2007-05 Vital Source Mag – May 2007
You, Mii and D&D
Sunday, April 1, 2007 6:30 a.m. In the years following my retirement from professional bass fishing, I’ve accomplished a great deal: I’ve survived Catholic grade school, gotten laid, graduated from college and even managed to watch all seven Police Academy movies in one sitting. Until recently, however, I had never once gotten up at the butt-crack of dawn in order to wait in a Toys ‘R’ Us parking lot. Joined by my long-suffering girlfriend, I’m among a dozen other foolhardy souls braving the morning freeze in hopes of scoring the impossibly hard-to-find Nintendo Wii. Though this video game-fueled madness certainly represents a troubling descent into pasty-faced, fan-boy territory, it’s merely the topper to a weekend already filled with role-playing games, minor sci-fi celebrities and a puzzling lecture on ghost hunting. Get out your 20-sided dice, grandma, ‘cause this column’s rolling with a +8 Dexterity… 15 Hours Earlier… It’s a perfectly lovely Saturday afternoon and I’m spending it listening to a handful of 19-year-olds discuss their favorite Super Nintendo games: “Did you know that Breath of Fire III was the first SNES game to utilize an Active Time Battle system?” …I actually did know that. After following a sizzling hot tip, I’ve found myself – again, with my patient-to-a-fault girlfriend – at the 2007 Concinnity Sci-Fi and Gaming Convention held at the MSOE Campus Center. Like the once-Milwaukee-based Gen Con (the largest sci-fi/gaming/still-living-with-your-parents convention in the country), Concinnity offers up RPG demos, video game tournaments and bored-looking vendors hawking used fantasy books and black light dragon posters. Of course, everything here is on a much smaller scale, a fact that bears out in the lineup of special guests: instead of Dungeons & Dragons creator Gary Gygax and a Billy Dee Williams meet-and-greet, Concinnity has, um…an anime voice actress and some guy who used to write Tomb Raider novels. It’s this micro-sized quality that gives the “con” it’s wonky charm, however, along with the small and endearingly awkward group of attendees that populate it. Fittingly, the place feels like a rec room sent from heaven (or hell, if you’re averse to these sorts of things): a few clutches of seasoned gamers roll dice in a faraway corner, a group of younger Evil Dead aficionados mull over arcane rule books in the back and, near the entrance, a pleasant-enough fellow recruits for a zombie LARP game (Live Action Role Playing). My girlfriend and I stroll through the room cautiously; though we’re enjoying ourselves, most of the attendees seem to steer clear of us (the requisite “guy-dressed-up-as-a-Jedi” seems especially aloof). It’s a strange feeling I can only equate to my experiences with gay bars: no matter how hard you try to blend in, no matter how kinda-sorta gay you may be, the pros will always sniff you out. Following the aforementioned Super Nintendo discussion (dubbed “AwesomSNES” on the schedule), as well as a look at an Alien-themed board game, we grab our seats for the highly anticipated lecture on ghost hunting. The star of […]
May 1st, 2007 by Vital Archives
1 Henry IV
Sometimes theatre hurts. Milwaukee Shakespeare’s production of 1 Henry IV can attest to this, having suffered a few minor injuries early in its run. When Jeffrey Withers sustained a show-stopping injury to his lower back, it was only a short while until someone else had suffered a minor broadsword wound to the hand. After a few days, however, the show was back on its feet to start the second weekend with a flourish. Milwaukee Shakespeare continues its multi-season staging of The Henriad, closing its 2006-2007 season with 1 Henry IV. Jeff Allin stars as King Henry IV, the consummate politician who has taken over a tumultuous empire. Allin’s performance echoes that of any contemporary politician in poise and presence. As the play opens, the audience is made aware of an uprising against him in the south lead by Welshman Owen Glendower (an intense Lawrnce O’Dwyer). Meanwhile, supposed Henry loyalist Henry Percy (a charismatic Brian J. Gill) is refusing to send reinforcements from the north that Henry had requested. As the play opens, the King is summoning Percy back to the court to explain his actions. The play’s center rests with Henry’s son, Prince Hal (Jeffrey Withers), who has taken in with bandits and highwaymen. Some of the production’s most intense moments happen at a tavern between Hal and the thieves. Hal is caught somewhere between royalty and thievery