FREE | JANUARY 10 - JANUARY 17 / 2019
Volume 53 | Number 2660
CANNABIS TOURISM Avoiding legal land mines
MUSIC FOR THE BIRDS VSO festival’s nod to nature
FITNESS FOR BOOMERS Ron Zalko’s prescription
Dine Out Vancouver The World Chef Exchange will bring Coquille Restaurant's Chris Janowski and other local culinary specialists together with colleagues from around the globe
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JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 3
CONTENTS
JANUARY 10-17 / 2019
15 COVER
Dine Out Vancouver has become Canada’s biggest food festival as well as a gathering spot for chefs. By Gail Johnson Cover photo by Eric Milic
T H I S M O N T H AT 9
CANNABIS
A new cannabis tour company says Vancouver is positioned well to become the next Amsterdam. By Piper Courtenay
12 HEALTH
Some folks have a tendency to give up on fitness in their 50s, but that’s a huge mistake, according to Ron Zalko.
3 RD FLOOR
By Charlie Smith
17 ARTS
THURSDAY 8:00PM – 12:00AM FRIDAY & SATURDAY 9:30PM – 1:30AM
Dakh Daughters mix all the political uprising in Ukraine with a manic cabaret of music and theatre. By Tony Montague
27 MUSIC
Only a Visitor’s second album, Technicolour Education, got kick-started when bandleader Robyn Jacob found an interesting artifact in her grandmother’s attic.
ONE AND A HALF
By Alexander Varty
JANUARY 10, 17
e Start Here 14 18 28 13 26 25 7 31 10
LEE NICOL BAND JANUARY 11, 18, 24, 31
DOUBLE DOWN KEYS
BOOKS THE BOTTLE CONFESSIONS HOROSCOPES I SAW YOU MOVIE REVIEWS REAL ESTATE SAVAGE LOVE TECHNOLOGY
e Online TOP 5
e Listings
EVE RY SATURDAY JANUARY 12, 19, 26
23 ARTS 28 MUSIC
e Services
28 CLASSIFIEDS
DUELING PIANOS AND GUITAR JANUARY 25
Vancouver’s News and Entertainment Weekly Volume 53 | Number 2660
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1 2 3 4 5
Foreign capital linked to 2.92 percent of home sales over 11 months. Rick Mercer loved Pierre Berton’s jointrolling tutorial. Usagi Sweets opens with mochi mochi and matcha cookies. B.C. judge finds no foul in VPD’s warrantless search of man’s tent. TransLink forms partnership with Modo, Evo, and Mobi.
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NEWS
Court rejects claim for drug dealer death benefit
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by Charlie Smith
ife insurance companies routinely void payouts if the claimant was involved in criminal activity. That’s what happened when the beneficiary of Kevin Valentyne’s policy tried to collect after he was murdered in January 2013. His death came after he entered a house occupied by drug dealers at the corner of North Templeton Drive and Oxford Street with his car still running. His girlfriend waited in the vehicle but he never returned. Valentyne’s blood was discovered in the home. Vancouver police issued a missing-person bulletin, but his body has never been found. According to a decision posted earlier this month on the B.C. Court of Appeal website, Valentyne’s mother, Vanessa, appealed Canada Life’s decision not to pay out a life-insurance benefit. The insurance company fought the claim in B.C. Supreme Court, obtaining an affidavit from then VPD sergeant (now staff sergeant) Dale Weidman. He declared that Valentyne was known to be a drug trafficker and known to be affiliated with gang members. Weidman also pointed out that Valentyne had been jailed in the past for trafficking drugs. “As a result of my investigation, it is my opinion that Kevin Valentyne is likely deceased, having been the victim of a homicide following his disappearance on January 7, 2013 as a result of his involvement in the drug trade,” Weidman stated in his affidavit. Valentyne’s mother, however, disputed that her son was involved in criminal activity at the time of his death. The judge sided with the insurer, dismissing the application. Valentyne’s mother then appealed to the B.C. Court of Appeal, objecting to the trial judge’s acceptance of the affidavits of Weidman and a private investigator. In particular, the mother felt that certain statements by Weidman were inadmissible. They include the sergeant’s claim that Valentyne was intruding on a rival gang’s territory and that Valentyne would have been in possession of cocaine or heroin when he entered the home on North Templeton Street. The three-judge panel—Elizabeth Bennett, Sunni Stromberg-Stein, and John Savage—agreed that the trial judge made errors, acknowledging that some of Weidman’s comments constituted hearsay. However, the three judges also concluded that Valentyne’s mother conceded at trial that he was associated with the United Nations gang and that he was murdered by people advised to do this by members of another gang.
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“Having made those appropriate concessions—taking the position that Mr. Valentyne was murdered as a result of his involvement in criminal activity—Ms. Valentyne cannot repudiate that position in this Court,” the judges concluded. The mother still didn’t admit that his death came while he was committing a criminal offence. However, that wasn’t enough to persuade the three judges to order a new trial. “Nevertheless, taking into account the evidence that was not contested and the admissions made, the inescapable inference is that Mr. Valentyne died while committing the criminal offence of possession, trafficking, or possession for the purpose of trafficking illicit drugs, all of which are indictable offences,” they ruled. “He was a known drug dealer, he went to a known drug reload house, he was affiliated with a criminal gang, and his intention was to go into the house and quickly return. “The only logical inference from this circumstantial evidence is that he bought or sold drugs at that location, was murdered, and therefore died while committing a criminal offence, invoking the exclusion clause.”
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TOF THE alk WEEK Michèle Stephenson has been a trailblazer in film and legal affairs.
HAITIAN FILMMAKER
and former human-rights lawyer Michèle Stephenson codirected American Promise, a Sundance Film Festival award-winning documentary about her son and one of his classmates navigating race relations at a prestigious New York private school. Now a visiting professor of journalism at UBC, Stephenson will deliver a lecture titled “Beyond Inclusion: Building Narratives of Liberation”, in which she’ll discuss inequitable power structures, personal accountability, and contributing to positive change through storytelling. Stephenson will speak at 7 p.m. on Wednesday (January 16) at UBC Robson Square. Register at eventbrite.ca/.
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HOUSING
City aims to amend dual entry
Revised drawings will be submitted for doors to a tower with social housing
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by Charlie Smith
he issue of “poor doors” has once again come up before Vancouver’s developmentpermit board. On January 7, it approved a 28-storey tower on the northeast corner of Robson and Cardero streets. According to the application, the project will include 24 units of social housing on the third and fourth floors. The site is across the street from the Robson Public Market and across the lane from a 43-storey tower that Westbank Corp. is building at 1550 Alberni Street. Another 153 market units will be built from the fourth to the 28th storey. The ground floor will be retail space; office units will be developed on the second and third floors. The board voted that prior to re- This IBI Group rendering shows what’s ceiving a development permit, VKJ going to be built at 1555 Robson Street. (Cardero) Investment LP must present revised drawings to director of entries, with consideration of a shared planning Gil Kelley indicating “a outdoor play area”. balanced expression of the adjacent The development-permit staff remarket and social housing residential port noted that this could be achieved
if the applicant can “widen the nonmarket entry to create a more generous interior lobby”. Staff also stated in the report that this balanced expression would be enhanced by an entry canopy over both doors and by creating an “entry forecourt unifying the two with a shared paving pattern”. In addition, the staff report suggested that there be some “consideration of shared access to the northwest roof deck at the 3rd floor”. In October, the Straight reported that the project’s consultant, IBI Group, previously stated that “entrances for each component of this development will be designed to be unique and easy to identify.” For many years, the City of Vancouver has been granting development permits for residential projects with separate entrances for social housing. Recent examples include towers being constructed at 1068–1080 Burnaby Street and 1318 Thurlow Street.
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CANNABIS
Vancouver’s weed tourism blooms by Piper Courtenay
W
ith recent changes to federal drug laws, Canada is poised to be a major competitor for weed tourism. Keenan Hall, founder of The Movement Cannabis Tours, believes that B.C.’s history and retail landscape place Vancouver in contention with internationally renowned pot hot spots like Amsterdam and Colorado. “I think Vancouver is probably one of the best places in the entire world to have a cannabis experience,” he tells the Georgia Straight by phone. Highlighting the city’s 420 culture, Hall’s visitors satiate their munchies at Granville Island’s vibrant marketplace and explore the Downtown Eastside’s “pot block” of landmark weed buildings like the New Amsterdam Café. “The activists and events that took place in this city are integral in how we got to legalization,” he says. “Sharing those stories is how we push forward.” Hall launched the tour company in October of last year, just a week after the country ushered in a new framework for cannabis law. Alongside Arnold Warkentin, founder of the educational platform Informed High, he has since led walking tours around the city—all aimed at debunking myths, unpacking the drug war, and clarifying regulations. “The core reason I started this company is really to destigmatize responsible use through creating positive experiences with cannabis,” he says, adding that 4.2 percent of the company’s profits go to organizations fighting for international legalization. “I called it The Movement Tours because I’d like to support a normalization movement across the world by giving tourists a chance to try it in
Legal pot shops offer an opportunity to destigmatize responsible consumption.
a safe and comfortable setting.” Hall led his first recreationalthemed tour on January 5. Now that Vancouver has legal dispensaries, the curated shopping trip provides guests with a chance to exercise their newfound purchasing and consumption rights. “No one has to consume—they can if they so choose—but my goal is to provide them with some context so they are more comfortable coming in contact with the industry,” he says. The tour begins with a brief history of prohibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery, ground zero for a handful of legalization protests. Guests can then buy weed while exploring a licensed dispensary, learn about various consumption methods at a cannabisaccessory store, and enjoy the high during an immersive gaming experience at a virtual-reality arcade. Each tour also includes a breakdown of public-consumption laws—
ensuring that anyone who chooses to spark up does so in a legal area. “I think legalization provides a huge opportunity to educate groups who have historically been opposed to cannabis,” Hall says, adding that many of his customers come from regions with outdated drug policies and deeply embedded stereotypes. “My hope is just to send people home with a more positive or realistic outlook on cannabis and have them feel comfortable talking about their experiences with their friends and families.” With Health Canada’s restrictions on promotion and education, Hall is limited in what he can actually say about weed. Cannabis consultant John Hewson praises educators like Hall but says stringent guidelines around disseminating information are detrimental. If Canada wants to be a global leader, he believes, government funds need to be directed to validating health claims about the plant so organizations can make assertions to counter the dominant fear-based narrative. “I believe there will be disappointment for tourists expecting our legal framework to be more open than it is. Right now, it’s incredibly restrictive,” Hewson says. “If we don’t embrace cannabis tourism, we run the risk of tourists coming and finding it in their own way and maybe having a negative experience.” “It’s been really tricky,” Hall says. “You can’t advertise places to go for cannabis consumption, or a place to go after consumption, or promote use. I’ve navigated that by providing a lot of history, anecdotal stories, information about the laws, and just creating space for people to make their own informed decisions about cannabis.”
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JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 9
HIGH TECH
Biidaaban imagines a reclaimed city
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by Kate Wilson
icture the Toronto skyline overgrown with plants. Green shoots poke through broken concrete, and trees sprout from patchy rooftops. The subway tunnels are flooded to platform level, forming a collection of interweaving tributaries just wide enough to be navigated by a canoe. Skyscrapers are crumbling under the eye of the CN Tower. The scene’s description invites a vision of a dystopian, postapocalyptic nightmare. But in the hands of Anishinaabe multimedia artist Lisa Jackson, creator of the virtual-reality experience Biidaaban: First Light in collaboration with the National Film Board, the transformed Toronto is both fertile and meditative. “I don’t like using the word postapocalyptic,” Jackson tells the Georgia Straight on the line from her home in the city. “That’s one of the words that comes to mind, of course, and Mathew Borrett—the amazing 3-D artist whose work fed into this—his creations can conjure those ideas. But there is no term for a future place where current societal structures aren’t operating, apart from one that implies there has been total death and destruction. Instead, I’ve sometimes been calling it a reconciled Toronto.” Jackson’s Indigenous heritage is at the heart of the seven-minute Biidaaban. Offering an insight into a world in which First Nations traditions flourish within Toronto’s urban jungle, her imagined future allows the viewer to wander around a to-scale vision of the city reclaimed by the natural world. The anchor point of the experience is language. As users slip between rich vantage points, words from the Wendat, Anishinaabe, and Kanien’kaha—the first individuals to inhabit the place initially known as Tkaronto—rise up
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Lisa Jackson’s virtual-reality experience Biidaaban: First Light depicts a “reconciled” Toronto in which First Nations traditions flourish. Artwork by Mathew Borrett
on the screen and are narrated over the sound of chirping crickets and stirring leaves. “The first flashpoint of my interest into this was about 10 years ago, when I started looking into Indigenous languages and reading a lot of linguistic books,” Jackson says. “Indigenous languages hold ways of looking at the world which are radically different. To oversimplify it, there’s a lot of stuff that has to do with relatedness—a heightened sense of relation between people and their environment. The English language is mostly nouns, and Indigenous languages are largely verb-based. Suddenly, actions, relationships, and interrelationships become highlighted, and objects start to recede. [Biidaaban] is taking another step and imagining a place reclaimed by nature, where the languages that have been spoken here for many thousands of years grow back in the same way as the plant life and the other things that are native to this world.” Jackson’s project falls under the banner of Indigenous futurism, a label that describes First Nations perspectives on the past, present, and future through the context of science
fiction. By building an imaginary vision of a reclaimed Toronto, the invented setting allows her to circumvent preconceptions about Indigenous people and portray Native culture free of the settler narrative. With its focus on creating fantasy landscapes, Jackson believes that Indigenous futurism is a framework that lends itself to VR experiences. “Being able to create new worlds within the immersive environment of VR is one of the most exciting pieces for me,” she says. “And I think for Indigenous folks, the world-views— whether or not we’ve been raised with the language—are so different from mainstream culture. [Using VR] is an opportunity to put people within a different world and have them express the view and cultures of Indigenous people.…It’s a great way to create a sense of place, and when you think that for Indigenous folks, culturally, every place is so central to how territory relates to identity, I hope that it will spark more people to explore that medium and those connections.”
