BY ASHLEY MYERS For the last day or two bicycling has consumed Philadelphia media. Yesterday the Philadelphia Bike Coalition’s Education Department met with Captain Wilson from the Philadelphia Police 9th District (one of Center City’s departments) to discuss enforcing the city’s bike laws. The meeting determined that as of today bike laws will tighten and a new education campaign about bicycling in the city will begin. After two recent deaths involving careless biking, police are going to enforce traffic rules that prohibit cyclists from riding on sidewalks, blowing through red lights and stop signs, and riding the wrong way on […]
WTF: Coatesville Arsonist Set Free After Copping Plea
INQUIRER: A former assistant fire chief accused in two Coatesville arsons this year walked into the Chester County Courthouse yesterday in shackles and exited without them, free to go home. Under a plea bargain that surprised the judge, Robert F. Tracey Jr., 37, of Coatesville, received a sentence of 242 days — the time he had served — to 23 months in prison followed by eight years’ probation. Tracey admitted that shortly before midnight March 20, he set fire to a front-porch swing cushion at an occupied home in the 600 block of Madison Street before walking three blocks to […]
CINEMA: 40 Years At Alice’s Restaurant
ALICE’S RESTAURANT (1969, directed by Arthur Penn, 111 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC Curiously, there is a a dearth of songs to sing around the Thanksgiving dinner table, despite being based on ideas of gratitude and family — I blame those uptight Pilgrims. Well, there is Arlo Guthrie’s “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree,” the eighteen-minute talking blues song by the then nineteen year old son of folk legend Woody Guthrie. The song chronicles a post-Thanksgiving dinner trip to the dump which results in a charge of littering that ultimately renders the young Guthrie unfit to serve in the war in […]
TONITE: Stay Golden, Ponyboy
[Video: Goldspot – Time Bomb] BY PHILLYGRRL “Today is Friday, it is my day to do what I want” is the opening line in the song “Friday,” sung by Goldspot, a Los Angeles-based band founded by singer/songwriter (and UPenn alum) Siddhartha Khosla. I’ve played that song every Friday since I first heard it back in August and today is no exception (He also does a Hindi version, if you’re so inclined.) And what do you know? Today is a Friday and all I want to do is go down to World Café Live tonight and watch Goldspot perform songs from […]
WORTH REPEATING: The Four Year Wait For Health Care Reform To Kick In Is Political Suicide
INQUIRER: His biggest concern is with the timetables of the two bills. Most of the House version does not go into effect until 2013. In a move meant to reduce costs, the Senate bill waits until 2014. “To me, this is a huge mistake,” Starr said. While some important provisions that would affect coverage for young adults and people who cannot buy insurance because of health problems take effect earlier, “most of the uninsured will not get coverage from the Senate bill for more than four years.” That leaves Democrats with a political problem — few results to show voters […]
GHOULISH: Police Say Peruvian Murder Ring Drained Victim’s Fat And Sold It For Cosmetic Surgery
ASSOCIATED PRESS: Police say a gang in the Peruvian jungle has been killing people and draining fat from the corpses to sell on the black market for use in cosmetics, although medical experts say they doubt a major market for fat exists. Three suspects confessed to killing five people, but the gang may have been involved in dozens more, said Col. Jorge Mejia, chief of Peru’s anti-kidnapping police. He said one suspect claimed the gang wasn’t the only one doing such killings. Mejia said two of the suspects were arrested carrying bottles of liquid human fat and told police it […]
CONCERT REVIEW: Jesus Lizard At Starlight Ballroom
BY MATT WYNNE Last night at the Starlight ballroom, I saw four middle aged guys put the current crop to shame. Easily one of the best shows I have ever been to. I have been trying to put my finger on exactly what it is about a band like the Jesus Lizard that stands in such stark contrast to much of the music I have heard and seen in the last few years. They are just authentic, and like all truly good things they require no explanation about why they are so good. Explanations serve their function when something awful […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR Private equity firms buy undervalued or under-appreciated companies, impose short-term improvements and sell them for a fast profit. Some of the companies they’ve bought include Hertz, La Quinta, Dunkin Donuts, and Toys R Us. Josh Kosman, a private equity expert, says that the way the firms have been able to buy these businesses — through leveraged buyouts — means the majority of the money for the buyout has come from loans that the firms dump on the company they’re supposedly fixing. Now burdened with debt, many of those companies owned by private equity firms are in danger of […]
CONCERT REVIEW: Bishop Allen At JBs
BY JAMIE DAVIS Bishop Allen [pictured, above] are basically a fun little Brooklyn indie pop band: Fairly nonsensical lyrics, a xylophone player, skinny jeans and guitars worn 1964 George Harrison style. On disc, the songs sound pretty much as you’d expect, catchy, low-key, nothing really fantastic but pleasant enough to hold the moment, if not much after that. However, the songs do seem to improve in a live setting, as was the case last night at Johnny Brendas. The performers were energetic, and the choruses tended to take off a little more with the extra volume. The band obviously enjoyed […]
N.A.S.A.: Spacious Thoughts
BOING BOING: Boing Boing Video proudly debuts a new piece from the “great god almighty could it get any more awesome?” N.A.S.A. music project, this one from two personal music heroes: Tom Waits, and Kool Keith. The track is called Spacious Thoughts, and you can pick it up on the project’s debut album, Spirit of Apollo (Amazon link.) NASA, short for “North America South America,” is a music collaboration project assembled by Squeak E. Clean (aka Sam Spiegel, brother of film director Spike Jonze) and DJ Zegon (Ze Gonzales, professional skateboarder). The music video embedded above was created by Montreal-based […]
EARLY WORD: Nacho Libre!
PHOODIE: Lee Frank may be a New York food blogger — he runs the all-nachos site NachosNY — but having grown up here in Philly, he still reps hard. So when Frank comes home next week for Thanksgiving, he’ll be mixing his wonderful past with his dizzying present for what is, as best we know, the first-ever Nacho Crawl Philadelphia. MORE
PAPERBOY: Slow-Jamming The Alt-Weeklies
BY DAVE ALLEN 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 steer […]