WEB EXCLUSIVE: A dangerous game
Reporters from across the country flocked to Louisville this week following the indictment of Pleasure Ridge Park High School football coach David Jason Stinson, who is charged with reckless homicide in connection with the heat-related death of a player last summer. Several witnesses say Stinson and his coaching staff withheld water from the team while…
What sci-fi teaches us
I recently saw a preview for the new “Star Trek” movie coming out in May. I’m juiced! I thought everybody was. Wrong! Did you know there are people who have never heard of James Tiberius Kirk — the original space cowboy, the greatest captain of the Starship Enterprise (sorry Picard fans)? Are you kidding me?!…
FIRST PLACE: New Releases
Bloodpussy — Cacophony (Stormwatch) — Stomach-punching inferno-metal from the kings of up-your-ass torture-rock, back again with an album guaranteed to get you arrested for singing along at the top of your lungs and frightening the neighbors. This time out, lead singer Torque Mazda and friends turn up the bass and let the scream do the…
HONORABLE MENTION 2: sea dreams
cornsilk yellow, seawater green, full of dark star-point eyelash eyes. he wants to touch her shoulders and kiss the clavicle and ask her what she wants to drink — pale green martinis, tall glasses of pink daiquiris glistening with water vapor. (she wants sparkling Perrier, the sunshine of lemon zest) he wants to…
Heads above water for The Wading Girl
In Stearns, Ky., an entrepreneur named Miriam Strunk found purpose in running a hotel and, abiding a deep-seated eccentricity, he let his pet bear roam freely in the land around it. Strunk’s business hummed along for many years, but his fortune capsized when a guest fell from the balcony of the hotel and died. He…
THIRD PLACE: Of Peace and Pardon
She sat in the aluminum boat with a numbness that traveled through her veins and out of her fingertips like cold rain from a rusted gutter. In this boat so much had happened. She had watched those most precious to her be taken away far into the darkness of the forest’s void. In the boat…
LEO’s change mantra
When creative director Britany Baker came to LEO Weekly a little over a year ago, she brought along a bag of substantive, if a little controversial, ideas: The paper looked crappy and needed to be redesigned from the inside out. The logo was dated and silly, no longer reflective of the content it represented. The…
SECOND PLACE: Paisley Rainbow and the Chocolate Milk Connection
Paisley Rainbow was a hippie who lived on chocolate milk. Now I’m not talking about a “smoke a joint, quote some Kesey, talk about jambands, and wear my tie-dyed tee shirt I bought at the mall” hippie. I’m talking about a “grew that joint, fuck a jamband, I passed Kesey’s acid test, tie-died-in-the-wool, I can’t…
FIRST PLACE: Exploding Henry Moore
(on viewing the sculptures at the Speed Museum) I: Gray Silk Tonnage Sex of a complete nation Bristling with the flesh Of a thousand mothers of gods. Fortress, lagoon, I don’t remember Falling into But here I am swimming in serene sand. II: Monster dove-heart Hums Swallows my head, A…
Welcome to Literary LEO 2009
We’ve been publishing Literary LEO — our annual call to action for the creative — for all kinds of a long time. It’s a tradition that has brought together thousands of writers, poets, artists and photographers in the shared pursuit of publication. It’s among our most-read issues, and we love doing it, even if a…
HONORABLE MENTION 1: Dandelion Wine
On a line by Thomas Pynchon In April, you gathered weeds from the field, made dandelion wine — blithe-picked flowers for drink, and the old ones, white windborne seeds, to blow into the air. Crushed yellow on the pestle, you bled their juice into bottles, added yeast, let it sit, fermenting over months. …
THIRD PLACE: The Red Second Hand Matches the Tractor
There’s no one there with her but the clock. It notes each second, but seems to slow until it’s marking every third or fourth one. She is surrounded by the odd assortment in her high school classroom — a crooked Christmas tree, the school mascot — a rocket, tilting towards the American flag. Her world…
Blueprints of Jazz Vol. 2
Saxophonist Billy Harper is the leader on the second volume of the Blueprints of Jazz series. He’s built his solid reputation over many decades with bandleaders such as Art Blakey and Max Roach. Interestingly, the best-known “sideman” on this recording is poet Amiri Baraka, who declaims a politicized history of jazz in three parts. “Amazing…
THIRD PLACE: Mourning Venetian Blinds
Once they were open. Hiding ourselves we block the light.
Self serve
“We never come at the true, and best benefit of any genius, so long as we believe him an original force.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson Our culture, our age, has been searching for a Champion. An archetypal hero who, with chiseled countenance and even hand, would serve to focus our collective will to humanity and thoughtfulness…
SECOND PLACE: Riga
Marla took the WhaleMart job after her husband Jonas went to the penitentiary for dealing oxycontin. He’d been the sweetest boy before Iraq. Every girl in Shale County mooned over the tall, lanky dark-eyed basketball player, but Marla was the one who figured him out. He was just a boy in a man’s body, and…
HONORABLE MENTION 2: The Mouse
As his mother left a telephone message about how much they were looking forward to seeing him on Christmas, the mouse he had been trying to kill for days scurried across the shiny black dress shoe encasing his now lifeless foot. Moments later, the same mouse was devoured by his normally sedentary house cat.