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HEALTH
Zalko urges not giving up due to age
V
by Charlie Smith
ancouver gym owner Ron Zalko can relate to some of the challenges that aging baby boomers face. In nearly four decades operating his own business in Kitsilano, he’s experienced career success and personal satisfaction helping his 3,000 members not only become more fit but also develop a greater sense of self-worth and confidence in their day-to-day lives. In an interview in the back office of Ron Zalko Fitness & Yoga, he pointed out that as people move into their later years—particularly after retiring—they can sometimes feel more listless. According to him, they commonly stop worrying about how they look to the outside world, so they might pay less attention to nutrition. And in his mind, that can sow the seeds for more rapid decline in their later years. “They sometimes don’t care about how they feel,” Zalko explained. He said that people can overcome the inertia that leads them to avoid exercising by retaining a personal trainer at his gym. Another option is joining groups of five or six baby boomers in a low-impact exercise program. There are a variety of fitness regimens for people over the age of 55, including high-intensity interval training, body-weight training, strength training, yoga, and functional training. “They can go at their own pace and listen to their own body,” he noted. High-intensity interval training includes cardio, stretching, and some weight training. The goal is to work on the upper body, waist, hips, thighs, and glutes—and particularly the core, which includes all the muscles in the midsection. Zalko noted that this is particularly important because the core
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supports and stabilizes the entire body. One way to strengthen this area is by doing Pilates. “I have lots of baby boomers here,” he said. “They come three to four times a week. They look great and they’re happy. They’re happy because they feel good about themselves.” Body-weight training doesn’t involve any machines, which makes it convenient for people who like to travel. It involves using a person’s own body weight as a resistancetraining tool, whether that’s through pushups, squats, planks, lunges, or other exercises. Functional training can help improve balance, coordination, and endurance through strength training. A squat, for example, is a functional exercise because it also helps improve an older person’s muscles for tasks like picking things up off the floor. This “training for life” can also make it easier for a person to grab a suitcase from an overhead compartment or haul boxes into their home. “There are different movements,” Zalko said. “You can write them down, and when you travel, you can do them on your own.”
In a 2014 study published in the International Journal of Wellbeing, Concordia University researchers reported that people over the age of 50 were usually more motivated to exercise as a means of reducing stress and becoming toned and fit. Having fun, meeting friends, and enhancing mental toughness ranked far lower for them than for younger age groups. The researchers noted, however, that “motivation matters in regard to living a meaningful life.” And they questioned what it will take to increase older people’s passion for exercise rather than simply working out on machines in a mechanistic way. Zalko is well aware that exercise needs to be fun for people to retain their desire to remain healthy. That’s why he pays close attention to assigning the right personal trainer to individual members, depending on their objectives, and encouraging baby boomers to join fitness groups at his gym. “This is my mission in life,” he said. “I don’t do it for the money. I’m here because I like to see people changing their lifestyle. I like to see them happy.”
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VCC Music Alumni Week Monday, January 14 to Friday, January 18 Big Band Jam – FREE Monday, Jan. 14, 6 p.m. · Auditorium VCC music alumni are invited to join James Danderfer for an evening of specially curated music. Bring your horn!
Fu n k y Fo o d B a n k Fu n d ra i s e r Wednesday, Jan. 16, 8 p.m. Auditorium · $10* All proceeds go to the Greater Vancouver Food Bank. Featuring members of Dan Mangan, Five Alarm Funk, Jesse Roper, Madd Riddim, Camaro 67, Leisure Club, and Queer as Funk. * includes light snacks provided by VCC Culinary Arts. Snacks will be served at 6 p.m.
M u s i c S c h o l a r s E ve n i n g – F R E E Thursday, Jan. 17, 7 p.m. Room 1228, building B Students from the Shostakovich and Women in Music Seminars present their research.
Masterclasses via Skype – FREE Friday, Jan. 18, 2 - 4 p.m. · Auditorium
APPLY TODAY! careers.cummins.com
VCC alumni currently working in Nashville, Hong Kong, New Orleans and San Fransisco drop in to chat about music in the real world.
O ff B ro a d way Fac u l t y S e r i e s Friday, Jan. 18, 8 p.m. · $10 Alumni Electronic Music Showcase – Curated by Peter Hannan Four Alumni performances capping off Alumni Week: Tiffany Calderbank, Tomas Valenzuela, Braedon Lim and Nicholas Marriott.
VCC Broadway campus · 1155 E. Broadway vcc.ca/events for more information and to purchase tickets
12 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019
HOROSCOPE
E
LEO
Through Sunday, there are still more facts to face, to get through, to work out or process. Want to see more significant results? Put the time into it; take it/take yourself seriously; stay ambitious; and be fully committed. You’ll feel an enormous sense of relief, satisfaction, or accomplishment once you can say that it is done and out of the way.
F
VIRGO
Greater clarity or confirmation is the result of a natural progression and the time you have already put into it. Friday to Sunday is shaping in some significant turn-thecorner or ground-covering way. You can reach a milestone or anniversary, an important conclusion or finish line. Aim higher, dream bigger, explore more. You will soon grow/go far beyond where you are now.
G H
J
C
K
TAURUS
April 20–May 21
The next few days can end a wait or see a circumstance, conversation, or relationship shape up in some solidifying or written-in-stone way. What is meant to be will be. Don’t struggle against it; work with it instead. Keep a good grip on it, but also allow for natural progression to take on a life of its own. Monday to Wednesday are opportune.
GEMINI
May 21–June 21
This is no ordinary passage of time. Whether it is an inner consciousness, a soul-to-soul interface, a health matter, or a financial undertaking, something of significance is in the works. An ending, a beginning, a renewal, a makeover—to a great extent, it is a natural evolution. Friday to Sunday, it is important, official, surpassed, revealed, cleared up, or completed.
D
CANCER
June 21–July 22
You can feel limited, thwarted, or under pressure, but something major is about to give way. Friday’s sun/Pluto and Sunday’s Mercury/ Saturn can bring you to a realization, conclusion, finish line, or goal post. It’s a positive development. Jupiter/ Neptune puts greater-than-average potential in the mix, but first there’s reality to deal with. Relinquish expectations; surrender to the process; go with the flow.
SAGITTARIUS
November 22–December 21
If you have spent the time and put in the effort, sun/Pluto and Mercury/Saturn will get you to some place good. A sense of accomplishment and/or a greater sense of security is a reward in and of itself. If you find yourself in a tough spot, see it as chance to prove that you have what it takes—in spades. Sunday’s Jupiter/ Neptune gives you wing.
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October 23–November 22
The next few days set the backdrop for an important talk, completion, paper-signing, or goalsetting. Define your terms; make it official, meeting with an elder, advisor, specialist, or someone in charge. Great for feeling your way along, Jupiter/Neptune assists you to gain more insight and clarity, to draw from a deeper sense of knowing. Monday to Wednesday the going is smooth.
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Your reality is in an active state of redesign, especially regarding career, responsibilities, and personal priorities. The inevitable is now proving its course. Roll up your sleeves and get with the program. Apply good effort and substantial achievement will be your net gain. With initial push-come-to-shove or force-the-envelope in the mix, through mid–next week, the getting is good.
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September 23–October 23
Both sun/Pluto and Mercury/Saturn are assisting you to get it under better control. Even if you feel forced into position, know that what you establish or commit to now holds greater-than-average benefit and potential. Face it, get at it, and set yourself up for later gain. There is no time to waste. Past Sunday, you should feel an ease-up of pressure.
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UP TO
he recent solar eclipse continues to keep reality on an amplification track. Be reminded that eclipses act as significant event triggers, and they continue to produce with karmic impact over a length of time. This is no ordinary moment in time. Venus, freshly into Sagittarius, is on an active growth-and-gain curve. The planet of net worth and self-worth is on a search to create more value, to make more money, to know more, and to go further. On Friday, the sun in Capricorn aligns with Pluto. This reset transit happens once a year, but it is even more significant this time around. A powerful creative process is under way, one that is shaping in some definitive, inevitable, and results-generating way. On Sunday, Mercury in Capricorn aligns with Saturn in its home sign. Watch for significant news; an important or official announcement, meeting, or discussion; and an ending, deadline, conclusion, good-bye, or termination. Use this transit to sign papers and formalize, finalize, authenticate, or establish it; broach a difficult subject; make an important decision; tackle precision work; and get down to brass tacks. Also on Sunday, Jupiter in Sagittarius squares Neptune in Pisces. Whether you feel the impact of this turnstile transit as subtle or major, Jupiter/Neptune moves us through an invisible barrier and onto a more visionary track. The potentials are greater; uncertainty is too. Watch for this transit to reveal, clarify, dissolve, disintegrate, or inspire more. Despite Mercury/ Saturn zeroing in on the target (and forcing accountability), Jupiter/Neptune will continue to keep everything moving along a f luid track.
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CAPRICORN
December 21–January 20
You are a powerhouse thanks to sun/Pluto and Mercury/Saturn in Capricorn. A pivotal endings-andbeginnings threshold reached, what’s done is done or in the process of a complete overhaul. Whether from the past, the present, or the as-yetunwritten future, a significant someone can act as a formidable catalyst for change. You could be the one.
AQUARIUS
January 20–February 18
Potentials are in the process of colouring themselves in. More than you know is in the works. A key someone can be at work behind the scenes too, either on your behalf or not. As of Sunday, Jupiter/Neptune reveals, clarifies, or inspires more. Friday/Saturday and Monday to Wednesday, it is an unfolding process; you’re on a roll.
L
PISCES
February 18–March 20
The stars keep your instincts, impulses, and creativity going strong. The next couple of days can be shaping in some long-term, momentous way. The first of three hookups this year, Jupiter/Neptune moves you/ moves it to a whole new level. Feel tested, feel blessed, or both; you are at the start of so much more to come.
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Read more about Jupiter and Neptune, book a reading, or sign up for Rose’s free monthly newsletter at rosemarcus.com/.
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d EVEN BEFORE George Bowering
was appointed Canada’s first parliamentary poet laureate, he was already the West Coast poet most widely known in the country as a whole. Yet he is not just a poet, though that is his primary field of endeavour. He has also written avant-garde fiction and quirky works of history and biography—in fact, all sorts of things. An appendix in Rebecca Wigod’s perfectly crafted work He Speaks Volumes: A Biography of George Bowering lists more than 150 books he has published between 1967 and today. She is a tireless researcher, a fine writer of prose, and a skilled explainer of Bowering’s work, his life, and his singular personality. The last of these was no doubt the most difficult to elucidate. She writes that “he’s more complex than many people realize. He’s an intellectual, though he doesn’t always give that impression.� He has had a deep, lifelong obsession with baseball and prefers the cuisine of cheap diners, and has often been criticized for advocating U.S.–style writing and indeed U.S. authors, for despite his Canadian patriotism his manner skews towards America. He’s a radical leftist who admired Richard Nixon and John Diefenbaker. He’s also a bit of a madcap. He has written under many made-up names and frequently changes his date of birth and likes to switch the places in B.C. where he claims to have grown up (all of them in the Interior). His friend Margaret Atwood has said, affectionately, that he hides his real self behind a goofy act, giving “a genial imitation of a man acting like a nincompoop�. He was a rural boy, “a kid of the sagebrush and rattlesnake country�, who in 1953 found a short stay in Victoria “intriguingly foreign [because it was] on a forested island�. When he enrolled at UBC “Vancouver’s rain was an affront to a young man who had known the aridity of the Okanagan.� In 1958 he began keeping a diary that was also “a record of his achievements and connections� as well as the minutiae of daily existence. “He strove for a look by emulating James Dean, slouching around with a cigarette hanging out of his bottom lip, sunglasses hiding his eyes.� He became more familiar with the rest of the country, the way writers and academics often do, by leapfrogging from one university to another. At Calgary he taught modern fiction to 700 engineering students! He became a staple figure at SFU. At other times he was on the faculties of what were then called Sir George Williams University in Montreal and the University of Western Ontario in London. Wherever he was, he made himself a leading part of the local scene. He’s 84 now and has endured serious health concerns. One of the many virtues of Wigod’s fine biography is that she accurately picks and presents what most readers would agree are some of Bowering’s most important books, such as Burning Water, Kerrisdale Elegies, The Gangs of Kosmos, and Rocky Mountain Foot. by George Fetherling
14 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019
dine out
Food festival is all about community The country’s biggest celebration of food and drink includes cooking classes, winery dinners
A
by Gail Johnson
cclaimed San Diego– based chef Jason McLeod has come a long way since leaving his hometown of Ladysmith in search of a summer job in Banff. He found it at the local Smitty’s, where he got hired as a dishwasher. McLeod worked hard, got promoted, and moved up the line. But he was hooked on restaurant life from the get-go, the industry introducing him to people he felt a kinship with from all over the world. Over the past two decades, he has worked around the globe with luminaries like the U.K.’s Marco Pierre White (who is sometimes referred to as “the man who made Gordon Ramsay cry”) and held positions at luxury properties like the Fairmont Chateau Whistler and several Four Seasons hotels. He was also the opening executive chef of Ria in Chicago’s fivestar Elysian Hotel, which earned two Michelin stars during its first year. “Michelin is all about consistency,” McLeod says in a phone interview. “You need a team vision and dedication. You need everybody to be focused. At Smitty’s, I learned speed and organization, the importance of working clean, working fast, and keeping your head down. Being a breakfast cook is one of the greatest trainings you can have. It all ties in together.” These days, McLeod oversees the culinary operations of Consortium Holdings, a hospitality group with 14 restaurants (plus more in the works) in San Diego. He’ll draw inspiration from one in particular, Ironside Fish & Oyster, when he comes to Tourism Vancouver’s Dine Out Vancouver Festival 2019 to participate in the Vancouver World Chef Exchange. Although Dine Out may be best known for the fixed-price menu deals that started it all 16 years ago, it has grown into the biggest annual celebration of food and drink in the entire country, with everything from cooking classes and food trucks to culinary tours and winery dinners. This year, more than 200 restaurants, wineries, breweries, and suppliers will take part in the 17-day event.
