Sinners + Saints – 4.18.08

Enter an otherworldly realm with us this Friday at THE ARTS BUILDING, as 10 artists from divergent traditions – from Kristopher Pollard’s compelling ink portraits to Adam Werther’s ethereal and disturbing imagery to the typographic riffs of Jeremy Pettis – take on heaven and hell, devotion and doubt, temptation and resistance, iconography and iconoclasm and everything in between. With acoustic reconsiderations of sex, drugs and salvation by Andrew Falk and Joe White, a reading by Milwaukee’s bard of bald-faced truth Eddie Kilowatt, and a generous contribution from SPARKS, this party will make you a believer! PARTICIPATING ARTISTS: Kat Berger, Jeff Kenney, Brandon Minga, Judith Ann Moriarty, Ken Pitt, Jeremy Pettis, Kristopher Pollard, Greg Schoeneck, Scott Van Vreede and Adam Werther 7-10 pm • 133 W. Pittsburgh, #409 Come early – the multi-talented members of The Arts Building will open their studios for perusal at 5 pm!

We Must Cultivate Our Gardens

“Tawdry and Despicable” — Milwaukee Journal Sentinel A “Tragedy” — Gov. Doyle “Unfit to be a judge or hold any public office — Bill Lueders Others have reflected on the awful campaign leading to the defeat of Justice Louis Butler by Burnett County Circuit Court Judge Michael Gableman in Tuesday’s election. My reaction was disappointment and anger. Justice Butler, a highly-respected, ethical and accomplished jurist was taken out by a truly mean-spirited, vicious and cynical campaign. But let’s stop putting the blame on how shady, anonymous third party groups manipulated the process. For one thing, the Gableman campaign itself was responsible for the most reprehensible ad. It was the one that flashed Butler’s picture on the screen next to the face of a child molester who Butler represented in his role as a public defender more than twenty years ago. Leaving aside the racist implications that led to comparisons with the Willie Horton ad of the 1988 Lee Atwater-George H.W. Bush campaign, Gableman’s ad crossed a clear line by suggesting that Butler was tainted for serving as a public defender offering competent defense to an indigent client. Gableman refused to withdraw the ad or apologize for it, insisting that he was simply drawing a distinction between his experience as a prosecutor and Butler’s experience as a defense attorney. A number of legal experts believe that this ad violated the prohibition of judges engaging in behavior detrimental to public confidence in the judicial system. Even many of his supporters, including the estimable Charlie Sykes, criticized the ad. So Gableman will join the court with an ethical cloud surrounding him much as Annette Ziegler did last year. But let no one be confused about those third party groups. They are neither anonymous nor obscure. Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, the state’s largest business group, bellied up to the bar and opened its wallet to make sure that the balance of power on the Supreme Court swung in its favor. These greedy, Gordon Gecko-wannabes shouldn’t be given the cloak of invisibility or unaccountability. Take a look at the WMC board. These are the folks responsible for replacing Louis Butler with Michael Gableman. Each one probably considers him or herself a civic leader, with ties to the community and charitable causes they support. I’ll bet they love their mothers, are good parents and maybe even have really, really cute pets. Maybe you know one of them or more. I suggest you do what I did. Contact them and ask them if they were involved in the decision to conduct this campaign and, if so, why. I exchanged emails with John B. Torinus, Jr., Chairman of Serigraph, Inc. of West Bend. Mr. Torinus, who also pens a business column in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, responded that he personally favors public financing of Supreme Court elections though he acknowledged that would be useless unless third party spending was reined in. We have no choice but to operate under the rules as they exist. So it seems somewhat […]

WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE! STOLEN PAINTING OF HEATH LEDGER

CALLING ALL RESIDENTS OF MILWAUKEE!!! If you (or any cowboys you know) have any information on the whereabouts or location of a one of a kind modern masterpiece entitled Cowboy Love Connection in Blue, please contact River Rat Galleries 347-9833 or The Palomino 747-1007. This highly collectible acrylic painting, framed in hemp rope, features the late Heath Ledger of Brokeback Mountain and the new Batman movie, The Last Knight.

