2007-09 Vital Source Mag – September 2007
“THE HEART has reasons that reason cannot know.” — Blaise Pascal
Radiance and darkness come from the same place. If the mind is the brightest place in the human body with its constant storm of electrical impulses, perhaps the human body’s darkness exists in the heart – a place of absolutely essential, tireless labor. The heart creates enough pressure in the course of its constant pumping to shoot blood out of the body up to 30 feet. It can continue pumping even after 1/3 of its muscle mass is decayed. In spite of this, what is strong and durable from within is also quite fragile from the outside. It only takes 25 to 75 watts of electricity to stop the heart from beating. Somewhere in every beat lurks the final one, pumping blood to darker veins on the other side of human consciousness. This season promises some particularly dark moments. In May, Windfall Theatre travels into a conspicuously bleak autobiographical musical with William Finn’s A New Brain. Finn chronicled his battle with brain cancer in a musical filled with more heart and true human emotion than most musicals ever aspire. The Skylight Opera launches a completely different take on the dark side of musical theatre with a production of The Midnight Angel at the end of September. It’s the story of a wealthy 18th century woman so bored with life that she throws a lavish, decadent ball, inviting Death itself as a guest of honor. A similarly dark specter descends upon the Waukesha Civic Theatre’s Concert Series this season with Igor Stravinsky’s The Soldiers Tale. It’s a brilliantly dark piece usually performed by seven instruments. Composed in 1918, it’s based on an old Russian folk tale about a deserting soldier who meets and loses his soul to the Devil. In February, Milwaukee Chamber Theatre presents its stage adaptation of the dense, gritty work of Russian darkness that is Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment. The heavily intricate story of the brutal axe murder of two women will be played out sparingly. It will take a particularly deft scalpel to bring the extensive complexity of the original novel to the stage with three actors in a 90-minute show, but with the unique talents of Drew Brhel, Leah Dutchin and Mic Matarrese under the direction of Patrick Holland, Milwaukee Chamber’s Crime and Punishment could be one of the better shows on local stages this season. Under an even deeper pall of surreal darkness, The Milwaukee Rep presents Samuel Beckett’s vision of The End next March. Mark Corkins stars in Endgame as Hamm, who sees the final curtain falling and a new one rising. Another classic tale of dystopia makes its way to Wisconsin Lutheran College’s Theatre Department with George Orwell’s 1984. The title may be out of date, but the concept of a world watched over by the all-seeing Big Brother is a very interesting choice for WLC. Earlier in the season, WLC also presents a pair of one-acts about the darker aspects of time, including playwright Susan Glaspell’s intriguing short drama Tickless Time. Written […]
Sep 1st, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
Heavy Trash
In Heavy Trash’s latest adventure (which picks up from their last release in 2005), there’s more riff-burning, pompadour-bobbing and gum-smacking than you can shake a fried chicken leg at. Bringing back the days of curvy cars, pinup ladies and smoking without borders, Jon Spencer (Blues Explosion) and Matt Verta-Ray’s (Pussy Galore) “Heavy Trash” moniker is definitely cheeky. Think Chris Isaak gone bad – pretty, blue-eyed boy soul with a sharp, ugly edge. Heavy Trash’s self-titled debut was a welcome addition to Jon Spencer fanatics’ collections. Going Way Out With Heavy Trash stacks up to their first release and even delves into a more fleshed-out, swinging sound. Rolling into the first track, “Pure Gold” hits like a cyclone in Tornado Alley, Spencer channeling Presley more convincingly than many white-caped King wannabes. Strutting like a rooster through a dusty coop of hens, Spencer lolls into the pretty garage n’soul of “Outside Chance,” then greases it up in “Double Line,” pairing up gritty guitar solos, sticks tapping short, short, short as if on a hot tin roof, along with brass-balls bass lines whose rough and ready tones are reminiscent of the infamous relationship between The Sharks and The Jets in West Side Story. Going Way Out With Heavy Trash is a hot little album, full of swagger and strut. The only truly campy departure is “You Can’t Win,” which thankfully comes at the album’s close, with Spencer drawling about “Pepsi-Cola, Doritos and beans” and being “drunk on pomade.” This doesn’t play nicely with the rest of the album. Still, Heavy Trash has turned out another call to all rebel rousers, one which will satiate those with a hankering for some straight-up rockabilly flavor.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Erin Wolf
Making It Work For Us