S ee
From left: As part of Dine Out Vancouver, Coquille’s Chris Janowski brings Parisian experience (photo by Eric Milic), while Heritage Asian Eatery chef Felix Zhou teams up with a revered early mentor (photo by Gabrielle Mustapich).
At the heart of the festival is community, and nowhere is this more pronounced than in the Vancouver World Chef Exchange. The program invites five visionary international chefs to collaborate with some of the city’s standout culinary talent to develop multicourse menus with wine pairings. McLeod’s visit is a homecoming of sorts: he hasn’t cooked in B.C. since the 2004 opening of the Whistler Four Seasons Resort. He’ll be teaming up with Coquille chef de cuisine Chris Janowski at the Gastown seafood restaurant run by the team behind L’Abattoir. The two will create a meal that celebrates the Pacific Ocean. McLeod hints at dishes featuring spot prawns, honey mussels, black cod, oysters, and more. “The World Chef Exchange goes back to how I got started in the industry in the first place: it’s all about relationships,” McLeod says. “Any chance you get to go cook in another restaurant or city, you meet really great people. The people are the most special part of it. We’re able to share stories and do different techniques, and there are all the things you learn from doing that.”
Janowski’s kitchen stories go back to his childhood in Saskatoon, where his family loved gardening and cooking together, making their own sausages, pickles, and Polish classics like cabbage rolls and Easter breads. By age six, he knew he wanted to be a chef, that dream being realized after he attended Toronto’s George Brown culinary school. He worked at several notable Toronto restaurants before taking on the head-chef role at Paris’s Ellsworth. During his tenure, Condé Nast Traveler magazine named it one of that city’s best restaurants. Janowski thrived under the pressure of a Parisian kitchen. “I learned to have courage, to be brave, to challenge yourself, and to follow your dreams,” he says by phone. “That’s where it really started to come to me, a real love and passion for the simplicity of the food and the quality of the products. I visited farms around the countryside to get the very, very best ingredients we could and prepared them simply, with care and passion.” Employing the same approach at Coquille, he views the exchange as an exciting opportunity for local chefs and diners alike. “It allows us to be a part of the new wave of food,” Janowski says. “It’s
nice to have a global community right here and cook together for a day of friendship and learning.” Presented by Aeroplan, the Vancouver World Chef Exchange has hosted chefs from Thailand, China, Japan, Ireland, Mexico, and other nations since launching in 2016. Though the popular culinary series gives food lovers the chance to taste cuisines by innovative chefs from far-flung destinations, it also helps raise the city’s culinary reputation worldwide. Visiting chefs typically take home with them news and inspiration from Vancouver’s vibrant dining scene, and the invites are often reciprocated, with local chefs later travelling abroad to bring their styles to other corners of the map. “I’m so stoked to be coming,” McLeod says. “Vancouver is one of the great dining cities of the world, with its ethnic diversity and so many young chefs. It’s still underrated.” The four other Vancouver World Chef Exchange pairings are just as exciting as the Coquille-Ironside mashup. Edgar Kano, executive chef of Yew Seafood + Bar at the Four Seasons Hotel Vancouver, who hails from Mexico City, will host Italian-born,
Australia-based Francesco Mannelli from Mode Kitchen & Bar at the Four Seasons Hotel Sydney. Bauhaus Restaurant’s chef team of Tim Schulte and David Mueller joins forces with Sascha Stemberg of Düsseldorf’s Haus Stemberg, which has had a Michelin star since 2013. For a night of classic French food with a Québécois flair, J C Poirier of St. Lawrence Restaurant will host Jérémie Bastien, who helms Monarque, a 10,000-square-foot brasserie and dining room in Old Montreal. “French food is festive,” Poirier says. “It feels like a big party. With these collaborative dinners, it gives us a connection with our customers; we want them to enjoy the experience as if they were in my home.” Heritage Asian Eatery chef Felix Zhou hosts Warren Geraghty, culinary director of the U.K.’s Rhubarb Hospitality Group. The two met several years ago while working at West Restaurant and worked together again at Galvin La Chapelle in London. Zhou considers Geraghty one of his early mentors. Geraghty, who has also held roles at other Michelin-starred restaurants throughout the U.K., tells the Straight that he’s looking forward to taking advantage of B.C. ingredients again, with foods such as short ribs from Two Rivers Meats, Thiessen Farms ducks, West Coast oysters, squash, sturgeon, pine, and more. “My time in Vancouver at West were truly some of the best years of my life,” Geraghty says. “The ingredients are second to none on the West Coast, and the love of food and wine in B.C. is so strong that it’s a real pleasure to be a cook here. “Since I left in 2010, I have followed the food scene, and it’s been amazing to watch the new and exciting places that have opened and flourished,” he adds. “It’s a real honour to come back. Vancouver is such an incredible culinary city, and events like these can only help to reinforce this.”
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Tourism Vancouver’s Dine Out Vancouver Festival 2019 runs at various venues from January 18 to February 3. See dineoutvancouver.com/ for more details.
PAGE
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JAN 11/12
WHOLE LOTTA SHAKIN’: FROM SWING TO ROCK
VSO POPS Trace the musical path from the golden age of swing through the early days of rock ‘n’ roll, including chart-topping hits by Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. You’ll be In the Mood to Sing Sing Sing!
JAN 13 THE HOCKEY SWEATER
KIDS’ KONCERTS One of the most famous of Canadian stories, author Roch Carrier’s short story The Hockey Sweater, set to music by Abigail Richardson.
JAN
NMF
From the “the loveliest apocalypse in musical history” to a meditation on birdsong, the VSO’s 6th Annual New Music Festival explores the state of our world today during four days of musical discovery. Featuring the music of John Luther Adams, Nicole Lizée, Claude Vivier, Emily Doolittle, and many more.
FEB 1/2
2019 VANCOU VE R SYM P HONY ORCHESTRA NEW MUSIC FESTIVAL JAN 16 – 19, 2019
VSO NEW MUSIC FESTIVAL JAN 16, 17, 18, 19
TOVEY CONDUCTS BRUCKNER & DEBUSSY
MASTERWORKS GOLD Maestro Bramwell Tovey makes his return as VSO Music Director Emeritus to conduct a piece by the very first composer he commissioned as Music Director, featuring the VSO’s former Principal Cello Ariel Barnes. This concert also features the towering sonic architecture of Bruckner’s Symphony No. 6.
FEB 8 CZECH BEAUTY: THE MOLDAU
INSIDE THE SYMPHONY The second concert in the VSO’s fun new afterwork series, featuring guest conductor Brett Mitchell and two of the best-loved Czech pieces: Smetana’s The Moldau and Dvořák’s Symphony no. 8. Join us for Happy Hour and a post-show mix and mingle with the musicians.
FEB 13 STRINGS, SONATAS & SEXTET 14/17 VSO CHAMBER PLAYERS
The Chamber Players shine a spotlight on strings with Gorecki’s highly virtuosic, Bartók-inspired Sonata for Two Violins, Ravel’s strikingly spare Sonata for Violin and Cello, and Dvořák’s energetic Sextet for Strings, written during the composer’s Slavic period.
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arts
Ukraine’s Dakh Daughters fearlessly meld music, theatre, and activism, striking up a hyperenergized seven-piece band and channelling the political and cultural rebirth happening in their homeland.
Dakh Daughters forge a “freak cabaret”
U
by Tony Montague
kraine’s Dakh Daughters are not just a seven-piece band, but a theatrical collective. They combine music and theatre in equal parts in highly original performances that are sonically and visually dynamic, and vast in their emotional range—from sweetness to explosive rage. “It’s very linked to Ukrainian culture, because we have a strong story of musical drama-theatre from the beginning of the 20th century—and even before that,” says Tanya Havrylyuk, like all the women in Dakh Daughters a multi-instrumentalist (keyboards, double bass, flute, percussion), reached at her home in Kiev the day before the group’s first North American tour. “So in the times when we used to be actors we performed shows that always had a lot of music and singing, a lot of folk. And since we are children of the theatre we always try now to make every composition a little performance piece, a little life story. I think that’s the most remarkable thing about Dakh Daughters—this connection between music and theatre, through ages and into the future.” The women have been friends for 10 or 15 years, working together as members of the Dakh Theatre company. Its director, Vlad Troitsky, is also the artistic director of Dakh Daughters,
formed in 2012, and is behind the group’s striking and unsettling look. “It was Vlad’s idea since we showed him the first esquisse [sketch] of the show,” Havrylyuk says. “He suggested we wear white dresses and have white faces and this is how we are united, how we put more dramatic sense into the art that we’re making.” The tag “freak cabaret”, as Dakh Daughters style their performances, is another of Troitsky’s ideas. “He has a very strong influence on us,” she says. “Sometimes when he suggests an idea, even if for the moment we don’t understand why it is, we trust him and his sense, and it always works. Actually, these two elements are what we call the connection between music and theatre, because the word freak in this sense means the hero of the modern world, the person who is not afraid to be unique, to be brave, and to express yourself the way you want. “And as for cabaret, its roots are not only in France—there was German and Austrian cabaret at the beginning of the last century, and in Ukraine also,” she adds. “When cabaret first appeared, it was the image of the modern theatrical stage on which you can tell the truth, and share your art and your opinions, your energy, your feelings, and connect with your public.” Dakh Daughters lived the link between art
and politics in 2014, during the bloody protests in Kiev against a Ukrainian government that was developing closer ties to Vladimir Putin’s Russia. Protesters set up camps in central Maidan Square and started taking over government buildings. In battles between them and police, some 80 people died. “It was a remarkable moment in our story and the story of our country,” Havrylyuk recalls. “First of all, it was the call of the heart, so when everything started we felt that we want to act like citizens, helping people, and taking care of each other. Then we realized, ‘Okay, what else can we do to unite this movement?’ We understood that as artists our weapon is art, so we are supposed to take it into the streets and into the Maidan Square and perform for people, to share these thoughts and feelings with them and show them that we’re all connected by the same dreams, the same good ideas. It was very exciting, very powerful for the band. We went through a rebirth and became stronger and more interesting. Everywhere we go, all over the world we’re telling the story of the new Ukraine and it’s a very important element of our artistic mission.” Words—sung or spoken—are a crucial element of Dakh Daughters’ performance, and there will be surtitled translations in
Vancouver. On-stage, film and video footage is projected behind the artists, who frequently change instruments. Their compelling music blends contemporary punk, new-music minimalism, and reimagined traditional Ukrainian folk. “We often work with very archaic folk songs,” says Havrylyuk. “And we always try to give a new breath of life to this music because it’s very beautiful and very powerful—it’s our roots and at the same time it’s very actual for the modern world, too.” Surprisingly, perhaps, Dakh Daughters don’t align themselves with any particular ideology. “We’re not getting into any movements, and we don’t want to take any radical point of view,” Havrylyuk says. “We’re not calling ourselves a feminist collective. We think that harmony and balance is the best way. Both female and male energies have to be in balance. We never had any problem with this in our country. Ukraine is very feminine in energy, and image. For us, it’s totally natural and that’s what we’re about. We’re moving into a bright future in which everyone can express themselves.”
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Dakh Daughters perform at the York Theatre from Tuesday to next Saturday (January 15 to 19).
Mrs. Krishnan dishes out laughs and food
A
by Janet Smith
uckland actor Kalyani Nagarajan has some clear advice for audience members attending the rambunctious, curry-fuelled Kiwi play called Mrs. Krishnan’s Party. “Be ready for a party. Don’t be shy,” she begins over the phone from a sunny morning on New Zealand’s North Island. “You’re going to have a good time. You’re going to enjoy yourself. You’re going to want to call your mom. Also, don’t come too full.” If that doesn’t sound like the usual preparation for a night out at the theatre… Well, Mrs. Krishnan’s Party is not a usual night out at the theatre. The comedy is an interactive experience that invites its audience to a dinner celebration, offering spots right at the table, plus standing room and nearby seating. In the fun-loving yet bittersweet creation from Indian Ink Theatre Company, Nagarajan’s title character
Kalyani Magarajan plays the title character in Mrs. Krishnan’s Party.
contemplates selling her convenience store—better known as a “dairy” in New Zealand. Her husband was shot during a robbery there over two decades ago, and she’s been running it alone, as a single mother, ever since. But her boarder James, a young Maori
DJ, decides to throw her a party celebrating Onam—the Indian harvest festival feting life, death, and rebirth—and the audience members play the party guests for the event in the corner shop’s back room. “She’s still grieving and this is about her facing her demons,” Nagarajan explains. “James is putting it right in front of her and saying, ‘You need to face this. Some grief has to happen for you to really change.’ ” Amid all this, there’s a lot of laughter—and a lot of cross-cultural fun, says Nagarajan, who explains the show reaches far beyond the South Asian community with its intergenerational tale. “It’s terrifying,” admits the actor with a hearty laugh, adding that only about 60 percent of the action is scripted. “It’s different every night. We warm up and me and my co-actor Justin [Rogers] say, ‘Oh shit, there’s nothing else we can do to prepare!’
It’s audience-dependent—which is both a blessing and a curse.” At least Nagarajan doesn’t have to stretch too far out of her comfort zone to play Mrs. Krishnan: creators Jacob Rajan and Justin Lewis drew heaps of inspiration from her own South Asian mother. “This character has been in development for seven years now, and a lot comes from my own experience from my Indian aunties and my mom,” says Nagarajan, who dons false teeth and glasses to take on the older character. “So I’m pretty much taking the piss out of my mother, but with a lot of heart and a lot of integrity.” Aside from her acting skills, Nagarajan is putting to use the culinary talents she honed living with her family, which hails from Madras. “Cooking is something I grew up with; cooking is my second-biggest passion after theatre,” explains Nagarajan, who makes her traditional dahl
throughout the play. “When we were building the show, we knew we wanted the audience to have food to build community. You see that with every culture: to build community you need food. The cool thing about the show is it’s happening in real time, and all the drama happens within one hour.” That means Nagarajan is juggling a lot over the course of a highly multisensory, family-friendly hour, from burning incense to blowing up balloons and mixing ingredients. “You really have to be on as a performer. But it’s also great, because you don’t get lazy,” says Nagarajan, also encouraging people to bring their kids. “Then, at the end of the show, people hang around for 45 minutes talking and connecting. And that’s exactly what you want theatre to do.”