VITAL’s 2008 – 2009 Spring Fine Arts Season Preview

By Jon Anne Willow and Lindsey Huster Spring brings a sea change in our fair city. Longer days, warmer nights and anticipation of the summer’s inherent ease all conspire to turn the tide of a particularly grueling winter. Yes, change is in the air in so many ways. From the White House to Wall Street and the Calatrava to Canal Street, seismic shifts in management, economics and principles are destined to affect us all in the foreseeable future. We have so much as consumers of local culture to keep track of with this ascent of the mercury.The Milwaukee Art Museum recently welcomed Daniel Keegan to the helm as Executive Director, replacing the highly successful and sometimes controversial <>b>David Gordon. He brings a love of new technology and multimedia to MAM; expect to tap into a guided tour from your cell phone, download a podcast about the latest exhibit and engage with your collection in new ways. Up the road and a few blocks from the lake, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra Music Director Andreas Delfs conducts his last season (and the MSO’s 50th) as Edo de Waart prepares to take the helm. By reputation, de Waart’s choices tend to be riskier and more contemporary than his predecessor. He also comes with an extensive collection of recordings, so look for MSO performances to be more readily available for download or CD purchase. This month he’ll conduct his first concert for the MSO, Holst’s The Planets, on April 18. The performance includes space exploration video footage provided by the Jet Propulsion Lab and NASA. Milwaukee gets another dose of fame from the MSO with new Pops conductor Marvin Hamlisch.He’s one of only two people in history to win an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, a Tony and the Pulitzer Prize, not to mention a clutch of Golden Globes. On the funding and advocacy side, funding powerhouse Christine Harris, formerly President of UPAF, steps into a parallel role at the Milwaukee Cultural Alliance. Her UPAF shoes were filled by former Journal Sentinel Inc. VP Christy GarciaThomas, who brings media savvy and a strong background in sales and marketing to her new role. Both will try to shake the money tree to ensure ongoing funding for a city with incredibly rich and diverse cultural offerings. There are other changes, of course. Some have gone unreported, some are less glamorous in print but of equal impact in their own way. As a loosely defined collective, the arts face their own sea change. Technology is changing the way we interact with art; a slow economy could change the way current and prospective arts consumers consider discretionary spending. On the upside, the increasing sophistication of local audiences and an ever-more conducive environment for ambitious young artists to produce – and market – quality performances on a small budget bodes well for the health of our vibrant artistic scene. We’re also blessed with unparalleled generosity in private and corporate support of the arts for groups of all sizes and stripes. […]