as he associates himself with the likes of the rotund rogue Sir John Falstaff (Richard Ziman). Hal and Falstaff play an intricate game of subtle wits at the tavern that plays out particularly well in the intimate space of the studio theatre. Shakespearian subtleties that don’t normally get rendered in all that much detail burst with texture here. Milwaukee Shakespeare further ratchets up the intensity by having the audience flank the stage. Actors play between halves of the audience in a captivating 3-dimensional space that lends the play a very accessible earthiness. Action is particularly intense in the tiny space. The fight scenes are meticulously choreographed with painstaking attention to detail. Careful thought was put into the psychology and motivations behind aggression and it all comes through with a remarkable degree of clarity. Fights are played out in epic slow motion, which runs the risk of seeming silly in such close quarters were it not all so well executed. The interaction between Withers and Ziman is particularly captivating. Both perform with a style and poise that serve as a memorable high point of the production. The production leads directly into part two without much of a feeling of finality. Local theater audiences will have to wait until next season to see Henry IV wrap up at the Broadway Theatre center. It’s a bit of a strange experience sitting through something like three hours of Shakespeare and not having it reach a final conclusion, but there’s more than enough that reaches some form of resolution to satiate audiences until next season. VS Milwaukee Shakespeare’s production of 1 Henry IV runs through May 20th […]
May 1st, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
Patti Smith
The word “mulatto” jumps from Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” the National Anthem for the blanker than blank generation. And until all the kids memorized the lyrics and drove Kurt Cobain over the edge it was that one word that hung like cool, moist ground fog on a hot summer night. But before Nirvana there was Big Joe Turner. In fact before just about everything there was Big Joe Turner. One might even argue plausibly that Big Joe was the real nirvana when it came to rock & roll. In his book Where Dead Voices Gather Nick Tosches writes: But enough of color. I tire of every race. I shall, however, here glance for a moment in this context of color and auditory evidence and speculation, to the bellowed words of Big Joe Turner’s “Tell Me, Pretty Baby” of 1948: They say brown-skinned women are evil. And yellow girls are worse. I got myself a mulatta, boy; I’m playin’ it safety first. Or is there no comma intended between the penultimate and ultimate words of the third line of this quatrain? – I got myself a mulatta boy Has the question of a solitary punctuation mark…, ever before or since presented an ambiguity of momentousness such as this? Get thee, then, a mulatto, regardless of gender, punctuation or pronunciation; and proceed, then, behind me, together as one. While the Cobain saga proves once again, sadly, that rock & roll eats its young, what is more vexing is just how many generations it took for mulatto to resurface in a lyric. Twelve, then, is Patti Smith’s twelfth album. (Longtime collaborators Lenny Kaye and Jay Dee Daugherty are still riding shotgun.) It is an album of cover tunes. She has earned the right to coast, pay tribute, have fun – whatever the explanation of this album may be. She is the ultimate case of the fan who made the leap of faith to the stage. (She behaved admirably when she was recently inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame because her late husband Fred Sonic requested she do so.) Twelve gives us an even dozen snapshots paying tribute to The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, the folky Neil Young, Jefferson Airplane and The Doors. Paul Simon and Stevie Wonder, too. The most interesting tune is an odd old- timey take on “Smells Like Teen Spirit” itself, with playwright Sam Shepherd on banjo. We may never know Smith’s reason for covering Gregg Allman’s “Midnight Rider,” but Tears For Fears’ “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” always sounded to me like it was writ for Muzak from the gitgo. Friends, we are currently living in modern times. Some Old Testament types may even vehemently suggest the end is near. So what better time to sidestep the laws of The Man and track down bootleg recordings of Patti Smith’s real covers. Her first single was turning “Hey Joe” into a heavy liquid ballad, and along the way she’s covered The Velvet […]
