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Rob Wells. / Doug Johnson

GSAS, CONVERSION THERAPY

PROTEST AGAINST CONVERSION THERAPY

Protesters Gather at Church to Decry Its Stance on LGBTQ2S+ Issues, Though a Pastor Denies Allegations

L

ast weekend, a few protestors stood outside a Sherwood Park church, wielding brightly coloured signs with slogans condemning the church for its alleged stance on conversion therapy and the United Conservative Party’s view on gay-straight alliances. The protest was organized by Rob Wells, who made headlines in 2016 for a sign in his car window that said “Fuck Harper.”

The church, Bethel Lutheran, is part of the Missouri Synod, a relatively traditional iteration of the church which doesn’t allow women to be ordained.

In short, Wells organized

the organizer maintains that others were more amenable to what he was selling.

Senior pastor at the church Matt Ziprick denies outright that Bethel supports conversion therapy. He says that this concern from the LGBTQ2S+ community comes from a misunderstanding, stemming from Glenn Schaeffer, district president of the Alberta-British Columbia District Lutheran Church-Canada, writing a letter to the province’s education minister David Eggen. Some people took this to mean he supported the controversial procedure.

“It’s been proven that reparative therapy is harmful and destructive ... Their idea, their self-righteousness is nothing but wickedness when they harm vulnerable kids.”

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“It’s not accurate at all,” he says. “He said he never used that term, so it kind of feels like he was misquoted.”

When asked how Bethel Lutheran viewed the UCP’s stance on GSAs, which critics fear will ‘out’ LGBTQ2S+ youth, Ziprick says that the church tries “to love everybody.”

“We try to welcome everybody here. We feel like this should be a place that everybody should feel like it’s a home,” he says. “It’s a diverse group of people here, so there are different opinions. But our church, we try to welcome everybody ... I don’t have any need to change anybody.”

Doug Johnson doug@vueweekly.com

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the small protest because of some of the harms it’s associated with conversion therapy. He says that the practice is panned by many medical agencies and that it can lead to further disorders down the road including, in some extreme cases, suicide ideation.

“It’s been proven that reparative therapy is harmful and destructive ... Their idea, their self-righteousness is nothing but wickedness when they harm vulnerable kids,” Wells says.

On Friday, the church itself drew a somewhat larger crowd as members of its congregation gathered for a convention. Some members who passed Wells in the parking lot shot him death glares, but

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Queermonton

A Lingering Hate Crime in Spirituality Edmonton Muslims Should Support the NDP Bill against Conversion Therapy

E

dmonton-Castle Downs backbench MLA Nicole Goehring is putting together a bill to ban gay conversion therapy. While the NDP government is soliciting input on the issue, I’m not sure if they will get much input from ethnic LGBTQ2S+ minority communities, who continue to remain closeted out of fear of social repercussions for themselves and their families.

However, I would like to share some input with the hope that this would embolden more ethnic and religious LGBTQ2S+ people to share based on their experiences.

In 2004, I was a 27-year-old graduate student at the University of Alberta. I have always been a traditional Muslim, which means that you do not engage in any sexual activity before marriage. While about two thirds of North American Muslim youth have engaged in sexual activity before marriage, I was not one of them.

I had completed my final doctoral comprehensive exams. I was going to be the first in my family to not just attend college but also receive a doctorate degree. But my program, which should have ended in 2007, took four more years to complete.

While some of it was due to my questioning of my routine life, as

to why I was always working hard and why I was studying economics, much of it was due to my beginning to address my latent sexuality.

I had not anticipated that trying to fix my sexuality would take so much out of me. I began visiting counsellors both in person and online. I even went to a doctor for hormonal tests and with the strange willingness for medical procedures to have myself fixed.

However, this excuse of sexual molestation, which I never considered as one, was a perfect opening to seeking help from Muslim scholars and professionals. It was more comfortable to address sexuality through the lens of molestation.

That way, I could justify that my sexuality was superimposed on me and distance myself from accepting the inevitable.

However, my clerics, elders and

Had I addressed this issue as a teenager, perhaps I would have succumbed to quack theories that sexual molestation, watching pornography, or having female siblings cause a homosexual orientation.

But I did not settle for such silliness.

I do know that something as beautiful as affection for another human being cannot arise from something as ugly as sexual abuse.

The American Psychological As-

“The inner angst, bitterness, and anger witnessed amongst those involved in the discredited ex-gay ‘straight struggle’ should not be the Hell where we throw Muslim LGBTQ2S+ youth.”

I just could not accept the fact that someone who had played by all the traditional rules would ever find himself in a situation to address the ‘mother of all issues.’

I began looking for the cause that I could blame for my sexuality. Was it the time an elder masturbated me when I was asleep as a 13-yearold? That was far too easy an answer, and I distinctly recall being drawn to images of men in speedos even before that.

scholars could not help me. We were all bound by the tradition, which had to be upheld at all cost.

The online counsellors stated that I seemed like a good person, and that they would pray for me.

The Muslim psychologist in Edmonton suggested that I join the gym as he found me effeminate. I am almost 41 now, I look as plain as Gandhi, and I have been attending the gym conscientiously. I suppose I am just incorrigible.

sociation Task Force report on sexual orientation change efforts (SOCE) is quite clear. The negative impact of SOCE include depression, hopelessness, loss of faith, deteriorated relationships with family, poor self-image, social isolation, intimacy difficulties, selfhatred, sexual dysfunction, suicidal ideation, feelings of dehumanization, increased substance abuse, and high-risk sexual behaviours.

Given that SOCE therapists have

not produced rigorous scientific research to bolster their claims, major health associations have condemned SOCE therapies, including the Lebanese Medical Association for Sexual Health (LebMASH), who released a position statement on SOCE in 2013, urging healthcare providers in Lebanon to refrain from this unethical and potentially harmful practice.

We cannot prescribe our youth outdated remedies based on medieval Arabic medical treatises or legal manuals. It would be absurd to expect Muslim LGBTQ2S+ youth to love from afar, sit on a severed camel hump, and expect martyrdom through inner struggles.

The inner angst, bitterness, and anger witnessed amongst those involved in the discredited ex-gay ‘straight struggle’ should not be the Hell where we throw Muslim LGBTQ2S+ youth.

I hope that Muslim professionals will reject clandestine unethical practices based on the Prophet’s teaching that there is no harm or reciprocating harm in Islam.

In essence, when Muslims remember that Allah creates whatsoever He wills, they will have no problems in supporting the long overdue NDP Bill against conversion therapy.

Junaid Jahangir

Dyer Straight

It Could’ve Been Good—but then It Wasn’t Hope Was High for Zimbabwe after Mugabe Was Ousted, but One Bunk Election Later and It’s Business as Usual

“

Zimbabwe is open for business” was President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s slogan in the July election that was supposed to show that the long and destructive reign of dictator Robert Mugabe, overthrown late last year, is really now a thing of the past. The country has been getting steadily poorer for decades now, but this election would be the turning point.

“You can rig an election—as they did on 30th July, 2018—but you can’t rig an economy; you can’t rig a supermarket or a gas station,” replied Tendai Biti, a leading member of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). It turns out that he was right. Less than three months after the election, Zimbabwe is in a huge economic crisis.

People are getting desperate, because shops are running out of essential items like bread. Even beer is being rationed (two bottles per person), and the cost of everything is soaring as people once again lose confidence in the currency. KFC and other fast-food chains have closed their doors because inflation is moving too fast to calculate.

Zimbabweans are comparing it to the great inflation of 2008, when the Zimbabwean dollar became less valuable than the paper it was print4 front

ed on—bags full of 100-trillion-dollar notes were not enough to buy bread—and peoples’ pitifully small savings were wiped out.

After that, the Zimbabwean currency was entirely abandoned and the country began using American dollars and South African rands instead. Gradually, however, the government began reintroducing a kind of local currency as well, pegged

Robert Mugabe was not overthrown last year by a popular revolution. He was overthrown by his own corrupt and overbearing ZANU-PF Party, because he was planning to make his own wife Grace his successor. (Mugabe is 94 years old.)

It was Mugabe’s long-serving deputy Emmerson Mnangagwa who organized his cronies in the army

in foreign investors and get control over its huge foreign debts, it could start to climb out of the deep hole Mugabe left it in. But for that, it needs an honest, democratically credible government.

This is tricky, because a really free election would almost certainly have removed Mnangagwa and his ZANU-PF cronies from power. They were never going to

“People are getting desperate, because shops are running out of essential items like bread. Even beer is being rationed (two bottles per person), and the cost of everything is soaring as people once again lose confidence in the currency.” one-for-one to the U.S. dollar, officially called ‘bond notes’ but popularly called Zim dollars or Zollars.

It’s these Zim dollars whose value is now collapsing, while real U.S. dollars have become as scarce as hens’ teeth. Today 361 Zim dollars buys you one U.S. dollar. Tomorrow, who knows?

The government is quite right to say that this is a panic driven by hoarding and speculation—but people are behaving like that because they do not trust the government. Nor should they.

(also controlled by ZANU-PF) to remove Mugabe from the presidency.

Mnangagwa’s record of corruption and violence is impressive even by the ruling party’s standards, but he needed to create what looked like a new, cleaner government if the country was ever to escape from its dire poverty.

Zimbabwe was once a prosperous country. It still has ample resources and a relatively well-educated population; and if it could just inspire enough confidence

accept that outcome, because it’s political power that makes them rich (by Zimbabwean standards).

So the election had to look clean, but come out the right way.

Compared to all ZANU-PF’s other election victories, it was relatively clean: little intimidation or bribery of voters except in rural areas, and little overt violence. But it was imperative that Mnangagwa win the presidency in the first round, when he faced a half-dozen rivals who split the opposition vote. For that, he needed to get over 50

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - oct 31, 2018

percent of the votes in the first round.

He clearly didn’t get it, because the vote-counting (largely controlled by ZANU-PF appointees) took three days longer than expected. After the numbers had been thoroughly massaged, it was finally announced that Mnangagwa got 50.8 percent of the votes. Congratulations, Mr. President!

Nobody believed it, and when opposition protests began in Harare, the police shot six of the protesters dead. That was all it took. The foreign institutions and companies that might have rescheduled Zimbabwe’s debt and invested in the country’s economy decided that it’s still the same old gang in power (as indeed it is), and turned their attention and their money elsewhere.

Three months later, the Zimbabwean economy, which had been momentarily buoyed up by the hope of better times, is collapsing.

In theory, this should usher in the second phase of democratization in the country, with massive demonstrations driving ‘the crocodile’ (Mnangagwa) out of power.

In practice, that may not happen.

Zimbabweans may be too cowed, or just too exhausted—and ZANUPF would not go without a fight.

Gwynne Dyer

GRAVEYARDS

The Graveyards in Edmonton’s Future Will Be Green, but No Less Macabre

P

lant life may replace stone in the future graveyards of Edmonton, as eco-friendly efforts begin to seep into the funeral business. According to Teena Changharathil—cemetery sales and operations supervisor with the city—Edmonton’s municipal graveyards are looking into green burial services like the eco-urn (which uses cremation ashes to grow trees).

More than that, though, this city department is hoping to have a natural burial space in Northern Lights Cemetery, and implement the city’s version of biodegradable urns in the South Haven Cemetery in the near future.

