Plumb Stupid
Courtesy of the folks at Keystone Progress comes this priceless exchange with “Joe the Plumber,” who as you may have heard, visited Pittsburgh earlier this week to hold forth on the Employee Free Choice Act: Q: “What’s the difference between the current National Labor Relations Act and the Employee Free Choice Act?” A: “I know…
Where Have All the Republicans Gone?
Kevin Acklin’s decision to run for mayor as an independent — if he runs at all — may not have much of an impact right off the bat. But Acklin, a former member of the GOP and onetime candidate for county council, has already shaped the election in one sense. His decision means that once…
The Blog of War
Back in the early days of blogging, a couple local bloggers used to tease me about how they were going to put me and my MSM brethren out of jobs. Personally, I don’t see it. We MSM types are doing a perfectly good job of putting OURSELVES out of work, thank you very much. And…
MP3 Monday: Centipede Eest
Sorry for the delay, folks — it’s still Monday, though, and thus not too late for MP3 MONDAYYYY. This week’s band is Centipede Eest, aka Centipede E’est, aka Centipede East, aka Centipede. Last fall, I wrote these dudes up for their newest release, Confluence. We discussed whether or not they’re a jam band, and talked…
Firelei Baez at Unsmoke Art Space
Unsmoke is likely the area’s most memorably situated art gallery: It’s housed in a former Catholic grade school in Braddock, right across Braddock Avenue from the gates and smokestacks of U.S. Steel’s Edgar Thomson works. The building, owned by Braddock Deputy Mayor Jeb Feldman, is home to a budding artists’s collective, and is part of…
Local release heads-up: Auryn
Just a quick FYI, a band that we weren’t able to cram into the paper this week, Auryn, releases their debut album tonight. Auryn’s an old-school political metalcore band who are all about environmentalism and direct action — fans of, say, the first facedowninshit LP might be interested, eh? (Though they have more of an…
Plumbing new depths
Just when you thought the whole Joe the Plumber thing had finally played itself out … plans are afoot to spring this idiot on us all over again. Yes, Joe Wurzelbacher is apparently coming to Pittsburgh to speak out against the Employee Free Choice Act on March 30. Wurzelbacher, of course, is to politics what…
Mary Beth Buchanan Mounts Her Defense
As a director, producer and sometime star of adult films, Rob Zicari was used to getting women to do anything he wanted. Zicari was the owner of Extreme Associates — the purveyors of a kind of porn that made even other adult filmmakers blush. “We’re the hardest, most envelope-pushing pornography company out there,” Zicari says…
Cross Keys Inn
The setting and atmosphere evokes a country B&B, but the food is sophisticated and urbane.
How I Learned to Drive
Brilliantly, Vogel reminds us that such behavior cannot be simplified.
Mary’s Wedding
With performances like these, you could almost believe this is a perfect play.
Persepolis author Marjane Satrapi visist the Drue Heinz Lectures.
Satrapi’s gift is illuminating history and revealing cultures in simple ways.
Wanting Something To Happen
A poem by Bruce Reisner
Same Old Story
Young people enter local politics … but to what end?
This Just In: March 26 – April 2
Highlights from the local TV news: Students gone bad!
Monsters vs. Aliens
After becoming gigantic in a hit-and-run with a meteorite, ordinary gal Susan (voiced by Reese Witherspoon) joins the ranks of the military’s super-secret monster squad. When an alien attacks Earth, Susan and her cohorts, who include a brainy cockroach, a blob, the missing link and a huge grub, come to the rescue in this animated…
Duplicity
Two former spies — a CIA agent (Julia Roberts) and an ex-MI6 man (Clive Owen) — match wits, while working as intelligence officers for two corporations, each headed by ego-driven, highly competitive CEOs (Tom Wilkinson and Paul Giamatti). An entertaining peek behind the curtain at big, nasty mega-bucks companies is just what the doctors ordered…
Che – Part 2: Guerrilla
The second half of Steven Soderbergh’s two-part bio-feature on Ernesto “Che” Guevara continues to downplay the heroic myth. In 1966, Guevara (a compelling Benicio Del Toro) secretly left Cuba for Bolivia, where he hoped to lead the poor peasants in an armed overthrow of the government. The film hunkers down for a year in the…
Knowing
An astrophysicist (Nicolas Cage) comes across a sheet of number which he believes show exactly when and where the world will end. Alex Proyas’ new apocalyptic thriller has a lot important numbers in it, but what’s lacking is logic. That makes Knowing an intermittently entertaining swirl of poorly defined characters, half-baked ideas, in-your-face special effects…
Shades of Green
The risk of focusing on individual reduction efforts is that we’ll lose sight of the urgency of getting off fossil fuels entirely.
The late Rick Gribenas was a gentle if artistically provocative influence on the local scene.
His trip was contemplation, and the pleasant surprise.
Free at Last? tells how slavery in Pennsylvania ended: slowly.
As the titular question mark suggests, the road to legal freedom was a long and crooked one, full of detours, switchbacks and dead ends.
Side Out
Regional gay volleyball tournament hits city
Insubordinate Clause
Duquesne faculty wants ‘no criticism’ section stricken from handbook
Sellin’ of Troy
Residents are hoping that revitalization plans will spark new interest in Troy Hill
Montreal duo Handsome Furs balance visceral and synthetic on Face Control
“Only in music does it have a negative connotation to work on different projects.”
Local supergroup Meeting of Important People releases Britpoppy debut
“A customer would come in and say, you know, ‘Do you have that Hidalgo movie?’ and I’d run to the back and call my cell phone, leave myself a message, singing that.”
Country’s greatest vocalist George Jones is still on the road
“I would love for Billy Bob Thornton to play me.”
Mandrake Project releases A Miraculous Container on Blistering Records
“The way the parts interlock makes them seem complex, but we’re not a math-rock band — it’s not written to be difficult.”
Pittsburgh n’@
Dispatches from the blogosphere: Ravenstahl “Pittsburgh’s own version of George W. Bush”
Bees Make Honey
Local honey is the buzz, in a new book and start-up beekeeping project
Pittsburgh’s The Cynics end SXSW on a triumphant note
“Well, lemme see what I can do. Go Steelers.”
Savage Love
The two things that I dig most on a woman are a nice big pair of … swim fins. Some of my earliest sexual fantasies revolve around Jacqueline Bisset in The Deep. It’s frustrating to have such a bizarre fetish. There is a small subculture devoted to scuba fetishism on the Internet, but it’s a…
