your experiments, the better. Possible bonus: If you are willing to question at least some of your fixed opinions and dogmatic beliefs, you could very well outgrow the part of the Old You that has finished its mission.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): The Supreme Deity with the most power may not be Jehovah or Allah or Brahman or Jesus’s Dad. There’s a good chance it’s actually Mammon, the God of Money. The devoted worship that humans offer to Mammon far surpasses the loyalty offered to all the other gods combined. His values and commandments rule civilization. I bring this to your attention, Virgo, because now is an excellent time for you to deliver extra intense prayers to Mammon. From what I can determine, this formidable Lord of Lords is far more likely to favor you than

By Rob Brezsny

usual. (PS: I’m only half-kidding. I really do believe your financial luck will be a peak in the coming weeks.)

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): It’s an excellent time to give up depleted, used-up obsessions so you have plenty of room and energy to embrace fresh, succulent passions. I hope you will take advantage of the cosmic help that’s available as you try this fun experiment. You will get in touch with previously untapped resources as you wind down your attachments to old pleasures that have dissipated. You will activate dormant reserves of energy as you phase out connections that take more than they give.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): “The best revenge is not to be like your enemy,” said ancient Roman philosopher Marcus Aurelius. I’m tempted to advise every Scorpio to get a tattoo of that motto. That way, you will forever keep in mind this excellent advice; As fun as it may initially feel to retaliate against those who have crossed you, it rarely generates redemptive grace or glorious rebirth, which are key Scorpio birthrights. I believe these thoughts should be prime meditations for you in the coming weeks.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Sometimes love can be boring. We may become overly accustomed to feeling affection and tenderness for a special person or animal. What blazed like a fiery fountain in the early stages of our attraction might have subsided into a routine sensation of mild fondness. But here’s the good news, Sagittarius: Even if you have been ensconced in bland sweetness, I suspect you will soon transition into a phase of enhanced zeal. Are you ready to be immersed in a luscious lusty bloom of heartful yearning and adventure?

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): What shall we call this latest chapter of your life story? How about “Stealthy Triumph over Lonely Fear” or maybe “Creating Rapport with the Holy Darkness.” Other choices might be “As Far Down into the Wild Rich Depths That I Dare to Go” or “My Roots Are Stronger and Deeper Than I Ever Imagined.” Congratulations on this quiet but amazing work you’ve been attending to. Some other possible descriptors: “I Didn’t Have to Slay the Dragon Because I Figured Out How to Harness It” or “The Unexpected Wealth I Discovered Amidst the Confusing Chaos.”

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): It’s sway-swirl-swivel time for you, Aquarius—a phase when you will be wise to gyrate and rollick and zigzag. This is a bouncy, shimmering interlude that will hopefully clean and clear your mind as it provides you with an abundance of reasons to utter “whee!” and “yahoo!” and “hooray!” My advice: Don’t expect the straight-and-narrow version of anything. Be sure you get more than minimal doses of twirling and swooping and cavorting. Your brain needs to be teased and tickled, and your heart requires regular encounters with improvised fun.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): When I was growing up in suburban America, way back in the 20th century, many adults told me that I was wrong and bad to grow my hair really long. Really! It’s hard to believe now, but I endured ongoing assaults of criticism, ridicule, and threats because of how I shaped my physical appearance. Teachers, relatives, baseball coaches, neighbors, strangers in the grocery store—literally hundreds of people—warned me that sporting a big head of hair would cause the whole world to be prejudiced against me and sabotage my success. Decades later, I can safely say that all those critics were resoundingly wrong. My hair is still long, has always been so, and my ability to live the life I love has not been obstructed by it in the least. Telling you this story is my way of encouraging you to keep being who you really are, even in the face of people telling you that’s not who you really are. The astrological omens say it’s time for you to take a stand.

MOSS

Midwestern Daydreams

Debut albums are always about moving boxes, and Bella Moss’ debut album Midwestern Daydreams is full of them. Throughout, this seven-song set feels like a “summer’s surely over” album delivered here at the blustery start of spring.