“Research has found that biodegradable urns ... take up to 10 years to break down. That really isn’t biodegradable, when you think about it, and the plant life doesn’t really survive,” Changharathil says, adding that the city’s take on this increasingly popular funerary rite will avoid this pitfall.

“There could also be the argument made that, 100 years ago, 150 years go, putting a body in the ground, could that contaminate [the land] as well?” she says.

Sandeep Agrawal, professor at the University of Alberta’s school of urban and regional planning, has studied land-use concerns surrounding graveyards in Ontario. He says that cemeteries used to play a role in the lives of urbanites as green spaces—and that they have done so for decades.

However, people have forgotten about this and, increasingly, cemeteries are being pushed out of cities.

That said, long-term planning will one day be needed to dictate the future of burial lots to conserve land use, Agrawal says.

“At some point, it’s going to come and hit us. I’m also thinking about technology ... In some places like Hong Kong, where land is a scarcity, people are thinking about

enough cemetery land, both developed and undeveloped, to last the city 35 to 40 years. There are no firm plans yet about what to do when this land gets used up, but Changharathil says the city is eyeing land to use in the future.

“That would be much further down the line,” she says. “I can’t say that’s actively being sought out, but right now we’re in a very good position for the next 40 years.”

Doug Johnson doug@vueweekly. com

“Research has found that biodegradable urns ... take up to 10 years to break down.

That really isn’t biodegradable, when you think about it.”

“There will be a biodegradable satchel or cloth material that the remains will be in, and we’ll put an actual plant to be supported there ... People are asking for new services.”

In some cases, these plans could also see whole bodies buried without the use of any embalming fluids like formaldehyde, and in a casket made of something that can break down easily.

“The end goal is—it would look like a woodland,” she says.

However, she says, this is all pending and requires city approval—both in terms of healthcare and budget.

According to Changharathil, there is likely some research to suggest the chemicals used in embalming could, potentially, leach into the soil, but the practice of preserving deceased loved ones has been in place for hundreds of years. Similarly, she says, there’s nothing that’s 100 percent confirmed on this.

It’s spooky. / Doug Johnson

multiple layers and levels of burial grounds putting it in stacks rather than just a space meant for one person. I think, moving forward, we will see people thinking about new ways of accommodating this need. As the pressure on the land increases, you’ll have to come up with new ideas.”

Also, across North America, there’s also an ongoing trend towards cremation—Changharathil says city cemeteries see a 50-50 split between cremations and traditional burials.

Edmonton’s seven municipal cemeteries—there are also private and religious providers—alone cover 238 acres of land. Of this sum, 117 acres have been developed so far. In context, developed land is land that has “active internments” or is in a “ready to go” state. This could take the form of cremation gardens, regular burial plots, scattering gardens, etc.

According to Changharathil, these city-run cemeteries have

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Some of Biera’s sourdough bread baked with spent grains. It’s pretty thicc. / Blind Enthusiasm

LEFTOVERS

Leftovers from the Booze-Making Process Can Feed Livestock, Mushrooms, and Humans

A

lley Kat Brewery goes through 200 tonnes of malt every year, give or take. After the beer is kegged or bottled, though, the dross called spent grain, the mulch-y leftovers of the starches used in the production of alcohol, lies damp and seemingly useless in the

brewery—any brewery or distillery that crafts its wares from wheat, at any rate.

But the kind of gnarsty plant matter is incredibly useful to others—enough so that Edmonton area distilleries and breweries have people coming to their shops to pick it up.

KITCHEN TIPS Smoked Salmon Cakes Are CrowdPleasing Morsels that Won’t Break the Bank and Take Almost No Effort Rosti Smoked Salmon Cakes Makes: 8 fish cakes Preparation: 20 minutes; 40 minutes cooking • 700g russet potato • 2 cans Ocean Odyssey Inland smoked spring salmon meat, drained • 2/3 cup Gruyere cheese, grated • 2 medium egg yolks, lightly beaten • 2 tablespoons, chopped fresh parsley • 1 small onion, peeled and finely chopped • Salt and pepper, to taste • 1/3 cup grape seed oil Cook half potatoes in their skins, approximately 20 minutes in lightly salted water. Drain and leave to cool. Mix the canned salmon, the cheese, egg yolks, parsley and chopped onion. Season well.

Peel and grate cooked potato and stir into salmon mixture. Peel and grate uncooked potatoes. Squeeze out excess moisture and starch over a strainer. Season with salt and pepper.

Using your hands, shape the salmon mixture into eight round fish cakes. Press each fish cake into the raw grated potato until coated on both sides. Heat oil in a large frying pan, and cook this fish cakes a few a time until golden and cooked through, about four minutes each side. Drain excess oil. Serve with tartar sauce or gremolata.

Enjoy!

—Chef Daniel from Ocean Odyssey Inland 6 dish

Alley Kat, along with many other local and Alberta makers of booze offer their spent grains for free to farmers, and pretty much anyone else who will take the lumps off their hands.

“We have a deal with the farmers ... I think as you get bigger and bigger, you can sell it, but it’s not worth a lot of money.

At our scale, it’s not worth a lot of money,” says Chase Gordon, production manager at the local brewery.

For Greg Zeschuk, founder of Blind Enthusiasm Brewing,

every week—in some of its sourdough breads. Since Blind Enthusiasm is fairly eclectic with the grains it uses for beer, Biera’s bakers always get something of a mixed bag.

“It has better structure and better flavour; that’s what I’ve been told,” Zeschuk says. “For bread aficionados, that’s a big deal, I guess.”

Rig Hand Distillery, based in Nisku, gives its grains to three farmers in the region. The first, a cattle farmer, mixes the

rooms per week. In the summer of 2016, though, they began growing their fungal friends on heaps of spent grain—since then, they’ve peaked at around 50 pounds per week. It even allowed the farm to grow golden oyster mushrooms which, according to Rachel Gruger, one of the farm’s co-owners, are incredibly finicky.

“It made a huge difference for sure,” she says.

Around a year ago, Terrie Holgerson of Tangents Treats picked up 10 pounds of spent

“We have a deal with the farmers ... I think as you get bigger and bigger, you can sell it, but it’s not worth a lot of money. At our scale, it’s not worth a lot of money.” these spent grains represent the first stage of a “virtuous cycle.”

A farmer picks up the detritus of the brewing process, feeds it to his cattle, and then that cattle gets sold to Acme Meats, which neighbours Zeschuk’s brew pub in the Ritchie neighbourhood— finally, Biera (the restaurant part of Zeschuck’s operation), uses that meat in its menu.

During the brewing process, much of the starch in the grains is washed away, leaving behind complex fibres and protein, making it fairly nutritious— for both animals and humans.

Biera uses some of its spent grains—it produces between 200 and 400 kilos of the stuff

mulch with silage (basically preserved grass) for extra fibre and starch. If a cow eats too much of the grain it can get protein poisoning.

“They get kinda glassy eyed and they stumble around,” says Mike Beile, general manager at Rig Hand. He adds that most of the other sources of starch (like potatoes) used in distilling don’t survive the process well enough to be much use to anyone.

Two years ago, the distillery also gave a sample away to a neighbouring mushroom farm, Gruger Family Fungi.

Back in 2015, the small-scale operation was growing between five and 10 pounds of mush-

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

grain from Alley Kat. It’s still going strong in her freezer, though she’s been using it to make dog treats since then.

The grain is very fibrous so it needed to go through a food processor again prior to freezing. Though Holgerson adds molasses, the treats, to a human, would be pretty bland.

But dogs have amazing senses of smell and taste, so they love the treats, Holgerson says.

“It’s kind of one of the big things with dog treats right now,” she says, then feels the need to add that the treats “don’t have any beer in them.”

Doug Johnson doug@vueweekly.com

DELIVERY

Knock knock open up the door, it’s real. / Adobe Stock

CONSIDER THIS: SOMETIMES LAZINESS IS GOOD T

Ordering Food Online Can Save on Emissions, Edmonton Environmental Firm Suggests

he future of groceries in Edmonton may be mobile, and despite the Black Mirror-ness of the situation, it may not be a bad thing. At face value, grocery delivery services—from highend operations like Organic Box to more corporate entities like Save On Foods’ iteration—may seem wasteful, even lazy.

But—and not that there aren’t some problems with them— matters of scale and efficiency come into play, making them, in all, not a bad outlet for people living in urban centres.

According to Courtney Powell, founder of Edmonton firm Elevated Enviro, having a single truck deliver foods to multiple people provides some fuel savings, compared to an equivalent number of people using their own vehicles to drive to the store.

“You have six people going to the grocery store at the same time, well that’s six individuals going to Save-On there and back, versus one truck making the trip,” he says.

This matter is a bit more pronounced in a city like Edmonton where driving to purchase food is the norm, rather than an exception.

Some of these delivery services also use re-useable containers, which cuts down on plastic waste.

The only major negative Powell can think of is related to online shopping in general. Consumers

don’t have a physical cart, meaning that they can be prone to over-purchasing, which can contribute to higher food waste.

Two years ago, former University of Alberta researcher and editorin-chief of Retail Insider Craig Patterson co-authored a study on food deserts. Given that Edmonton is a car-focused city, it’s perhaps not surprising to know that its downtown area is something of a food desert.

Similarly, the region still lacks the population concentration of larger cities like Toronto or Vancouver.

“The whole idea behind urban grocery stores is that they should be walkable, within a convenient distance of homes,” he says. “That is something a lot of city cores miss ... That isn’t being served in Edmonton’s core right now.”

According to Patterson, the value of property downtown is, in some cases, more valuable in theory than a business, so Edmonton’s core may not see an influx of grocers any time soon. But that might not even matter.

At some point, tech will likely equalize most of the country, unfortunately except the North, Patterson says. Big-name companies will find a way to get their wares to consumers, he adds. This raises the question, he says, of whether or not some areas even need gro-

cery stores, or if in the future, some areas will just need a corner store with the basics.

“Perhaps, by that time, we’ll have self-driving cars. We’re preparing for crazy things like that,” Patterson says. “It does sound outlandish, but ... we are looking at a time when people won’t drive their own cars. It might be

sooner than we expect.”

Save-On-Foods’ grocery delivery service’s popularity in Canada has doubled in the past year, according to Brenna Gillespie, who works in e-commerce operations with the company. Generally, the service sees users buy a lot more than what they would in store—it’s “pantry loading,”

Gillespie says. She adds that it’s likely that Edmonton followed this trend, and that mostly urban centres see its use.

“We’re definitely seeing growth in perimeter communities as well,” she says. “They are a little slower in uptake.”

Doug Johnson doug@vueweekly.com

cheers to sweater weather

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

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Keestin O’Dell wants you to think about what your intentions are before you buy an ‘Indian’ Halloween costume. / Chelsea Novak

’TIS THE SEASON TO BE RACIST

I

Keestin O’Dell of Grant MacEwan’s kihêw waciston Indigenous Centre Explains How Stereotypical Costumes Are Harmful to Indigenous Peoples

f for some reason you’re thinking about grabbing an “Indian” costume off the rack at your nearest Halloween store, Keestin O’Dell, student engagement advisor at Grant MacEwan’s kihêw waciston Indigenous Centre, asks that you first think about what your intentions really are.