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Mrs. Krishnan’s Party is at the Vancity Culture Lab from Tuesday (January 15) to February 3.
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DRINK
A new year of wine adventures Fill your 2019 calendar with grand tastings and can’t-miss festivals
I
by Kurtis Kolt
’m doing plenty of the common, expected things to start off the new year. I’ve been hitting the gym fairly often, going for runs, trying to read more, and so on. Eating better is a big one; my meals have been a little fresher, less processed, plant-forward, and when opting for meat or seafood, I’m putting extra effort into ensuring they’re sourced ethically and sustainably. I’ve been on the same train of thought with wine lately, too. If I’m looking for my food to be authentic and sustainable, I want my wine to follow those same lines as much as possible. I’m not saying that every bottle I reach for this year has to be organic or come out of a LEED–certified winery, but I do want to put more of a personal focus on drinking wines where the growers, winemakers, and proprietors behind them err in those sorts of directions. While I won’t be militant or sanctimonious about these choices, I will try to be much more thoughtful with them, and the wines featured in these pages will likely ref lect that. We’re certainly primed for a year full of wine-fuelled adventures. Tourism Vancouver’s annual Dine Out Vancouver Festival runs January 18 through February 3, when we’ll see a multitude of local restaurants offering three-course menus at incredible value while pop-ups, food tours, and other events fill the calendar. All the events are kicked off on January 17 at the Rocky Mountaineer station with the Grand Tasting. For $99, attendees will have the opportunity to try culinary delights from more than a dozen local restaurants like La Mezcaleria, the Arbor, and Wildebeest while enjoying drinks from over 30 British Columbian craft breweries, cideries, and wineries—from Central City Brewers and Distillers and Steamworks Brewery to Summerhill Pyramid Winery and Vancouver Island’s Blue Grouse Estate Winery. More information and tickets are available at dineoutvancouver.com/. In the past, it’s been a quick sellout, so don’t sleep on this one. Following Dine Out festivities is the return of the Vancouver International Wine Festival, running February 23 to March 3. Tickets have just been released for all events, and the can’t-miss editions of the International Festival Tasting—with all participating wineries at the Vancouver Convention Centre overlooking the North Shore mountains—go down February 28, March 1, and March 2. Although wines from all over the globe—including Australia, Portugal, Italy, and Chile—will be
Domaine de la Pépière’s La Pépiè Cabernet Franc is light on its feet.
poured by winery principals, the theme region this year is California, where folks from more than 50 wineries are heading up the coast to show us their best stuff. I’m particularly looking forward to sipping the dynamite organic fare from Grgich Hills Estate and catching up with the Trefethen family, whose sustainable methods span the vineyard and the winery, including employment practices that incorporate living wages and benefits. Oh, and they make kickass wine, too! All you need to know is at vanwinefest.com/. I’ll have more of a comprehensive preview in coming weeks. If you’re looking to enhance your wine knowledge, mark January 24 and February 1 in your calendar. Those are the dates of the local two-
day course from the Wine and Spirit Education Trust of London, where passing the final exam nabs you the level-one award in wine certification from the most respected wineeducation body on the planet. Local educator Iain Philip will lead two three-and-a-half-hour classes at the Les Amis du Fromage digs on East Hastings Street, covering classic regions, grape varieties, food-andwine pairing, and more. Head to wineplus.ca/ to lock things in. Finally, I found myself smitten with a bottle of Domaine de la Pépière La Pépiè Cabernet Franc 2017 (Loire Valley, France; $25 to $29, private wine stores) I picked up recently. Out of southwest-facing hillside granitic soils comes this zesty, biodynamically farmed red, which is macerated for four days postharvest, lightly pressed, then fermented in stainless steel. Far from a chunky, Napa-style Cabernet Franc, this one is clean as a whistle and light on its feet. On the nose, an abundance of fresh herbs like basil, sorrel, and mint leads to a palate loaded with vibrant red berry fruit, a little red bell pepper, and a pinch of white pepper on the finish. Served with a hint of a chill, it’s buoyant and cheery and will go well with anything from duck confit to stinky cheeses. I picked up a bottle at Robson Wine Beer & Spirits, right across from the library downtown, but it’s also recently been spotted at Kitsilano Wine Cellar on West 4th Avenue. A highly recommended, bright start to the new year.
D rink OF THE WEEK
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CROWBAR OWNER William Johnson is a certified sommelier and a certified cider professional whose Fraserhood restaurant features one of the city’s largest local-craft-cider lists. With his Negroni Sbagliato, he puts a cidery twist on the classic Italian cocktail that takes its name from the Italian word for “mistake”. “This cocktail is for the bold and playful,” Johnson says. “It’s a nod to the happy experimentation of replacing Prosecco with B.C. cider.” NEGRONI SBAGLIATO 30 mL Campari 30 mL sweet vermouth Lone Tree Apple Cider, to top 1 slice dried apple
Stir together Campari and sweet vermouth and pour over a large ice cube in an old-fashioned glass. Top with cider and garnish with a dried apple slice.
by Gail Johnson
ARTS
“Fejérvári performed the piece with sweep and discernment and made the concerto’s bird-like song and nocturnal atmosphere tremendously affecting” — International Piano Magazine
Tickets start at
Composer Emily Doolittle is one of several VSO New Music Festival composers bringing an awareness of environmental issues to their work (photo by Jose Mandojana). The inspiration for her Reedbird is the bobolink’s burbling (photo by Jim Hudgins).
VSO New Music fest takes flight
J
by Alexander Varty
ust as there are cyclical forces in nature, there are tides and currents in art, and what we’ve been seeing in much contemporary music is a move away from the austere conceptualism of the post–World War II past. Whether by incorporating elements of popular music, reconceptualizing baroque or classical notions, or adopting musical concepts from beyond the western canon, composers are gleefully expanding their sonic possibilities—and one of the most fruitful new avenues involves music inspired by the natural world. This is not an entirely new concept, of course. Antonio Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons is but one example of a composer taking his cue from nature’s rhythm. Ludwig van Beethoven emulated cuckoo song in his Piano Sonata No. 25, and the inspiration behind Ralph Vaughan Williams’s The Lark Ascending needs no explanation. But today’s bird- and whale-song-besotted composers— like Emily Doolittle, John Luther Adams, and VSO composer in residence Jocelyn Morlock, all of whom will be featured in the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra’s upcoming New Music Festival—are bringing a pointed awareness of environmental issues to their work, along with analytical techniques borrowed from biological researchers. “I think there’s a lot of people writing new music based on animal songs or other natural sounds,” Doolittle confirms in a Skype interview from her Glasgow home. “A lot of people are looking for that connection in various different ways.” Given that the Nova Scotia–born composer’s father is pioneering microbiologist Ford Doolittle, one might speculate that she’s predisposed to examining the minutiae of the natural world. Instead, she reports that her interest in working animal song into her music comes from a revelation she experienced not long after moving to Amsterdam to study composition. “One night I heard this really amazing bird singing outside my window,” Doolittle explains. “I hadn’t heard a bird like it before, so I sort of threw open my window and listened. I was interested by the way that what it was saying sounded like human music—but the whole song didn’t sound like human music. I listened for a long time, and the next day I went and asked everyone what the bird was, and it turned out that it was a European blackbird.…I ended up writing a piece called night black bird song in which I transcribed some motifs of what that blackbird sang, and then organized them first the way
I thought a blackbird might, and then gradually transformed them into the way I thought a human might. “At the time, I thought, ‘Okay, that will be my bird-song piece, and then I’ll be on to another topic,’ but it actually started something that I’m not done with yet,” she adds. “Twenty years later, I keep coming back to bird song and other animal songs in lots of different ways.” Reedbird, which the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra will premiere at the Orpheum next Saturday (January 19), exemplifies that fascination. When Doolittle first received the VSO commission, she intended to work with whale song in order to fit in with the aquatic theme of the other pieces on the New Music Festival program, notably Adams’s transfixing meditation on climate change, Become Ocean. But the birds kept calling her back. “There are actually 5,000 species of songbirds, and they each have their own song, which has its own motivic patterns; they each have their own way of arranging them and juxtaposing those patterns, their own way of structuring the songs. So I think that the more you look at one bird song, the more you become curious about other bird songs,” she says, noting that exploring the alien intelligence of birds is a way of breaking free of her human preconceptions of
what music should be. “Plus,” she adds with a laugh, “listening to bird songs is a less lonely way to begin a piece than just sitting at the piano with a blank page.” Sometimes the beauty of the song is enough to spark a piece, as was the case with Reedbird, inspired by the burbling call of the bobolink. Although this small, songful blackbird was familiar to her from her Nova Scotia childhood, and although it’s becoming endangered due to the loss of its favoured marshy habitats, Doolittle says her concerns were primarily musical rather than nostalgic or environmental. Still, in the current moment it’s hard to separate the social from the sonic. “I do think there’s a general, underlying message in my music, which is that these animals are important, and that there’s not just an anonymous mass of birds out there,” she notes. “There’s all these different species, and inside all these species there are all these individuals, and they each have their own song and their own desire to be living in the place they’re in. So the message is that we need to pay attention to these other living beings, and preserve a space for them.”
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The Vancouver Symphony Orchestra’s New Music Festival takes place at Christ Church Cathedral and the Orpheum from next Wednesday to Saturday (January 16 to 19).
VSO New Music TIP SHEET
c NEW MUSIC FOR OLD
INSTRUMENTS January 16 at Christ Church Cathedral The oldest instrument of all, of course, is the human voice, and there are few finer exponents of unaccompanied singing than the members of New York Polyphony. The “new” aspect in this Early Music Vancouver collaboration is Gregory Brown’s Missa Charles Darwin, a setting of texts from the pioneering evolutionary biologist. And the composer presumably knows a thing or two about reinventing the past: his brother is Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown.
c DEEP GROOVE January 17 at Christ Church Cathedral Standing Wave’s chamber
concert is an annual highlight of the New Music Festival. Made up of some of the VSO’s finest new-music specialists, here the ensemble will perform works by half a dozen adventurous thinkers, including Jared Miller’s humpback-inspired Leviathan and Hafdís Bjarnadóttir’s rockinflected Woodstock Revisited.
c VSO PLAYS JOHN LUTHER ADAMS January 19 at the
Orpheum Excellent as all of the New Music Festival’s programming is, the one don’t-miss event is surely the local premiere of John Luther Adams’s Pulitzer Prize–winning Become Ocean, in which the American composer represents the coming ecological catastrophe as a musical storm of roiling waves, rising seas, and strange, apocalyptic beauty. It’s been universally hailed as a modern masterpiece since its debut in 2014.
8pm Friday, January 25, 2019 Shaughnessy Heights United Church 1550 West 33rd Avenue at Connaught Drive Vancouver Chamber Choir | Erick Lichte, conductor The final audition concert presents Erick Lichte, whom Vancouverites know as Artistic Director of Chor Leoni Men’s Choir. His mostly contemporary and international repertoire will include Tavener’s Village Wedding, Lang’s manifesto, Whitacre’s A Boy and a Girl, Rautavaara, Wadsworth, Caamaño, Ešenvalds, Daley, Higdon, Sametz, Mendelssohn and Gershwin.
1.855.985.ARTS (2787) vancouverchamberchoir.com
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JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 19
ARTS
Fred Armisen and Steve-O join fest lineup
F
by Janet Smith
red Armisen, of warped Saturday Night Live and Portlandia fame, is bringing his Comedy for Musicians but Everyone Is Welcome show to the JFL NorthWest comedy fest. He’ll hit the Vogue Theatre on February 16 as part of several big new additions to the festival’s roster. As well as putting a bird on it with fellow musician Carrie Brownstein (of Sleater-Kinney) in the satirical TV show Portlandia, Armisen is the drummer and leader of the Fred Armisen and Steve-O are coming to February’s JFL NorthWest comedy festival. house band for Late Night With Seth Meyers, where he’s always eager to and Brit punk rocker Ian Rubbish. appearances in films like Trainwreck, judge a book by its cover. On SNL, Elsewhere, Dave Attell, known for appears at the same venue on Februhe’s nailed such eccentric roles as his Netflix series Bumping Mics with ary 14. He gained a following with Nuni Schoener, the foreign art dealer, fellow comic Jeff Ross as well as movie Comedy Central’s crudely hilarious
Insomniac With Dave Attell. And Jackass stunt dude SteveO brings his multimedia comedy show The Bucket List to the Vogue on February 17. The man born Stephen Glover is clean and sober these days, but evidently doing stunts more bone-breaking than ever. Meanwhile, podcast fans will be stoked to hear SuperMega Live’s Matt Watson and Ryan Magee bring their weird assortment of videos, video games, and mail openings to the Biltmore on February 14. In other news, due to popular demand, JFL NorthWest has added a second show for another hit podcast, Girls Gotta Eat, on February 15 at the Biltmore.
Tickets for all of the above go on sale Friday (January 11) at www. jflnorthwest.com/. Previously announced headliners include Howie Mandel & Friends (February 14 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre), comedian and Parks and Recreation star Aziz Ansari (February 15 at the Q.E.), MexicanAmerican standup Gabriel Iglesias (February 18 at the Q.E.), and 2 Broke Girls creator and Whitney star Whitney Cummings (February 16 at the Vogue Theatre). MADtv alumnus Bryan Callen performs his standup show February 21 at the Vogue, and An Evening With Antoni Porowski is set to take place on February 20 at the same venue.