“Change” is the not-so-secret word in these songs, and Bella Moss sings about loves losing their effect and friends leaving friends behind for brighter places. They are all strung together with sparse melodies delivered over a

somewhere else.

On “Flower Beds”, Moss reveals a Phoebe Bridgers influence that permeates the whole of this debut. Complete with a sweeping strings section, Moss cleans the footprints off of her dashboard, then crosses her fingers behind her back.

The song “Slow Burn” features a strumming guitar and the most adventurous vocal harmonies that Moss builds on the album. Her voice finds its power in restraint and layered on top of itself until finally each line becomes simultaneously a whisper and its resounding echo. There’s a lot of wandering possibility in these songs, like on “Sudden Strangers” when Moss admits that she’s still grieving the end of a relationship that only might have been. Not all of the moving boxes can be full of things you need.

On the track, “Candle Lit,” Moss wants to hear the whispered secrets of an old love who’s delivering them to someone new. And

HISTO JGDC

HISTO.BANDCAMP.COM/ALBUM/JGDC

Anear-fatal lung infection gave multi-instrumentalist Donald Curtis a sense of urgency to follow his passions for music and form a band, the bio for Madison–Cedar Rapids band Histo reveals. The etymology of the word fragment “histo” medically refers to body tissue, but it also can mean “structure” or “set upright” (as in a histogram bar chart)—either of which could have been on Curtis’s mind following his medical crisis.

JGDC is Histo’s third full-length release since the band’s self-titled debut in 2019.

The album is a more collaborative work than Histo’s previously release, Asleep in the Firehole, in 2020.

and Toro y Moi. Curtis’s reaching vocals recall Dean Wareham of Luna and Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips. Vocal harmonies add a depth and substance that buoys them up over the layers of instruments below.

It’s clear that Curtis has a decent collection of guitar effects and he’s not afraid to use them. Every time I listen to “Cosmic Trends,” I note a chiming vibrato pedal evoking Robin Guthrie of Cocteau Twins. Galloro’s bass walks give the listener another melodic path to follow through the song. Curtis delivers an existential chorus. “Celebrate / Feel alright / In my death / Live your life.”

The instrumental guitar workout appropriately named “Fuzzy Feelings” works as a prelude to my favorite track on the album, “Regression Never Ends.” (By the way: a Gish-era Billy Corgan with hair wants his Big Muff pedal back.)

finger-picked acoustic guitar. For a record made amid this collective mess we share, Midwestern Daydreams remains musically mellow, gentle and, at times, even delicate. Moss’s lyrics, however, are anything but.

“Time For Change” stays true to the best of those last-night-of-summer songs. Somebody is always about to head out to California in them, and Moss can already imagine them there, singing, “I like to picture you / Sitting at a tiny hip cafe.” Those are the ones that you wind up missing the most, the ones you can already imagine being

she doesn’t seem scared by it. On “Out West,” Moss tries an old trick when trying to forget about a relationship that somehow fell away: laying the picture frame face down. Her I-wish-you-well line takes on double meaning in this broken new world that she’s been handed: “I hope you like it where you ran to / I hope the climate treats you well.”

Bella Moss has learned life lessons early, and exhibits full grown feelings across a serene and dream-filled debut collection.

––Avery Gregurich

From the Histo press kit: “Don reached out to previous band member Joe Galloro, who played bass on the first eponymous album, and asked if he’d ‘consult’ on the next phase of the band. In the end, Joe became an essential part of the new album, writing a lot of the musical progressions and melodies, playing bass, synths and guitar and even mixing the album.”

Galloro lives in Cedar Rapids; among his other gigs, he plays bass and collaborates with LV’s own Jordan Sellergren.

The resulting album is a melody-forward pop trip through layers of delicious guitar. A convenient (if not pinpoint-accurate) description of the music places it somewhere between laidback chillwave and shoegaze. It fits well next to my current diet of bands like Tame Impala

“Regression …” has a strippeddown-to-drums-and-bass backing to the verses that lends a sober and ominous tone to the depressing vignettes. “Onward and outward with the trash / aggressive glances with the bears / How can I forgive myself if I don’t at least put up a fight” paints a stark picture of how nature quickly moves to adapt to the presence of humans, even if the humans have seemingly stopped their own march.