Earlier this month, O’Dell gave a talk called My culture is not a costume: How Halloween costumes sexualize Indigenous women as part of Sexual Violence Awareness Week at the university. The talk evolved from a paper he wrote for a sociology class while he was still a student at MacEwan. It was a content analysis where he looked at 52 adult women’s costumes on the Spirit Halloween and Costume Super Centre websites. “[Costume Super Centre] isn’t a household name, but it’s the largest online retailer of Halloween costumes,” he says.

He looked at three different characteristics for each costume—the title, the physical costume, and the description. For the titles, he found that most of them were sexual in nature.

8 arts

“No matter what, the costume had something that either just straight up had the word sexy or used cultural identifiers like ‘temptress,’ ‘tribal trouble,’ ‘hottie,’ ‘Poca Hottie,’” O’Dell explains.

The titles also commonly use the term “Indian,” which he points out is a word that’s fallen out of use.

“I feel like it’s a way that they can ‘other’ contemporary issues of Indigenous people, by using that word Indian, right? Because they say ‘This is historical, this is back in the day, this is over there. We’re past this,’” O’Dell says.

Looking at the costumes themselves, he found that the most characteristics were fringe and headbands or headdresses—mostly based on Plains Indigenous peoples.

“These costumes are supposed to represent Indigenous peoples throughout North America, but really just create a monoculture—that all Indigenous peoples are just Plains peoples instead,” O’Dell says.

The costume descriptions were also very sexualized, but were also very down on Indigenous life and Indigenous men.

“A lot of them were about attracting men, but specifically a lot of them were about attracting non-Indigenous men—so ‘Wearing this costume, you’ll have all the settlers howling at you;’ ‘Sex up a game of cowboys and Indians’ … So stuff like that. It’s hilariously offensive,” O’Dell says.

“A lot of them promoted the idea that being an Indigenous woman isn’t fun. So they’re all about ‘get away from basket weaving,’ ‘leave the teepee,’ ‘leave the tribe’ … So basically the costumes described how you should act as an Indigenous woman. ‘Use your culture to attract non-Indigenous men because they’re the more exciting ones, and also your culture is boring so you should leave the reserve or leave your community.’”

O’Dell acknowledges that women’s Halloween costumes are often marketed as sexy, but says that while sexy maid or nurse costumes sexualize the wearer, sexualized ‘Indian’ costumes sexualize Indigenous culture.

“And the one thing about Indigenous people and culture is that

they’re intertwined. You can’t really step out from it,” O’Dell says.

“Because when the average person sees an Indigenous person, they often assume that they know about culture, about language, and about this and this—so they can’t take off [their culture].”

Since writing the paper, O’Dell has presented his findings a number of times—first at a sociology symposium, then at MacEwan’s Student Research Week, during a few classroom visits, and finally at this month’s Sexual Violence Awareness Week.

O’Dell says that speaking to the students can be like preaching to the choir—they already agree with him—but, as his work has garnered some media attention, the response from the public has been more hostile. He says he’s been accused of being too PC (politically correct), or too sensitive.

O’Dell also points out that it’s non-Indigenous people who respond that way, and it’s people who are likely to wear the costumes themselves.

“I find it so interesting that these people who don’t get with

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

the cause or don’t understand why it’s offensive, are the ones who wanna dress,” he says. “They don’t sympathize with Indigenous people, but they want the right to dress up as Indigenous people.”

O’Dell also points out that academic research has shown that when adults dress up for Halloween, most of the time it’s done out of humour—as a joke.

So he asks that before you buy an ‘Indian’ costume off the rack or off a website, you ask yourself what your intent is.

“Because when they’re going to buy a costume, when they’re going to buy any costume, it’s because when you intend to wear it, you intend to act a certain way.

You intend to … perform in certain ways and carry on certain perceptions and stereotypes,” he says.

For those genuinely interested in celebrating Indigenous peoples and culture, O’Dell invites them to take part in local Indigenous celebrations.

“Come celebrate with us. We’d love to have you here,” he says.

Chelsea Novak chelsea@vueweekly.com

BALLET

BALLET EDMONTON’S NEW ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OPENS SEASON WITH TWO NEW PIECES

Wen Wei Wang Draws on Tradition and Creativity to Choreograph Contemporary Works

Fri., Nov. 2 – Sun., Nov. 4 Where We Are Triffo Theatre, Allard Hall, MacEwan University Tickets are $40 for adults, $25 for seniors and students, and $20 for children (under 12) tickets.balletedmonton.ca

W

en Wei Wang likes to think he’s lived two lives. One in Mao Zedong’s Communist China, and one when he moved to Vancouver on his own, without knowing the language. The one connection he has between his two lives is ballet. Wang was able to communicate through dance and create a name for himself as a leader in contemporary ballet across Canada. This season he will lead Ballet Edmonton (formally Citie Ballet) as the new artistic director.

Wang was just six years old when he fell in love with the dance genre.

“I went to go see the one Chinese Ballet called The White Haired Girl,” Wang explains. “I came back home and took my mom’s white silk scarf and put it over my head to pretend I had this white hair. I just danced the steps I remembered. Everyone was shocked. ‘You’re a little boy, how can you dance like a little girl. How do you remember steps?’ That’s how I knew I wanted to dance.”

Wang grew up as the only son

of two teachers in a very traditional family. He understands why his parents were hesitant to have him so focused on dance and instead encouraged him to paint or play the violin. He resisted, and was accepted into an army run art school where he was able to practice ballet. The school had ties to the Communist Party of China, which gave Wang’s family a sense of pride and made his parents comfortable with his decision to practice dance.

Various opportunities with different dance troupes eventually lead him to Vancouver for Expo 86 to teach and dance on a cultural exchange.

“The thing we learned is that we’re the best country,” Wang says about his life in China.

“We’re the best people. We have the best life in the world. So you don’t know what the outside world looks like. When I arrived in Vancouver I was like ‘This is like a wonderland.’ Everything is upside down from where I come from.”

After his exchange he returned to go to university in Beijing but was was still fascinated

by Western culture and contemporary dance. He returned to Vancouver in 1991, and aside from residencies like the one he’s doing in Edmonton, he’s been based there ever since.

Wang uses his traditional background and his love for creating something new to choreograph

unique contemporary works.

Where We Are is the first show Wang will direct and choreograph with Ballet Edmonton. The first piece in the show, X-Body, is a pure contemporary work that is set to electronic music and showcases the energy of the human body.

“We’re living in our time now,” Wang explains. “The history is there, the classic has been done.

You have the amazing Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty and Nutcracker. It’s been done. I think as artists it’s about what is new, it’s about creation, and it’s to make something we don’t know.

That’s what keeps us alive.”

The second piece Wang created is truly Edmonton inspired.

Last Words is a tribute to Orville Chubb, the former publisher of Avenue Edmonton and late husband of Ballet Edmonton board chair Trudy Callaghan. Chubb

toured through multiple continents, he’s won awards in both China and Canada, and created his own dance company. Despite all this, he doesn’t feel dried out yet. He says he doesn’t know what he’s trying to achieve in life but he still has so much creative energy that he knows he’s not done yet.

So what’s Wen Wei Wang’s secret to living two lives while constantly creating?

“Simple, don’t waste too much.

Just believe in yourself… that’s what I do.”

Tamanna Khurana

passed away suddenly in August, and was a large supporter of fine arts in Edmonton. Wang was inspired by Chubb’s contributions and by the way someone’s passing affects everyone left behind.

“The piece is about life and death, memories, and grieving… and keep moving on.”

Wang has experienced quite a bit in his two lives. His work has

Where We Are is the first show Wen Wei Wang will direct and choreograph with Ballet Edmonton. / Supplied

FRIDAY • October 26 • 2018

MISS MONEYPENNY’S

50/50 FUN - RAISER

7 - 11pm I Entrée by DONATION I CASH Bar Martinis • DISCO music • 50/50 raffle @ HARCOURT HOUSE ARTIST RUN CENTRE 3rd Floor, 10215 – 112th Street, Edmonton for the best costume contest > for more info: www.harcourthouse.ab.ca

POLITICS, MUSIC, ART, FOOD, FILM AND MORE! *BIRD’S... EYE... VUE. GET IT?

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

arts 9

OPERA

Fri., Oct. 26 (7:30 pm) La Traviata Northern Alberta Jubilee Tickets from $35 edmontonopera.com

ON THE TRAGIC STEPS OF LOVE

Edmonton Opera’s La Traviata Impresses with Strong Performances and a Dazzling Set

L

a Traviata’s returns to Edmonton on a stage as grand as it gets and with a talented cast to suit. Giuseppe Verdi’s tale of a terminally ill, delight-seeking courtesan overcome by her first true love (before being forced to relinquish it) does not disappoint as the opener to Edmonton Opera’s 55th season.

The set stuns at first glance. A two-story Parisian foyer features chandeliers, dimly lit club seating for the upcoming parties, a folding screen and makeup station that define Violetta’s (Laquita Mitchell) space—and most impressively, a magnificent curved staircase that stretches from one side of the stage to the other.

Primarily built here in Edmonton, and supported by the work of several dozen construction crew members from opera companies across Canada, the set drew applause from the audience before a note was ever sung.

When Violetta, lost in thought, silently descends the staircase to Giuseppe Verdi’s melancholic pre-

lude—played by the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra and conducted by Judith Yan—the meandering tone of this opera springs forth with her every step.

La Traviata’s iconic brindisi, “The Drinking Song,” excellently showcases the strength of The Edmonton Opera chorus. Their merrymaking is infectious, and director Alain Gauthier’s placement of the chorus around the stage—including the second-floor balcony—adds a sense of vertical depth to the festivities that’s uncommon in other productions.

As the chorus clears the stage and Alfredo (Jason Bridges) confesses his love to Violetta in a more personal duet, the singing strength of La Traviata’s leads shines through.

Mitchell’s soprano expertly flits through jumps in her range as horns in the orchestra sustain long, clear notes. Bridges’ tenor compliments Mitchell throughout— whether he entreats his love from the wings, or while embracing Violetta in centre stage.

Laquita Mitchell stars as Violetta. / Nanc Price

Alfredo’s father Germont (James Westman) delivers another great vocal performance in the second act as he arrives to ask Violetta to abandon her love. His baritone adds needed weight to his request that will upend Violetta’s newfound peace. Edmonton Opera’s production flaunts its strength here again in the mood shifts between acts, which are empowered by the set.

As Violetta and Alfredo escape to the countryside, the darker corners of the club give way to open shutters and a bright blue sky shines through. Kevin Lamotte’s lighting design makes the space feel like an

entirely different place—a striking feat, given how dominant the staircase remains in each scene. When the set later converts to a new club with red curtains and then finally to a poor, gloomy space with shuttered windows letting minimal light through the slats, the transition is no less impressive.

It’s a good thing so many interesting details from the costumes, set and vocal performances exist though, because as moving as the core beats of La Traviata’s story remain, many of them still drag on too long. Violetta and Germont’s songs interweave beautifully, but once

she’s convinced, their overwrought back and forth continues for too long. The pacing of Germont’s visit sucks energy out of the story, as opposed to the happy professions in the first act, or Violetta’s last moments in the final scene, which consistently builds over several minutes into a meaningful climax. It’s especially in this tragic finale that La Traviata leaves its mark. With an uncanny clarity of her situation and afforded the beauty of song to describe it, Violetta delivers a dramatic beat that hangs in the air after the curtain falls.