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ARTS LISTINGS ONGOING THE FULL LIGHT OF DAY Provocative hybrid of theatre and film features the talents of Jim Mezon, Gabrielle Rose, and Jillian Fargey. To Jan 12, Vancouver Playhouse. $19.99. THROWDOWN—INTERNATIONAL THEATRESPORTS FESTIVAL 2019 Vancouver TheatreSports’ annual improv celebration. To Jan 27, The Improv Centre. From $10.75. DOUGLAS COUPLAND’S VORTEX Douglas Coupland’s radical art installation takes an imaginative journey to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, immersing viewers in the ocean-plastic pollution crisis. To April 30, 2019, Vancouver Aquarium. $22/39. TITANIC: THE ARTIFACT EXHIBITION Exhibition focuses on the legendary RMS Titanic’s
compelling human stories through more than 120 authentic artifacts and extensive room re-creations. To Jan 11, 2019, Lipont Place. MUSEUM OF ANTHROPOLOGY AT UBC IN A DIFFERENT LIGHT: REFLECTING ON NORTHWEST COAST ART to spring 2019 MARKING THE INFINITE: CONTEMPORARY WOMEN ARTISTS FROM ABORIGINAL AUSTRALIA to Mar 31 SHAKEUP: PRESERVING WHAT WE VALUE to Sep 1 BILL REID GALLERY OF NORTHWEST COAST ART BODY LANGUAGE: REAWAKENING CULTURAL TATTOOING OF THE NORTHWEST to Jan 13 INTERFACE: THE WOVEN ARTWORK OF JAAD KUUJUS to Jan 9 MUSEUM OF VANCOUVER WILD THINGS: THE POWER OF NATURE IN OUR LIVES to Sep 30 HAIDA NOW: A VISUAL FEAST OF INNOVATION AND TRADITION to Dec 1, 2019
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OBJECT ON THE GROUND to Jan 13 KEVIN SCHMIDT: RECKLESS to Mar 10, 4-11 pm
VANCOUVER ART GALLERY A CURATOR’S VIEW: IAN THOM SELECTS to Mar 17 GUO PEI: COUTURE BEYOND to Jan 20, 10 am–5 pm DANA CLAXTON: FRINGING THE CUBE to Feb 3 THE METAMORPHOSIS to Mar 7
PENDULUM GALLERY KLUSTERFLUX: STEFANY HEMMING & CAROLE SINCLAIR to Feb 1
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POLYGON GALLERY BATIA SUTER: PARALLEL ENCYCLOPEDIA EXTENDED to Jan 13 LOOKING AT PERSEPOLIS: THE CAMERA IN IRAN 1850-1930 to Jan 13 HANNAH RICKARDS: ONE CAN MAKE OUT THE SURFACE ONLY BY PLACING ANY DARK-COLOURED
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WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 9 STORY STORY LIE: HOT AND HEAVY Sex stories by Tristan Risk, Shirley Gnome, Cory Thibert, Claire Pollock, Montana Roselle, and Anjie Mittelholtz. Jan 9, 7-8:30 pm, Rio Theatre. $10. PATRICIA SANDBERG—VOICE: WHO SHOULD TELL YOUR STORY? Author discusses the voice she used in Sun Dogs and Yellowcake. Jan 9, 7-9 pm, Alliance for Arts and Culture. $5-10.
BLIND DATE Fusion of clown, improv, theatre, and social experiment. Jan 9-19, 7:30-9:30 pm, Surrey Arts Centre. $29-$49.
THURSDAY, JANUARY 10 TWENTIETH CENTURY CLARINET SONATAS Featuring pianist Scott Meek and clarinetist Liam Hockley. Jan 10, 1-2 pm, Laura C. Muir Performing Arts Theatre. Free. SONGS OF THE VAGABOND CELLO Cellist, composer, and multilingual vocalist Ian Maksin. Jan 10, 7 pm, Columbia Theatre. $30-65. THE ODD COUPLE (FEMALE VERSION) Easygoing and neurotic personalities clash when two women become roommates. Jan 10-19, Evergreen Cultural Centre. $24/$19.
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TICKETS SELLING FAST! 24 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019
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UNSCRIPTURED: EXPANDED EDITION Improvised church service for a religion made up on the spot. Jan 10-12, 8-9:30 pm, Havana Theatre. $5 plus donation. ALEX MOFFAT New York–based comedian performs three nights of standup. Jan 10, 8:3010 pm; Jan 11-12, The Comedy MIX. $15/$20. JOKES PLEASE! Standup comedy show hosted by Ross Dauk. Jan 10, 9-10:45 pm, Little Mountain Gallery. $7.
FRIDAY, JANUARY 11 STUDIO SHOWING: COMPANY 605 Excerpts from a new work in development, Loop, Lull. Jan 11, 3 pm, Scotiabank Dance Centre. Free. UBC CONCERTO COMPETITION UBC Music students compete to perform with UBCSO. Jan 11, 6:30 pm, Roy Barnett Recital Hall. Free. JOSH WOLF American comedian performs two nights of standup. Jan 11-12, Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club. $25. DBLSPK: GRAMMA Boca del Lupo and rice & beans theatre present a quarterly reading series. Jan 11, 8-9:30 pm, The Fishbowl. $10. ALICIA TOBIN’S COME DRAW WITH ME Part art class, part comedy show. Jan 11, 10 pm, Little Mountain Gallery. $10/$12.
SATURDAY, JANUARY 12 CIRCLE GAME: REIMAGINING THE MUSIC OF JONI MITCHELL The music of Joni Mitchell is reimagined in a play by Andrew Cohen and Anna Kuman. Jan 12–Feb 9, Firehall Arts Centre. From $25. SODA FOUNTAIN Comedy/variety show hosted by Graeme Achurch and Nathan Hare. Jan 12, 10:30 am, Little Mountain Gallery. $7/$10. PINOCCHIO Theatrical flamenco dance. Jan 12, 3-4 pm, 5-6 pm, The Improv Centre. $12. PERFORM FOR PRIDE Benefit cabaret for QMUNITY, an LGBTQ+ community centre
and resource centre. Jan 12, 7 pm, Deep Cove Shaw Theatre. $15. BRUNCH: A COMEDY SHOW—NEW YEARS 2019, AGAIN Sketch- and improv-comedy show. Jan 12, 7-9:30 pm, Little Mountain Gallery. $10/$12. COMEDY FOR A CURE #ENDNF An evening of comedy with three funny folks: Charlie Demers, Jacob Samuel and host KatieEllen Humphries. Funny fun FUNdraiser to benefit the Tumour Foundation of BC and children and individuals living with neurofibromatosis. Jan 12, 7:15 pm, Rio Theatre. $25/$30. VANCOUVER CHAMBER MUSIC SOCIETY: STEFAN JACKIW & CONRAD TAO One of the most significant artists and a leading soloist of this generation, violinist Stefan Jackiw returns to Vancouver after his striking concerto appearance with the VSO in 2016. This recital is in collaboration with pianist Conrad Tao, a recipient of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant and the Presidential Awards Grant. Jan 12, 7:30 pm, West Vancouver United Church. $25-$35. GOD IS A SCOTTISH DRAG QUEEN: THE SECOND COMING Comedian Mike Delamont skewers everything from Platypus to Pocahontas. Jan 12, 8 pm, The ACT Arts Centre. Tix $42/$36/$33. THE COMIC STRIP Comedy by Gavin Clarkson, Oli Maughan, and headliner Steev Letts. Jan 12, 9 pm, Tyrant Studios. $18. FISTFUL OF KICKS Anime comedy brought to life. Jan 12, 10:30-11:30 pm, Havana Theatre. $12.
SUNDAY, JANUARY 13 MUSICIRCUS AT THE POLYGON GALLERY The event is simple: as many musicians as possible are invited to perform anything they want and in any way they desire—all at the same time. This act of artistic community brings together numerous musicians and performers for
an improvisatory afternoon, featuring compositions by legendary composer John Cage. Jan 13, 1-4 pm, The Polygon Gallery. By donation. CHACCONE Violinist Nancy DiNovo performs a solo program. Jan 13, 4-5 pm, Roedde House Museum. $15/$12. EAST VAN IMPROV LEAGUE Instant Theatre presents competitive improv comedy. Jan 13, 7:30-8:30 pm, Havana Theatre. $12.
MONDAY, JANUARY 14 PITCH, BITCH, OR DITCH The Dragon’s Den of theatre. Jan 14, 8 pm, The Cultch. $10.
TUESDAY, JANUARY 15 DAKH DAUGHTERS Seven actresses use musical instruments in a performance about love, freedom, and beauty. Jan 15-19, 8 pm, York Theatre. $10-$51. MRS. KRISHNAN’S PARTY Mrs. Krishnan’s boarder invites a few friends into the back room of the corner shop as a special surprise to celebrate Onam. Jan 15–Feb 3, 8 pm, Vancity Culture Lab. $24-$59. JUDGE JOHN HODGMAN American comedian. Jan 15, 9 pm, Rio Theatre. $35.
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16 LONDON HAYDN QUARTET The quartet performs Haydn’s String Quartet Op. 76 with early clarinet specialist Eric Hoeprich. Jan 16, 10-11:30 am; Jan 17, 10 am–11:30 pm, Vancouver Academy of Music. $38/$42.
THURSDAY, JANUARY 17 PUSH INTERNATIONAL PERFORMING ARTS FESTIVAL Startling theatre, innovative dance, and genre-defying music. Jan 17–Feb 3, Various Vancouver Venues. MUSIC FACULTY WINTER SHOWCASE Music from across the ages by Gabrieli, Cage,
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MOVIES
Ain’t no past like the present A teen malcontent yearns for another time in superb The Fireflies Are Gone
A high-schooler and her older friend make sweet but age-appropriate music in The Fireflies Are Gone (top); Anne Innis Dagg battles institutional chauvinsim in The Woman Who Loves Giraffes (bottom left); Is There a Picture puts Vancouver’s famed photographers in the frame (bottom right).
REVIEWS
THE FIREFLIES ARE GONE
Starring Karelle Tremblay. In French, with English subtitles. Rating unavailable
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“HEY, BACK to the Future,” someone yells at a hirsute fellow at the start of The Fireflies Are Gone. “What’s life like in 1985?” It’s meant as an insult, already ironic since it happens in a ’50s-style diner where teens still hang out. But everything in this unusually fresh coming-of-age dramedy from Quebec is soaked with nostalgia— in this case, major longing for a time before some of its characters were born. High-schooler Léonie, who has just turned 18, is pissed about almost everything relating to the present. Played with unfussy force by Karelle Tremblay (who’s actually 23, and will remind more than a few viewers of Ellen Page in Juno), our bratty teen, aswim in oversized sweatshirts and bad attitude, is chilly with her mom (Marie-France Marcotte) and downright vicious with her stepdad (François Papineau), an oily right-wing radio star. She has enough reason to loathe his reactionary smarm on the face of it, but it turns out he also had something to do with the downfall of her real father (Luc Picard), a union head who failed to keep alive a paper mill once central to the life of Chicoutimi, a working-class town north of Quebec City. With no real plans afoot—“The future lasts a long time,” she says with a shrug—Léo takes a job caretaking at a local baseball field. It actually suits her level of disinterest perfectly, and leaves her time to dabble in other things, like guitar lessons. These come courtesy of Steve, played by the excellent Pierre-Luc Brillant, who played one of the bullying older brothers in C.R.A.Z.Y. and provides some impressive guitar music here. Also the subject of that cinematic jibe at the start, Steve is pushing 40 and still lives in his mom’s basement. He is oddly content, however.
Writer-director Sébastien Pilote, who specializes in tales of disappearing old Quebec, is not interested in exploring an age-inappropriate romance here, and neither are the principals. Instead, it’s a beautifully shot and edited character study that captures some of the most elusive feelings that accompany the transition to adulthood. The fireflies of the title represent the changing environment of outer and inner worlds, and they lead to one of the most perfect movie endings of the year. Don’t miss it. by Ken Eisner
IS THERE A PICTURE
A documentary by Ric Beairsto and Harry Killas. Rating unavailable
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to the lack of a question mark at the end of the title quote from Jeff Wall, perhaps the best known (and named) of the haute-gallery photographers under glass in this thoughtful documentary. He’s the most religious adherent to the artifice-is-truth segment of what’s become known as the Vancouver School, in which documentary-style realism usually turns out to be highly managed stagecraft. So if Wall is asking about imagery at all, it’s mostly to identify what’s already in his head. The other superstar in the conceptual galaxy illuminated by veteran filmmakers Ric Beairsto and Harry Killas is Rodney Graham. He likewise undertakes large-frame, sometimes backlit studio images with a theatrical bent, but there are sometimes more elements of accident and disinformation built into them. Graham is also a painter, filmmaker, and long-time musician, and his tenure alongside Wall in the proto-artpunk band U-J3RK5—pronounced “you jerk”—is lightly explored, with archival footage helping to document that fading slice of Vancouver cultural history. (Band member and veteran CBCer David Wisdom is on hand to testify.) Marginally the eldest of the group, British-born Ian Wallace taught Wall and Graham at UBC. He’s been living in Paris and other
far-flung places, and his works often deal with urban dislocation, as well as the kind of abstraction that ties him to the postwar antifigurative movement. Like Wall, Greek-raised Christos Dikeakos sometimes sets up elaborate pictorial tableaux that expertly capture the illusion of candid snapshotting. His images tend to linger on some disruption between the present and buried history, often regarding the relentless development of False Creek and other familiar zones, or the scattered remnants of First Nations culture. The sole woman featured here, Marian Penner Bancroft is a multimedia artist and long-time professor whose current work favours the subtler textures of rural landscapes increasingly overlaid by modern life. The 95-minute movie doesn’t pretend to be comprehensive about contemporary photography in Vancouver, and the participants don’t really attempt to define their own ethos—where’s the advantage in that? But a fascinating Picture emerges nonetheless.
by Ken Eisner
THE WOMAN WHO LOVES GIRAFFES
A documentary by Alison Reid. Rated PG
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THERE ARE two endangered species mentioned in the title of The Woman Who Loves Giraffes, and Anne Innis Dagg speaks up for both of them. This well-assembled doc is a thoroughgoing introduction to someone who should be as familiar for her knowledge of and advocacy for giraffes as Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey are for primate studies. Her curse, if that’s what it was, was to begin work before the better-known but equally self-taught zoologists, and to come from the wrong country. Intriguingly, these pioneers were born within two years of each other, and Dagg—who turns a supremely active 86 this month—started out as the best connected of them. Her father, Harold Innis, was a hugely influential professor of economics and see next page
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Hawksworth Restaurant hawksworthrestaurant.com
Butler Did It Catering butlerdiditcatering.com JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 25
all without success. (One of the “oldstock” professors who blackballed her attempts at tenure appears briefly, and smugly.) This unfortunate passage marks only the middle section of an otherwise uplifting effort from first-time feature-maker Alison Reid, who spent three decades as a stuntwoman and stunt coordinator before easing into the director’s chair—and sitting quite tall there, from the look of it.