The chorus blooms gloriously, like a noxious cloud birthed from a trainwreck. “Regression never ends / Engines spin up but we destroy ourselves again.” A depressing message, but a clarion call for us to pay attention.

Curtis’s near death experience continues to propel his desire to share his perspectives in music and his lyrics. In that way, I suppose the band name is more accurately defined as “setting upright”—asking all of us, perhaps, to set things upright.

––Michael Roeder

BEllA

FOr A rECOrD MADE AMID THIS COllECTIVE MESS WE SHArE, MIDWESTERN DAYDREAMS rEMAINS MUSICAllY MEllOW, GENTlE AND, AT TIMES, EVEN DElICATE. MOSS’S lYrICS, HOWEVEr, ArE ANYTHING BUT.

CONOR HANICK WITH KEIR GOGWILT AND JAY CAMPBELL

Friday, April 14, 7:30 pm

$10

STUDENT & YOUTH TICKETS

Iowa City native Conor Hanick has been called the “soloist of choice for…thorny works” by The New York Times and is a champion of many composers of his own generation— as well as a brilliant performer of works by the full range of great composers. Hancher welcomes Hanick home for a performance that will feature solo, duo, and trio works.

TICKETS

Adults $20 / $25 / $30

College Students $10 / $10 / $24

Youth $10 / $10 / $24

EVENT PARTNERS

Mace and Kay Braverman

Hills Bank and Trust Company

H. Dee and Myrene Hoover

EMERSON STRING QUARTET

Friday, April 21, 7:30 pm

Gary and Randi Levitz West Music

Candace Wiebener

$10

STUDENT & YOUTH TICKETS

Undeniably one of the finest string quartets of the last four decades, the Emerson String Quartet has announced it will disband in 2023. Hancher is proud to once again present these incomparable musicians as part of their final tour. Don’t miss your last chance to experience this essential ensemble live.

TICKETS

Adults $40 / $55 / $60

College Students $10 / $10 / $48

Youth $10 / $10 / $48

EVENT PARTNERS

Bill and Fran Albrecht

Richard and Judith Hurtig

AMERICAN BALLET THEATRE

Saturday, May 6, 7:30 pm

Over the last several years, American Ballet Theatre has delivered astonishing performances for Hancher audiences—including the whimsical Whipped Cream and an incredible outdoor show on the Fourth of July in 2021. Now the Company returns to close Hancher’s 50th anniversary season with a mixed repertory program—including ZigZag, choreographed by Jessica Lang to music by Tony Bennett—that is sure to thrill and delight everyone who experiences it.

TICKETS

Adults $70 / $85 / $95

College Students $56 / $68 / $76

Youth $56 / $68 / $76

EVENT PARTNERS

Charles Richard and Barbara S. Clark

Robert and Karlen Fellows

Sue and Joan Strauss

LaDonna and Gary Wicklund

Individuals with disabilities are encouraged to attend all University of Iowa sponsored events. If you are a person with a disability who requires a reasonable accommodation in order to participate in this program, please contact Hancher in advance at (319) 335-1160.

Scene from ZigZag. Photo: Rosalie O’Connor.

Photo: Laura Desberg

Photo: Erin Baiano

Photo: Jürgen Frank

WAGE CAGE Heart Notes

WAVECAGE.BANDCAMP.COM

When two artists who work in different forms or genres or tones come together to collaborate, there is a range of possible results.

On one end, there is the danger of a kind of subtraction by addition. In that sort of collaboration, neither artist is truly well served by the blending of their work—and the audience is not served either.

On the other end, there can be a kind of alchemy through which the collaborators make something precious and rare by coming together—something the audience can feel in the moment and carry forward with them.

Of course, there are countless spots between those two extremes where a collaboration might land. In the case of Heart Notes Live, which finds poet Caleb “The Negro Artist” Rainey and jazz fusion/electronic ensemble Wave Cage sharing the stage, the amalgamation yields something engaging and often moving. It may not be all the way to alchemy, but it is far from subtraction by addition.