Kevin Pennyfeather

PLAY

INTO THE MIND OF A KILLER

Marty Chan’s The Bone House is a Piece of Immersive Theatre That Challenges What We Think of Serial Killers Thu., Oct. 25 – Oct. 31 The Bone House Varscona Hotel on Whyte tickets available at universe.com/events

E

Think you know what a serial killer looks like? / Supplied

10 arts

ver since the mid-1970s, society has had a powerful attraction to the minds of serial killers. Guys like Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, and John Wayne Gacy Jr still appear in pop culture today, and their names continue to live in infamy. During The Bone House—a play written by Marty Chan—another killer will be burned into our consciousness.

Eugene Crowley (played by Lew Wetherell), a self-proclaimed mind hunter, is leading a lecture on serial killers. As the lecture advances, Crowley reveals that another serial killer that he names The Midnight Cowboy is indeed, on the loose, leaving the audience to their own grim imaginations.

“When I wrote The Bone House, I was fascinated with the way people ignored the danger signs around them,” Chan says. “I wanted the audience to be involved, engaged, and complicit with what was going on. I wanted to break down the fourth wall to the point that the audience couldn’t tell if what was happening was theatrical or real.”

Basically, as an audience member, you will have to remind yourself that you are in fact watching a play. You also have to make the decision to trust Crowley, who seems to know a little too much about The Midnight Cowboy.

“It’s very Silence of the Lambs where you’re having a dinner party and then you find out you’re eating your buddy,” director Jennifer Krezlewicz says. “It [the play] exposes how we don’t know really what a serial killer looks like, and we don’t know what sets them off.”

It’s true, we don’t really know what a serial killer looks like, but amid all of the movie slasher films, we have a pretty good idea. For some reason—probably thanks to Hollywood—we believe they are all unkillable monsters in masks.

“The real serial killers look innocent,” Chan says. “I wanted the play to challenge this strange attitude and push audiences out of their comfort zones not only in the play but also in their lives.”

The performance also plays with the theme of control. Without giving too much away,—both Chan and Krezlewicz want the audience to be unsettled and surprised—each character in the

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

play has to deal with their own element of control.

“It’s an honest human characteristic,” Krezlewicz says. “We like to control things, like folding my laundry in a specific way or gassing up at one gas station. So it’s been interesting in this play to find when the control slips for each character.”

Control will also be taken away from the audience members as well. Before the show the audience will have to surrender their phones, leaving them completely immersed in The Bone House.

“We break the fourth wall and set it in a venue that doesn’t have the traditional safety nets of a play,” Krezlewicz says. “We purposefully picked the Varscona hotel to make it feel like you’re going to an actual lecture about serial killers.”

“In the play, the history of the serial killer is that he makes his victims watch a murder being committed live,” Chan adds. “When there are no witnesses, he kills the last victim and burns down the “kill room” with the bodies inside, leaving only bones.”

Hence “The Bone House.” Seems perfect for Halloween.

Stephan Boissonneault stephan@vueweekly.com

DRAMEDY ON STAGE

CREATING COMEDY AMIDST HORROR

The Comedy Company, Written by Neil Grahn, Shares the True Story of the Members of the PPCLI Comedy Company, Who Entertained Their Fellow Troupes During the First World War

or Neil Grahn, history and sketch comedy often go hand in hand. Whether he’s co-writing a funny song about the War of 1812 with Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie or getting really literal about The Bible with Literally, The Bible Stories, the performer, writer and director can always find some yuks in the days of yore—even the First World War. The Comedy Company—written by Grahn and directed by John Hudson—tells the story of the members of Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry (PPCLI) Comedy Company, who were asked to entertain the troupes during the ‘War to End All Wars.’

Grahn stumbled across the story while researching a documentary on the 100th anniversary of the Princess Patricia’s Candian Light Infantry Division.

“I was in their archives and then came across these articles on the comedy company, and went ‘What is this? What the hell?’” he says.

What struck Grahn was the challenge of having to come up with comedy during “the bloodiest, most horrific war to be in as a participant in all known wars.” He points out that the members of the PPCLI Comedy Company where the last soldiers ever tasked with entertaining their fellow soldiers.

“The very last where it would be, ‘OK, you’ve got to stop rehearsals because we have to throw you into the front line trenches. There’s an attack,’” he says.

The PPCLI also has a local connection—two of its current battalions are based in Edmonton.

Grahn shared what he’d learned with Hudson, who asked if Shadow Theatre could commission the play. As he set to work on writing a fictionalized account of the PPCLI Comedy Company, Grahn found a number of historical resources that he used to inform the script, including some old recordings.

“I … discovered in the archives—

VUEPICKS Blood: A Scientific Romance // Until Sat., Oct. 27 If haunted houses aren’t really your thing, here’s another way to have a spooky time this Halloween season—Blood: A Scientific Romance offers blood, twins, and a doctor of dubious ethics.

Twin sisters Poubelle and Angelique are left orphaned after a bloody highway accident, and Dr. Glass takes them in, but soon begins experimenting on them.

(Backstage Theatre, ATB Financial Arts Barns, $22, visit tickets. fringetheatre.ca for times)

the national archives—some original recordings with some of the guys from the original company— so I got some really great source material there,” Grahn says. “I was giggling when I discovered [that] …

To hear their voices talking about their experiences was so amazing.”

Grahn was also lucky enough to find some original scripts from the company. Though they were written after the end of the company’s first year—which is the span of time The Comedy Company covers—they also made for great source material.

Given the horrific setting, there’s also a more serious aspect to the story.

“Throughout he play, I just bring back where they are, what it is,” he says. “So there’s a series of really quite theatrical moments—because I’m really into theatricality— of just ‘what is the war?’ and trying to take the senses. What does war sound like? What does it feel like?

What does war smell like?—and taking those things that are the

War never changes. / Marc Chalifoux

experiential feelings and turning them into theatrical beats.”

After Grahn had written the script, there was a table read over the summer, and he made some changes from there—but after attending one rehearsal, he stepped back.

“It was great watching them and getting a sense of what was going

on, but it’s best not to be there, because I can be a control freak,” he says. “I’ll have suggestions—I think they’re doing a great job— it’s just I always have ideas. For me it’ll be beyond exciting to go to that opening night to see what the hell they came up with.”

Chelsea Novak chelsea@vueweekly.com

OCT 12 - 27, 2018

F

Until Sun., Nov. 11 The Comedy Company Shadow Theatre Visit shadowtheatre.org for showtimes and ticket prices

Chelsea Novak chelsea@vueweekly.com

Dead Centre of Town XI // Until Wed., Oct. 31 Catch the Keys Productions is promising that this year’s show will be its “most immersive, horrifying experience yet.” A choose your own adventure that draws inspiration from Edmonton’s “darkest aviation secrets,” this performance may both scare and inform. (Blatchford Field Air Hangar at Fort Edmonton Park, $25, $30 with DARK Circle Access, $55 with DARK Haunts)

Miss Moneypenny’s 50/50 Fun-Raiser // Fri., Oct. 26 (7 – 11 pm) Harcourt House invites you to dress to kill some martinis.

Proceeds from the event will support the gallery’s renovations, and the evening will include food, drink, music, James Bond Trivia, a 50/50 draw, a costume contest, and of course, art—the launch of Natalie Jachyra’s Lakeshore and Dixie exhibition. (Harcourt House, Admission by donation)

NORTHERN LIGHT THEATRE PRESENTS

Canadian Premiere!

by Bryony Lavery @ Studio Theatre inside the ATB Financial Arts Barns $25 Student/Senior, $30 Adults, $20 Sunday Matinée T I C K E T S A N D S E A S O N S U B S C R I PT I O N S : www.northernlighttheatre.com or 780-471-1586

The twin sisters from Blood: A Scientific Romance. / BB Collective Photography

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

arts 11

Tyler Duffy and Samantha Jeffery are Spalding and Penny Savidge. / Sean Gordon Photography

HAUNTED HOUSE TV

The Rutherford Manor Universe May Soon Make It to the Small Screen

P

op culture is ready for a new horror family—at least Preston Ewasiuk, creator and executive producer of the hopefully-soonto-be Rutherford Manor TV show, thinks so. To sate this twisted desire, Ewasiuk and his creative team have been working to bring the Flesher clan to the screen. The freakish, Edwardian-era family originated from an Edmonton haunt, but have since crept their way into a concept album, a collection of short stories, a few comics, trading cards, and now a TV trailer and vignettes.

The Rutherford Manor Haunt started as a haunted yard almost 12 years ago. Hugh Flesher and Therese Hansell started it to raise funds for the Edmonton Food Bank and the Second Chance Animal Rescue Society (SCARS). Six or seven years later, Ewasiuk got involved in the haunt as something to do with his girls’ soccer team.

He actually knew Flesher and Hansell through soccer, and a ghoulish partnership was born.

Flesher and Hansell had already

12 film

created the characters of Nox and Lilith Flesher, but Ewasiuk went on to expand the cast of characters and write backstories for all of them. The haunt cast then took part in a photoshoot to create a set of trading cards, which were distributed at the Edmonton Expo.

“That year alone, we doubled our attendance,” Ewasiuk says.

Almost 2,400 people showed up that year, and the success inspired him to expand the Rutherford Manor universe.

“It kind of dawned on me that I spent so much time and effort in developing all of these unique characters and storylines, and what-have-you—and at that point it was very small compared to what we have today—and I realized pop culture might be ready for another true horror family,” he says.

With Flesher and Hansell’s blessings, he began working on comic books, chronicling the Flesher clan.

The Rutherford Manor universe expanded from there, and it took a major leap this past summer.

Ewasiuk, director Dylan Rhys Howard, cinematographer Chase Gardner, and co-producer Hanako Nagao put out a casting call for the main six characters, and found actors who agreed to head off to Rowley, Alta. sans pay, and shoot a short trailer and a few short vignettes—all of which were shot for a Kickstarter campaign to raise money for a full pilot.

The trailer gives a short, visual introduction to the characters of Rutherford Manor and is set to “And Then There Was One, Pt. 2” off of the Rutherford Manor concept album, A Taste of Madness

by Daniel Martin and the Infamous.

Further details about the murderous family are included on the Kickstarter page, including characters descriptions for patriarch Nox Flesher (Matt Mihilewicz), his wife Lilith (Roseanna Sargent), his niece Penny (Samantha Jeffery), her husband Spalding Savidge (Tyler Duffy), and their fraternal twin daughters, Lisa (Ryley Shandro) and Louise (Lindsay Christopher).

Only one vignette has been released so far, and it shows a quaint familial scene in which Savage supervises his daughters’ body dump.

The original intention was to shoot a pilot to help pitch a fulllength series to possible investors, but it may be a mute point. Since launching the Kickstarter campaign, Ewasiuk has already been approached by potential backers, and ultimately, the pilot-as-marketingtool may be unnecessary.

“Within two hours of dropping that trailer, I’m starting to get telephone calls and emails,” Ewasiuk says.

Nothing is written in stone yet, but he’s hopeful and if the show comes to fruition, his ultimate goal is to employ Albertans, and specifically Edmontonians. He also hopes that next year, regardless of what else happens, he and his team will be able to shoot some short films about the Fleshers and the Savidges.

Only one of the TV cast members has participated in the haunt.