May 1st, 2007 by Blaine Schultz
Garrett Burton
Photo by Erin Landry Garrett Burton is somewhat of a rare breed. Not only is he a guitarist in the outfit General Jive and the Souldiers, but he is also a luthier; he builds and repairs guitars and he’s been hard at work at it for the past three years. After being certified in 2004, he moved back to Milwaukee where he found work restoring classical stringed instruments such as violins, cellos and violas. From there, he went on to work as a guitar technician for local guitar shops while opening his own shop in the process. Currently, he is doing repair work at Gearheadz Music while also restoring guitars out of his home. To hear more from Burton, check out myspace.com/milwaukeeguitarrepair or myspace.com/generaljiveandthesouldiers. 1. When did you know you wanted to build guitars? I took a couple of woodworking classes in high school and in physics class my teacher was really into sound and making his own speakers. So that’s when I thought about the two different worlds: one of science and one of wood-working. Being a guitar player, the two just merged together for me. I didn’t know what I wanted to study in college, so I decided to go school for luthrie at Bryan Galloup’s School of Luthrie in Big Rapids, Michigan. That’s where I developed an interest in the acoustic properties of instruments. 2. How has Milwaukee’s guitar luthier scene been? There’s definitely been appreciation for my work around here. Presently, I’m over at my friend Benny’s music store, Gearheadz Music, on National Avenue. I like the vibe of his shop; Benny’s super cool, and being a musician, he understands other musician’s interests in instruments. 3. How much has music influenced your life? Well, considering my occupation, it has completely altered my life, or kept it on its path. It has given me many tools to express my feelings. I remember the first time music hit me: shivers. This was junior high. I got the White Album and I needed to put a band together immediately. That’s when I knew I wanted to play music. I’ve been playing ever since. 4. How has building guitars deepened your understanding of guitar music? If you look at the timeline of the invention of different types of guitars, you can see [a relationship to] how the sound of the music changes, and the style being played. For instance, surf rock most likely wouldn’t exist without the Fender Stratocaster and some mad reverb, dig? But classical guitars brought my ear to Brazilian music. Arch-top guitars drew me to early jazz. Flat-tops introduced me to ragtime, country blues and country music. 5. What’s one of your favorite things about repairing guitars? The look on the customer’s faces when they play their fixed instrument and it plays the way they want it to play; they’re happy. I also really like to experience working on all sorts of stringed instruments, especially older ones. They tend to have more craftsmanship and detail or thought […]
May 1st, 2007 by Blaine Schultz
Wrong is wrong
Dear Readers, Freedom to say what you want, smoke where you want and carry a gun in your jacket pocket are all under loud discussion at the moment. The question of how much restraint is appropriate in our local schools should also be near the top of the list, though public outcry on this matter is grossly under-reported for reasons that should be obvious to all but the most insulated or ignorant of us. Also not in the headlines is proposed state legislation that would prohibit municipalities from requiring revenue-sharing with cable companies to fund public access television programming. Passage of the bill, co-proposed by our own Jeff Plale, a Progressive in name only, would radically reduce public access programming, the last bastion of equal time broadcasting. With so many axes to grind and fortuitous access to the the Fourth Estate, I’m weighing in this month on several issues in list form. I apologize in advance for the inelegance of the format, but I am limited in word count exactly as anyone else who writes for VITAL. 1. The statewide smoking ban. Guess what? It’s happening. It’s time to stop whining and meet up with modern thinking. To say that a person has the right to fill another person’s space with life-threatening toxins is like saying, to paraphrase smoker Angie Miller, quoted in Ted Bobrow’s cover story this month, that because you choose to hit yourself in the head with a hammer, you should be allowed to hit other people in the head with a hammer. Wrong is wrong. Smoke outside. 