Gun owners were portrayed as obese white supremacists. I am a physician, a body builder, and an avid shooter who would like never to shoot anyone or anything. My purpose (as is many of my colleagues’) is to be able to defend myself and my family against criminals who have…
The incomparable Tiny Valdez, the hardest-working man in show business, at the organ in The Hamlet bar and all’s well with the world. Tiny, a 300-pound lounge singer and former Gayety Burlesque Theatre go-go dancer, closing out the set with a signature number. “Now I play for jeuw Orgasmo….I hope…
Hialeah. What a place. One minute it’s a big, brawny city in search of respect, the next it’s a juvenile delinquent caught in the act. Second in population, first in corruption. No tolerance for boredom, a gifted talent for entertainment. If it isn’t political intrigue, it’s political farce. As Carl…
Instead of watching the riot-lootin’ be televised, my baby and me plugged in some classic footage of Billie Holiday performing – singing, vocalizing, whatever you want to call it – her revolutionary piano-and-voice protest/masterpiece, “Strange Fruit.” With that song Lady said it all – music can transcend reality, censorship can’t…
Havana, 1964, Fidel Castro flogging the new Cuba at a huge political rally. For no apparent reason, a band starts playing, a conga line snakes through the crowd. And then, it is the crowd, everyone dancing and oblivious to the speech, chanting “Viva la Revolucion!” as a kind of salsa…
MORELLO: THE TRIUMPH OF THE KILL After reading reactions you published regarding the Andrew Morello case (“Letters,” April 22) and listening to talk-radio reaction, I am appalled at the number of people who think it’s quite all right to kill someone for stealing a car (“Justice Undone,” April 15). These…
“We deeply regret having to write this at all, so please forgive the impersonal form.” So begins a fax I requested last week from DB Recs in Atlanta. Sorry, but I feel the same way. Cold, impersonal. Stunned, maybe. And very uncomfortable broaching this in a stupid-ass newspaper column. But…
MORELLO: EXTERMINATE THE HOODS! I read Jim DeFede’s article about the death of Andrew Morello (“Justice Undone,” April 15) and I have one thing to say: Good. Morello was busy committing a crime, and I only regret Laura Russell was unable to kill the other two hoodlums. Unfortunately the parents…
The Strand, Saturday night. Mickey Rourke, the phrase “looking like shit” coming to mind, with Christopher Walken, who’s in town shooting some French Godfather-esque gangster drama. The usual assortment of B-rich Euros, people without jobs, modeling-industry types smoking like Peter Lorre, the tenuous. A group of us sitting around after…
May belongs to the Mavericks. Guitarist David Lee Holt arrives in town May 3 for rehearsals. On May 8 the ‘pokes play what they’re calling a “warm-up” gig at the venue where they were born (if you don’t know, too bad). Then they tape a show for cable TV. May…
A gaggle of fey boys stand behind a backdrop of a tenement window, watching a long-haired muscleman lounging in bed, lost in his own, no-doubt spectacular private parts. Warsaw, and some man/woman/hybrid creation is spinning on a revolving mushroom above the bar, thrusting her hips in the air, hands between…
A PAUSE FOR THE CAUSEWAY In Kirk Semple’s article, “Asphalt Bungle” (April 8), Donald Kipnis is attributed the idea that scaevola bushes should be planted along the causeway’s edge to – among other things – keep out individuals who want to fish. This idea is representative of the segregationist attitude…
I’m going to visit a psychic. See, I don’t believe in anything – nothing – not God, not ESP, not fate or karma or luck. “Coincidence,” to me, is nothing more than a human descriptive for a human conception. There is no reality here. (In the world, I mean. This…
Lydia Lunch and her spoken confrontational words are festering on-stage at Washington Square, and the scene is totally, completely downtown: the regulation black-on-black ensemble, the dangling cigarette, the attitude problem. The crowd, punk types and assorted interesting characters you never see anywhere else, is yelling out something encouraging, along the…
CABBIN’ FEVER Shame on Greg Baker for smudging his column (“Program Notes,” April 1) with acrimonious comments about a subject about which he apparently has little knowledge. Although illegal jitneys may save a small minority of bus riders 25 cents and a few minutes here and there, they are generally…
Tim Dog is a real mother for ya, as Johnny G. Watson might put it, make ya wanna run for cover, or at least poke a b-hole in the break-bad front of alleged gangsta rappers and chart toppers N.W.A. Yo, I know you’re already down with the dispute: West Coasters…
A lonely wind tearing along Washington Avenue at 3:00 a.m., an inflated condom bouncing down the street like so much tumbleweed. The futile dreams of the dark world slowly disintegrating. It’s a dumbed-down kind of town, a land of creative death, a place of plague and Karaoke. It’s Oceanside Promenade…
OCCULT OF PERSONALITIES Thank you so very much for the write-up about my work in the 1992 Best of Miami issue (“Best Psychic,” March 25). The item presented the word witch in a positive light, which I do appreciate. It is refreshing to see media coverage of the craft that…
Told ya I’d say more. Greg Brown’s latest masterpiece, Dream Cafe, has been released, and might even be available in better record stores. (If you can’t find it, call 800-695-4687.) The album is studded with mind-boggling guitar inventions – the acoustic glides of “I Don’t Know That Guy” perfectly accentuate…
INSULT SUAREZ AND MAS CANOSA? THE SMEAR THOUGHT OF IT IS INCREDIBLE It’s really not surprising to me to see Jim Mullin grapple with the far-out notion of patriotismo and decisions based on moral concerns (“The Cubanization of Xavier Suarez,” March 18). My first impression after I grudgingly finished the…
February 10, 1992 Mr. James Batten, Chairman/CEO One Herald Plaza Miami, Florida 33132 Dear Mr. Batten: Last Wednesday, you called me and complained in rather accusatory terms of my “activities during the last ten days.” You proceeded to confront me with supposed quotes from a radio program in which I…
You people are too damn good to me. I mean, I spend about 30 hours per day seeking out the creamo music and ways to turn you on to it, and what do you do? You call me and thank me, tell me you actually went out and bought the…