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

Fri., Oct. 26 – Sun., Oct. 28, Wed., Oct. 31 Rutherford Manor Haunt 1906 Robertson Cres SW Admission is by donation to the Edmonton Food Bank or SCARS Haunt: rutherfordmanorhaunt.com Universe: rutherford-manor.com Shandro is the original Lisa Savidge, but everyone else was fresh to the slaughter. That will change as Ewasiuk explains that some members of the TV cast will be making appearances at the haunt this year. He is the original Spalding Savidge, but says he’ll only be playing the part one day.

“We’re expecting over 4,000 people this year, so I’m probably going to have to work behind the scenes,” Ewasiuk says.

Chelsea Novak chelsea@vueweekly.com

HORROR HOTEL

Jon Hamm, Jeff Bridges, and Cynthia Erivo star in

Bad Times at the El Royale. / 20th Century Fox

BAD TIMES AT THE EL ROYALE INDEED

Drew Goddard’s Creepy Roadside Motel Flick Goes on Too Long, Dawdling along the Way

Bad Times at the El Royale Directed by Drew Goddard Now playing 

A

mong American-film locales, the roadside motel’s had a creepy starring-role—as if coverlet and sheets need to be pulled back to expose society’s underbelly. There’s Norman Bates spying on Room 1 in Psycho, Bruno Dumont’s French twist on it with Twentynine Palms, unfolding at a Mojave Desert lodge, and

documentary The Voyeur’s Motel, based on the scuzzy-but-true story of a Colorado innkeeper who, for decades, secretly gazed down on his customers through ceiling grilles.

Offering just one-and-a-halfstar accommodation, though, the sub-par neo-noir Bad Times at the El Royale takes us through the peepholes at a motor court one rain-lashed 1970s night, but the story just keeps running on and on. Each shady character—Father Daniel Flynn (Jeff Bridges), singer Darlene Sweet

(Cynthia Erivo), freewheeling Emily Summerspring (Dakota Johnson), vacuum salesman Laramie Seymour Sullivan (Jon Hamm), even concierge Miles Miller (Lewis Pullman)—has backstory baggage that could make for its own feature. But the movie dumps and sprawls out all the contents, tossing in some crumpled-up period references (Hoover, and Nixon, and secret surveillance, Motown, a Manson family-like cult, Vietnam), and piling up the corpses, too (the body count nears double digits).

It’s soon a tawdry, tear-soaked, blood-stained affair.

Writer-director Drew Goddard (The Cabin in the Woods) delves— room-occupant’s secret by roomoccupant’s secret—deep into El Royale, then laces everyone’s storylines together. The hotel itself, bisected by the California-Nevada border and offering a dank secret corridor, a pie-slice vending machine in the lounge, and different room rates depending on which state you’re staying in, remains the best character.

Flashbacks can interrupt the ac-

HORROR SEQUEL

tion-packed present, some stories dawdle, and the grand finale is much too long. Perhaps only the Coen brothers could have brought enough snappy patter and cinematic flair to make this variety of seedy crime-drama blossom. As it is, Bad Times at the El Royale ends up feeling like a long drive in a slow-building desert storm: vast, arid stretches of story between lightningflashes of action. My TripAdvisor review: check out, pronto, and don’t leave a tip.

Brian Gibson

FRI, OCT 26– THUR, NOV 1

HALLOWEEN 2.0

The Latest Chapter of Michael Myers’ Story Sees a Rematch with Jamie Lee Curtis

THE OLD MAN WITH THE GUN

BEL CANTO

SUN: 1:15 & 6:15PM MON TO WED: 7:00PM

FRI & MON TO THURS: 6:45 & 9:00PM SAT: 1:00, 3:15, 6:45 & 9:00PM SUN: 1:00, 3:15, 6:00 & 8:00PM

RATED: 14A

THE WIFE

SUN: 3:45 & 8:30PM MON TO THURS: 9:15PM

RATED: PG

RATED: 14A, CL

Jamie Lee Curtis is back for round two in Halloween. / Universal Studios

T

he latest Halloween isn’t a remake of the original 1978 slasher-flick but a direct sequel (not to be confused with Halloween II), ignoring the storylines of the other eight teenscream ’weens. It all adds up to 10 rubber-masked frightfests in 40 years.

Mostly ripping Halloween down to its essentials (John Carpenter’s synth-score; those orange ITC Serif Gothic opening-credits, this time with a collapsed pumpkin slowly bulging back to life; that bloody kitchen knife), this installment reunites Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) with archenemy Michael Myers, that mute, ever-striding serialkiller. It’s elemental (perhaps it should have been marketed as H2.0), with trauma fizzing and dread flaring up.

Laurie lives in a country home she’s arsenal-loaded, gated, and booby-trapped in anticipation

of her doomsday-visitor. But her daughter Karen (Judy Greer) wants little to do with her, while her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) is trying to enjoy her high-school days.

Mostly, director David Gordon Green creeps up the fear in each stalking scene without overstretching the suspense or making the murders too gruesome or predictable. There’s some comic and meta horror relief in a babysitting scene—one of many allusions to the first film.

While the callow original had its moments, they were as few and far-between as the teeth, and gaps between them, in a jack o’lantern’s mouth. In this sequel, there’s an over-reliance on closeups—the teen drama gets tedious. The story’s pretense of realism can be a bad mask, especially with a subplot involving crass, provocative reporters, the creakily plot-rolling neces-

Halloween Directed by David Gordon Green Now playing  sity of Myers’ escape, and some rickety corners of the househunting climax.

Beyond the stabs of tension, there’s a disturbing self-reflection on Halloween’s appeal. Laurie’s almost luring Myers—she mentions dreaming he’s on the loose, so she can kill him—and Myers is so horribly alluring: those idiot reporters are agog; a psych-ward doctor’s been fascinated for years; many moviegoers have been watching, decade after decade. So, for all the sense of a final battle here, is this toxic co-dependence, the obsession, over? Too bad there’s no gourd chance of that.

Brian Gibson

PRESENTS

OCT 25 - OCT 31

GHOSTBUSTERS (1984) PECHA KUCHA 32 THU @ 7:00 LIVE EVENT SUN @ 3:30 ADMISSION BY FOOD OR CASH NEXTGEN

NOT YOUR FINAL GIRL FILM FESTIVAL

GINGER SNAPS FRI @ 6:30 THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW FRI @ 10:00 - SOLD OUT, SAT @ 10:00 - SOLD OUT REEL FAMILY CINEMA

FREE ADMISSION FOR SAT @ 1:00 KIDS 12 & UNDER

THE WITCHES BLACKKKLANSMAN SAT @ 3:30, TUE @ 9:30, SUN @ 7:00

DONATION TO THE EDMONTON FOOD BANK

NOT YOUR FINAL GIRL FILM FESTIVAL

GOODNIGHT MOMMY SUN @ 9:30 GERMAN WITH SUBTITLES

MATANGI / MAYA / M.I.A. MON @ 7:00 METRO RETRO

THE LOST BOYS MON @ 9:30 METRO MOVIE PARTY! / 30TH ANNIVERSARY

BEETLEJUICE TUES @ 7:00 NOT YOUR FINAL GIRL FILM FESTIVAL SUSPIRIA (1977) SAT @ 6:30 ITALIAN, HOSTED BY LILITH FAIR RUSSIAN, GERMAN, LATIN, & ENGLISH W/ SUBTITLES 5TH ANNUAL METRO HALLOWEEN MASH

3D THE CREATURE FROM THE THE GARNEAU GHOST LIGHT TOUR SUN @ 11:00AM - SOLD OUT LIVE EVENT BLACK LAGOON (1954) WED @ 7:00 SUNDAY CLASSICS

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film 13

You know exactly what’s happening in this don’t you? / Curtis Hauser

MUSIC MEMES

The Creator of Edmonton music scene SHITposting Shares Their Thoughts About Memes, Lucky, and Music

E

dmonton’s music scene has always been a strange beast.

Sometimes it’s one of the most welcoming breeding grounds for local and new musicians, and other times it feels like it’s systematically trying to tear itself apart. Either way, it’s never a quiet place; it’s full of talented musicians, promoters, DIY venues, and memes—perhaps the most popular way to spread information over the internet.

Edmonton music scene SHITPOSTting is a Facebook page that shares and repurposes memes specifically unique to our local music scene.

It started off a little over a year ago as a harmless way for the creator (an active person involved in the music scene who prefers to remain anonymous) to move their meme expertise away from their personal Facebook profile.

“Also my friends on my feed were getting sick of my shitposting,” the creator says. “[It was] also an excuse to keep churning them out at a higher volume. The first one I made on my personal Facebook got around 200 likes and I was like ‘Wow I could keep this going.’”

Over a few months, the page began picking up steam with more and more followers—it now has close to 2,300—waiting for the opportune moments to remodel 14 music

trending memes for the Edmonton music scene to enjoy.

“I was actually livid when the page got more likes than my band at the time,” the creator says. “I was like ‘Holy shit. I’m better at memes than I am at being a musician.’”

A meme’s longevity is a very curious concept. Some memes only last for one to two weeks while others survive the digital maelstrom for long periods of time, and no one truly knows why.

“They’ve gotta be relatable,” the creator says. “They’re like a bad

ing their band will be the next big name like Mac Demarco. So every once in a while, it can be beneficial to poke fun at one another in a group setting. And that’s what the Edmonton music scene SHITPOSTing pages does—it creates a space for collective laughs.

“Artists take themselves too seriously,” the creator says, being one themselves. “There’s space for seriousness and jest—both can exist simultaneously [and] memes are like little bites of cultural information that help us relate to each other.”

“Musicians are broke and Lucky is cheap,” says the meme page creator.

“It’s cheaper here than other cities from what I’ve noticed. It’s also such a meme. I’m not sure if that was my doing or not, probably not.”

There’s also a running joke in some circles where it’s common for bands to crush a couple Luckys behind the venue before their show. “‘Wanna crush a lucky behind The Buck?’ Quintessential trash musician move,” the creator says who has made many memes with Lucky Lager at the forefront.

“I was actually livid when the page got more likes than my band at the time,” the creator says. “I was like ‘Holy shit. I’m better at memes than I am at being a musician.’” pun. The best ones make ya go ‘aw fuck.’ You know how good puns kinda hurt? I always want people to see my memes and think ‘This is so me’ or think of a friend who it relates to.”

Much like any music scene, Edmonton’s is full of artists who sometimes take themselves a bit too seriously, constantly think-

One beverage that has become synonymous with the Edmonton music scene is Lucky Lager, a light, classic Canadian-style lager with only 4.8 percent alcohol per volume. It doesn’t matter what venue or genre show you’re at in Edmonton. Lucky is always available and always flowing through patrons be it the bands, fans, the sound guy—you name it.

Of course—once again—it’s all in jest. All of the memes found on the page aren’t really a secret. It’s usually a common understanding between members of the music scene. But “Moving to Montreal won’t fill the void,” is the page’s “magnum opus” meme. There’s also the running one about every band using a chorus pedal and sounding like Mac Demarco (it’s

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

still a thing), or every Edmonton band playing Sled Island.

“People love to big dick each other about Sled; I’ve got no idea why,” the creator says. “Sled seems to be the end all be all. ‘We played sled’ is such a huge bragging right.”

This is not to say that Sled Island isn’t a fantastic music festival. It is, but it has become an Edmonton music meme and everybody knows it.

“Every band in Edmonton is trying to either be a slut for Sled Island or a slut for the EMAs [Edmonton Music Awards]. One or the other.

Always,” the creator says.