2. Handcuffs in Milwaukee Public Schools. Teachers are being assaulted in their classrooms at alarming rates. School safety officers sometimes have to physically restrain students for up to an hour while they wait for police to arrive. I don’t necessarily disagree that these adults need more effective tools to deal with their daily reality. My problem is with the discourse. To pretend this solves any problem is foolhardy, if not downright disingenuous. It’s a band-aid on a massive head wound. We wouldn’t be in this position if the mental and physical well-being of so many of our MPS students wasn’t in such jeopardy. School Board Director Charlene Hardin suggested recently on WNOV AM 860 that what students, teachers and staff need in the schools is parental presence, a whole other can of worms with causes rooted far outside MPS. It needs to be possible. Wrong is wrong. Peel the onion, don’t pretend to patch the missing roof. 3. The right to bear arms. At the time of the framing of the Constitution, the right to bear arms was tantamount to the right to survive. With no organized police force and high consumption of wild game as a food source, a gun in every home was necessary. And I bet they were rarely concealed. But in the wake of the Virginia Tech shooting tragedy, some pundits have suggested that if concealed weapons had been allowed on campus, Cho Seung-Hui might […]
May 1st, 2007 by Jon Anne Willow
Feist
Leslie Feist has all the makings of a classic indie girl – completely indecipherable, yet at the same time completely able to be pigeonholed. For one not familiar with Feist, the Canadian has some pretty ridiculous credits racked up: from the electro-shock value of Peaches to the pretty indie-pop of the Broken Social Scene (not to mention stints with By Divine Right and Kings of Convenience). She seems comfortable with and suited to each place she ventures. Her newest album, The Reminder, sees her travel right from writing in the tour bus and creating in the studio to finishing up a tour stint in Berlin and capping it off with a recording session with pals Mocky, [Chilly] Gonzales and Jaime Lidell in la Frette Studios outside of Paris. Feist’s previous releases, Let it Die and Open Season, made Canada and Europe take notice of her youthful but classic jazz vocals and guitar playing that lent a punchy yet wispy quality to her pop, half penned by her, half lent by others. This time around, Feist is writing more, collaborating with her recording pals Mocky and Gonzales as well as Ron Sexsmith. If Feist was arresting before doing other people’s songs, she is even more so singing her own. The lone cover song, “Sea Lion Woman,” was originally written by George Bass and made famous by Nina Simone. Feist revamps it by pairing light-stepping vocals with energetic and full handclaps. Feist also tries her hand at gospel, country-twinged pop in “Past in Present,” brooding piano dynamics in “My Moon My Man,” haunting ethereality in the chilling “The Water” and upbeat with “I Feel it All.” Versatility is the mark of a great songwriter, and Feist is writing with such fluidity on The Reminder that it will be interesting to see which direction Feist will travel next. VS
May 1st, 2007 by Erin Wolf
Bridging the gap
Photo by Kat Jacobs Pieter Godfrey and Ken Leinbach have more in common than first glance betrays. Pieter, in corduroy slacks and vintage frames, looks like someone who would refurbish warehouses and watch silent horror movies on the weekends. Ken is more of a jeans and hiking boots kind of guy; he looks like he’d be most comfortable helping kids identify unusual plant species out on the trails. Pieter does like silent films, and Ken does teach little kids about nature’s awesome rarities. But Pieter and Ken – a restorations and reclamations professional and the executive director of the Urban Ecology Center, respectively – have forged an unlikely marriage of offbeat equals in the service of a common goal. Together, Pieter and Ken are building a parking lot. And it may just be the noblest parking lot ever built. A brief history of the Milwaukee River Corridor The 5.5 mile stretch of the Milwaukee River that flows through the city proper was the most vibrant corridor of the city at the turn of the century. Dense with boathouses, swim clubs and biergartens, it was a year-round recreational Shangri-La: pleasure cruises in the summer, ice-skating and curling in the winter. But heavy traffic and rapid development in an industrial city led to pollution and, without a comprehensive sewage system, the river gradually