Items discussed: long-running local rock & roll bands, bocce ball, “Weird Al” Yankovic Items not discussed: baffling cell phone plans, the inexorable flaking away of my humanity, that episode of Punky Brewster where Cherie gets stuck in an old refrigerator For the past 28 spine-tingling (or coma-inducing, depending on who you ask) installments of SubVersions, the little byline-thingy at the bottom has always read, “Matt Wild is ¼ of the rock & roll band Holy Mary Motor Club.” What hasn’t been stated, however, is exactly how long I’ve represented this not-so-enviable quarter-slice. Some scattered pockets of inactivity notwithstanding (several of which swallow up entire years), H double-MC (as the kids used to call it) has been around for a terrifying 16 years. Initially born out of a shared love for Mad Magazine, “Weird Al” Yankovic and copious amounts of Mr. Pibb, our scrappy little group has gone on to write and record hundreds of songs, release a couple of albums and play cities as far-off and exotic as Alton, Illinois. I was 13 years old when we first started; now, at 29, I can easily say that I’ve been a member of this band longer than I haven’t. One of my fondest band-related memories occurred near the very beginning: on a whim – and high on whatever small-town, 13-year-old dweebs could possibly be high on – we decided to move our equipment from our drummer’s basement to his spacious, bucolic backyard. It was summer (of course) and I recall some vague notion that we were putting on our version of the Beatles’ Abbey Road rooftop concert, except that instead of a city roof there would be a suburban backyard in Mayville, Wisconsin; and instead of a crowd of adoring Londoners, there would be a nearby soccer field filled with puzzled 7-year-olds. As was our custom in those days, we simply thought up a random title, hit “Record” on a barely-working boombox and hoped for the best. Three minutes later, we had unwittingly produced an adolescent masterpiece: a bouncy little ditty called “Bocce Ball.” So enamored were we with our new creation that we shouted for joy and began rolling through the grass, the sounds of which you can still hear on the original, near-fossilized cassette today. All of this is to simply say that at one point in the distant, summer-soaked past, three scrawny, affable kids formed a band and recorded a song called “Bocce Ball.” Nearly 15 years later, one of those kids – now a grown man with a full-time job and a generous dental plan – would catch himself humming that very same song throughout the 2007 Forward Bay View Bocce Fest, where he and his fellow VITAL Source teammates would eventually suffer an ignominious defeat in the third round. For the uninitiated, bocce ball is a relatively simple game: throw a little ball in the grass, then try to roll a heavier ball closer to that first little ball. It’s fun, surprisingly addictive and gives you […]
Sep 1st, 2007 by Matt Wild
“The LEGS are the wheels of creativity” — Albert Einstein
In tribute to their strength and versatility, legs are used metaphorically in a variety of different cultures all over the world to indicate strength or mobility. Consisting of thousands of flexible muscle fibers grouped into numerous muscles, the legs are capable of impressive range of motion and are used for a wide array of different movements from walking to running to jumping to dancing. In any given performing arts season, local dance groups celebrate dances from cultures all over the world. In September, Madison’s Kanopy Dance Company hosts Riad Middle Eastern Dance Company to blend disparate movements from two sides of the world. From further south, Ko-Thi performs its annual African-styled harvest show at Alverno. The bite of December’s cold blows in the Russian heat of not one, but THREE productions of Tchaikovski’s The Nutcracker. The month opens up with The Minnesota Ballet at the Schauer Center. The next day, the Moscow Ballet comes to the Riverside Theatre while later on in the month The Milwaukee Ballet brings Michael Pink’s vision to the Marcus Center. Things continue to heat up in January as the fleet-footed and colorful Ballet Folklorico Mexico comes to the Waukesha Civic Theatre. In March, legends from Russia mix with puppets and contemporary choreography as Kanopy Dance presents Dark Nights: Baba Yaga and Other Dreams – a collaboration with mask and puppet artist Heidi Cooper. The range of motion broadens even further in February as Alverno Presents the return of David Nieman’s Advanced Beginner Group in a show featuring dance inspired by the rules and tactics of sports. In April, Alverno Presents also welcomes the work of highly accomplished choreographer Karole Armitage and her Armitage Gone! Dance Company. Also in April, Danceworks presents a fusion of dance and new musical compositions as it collaborates with fresh art music gurus Present Music in what should be an extremely refreshing evening of dance and music. Milwaukee Ballet also has a few premiers coming up, including its annual trip to the Pabst Theatre for a concert featuring new work and the season-closing La Bayadere, featuring new work by Artistic Director Michael Pink.