In all seriousness, the creator does want some positive change for Edmonton’s music scene. In their eyes, there needs to be more focus on all-ages shows, more unity among scenes, and more interest in the majority of the music and arts community from the local press.

“The money seems to get channeled into one type of band, but there’s so much else that deserves money, attention, and recognition,” the creator says. “Where is the hardcore/punk recording of the year award? That’s a massive scene that has zero chance of being acknowledged.”

We’re looking at you EMAs. Stephan Boissonneault stephan@vueweekly.com

HARD GIVN’R ROCK

Deaner (third from left) knows how to party—Canadian style. / Ryan Faist

STILL GIVN’R AFTER ALL THESE YEARS

Deaner of FUBAR Fame Chats About His Band Nightseeker and the State of Partying in Canada

“

Yeah let me grab Deaner, he’s just finishing his breakfast beer.”

These were the last words uttered to me by Paul Spence before letting his alter ego ‘Deaner’ take over our conversation.

For the uninformed, the Canadian 2002 indie film FUBAR follows the exploits of Terry and Deaner, two Alberta lads that want nothing more than a cold Pilsner and to ‘give’r’ at a good party. Deaner is now bringing some of his barn-burning mentality to Edmonton, in the form of his band Nightseeker.

The group pays homage to such classic artists as AC/DC, Led Zeppelin and Ronnie James Dio while embodying many of the elements in which Deaner stands for. And their debut al-

bum 3069: A Space-Rock Sex Odyssey is a cold beer that is just waiting to be tilted and shotgunned.

“We wanted to do it right. We had this idea of doing this highly produced rock record with that kind of classic rock value and ya can’t just do that in a basement,” Deaner says.

The album, which came out back in April, harkens back to concept albums of the 1970s, and covers subjects such as cataclysms, space battles. and of course— partying. If you’ve ever seen a fantasy mural on the side of a beat up van, that is how the band sounds, and it’s a sound that Deaner himself thinks is long overdue for a comeback.

“This is the kinda music that I like to crank up and just listen to, and I do think there’s an appetite for it out there ya know?

The wheel of popularity moves in different directions, and I think nowadays people want a bit more tone and energy in their music,” Deaner says.

His mind for music production is equal to his knack for getting too drunk to function and he has noticed trends in the industry that pose difficulty for up-andcoming artists who focus on the more classical elements of rock.

Nightseeker had to go through a couple of iterations before getting off the ground. Since the release of the first album however, the group has been tearing across

Canada teaching the country how to give’r.

“When it comes to party rock, I think it got lost for a while. Those kinda bands gotta hammer out five to six years of work, where as in the indie rock scene, you got labels sending people to all these shows just because they gotta sign someone … I think a lotta folk can be opinionated and angsty these days. I feel like it’s nice to imagine a world with people like me and Terry in it,” Deaner says.

The ethos of Deaner and Nightseeker focuses on the element of having a good time. Songs like “Thunder and Lightning” and “The Dragon’s Lair” all have a certain quality that would be misheard unless blasted while tearing down the road on a booze run,

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

Thu., Oct. 25 (8 pm) Nightseeker w/ Sparrow Blue, Jazz Cigarette Starlite Room $20 via ticketfly.com or head banging around a campfire, and it all comes down to the power of Deaner’s falsetto vocals and lyricism.

“I always see myself as a bit of a poet; I love bringin’ what I wrote on a crumpled up napkin to life on stage,” Deaner says.

In essence, Nightseeker and Deaner are akin to mainlining the raw Canadian experience, but instead of maple syrup and Michael Bublé— it’s cold beer and bong rips.

Jake Pesaruk

music 15

EDM

KEEPING PLUR ALIVE IN OUR EDM SCENE Boodang Enacts Harm Reduction Framework before Its Halloween Extravaganza, SCREAM

SCREAM 2017 / Supplied

16 music

W

hile Boodang—one of Canada’s largest electronic music promoters—has mastered the art of throwing a damn good party, what really stands out about the company is its dedication to its community.

In response to the city’s concerns about the safety at electronic shows earlier this year, Boodang now employs the services of Indigo Harm Reduction Services at their venues to provide a judgement-free space for festival-goers.

“They’re really more about education, and there’s an escalation and de-escalation of issues that happen at events,” says Viet Nguyen, one of Boodang’s owners.

Due to a spike in hospital transports from electronic shows in the past year, the city recommended a ban on all ‘raves.’ Ofcourse, this was cause for much distress in the dance music community. However, Boodang jumped into action, and enlisted a group of people in the industry to determine a possible solution.

They got together to identify “what level of care is needed at the events in order to reduce the amount of stress on the city’s resources,” Nguyen says.

After much deliberation, the civic group came up with numerous ideas, which they implemented in their first outdoor music festival BOMFEST!, this past September.

The event was the first electronic show in the city following the moratorium, and as Nguyen puts it, “it was a guinea pig and a testing ground” for Boodang’s new concept.

Indigo was at BOMFEST! to assist and educate attendees in distress. Furthermore, BOMFEST! also called on Odyssey, a “medi-

cal team which has an on-site physician and nurses,” that can take care of guests on site instead of requiring medical transports. These valuable services were also employed by Boodang.

“The cause for concern was there, and I believe that from that, we were able to come out with better solutions for what we’re doing now,” Nguyen says.

Boodang plans to incorporate these new tactics in all their shows moving forward, including their upcoming Halloween massive event SCREAM. Passion, dedication, and care for the music community are the fundamental values that have made Boodang a success since its inception in 1999.

The promoter has been bringing outstanding talent to Western Canada, enabling the electronic dance music community to stay alive and flourish. In its 20 years of existence, Boodang has managed to keep a pulse on the music industry and has consistently organized sold-out shows with stellar lineups and captivating production.

In its founding days, Boodang “just wanted to throw a good party,” Nguyen says.

Their earliest shows were held in smaller nightclubs and halls. Today, Boodang hosts some of the largest events in Western Canada. Through its many massive events—such as SCREAM, Pure, and Frequency— Boodang brings some of the most illustrious legends of the electronic dance music industry to Edmonton.

SCREAM is one of Boodang’s most anticipated shows and is notorious for always selling out. Although SCREAM has typically been an all-night event that goes on until

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

Sat., Oct. 27 (8 pm) SCREAM 2018 Shaw Conference Centre Tickets at Boodang.com 6 a.m., this year, Boodang has decided to reduce the hours of the show to an end time of 2:30 a.m..

While many fans were disappointed by this change, Nguyen believes that this is a wake-up call for the dance music scene.

“The scene needs to start governing itself, and people need to start looking out for each other,” he says. Nguyen firmly believes that by working together as a community, electronic shows can be a successful, risk-free experience for everyone.

This year’s SCREAM lineup boasts a wide variety of genres and includes artists such as REZZ, Tritonal, Aly & Fila, and Salvatore Ganacci. While this year’s lineup may not be stacked with mainstream artists, it promises a little something for every fan with its variety. Boodang’s shows are almost always star-studded with the industry’s top-talent, however, the promoter has also consistently delivered variety to Edmonton’s music scene.

“It’s about getting people out, but at the same time, it’s also about educating people on music,” Nguyen says.

Boodang’s hope is that fans choose to come to events not just for mainstream acts, but for the overall experience and to see new artists.

“Part of throwing events is giving people this bigger spectrum of artists to listen to, and that’s [my] responsibility as a promoter as well,” he says.

Anuska Sarkar

DREAM PSYCH POP

UPCOMING

THE RELUCTANT SONIC PERFECTIONIST

EVENTS

Nothing Ever Feels Finished for the Lead Songwriter for Morewine

SOUTH EDMONTON COMMON

Morewine—always a good motto. / Supplied

OCT 25

NEW CITY w/ MILQ & SHAY ESPOSITO

OCT 26

SWOLLEN MEMBERS

OCT 27

SHORT OF ABLE: LAST CALL

WEST EDMONTON MALL OCT 25

BEER SERIES 101: THE BASICS

OCT 26

JUSTIN HOGG

OCT 27

SHAGUAR

Tickets and full listings TheRecRoom.com The Rec Room® is owned by Cineplex Entertainment L. P.

Fri., Oct. 26 (8 pm) Casper Skulls w/ Morewine, Doreen, The Eclipse Sewing Machine Factory $10

M

orewine is a local, dreamy, psychdelic-sounding indie band that sprung from the mind of Mathew Richard Louis. He never meant for the band to sound the way it does, Louis admits, but it’s what came out when they started playing together.

them for however many years,” Louis says. “Nothing ever feels finished for me.”

Which is something any artist has probably dealt with at some point in their lives. Despite this, however, Louis still loves playing music—he would just rather spend his time on stage rather than in the studio.

“It’s not like I find playing music awkward or challenging, I really love it. It’s the process of writing and recording my own music is the part that I find really labourious. It’s really reward-

Which is funny, considering Louis fully admits to struggling with the songwriting and recording process and not being a fan of that particular aspect of the music business.

“I find the process of writing and recording to be extremely difficult,” Louis says. “The rewarding part for me is performing. I like playing shows. I like being in that environment and being on stage more than I like any other stuff.”

So far, Morewine has two EP’s to their name and are working on their first full-length album due out either later this year or early

OCTOBER 26TH Tickets $24.95 plus gst

“Still to this day, I go back and I feel like I’m still writing songs even though we’ve been playing them for however many years,” Louis says. “Nothing ever feels finished for me.”

“I’m not the best guitarist in the world, so I have a limited set of tools that I work with and that’s what it ends up sounding like at the end of the day,” Louis says.

“There’s not a lot of intent in terms of how it sounds.”

One of Louis’ biggest problems is something many creative folks struggle with. It’s part perfectionism, and part ownership—he can do whatever he wants to the songs.

“Still to this day, I go back and I feel like I’m still writing songs even though we’ve been playing

ing but I guess I’m kind of lazy. I just like to rock,” Louis says.

Louis is the main songwriter for all Morewine songs. He comes up with the song ideas and writes the lyrics himself, then lets the other members of the band fill in the space however they choose. Originally, though, Louis had wanted a more collaborative approach to the songwriting.

“It didn’t really work out that way,” Louis says. “And we needed songs, so that became me.”

next year. The full-length album, tentatively named Privacy, digs into Louis’ own emotional state over the last few years. “[It deals] with my perpetual personal tragedy that is still sort of ongoing,” Louis says. “It’s a lot of self reflection and self care put into songs as a way to express what I’m dealing with.”

The album was recorded in Louis’ spare bedroom over the last couple years and is currently being mixed.

Alexander Sorochan

OCTOBER 27 TH

TICKETS $59.95 PLUS GST Some conditions may apply. Promotion subject to change without notice and AGLC approval.

cnty.com/edmonton

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

music 17

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Alexandra Stréliski INSCAPE Secret City Records

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NOV 1 - SUE FOLEY 3 - THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS 8 - THE SADIES 9 - BIF NAKED 10 - JACK SEMPLE 16 - CAPTAIN TRACTOR 18 - THE DUNGAREES - SUNDAY COUNTRY NIGHTS 23 - REVOLUTION ENGINE 24 - MIKE PLUME 28 - JOEY LANDRETH 30 - YUKON BLONDE/THE ZOLAS

The word “cinematic” has been used to describe Alexandra Stréliski’s work before, but what exactly does that mean? On paper, cinematic music is created for a specific scene in a film or series, and while her awakening piano ballads have made it on screen, (Dallas Buyers Club, Big Little Lies, Sharp Objects) Stréliski’s sound cannot be tied down to only moving pictures. Her pieces on her latest album INSCAPE, inspire, depress, and satiate all at the same time.