Heart Notes is a collection of poems about love—its ups and downs, joys and heartbreaks. At one point in the album, Rainey explains how the project differs from much of his other work:

“So this whole collection is my own experiences,” he tells the audience. “I have always been a big softie, which means I’ve also loved a lot, been hurt a lot, and I’ve also hurt other people a lot. And so this collection is often one of the

hardest collections of poems I’ve ever written. It is way easier when I do poems that can point at a system and tell you that system is messed up than it is to go, ‘I’m part of the messed up system of love,’ right? Or to say, ‘I’ve made mistakes,’ or, ‘Your mistakes hurt me at a deep level that has nothing to do with the systemic world around us. But the fact is, you didn’t treat my heart well,’ right? That’s way harder to say sometimes.”

Rainey, however, has a knack for saying those hard things in his poems and for capturing the real delight that love can inspire. He is able to turn a cliché into something new and he is able to mine the quotidian for meaning. His tenor speaking voice might break or soar or be infused with laughter, and in each case he brings the listener along.

For its part, Wave Cage—a band I have praised in these pages before—manages to avoid the potential trap that comes with performing with a spoken word artist. It would be all too easy to become mere background music, a kind of sonic wallpaper onto which the poems

THE r U r A l ISTS Trying

“Iprayto the saints,” begins the Ruralists’ “pandemic album,” Trying. Then, later, with the strained tension of drawn out tones and stretched-then-resolving chords, album opener “HereNow” continues, “And I wait / on the word / on the whisper never heard / though I listen with all my might.”

The northwestern Iowa band includes several members who teach at Sioux City’s evangelical Dordt University. And, like every intersection of faith and learning, Trying is exploring meaning in ways both familiar and discomfiting, tying the shit we see happening around us to the reality we believe underpins all truth—or, well, it’s trying to.

“What is this ache / threatening to break / my heart in two?” It’s the experience of swimming through the languid ecstasy of track three, “Time.” The choral assertion is tinged with acceptance of futility: “The trouble with time is / the line that it flies / is straight and true.” But later, the track’s crashing cymbals still, and the lyrics admit, “Course, a shortness of breath / doesn’t always lead to death.” The slowing metronome closer allows “Time” to continue even past its end.

Tracks like “Strange Machines” (“Aren’t we strange machines / human beings?”) and “People Are People Too” drive themes of acceptance home in unsubtle ways that might be redundant or reductive if they weren’t wrapped in such engaging instrumentation. The lyrics and music intertwine, passing off intent like a baton, exploring new territory when they can and at other times reinforcing the lessons of the other.

Then comes “Helluvathing”: “When I mention, ‘Jesus Christ,’ I know you roll your eyes. To tell the truth, most days I do, too.”

are projected. But the band clearly has engaged with Rainey’s work on a more than superficial level, allowing them to punctuate and elevate individual moments. And when they sit out on the poem “Wendy the Good Little Witch & Casper the Friendly Ghost,” the band adds by subtraction. It’s a nifty trick midway through the set.

If you are in the mood for musings on love accompanied by a talented and thoughtful group of musicians, you may well find Heart Notes Live heart-stirring.

––Rob Cline

Yes, I said evangelical back there. If you’re alive in the 21st century in America, you probably have a complicated relationship with that term. There’s a strata of Christian churches that claim it and utilize it as a way to persecute and judge. But at its core, it’s a practice of questioning and understanding. And besides, I wouldn’t be using these few sparse words to throw some Stryper or even Jars of Clay at you. The Ruralists, and this album, strike a more sonorous chord; they use faith as a lens, not a hammer.

Coming in hot at track two, “Mother Mary” delivers smooth jazz vibes recalling a certain corner of the 1980s that rejected that decade’s frivolity for denser excesses. Both the tonality of the piece and the rolling sax line in the background are echoes of the best collaborations between Sting and Branford Marsalis.