Sep 1st, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
September 2007
SEPTEMBER 4th Joshua Bell Red Violin Concerto Sony Classical Ted Nugent Love Grenade Eagle Super Furry Animals Hey Venus! Rough Trade SEPTEMBER 11th Black Francis Bluefinger Cooking Vinyl 50 Cent Curtis Interscope The Go! Team Proof of Youth Sub Pop Hot Hot Heat Happiness Ltd. Sire/Warner Monade Monstre Comic Beggars Banquet Orange Escape From L.A. Hellcat/Epitaph Pinback Autumn of the Seraphs Touch and Go Shout Out Louds Our Ill Wills Merge SEPTEMBER 18th Babyface Playlist Mercury bella No One Will Know Mint James Blunt All the Lost Souls Custard/Atlantic The Donnas Bitchin Redeye Kevin Drew Spirit If… Arts & Crafts Dropkick Murphys The Meanest of Times Born & Bred/Warner Gloria Estefan 90 Millas Burgundy/SonyBMG Mark Knopfler Kill to Get Crimson Warner Ben Lee Ripe New West Barry Manilow The Greatest Songs of the Seventies Arista Ministry The Last Sucker 13th Planet Recordings/Megaforce Thurston Moore Trees Outside the Academy Ecstatic Peace Mya Liberation Motown New Found Glory From the Screen to your Stereo Part 2 Drive-Thru SEPTEMBER 25th Athlete Beyond the Neighborhood Astralwerks Devandra Banhart Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon XL Recordings Jim Brickman Homecoming Savoy Jazz Steve Earle Washington Square Serenade New West Melissa Etheridge The Awakening Island Foo Fighters Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace Roswell/RCA Brian Setzer Orchestra Wolfgang’s Big Night Out Surfdog Freezepop Future Future Future Perfect Rykodisc Herbie Hancock River: The Joni Letters Verve Deborah Harry Necessary Evil Eleven Seven Music PJ Harvey White Chalk International-Island Iron and Wine The Shepherd’s Dog Sub Pop Ja Rule The Mirror The Inc. Chaka Khan Funk This Sony BMG Matt Pond PA Last Light Altitude Nellie McKay Obligatory Villagers Hungry Mouse Meshell Ndegeocello The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams Decca Queen Latifah Trav’lin’ Light Verve Shocking Pinks Shocking Pinks Astralwerks Small Sins Mood Swings Astralwerks Stars In Our Bedroom After the War Arts & Crafts
Sep 1st, 2007 by Erin Wolf
Gardasil – Hope or Hype?