She’s the perfect example of minimalist virtue, only using a grand piano and sometimes a quiet string section. We are in a maximalist age where many artists feel it is necessary to strive for more instruments to evoke a feeling within their listeners. Stréliski achieves this with a few piano chords and melodies that dance off each other in beautiful unison.

There are not stand out tracks on INSCAPE. They all hold up and honestly, the whole album needs to be played from start to finish to truly experience its wonderment. It’s as if Stréliski has created a neoclassical opera, as each song plays off of the next slowly ending on the closer “Le Nouveau Depart.” Stréliski is on par with composers like Hans Zimmer and Jóhann Jóhannsson, and it’s time for the world to give her the recognition she deserves.

Stephan Boissonneault stephan@vueweekly.com

DEC 2 - BIX MIX BOYS - SUNDAY COUNTRY NIGHTS 7 - SPARROW BLUE 8 - CRAIG CARDIFF 15 - KHALED RAHIME, JENESIA, LAUREN MARIE, AMBER AVINA, VANESSA DOMINGUES 21 - SMALL OFFICE LIVE MUSIC CHRISTMAS PARTY (CONTACT@STATIONONJASPER.COM FOR DETAILS)

WEEKEND

B R U N C H E S

B RU N C H E S A R E B E TT E R W I T H L I V E M U S I C .

FA M I LY ST Y L E S E RV I C E . FA R M E RS ’ M A R K E T B RU N C H O N SAT U R DAY & FO L K F E ST S U N DAY B RU N C H , 11 A M – 2 P M .

John Butler Trio Home Nettwerk Records The roots/rock and dub vibrations you’ve come to love from guitar virtuoso John Butler will still permeate with his album Home. With hints of love,

S TAT I O N O N J A S P E R . C O M 18 music

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

light, warmth, and passion, Butler’s passion is always on display. Though Home is experimentation with space and electronic music.

The album investigates the balance of electronicrooted experiments that, rather than distract, only lend able hands to the accomplished song writing of the John Butler Trio. Butler himself a man on the road, a man with a message of peace, and a man willing to stand up for the his beliefs. Butler dedicates this album as an “ironic duality” of living out your dreams but being away from “those you love most” at home.

“Brown Eyed Bird” melds this duality with a combination of uplifting folk choruses and spacey electronic/dub verses.

Though Butler isn’t full of graces, as, often, what’s meant to be a catchy chorus just falls flat like in “You Don’t Have to be Angry Anymore.” If you’re a fan of John Butler Trio, this album will give an extra kick to what you love; and if you’re listening to John Butler Trio for the first time, sit back, relax, and enjoy; legalization is here.

Ryan Hook

Sandro Perri In Another Life Constellation It has been seven years since Sandro Perri delivered us the unimaginably beautiful record Impossible Spaces. Its follow up does not disappoint nor does it follow the same formula.

Perri calls In Another Life an experiment in “infinite” songwriting, which is a good descriptor, as the album is made up of only four songs and runs 44 minutes long. The title track makes up Side A and has a runtime of nearly 25 minutes, but you’d never know unless you looked at its length. The song wraps you up like a warm blanket fresh from the dryer and puts you into a dreamlike state making time meaningless.

Repetition is the backbone and it gives Perri the opportunity to play with layers of soothing synths, subtle guitar and calming piano which rise and fall so expertly that sometimes you’re unsure if they were even there.

“Everybody’s Paris” takes up Side B and is made up of three parts with Perri singing the first, Andre Ethier (The Deadly Snakes) the second, and Dan Bejar (Destroyer) the third.

The melody and lyrical content tie the parts together with the instrumentation differing between them, matching the mood to each singer’s respective style. Although in three parts, Side B really plays like one track as well and continues the theme of moving sideways instead of forward. This theme makes In Another Life a meditative experience that challenges the status quo and its success in doing so solidifies Sandro Perri as one of Canada very best in song craft.

Jeff MacCallum

ALBERTA-WIDECLASSIFIEDS

VUEPICKS

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UNRESERVED AUCTION Saturday, October 27th @11 AM. Cars, Trucks, Trailers, Snowmobile, Tools, Shelters, Gates, Tire Machines, Pressure Washers, more. Scribner Auction, Wainwright, Alberta.

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•• coming events •• Allison Russell and JT Nero make Birds of Chicago. / Supplied

Birds of Chicago w/ Daniel Rodriguez // Thu., Nov 2 (7:30 PM) Usually by a band’s fifth album, its sound can feel repetitive and somewhat stale, but this isn’t the case with Birds of Chicago. The secular gospel-blues folk duo, who are now based in Nashville, have become an Edmonton favourite since the release of Real Midnight in 2015. Now with Love in Wartime released this year, they are continuing to build on their earpleasing melodies. JT Nero and his wife/muse Allison Russell are going to continue to get big. The audiences are going to grow and shows will sell out quick, so maybe check them out while you have the chance. (Arden Theatre, $38) Bands As Bands at the Starlite // Fri., Oct. 26 (6 PM) The Misfits, SNFU, Rancid, DIO, Amon Amarth— these are just some of the bands that will live vicariously through their fans (who also happen to be pretty good musicians) on Friday. It’s bands as

VUECLASSIFIEDS 1600.

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can you read this? help someone Who can’t!

Volunteer 2 hours a week and help someone improve their Reading, Writing, Math or English Speaking Skills.

Call Della at P.A.L.S. 780-424-5514 or email volunteers@palsedmonton.ca

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bands season, the fun time of year where local musicians conquer and struggle through some covers.

An important thing to note for these kinds of shows is to not go in thinking that your going to hear an identical sound to the band being replicated. (Starlite Room, $15) Halloween! The Slight Brains, Dead Friends, Laundry Week // Wed., Oct. 31 (7 PM) Halloween fell on a Wednesday this year, but our friends at The Absurd Collective—a relatively new DIY promoter in Edmonton—are making sure the spooktastic day is still going to be a greasy rager.

The Slight Brains play lo-fi, indie, goblin rock, Dead Friends are obviously ghosts, and Laundry Week, well, their bass players last name is Blade, so ... fill in the blanks. Attendance is restricted to staff, and University of Alberta students/alumni, but they’re allowed to bring five guests, so start making some friends or steal a OneCard. Don’t actually do that.

(Dewey’s, Free)

ANTIQUES & COLLECTIBLES Show & Sale. November 2-3.

Howard Johnson Hotel, 15540 Stony Plain Road, Edmonton.

Friday & Saturday, 10 AM - 5 PM. Fine Glass, Jewelry, Furniture, Oil Lamps, Coins, Toys/ Dolls, Sports Memorabilia, Country Collectibles, more!

Admission $5.00/person. 780908-5790.

•• employment •• opportunities NELSON BROS OILFIELD SERVICES (1997) Ltd. requires Heavy Duty Mechanic due to continual growth. We offer: competitive wages, competitive compensation package, scheduled days off, quality equipment.

Successful applicants will require: journeyman ticket; dependability; independent work ethic; likes a challenge; great

To Book Your Classifieds, Call 780.426.1996 or email classifieds@vueweekly.com Artist to Artist

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GO

SAVAGELOVE CAT’S MEOW

Hi, Dan: I am a homosexual young adult seeking advice about kitten play. I find it very intriguing, and I’m wondering where to start. It’s a turn-on when someone calls me kitten, but I’m not sure how to express my kink or desire for kink play to the person or persons I am into.

Any advice would be appreciated.

CONSTRUCTIVE ADVICE THOUGHTFULLY SOUGHT Hi, CATS: I am a homosexual notso-young adult without much advice to offer where kitten play is concerned. I’ve encountered plenty of gay puppies in the wild—at various leather/fetish events—but I’ve seen only one fetish kitty in my lifetime, and she was a queen.

(A female cat is called a queen, a male cat is called a tom, and a group of cats is called a glare. #TheMoreYouKnow!)

But Amp Somers, who hosts the kink-friendly sex-ed show Watts the Safeword, assures me that gay kitties are definitely a thing.

“Kitten play is a subcategory of the ‘animal role-play’ or ‘pet play’ kink,” said Somers. “It is a form of domination and submission in which someone gets into the head space of an animal they are roleplaying and takes on its characteristics—be it with gear (masks, tails, collars) or by acting out the mannerisms of their animal. Most importantly, and this goes for all proper pet players, there are no actual animals involved in this play.”

Puppy play is the most common form of pet play—by far—and it’s very popular among younger gay kinksters. (Please don’t confuse gay pups or kitties with gay bears or otters. The former is about role-play and fetish; the latter is about body type, affirmation, and community.) But what accounts for the popularity of pet play among younger kinksters?

“This sort of play allows someone

Dan Savage

to get into kink easily with or without a partner and in a playful manner,” said Somers. “Pet play allows players to get their feet wet in the BDSM world without having to visit a dark dungeon, get tied up, or engage in anything a newer kinkster might find intimidating.

It’s a great entry-level kink.”

As for expressing your kink, CATS, that’s something you’re going to have to work out on your own.

“I imagine CATS already has an image of what kitten play looks like to them, and I bet it differs from what I might imagine my own pet play would look like or even from what readers imagine a kitten player to look like,” said Somers. “Is CATS a domesticated lazy kitten who lies in the sun?

A curious, well-trained, docile cat responsive to cuddles and treats?

Or is he a rambunctious, bratty, independent stray?”

To find your way into the kink scene, Somers recommends getting online.

“That’s how I first found pet play,” he said. “Sites like kitten-play.com offer in-depth written pieces by players, links to resources, and forums where CATS can educate himself. Other sites like FetLife or Facebook provide more private groups to ‘meet’ others, ask more in depth questions, find local gettogethers, and make friends to socialize with. Or if they prefer video content, YouTube has a number of creators (like ‘Scream Kiwi’) who talk about their kinks in a fun, educational, and personal way. And once CATS feels comfortable in their own identity and has defined what they want out of this play, they will be able to really communicate to their partner(s) what they’re into and what they want out of kitten play.”

Check out Amp Somers’s show— Watts the Safeword—at youtube. com/WattsTheSafeword, and follow him on Twitter @Pup_Amp.

DICKHEAD DEALER

I’m a gay male, and one of my good friends has put me in a strange position. The friend has been married to his husband for 15 years, and they are allowed to “play.” I have no desire to be in an open relationship, and I don’t think my boyfriend does either. I occasionally go over to this friend’s house right after work to buy weed, and he’s always alone when I come by. He joked about answering the door naked and then did it. (He told me he was going to, but I honestly didn’t think he would do it.) I was extremely uncomfortable, and he knew it.

The last time I went over, he was naked again—and this time, he jerked off to completion in front of me. He asked me to join in, and I told him I couldn’t because I hadn’t discussed anything like this with my boyfriend. I’m supposed to go over again tomorrow, and he asked me to come by early because his husband would be getting home from work early that day. This leads me to believe that the husband would not be okay with this.

I haven’t said anything to his husband or my boyfriend because I don’t want this to become a huge mess and I hoped my palpable discomfort would put an end to it. Any thoughts on how I should handle this nicely to make it stop without hurting his feelings?