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communications, and mother Mary Quayle Innis was a noted historian. Although she was encouraged in early research by Louis Leakey, the anthropologist who fostered Fossey and Goodall ultimately wouldn’t stick his neck out for giraffes. Indeed, their otherworldly nature has never sparked the popular enthusiasm that primates, pachyderms, and large cats seem to generate. In 1956, with no academic sponsorship, she found (or rather created) a willing host in South Africa, in a wildlife rancher who also let her use his 16mm camera—thereby inadvertently supplying this breezy effort with beautiful colour footage detailing the lives of her subjects, and her own, as a brave and contagiously outgoing 23-year-old on a mission. Eventually married to unusually supportive Ian Dagg—himself a physics professor at the University of Waterloo—our budding giraffologist spent the next 10 years com-
by Ken Eisner
Gold is the new black for superstar designer Guo Pei, profiled in Yellow Is Forbidden.
pleting a high-level education, with all attendant degrees and the publishing of books and papers that remain paramount in her field. When she tried to turn that into gainful academic employment, however, it yielded worse than nothing. As recently as 1979, she was litigating against misogyny in Canada’s scholarly world,
YELLOW IS FORBIDDEN
A documentary by Pietra Brettkelly. In English, Mandarin, and French, with English subtitles. Rating unavailable
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AT ONE point in this intriguing and visually provocative documentary, Guo Pei declares herself “the slowest designer in the world”. She’s not far off. Some of her massive and densely detailed dresses—like the one Rihanna famously wore to the 2015 Met Gala—can take as much as 50,000 hours to complete. But there’s also the years that went into making the Chinese designer who she is. At just over 50, Guo is barely old enough have felt the tight grip of the Cultural Revolution, which demanded conformity in all things—especially visual presentation. Despite, or maybe because of, her parents’ party connections, she persisted in coming up with creative deviations from the norm. Fortunately for her, she graduated in fashion from the Beijing Second Light Industrial School just as Deng Xiaoping let private enterprise back in the door. The otherwise far-ranging movie, made by sharp-eyed New Zealander Pietra Brettkelly (A Flickering Truth), doesn’t delve much into her background. But it’s clear that persistence and good timing have marked her whole career, picked up here as she prepares for a big show in Paris, and attempts to join an haute-couture society formerly restricted largely to
French and Italian men. Guo has a neurotically large collection of stuffed bears, and her childlike countenance—she giggles dismissively when the former Wendi Murdoch tells her they’ll be meeting U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump at a fashion event—helps mask what appears to be a nuanced understanding of the political tightrope she walks, rather adroitly, over the world stage. The show in question is to be held at the Conciergerie, where Marie Antoinette was held before losing her head. The designer, who favours real gold in her intricate creations (which sometimes weigh more than 50 pounds) and now dresses a new class of oligarchs, explains that the yellow of the title was previously reserved for China’s imperial rulers. We all know what happened to them.
by Ken Eisner
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TIP SHEET VOX LUX Starring Natalie Portman, one of the most talked about movies of 2018 finally reaches the big screen in Vancouver with four nights at the Rio Theatre starting Thursday (January 10). LES SALOPES OR THE NATURALLY WANTON PLEASURE OF SKIN A horny academic boffs her way through today’s sexual politics in Renée Beaulieu’s racy film, coming to the Cinematheque for four nights starting Thursday (January 10). V6A After bringing the house down at the Italian Film Festival, Ruggero Romano’s heartfelt doc about the Downtown Eastside gets an encore screening at the Vancity Theatre on Sunday (January 13).
> Go on-line to read hundreds of I Saw You posts or to respond to a message < SAUNA WAVE
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 7, 2019 WHERE: Kits Community Center I was talking in the sauna at the Kits Community Center and you mistook my gesticulation for a wave. You gave me a thumbs up and left when you realized. You were cute! HMU if you thought I was cute too
MEXICAN FOOD - I WATCHED YOU EAT
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 6, 2019 WHERE: La Tacqueria You were having Mexican food with another woman. I was at the next table with a small Chinese woman friend. On a cold day, you were wearing a sleeveless summer weight top that displayed your quite beautiful tattoos. I wanted to look closer. You were slender and a peculiar amalgam of small wounded bird and steel taloned raptor. I was entranced by your presentation to the world. And, oh yes, those killer cheekbones.
BUSHY EYEBROWS TATTOO SLEEVES
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CANADA LINE GIRL WITH THE TAIKO DRUM PLUSHIE
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 7, 2019 WHERE: Canada Line This is a long shot but we were both riding the Canada Line downtown during rush hour in the morning. You were a petite blonde woman with frizzy hair and dirty grey converse, wearing an Anime sweater. You had some Japanese pins and a Donchan taiko drum plushie. I was the bearded plaid wearing lumberjack with a toque, hoping I’d give you my number as we got off at Waterfront but you never left the train. Drinks sometime?
NO.6 BUS,TRAVELLING EAST ON DAVIE
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 4, 2019 WHERE: Davie St. You, in wheelchair, me cheeky Brit. We chatted and then shouted first names to each other as you exited - to the amusement of other passengers. I’d like to see you again.
WEARING AN EXCESSIVELY ORANGE HAT
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 7, 2019 WHERE: Saanich
I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 5, 2019 WHERE: London Drugs #10
I saw you at the gym near the office. You commented on my koi fish tattoo. That they could use a mermaid to keep them company
You filled my prescription, and I said I was a bit like Eeyore because it wasn’t fully covered. I work with computers and am horrible with people. You are lithe with a becoming grace.
CAUGHT YOUR EYE AT DONALD’S ON HASTINGS
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 6, 2019 WHERE: Donald’s on Hastings and Nanaimo Busy Sunday shopping but you caught my eye a few times as we shopped. We ended up in the same line and I wanted to chat with you but the older lady was talking too much about chicken behind me and ahead of you. I was the cyclist guy with the blue jacket. You Brunette with baseball hat and black jeans? Was there some chemistry? Love to see!
STARBUCKS, YALETOWN STATION.
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: JANUARY 2, 2019 WHERE: Starbucks at Yaletown Canada Line I was putting sugar in my coffee and you came up to me and asked if I was going to work. I was wearing my orange hi viz vest and we talked briefly and I had to run for the bus. You: tall, partly Oriental, nice smile and great talker. Me: Tall, carrying black knapsack, in my uniform. Let's connect. Had no time for proper intro.
A LOVELY SURPRISE AT THE MATCHSTICK CAFE FRASER STREET
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: DECEMBER 29, 2018 WHERE: Matchstick Café on Fraser You: Short, beautiful, Asian, relaxing in the corner with rubber boots peeking over your device. Me: blond guy with a large group of people talking shit and drinking java’s. You got up to leave wearing your adorable beige toque and as you discarded your stir sticks and such you made eye contact with me and froze me with your smile. You did the same thing as you walked by outside. I’ve never done this, but 5 mins later I jumped in my car and went to find you, my dog was flying all over my back seat as I sped illegally... and I did find you in a store. I waited to long, when I looked back in you were gone. That wasn’t supposed to happen. We need to meet again. Haven’t stopped thinking about you. See you next Saturday? Over a glass of wine.
“WINGS OF DESIRE” SCREENING, 30 DEC
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: DECEMBER 30, 2018 WHERE: Pacific Cinematheque Going into the film I asked if you were there as part of our Meetup group. You said you were there because it was one of your favorite films. Afterwards I asked you to join us, but you already had plans. I had mentioned that you looked familiar from someplace, but didn’t get the chance to explain that I wish I knew you better.
GREY FUZZY DOG AT CONTACT
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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: DECEMBER 28, 2018 WHERE: BC Place I was in a Grey dog suit and you were quite tall in your shoes, gorgeous eyes, chin length hair and black t-shirt. We locked eyes for a few moments but you disappeared into the crowd.
Visit straight.com to post your FREE I Saw You _ 26 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019
Arts
HOT TICKET
CIRCLE GAME (January 12 to February 9 at the Firehall Arts Centre) If you missed this show subtitled Reimagining the Music of Joni Mitchell before, get ready to gain a new appreciation for the songs of the Canadian-born singer with this remount. The beauty of Andrew Cohen and Anna Kuman’s show is that, rather than aim for faithful cover versions, they spread the music between six singers and 18 different instruments. That means still-relevant works like “River” and “Big Yellow Taxi” take on beautiful new colours— making this a meaningful way to ease into the new year. MUSICIRCUS (January 13 at
the Polygon Gallery) The idea of John Cage’s monumental piece is simple: as many musicians as possible can perform anything they want in any way they desire—all at the same time. In this case, noted local musicians like Corey Hamm take on Cage pieces, while other ensembles and individuals play simultaneously. In other words, just follow your ears to this concert, held, fittingly, in conjunction with Hannah Rickards’s installation One can make out the surface only by placing any dark-coloured object on the ground.
HEXSA’AM: TO BE HERE ALWAYS (January 11 to April 7
at the Morris and Helen Belkin Gallery) Last summer, a group of artists converged on B.C.’s isolated Kingcome Inlet to address urgent threats to the land and water. Using media from weaving and song to film and animation, their work has culminated in a profound new show that pays tribute to, and fights for, the majestic fiord and its First Peoples. Names include Marianne Nicolson, Althea Thauberger, Siku Allooloo, Scott Benesiinaabandan, and Tania Willard.
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and Stockhausen. Jan 17, 1-2 pm, Laura C. Muir Performing Arts Theatre. Free. VETTA AFTERNOONS: GREAT RUSSIAN TRIOS Russian virtuoso pianist Anastasia Markina returns to Vetta. Jan 17, 2 pm, West Point Grey United Church. $20. SPAWNING GENERATIONS: RANTS AND REFLECTIONS ON GROWING UP WITH LGBTQ+ PARENTS Launch of a collection of stories by queerspawn (people with LGBTQ+ parents). Jan 17, 7 pm, Massy Books. LION IN THE STREETS Canadian playwright Judith Thompson’s seminal play. Jan 17–Feb 2, 7:30 pm. $24.50. BRITTANY LYSENG Canadian comedian performs three nights of standup. Jan 17-19, Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club. $10/20. THE FIGHTING DAYS Sidekick Players presents Wendy Lill’s play about the polarities of public and private lives. Jan 17–Feb 2, Tsawwassen Arts Centre. $18/$15. MILLENNIAL LINE Standup comedy and poetry show with headliner Aaron Read. Jan 17, 8:30 pm, Red Gate Arts Society. $7-10. SARAH TIANA L.A.–based comedian performs three nights of standup. Jan 17-19, The Comedy MIX. $15/$18/$20.
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 17 THE OPEN HOUSE BY WILL ENO People have been born into families since people started getting born at all. Playwrights have been trying to write “Family plays” for a long time, too. And these plays try to answer endlessly complicated questions like “Can things really change?” This has to stop. With generous support from Fets Whiskey Kitchen and Cartems Donuts. Feb 17-19 & 22-26, 7:30 pm; mats. Feb. 19 & 26, 3 pm, Havana Theatre. $25/$17 for students. ARTS EVENTS are a public service provided free of charge, based on available space and editorial discretion. We can’t guarantee inclusion, and we give priority to events taking place within one week of publication. Submit events online using the eventsubmission form at straight.com/AddEvent. Events that don’t make it into the paper due to space constraints will appear on the website.