Comedy: Suzanne Westenhoefer keeps it ‘vibrant’
Suzanne Westenhoefer never considered leaving the lesbian out of her comedy routine when she started in the New York City comedy clubs in the early ’90s. One of the first openly gay comedians in the U.S., most of Westenhoefer’s routine deals with finding humor in everyday interactions. No topic is off limits, she admits, and…
SECOND PLACE: Following the Grunion
San Diego, 1967 A full moon dropped its gray glory into high-blown pewter clouds. Fishy air and black water churned as grunion advanced in silver waves. On the beach that March night, we were like flower children but for our straight shoulders, our too-short hair. We sang “Yellow Submarine” and about President Johnson “Waist…
FIRST PLACE: Sons and Fathers
We are standing in the road, the two brothers and I. Not a smooth road for real traffic. Just a rough, curving, dead-end lane. Once an ancient toll pike of hand-cracked stones and now by-passed by the highway higher up beyond the tree line. Below us, farther on, the old trail curls down the hill…
THIRD PLACE: Boy with torrential rain on his eyelids
boy with torrential rain on his eyelids last summer- the tautness of his cheekbones shining in the dark water, and all I could think was, how could someone look so peaceful while drowning? I pulled him out from the bridge’s ledge until he coughed the river from his lungs, trying to see a different shape…
From The Ruins
You should always be dubious when people tell you someone “discovered” or “invented” something. For example, Balboa “discovered” the Pacific Ocean. Well, it was already there. How can you discover something that was already there? So, if you think Santana was the one who “invented” Latin rock, think again. While Santana was, undoubtedly, a driving…
Comedy: Skip the Bowl and hang with the ladies
Comedy Caravan is offering an alternative to sitting on a couch, screaming at a television and eating fried globs of chicken parts on Super Bowl Sunday. The “Ladies of Laughter” show this weekend features comedians Melanie Maloy, Barb Neligan and Lady Jae. Maloy is a regular on Sirius-XM Radio and made the list of E!’s…
Video TapeWorm
THIS WEEK’S TWIN PEEKS: NICK & NORAH’S INFINITE PLAYLIST 2008; $24.95-$39.95, PG-13 Gangly Michael Cera and lovely Kat Dennings are just plain precious in this modern, too-hip romantic comedy. They are strangers; he’s a loser bass guitar (almost-)player in a band, she’s just some girl in the crowd who needs an instant boyfriend to scare…
Inbox — Jan. 28, 2009
Corrections, Amendments and Clarifications • In the Jan. 14 art preview on the Greenhouse Arts Project, the Zoom Group was listed as a sponsor. GHAP has been unable to coordinate a partnership with them. • “Starving arts scene” in the Jan. 21 LEO Weekly incorrectly mentioned that Mayor Abramson declared 2009 the “Year of the…
Locavore Lore
Raise your hand if you heard someone utter a New Year’s resolution related to A) being healthier in 2009, or B) enhancing a spiritual practice (yoga, meditation, etc.). There’s a bonus point if you heard both of them, and three cheers if you can claim them as your own. I’ll happily own them if no…
HONORABLE MENTION 2: Bus Ride
Smith: I’m lost. Jones: Where ya going? Smith: I don’t remember. Jones: Where ya from? Smith: You sure do ask a lot of personal questions. Jones: Hey man, I’m just trying to help. You ask me. I don’t have to tell you anything. Ding. Ding. (Ten seconds or so pass) Smith: Where you going?…
Review: Rock & Rollin’ down memory lane
(Actors Theatre of Louisville presents “Rock & Roll: the Reunion Tour,” directed by Sean Daniels. Continues through Feb. 8 in the Victor Jory Theatre. For tickets, call 584-1205 or visit www.actorstheatre.org.) Working with contradictions can be tricky but rewarding. Actors Theatre of Louisville’s “Rock & Roll: the Reunion Tour” has a doozy to overcome: Rock…
The Bar Belle
Believe it or not, I’ve been accused of being immature many times throughout my life. Perhaps it’s in my nature to not want to take things — especially life — too seriously. The way I see it, life is pretty much a series of unfortunate mishaps scattered with a handful of good times. Shit happens.…
FIRST PLACE: Franklinton, North Carolina, 1969
You have to write this all down before you forget. The Askew’s gas station and store across the railroad tracks and down the path lined with red-rusted bedsprings and the corpses of stoves and ice boxes. That baby rabbit that one fine dog held squirming in his jaws as you chased them down the path…
Working on a Dream
Springsteen’s fans have always wondered what would happen if he and his band cut loose a little more. That seems to be about half of the recipe that was used for this sometimes-subtle collection. In the best lyrics and arrangements here, these are the tracks of a mature artist looking backward. He wants to see…
Radio Romanista
Gypsy dance-masters Kal continue their steady rise from the clubs of their homeland Belgrade, scrambling notions and rerouting their roots in a genre far from myopic. Opener “Krasnokalipsa” finds outspoken bandleader Dragan Ristic collaborating with Serbian rap kingpin Marcello to volcanic results. From there, Kal’s arsenal — rapid and relentless one moment, undulating and seductive…
Staffpicks
Thursday, Jan. 29 The Payton Brothers Countrypolitan has many names and metaphors, and The Payton Brothers sound like they’re comfortable will all of them, thanks. The Bloomington group (a veritable invasion this weekend; see: The Delicious staffpick) has planted its feet in a post-country world thanks to shared bills with Cross Canadian Ragweed, Big Smith…
Tough coaching or criminal act?