became contaminated. Several large dams built to staunch floods collected runoff and waste and choked off surrounding ecosystems. The beaches and swim clubs were closed, the arch tunnels and stone bridges abandoned and the river corridor fell into ruin. Starting in the 1970s, the city began to consolidate its sewer strategies, a multi-million dollar undertaking several decades in span. In 1986, Pieter Godfrey bought and refurbished his first warehouse when the river was still smelly and the surrounding park was still littered with the detritus of crime and drugs. Then in 1989, the Department of Natural Resources discovered a rare species of fish that spurred widespread discussion of the river’s devastated ecological condition. In 1990, the North Avenue dam – the largest on the river – was removed. In 1991, the Urban Ecology Center was founded. Today, where there were once NO fish, there are at least 33 different species. The Urban Ecology Center features a green roof garden, the largest solar panel array in the state of Wisconsin and furnishings crafted from Pieter Godfrey’s salvaged wood. The UEC sees 30,000 students from 30 area schools a year and a total of more than 50,000 people. In the city of Milwaukee alone, there are 794 acres of green space along this recovering river “that hardly anybody knows is there,” according to Ken. Pieter and Ken may be looking at this verdant stretch from different angles, but what they see is essentially the same. “This is a tremendous asset for the city,” says Pieter, “and the reason it’s there is because nobody wanted it – because it was abused for so long.” Parking: the great equalizer The Park Place project […]
May 1st, 2007 by Amy Elliott
May 2007
May 1 Tori Amos American Doll Posse Epic Joan Armatrading Into the Blues Savoy Black Rebel Motorcycle Club Baby 81 RCA Michael Bublé Call Me Irresponsible Reprise Dinosaur Jr. Beyond Fat Possum Feist The Reminder Cherry Tree/Interscope Hanson The Walk 3CG Chantal Kreviazuk Ghost Stories Nettwerk America/Red Distribution The Mission God is a Bullet Cooking Vinyl Rush Snakes & Arrows Anthem/Atlantic Tangerine Dream Madcap’s Flaming Duty East Gate Patrick Wolf The Magic Position Low Altitude/Universal May 8 Paul Anka My Way – Swings & Strings Decca Björk Volta One Little Indian/Atlantic Bone Thugs-N-Harmony Strength & Loyalty Full Surface/Interscope Brakes The Beatific Visions Rough Trade/World’s Fair The Clientele God Save the Clientele Merge DJ Encore Unique Koch Sage Francis Human the Death Dance Anti-/Epitaph Hayseed Dixie Weapons of Grass Destruction Cooking Vinyl Mystery Jets ZooTime Dim Mak The Ike Reilly Assassination We Belong to the Staggering Evening Rock Ridge The Sea & Cake Everybody Thrill Jockey Travis The Boy With No Name Epic The View Hats Off to the Buskers Columbia Shannon Wright Let in the Light Quarterstick May 15 The Avett Brothers Emotionalism Ramseur Groovie Ghoulies 99 Lives Green Door Ian Hunter Shrunken Heads Yep Roc Megadeth United Abominations Roadrunner Dolores O’Riordan Are You Listening? Sequel/Sanctuary The Phoenix Foundation Horsepower Young American Recordings Satellite Party Ultra Payloaded Columbia Rufus Wainwright Release the Stars Geffen Wilco Sky Blue Sky Nonesuch May 22 Tim Armstrong A Poet’s Life Hellcat/Epitaph Meg Baird Dear Companion Drag City The Bravery The Sun and the Moon Island Chick Corea and Béla Fleck The Enchantment Stretch The Cribs Men’s Needs, Women’s Needs, Whatever Warner Erasure Light at the End of the World Mute Fiction Plane Left Side of the Brain Bieler Bros. The National Boxer Beggars Banquet 1990s 1990s Rough Trade/World’s Fair Joan Osborne Breakfast in Bed Time Life Jean-Luc Ponty The Acatama Experience Koch Luther Russell Repair Ungawa/Adrenaline Uncle Monk Uncle Monk Airday/Burnside Distribution The Used Lies for the Liars Reprise White Rabbits Fort Nightly Say Hey May 29 Cary Brothers Who You Are bluhammock music/Procrastination Music Firescape Dancehall Apocalypse We The People R. Kelly Double Up Jive The Vacancies Tantrum Blackheart
May 1st, 2007 by Erin Wolf
Up in smoke