MUSIC
Only a Visitor probes family history
An attic find sent the Vancouver band’s leader, Robyn Jacob, down a rabbit hole of research
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by Alexander Varty
hen starting work on local art-pop quintet Only a Visitor’s second full-length, Technicolour Education, bandleader Robyn Jacob knew that she didn’t want to write another record about herself. She didn’t quite succeed in that regard, but otherwise she’s created a revelatory new frame for her life, her family, and her music. The process began on a sad note: her grandmother, after decades in the family residence, was having to move to a seniors’ home, and Jacob was helping out. “We were just cleaning out all this old stuff, because her house was the depository for everyone’s stuff as they moved out—and there were six kids in my mom’s family,” the singer and pianist tells the Straight in a telephone interview from her own East Vancouver home. “I’d spent a lot of time in that house as a child, so there were a lot of things I remembered, and it was neat going through all that again. And I think that’s where [the new record’s] ‘Bedroom Archaeology’ comes from, just going through all of The Vancouver-based art-pop quintet Only a Visitor’s second full-length album is called Techincolour Education. this stuff, some of which you remember and a lot of which you’d never seen wives and children behind in China father, who moved here in 1920, was back. So that’s the beginnings of the before. And it’s remarking on how and returning only infrequently. going back every once in a while,” ‘astronaut’ family; it started there. much is in a life, and all the things that “One of the biggest things that I she says. “His partner came here for His son, my grandfather, also came we don’t know about those who have realized was that my mom’s grand- a while and didn’t like it, so she went here to work when he was young, come before us.” One particular attic find had special meaning for Jacob, who is of mixed Chinese and European ancestry. “In the process of digging through Q. How did it feel to learn about pay them to translate them all. of how I was approaching the all the stuff in the house, my mom material, the lyrical material was your family through century-old found her grandfather’s head-tax letters written in a language you Q. How did you incorporate more intentionally related than certificate, which was from 1920,” music from the Chinese dias- the sonic material. don’t read? she reports, referring to the steep fee A. I had a lovely date with my pora (and a quote from Stan Chinese immigrants—and only Chimom, where we went through Rogers’s “Northwest Passage”) Q. How did your Europeannese immigrants—once had to pay to the letters together and she into Technicolour Education? Canadian bandmates react to enter Canada. “He was the first of the translated them for me. But it A. I was actually toying a lot with making an album about the family to come to Canada, and he, takes a long time to get through trying to weave in some Canton- Chinese-Canadian experience? I think, spent a lot of time in Golden, each one, so we only did a few, ese opera motifs; I tried working A. They were fully onboard right working as a cook, and then also he and they were so packed! They a little bit with material my mom from the get-go, and they were realwas based in Vancouver for a while, were packed with stuff! It’s had given me, ’cause she sings ly excited. Definitely, the research too. At first it was just ‘Oh, look! This now kind of an ongoing project Cantonese opera and she’s also aspect of it was more of a solo enis an interesting piece of memorathat we have. My mom will ex- quite actively performing around terprise, but bringing the songs bilia,’ and then it really struck me a plain how different people in town. But I just couldn’t find a way to the group, I gave them a little few days after finding that how little the family would have different that didn’t feel just kind of… Like, bit more flexibility in terms of arI really knew about my mom’s family writing styles—like “So-and-so I have this really strong distaste ranging. I think that really helped and how they got to Canada.” is very f lowery in their writing, towards fusion, and so I didn’t bring everyone in, but they’ve been Further research ensued, as reand so-and-so is very concise.” feel that I had found the right way incredibly supportive, and have acflected in Technicolour Education And I think the letters are so to incorporate it without it being tually kind of found their own way songs like “43 Years” and “Letters beautiful that what I should do a little bit hokey. So I just sort of of interpreting a lot of the material From a Child”. The first is written is have somebody from outside let myself find an intuitive place as well, thinking and reflecting on from the male perspective: Jacob’s of the family come in and just for the music to rest at.…In terms their own histories. grandfather and great-grandfather were the first to emigrate, leaving their
3 Questions for Robyn Jacob
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going back and forth every couple of years or once a year or something— doing a similar thing with his family there. So it wasn’t until 1968—when a lot of government policy was changing, with Trudeau senior— that it became a lot easier for families to reunite, and that was when my mom’s whole family came here. “It was really striking to realize that my mom never really lived with her dad until she was 13,” she adds. “There were essentially three generations— her, her mom, and her grandmother—who were separated, essentially, for about 50 years. And that just sort of led me down this huge rabbit hole of research.” And that research is ongoing: now that Technicolour Education has been released, Jacob’s working on turning it into a multimedia production in conjunction with the Chinese-Canadian composer and performance artist Nancy Tam. (What this might possibly look like is suggested by Roxanne Nesbitt’s marvellously evocative video for “Bedroom Archaeology”, a flickering, pastel collage of family photographs and household bric-a-brac.) Tam, a more recent arrival from Hong Kong, is “writing a kind of sister record, tracing movement from China into Hong Kong—there was a huge, huge migration of people into the colony of Hong Kong during the ’40s and ’50s,” Jacob explains. “So what we’re doing is that we both have our collections of songs, and we’re weaving them into a multidisciplinary work, where we’re planning to have movement and the band performing, but also video and live foley. We actually just finished our first devising session for that in early December, so it’s currently in development, but it’s very exciting because it’s a totally new way of working.” Compared to the intimacy of Technicolour Education, the new project—due to debut in 2020—feels “very macro”, Jacob contends. Yet that just suggests that she’s onto something deep. Full of personal meaning, Only a Visitor’s latest is also a record that will speak to a lot of us, as we grapple with creating a more inclusive Canada in the 21st century.
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Only a Visitor plays a release party for Technicolour Education at the Cultch on Saturday (January 12).
MIC THE ROLLIN’ & POSING TIL OPEN WITH PHONIX TUMBLIN CLOSING MIKE WETERINGS POUTINE $12
CLOSED ON MON & TUES, OPEN AT 4PM WED-FRI, NOON TILL LATE ON SAT & SUN.
The Phonix ...are back! Playing every Thursday Night
JANUARY TO APRIL 2019 1585 Johnston St. Granville Is | 604.687.1354 |thebackstagelounge.com *** VISIT US ONLINE FOR UP TO THE MINUTE LISTINGS, DRINK SPECIALS AND MORE www.thebackstagelounge.com ***
JANUARY 10 – 17 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 27
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The Georgia Straight Confessions, an outlet for submitting revelations about your private lives—or for the voyeurs among us who want to read what other people have disclosed.
Scan to confess Bad design mistake As a graphic designer my biggest regret was to use the Papyrus font for a logo in the early 2000’s. That said, it actually worked at the time
ghosting I am really sorry that I ghosted you almost two years to the day. I think of you often, and our friendship, and had enjoyed re-connecting with you after all these years. I just couldn’t keep giving you a monthly $$$ boost without end after you finished your re-training while you were looking to get your new career going. Didn’t have the guts to tell you that I couldn’t help in this way anymore, and equally troubling was that I was starting to develop some confusing romantic feelings towards you..... which would not be good for my mental health. Sincerely hope that you are doing well and using your talent in a career that is true to your heart
Good bye lover. I fell in love with you the moment we first met, as we sat across from one another and I looked into your eyes, I fell in love with your soul. We are so evenly matched that it doesn’t seem real. I will be forever grateful that you and I have shared this connection, this very rare and surreal connection. I will always hold you very close to my heart as I have always done. This time though I will embrace and accept your decision. Xo
Transit etiquette 101 We all know preferred seats are for seniors and the disabled but pregnant women should be included too! I have no intentions of having a family of my own but lets have a little compassion people...
Visit
to post a Confession
HAVE YOU BEEN TO... Sas & Ing
The Vanity Lab
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Employment EMPLOYMENT
Mind EMPLOYMENT Body & Soul
Hospitality/Food Service
Alternative Health
2 COOKS Needed for PinPin Restaurant
Fraser St, Vancouver At least HS Grad with 2 yrs. Experience. Permanent F/T, $18.00 per hour Duties: Prepare/Cook complete meals or individual Filipino/Chinese dishes & Supervise kitchen helpers. Maintain inventory, Records of food, Supplies and Equipment. May help clean work area. To apply please send resume to pinpinrestaurant@gmail.com
Trades INDUSTRIAL SHEET METAL SUPPLY LTD. has an opening for a sheet metal fabricator. Duties include manufacture and installation of sheet metal fittings. Must have own hand tools and transportation. Fluency in English and Spanish preferred. Please email resume to indyfittings@gmail.com
Survive? Strive? Thrive! Peace_Health_Success_Unity! WAY2Thrive@lightspeed.ca
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28 THE THE GEORGIA GEORGIASTRAIGHT STR AIGHTJANUARY JANUARY 1017–/172019 / 2019 10 –
MUSIC LISTINGS CONCERTS JUST ANNOUNCED MIXTOPHONICS 8 An evening of high-end sonic trip-hop. Jan 16, 8-11 pm, LanaLou’s. $10. HAPPY HOUR PRESENTS Performances by Bridal Party, Yung Heazy, Club Sofa, and Luv Supreme. Jan 18, 8-11:30 pm, WISE Hall. $12-15. FRIDAY JAZZ The Winston Matsushita Trio performs piano-based jazz. Jan 18, 9 pm, Tyrant Studios. $10. CLAIRE HUNTER Toronto singer-songwriter, with guest Zach Kleisinger. Jan 18, 9 pm, Café Deux Soleils. $10. TRAILERHAWK Outlaw country, with guests Mississippi Live & the Dirty Dirty and R.d. Cane. Jan 19, 7 pm, WISE Hall. $18.75/$20.00. SIMPLE GIFTS CHOIR BENEFIT CONCERT Swing jazz, classical, Broadway, and gospel music. Jan 20, 3-5 pm, Knox United Church. $15. INTERNATIONAL GUITAR NIGHT Performances by four acoustic guitarists. Jan 24, 7:30 pm, Massey Theatre. $39/$29. ROOT DWELLERS SHOWCASE Performances by Whelming, Cory Owens, and thatfriend. Jan 24, 8-11 pm, Kings Cafe. $10. MOONDLE Jazz-inflected indie pop, with guests Parlour Panther and Tonye. Jan 24, 8-11:55 pm, WISE Hall. $15. BOBBY’S CANE Vancouver rock quartet, with guests Servo, the Segues, and Sail With Kings. Jan 25, 7:30 pm, Bourbon. $10. SOUTH VAN BIG BAND Seventeen-piece jazz orchestra, with guest vocalist Ikuko. Jan 25, 8 pm, Pat’s Pub & Brewhouse. $10. BOB SUMNER Album-release party for Wasted Love Songs, with guests Leslie Stevens and Willy Tea Taylor. Jan 25, 8-11:30 pm, WISE Hall. $12/$15. FRIDAY JAZZ The David Sikula Trio performs progressive guitar jazz. Jan 25, 9 pm, Tyrant Studios. $10. WILD/KIND Indie-pop band plays an albumrelease show, with guests Devours and Babe Corner. Jan 26, 8 pm, Red Gate Arts Society. $10/pay-what-you-can. HOGAN SINGS HOLIDAY Victoria vocalist Alison Hogan performs favourites from the Billie Holiday catalog. Jan 27, 8 pm, Frankie’s Jazz Club. $16. JIM BYRNES Local blues great performs a fundraiser for First Impressions Theatre. Jan 31–Feb 1, 8 pm, Deep Cove Shaw Theatre. $35. SARAH MACDOUGALL The Rogue Folk Club presents Canadian folk singer-songwriter and guitarist. Feb 1, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $26/$22. THE LONGRIDERS Tribute to southern-rock legends Lynyrd Skynyrd. Feb 2, 8 pm, The Flamingo Events Centre. $15. ROY FORBES Canadian folk-rock veteran. Feb 2, 8 pm, Deep Cove Shaw Theatre. $35. GOLDEN OLDIES BIRTHDAY BASH Tributes to Elvis, Roy Orbison, and Patsy Cline. Feb 9, 7 pm, The Flamingo Events Centre. $20. THE REVELERS The Rogue Folk Club presents founding members of the Red Stick Ramblers and the Pine Leaf Boys. Feb 9, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $36/$32. ASHLEY MACISAAC The Rogue Folk Club presents Canadian Celtic fiddler. Feb 10, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $40/$36. DE TEMPS ANTAN & GENTICORUM The Rogue Folk Club presents a double bill of folk acts from Quebec. Feb 11, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $30/$26. TRIBUTE TO THE LEGENDS Tributes to Connie Francis, Brenda Lee, Roy Orbison, Patsy Cline, and Elvis Presley. Feb 12, 6 pm, Elements Casino Surrey. $40. VENUS AND MARS: A LOVE STORY Valentine’s Day event features drinks, appetizers, activities, and a musical performance by Jody Glenham. Feb 14, 6:30 pm, H.R. MacMillan Space Centre. $35. STUPID CUPID! The Party Timers perform rockabilly tunes by Wanda Jackson. Feb 14, 8-11 pm, WISE Hall. $10. DANNY MICHEL The Rogue Folk Club presents Canadian folk-pop singer-songwriter. Feb 20, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $20/$16. JOY WILLIAMS Nashville-based singersongwriter from the Civil Wars performs tunes from latest solo album Front Porch. Mar 6, 8 pm, WISE Hall. Tix on sale Jan 11, 10 am, $22.50. REALLY ROD Tribute to rock legend Rod Stewart. Mar 15, 8 pm, Scandinavian Community Centre. $20.
Healing Our Spirit B.C. First Nations AIDS Society has volunteer opportunities for hospital visitation, information booths, office assistance & preparation of pamphlets & condoms for distribution. We offer volunteer orientation, training & recognition & bus tickets. If interested, please call 983-8774 Ext. 13. We are dedicated to preventing and reducing the spread of HIV in the aboriginal communities of B.C. Infertility Awareness Assoc. of Canada (IAAC) provides educational material & support to individuals or couples experiencing infertility. Meetings: 7 pm the 2nd Wed of the month. Richmond Library & Cultural Centre, 7700 Minoru Gate. Info 523-0074 or www.iaac.ca AL-ANON FAMILY GROUPS Does someone else's drinking bother you? Al-Anon can help. We are a support group for those who have been affected by another's drinking problem. For more information please call: 604-688-1716 Anorexics & Bulimics Anonymous 12 Step based peer support program which addresses the mental, emotional, & spiritual aspects of disordered eating Tuesdays @ 7 pm @ Avalon Women's Centre 5957 West Blvd - 604-263-7177
A lbum OF THE WEEK GLOVE AND GHOST DEAD DROP
As is becoming the norm when it comes time to write one of these weekly local-album reviews, I have no idea who the act in question is. Glove and Ghost has exactly zero online presence outside of its Bandcamp page, which features precisely one release: a six-track EP called Dead Drop. From said Bandcamp page we can glean that Glove and Ghost is the work of someone named richardM, but beyond that, there are few details about the artist. What we do get, however, is extensive information about what inspired the EP: the Cold War. From that we can infer that richardM was a kid in the 1980s, and there’s certainly something redolent of that decade in his palette JD MCPHERSON Singer-songwriter and guitarist from Oklahoma. Apr 7, 8 pm, Imperial. Tix on sale Jan 11, 10 am, $20. MISSIO Electro-trap duo. Apr 9, 7:30 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. Tix on sale Jan 11, 10 am, $22.50. BLAC RABBIT Psych-rock band from New York. Apr 18, 9 pm, WISE Hall. Tix on sale Jan 11, 9 am, $13.