It’s a plaintive, longing track, anchored in a shared search that carries more weight than any one answer ever could. “And we both might find ourselves awake asking what all of this means.”

The choral outro, which echoes the final line (“We’re here because we’re here because we’re here”) sung to the tune of “Auld Lang Syne,” works both at the surface level and deeper, when you discover or recall that in World War I, British soldiers sang that in the trenches, as they pondered meaning in ways unfathomable to most of us now.

The rest of the album persists in mixing facts and philosophy in ways that comfort and challenge in equal measure, wrapping up with a discordant, carnival-esque chorus of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” at the end of album closer “Right‽” which leaves you wondering whether there might be more answers to the question of life in the living than in the questioning.

—Genevieve Trainor

HEART NOTES IS A COllECTION OF pOEMS ABOUT lOVE—ITS UpS AND DOWNS, JOYS AND HEArTBrEAKS.

history of her shattered family in an effort to piece together her story, tracing back the events of her life to better understand herself. Even as Kat relays the account of her upbringing, she calls into question how she came to learn her personal history and, at times, her own telling of it.

particular dream isn’t the right fit for him. His musical tastes change, as do his creative ambitions. The thrill he felt at first signing a contract can’t sustain him, even as his band’s music gets some serious play on the radio.

NICK

HOlMBErG The Emergent KOEHLER BOOKS

In Nick Holmberg’s debut novel, The Emergent, he asks whether we can come to understand and know a person through the way they tell their story. The book shows the psychological and moral growth of the narrator, a young woman named Kat, as she challenges her audience to piece together the account she gives them of her time between San José, California and New York City to form a more complete portrait of her through the details of her life both shared and omitted.

The novel follows Kat—a queer woman of color simultaneously discovering and revealing her identity—through her schooling, family tragedies, an earthquake and the dawn of the internet. At times, she experiences frustration as she finds herself conveying the stories of her family word for word from her brother’s and grandfather’s accounts, struggling to find her own voice and to understand why she was told some things and left in the dark about others. She watches her family try to pull together in the face of hardships only to eventually scatter, she can’t help but wonder whether people are born into behaviors and destinies or whether it depends on how they react to their circumstances and their circumstances to them.

Kat observes that her life “has always hung in the balance of other people’s perceptions of me, my story, my race, my musical tastes, my family life, my reading preferences and my relationships.” Despite these frustrations, she recounts the

The Emergent is more than just a family history—it’s Kat’s attempt at finding her own voice and defining herself on her own terms, crafting her identity by choosing what details of her life should make up the person she has become. Kat’s account of what appears as a family history spanning generations succeeds at holding the reader at bay much more effectively than can be understood until the novel reaches its close.

Holmberg’s story about Kat is a moving story of trauma and family and the ways in which we are defined. It also asks us, in more ways than one, to consider what stories are ours to tell.

NIC BrOWN Bang Bang Crash COUNTERPOINT

Once a drummer, always a drummer? When Nic Brown landed a fellowship to enter the very selective Iowa Writers’ Workshop (where he earned his MFA in 2006), he figured his drumming days were done. He didn’t want to reference his years on the rock circuit with his new friends in Iowa City. At parties, the words he most feared hearing were, “Nic was in a band.” Though he’d been in Rolling Stone and on The Tonight Show, he’d suspected that, if anyone asked about his music career, they would never have heard of the band he’d been in (Athenaeum) or its signature hit (“What I Didn’t Know”). This might have embarrassed them, which would have embarrassed him. Better to let those sleeping dogs lie.

He also develops the “yips,” a term most often associated with sports, with baseball players or golfers, who overthink the throw or the putt that used to be instinct. What they could once do naturally they can no longer do as well, or sometimes at all. He had trouble finding the groove, or keeping the beat. Something was seriously wrong.

One of the memoir’s other unexpected revelations shows how he gained more confidence to switch from drumming to writing. He wrote a fake bio for one of his later bands. He thought it was as outlandish as anything, say, Cheap Trick had once issued, but others took it seriously. And it could have had serious repercussions, as the New Yorker (he’d aimed high to publish his own work) was interested in writing a piece on the band, based on this fake origin story.