When Michael Bloomberg became mayor of New York following 9/11, there was concern that the terrorist attack would harm the city’s economy. Bloomberg and the New York City Council, with help from the state and federal governments, enacted a wide variety of tax incentives and other programs designed to support businesses and save jobs. But Mayor Bloomberg also pursued another policy that some regarded as anti-business. Bloomberg was relentless in his support of a ban on smoking in all public areas and workplaces including restaurants and bars. This was just plain common sense, Bloomberg, a Republican, said. The evidence was overwhelming that secondhand smoke is a public health hazard and one of government’s key functions was protecting the health of its citizens. Despite the objections of some business owners who feared customers would stop frequenting restaurants and bars if they could no longer smoke, the policy passed and the impact on the hospitality industry has been negligible. Few businesses closed, net revenue grew and the policy has been replicated in many other places. The entire state of New York soon followed the city’s lead and other states including California, Connecticut and Georgia and cities ranging from Chicago, Madison and Appleton have gone smoke-free. Ireland, Italy, Norway, Sweden, Spain and New Zealand are among the countries that have enacted smoke-free workplace legislation nationwide. The war at home If we shift our lens to Milwaukee we see a different picture. Early in the administration of Mayor Tom Barrett, his newly appointed health commissioner, Bevan Baker, was quoted in an article on the proliferation of smoking bans in support of them. Unfortunately, he made the mistake of saying what he believed before checking with his boss. Barrett distanced himself from Baker’s position and dropped the hot potato into the lap of the Common Council. The Mayor stated that he would sign a bill banning smoking in workplaces if the council passed it, but he felt a ban probably should include an exemption for bars and taverns, where people expect to be able to smoke. When Alderman Joe Davis introduced a comprehensive workplace smoking ban for Milwaukee, he urged his colleagues to support it as a public health imperative. The proposal was assigned to the council’s Public Safety Committee, chaired by Ald. Bob Donovan, a smoker and outspoken opponent of restrictions on tobacco use. The hearing attracted hundreds of people who spoke passionately on both sides. It got off to a contentious start when Donovan restricted Davis to the same three-minute limit placed on all members of the public who wished to speak. Davis objected that the customary practice was to permit a bill’s sponsor to speak at greater length, but Donovan stuck to his guns and Davis left angrily. Health advocates, students, people with asthma and other chronic conditions were among the bill’s supporters while bar and tavern owners and their customers argued passage would drive customers to establishments in West Allis, Cudahy, South Milwaukee and other communities. Donovan’s committee eventually tabled the […]
May 1st, 2007 by Ted Bobrow
Amandine
Banjo. Strings. Piano. Guitar. Maybe the occasional trumpet. The acoustic over the electric; the organic over the synthetic. This is the shape of indie-pop today. From Songs:Ohia to The Mountain Goats to Paige France, Americana and folk have spread across the countryside in a blaze of unconventional instrumentation and unshaven singer-songwriters. If quiet is the new loud, a mountain-man beard is the new trucker hat. Apparently the Atlantic Ocean didn’t stop this wildfire from besieging Europe. Amandine have checked in as Sweden’s offering to this renaissance with their sophomore release, Solace in Sore Hands. Unfortunately, they journey across the pond to offer nothing new to the mix, and instead deliver a homogenized blend of formulaic indie-pop. “Faintest of Sparks” opens the album with banjo and glockenspiel and the lyrics “Started a fire with the faintest of sparks/sprung from the friction of two empty hearts.” Amandine don’t waste time setting a mood, instead opting to spin dark, pretty yarns of lovelorn weariness. The second track, “Chores of the Heart,” features the album’s high point – a waltz melody crescendos and fades with choruses that resemble many a standout Decibully track. But from there on the disc suffers from suffocating sameness. The tempo rarely varies; the mood never changes. It’s a trap that ensnares many an aspiring indie band – develop a formula, write a few songs, record them, forget to pursue variety. This being Amandine’s second release, they’ve already spent their one pass in that department. Solace in Sore Hands has its moments, but they’re lost amidst the 6/8 tempos and acoustic strings. Perhaps if Amandine hit upon a mood other than “wistful,” that’ll change. VS
May 1st, 2007 by DJ Hostettler
Falling in love with Roberta
