BY JONATHAN VALANIA A long time ago, in a Clinton campaign far, far away, James Carville famously declared that Pennsylvania is Pittsburgh and Philadelphia and Alabama in between. Aw, yeah: Pennsyltucky. We know thee well. It’s sort of like watching the Dukes Of Hazzard after smoking too much kielbasa. Like sweat socks with a Sunday suit. Like the Deer Hunter costumed by Wal-Mart. It’s the long dark Chicken Dance of the national soul. Lord help us all. Anyway, with the national press are already converging on the Keystone state to get some local color on their laptops, we feel an […]
TONITE: O Brother, Where Art Thou?
TO MY GREAT CHAGRIN: THE UNBELIEVABLE STORY OF BROTHER THEODORE (2007, directed by Jeff Sumerel, 90 minutes, U.S.) Artlessly cobbled together, TO MY GREAT CHAGRIN tells us the story behind Brother Theodore, a one-of-a-kind act who delivered intelligently insane monologues in a ranting thickly-accented voice, most memorably on the NBC version of Letterman’s late night show. Brother Theodore never broke character on stage, so it does satiate the curiosity fans might have had about just who this madman really was. His story is stranger then you might imagine; once a German playboy, the son of fashion magazine magnates, WW2 took […]
All Of This Happened While You Were Sleeping
ROAD TO EXCESS LEADS TO THE PALACE OF WISDOM: Excess, Medusa Lounge, Last Night [photos by TIFFANY YOON/CLICK TO ENLARGE]
WORTH REPEATING: When The Internet Disappears
[via THE CRAP I WAS THINKING] I’ve been without access to most of the web via my Comcast broadband service for about 5 hours now. This is an extra pain this weekend, because I need to log in to my work VPN to do some system maintenance, and I can’t get there from here. My wife, who never likes being without the web, called in to Comcast, and after an excruciating 40 minutes listening to the 20-second hold music loop, got a tech rep who said that the AT&T backbone is down for all of Pennsylvania. It does seem like a […]
TONITE: PHAWKER’S FIRST FRIDAY GUIDE
BY TIFFANY YOON LIVING ARTS CORRESPONDENT Every First Friday of the month, galleries around the city graciously open their doors and bottles of wine for both the local hipster Great Unwashed looking to get buzzed cheap and beret-clad tourista Philistines from suburbs in search of a little BMW boho-edge. Local merchants and busking musicians line the sidewalks, creating a de facto slalom of hand-made bric-a-brac and subterranean homesick blues. Yes, cynics may bitch, but First Friday is nothing short of an embarrassment of riches and we are not afraid to say so. Having long-since outgrown the gentrified confines of Old […]
EARLY WORD: Where Have All The Good Times Gone?
[illustration by ALEX FINE] Do yourself a favor: Cue up “Waterloo Sunset” by the Kinks (SEE BELOW). Ah. Don’t you feel better already? Music in the left speaker, vocals in the right — totally old-school. That twinkling strum of brotherly guitar and gently piddling snare, those drowsy sha-la-las drifting upward while the bassline tumbles downward, and the comforting sentiment that even the shittiest day on earth ends with a glimpse-of-paradise sunset. That, my friend, is the sound of your father’s Britpop. They don’t make singles like that anymore — Damon Albarn has long since stopped even trying. Sadly, the Gallagher […]
NEWS CLUES: It’s Like Sensible Subway Violence
SUBTERRANEAN JUNGLE: Another Brutal Subway Attack By Gang Of Teens By Tyesha Tazwell’s count, there were a dozen of them — six girls, six boys — hanging around together. One of the girls tried to get Tazwell’s attention by uttering a polite-sounding “Excuse me.” Then they pounced. Tazwell, 24, said it took only a few seconds for the teens to knock her to the ground. They pounded her face with a barrage of kicks and punches, stole her purse and chanted “Watch your mouth! Watch your mouth!” when she finally got to her feet and tried to get help. Police […]
TAWK RADIO: Q&A With WIP’s Anthony Gargano
[Illustration by ALEX FINE] PREVIOUSLY: “Just wanted to give a little positive feedback — amazing blog! I stumbled on to the site a little while back, and it’s very well done. I think the site is thoroughly enjoyable, creative and rich! I enjoy something that will make people think or explore, that will reach them on another level. I’ve always tought if you truly want to reach people and express yourself, why settle for the topical? Reach them in a place where you force them to think. I’m not talking negatively or positively — I’m talking both, talking inspiration, whether […]
5 Things U Need To Know 2 Survive A Boredoms Show
Black Pus Stokes The Crowd For The Boredoms, Starlight Ballroom, Last Night 1. As with altitude sickness, you might expect to slowly acclimate to the stomach-flipping level of insanity in the room with the passage of time — let’s say, as the opening bands perform. This is would be foolish, as they are called Black Pus and if that’s not icky enough, they are all about the 10-foot-high walls of amplifiers, mind-bending drum gymnastics, and gimp masks a la Pulp Fiction. About this point it will hit you like a ton of bricks: I have ALWAYS been insane. This […]
PAPERBOY: ‘The Bitch Is Back’ Edition
BY AMY Z. QUINN Like time, news waits for no man. Keeping up with the funny papers has always been an all-day job, even in the pre-Internets era. These days, however, it’s a two-man job. That’s right, these days you need someone to do your reading for you, or risk falling hopelessly behind and, as a result, increasing your chances of dying lonely and somewhat bitter. That’s why every week, PAPERBOY does your alt-weekly reading for you. We pore over those time-consuming cover stories and give you the takeaway, suss out the cover art, warn you off the ink-wasters and […]
Former NJ Stripper Convicted Of Murder For Hire
INQUIRER: A former stripper turned soccer mom, convicted of plotting with a South Jersey man to kill her fiance, was sentenced yesterday to 99 years in prison. Mechele Linehan, 35, was convicted of murder last year for orchestrating the murder of an Alaskan fisherman she had promised to marry. In January, John Carlin 3d, a love-lorn steelworker from Salem County, was sentenced to 99 years for shooting Kent Lippink outside Hope, a tiny mining community an hour from Anchorage. Linehan ordered Carlin to kill the fisherman, prosecutors said. The exotic dancer believed she would be the beneficiary of a $1 […]