400 years in a convent, three nights at Rooters

When our charming local presses take an occasional breather from their weekly “Where to Get the Best Brunch in Milwaukee!” pieces, they sometimes find it in themselves to sit down and interview local musicians (The Red Dot has a fantastic brunch, by the way). Asked their opinion of the Milwaukee Music Scene, the artists in question will almost always start ranting about cover bands, claiming this nefarious breed of entertainment diverts attention away from local, original music. While certainly not without merit, I’ve always found this assessment to be a bit hollow; after all, barring Summerfest and the occasional soul-crushing wedding, when was the last time any of us have actually seen a cover band? In the interest of getting to the bottom of this supposed dilemma, I recently decided to do what many have previously deemed impossible: willfully subject myself to three nights’ worth of questionable cover bands. Skimming through the local weeklies (past the “Who’s the Hottest George Webb Waitress?” articles), I found three intriguing groups to, um, cover: a bunch of dudes calling themselves Doc Hammer, a bunch of other dudes (and one girl) named 76 Juliet, and a Def Leppard tribute band called Photograph. All would be playing separate nights at Rooters, a veritable Mecca for bands with thinning hair and monthly mortgage payments. As the first evening approached, I found myself strangely excited: would I actually enjoy this excursion to the other side? Would I come away with a newfound appreciation for local, original music? Would I be able to sucker anyone into accompanying me? Would I be treated to at least one scorching-hot cover of “I Can’t Drive 55”? (Answers: sort of; yes; yes; sadly, no.) NIGHT #1 – DOC HAMMER Representative Song: Pat Travers, “Snortin’ Whiskey, Drinkin’ Cocaine” “It’s all about getting’ wasted on a Friday night! YEEEAAAHHH!!!” So proclaims the lead singer of Doc Hammer immediately after downing a shot and flipping the emptied glass through the air like a coin. To call Rooters anything less than Ground Zero for this sort of weekend-warrior debauchery would be an insult: it’s big (a second-story balcony surrounds an already large dance floor), it’s loud (even the volume behind the stage is ear-splitting), and it’s attached to a bowling alley. It’s also in the middle of bumble-fuck Waukesha, and a total pain in the ass to find. Accompanied by two courageous friends (Vital’s own Jon Anne Willow and Amy Elliott), I quickly come to the conclusion that Doc Hammer is actually pretty fucking excellent (their take on The Police’s “Roxanne” kicks particular ass), and represents everything a cover band should be: big, ballsy, and polished to a shine. The lead singer looks like a shorter, stockier Brett Favre, and the drummer seems to be an amalgamation of every member of Motley Crue. What’s the appeal? Well, getting wasted on a Friday night, that’s what, along with going out to see some live music and knowing every single word. Following a blistering yet needlessly extended rendition […]

New Model Army

I started writing my column this month on booze in the newsroom and other lost traditions. In my 21 years in journalism, I’ve witnessed the devolution of media culture from free-wheeling hotbeds of professional tension and excessive living into hushed, corporate cubicle warrens, with reporters and sales folk alike watching their companies’ stock prices as a key indicator of success or failure. I find this development counterproductive, unnecessary and possibly even fatal. Bloggers, gun-for-hire correspondents and foreign news agencies like the BBC and Al-Jazeera have become the new vanguard, and their work constitutes most of the heavy lifting in global coverage. The biggest loss is at the local level, where panicking publishers retire their most experienced newshounds in favor of cheaper, younger labor (or nobody at all), compromising our access to the information that affects us most directly by eliminating the beat reporter with intimate knowledge of the players. Experience has been devalued into obsolescence: a strong statement where exceptions are surely demonstrable, but generally true in my opinion. As a publisher, I absolutely understand the financial travails of for-profit journalism. I know that lifestyle sells to advertisers better than news coverage and that bills must be paid. I know that print is on the wane and web is on the rise, and that the big challenge is monetization of web opportunity. I also understand that the digital democratization of information is one of the greatest blessings of this modern age, but that as a result, it is increasingly difficult to be the exclusive source for anything. It’s a conundrum of biblical proportions and it’s threatening to take down the existing structure of the Fourth Estate. The New York Times and Washington Post are two excellent examples of locally-based daily newspapers that successfully serve an enormous national and international audience on the web, yet haven’t built enough web revenue to close the gap on lost print dollars. It’s democratization again; once online, news outlets compete with everyone else on the web for ad dollars and it’s no longer enough to send sales reps to every business and agency in town to exact the formerly customary pound of flesh. Advertisers now have the same limitless choices as media consumers, plus a long-standing bad taste in their mouth from the extortionary tactics previously employed by daily newspapers and the Yellow Pages. It’s a big mess, that’s for sure. High-quality local news coverage is an absolute must in every community. On the other hand, a long-term soft retail economy and broader competition for ad dollars has local news organizations stuck between a rock and an even harder rock. So, what’s the answer? I’m just one small publisher and I can’t solve all of the world’s problems – I can barely even keep up with my own stuff. But I have seen a few agile publishers here in Milwaukee do some pretty smart things to connect with their constituencies. The Small Business Times was started in 1995 by a group of Business Journal expatriates […]