As my oldest daughter, Lena, moves out of childhood and into adolescence, her dad and I are plagued with so many new dilemmas. She, like all 12-year-olds, would like more privileges and wants us to trust her to make more of her own decisions. These things slip in and out of our daily conversation pretty easily now. We discuss, resolve and move on. Then there are the bigger issues regarding Lena’s growth that have just sort of woven themselves into the fabric of our lives, changing our interaction slightly while we learn about the woman she’s becoming. These issues largely revolve around her health and emerging sexuality. At 12, she’s noticing boys. She’s picking clothes that make her look cute and gazing in the mirror, trying to figure out who she is. We are gazing back at her, watching our baby grow up. While these developments have been in the forefront in our home, the backdrop for young women all over the country has been altered. There is a new vaccine that prevents HPV (human papillomavirus), one of the major causes of cervical cancer in sexually active women. I decided to do some research about this vaccine after Merck (the manufacturer of Gardasil) recommended it be given to girls as young as 9, meaning I have not one, but two daughters who are prime candidates for receiving it. What I learned while I was digging around was interesting, to say the least. In the convincing ad campaign for the vaccine, young street-wise beauties from all walks of life look the television audience straight in the eye and talk about taking their health into their own hands. In place of the sing-song jingle so common in pharmaceutical commercials (as in, “Gotta go, gotta go, gotta go right now” ) , there is an infectious, urban chant proclaiming that recipients of the vaccine will be “One Less, One Less” victim of cervical cancer. Did you know? There are over 100 strains of HPV, and about 30 of them are sexually transmitted. Other strains cause warts on the hands and feet, or occur asymptomatically. Nearly 75 percent of Americans will contract HPV before their 50th birthdays. Most cases of HPV need no treatment and will resolve on their own without any problems. Of the 30 sexually transmitted strains, about 14 are considered high risk, meaning they have the potential to mutate into precancerous lesions on the cervix. Not all precancerous lesions will become cervical cancer, however. Many will also disappear on their own. Gardasil protects against four strains of sexually transmitted HPV. Two of them are low-risk strains, causing visible genital warts but not presenting any real danger. The other two are high-risk strains, meaning that if they went untreated, they might become precancerous. According to the studies done before the vaccine was released, Gardasil is about 70 percent effective in preventing these four strains of HPV in women who have never had those particular strains before. Gardasil is a three-injection series to […]
Sep 1st, 2007 by Lucky Tomaszek
“THE BRAIN is a commodity used to fertilize ideas.” — Elbert Hubbard
The mind is run by the brain through an extraordinarily complex series of bioelectric reactions. Much like local arts groups, the brain does remarkable things with profoundly few resources. The brain runs an individual’s body and arguably everything abstract going on in his/her mind on very little quantifiable physical energy. If, for instance, a waiter (who we’ll refer to here as Mark) decides to become the artistic director of a new theatre company, he can find a space in Bay View and start the Boulevard Theatre. The brain in its near-infinite complexity allows this individual to adjust to the new role. If, years later, this same individual and his theatre company are pushed out of a season-opening production of playwright David Mamet’s very modern and ridiculously acclaimed Glengarry Glen Ross by a larger theatre company, said individual will adapt to the situation (through a dizzying set of neurological interactions) by planning a production of David and Amy Sedaris’ irreverent comedy The Book Of Liz. Leaping from Mamet’s serious and deeply engaging glance into the heart of human motivation to a comedy that briefly involves a person in a Mr. Peanut costume by the side of the road seems a bit nonlinear, and as the process of adaptation took its course The Book of Liz was rescheduled. The new season-opening work finally rendered was Will Eno’s Thom Paine (Based on Nothing), which opened last month. While the Sedaris’ piece is no longer the Boulevard’s replacement for Mamet’s brilliant drama (it may have never, in fact, ever really been intended for this purpose), it remains on the Boulevard’s season schedule this September. The comedy tells the story of a woman living in a fictitious, secluded religious commune who makes the cheese balls for which the commune is so well known by the outside world. Featuring some pretty deft dialogue, Thom Paine is a brilliant fusion of the distinctive comedic voices of both writers. Thus, thanks to the process of adaptation, Milwaukee theatre is host to the comedy AND the drama of both Eno and Mamet. The adaptability offered through the constantly changing architecture of the human brain can produce astonishing versatility within a single individual as well. For instance: say a young man from New Jersey (we’ll call him Jim) gets a job on a fishing boat. He dreams of being a captain of his own boat, so he graduates from high school and goes to the local community college to perfect the math skills he will need for navigation. If, in the process of going to said college, he finds himself in a theatre watching someone onstage and thinks, “I want to do that,” neurological adaptation at a cellular level kicks in, allowing him to travel across the country to Wisconsin and attend UWM’s professional theater training program. Years later he’s a successful actor/playwright/author. This year, Jim DeVita has a tremendous amount going on, thanks to the basic fundamentals of neurologically-fueled human adaptation. The fall arrives as DeVita’s summer season as […]
Sep 1st, 2007 by Russ Bickerstaff