While writing from a perspective that Holmberg acknowledges is not his own, he attempts to step outside of himself and his experience to provoke conversations about identity, history and the events that shape us without assuming the voice of any particular group. Whether or not he succeeds in this endeavor is up to the reader.

––Kelsey Conrad

But as he admits in this self-deprecating memoir, he had trouble getting drumming out of his system. Even when he pivoted his career toward publishing novels and teaching aspiring writers, he would find a rhythm track coursing through his veins. His dentist asked if he’d been grinding his teeth. Not exactly. He’d been using them as a non-stop click track.

As a coming-of-age memoir, Bang Bang Crash isn’t your typical Behind the Music episode. No sex or drugs, nor detailed accounts of drama with the record label or management. Instead, it’s a more thoughtful rendering of how a kid achieves his dream—so fast and so young, with his high school band—and then discovers that this

It’s a funny story, and could have had serious consequences, but it gave Brown the confidence that he could craft a story that would connect with others. He appreciates the autonomy a writer has, though he missed a band’s collaborative spirit. And he discovers that the writing racket doesn’t necessarily provide a smoother career path or a road to riches. Though it seems to suit him as a better vocation for growing up and growing older, as he becomes a husband and then a father.

Ultimately, he decides to revisit what he had once wanted to outgrow. He reunites that first band for a 20th anniversary performance, partly to give this book its conclusion, but maybe a little to come to terms with what he’d never gotten past. And in the process he opens the door, at least a little, that he’d once been so determined to slam shut.

––Don McLeese

THE EMErGENT IS MOrE THAN JUST A FAMIlY HISTOrY—IT’S KAT’S ATTEMpT AT FINDING HEr OWN VOICE AND DEFINING HErSElF ON HEr OWN TErMS, CrAFTING HEr IDENTITY BY CHOOSING WHAT DETAIlS OF HEr lIFE SHOUlD MAKE Up THE pErSON SHE HAS BECOME.

KATHErINE lINN CAIrE Accidental Sisters

BOOKS FLUENT

Itry to imagine myself learning, at age 52, that I have a sister. I think about my own sister and how important that relationship is to me. I think about how much life there is in 52 years—how much identity is formed, how awkward it becomes just making friends as an adult— and I can’t imagine it. Surely it would be confusing and scary and thrilling, but what would that even mean?

This is the premise of Katherine Linn Caire’s memoir, Accidental Sisters: The Story of My 52-Year Wait to Meet My Biological Sibling

A self-proclaimed happy adoptee from Des Moines, Kathe—who was heretofore uninterested in anything to do with her biological lineage— decides in her 50s that she should look into getting medical records for her own children.

(She says, “[E]xperience showed me that if children were not happy with their adoptive parents or their family life in general, they would be more likely to seek their birth mothers … This was my myopic view of adoption as a child growing up with adoptive parents.” She recants this idea a few times, aware of the privilege and naivete of this take.)

Kathe’s story is full of fateful moments, the first of which is her sudden impulse to procure a medical history for her children. “I found myself staring out the window into our very dark, quiet front yard and suddenly the thought came to me: our precious three daughters were approaching … adulthood, and they only had exposure to 50 percent of

their medical history.”

Divine intervention is a prominent theme, which is fitting for a story that started with a Catholic girl in a Catholic hospital giving up a child for adoption at Catholic Charities. Religion itself is not a major theme, though religion did connect the biological family to the adopted family. These instances are catalysts for near-misses and odds-defying revelations for Kathe. “[B]y that point in my life I knew that ideas that ‘come out of nowhere’ tend to have a distinct purpose,” she said.

The narrative is chronological, almost entirely exposition, and starts with Kathe’s adoption, including her parents’ application letters to the adoption agency. There are anecdotes about her early childhood and then her search for medical information. It’s an error in the redaction of one of the documents Kathe receives which sets off her journey to learn more about her biological mother and, eventually, to meeting her sister.