UNDRESSED NAKED FRIEND REALLY IS ENGINEERING NEEDLESS DRAMA

asshole is sexually harassing you, and you haven’t told him to stop in unambiguous language.

The only reason you’ve given him for not whipping it out yourself is that you haven’t “discussed anything like this with [your] boyfriend.” He has self-servingly interpreted your reason for not joining in like this: “He wants to, and maybe he will after he has a ‘discussion’ with his boyfriend.” I’m sorry, UNFRIEND, but you’re going to have to be blunt: “You have to knock this shit off. It’s disrespectful, it’s nonconsensual, and it’s pissing me off.” Don’t worry about hurting his feelings—he obviously doesn’t care about your feelings— and find a new weed dealer.

APP-ROPRIATE

I have a follow-up question on your advice for JACKS, the gay manager who ran into an employee at a JO party. Alison “Ask a Manager” Green told him he couldn’t go to these parties anymore. A distinction was made between sexual situation encounters between bosses and those they manage in “private clubs” (the JO club) or at “public events” (Folsom Street Fair). My question is about Grindr/Scruff/ Growlr/etc. Are these more like “private clubs” or “public events”?

In part, my question stems from being a professor and having seen students and colleagues on these

apps. I feel like I should not be reading the profiles of students in my department (who are mostly graduate students). I am also troubled by my colleagues appearing on these apps—from the perspective that this seems to be a sexually oriented space and there is the power differential between faculty and students.

BASICS OF SEXUAL SPACES Dating apps are the new gay bars—more than 75 percent of same-sex couples met online— so telling gay bosses or college profs they can’t go on dating apps because their gay male students or underlings might be on them means condemning gay bosses and profs to celibacy. Bosses and profs shouldn’t flirt with their students and underlings, of course, and it might be a good idea to block ’em when you spot ’em— so you won’t be tempted by their profiles/torsos and they won’t be tempted by yours—but gay bosses and profs are free to look for dick on dating apps.

On the Lovecast, where do kinks come from? Dr. Justin Lehmiller on the science of desire: savagelovecast.com. mail@savagelove.net @fakedansavage on Twitter ITMFA.org

Your “good friend” is an asshole, UNFRIEND. He’s violating a whole bunch of social norms—chiefly the don’t-jerk-off-to-completion-infront-of-other-people-without-theirenthusiastic-consent norm (a.k.a. the Louis C.K. career in comedy memorial norm)—and relying on your adherence to other social norms (avoid being rude, defuse don’t confront, spare others’ feelings) to get away with violating you as well. This

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JONESIN’ CROSSWORD

Matt Jones

“I’m Certain”-- some hidden veracity.

Across

1 Countrified 7 Allison Janney sitcom 10 Haydn’s nickname 14 Fleecy fabric 15 Yoko who turned 85 in 2018 16 Racetrack shape 17 Get louder 20 “GymnopÈdies” composer Satie (or “Jeopardy!” and crossword champion Agard) 21 Hesitant sounds 22 “Right Now (Na Na Na)” rapper 23 Considered groovy, man 24 Slo-___ fuse 25 AKA, in the business world 26 ___ in “Charlie” 29 Fountain reward of myth 32 Alpine cottage 35 Haven’t yet paid 36 Balletic bend 37 Varnish ingredient 38 Jim Acosta’s network 39 Golden Globes category 40 Solemn promise 41 Some people’s preferred pronoun 42 One not responsible for the bad news 43 Hit the mother lode 46 “Shameless” network, for short 47 Baby anteater 48 Noah’s ride 49 Suffix in geometry 52 Bread served with aloo gobi 54 Takeover try 55 Prefix meaning “one billionth” 56 Buddy cop show of the 1970s 60 Look sullen 61 “Jellied” British fish 62 “Certainly, Monsieur!”

63 March participants?

64 7-Across partner, maybe 65 Phrase before “Go!”

Down

1 “___ T for Teen” 2 Aboriginal name for Australia’s Ayers Rock 3 Parsley bit 4 Do horribly 5 Closely monitored hosp. area 6 Juliet, for one 7 Mineralogist with a scale 8 Number of times the Milwaukee

22 at the back

ARIES (March 21-April 19): In her poem “Shedding Skin,” Harryette Mullen compares her own transformation to the action a snake periodically carries out to renew itself. Since you now have an excellent opportunity to undertake your own molting process, you may find her thoughts helpful.

(I’ve rendered them in prose for easier reading.) “Pulling out of the old scarred skin—old rough thing I don’t need now—I strip off, slip out of, leave behind. Shedding toughness, peeling layers down to vulnerable stuff. And I’m blinking off old eyelids for a new way of seeing. By the rock I rub against, I’m going to be tender again.”

Halloween costume suggestion: snake sloughing its skin.

Brewers have appeared in the World Series 9 Not fixed 10 Sport involving horses 11 Friendly, like some relatives 12 “Jackie Brown” actress Grier 13 It’s made with warm fermentation 18 “___: Ragnarok” 19 Adequate 24 Vitamin also known as PABA 25 Early morning 27 “Once upon ___ ...”

28 Clip hedges 29 1912 Nobel Peace Prize winner Root 30 Trio of trios 31 “Everybody gets a car!” impresario 32 “Mr. Show” costar David 33 “English Toffee” candy bar 34 Carpenter or Ride, e.g.

38 Dale’s cartoon pal 39 Pack of cards 41 Soundly defeated 42 Pointer, for one 44 They’ll look over W-2s 45 Something stored in the cloud?

49 Los ___, California 50 As scheduled 51 Like a game for the record books, perhaps 53 They can be fine or graphic 54 Like a worn tire 55 Night, in Nice 56 Getaway spot 57 Bunch 58 House support 59 Artist’s selection ©2018 Jonesin’ Crosswords

FREEWILL ASTROLOGY

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): “Only the young and stupid are confident about sex and romance,” says 49-year-old author Elizabeth Gilbert, who has written extensively about those subjects. I agree with her. I’ve devoted myself to studying the mysteries of love for many years, yet still feel like a rookie. Even if you are smarter about these matters than Gilbert and me, Taurus, I urge you to adopt a humble and curious attitude during the next few weeks. The cosmos has prepared some interesting lessons for you, and the best way to take advantage is to be eagerly receptive and open-minded. Halloween costume suggestion: sex researcher, love explorer, intimacy experimenter.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): “My way of learning is to heave a wild and unpredictable monkeywrench into the machinery,” wrote Gemini author Dashiell Hammett.

But I recommend that you use his approach very rarely, and only when other learning methods aren’t working. Most of the time, your best strategy for getting the lessons you need is to put lubricating oil into the machinery, not a monkey-wrench. That’ll be especially true in the coming weeks. I suggest that you turn the machinery off for a while as you add the oil and and do some maintenance.

Halloween costume suggestion: repair person; computer techie; machine whisperer.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): The great Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman was a Cancerian like you and me. One of the factors contributing to his success was that he put his demons to good use, “by harnessing them to his chariot.” He also testified that he gained control over his demons by taking long walks after breakfast. “Demons don’t like fresh air,” he said. “They prefer it if you stay in bed with cold feet.” I suspect that now would be an excellent time to adopt his advice. Halloween costume suggestion: walk your demon on a leash, or make it into a puppet, or harness it to your chariot.

VUEWEEKLY.com | OCT 25 - OCT 31, 2018

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Throughout the Halloween season, I encourage you to fantasize extensively about what your dream home would look like and feel like if you had all the money necessary to create it. What colours would you paint the walls? Would you have carpets or hardwood floors?

What would be your perfect lighting, furniture, and décor? As you gazed out your windows, what views would you see? Would there be nature nearby or urban hotspots? Would you have an office or music room or art studio?

Have fun imagining the sanctuary that would bring out the best in you. Halloween costume suggestion: the ultimate homebody.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): “Extraordinary things are always hiding in places people never think to look,” writes novelist Jodi Picoult.

That’s crucial for you to meditate on during the coming weeks.

Why? Because your superpower is going to be the ability to find extraordinary things that are hiding in places where people have almost never thought to look. You can do both yourself and those you care for a big favour by focusing your intensity on this task.

Halloween costume suggestions: sleuth, treasure hunter, private eye, Sherlock Holmes.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): “There is a season for wildness and a season for settledness, and this is neither. This season is about becoming.” Author Shauna Niequist wrote that. In accordance with the astrological omens, I endorse her persepctive as true and useful for you. You’ve zipped through your time of fertile chaos, conjuring up fresh possibilities. When January arrives, you’ll be ready to work on stability and security.

But for now, your assignment is to blossom. Halloween costume suggestions: beautiful creature hatching from an egg; strong sprout cracking out of a seed.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): “He believed in magic,” writes author Michael Chabon about a character in his novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. “Not in the so-called magic of candles, pentagrams, and bat wings,” nor “dowsing rods, séances, weeping statues, werewolves, wonders, or miracles.” Then what kind? Chabon says it’s the “impersonal magic of life,” like coincidences and portents that reveal their meanings in retrospect. I bring this to your attention, Scorpio, because now is a favourable time to call on the specific kind of magic that you regard as real and helpful. What kind of magic is that? Halloween costume suggestion: magician, witch, wizard.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): “If adventures will not befall a young lady in her own village, she must seek them abroad.” Sagittarian author Jane Austen wrote

Rob Brezsny

that in her novel Northanger Abbey, and now I’m passing her message on to you, slightly altered.

My version is, “If adventures will not befall Sagittarian people of any age or gender in their own neighbourhood, they must seek them abroad.” And where exactly is “abroad”? The dictionary says it might mean a foreign country, or it could simply mean outside or in another place. I’d like to extend the meaning further to include anywhere outside your known and familiar world. Halloween costume suggestion: traveller on a pilgrimage or explorer on a holy quest.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): PR executives at a beer company offered to pay me a lot of money if I would sneak a product placement ad into your horoscope. They asked me to pretend there was a viable astrological reason to recommend that you imbibe their product in abundance. But the truth is, the actual planetary omens suggest the opposite. You should not in fact be lounging around in a haze of intoxication. You should instead be working hard to drum up support for your labour of love or your favourite cause. Very important people will be more available to you than usual, and you’ll be wise to seek their input. Halloween costume suggestion: the ultimate fundraiser; networker of the year; chief hobnobber.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): “What kind of idea are you?” asks author Salmon Rushdie. “Are you the kind that compromises, does deals, accommodates itself, aims to find a niche, to survive; or are you the cussed, bloody-minded, ramrod-backed type of damnfool notion that would rather break than sway with the breeze?” I pose this question to you, Aquarius, because I think you could be an effective version of either idea in the coming weeks. If you’re the latter—the cussed, damnfool notion—you may change your world in dramatic ways. Halloween costume suggestions: revolutionary; crusader; agitator; rabble-rouser.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): “There is no beauty without some strangeness,” wrote Edgar Allen Poe. Fashion designer Rei Kawakubo ventured further, declaring, “Strangeness is a necessary ingredient in beauty.” She also added another nuance to her definition: “For something to be beautiful, it doesn’t have to be pretty.” I’ll offer you one more seed for thought: wabi-sabi. It’s a Japanese term that refers to a kind of beauty that’s imperfect, transitory, and incomplete. I bring these clues to your attention, Pisces, because now is an excellent time to refine and clarify your own notion of beauty—and recommit yourself to embodying it.

Halloween costume suggestion: the embodiment of your definition of beauty.

CURTIS HAUSER

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24 Abra-cadaver

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