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 9 DEVON Intimate concert of indie-pop tunes. Jan 9, 7:30-9 pm, The Havana Theatre. $13/$15.
THURSDAY, JANUARY 10 KATE MCGARRY Joy of Jazz Concerts presents American jazz singer. Jan 10, 8 pm, Pyatt Hall. $30. KAT EDMONSON Retro-style jazz with pop sensibilities. Jan 10, 8 pm, BlueShore Financial Centre for the Performing Arts. $35/$32. EVER-LOVIN’ JUG BAND AND STARDUST STRINGBAND Double-bill features ragtime, blues, and country-blues. Jan 10, 8-11 pm, WISE Hall. $10.
FRIDAY, JANUARY 11 STILL WOOZY Electronic artist Sven Gamsky. Jan 11, Biltmore Cabaret. $13. SUPER CHIKAN Delta blues legend, with the Mojo Stars and guest Steve Kozak. Jan 11, 7:30 pm, Rio Theatre. $30/35. FRIDAY JAZZ The Astrid Sars Trio performs classic and New Orleans jazz. Jan 11, 9 pm, Tyrant Studios. $10.
SATURDAY, JANUARY 12 RAY GALLON New York City jazz pianist. Jan 12, 3 pm, Pat’s Pub & Brewhouse. Free. EAST COAST KITCHEN LAUNCH PARTY Live music by the Mike Cody Band. Jan 12, 6-9 pm, The Portside Pub. Free. BOWIE BALL Eighteen local bands perform at a David Bowie-inspired cancer benefit. Jan 12, 7 pm, Rickshaw Theatre. $15/$20. MARTIN TAYLOR Pat Metheny calls Martin Taylor “one of the most awesome solo guitar players in the history of the instrument”. Presented by the BlueShore Financial Centre for the Performing Arts. Jan 12, 8 pm, BlueShore Financial Centre for the Performing Arts. Tix $38/$35 at www.capilanou.ca/centre. CALM LIKE A BOMB, BONNIE SCOTT, ALIVE N KISSIN Tributes to Rage Against the Machine, AC/DC, and Kiss. Jan 12, 8 pm, Blackbird Hall. $15. ONLY A VISITOR Local art-pop band, with guest Wallgrin. Jan 12, 8 pm, The Cultch. $20.
Anxiety? Depression? Free Mental Wellness Support Group held on Saturdays (10:30 am – 12:30) Promotes a holistic approach to healing (body, mind & spirit). Networking and interactive learning experience in a safe, non-judgmental environment. For more information call 604-630-6865 or visit www.mentalwellnessbc.ca ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION Looking to start a parent support group in Kitsilano. Please call Barbara 604 737 8337 Battered Women's Support Services provides free daytime & evening support groups (Drop-ins & 10 week groups) for women abused by their intimate partner. Groups provide emotional support, legal information & advocacy, safety planning, and referrals. For more information please call: 604-687-1867 BC Balance & Dizziness provides information & support for persons with balance, dizziness & vestibular disorders. Bi Monthly info meetings @ St. Paul's Hospital. Call for info. 604-878-8383 www.BalanceAndDizziness.org Equal Parenting Group - North Vancouver Support group for fathers going through the divorce process needing help. Call 604-692-5613 Email:nspg@mybox.com
of Iron Curtain–grey synths and drum-machine beats. You could say that Vangelis was trying to evoke a bleak future with his Blade Runner score, and Glove and Ghost does its best to conjure up a paranoid past. It’s almost like the antithesis of vaporwave’s blurry VCR–era nostalgia. With the exception of “Mantra for Barflies”, there are no lyrics on the EP, just distorted snippets of intercepted transmissions. Some of them sound like police-radio messages, but a few are darker and less easy to place. Who, for example, is the man on “Blackpool Discotheque” who casually observes, “It’d be a good place to corral ’em and gas ’em”? Sometimes it’s better when you don’t know exactly what you’re listening to. by John Lucas
SUNDAY, JANUARY 13 SUNDAY AFTERNOON SOUL World music by Ardent Tribe. Jan 13, 4 am, Fairview Pub. $10. KAREN GRAVES & MIMOSA Vancouver jazz quintet performs Brazilian sambas, French ’60s pop, and cabaret. Jan 13, 4-5 pm, Northwood United Church. By donation. KONGOS Alternative-rock quartet from Scottsdale, Arizona. Jan 13, doors 7 pm, show 8 pm, Imperial Vancouver. $25.
TUESDAY, JANUARY 15 AARON PRITCHETT Canadian country singersongwriter, with guests Kira Isabella and David James. Jan 15, Vogue Theatre. $30-$34.99. A CELEBRATION OF THE BAND Music of the Band reimagined by Dustbowl Revival and Hot Club of Cowtown. Jan 15, 7:30 pm, Kay Meek Arts Centre. $19-48. WARBLY JETS Rock quartet from L.A. Jan 15, 9 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $12.
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16 SVER The Rogue Folk Club presents Norwegian folk quintet. Jan 16, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $12-24. REEL BIG FISH Ska-punk band from Orange County, California, with guests Masked Intruder and Bikini Thrill. Jan 16, 8 pm, Commodore Ballroom. $25. THE YAWPERS WITH BLACKFOOT GYPSIES Rock bands from the States. Jan 16, 8 pm, The Flamingo Events Centre. $12.
THURSDAY, JANUARY 17 YG American rapper performs material from latest album Stay Dangerous. Jan 17, 7 pm, PNE Forum. $49.50. CAUTIOUS CLAY Brooklyn-based R&B singer-songwriter and producer. Jan 17, 9 pm, Fox Cabaret. Tix $15.
SATURDAY, JANUARY 19 COLTER WALL Country-folk singer-songwriter from Swift Current, Saskatchewan. Jan 19, doors 8 pm, show 9 pm, Commodore Ballroom. $29.50. MUSIC EVENTS are a public service provided free of charge, based on available space and editorial discretion. We can’t guarantee inclusion, and we give priority to events taking place within one week of publication. Submit events online using the event-submission form at straight.com/ AddEvent. Events that don’t make it into the paper due to space constraints will appear on the website.
Nar-Anon North Van
12-step program for families and friends of addicts, meets Tuesdays from 7:30 to 9 pm 176 2nd Street East in North Van.
Info: nar-anonbcregion.org
Join Our Support, Education & Action Group
July 11th 6:30–8:30pm (8 weeks) Women who experienced any form of male violence CALL Vancouver Rape Relief & Women's Shelter 604-872-8212
Distress Line & Suicide Prevention Services NEED SOME ONE TO TALK TO? Call us for immediate, free, confidential and non-judgemental support, 24 hours a day, everyday. The Crisis Centre in Vancouver can help you cope more effectively with stressful situations. 604-872-3311
Gay EMPLOYMENT Personals
Genital Herpes Support Group for Women Are you living with Genital Herpes in Vancouver? We are a group of women that draws upon each others knowledge and strength to grapple with this sometimes trying condition. Through mutual support and honest conversation we aim to address the physical and emotional health implications of this virus and how it affects romantic relationships, sex, dating & life in general. Contact: ghsupportgroup@gmail.com
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Parkinson Society BC offers over 50 volunteer-led support groups throughout BC. These provide people with Parkinson's, their carepartners & families an opportunity to meet in a friendly, supportive setting with others who are experiencing similar difficulties. Some groups may offer exercise support. For information on locating a support group near you, please contact PSBC at 604 662 3240 or toll free 1 800 668 3330.
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Vancouver Society for Sexuality, Gender & Culture Educational group with monthly meetings are planned for: 1st Tuesday of each month, 6:30 PM 8:30 PM Vancouver Public Library - Firehall Branch 1455 W 10th Ave (by Granville St next to the Firehall) All are welcome, and we are looking for Board Members from the Health, Counseling, Education, and Business Professions Info: Michael or Darren: VSSGC@yahoogroups.ca
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- In Lasting Love
You are wrong .
She does not want what you want. Your gut is lying to you. She is not in love with you. You do not share a connection. You need to listen to her words. She is not tied to the “energy” you are feeling. You have got to stop thinking with your dick. She was probably scared out of her wits when you managed to “find” her alone. You cannot reach this woman. She can sense your resentment and she’s afraid of you. In all honesty, ILL, I’m afraid of you. Just as this poor woman most likely fears becoming one of the many women murdered every year by men they’ve rejected, I fear being the messenger who got shot. But you asked for my advice, ILL, and here it is: get into therapy. You need help. And my advice for her, if she sees this, is to do whatever you must to protect yourself—up to and including moving away.
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On the Lovecast, who are furries and what do they want?: savagelovecast.com. Email: mail@ savagelove.net. Follow Dan Savage on Twitter @fakedansavage. ITMFA.org.
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SAVAGE LOVE
Girlfriend doesn’t need shameful words by Dan Savage
b
I’M A 40-YEAR-OLD guy with a 30-year-old girlfriend. We’ve been together a year, and I can see a future with her. But there are problems. This girl comes after two minutes of stimulation, be it manual, oral, or penile. As someone who takes pride in my foreplay/pussy-eating abilities, this is a bummer. She gets wet to the point where all friction is lost during PIV and my boners don’t last. It’s like fucking a bowlful of jelly. Part of me is flattered that I get her off, but damnit I miss a tight fit! (Her oral skills aren’t great, either, so that’s not an option, and anal is a no-go.) I love to fuck hard, and that’s difficult when I’m sticking my dick into a frictionless void. Is there a way to decrease wetness? Help, please.
- Can’t Last Inside Tonight First things first:
she’s not doing anything wrong, CLIT, and neither are you—at least, you’re not doing anything wrong during sex. (When you sit down to write letters to advice columnists, on the other hand…) She can’t help how much vaginal mucus she produces or how much vaginal sweating your foreplay/pussy-eating skills induce any more than you can help how much pre-ejaculate you pump out. (Her wetness is a combo of vaginal mucus and vaginal sweating—the latter is not a derogatory expression; that’s just the term for it.)
And all that moisture is there for a good reason: it preps the vagina for penetration. In its absence, PIV can be extremely painful for the fuckee. So the last thing you want to do is dry your girlfriend up somehow. Now here’s something you are doing wrong: “It’s like fucking a bowlful of jelly”; “I miss a tight fit”; “Her oral skills aren’t great, either”; “I’m sticking my dick into a frictionless void”. You’re going to need to have a conversation with your girlfriend about this, CLIT; you’ll need to use your words, but you can’t have that conversation—not a constructive one— until you can find some less denigrating, resentful, shame-heaping words. Again, she’s doing nothing wrong. She gets very wet when she’s turned on. That’s just how her body works. Too much lubrication makes it harder for you to get off. That’s how your body works. And this presents a problem that you two need to work on together, but insults like “bowlful of jelly” and “frictionless void” are going to shut the conversation down and/or end the relationship. So try this instead: “I love how turned on you get, honey, and I love how wet you get. But it can make it difficult for me to come during PIV.” If you don’t put her on the defensive—if you don’t make her feel like shit about her pussy—you might be able to have a constructive conversation and come up with
some possible PIV hacks. If there’s a move (clitoral stimulation) or an event (her fi rst orgasm) that really opens up the tap, CLIT, save that move or delay that event until after you’ve climaxed or until after you’ve reached the point of orgasmic inevitability—if PIV isn’t painful for her when she’s a little less wet. You can also experiment with different positions to find one that provides you with a little more friction and doesn’t hit her clit just so—perhaps doggy style—and then shift into a position that engages her clit when you’re going to come. And there’s no shame in pulling out and stroking yourself during intercourse before diving back in. Be constructive, get creative, and never again speak of her pussy like it’s a defective home appliance, CLIT, and you might be able to solve this (pretty good) problem (to have).
b I’M A WOMAN in an open relationship of four years. I adore my partner. When we were first dating, it was casual and there were no ground rules. During that time, I slept with a guy without condoms after he cornered me in a motel room. One of the biggest rules in my current relationship is to use condoms with other partners. My current partner has made it clear that he would consider exchanging fluids with someone else cheating. I’m worried he’ll somehow
find out about that night in the motel room, and I feel bad keeping it a secret. If I tell him, there’s a chance that our relationship will end and I’ll be living in my car. What should I do? - Burdensome Unbearable Guilt Sucks This thing happened —or
this thing was done to you—before you made a commitment to your current partner, BUGS, and before ground rules were established. I’m assuming you got tested at some point over the last four years; failing that, I’m assuming neither of you has developed symptoms of an STI over the last four years. (And condoms don’t protect us from all the STIs out there, so even if you did come down with something, your partner could have passed it to you.) So cut yourself some slack, BUGS: you had unprotected sex under a sadly common form of duress. Fearing something much worse, you “agreed” to unprotected sex—you agreed but didn’t freely consent to unprotected sex. Too many men don’t understand that kind of fear or the de-escalation techniques women are forced to employ when they find themselves cornered by threatening men—de-escalation techniques that can include “agreeing” to but not freely consenting to sex, unprotected or otherwise.
You’re under no obligation to tell your current partner about that night, as it took place before you established your ground rules, so it’s not really any of his fucking business. And if homelessness is a potential consequence of telling your partner how you were pressured into sex you did not want, then you’re lying to him now for the same reason you went bare with that asshole back then: duress.
b I’M A MAN in love with a woman
half my age. We met shortly after I had to leave the city I was living in to escape a toxic relationship. I know this girl has feelings for me. My gut screams it. We also share a strange connection. It’s something I know she feels. She simply can’t help being tied to the energy I’m feeling. A while back, I hurt her. Unintentionally, but it hurt just the same. I was still not over my ex and very leery of ever experiencing that kind of pain in my heart again. The problem now is that this young woman won’t acknowledge her feelings for me. She swears she never had feelings for me. We found ourselves alone one day, and her actions were clearly indicating that she wanted to have sex with me but her words prevented me from taking the opportunity. How see previous page
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