Kathe’s story includes watching her parents age, receiving the support of her family, extreme moments of synchronicity and a lot of introspection and exploration of her birth mother’s experience.

While the book’s subtitle assumes the climax of the narrative would be the meeting of two estranged sisters (and I would say that it is), that meeting is about halfway through the memoir, and is followed by further odd surprises from research, building the relationship between the sisters and cultivating a spiritual connection with the Maurer family. (Maurer being her biological mother’s maiden name.) Kathe’s journey (and her sister’s) are not that of self-discovery, but of an ongoing quest to learn one’s self.

––Sarah Elgatian

DRACULA: A FEMINIST REVENGE FANTASY by Kate Hamill

Oct. 12 – 29, 2023

THE WIZARD OF OZ

Nov. 17 – Dec.17, 2023

SOMETHING ROTTEN !

Feb. 9 – Mar. 3, 2024

FAIRVIEW

by Jackie Sibblies Drury

Mar. 28 – Apr. 7, 2024

SCHOOL OF ROCK

May 3 – May 26, 2024

IN THE NEXT ROOM

(OR THE VIBRATOR PLAY) by Sarah Ruhl

May 16 – June 2, 2024

TO BE ANNOUNCED (A SUMMER BLOCKBUSTER SURPRISE!)

June 21 – July 28, 2024

FIREARM • INJURED IS WAITING WITH ANIMAL ROSE BOWL TICKETS FROM SUSPECT LIVES IN IOWA PAUL^S DISCOUNT BY WHEEL CURLED UP IN A

THE CURB • RACOON IN THE BUSHES • CUPOFJO AT CASEY^S • WB OWL WAS HIT RP ADV IT IS HUGE ON SHOULDER • FEM WHO WALKED OUT OF RESTAURANT/ VERY INTOX/ LAYING DOWN IN PRKING LOT • SNOW LEFT ON THE STREET BY A SNOWPLOW, CALLER DOESN^T THINK THIS IS RIGHT AND THEY SHOULDN^T BE ALLOWED TO DO

Christopher Patton’s final police log show will take place at riverside Theater

Saturday, May 27 at 7:30 p.m.

Hosted by Yale Cohn, the event will include stand-up comedy from Dante Powell, Audrey Brock and Travis Coltrain as well as improv from Lady Franklyn and a reading from Patton’s book.

• PICK UP TRUCK WITH KEYS IN THE IGNITION, CERTIFICATE OF TITLE ON THE FRONT SEAT, UNLOCKED HAS BEEN THERE FOR A WEEK • PERSON APPROACHED RP AND WERE AGGRESSIVE ABOUT VOTING, THOUGHT IT WAS VERY SUSPICIOUS, RP ASKED TO LEAVE REPEATEDLY, NEWER BLK SUV WI PLATES 839XPZ RP REQ OFCR JUST CHECK THE AREA • JUST NORTH OF NEW HYVEE. DEER IN THE ROADWAY, STILL ALIVE, BACKEND DESTROYED • SB CADILLAC 502RWA CAR DRIVING ALL OVER THE RAOD NO TIRES DRIVING ON RIMS • MALE IN SHERATON LOBBY LOOKING FOR KEY, ON 911 ARGUING WHY HE SHOULD CALL 911 FOR THIS • RP WAS AT DEADWOOD AND GOT THROWN OUT BY A WORKER. HE RQ A WHITE OFFICER MEET WITH HIM TO TALK TO THE FEMALE • MALE CAUSING CRAZINESS IN THE FOOD COURT...TELLING PEOPLE HE IS GOING TO KILL THEM. MALE HAS A FLASK. ASIAN MALE • DEER SITTING NEXT TO PATIO/ MIGHT BE SOMETHING WRONG WITH IT, IT WILL NOT GET UP • INJURED DEER IN THE ROADWAY, ON 1ST AVE TOWARD HICKORY HILL PARK • SEVERAL VEHICLES PARKED OUTSIDE OF THE CALLERS HOUSE AND HE DOESNT LIKE IT, 2 WHITE CARS IS THE ONLY DESCRIPTION • MALE WALKED INTO STAFF MANAGEMENT AND TOOK HIS PANTS OFF • FRIEND GIVING RP A RIDE AND KICKED FM OUT OF HER CAR CAUSE SHE SAID RACIST WORDS TO HIM • SUBJECT ON HYVEE PROPERTY 15 MIN AGO TRYING TO SELL DRUGS, IS NOT LONGER THERE. THEY DID TAKE THE DRUGS FROM HIM • MALE IS IS PART OF THE MEXICAN CARTEL IS TRYING TO SELL RP METH ON FACEBOOK • CHEVY IMPALA WAS DROPPED