Knowledge is power- at any age

Out like a lion

Where have I been? I’m so glad you asked. Painting the town red I’ve been to the Old German Beer Hall (once on my birthday, for shots on skis and that hammer/stump game; again, days later, after the Scarring Party show at Turner Hall with Brent Gohde and Matt Wild, where I ran into a bunch of guys I sort of knew in college) and I’ve seen bar time at the County Clare, BBC, Roots, the Riverhorse and Walter’s. On St. Patrick’s Day I drank gin and tonics with some financiers at the Hi-Hat and lost my wallet not once but twice – first at the Landmark, then at the Nomad (I got it back the first time, but lightning never strikes the same place. Milwaukee bartenders and bouncers, beware; that pretty girl with the dubious Michigan driver’s license is SO not for real.) I’ve sidled up at Foundation with Captain Rick and Eddie Kilowatt and I’ve hunkered down at The Social , Coppola zinfandel precariously in hand, to get the inside story on Milwaukee film culture (and other less serious subjects) from scenesters like Andrew Swant and Bobby Ciraldo of Special Entertainment and Milwaukee’s own Mark Metcalf, who told me how he drove from Ann Arbor to Detroit in 1967 to see the riots — while he was on mescaline. Seeing shows I’ve been spending a lot of time at the Echo Base Collective down in the factory district, which on the basis of my three visits I’ve inferred is ALWAYS a good time, regardless of whether it is packed with hundreds of people watching an Israeli punk band light themselves on fire or attended by two dozen high school kids watching their friends jump up and down on a beat-up crash cymbal. Dave Casillo (the brains AND the brawn behind the organization) brings in shit-crazy local and underground bands (think Geocash, We’rewolves, Cougar Den) and some folksy, understated operations (like the soft-psychedelia of Minneapolis’ Daughters of the Sun). He also fixes up bikes for kids. This was the first place I thought to seek shelter during that terrible Friday snowstorm when my car was buried in high, desperate drifts, and I was comforted with beers, a puppy, terrific music and a couch on which to crash. There’s also been the typical noise issuing forth from the Bermuda Triangle of the Pabst/Riverside/Turner – the aforementioned Scarring Party CD release show at Turner Hall, the champagne-brunch-appropriate Pink Martini at the Pabst two days later, Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks (that was the show where PR maven Cecilia Hrobsky crab-walked across the floor of the Cudahy Pub to score a tote bag) – and just last night, Swedish pop crooner Jens Lekman with his honey-voiced tales of love, woe, excitement and incredible beauty. Hiding away I house-sat in Wauwatosa and stayed in all weekend playing waltzes on my accordion, drinking tea and cuddling with an elderly schnauzer, leaving only for a well-documented trip to Rooter’s with Matt Wild, Chinese take-out on […]