As I sit to write this, I am surrounded by half-full boxes and piles of things for Purple Heart. The Slightly Crunchy Parent has bought a new house, and we’ll be moving very soon. The house my partner and I found was a foreclosure and in desperate need of much work before being habitable and, as a result, we have spent the last three weeks just getting it put together enough to move in. I wrote the following poem while I was working and falling in love with our new home. This four-bedroom, four-square colonial is all I’ve been able to think about for weeks. I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has helped during this process, because contrary to the way it sounds when you read the poem, I did not do the work on the house by myself – there is simply no way one person could have done it all and, as usual, my friends and family stepped up and lent more than a hand. My sisters have been there for us every step of the way, encouraging and cleaning, sanding, painting and cleaning some more. Michelle and Mrs. Jesi have fed us and listened to us cry and worked at our side. My parents Jude, Kenny and John have been instrumental with the greenbacks and I am grateful to have come from such great people. Allen, the wood guru, walked us through doing the floors and logged uncountable hours managing that monstrous project. My secret connection at the paint store made it possible for us to repaint the entire interior of the house before we moved in and gave us solid counsel about just how to manage the minor mold problem in the basement. As always, my little Lena has showed up to work every day she wasn’t in school, and has made me more proud than I’ve ever known I could be. There were more people who helped and more people who have promised their services than I can name here, and we are thankful to each and every person. VS
May 1st, 2007 by Lucky Tomaszek
Watts Tea Shop – 103 years and counting
photos by Kevin C. Groen Watts Tea Shop 761 N. Jefferson Street Milwaukee, WI 53202 414-290-5720 Tom Millot is one of those rare managers who actually wants his employees to learn how to do his job. As Executive Chef of Watts Tea Shop, he fosters leadership qualities in his staff of 14 full and part timers. “I love my staff. They respect what I try to do and the reverse. We have a team concept. We’re always looking to go forward. Besides myself, we have three staffers who can produce any of our baked goods,” he says proudly beaming ear to ear. “You’re only as good as your team.” If Millot sounds like a major league coach, it may be because he’s always been a team player: at home, on the field and in the kitchen. Raised in a family of 11 children, he says, “Everybody pitched in. Sometimes there were too many cooks and not enough elbowroom. We didn’t even fathom eating out, we were so used to eating off the land. We were on a tight budget and that has helped me in my profession. It keeps waste to a minimum and you value everything.” Everyone in the Millot family was expected to be at the dinner table on time. “That was very important for bonding with family. There’s not enough of that [today]. Everybody’s in a hurry to go nowhere fast.” Summers in Hartland, when not doing chores, Millot played baseball in six leagues, several games a day, seven days a week. However, he decided on a career in cooking in his teens and some years later found a lifelong mentor and friend in Louis Danegelis, Senior Chef Instructor at Waukesha County Technical College, where the young chef studied. “He taught me passion. Passion for what I do for my career, with food and more importantly with the people you work with and manage – the culinary team. He taught that the speed of the leader is speed of the team.” “Cross train yourself and your employees. Having an employee adept at doing any job duty within your framework, giving them a sense and feeling of leadership, that’s what he taught me and I try to pass that on.” Millot did double duty with Danegelis, studying by day and working nights and weekends at his catering company, Lee John’s. “He instilled confidence in me and helped me overcome my doubts. I have no fear of failure. Louis said when the pressure’s on, the only thing you can do is pin your ears back, pray and go for it and you will get through the day.” It was advice Millot has applied throughout his career from working as Corporate Chef at QuadGraphics to opening the Union House in Genesee Depot. As a result of this attitude, Millot can not only stand the heat in the kitchen, he thrives on it. “I want to get slammed, otherwise you don’t make any money. Titles aside, when everyone works together, they […]
May 1st, 2007 by Cate Miller