ACROSS

1. Juice brand with a shapely bottle

4. Token of appreciation

9. Aubrey Plaza’s role on Parks and Recreation

14. Highway assistance org.

15. One appealing aspect of studying in a coffee shop

16. Organizing determinant at botanical gardens

17. The ___ (Showtime series)

18. “When I feel like it!” or “Once in a blue moon”

20. Martial art with five different animal “fighting styles”

22. Subj. of the lawsuit in season 2 of Hacks on HBO Max

23. Mode of fashion in superhero movies?

24. Smooth sail?

26. ___-pitch

28. “Don’t try me!”

34. Bea Arthur title role

35. ___ and aahed

36. Drink commonly spiked with rum, brandy, or whiskey

37. Vegetable hidden in “cook raw”

38. Ford car featured in a Beach Boys tune

39. One-third of the hiphop group with the hit song “Shoop”

40. Tel. book figures

41. Tiny bit

42. Leading

43. “When hell freezes over!”

46. Track and field star turned actress Aduba

47. Dips a toe into, maybe 48. Wading wetland bird

51. League whose mascots include Lucky the Leprechaun and Benny the Bull

54. Wiped

57. “Use some common sense!”

60. Odor of a middle school

boys’ locker room

61. Girl’s name translating to “of the night” in Arabic

62. Impractical Jokers network

63. What one should call when this entry backwards is over .08

64. Lauder of beauty fame

65. Longer version of PIG

66. Essential worker, for short

DOWN

1. Get ready for a trip

2. Honolulu’s home

3. The meat of it, perhaps

4. Dramatic announcement of someone’s arrival

5. Excite

6. Swear (to)

7. Middle Eastern country with a protected green turtle population

8. Novelist Alisa Rosenbaum’s pen name

9. Gp. for lawyers

10. Brooklyn bird

11. Word before “race” and “rage”

12. “Let’s do it!”

13. Screenwriter Waithe of Master of None and 17-Across

19. Squashed, as with hopes

21. Cheese sibling to Edam and havarti

25. “___, so sad”

27. Cap

28. UkrainianAmerican comic Smirnoff

29. Andy Sambergism for

“neat”

30. ___ Level Midnight

(Michael Scott’s screenplay in “The Office”)

31. “Give me some room”

32. Barrier for some receiving medical treatment

33. “Golly gee!”

34. Chronic college affliction

38. “Here! They’re good!”

39. Incriminating form of evidence

41. Tabloid named for a certain radius surrounding L.A. 42. Rid of sins

44. Blow one’s cover in a game of sardines, maybe 45. Supply stockpiles

48. Loafing

49. Drag neckwear

50. “She’s ___ for the right reasons”

52. English city named for its history of Roman-built fixtures of the same name

53. Angela Davis’s signature hairstyle

55. Something taken to get into college

56. Something taken on to get into college

58. Lovey

59. Non-gendered possessive

MARCH ANSWERS

CUSTOMIZED LEGAL SERVICES POWERED BY

UPCOMING EVENTS

MAY 12

Friday Night Concert Series

IOWA STEEL BAND

MAY 19

Friday Night Concert Series

LIBERTY, CITY & WEST HIGH JAZZ ENSEMBLES

MAY 20

Free Movie Series

TOPGUN MAVERICK

MAY 26

Friday Night Concert Series

ANNIE SAVAGE AND HEAR MY VOICE

MAY 27

Northside Concert Series

UNIPHONICS

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