Vote As If Your Life Depended On It

Yes, we all have the right to stay home and not vote. That doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. Yes, elections are messy, aggravating, distasteful affairs. But the brains in our head (the gray matter, if you will) give us the capacity to evaluate the candidates and make an informed decision. Yes, there is an incredibly important presidential election this year that seems to be sucking the oxygen out of the multitude of local contests here in Wisconsin and elsewhere. But the truth is that your vote for Wisconsin Supreme Court justice may be the most important one you cast this year. Look, I know that the deluge of manipulative, offensive ads run by so-called independent third party groups make it difficult not to turn your back on the whole unseemly process and wish a pox on both of their houses. But there is a reason these organizations with deep pockets are spending so lavishly on this race. It really matters. Just imagine if we held a national vote to elect a justice to the Supreme Court of the United States. The airwaves would be bursting with provocative ads trying to convince us of the relative merit (or, more likely, the scandalous past) of one candidate or the other. Could you possibly decide to ignore the process and stay home on Election Day? So I urge you to approach Tuesday’s election as if your life depended on it. By that I mean you should do what you would do if you learned you have a serious illness and had an important decision to make about your care. You would go online and research your options. You would seek out experts with the knowledge and experience that could provide you with valuable information to help with the decision. And you would talk to your friends whose opinions you respect. Time is short. Do your due diligence and vote tomorrow. I think the choice is clear. Justice Louis Butler is an intelligent, accomplished, respected, ethical jurist who has the support of an overwhelming majority of his fellow judges. His opponent, Mike Gableman, has been a judge for a fraction of the time Justice Butler has and has engaged in the kind of sleazy campaign that is so antithetical to our notion of a respected and thoughtful judiciary. But don’t take my word for it. Visit the candidates’ own websites, see how the campaign has been covered by the state (and the nation’s) media, and talk to people. Can’t we all please agree that elections are important and that all of our votes matter? Do I need to remind you of that drawn out debacle 8 years ago in Florida when the term “hanging chad” entered our nation’s vernacular? So vote. I don’t want to hear any excuses.

Milwaukee distillery wins prestigious gold medal

Milwaukee’s own Great Lakes Distillery has received a Double Gold Medal at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition for their Rehorst Premium Milwaukee Gin. This small local distillery beat out over 800 entries from 63 countries in a blind tasting with their unique spirit that combines the flavors of sweet basil and Wisconsin ginseng to create a gin that’s truly…intoxicating! For more info, check out their website!

Hey Milwaukee Bad Guys, There’s A New Maestro in Town!

When Edward Flynn was appointed Milwaukee’s new police chief, the community engaged in a group swoon. Flynn hit all the right notes as he met with the various key constituencies in town. Politicians, law enforcement officials, community activists and the business community all applauded the choice and Mayor Tom Barrett was praised for using the heft of his office to twist arms and influence this critical appointment (which, of course, was made by the Fire and Police Commission and not by the Mayor). Chief Flynn is closely associated with the philosophy of community policing and everyone seems to agree that this is a wonderful thing. But community policing is one of those generic terms, like democracy, good schools and market economies, which appeal to most everyone but are not always so easy to put into action. While it’s way too early to issue a judgment on the chief’s performance, you have to say that so far, so good. First of all, he has authorized (ordered?) his district captains to develop proposals for addressing the critical issues in their communities. He has held public meetings to announce and promote these initiatives. People have noticed and, by and large, have responded well. Second of all, he has expanded the presence of beat cops in busy neighborhoods. I’ve seen more police walking around in the last few weeks than I have in years. This is a key component of community policing. Beat cops walking around neighborhoods obviously isn’t a new idea; but it happens be incredibly effective. Who’d have thought? Yesterday, Chief Flynn held a news conference at the District 5 headquarters to call attention to an early, if modest, success. Police conducted a crackdown in the neighborhood around N. 19th Street and W. Nash where a gang known as the Nash Street Boys was believed to be dealing drugs and intimidating people. A group of law enforcement officers including Milwaukee police and FBI agents conducted arrests of 39 individuals suspected of gang involvement on Feb. 14th. In the month following the Valentine’s Day arrests, total criminal activity decreased by one third (24 incidents in the month before contrasted with 16 incidents since). Chief Flynn was joined at the news conference by Mayor Barrett, District Attorney John Chisholm, as well as a cross section of uniformed officers and appreciative residents. Chief Flynn pointed out that this was only the beginning but part of community policing is to focus on results and these positive results were worth noticing. But I found the most noteworthy aspect of the announcement were the broad smiles on the faces of the young police officers. Flynn remarked that they were smiling because successful police work is fun. But after the news conference, the officers made it clear that they enthusiastically support the chief’s program. “It’s taken away a lot of the red tape and lets us do our jobs,” said Officer Teresa Heidemann. “We get to be cops.” It hasn’t been all smooth sailing for Chief Flynn. Somehow, his […]

More than numbers in Iraq