Your Locally Grown Alternative Newspaper
Volume 9 * Issue 45 * February 15 - 21, 2006 *
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Hot Tickets for February 15 - February 21, 2006

Household Saints...Goddess Growth...Earth First!...Tin Star oddities...Burning Bridges: Country AND Western...Jelloslave...creaky pop-folk of The Undertow Orchestra...plus, Kick-it Spot Hip-Hop and other shows/tix/events to spice up your week.

A Search for Divine Love:
 Bad acid, rock 'n roll and a pilgrimage to India
by Lynn "Valentine Baby" Zecca

Valentine's Day 2006 has come and gone, taking with it the visual assault of red and pink merchandise and marking me as another year older. Being born on this veritable Hallmark holiday (no disrespect intended to the martyred St. Valentine, who couldn't help what it's become), I've had my fill of heart-shaped jewelry and questionable, waxy chocolates. I take issue with the notion that on one certain day we're supposed to turn on the romance and prove our love. Even though the whole thing gives me a giant 'tude every year, I'm not cynical about love itself - far from it, in fact. Being an ber-Aquarius, I am particularly interested in the pursuit of love in the universal sense of the word: divine love.

Hundreds march down Lake Street in show of unity for immigrants
by Jeremy Breningstall

Smarting over a perceived effort by Gov. Tim Pawlenty to make them political scapegoats, hundreds of immigrants and their supporters took to the streets on Sunday, Feb. 12 in South Minneapolis. The Immigrants' Rights March began in the parking lot behind the Carne Asada restaurant on East Lake Street and continued down past the Mexican and Somali shops on Bloomington Avenue, ultimately reaching the pews of Holy Rosary Catholic Church on 18th Avenue.

 Progressive rabbi to speak on new "spirtual politics"
by Lydia Howell

Rabbi Michael Lerner is most known for what he calls "a progressive middle path that is both pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinian." He has abhorred Palestinian suicide bombers as well as Israel's violent repression in the Occupied Territories, earning the ire of some on both sides. Lerner weighs in on another hot-button issue - the concept of morality in politics - with his newest book, "The Left Hand of God: Taking Back Our Country From The Religious Right."

Jon Langford
by Christopher Koza

If you've seen a local newspaper in the last week, you probably noticed a certain luminary whose artistic output has been embraced and commissioned by art directors and audiences. Last week in the Twin Cities, Renaissance man Jon Langford put his guitar away long enough from his performances at the Walker Art Center and Electric Fetus in-store to open his one-man art show at Rouge Buddha Gallery. This collection of paintings and etchings are in some instances visual companions to his music, and in others, seekers and claimers of uncharted territory.

Bedlam Theatre: Quality Avant-Garde
by Dwight Hobbes

You don't need to be insane to start a theater company but, of course, it does help. In the case of Bedlam Theatre, it not only helps, but has proven to be essential. For openers, to think avant garde theater - sans PC values or racial or sexual minority status to get in on multi-culti funding - has a snowball's chance of attracting strong support you have to be nuts. Secondly, avant garde theater - producing absurdist scripts that count not on oddness for the sake of being odd but sound writing instead - calls for a creative mind inherently crazy as an outhouse rat. You have to get weird and make sense at the same time.

Matt Pond PA: High Anxiety
by Rob van Alstyne

For being the mastermind behind six albums worth of lyrics revolving around awful accidents and awkward encounters, Matt Pond gives a surprisingly affable interview. The paranoid phrases that populate his work ("Look out: there is danger in the simple word hello") are markedly absent from our half-hour phone encounter. Then again, the man's got plenty to be happy about these days. After toiling in relative obscurity for five years, the last two Pond albums - both delicious concoctions of stately sparkling pop - appear to have finally found their niche. Throw in the surprise sensation their cover of Oasis' "Champagne Supernova" started after being prominently featured on ber-hot-teen-show-of-the-moment "The O.C." and things are going rather swimmingly for Mr. Pond.

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