Since Max Gilpin collapsed during football practice in the sweltering heat last summer, there have been rumblings about the 15-year-old taking a dietary supplement and prescription medication that might have contributed to his death. But a deputy coroner who handled the case says a toxicology report was negative, reiterating that heat stroke was undoubtedly the…
SECOND PLACE: The Sound of a Train
The sound of a train. I’d like to be able to say “in the distance,” but it is so close that I can hear the rhythm of the rails as the metal wheels speed across them. I can tell something about the personality of the engineer, or whoever is in charge of the whistle. One…
A belated dispatch from Obamaland
Before We Begin: A Preamble to What Happened WASHINGTON, D.C. — For the vast majority of the 4.8 bazillion people that flooded our nation’s capital yesterday, this was as close as we were ever going to get to President Elect Barack Hussein Obama: A trailer-sized Jumbotron (one of many, with accompanying gigantic floating speaker boxes)…
B-Sides
Silver HollowLouisville’s Arnett Hollow is opening what will apparently be the final Silver Jews performance, on Jan. 31 at Cumberland Caverns, 300 feet underneath McMinnville, Tenn. According to a post on Drag City Records’s website, Berman announced that he’s pulling the plug — calling it quits, if you will. The show is sold out. On…
Let the sun shine in
Touting a desire to hold public officials accountable for wasteful spending, two Metro Council Republicans have proposed launching a website that would allow the public to track how tax dollars are spent. Sounds like a great idea, right? Skeptics suggest the measure is politically motivated — a jab at the mayor, who has been criticized…
The Bright Orange Years/All Night Lotus Party
Volcano Suns was started by Peter Prescott, drummer for (late, great and now reformed) Mission of Burma. Apparently he wanted to continue making the rock music but didn’t want to take it too seriously. I imagine him and his cohorts pounding these tunes out in the garage, after a couple 12-packs of whatever local swill…
HONORABLE MENTION 1: Do You Know A Cunning Linguist? Or, That Joke Isn’t Funny Anymore.
>This is a boring sentence.< Let me tell you why. Adverb + verb + indefinite article + adjective + direct object. Oh, God, I’m not reading this. That’s alright, my feelings aren’t hurt. Go back to your iPod, your PlayStation, your SpongeBob SquarePants (all of which are typed in what is known as CamelCase) because…
Notorious Movie Soundtrack
I have mixed feelings on watching the biopic of the late Notorious B.I.G., which I will not go into here. Here, we look at the 17 songs chosen by label and movie producer Diddy to grace the film’s retail soundtrack. Of these, only seven are some level of “unreleased,” with the others chosen from his…
HONORABLE MENTION 1: Dear Darkest Diary
March 20, 1980 Tomorrow is my 18th birthday. Tomorrow I become a “man.” Being a “man” doesn’t seem all that great. Most of the “men” I know always seem to be angry. When they aren’t angry they are stone silent. They sit staring off into the distance almost as if they are waiting for something…
Rap as tactical art
“You don’t do hip hop,” Christian Hudson says. “People say, ‘What kind of MC are you?’ ‘Well, I’m an abstract MC.’” Hudson, aka Nacirema, whose new album The Jesus Piece is out now, keeps his beats close and his abstractions closer. Rhyming since high school, he fell under the wing of an Indianapolis rapper named…
Miracles
I love Turner Classic Movies. My DVR is loaded with movies from TCM, movies I’ve seen but would like to see again, movies I never saw but have wanted to, movies I never heard of but are likely to be fascinating glimpses into a world long gone away. One of my recent discoveries was “Sahara,”…
Aftertastes
Shady Lane Café, 4806 Brownsboro Ctr., 893-5118, www.shadylanecafe.com. This friendly East End spot has long been a favorite for breakfast and lunch and stays open for dinner Tuesday through Fridays. Each night offers a different dinner special, which ranges in price from $3.95-$6.95. (Reviewed 11/5/08; Rating: 87) Seviche A Latin Restaurant, 1538 Bardstown Rd.,…
HONORABLE MENTION: Abandon Hope
Joey Tackett stretched his lanky teenaged body, reached behind his head and readjusted the pillows. As he eased back, the headboard on the narrow bunk wobbled. The thing was made of fiberboard covered with photo finish plastic. Like the walls of his room. Like the whole damn trailer. And he lived a hundred feet from…
